Something like this ? ☺

Most games require the use of Cheat Codes to do something like that, but not Morrowind! That part of the 'normal' gameplay. Once I had the Boots of Blinding Speed and the Levitation blessing from the Vivec temple I realized just how powerful magic could be in this game. For the first time I realized what drove the Televani and from that point forward I eschewed all magic lest it corrupt my noble Redguard.

Now my Breton sorcerer on the other hand... that dude scares me.

Well don't have anything against steam and retail nowadays is not my thing, so I guess I will wait for the summer sale.

The three scrolls that 'fall into your lap' early in the game give a good indication of what's out there - though it probably needs the graphics extender to really appreciate it as the character plummets to a squishy end ☺

I'm partial to playing a Breton, though I tend to do the first few levels as a fighter to build up endurance (amongst other things) - looking forward to finding out how the Galsiah mod changes things.

Well it really depends on how hard you normally powergame. A good powergamer will have a few attributes maxed by level 10, this just isn't possible with GCD so the game will be much harder early on. But specialization really pays off and you will soon be much more powerful in the skill that are most important to you rather than having to diversify your way to advancement.

Morrowind is such an awesome, awesome game. And this overhaul really does make it prettier (yay!). I'm thinking about reinstalling it and playing through again, but I've already got 3 games I'm playing. Soon, though. :)

Character creation in Morrowind is unfortunately regrettably draconian. If you want to play a mage, you pretty much have to pick Breton or Dark Elf in the beginning.
Stunted magicka obviously helps a bit, though it makes the early game fairly tough.

Without the racial INT bonuses your career in magic can pretty much be written off, though any mage can also be any warrior at the end of the day (that is, past the say 10h mark).

Hmm, that likely means I'm going to get my butt handed to me ☺

I do grind at times, but try to avoid totally maxing attributes, so spread skill building around. In the game-before-last, the best attribute my level 22 character had was 97 str.

That's why I'm hoping Galsiahs' mod will let me concentrate on advancing the character without all the book keeping ☺

I'm not sure as to how much experience you have in Morrowind, but maybe have a look at my post here if you're thinking about replaying and need a hand:
http://www.gog.com/en/forum/general/happy_10th_birthday_morrowind/post34

Seeing that makes me want to start up a new game of Morrowind, although I know that if I do that it'll eat up all of my gaming time for the next 6 months (just selecting the mods I want to use will take a full weekend), and given the size of my backlog I'd rather trim that down a bit before engaging in such an undertaking. Still downloading the mod, though, for when I do eventually get around to it. How much of a hassle modding Morrowind is depends on how heavily you try to mod it. Under 30 mods and everything is pretty simple and works fairly well. Get into 200+ mod territory and you have to devote a fair amount of time to ensuring that all those mods play nice together and don't destabilize the game too much (although quite a few tools have been developed to help with this task). That said, visual enhancement mods tend to be the easiest to use and create the fewest things to worry about. This particular compilation has a slight additional complication of using the Morrowind Graphics Extender (MGE, an external program that runs alongside Morrowind), but MGE has become quite polished over the years and shouldn't cause much in the way of complications. Short version- if all you're installing is this mod and perhaps a few others, and you follow the installation instructions correctly, then it should work just fine without any issues.

Yep thanks for that.

I know about the levelling up, but it's a pain in the backside keeping track to make sure you get the best result - +5 for three attributes - at each level (my comment about bookkeeping).

Another problem with the Morrowind system is that it can be counter intuitive. I'm sure many new players have given their character athleticism as a major skill, rubbed their hands together as the levels come thick and fast, then find their character starts getting killed regularly because he/she is great at running and not much else ☺

Hopefully Galsiahs mod will avoid all that.

One thing I did read was a suggestion to take enchanting (which i usually ignore) as a major skill. Worked very nicely in my current game since it can reduce the charge cost when using items (Fargoths' ring gives an extra heal, for example). Means you get more bang-for-your-buck from enchanted weapons.....

I always take Enchanting as a Major Skill, simply because it's so bloody difficult to level. Not helped by the fact that the Enchanting Master (every skill has a Master in the game - someone who will train you to 100) is hostile and the target of one of the early game quests (Mage's Guild, I think). I think you had to get a fairly high level of Sooth Humanoid to be able to talk to him to have him teach you. Nightmare.

I do realise that the whole 'bookkeeping' thing can be an issue, but I'd recommend the same as I did in the other thread - save up 20k and then go and get it over and done with. Make a large save, then keep on quicksaving between the difference purchases. Once you get the hang of it, it's not too but. Admittedly, it is immersion breaking though. Ultimately, do not give a shit. The game will give you plenty of opportunity to max everything out. Also, you will be getting a lot of multipliers in the early game anyway.

Just enjoy!

Yes, yes you will. For a little while at least. But the beauty of GCD is that there is no cap on skills and attributes. The more you use a skill the more it grows and it will never stop growing. Eventually you will get to a point where growing a skill even one point will take a long time, but it will always advance. So if you specialize in just a few skills you can get them well past 100 fairly quickly, but if you try to make a more rounded character who can use any weapon, cast any spell and wear any armor you will end up with a character who can do anything but won't be good at any of it. IIRC the skill advances become harder at 25 point increments. So if your starting skill level is 25 then you can get to 50-75 pretty easily but will have to put in some work to get to 100-125 and anything beyond that would take some concerted effort. Now if you start with a skill of 5 then getting to 55 would be about the best you can hope for without a fair amount of grinding. So racial bonuses and class skills are very important. Also each skill increases 3 (?) attributes instead of just one so you don't have to switch weapons and tactics to try to up a specific attribute, just play how you want and the attributes that are important to you will handle themselves.

And for those GOGers who, like me, speak french, let it be known that, thanks to the amazing Confrerie des Traducteurs, a community dedicated to translate mods for Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim and more, this amazing compilation done by Kingpix is available in French!!

Here's the main pack :
http://www.confrerie-des-traducteurs.fr/morrowind/mods/graphisme/visuels/morrowind_overhaul___sons_et_graphismes.php

And be sure to download the latest patch :
http://www.confrerie-des-traducteurs.fr/morrowind/mods/graphisme/visuels/patch_mosg.php

I'm currently playing it and i can assure you that the work done by Kingpix AND the Confrerie is purely amazing.

Thanks for the reply. I shouldn't have to worry too much, then, because I'll most definitely just be installing this. I'll need to look into it more so I know what all it does, but from what I've seen, it should change the game just enough to where I don't notice the things that usually prevent me from enjoying the game much. Which will be nice, because I'd really like to enjoy it.