How can one tell if a build is viable or not?

[InDarkestNight]

I like to play builds I find on youtube. However, they have not always gone so well. For an example, long ago I tried to play as Fudgemuppet’s Paladin build. Its skills were two-handed, heavy armor, restoration, and enchanting. Its gear was steel plate but an apprentice robe of restoration in place of the cuirass. Its weapon was the dawnguard runehammer.

Now, I opted to go without enchanting because I always thought it was morally questionable, and I was supposed to be playing as a religious character.

This build did not end well. It was fine early on, but as I leveled I found enemies hitting me harder and harder due to my lack of armor. Only wearing 3 pieces surely also lowered the rate at which I was gaining armor points. Plus, because I was so frail I was trying to keep my distance a lot and avoid getting hit. I was wielding a two-hander after all. I ended up doing backwards power attacks a lot just to keep distance from whatever I was fighting. The hammer itself though was more a hindrance than anything. Its long swing animations often left me open to attack, and its stupid long-winded unsheathing animation only made things worse. Whenever I switched out to heal, I would get hit at least one or twice before my character finished drawing their weapon. I actually got used to playing the game on half health, because I simply couldn’t keep it any higher than that. Eventually, I tried to approach a large forsworn camp. However, I wasn’t able to approach no matter how many times I tried. The archers were literally one-shotting me from full health! And yes, I did keep trying to make that build work far longer than I should have. This was an area for a questline too btw, so I was forced to abandon that character because I had no way to progress anymore.

Now, not all of Fudgemuppet’s builds have turned out badly. Actually, most have worked out for me. I’ve done playthroughs as The Dragonslayer, The Glasswarrior, The Sorcerer, and The Puppetmaster. Here were their builds:

Dragonslayer:

One-handed, block, heavy armor, archery, smithing

Dragonplate armor plus shield, waraxe and bow

Glasswarrior:

One-handed, block, light armor, archery, smithing, enchanting

Glass armor and weapons

Sorcerer:

Destruction, alteration, conjuration, heavy armor, enchanting

Daedric armor plus circlet

Puppetmaster:

one-handed, sneak, illusion conjuration

Archmage robes, dark brotherhood gauntlets and boots

Note that I made this character a vampire lord and also used archery.

Of these builds, I really enjoyed the Puppetmaster. I literally had half a dozen different playstyles I could switch between. I could be a dagger assassin, stealth archer, stealth illusionist, vampire lord of if I simply did not feel like fighting I would just summon dremora lords and casually walk around looting the place while my demos massacred people. That always felt really badass. I played this character for far longer than usual, because me being able to change up my strategy so much really kept the character from getting boring. I’ve actually long thought about making it a permanent character.

I also did another build one that was from a channel that was deleted years ago. It was called The Deathknight:

Deathknight:

Two-handed, heavy armor, conjuration, destruction, restoration, smithing, enchanting

Jagged crown, dragonbone armor and greatsword

Spells were restricted to necromancy and frost spells.

This build was designed around the necromage exploit, which was the sole reason for restoration. This build turned out to be quite powerful. I was able to smith up my gear higher than usual, the necromage exploit was buffing my armor enchants, and also due to the exploit a single close wounds spell could more than restore my health to full despite having buffed health enchants on my geat. Combine that with being a nord vampire, I was practically indestructible. And of course he had some pretty powerful dead thralls with him. I went with Umana and Orchendor, if you care. The only real downside to it was the sole reliance on frost magic for ranged offense. This really sucked when fighting frost dragons. Not only did my spells barely do anything, but being a nord vampire with abnormally high health and an op close wounds, there was no way that thing could kill me. I would essentially have to just wait for it to land so I could quickly dispatch it with my OP sword. I ended up rushing the main quest-line just so I could get dragonrend.

