I agree with OP and absolutely loath this form of difficulty. I don't want to play on easy, but trading headshots for 3 minutes is not my idea of fun. Instead of uping enemy health as you up the difficulty they should reduce your health. That way enemies never feel like bullet sponges and those of us who want a more intense experience can get that.

I am pretty sure there are mods that do that.

I hate that as well. I HATED how hillbillies were stronger than mutant brutes in Fallout 3. So from my experience in Fallout 3 and other TES games, I just left Fallout 4 on normal difficulty level. Why Bethesda thinks bullet sponges makes the game more difficult mind boggles me. Maybe after 20 years that is all they know, and don't know how to make a game more difficult besides bullet sponges.

I hate to talk bad about Bethesda like that, I really like them a lot, love there games, but for me, this is where I see Bethesda fails. Bullet sponges does not make a game more difficult, just makes the game less fun.

So now I am not sure if I am missing out on not increasing the difficulty level to get those legendary weapons by playing on normal.

Sorry, if you encounter a "bullet sponge" you're just doing something wrong.

It's just a matter of knowing how to play.

My character can take down a Mirelurk Queen with 7-10 shots from a rifle. It's why there are things like weapon perks, armor perks, and other perks that enhance damage and damage resistance. There are also special weapons that do additional damage to specific enemy types.

Bullet sponge? Are you guys taking the right perks for the guns your using? Of course the game will feel bullet spongy if your using pistols while having a maxed out rifleman perk and perks for pistols. Im on survival and headshots do serious damage when they connect not all are one hit kills but still not bullet spongy. Also when I played fallout 1 and 2 going for the eyes ir head wasnt a sure dire kill it just did serious damage....sometimes.

Headshots are what I was talking about, quite clearly. I have few perks in buffs, some, but most of mine go into crafting perks. I have 4 Gun Nut, 4 Armorer, 4 Science and 3 Blacksmith.. My guy is very well equipped.

Realism...

How can there be any oxygen in this world when all the trees have been dead for 200 years?

You did not notice the trees everywhere?

We could sprain our in game ankle, and have to wait 4 to 6 weeks before walking again. Yeah, I'd buy that game.

Realistic weapon damage mod...Nuff said...

Did you not notice they have no leaves?

Unrealistic? Wow dude... do you not notice the power armor physics? Jumping from air-ships, sinking to the bottom of the sea? You're delusional.

You expect realism in a bethesda game HERESY.

I agree with you. It would be better if Beth removed the increase difficulty equals bullet sponge approach and went the other way and made the battles more fast and frantic when you lifted the level. On my modded FO3 the damage amount was increase 5x and it made everything so more realistic. Cover became so more important because you knew that each moment was truly life or death. But unfortunately Beth still thinks that 10 minute battles of wasted ammo equals a harder battle....

So going from the limited in game time I've played this and going by the comments so far in this thread, the difficulty slider is based on similar/same principle as 1st gen creation engine game.. aka, Skyrim? in other words, higher difficulty means percentage scaled less damage player inflicts...

Amazing, who would have imagined...

been liked that since morrowind....maybe even daggerfall why anyone is expecting anything different is beyond me?

Don't play Beth games on higher difficulties. It's just not worth it, all it does is turn enemies into bullet sponges.

Oh. LOL. You are right. It's like that here now so maybe I was transposing reality into the game.

I don't remember people saying the same thing about Skyrim, even though the system was pretty much the same, spam them in the face repeatedly with your sword till they come to an end. It's just as unrealistic to be a pincushion as a bulletsponge. I could be wrong but I don't seem to remember the same criticism leveled at Skyrim.