Oblivion:Block

Block allows you to reduce damage from melee and ranged combat, using a shield, weapon, or your hands.  At higher levels, block gives you a chance to recoil, disarm, or knock down your opponent.

In-game Description: Parry melee attacks with shields and weapons. Successful blocks reduce damage.

Mastery
Mastery Perks
A Novice is fatigued by blocking, and hand-to-hand blocking against weapons has no effect
An Apprentice is no longer fatigued by blocking
A '''Journeyman's shield or weapon is no longer damaged when he/she blocks, and opponents may recoil when blocking with hand-to-hand
An Expert blocking with shield has a 25% chance to do a knockback counterattack, staggering the enemy if the shield blow connects
A Master''' blocking with a shield has an additional 5% chance of disarming the enemy with a successful knockback counterattack

Skill Increases
Your block skill increases by 1.25 experience points each time you successfully block an attack, whether using a shield or a weapon, regardless of the amount of damage blocked.

General tips on how to increase your block skill are provided at General Combat Strategies.

In addition, the Fighter's Stronghold official plug-in comes with a trainer, Shagrol gro-Uzug, who can be used specifically to train your block skill.

See also:
Increasing Skills: General tips on how to improve your skills semi-naturally.
Trainers: Pay for block lessons.
 
Skill Books: Books that provide lessons in block.
Increasing Attributes: Tips on training skills to improve the Endurance attribute.
Free Skill Boosts: Several free skill boosts are available for block.
Magic Items: There are multiple generic items with the fortify block enchantment.
Unique Items: There is only one unique shield in the game, the Tower of the Nine. It is also the only unique item that fortifies your block skill, fortifying block by 5 points. Note that unique items are not considered Leveled Items such as those received from quests, or Artifacts.

Dialogue
When your block skill reaches 70 people will start saying "Your shield arm looks strong".

Character Creation
The following races provide initial skill bonuses in block:
+5 bonus: Nord
+10 bonus: Orc

The following standard classes include block as a major skill:
Acrobat, Barbarian, Bard, Knight, Pilgrim, Rogue, Scout, Spellsword, Warrior

Blocked Melee Damage
Shields block 1% damage per skill level. Capped at skill level 75 with 75%.
Blade/blunt weapons or bows block 0.5% damage per skill level.
Hand to hand blocks 0.25% damage per skill level, but only against unarmed opponents. NPC's equipped with weapons will always deal full damage.

Skill levels over 100 will not increase the blocked damage any further.

Messages
The following table provides the messages that are displayed when your Block skill levels up.



Notes
At Master level, you block 75% of a hit when using a shield or 50% if blocking with a weapon. If you block 75% of the damage with a shield, and have an armor rating of 85%, then the actual end damage delivered to your hitpoints is 1*0.25*0.15 = 3.75% of the original hit.
Damage reduction while blocking is the same for melee and ranged attack.
The initial printings of both the game manual and the official game guide incorrectly have Block listed as an Agility-governed skill. This was fixed in later runs.
Once your combined Fame and Infamy reaches 60, you can visit the Shezarr heaven doomstone to receive the greater power Shield of Shezarr. One of several benefits of this power is that it fortifies Block 20 points once a day for 120 seconds.
   Pushing the left analog stick only slightly while blocking will cause you to move faster than pushing it all the way.
Opponents will take longer to attack while you are blocking (unless they are using magic or possibly ranged weapons). Therefore, it is more efficient to release the block, then restart it as your enemy starts to attack.
It is faster to gain experience barehanded (no weapon equipped) than with a shield. From level 0-50, blocking barehanded has no recoil for the opponent, allowing them to attack more often. At level 50, blocking barehanded will occasionally provide recoil, but still less often than with a shield.
The Expert and Master perks are also given for unarmed blocking at the Expert and Master levels in Hand-to-Hand.  The chance to stagger, counter, or disarm may or may not stack.