Player health is now calculated as twice your current endurance, with no level up bonus. This means your maximum health is less, and tank characters will have to rely more on good quality armour instead. It also prevents the meta game of raising endurance early, which is off-putting, difficult to understand for new players, and breaks immersion.

Magicka regenerates much more slowly, but spells in general cost much less if you are skilled in the school. This means that spamming spells in no longer a viable tactic for most characters unless they specifically excel in the arcane arts. Characters with spell support may find that they need to pack some more potions of sorcery for their adventures. Draining a spellcaster’s magicka is also far more detrimental now, and will force them to engage you prematurely in close combat.

The fatigue system has been overhauled to create a balance similar to Morrowind. Fatigue will drain whilst running, but only VERY slowly—much slower than it regenerates whilst not running. The rate of fatigue drain is influenced by the amount of equipment you're carrying, so travelling light will prevent you getting tired as fast. Those skilled in athletics may even be able to regenerate fatigue whilst running when they are carrying less, and a master of athletics will always slowly regenerate fatigue, regardless of their encumbrance. Fatigue is now a resource that has to be monitored during combat, just like magicka or health. Potions, food, and drinks all restore more fatigue, and can be found more often in loot. You may find that you have to slow to a walk or rest for a short period of time between fights, and this immerses you in your character's sense of exhaustion. It's also a great opportunity to survey your surroundings and take in some of the amazing Cyrodiilic vistas that you usually run straight by.

I designed the new fatigue system with a low-level, heavy armour spellsword, unskilled in athletics in mind (the worst-case scenario). I found that the new fatigue drain whilst running was perfectly playable—you only have to slow to a walk for less than 30 seconds at most after heavy combat to regenerate your fatigue fully from zero. Running alone with no breaks will usually take 5 minutes or more to fully drain your fatigue. If you are finding the new fatigue system a slog, try carrying less equipment, raising your fatigue, or increasing your athletics. Characters that rely on heavy armour or melee combat should consider taking athletics as a main skill.

Your maximum encumbrance is now three-and-a-half times your strength, rather than five times. This is quite a severe limitation on your inventory space early in the game, and you will now have to make more decisions as to whether you really need to pick an item up. Do you really need to be carrying a shield? Should you carry a shortword as backup instead of a longsword? Can you wear clothing or light armour instead of a piece of heavy armour? Do I really need an Alembic? These will be things that you now have to consider, and it will enhance your immersion in the game world. Don't worry, characters with high strength will still be able to wear a full set of heavy armour, and feather is now a much more valuable enchantment at all stages of the game. Burden can be more potent against your foes too, as the effect is more likely to immobilise them and will also make their fatigue drain quicker due to the fatigue changes.

The movement speed penalty for worn equipment weight has been reduced, meaning that heavy armour has one reduced downside versus light armour. The Light Armor master rank bonus has also been reduced, meaning that heavy armour will always provide more protection than light, making it the armour of choice for tank characters. All armour will also protect more regardless of skill, and a full set of Daedric armour can now actually reach the armour cap. Playing a heavy knight should now be less painfully slow, and heavy armour in general is less of a dud choice.

All the changes made by this mod have been made to be consistent with the vanilla game—the goal is to make it appear as though they could have been there from the start. This means that all loading screens, menu text, and tutorial messages have been updated to reflect the new features. A handful of new loading screens have also been added to explain extra details, and these all use vanilla loading screens which were rarely seen in the vanilla game.