The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Q&A

Xbox360Achievements had the chance to have a brief chat with The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim’s lead designer Bruce Nesmith about the game. Most of the information was already available one way or another, but it should still be an interesting read. Here’s a snippet:

There’s a lot of chatter about the new skill system in Skyrim and what you’ve taken off the table and what you’ve streamlined… like Mysticism for example being cut, as well as acrobatics and athletics, what other skills have you cut from Oblivion and what new ones are you introducing in Skyrim?

We looked at the skills from Oblivion for their usefulness and clarity to the player. Some skills just weren’t very useful as skills, such as Acrobatics. Others were confusing, such as Mysticism. We wanted to pare the list down a bit to get to the best and most fun skills.

Melee weapon skills are now distinguished by the single most important attribute they have. Can you use it with one hand, or does it take two? The differences between Blade and Blunt in Oblivion were minor. You didn’t really have a reason to choose one over the other. In Skyrim, the choice is between using a weapon and shield, or a really big two-handed weapon and no shield. The differences between swords, axes and maces comes out in the perks you choose. So you will still have a reason to choose axes over swords.

In the case of magic skills, we liked the spells from Mysticism and have kept most of them. But they got redistributed to the other skills. So we didn’t so much cut it as we reorganised it.

It’s already been revealed that sharp weapons such as axes and son on can leave wounds that can bleed over time. Will we be able to see these wounds and such visually? And is there any possibility for any sort of dismemberment?

You can’t see every sword cut on your opponent’s body, but you do see them getting progressively bloodier as you hurt them.