[WIP] Arcanium, A Magic Rebalance Project

[wilson212]

Hey folks! I've been wanting to balance out the magic in Skyrim for a VERY long time. I think magic in skyrim is too weak at times, and too strong at other times. So i finally started working on my mod, and her is my ideas and what ive dont so far:

 

Runes:

 

Runes, plainly put, are too powerful, especially as an apprentice spell, and on top of that, they cost WAY to much magicka to even be considered whilst in combat. My solution, is to reduce the cost of the runes, as well as the damage they produce. On top of that, i decided to add secondary effects to the runes. Frost runes, now freeze opponents in place for 6 seconds, or until damaged, much like the Ice Form voice power. Fire runes stagger everyone within 30 feet of the explosion, and shock runes paralyze everyone within 30 feet of the explosion for 1 second.

 

Cloaks:

 

Cloaks are one of the most useless spells in the game imo. As a mage, especially at higher levels, don't want opponents within melee range of you. My solution? I decided that while active, these cloaks should provide some resistance to its magic school. Additionally, as an added incentive to use the cloak, Spells that you cast from that school do slightly more damage, and cost less magicka to cast. I also felt that cloak damage does slightly too much... so i reduced the damage from 8 to 5 points per second, but i allow cloaks to receive bonus damage from perks.

 

Impact Perk:

 

Lol, this perk is way overpowered. Stunlocking is kind of ridiculous. My solution is to give impact a chance to proc, instead of a guaranteed chance.

 

 

Intense Flames, Deep Freeze, and Disintegrate Perks:

 

These perks are crap. They only affect targets below 15% health.. THEY ARE ALREADY DEAD at that point! Useless, Useless, Useless. My Solution? Intense flames, and Deep Freeze perks no longer activate automatically when the target is below 15%. Instead, These perks now offer a chance for its effect to activate, no matter the health value of the target, and the Disintegrate perk now has a 10% chance to disintegrate targets that have less than 75% health.

 

Flesh armor spells:

 

The only issue i have with flesh armor spells, is the fact that they don't last very long. I have fixed that in this mod, allowing them to last for 5 minutes at a time. But, I've also made flesh spells cost a sustained magikca cost. For example, Oakflesh will last 5 minutes when cast, but reduces the amount of magicka you have available to cast spells by 15.

 

Wards:

 

Wards are too expensive and slow imo. They take a lot of magicka to sustain, and since they have to charge before they absorb any damage, it makes it hard to stop a spell from doing damage or staggering you. My Solution? I decided to cut the charge time of wards by 50%, making it much more possible to stop a spell (this also affects AI mages!). On top of that, i reduced the amount of magicka needed to sustain the shield.

 

 

Final Notes:

 

Below, I'm going to list all the changes I've made so far. I would really enjoy to listen you your feedback and ideas :cool:

Core:

• Combat Magicka regen increased to 66%, up from 33%
• Dual cast does 200% damage, for 225% cost

Alteration:

• Reduce Paralyze time from 10 seconds to 6, which also reduces the spells base cost by 40%
• Reduce Mass Paralyze time from 15 seconds to 10, which also reduces the spells base cost by 33%
• All Flesh Armors now last 5 Minutes, Casting Costs remain the same.
• Flesh Armor Spells now cost a "maintain" cost. While active, they reduce your total magicka slightly.
• Flesh spells now properly dispell any previous flesh spells on the actor.
• Added a new spell that will remove your Flesh armor when cast. This spell use the Voice slot, and is learned automatically once you learn a Flesh spell.
• Added new Unlock locks spell, which scales based on your alteration level.
• Added new "Feather" spell, which increases your carry weight for 5 minutes.

Destruction:

• Stagger Perk no longer has 100% chance to proc, but rather 40% chance.
• Elemental cloaks now last 5 Minutes, Casting Costs remain the same.
• Elemental cloaks provide increased elemental resistance, spell damage, and reduced spell cost to said school by 20%.
• Added a new spell that will remove your elemental armor when cast. This spell use the Voice slot, and is learned automatically once you learn an elemental spell.
• Speed reduction on Ice spells increased to 66% from 50%.
• Reduced Rune cost significantly, as they were too expensive, and not worth casting in combat
• Frost rune's damage reduced by 50%, but now freezes opponents within 25 feet for 6 seconds, or until damaged
• Shock rune's damage reduced by 50%, but now paralyzes opponents within 25 feet for 3 seconds.
• Fire rune's damage reduced by 40%, but now also staggers opponents within 30 feet of the blast.
• Reduced FireStorm's base cost from 9 to 6, casting time reduced to 2 seconds.
• Reduced Blizzard's base cost from 41 to 28, casting time reduced to 2 seconds.
• Blizzard now also slows targets within range.
• Intense flames, and Deep Freeze perks no longer activate automatically when the target is below 15%. Instead, These perks now offer a chance for its effect to activate, no matter the health value of the target.
• Intense flames has a 20% chance to activate, causing targets to flee for 5 seconds.
• Deep Freeze has a 15% chance to activate, causing targets to become frozen in place for 3 seconds.
• The Disintegrate perk now has a 10% chance to disintegrate targets that have less than 75% health.
• Illusion skill is no longer increased when Intense flames is activated [Vanilla Bug]
• Alteration skill is no longer increased when Deep Freeze is activated [Vanilla Bug]

 

Restoration:

• Increased ward charge rate from 1.3 to 2.5, to make it easier to "catch" enemy spells.
• Reduced ward spell costs by 30%
• Increased the spell damage absorb vaules slightly

 

 

Edited August 25, 2013 by wilson212

[IronDusk33]

I like the sound of this! Cloak spells and wards are something I've always wanted to use, but they are mostly useless in most cases of a mage character. I'll definitely try this out if you publish it.

[Halendia]

I dunno about runes though. I think they're pretty much useless as is. I'd rather have increased damage there :s

[fifteenspades]

Idk about you but i hate Intense Flames Fear effect.

 

As a Squishy mage, the last thing i need is for someone to run away and go get even more of their buddys to kill me.

 

As for the ward how about making their sustain cost 0 and they just drain magicka whenever they are hit. or make the sustain just barley anything.

[wilson212]

I dunno about runes though. I think they're pretty much useless as is. I'd rather have increased damage there :s

 

Well, i had forgot to mention in my OP that the Rune Master perk will double the damage of runes, essentially making the damage equal to vanilla runes, but at 1/3 the cost, and the added CC effect :smile: . But, as a low level mage, having access to that much damage is alittle OP for an apprentice skill.

 

 

Idk about you but i hate Intense Flames Fear effect.

 

As a Squishy mage, the last thing i need is for someone to run away and go get even more of their buddys to kill me.

 

As for the ward how about making their sustain cost 0 and they just drain magicka whenever they are hit. or make the sustain just barley anything.

 

That is indeed true, aggro'ing more hostiles is not good! I could definitely look into removing the Fear effect... But then i would have to give flames some other effect :smile:

Edited August 27, 2013 by wilson212