Just throwing it out there if you pick conjuration you start with summon ancestral ghost which if you attack 3 times will aggro casting spells that gives a repeatable means of refilling mana with Atronach sign, or alchemy is easy to break I heard somewhere.
Breton + Atronach sign gives you x2.5 Int 50% spell resist 50% spell absorption. Combine with mark/recall/divine intervention, you can go back to an altar anytime and refill your magika by asking for a characteristics restoration...🎉 I will call that overpowered
I would suggest getting the Frostbite spell from Arrille as soon as possible, since Dark Elves are resistant to the standard Firebite spell. The DB assassins are all Dark Elves too, so it makes killing them a lot easier.
Then again, Nords are completely immune and while nords are not everywhere, they're common enough. Lightning is the damage to go with as it has the least resistances in the beginning. Later you'll have plenty of spells to choose from so it is less of an issue.
When making mages I usually go Breton just because they are so good. But I would like to point out something lots of people don't seem to know. Mysticism is one of the best offensive spell schools in the game. Yeah I know its mostly known for teleportation and other mobility/support spells. But it also governs the drain health spell effect. Once you have a drain health spell effect you can do things like create a drain health 5-10 points, in a 10'-20' radius on target or touch for 1-5 seconds depending on your ability. If you are beset by a group of bandits for example the sheer amount of life you have coming over those few seconds will literally make you able to survive any damage they dish out. As you get better in Mysticism you can create greater and greater effects to the point that my favorite spell I use, is a unique spell called Vampiric Cloud. It is 10-20 points of drain on target, last 5-10 seconds in a 20'radius. A group of enemies cannot kill you once that spell is in effect. I've literally just stood in the path of rampaging bandits and did nothing but let their health tick down into my own health pool and laughed while they died. Don't discount Mysticism. :)
I also love drain health because fighting golden saints, storm atronachs, and vampires? (I forget if vamps have it) will have reflect magicka, and bouncing normal destruction spells onto a squishy mage can easily kill you, but reflecting an absorb health does nothing but waste mana.
I love playing a variant of the mage that I call the Artificer. They make spell rings and amulets and collect objects of power. It has downsides; you can only have the spells you prepare and enchantment limits the strength of your spells. The upsides are: you can spam your attack spells because it doesn't use spell animations and each spell ring or amulet recharges themselves over time. You can make your entire build on that.
I think I'm going to try this for my first playthrough in morrowind, I've always loved the artificer/enchanter archetype. My favorite skyrim playthrough was a mostly warrior character with self enchanted armor and heavy thuum use. Sort of like a gish.
I call this class a charlatan. Some prebuilt items to consider: Vampiric ring, Shashev's ring, Ring of toxic cloud, Ring of firestorms, Amulet of admonition, Ring of thinderstorms. All can be gotten at level 1 at set locations.
Bound Daedric armor items are considered light armor by the game, so a good armor skill for a conjurer type mage would be light armor, possibly coupled with unarmored.
Atronach is my go to for mage. with a high elf you end up with a +3.5x boost to your magika which is just insane and the absorb helps to mitigate a lot of the weakness to magic and in fact it actually roughly balances out as you absorb 50% of the time but the remaining 50% of the time you do not absorb you take 50% extra damage which on average still nets you 25% reduction in damage on average with the benefit of absorption. But train your alchemy early as you will be needing strong restore magika potions to sustain your massive ridiculous mana pool. That was probably my favorite mage build the weaknesses really were not a problem with the 50% absorption and it really is quite fun just levitating around blasting the ground with fireballs. this game was certainly special. Also remember in morrowind resist and weakness to magic does not include elemental effects fire, frost, and lightening so breton's natural magic resistance does nothing for that which is where the atronach stone is so good for them as well since it works on ALL magic. though I am not sure about paralyze as that one is weird. I even used Atronach on my warrior characters before and it was nice because even though they do not benefit that much from the absorption save for healing, the fact that it is basically a constant 50% chance to resist all magic damage is very good and lets you just charge into a group of mages without too much worry. this really is the best birth sign and is surprisingly versatile for many builds.
you have just to summon a freaking ghost (or lich if modded?) and attack him, absorbing the spell from the ghost is enough for refill of all your magicka at low levels and work also pretty well in higher levels.. expect maybe taking the usual 5/6 mana potion for emergency, YOU DONT NEED POTIONS at all
@@michaeldavies7949 I went with Lady Stone to synergize my Endurance priority and give me some extra Personality. Felt right for the character I was making.
I am played this character now, Nord atronach custom Battlemage. I picked endurance and luck as chosen attributes, and had 100 endurance by level 8. My character is so tanky. My strategy to restore magicka is to absorb a shrine's restore attribute effect.
I always loved the Atronach birthsign on a warrior archetype. Sure you lose the initial power boost of some other signs, but that permanent 50% magic absorb really allows you to bully mages and the more dangerous creatures later on, especially if you acquire some more magic absorption. It also gives warriors a respectable magic pool to allow you to cast 1 or 2 really high-spec spells. Of course as you approach endgame it's arguably the best sign as you can mitigate the stunted magicka easily.
The only problem of absorb magic is that in Morrowind the chance is calculated differently for each item. So, if you have an Atronach sign and another item giving you 20% absorb magic you will have only 60% absorb magic chance because half of the time of this 20% chance both items will activate meaning you lose 10% of absorption. So, it is impossible to get 100% unless you are playing as Telvanny (with Ring of Equity all mages are jokes against you).
You missed one of the best attack spells that you can make: Levitation on target 1pt for as long a duration as you can afford. It essentially slows the enemy down enormously and keeps you out of their attack range. It greatly improves your ability to kite enemies and bombard them with damage dealing spells. If you fight clustered groups you could probably give in an AOE radius, but the cost might be prohibitive.
Yeah if you want to cheese you can put 1 or 2 second invisibility on self tp your offensive spells. Adds like 7-8 magicka cost and it causes most enemies to drop aggro or run away f rom you (in OpenMW's better AI) every time you hurt them. Or if you want to be super cheesy, just cast calm on them and then kill them. They'll just swear at you but won't do anything. Fun for a while but pretty much ruins the game in the long run.
