Enchanting is arguably the most broken Skill in all ofSkyrim. When given the proper attention and brought to Level 100, Enchanting has the capability to completely negate incoming damage, completely erase Magicka Costs, boost other Skills immensely, and otherwise breakSkyrimacross all playstyles.
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It’s a skill just about every player will find incredibly useful, but itdoesn’t start out very strongat all. To get these game-breaking end-game Enchantments one has to reach the max level in the skill. Getting to Level 100 in Enchanting is tedious, but it’s well worth all the effort disenchanting and min-maxing boosts to get there.
Stack XP Boosts As Much As Possible
There are few sources of XP boosts inSkyrim,the main ones being from Standing Stones. Enchanting benefits fromThe Mage Stone, which grants a 20% boost to XP gain in Magicka-related Skills, as well asThe Lover Stone, which increases XP gain for all skills by 15%.
Players can also use theAetherial Crown to stack these two Standing Stone bonusesinto one, effectively a 35% boost to Magicka-related Skills.Ahzidal’s Armor, which can be found in Solstheim, boosts Enchanting by 10% when thefull set is equipped(though players have to make a huge Gold investment to open up Kolbjorn Barrow completely).
Disenchant Everything You Won’t Equip
The fastest and most useful way to level Enchanting fast is to disenchanteverything you aren’t using– that meanseverything. Disenchanting not only gives massive Enchanting XP, it also allows the player to imbue that Enchantment onto a new piece of gear.
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While it can be nice to keep memorable weapons or unique items for display, you may find yourself wanting their effects on other pieces of equipment. If a weapon can’t be Disenchanted, it means either the player already knows the effect or it is simply unable to be Disenchanted. This tends to give multiple Enchanting levels at once at low levels.
Level 90
Each level players are able to visit trainers andpay money to train skills five times. It’s a good idea to constantly train Enchanting while leveling up to get the most out of this system, as you don’t carry over unused training slots after leveling up. This means that every level players can raise their Enchanting skill by 5, as long as they have the gold.
There are only a few Enchanting trainers in Skyrim, but the easiest trainer to find is Sergius Turrianus at the College of Winterhold. He can only train players up to Enchanting 75, though, at which point either Neloth in Solstheim or Hamal in Markarth’s Temple of Dibella are able to train up to Level 90.
Up to Level 4
Up to Level 16
Up to Level 28
Up to 38
All non-humanoid Souls
Any Soul
The Enchanter’s best friend is the Soul Gem as it can be used both in the act of Enchanting itself or for re-filling used Enchantments on drained weapons. Everything from Petty Soul Gems to Black Soul Gems can be used to imbue traits onto gear. Re-filling a weapon’s Enchantmentdoesn’t contribute to theEnchanting skill, unfortunately. They do, however, weigh almost nothing and should be looted at every opportunity.
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The Soul Trap spell is cheap, but putting the Soul Trap Enchantment onto your weapon of choice is much more effective at filling Soul Gems regularly. The best part is, if you don’t use them all at an Arcane Enchanter, filled Soul Gems can be sold for much, much more than their empty counterparts.
Farming Each Type Of Soul Gem
All non-unique Soul Gems can be farmed out in the world, either by visiting specific locations or by killing specific enemies. Dwarven Automatons, hostile (and, for that matter, friendly) Mages, and other enemies that use spells all have a chance to drop various levels of Soul Gems. As you level up, the Soul Gems that drop will become stronger and stronger.
All Soul Gems can also be bought from merchants throughout Skyrim, though they are extremely pricey, and a handful can be looted upon becoming Arch-Mage. The two unique Soul Gems, being The Black Star and Azura’s Star, function as a reusable Black and Grand Soul Gem respectively, and can only be acquired as part of Azura’s Daedric questline.
Common animals (wolf, crab, deer etc)
Strong animals (bear, sabertooth, etc)
Strong nonhumans (trolls, giant spiders, etc)
Large nonhumans (giants, atronachs, etc)
Massive nonhumans (dragons, mammoths, etc)
All humanoid settlements (forts, outposts, towns, etc)
The key to leveling Enchanting quickly is gathering as many Souls and filling as many Soul Gems as possible before returning to the Enchanting Table. There are some locations that are better for farming souls of various types than others, though it mostly depends on your own level - for example, don’t go wandering the wilderness if you need a Black Soul Gem filled.
It’s important to note that if you don’t have the right Soul Gem for a given enemy, its trapped soul will instead fill a higher-level Soul Gem. Don’t Soul Trap Wolves if you only have Grand Soul Gems in your inventory, as it will be a Grand Soul Gem with a Petty Soul inside, rendering it practically worthless.
Enchant Every Basic Item You Can Loot Or Buy
The act of Enchanting requires three things: a Soul Gem, the chosen Enchantment, and a piece of gear to apply the Enchantment to. It’s all too easy to pass up unenchanted basic gear while dungeoneering, but if you want to level Enchanting as fast as possible, plan to make room for some of these vanilla weapons and armors.
The lighter the item the better, as the XP gained for Enchanting an item depends more on the power of the Enchantment, not the strength of the item. As such, Daggers, Short Swords, Helmets, Boots, and Bracers tend to be the best things to pick up as they take up little inventory space and can be imbuedwith a variety of helpful(and valuable) bonuses.
Themost important thing to dowhen leveling Enchanting efficiently is to completely avoid reading any Enchanting Skill Books until you cannot learn anything else from trainers. At Level 90 no trainer in Skyrim can teach you anything new about Enchanting. Until then, avoid reading these books.
The Oghma Infinium is unique in that it is only readable after completing “Discerning the Transmundane” and gives 5 Levels to a variety of skills at the player’s choice. Read this as soon as you can upon reaching Lvl 90 Enchanting to bring it up to Lvl 95, then hunt down the remaining five Skill Books as you level normally.
The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Special Editionis available for PC, PlayStation 4 and 5, and Xbox One and Series X|S
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