I'm glad to see that so many more people are sick of these whiners. Unfortunately we've been raised in the age of complainers though. People who've had too much convenience all their life and who believe that everything is their due.

The next 20 years are going to put some of these folks to the test if you ask me.

I voted no , but I also think its BGS's fault for letting people level smithing to 100 just off of iron daggers.

Honestly, I think if someone can't tell they're ruining the game for themselves by spellcasting uselessly for 30 minutes, or going from 0-100 in blacksmithing in 30 minutes, they have bigger issues than being taken seriously.

As been mentioned above, though, we've grown up in a society of self-entitlement and self-delusion. But bluntly, we a giant society of big fat p***ies. And afforementioned people are a prime example of that.

Ish perfecably *hic* truesy. :foodndrink:

Anyway, no. No they shouldn't. :shakehead:

I voted No... For all the reasons why people who play this game as it should be played have stated above.

You only have yourself to blame if you use exploits to level up.

But atm, smithing and enchanting is so powerful, that even if you don't use exploits, they end up extremely powerful.

That to me is broken.

I've been as harsh as anyone when writing essays on this subject, but its very scary to see a "us vs them" mentality that has occurred.

Some of the more eloquent posters on the subject of overpowering themselves, and the result of some of the longer discussions, is that this actually has very little to do with the game itself, but rather a type of mindset on approaching games.

If you say they are less of a roleplayer for it, you deserve an elitist slap. Its simply that this method of roleplaying was socially frowned upon in roleplay games. Nobody ever liked the "munchkin" who played to max out his stats and kill everything because all his skills were powers of smackdown, whilst other players had spent points on wood sculpture for instance . Without the peer pressure to play a roleplaying game in the spirit it is intended, I think its natural for players to revert to the "beat the game" mentality which is the basis of games.

I've used this strained anology before, but its very much the difference between those who enjoy the Sims, and those who are completely baffled by it. I'm not a huge fan of the Sims, but when I play it, my first thought is not "how do I min/max all my skills", its about how the sims story develops for your little avatar, and guiding them through life.
Obviously Skyrim is far removed from the Sims, but the core concept that there are skills that, that will make you better at things, and reflect your choices as you live your life. It is neither The Sims, nor Skyrims intention for you to craft 468 daggers in one sitting, or even to aim for the goal of making ebony armour from the get go, and rather allow your character to naturally drift towards it.

Its an understanding of the heros journey, that the hero reacts to the challenges, and improves himself to overcome them. Without the understanding of telling a story, its perfectly natural to gravitate towards a "pre-emptive strike" progression of thought, that I must get the best equipment to ensure I overcome my obstacles.
I personally would feel sick if I saw a story outline that read "Dragons Return. Hero crafts Grenade Launcher. Dragons get Pwned". Thats not how a story works, and not how Skyrim was envisioned.

But neither can I demand Bethseda inflict the heros journey on me.. They tried that by slapping the journey on Martin to enforce the illusion of the monomyth in my opinion (reluctant hero, great obstacles, tragedy forces acceptance of the challenge, and finally overcoming through sacrifice yadda yadda yadda).

If we change the game, into an entity where someone telling a story has to stop their story for a few hours to do some grinding to achieve for instance, smithing levels instead of the current ability to simply increase it by improviing low level stuff, removes yet more potential to tell your Dovahkiin's story, and that upsets me.

No, they shouldn't be taken seriously.

I will say this though: those posts can sometimes be quite entertaining. I mean, when you think about the fact that people intentionally try to break the game, then [censored] about it when they succeed? AND they expect to be taken seriously? It's hilarious!

Okay, we need to draw a line here and distinguish the difference between optimization and exploiting.

Exploiting (using a bug in the game's script/coding to perform a feat that the developers never intended you to; IE using the Alchemy bug to make a weapon that deals 100,000 damage) and complaining that the game is too easy is clearly absurd; the person is essentially cheating to make the game easy. For all that this person is doing, they might as well just open up the console and type tgm; and they have about as much right to complain about the game being easy as someone who actually does this.

Optimizing, however, is a different story. Making a character with a powerful build should not trivialize the game. In fact, a character with a powerful build should be required to effectively function on higher difficulty levels of the game; it shows that the developers understand the capabilities that they're bestowing upon their players and are providing a challenge to them regardless of what path they take. This is not currently the case.

While you shouldn't complain about being to easy, with smithing/ enchanting it is to easy. There shouldn't be a way to 2 hit a dragon priest at level 25. Or better yet 1 hit a elder dragon. It's just dumb that this is possible. "don't abuse it and complain" how about don't make a way to 1 hit level 80 creatures at level 25? Common sense prevails. Did they even make a daedric sword (legendary) with 2 effects on your legendary deadric armour? At level 25. Not to mention shouts. Talk about rushed.

I'd prefer a less binary response. Yes, they should be taken seriously. But that doesn't mean the problem is a major one.

Using the available ingame mechanics (enchanting/smithing) to their fullest extent (even without "breaking" the game via alchemy potion loopholes) WILL make your game an easy joke.

The only way to not break the game is to purposely NOT make your character as strong as he can be. How counterintuitive is that?

@Levanon: I completely agree.

Apparently though, we're doing it wrong.

