Is there any reason to not wear armour?

[7empest]

I wanted to make a conjure build and wear cloth “armour” I.e. robes. But as I’m looking over the skills it doesn’t seem like there is any benefit for not wearing armour. It seems like only heavy armour is worth it.. unless you like sneak.

Is there any reason to not wear armour?

[-={LG}=-]

Not really. I don't go with heavy armor because you have to put a couple points into some highly situational stuff before you get to the good stuff, and you can quickly get light armor up to the soft cap. Plus I think light armors are more attractive.

Either armor is fine though, once you max out there's no real difference.

The only benefit to robes is that they come natively sometimes with mage bonuses. But you can just disenchant them and then enchant your armor with that stuff.

[peppermint hollows]

Well, when you take smithing into account, you can wear pretty much any armour and I'd say light armour beats out heavy armour since it can also reach the armour cap.

That said, if we're talking strictly about vanilla, yes, unarmoured mage isn't as good. But it's not really because you can't get enough protection, because the flesh spells are generally good enough. It's actually mainly that you miss out on extra enchanting slots to either give yourself more magicka/magicka regen or spell cost reduction. There's no spell effectiveness anymore like in Oblivion when you would lose some spell effectiveness for wearing armour. So no, there's really no reason not to go for unarmoured mage except for roleplay reasons or personal preference.

[steventirey]

The mage spells that boost your armor rating are not as effective as you might think, even with the perk that multiplies their effectiveness when not wearing any armor. Casting a spell that gives you a 40 armor rating does not provide the same amount of protection as wearing a suit of armor with a 40 armor rating, as every piece of armor provides an additional 25 armor rating that is not displayed. So a full suit of armor (legs, chest, helmet, and arms) that shows a total armor rating of 40 actually provides a total armor rating of 140.

The only benefits of going without armor are that you are quieter (but there is an enchantment that removes all sound, so you can be totally quiet in armor) and carrying capacity due to not carrying the armor (but there are perks that remove the weight from the armor you are wearing).

Clothing tends to come with enchantments for mages, but in general you are better off making your own enchanted gear. And you can apply that to armor.

[Rez Elwin]

Mage armor, that's the only reason. But even with maxed out mage armor and Ebonyflesh you still only have 300 armor, less than half the cap.

Other than that there is no practical reason to not wear armor, aside from aesthetics.

[worm_master]

Originally posted by Rez Elwin:

Mage armor, that's the only reason. But even with maxed out mage armor and Ebonyflesh you still only have 300 armor, less than half the cap.

Other than that there is no practical reason to not wear armor, aside from aesthetics.

Did u know, u can cast Ebonyflesh, then don a shield? U;d imagine u could wear other bits, havent tried.

[Rez Elwin]

Originally posted by worm_master:

Originally posted by Rez Elwin:

Mage armor, that's the only reason. But even with maxed out mage armor and Ebonyflesh you still only have 300 armor, less than half the cap.

Other than that there is no practical reason to not wear armor, aside from aesthetics.

Did u know, u can cast Ebonyflesh, then don a shield? U;d imagine u could wear other bits, havent tried.

Shields work with mage armor, though I always like to use both hands with magic myself.

The Diadem of the Savant can be worn, it has a slight armor rating but it not counted against the mage Armor perk. That's about it though.

[Lux]

I don't recommend wearing heavy armor during sex

[Rez Elwin]

Originally posted by Lux:

I don't recommend wearing heavy armor during sex

It very important to have maximum protection during sex.

[St✩rlight]

If you don't want to cheese the game by grinding up OP crafting skills and investing perks.

[Rez Elwin]

Originally posted by Starlight:

If you don't want to cheese the game by grinding up OP crafting skills and investing perks.

What does armor have to do with that? You can use the crafting skills with or without armor. The only difference between mundane armor and clothing is the armor rating.

[St✩rlight]

What?

[Yellowbeard]

Yes.

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/5796

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/16398

[7empest]

Originally posted by Yellowbeard:

Yes.

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/5796

https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/16398

This is interesting. I guess I’ll have to invest points into alteration then.

I guess that balances out because I’d be putting points into my main damage skill (conjuration) and my “armour” skill being alteration.

[Mormuyoo]

Summons usually tend to hold aggro for me but still always have dragonhide active on so. Ward spells also increase your armor while leveling although according to its text Dragonhide provides the maximum ammount of physical damage reduction possible.
However even with enchanting you can technically make a 100 percent spell cost reduction set for conjuration.

[Rez Elwin]

Originally posted by Mormuyoo:

Summons usually tend to hold aggro for me but still always have dragonhide active on so. Ward spells also increase your armor while leveling although according to its text Dragonhide provides the maximum ammount of physical damage reduction possible.
However even with enchanting you can technically make a 100 percent spell cost reduction set for conjuration.

Dragonhide does give you max damage resist, but being a master spell is has a few problems.

First being cast time, master spells take 3 seconds to charge, and you cannot move during that time. Makes you quite the easy target,
The second is that you cannot dual cast it for a longer duration, if that spell were to run out during combat, it could get you killed.
Lasty is the acquisition, if you have not activated dragons yet, you can't get the spell as it requires a flesh and blood dragon to complete the ritual spell.

Ebontflseah might be singificantly weaker, but you can move around while casting and dual cast it.

Originally posted by Starlight:

What?

What do you mean what? If your response to "Any reason to not wear armor" is "To not abuse the OP crafting system" then it makes no sense. Wearing armor or wearing clothes has zero bearing on being able to use the crafting skills.