Why would anyone spellsword?

[Xen0tech]

Be flexible and don't get into a rut. What spell you equip in your off-hand should reflect the situation.

 

If you're fighting a mage who gets in pretty close, then you may want a ward. If you have opponents off in the distance who are sniping at you while someone is toe-to-toe with you and intent upon removing your head from your shoulders you might want to have a missile-type spell to use. If you're up against a particularly tough opponent it might not be a bad idea to equip a healing spell. I've even used the sword / conjure option to keep my opponent's attention divided between me and my familiar/atronach/whatever.

 

One good tactic I've found is to use a simple flames or frostbite spell. Hack with your sword and then backpedal, while your opponent advances on you, spray him with your spell until you deplete your magicka and then back to hacking with your sword until your magicka pool is refreshed.

 

Regarding the use of daggers, I don't see the point unless you have a very good dagger. The extra reach of a sword means you can hit your opponent from farther away. Daggers offset this partially by being faster than swords, although the Ebony Dagger is bugged and doesn't have the speed of other daggers in the game (it's only a speed of 1.0, vs. 1.3 for the others).

 

I think the key to success as a spellsword is to be able to dish out as much damage as quickly as you can using whatever means are at your disposal. That means concentrating upon destruction magic and possibly conjuration to complement your melee weapon. The more ways you have of hurting your enemy the greater the chance that he'll go down before you will.

 

They fixed the ebony dagger :) I use a hp draining enchant on my ebony dagger to take advantage of the quicker attack speed of daggers in all out offense. I like your idea about back pedling with basic destruction I thought of doing that myself too. Was experimenting with quick reflexes was fun for dancing around animal attacks.

Edited April 28, 2012 by Xen0tech

[RedRavyn]

That's good to know, Xen0tech. I'm still running 1.4, though, and I think it's still broken in that version of the game. I have a mod installed that corrects a lot of the discrepancies in weapons and armor, though, so it's not an issue for me. I'll sometimes dual wield with a dagger and I like that dagger to be Ebony, once the game starts dropping them for me. It lets me keep a high-damage weapon at the ready, while I shift to a quick spell. At that point, the Ebony dagger is frequently the highest-impact one-handed weapon you can get, swords included.

[Rooker75]

I use Paralyze + Dagger w/Fiery Soul enchantment a lot. Paralyze + anything is really powerful.

 

One thing that annoys me when playing a mage are the Thalmor who put up a ward while charging at me with a mace. Nasty combo.

[firsTraveler]

Have you looked at the Buckler shield mod?

[CasperTheLich]

long time spellsword here. i typically use daggers when i'm doing some neck hacking, otherwise sword & spell is the way to go. When fighting melee opponents I usually use frost base spells, unless I’m fighting a bunch of nords, then I go with flame. for casters I use lightning, and if I’m having trouble hitting targets I might switch to lightning anyway, it hits a lot faster. at medium to long range I use frost spear (or is it ice spear?), or thunderbolt (if I’ve gotten to the point where I can cast such spells without using all my magicka in one shot). Up close flames, or the other simple spells work a bit better. (imho) Edited April 28, 2012 by Invisible Man

[shuriken88]

Sometimes I spellsword, because while I prefer either running up and slashing the f*ck out of everyone, or killing from the shadows like a ruthless ninja; I also enjoy using spells on people, and I often find myself getting absolutely RINSED by powerful mages ever since I got past level 25ish, so I wanted to always have a good selection of magic tricks up my sleeve, and a FAIRLY good magica skill level. My main skills are "Sneak, one handed, light armour, stamina etc", but I decided to branch out to other skills too, and extend on anything that seemed necessary, adapting to any areas that really needed adressing (such as being completely ABUSED by wizards all the time). Like other people have said, doing this, and not concentrating one ONE specific "path", means that I'm generally more weak in all areas that some people specialise in, but I'll always have a higher skill level in some other fields. It COULD be the case though that Im suffering far more than I would be if I just stuck to my main skills. I just like trying everything I guess.

 

I've tried dual spells, dual blades (in Tenchu, the best ninja game ever, the female ninja used two daggers), a spell & blade, a spell & shield (which is quite effective I've found). At the end of the day though, the recurring theme seems to be this: Mages are VERY angry, and will F*CK you up on higher levels, unless your magic proof, which I'm not. Everyone else is a piece of cake.

[RedRavyn]

One thing that annoys me when playing a mage are the Thalmor who put up a ward while charging at me with a mace. Nasty combo.

 

Solution: Unrelenting Force. It's best if you have all three words activated. This will severely disrupt said Thalmor's plans, and give you some breathing space (and time). Once you've interrupted the Thalmor's attack, you can then stun-lock him using dual-cast destruction spells, if you have the necessary perk. Combine this with an Amulet of Talos. You can get one from the pilgrim on the way to High Hrothgar (the woman right before you meet the frost troll). Lure the frost troll to her location and then hide, and they'll duke it out for a few moments (the troll always wins). Loot the amulet from her body, equip it, and it decreases the cool-down time for shouts by 20%.

 

Second Solution: Ice Form shout, if you have it. Hit him with it after you disrupt his ward by whatever means (see above), and it will paralyze him and do a bit of DoT while you can recharge your shout and magicka.

 

Third Solution: Combine the above two (or a Paralyze spell) to immobilize the Thalmor. Equip a dagger, maybe poisoned, and cast invisibility. Go into sneak mode and get behind him. The instant he regains control of his body, hit him with the dagger for extra sneak attack damage -- even better if you've put some points into the appropriate branch of the Sneak tree. Note that paralyze poisons are easy to make and they would be the best one to use, here. You can even make one using three ingredients that does damage to Health.

 

Moral of the story: Justiciars are tough SOBs. Use every trick in your repertoire to fight them, and don't go toe-to-toe with them at lower levels when you're running a magic-based character. Thalmor soldiers are easier. Those are the ones that tend to charge you dual-wielding a weapon and spell, but the same maxim applies.

[Moredhel]

Block's Elemental Protection-perk + Spellbreaker (shield) = win vs. mages, they really can't hurt you anymore unless they use really hard spells. If you're Breton you're even more protected from magics ^^

[Rooker75]

One thing that annoys me when playing a mage are the Thalmor who put up a ward while charging at me with a mace. Nasty combo.

 

Solution: Unrelenting Force.

 

Wards block shouts too and they usually cast it the moment I shout the first word. I do that myself when I see a high level draugr getting ready to shout.

[RedRavyn]

Yep Rooker, I failed to mention that, and that's my bad (and I knew better). You have to get off the Unrelenting Force shout before the NPC throws up his ward. This is what momentarily disrupts the NPCs actions. You don't even have to do the whole thing. Just the first word will usually stagger him enough to follow through with something else.

 

An arrow with a paralyze poison applied to the bow will do this most effectively, even with a ward up, allowing you to use a shout. I've used this on a number of occasions (OK, it's one of my favorite tactics), especially when the NPC in question is standing next to a cliff and I'm pretty sure he doesn't have anything in his inventory that might interest me.

 

Using shouts to counter prepared shouts (vs Draugr) should be in everyone's standard battle plans. They give an audible warning right before they shout. Hit them with Unrelenting Force or Ice Form and you have them right where you want them, especially if you have spells that can stun-lock them just as they recover.