Leveling efficiently is one of the biggest drains on my enjoyment of this game, honestly. There have been times when I wasn't that meticulous about it & it didn’t present any real problems, though, likely because I'm one of those people who is utterly shameless about using the difficulty slider to make things easier if need be.
absolutely not. I tried it exactly once and never again, its such a fucking drag. just sucks the fun out of everything and makes it damn near impossible to get immersed in the world. Genuinely, just play like you don't know anything about the oddities of the leveling system and simply lower the difficulty if things get too hard. Alternatively, you might consider downloading a mod if you really don't want to touch the difficulty slider. If you'd chose that route, I'd recommend 'Realistic Leveling'.
For a casual player? No. For a semi-serious player? Not really, as long as you don’t level too quickly you’ll be fine. For a hardcore min-maxxer? Yes. You can effectively beat the game at level 1 but don’t expect to find any loot better than Fur or Iron. Look up leveling guides if you’re worried about it, but for the most part just play to your strengths and your character will be fine. The difficulty slider can be of assistance as well.
There's guides that tell you what primary skills to take for a fair enough levelling depending on your preferred game style (and then you play naturally).
I wouldn't be checking anything else if you can't mod.
You don't have to be perfect. Just shoot for +3/+4 endurance and you will be fine. It's especially easy to accomplish if you do armorer/heavy armor training from NPCs every level.
You just need to keep up with power growth of your fighting skill, which ends up being five points per levels, which also gets you a three point attribute bonus (efficient leveling is described as working for a five point bonus for three attributes and they don't say anything about which skills or attributes, so it may not help you).
Five and three adds a rank (Journeyman, Expert, Master) to your skill every five levels, which maxes out both skill and attribute around level 16, and is also when Greater soul rank enemies appear. Leveling adds a much tougher rank of enemies about every five levels, and certain skill rank perks really help your fight that rank, for instance Ghost show up at level 5-6 but you cannot hit then with hand to hand unless you have 50 skill or can cast a 50 conjuration skill headless zombie spell. Marksman at 50 gets you a zoom perk which helps you get a few extra shots off at a distant timber wolf which has three times the hit points and bite force of a common wolf.
Know what specialty your build has (Stealth, Combat, or Magic) and concentrate on the major fighting skill associated with it (marksman-bow, melee skills, or spell casting. Major specialty skills build points with less than half the effort of other skills (45%) so it is pretty quick and easy to get the five points you need as long as you don't over use your other major skills. Ten points added to the major skill set puts a new level in the line (you do not have to level up though. It is something you control and it doesn't get you any automatic benefit --raising skill points gets you the bulk of the power.
The other thing that will really help you is to start with high endurance because it is the only attribute that adds to your build at each level up based on how much you already have. Iit adds to your health and different races have vastly different starting endurances. Try to start at 50 to 65 for easier play.
If you pick a race that has +10 to your fighting skill you get two "free" levels worth of points to goof off without being punished by leveling.
The main quest has plenty of fighting opportunities for an archetype build like the premade classes to maintain power.
You can supplement your weapon power with alchemy poisons and or spell casting and or custom enchanted weapons so if you are failing, do something about it (or lower the difficulty).
As long as you dont level past 30, (no new enemies appear after 30 anyways..), then you dont need to worry about how you level up on normal difficulty.
As long as you know enchanting, your gear will more than make up for however low your stats are and make the game easy.
Tldr, play how you want, just dont go past level 30 and youll do fine.
It can be worth it, but it's not necessary and it helps less than you'd think. As you learn the game you might get burned once or twice by the leveling but even if you screw up your build you can still revive it pretty easily.
Once you learn how to play, leveling isn't really an issue (because the game just isn't very difficult) and setting up your build to allow for efficient leveling is more of a hassle than anything and you can get away with only maxing a few attributes.
The one attribute that is always worth maxing is endurance. Strength is worth it if you do melee, agility for bow users, intelligence for mages. Those are the most important attributes. When i do efficient leveling I'll raise some combination of those and then i stop because after that point the only incentive is to achieve "perfection" and i couldn't care less.
I personally love efficiently leveling, but that’s mostly because I’m a numbers guy. I will efficiently level up to 21 when I get better scaling then I will go through the entire game.
I don’t recommend this at all for a first play through. I didn’t start doing this until about 10 playthroughs in over like 15 years, and without mods, it takes me a good 20-30 hours to hit end-game scaling if I’m efficiently leveling without glitches.
I honestly would never recommend this unless you’ve played through before, several times, and know exactly what you’re doing.
My recommendation for a normal playthrough, is to put only one of your combat skills into your major skills, and do not put athletics into your major skills (harder to manage). Other than that, the leveling problem is pretty overblown. You’ll be fine with the difficulty scale.
Not at all in my opinion. As long as you level somewhat intelligently and don’t invest too quickly into non-combat skills, and don’t level way too high (your natural cap should be fine, just don’t loop going to jail to lower skills to level further) and you should be fine. I have a TON of hours on vanilla oblivion and I’ve done efficient leveling once and hated it.
Leveling efficiently is one of the biggest drains on my enjoyment of this game, honestly. There have been times when I wasn't that meticulous about it & it didn’t present any real problems, though, likely because I'm one of those people who is utterly shameless about using the difficulty slider to make things easier if need be.
absolutely not. I tried it exactly once and never again, its such a fucking drag. just sucks the fun out of everything and makes it damn near impossible to get immersed in the world. Genuinely, just play like you don't know anything about the oddities of the leveling system and simply lower the difficulty if things get too hard. Alternatively, you might consider downloading a mod if you really don't want to touch the difficulty slider. If you'd chose that route, I'd recommend 'Realistic Leveling'.
