Skyrim Tips and Tricks » Discussions


Debate: Feeling Lucky?

Tags: #Tips and Tricks Debates 
  • Member
    May 20, 2015

    Skyrim's character leveling system took several significant departures from those of its predecessors. For instance, there is no longer a need to go to sleep in order to level-up, and you no longer choose a class or major/minor skills when designing your character. However, perhaps the biggest change of all was the removal of Attributes.

    In Morrowind and Oblivion, when your character leveled up, you could allocate points into Attributes such as Endurance, Willpower, Strength, etc. These Attributes governed several skills apiece, improving their functionality and effectiveness. They also governed various actions — higher Agility meant less chance of being staggered, Willpower translated to Magicka Regen, etc.

    But to me, perhaps the most fascinating — and certainly the most nebulous — of these attributes was Luck. Luck was the one attribute that did not directly govern any skills; rather, it had a more subtle role in many of the events and actions your character would undertake. A savvy builder could use this to great effect in the right circumstances. Consider, for example, Mehrunes Razor. In Skyrim, it has a flat 1.98% chance to instantly kill enemies. In Oblivion, if pushed to its limit, Luck would allow for up to an 11% chance to instantly kill with the same weapon! Think about the implications this can have for gamblers, bards, burglars ... and really, any type of character at all.

    So, given that we've all had a fair bit of time to master the mechanics in Skyrim, do you wish Luck had been implemented into the game? Why or why not? If so, how would you propose incorporating it? 

    Note: For more details on how Luck worked in Morrowind and Oblivion, see their respective pages on UESP! [1] [2]

  • Member
    May 20, 2015

    Some of you already know my thoughts on this subject, but seeing as I’m the one inviting the discussion, it’s only fair that I open things up by sharing my position.

    tl;dr: I really like the idea of Luck in Elder Scrolls games.

    Granted, a lot of its use is no longer relevant — (Oblivion and Skyrim dispensed with the chances for attacks/enchantments to fail, as was the case in previous games) — but I still think Luck is perhaps the best way for Bethesda to keep some of the mechanical ties to the series’ tabletop roots. Skyrim actually has quite a few “chance to proc” effects that you may see regularly: paralyze enchantments, Ahzidal’s armor, Merhunes razor, diseases, spell absorption, chaos damage, etc. I would absolutely love a chance to push these effects to their limit in terms of maximizing the chance for them to occur.

    Now, with Skyrim’s leveling system, it’d have to be done a bit differently. One option would simply be to allow the player to put points into Luck when leveling up, instead of Health/Magicka/Stamina. Which, honestly, I think would work fine. Another option, that might be especially preferable to avoid too much exploitation: Only include buffs to Luck in the form of unique items and passive abilities. A reward for a Daedric quest, or a unique amulet found in the wilds, or a divine blessing that needs to be re-acquired every 12 hours. Don’t even make Luck a tangible trait that the player can observe, but simply keep it in as an underlying mechanic that may be altered via a select assortment of spells and abilities. Make the player work hard to get even the smallest buffs, and knowingly forego tempting alternatives in order to use any Luck boosting item.

    I’d love to make a proper Luck-based gambler, even if it meant giving up other useful effects/rewards. We’ve had a few builds here that were based around items/effects with diceroll mechanics, but they’ve never felt fully authentic to me, because you have no way of tilting the odds in your favor. There’s a whole dynamic to characterization here that’s just missing from Skyrim, and I really hope they bring it back in some form for TES VI.

    What do you guys think? Old/outdated, or a mechanic worth revisiting? How extensive would you want its role to be if it were brought back?

  • Member
    May 20, 2015
    I wish all attributes would come back...

    But to your question, I feel like a chance to fail or not hit as hard, stagger, maybe an occasional trip lol would be awesome. It would bring so much life to the game.

    Low level characters might experience some bumbles and screw ups since their luck is so low. Higher level characters would obviously take charge and not make as many mistakes.

    I am 100% on board if they brought some sort of mechanic like this back!
  • May 20, 2015

    I love Luck but the Elder Scrolls decided to base itself of IRL sources and I don't get luck in either..

    I think that it has and always had the ability to be one of the most interesting attributes or skills in a video game. Having an attribute that effects everything by a little amount and when pushed to the limits really pushes your character up as a more interesting and in particular scenario, extremely skilled character is great.

    I loved that skill but much prefer Skyrim's mechanics, bring back some way to alter Luck and I'd be cool with it but Oblivion/Morrowind had fairly horrible leveling systems. 

