How many hours in? How many trips to a mine? What did you craft?

Because as it's already been pointed out, it takes hundreds of items to get there. HUNDREDS. And that's the LITTLE ITEMS, not counting the ones with multiple ingredients. That doesn't happen by accident, and it doesn't happen easily unless you're power levelling.

I don't understand what the problem is. 200 or more daggers to get to 100 smithing. More items than that if you're crafting other things.

Do you not see...that crafting this many items...is not normal, everyday, casual play?

That's hours and hours of collecting items. Unless...you're buying the ingredients over...and over...and over.

If you choose to play this way, go for it! I want you to be happy collecting stuff and doing whatever. Heck, some people spend 100's of hours collecting JUST butterflies. Have at it!

But afterwards...don't complain that the system is broken or too easy. What I just listed is not easy. Not to me at least.

Crazy. I'm 70 hours in at level 24 and still get killed a lot. Guess I must be playing wrong. Any advice how I should be playing?

Again, you didn't trip and fall on a level 100 certificate, and you know it. Most players of this game don't naturally achieve level 100 (even in smithing) until they are at a player level of 30 or above, which at that point, you'd likely be done with the main quest and have likely explored at least 75% of the game map/quests. I think whatever limitations they've got on the skills in this game, they work pretty well.

Should we perhaps talk about the various other exploits that are possible in this game, like the problems that the main bosses have with the doorways to their chambers where an otherwise overmatched player can just go wait to re-heal and then come back in? Hell, to me that's more of a game-breaker than any sort of exploit you have to actually work at.

Why do they turn into a crafting debate? Because it's the easiest example. People somehow have forgotten standing in the swamp of Morrowind jumping in place and throwing spells at trees until they were 100. I got 100 sneak in one afternoon at Balmora's Mages' guild. I put a coffee cup on my button and went to watch tv.

TES games have always been easy. Which is why I'm flabbergasted every time people COMPLAIN. They have a track record of this for god's sake.

Is it out of the question to ask for more balanced gameplay? Absolutely not. BUT the complaining, whining, and bitter disappointment can shove it.

Keep your eyes on the monitor, make sure your hands are on keyboard and mouse or the controller.

And stay awake.

It's not too easy for me. Then again I just play the game and have adventures... I take whatever perks seem the most fun and I don't stand around leveling up my skills.

I agree with you on this front for sure. I just feel like AI is something that will take a ton more effort to really get right. I do feel like other game mechanics can be handled with much less effort.

This game is definetly challenging. I tried to start a light armour melee character and I was getting killed all the time at the adept level. I even noticed playing the first companion quest I was getting my ass kicked in the room with all the silver hands.

Depends:

Are you having fun? If so, then you don't need to change a thing!

Lol. Obviously what you define as "everyday, casual play" is really "how I chose to play." When I learned that we were finally going to be able to craft items through an armorsmithing skill in Skyrim, I designed a character concept based around the idea. Why did I get to 100 smithing? Because I was roleplaying a blacksmith! And yet you cannot do that on these boards without being accused of exploiting and powergaming. I guarantee you it will happen in every single thread regarding the difficulty of this game.






Another pathetic argument. What you're essentially saying is this:

1.) Because of my choices I don't deserve to be challenged.

2.) Because you found something challenging, obviously everyone does. There is no way that someone approached the problem from a different angle, or has a different skillset than you.

Obviously, you didn't choose to make smithing one of your primary focuses in this game. I did. And because of that, I have essentially broken the game for myself, and I come on these boards and find out that my playstyle is considered exploiting, powergaming, or worse. Sorry guys, I didn't realize that blacksmiths were uber in Skyrim.

You don't need to be insulting to make a point

I will try once again to ask this question of you: what is different in the challenges in Skyrim and previous TES games?

How is levelling blacksmithing in Skyrim any 'easier' than levelling a skill in previous TES games?

My opinion and stance remains: it's harder to level skills in Skyrim than it was in previous games, because you actually have to use them in real situations. Tell me how that was harder in previous titles. Thanks.

What makes it worse about the power-levelers is that they likely have access to console commands to get whatever they want, but instead choose to do the power-leveling manually....like somehow the fact that they are exploiting just doesn't sink in unless they do it a more natural way. LOL

While the crafting argument may be a small part of the problem we really need to steer away from that. What we need to discuss is how to make the AI more combat worthy. Dragons fly around blowing at your cover while you take pop shots till they die. Melee attackers spam slow power attack that are easy to dodge or stop short by stunning them. I think magic users are the only thing that are somewhat reasonable as they shoot and move like they should.

I just don't think the crafting topic is a good focus for these discussions. It's been over done.

See this is where I would stray from your opinion. This type of thing has been in many TES games, though Smithing may be a very good example of it. When someone comes on the forum saying their game has lost all enjoyment because they wanted to roleplay a smith, I think it is at least worth considering whether there the gameplay mechanics are completely solid. At least for me it seems strange to say that the natural progression of skills is such that just progressing skills normally will make you overpowered. In a previous post, I drew a distinction between Oblivion's spellcrafting (which can easily make you overpowered should you attempt to use it as such), and the regular skill mechanics of the game. I don't mind something like spellmaking containing such power, I would just prefer that the regular skill tree not make you ridiculously powerful.

Sorry, after arguing the same points over and over again to people, you start to get frustrated.



