Sithis Posted January 10, 2012 Share Posted January 10, 2012 Give credit where it is due... This spent me a long time writing out and formatting. Adding more content regularly. Latest Update: v2.2 Added the Jason Yang Theme Song General Guides Useful to ALL players: These are my own personal guides please do not steal ANY of the following. Smithing Guide for all Archetypes: Save up your Perk Skill points. You will need them later so only spend them when reaching the key points in your Archetype build. The very next perks you will be working towards is your Smithing. Doesn't make sense for an early character build to be using Smithing right? Wrong. Smithing is the BEST way to raise your level, increase your income, AND gets you the best bows the game has to offer. As soon as it is available craft a Daedric Bow and improve it. Spend a few hours mining ore, smelting it, and making Iron Daggers. These are cheap and can raise your smithing skill VERY quickly. Go out hunting whenever you are bored and kill animals for their fur, deer and wolves are easy targets to collect fur from. Take these to a Tanning Rack and turn your pelts into Leather and make some of your leather into Leather Strips. Then forge Hide Bracers from these to help increase your Smithing Skill even more. Turn around whenever you are done forging and sell off your Iron Daggers and Hide Bracers to merchants to increase your gold and your Speech Skill. Do this until you max out your Smithing Skill at level 100 and you can improve your weapons and armor to nearly double their starting values. Alternative Smithing Suggestion Compliments of Cyo: just get the transmute spell tome (some bandit nest west of Whiterun, whatever you can look it up in the wiki), buy some iron ore, transmute it into gold ore, smelt it into bars and then smelt one bar into "Gold Ring (2)". Why? Because jewellery gives you quicker more smithing experience than iron daggers does and then all you have do to repeat the process is to enchant the two rings with whichever enchantment makes the most money that you have, then sell the rings and bam, you got a buttload of money. - Cyo Enchanting Guide for all Archetypes: As soon as you have finished increasing your Smithing Skill immediately shift gears to Enchanting. You will want to find yourself a weapon that has the Steal Soul ability and Disenchant it. Enchant your bow with the weakest possible Steal Soul enchantment to get the most use out of your charges. All you have to do is make the last arrow kill the enemy. Stock up on empty soul gems and go killing. You can do this simultaneously with your hunting for Smithing leveling so keep that in mind. It will save time here if you were already working on this. If you have trouble finding Soul Gems then just go dungeon diving in Dwemer ruins. These places are filled with them. Come on out arms stocked and ready to fill! Remember all those Iron Daggers you forged? If you didn't sell them all off take them and enchant them. Their value skyrockets... currently a single Iron Dagger I enchant is worth 1,750+ gold as a base. I can usually only sell a single enchanted dagger to any given merchant but there are a few, such as the merchant at the Trader in Riverwood, that have 10,000+ and after 48 hours game time they are ready to buy your reserves up again. This increases your Speech Skill and your gold assets all at the same time. Once you get your enchanting to level 100 you can purchase the perk to Double Enchant your items! This perk is called Extra Effect and is my favorite perk in the game! Alchemy Guide for all Archetypes: Just as Enchanting and Smithing are staples for all Archetype builds so is Alchemy. This amazing skill set will allow you to take your skills above and beyond what previously thought possible, ultimately allowing you to make endless gains to your stats. Mass collect and store your alchemy ingredients such as Nirnroot and Hanging Moss and as soon as you are done maximizing your potential with Enchanting and Smithing you will start working on figuring out the affects of these ingredients and using those Alchemy Labs you've been walking past up until now. Once your skill is high enough invest in the following Perks: Alchemist (Level 1, you must have this perk to continue the tree there are 5 levels to this Skill; each increasing the effectiveness of your created potions by 20%, level 5 granting a 100% increase to a