Skyrim Character Building » Discussions


Contest Build: The Hedge Mage

Tags: #Character Build Elementalist  #Character Build Mage  #Character Build Bound Weapons  #Rank:Exemplar  #Contest4  #Raidriar  #Tae-Rai  #Someone sort these tags out I'm in a rush :P  #Tags courtesy of Albino cuz he's the best CB host :P 
  • Member
    February 8, 2016
    Holy Jesus Christ this is a blog post.
  • Member
    February 8, 2016
    I Have created a short collection of Clothes/Robe combos for when i play this in the Future. If are interested i could PM the Combos for you.
  • Member
    February 8, 2016

    Just got around to replying to this, sorry about the wait...

    There is a 'free' Apprentice Robes set on some fool of a Vigilant investigating the abandoned house in Markarth.  You might also suggest the plainer-looking 75% robes, like the necromancer ones, or one of the simpler 50% robes worn by 'bad guy' mages that give a small cost reduction to one spell school?  I think blue robes look decent enough with apprentice hoods, and they really fit the hedge mage look well.

    For clothing, there isn't really a set look - novice stuff is just my recommendation since it's easier to get hold of, and some people like to have an outfit that will last them the whole game.

    Wait, what?  Why?  30 gold?  Seriously?  Go pick up a free woodcutter's axe, activate a firewood pile once, and let me know how you think 30 gold is such a huge ordeal.  If you're particularly concerned with the spell Faralda teaches, save scum until she offers Healing Hands.  It's useful for the doggy, and not otherwise functional or powerful compared to the guaranteed spell tome drops elsewhere.  Since the flame atronach can (and will) also be created at the Atronach Forge either way, there's really no excuse for at least getting in that way (as opposed to buying the spell and not 'earning' Flamey yourself).  I know you want the idea of not being strongly associated with the college, and there's not much of interest in the place when buying spell tomes isn't a part of life, but this bit of writing just doesn't make sense.  There are better ways of explaining having little to no interest in the college, like just deciding after going to class that you have no interest in these idiots and their teaching style and their Saarthal nonsense, or even just skipping class forever.  There are still a few side quests that don't involve heavy association with the college, and Shalidor's Insights scrolls could be pretty helpful.  Training Destruction is also really important for reaching Adept spells in the first place.  Do you know how many ice spikes, or how many hours of spamming Sparks/Frostbite at higher-level enemies it will take to reach 60 Destruction?  I did it pretty recently with unlimited concentration casting in order to test just how awful it is vs. alternatives for my own WIP build, and I wouldn't wish that torment on anyone.  It's possible to use Sybille instead, but I wouldn't.  She's scary! 

    Erm... Have you missed the point of the build? The whole idea here is to not buy spells. The whole point of this build is that the Hedge Mage turns away from the pompous wizards at the College and favours a more adventurous style of learning. But, rather than just saying that, I presented that Faralda encounter as the justification of turning your back on the College. You visit the College first, when you have little to no other spells in your spellbook aside from Flames, Sparks and Healing. Faralda is asking for a spell that is way above his skills, and is charging for it, so he, being the Nord/Orc/other non-magical race that he is decides to stuff it and go learn himself. To me that makes way more sense than just turning up to first lesson and deciding to not show up again - why would he do that if he's already in the College, and what he seeks is ultimate magical power? He's looking for an alternative to the College, if he was already inside he'd have no reason to go adventuring. Also, no College also means no quests there, again it's the ground rules of the build to not interact with other wizards.

    I found Destruction levelled fine, since that's one of your main offences. Ignite and Freeze are good for levelling, as is Flame Cloak. It took some time, but Destruction usually does without training.

    The problem I have with this is related to being very interested in hedge witches, folk tales about them, and of course regularly associating with several in my 'business' circles.  What you are describing is the exact opposite of a hedge witch.  They are very much folk healers, and while they'd normally be the sort to aid a hero on their quest rather than the hedge witch going on a quest herself, I like to imagine that helping Lars with a bully is exactly what a hedge witch would do... and in fact is doing.  His friend, Olava the Seer?  You see where this is going?

    I was more going off the Wikipedia article when I initially planned this build. The idea was to create a self taught mage - he's still a mage nonetheless, which means a certain arrogance is needed. He also believes himself to be better than the other mages, because of his unique style of learning. While I can accept that helping Lars is certainly a folk healing activity, I never created this Hedge Mage with this in mind. My vision of a Hedge Mage was that he'd be way too pompous to deal with a weak non-magical child, when he could be helping Andurs clear out his crypt or helping the Gray Manes find their son.

