Damage Calculations Are Too Gear-Dependent

[Artificial]

I looked at how Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim all calculate melee damage and it seems like Oblivion is too biased in favor of quality of weapons and magic. Which is a shame because with some slight tweaking, it could be really good.

I both calculated exact damages on paper and then also put it into practice as well by modifying both my Strength attribute and Blade skill to 100. (Small disclaimer. I'm using Oscuro's Oblivion Overhaul, so everything has been deleveled.) I then tested out the damage of my swings with a stock standard Steel Longsword, making sure my Fatigue was at maximum. What resulted was high damage, yes, but with both my skill and attribute at 100, the results were still very underwhelming. Optimally, I should be destroying NPCs in one or two hits, but it still took 5 hits or so without power attacks to finally bring them down. This is simply not right.

And it's weird too because both Morrowind and Skyrim do not have this problem at all. I don't know why they decided to nerf melee damage so deeply in Oblivion. Now, you could say, "Well that's how it's supposed to be if you're just using a crappy steel longsword. By the time you get to those numbers in-game, you should have gotten at least an ebony weapon." I don't agree with this at all though. If I stab you with my insane strength, whether it's with a rusty butcher knife or a steel sword that's been polished to a shine, the damage should be the same and it should be utterly fatal. Morrowind and Skyrim understand this but Oblivion does not.

[Shiroi Ren]

The least weapon depended is Morrowind, while Oblivion is in the middle... Skyrim is VERY WEAPON depended. You can dish out several hundred thousand damage with one hit with rightly enchanted weapon. Skyrim is the worst in this regard.

[Artificial]

Originally posted by Shiroi Ren:

The least weapon depended is Morrowind, while Oblivion is in the middle... Skyrim is VERY WEAPON depended. You can dish out several hundred thousand damage with one hit with rightly enchanted weapon. Skyrim is the worst in this regard.

But you can do the same thing in Oblivion. In fact, I daresay it's even easier in Oblivion since you can just make spells that do the same thing.

[Shiroi Ren]

Originally posted by Artificial:

But you can do the same thing in Oblivion. In fact, I daresay it's even easier in Oblivion since you can just make spells that do the same thing.

Well, nope... It is impossible to make weapon that deal literaly 10 000 damage in Oblivion unlike Skyrim. Though you can make very overpowered weapons but they still would be very-very soul gem hungry. What's really overpowered in Oblivion... Is Magicka.

[Artificial]

Originally posted by Shiroi Ren:

Well, nope... It is impossible to make weapon that deal literaly 10 000 damage in Oblivion unlike Skyrim. Though you can make very overpowered weapons but they still would be very-very soul gem hungry. What's really overpowered in Oblivion... Is Magicka.

Regardless though, my point still stands. Melee damage in Oblivion, not including enchanted weapons, is generally too low.

[ManualMakron]

It was designed this way in Oblivion for balancing issues. They did a pretty good job with Oblivion when it comes to gameplay depth and balancing.. Did you even consider any greater powers, potions and consumable ingredients that bolster your physical strength?

[Artificial]

Originally posted by Nlich:

It was designed this way in Oblivion for balancing issues. They did a pretty good job with Oblivion when it comes to gameplay depth and balancing.. Did you even consider any greater powers, potions and consumable ingredients that bolster your physical strength?

You misunderstand me. It's not that I'm having trouble surviving per se. It's that even if I have a max Blade skill and maxed out Strength together, I still am not able to do very much damage with a steel longsword. In Morrowind, with everything maxed out, I would naturally deal an absolute ton of damage as I should.

[ManualMakron]

Originally posted by Artificial:

Originally posted by Nlich:

It was designed this way in Oblivion for balancing issues. They did a pretty good job with Oblivion when it comes to gameplay depth and balancing.. Did you even consider any greater powers, potions and consumable ingredients that bolster your physical strength?

You misunderstand me. It's not that I'm having trouble surviving per se. It's that even if I have a max Blade skill and maxed out Strength together, I still am not able to do very much damage with a steel longsword. In Morrowind, with everything maxed out, I would naturally deal an absolute ton of damage as I should.

That's why people say that the player becomes overpowered in Morrowind for a reason. It's designed like this for a purpose.

[Rithm Fluffderg]

I mean, sure, in Morrowind, you could deal crazy amounts of damage with a Steel Longsword with ridiculously high strength... Once. After ramming your sword into the gut of your enemy with the force of a planet hurling through space, the relatively thin metal piece snaps in half like a twig underfoot.

