The best skills in Oblivion Remastered

The best skills in The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion Remastered are largely the best skills from Oblivion. For the most part, what worked well in 2006 works just as well today. But you should know the quirks before choosing.

Leveling up in Oblivion doesn’t work the same way it does in many RPGs. Rather than a typical skill tree with points, you level up skills by using them. And skills level up more quickly depending on what class you choose in the tutorial (after picking your race and birthsign).

Below, we’ll briefly explain how skills work in Oblivion Remastered, before getting into the best skills in Oblivion Remastered.

How skills work in Oblivion Remastered

As mentioned, you level up skills in Oblivion Remastered by using them.

Take the Acrobatics skill, for example. This skill impacts your ability to jump higher and withstand falls. In order to level it up, you simply have to perform an action that’s tied with the skill, such as jumping. For the Armorer skill, one way to level it up is to repair weapons and armor. Destruction levels up the more you cast offensive magic, while Heavy Armor levels up the more damage you take while wearing heavy armor.

Skills in Oblivion Remastered are split into major skills and minor skills. There are 21 skills in the game, and your character can have up to seven major skills. The remaining 14 automatically become minor skills. Major skills receive an initial +20 level bonus when selected and level up much more quickly than minor ones.

After completing the tutorial, you’ll be given the option to pick your character class. There are 21 classes, and each one comes with a predetermined allocation of major skills and favored attributes. Each class is associated with a specialization (Magic, Combat, or Stealth), which gives a bonus to all of the skills in that specialization. Or you can create your own custom class and pick out all of those parameters yourself.

If you’d like to go with a predetermined class, see our guide to the best classes in Oblivion Remastered. But if you’re planning on making a custom class, read on to see the best skills in Oblivion Remastered.

The best skills in Oblivion Remastered

When picking skills, select those that fit your class. If you’re going for a pure magic build, obviously don’t take the Blunt skill, as that only impacts how much damage you deal with blunt weapons. On the other hand, if you’re not planning on using magic, don’t bother with the Destruction skill.

That said, if you’re going for a custom class, these are 10 of the best skills to pick as your major skills in Oblivion Remastered, regardless of your class build.

Read on for more details about why all of these skills are the best in Oblivion Remastered, or use the table of contents above to navigate directly to the skill you’re curious about.

The higher your Acrobatics skill, the farther you’ll jump and the less damage you’ll sustain from jumping off of high points. Your fatigue while jumping will decrease, and you eventually earn the Dodge ability, which will let you outmaneuver enemies by rolling. At its max level, you will be able to jump on surfaces of water. This skill is the easiest to level and, in turn, can increase your character’s overall level very quickly.

Sneak is vital to getting the drop on enemies. Not only do you deal a damage bonus, but you can also avoid being spotted when pickpocketing as your footsteps will be quieter. Eventually, undetected attacks ignore targets’ armor rating, and that becomes incredibly useful when it comes with dealing with certain enemies.

This skill impacts how quickly you can run, swim, and sprint. If you need to retreat in a hurry, Athletics is invaluable. Plus, it’ll get you across the overworld map quicker when you’re not in battle. The higher this skill, the higher fatigue regeneration while running. Athletics is just an all-round great general skill to have for non-combat purposes.

This skill lets you pick locks easier, as the act itself can be a bit tricky to master. A higher Security level gives you more leeway when picking locks. Some rare loot is locked behind chests, so being able to pick the locks can give you access to some powerful items early on. At the highest level, lockpicks won’t break, which will bring you peace of mind of never running out of lockpicks again.

5. Heavy Armor/Light Armor (Combat/Stealth)

Depending on your build, you’ll want to either choose Heavy Armor or Light Armor in the Combat or Stealth specialization, respectively. The higher the level, the slower your armor degrades. Encumbrance (slow movement speed as a penalty of carrying too much) will be reduced, with the max level getting rid of encumbrance completely when wearing the respective armor type. Plus, these skills are easy to level up, as you just have to wear the armor while fighting.

This skill lets you repair your equipment with hammers. At higher levels, you can actually repair equipment past its highest condition, which is 125%. This means that repaired equipment can absorb more damage and deal more. At its max level, repair hammers will never break, which is very useful as you won’t have to buy any more hammers.

This skill lets you create potions and poisons from various ingredients. Ingredients typically have four effects, and the higher the Alchemy level, the more effects will be added to the final product. Alchemy also synergizes well with archers, as the poison through alchemy can be laced onto the arrows. The potions made can be sold for extra gold too.

Besides healing potions, being able to use magic spells to restore your health is invaluable to surviving out in the wild. During battle, you can also fortify your different attributes like strength and speed to give you a boost in battle. Additionally, being able to cure yourself of status effects like paralysis and disease is really handy so you don’t, you know, die.

9. Destruction/Blade/Blunt/Marksman (various)

Depending on your build, these skills will be your primary source of damage. Destruction (Magic) is for magic attacks, while Blade and Blunt (Combat) are for close combat weapons like swords and hammers. Marksman (Stealth) is for archers. Due to Oblivion Remastered’s level scaling, it’s vital to have one of these offensive skills so that your enemies don’t deal extra damage to you as you get stronger.

This skill provides a bunch of different useful spells like Invisibility and Paralyze. The former lets you sneak around in the dark and synergizes well with the Sneak skill. Even if you’re invisible, enemies can still hear your footsteps, and a high Sneak skill mitigates that. Casting Paralyze can completely stop an enemy in its tracks, letting you unleash more damage or make a getaway. The Charm spell is helpful in getting information out of characters if your Speechcraft skill isn’t as high.