Efficient Levelling

A lot has been said and written on the topic of the best leveling methods, but the biggest amount of work has been done by the guys from The Unofficial Elder Scrolls Pages. I would like to present here the most interesting points and opportunities of "smart leveling," as I call it, and at the same time ask how widely you apply it while playing Oblivion.

Why "smart leveling"?

Let's remember: when a character levels up, they can increase the value of three of their attributes (strength, agility, endurance, willpower, speed, intelligence, charisma, luck) by a certain value from 1 to 5. This value is derived from the number of skill increases tied to a particular attribute (for example, agility is related to archery, sneak, and lockpicking skills). Accordingly, during a level-up, we can increase the values of our three attributes by the following amounts:

1 - the skills associated with this attribute have not been increased at all;

2 - the skills associated with this attribute have been increased 1 to 4 times;

3 - the skills associated with this attribute have been increased 5 to 7 times;

4 - the skills associated with this attribute have been increased 8 to 9 times;

5 - the skills associated with this attribute have been increased 10 or more times.

Usually, when leveling up, a player raises their attributes by 2-3, rarely by 4 or 5, which is considered lucky and more common at lower character development levels. With smart leveling, it becomes possible to develop all attributes to their maximum values of 100, and with quest-based attribute boosts - even above 100. At the same time, a player using "smart leveling" will always feel comfortable in the world of Oblivion, as they maximize their stats without using cheat methods.

What is "smart leveling"?

Smart leveling is precise micromanagement of character development, where at each level-up, the player raises the values of three possible attributes by 5 (or two attributes by 5 and luck by 1, as an option). It is important to avoid "over-leveling," meaning situations where the skills of a particular attribute are increased more than 10 times (the attribute value will still only be raised by 5, so all skill increases beyond 10 will be wasted).

In practice, while leveling the character to a value of all attributes "100," there is a certain number of skill increases that can be effectively "wasted," and this can be easily calculated.

Suppose you start the game with a parameter value of "Agility" at 25. This means with "smart leveling," to reach a value of 100, you will need to increase the "Agility" attribute 15 times (15 times 5 = 75). Agility corresponds to archery, sneak, and lockpicking skills. Suppose you also start the game with these skills at 25. Then you have (100-25)*3=225 skill increases associated with the "Agility" parameter. And to develop agility to a value of 100, you will need, as we've calculated, only 150 increases in the corresponding agility skills (15 agility increases of 5 units = 150 increases of corresponding skills).

Accordingly, you can "waste" 75 skill increases (however, in reality, this number is even higher, as attributes at the start of the game generally have values greater than 25, while skill values often are less than 25).

It should be noted that constantly tracking skill increases across all attributes without over-leveling is difficult. Personally, I used the mod Skill Diary, which introduces a book into the hero's inventory that allows you to track the number of skill increases across all attributes and remaining increases until the next level-up at any time. IMHO, it is a very useful tool that significantly simplifies playing with "smart leveling."

Some may say that "smart leveling" kills the essence of the game, its atmosphere, concentrating the player on questions of skill and attribute increases, etc. As someone who has tried this method of play, I would say that it is not entirely true.

"Smart leveling" encourages role-playing, and in a more complete way than one might think. If a player needs to increase strength by 5, it implies they must raise sword, hand-to-hand, or blunt weapon skills 10 times.

This means that the player will role-play as an unarmed monk, a brave swordsman, or a bloodthirsty beast with a hammer until the next level-up.

Increasing agility - no problem, role-play as a thief-archer!

Charisma? OK, role-play as a talkative trader with illusionist skills!

Need intelligence? Sure, play as a summoning mage with mysticism and alchemy skills!

And so on, except, of course, for luck, which does not correspond to any skill, thus only increases by 1 during level-ups.

And considering that when leveling up, you can increase three attributes by 5, at each level the player must fully role-play at least three roles (one for each attribute).

To be honest, for me, "smart leveling" added excitement and drive to the game because you are not role-playing just a good paladin or a nimble thief but must constantly switch roles and practice in all aspects throughout the game. Add to that the spicy gameplay mods OOO and MMM, and many others, and you will find yourself wanting to enjoy this endless game at least one more time!