Ha! I have played Morrowind since it came out an love playing mages and messing around with the magic system making my own spells. But I never though to a touch based levitate spell. I'm giving that a try.
Every veteran Morrowind player seems to have their go-to early gold cheese. Mine was sniping Vivec guards with bound longbow or raiding the Vivec vaults
I have been playing Morrowind once a year since release with zero cheese. I try to clear my mind as much as possible and play each of my characters as a true outlander. Of course, it's not *entirely* possible... I always save Tarhiel, or at the very least, avoid his death.
I just made an imperial mage. Been playing maybe 6 months. 120 hrs. But have not beat the main quest yet. Or any quest line tbh. My first mages save file got corrupted somehow. Second character was an imperial short blade/illusion/alchemy with a focus on intelligence and speed. 3rd character is another mage with a focus on alteration/alchemy/destruction. Having fun. Gonna go play rn
for people who cant get the dark brotherhood assassin to spawn so you can get that extra gold, go to the guard tower in southwest of balmora, on the top floor, on a wardrobe, will be a sword worth a bunch of gold, sell it to a vendor, preferably creepy in caldera because of his huge amount of gold being 5000
Fun bit in regards to the Breton: If you pick Magic Specialization, Destruction, Illusion, and Alterations as majors and Restoration, Conjuration, and Mysticism as minors, you'll start the game with at least 30 in every caster skill + the complete list of starter spells. Lots of versatility right off the bat. I normally go with STR + END as starting Attributes (More starting health, More health per level, better carry weight and melee damage) Then pick Shortblade and Light Armor as Majors + Blunt Weapon and Block as Minors. Top it off with Atronach birthsign, and you have a powerhouse start. Use Bound Dagger for insane early game melee DPS, summon and piss off your own Ancestral Ghosts to counter Atronach's stunted Magicka, and have access to all utility spells, like teleport, Unlock, Calm, Frenzy, Levitate, Waterwalking/Breathing ASAP. Combine the easy grabs Mentor's Ring, the Cuirass of Savoir's Hide, Boots of Blinding Speed, and Mantle of Woe to buff the ever living crap out of your mage, and score The Blackhand's Dagger and Mace of Molag Bal as primary weapons. Net the Vampiric Ring and a Blood Feast shield and so long as you don the Cuirass of Savor's Hide, you'll never need to fear Reflect for all your Absorb Spells and Enchantments. Atronach BS is phenomenal on mages, as long as you know the tricks (Summon and Aggro your own Ancestor Ghost for Spell Absorption; Join the Tribunal Temple for cheaper shrine fees; pay 5 gold for Almsivi Restoration and get all your magicka restored). Atronach is strangely exceptional on Warrior type builds who are less dependent on spells to do damage. It gives warrior types a defense against spell casters in the form of Spell Absorption and also increases their magicka pool enough to warrant picking up some healing and utility spells.
@@MrRDRII Because if you're going to use Daggers and the Mace of Molag Bal (For it's magic absorb effect), you might as well benefit from the defense of a shield. Plus if you rush for a Blood Feast Shield, you'll have access to a stupidly powerful Absorb Health effect.
If you have the Tribunal expansion, Light Armour is the best starting choice. You can paralyse, poison, and then sit back and wait for the assassins to die, and loot them for their stuff. It's the best Light Armour in the game until you get Glass.
Fun mage facts: You can restore all ur magicka on unmodded version by making spell or enchant of drain inteligence 100 for 1sec on self. Rings with attack spells on cast dont use mana and u can cast their spells faster cause they dont have animation. Magic resistance is not as good as someone might think cause it doesnt work on fire, shock, ice and posion spells. It works only on magic effects like burden, drain etc. It also prevents u from using drain inteligence trick.
For future reference. When casting spells like telekinesis(or any spell) they are more likely to cast when your stamina is fully recovered. Full stamina makes you more likely to cast a spell. Low stamina does the opposite. It factors into the dice roll.
The trick here is to just create a restoration spell with 2 fatigue per second for 120 seconds or something. Costs like 20 magicka to cast and it negates stamina drain when you're running completely. Really effective early game (unless you move by jumping 100% of the time).
my first playthrough was using the atronach sign. and my god... if you get the right enchants you can be completely immune to magic users and it's absolutely glorious, tho during this playthrough i believe i was able to stack a stupidly high reflect damage too so by the time i wasclose to the end of the main story i could just stand there afk and still kill people
I'm glad you gave people recommendations for gear what a lot of people don't understand is Mages are extremely magical item Reliant I'd also recommend the boots of blinding Speed on breton's because they can resist binding effect and since they are slow starting off anyway
The last mage I played was a Khajit Sorcerer Atronach. Worked very well. Blast some spells and use the ghost to recharge. Make enchanted items for healing. Female Khajit start with 40 endurance... which is better than 30. And they have that handy night vision spell.
Note that choosing willpower as favored attribute only grant a +2% chance to successfully cast spells, and willpower is very easy to level up as a mage. While choosing endurance instead grants +5 health point at level 1 and +1 health point every level (+4 instead of +3 as a breton). And endurance is hard to level up as a mage unless you use heavy armor and/or spears.
@@Sai-go6lr Willpower also increases paralyse resistance. Paralyse effects are rare but very dangerous. However I don't think 5-ish % of paralyse resistance is a match for 25-ish % health bonus. Willpower also increases fatigue points. But endurance too (and it also slightly increases fatigue regeneration).
Great video! Love your presentation and content. Btw, if you put on that amulet you get from the locked box, you get transported to a scary room where this powerful daedra attacks you. If you defeat him you get a powerful cool looking sword
Mages are incredible. Just be careful with enchanting. I took it too far and now I struggle to enjoy the game. 😭or maybe it's because I've been playing unmodded for 20 years.
