Help, my mage sucks!

[tague.84]

So I started a new character yesterday with a game plan in mind - a dark elf nightblade type chap who uses a sword and focuses on illusion resto and alteration for his magic. I really wanted to steer clear of destruction and conjuration.
I've thought that a shield might not be a bad idea but as its progressed, I've thought I'd rather go with magical protection.

Only problem is, he sucks. He's painfully fragile and with needing to put my level ups into magicka, there's no room to expand his hp. I really can't get along with using lesser ward in my off hand, it seems pretty cr*p imo - am I missing a trick?

I'm now at level 7 and I can barely get thru Bleak Falls alive. If people can offer any ideas or tips for playing this kind of build, I'd appreciate it. I'm quite an experienced player (though not to the point of calculating damage outputs and dps or anything!) and tbh that makes it all the more annoying that I feel like I can't make this guy work well!
cheers y'all

[CBR JGWRR]

If all else fails there is the semi-infinite magicka glitch of wearing an item of fortify magicka (eg the novice hood found in Helgen) and taking it off, putting it back on whenever you run out of magicka, but the novice hood won't cover a single flesh spell or more than a few seconds of ward at a time...

Wards are best used for blocking magic only really, the extra armour rating they provide isn't all that useful with weapons. Same with the flesh spells, even with all 3 mage armour perks they aren't as effective as wearing armour once the hidden 25 bonus per piece is included...

Illusion will be basically useless inside Bleak Falls (or anywhere with draugr/undead) since they require the master of the mind perk to be affected.

If all else fails you could turn the difficulty down for a bit.

[MaKo]

So I started a new character yesterday with a game plan in mind - a dark elf nightblade type chap who uses a sword and focuses on illusion resto and alteration for his magic. I really wanted to steer clear of destruction and conjuration.

You have made some difficult choices. How you thought you do damage? Using sword and/or bow? EDIT: Ah, you said that you use sword. Start your game as a normal sword-swinger, you will need lots of health if you take close combat. Start concentrating to your magical skills later, when you can start developing your magicka pool. You may have some difficulties to combine spells and combat, because at first you need health, so you don't have much magicka for spells. The other problems are that when using weapons, you probably use armor, too, and you probably need perks to those skills including Smithing. You will also need perks to magical skills, especially Illusion requires lots of perks to be useful. In the other hand, Conjuration is very useful without any perks.

I built my mage character around Illusion, Destruction and Conjuration. Destruction is the number one damage dealing tool for mages, because when you develop your magicka pool, it is good to put it in some use. Conjuration is very useful school to all characters. Illusion is very powerful school, but it starts to really work when you have perked it - and it is always a little bit tricky school, many times you need some luck to make it work as you wanted. In the beginning, stay out from undead dungeons (draugr, vampires, ,,,), or make lots of use sneak (including Muffle & Invisibility spells).

Only problem is, he sucks. He's painfully fragile and with needing to put my level ups into magicka, there's no room to expand his hp. I really can't get along with using lesser ward in my off hand, it seems pretty cr*p imo - am I missing a trick? I'm now at level 7 and I can barely get thru Bleak Falls alive. If people can offer any ideas or tips for playing this kind of build, I'd appreciate it.

My suggestions: (1) use follower, (2) use Conjuration (temporary followers), (3) use Destruction, (4) use Alchemy (make potions to make your Illusion & Destruction spells stronger), (5) until you get Master of Mind perk, stay out from dungeons having machinery or undead. Cook Paralysis poison, it can help you out from some tricky situations.

[SuperNull]

To use illusion effectively you need to combine it with sneak.
Invisibility only works if the enemies can't hear you either.
Fury/Frenzy are only useful if the enemies aren't targeting you yet (and can't find you in the next 3 seconds).

[Angrun]

To use illusion effectively you need to combine it with sneak.
Invisibility only works if the enemies can't hear you either.
Fury/Frenzy are only useful if the enemies aren't targeting you yet (and can't find you in the next 3 seconds).

This is the strategy I used - Illusion and Sneak. I was able to complete the MQ with only one kill btw (Alduin).

Although I did not begin the MQ until I was level 20. Spent levels 1-20 mostly in the Thieves Guild keeping Sneak mode on 24/7 until that reached 90+. Completed the College of Winterhold quest too to get magic training and the Arch Mage's stuff.

At level 61 now and have only killed 4 dragons and 2 people Alduin/Sahrotaar/Kruziikrel/Relonikiv/Astrid/FestusRex

Illusion and Sneak, tague.84, Illusion and Sneak.

[CBR JGWRR]

How did you get the dragonstone without killing the draugr?

[Angrun]

How did you get the dragonstone without killing the draugr?

Don't mean to derail the thread but...

Spoiler:

Had him chase me into the swinging ax hallway trap. Lots of draugr's met their demise that way. That was not NEARLY as hard as getting Esborn out of the Ratway without registering kills. As a follower, Esborn's kills count against you. That was hard.

[CBR JGWRR]

Hidden:

Ah. I would have paralyzed the draugr and searched it while it was getting back up myself. Assuming that works...

