Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion

[Drasca]

What load times? 5s-15s for me.

Alchemy: Can still make as many potions as you'd like. That's time consuming, and potions weigh as much as their summed component ingredients now 2lb boar meat + .5 lb bread = 2.5 lb restore fatigue 'potion' (sandwich in a bottle really). There's another sensible addition, you only gain properties you have the skill to detect and use. No more using 4th tier properties with alchemy lists. If you want though, you can play the alchemy merchandise game in Oblivion too, and you'll rightly (and slowly) earn additional alchemy skill and profit off of restore fatigue potions by traveling from town to town making and selling your wares.

Skills have been restructured and reclassified a bit. There's no more unarmored skill, and some skills have been truncated. Some weapon skills merged. No more spears. Other skills' linked attributes have been reassigned.

Indoor/Outdoor--> Too much of both to establish a ratio. Fought & Quested indoors, outdoors, everywhere.

Combat's a lot more interactive now. Not overly complicated, but enough to add complexity.

Clicking attack does fast swipes. Holding down attack charges big attacks, and with higher attack skills, power attacks with chance of special effects like paralyze, knockback and disarm.

Block is a seperate action (cannot attack while blocking), and blocked attacks lead to attacker recoil, opening time for your attacks. You'll find that the enemy AI strings attacks, power attacks, and blocks intelligently, so if you're not watching out you'll be recoiling from blocked attacks. Oh, you move a lot slower while blocking, so the enemy will try to outflank you.

These are simple and effective 'gladiator' style combat improvements that add some needed interactive complexity to combat, and puts the player in control. Your skill factor can overcome a lot of numerical difficulty, or die from lack of player attention.

Oh, magicka regens on its own now depending on your willpower, so magic users aren't completely borked when they've tapped out on reserves.

[Roland]

I was an active Morrowind Player when it was released on the X-Box, and recently became enamored with it all over again when I picked up the GoTY edition.  I have a few questions for Oblivion players, in reference to the changes made between the two:

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• I recall reading an article claiming that the combat system - a sore spot for a lot of gamers - would be completely revamped for Oblivion.&nbsp; Has the combat system been revamped?&nbsp; And if so, is there much of a difference - are there still three randomly chosen slash/jab/etc actions?&nbsp; Does it still feel 'rough' and more mathematical than other RPG combat?

It was never random. It was based on the direction you were "moving"while swining. I.e. pushing forward while attacking would result in a "jab" of sorts. Sideways led to a sideways slash / bash, IIRC, and not doing anything resulted in a general slash / overhead bash, IIRC. I could be slightly off on the latter two, but you get the idea. It was never random.

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The potion drinking limit been commented on in this thread, but what about potion creation?&nbsp; In Morrowind one of the 'cheapest' tricks to the game was buying massive quantities of herbs, making potions, and then selling them to the Creeper in Caldera.&nbsp; I'm guessing the references to being a flower picker means ingredients must be found more than bought, is that correct?

Ingredients can be found or bought, same as always. And that bit about a potion's weight being the sum of its reagents' weight is wrong. I regularly drop my weight level down by turning heaving reagents into potions (which average between .2 and .5 lbs. apiece). One thing you won't find, at least early on, is the ability to generate massive wealth off of Alchemy. I'm only a Journeyman (3 effects unlocked), and my supplies are limited, but from what I've seen it's no longer possible to make a killing on Alchemy. Plus, reagents bought from merchants are generally much more scarce, so no buying 50 of two items for 10 gold, making 50 potions, and selling them back for 1000 gold. You make a meager profit, but it's a profit. With enough hunting and creative potion use, I was able to scrounge up a couple hundred gold in about two hours, keeping my most useful potions and selling the rest.

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Are any of the classes or skills radically different than they were in Morrowind?