Enchanting actually is not as powerful as spellcasting could be. While enchanted items are limited in strength by item's capacity (I used to carry seven or eight daedric tower shields), mage's capabilities are limited by skill values and magicka supplies, and willing to mix up some ash yams with netch leather into a potion, drink it and repeat the process. Thinking about the MOST powerful spell in the game, enchanting is not the answer to this question, yet really powerful thing to turn the game into kindergarten experience
@@CoffeeNutGaming Thanks! I like Dwarf Fortress so graphics are not a concern most of the time. My commitment to the vanilla game will only last until I exhaust the original content and I STILL haven't! Can't wait to start Tamriel Rebuilt. 😍
Nice content, for sure subbed. Yours and Lyle Schnubs Morrowind informational videos are some of best I've found for sure. A nice tidbit about Conjuration as major skill and Short Blade as a minor is you can summon a Bound Dagger pretty effectively in the early game that fortifies Short Blade and makes that hit chance better til you can access the paralysis dagger.
Also a good spell to have is the light spell. Then enchant it constant effect onto right and left ebony pouldrons. There is a robe in Molag mat that is enchanted constant effect 50pts. Feather.
An unarmed, unarmored mage is a blast once you make a Sanctuary suit and start brewing OP potions... you can carry everything in the game, AOE kill an entire cave and frenzy then falcon punch Ordinators for fun and gold.
7:04 weakness to magicka is actually not that bad. It doesn't affect any elemental spells, only damage attributes, blindness, burden, absorb health and such. Literally only bad against vampires and bonewalkers. And if you are trying to equip boots of blinding speed ofc.
I had already made a mage based character so mine obviously was a lil weaker than yours however I was lost on where to go and how to get started and this vid helped so much and taught me a little more about morrowind and my plan is to watch all these guides to give me that base knowledge on how to start any type of character
Best thing I ever did for a High Elf I played was immediately craft a 2-12 damage for 6 in 10ft spell. Casting it wasn't out of reach even at level 1 and it just wrecked most enemies it hit.
gotta go with altmer atronach sign. you'll have your alchemy to recover magicka thats more convenient than sleeping anyway and late game with the mantle of woe and a ton of intelligence and willpower boosting stuff you can sling some truly apocalyptic spells.
For efficient leveling, make sure to tag a few endurance based skills. Early bonuses to endurance ensure your health per level won't leave you getting clapped in two hits in the higher levels.
No for efficient leveling do not tag any endurance skills if you can avoid it. Then use training to level the now low endurance skills to get maximum bonuses to endurance every level. Though like he said spear is a great weapon skill, so thats not an absolute thing.
@@JayAshkevron thanks for the comment man, I've genuinely been misunderstanding efficient leveling for YEARS. makes so much more sense now lol. cheers!
@@DavidBrown-zp5br No problem man, I hope I didn't come off sounding like a jerk. I didn't mean it like that. Morrowind leveling is very obtuse and counter intuitive. lol
@@JayAshkevron all good man! i know how rare it is to have a genuinely nice interaction in a youtube comment section but i'm glad to have had one with you!
It's so much easier to build a warrior then switch to magic later once you can buy the spells and equipment. There's a million ways to cheese the game with permanently enchanted gear.
Thanks man, started playing morrowind as argonian spearwoman a few days ago but I plan another playthrough with magic, very helpful! Btw I think forgetting about Tarhiel is amazing, this encounter is hilarious.
This game is more enjoyable than skyrim, just by using mark and recall there's a sense of relief and feeling safe everytime i recall to a marked location from a creepy dungeon :3 and u just made me want to play again, good thing i have open morrowind on my phone lol
@@CoffeeNutGaming proceedfed to trai ncojuration and my other magic skills fgor 2 hourss and havent touched the main quest at all. Currently using flame atronarchs to eradicate my enemies
For any beginners if you use a Breton or High Elf and take the atronach have conjuration as a major skill. Conjuration as a major skill gives you the Ancestor Ghost ability. If you summon a ghost and attack it you can absorb the spells cast and restore magicka easily. That technique works with any race but best with the 2 mentioned before
I made a hybrid class with long blade and heavy armor as major skills, it's really powerful paired up with conjuration in the early game when you don't have a whole lot of strength to haul around equipment. I also took destruction as a major skill and eventually transitioned to primarily using that for big damage, binding my equipment and stepping into the fray when I'm low on magicka. I went with the apprentice instead of the atronach for my birth sign, because it cancels out the resist magicka from my Breton heritage and gets me a very serviceable pool without being a pain to deal with in the early game. Used to be I would just cheese the game with the alchemy exploit but seeing how quickly you end up with lots of money just from looting dungeons and stuff kind of made me feel bad about that. I can't say I'm not exploiting anything because I did the classic one where I rest several days when I first got corprus so I got a major permanent buff to strength and endurance, but I feel a lot more balanced out and while I'm quite powerful I'm not literally mathematically unkillable either. Ilunubi even at level 15 was challenging in the end with juggling my relatively low health pool with dealing damage to Dagoth Gares.
A couple of other good mage items to go for are the staff of magnus and mantle of woe. Also have to say playing an atronach birthsign isn't hard, if you join the temple and imperial cult bc you can replenish Magicka for free with the altar blessings wherever you go
Having all the willpower based skills as major or minor is IMHO a mistake. I always leave one out so I can 'top up' when levelling up; it's usually Alteration as it's not that important initially and buying enough skills to make it usable is easy, and it levels quickly anyway. I also also leave out Alchemy too, for similar reasons, security is available of course but again, IMO, it should be agility based not intelligence based.
For Atronach builds on consoles get a damage attribute spell preferably INT, go to spell creator in the mages guild, then create damage intelligence spell x100 on self. Who needs recover magika pots or resting lol.
Depends on your other specializations. I did a mage-heavy hybrid character that also specced into heavy armor, block and a minor in short blade, so I could have good defense and a bit of a backup when I ran out of magic.
I think people just need to remember that morrowind is more of a sim game than a hero RPG. You start as a literal nothing nobody who can be killed by literally anything. To go pure mage and not wear armor or use weapons, is very difficult and conflict needs to be mostly avoided if possible until you are fairly adept at combat magics and protection spells.
What i like to do, is have that stunted magicka and exploit trapped chests and doors with saves, you have a 50% chance to absorb the trap, and it's quite useful.
