What you miss from oblivion that skyrim doesn't have .

[Helmic]

I'm going to reiterate that Acrobatics should die in a fire, have its ashes shat out a bear's ass, and never be mentioned again. You level it by jumping around. That means if you want high acrobatics, you gotta bunny hop your way around the Imperial city looking like the twink fool you are. There's no point in having a high Acrobatics because the entire game world has to be accessible to multiple builds, if you can't jump up somewhere another character can there needs to be an alternate route or else anyone that's ever played Deus Ex will start hiring hits on the Bethesda team. If it were to come back, it'd better be as something cool like running along walls or nimbly dodging attacks or something active and should level in combat situations. There is zero fun in spamming space until your stamina runs dry, and even less fun in having to monitor how much you've jumped so you don't overlevel Endurance. I'm not too keen on reflecting damage or magic either, they're very powerful passives and can make the game boring even at the highest levels. Even the 10% you get from the Heavy Armor perk in Skyrim feels pretty powerful; it's pretty much THE reason you would pick heavy armor over light.

 

As far as the whole casual versus hardcore thing: since we're bringing up pen and paper RPG's, a lot of desktop gaming has been moving towards being more "casual". The ones pushing this? The GM's. It is an absolute *censored* having a dickton of rules for your players to rules lawyer over, or having to wait a week for everyone to finish their character sheets, and another day or so for you to look over everything to help the newer players make decent and fun builds and to make sure the munchkin in the group hasn't found some way to fire off fully automatic crossbows. Overly complex rules slow down gameplay and a big reason I prefer Pathfinder to plain old 3.5 is because it consolidates some of the stuff that wasn't all that necessary or only served to slow things down.

 

Now, with video games, this isn't as much of an issue. It's OK if the damage formula requires you to remember your Calculus II homework because it's done in the background by the game itself, it can include as many factors as makes sense without slowing down gameplay. When the player has to make decisions about their character, however, is where you start having to decide whether the complexity is serving a purpose, whether it's taking up too much time for how much fun it's providing. I've spent a lot of time in the perk screen in Skyrim, probably more than what I've spent in Oblivion, but I'm making many more meaningful decisions in that given amount of time. I'm having more fun with this sort of complexity. In Oblivion most of the time spent on stats was actually spent trying to precisely grind them to where you can get perfect (or at least good enough to reasonably keep up with level scaling) +5 bonuses to three stats. Most of the strategizing was about which stats you were going to level first; it had an impact certainly, if you spent too much time chatting people up you'd find your ass getting kicked by bandits running around in Daedric armor, but that's neither fun nor complex in the fun to fiddle around with sense. The ES series tries to have you level "organically", deciding through gameplay what you actually want to do with your character, leveling up skills independently of one another as you used them to gauge what you actually do the most. I feel the perk system in Skyrim does this a lot better than the stat system in Oblivion; you have to take a more active role, but you can only pick perks in skills you've made use of, herding you towards perks that benefit how you actually fight. This is as opposed to Oblivion where you have to make your character suck at whatever it is you plan on doing.

 

tl;dr perks/feats take more thought than stats alone, stats can have a place but they're not all that fun to fiddle with in comparison

[Lachdonin]

And more variety on enemies Oblivion and Morrowind had a lot more Alien like creatures running around to slay then Skyrim does.

 

Unless you count Shivering Isles, Oblivions enemies were class A generic. The only remotely 'unique' creatures were the Dreugh, and the've appeared before. Compared to Oblivions monster lists, Draugr (again, a reapearing creature) Whisp Mothers, Skeever and Ice Wraiths are actually rather creative. Still nothing on Morrowind, however...

 

Seriously though, you guys play FPS games to calm down? How high strung are you at the best of times? Yikes!

[nakakita]

Skeevers? An ROUS by any other name smells just as bad.

[sukeban]

I think that stats hold nostalgic value simply because of the contrast with the vanilla Skyrim perk system. Stats have the perception of being "deeper" and "more involved" than vanilla perks, and... that might very well be true, at least right now. But I would agree with some others here that the perk system, as evidenced by some enterprising modders (SkyRe and Requiem come to mind), has the potential to greatly surpass them in terms of both roleplaying and character complexity.

 

Given that vanilla Skyrim has, what, twelve perks per tree, this is not terribly difficult to understand. ANY warrior is going to take all give perks in either one-handed or two-handed, ANY archer is going to take all five ranks of that beginning perk. Skyrim suffers from too few perks per tree, lacking any true degree of specialization between characters broadly defined as "warriors." Yes, one warrior may take the Speechcraft tree and the other Restoration, but they will fight exactly the same and have the same proficiencies with their weapons. Skyrim missed the mark in terms specialization (meaningful sub-trees within the larger tree) that would allow one character to develop a specific mace-centric fighting style whereas another would opt for a longsword or claymore that played entirely differently.

 

In this sense, Diablo II serves as a good example. In D2, you were able to develop loads of unique builds (though, of course, some were more min/maxed than others) that specialized in certain sub-trees. Trapsins, Kicksins, Javazons, Bowazons--that sort of thing. You also had builds that were entirely dependent upon equipment, often a single piece, a cool feature that TES doesn't really do and I don't really know why not.

 

I think it is true that casual gameplayers don't want to think overly long about what they are doing in a game, a reality that undermines many features of older RPG mechanics. But I think that a potentially more powerful countervailing force is the degree to which casual players (indeed, ALL players) desire customization and personalization of their characters. I think that casual players would be highly amenable to in-depth specialization if it were accessible in a presentable and straightforward way (like perks), where they could read a description, say "that sounds badass!" and select. That probably cuts against math and stats, but it doesn't cut against customization writ large.