Magicka regens, albeit slowly. Health does not. There is no Unarmored skill, as mentioned before, and now there are only two weapon classes: Blade (all swords and daggers), and Blunt (Maces and Axes of all types). Hand-to-Hand is still around. Running no longer drains fatigue, but jumping does, as does swinging a sword, so Mages will have to be very conservative about how much they swing (although with Magicka regen, and potions abounding to restore Magicka, they won't be nearly as dependent on weapons as before). Other than that, the combat changes make the biggest effects, although wearing all Light Armor (unsure of Heavy Armor) while being of Journeyman or Expert and better (forget which) will grant you a 50% armor bonus, which I don't recall from Morrowind.

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And finally - How are the load times?

No better, no worse than Morrowind. Actually, maybe I can't say that. Oblivion actually loads just about as fast as Morrowind does on this comp, which is to say very fast. Sometimes it's longer, but the "loading area" screen every few feet barely even makes a jitter on my FPS, and is almost too short to notice. Think Diablo II's loading screens, and you'll have a very solid grasp. My rig is very good, but not legendary, and I can run it at 1024 with mostly all high settings (defaults to "High Quality", with some of the highest options toned down or shut off, on my hardware) with nary a stutter. Draw rate is good so long as you're not gazing a half a mile away, and even then it's not noticable unless you go looking for it.
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[st]

I know its a rather long list, but if anyone wouldn't mind posting an answer here or there, it would be immensely appreciated :)

Cheers,

Munk
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Pssssh... You call that long? :)

What irks me is how utterly useless the strategy guide is compared to the one for Morrowind. But I digress. Combat is improved, IMHO. Magicka regen is awesome - Mages now have unlimited staying power without the need to rest (more on this in a moment), but still have to be very tactful while casting spells, and make sure their spells HIT. Even cheap spells will drain you dry if you're constantly missing, and Magicka doesn't regen all that fast (maybe a bit faster than in D2), so you can't nuke everything and expect to live without some serious tactics.

One major change: You can ONLY rest in beds. Not anywhere else. Not even in towns. This is made up for by most dungeons having bedrolls somewhere in them, and the fact that Magicka now regens. You also start off with a very minor Healing spell (Heal Minor Wounds), which can eventually heal you back to full, even if it takes you an hour. :P So you'll never truly be stuck simply because you can't "rest". You can, however, "Wait" if you want to pass time quickly.

Facial animations range from god-awful to fairly good, with the worst making Morrowind look good. :P The camera breakaway during speech becomes unnoticable if you let it, otherwise I suppose it will always bother you if you can't ignore it.

Interface, as has been said, is clunky for mouse & keyboard, until you get used to it. I HATED it, and many other things about Oblivion, at first, but after playing for only about 4 hours total, 90% of my problems have just melted away since I got used to playing the game, and actually gave it a chance. Game effects are astounding, including weather, spell effects, etc. VERY visually impressive, and way more immersive than Morrowind (I never thought that was possible).

Enough babbling for now, though. I'm jumping back in, this time to maybe set up a more Mageish Thief class (think Nightblade, only tweaked; not sure just how yet though). I love Thieves. Can't play without them. :D

[kandrathe]

...
Enough babbling for now, though. I'm jumping back in, this time to maybe set up a more Mageish Thief class (think Nightblade, only tweaked; not sure just how yet though). I love Thieves. Can't play without them. :D
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... if only I could find the thieves guild. No, don't tell me. I'll figure it out.

That is one change I actually like, secret societies are really secret. The other is that your initial level 1 char is not a pathetically slow and inept invalid who misses hitting slow mudcrabs 95% while they easily kill you before you can run away from them.

Some other cheap exploits I noticed are plugged are; that you can no longer pick pocket away a persons armor, you can no longer drown the guards pursuing you, you cannot repeatedly sell and buy a vendors inventory into the thousands, many items are worthless so running around thieving yields a meager and reasonable amount of gold, so far the best items have been obtained via quests appropriate to difficulty.

I'm enjoying it. :D

[Roland]

... if only I could find the thieves guild.&nbsp; No, don't tell me.&nbsp; I'll figure it out.

It's been staring you in the face since the very beginning, and making subtle affirmations throughout the first tiniest sliver of the game.

