Stabbing damage: Fighting/Short Blades skills important?

[calebnoble]

I'm working on a deep elf caster build. I plan to go with pure spellcasting, except for stabbing monsters that are incapacitated. Should I bother with the Short Blades skill? How about Fighting?

[greepish]

Fighting yes, for hp (not a whole lot mind you). Short blades, not really.

Edit: I'm assuming you're just stabbing mephitic victims, and never looking back after that?

[calebnoble]

I'm assuming you're just stabbing mephitic victims, and never looking back after that?

Yes, anything that is confused (through mephitic cloud or confuse spell), fleeing, or that happens to be asleep when I bump into it (though I'm not bothering with stealth so it's mainly for confused monsters).

[greepish]

For the most part you don't even really need to kill with a weapon, most classes are capable enough with spells alone, especially if you're using sif muna's channeling. If you're running out of MP, usually you're tackling too many monsters at once.

[calebnoble]

Fighting yes, for hp (not a whole lot mind you).

Is there any general consensus on a good place to stop with the Fighting skill for casters? 3 to 5, maybe?

[greepish]

I dunno, I just wing it. In general, 0 until level 10 or so, then Level/2 (turn it off and on every once in a while, no need to OCD it). If you're in vaults with less than 130 hp, you're too low.

[snow]

Weapon skills increase your attack speed but do not noticeably increase your damage. It does effect stabbing, I think, but the additional damage isn't really noticeable.

My stabbers don't tend to get up weapon skills... but that's just me.