Hehe, well since I got the notice about the reply below anyway, I'd be happy to.
It definitely is a great way to change up the vanilla leveling without really changing anything, if that makes sense. One thing I really like is how it incentivizes the training aspect much more than vanilla. Whereas there you can just spam lots of skills over and over, here you have to plan accordingly because now gold is your most important asset for leveling properly, which also indirectly affects questing/exploring since you have more of a push to find gold to pay for it now.
But my favorite aspect is how it allows you to really fine-tune a character. Before, some skills like security, acrobatics and athletics would level regularly no matter what, because you use all three in a variety of circumstances constantly. Now you can have a deliberately slower character who doesn't gain a bit of athletics every now and then simply because you have to move to play the game.
side note: would you, perchance, know of a way to only remove Conjuration skill experience-gaining? Currently using Av Latta Magicka with max 2 summons, which get cast so frequently (as well as a Banish spell) the leveling becomes unimmersively op. Would be interested in only having to go to trainers for Conjuration.
I've been wanting this for I couldn't tell you how long. The biggest gripe I have with the "skill through use" method is that some things will just be affected by using them in vanilla no matter what you do. Athletics and Acrobatics are good examples of this. They both are affected by things you will be doing regularly, i.e. running, jumping, falling, etc. So this handles that nicely. And other than that, it doesn't fundamentally change the leveling system. You still require skill ups through training, but now you have complete control over what you want to level up.
Great! Works completely as advertised for me... But what do you do about your stats? I understand that the stress of efficiently leveling so you get the right stat boosts is kind of tedious... But you make it significantly worse by eliminating stat boosts entirely. The problem with inefficient leveling was the fact that we may not level up enough skills to increase strength enough, or willpower, or speed, etc, meaning we'd only get 3 points in strength and 4 points in willpower when we could have/should have gotten 5.
With this mod, you ALWAYS get only ONE point to spend... How is that an improvement? The mod, when just requiring the use of trainers, results in a fix to the inefficient leveling problem by itself. If you want to get +5 willpower when you level up but you're a warrior, train restoration or destruction 10 times before training your primary skills for the tenth time. The mod gave you finer control over your leveling, albeit at a significant gold investment. If you DON'T want to worry about the stat boosts, then don't; just level the skills you want regardless, and nothing will be different from how you made the mod without you needing to make any adjustments at all.
TLDR: the problem with the "efficient leveling" concept is not that you have to worry about picking the right skills at the right time to level up; it's that, if you DON'T pick the right skills at the right time to level up, you're gimping yourself. This mod, unaltered, makes you gimp yourself even worse lol.
Anyway, that's my two cents on that aspect of the mod, I don't know if you wanted feedback or not lol. I appreciate you telling us explicitly what you edited for that, it made changing it back extremely easy (anyone need help doing that small adjustment, message me or respond here and I'll try to help you, though I'm not on here often and it will probably take a few days!), so no big deal at all. I wish more modders do what you do with stuff like that, I really appreciate it!
The rest of the mod kicks ass and it's an idea I'd have honestly never thought to do, but it COMPLETELY changes the way the game is played for me, for the better.
First: it makes money actually MATTER. When money matters, quests and dungeons and enemies and loot actually matter. It makes me want to explore far more than I ever have before. When I see a cave or a mine, I want to explore it, no, I NEED to explore it and it doesn't feel like a chore or an inconvenience. It feels like I'm progressing, because when I clear a dungeon and loot everything, I get the means to improve my character.
Next, to elaborate a bit on the loot aspect: when progressing my lower level skills at the early stages of the game cost at LEAST 50 gold per level, I don't have the luxury of discriminating as much when looting. If I see something that has value at all, part of me weighs the benefit of picking it up no matter the cost/weight ratio. That bear pelt that weighs 8lbs is something I'd normally ignore, but if I can get 15-20 gold out of it, that's almost half a skill level right there at the cost of carrying 8lbs back. It makes making trips from towns to dungeons and back feel meaningful, and makes me appreciate every gold piece I find. I feel ecstatic when I find alchemy equipment, potion caches, valuable armor, when I found that first Goblin Totem Staff, etc.
Exploration, questing, pacing, etc.: the game feels slowed down big time, and that's a very good thing. When I couldn't control my level ups, it felt like the world was rushing ahead and I didn't feel like I was making "progress" when new/stronger enemies were introduced in the game, I rather felt that I was falling behind. Now it feels like I'm playing an actual Roleplaying game, as in I'm genuinely roleplaying my character, not grinding, not focusing on excessively "gamey" strategies, etc.
