Oblivion - help, I killed my own experience

[CannonFodder-jm]

Ok, I know Oblivion is old topic now, but I just finished and wanted to get some feedback.

After I figured out the wierd leveling system was outpacing my character's abilities (as in, hit it with an arrow and get rushed and squashed flat), I tried a different strategy.
I made a character whose primary skills I would basically never use. This way, I could up my important skills without resulting in overpowering monsters. This brilliance turned out to be not so bright.

I finished the game: all guild quests, arena, randomly encountered quests, and finally the main quest. I am level THREE. This is mostly from reading books that upped my primary (unused) skills. The skills I used are all 50-90.

I never saw 80% of the game's armor, weapons, magic items, and monsters. The wilderness is still populated by rats and wolves. I hoarded a whole 6 silver arrows that were shot at me throughout the game. I have all these summon spells that I can't cast (due to mana cost) for creatures I've never seen.

I don't really feel like leveling just to do the daedric shrines. I put in LOTS of hours to see everything I could, and now I realize my superpowered hero is done, yet I have little satisfaction.
I want to start over, but wow, that was a lot of time I spent. The stories are now repeats, plots revealed, suprises sprung. What do you guys think?

[BobJustBob]

Oblivion sucks. Play Morrowind.

[roguefrog]

Say hello to Oblivion's shitty scaling system.

[Xaroc]

Or you can just play the game and have fun with it and it generally isn't a problem.

[Jake Plane]

Morrowind was infinitely better on this count. I still wish there were areas where low level beasties lived and an area where angels feared to tread. Or if not angels, heroes.

[JM]

If you have a problem with the levelling system, play one of the many many mods that "fix" it. Otherwise, remember that whenever BobJustBob hates a game, it's worth playing.

[Skipper]

Look into two of the mods. Oscuro's or Francesco's. You won't need both. Unfortunately you'll need to start over, but either will give you a much fresher experience playing the game.

Oscuro
http://www.tescreens.be/oblivionmodwiki/index.php/Oscuro's_Oblivion_Overhaul

Francesco
http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=268

[Mike Hussey]

The thing to do is to have main skills iin things you can control, like alchemy so that you can level when you want. Hardcore minmaxers aim to be able to raise three attributes by 5 every level. mMost of the fansites have guides on how to do this.

[Midnight Son]

Francesco is the shizznit.

[Skipper]

Cannon I'll also add that you should check out the multiple game enhancing quest add-ons too. There's a nice list here, but this is only a small part of a long list:
http://devnull.devakm.googlepages.com/quests

[Damien Neil]

Morrowind was infinitely better on this count. I still wish there were areas where low level beasties lived and an area where angels feared to tread. Or if not angels, heroes.

Morrowind had leveled content as well. I distinctly remember the moment at which netches started to appear in areas that had previously been devoid of them, and going back to dungeons to discover that they were now populated by brand new higher-level creatures.

I don't remember it bothering me as much in Morrowind, however, or being quite as noticeable. I'm not certain why.

[ElGuapo]

I don't understand how the game comes equipped with a built in difficulty slider (which is even better than having to restart a whole game on say, easy or hard mode), and people bitch about the difficulty.

If its too hard, turn down the difficulty. If its too easy, turn it up. Do people really have something dead set against this?

Note this isn't meant to be a slam against you, CannonFodder. It's just a general confusion . . . what's so impossibly complex and frustrating about a difficulty slider?

[DennyA]

I'm going to restart the game soon. If I want to avoid the bad leveling design, but not make the game generally harder, will Francesco work for me? I heard Oscuro ups the challenge.

I don't mind challenge, but in games like Oblivion I'm more into the exploration and interaction than the "figure out how not to die for a fifth time."

[Skipper]

Elguapo - I think the OP was referring to gimping his character and wanted a fix for it, unless you were referring to Damien's comment

DennyA - Oscuro includes more by default so yeah i guess it could be slightly harder. Francesco is more modular so you could pick and choose what you wanted to change. Neither really makes the game hard though. They just set level ranges on certain areas. So it forces you to play a little more of the sidequests than you would normally, otherwise you get the beat down when you try to jump through the main quest too fast.

[Damien Neil]

If its too hard, turn down the difficulty. If its too easy, turn it up. Do people really have something dead set against this?

Yes, I do have something against it. I'd like it if the game designers did their damned job, rather than relying on the user to fix it with mods and difficulty sliders.