Obviously, it's a lot harder to powergame in Skyrim. They've imposed limits on Magic resistance and damage resistance that flat out weren't there in previous TES games. However, Bethesda has failed at their own goals. They've tried to make their game more reasonably challenging, and yet certain skills completely nullify the game's challenge. And the worst part? The problem isn't even in the skills themselves! The problem is with the AI and the difficulty scaling. THings that Bethesda should have been on top of.



It's not any easier or harder to level than any other skill.




No you don't. We just talked about becoming a Grand Master Blacksmith by crafting a zillion iron daggers.

That brings us back to the question I keep asking but no one answers: how is this any different than any other TES game?

I posit that the AI has been greatly improved. It's not perfect, but it is better than previous games. But people want to complain about how 'easy' and 'exploitable' everything is in this game.

Did no one in this thread play a previous TES game? Anyone?

I know I'm getting snarky, I apologize. I'm just really frustrated that no one will acknowledge this.

Hitting A 10-20 times each time you come back from a dungeon run isn't "power-leveling".

Crafting stuff, then enchanting those crafted items and selling to a vendor isn't breaking the game. Almost all of the people I know who play the game in real life independently came up with the idea to do it. Bethesda must not play test their game if they didn't know how easy it was to craft stuff. This isn't "wait, buy materials, wait, buy materials, wait, buy materials". Through the nature process of running dungeons, coming back and finding out they don't have enough gold so you barter for their materials in exchange for your loot, and then using the materials to craft seems 110% obvious and intentional. Heck, on my wizard I have a hard time not leveling up my smithing, otherwise I end up with hundreds of leather or piles of swords, armor, etc.

What I find challenging about this game is to take my time and enjoy what I am doing and experiencing everything. I saw it pointless to buy a game this size and complexity and bolt through it in a week or two. I also don't play every day for 8 hours. I hope to enjoy this game most of the winter before finalizing the main quest.

Yeah i use light armor and don't find it even a bit of challenging. It's a certain kind of pompous to recommend players play their game differently if they're complaining about the difficulty. The main reason I don't focus on speech is becase it's boring and horribly implemented. Maybe if this was deus ex. After 40 hours I've figured out whats fun and what not in this game, I'm def not gonna change up my style cuz Bethesda can't create a challenging game. 40 hours in on game is already plenty in my book anything past 80 and I would go get counseling for an escapist addiction. Here's a thought: why not play skyrim like u want and then save the time u would have spent playing it they way u don't want and work on real life speech skills which are infinitely more valuable. Sometimes I think super scrolls fans will deceive themselves any way possible to beleive this game is actually a good substitute to being who they really are.

It's not. So your argument should be valid if somebody was complaining that Skyrim is much easier than any other TES games.

However, I think it's valid to criticize (not [censored] and whine) the lack of TES series' progression on this subject of having sensibly balanced game mechanics.

Sigh What do you expect from everyone nowadays, they all compare everything to COD -.-

And most Skyrim players are noobs that don't understand the lore or history of any of the games. I played through 4 of the 5 games, and have a decent understanding of each one, but like some people said earlier, it's a ROLE PLAYING game. Its made for role playing. Id rather create 20 different characters who specialise in different skill combonations and such and role play like crazy than play the game through once, call myself a huge know-it-all Skyrim "fan", yet not appreciate the game at its roots.

Sigh some people these days. I seriously know like 2 other people that know played through morrowind and oblivion, did everything they could, roleplayed liked crazy and actually appreciate the game for what it is, even though none of us a knowledge bases of Lore and all things Elder Scrolls, I still like to believe I know a fair bit xD

Anyway yeah, majority of skyrim players a [censored] bags that dont even understand the concept of the game, yet (as I so gracefully stated earlier) thing they know everything about it and are clearly the biggest fan (-.-)

But I think (ignoring the hiccups and bruises) Bethesda did a bloody good job on this game. An Elder Scrolls game wouldn't be Elder Scrolls without Glitches and bugs. Most "true" RPGs (like two worlds and arcania) are full of bugs, I think its kinda good. now I'm going off topic XD

Regardless if you believe the game is too easy or too hard, I am not quite sure how anyone can be against having options within the game to increase the difficulty of the game even further, outside strictly gimping yourself or playing with some rule-sets. It is not too much to ask for to have an option that allows you more control over the level scaling of enemies, the types and quantities of enemies you are able to encounter, and the frequency of encounters. This does not FORCE anyone to make their game easier or harder. That is equivalent to you being against the fact there is a Master option, when you can play it on an easier option.

The fact that so MANY players have said the game is too easy, regardless if it is their playstyle or levels that have caused this, would seem to me that it is feasible and warranted to add something akin to a system that allows for more control of the difficulty of the game, especially one that increases the difficulty - OUTSIDE OF - making monsters deal more damage and you deal less.

End of story.

Agreed, completely. I am all for healthy, polite discussion of how Bethesda can take the current structure and system and implement more. Just tired of the hate. It's Christmas, man!

How is that? Your character knows if he is getting better at a skill or not. Just like your characters knows if a piece of loot is better or not.

Sure, there's something wrong RP-wise with hanging out at a city for weeks and constantly just buying materials and crafting, but I don't see how it is out of character to barter for materials for loot received from a dungeon, and keeping his skills sharp by forging stuff.

What exactly do you think you are doing when you pay a trainer? He probably just helps you craft some stuff.