Bloodmoon, Spells, et al. - by Stainboy
Stainboy on 21/10/2003 at 19:22
[disclaimer]May contain spoilers. Depends on how familiar you are with the game, really.[/disclaimer]
So I bought Bloodmoon the other day. Mixed feelings so far:* at last, I can shoot things properly with my bow! Always a big problem for me previously - arrows completely missing the target at point blank range. Vast improvement. :thumb:
* the effects of the Charm spell seem to have changed. Before, opinion changes due to the spell were permanent. Now, they're temporary. Sod's Law really - this is one of the few spells in the original game that I thought was balanced; now they go bugger it up again. :erg:
* Sothsheim (or whatever it's called) is a nice place. Bit overrun by monstars/beserkers/ice ewoks but still a nice change. Good place for my Wood Elf to jump around shooting stuff. I'd prefer a few more settlements though - it seems a bit too wilderness-like. Hell, I ran out of Steel Arrows in about 30 minutes, and couldn't find anywhere that sells them. Back to Khuul to stock up again I suppose...
* new journal system = win.
* seems that MW crashes more now - especially when equipping new armour. Anyone else have this problem? New wolf/bear armour is great too - looks kinda funky.
So generally, I like Bloodmoon. So far. Tribunal next perhaps?
Now the other thing that's been getting on my tits is the whole balancing of the spell system. It may be because i'm a bit of an RPG n00b, but IMO it shouldn't require almost half your magicka reserves to cast a single spell (Invisibility springs to mind). Things like Paralysis also seem to be stupidly biased. So far though, i've only been dabbling in Restoration, Illusion, and Mysticism, so cannot comment on other schools. But on the whole, I find the whole system completely imbalanced. And thus frustrating. I wouldn't mind too much if my total magicka limit wasn't so low. Perhaps magic should be left for the Altmer?
Thoughts? Am I being naive in expecting most spells to be cheap? Or do you agree?
Feedback would be appreciated. :)
Stainboy.
RyushiBlade on 21/10/2003 at 19:47
If you have a good mage char, you shouldn't have to worry about magicka. I don't think they're expecting to let you cast invisibility for 1000 seconds or something. Besides picking a race, class and sign that give you magicka/intelligence bonuses, there are also items out there with magicka multipliers.* On top of that you can enchant everything you have with Fortify Magicka. So really, if you want to be a true magic-based char, then having enough magicka isn't a problem at all. And because you won't need many heavy-duty weapons, you can carry enough Exclusive Restore Magicka Potions to meet all your needs.
I'm not a magick-based char though ^.^
My game crashed enough even without Bloodmoon, so I didn't notice much difference. The blizzards, or even normal snow, wreaks havoc on my PC and I'm usually forced to find shelter. But Bloodmoon was definitely worth it.
Tribunal was too. Get it!
WingedKagouti on 21/10/2003 at 20:51
Quote:
Originally posted by Stainboy the effects of the Charm spell seem to have changed. Before, opinion changes due to the spell were permanent. Now, they're temporary. Sod's Law really - this is one of the few spells in the original game that I thought was balanced; now they go bugger it up again. :erg:I only have Morrowind, haven't found the cash to get the expansions yet.
IMO Charm is way overpowered in MW. It essentially puts everyone you meet at 100 disposition without any effort. This change makes it a much more balanced spell.
Quote:
Originally posted by Stainboy Now the other thing that's been getting on my tits is the whole balancing of the spell system. It may be because i'm a bit of an RPG n00b, but IMO it shouldn't require almost half your magicka reserves to cast a single spell (Invisibility springs to mind). Things like Paralysis also seem to be stupidly biased. So far though, i've only been dabbling in Restoration, Illusion, and Mysticism, so cannot comment on other schools. But on the whole, I find the whole system completely imbalanced. And thus frustrating. I wouldn't mind too much if my total magicka limit wasn't so low. Perhaps magic should be left for the Altmer?
Thoughts? Am I being naive in expecting most spells to be cheap? Or do you agree?
Feedback would be appreciated. :)
Stainboy. In most RPGs you can't even cast spells unless your class allows for it with mage and cleric beeing the most common. Here everyone has a tiny bit of potential, so unless you want weapons to take a secondary role you need to make magic difficult to use, as to force people into making a choice with their character.
Both Bretons and Altmer make good mages with their innate magicka boost and favored skills. The Mage (for Altmer), The Apprentice and The Atronarch are more or less the only signs you should consider when making a pure mage. If you aren't pure mage you shouldn't be bothered that much about not being able to rain fiery death upon your enemies, you should have other options to deal with them.
If you're a mage you should also have Alchemy at a high (90+) level. This will let you create Recover Magicka potions that are much better than anything you can find.
RE: Constant Enchantments: Unless they have been rebalanced Fortify Intelligence is much better than Fortify Magicka for mage chars since magicka multipliers from race/sign only working on Intelligence.
BTW has the Intelligence debuff cheat/bug been fixed in Bloodmoon? It would be nice if it was (and a good reason to get Bloodmoon).
Stainboy on 22/10/2003 at 10:13
Quote:
Originally posted by WingedKagouti In most RPGs you can't even cast spells unless your class allows for it with mage and cleric beeing the most common. Here everyone has a tiny bit of potential, so unless you want weapons to take a secondary role you need to make magic difficult to use, as to force people into making a choice with their character.
A good point - except that you get races like the Argonians who get an Illusion and Mysticism bonus as well as a bonus in combat skills. This is how most of my characters are - mostly combat, but with the odd bit of spell casting ability. Same with some of the classes - IIRC, being a Knight includes having Restoration skills. Which suggests that you should be able to play both styles fairly well. Which you can't. :erg:
Stainboy.