For balancing issues, if a wizard is limited by their spells, a warrior should be limited by the quality of their gear. Skyrim, conversely, lets you hit the damage cap with an iron dagger and the armor cap with fur armor as long as your blacksmithing skill is high enough and you have good enchantments for it.

...Actually in some ways, Skyrim is actually more like Morrowind than Oblivion is, though also less so in other other ways. Huh.

[ManualMakron]

Originally posted by HeroicSkaldZach:

I mean, sure, in Morrowind, you could deal crazy amounts of damage with a Steel Longsword with ridiculously high strength... Once. After ramming your sword into the gut of your enemy with the force of a planet hurling through space, the relatively thin metal piece snaps in half like a twig underfoot.

For balancing issues, if a wizard is limited by their spells, a warrior should be limited by the quality of their gear. Skyrim, conversely, lets you hit the damage cap with an iron dagger and the armor cap with fur armor as long as your blacksmithing skill is high enough and you have good enchantments for it.

...Actually in some ways, Skyrim is actually more like Morrowind than Oblivion is, though also less so in other other ways. Huh.

Yeah this is true Skyrim is more like Morrowind when it comes to scaling for levels, progression and player power.

[Artificial]

Originally posted by Nlich:

That's why people say that the player becomes overpowered in Morrowind for a reason. It's designed like this for a purpose.

I say why is it a bad thing if a player gets really powerful? Isn't that the whole point of leveling up? To progress more and more in power? That was the big problem with Oblivion's level scaling system. It didn't matter how much you progressed. The enemies would still be just as hard and there was no sense of progression whatsoever because of that.

Originally posted by HeroicSkaldZach:

For balancing issues, if a wizard is limited by their spells, a warrior should be limited by the quality of their gear. Skyrim, conversely, lets you hit the damage cap with an iron dagger and the armor cap with fur armor as long as your blacksmithing skill is high enough and you have good enchantments for it.

But Oblivion isn't balanced at all, even if we totally ignore the melee damage calculations. You can still easily break the game.

[Rithm Fluffderg]

I don't think anyone's arguing that Oblivion's level scaling system is good, though I will also point out that every game in the series has had higher level enemies spawn when you become a higher level - even in Morrowind. Higher level enemies also grant higher rewards. That's just the way this series is.

Oblivion just tried to have its cake and eat it too by making enemy's levels scale as well, rather than being within a fixed range like it is in Skyrim. (Though in Daggerfall, humans *did* directly scale with you, using better weapons against you and casting higher-level damaging spells. In that sense, Oblivion is more like Daggerfall than Morrowind is.)

Just because the world is growing with you, however, does not mean that the point of leveling up is lost, however. You gain more resources and are able to take on more complex challenges, and the reward is coming out on the other end of a really fantastic fight.

I'm not arguing Oblivion is balanced, either, though I will say that nobody's holding a gun to your head and forcing you to use exploits like 100% chameleon and whatnot. Philosophy-wise, though, better weapons should have more weight than character stats, just like better spells should matter, as well.

[cyäegha]

it is quite unfortunate, though, because you pretty much had to use some ungodly ugly-looking gear if you wanted decent stats relative to the enemy, unless you just never levelled up

of course, mods take pains to fix that, but damn if you weren't pretty much running around with just glass, daedric / artifacts or the shivering weapons by endgame just because everything else was simply too underpowered for the job, even if they did look swank-as

that's probably one of the few areas skyrim kind-of improved, even if tempering went too far in the other direction and became way OP, simply because with enough investment pretty much any material could be made viable if you so desired

[󰀉tempeh󰀉]

Originally posted by HeroicSkaldZach:

Just because the world is growing with you, however, does not mean that the point of leveling up is lost, however. You gain more resources and are able to take on more complex challenges, and the reward is coming out on the other end of a really fantastic fight.

If smacking a goblin shaman with a deadric mace until it breaks while she spams healing spells counts as a fantastic fight, and coming out on the other end of the fight means running away because you're out of mace but she isn't out of zombie...

[jovalleau]

The problem isn't weapon damage, per se. The problem is that high-level enemies have hundreds of hit points so it takes forever to kill them with a melee weapon. They're simply damage sponges.

[ManualMakron]

The game is poorly optimised towards end game when it comes to damage to health ratio.. However, there are a lot of power ups that the player can get as he progresses. For example in the Shivering Isles you have the Heart of Order. Find the Warrior stone in Cyrodiil for that power up. Also as you raise your fame, you gain access to more Doomstones.