Tips for playing a mage in Morrowind, (caution...might be SPOILERS for some!!!) Options

[Renee]

Playing a mage character in Oblivion and Skyrim is pretty straightforward. You pick a few Destruction spells and blast away. You pick a few Conjuration spells and let your summons do the work. You pick some Illusion spells. Most of these are not really all that tops until the mage gets to Journeyman level, and that's when Invisibility and Chameleon kick in. Control and frenzy spells too!

It doesn't take that long to get to this level of magedom if some spells get spammed, though. Only if (let's say) somebody is totally new to the game, or if somebody is going for something unconventional, like a non-confrontational-type of mage, might they need to plan ahead.

Morrowind is nothing like the others. I don't know about Daggrefall yet, but MW is definitely more difficult to approach than Arena is, even with Arena's forced classes. And I've had to rethink a lot of ways I'd normally game, just to make my mage successful in this game.



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Tip 1: Restore Magicka potions seem like they're almost extinct in this game. Even as an alchemist at Journeyman level (three effects can be seen when making potions) I still haven't figured out what to mix with comberries to make dozens of these potions!

I did not know that all Mages Guilds have a respawning chest though, called Mages Guild Supply Chests. These include 10 free mana-restoring potions. I'm not sure how often stuff respawns in this game, but still, 10 potions per guild is a lot better than scrounging around in merchant shops. Merchants seem to sell every damn potion in the game except magicka potions, sometimes.

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Tip 2: The Spellmaker is a mage's best friend. This becomes more apparent especially as the game levels upward higher and higher. My opinion now: I never really found the Spellmaker that useful in Oblivion. In that game, it can be merely used to make some spell effects more creative, effective, and/or efficient. But in my opinion, I never actually needed to use the Spellmaker in Oblivion. It's more of a convenience than a necessity (in my opinion).

Well in Morrowind, you really are going to NEED to make your own spells, and you'll also need to know how to use the spellmaker. Thank goodness we don't have to get into any university just to create our own spells. Nor do we have to be a Mages Guild member. There are some temple-dwellers, and probably a few other NPCs out there, who can help us make spells. All we need is some gold, and also to know the effect we're trying to work with.

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Tip 3: Conjuration levels up slowly in this game. MUCH slower than in Oblivion. In OB, those who spam this school will be guaranteed to hit Journeyman level within a month, if they play frequently enough.

And this seems to be a reaction against Morrowind, in which Conjuration levels upward extremely slow, especially if it was started as a Minor skill rather than a Major.

And here comes my very first use of the Spellmaker. There's a reason Conjuration moves upward so slowly: it's because a lot of the default Bethesda-made spells (Summon Bound Dagger, for instance) last 60 seconds each. Once the spell is cast, we have to WAIT that entire 60 seconds before it can be cast again. Unless we cast the summon, cast dispel, cast the summon, cast dispel, etc. Tedious work to go back and forth like that.

Each time that dagger is cast, 3 points get added toward the Conjuration level-up of 100. Doing the math, this means that somebody diligent enough to keep casting this spell will spend thirty-three real-time minutes (I think I got my math right...) doing nothing but waiting to recast that silly spell over and over.

BUT, a trick I learned is to simply make a Bound Dagger spell which lasts 5 seconds, not 60. Voila. When this version is cast, have a look at the number of Conjuration points the game gives toward 100. It's still 3 points per summon! This means two things: you'll be able to level this skill up much faster, but the overall level of the game will also level up faster, too.

Still though, if you are like me, and want to see your character become a conjuring fool in no time, this is a good way to go.

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Tip 4: Last one for today. Also deals with Conjuration.

A lot of default Conjuration spells, lasting 60 seconds each from Bethesda, will have rather high magicka costs, not to mention some pretty dismal success ratings. For instance, the Bound Dagger spell is pretty light. My mage could cast it with 95% success, and it only cost maybe 5 points when it was still a 60-second spell.

But a more advanced spell, such as Summon Lesser Bonewalker, cost my mage almost 40 points of mana, with a really [CENSORED]ty 61% percent spell success rating. That's just too unreliable to be useful. And let's remember my mage has been using Conjuration for several months now.

The way to fix this is to use the Spellmaker again. Make a Summon Bonewalker spell which lasts maybe half as long. Matter of fact, I made a spell for my mage which summons this undead for 25 seconds instead of 60. Voila. Magicka cost went way down to just 17, and the spell failure rate is just 3%.

Time for some pwnage!

This post has been edited by Renee: Oct 7 2018, 03:43 AM

[Renee]

Thanks ghastley. I agree that with Oblivion, Beth went backwards on a lot of things.

Super Potions
This post is going to describe how to make super potions. Really, the sky is the limit when it comes to Alchemy in this game! Some may think what I'm about to describe is cheating, but there's a lot of work involved, a lot of button-mashing, and it does take some time to create these sort of potions. I'm not just entering a code and walking away.

The key is to make and consume a lot of Fortify Intelligence potions. Luck can also be fortified, too. If you've got a spell, scroll, or item which fortifies Luck, this increases your character's early chances for potion-making success. Eventually though, Intelligence will get so high, there will then be 0 chance of Alchemy failure.

Most of all, this endeavor begins with a lot of gold, at least 1000 pieces, so you can buy plenty of ingredients.