I chose dark elf because of the 75% resist fire and the destruction stat boost. Im playing a battle mage character so not a full on mage only build. I know bretons are great battlemages in other tes games but I figured dark elf would of been the safest bet. Will this choice screw me over late game or should it be fine. I should mention my major attributes are Short Blade, Destruction, Mysticism, Restoration, Heavy armor, and unarmored. My minors are Athletics, Acrobatics, Illusion, Long Blade, and im blanking on the rest but im sure you get the picture. lmk ty Edit: and also my favorite attributes were strength and willpower. And my specialization was combat
So, what I often do with my mages is train heavy armor, medium armor, block, and pole arm to level endurance in addition to giving me access to that equipment late game.
Just go with dark elf because they're cool and use the Atronach to have loads of mana. Magicka potions and cash are both plentiful so the stunted Magicka won't be that much of an issue.
11:52 "streamer brain" I've heard of this phenomenon. Your concentration is split between entertaining and playing a game, so you're actually doing both things less good than you can.
TBH I just started power-leveling Illusion and Destruction. Illusion is in my major skills and Destruction in my misc. When I'm done I'll do Conjuration and Mysticism and then Alteration and Restoration. I'm not doing any quests until I've mastered at least three schools.
Still remember the first time I played Morrowind. Broke the game in ten minutes as a Breton named Shapiffany, then crashed the game and never played it again lmao
I usually do a custom dark elf battlemage with a good spread of skills but don't take all the skills that cover a single attribute. It's essential if you want those 5+ bonuses on level up
Marshmerrow/Wickweat (guy in balmoral temple) make about 2k gold then go to sadrith mora through mages guild. Go to imperial shrine there and Ash yam/Bloat make, drink and sell intelligence potions until you get 100 million intelligence. Go back to balmora and make about 50 ish health potions. Then Wickwheat/Scrib Jelly from lady downstairs in temple make willpower potions. Then Void salts/frost salts from alchemist in balmora make refill Magicka potions. Go to scamp in caldera and sell the rest of your potions keeping 5 of each. Go make godly spells. Have fun!
Instead of selling the deadric sanctuary amulet wait till your a higher lvl and put it on trust me it’s really cool and you could get a cool item from battlespire
also if you use a resist magicka spell of 100 percent and put on something like the Mantle of Woe, it negates any negative effects while giving you the perks. its broken and usually what i do if i play a mage. only real problem is heading all the way to the corner of solstheim to get it, lol
Nah jokes aside thank you, a lot of this was helpful to me for remaking my first character(I chose a name in the Arena style of name generation and it wasn't meshing well with the other Bretons in the game culturally so I remade the character and took it as a chance to change my skills). Went a bit of a different way, I'm a defensive mage with heavy armor, unarmored and block, I generally walk around in nice clothes or robes and throw on the gauntlets, the shield, and now I guess the helmet and cuirass for when I'm in combat, but I never specced an offensive combat skill, so when I'm out of magic I'm fairly out of options. That's not a worry though since this setup gives me a good arsenal and the means to build up a veritable stockpile of useful spells and the magicka to sling them, while rolling damage when I can.
Seen a million posts on r/Morrowind asking about how to create a mage, so hopefully this sheds some light in the community on this playstyle.
you n'wah!
Crap 😂
Under sun and sky, outlander, we greet you warmly.
Just throwing it out there if you pick conjuration you start with summon ancestral ghost which if you attack 3 times will aggro casting spells that gives a repeatable means of refilling mana with Atronach sign, or alchemy is easy to break I heard somewhere.
Breton + Atronach sign gives you x2.5 Int 50% spell resist 50% spell absorption. Combine with mark/recall/divine intervention, you can go back to an altar anytime and refill your magika by asking for a characteristics restoration...🎉
I will call that overpowered
I would suggest getting the Frostbite spell from Arrille as soon as possible, since Dark Elves are resistant to the standard Firebite spell. The DB assassins are all Dark Elves too, so it makes killing them a lot easier.
Useful frost damage?! This isn't Skyrim.
This little tidbit has put a smile on my face in every playthrough ever since I figured it out myself. F* Helseth.
Then again, Nords are completely immune and while nords are not everywhere, they're common enough. Lightning is the damage to go with as it has the least resistances in the beginning. Later you'll have plenty of spells to choose from so it is less of an issue.
When making mages I usually go Breton just because they are so good. But I would like to point out something lots of people don't seem to know. Mysticism is one of the best offensive spell schools in the game. Yeah I know its mostly known for teleportation and other mobility/support spells. But it also governs the drain health spell effect. Once you have a drain health spell effect you can do things like create a drain health 5-10 points, in a 10'-20' radius on target or touch for 1-5 seconds depending on your ability. If you are beset by a group of bandits for example the sheer amount of life you have coming over those few seconds will literally make you able to survive any damage they dish out. As you get better in Mysticism you can create greater and greater effects to the point that my favorite spell I use, is a unique spell called Vampiric Cloud. It is 10-20 points of drain on target, last 5-10 seconds in a 20'radius. A group of enemies cannot kill you once that spell is in effect. I've literally just stood in the path of rampaging bandits and did nothing but let their health tick down into my own health pool and laughed while they died. Don't discount Mysticism. :)
You can also absorb like 50 pts of speed from a group of enemies and go super fast
I also love drain health because fighting golden saints, storm atronachs, and vampires? (I forget if vamps have it) will have reflect magicka, and bouncing normal destruction spells onto a squishy mage can easily kill you, but reflecting an absorb health does nothing but waste mana.
I'm pretty sure that drain health is governed by destruction, not mysticism...
This is how I play MTG Arena
I love playing a variant of the mage that I call the Artificer. They make spell rings and amulets and collect objects of power. It has downsides; you can only have the spells you prepare and enchantment limits the strength of your spells. The upsides are: you can spam your attack spells because it doesn't use spell animations and each spell ring or amulet recharges themselves over time. You can make your entire build on that.
I think I'm going to try this for my first playthrough in morrowind, I've always loved the artificer/enchanter archetype. My favorite skyrim playthrough was a mostly warrior character with self enchanted armor and heavy thuum use. Sort of like a gish.