potion's effectiveness), Physician (Another required perk; Healing potions you make are 25% more powerful), Benefactor (Increases the effectiveness of beneficial potions you create by 25%), Experimenter (Another required skill to necessary to move on to more powerful potions, this perk has 3 levels and with each increasing level whenever you consume an Alchemy ingredient you reveal more about its traits, such as; Frost Damage, Frost Resist, Fortify Magicka, Damage Health), Snakeblood (Another required skill that is essentially useless as nearly everyone who plays this game plays as either a Vampire or Werewolf. If you are in the small percentage that can get poisoned then this grants you a 50% resistance.), Purity (THIS IS IT. All negative effects are removed from potions and all poisons have been stripped of beneficial aspect). Another equally useful Perk would be during the A Return to Your Roots quest. This grants you with Sinderion's Serendipity this wonderful skill allows you a 25% t o chance of duplicating all powers egually. Non-Typical Skyrim Character Archetype Builds: You will not find these awesome builds in the Skyrim Bible! Archer-Mage This build is primarily Magicka and Archer based. You will take advantage of your Destruction School of magic early on in the game Burning, Freezing, or Zapping your enemies to death. Using your bow to initiate all battles and you sneak around a lot which will help you raise your Sneak Skill quickly and thus level faster. Since you are losing travel time sneaking being able to level fast is the primary objective for this build. You will be naturally increasing your skills as follows: Sneak, Destruction, Archer. As you progress and begin leveling your Archer-Mage you will find yourself using your Magicka less and less. Maybe to heal or to cast a Rune on the ground and set up an awesome trap. Your high Magicka will help a great deal for over-charging your Rune Destruction School traps that you place and make for some awesome death traps. When leveling you will be using your upgrade points as follows: Level 2 - Magicka increase. Level 3 - Stamina increase. Level 4 - Magicka increase. Level 5 - Stamina increase. Level 6 - Magicka increase. Level 7 - Magicka increase. Level 8 - Health increase. Repeat pattern for all following level ups. This will create the optimal Archer-Mage Archetype and allow you to utilize this Archetype to its fullest potential. Perk Spending for the Archer-Mage Archetype Which Skills will work best for the Archer-Mage Archetype? I recommend investing into the following skills first: Your very first Perk skill point should be used in Destruction, period. This is because Destruction is how you will be killing enemies early on. By level 5 you should be able to roast a Dragon to death with only two recharged dual handed Flames Destruction spell using all of your available Magicka on Master Difficulty. After that skill point put your next one into Stealth which is in the Sneak Constellation. You will raise your Sneak skill rapidly if you sneak virtually everywhere. By the time you hit level 10 you SHOULD be able to purchase both Backstab and Deadly Aim. This is going to maximize that first hit you get to initiate your fight with an enemy. The higher your sneak skill is the more of these Deadly Aim shots you can take advantage of. Save up your Perk Skill points. You will need them later so only spend them when reaching the key points in your Archetype build. The very next perks you will be working towards is your Smithing. Doesn't make sense for an Archer-Mage to be using Smithing right? Wrong. Smithing is the BEST way to raise your level, increase your income, AND gets you the best bows the game has to offer. As soon as it is available craft a Daedric Bow and improve it. Spend a few hours mining ore, smelting it, and making Iron Daggers. These are cheap and can raise your smithing skill VERY quickly. Go out hunting whenever you are bored and kill animals for their fur, deer and wolves are easy targets to collect fur from. Take these to a Tanning Rack and turn your pelts into Leather and make some of your leather into Leather Strips. Then forge Hide Bracers from these to help increase your Smithing Skill even more. Turn around whenever you are done forging and sell off your Iron Daggers and Hide Bracers to merchants to increase your gold and your Speech Skill. Do this until you max out your Smithing