Alright, so my swords master Lon'qu is having some issues. I'm level 9, I wear light armor and use swords and sometimes a shield. Problem is, I keep getting destroyed. It took me like 30 minutes to kill The Grey Prince. I really svck and I have trouble killing A few mountain lions. What am I doing wrong?

Dude, mountain lions svck at all levels. I run like hell.

Need more info on dat other stuff.

Majors. Class.

Didja have any long conversations a while back with the Grey Prince before you met him in battle?

A couple of things come to mind immediately. 1. Are you repairing your equipment? 2. Have you been leveling up a lot of non-combat skills?

A Mountain Lion is a pretty fearsome beast to face at level 9. It is a level 10 creature. It has 160 Health and 32 attack damage. There is no shame in running away until you have gained a level or two.

Sworsmaster:Swords, light armor, block(the ones I use).

And I did kill him, but Lon'qu fights with honor.

I constantly repair, leveled combat skills and repair.

What is your Endurance

55ish
Strength in the 70s.

You're right on schedule.

Level 9 is pretty much the exact point at which the game is most difficult. Before that, enemies are pretty weak, so the fact that your character is also weak isn't so apparent. After that, your character will start getting notably stronger as some of the better perks kick in and better equipment becomes available. But right there - right at level 9 (and through about level 12), the character's still pretty weak but the opponents get quite a bit tougher in a short span of time.

Just hang in there.

More narrowly, I can only guess but very often I find that when people are having a hard time with melee combat, it's because they're just standing there trading blows with opponents. That really only works well with other armed melee opponents (bandits and marauders and the like) and even then only if you get into a 'swing/swing/block' rhythm so you're successfully blocking all their attacks. Dodging is a FAR better strategy, in pretty much all situations. Pay attention to the patterns of the opponents' attacks and learn to judge when they're going to attack and when they're open. Step out of reach just when they're about to attack and they'll end up off-balance and then you'll have a chance to step in and get in an unimpeded attack. Then step back out again before they have a chance to counter. Or if they're hesitating, step in quickly before they gather themselves for attack and hit them right then, then again step back out before they have a chance to counter. Only block against weapon users or if you get caught in too close and just don't have any other choice.

Beyond that - make sure you've got the best equipment you can get your hands on and look into enchanting it for additional damage or protection (weapon or armor respectively). At level 9, you should at least have Dwarven weapons and Elven should be showing up. For armor, you should have chain or Dwarven, and Mithril and Orcish will start showing up at level 10 (though it'll be rare at first). Early or later in the game, you can better get away with quirky individual equipment choices, but at this particular point, just because it's pretty much the peak of the difficulty spike, it really pays to consciously use the best possible stuff.

What is your armor rating when all armor + shield and weapons are equipped? What specific light armor are you wearing? What sword? What level are the following skills:

- Blade?

- Light Armor

- Block

By level 9, you should ideally be wearing full chainmail armor - at level 10 Mithril will start showing up in loot. That will unfortunately only give you an armor rating of 30% at maximum, which means 30% of incoming physical damage would be absorbed by it, assuming it is at full 100% health.

You can greatly increase your armor rating by using enchantments that grant Shield or any of the Fire/Frost/Shock Shield protections. If you haven't yet or don't choose to join the Mages Guild for access to their custom enchantment altars, you can still normally find assorted rings/necklaces/armor with enchantments as random loot or quest rewards.

If you are a combat-oriented player, then doing the Fighters Guild questline can net you some decent rewards, including access to some better armor early. If you are closing Oblivion gates, then you should be occasionally getting some useful Sigil Stones which you can use to create enchanted weapons and armor depending on the particular spell effects from the stones.

When you are leveling up, are you paying attention to the attribute multipliers (+2, +3, +4, +5)? For the most powerful character you should be trying to get a few +5s in there, if not all +5s in all three attributes you plan to increase that level. Especially important is Endurance, since your character's Health stat is based on that, and it's cumulative, since at each level up your health increase is determined by your total Endurance. So you want to raise that one early and often.

To increase your damage output, use Alchemy to create poisons and poison your weapons. Even a simple Damage Health potion which can be created by any Novice just using the same ingredients you collect in the training dungeon can help. If you have access to the Arcane University and can create custom spells, a short duration of 100% for 5 to 7 seconds of Weakness to on Touch, combined with a weapon enchanted with a Sigil Stone of the same element, can make for a powerful combo in melee.

Those are just some general suggestions. Without seeing your character build and current stats its hard to see exactly what you might need to change.

Thanks guys, I appreciate the help.