Elder Scrolls Oblivion: Help Needed!!!

[pchimmy]

After all the Oblivion hype and awards, I finally picked the game up.  The game is freaking hard.  I hate how enemies level up as you level up.  It makes it difficult to progress anywhere in the game!!!  I'm playing as a character with lots of stealth but can also cast magic.  Am I doing anything wrong?  Am I leveling up the wrong stats?   Please, someone give me some advice on how I should play this game.  I'm dying all the time and it's so frusturating!!!

Thanks.

[D-Rider]

Well, you could always turn down the difficulty.

Yes, that's all the advice I have.  Oblivion is one of the easiest games ever made. :P

[Eusis]

That's probably also the best advice too. You could play it the right away and have the difficulty curve like it should, but it seems more likely the game will just get nigh-impossible on you. As such, just tune down the difficulty by little bits until you reach a satisfactory level.

[pchimmy]

I actually didn't know there was a "difficulty" option.

Thanks for the tip!

[Tooker]

I had that same problem with Morrowwind - I really tried to get into it, but couldn't because I kept dying all the time.

[TSG]

There are many schools of thought.

One school of thought says that you build yourself to have the highest starting major skills you can, and keep them solid as you level quickly, thus leaving you on par with the enemies.

I prefer this approach, but it does require some gumption, a willingness to level, and is rather dangerous at high-end depending on your major skills. Sneak is probably a must, and your primary.

Another school of thought says that you set as your major skills only those skills you use when you specifically want to use them. By doing this, you can effectively control when you level - by only using those skills when you're good and ready - and ensure great level ups and great skills compared to your actual level.

I find this approach boring because being level 1 with 100 Blades as a minor skill seems really boring.

Or there's the difficulty.

Or there's some mods out there which will make sure your every level up involves +5 stat mods, which removes the metagaming around skills.

[Shiguma]

Oblivion is one of the easiest games ever made. :P

I have to concur.  Oblivion was a cakewalk.

Hell, there's even an "infinite money" glitch NPC in the game.  My personal policy on "cheating" is that using codes/devices to manipulate things is a no-no, but any exploits/glitches discovered without the use of external tools are fair game.  "Duping" in the original Diablo is another example of the type of "cheating" I'm referring to... no hacks involved, simply taking advantage of an oversight on the part of the development team.  So look into that, as well, if you need a little boost.

[Eusis]

Ok, this is going to derail the topic somewhat, but I feel that it's kinda cheating when it's glitch abusing, but it depends on the glitch. The money one counts for me, but something like getting certain items early in Metroid games doesn't really count since those could require an absurd amount of skill to pull off and whatever trouble you'll save getting it early is just your fair reward for perfecting that bomb jump or jumping from tiny points perfectly. I suppose then it's an issue of the amount of work needed and how good the reward is.

Abusing the games mechanics are another story though. Junctioning 99 Ultimas to Squall's attack in FFVIII can be pretty insane, but everything's functioning as it should.