Skill at level 100 and you can improve your weapons and armor to nearly double their starting values. As soon as you have finished increasing your Smithing Skill immediately shift gears to Enchanting. You will want to find yourself a weapon that has the Steal Soul ability and Disenchant it. Enchant your bow with the weakest possible Steal Soul enchantment to get the most use out of your charges. All you have to do is make the last arrow kill the enemy. Stock up on empty soul gems and go killing. You can do this simultaneously with your hunting for Smithing leveling so keep that in mind. It will save time here if you were already working on this. If you have trouble finding Soul Gems then just go dungeon diving in Dwemer ruins. These places are filled with them. Come on out arms stocked and ready to fill! Remember all those Iron Daggers you forged? If you didn't sell them all off take them and enchant them. Their value skyrockets... currently a single Iron Dagger I enchant is worth 1,750+ gold as a base. I can usually only sell a single enchanted dagger to any given merchant but there are a few, such as the merchant at the Trader in Riverwood, that have 10,000+ and after 48 hours game time they are ready to buy your reserves up again. This increases your Speech Skill and your gold assets all at the same time. Once you get your enchanting to level 100 you can purchase the perk to Double Enchant your items! This perk is called Extra Effect and is my favorite perk in the game! Once you have these your build is pretty much set to grow as you see fit. Many find it useful to increase Speech at this point and spend perk points here to increase the gold available at merchants across Skyrim and turn all of them into fences. Others now shift focus to Archery and dump points into making their legendary bows even more effective through passive increases to damage. You should be far enough along now that you can mold your character how you need to better suit your playing strategy. Enjoy your Archer-Mage as they are definitely a fun class! Paladin Class The Paladin Archetype is a wonderful hack and slash build that focuses on Restoration and Two Handed Weapon traits. You will be taking advantage of Greatswords primarily as well as the entire Restoration Magicka School. Caution does not take priority here and having high health and LOTS of potions for quick healing is a must. When starting at save as many healing potions as you can get your greedy little hands on because you will be needing them often. This Archetype is pretty straight forward still focusing on Smithing and Enchanting to help your weapons and armor ratings but this class also exploits the Alchemy in the game so that you can create your own potions to help heal you as you go. When leveling you will be using your upgrade points as follows: Level 2 - Health increase. Level 3 - Health increase. Level 4 - Magicka increase. Level 5 - Health increase. Level 6 - Magicka increase. Level 7 - Health increase. Level 8 - Health increase. Level 9 - Stamina increase. Repeat pattern for all following level ups. This will create the optimal Paladin Archetype and allow you to utilize this Archetype to its fullest potential. Perk Spending for the Paladin Archetype: I strongly recommend investing Perks into Restoration and Two Handed Constellations as your skill level allows for them. Since you will be hacking your way to victory Heavy Armor is a must and should be invested in when you have plenty of Perk points to spend and nothing coming up for awhile in Restoration or Two-Handed Constellations. As I said before this is a pretty straight forward Archetype and doesn't require a bunch of complicated setup. Smithing and Enchanting if you are wanting to maximize on your equipments potential. Ideal Followers for the Paladin Archetype: This is the first Archetype that requires special choosing of your Follower's equipment to help better aid you. Don't count on your Follower healing you, you have to heal them. So what you want is someone who is going to hang back with a bow that way you don't hit them yourself while sawing down enemies. Just rearrange your Follower's equipment and in Weapons give them only a bow and arrows. The Followers all tend to be fairly accurate so this makes error on their part less damaging to you. Their range and your Melee damage will end battles with most creatures quickly. Blood Mage The Blood