Is this mathematically possible on normal (adept) difficulty?

I have a level 45-ish redguard with 450-490 health depending on equipment. Zero magic or elemental resistance. Over the last couple hours of playtime, I've been killed twice with shouts/magic: once while I had half health by a draugr deathlord using Unrelenting Force that pushed me into a nearby wall (estimated 250 health at the time). The second I was full health by a master necromancer using some sort of ice spell (single shot, and I had estimated 480 health at the time).

I don't mind some difficulty in the game, but I don't understand how a character that can bask in dragon fire gets one shot by nameless enemies. Is magic really that powerful?

This is the trade off when you play as a warrior, you have to get in on the mage cuz once you do hes dead. Keep in mind just keep moving, slow time, ice form, all of these will help you.

This is your problem, I don`t complain about taking hard hits from magic users. Think your way around it if you don`t use resistances. NPC`s run out of magicka too.

I know nothing about magic based attacks as i only have a Warrior and a Thief at the moment, but i agree, you can't play around with high end mages, you have to kill them quickly. Especially when they use shock blasts of some sort to drain your stamina and health simultaneously. I also get into a lot of stand off situations, where the mage will wait for me to pop out before blasting me with some sort of dual ice cone blasts that completely destroy my health. If it wasn't for my perking in archery, some would be impossible for me to beat.

nope not a normal situation at all, some bug must be hapening there.

Yep, once you begin meeting Master or Ascendant mages, you will need stuff with resistance on, as a no-sneaky character.

Magic Resistance has been reduced to 0% for most players ever since patch 1.2 got released. There's also a new bug on patch 1.3 that reverses fortify effects. Just saying.

Ice spike I suspect is in line for the tunehammer. Little bit too powerful in the hands of enemies, little bit too useless in the hands of the PC. Enemies sling them around like crazy, super accurate, super fast, super high damage, super bad slowing effect on the player. Little tad overpowered.

Trick is to spam the Clear Skies shout at your enemy as you approach him, this will keep the enemy staggered. Make sure you get it off before he puts his ward up, since the ward will negate the shout completely.

The reason you use Clear Skies rather than Unrelenting Force, is that the single word version of Clear Skies has a ridiculously short cooldown, perhaps 1 second. So you can practically silence a mage with it until you get into melee range, at which point you can just vegetable soup him to death. Veggie soup = infinite shield bashes.

Even if you are a no sneak RP'er, carry a bow, some arrows, some poisons to drain magika/stamina/paralyze.

prioritize targets esp if you encounter a group.

• Temple of mara quest in riften, gives you +15 magic resist, I presume they mean 15%.
  
• Lord stone, +50 armor rating and +25% magic resist.
  
• Breton starts with +25% magic resist.
  
• Enchanting/buy/find jewellery or shields for resist magic/elements.
  
• Use alchemy or buy potions for magic resist.
  
• Alteration perks can give you +20% magic resist, and 30% absorb magic.
  
• Block perk that gives you 50% elemental resistance when blocking.
  
• Unique heavy shield that gives you a magical ward when blocking.

The magic resist limit is 85%, I believe elemental resist is around the same number.

How effective are the various magicka poisons against mages? It sounds good on paper but I've never really tried it out.

I do play a sneaky type, but I'm not strong enough to knock off master mages before they heal themselves.

In the mage encounter I described, I whittled him down to maybe 1/5 health with a couple arrows. I swapped to sword/shield as he ran up to me. Before I could take a swing, he hit me with his ice spell. 480 hit points in an instant... I understand I need to be tactical, but that kind of damage seems rather obscene for normal difficulty, no??? Is there an insta-kill freeze spell I need to be aware of?

480! really? What kind of spells are they using. I have magical resistance, so is this a accurate total without resistance?

if you make them, it all depends on your alch skill, if you buy them, it's as advertised, as long as they, themselves don't resist applied poison.

paralyzing/e-denial against mages while you drag off the tanks is hella fun.

just like any MMO. Casters are priority. tanks are..tanks. if solo, on a mage, and as a tank getting pwnt, I'd look into (buffs) magic resist, as well as /frost/fire/lightning resists. wheather it be from pots/enchants etc, etc.

also, you can apply those same poisons to a sword, mace etc, etc.

breaking LOS helps tons. the AI pathing is easily exploitable in this game.

How does magic resist work? If I have 15% magic resist does that mean I have a 15% chance to resist all magic, or does it mean I always resist 15% of magic damage?

The resistance thing was fixed in the 1.3 past supposedly though. Not long now hopefully for us console players.

EDIT: Whats this about reverse effects?

the latter.

Thanks

I wish my 56 full destruction mage was that strong..............

Just checked... 495 health with zero magic resistance. The magic resist items are so rare that I've never bothered with it, and I don't want to exploit enchanting/alchemy. Besides, I haven't had much trouble with mage bosses for the last 20 levels, I usually sneak snipe them, or shield bash them to a pulp. But the last couple mage bosses were ridiculous, and this last guy just insta-killed me D&D Finger of Death-style.

Sigh... maybe I should just go play The Sims.

Yeah, I've noticed the strange disparity in firepower between high-level player mages and high-level non-player mages and i've gotta say it's pretty ridiculous. Here's a good idea - why not tailor the loot we find to our playstyle? When my pure mage finds (sigh) yet another axe instead of a good staff of fireball or whatever, I'm forced to wonder what the devs were thinking. More importantly, why can't we make staffs? Don't you think that's the first thing a mage would make rather than a magic sword or battleaxe or whatever?

I tthink someone needs.....some magical ward spells from good ole saint Nick, but really magical resistance will help. Feels like mosquito bites to me.

You have to get magic and element resist gear

:D

I don't have magic resist gear, but I do have loads of element resist gear that I put on as needed. Never got a chance to hit the inventory button in the last fight.

Meh... I'm going to sleep now. I'm conceding Skyrim to the invincible mages. Apparently dragons have nothing on 'em.

iam also a redguard and found out early on what you are talking about.the other OP is right just try and sneak and get right in there duel welding...or a what i do against these enemies is using dispell magika potions onn my bow that works alot .i give them 3/4 arrows(i have the zoom/slow time perk with bow) with dispell magika and damage health then i run and duel weld them as by that time there energy is at least half and maybe even use a shout