OP - are you using the cost reduction perks? Granted, long term they are a waste of perk points but early on they make the game so much easier.

[Chaos the N'wah]

I would highly recommend focusing on your onehanded and sneak early on as a nightblade, as illusion will take quite a few perks to until it becomes useful for the build (Silent Casting should be on priority)
Focus on casting muffle and flesh spells before every encounter to boost them up while using sneak attacks as your main approach, wards should be last case scenario for eagle eye mages and dragons.
There is good news though, illusion and alteration level quickly and grant great powers later on (the passive magic defense perks in alteration are a must for all my characters)

Both Dragonborn and Dawnguard add some nice spells for the magic schools you're focused on as well

If all else fails..

Spoiler:

...get to level 12, do Peryite's shrine quest to get Spellbreaker, a shield that casts a 50 point ward every time you block and is affected by the restoration ward perk.
As well as not counting against any of the alteration flesh perks

[SuperNull]

Hidden:

Ah. I would have paralyzed the draugr and searched it while it was getting back up myself. Assuming that works...

OP - are you using the cost reduction perks? Granted, long term they are a waste of perk points [...]

I disagree. The cost reduction perks give you the freedom to put less statpoints into magica and to not wear cost reduction gear.

[CBR JGWRR]

OP - are you using the cost reduction perks? Granted, long term they are a waste of perk points [...]

I disagree. The cost reduction perks give you the freedom to put less statpoints into magica and to not wear cost reduction gear.

Or not put any points into magicka for that matter. But they can be entirely replaced by other means, and since perk points are limited it can make sense long term to not use them even though it makes earlier levels more difficult.

[BlackDrake]

I always found Nightblades to suck a bit. Maybe I'm just not playing them right, but I just sneak around and end up being some Assassin with poison.

Try using your illusion spells more often (if only to level quicker). You can use your Muffle spell should you have any issues sneaking around. Try using it as soon as you enter an area, just so you don't give any enemy inside an alarm.

To be honest, I'd still have a few destruction spells, but as long as you keep your one-handed up, you should be okay.

[SuperNull]

Or not put any points into magicka for that matter. But they can be entirely replaced by other means, and since perk points are limited it can make sense long term to not use them even though it makes earlier levels more difficult.

O yeah, but the stuff used to replace the perk points are limited resources as well.
You can only spend 80 perk points.
You can only spend 800 statpoints.
You only have 12 gear enchantment slots (2 for each item with perked enchanting)

If, for example, the OP doesn't have to wear a magica/cost reduction necklace he can wear a +sneak/+onehanded one instead...

[CBR JGWRR]

Sneak is stupendously easy, it doesn't need fortifying. Anyway, muffle and invisibility solve that issue entirely, making even a heavy armour wearing assasin viable...

Another thing to consider is that you are only limited to 12 enchants at any given time - what those enchants can be isn't. Yes it means swapping gear fairly often as the situation changes and the demands on the character change, but that's no real hardship.

[Chaos the N'wah]

I always found Nightblades to suck a bit. Maybe I'm just not playing them right, but I just sneak around and end up being some Assassin with poison.

The Oblivion and Morrowind Nightblades don't have alchemy as one of their main skills and focus more on offensive magics like destruction anyway

But where nightblades shine (with alchemy focus) is when stealth fails and the interplay of magic weakness poisons/fortify destruction potions and close combat spellcasting really does some damage.

[tague.84]

Really appreciate all the notes guys,very interesting.

I think I'm going to crack on a bit with some sneaking and maybe sub something in on the off hand to use against non-spellcasters and use wards when necessary. Maybe readjust if it turns too assassin-y (BlackDrake, I was worried about this lol!)

[The SheoDovah]

Never dump all of your points into magicka as you will end up with a powerful but extremely weak mage who can be killed in one shot. I would reccomend leveling up health and magicka on a 2:8 ratio. You will get enough health over time to avoid getting killed often and have a lot of magicka.

[BlackDrake]

I always found Nightblades to suck a bit. Maybe I'm just not playing them right, but I just sneak around and end up being some Assassin with poison.

The Oblivion and Morrowind Nightblades don't have alchemy as one of their main skills and focus more on offensive magics like destruction anyway

But where nightblades shine (with alchemy focus) is when stealth fails and the interplay of magic weakness poisons/fortify destruction potions and close combat spellcasting really does some damage.

I bought them mostly if I'm honest, but I had a little bit in alchemy...all my characters do.

[NyarlathotepJr]

Never dump all of your points into magicka as you will end up with a powerful but extremely weak mage who can be killed in one shot. I would reccomend leveling up health and magicka on a 2:8 ratio. You will get enough health over time to avoid getting killed often and have a lot of magicka.

Enchanting sets of clothes to give Magicka free spellcasting works pretty well. It does however make one wish that Bethesda would have loadouts as done in COD, BF, and such. I've spent a lot of time swapping between sets of necklace/ring/hat/robe/shoes/gloves depending on the situation. Really makes one appreciate those zero-weight shoes - must be Timberlands.