Mage Archetype is for those who delve into the dark arts more frequently. The main functionality of this rather unique Archetype is the use of the Equilibrium Alteration spell. This spell works as follows: Convert 25 points of health into magicka per second. Caster can be killed by this effect. The way that this is used is by using this spell in conjunction with a destructive spell such as Flames. You can cast both simultaneously and by doing so you can use your health to sustain your destructive spell. Think of this Archetype as the tank unit for Mage's. You will not be focusing on your sneaking skills very much in this Archetype build as virtually all of your Perk Points will be spent making your spells more powerful. Augmented Flames, then Intense Flames respectively. Atronach can help quite a bit too in the Alteration Constellation. The rest of your Perk Points should be spent improving your light armor and heavy armor abilities to better protect yourself, Smithing and Enchanting is also vital as with all Archetypes. Spend as you gain the ability to upgrade perks. When leveling you will be using your upgrade points as follows: Level 2 - Health increase. Level 3 - Magicka increase. Level 4 - Health increase. Level 5 - Health increase. Level 6 - Magicka increase. Repeat pattern for all following level ups. This will create the optimal Blood Mage Archetype and allow you to utilize this Archetype to its fullest potential. Equilibrium in Perspective This spell is unique and can ONLY be acquired in the Labyrinthian Chasm during the College of Winterhold Quest: The Staff of Magnus, in a side chamber. This is a risky spell but the fastest way to recover Magicka quickly. Boosting large amounts of both Magicka and Health will help you sustain your spells MUCH longer. This spell can kill you so use it with caution, and don't use it immediately in a fight. Flames only drains 13 Magicka per second so using a spell that drains 25 Health per second at the same exact time is only going to hurt you faster as you will not be gaining any advantage from using this strategy. Instead wait until your Magicka is drained about 50% and then begin casting Equilibrium to increase your Magicka. Don't let Equilibrium fill your Magicka all the way, only allow it to 75-80% Magicka and then kill it again. When your Magicka drops back down to the 50% area then start casting Equilibrium again. It is complicated at first but soon becomes second nature. You lose the advantage of Dual Flame bonuses but you can still use them so long as you don't mind taking a break in the fight every 5-10 seconds to switch your spells. This class is for the truly devoted spell user and not for the faint of heart or absent minded spell caster. Gallant Cleric The Gallant Cleric is an Archetype that specializes in One-Handed Weapons and Restoration School Magicka. Unlike the Paladin Class Archetype build this class utilizes the One-Handed Weapons instead of the Two-Handed Weapons. This means faster healing as you only have to stop swinging to let loose your flow of healing magicka! I recommend acquiring a basic Healing spell early on, the Healing spell is the easiest to get here but Fast Healing is another early choice, and once you have one you are well on your way to developing your class. When leveling you will be using your upgrade points as follows: Level 2 - Health increase. Level 3 - Health increase. Level 4 - Magicka increase. Level 5 - Health increase. Level 6 - Magicka increase. Level 7 - Health increase. Level 8 - Health increase. Level 9 - Stamina increase. Repeat pattern for all following level ups. This will create the optimal Paladin Archetype and allow you to utilize this Archetype to its fullest potential. Perk Spending for the Gallant Cleric Archetype Unlike the Paladin Class Archetype build I recommend instead focusing solely on Smithing and Enchanting until these are maxed out. Immediately begin investing into your Restoration Constellation particularly the Rank 2 Recovery. This perk allows your Magicka to regenerate 50% faster and helps offset the difference in Health to Magicka ratios when leveling. Avoid Death is another extremely useful perk in the Restoration Constellation worth investing in. This wonderful perk is passive and automatically gives you 250 Health if your health bar drops below 10%. Investing heavily into the Armsman Perks, specifically reaching Armsman Rank 5 allows