I call this class a charlatan. Some prebuilt items to consider: Vampiric ring, Shashev's ring, Ring of toxic cloud, Ring of firestorms, Amulet of admonition, Ring of thinderstorms. All can be gotten at level 1 at set locations.
I really like the idea of an atronach artificer
I like your style of presentation. You're comfortable with the camera, and the delivery is well executed. Well done.
I appreciate hearing that! Thank you fellow outlander 🙇♂️
agree!
Bound Daedric armor items are considered light armor by the game, so a good armor skill for a conjurer type mage would be light armor, possibly coupled with unarmored.
I never played Morrowind before, this will be very helpful for me as a main mage player, Thanks!
Glad you enjoyed it! Best of luck with your time in Vvardenfell
Based Violet Evergarden pfp
What are your feelings about Morrowind after this year of playing ? Ultrainteresting :D
Atronach is my go to for mage. with a high elf you end up with a +3.5x boost to your magika which is just insane and the absorb helps to mitigate a lot of the weakness to magic and in fact it actually roughly balances out as you absorb 50% of the time but the remaining 50% of the time you do not absorb you take 50% extra damage which on average still nets you 25% reduction in damage on average with the benefit of absorption. But train your alchemy early as you will be needing strong restore magika potions to sustain your massive ridiculous mana pool. That was probably my favorite mage build the weaknesses really were not a problem with the 50% absorption and it really is quite fun just levitating around blasting the ground with fireballs. this game was certainly special.
Also remember in morrowind resist and weakness to magic does not include elemental effects fire, frost, and lightening so breton's natural magic resistance does nothing for that which is where the atronach stone is so good for them as well since it works on ALL magic. though I am not sure about paralyze as that one is weird.
I even used Atronach on my warrior characters before and it was nice because even though they do not benefit that much from the absorption save for healing, the fact that it is basically a constant 50% chance to resist all magic damage is very good and lets you just charge into a group of mages without too much worry. this really is the best birth sign and is surprisingly versatile for many builds.
Yes and you can get Denstagmer ring very early in the game from a tomb near Gnisis which grants you further resistances to fire frost and shock
you have just to summon a freaking ghost (or lich if modded?) and attack him, absorbing the spell from the ghost is enough for refill of all your magicka at low levels and work also pretty well in higher levels.. expect maybe taking the usual 5/6 mana potion for emergency, YOU DONT NEED POTIONS at all
@@michaeldavies7949 I went with Lady Stone to synergize my Endurance priority and give me some extra Personality. Felt right for the character I was making.
I am played this character now, Nord atronach custom Battlemage. I picked endurance and luck as chosen attributes, and had 100 endurance by level 8. My character is so tanky. My strategy to restore magicka is to absorb a shrine's restore attribute effect.
U can use shrines to cheaply restore magicka
I always loved the Atronach birthsign on a warrior archetype. Sure you lose the initial power boost of some other signs, but that permanent 50% magic absorb really allows you to bully mages and the more dangerous creatures later on, especially if you acquire some more magic absorption. It also gives warriors a respectable magic pool to allow you to cast 1 or 2 really high-spec spells. Of course as you approach endgame it's arguably the best sign as you can mitigate the stunted magicka easily.
When considering endgame, it is easily the best sign.
The only problem of absorb magic is that in Morrowind the chance is calculated differently for each item. So, if you have an Atronach sign and another item giving you 20% absorb magic you will have only 60% absorb magic chance because half of the time of this 20% chance both items will activate meaning you lose 10% of absorption. So, it is impossible to get 100% unless you are playing as Telvanny (with Ring of Equity all mages are jokes against you).
The Atronach is good on Mages too because of the existence of Restore Magicka potions
Gotta appreciate a man that puts product in his hair and then puts a beanie on.
You missed one of the best attack spells that you can make: Levitation on target 1pt for as long a duration as you can afford. It essentially slows the enemy down enormously and keeps you out of their attack range. It greatly improves your ability to kite enemies and bombard them with damage dealing spells. If you fight clustered groups you could probably give in an AOE radius, but the cost might be prohibitive.
theres also the fact that it aparently can kill cliff racers from what i heard
@@creater20225 It can, they just have to be high enough in the air to die from the fall damage
hmm. make a levitation and frenzy aoe spell. 1-100 with 10-20 radios lol
Yeah if you want to cheese you can put 1 or 2 second invisibility on self tp your offensive spells. Adds like 7-8 magicka cost and it causes most enemies to drop aggro or run away f rom you (in OpenMW's better AI) every time you hurt them.
Or if you want to be super cheesy, just cast calm on them and then kill them. They'll just swear at you but won't do anything. Fun for a while but pretty much ruins the game in the long run.
Ha! I have played Morrowind since it came out an love playing mages and messing around with the magic system making my own spells. But I never though to a touch based levitate spell. I'm giving that a try.
I just picked Morrowind back up after watching your videos. Such a nostalgic game. Love the videos dude!
That's awesome to hear! Good luck out in Vvardenfell fellow outlander🙏
Every veteran Morrowind player seems to have their go-to early gold cheese. Mine was sniping Vivec guards with bound longbow or raiding the Vivec vaults
I have been playing Morrowind once a year since release with zero cheese. I try to clear my mind as much as possible and play each of my characters as a true outlander. Of course, it's not *entirely* possible... I always save Tarhiel, or at the very least, avoid his death.
Timing of these videos for me is perfect. I haven’t played this since I was 14 (now 33). I just picked it up and am having a blast.
That's awesome to hear! Glad you're enjoying the channel. Best of luck out there adventurer.
I just made an imperial mage. Been playing maybe 6 months. 120 hrs. But have not beat the main quest yet. Or any quest line tbh. My first mages save file got corrupted somehow. Second character was an imperial short blade/illusion/alchemy with a focus on intelligence and speed. 3rd character is another mage with a focus on alteration/alchemy/destruction. Having fun. Gonna go play rn
for people who cant get the dark brotherhood assassin to spawn so you can get that extra gold, go to the guard tower in southwest of balmora, on the top floor, on a wardrobe, will be a sword worth a bunch of gold, sell it to a vendor, preferably creepy in caldera because of his huge amount of gold being 5000
Fun bit in regards to the Breton: If you pick Magic Specialization, Destruction, Illusion, and Alterations as majors and Restoration, Conjuration, and Mysticism as minors, you'll start the game with at least 30 in every caster skill + the complete list of starter spells. Lots of versatility right off the bat.
