Skyrim is worse than Oblivion in every way

[Commissar Draco]

Anders Breivik said:

A usual day for me involves email farming, writing, sharing “moderate” resources from my book on debate groups to coach fellow cultural conservatives, smoking, eating chocolate lol, taking a daily 1 hour walk/motivational meditation and doing some occasional battlegrounds in WoW on my badass Horde resto druid. I just completed Dragon Age Origins not long ago. A brilliant game!:D ​

Given Dragon Age Origins was Goty and popularity of Diablo 3 and TOR here someone should invite Brovik to join... Somebody still playing Skyrim? It is not like Dawnguard is worth 1/10 of Dead Money.

 

[Wyrmlord III]

Except that vampire chick that's forced on you for some quests ruins all your summons by raising useless shit all the time

That vampire chick was a shocking disappointment.

Your first encounter started out okay:

"What the hell, there is a woman inside the monolith?! And she is alive?!"

But then, she starts talking like a Valley Girl teenager:

"Hey, so like you know whatever, I am totally a vampire, takemetodaddypls."

The idea was good. The voice acting choice was bad.

Still, I had a good laugh when Lord Harkon meets his daughter after 10,000 years and says, "Have you brought my Elder Scroll?"

 

[logrus]

I just DLed dawnguard for crossbows and werewolf perks

Same here! :D

I can't agree with the OP. I'm really love Skyrim, when compared to Oblivion. However there are aspects of the game I'd point out as not so well-done.

Balance issues
Great that Beth has thrown out the awful monsters matching exactly to your level as in Oblivion, including every bandit scum running in full ebony equipment. Skyrim is match more interesting when you are low level and really have to watch the environment when you're level 5 and trolls or sabrecats can eat you up for breakfast. It adds a thrill as it should be. Then comes a short moment when you gain a couple of levels (leveling is really easy, even too easy) but your core offence skills are yet not developed well and stronger and stronger enemies appear that one-shoot you. This phase is really irritating, but short. Then after leveling to around level 35 you become so powerful that you start to increase the difficulty level and after a while even Master becomes a walk in the park. And it's so easy to build overpowered character - my destruction/conjuration wizard nuked everything. I see some other builds like daggers assassin with x30 damage from stealth modifier, or a tank with 80% physical and 85% magic damage reduction have a potential to be even more overpowered. No to mention god-mode if you abuse alchemy/smithing/enchanting combo which makes any other perks or player skills redundant
My first character was dual-casting destruction school specialist with conjuration as a second specialization. While in the beginning it was so refreshing to finally play a powerful mage character in TES game but after a while I felt like playing on cheats. I put a lot of effort in enchanting (100 and the set of perks to reach the double effect enchanting), and even without abusing it with +enchanting alchemy potions I was able to craft gear putting deaderic artifacts to shame. And fights were so easy when I summon two elementals and dual-cast aoe spell with stagger effect. Only surprise I got during fight with one of the dragon priests when he reverted the summons against me. I got bored on master difficulty before finishing game.
Right now with Dawnguard I rolled stealthy sword/daggers dual wield fighter and archer. So far it's more challenging since my sneak is not so good and I'm not yet able to sneak behind enemies in dungeons. On the other hand this particular char is a werewolf and in beast form he just rips through dungeons like a knife through butter. Power attack to floor everyone including dungeon bosses and fast and furious claw attack while he is defenseless = another god mode.

Dragons
Stupid AI - how many times a fight looks like the dragon is just flaying a few minutes in the air then makes a few easily avoidable attacks and stops them and goes up in the air to give you time to regenerate health/mana. Dragons are way too easy and fights with them are... well, cheesy. Worse, the Oblivion-like scaling of dragons = on level 7 it was easier for me to slay a reptile then to get rid of sabre cat in the wilderness.

Too easy progress with the factions
I miss the way it was implemented in Morrowind so you would need to get appropriate attributes/skills to reasonable levels before you get promoted. I welcome the possibility to join different factions in parallel without conflicting quests, but it should not be like you become arch-mage of College of Winterhold while the only magic-related thing you do is casting a simple Magelight once...

Changes/flaws in character progression
I really miss the main attributes. Having just three bars as main statistics describing character is definitely a decline for me.
On the other hand perk trees are way better then static perks assignments tied to skill level. You still have freedom and train any skill you want and if it comes high it's benefitable. On the other hand it's not like if you train all the skills than every character is the same except the health level/luck attribute. Another issue is that while some perks are must-have if you specialize in the particular skill (+damage % for weapons/spells) while other perk trees are nearly useless even if you specialize - for example lock picking/pick pocketing tress are nearly useless even for a thief.