your One Handed Weapon to do DOUBLE damage. Bladesman is another very useful investment once Armsman has been completed as this perk increase your critical hit chances. Critical Charge is a useful perk that gives you an entirely new move. Ideal Followers for the Gallant Cleric Archetype: This is the second Archetype that requires special choosing of your Follower's equipment to help better aid you. Don't count on your Follower healing you, you have to heal them. So what you want is someone who is going to hang back with a bow that way you don't hit them yourself while sawing down enemies. Just rearrange your Follower's equipment and in Weapons give them only a bow and arrows. The Followers all tend to be fairly accurate so this makes error on their part less damaging to you. Their range and your Melee damage will end battles with most creatures quickly. Take note that this is exactly the same follower strategy that the Paladin Class employs use of to solidify your standing. Mage Assailant The Mage Assailant Archetype focuses on using Alteration and Conjuration. Recommended Race: Breton, the 25% Magic Resistance is going to do wonders once you are higher leveled. Alteration Spell Breakdown: Ebonyflesh uses the most Magicka but provides the biggest boost to the Armor rating available. Upon completing the College of Winderhold Radiant Quest: Alteration Ritual Spell you are awarded with Dragonhide which is an amazing spell that allows the Caster ignores 80% of all physical damage for 30s. These are the two best spells for a Mage Assailant to use however any "flesh" spell works. The cheapest and probably first one you will get is Oakflesh, as soon as a new spell becomes available it is highly recommended that you switch to using it. This is what is going to keep you alive as you use your conjuration spells to kill your enemies. Another very useful late game spell is Mass Paralysis, this is another spell that is unlocked after a College of Winterhold Radiant Quest. This one you can pick up from Tolfdir, he is selling it after you complete the College of Winterhold Radiant Quest: Alteration Ritual Spell. Conjuration Spell Breakdown: Bound Weapons are going to be your saving grace here, and as you will soon find the Bound Bow does flat out the most damage. You also don't need to worry about arrows as you are provided with bound arrows for the duration of the spell. Summoning Atronach's are your saving grace and your best bet is to use whichever one is going to compliment the situation best. Late game spells are Summon Unbound Dremora, Flaming Familiar, Flame Thrall, Frost Thrall, and Storm Thrall. When leveling you will be using your upgrade points as follows: Level 2 - Health increase. Level 3 - Magicka increase. Repeat pattern for all following level ups. This will create the optimal Mage Assailant and allow you to utilize this Archetype to its fullest potential. Mage Assailant True Strength: The real strength of this class lies in the Constellation Skills. For the Alteration Tree the Mage Armor makes your "flesh" spells exceedingly powerful with each level increase. This is what is going to save you from dying left and right. Magic Resistance is going to help you block spell affects from enemies. Atronach is exceedingly powerful and allows you to absorb 30% of the Magicka of any spells that hit you. For the Conjuration Tree Mystic Binding and Soul Stealer are essential. Conjuration Dual Casting also helps quite a bit as well. Besides working on Smithing, Alchemey, and Enchanting (essential for all Archetypes for leveling purposes) another sub skill that is going to help is Restoration and investing some skill points into this Tree can help you sustain life longer. All in all the Mage Assailant is a force to be reckoned with. A difficult to get started Archetype but immensely fun once you get going. Dragon Shouts/Locations: Animal Allegiance - Words: Raan - Mir - Tah. Locations: Angarvunde (The Rift), Ancient's Ascent (Falkreath Hold), Ysgramor's Tomb (Winterhold Hold). Aura Whisper - Words: Laas - Yah - Nir. Locations: Northwind Summit (The Rift), Valthume (The Reach), Volunruud (The Pale). Become Ethereal - Words: Feim - Zii - Gron. Locations: Ironbind Barrow (Winterhold Hold), Lost Valley Redoubt (The Reach), Ustengrav (Hjaalmarch). Call Dragon - Words: Od - Ah - Viing. Locations: NONE: You earn this Shout during the Main Quest: The Fallen, Only works when