Freedom remains one of the reasons why Bethesda fans love The Elder Scrolls series. After all, the series lets players live a life as an adventurer in a living and breathing world where their choices matter. However, aside from its fully-open world, players of Oblivion might slowly realize that this "freedom" also comes in the form of making their own spells.
This activity, called Spellmaking, becomes accessible once players become a part of Cyrodiil's Mages Guild. As a member of the Guild, players can then combine various effects and "mechanics" to create fully-optimized spells for their needs. However, this system becomes a bit overwhelming at first glance. Thankfully, the game slowly eases players into spellmaking if they understand its basic principles. Here are some important considerations.
10 Create Spells For A Price
While players can theoretically create and use any spell they want, they still need to follow certain considerations. As such, players who want to maximize their use of Oblivion's Spellmaking feature should always keep the costs of Spellmaking in mind.
Naturally, players who end up making a spell too expensive for them can't craft the spell. Players who don't want to cheat their way to get gold should consider creating spells based on their budget and intended use. Moreover, if players end up needing an exorbitant amount of gold for an OP spell, players might become OP in terms of other skills before acquiring said gold in the first place.
9 Spellmaking Has Limitations
Aside from Spellmaking costs, players also need to consider particular limitations when creating spells. In essence, spells characters create have a corresponding crafting cost in gold, Magicka requirement, and the skill level required for casting.
Moreover, players can't use spell effects they themselves can't cast through their own arsenal of spells. This caveat means the kinds of effects players can access in the Altar of Spellmaking are only based on spells they know. Interestingly, this factor serves as a good way for players to explore other magic schools.
Lastly, players can only cast custom spells if they meet a certain rank. At first glance, this caveat can discourage the use of the Altar at early skill ranks. However, players may start making their spells early on to fully optimize their spells based on their playstyle.
8 Acquire Effects You Want
Given the above limitations, players should likewise try their best to maximize their current slate of spell effects. In turn, the best way to acquire the most spell effects is to purchase various spells from merchants and various NPCs. Alternatively, players can acquire these effects if they have spell effects from their Lesser and Greater powers - such as traits from Birthsigns or their Race.
In essence, players should check spells for effects they truly want their custom spells to have. Moreover, they need to look for spells that can help facilitate this effect.
For instance, a player who wants to escape tricky situations might think invisibility should do the job. However, enemies can still reach invisible players if they can't run fast enough. As such, a custom spell for this situation should have the effects "Paralyze" and "Invisibility." Theoretically, this should let players be invisible while the enemy is paralyzed, giving them time to escape.
Players should note that the Fortify and Drain Attribute effects are some of the hardest to acquire in the game, and are often granted by certain quests, or special items like weapons, armor, and trinkets.
7 Use Custom Spells For Training
Players who learn that custom spells still need a skill level for casting might discourage them from creating spells at all. However, players who want to maximize the Altar of Spellmaking can use their low-tier custom spells to their advantage. In fact, players can tweak their custom spells to help them train in skills of their choice.
Essentially, custom spells get a specific Magicka cost based on the individual base Magicka cost of all its effects. In turn, the school of any custom spell (single or multi-effect) will be based on the school of the effect that grants the highest base Magicka cost.
As such, players can train hard-to-level skills (e.g. Restoration) by combining a Restoration spell with an effect from another spell school with a lower base Magicka cost.
6 Circumvent The Need To Train At All
Interestingly, players can remove the need to even train for higher ranks in other schools. Essentially, players can insert any powerful spell effect they possess provided they insert another effect with a higher base Magicka cost. Remember, the custom spell assigns its school-based on Magicka cost and not school rank.
For instance, players with novice Destruction can't insert a high Shock Damage effect to a custom spell. However, they can bypass this limitation by adding any other effect - provided it has a higher base Magicka cost than the Shock Damage effect. Unfortunately, this custom spell may also need a tremendous amount of Magicka to cast, so tread carefully.
5 Create An Eldritch Blast
In Dungeons & Dragons, some min-max players might not even need higher-level spells thanks to Cantrips, or spells they can cast without using spell slots (the game's equivalent to mana). Warlocks become notorious for this due to their ever-popular Eldritch Blast. In Oblivion, players can make their own versions of Eldritch Blasts with the right formula.
This method, called spell chaining, enhances any custom spell with the Fortify Magicka effect. Players succeed in making a chainable spell if the spell still costs less than 50 Magicka after adding Fortify Magicka.
In turn, adding Fortify Magicka 100 to a spell with low Magicka cost allows players to spam this custom spell while constantly replenishing Magicka. Theoretically, this should pave the way to a low-cost spammable custom spell. Players should note what kind of armor they're wearing, though, as it seems to affect the Fortify Magicka spell.
4 Create A Middle Ground
Players in the Mages Guild who aren't in the endgame may have a hard time finding spells for their needs. After all, useful combat spells a mid-level character has might not be enough against certain opponents. However, higher-tier combat spells may be severely out of their caliber.
Thankfully, creating custom spells can help bypass this problem. Theoretically, players still building their arsenal of spell effects can create "middle ground" spells. In essence, these spells serve as the "transition" custom spell between a low-tier spell and the player's desired higher-ranked spell.
3 Effects Can Stack
Interestingly, players can also create spells with stacking effects without pushing the Magicka cost. That's because players can actually stack spell effects provided they come from differently-named spells. As a result, players can create spell chains with low Magicka cost that has the same or similar effects as a high-Magicka spell.
For instance, chaining spells that inflict 10 Frost Damage in a single blast can be Magicka-sustainable compared to a single spell that deals 60 Frost Damage.
2 Effects Can Happen Simultaneously
Another interesting tidbit about spell effects is the fact that they can happen simultaneously, again if they have different names. In essence, players can lengthen the duration of custom spells they plan on casting consecutively to give themselves simultaneous boosts. That way, their spell attacks can go beyond the 100 point maximum of spell effects.
Players can use this to amplify magical effects that harm opponents in touch or from afar. Likewise, they can use this on self-targeted spells to vastly increase the benefits they gain from the spell.
1 Weakness Is A Death Sentence
Players who want to maximize their custom spells might want to whip in some "Weakness" effects to their spells as well. As mentioned, spell effects from different names can actually stack. However, "Weakness" effects can take advantage of this stacking thanks to its nature as a spell amplifier.
Remember, "Weakness to Magic" boosts the damage of any spells that come after it, including another "Weakness to Magic" effect. In turn, other "Weakness to X" effects work the same way. In theory, players can give their spells a shocking damage boost by spamming "Weakness" effects before pulling off the main attack spell - perfect for necromancer builds.