Skyrim Character help

[T3h Merc]

I'm trying to pick a 5th skill for my pure mage run. I'm using these four so far:

Destruction (Ice/fire)
Conjuration (Necromancy)
Enchanting (for thralls/companions/necromantic sorcerer rp)
Restoration (defense/necro rp)

Now, I'm attempting to choose between Alchemy (at the risk of granting myself too much power) or Alteration or perhaps Illusion if someone can provide evidence that it's worth it for a non-sneak mage. I'm wearing only cloth for roleplaying purposes. Can you guys help out?

 

[Maxtro]

I'm trying to pick a 5th skill for my pure mage run. I'm using these four so far:

Destruction (Ice/fire)
Conjuration (Necromancy)
Enchanting (for thralls/companions/necromantic sorcerer rp)
Restoration (defense/necro rp)

Now, I'm attempting to choose between Alchemy (at the risk of granting myself too much power) or Alteration or perhaps Illusion if someone can provide evidence that it's worth it for a non-sneak mage. I'm wearing only cloth for roleplaying purposes. Can you guys help out?

You need Alteration or else everything will kill you with one hit.

 

[SlaveNumber23]

Depending on how you want to play, pick Illusion if you want to be more stealthy and Alteration if you want to Rambo it. Possibly Heavy Armour, you can get a perk that makes your unarmed attacks do damage equal to the armor rating of your gloves, add to that extra unarmed damage from enchantments and the racial bonus if you play Khajit (not required though) and you will have unarmed attacks to fall back on when you run out of mana, the benefit being that as unarmed is not an actual skill it does not over level you. That and you have some good survivability from wearing heavy armour.

 

[King of Asgaard]

Go Alteration, for the defence buffs and the Paralyse spell, which is amazingly OP.

 

[Daveman]

If you aren't being stealthy illusion ain't gonna be that useful. Could always pick one handed, just so you can be a badass with conjured weapons.

 

[Lyri]

Enchanting (for thralls/companions/necromantic sorcerer rp)

That's conjuration buddy.

Also if you're going conjure then you're going to have tanks so you don't specifically need abjuration.
However it's a toss up between illusion for manipulation of people/crowds or abjuration for survivability.

If you're playing more out in the open I'd go abj, unless you see yourslf needing some serious crowd control.

 

[RedDeadFred]

Go the alteration route simply for the perks. You get 30% magic resistance. Also, if you haven't picked your race yet, choose Breton. That's another 25% resistance to magic. Then, late game, you can use the Lord Stone to have yet another 25% resistance to magic.

Voila, you have reached the magic resist cap and you didn't even have to waste enchantments on it!

 

[direkiller]

Alteration
unless they fixed it you will cry at how little damage you do. and you will need the protection it gives

 

[Terminal Blue]

Illusion..

Illusion is probably the most underrated skill in the game. It's extremely easy to level, provides essential crowd control, gets you out of tight spots (with invisiblility) and when maxed out, works on everything. Later on, you can clear whole areas just using illusion alone.

You'll also find it synergies pretty well with conjuration if you're using necromancy. Fury a group, reanimate the first one who dies, then sit back and grab a beer. Recast fury and reanimate if necessary and you'll wind up standing on a huge pile of corpses having not even had to ready a pitiful destruction spell.

There's also a weird glitch where buffing fear spells also causes your fire spells to do more damage (probably because fire spells can be upgraded to cause fear). Seriously, given how weak destruction spells are.. this is a good thing.

 

[Itsthatguy]

Alchemy

Screw alteration. You have dual casted stun locking fireballs that cost 0 magicka due to your 100+ percent cost reduction on destruction spells (enchanting totally isn't broken). If you are taking hits then you are clearly doing it wrong.

Also, I would use lightning instead of ice personally. Fire is the most damaging (burn after hit + cheaper) so it really comes down which one has more utility. All ice has is slow which is kind of redundant with your stunlocking dual casting goodness. Lightning can be used to snipe with and is really effective at dealing with dragons. The stagger effect interrupts their attacks, so you can just sit there holding a dual cast bolt while they circle (or snipe, whatever) and laugh

Also, get rid of conjuration and restoration and go with stealth + archery/one handed.

WHAT DO YOU MEAN I AM MISSING THE POINT

 

[DracoSuave]

Illusion..

Illusion is probably the most underrated skill in the game. It's extremely easy to level, provides essential crowd control, gets you out of tight spots (with invisiblility) and when maxed out, works on everything. Later on, you can clear whole areas just using illusion alone.

You'll also find it synergies pretty well with conjuration if you're using necromancy. Fury a group, reanimate the first one who dies, then sit back and grab a beer. Recast fury and reanimate if necessary and you'll wind up standing on a huge pile of corpses having not even had to ready a pitiful destruction spell.

There's also a weird glitch where buffing fear spells also causes your fire spells to do more damage (probably because fire spells can be upgraded to cause fear). Seriously, given how weak destruction spells are.. this is a good thing.

Alteration is the easiest of the schools to level tho.

Cast Detect Life in city of your choice.

No that's it.

100 comes very quickly, then you can do a very easy quest to get the Dragonhide spell. Dragonhide+the afformentioned perks and race choices=capped in defense for physical and magical damage. Tank ALL the things.

 

[theblindedhunter]

Destruction if you don't mind a bit of feeling lame as you use firebolt after firebolt to blast your enemies away from ever touching you.
Who needs alteration when you aren't getting hit?

 

[jehk]

Archers and other mages will ruin your day if you don't get some kind of protection. A Breton with Alteration, Destruction and Enchanting is pretty much God. Don't even need Restoration.

 

[Erana]

Forget everything else, focus on Cojuration, and get this spell:

Spoiler

At least for me, nothing was more satisfying as using that as my primary weapon. They're exploding, kamikaze wolves on fire.

Still, if you're going for RP, I'd say Illusion. Considering the various calm and frenzy spells, it totally fits with the "dark sorcerer/necromancer" theme, without being to meta and making everything too easy through Alchemy. Unless you're into paralysis or telekenesis, I don't really see much of a use for defense spells when you'll be able to summon more skeleons for a pittance of MP.

 

[Jimmy T. Malice]

Make sure you get ward spells. They're essential for fighting dragons and mages if you have no armour. If you have enough magicka you can throw up a ward and stop the dragon fire from ever damaging you, then get up close and kill it in melee.