I didn't abuse them, I leveled all 3 as I went and because of that, I ended up being a demi god compared to half the content. Just saying, you can do them as you go, and with all the flowers and other alchemy stuffs out there, it's easy to accumulate a massive store. I don't look for them, but they sure found me; I personally, re-rolled an self imposed some restrictions, but honestly, should I have too? The biggest problem, and easiest to fix, is just have a level range where an item stop giving you level gains. It's really, really simple.

And keep in mind, you go into a mine and there are 8 nodes in 1 spot, and by the time I kill the dinky boss inside, they already respawned. You can really only go so far before you knit pick every little thing becasue you know it might break your experience.

Actually, I use the tri-crafting loop. Personally, I don't consider this an exploit, as the fortify skill enhancement was given to us by the game developers, and the algorithms that they themselves set in place limit how much you can enhance your gear.

Nevertheless, you don't need to use the tri-crafting method, or any method that is clearly a black and white case of exploiting, to make this game relatively challenge-less on Master difficulty.

To me it seems like this is what difficulty levels are for though. They even come with names like "Expert" and "Master" that lead you to believe there's some sort of technical challenge. If some players want their character's story to unfold like a carefully edited movie, they can select "novice" or "casual" or "easy" and just watch everything happen. But its a shame when players at the other end of the spectrum are left unsatisfied, especially when the game contains so many elements that could lead to a real challenge. I've had a few battles that seemed to be accidental intersections of several individual spawns - all hell breaking loose between Imperials, Forsworn, bears and a dragon, and it was awesome and a challenge to stay alive. Give me a setting with more of that.

I also think the destruction school that most people complain is underpowered is just about right (well, once you've addressed the magicka balance issues with a little enchanting exploitation) - I can one-shot a small proportion of lower level enemies and feel powerful doing it, but most encounters turn into something lengthier and more interesting. My dual wielder and archer characters, at the same level (around 40) with the same level of crafting skills, both one-shot just about everything, turning every fight into the same exercise of point and click. I really like this game, and the difficulty up through about level 20 is great, but the scaling and available buffs quickly start to get out of whack after that, even if you keep your crafting skills locked in step with your combat skills.

Illusion will do it, sneak will do it, conjuration will do it.

Lots more, but those work out of the tree/out of the vendor.

Don't even need to craft a single item

My friend is around level 33 and has perhaps a 70ish score in smithing because she uses the mechanic to make new apparel and weapons, and to supplement her dungeon income. Now, with the numerous hours she has put into the game, factoring in her level, that smithing score seems about right. She has not imposed any restrictions on herself, she has simply not created a thousand iron daggers to grind her skill.

I used the Infinium glitch to rocket to level 81 and am having just as much fun as her. Level 81 allows me the freedom to wear the clothes/armor-- and use the weapons-- I think are the most aesthetic for my roleplay. Its great fun to take on a dungeon of bandits wearing the belted tunic and using an iron sword, and I don't particularly feel like I'm "restricting" myself, either. I'm just not choosing things based solely on their power.

If you have enough time to discover easy ways to spam powers or exploit glitches then you have enough time to figure out how not to use them. If it breaks your immersion to solely craft iron daggers then that is not the game's fault. Conversely, if you are 100 hours in and now find it a little too easy, even after taking a longer route to level your skills, remember your playtime. 100 hours should net you considerable power. Anything upwards of 25 hours should, really. RPG's used to only last 40 hours, and that was if you stretched them out, squeezing every little tedious drop of gameplay from them; it is not unreasonable that a company would shoot for a nice balance between your casual gamer's bang for their buck, and your more hardcoe gamer's.

No, they shouldn't. I'm tired of hearing someone say "oh yea that part was really easy" or "oh well scaling isn't bothering me at all in my playthrough".....and then hearing that they "glitched" their weapons/armor to moronic levels.

Why not just use a console command for God Mode? Takes less effort

Actually, it's not. If you make armor or weapons for your character as you play through the game, and not just grind them out to sell them and level, these two skills level naturally. As in your increases in these skills go hand in hand with your characters leveling. I did not seek to power level enchanting, but I make and use enchanted weapons. I have made one set of enchanted gear for my companion and two sets for myself. My character is at level 34 and my Enchanting is at level 61. I fully expect enchanting to be maxed when my character reaches the 50's in level. Which is about where I would expect a skill that I used all the time in the game to be at. My skills in Light Armor and 2 Handed is up in the 70's and that is mostly from combat. I did use training about 3 times on LA and 2H.

My smithing skill would be at a similar level, if not lower if I had not chosen to grind on it. However I did that just to see what Dragon Armor looks like on my character. I do not see it as overpowering my character, simply because I do not use light materials for weapons. Other people might see me making Legendary Light Armor at character level 34 as overpowering, but so what, it's my game and I play it the way that I want to.

Actually, yes, it is.

How quickly you level the skills is meaningless. Once you get both skills to 100 the gear you create trivializes the game, whether you're level 10 or level 70. Keep in mind this is without any synergies applied to either skill; if you use fortify enchanting potions, fortify smithing enchantments and/or potions, or any other sort of skill enhancing items, things simply become even more skewed.

And those that dont craft, that didnt glitch? What about them? They're not illusions you know....

Well.... they might be, if they leveled up the Illusion skill.

I did that, that was an error

When enemies fight themselves, the difficulty level becomes academic.