I normally go with STR + END as starting Attributes (More starting health, More health per level, better carry weight and melee damage) Then pick Shortblade and Light Armor as Majors + Blunt Weapon and Block as Minors.
Top it off with Atronach birthsign, and you have a powerhouse start. Use Bound Dagger for insane early game melee DPS, summon and piss off your own Ancestral Ghosts to counter Atronach's stunted Magicka, and have access to all utility spells, like teleport, Unlock, Calm, Frenzy, Levitate, Waterwalking/Breathing ASAP.
Combine the easy grabs Mentor's Ring, the Cuirass of Savoir's Hide, Boots of Blinding Speed, and Mantle of Woe to buff the ever living crap out of your mage, and score The Blackhand's Dagger and Mace of Molag Bal as primary weapons. Net the Vampiric Ring and a Blood Feast shield and so long as you don the Cuirass of Savor's Hide, you'll never need to fear Reflect for all your Absorb Spells and Enchantments.
Atronach BS is phenomenal on mages, as long as you know the tricks (Summon and Aggro your own Ancestor Ghost for Spell Absorption; Join the Tribunal Temple for cheaper shrine fees; pay 5 gold for Almsivi Restoration and get all your magicka restored). Atronach is strangely exceptional on Warrior type builds who are less dependent on spells to do damage. It gives warrior types a defense against spell casters in the form of Spell Absorption and also increases their magicka pool enough to warrant picking up some healing and utility spells.
Why block as a minor? This is my first playthrough.
@@MrRDRII Because if you're going to use Daggers and the Mace of Molag Bal (For it's magic absorb effect), you might as well benefit from the defense of a shield. Plus if you rush for a Blood Feast Shield, you'll have access to a stupidly powerful Absorb Health effect.
@@clayendfield4850 thanks for the help!!
I literally could not find a serviceable Morrowind mage guide when I started my latest character just a few months ago.
Go figure. Great video.
If you have the Tribunal expansion, Light Armour is the best starting choice. You can paralyse, poison, and then sit back and wait for the assassins to die, and loot them for their stuff. It's the best Light Armour in the game until you get Glass.
Fun mage facts:
You can restore all ur magicka on unmodded version by making spell or enchant of drain inteligence 100 for 1sec on self.
Rings with attack spells on cast dont use mana and u can cast their spells faster cause they dont have animation.
Magic resistance is not as good as someone might think cause it doesnt work on fire, shock, ice and posion spells. It works only on magic effects like burden, drain etc. It also prevents u from using drain inteligence trick.
For future reference. When casting spells like telekinesis(or any spell) they are more likely to cast when your stamina is fully recovered. Full stamina makes you more likely to cast a spell. Low stamina does the opposite. It factors into the dice roll.
The trick here is to just create a restoration spell with 2 fatigue per second for 120 seconds or something. Costs like 20 magicka to cast and it negates stamina drain when you're running completely. Really effective early game (unless you move by jumping 100% of the time).
my first playthrough was using the atronach sign. and my god... if you get the right enchants you can be completely immune to magic users and it's absolutely glorious, tho during this playthrough i believe i was able to stack a stupidly high reflect damage too so by the time i wasclose to the end of the main story i could just stand there afk and still kill people
Fondling leaves in the garden fucking got me dude. Lmao
I'm glad you gave people recommendations for gear what a lot of people don't understand is Mages are extremely magical item Reliant
I'd also recommend the boots of blinding Speed on breton's because they can resist binding effect and since they are slow starting off anyway
The last mage I played was a Khajit Sorcerer Atronach. Worked very well. Blast some spells and use the ghost to recharge. Make enchanted items for healing. Female Khajit start with 40 endurance... which is better than 30. And they have that handy night vision spell.
Thanks for the morrowind vids. Felt like playing again, but had no idea where to start as a mage.
Just found you today and I can't believe your channel isn't bigger. Great content man.
Note that choosing willpower as favored attribute only grant a +2% chance to successfully cast spells, and willpower is very easy to level up as a mage. While choosing endurance instead grants +5 health point at level 1 and +1 health point every level (+4 instead of +3 as a breton). And endurance is hard to level up as a mage unless you use heavy armor and/or spears.
Willpower has no other effects?
@@Sai-go6lr Willpower also increases paralyse resistance. Paralyse effects are rare but very dangerous. However I don't think 5-ish % of paralyse resistance is a match for 25-ish % health bonus. Willpower also increases fatigue points. But endurance too (and it also slightly increases fatigue regeneration).
Great video! Love your presentation and content. Btw, if you put on that amulet you get from the locked box, you get transported to a scary room where this powerful daedra attacks you. If you defeat him you get a powerful cool looking sword
Mages are incredible. Just be careful with enchanting. I took it too far and now I struggle to enjoy the game. 😭or maybe it's because I've been playing unmodded for 20 years.
Enchanting actually is not as powerful as spellcasting could be.
While enchanted items are limited in strength by item's capacity (I used to carry seven or eight daedric tower shields), mage's capabilities are limited by skill values and magicka supplies, and willing to mix up some ash yams with netch leather into a potion, drink it and repeat the process. Thinking about the MOST powerful spell in the game, enchanting is not the answer to this question, yet really powerful thing to turn the game into kindergarten experience
So enchanting is the strongest form of offense -without exploits-.
WoW! Even disregarding the discussion on enchant, I'm impressed youve stayed vanilla after all this time!! A true connoisseur 👌
@@CoffeeNutGaming Thanks! I like Dwarf Fortress so graphics are not a concern most of the time.
My commitment to the vanilla game will only last until I exhaust the original content and I STILL haven't! Can't wait to start Tamriel Rebuilt. 😍
Play modded
Underrated channel right here. Great vid!
