The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion - REMASTERED

[Wallcrawler]

Originally Posted by Frazod

I'm now remembering something I never liked about this game - you don't gain experience points for killing things or completing quests - just advancing skills. And obviously as your preferred skills get higher and higher it takes longer and longer to advance, unless you start concentrating on other skills that you don't generally use or give a shit about. My character is a stealth archer and I really don't look forward to having to shift over to doing weak ass low level shit that's completely contrary to my build in order to keep leveling up. Yeah, I realize that the intent is to force you to round out your character, but I don't really want to round out my character. I just want to be a stealth archer. Oh well.

That's the kicker with ES games though. Unless you turn the game down to Novice, you'll never get that power fantasy character of being a total badass.

Enemies scale with your level, so they're always just as strong as you are, and as a stealth archer build, those 5 agility points you're spending ( along with the 5 ranks of training marksman before each level up if you're really smart) is just enough to get you marginally more powerful on a level up.

I have a character that has 100 Marksman, and using a Daedric Bow with Daedric Arrows, it's still a chore to drop anything armored with my bow, even if I lead with a triple damage stealth shot.

There's no way I'd have been able to grind out 75 levels of marksman through normal gameplay, so the 5 training ranks per level up was a godsend, albeit expensive as ****.

The only real bonus to leveling marksman all the way up is the chance to paralyze at 75, and then greater chance to paralyze at 100.

That seems to fall short when you can literally enchant a bow with paralyze far before you reach those ranks.

Leveling up really only serves the combat portion of the game anyway, with the exception of strength allowing you to carry more weight, and speed allowing you to move a little faster, both of which can be augmented much faster through enchanted gear or fortify spells.

I'd seriously consider just dropping your difficulty to apprentice, or Novice, where you can then simply focus on stealth and marksman and play through the entire experience without having to feel obligated to grind skills you don't use just to get to max level.

I think level 18 is when top tier enemies, gear, and sigil stones from the oblivion gates appear. I'd grind to reach 18, then drop it to apprentice or novice, whichever provides the most fun, and just enjoy the game tailored how you want to play.