fully charged. Call of Valor - Words: Hun - Kaal - Zoor. Locations: NONE: You earn this Shout at the end of the Main Quest. Clear Skies - Words: Lok - Vah - Koor. Locations: NONE: You earn this Shout during the Main Quest from the Greybeards during the Main Quest: The Throat of the World. Disarm - Words: Zun - Haal - Viik. Locations: Eldersblood Peak (Hjaalmarch), Silverdrift Lair (The Pale), Snow Veil Sanctum (Winterhold Hold). Dismaying Shout - Words: Faas - Ru - Maar. Locations: Dead Crane Rock (The Reach), Labyrinth (Hjaalmarch), Lost Tongue Overlook (The Rift). Dragonrend - Words: Joar - Zah - Frul. Locations: NONE: You learn this Shout during the Main Quest: Alduin's Bone. Elemental Fury - Words: Su - Grah - Dun. Locations: Dragontooth Crater (The Reach), Kilkreath Ruins (Haafingar), Shriekwind Basiton (Falkreath Hold). Fire Breath - Words: Yol - Toor - Shul. Locations: Dustman's Cairn (Whiterun Hold), Sunderstone Gorge (Falkreath Hold), Throat of the World (Whiterun Hold). Frost Breath - Words: Fo - Krah - Diin. Locations: Bonestrewn Crest (East March), Folgunthur (Hjaalmarch), Skyborn Altar (Hjaalmarch). Ice Form - Words: Iiz - Slen - Nus. Locations: Frostmere Crypt (The Rift), Mount Anthor (Winterhold Hold), Saarthal (Winterhold Hold). Kyne's Peace - Words: Kaan - Drem - Ov. Locations: Ragnvald (The Reach), Rannveig's Fast (Winterun Hold), Shroud Hearth Barrow (The Rift). Marked for Death - Words: Krii - Lun - Aus. Locations: Autumwatch Tower (The Rift), Dark Brotherhood Sanctuary (Falkreath Hold), Forsaken Cave (The Pale). Slow Time - Words: Tiid - Klo - Ul. Locations: Hog's End (The Reach), Korvanjund (The Pale), Labyrinthian (Hjaalmarch). Storm Call - Words: Strun - Bah - Qo. Locations: Forelhost (The Rift), High Gate Ruins (The Pale), Skuldafn (OTHER REALM: Main Quest: The World Eater's Eyrie). Throw Voice - Words: Zul - Mey - Gut. Locations: Shearpoint (The Pale). Unrelenting Force - Words: Fus - Ro - Dah. Locations: Bleak Falls Barrow (Falkenreath Hold), High Hrothgar (Whiterun Hold). Whirlwind Sprint - Words: Wuld - Nah - Kest. Locations: Dead Men's Respite (Hjaalmarch), High Hrothgar (Whiterun Hold), Volskygge (Haafingar). Species Specific Perks: Argonian: Light Armor, Sneak, Lockpicking, Pickpocketing, Restoration, Alteration Breton: Speech, Alchemy, Illusion, Conjuration. Restoration, Alteration Dark Elf: Light Armor, Sneak, Alchemy, Illusion, Destruction, Alteration High Elf: Illusion, Conjuration, Destruction, Restoration, Alteration, Enchanting Imperial: Heavy Armor, Block, One-handed, Destruction, Restoration, Enchanting Khajiit: One-handed, Archery, Sneak, Lockpicking, Pickpocket, Alchemy Nord: Smithing, Block, Two-handed, One-handed, Light Armor, Speech Orc: Smithing, Heavy Armor, Block, Two-handed, One-handed, Enchanting Redguard: Smithing, Block, One-handed, Archery, Destruction, Alteration Wood Elf: Archery, Light Armor, Sneak, Lockpicking, Pickpocketing, Alchemy Jason Yang Theme Song: Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sithis Posted January 18, 2012 Author Share Posted January 18, 2012 This second post has been made with the approval of Anime. Thread Update History: v1.1 Added the Non-Typical Archetype Build. Added the Smithing Guide for all Archetypes. Added the Enchanting Guide for all Archetypes. Added the Archer-Mage Archetype. v1.2 Added the Paladin Archetype v1.3 Rearranged the thread so that everyone stops thinking it is just about Shouts. v.1.4 Added the Blood Mage Archetype Added the Gallant Cleric Archetype v2.0 Facelift, added a bunch of spoilers to make the first post making it much easier to read. v2.1 Added the Mage Assailant Archetype v2.2 Added the Jason Yang Theme Song Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
-Ryan Posted January 18, 2012 Share Posted January 18, 2012 Lol cool. Looks like you put a lot of work into this. I don't have a 360 though so i'm stuck playing Morrowind which actually is pretty amazing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tyler. Posted January 18, 2012 Share Posted January 18, 2012 great guide you're smarter than me. I've been trying out a lot of different character builds and am currently messing around with a illusionist assasin Argonian. illusion magic is fun. Ryan, buy one right now, one of the best purchases you'll ever make this game Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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