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Sir Lawrence
Eager Tradesman
Joined: 19 May 2002
Posts: 26
Location: Jacksonville, Fla. |
| Advice for playing a mage |
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I tend to play knights and paladins, prefering big swords and strong armor. Trying a mage character always seems intimidating with the weapons and armor limitations usually found in RPGs. M/W seems to give an opportunity to branch out. Any of you wizards out there have advice for starting up a mage character in this game? What kinds of armor and weapons should be considered? I can't imagine that unarmored is an intelligent choice. Thanks for passing on a little wisdom.  |
Mon Jun 10, 2002 10:05 pm |
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Fireteddy
City Guard
Joined: 24 May 2002
Posts: 148
Location: Windsor, Canada |
This is just in my experience, which as some of you know is usually wrong, but here goes:
If you want to play the traditional mage, go with Light Armor, Blunt Weapon, and Short Blade as far as armor and weapons go. I'd recommend you stay away from Hand-to-Hand and Unarmored, as they are pretty useless in practice. Light Armor should be more than enough to protect you from the (hopefully little) damage you'll be taking, and if you max it out and get the incredible-looking Glass armor, you'll be a tank anyways. All of the schools of magic are useful in one way or another, but the ones you'll want as Major skills are Destruction, Alteration, and Conjuration, as you'll probably be using those most. Illusion has little practical application beyond thieving, so consider just keeping it Miscellaneous unless you want to be a thief, too. Consider Alchemy and Enchant, but only if you plan on making heavy use of the skills - the latter is somewhat useless, since charged items recharge quickly and you can pay people to enchant stuff for you anyway.
Put a few extra points into Speed (and consider making it and Intelligence your main attributes), as more often than not you'll want to be far, far away from whatever you're trying to kill.
Obviously, choosing the Breton, Dark Elf, or High Elf races (depending on your preference... Dark Elves get a big Destruction bonus, which can help early on in the game) will aid your development. The Apprentice or The Mage birthsigns, ditto, obviously. And pick the Atronach for a somewhat unique experience.
Always stay well-stocked with healing potions for those just-in-case situations.
Enjoy 
-Matt
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"What Plato is about to say is going to be a lie." - Socrates
"Socrates has just spoken truly." -Plato |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 12:35 am |
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sauron38
Rara Avis
Joined: 14 Jan 2002
Posts: 4396
Location: Winnipeg's Sanctum Sanctorum |
You will either want to be an Altmer with "The Mage," or a Breton with "The Apprentice" - The Dunmer have no inherent Magicka bonus. Willpower and Intelligence are the way to go, and if you do not feel bad about exploiting, you could use your wizardly powers to make permanently bound Daedric items. Make sure that you pick up the Mentor's Ring, which is in a tomb to the northwest of Seyda Neen. Oh, also, I'd (when powerful enough) make a beeline to the Vivec Mage's Guild and kill the leader, Trebonus, (If you are not in the Mages Guild, else you must wait until the right time) to get his Amulet. Then I'd pick up the Robe of some Telvanni Servant, which adds to intelligence.
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Make good choices. |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 1:13 am |
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Guest
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Illusion has little practical application beyond thieving, so consider just keeping it Miscellaneous unless you want to be a thief, too.
Beg to differ. The Chameleon spell, which is based in the Illusion school, can be extremely powerful once you become capable of making 80% Chameleon effect.
Using the Amulet of Shadows as a fighter, one can chop up/shoot spells/ shoot arrows/whatever at anyone as long as the chameleon spell is in effect and 95% of folks in the game won't even see you. They'll just run around wondering where the attack is coming from while you keep attacking them in whatever manner.
Illusion can be quite powerful to the point of imbalancing the game. How imbalancing? Again, using the Amulet of Shadows - one quest forces you to fight 2 Ordinators at once. I beat them with a 4th level character, 40 HPs, Strength in the 40s, Longsword at 50, Heavy Armor skill in the 40s, wearing Imperial Steel set of armor, and using a non-magic Silver Claymore. They didn't get one hit in because they never saw me thanks to the Illusion-based Chameleon spell in the Amulet of Shadows.
