Oblivion Remastered: Complete Spellmaking Guide | Elder Scrolls IV

Spellmaking is one of the powerful mechanics you have access to in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered.

As the name implies, this system lets you make your very own spells. This lets you create combinations of effects that you wouldn’t be able to use otherwise. Even better, the game boasts around a hundred spell effects, so there are quite a lot of potential combinations!

Eager to dive into this powerful system? Read on and we’ll tell you how to use Spellmaking in Oblivion Remastered!

Complete Spellmaking Guide | The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered

Unlock Spellmaking Fast

Spellmaking, also known as Spellcrafting, is much more readily accessible in Oblivion Remastered than in the original release of the game. In the original release, you needed to complete quests for the Mages Guild until you could enter the Arcane University.

However, since Oblivion Remastered includes the game’s DLC from the get-go, you can just go to Frostcrag Spire instead. It’s in The Jerall Mountains, to the east of Bruma. We’ve marked its spot on the map above.

Once you enter the Frostcrag Spire and make it your home, you’ll also need to activate the Altar of Spellmaking within. For that, go to the Mystic Emporium in the Imperial City Market District. Meet Aurelinwae there and buy the Magetallow Candles Boxes from her. There are two for around 3200 a pop, but you only need for Spellmaking.

Now, once you’ve bought at least one of the Magetallow Candles Boxes, return to Frostcrag Spire and interact with the Altar of Spellmaking within. You’ll place the Magetallow Candles around the altar, activating it and opening it up for use!

This is, by far, the easiest and earliest method there is for unlocking Spellmaking. The candles are expensive, sure, but it beats having to progress deep into the Mages Guild’s quest line.

Using the Altar of Spellmaking

Once you have access to an Altar of Spellmaking, interact with it to start making your very own spells. You can use any spell effects that you both know and are also able to cast. This means that improving your Magic Skill levels, such as Destruction, is key to expanding your repertoire.

As for how to get the spell effects themselves, the easiest way is to simply buy them from merchants. There are over a hundred of effects in Oblivion, too! We’ll tell you where to find all of the merchants for them later on in this guide.

That aside, pick any spell effect you wish to use and you can define the following parameters:

• Name – A custom name for the spell, you can make it whatever you want.
• Range – Defines where the spell is going to be cast, as follows:
  • Self – Casts the spell on yourself.
  • Touch – Casts the spell on an entity you physically touch.
  • Target – Casts the spell as a long-range projectile.
• Magnitude – Defines the spell’s potency. The higher it is, the stronger the effect. However, this also increases the Magicka costs.
• Area – How large the blast radius is when the spell touches its target. Increasing the target area greatly increases Magicka costs, however.
• Duration – The duration of the spell’s effect. Longer durations increase Magicka costs, as well.

You can define these parameters individually for every effect in your custom spell, too!

It’s also worth noting that each spell you make has a Gold cost, depending on the parameters you set. You can see this in the bottom right corner of the Spellmaking interface.

Speaking of, you can also see the Magicka costs on the bottom left. The number on the left is the spell’s cost, the one on the right is your max Magicka.

Where To Get Spells

Next up, as we mentioned before, is our list of where to find all of the Spell Merchants in the game:

Closing Words | Oblivion Remastered Spellmaking Tips and Tricks

There are some things to keep in mind when making custom spells. The first is that Weakness effects do not work when paired with Damage effects. You should keep Weakness effects separate and just cast them first before using Damage spells.

Similarly, multiple Fortify Skill and Fortify Attribute effects can’t be put together. You can combine Fortify Skill and Fortify Attribute effects with each other, though. Just don’t try to boost two Attributes and two Skills at the same time!

Speaking of, obtaining any Fortify Attribute or Fortify Skill spell will unlock the ability to use them all. For example, buying Fortify Strength will allow you to to also use Fortify Intelligence.

Also, a common trick with Spellmaking is to set the Magnitude to 100 and the Duration to 1. This is particularly useful when making spells that Fortify Skills, such as what we explained in our guide on how to level up Armorer quickly. This gives you extremely potent spells while sacrificing Duration to keep Magicka drain low.

However, in other cases it’s best to increase Duration instead of Magnitude, such as for damaging spells. A 5-second 10-point Shock Damage effect would be cheaper to cast than a 1-second 50-point Shock Damage one. This is worth keeping in mind when you don’t need extremely potent burst spells!

With that final tip, you now know everything you need to get started with the extremely powerful Spellmaking system in The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion Remastered. Make good use of it to create game-changing (and game-breaking) spells!