And you're right, you will figure it out. And if you truly get stuck, let me know. ;)

That is one change I actually like, secret societies are really secret.&nbsp; The other is that your initial level 1 char is not a pathetically slow and inept invalid who misses hitting slow mudcrabs 95% while they easily kill you before you can run away from them.

Ah, the beauty of Morrowind. So simple, and yet so wonderful.

Some other cheap exploits I noticed are plugged are;&nbsp; that you can no longer pick pocket away a persons armor, you can no longer drown the guards pursuing you,&nbsp; you cannot repeatedly sell and buy a vendors inventory into the thousands, many items are worthless so running around thieving yields a meager and reasonable amount of gold, so far the best items have been obtained via quests appropriate to difficulty.

I'm enjoying it.&nbsp; :D
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Vendors in Morrowind had a limited amount of gold. Once it was gone, it was gone for 24 hours, so unless you knew about the Mudcrab merchant, you were SOL for mass-selling unless you knew of a good spot in one of the major cities. Oblivion chose a different route; all vendors have unlimited gold, but they have a maximum "available" gold value, meaning they can only spend X gold on buying merchandise during any given transaction. So if Joe Schmoe only has 50 gold, and you try to sell him a magical sword worth 300 gold, you're gonna get majorly stiffed. However, Alexa the Alchemist, who regularly has a stockpile of gold around 800 (due to the expense of her wares), will gladly buy that item off you for the 300 gold, along with most anything else you have.

Oh, and one more thing I noticed, although I haven't 100% confirmed it: all merchants do NOT buy everything. Trying to sell Heavy Armor to an Alchemist simply won't work. And to that end, selling Heavy Armor to a Light Armor merchant will yield less profit than selling it to a Heavy Armor merchant. Makes the game much more realistic, and immersive, and gives incentive to just what you're willing to lug around.

[pakman]

I'm in the thieves guild and the brotherhood. But I'm kinda stuck on one of the thieves guild quests at the moment, so I decided to actually start the official story line :D

[kandrathe]

Vendors in Morrowind had a limited amount of gold. Once it was gone, it was gone for 24 hours, so unless you knew about the Mudcrab merchant, you were SOL for mass-selling unless you knew of a good spot in one of the major cities. ...
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Ah, yes. But there was a bug too where if you had 100 arrows you could sell them to some vendors for 1g ea (min price), then the vendor would have 100 arrows. You buy the arrows back at a hugely reduced price, then sell them again 1 at a time back to the vendor. Now the vendor has 200 arrows, etc, etc, etc. The vendor eventually has a huge number of arrows and they continue to restock to the new level. Voila! Super arrow vendor, and you traded back and for enough to sap all the vendor's gold and leave them super stocked. Same thing worked with Alchemy ingredients.

[roguebanshee]

The potion drinking limit been commented on in this thread, but what about potion creation?  In Morrowind one of the 'cheapest' tricks to the game was buying massive quantities of herbs, making potions, and then selling them to the Creeper in Caldera.  I'm guessing the references to being a flower picker means ingredients must be found more than bought, is that correct?

They also closed the mega potion exploit by ignoring Alchemy above 100 and seemingly completely ignoring Intelligence. 100 Alchemy seems to let you make the most powerful potions your equipment allows for.

Are any of the classes or skills radically different than they were in Morrowind?

Enchanting has been revamped some. There is no Enchant skill anymore, you have to be a ranking member of the Mages Guild to get access to player made enchantments. However, any wearable item accepts enchantments of any strength, with weapons using charge based stuff and clothing/armor using constant effects. The power of a constant effect enchantment is based on the soul used, a petty soul will not give as high a buff as a greater.

There are also (as explained in the manual) Sigil Stones which can be used by anyone to enchant an item with a fixed (defined when you pick up the stone) effect. The effect is split into two different, one used if applied to a weapon and the other when applied to armor/clothing.

They also removed some spell effects from the possible choices when making an enchanted item. Restore Health & Fatigue, Chameleon and Spell Absorption are the major exploitable ones missing from player made enchantments. You can find Sigil Stones with the last two.

And finally - How are the load times?