So now, why did all these builds work out fine while the Paladin did not? Everyone has either an armor skill or sneak for one. Many possessed other defensive skills too like block, restoration, and conjuration. Note though the sorceror didn’t use restoraion, but it still ended up kinda OP. I’ve even done multiple playthroughs as mages who didn’t wear armor, just to give you an idea of how easy it is to keep a mage alive. The paladin didn’t wear really armor (no cuirass and sticking to a mid-game armor set), despite being a melee character, which is obviously always a recipe for disaster. Also, as stated his skills conflicted with each other. Restoration and two-handed just don’t mix. Having the ultra slow warhammer only made things even worse. Really, warrior characters seem to only benefit from spells that you only cast as the start of a fight, like conjuration, cloak, and armor spells, then stick to your weapon the rest of the fight. I have done proper paladin builds though with restoration. They wore a full set of armor, and using a shield I could easily block while healing, and my weapon didn’t take long to draw at all.

Clearly, some builds work and others do not. What I want to discuss here is how to ascertain this before you waste time playing an impractical build. I’ve also looked at other builds of fudgemuppet that also questionable. One good example is The Witch:

Witch:

alchemy, enchanting, illusion, conjuration

Skull of Corruption and self-enchanted clothes

Now, its not hard to see why this is questionable. There’s no true offensive skill; to deal direct damage you have to rely on a sub-par daedric artifact. There’s no armor, or healing outside of potions You’re only defensive are summons and calm spells. In the video btw their character gets hit a lot.

Now, just because they show them using the character doesn’t mean they actually playtested it. At the rate they were uploading them, they clearly weren’t actually doing full playthroughs. What they were doing in reality was using console commands to give a level one character the spells and gears, and then recorded themselves playing in god mode. This is evidenced coincidentally in the Telvanni video, where at the end of the video you can see them pull up the console and it shows console commands they used to buff their character.

So, how can you tell if a build will work or not? Would something like The Witch work? It does look interesting, but so does that paladin build. What is required to make a viable build? Can you get away without suing any offensive skills (one-handed, two-handed, archery, and destruction). What do you need if you don’t wear armor? Restoration and conjuration can suffice, obviously, but what about other things? Would that paladin build have worked better if I used armor spells? Can armor spells let you get away with dressing like a Vigilant? It will in the end yes, but can you get there?

Edited July 16 by InDarkestNight

[IsharaMeradin]

I don't think you can effectively play the game without utilizing other skills beyond what is mentioned in a build.  Pretty sure that these builds were put together after having leveled up all the skills and then testing out what worked well together.  Unless the build creator states that they used that build from the very beginning, I'd consider the build to be something to work towards rather than something to rigidly follow.

[Karna5]

I returned to Skyrim SE a couple of months ago after around 10.5 thousand hours at Fallout 4. In Fallout, my favorite play style is to wear no armor at all and to build up stealth and try to sneak around killing everything without being spotted.

I'm finding this works well in Skyrim AE as well. I carry armor for the occasional ridiculously hard fight I can't end before getting hit, but generally I wear nothing at all and have a dagger in my main hand (the best I can craft and enhance at any given level) and a fast healing skill ready in my off hand. I also carry the best bow I can craft and enhance with the best arrows I can make for picking off guards in open areas.

In addition, I play a vampire which makes my sneaking even more effective.

I've tried two handed weapons and open combat in skyrim, but personally it feels clunky to me. The combat mechanics in Skyrim are not fluid and fun--the same with Fallout. But the stealth mechanics are fun.

Finally with regard to difficulty settings in Skyrim AE, I've tried legendary, but it's downright impossible for me to kill tough creatures with that setting. One fight with a boss draugr at Legendary typically kills me 20+ times. The lowest settings are no good because everything dies in one hit. I find that level 3 out of 5 in difficulty makes tough monsters and enemies require a few hits to kill meaning it's a race to stealth kill them before i get one or two shot killed (no armor).

I agree with Ishara above. Builds don't really exist in Skyrim. What exists is play style, either open combat or stealth, magic or archery.