1). Empty your character's inventory (especially heavier items, but also anything that is not an ingredient, or clothing) into a safe place. Place any potions, scrolls, and other such items in this safe place too. It helps to have a near-empty inventory menu, so we can zip back and forth in this menu later on.

2). If you've been saving any ingredients to make into potions, go grab these now. Also, go on a buying spree, snatching up as many ingredients as you'd like. There's going to be a very large potion-making session, and it helps to be prepared. To make this process go as efficiently as possible, it helps to focus on certain types of ingredients. If you're planning to make a lot of Restore Health for instance, only grab up wickwheat, corkbulb, and other ingredients which make these sort of potions.

3). Now go to any Mages Guild. Find the teleport lady, and teleport to the Wolverine Hall.

4). Find the door which leads out of this hall. Now go downstairs. Straight ahead is the Imperial Shrine. Go in there. Find Aunius Autrus.

5). Get into his Barter menu. Buy all 10 of his ash yams, and all 5 of his bloats.

6). Pay for these items, and back out of Aunius's dialog menus entirely.

7). Speak to Aunius again, get into his barter menu again. Notice that the ingredients you just bought have been restocked. This guy has a never-ending supply of ingredients! Buy all 10 ash yams, all 5 bloats. Keep doing this until you wind up with about 75 ash yams, and 75 bloats. Both of these ingredients Fortify Intelligence. You can also go for 150 ash yams at this point, since they are cheap. Save whatever you don't use for later.

Note: Netch Leather also fortifies Int as well, and Aunius sells these, but this ingredient also weighs a lot more than yams and bloats. Your character won't be able to move if too many of these are carried.

Note 2: it is a good idea to buy a few frost salts, which are sold by various vendors in Mages Guilds and Imperial Shrines. Craetia Jullalion of the Vivec Mages Guild (the alchemy guy, basically) sells these. These are rather expensive at 75 gold a piece, but they mix with comberry to make Restore Magicka potions, and any mage knows it'll be worth it to be able to make a few of these.

Hound meat is also another good, cheap buy. Once your mage gets really smart, and all four alchemy effects can be seen, suddenly we learn that hound meat and comberries mix to make Reflect potions. Very useful against mages, vampires, daedra, and other powerful magic-users.

Optional: To really make potions with 1N$4n3 amounts of powers, it's best to use a Master alchemy set, which is expensive to buy, but there is a set available in the game which can be used for free.



You won't actually need the very BEST equipment though. A full set of Journeyman gear (mortar & pestle, retort, calcinator, and alembic) will also do the trick. But with Master stuff, you'll get to that golden nirvana-like level of potion-making much faster.

8). Take note of your character's current Intelligence. My mage has an Int of 89, Which is pretty high, right? Well, it's going to get a lot higher!

9). Get into your character's inventory window, and make sure All is selected at the top of the page.

10). Select an alchemy apparatus, then mix an ash yam and a bloat together. Exit the alchemy menu, then get back into the inventory menu.

11). Drink this potion, exit the menu, then immediately get back into it, and create another Fortify Intelligence potion. Drink that one, exit the menu, then immediately create another potion. Keep doing this!

* It's important to keep exiting the menus over and over, rather than just drinking each potion as they are made. The reason is, each potion will begin to stack on top of the last one's effect.

So initially, you might create Fortify Intelligence 15 points for 36 seconds. If you keep making potions and drinking them (without exiting the menus) you will wind up making a lot of Fortify Intelligence 15 points for 36 seconds potions. But if you exit and reenter menus, eventually you'll begin to see Fortify Intelligence 77 points for 223 seconds after making and drinking roughly 25 of these! And these potions only get stronger and stronger from there.

At this point Igodah still had 125 ash yams, and 67 bloats to go. She kept mixing potions until I got that "carpal tunnel" feeling with my hands. My character leveled up in Alchemy TWICE, and then a third time. The game informed me it was time to "rest and meditate..." She kept mixing until just 10 bloats were left. Overall, her Intelligence reached 18,533, and she was making Fortify Intelligence 771 points for 2,306 seconds. It is not good to keep going on for hours with this method; I have heard eventually the game will crash. But once your character has gotten this smart, now's the time to move on.

It's a good idea to NOT drink all the Fortify Int potions... once your character has gotten super-smart, save a few of these potions (maybe 10 or 15) for later. When the next potion-making marathon comes, the potions you saved can be gulped down, exiting the menu after each gulp, for a nice, easy boost of Intelligence.

12). Eventually, you get to the point that you get sick of mixing Fortify Int potions, or all the bloats are gone. SAVE the game.

13). Now's the time to start making other potions. Let's take Restore Health, for instance. Normally, Igodah would make something like Restore Health 2 points for 9 seconds. Not very useful when up against a horde of cliff racers and kagouti. But after getting her Intelligence up to 18K, now she could make Restore Health 157 points for 464 seconds! ! ! She basically can become a little God for about 7 minutes, and even the most powerful daedra in the game won't be able to take her down (health-wise, anyway).

Notice that any potions you make with this process will be worth extreme amounts of money. Way too much for any one merchant to afford, in full. In my opinion, this is why I only focus on certain types of potions which my character will actually use. All the "throwaway" potions, such as Restore Fatigue and any poisons ... these can be made as well, but you won't be able to sell them at full price, or anywhere near full price... (without mods, of course).

Overall though, now my mage is ready to take on the world. This method also works with making enchantments too. That will get described in the next post, hopefully.

This post has been edited by Renee: Nov 5 2018, 07:05 PM