Disappointing puzzles in dungeons
When I watched the demo walkthrough Bleak Falls Barrow it was so promising, but when you play a game you realize that there are just two puzzles in the whole game - claw and stone statues. It's cool when you encounter them the first time, but especially the stone statue riddle becomes nothing more than irritating chore since you always have an appropriate pattern shown just by the door. And it could be so awesome if Beth hired the Grimrock guys for creating unique puzzle for every dungeon. Or at least make not 2 but 20 types of puzzles and ensure that solutions are not so obvious and given to the player on a plate.

 

[Bahamut]

That vampire chick was a shocking disappointment.

Your first encounter started out okay:

"What the hell, there is a woman inside the monolith?! And she is alive?!"

But then, she starts talking like a Valley Girl teenager:

"Hey, so like you know whatever, I am totally a vampire, takemetodaddypls."

Nowdays bethtard forum is drowning in topics "we we cant marry serana" and praising how awesome npc she is

Also

 

[DraQ]

I just DLed dawnguard for crossbows and werewolf perks

Same here! :D

I can't agree with the OP. I'm really love Skyrim, when compared to Oblivion. However there are aspects of the game I'd point out as not so well-done.

Balance issues
Great that Beth has thrown out the awful monsters matching exactly to your level as in Oblivion, including every bandit scum running in full ebony equipment. Skyrim is match more interesting when you are low level and really have to watch the environment when you're level 5 and trolls or sabrecats can eat you up for breakfast. It adds a thrill as it should be. Then comes a short moment when you gain a couple of levels (leveling is really easy, even too easy) but your core offence skills are yet not developed well and stronger and stronger enemies appear that one-shoot you. This phase is really irritating, but short. Then after leveling to around level 35 you become so powerful that you start to increase the difficulty level and after a while even Master becomes a walk in the park. And it's so easy to build overpowered character - my destruction/conjuration wizard nuked everything. I see some other builds like daggers assassin with x30 damage from stealth modifier, or a tank with 80% physical and 85% magic damage reduction have a potential to be even more overpowered. No to mention god-mode if you abuse alchemy/smithing/enchanting combo which makes any other perks or player skills redundant
My first character was dual-casting destruction school specialist with conjuration as a second specialization. While in the beginning it was so refreshing to finally play a powerful mage character in TES game but after a while I felt like playing on cheats. I put a lot of effort in enchanting (100 and the set of perks to reach the double effect enchanting), and even without abusing it with +enchanting alchemy potions I was able to craft gear putting deaderic artifacts to shame. And fights were so easy when I summon two elementals and dual-cast aoe spell with stagger effect. Only surprise I got during fight with one of the dragon priests when he reverted the summons against me. I got bored on master difficulty before finishing game.
Right now with Dawnguard I rolled stealthy sword/daggers dual wield fighter and archer. So far it's more challenging since my sneak is not so good and I'm not yet able to sneak behind enemies in dungeons. On the other hand this particular char is a werewolf and in beast form he just rips through dungeons like a knife through butter. Power attack to floor everyone including dungeon bosses and fast and furious claw attack while he is defenseless = another god mode.

Dragons
Stupid AI - how many times a fight looks like the dragon is just flaying a few minutes in the air then makes a few easily avoidable attacks and stops them and goes up in the air to give you time to regenerate health/mana. Dragons are way too easy and fights with them are... well, cheesy. Worse, the Oblivion-like scaling of dragons = on level 7 it was easier for me to slay a reptile then to get rid of sabre cat in the wilderness.

Too easy progress with the factions
I miss the way it was implemented in Morrowind so you would need to get appropriate attributes/skills to reasonable levels before you get promoted. I welcome the possibility to join different factions in parallel without conflicting quests, but it should not be like you become arch-mage of College of Winterhold while the only magic-related thing you do is casting a simple Magelight once...

Changes/flaws in character progression
I really miss the main attributes. Having just three bars as main statistics describing character is definitely a decline for me.
On the other hand perk trees are way better then static perks assignments tied to skill level. You still have freedom and train any skill you want and if it comes high it's benefitable. On the other hand it's not like if you train all the skills than every character is the same except the health level/luck attribute. Another issue is that while some perks are must-have if you specialize in the particular skill (+damage % for weapons/spells) while other perk trees are nearly useless even if you specialize - for example lock picking/pick pocketing tress are nearly useless even for a thief.