    Now, let's talk about perks.  I'd be a lot happier if I had a bit more archery, but that's just me.  I survived just fine with only Overdraw when playing the Mystic Diplomat, but Ranger perk is a hell of a drug, mate.  My biggest peeve with the perks, though, is how much you invested in augmenting all three Destruction elements and reducing the hardly-combat-useful Alteration spells, but then after talking up Conjuration so much you didn't even bother with Necromancy, Dark Souls, Summoner, Elemental Potency, Twin Souls...

    The idea with the perks was to enable you to use basically every spell that is available to you, rather than create a powerhouse. Normally I'm all about that, but this is more of an RP based build. Therefore, as a weaker mage, it made way more sense for me to go for more damage in Destruction, which is far more mundane and easier to pass off than having superpowered minions who don't even need backup, or two summons for that matter. That's just way too 'master wizard' for this guy, he's not that powerful. Also, Ranger and kiting isn't as necessary with a bow since you're usually using the bow from either the shadows or while hiding behind a summon.

    Completely forgot about Meeko, just thought Bran/Sceolang would be good since you can pick them up from the Dawnguard while helping them out. I'll add something about Meeko as an alternative.

  • Member
    February 8, 2016

    Sure!

  • Member
    February 8, 2016

    I altered it for this coment. Calm down. I recite the quite all the time when I am late to something. xD No hard feelings. I just altered to add in how he is late on putting the build up and it happens to be a mage/wizard build. :p

  • Member
    February 8, 2016
    I will send em when i get home.
  • February 8, 2016

    Wizards can be verbose at times... or all the time...

  • February 8, 2016

    Erm... Have you missed the point of the build? The whole idea here is to not buy spells.

    I believe I pointed out the not buying spells part?  I still feel this section could be better written, with less contrived and forced proceedings than "30 gold? NEVAR!" which is the impression I still get reading that text.

    I was more going off the Wikipedia article when I initially planned this build.

    The article that doesn't cite a single source other than a Terry Pratchett novel?  Don't trust those, mate.  The articles, obviously.  You can trust everything Mr. Pratchett wrote to be an excellent read.

    I found Destruction levelled fine, since that's one of your main offences. Ignite and Freeze are good for levelling, as is Flame Cloak. It took some time, but Destruction usually does without training.

    This statement actually makes me question whether you legitimately played this build, mate... I just tested some of these spells in-game for comparision.

    On a fresh Breton (15 Destruction) character with Mage Stone and no sleeping bonuses, on Adept, with a wolf consoled up to 1000 hp:

    • Ignite did not level once, even if I spammed the spell nonstop to make less use of the taper damage.
    • Freeze leveled up to 19, nearly 20.  I remembered this spell being a lot worse, but might have confused it with Ignite's painfully low XP yield, plus I have an aversion to using frost magic. Also, the wiki information about its skill XP is wrong (it states 0), and since that is the first place I look for reference...
    • Lightning Bolt (for comparison) leveled up to 21.
    • Sparks leveled up to 23 (nearly 24)!!!
    • Flame Cloak, uh, have you ever tried using cloaks to level?  There was barely a dent in my Destruction skill XP, so I gave the wolf 10,000 hp and just kept a flame cloak up to see how long it would take.  I finally got to 16 Destruction after several minutes of getting chewed on.  A mammoth would have been long dead, hell even a draugr death overlord would be.  This is basically like attaching an RC car to the bottom of your 3000-lb. automobile and saying that the RC car 'helped' your car accelerate.  Cloaks will never be a noteworthy factor in leveling Destruction.

    I was seriously just doing all of this in-game within the last week, while trying to get a character of my own up to 60 Destruction.  It's not fast, it's not easy, it's not worth it.  If I were going to play this build, I would either train Destruction with Faralda/Sybille, or buy a rune spell.

    Also, you said Destruction is one of the main offences [sic] just now.  But I thought that was what the Bound Bow is for?  And it'll certainly be more effective than Destruction, trust me.  This is something I was just doing with my WIP build too.  You saw the photos recently with bound bow and robes, right? There's a reason I started using runes before battle.

    And on the subject of the Bound Bow, you're still standing by the idea that this mage, who will leave the college because they want him to cast a simple Apprentice-level spell like Healing Hands, which would actually add to the build by making the dog companion more helpful, is going to refuse because the spell is beyond his abilities and then immediately go learn Adept and Expert-level Conjuration spells‽

  • Member
    February 8, 2016
    We played this build, mate. We both did.
  • Member
    February 8, 2016
    I think this is a great build for being a mini-build even though I'm not too fond of mini-builds but I love the roleplaying aspect of no buying spells. Well done in my opinion! Currently level 10 with this and having a blast!