So if one is playing a mage, developing Illusion CAN be extremely beneficial when it comes time to kill someone for quest X. |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 4:37 am |
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crazy_smurf
Village Dweller
Joined: 17 May 2002
Posts: 6
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I can only agree with above statements that illusion skill is underated. Paralysis is another illusion spell I have found invaluable. Paralyze enemy, then soultrap, conjure some critters, or just beat the crap out of them with destruction spells, whatever, it all works. I went with a dark elf with the apprentice sign and it seems very effective to me. But I can easily see how similar combinations of High elf/Breton with Atronach/Apprentice signs could be effective as well. It's all a matter of your choice of roleplaying. I'd suggest choosing A weapon skill, doesn't matter which, just pick one. It's useful to be skilled in something when you need it. I agree light armor is probably the better idea, but I choose unarmored my first run through, and really experienced no signifcant problems. Alchemy is also very useful, as it's a simple source of useful things like health, mana, and levitate as well as money. The alchemist in Blamora has 3000 grand, which is pretty good and selling her potions is all I needed for money all game. |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 5:48 am |
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Merkin
Head Merchant
Joined: 01 Dec 2001
Posts: 65
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My favorite mage so far:
Breton
Shadowmage (custom magic)
Birthsign: Atronach
Bumps to INT and WIL
Majors:
Illusion
Alteration
Destruction
Light Armor
Sneak
Minors:
Conjuration
Restoration
Mysticism
Speechcraft
Shortblade
My reasoning:
The Breton is hands-down the best mage in the game, the bonuses to multiple schools, the magicka bumb, the magicka resistance all combine to make him FAR superior to the altmer (crippled with weaknesses) or the dunmer (the best fighter-mage, but doesn't pack the punch for an *almost* pure mage)
The bumps to INT and WIL, and specialization in magic for obvious reasons. If you're going to play a mage, don't try and do it halfway.
The Atronach sign because it gives you an insane amount of magicka to start, plus a virtually foolproof unlimited magika supply. (see conjuration below) A breton with the atronach STARTS the game with 210 magicka points!
On skills, I agree with the above posters that illusion is very underrated. Destruction is your workhorse school, and you DON'T want that fireball to fizzle on you. Alteration is maybe the most versatile spell in the game, I get out of jams with it over and over again. Light armor is critical, at least for my playstyle. I like to get in and mix it up once in awhile, and unarmored just doesn't cut it. Plus you will soon be able to summon the awsome Daedric armor. Sneak because early in the game, illusion WON'T cut it, and sneak can be bumped rapidly to a useful level. The ability to avoid guards, pick pockets, and crit damage are VERY handy early on.
The truly critical skill though for a mage with the atronach sign is conjuration. When you run low on magicka, summon a ghost and a Daedric blade, attack the ghosat, let it get a few free shots while you absorb the magicka, then kill it with your Daedric blade. Cast a hearthheal when it's dead, and all of a sudden your healthy, topped off (except for 13 points) with magicka, and ready to go. Those who complain about mages sleeping too much don't know what they're missing. Us in this you can run your mage around the clock. JHust make sure you leave the needed 21 points to summon ghost, or youy can be well and truly screwed. 
I'm tempted to try an Atronach mage WITHOUT conjuration, to see how it plays, but this is a winning, fun, very viable combo. A newbie to playing a mage could hardly do better, IMO.
_________________
Proprietor of
Spydah's Web
A Gaming Community |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 6:19 am |
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Guest Dare
Guest
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I don't know what you all have against unarmored but I much prefer NOT getting hit rather than merely reducing damage and taking every hit.
Besides, if you play with the skill enough you'll notice you can wear 'some' armor with unarmored and raise your AC while still dodging attacks. |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 6:57 am |
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mDrop
High Emperor
Joined: 06 May 2002
Posts: 479
Location: Under the desk |
One thing that I found useful in the game, when playing my mage was the paralyzing short sword you can buy from Balmora Fighters guild. With it, the early battles are very easy. I used it throughout the game with great success. Hit - paralyze - cast draining spell - hit - paralyze - etc...