Disappointing puzzles in dungeons
When I watched the demo walkthrough Bleak Falls Barrow it was so promising, but when you play a game you realize that there are just two puzzles in the whole game - claw and stone statues. It's cool when you encounter them the first time, but especially the stone statue riddle becomes nothing more than irritating chore since you always have an appropriate pattern shown just by the door. And it could be so awesome if Beth hired the Grimrock guys for creating unique puzzle for every dungeon. Or at least make not 2 but 20 types of puzzles and ensure that solutions are not so obvious and given to the player on a plate.

Actually, add magic system to the list too. New casting system is really good and stuff like having to raise actual corpses as undead is definite incline too, but where the fuck is my spellmaker? And stuff like levitation or waterwalk? Magic is hardly that powerful in Skyrim, it might have seemed underpowered in Morrowind, but when you figured out some synergistic combinations of effects you could become something close to physical god. For that matter loss of attributes has hurt the magic system too - in MW you could've drained someone's agility to make them easy to knock down, or their willpower to make them susceptible to stuff like paralysis.

 

[Machocruz]

Didn't they get rid of Levitate for Oblivion because of the way they handled towns? Closed cells, or some such technical jargon I'm not familiar with.

Which leads me to some questions about some things that have been bugging me for a while about the direction this series has taken. Some answers are probably obvious, but I'm particularly interested in what, if any, reasons Bethesda has given for these changes, in interviews and etc.

- Why did they get rid of sales floor inventory in Oblivion? This was a huge blow to my enjoyment of ESIV and to the credibility of its world. Thieving made pointless. I'm thinking they didn't want the player to get good items too easy, but why care about that in a SP game? If you've pumped up your thief skills, you've earned having a chance to rip off merchants. Also, no store guards -which was an awesome detail in MW- because of this.

-Yeah, why did they get rid of spellmaking for Skyrim?

-No skill requirements for guild rank advancement. I understand they don't believe in "locking out content" anymore, but in MW you could still do all the quests right? Do fucking casuals really care if they can't get meaningless grandmaster tag?

- Paucity of unique items. I remember being fairly low level in MW, going into a cave for some reason and levitating out of the reach of skeleton warriors, and finding Magebane in another room. Was awesome feeling of surprise and discovery. Never to be seen in ES again. Yeah, yeah, leveled items, but still. Constant and leveled loot can co-exist in a game. And the leveled items were never anything good, like you would get in Diablo 2.

-Why no mortar and pestle? I don't see alchemy stations as being more convenient or a better idea.

-High level chests with bullshit in them. In MW, you were pretty sure you would fine something worth your while in high security level chests. Why the fuck would a noble lock a wooden bowl and 22 gold in a chest?

- No more teleportation spells. Yeah fast travel, but spells are cooler. Why have an exit at end of Skyrim cave when Mark, Recall, Divine/Amalsi Intervention are more lore-worthy? Using spells not as 'accessible' as putting cursor over map icon?

- Wtf is up with the enchanting in Skyrim? Not an improvement, not really more streamlined for masses either, from what I can tell.

-Birth-signs too complicated?

What say you, Codexian masters of developer lore?

 

[Regvard]

Didn't they get rid of Levitate for Oblivion because of the way they handled towns? Closed cells, or some such technical jargon I'm not familiar with.

Which leads me to some questions about some things that have been bugging me for a while about the direction this series has taken. Some answers are probably obvious, but I'm particularly interested in what, if any, reasons Bethesda has given for these changes, in interviews and etc.

- Why did they get rid of sales floor inventory in Oblivion? This was a huge blow to my enjoyment of ESIV and to the credibility of its world. Thieving made pointless. I'm thinking they didn't want the player to get good items too easy, but why care about that in a SP game? If you've pumped up your thief skills, you've earned having a chance to rip off merchants. Also, no store guards -which was an awesome detail in MW- because of this.

-Yeah, why did they get rid of spellmaking for Skyrim?

-No skill requirements for guild rank advancement. I understand they don't believe in "locking out content" anymore, but in MW you could still do all the quests right? Do fucking casuals really care if they can't get meaningless grandmaster tag?

- Paucity of unique items. I remember being fairly low level in MW, going into a cave for some reason and levitating out of the reach of skeleton warriors, and finding Magebane in another room. Was awesome feeling of surprise and discovery. Never to be seen in ES again. Yeah, yeah, leveled items, but still. Constant and leveled loot can co-exist in a game. And the leveled items were never anything good, like you would get in Diablo 2.