[mono]

I lowered the difficulty slider early on. I dunno, maybe I made the game a bit too easy, but I'm in it more for the quests and exploration than the actual fighting. It took me 10 seconds to drag the slider to the left, I got to see all the creatures/armor evolve as my character leveled, and I had a blast.

[Desslock]

Morrowind had leveled content as well.

All of the Elder Scrolls games have -- in fact, Oblivion's system is very similar to Daggerfall's. So have many other RPGs to varying degrees (like the Ultima games had harder creatures gradually appear in the wilderness as the game went on). But one of the big problems with Oblivion's implementation is that it affects items/equipment, in addition to monsters -- Morrowind had higher level equipment around from the outset. There were also no real "danger zones" where you could see high level creatures as a low level character - the closet thing to that in Oblivion would be encountering Ogres through the related quest, but those instances are few.

[unbongwah]

I don't understand how the game comes equipped with a built in difficulty slider (which is even better than having to restart a whole game on say, easy or hard mode), and people bitch about the difficulty.
It isn't about the difficulty (or lack thereof), it's about the automatic scaling of content and the loss of a sense of hidden danger. When you know there will be level-appropriate foes wherever you go, it drains the game of its tension and surprise. Some people prefer RPGs which go, "OK, the kobolds go down here, while the dragons are over there," and not knowing which area is which until they get there.

In short, some people enjoy not knowing if there is a dragon `round the next bend who can squash `em flat. Keeps them on their toes.

[Aeon221]

Ride into the Danger Zone!

[Desslock]

It isn't about the difficulty (or lack thereof), it's about the automatic scaling of content and the loss of a sense of hidden danger. When you know there will be level-appropriate foes wherever you go, it drains the game of its tension and surprise. Some people prefer RPGs which go, "OK, the kobolds go down here, while the dragons are over there," and not knowing which area is which until they get there.

In short, some people enjoy not knowing if there is a dragon `round the next bend who can squash `em flat. Keeps them on their toes.

Yep. You also miss out on the sense of accomplishment if the content always scales -- it's cool to struggle to fight, say, a minotaur as a low-level character, and perhaps get lucky and plan well enough to kill it -- and it's also cool to be able to go back into that minotaur's lair as a high level character and be able to stomp him and his whole family with a rain of death spell and really feel like you've become much more powerful -- Oblivion misses out on both those types of experiences.

I much prefer how Gothic 3 handles things -- treking into a goblin's lair, chomping on some meatbugs and following their trail....only to walk into a shadowy room that's the lair of a deadly shadowbeasts that tear you apart in 2 seconds if you don't make a successful run for it.

It's also another reason I dislike MMOs for the most part -- I hate the fact that they "grey" out creatures and make them either oblivious to your presence or worthless to deal with, so there's no point in showing off your new power to taunt the bastards who killed you before.

It all comes down to this for me -- those devices just make the experience feel "gamey" to me, i.e. obviously very artificial, and prevent me from being immersed in the world and roleplaying. A more 'realistic' immersive world has dangerous creatures and high level equipment that you can use from the outset, and the creatures in it don't suddenly get replaced and it doesn't suddenly become populated with bandits in shiny glass armor just because i've been exploring it for 20 hours.

[metta]

I much prefer how Gothic 3 handles things -- treking into a goblin's lair, chomping on some meatbugs and following their trail....only to walk into a shadowy room that's the lair of a deadly shadowbeasts that tear you apart in 2 seconds if you don't make a successful run for it.


RPG: Reload Playing Game. The problem with the scenario you describe is, unless the game uses a con(sider) system, you have to begin fighting the shadowbeasts to figure out if you need to run for it, and by then it's usually too late.

I haven't played Gothic 3 but Gothic 2 drove me bonkers. Hmm, I killed this ugly just off the road, and that looks like a little pond down there, let me go see. Oops! I'm dead from that thing that lives beside the pond. Reload. Okay, I'll try the other side of the road, that looks like a cave entrance, yes it is! And I was able to kill the thing just inside it, I'll explore some more. Oh, I killed two more things in here, this is much better, what's around this corner? Oh, I'm dead. Reload. I guess I'll keep walking down the road. Oh some bandits on the road. Oh, I'm dead again. Bleh. Uninstall. Trade to Matt Perkins for AOE III.

[nijimeijer]

RPG: Reload Playing Game. The problem with the scenario you describe is, unless the game uses a con(sider) system, you have to begin fighting the shadowbeasts to figure out if you need to run for it, and by then it's usually too late.