  • Member
    May 20, 2015
    I ignored Luck in Oblivion, but that was before I got to this site and learned that Roleplay can drastically enhance enjoyment of the game, or that you can do some major things with what seems like insignificant aspects of it. I would probably enjoy messing about with Luck if it was included in Skyrim. I did NOT enjoy trying to increase the right skills and attributes at the right time so that I could get that +5 bonus, though... "Crud! Here comes an ogre; no way I can take that bad boy on, but if I run away it's going to level my whatever, and if I do that it will be to late to level my..." WHAM!!!
  • Member
    May 21, 2015

    There's also the opposite end of the spectrum: You could intentionally nerf your character's Luck to create disadvantages that effectively tie roleplay and gameplay together. Imagine a unique item or artifact with a super powerful enchantment but that also has a secondary "Damage Luck" effect. Do you knowingly accept that penalty?

    As for all attributes, I'm torn. On the one hand, there was some good fun to be had with them -- as well as some of the skills that have been removed. In particular, the Agility attribute and Acrobatics and Athletics skills were a blast when you maximized them in Morrowind and Oblivion. Jumping across wide streets from roof to roof, surviving falls from 50 foot cliffs, skipping across rivers, etc. Those were both entertaining and practical to have. Not to mention better movement speed, reduced stagger chance, etc.

    On the other hand, attributes led to too much micromanagement, at least for a lot of players out there (myself among them). Allocating points to attributes upon leveling up meant that you had to be very cognizant of the skills you were using at all times ... which could be difficult with skills like Athletics, Acrobatics, Speechcraft, and Security, all of which would level-up pretty quickly whether you liked it or not. It was easy to "waste" those points and feel like your build wasn't quite "perfect". Skyrim's system definitely gets rid of that issue, and I think that's a positive thing. But yeah, if there's some way to bring back attributes without muddling up the level-up system as much as prior TES games, I'd be all for it.

    As for Luck, I feel it was only tenuously linked to the other attributes. It would be pretty trivial to add it back separately from the others in some new form, as I suggested in my first comment. So even if bringing them all back isn't as practical, I think it'd be feasible for Luck to return in some form.

  • Member
    May 21, 2015

    Yeah, I didn't really fiddle with Luck that much in the old games either, honestly. But looking back now, I really see how much you could do with it if you tried. If it were in Skyrim — and if it were effectively implemented — I feel like we could have plenty of unique builds based around it.

    And yeah, Luck was a great mechanic for marrying roleplay with gameplay, whether you go all-in for max Luck, or all-in for min Luck, or simulate growth by increasing Luck gradually as the character develops. Or maybe have a character who's lucky at night but unlucky during the day, based on his gear/blessings/spells, etc.

    I'm with you on the micromanaging attribute allocation during level-ups being a sloppy system. But that's something that I feel could be improved without needing to totally ditch attributes. I know there are a few mods that bring back MW/OB style attributes and some of them seem to have done a pretty good job of it despite being limited by the vanilla game engine and scripts. No reason Bethesda couldn't do it even better, since they have more access than modders do.

    But even without bringing back all the attributes and/or the old leveling systems -- and that could be a whole separate debate  -- I think there's a place for Luck in Skyrim. And I hope Bethesda considers that while working on TES VI.

  • Member
    May 21, 2015

    I love Luck but the Elder Scrolls decided to base itself of IRL sources and I don't get luck in either..

    Yeah, I think it's super interesting, and one of the more unique things about the older TES games. I know the mechanics of Luck could've fueled many T&T investigative threads, stuff like:

    • Is it more valuable to perk Luck vs. _____? Here's the math....
    • Mehrunes Razor: The Best Weapon in the Game
    • How Luck Impacts Speech Checks
    • etc.

    There are probably a lot of builds on the blog where, if you played it once with max Luck and then again with min Luck, it'd be a completely different experience. Now imagine building a character utterly around Luck manipulation, and just how much you could do if the game used that mechanic effectively. It's a serious shame they got rid of it, IMO.

  • Member
    May 21, 2015

    I don't have much to say on the subject, but while I don't want to have attributes added back into the game, I think adding a few opportunities for players to get active effects(s) that increase the chance for things like paralyze enchantments, spell absorption, etc. to proc.

  • Member
    May 21, 2015

    Very interesting ideas!

    Luck as a fourth attribute, alongside M/H/S, could be really cool.  Currently, we have 3 attributes that are strongly associated with the 3 archetypes: Mage, Warrior, Thief.  The problem is, Stamina isn't all that useful for thieves, who in a lot of cases would prefer to avoid fighting altogether.  

    But Luck would be great for a thief character to build up!  Of course, a lot would depend on how powerful the effect of Luck would be in the game.  If Luck had a small but notable impact in combat (damage taken or damage received, like it did in Oblivion/MW), a thief could afford to spend fewer perks in combat skills.  

    This is another topic altogether, but I wish Speech challenges had a percentage chance of success instead of auto-success/fail depending on your Speech skill level alone.  If Speech challenges were like Fallout 3, Luck could play a role there too.

    Also, I'd imagine Luck could play a role in bartering.  Even if there wasn't a barter mechanic per se, you could still imagine the game "rolling" at the start of a transaction to determine how good your prices were going to be, with Luck influencing that roll.