Nice content, for sure subbed. Yours and Lyle Schnubs Morrowind informational videos are some of best I've found for sure.
A nice tidbit about Conjuration as major skill and Short Blade as a minor is you can summon a Bound Dagger pretty effectively in the early game that fortifies Short Blade and makes that hit chance better til you can access the paralysis dagger.
Thanks, that's great to hear! And very true, bound weapons are amazing early.
Something about your millennial dad vibe that really appeals to this millennial dad. 10/10 chuckled at the census and excise diddy
I pride myself in my Altmer builds. I've of my favorites was a Altmer Atronach Battlemage. I would eat daedra hearts to regain Magicka.
Also a good spell to have is the light spell. Then enchant it constant effect onto right and left ebony pouldrons. There is a robe in Molag mat that is enchanted constant effect 50pts. Feather.
Can you also do an alchemy and enchanting guide? that would be awesome . Thanks for the video by the way you gain a sub 👍
An unarmed, unarmored mage is a blast once you make a Sanctuary suit and start brewing OP potions... you can carry everything in the game, AOE kill an entire cave and frenzy then falcon punch Ordinators for fun and gold.
7:04 weakness to magicka is actually not that bad. It doesn't affect any elemental spells, only damage attributes, blindness, burden, absorb health and such. Literally only bad against vampires and bonewalkers. And if you are trying to equip boots of blinding speed ofc.
I had already made a mage based character so mine obviously was a lil weaker than yours however I was lost on where to go and how to get started and this vid helped so much and taught me a little more about morrowind and my plan is to watch all these guides to give me that base knowledge on how to start any type of character
holy shit, i never knew telekinesis can bypass traps! i no longer deserve to call myself telvanni...
Took me a long time to learn that as well. Don't worry, you still have a place in the mushroom 😄
Best thing I ever did for a High Elf I played was immediately craft a 2-12 damage for 6 in 10ft spell. Casting it wasn't out of reach even at level 1 and it just wrecked most enemies it hit.
gotta go with altmer atronach sign. you'll have your alchemy to recover magicka thats more convenient than sleeping anyway and late game with the mantle of woe and a ton of intelligence and willpower boosting stuff you can sling some truly apocalyptic spells.
For efficient leveling, make sure to tag a few endurance based skills. Early bonuses to endurance ensure your health per level won't leave you getting clapped in two hits in the higher levels.
No for efficient leveling do not tag any endurance skills if you can avoid it. Then use training to level the now low endurance skills to get maximum bonuses to endurance every level. Though like he said spear is a great weapon skill, so thats not an absolute thing.
@@JayAshkevron thanks for the comment man, I've genuinely been misunderstanding efficient leveling for YEARS. makes so much more sense now lol. cheers!
@@DavidBrown-zp5br No problem man, I hope I didn't come off sounding like a jerk. I didn't mean it like that. Morrowind leveling is very obtuse and counter intuitive. lol
@@JayAshkevron all good man! i know how rare it is to have a genuinely nice interaction in a youtube comment section but i'm glad to have had one with you!
It's so much easier to build a warrior then switch to magic later once you can buy the spells and equipment. There's a million ways to cheese the game with permanently enchanted gear.
Thanks man, started playing morrowind as argonian spearwoman a few days ago but I plan another playthrough with magic, very helpful!
Btw I think forgetting about Tarhiel is amazing, this encounter is hilarious.
Tarhiel gets me everytime haha Glad you enjoyed the video!
Spear is also one of the only 3 Endurance Skills. Handy to be able to pump Endurance early.
This game is more enjoyable than skyrim, just by using mark and recall there's a sense of relief and feeling safe everytime i recall to a marked location from a creepy dungeon :3 and u just made me want to play again, good thing i have open morrowind on my phone lol
great guide dude, usually play the stealth archer in every bethesda game but i wanted to try mage and this was hekpful af
Glad you enjoyed it!
@@CoffeeNutGaming proceedfed to trai ncojuration and my other magic skills fgor 2 hourss and havent touched the main quest at all. Currently using flame atronarchs to eradicate my enemies
For any beginners if you use a Breton or High Elf and take the atronach have conjuration as a major skill. Conjuration as a major skill gives you the Ancestor Ghost ability. If you summon a ghost and attack it you can absorb the spells cast and restore magicka easily. That technique works with any race but best with the 2 mentioned before
just found this video about searching for builds and i loved watching this video from beginning to end.
I made a hybrid class with long blade and heavy armor as major skills, it's really powerful paired up with conjuration in the early game when you don't have a whole lot of strength to haul around equipment. I also took destruction as a major skill and eventually transitioned to primarily using that for big damage, binding my equipment and stepping into the fray when I'm low on magicka. I went with the apprentice instead of the atronach for my birth sign, because it cancels out the resist magicka from my Breton heritage and gets me a very serviceable pool without being a pain to deal with in the early game.
Used to be I would just cheese the game with the alchemy exploit but seeing how quickly you end up with lots of money just from looting dungeons and stuff kind of made me feel bad about that. I can't say I'm not exploiting anything because I did the classic one where I rest several days when I first got corprus so I got a major permanent buff to strength and endurance, but I feel a lot more balanced out and while I'm quite powerful I'm not literally mathematically unkillable either. Ilunubi even at level 15 was challenging in the end with juggling my relatively low health pool with dealing damage to Dagoth Gares.
Underated CZcamsr
Thank you 🙏
A couple of other good mage items to go for are the staff of magnus and mantle of woe. Also have to say playing an atronach birthsign isn't hard, if you join the temple and imperial cult bc you can replenish Magicka for free with the altar blessings wherever you go
Love the cliff hanger with the Amulet at the end. peeps that are new watching this in for a surprise when you put it on.
Which you just ruined. Lol.
Having all the willpower based skills as major or minor is IMHO a mistake. I always leave one out so I can 'top up' when levelling up; it's usually Alteration as it's not that important initially and buying enough skills to make it usable is easy, and it levels quickly anyway.
I also also leave out Alchemy too, for similar reasons, security is available of course but again, IMO, it should be agility based not intelligence based.
