A Bit of Everything

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There's so much to try out in this game. I'm enjoying my current character immensely, but as I am want to do, I've already started considering my next character. And in an effort to try out everything, I'm going to attempt a combo character. (And probably get the Lover Stone. I know you cannot combine the Lover Stone with Lover's Comfort, but what about other resting bonuses? Well rested + Lover Stone possible?)

Since there is limited offensive ability in the thief skills, it seems that out of necessity, all thieves are in actuality fighter-thieves or mage-thieves. So what I'm thinking of is a character similar to the one I started out with but with some changes to some early going errors I made the first time around.

The focus of the build will still be archery and sneak. However, the other two things I want to build the character around are smithing - major oversight in the first playthough - and I should have the skill points to squeeze in one school of magic. The question being which one, and which one will help the most in overcoming the major weakness of this character that I discovered in my first attempt - lack of any type of offensive ability when you're detected.

As I see it, there are a few possible choices for where to go with this. I can eliminate restoration and alteration immediately, as that doesn't provide any offense - at least not directly. So that leaves me with illusion, conjuration, and destruction. I can see pros and cons for each:

Illusion - What are the range on these spells? Can you at least start casting before they see you? If so, this would appear to provide some very nice crowd control - even having groups of monster kill each other for you at times.

Conjuration - How is the relative hardiness of these summons? They don't necessarily have to kill a whole bunch of stuff. The idea is to stand far away from the enemy, and conjure the critter between me and enemy, and have the enemy focus on the critter instead of me, and hopefully, remain hidden while doing so. However, if most summons are killed near instantly, this won't do me any good.

Destruction - This is probably the most obvious way to get an alternate damage source. When hiding fails, blast away. That said, it would also appear to be the most magicka intensive of the three choices. It would seem like the first two would require about an even split among magicka, health, and stamina, as you wouldn't constantly be summoning stuff, or spamming illusion spells as the effects of each have durations of 30 or 60 seconds. It would seem like if you're relying on destruction when detected, and you run out of magicka, you're back to square one in having no offensive once detected.

The Dunmer seems like a solid starting race for something like this, with a mix of thief and mage-based skills. Also like the innate fire resistance, and the ability to cause 8 fire damage per second to everything around them, once per day for 60 seconds. (That's more of an emergency power for when you're detected.)

Suggestions?

 

I'd say Illusion. You get such an immense damage bonus from backstabbing that any way you can augment that and/or set up more opportunities to use it, the better. Destruction you would have to use A LOT for it to be worth it in the long run, and if that's what you want, you may as well be a mage. I believe with Illusion you can cast some spells and remain hidden, but I'm not certain.

 

I was thinking along similar lines. From a pure coolness perspective, Destruction sounds like the way to go. But it also would appear that is also the most magicka intensive way to go. Since this isn't a pure mage, I need to be able to spread my magicka/health/stamina increases approximately evenly. It seems like if you get the perks that cut the casting cost in half, that spells from this school won't be super-magicka intensive. (As there should be little need to spam spells from this tree.) I also like the fact that dual casting increases the level of creature affected. Add to the fact that because this isn't a pure mage I will probably want to be using something like Nightingale or Dark Brotherhood gear over mage robes. (Hmmm... Actually the Nightingale set has a bonus to illusion spells as one of its effects.)

Remember that the goal here is to limit the amount of melee combat I have to engage in. Thus, the spells I'll use the most are the calm and fury spells (and their higher level equivalents of course). Fury against groups, and calm when I realize that hand-to-hand combat is inevitable. So long as the range is fairly decent, it will be OK (it doesn't do me any good to cast Fury if I have to be nearly on top of them to do it - they'll just attack me).

Given that I'm so concerned over Magicka, it might be best to just go with Altmer. Sure, I'll lose some early levels in sneak and archery, but those skills level so quickly when they are that low that it shouldn't be a big deal.

EDIT: The one downside being that Illusion does jack against undead.

 

You can make Destruction spells free to cast with the right enchants, but I don't really see any point in using precious perks on destruction when you're already an Archer.

I wouldn't spend too much time on conjuration if your aim is to be a stealthy archer. They will get in the way of your arrows constantly and get you spotted when you try and sneak up on the enemies.

The Master of the Mind perk does so that Illusion works on Undead. Need 90 in the skill though.

I would go for enchanting as well if I were you. Even though it's kind of broken (read ridiculously overpowered), it just seems kind of pointless to pick up smithing if you cannot even enchant the gear you make.