I would think that good character design and design choices can eliminate this (or at least mitigate it to some degree). Design can simply make the threat recognizable; in other words, rather than having a level 50 Rat, have a level 50 Minotaur -- a creature that you haven't dealt with yet, and is visibly intimidating.

This way, players can get visual cues that perhaps they're in over their heads.

[Damien Neil]

In short, some people enjoy not knowing if there is a dragon `round the next bend who can squash `em flat. Keeps them on their toes.

For me, it isn't not knowing if there's a dragon around the bend. I'm happy to know, in general, where the dragon is. I just want there to be a dragon out there somewhere.

In Oblivion, there aren't any (metaphorical) dragons until you're tough enough to handle them...by which time, they aren't really dragons, are they?

[Damien Neil]

I would think that good character design and design choices can eliminate this (or at least mitigate it to some degree). Design can simply make the threat recognizable; in other words, rather than having a level 50 Rat, have a level 50 Minotaur -- a creature that you haven't dealt with yet, and is visibly intimidating.

Certainly, I've never had the slightest problem knowing that a shadowbeast is bad, bad news in Gothic 2. Those things look mean.

And it's quite fun to sneak into a cave with a sleeping shadowbeast and quietly loot treasure from among the bones littering the ground. Makes me feel as if I'm getting away with something I shouldn't be. :>

[worm]

Fodder: What's your characters skill layout?

[Kunikos]

I'm not a big fan of how they made leveling directly tied to your tagged skills without letting you know that in the first place during character creation. People would immediately realize that if you tag all non-combat skills like acrobatics, speechcraft, and illusion, and you will level up shitloads if you love talking and conniving and jumping around towns a lot. Travel outside and you get killed in 2 seconds by a bear because while you are level 15, your hitpoints and combat skills match that of a level 3 character.

GIMPED

[Robert Sharp]

The thing to do is to have main skills iin things you can control, like alchemy so that you can level when you want. Hardcore minmaxers aim to be able to raise three attributes by 5 every level. mMost of the fansites have guides on how to do this.

Forget the guides. Get the mod, and never worry about it again. Then you can just have fun and play without worrying that you aren't getting your max stat boosts.

[Desslock]

RPG: Reload Playing Game. The problem with the scenario you describe is, unless the game uses a con(sider) system, you have to begin fighting the shadowbeasts to figure out if you need to run for it, and by then it's usually too late.

A "con" system is another "gamey" convention that I hate -- there's no reason that they can't make it obvious that a creature is powerful using the same ways you'd be able to tell in the "real" world -- that it's very large and muscular, etc.

In the case of that Shadowbeat example -- the cave was littered with bones, and blood was splashed all over the place -- it should be obvious to anyone that something very dangerous was nearby.

If your problem was that you couldn't tell those things - then that may be bad design. If your problem was that you didn't want to be fussed with making those sort of determinations, then the game may not be for you, but I'm glad someone developed it.

[Desslock]

I'm not a big fan of how they made leveling directly tied to your tagged skills without letting you know that in the first place during character creation.

They do explain that in character creation, but I guess you're given a lot of new information at the time.

But you're definitely right that it's possible to create a character who levels quickly but is unable to combat the resulting higher level critters.

[Kunikos]

Especially since conjuration, speechcraft, and acrobatics are super easy to level up. :)

[espressojim]

Certainly, I've never had the slightest problem knowing that a shadowbeast is bad, bad news in Gothic 2. Those things look mean.

And it's quite fun to sneak into a cave with a sleeping shadowbeast and quietly loot treasure from among the bones littering the ground. Makes me feel as if I'm getting away with something I shouldn't be. :>

If I recall correctly, the area outside the cave had had bloodtrails and bones all over the place. You probably knew you weren't dealing with just goblins. I really liked that cave - seeing some gigantic creatures slumbering nearby, and thinking "how close can I get?"

It was a decent moment in a game that could have used more (granted, it's a good game, but G1 and G2 were more 'concentrated' games in my opinion.)

[LionelThompson]

It's also another reason I dislike MMOs for the most part -- I hate the fact that they "grey" out creatures and make them either oblivious to your presence or worthless to deal with, so there's no point in showing off your new power to taunt the bastards who killed you before.


Areas with greyed out creatures would become very annoying to traverse with your uber-hero if they continued to attack you when you were passing through. See WoW as an example of this.