Finally, the combat: it takes away the desire to land EVERY hit, every chance I get. I no longer feel the need to maximize the number of hits to kill an enemy to level up my combat skills, it actually makes me want to MINIMIZE my hits to kill every enemy. I used to hate using traps, because they meant I got no XP from a kill, right? Now, I look for ways to kill quicker. If I see a trap, you bet I'm going to use it to my advantage even though I used to avoid using them because it was "wasted experience" if I didn't do every bit of damage personally. Look! Two enemies fighting! Nope, I'm not stepping in to try to get a few extra hits in before one dies, I'm going to keep them fighting and fight the victor, who now has less health than before.
Anyway I didn't set out to do a whole review here, but this is a damn good mod, simple though it may be. Voted & endorsed lol, I absolutely love it.
Suggestion on the Stat point thing: Set all, regardless of skill acquisition, to +2 or +3. I haven't really calculated a good "middle ground" quantity of points to receive; if you make it too high, you're going to cap stat points way too early. Set it too low (or 1, as it is now) and you'll cap skills before reaching end-game stats. +5 would work too, as it would simulate "efficient leveling" without actually worrying about doing the work for it, but you'd have people b*tchin' & moaning about making it too easy, it being a cheat mod, etc.
Anyway, my two cents, again lol, and again, I LOVE this mod, thank you!
Hey, thanks so much for this reply, I'm glad you enjoy it!
I understand your first point, that players can just dump points into whatever they want to game the system and receive the attributes they want, but the overall point of this mod was to eliminate as much micromanaging as possible. I didn't want players fast traveling all over the place just to raise specific skills a really specific amount just to maximize their character. For me personally, it's better to just add to whatever you want without having to think about it!
The concept in your reply is a really good idea and it's something I've already considered, however, like all good things in life, the Construction Set simply doesn't allow for that kind of stat distribution. The multiplier goes down to 1, meaning you always get a minimum of +1. You can't change that minimum, so no matter what there would be some degree of managing skill increases for better attributes.
I was hoping the silver lining to all this would be that attribute enchantments would have way more value, thus increasing the value of gold even more by using it to make those items. Having a character that resembles a god by the end of the game isn't a concept that I like very much, so the trade-offs you're forced to make that are created by this mod make the game more challenging and fun (hopefully!).
Anyways, I really enjoyed reading the latter half of your post. These are the types of gameplay experiences that I'm hoping players have with this mod.
Do you think the "Automatic Plus 3 Attribute Modifiers" mod could work in synergy with this one? Of course having a weak char is a nice way to play sometimes, gives you more of an incentive to play differently, for example with follower npcs which can be fun.
You're right on with that connection! It's similar to Oblivion XP as well; gold instead of XP and the interface for leveling being training instead of menus.
Ive been wanting a mod like this for some time, but have been lazy to learn how to mod TES for it :P Hopefully, some will come to Skyrim and Morrowind!
I'd love to hear from others but it's brand new so it might be a while. My own experience was positive; I found myself playing the game the way I like and leveling up reasonably fast.
The gameplay loop of TES games (*especially* Morrowind) theoretically encourages players to regularly see trainers, but the "use-to-improve" system means it's easier to just constantly spam jump and cast pointless spells.
Skyrim amended this somewhat by overhauling how experience is gained for skills (More xp when dealing or absorbing more damage, only gaining xp when restoring lost hp, etc.) but I like how this kind of system connects the player to the world more, and reduces the feeling of progressing too fast.
Thanks for the insightful comment! I'm honestly not super familiar with any of the other games so it's interesting to the see them compared. It sounds like Skyrim's system was a case of putting a band-aid on a bullet wound. Now, I've clearly taken the path of least resistance here, but you have to address the core issue no matter what.
21 comments
It definitely is a great way to change up the vanilla leveling without really changing anything, if that makes sense. One thing I really like is how it incentivizes the training aspect much more than vanilla. Whereas there you can just spam lots of skills over and over, here you have to plan accordingly because now gold is your most important asset for leveling properly, which also indirectly affects questing/exploring since you have more of a push to find gold to pay for it now.
But my favorite aspect is how it allows you to really fine-tune a character. Before, some skills like security, acrobatics and athletics would level regularly no matter what, because you use all three in a variety of circumstances constantly. Now you can have a deliberately slower character who doesn't gain a bit of athletics every now and then simply because you have to move to play the game.
Thanks for this!
Hey NEXUS, there are a few tweaks that would be useful for the mobile version of your site.
With this mod, you ALWAYS get only ONE point to spend... How is that an improvement? The mod, when just requiring the use of trainers, results in a fix to the inefficient leveling problem by itself. If you want to get +5 willpower when you level up but you're a warrior, train restoration or destruction 10 times before training your primary skills for the tenth time. The mod gave you finer control over your leveling, albeit at a significant gold investment. If you DON'T want to worry about the stat boosts, then don't; just level the skills you want regardless, and nothing will be different from how you made the mod without you needing to make any adjustments at all.