About 10-15 seconds max for me, on an "Oblivion low spec" laptop. Mostly about 5 seconds.

[Zippyy]

That is one change I actually like, secret societies are really secret.&nbsp; The other is that your initial level 1 char is not a pathetically slow and inept invalid who misses hitting slow mudcrabs 95% while they easily kill you before you can run away from them.
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In Oblivion, there is no such thing as "missing" unless it's the player's fault. There is no random roll to see whether you hit or miss. If your swing intersects with an enemy, you will hit them. The damage you do is determined by your skill with the weapon.

As for the secret societies, I have had boatloads of fun doing the quests for one in particular. The feel of the organization and the quests are absolutely spot-on.

[Drasca]

The damage you do is determined by your skill with the weapon.
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Additionally, how much fatigue you have available for power attacks. Low fatigue supposedly means you do less damage overall too.

[ima_nerd]

As for the secret societies, I have had boatloads of fun doing the quests for one in particular.&nbsp; The feel of the organization and the quests are absolutely spot-on.
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I haven't gotten around to joining the Brotherhood yet but the Thieve's Guild quests are a lot of fun. The world feels much more alive and the AI, while still pretty stupid, allows for more in depth quests. Having to stalk a target, learning their daily schedule to know when to sneak into their chambers to steal an item is so much more fun than Morrowind's "go here and take that whenever you want" quests.

So you'll never truly be stuck simply because you can't "rest". You can, however, "Wait" if you want to pass time quickly.

Waiting will regenerate your health and mana. Resting is only useful for leveling up, as far as I can tell. Waiting one hour will put your health and mana to full (or it has for me at my lowish level).

My initial view of the game is nothing short of amazing. I loved Morrowind and Oblivion will be the same way. I haven't been playing constantly, I do still have my WoW subscription after all, but I know I will be playing this game for years. I played Morrowind for 2 years off and on and I still never did the Temple or Imperial Cult quest lines, I never found any vampire clans to join with to do those quests and I never ranked up in any of the great houses. In 2 years I still had probably 1/3 of the content left and Oblivion is even bigger ... Bethesda is like my God.

[pakman]

I'm a kleptomaniac when it comes to these games. I always find the sneakiest class and play that one first because I think it's more challenging to stalk targets and eliminate them from a distance even though Blade is one of my major skills. Especially since I'm not that strong a character and have fun outrunning opponents and firing arrows into various body parts (I usually try to have one sticking out of each extremity and one in the front of the face because it looks funny) and making them look like pincushions.

I find that I don't use the horse travel that much. I like running everywhere so I can kill various things along the way AND look for alchemy components. The hardest thing I've run into so far is a Will-O-Wisp and I can't hurt them worth crap :(. I even ran into a Troll....man are those things fast, but I was more acrobatic than the troll and won the day.

All in all I'm having a lot of fun with it, and probably will for a while.

[Rhydderch Hael]

All this mention of slow mana regeneration leaves me confused. With my Imperial ranger I'm playing at the moment, it regenerates fast enough to throw a few Heal Minor casts every two minutes or so. Certainly not an hour as previously mentioned.

And the Breton healer I started out with— the mana regen was blazingly fast. Full charge in about a minute.

[ima_nerd]

Certainly not an hour as previously mentioned.

Waiting isn't literally leaving OB running for an hour while I go watch TV. Waiting is the alternative to resting when not in the prescence of a bed or bedroll. Just to clarify :)

I even ran into a Troll....man are those things fast, but I was more acrobatic than the troll and won the day.

Bah, I ran into one as well. I got three sneak attack bow shots off before he saw where I was and by the time he got to me, his health was back at full. Troll health regen is INSANE. Backing off and healing doesn't even seem to be an option. I suppose I was way too low to be fighting them ... scaling dungeons my arse.

I'm a kleptomaniac when it comes to these games. I always find the sneakiest class and play that one first because I think it's more challenging to stalk targets and eliminate them from a distance even though Blade is one of my major skills.