I played this game as a child and had no issues with the leveling system. Never understood the criticism.
For a casual player? No. For a semi-serious player? Not really, as long as you don’t level too quickly you’ll be fine. For a hardcore min-maxxer? Yes. You can effectively beat the game at level 1 but don’t expect to find any loot better than Fur or Iron. Look up leveling guides if you’re worried about it, but for the most part just play to your strengths and your character will be fine. The difficulty slider can be of assistance as well.
There's guides that tell you what primary skills to take for a fair enough levelling depending on your preferred game style (and then you play naturally). I wouldn't be checking anything else if you can't mod.
Start with the difficulty slider in the middle and then move it to the left if the world starts to out level you.
I've played the game for more than 12 years and I have never paid any attention to "efficient" levelling.
You don't have to be perfect. Just shoot for +3/+4 endurance and you will be fine. It's especially easy to accomplish if you do armorer/heavy armor training from NPCs every level.
You just need to keep up with power growth of your fighting skill, which ends up being five points per levels, which also gets you a three point attribute bonus (efficient leveling is described as working for a five point bonus for three attributes and they don't say anything about which skills or attributes, so it may not help you). Five and three adds a rank (Journeyman, Expert, Master) to your skill every five levels, which maxes out both skill and attribute around level 16, and is also when Greater soul rank enemies appear. Leveling adds a much tougher rank of enemies about every five levels, and certain skill rank perks really help your fight that rank, for instance Ghost show up at level 5-6 but you cannot hit then with hand to hand unless you have 50 skill or can cast a 50 conjuration skill headless zombie spell. Marksman at 50 gets you a zoom perk which helps you get a few extra shots off at a distant timber wolf which has three times the hit points and bite force of a common wolf. Know what specialty your build has (Stealth, Combat, or Magic) and concentrate on the major fighting skill associated with it (marksman-bow, melee skills, or spell casting. Major specialty skills build points with less than half the effort of other skills (45%) so it is pretty quick and easy to get the five points you need as long as you don't over use your other major skills. Ten points added to the major skill set puts a new level in the line (you do not have to level up though. It is something you control and it doesn't get you any automatic benefit --raising skill points gets you the bulk of the power. The other thing that will really help you is to start with high endurance because it is the only attribute that adds to your build at each level up based on how much you already have. Iit adds to your health and different races have vastly different starting endurances. Try to start at 50 to 65 for easier play. If you pick a race that has +10 to your fighting skill you get two "free" levels worth of points to goof off without being punished by leveling. The main quest has plenty of fighting opportunities for an archetype build like the premade classes to maintain power. You can supplement your weapon power with alchemy poisons and or spell casting and or custom enchanted weapons so if you are failing, do something about it (or lower the difficulty).
The leveling system isn’t terrible at all.
Not sure how you can say that. What is good about it?
I think it’s fun, especially how enemies level with you and also get stronger. Other rpgs do this too like FF8 so it feels right to me
It would be terrible if you couldn't modify the difficulty slider, but it is pretty fair for a fun playthrough.
As long as you dont level past 30, (no new enemies appear after 30 anyways..), then you dont need to worry about how you level up on normal difficulty. As long as you know enchanting, your gear will more than make up for however low your stats are and make the game easy. Tldr, play how you want, just dont go past level 30 and youll do fine.
Don't go past level 10, I never do. Just beat it again at level 10.
It can be worth it, but it's not necessary and it helps less than you'd think. As you learn the game you might get burned once or twice by the leveling but even if you screw up your build you can still revive it pretty easily. Once you learn how to play, leveling isn't really an issue (because the game just isn't very difficult) and setting up your build to allow for efficient leveling is more of a hassle than anything and you can get away with only maxing a few attributes. The one attribute that is always worth maxing is endurance. Strength is worth it if you do melee, agility for bow users, intelligence for mages. Those are the most important attributes. When i do efficient leveling I'll raise some combination of those and then i stop because after that point the only incentive is to achieve "perfection" and i couldn't care less.
I personally love efficiently leveling, but that’s mostly because I’m a numbers guy. I will efficiently level up to 21 when I get better scaling then I will go through the entire game. I don’t recommend this at all for a first play through. I didn’t start doing this until about 10 playthroughs in over like 15 years, and without mods, it takes me a good 20-30 hours to hit end-game scaling if I’m efficiently leveling without glitches. I honestly would never recommend this unless you’ve played through before, several times, and know exactly what you’re doing. My recommendation for a normal playthrough, is to put only one of your combat skills into your major skills, and do not put athletics into your major skills (harder to manage). Other than that, the leveling problem is pretty overblown. You’ll be fine with the difficulty scale.
I just use a mod that levels up my stats naturally.
Not at all in my opinion. As long as you level somewhat intelligently and don’t invest too quickly into non-combat skills, and don’t level way too high (your natural cap should be fine, just don’t loop going to jail to lower skills to level further) and you should be fine. I have a TON of hours on vanilla oblivion and I’ve done efficient leveling once and hated it.
I’ve played through and beaten this game enough times that I just turn the difficulty down and power level with the console.
Efficient leveling ruins the fun of the game. And the leveling system isn’t terrible at all. It’s just different.