 

Rather than skill-specific perk trees, I would favor three large ones--Warrior/Thief/Mage--each encompassing all of the skills normally housed within that archetype. Players could select which archetype they wanted to align with and select it, bringing them to multiple entry points to the tree, clearly begging the question "what do you want your character to do?" If they want their warrior to begin with maces, they can start there; if not, then elsewhere. Dual-classing would be permitted, but would obviously require the sacrifice of certain other skills. Not exactly groundbreaking mechanics here, just something simple that Skyrim (IMO) really missed the mark on.

 

Skyrim's perks (and really, entire trees) are largely either a) half-assed, ill-conceived, and/or incomplete, b) useless, even for RP purposes, c) completely overpowered and the "obvious best choice." In this sense, Skyrim merely messed up in creativity (needs more perks) and game balance, rather than in the perk mechanic itself. If greater care is taken in developing perks, and in allowing perks to interact with each other in more meaningful/unique ways (synergies and added-effect), then we can talk about how perks are superior to attributes. Until that time comes, however, attributes provide the more meaningful measure of character uniqueness.

 

Also, I think folks lament spears/longswords/greaves/unique clothes for the same reason, that each loss compounds the losses that have gone before, limiting the opportunity for customization and personalization. Is a throwing animation REALLY that hard to add to the game (knives, darts, stars) especially when it can just copy the archery physics in-flight? Would more types of swords REALLY have killed the devs to make, when they share the same animations as the other two? Moves like these toward needless streamlining eliminate options, reducing the number of unique roleplaying opportunities in an ostensibly roleplaying game.. In MW you could you could be as stylish or as square as you wanted to be, the options were there. In Skyrim, you have hilarious situations where there is but a single pair of generic gloves in the entire game....

Edited November 29, 2012 by sukeban

[Deleted561670User]

And more variety on enemies Oblivion and Morrowind had a lot more Alien like creatures running around to slay then Skyrim does.

 

Unless you count Shivering Isles, Oblivions enemies were class A generic. The only remotely 'unique' creatures were the Dreugh, and the've appeared before. Compared to Oblivions monster lists, Draugr (again, a reapearing creature) Whisp Mothers, Skeever and Ice Wraiths are actually rather creative. Still nothing on Morrowind, however...

 

Seriously though, you guys play FPS games to calm down? How high strung are you at the best of times? Yikes!

 

Cmon ice wraiths and whisp mothers are so rare and only in exteriors its super rare to encounter one of these, most of the time you run into dungeons, and lets face it you only got draugr or bandits and maybe Necromancers. Falmer are great I love those and dwemer stuff. I think there should atleast be some more dungeons in skyrim like in oblivion with Conjourer and their summoned Daedra. I want Golden Saints and Clanfears back! :(

 

@helmic Acrobatics should be back you can disable them with a mod later if you dont want them , I liked to only move around with jumping, not everyone is a roleplayer who punish himself with rules so he dont breaks the game or it is all so serious reallistic. Elder Scrolls is still a fantasy RPG. You can make mods for Roleplay or Realistic needs, but not mod a new Skill like acrobatics in or add a new enchantment like damage reflect or magic reflect and to expect that it works with game.

 

I still remember the first time where I saw a tv review for morrowind where they praised you level up while using your skills the more you jump the better you get! That was my first reason to purchase it I never saw something like that before, jumping higher the better your skill is how cool is that please? I dont care if I could run with lightning speed or jump 1km high I could download a mod with a limit if I dont like it anymore, but first you need to have it in the game from begin with.

[AnimeOtaku102]

Without stats, I won't be able to make a character that dumpstats Intelligence and gets all the hilarious dialogue options (not that Bethesda did a good job with that in Fallout 3) or make a high Strength character that intimidates with bulging muscles instead of leveling up Speechcraft to get the appropriate perk that never works anyway.

 

But I guess that's what we lose for having voiced games these days. Giving the players too many options just makes dialogue all that much harder to record.

[Ricksnowy]

Ok I agree on the monsters part there is too few.. fortunatly there are mods like SKYRIM MONSTER MOD By Dogtown1 that add a boatload of new enemies to fight honestly if it wasnt for mods like this I would have flushed skyrim long ago.on the other hand my personal feeling about the leveling system --dismal FAILURE.... sit in a corner an make potions and because of the perks you pick you become the best swordsman on the planet WITHOUT ever touching a blade?????????? LAMEUSMAXIMUS

There is a boatload of armor replacement mods but I havent seen any WEAPON replacement mods.I finding the best way for ME to keep playing is to FORGET this is a TES game and just go eith the thought it is a new type game.

Oh and NO point in flaming me over this post. Its easy to ignore

rant over

[Soris81]

Those glowing rocks you could pick up from alyied ruins.

[Jitansgate]

Those glowing rocks you could pick up from alyied ruins.

 

The Varla Stones are the Best especially with the Dupe Glitch.

 

http://fc03.deviantart.net/fs70/f/2011/105/e/d/oblivion_varla_stone_by_aixapredator93-d3e184x.jpg

[Lachdonin]

on the other hand my personal feeling about the leveling system --dismal FAILURE.... sit in a corner an make potions and because of the perks you pick you become the best swordsman on the planet WITHOUT ever touching a blade?????????? LAMEUSMAXIMUS

 

I'm not sure we're playing the same game... but in order to have access to the sword perks (or more properly the 1handed/2handed weapon perks you have to actually meed a prerequisite level. You can't unlock paralysing strike by just making potions and spending perk points, because you require a level 100 1handed weapon skill.

 

In'm sorry, but that complaint sounds like its comming from someone who hasn't even played...