EQ2 does as you say with the mobs ignoring you, but that doesn't mean you can't show off your abilities and one-shot them all with your uber powers. Heck, when you approach orcs that are greyed out, they actually cower before your presence, avoiding eye contact. A very nice touch if you ask me.

[JM]

Areas with greyed out creatures would become very annoying to traverse with your uber-hero if they continued to attack you when you were passing through. See WoW as an example of this.

Except in WoW the grey mobs ignore you unless you run right over them.

[BDGE]

They do explain that in character creation, but I guess you're given a lot of new information at the time.

But you're definitely right that it's possible to create a character who levels quickly but is unable to combat the resulting higher level critters.

Yep, this killed the game for me. I decided to do the 'Thief' thing. Made a ranged archer type with fabulous speechcraft and sneaking skills. Everything was going fine in the sidequests, I can evade direct combat easilly enough and pelt arrows from the shadows for 3X crit damage, but then came Kvatch for my level 20 Garret-clone...

A gauntlet of spider things, and demons that can take close to an ENTIRE quiver of glass arrows to put down(even with the diff. slider lowered) is just ludicrous. Forget that at any given point I'm fighting 3-5 of these things at once, and suddenly the main plotline is a giant deathtrap.

I loaded up a new character and warped right to Kvatch at level 1. The little wolves and whatnot that populated the zone were spit under my boot, disgusted by the imbalance I can't even look at the game anymore.

[JM]

disgusted by the imbalance I can't even look at the game anymore

With that kind of hyperbole, the thread is WON.

[CannonFodder-jm]

...it's cool to struggle to fight, say, a minotaur as a low-level character, and perhaps get lucky and plan well enough to kill it -- and it's also cool to be able to go back into that minotaur's lair as a high level character and be able to stomp him and his whole family with a rain of death spell and really feel like you've become much more powerful -- Oblivion misses out on both those types of experiences.

Exactly my sentiment. At level 3, I felt like I had fumbled my way to the top of everything and just been mistaken for a hero, especially since any 2 town guards could whip me.

Note this isn't meant to be a slam against you, CannonFodder. It's just a general confusion . . . what's so impossibly complex and frustrating about a difficulty slider?

Mostly because I didn't notice it until I had many hours into my new character. Still, you never know what that slider will do...add new, higher level monsters? Just affect damage given/received with normal monsters? Add to the quantity of normal monsters? Modify my Luck?

Fodder: What's your characters skill layout?

Primary skills are melee and heavy armor, alchemy, armorer, etc.
Secondary skills--my real gameplay style skills--were all magic, sneak, marksman, acrobatics, athletics, light armor, speech, mercantile, etc. All things I use.
My char was basically an assassin with heavy magic skills. However, I ended up killing most everything in the game with a bow, using magic for variety, since it is not very stealthy. (I did enjoy the variety of enchanting bows with say, max burden and light to pin the bastards down and light them up while I pincushioned them.)

[peterb]

Ahem.

http://jargon.net/jargonfile/d/Dontdothatthen.html

Hope that helps.

[worm]

Mostly because I didn't notice it until I had many hours into my new character. Still, you never know what that slider will do...add new, higher level monsters? Just affect damage given/received with normal monsters? Add to the quantity of normal monsters? Modify my Luck?
Make the game more difficult. This is your problem right? I'm not defending the leveled system, but a few mods or the difficulty slider. It's not much a game killer.

[zan23]

The leveling system wasn't that bad for me, though I still think it is flawed (non-combat skills shouldn't really count towards levels). Not knowing any better, I chose one of the presets that gave me stuff like speechcraft as a primary, along with other mage skills.

For the first half of the main quest, I deliberately held off on leveling up too much, knowing that I probably couldn't handle the next tier of monsters. If I needed to do a time-dependent quest, I just fast traveled back and forth to pass time.

IMO, there's a huge boost in power once you reach a destruction skill of 75. Once I achieved that, I started to level like crazy (went from like 9 to 17) and created customized spells to take down the harder stuff. Due to not being a min-maxer, some of those levels were awful (+2's all over and such). The spider things that shoot lightning can take me down in 2-3 hits, due to having abysmal max HP.

Haven't played a pure melee character yet, but it looks like they are tougher to play than a mage.