For Atronach builds on consoles get a damage attribute spell preferably INT, go to spell creator in the mages guild, then create damage intelligence spell x100 on self. Who needs recover magika pots or resting lol.
Great guide, gonna go make things go boom as a mage now
Enjoy! Just make sure you test the fireballs outside
Hell yea we fucking love morrowind
Damn right we do 💪
Good quality editing. Excited to see this channel grow
I'd recommend a high elf over a Breton for a mage, that extra magic is way better than the magic resistance
Laughs in intelligence potion
Depends on your other specializations. I did a mage-heavy hybrid character that also specced into heavy armor, block and a minor in short blade, so I could have good defense and a bit of a backup when I ran out of magic.
Awesome video, this really helped me. Your channel deserves more subscribers!
Playing as a High Elf with the Apprentice star sign is both cracked and whacked.
I saw Chris at the Luxor actually. It was pretty cool
Actually learned about the pea guy in biology in highschool lol
First mistake you did was not grind until you had endurance, intelligence and willpower at 100
First time starting morrowind , thank you
13:37 that sh*t startled me way more than it should have...
I think people just need to remember that morrowind is more of a sim game than a hero RPG. You start as a literal nothing nobody who can be killed by literally anything. To go pure mage and not wear armor or use weapons, is very difficult and conflict needs to be mostly avoided if possible until you are fairly adept at combat magics and protection spells.
What i like to do, is have that stunted magicka and exploit trapped chests and doors with saves, you have a 50% chance to absorb the trap, and it's quite useful.
I chose dark elf because of the 75% resist fire and the destruction stat boost. Im playing a battle mage character so not a full on mage only build. I know bretons are great battlemages in other tes games but I figured dark elf would of been the safest bet. Will this choice screw me over late game or should it be fine. I should mention my major attributes are Short Blade, Destruction, Mysticism, Restoration, Heavy armor, and unarmored. My minors are Athletics, Acrobatics, Illusion, Long Blade, and im blanking on the rest but im sure you get the picture. lmk ty
Edit: and also my favorite attributes were strength and willpower. And my specialization was combat
Impressive. These clothes suit you well.
So, what I often do with my mages is train heavy armor, medium armor, block, and pole arm to level endurance in addition to giving me access to that equipment late game.
Mindfreak! Loved that show!
Just go with dark elf because they're cool and use the Atronach to have loads of mana. Magicka potions and cash are both plentiful so the stunted Magicka won't be that much of an issue.
11:52 "streamer brain"
I've heard of this phenomenon. Your concentration is split between entertaining and playing a game, so you're actually doing both things less good than you can.
3:13 Hey, bro. Thanks.imma play my own.
TBH I just started power-leveling Illusion and Destruction. Illusion is in my major skills and Destruction in my misc. When I'm done I'll do Conjuration and Mysticism and then Alteration and Restoration. I'm not doing any quests until I've mastered at least three schools.
"Thinking caps", Outlander? Here we call them Colovian Fur Helms.
An ashlander of culture I see
great vid really feel ready now
Best of luck adventurer 🤘
Still remember the first time I played Morrowind. Broke the game in ten minutes as a Breton named Shapiffany, then crashed the game and never played it again lmao
The true Morrowind experience haha
Does anyone else get a Sam Rockwell vibe from this guy? I love it.
Can we get a video on how to make a highly efficient spear build, possibly using an argonian?...
I usually do a custom dark elf battlemage with a good spread of skills but don't take all the skills that cover a single attribute. It's essential if you want those 5+ bonuses on level up
For me, the reason I'm looking at your guide is I just discovered that you can't regen mana automatic ly
Marshmerrow/Wickweat (guy in balmoral temple) make about 2k gold then go to sadrith mora through mages guild. Go to imperial shrine there and
Ash yam/Bloat make, drink and sell intelligence potions until you get 100 million intelligence.
Go back to balmora and make about 50 ish health potions. Then
Wickwheat/Scrib Jelly from lady downstairs in temple make willpower potions. Then
Void salts/frost salts from alchemist in balmora make refill Magicka potions.
Go to scamp in caldera and sell the rest of your potions keeping 5 of each. Go make godly spells. Have fun!
Instead of selling the deadric sanctuary amulet wait till your a higher lvl and put it on trust me it’s really cool and you could get a cool item from battlespire
Man i like your videos, nice style haha. I played Morrowind too but i do it all in german. Still my favourite game :)
Glad you enjoyed the videos and thank you for the compliment! Its good to know that the love of Morrowind transcends language 💯
Please make more Morrowind build vids
Ask and you shall receive (soon)
Heavy armor, spear/staff mage. My fav mage build.
also if you use a resist magicka spell of 100 percent and put on something like the Mantle of Woe, it negates any negative effects while giving you the perks. its broken and usually what i do if i play a mage. only real problem is heading all the way to the corner of solstheim to get it, lol
Can't you also pop on down to Divayth Fyr's Corprusarium and loot all of the 100 locked chests down there for more gold?
Mage is OP. I personally never had an issue. Good vid.
Atta boy for the Testement t shirt. Long love Metal
I just recommended going to Tel Fyr to get the Saviors Hide in your spell's word video.
Nah jokes aside thank you, a lot of this was helpful to me for remaking my first character(I chose a name in the Arena style of name generation and it wasn't meshing well with the other Bretons in the game culturally so I remade the character and took it as a chance to change my skills). Went a bit of a different way, I'm a defensive mage with heavy armor, unarmored and block, I generally walk around in nice clothes or robes and throw on the gauntlets, the shield, and now I guess the helmet and cuirass for when I'm in combat, but I never specced an offensive combat skill, so when I'm out of magic I'm fairly out of options. That's not a worry though since this setup gives me a good arsenal and the means to build up a veritable stockpile of useful spells and the magicka to sling them, while rolling damage when I can.
Hi I'm new to morrowind and this helped I just don't know where to sell these items 😅
It sucks I’ve missed out on this game and Oblivion, but on the bright side, they aren’t going anywhere, I can always just play them 😂
Every time I make a mage it dies within two seconds, thanks❤
Well played, sir.
Great guide. Keep em coming.