This may seem like a "Duh" sort of question with the answer being obvious to some, but I am truly genuinely confused and curious.

She is best with Heavy Armor, Archery, One-Handed weapons, and Block. Now, I recently have had her been using a two handed Fine Honed Nordic Greatsword, but changed that to a One-Handed Ebony Mace when I found that and an Orc shield. Then switched it to an Ebony Shield when I came across it.

This brings a dilemma though. I want Lydia to be a beast in terms of damage and Defense. A tank pretty much. I've been playing on Legendary with a new character straight from the start as a pure mage so she is pretty much my life line. Summon an Atronach, Buff myself, buff lydia, heal lydia, stay safe. That's the plan, and lately she isn't doing enough damage, but can tank like a beast in full Orc armor. Soon I hope Ebony and such, but anyways.

I was thinking about our skill trees and since NPCs also have skill trees (Or I would think they do) that she might have the skills more for Swords than for Maces since she started out with a sword. Meaning though the mace does more damage (On my end since I have base One-Handed Weapons skill) than the sword, the sword would be more damage for her if she invested in the Sword skill sets of the tree.

Does anyone know if she does or not? Also, it's weird. I have been sneaking a lot (Squishy mage needs to be sneaky to survive on legendary), and I've found she has had the roll in Sneak that is a 50 sneak skill perk. So, anyone know if they changed things to have NPCs level skills?

Well, anyways. My main question is if she does more damage with swords, axes, or maces even if Maces are technically higher on the damage scale.

Give Lydia a One Handed Sword. A One Handed Sword is 20% faster than a Mace, and 10% faster than an Axe.

I usually give her an axe myself. I don't know why but, to me, it seems an axe is more fitting for a Nord.

And I'd be more concerned with Lydia's ranged weapon because, to me, it seems all she ever does is shoot.

She's an archer, so a slim sword or axe would be a logical choice.

I think her armour skill should not have been fixed that by the unofficial patches. After all, an archer/hunter in Heavy? Ick. If there was a fix to apply, it should have been to make her default inventory armour Light.

I never knew she was an archer. (I thought that was Faendel's job.)

What I usually do is to transfer several weapons and armors to the Follower in question and see which they equip on their own. By doing so, I've generally found that Lydia prefers Heavy Armor and to use sword & shield (rather than a two-handed weapon). And given a choice between sword, axe, and mace, she will choose the sword.

Selection may be altered by the Damage values of the weapons in question. An axe that does LOTS more Damage may be more appealing than a sword that does only so-so Damage. Also, it seems that the Followers don't factor in that a weapon that does X Damage + Fire Damage is any different than a weapon that does only X Damage with no magical enhancement.

Another oddity is that despite a Follower preferring Light Armor, if given the opportunity, they will wear whichever helmet provides the most Armor protection = a Heavy Armor helmet. That sort of eliminates any complete set (boots, gauntlets, body armor, and helmet) of Light Armor bonus the character might have had available.

I'm not sure what Shins is talking about. Lydia is classed a Combat Warrior 1 handed (see the uesp)., so 1 handed , heavy armor and block are her primary skills. Archery and 2 handed are secondary skills. As for which 1 handed weapon a sword probably is the best due to its speed, assuming you have equivalent level weapons. I always choose which one I think looks the best depending on her armor, or mine. It's usually a sword, but I have had her use plenty of axes and even a mace or two.

No block is not http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Lydia, it's One-handed and block is her secondary skill according to UESP.

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Heavy_Armor, http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:One-handed, http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Archery, http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Block

Indeed. Checking in TES5Edit, Her class is not one of the things that USKP alters. She is CombatWarrior1H, which favors heavy armor and 1H weapons, with some secondary consideration to Block and Archery, and a little bit of 2H skill sprinkled on top.

As for Lydia's damage output for the OPer... You're a Mage, so sharpen up that Enchanting skill and enchant the crap out of her sword. You'll need to take it back every now and then to refuel the enchantment. It couldn't hurt to just sharpen the blade with conventional Smithing beforehand too, even for a small boost.