[Rob_Merritt]

I haven't played Gothic 3 but Gothic 2 drove me bonkers. Hmm, I killed this ugly just off the road, and that looks like a little pond down there, let me go see. Oops! I'm dead from that thing that lives beside the pond. Reload. Okay, I'll try the other side of the road, that looks like a cave entrance, yes it is! And I was able to kill the thing just inside it, I'll explore some more. Oh, I killed two more things in here, this is much better, what's around this corner? Oh, I'm dead. Reload. I guess I'll keep walking down the road. Oh some bandits on the road. Oh, I'm dead again. Bleh. Uninstall. Trade to Matt Perkins for AOE III.

Thats EXACTLY why I can't stand the Gothic series (outside of the controls and graphics). Its linear without lines. I'm ok with some areas being hard. The Might & Magic series does that but atleast there, it was clear where you could go until you level up. In Gothic, unless you follow the "lead by the nose" narrative, you are stomped to hell. Even in the demo of Gothic III, I could kill the village raiders like I'm Conan, but a lone worf standing 10 feet outside the gates kicks my ass.

[worm]

I agree, I don't see why they don't handle the entire game with a bunch of "You can't go here ... yet" messages and invisible walls. I don't get how people keep playing the things when everything about the games has remained the same, and when the first one had the only compelling story-line.

I furthermore don't understand why people hold it up as a constant challenge to any and every game. It's an okay game, but takes on a whole new tint the second you get tired of the rhythm blocking game that's require for anything that's somewhat stronger than you, or get tired of the quests that feel like they should have MMORPG style con colors. It's a perfectly fine game to enjoy and play, but to somehow claim that Oblivion's leveled system is inherently flawed because it's not similar to the built in hardcoreness affirming pain-in-the-ass gameplay of the Gothic series is totally insane. Both systems are flawed, it's just what pisses you off less, getting torn into ribbons for trying to reclaim a guy's lighthouse or becoming the Arena Champ at level 1.

Oblivion was attempting something, I hope they implement their own fix that takes the game slightly closer back to Daggerfall's system. I really don't want anything like Gothic, especially in a add-on, and I really don't want to start a new character with a mod maker who just can't help himself from making his mod throw ancient vampires in your face.

[Damien Neil]

Thats EXACTLY why I can't stand the Gothic series (outside of the controls and graphics). Its linear without lines.

I've been playing through Gothic 2, and this completely does not match my experience in any way.

Yes, there are areas that aren't easy to get to at low levels--but it's linear in only the very vaguest of senses. I'm wandering all over the map, tackling different quests in whatever order I want, and having no problems doing so. When I run into impossibly hard enemies, they're generally in little pockets that can be worked around.

It's a brutally hard game at the start--no question about that. It's utterly unforgiving, and I die a lot. I rarely die unexpectedly, however; usually I find myself saying, "I'll bet this is a bad idea...(ouch)...yep, that was a bad idea." But it isn't linear.

It also encourages taking the non-direct approach, which can take a bit to get used to. There are plenty of enemies early on in that you don't have a hope in hell of facing directly, but which are trivial if you use a scroll or two.

[xahlt]

[...] but G1 and G2 were more 'concentrated' games in my opinion.)

IAWTP. I think Gothic 3 lost a lot of atmosphere by trying to present so much. The first two games were confined and as you travelled you became intimately familiar with the areas.. and then things changed subtly as the acts progressed. All the NPCs you met were trapped there just like you and life was gritty and hard. G3 is huge but it doesn't feel as thought-out or as populated as the island.

[Alistair]

A major point about the combat which I've never heard mentioned is that the Gothics are specifically deisgned to let you run away from virtually every beast. You are faster than everything... this is why the game provides a look-behind-you key :) There are few off limits areas, other than those produced by politics or terrain but there are plenty of areas where you can't kill every thing you see.

Not a design choice I particularly agree with (in G3, I think runspeed would neatly mesh with type of armour) but it is pretty key to the Gothic experience.

[worm]

Yeah, I did my time man. I played through the first one, and I just can't do it again. In that I identify with Beth's choice in Oblivion.

[StGabe]

Gah, Oblivion.

Absolutely detest the leveling system. I want to be able to create a fun character and make interesting choices about how that character develops. The choices in Oblivion are: I could keep playing and get crappy stat boosts or I could jump up and down for an hour, and then follow people around in stealth mode for an hour to make sure I get a good stat boost. What were they smoking that made them think this was a good idea. It just kills me to think that there are systems designers out there, getting to work on projects like this, that can't do the math and figure out what a system like this results in.

