The best stones

[Daded]

Which is the best stone for you ?

For me it's the one with 25% regen of life and stamina and the one with +100 capacity of inventory.

[Morgan Fun Gamer]

Do you mean standing stones sorry for not undestanding and if you mean standing stones its the one that increases warrior skills progression by 20 percent the warrior stones it is one of the 3 standing stones guardian stones.

[Rez Elwin]

Lord Stone.

Extra armor and Magic resist is really good early on.

[Doggy Friend]

Steed Stone hands down, since I'm a big hoarder.

[Skumboni]

the Lover's stone as all skills go up faster.

[hawklaser]

Originally posted by Rez Elwin:

Lord Stone.

Extra armor and Magic resist is really good early on.

Yep, early game I also tend towards the Lord stone. Its not easy to acquire magic resist until late game, and it stacks with both spell absorption and elemental resistances.

Late game, Atronach, Apprentice, and Lady become more interesting. Atronach has the rare spell absorbtion effect, which with later game gear and perks can let you become fully immune to spells. Apprentice and Lady both adjust regeneration rates, and since regen rates are based on maximum amounts, they have more of an effect later on.

The mage, thief, warrior, and lover stones are always useful too, as the extra xp gain can be quite useful when improving certain skills.

I used to use the Steed stone somewhat often, until I realized that hording all the random junk from locations was taking up more time than it was worth. In the time it takes to go back to town, sell all the low end bandit armors and draugr weapons, could have been used going to another location to clear out and selectively pick out stuff that weighs less and is worth more than the junk would have sold in town.

The rest... are a bit too situational unless you plan on abusing the wait function to pass days constantly.

[Steelfleece]

Depends. Level 1 challenge, Lord stone hands down. 25% magic resist goes a long way. Combine with Agent of Mara's passive 15%, and throw in playing as a Breton and Savior's Hide (easily attainable at level 1 if you're remotely careful), you can hit 80% magic resist. Suddenly overlevelled dragons and packs of mages aren't so scary if you can keep at range. The effectively 6% bonus increase to physical damage resist adds up too, since you're unlikely to cap out on that at 1.

The Lord Stone can also be quite useful if you're about to go do some tougher quest or questline and your physical and magic resistance aren't capped. Losing out on a little experience in skills for bumping up to the caps is probably worth it.

If you're tackling less challenging fare, the Lover Stone. It's rare to only focus on just one category of skills unless you're going all in heavy armor berserker with no enchanting/alchemy/backup spells/stealth. If you are, just pick the appropriate guardian stone, like Warrior for the above and go with it. If you add in the Aetherial Crown, no reason not to stack 'em.

[Martial Autist]

At low level I would use the exp buffs. Once I get high level I switch to the lord stone. Nice armor buff and I don't have to enchant magic resist. One of the best stones for a battlemage imho.

[Sogreth]

Originally posted by Daded:

For me it's the one with 25% regen of life and stamina

I always end up on this one too. Or The Lord is a top pick for me as well.

I never take the faster skill leveling, as I am never in any rush to level. I like enjoying the ride. And I'm not a fan of the "Power" ones that can only be used once a day.

The Steed is alright. But I play with mods and have some for pouches that increase carrying capacity so it's not really needed.

[alexander_dougherty]

None of the stones are that great, they served a purpose in Oblivion but in Skyrim you don't need any of them, and enchantments are far more important....
I choose on a semirandom basis, I eliminate the ones that give me a benefit I will never use, then choose at random from what's left.

[Arondil]

It depends on what kind of character I am playing. With that out of the way, I admit I have never used the Apprentice stone, Tower stone, or Serpent stone.

[toasty frosting]

Originally posted by alexander_dougherty:

None of the stones are that great, they served a purpose in Oblivion but in Skyrim you don't need any of them, and enchantments are far more important....

Stones are basically free power and only compete with each other. If nothing else, they're a early/mid-game boost to tide you until you put in the work for craft loops or find gear with good enchantments. This is evidenced by the first three stones being different flavors of "learn your major skills faster". And if you're feeling especially charitable, by a few of the stones having parlor tricks that get outclassed by lategame perks and spells.

[Varanus]

Lover or lord stones. Depends on whether I'm prioritizing leveling, or not dying.

[alexander_dougherty]

Originally posted by toasty frosting:

Originally posted by alexander_dougherty:

None of the stones are that great, they served a purpose in Oblivion but in Skyrim you don't need any of them, and enchantments are far more important....

Stones are basically free power and only compete with each other. If nothing else, they're a early/mid-game boost to tide you until you put in the work for craft loops or find gear with good enchantments. This is evidenced by the first three stones being different flavors of "learn your major skills faster". And if you're feeling especially charitable, by a few of the stones having parlor tricks that get outclassed by lategame perks and spells.

Again the just aren't as important as in the last game, yes they are a free power/perk, but while OK they aren't important. my choice of standing stone isn't as important as my choice of enchantments on my armour, or weapon.

[Madao]

Lord Stone on the Aetherial Crown and Lady's Stone on my character.

[Sogreth]

Originally posted by alexander_dougherty:

Originally posted by toasty frosting:

Stones are basically free power and only compete with each other. If nothing else, they're a early/mid-game boost to tide you until you put in the work for craft loops or find gear with good enchantments. This is evidenced by the first three stones being different flavors of "learn your major skills faster". And if you're feeling especially charitable, by a few of the stones having parlor tricks that get outclassed by lategame perks and spells.

Again the just aren't as important as in the last game, yes they are a free power/perk, but while OK they aren't important. my choice of standing stone isn't as important as my choice of enchantments on my armour, or weapon.

Yeah, but enchanting is way too much admin sometimes.

Finding the right enchants. Leveling up enchanting. Restoration loopholes.

I'll just go find a stone and be good for half the game.