-Why no mortar and pestle? I don't see alchemy stations as being more convenient or a better idea.

-High level chests with bullshit in them. In MW, you were pretty sure you would fine something worth your while in high security level chests. Why the fuck would a noble lock a wooden bowl and 22 gold in a chest?

- No more teleportation spells. Yeah fast travel, but spells are cooler. Why have an exit at end of Skyrim cave when Mark, Recall, Divine/Amalsi Intervention are more lore-worthy? Using spells not as 'accessible' as putting cursor over map icon?

- Wtf is up with the enchanting in Skyrim? Not an improvement, not really more streamlined for masses either, from what I can tell.

-Birth-signs too complicated?

What say you, Codexian masters of developer lore?

Itz next gen, bro.

 

[logrus]

Actually, add magic system to the list too. New casting system is really good and stuff like having to raise actual corpses as undead is definite incline too, but where the fuck is my spellmaker? And stuff like levitation or waterwalk? Magic is hardly that powerful in Skyrim, it might have seemed underpowered in Morrowind, but when you figured out some synergistic combinations of effects you could become something close to physical god. For that matter loss of attributes has hurt the magic system too - in MW you could've drained someone's agility to make them easy to knock down, or their willpower to make them susceptible to stuff like paralysis.

Ha, that's true about the synergies and custom spells. I remember my one attempt to mage was sadist wizard abusing custom "Medusa's Touch" - drain strength + poison, sick fun when casting the spell on heavily armored juggernauts making them unable to move and slowly dying in pain. But I never figured out how to effecively play elementalist in Morrowind - either spells I had where too weak to make serious harm to tougher opponents or my mana got depleted. In Skyrim on the other hand elementlist is extremely powerful when one has dual-casting and stagger perks.
Lack of spellmaking is disappointing. I thought that it was cut from initial release just to push game to the market and was pretty sure we get it in the first expansion
Still, I hope for second DLC to have spell making.
Levitation was indeed overpowered when fighting melee fighters in MW. Levitation and waterbreathing were interesting as they were allowing to explore otherwise unaccessable places which was often very rewarding to do.
On the other hand regadless of many design flaws TES games are inceribly rich. If one does not read all about the secrets on the interwebs it's always something to discover.

Spoiler

Yesterday, after 50+ hours in Skyrim I discovered that there are treasure maps in the game! :D I found "Treasure map III" in some unobtrusive shack and it's time to go treasure hunting today. I'm really curious if I get just a bunch of gold/gems/generic magic loot or some special items :D

 

[Bahamut]

Spoiler

Yesterday, after 50+ hours in Skyrim I discovered that there are treasure maps in the game! :D I found "Treasure map III" in some unobtrusive shack and it's time to go treasure hunting today. I'm really curious if I get just a bunch of gold/gems/generic magic loot or some special items :D

There are loads of them, but they only contain generic loot, only with moar gems and monnies

 

[Toffeli]

Not sure if posted but next dlc


Let the larping commence. I don't have 'rim installed anymore, but I liked the House Manor questlines in Morrowind, and getting something permanent for your deeds to the house and your status in it.

 

[Bahamut]

Not sure if posted but next dlc


Let the larping commence. I don't have 'rim installed anymore, but I liked the House Manor questlines in Morrowind, and getting something permanent for your deeds to the house and your status in it.

1.Build a house
2.Build a basement
3.Built a vault in basement
4.Adopt kids
5.Lure them into basement
6.PROFIT!

Fucking larpers gonna cum

 

[Manjuice Nutella]

Not sure if posted but next dlc


Let the larping commence. I don't have 'rim installed anymore, but I liked the House Manor questlines in Morrowind, and getting something permanent for your deeds to the house and your status in it.

EDIT:

Even Nexus users are mostly disappointed but

Okay I've been thinking this since Day 1 I completed MQ . I don't care how many DLCs Bethesda will release but I'd bet a lot that the last DLC would be a war or sth with Thalmor and I would really like (and believe) it to be named "The Empire Strikes Back" . This is something I and many other gamers I believe want like hell )

Awwww, adopt children, make a home, that's sweet.....NOW Where Are the GD SPEARS!!!!!

Im gonna adopt all the children :D

 

[IDtenT]

I'm sorry, this must be a April 1st joke. It just needs to be.