Creatures that autoscale was just the frosting on the cough syrup. I was already unhappy that character development sucked and then when I realized that the monsters autoscaled meaning that I was almost certainly going to either gimp myself or overpower myself based on the arbitrary fucked up nature of the leveling system and that I'd never be surprised by, well, anything nor ever be able to go stomp something easy for fun or go try something really hard just to see if I could do it.

Any gains that were made in having a "dynamic" and "open ended" world were completely destroyed by these two features and, despite really wanting to like this game (it was the game I bought initially with my XBox), I just couldn't play it.

Ok, so just use such-and-such mod you say.

Uh, on an XBox?

Yeah......

:(

[Becoming]

Not everyone feels like jumping up and down for an hour instead of actually, ya know, playing. I'm not a huge fan of the leveled items or enemies (at least not quite to the extent that it's implemented), but it's far from the worst thing ever imo.

It's pretty tough to make a world to play in with so many variables and completely avoid ways for players to break or exploit the systems if they are dead-set on doing so. There is no more likely type of player than an rpg fan to sit there for hours staring at the numbers trying to figure out just how they can work every little thing to their advantage and then bitch that it's no fucking fun when it actually works. It honestly confuses me.

[DustyTheHamster]

If there is but one Mod to suggest for Oblivion to Solve the headache that is the leveling system it would be Kobu's Character Advancement System (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=199). I've used it for quite a few months now and am quite happy with how it performs.

[worm]

Aside from the argument of the lack of variety within the leveled system (a real bummer, I agree), I still think that the difficulty slider sufficiently solves the problems for different character designers. However, it obviously cannot solve the problem of someone who primarily uses his secondary skills.

[Quaro]

I'm practically the opposite of the min/max player, but it was obvious at one point that my character was becoming weaker as he leveled and I should start using secondary skills instead to put the brakes on the leveling. Even though that worked and it's easy, it still felt stupid. It felt like I was playing against an invisible difficulty slider (your level) rather the game.

[Timemaster Tim]

I had the same experience as Quaro. I kept nudging the difficulty slider down, but it seems to be a rather silly thing to do keep doing that to compensate for a goofy levelling system.

[Jab2565]

I hated the leveling system in Oblivion, and no matter what kind of character I made, the game was broke for me. Mainly on the impossible to survive level. I went thru 4 different character templates and each one didn't work. So I had to settle on a battlemage type.

[JMR]

If there is but one Mod to suggest for Oblivion to Solve the headache that is the leveling system it would be (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=199)Kobu's Character Advancement System (http://planetelderscrolls.gamespy.com/View.php?view=OblivionMods.Detail&id=199#Files). I've used it for quite a few months now and am quite happy with how it performs.


Does this require starting a new game or can you continue with your present character?

[DustyTheHamster]

I think it can be applied to an existing game.but according to the manual

You can use KCAS with both new and existing characters.

I can't tell you off the top of my head as since I had originally beaten Oblivion I've heavily modified it with addons and monster adders since that have required total fresh starts and I've always used that advancement system.

[StGabe]

Not everyone feels like jumping up and down for an hour instead of actually, ya know, playing. I'm not a huge fan of the leveled items or enemies (at least not quite to the extent that it's implemented), but it's far from the worst thing ever imo.

As has been pointed out, not doing so can gimp your character.

Furthermore, a lot of the enjoyment for me in an RPG is in the character development systems. In Oblivion, to meaningfully do anything to change your character development means doing stuff like jumping up and down to get enough skill boosts to max a certain stat gain. Or otherwise going out of your way not to use the skills that you actually want to use (because they are your "primary" skills) just to make sure you get a varied and decent stat boost.

I shouldn't have to metagame at that level in order to impact how my character develops. In my opinion it's just a completely broken system. The game works if you don't care about character development and you are lucky enough not to gimp yourself in your ignorance of how all this works. Which is to say, the game works only if you can enjoy it in spite of the crappy character development. For me, a character development junkie, this ruins a lot of my potential enjoyment.

[Becoming]

I realize everyone has their own particular pet peeves, but personally on my first play through I really payed almost no attention to such things. I just played my character as I wished and the only real problem I ran into was the "Kvatch nightmare" when I was doing it around level 18. THAT was retarded and one of the easiest examples of how the leveling system sucks, but it's one of the more extreme examples. Other than that though I never got the idea my character was gimped in any way at all.