Definitely. Whenever I made a character in Morrowind that didn't have Sneak or Security, I felt so exposed and not to mention extremely poor :) In OB I'm playing a modified Assasin ("Nighthawk") that switched out Alchemy for Mysticism. Having a blast with 6x damage on sneak attacks with my sword :D

[NiteFox]

Damn all of you. And pretty much everyone I know on RetroMUD that was constantly banging on about how good Oblivion was when I mumbled something about in Morrowind all you need to do to max sneak is tape down your crouch key and then finish a few DS games.

I buckled and bought Oblivion. And I'm finding it much more fun than Morrowind (The world's finest coma simulation since Shenmue).

Despite coming up short on the suggested specs, and submitting a whole .2 GHz less than the minimum processor speed, this game still looks like sex on the minimum settings, and I can't name many modern games to which that can apply.

So since every single Morrowind character I've ever made has been male and some sort of elf, I decided to go with something different - A female khajit (The opening taunts from the prisoner across the way was so damned cool). I went with a thief/combat mix that won't specialise much in magic. Basically, she'll be nicking everything that isn't nailed down. If it is, the nails will be stolen and pawned to a blacksmith and then the first rule applies. The monks in the first place your told to go to had some nice possessions which I now possess.

Spent most of the day practicing picking locks and sneaking into buildings for when I'm skilled enough to do some real thieving. Plus I've intentionally made the character with a higher strength than most of the thief kits have, not only for the inevitable scraps but also for lugging all that loot around.

Niw maybe I'll spend tomorrow looking for the thief's guild after I've dealt with the first Oblivion gate.

I have one gripe though: Rather than use map travel I decided to just hoof it on horseback. It annoys me no end to have "Loading area" pop up on the screen every ten or so steps, even though my system barely shudders at the loading I could really do without the text being there. Anyone know of any fixes?

[Rhydderch Hael]

I still don't get it. There is no "Wait" option akin to "Rest" in Oblivion that I've used (or even seen).

The mana regen on my Breton mage was fast enough to top off when sneaking from one dungeon chamber into another.

[NiteFox]

I still don't get it. There is no "Wait" option akin to "Rest" in Oblivion that I've used (or even seen).
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It's the same damn hotkey by default, T :)

Used it all the time while running the Paranoia quest, fortunately the game no longer considers it "sleeping in the open air, therefore illegal" but instead "loitering without intent, staring up at the clouds" so you won't be harrassed by guards every non-waking moment. Plus, you can also cancel the rest at any moment, which is handy if you miscalculate how many hours rest you need and almost miss a deadline.

[Rhydderch Hael]

It's the same damn hotkey by default, T :)[right][snapback]105834[/snapback][/right]

Okay. :unsure:

Can I get that by pressing X+A, tapping the right bumper three times and wiggling the left stick counter-clockwise while reciting the Mak'tar Chant of Strength?

[Raven Vale]

while reciting the Mak'tar Chant of Strength?
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Absolutely and positively one of my / family's favourite movies btw . It's non stop quoting :P

Before reading these posts I was around 60 / 40 not to buy it , slowly turning that round in its favour to 40 / 60 in favour of buying . Keep em coming .

[roguebanshee]

Okay.&nbsp; :unsure:

Can I get that by pressing X+A, tapping the right bumper three times and wiggling the left stick counter-clockwise while reciting the Mak'tar Chant of Strength?
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I think buying a computer may solve your problems :P :whistling:

Otherwise you could try to check in the control options. I hope that the <bleep!> version has the ability to change that.

[Mithrandir]

My current computer doesn't quite meet the recommended requirements (the GeForce FX 5600 and 2.8 GHz CPU isn't cutting it anymore) according to http://www.srtest.com/referrer/srtest and, from what people have been telling me, I'd be doing myself a disservice by not playing this game on Ultra High settings. I wanted to get a new computer so I could play F.E.A.R. with everything pumped up anyway (holy shnickeys does that game look sick on my buddy's rig and absolutely gross on my minimum settings computer) so I'll probably hold off on getting Oblivion for a while.

Edit: I'd definitely get Oblivion on my PC, even if I had a 360, though. I'm sure the mod community is going to do some great stuff.