TLDR: the problem with the "efficient leveling" concept is not that you have to worry about picking the right skills at the right time to level up; it's that, if you DON'T pick the right skills at the right time to level up, you're gimping yourself. This mod, unaltered, makes you gimp yourself even worse lol.
Anyway, that's my two cents on that aspect of the mod, I don't know if you wanted feedback or not lol. I appreciate you telling us explicitly what you edited for that, it made changing it back extremely easy (anyone need help doing that small adjustment, message me or respond here and I'll try to help you, though I'm not on here often and it will probably take a few days!), so no big deal at all. I wish more modders do what you do with stuff like that, I really appreciate it!
The rest of the mod kicks ass and it's an idea I'd have honestly never thought to do, but it COMPLETELY changes the way the game is played for me, for the better.
First: it makes money actually MATTER. When money matters, quests and dungeons and enemies and loot actually matter. It makes me want to explore far more than I ever have before. When I see a cave or a mine, I want to explore it, no, I NEED to explore it and it doesn't feel like a chore or an inconvenience. It feels like I'm progressing, because when I clear a dungeon and loot everything, I get the means to improve my character.
Next, to elaborate a bit on the loot aspect: when progressing my lower level skills at the early stages of the game cost at LEAST 50 gold per level, I don't have the luxury of discriminating as much when looting. If I see something that has value at all, part of me weighs the benefit of picking it up no matter the cost/weight ratio. That bear pelt that weighs 8lbs is something I'd normally ignore, but if I can get 15-20 gold out of it, that's almost half a skill level right there at the cost of carrying 8lbs back. It makes making trips from towns to dungeons and back feel meaningful, and makes me appreciate every gold piece I find. I feel ecstatic when I find alchemy equipment, potion caches, valuable armor, when I found that first Goblin Totem Staff, etc.
Exploration, questing, pacing, etc.: the game feels slowed down big time, and that's a very good thing. When I couldn't control my level ups, it felt like the world was rushing ahead and I didn't feel like I was making "progress" when new/stronger enemies were introduced in the game, I rather felt that I was falling behind. Now it feels like I'm playing an actual Roleplaying game, as in I'm genuinely roleplaying my character, not grinding, not focusing on excessively "gamey" strategies, etc.
Finally, the combat: it takes away the desire to land EVERY hit, every chance I get. I no longer feel the need to maximize the number of hits to kill an enemy to level up my combat skills, it actually makes me want to MINIMIZE my hits to kill every enemy. I used to hate using traps, because they meant I got no XP from a kill, right? Now, I look for ways to kill quicker. If I see a trap, you bet I'm going to use it to my advantage even though I used to avoid using them because it was "wasted experience" if I didn't do every bit of damage personally. Look! Two enemies fighting! Nope, I'm not stepping in to try to get a few extra hits in before one dies, I'm going to keep them fighting and fight the victor, who now has less health than before.
Anyway I didn't set out to do a whole review here, but this is a damn good mod, simple though it may be. Voted & endorsed lol, I absolutely love it.
Anyway, my two cents, again lol, and again, I LOVE this mod, thank you!
I understand your first point, that players can just dump points into whatever they want to game the system and receive the attributes they want, but the overall point of this mod was to eliminate as much micromanaging as possible. I didn't want players fast traveling all over the place just to raise specific skills a really specific amount just to maximize their character. For me personally, it's better to just add to whatever you want without having to think about it!
The concept in your reply is a really good idea and it's something I've already considered, however, like all good things in life, the Construction Set simply doesn't allow for that kind of stat distribution. The multiplier goes down to 1, meaning you always get a minimum of +1. You can't change that minimum, so no matter what there would be some degree of managing skill increases for better attributes.
I was hoping the silver lining to all this would be that attribute enchantments would have way more value, thus increasing the value of gold even more by using it to make those items. Having a character that resembles a god by the end of the game isn't a concept that I like very much, so the trade-offs you're forced to make that are created by this mod make the game more challenging and fun (hopefully!).
Anyways, I really enjoyed reading the latter half of your post. These are the types of gameplay experiences that I'm hoping players have with this mod.
Of course having a weak char is a nice way to play sometimes, gives you more of an incentive to play differently, for example with follower npcs which can be fun.
I think that we will spend more time getting gold than doing quests or playing the game. That can be a bit annoying. But I didn't try it yet
But it still being a nice idea, I wish more poeple describe them experience with this mod
The gameplay loop of TES games (*especially* Morrowind) theoretically encourages players to regularly see trainers, but the "use-to-improve" system means it's easier to just constantly spam jump and cast pointless spells.
Skyrim amended this somewhat by overhauling how experience is gained for skills (More xp when dealing or absorbing more damage, only gaining xp when restoring lost hp, etc.) but I like how this kind of system connects the player to the world more, and reduces the feeling of progressing too fast.