BGS's lack of gameplay balance considerations have basically made axes and maces pointless. Any weapon can be craft-buffed to the Nth degree by smithing and enchanting, the damage differences aren't significant enough to justify the slower swing speeds of axes and maces, and the perks are useless; bleed damage for axes is piddly, hardly anything out there has enough armor value to justify maces' armor penetration perks, and most creatures don't even have armor values and are instead damage sponges, and there is evidence that the crit damage doesn't calculate at all and instead just does the base damage (which is again, a piddly amount compared to properly calculated regular damage).

I usually go for more speed over slightly more power...a good sword and some heavy armor should do you well

I believe Shins is talking about Aela.

As for one-handed weapons, the sword/mace/axe perks are useless anyway, so give here whatever. Swords are faster, so they'd be my first choice, but all weapons work well enough, especially if you improve and enchant them yourself. I don't know if Lydia even has any perks.

On my current play through I'm having Marcurio as my follower. He is badass with his sparks attack.

I usually like giving followers fast weapons if I'm using a squishy character that needs them to stay in front tanking for me, so that would be swords. Since you're a mage, enchant her weapon with one or more nasty effects for extra fun, with a fast weapon they'll get in lots of weapon hits that will cause the enchantment to hit the target for more damage. The Firey Soul Trap enchantment is a good choice for follower weapons, just give them all of your common and lower level soul gems and let them fill them up for you. You'll have to take back and recharge their weapon periodically but FST on the lowest level of enchant still hits for respectable damage and lasts for hundreds of uses.

Usually, Lydia is one of the characters I decide to turn into a blade, just to get rid of her without killing her (do not like seeing her in a city I refuse to go to thanks to one quest).

Hi all.

Sorry for the confusion. I had a brain fluff earlier. Thought you were talking about Aela. Sorry. Was going to edit/scrub my earlier post, but that might have made the thread look weird.

I like to feel that Lyds is in some sense, alive and so I let her choose from a weapons selection and keep what she likes. The only exception is when she oddly, sometimes selects a really low damage weapon from the junk she carries for me, leaving a much better weapon unused. In that case I intervene, by taking back the low level weapon thus forcing her to reselect from the good weapons.

That's my general rule for any followers. They keep what they choose.

???

There is a quest that starts in Whiterun that makes me just go there for the companions questline and not much else.

Yeah but which quest?

Not going to tell. Just one quest annoys me, so I do not go to whiterun after the quest often, and If I do, it is fast travel to dragons reach and to eorlund to sell stuff (if I can) then out of the city.

That is not important though. All that is important is that Lydia gets a sword as I make her a member of the blades.

I generally stick Lydia with the Axe of Whiterun, whatever it is. Balgruuf enjoys his little jokes, and whatever my skills are, he gives me the opposite. I'm good with one-handed, he gives a two-handed, and so forth. The enchantments on the thing often svck for my characters as well, so giving it to Lydia somes my problem. I always fit her out with a nice bow as well, but I don't give her more than about 50 arrows, and that way if she decides to favor the bow too much, she's soon forced to go with the axe or whatever.

As to the weapons they choose, it's been my experience that for weapons and armor, they tend to choose the stuff with the higher value, rather then the best attributes...

Suit yourself that's just childish.

Well... since the quests in Witherun aren't automatically handed to you without you talking to somebody, I'd say it has to be Amren's Sword quest or the Tree quest for the Kynareth priestess. Out of the two, I personally find the tree quest somewhat objectionable, so I'm going to guess that's the one... not that it matters particularly, eh?

Think that if you wish. But that is probably not it.

As I said, Lydia gets a sword since she almost always ends up in the blades in my games.

I don't really care, eh? Why would I? It's just that there are a limited number of possibilities, and it's fun to consider them. I mean looking for a quest that is so repulsive, difficult, or annoying that it makes a player avoid a central area of the game is simply fun. It's not of any importance though.

In my time of need, most likely. That one can be annoying to avoid. Neil, as far as the Gildergreen quest, what do you find objectionable? There is a peaceful way to resolve the quest.