[InDarkestNight]

Yeah, that's the main issue I've always had with warriors. The gameplay just isn't very interesting. Stealth is more interesting, even if it pales to true stealth games, and magic gives you multiple ways of interacting with the world, even if its limited compared to past games. Mods can pretty easily fix that though. I've found a simple mod like Combat Behavior Improved makes combat feel far more interesting, even though all it does it let you and the ai cancel attacks to block. My preferred set-up for years was to run that and play on expert. I think I played most of my warrior builds with that mod installed. Guess I should think about it again. Of course, I sorta grew tired of the simplicity and wanted more. Besides, I've been spending years now testing out various difficulty mods, so I couldn't use it or any combat overhaul. Been looking at Ultimate Combat lately, after deciding that maybe I should tolerate characters doing dark souls dodges just so I can have a more interesting game. Also, it adds in some refreshing combat animations, and even incorporates the feature of Combat Behavior Improved. Also, its probably popular for a reason. I did try Ultimate Dragons for a bit though, and didn't really like it. Most of the new dragon attacks aren't aiming at anything, and the ability to stun dragons actually makes them easier to fight despite the mod by default tripling their health! Besides, it doesn't play nice with mods that add new dragons (it gives fire abilities to any dragon without the vanilla frost resist ability dragons, including the Blizzard Dragons from Elemental Dragons famously). Still, perhaps I should stick to them in a full playthrough. Maybe then I'll get an appreciation for their all features.

[Karna5]

With regard to two handed melee weapon characters, my favorite gameplay style is the Guardian in Black Desert Online.

The awakened guardian uses a two handed pole arm, and her attacks are slow but brutal. In addition, she can self-heal by hitting stuff. The more she's attacking, the faster she's self healing.

Skyrim two handed melee techniques have several weaknesses compared to BDO:

1. BDO guardian's attacks are wide area swings with good range and able to hit up to ten monsters at a time. Skyrim two handed swings  just hit the floor if your body happens to be facing the wrong way (even if your screen is facing the right way).

2. BDO guardian can self heal without unequipping weapon. Skyrim cannot.

3. BDO guardian animations just plain look good. Skyrim's does not.

It's fun for me to use a guardian in BDO (I've got 15.5 thousand hours in it over several years). It's not fun for me to use a two handed weapon in Skyrim even though I've tried many times.

I don't even bother with dual wield in skyrim anymore because I can't self heal with weapons in both hands. I just carry one dagger, a heal spell and try not to get in open combat if I can help it.

Example of my Guardian in BDO:

 

[InDarkestNight]

Heh, funny enough, I saw a Skyrim video years ago with combat that looked A LOT like that. I can't seem to find it now though. It showed a person fighting a dragon in Solitude on a Japanese version of the game. The thing showed a LOT of new and rather cartoony combat animations that look a lot like that (the player was clearly going for an anime look with their load order). I would link the video if I could find it, but I cannot.

[Karna5]

There's a skyrim mod that ported a lot of the BDO Guardian two handed axe animations to skyrim SE. I saw it the other day when I searched a filter of animations to see what animations exist in Skyrim modding.

I did not download the mod, however, as it's not enough to use the appearance of the attacks. It needs to have the area, the range and, most importantly, the multiple target hit boxes and life leeching.

[Karna5]

Post script: I found the mod for you in case you want to try it:

ADXP I MCO BDO Guardian Awakening at Skyrim Special Edition Nexus - Mods and Community (nexusmods.com)

I didn't try it for the reasons I expressed, but it would make the animations more beautiful, so you may want to try it.

[InDarkestNight]

Honestly, I prefer my game to be more realistic. I've never found an animation replacer I like. Also, I strongly prefer to play first person, and combat animation mods rarely support that. The only animation mods I've ever used are some old werewolf mod that added a jumping animation and those evg mods. That Combat Behavior Improved is technically an animation replacer, though all it does is change a toggle on the animations. It doesn't change what they look like in the least bit. This does mean its incompatible with mods that do replace attacking animations.