Conjuration should definetly be a major, when you get high enough, summoning those atronachs to your aid can really make a difference. I made a custom spell that conjured two atronachs for 45sec, it really helped me when I had to fight multiple monsters or atronachs.
If you really want to get powerful and make the game easy, go to the tomb southeast of Seyda Neen, on those small islands. There you will find a robe that has constant +15 health/fatique regen(I know this has been posted a zillion times, but still). The tomb has some nasty mosters, so it's not the first place to go.. |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 10:08 am |
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Guest
Guest
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Here's my mage: Altmer with Atronach. Can't get more magicka than that. The weaknesses to fire etc. hardly come into play (for me). Either dodge those spells or absorb them via Atronach.
Destruction: major in it. No question here. You will need those spells.
Conjuration is not necessary, IMHO. Just learn 'summon ancestral ghost' and make yourself an amulet with it. Should suffice to fill up your magicka pool with one or perhaps two summoned ghosts.
Armor: well, unarmored is pretty weak. Even with unarmored and agility in the high 70s and 100 speed my armor is not even 40 yet. Nearly anything that hits me is a threat. Armored NPCs are a major battle. With Alteration below 40 I cannot even make myself a useful Shield or Armor spell yet - they are damn hard to cast with a useful magnitude and length. Time to don some armor - that ebony cuirass looks mighty good on my Altmer
Illusion: get it to 50, make yourself a 100% chameleon spell and rob everybody blind. Enough said. Very useful.
Another funny effect: Levitate magnitude 1 on target. Should give you all the time you need to deal with enemies. Just don't cast it indoors - enemies tend to disappear through the roof when you do 
Weapons: I picked short blade and long blade. Pretty good stuff available for those skills: dwemer jinksword, magical glass swords... OTOH, a daedric mace looks really cool!
Enchant: useful to custom-make stuff. Enchanters at guilds charge so much for even the simplest items that you'll never be able to pay for better stuff. Don't bother enchanting unless you skill is 30+, though. With lower skill you'll never make anything worthwhile.
Potions / Restoration: either plan to lug quite a few potion around or take restoration and cast those spells yourself. One caveat: you'll need 'cure blight' potions. The spell is ridiculousy difficult and costly. Restore Health/magicka/attributes are ok, but can be cast by yourself eventually.
Paralysis is ok, but once again, hard to cast with any useful duration unless your skill is rather high. Jinkswords are plentiful and offer the same effect (I usually carry 2 dwemer and 1 glass jinksword).
In the end, it's about what you want. I suppose going unarmored and hand-to-hand (like I did) is as bad as it can get, and even that is do-able. A lot more difficult that your typical Redguard fighter, but fun none the less. |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 1:12 pm |
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sauron38
Rara Avis
Joined: 14 Jan 2002
Posts: 4396
Location: Winnipeg's Sanctum Sanctorum |
I loved playing as a mage with unarmoured, until I got my destruction skill to 90... Now, I love my lightsaber with a mix and match of armour...  I really like the ability to "switch over" at any point in the game.
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Make good choices. |
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Tue Jun 11, 2002 10:04 pm |
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corwin
On the Razorblade of Life
Joined: 10 Jun 2002
Posts: 8376
Location: Australia |
Merkin has it about right, but he nearly ignores the enchant skill. Enchant something with Ancestral Ghost and something else with soul trap and you're set for life. Not only will it restore your magic, but a trapped ghost soul is worth $4000. This provides a never-ending source of money. Spoiler*********
Summon bound armor/ weapons place them in your inventory and then on the ground. Rest an hour and they are permanently yours. Free, powerful and lacking in weight if your mage isn't too strong. Enjoy. 
_________________
If God said it, then that settles it!
I don't use Smileys, I use Emoticons!!
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Wed Jun 12, 2002 7:07 am |
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