 

[Bahamut]

I'm sorry, this must be a April 1st joke. It just needs to be.

This is bethesda, jokes are canon in their games

 

[Sranchammer]

Every time I enter a city I'm bombarded by people requesting help from me. I don't even need to talk to them. Just walk around and people will scream at me hoping I'll travel across the fucking map to find something for them, which, will lead me to another guy yelling at me to do a quest for him

 

[Stabwound]

rooofles, that is some of the shittiest DLC they could have possibly released. Wow. Watch it be like $25 too.

 

[Deleted member 7219]

So Obsidian came along and made Fallout: New Vegas, which was brilliant, and then some good story-based DLC too, and we all hoped Bethesda learned a thing or two. Nope. Obviously not.

 

[Bahamut]

rooofles, that is some of the shittiest DLC they could have possibly released. Wow. Watch it be like $25 too.

Nah this one's like 5 bucks

 

[Brinko]

So Obsidian came along and made Fallout: New Vegas, which was brilliant, and then some good story-based DLC too, and we all hoped Bethesda learned a thing or two. Nope. Obviously not.

It's not surprising as even some of the basic shit put into NV like throwing weapons were not implemented into Skyrim. That probably would have made the two factions a fraction different with throwing spears for the Imperials and throwing axes for the Nords. But nope, Bethesda proves once again that both effort and talent should take a back seat to crafting their majestic derpland theme park.

 

[DraQ]

Ha, that's true about the synergies and custom spells. I remember my one attempt to mage was sadist wizard abusing custom "Medusa's Touch" - drain strength + poison, sick fun when casting the spell on heavily armored juggernauts making them unable to move and slowly dying in pain. But I never figured out how to effecively play elementalist in Morrowind - either spells I had where too weak to make serious harm to tougher opponents or my mana got depleted. In Skyrim on the other hand elementlist is extremely powerful when one has dual-casting and stagger perks.

Well, the thing is that destruction wasn't limited to elemental magic.
It had drain, damage and weakness to X. Custom spells combining weakness to magic, weakness to element and elemental damage were pretty powerful if used on the right enemies, drain health was excellent pest killer, and destruction meshed extremely well with both illusion (paralysis, silence) and mysticism (absorb health). You had to conserve magicka and never just rush in without a plan, but if you were prepared then you could roflstomp your way through the game as caster.

Levitation was indeed overpowered when fighting melee fighters in MW. Levitation and waterbreathing were interesting as they were allowing to explore otherwise unaccessable places which was often very rewarding to do.

Yes, but Skyrim has all the tools to prevent levitation from being OP - make it concentration spell requiring both hands to be cast. Give most enemies ranged attacks or brains to run away when incapable of reaching you. Problem? Solved.

 

[IDtenT]

Yes, but Skyrim has all the tools to prevent levitation from being OP - make it concentration spell requiring both hands to be cast. Give most enemies ranged attacks or brains to run away when incapable of reaching you. Problem? Solved.

But you're not supposed to be able to fly there yet. That's why they took it out. You'll ruin the cinematic experience.

 

[Erzherzog]

Will I be able to buy a horse armorer for my house?

 

[Papa Môlé]

Between mods and minecraft I don't understand how this sort of thing can turn much of a profit. Can it really compete with either?

 

[logrus]

Not sure if posted but next dlc


Let the larping commence. I don't have 'rim installed anymore, but I liked the House Manor questlines in Morrowind, and getting something permanent for your deeds to the house and your status in it.

Funniest thing is that we already have a fan mod with nearly exactly the same functions:
http://skyrim.nexusmods.com/mods/18480



Seriously, the second DLC is pure WTF. And I thought they learned something after the horse armor dlc...
What I would expect after Dawnguard (which was good dlc, nicely blending into the game) is old-school expansion pack with:
- new landmass - part of Morrowind or Hammerfall
- serious challenge for high-level characters including new monsters
- new dungeon tile sets with new traps and puzzles
- new combat mechanics - spears, thrown weapons (axes, knives)
- spell making and maybe some new spell effects
- diving experience - underwater exploration of lakes and flooded mines with waterbreathing and underwater combat

One more thing AFAIR Beth guys announced that there will be less dlc for Skyrim but more like "expansion packs"...

 

[sea]

If the DLC gave you something like the Dragon Tower from Divinity 2 it might actually be worth $5. This however...

Do you seriously think Bethesda has actually bothered playing a game like Divinity II, much less enough to draw inspiration from it?