So Ive started a two handed nord barbarian on Master difficulty, and I just dont see where the FUN is.

I got one shotted by a restless daugr.

More then one opponent and I cant block them, Im dead in a few hits.

I understand there are places you shouldnt go, but this was all bleak fall barrows. So I understand people want a challenge, but without
some sort of dodge mechanic, master difficulty is just hard for hard's sake.

Im going to try expert, but just wanted to know why people go on and on about this difficutly level when its just plain exhausting.

Heck I was scared of SKEEVERS! Then I took an arrow in the knee.

Havent tried Master but expert is challenging and fun

:D

just for a random challenge to kill smaller enemy's, and they give more experience because you use more attacks and stuffs

People who say that Master difficulty is easy are the ones crafting Godlike items or using Illusion/Sneak.

Having done this myself, I can tell you that it makes Master difficulty a LOT easier, but you still do have to keep your guard up. Think of it this way; using one of the above tricks, I can make Master difficulty feel like Adept with an occasional death trap.

You get a bit better loot on higher difficulty levels.

Honestly the reason I think a lot of people use Master is because, like myself, they like min/maxing and that can make you ridiculously overpowered in TES games. Or they just like a really hard challenge (like the "Dead is Dead" super-hardcoe folks). Again, it's all about personal playstyle.

For your information, enemies do about 4x more damage to you, are higher level, sometimes have new abilities, but damage from your companions and summons to enemies is normal.

If you're on PC you may want to try this mod with a slightly lower difficulty like Expert -- http://skyrimnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=1269

Instead of just scaling up damage to ridiculous levels it actually makes the game harder tactically by tweaking AI, making enemies heal themselves, etc.

Remember you can change the difficulty at any time, so ramp it up if you feel the game's getting too easy.

I have an easy time on master on my mage with 0 armor and 100 HP. An no, I have not abused 100% reduced destruction enchants. No illusion either. Everyone is going to have different levels of difficulty on different settings.

Edit:
@generalnmx: That mod sounds more fun that smacking enemies for 6 years before they die. I guess I should have stated while I find master very easy, its also not very fun. Its the AI that makes this game so easy for me. Increasing Hp just delays the NPCs deaths.

Depends on your spec. Going master while being melee is difficult if your not using a shield because in order to compensate, you will need to have your armor skills and damage resistance leveled in order to survive.

I played around 60 of my 85 hours on Master and that one shot thing simply didnt happen with light armor wearing characters and some Health ups.
Sure, sometimes the broken balance suddenly makes guys that are 20X as difficult as their mates appear and if those wear 2H or use high level spells they do a lot of damage, but no one shots yet.

"Grunk SMASH!!" doesn't work on Master difficulty without uber-gear from maxed alchemy, smithing. and enchanting.

My alchemy is 50, my smithing is 80 and my enchanting is 20 and with my Sword and Board character, as long as I guard properly and time my swings; I live. My previous character was just in plain ebony, non-enchanted fighting just fight with no problems.

For RP purposes, Im now sticking to full steel plate. Nothing special.

I just assume that most people who play on master simply only go through the main story and maybe a few guild quests.. I can't imagine exploring every major and minor area on the map and having any fun on master level. Every single battle would be a pain and just become a boring trudge. I was just in a tomb that every single draugr was an overlord, deathlord or scourge. It was huge and by the end a bit frustrating because they just kept coming. I felt so good to get out of that tomb and felt pretty darn good about myself and that was simply on adept level... Can't imagine going through that on master.. I probably would have just given up,... or broken the controller.

I have a level 40 High Elf Destruction/Conjuror Mage on 'expert' that I just parked, he is fun.

I have started a, level 9 now, Nord Two Hand, Heavy Armor so far and he will be a Battle Mage. I have plans for 100 conjure, 100 smithing, 100 enchanting push through level 30 or so.I am playing him on master.

Tips for two handed:

It's a really long weapon you do not have to get that close.
Only power attack when you have an opening. It took a while to gain the trigger discipline required, one tends to mash the button under stressful conditions which creates a power attack till your stamina is gone.
Up stamina, two handed lives and dies on this.

Lydia and I just took down a cave bear at level 7 or so. Not easy. As I get better at the mechanics I get more kill scenes and die less.

Pro tip:
Skill in two handed matters more than you would think.

My ultimate purpose is to cast Dremora Lords and be close to equivalent in ability to melee. My level 40 guy is very powerful but fragile. I want a true Battle Mage.

Master is hard but that's why it's master. I play all games at the hardest setting but I thought I'd show some respect for a game and genre I don't know well by starting one down from master. I have paid my dues.

I just started a new character ... Got tired of my level 29 dual wield sneak assassin. My new character just finished Bleakfalls Barrow on MOSTLY Expert.

I met the frostbite spider near Aravel as an Altmer in heavy armor (imperial) head on with an iron shield and Flames / steel axe. No sneaking and no ranged except for the Flames spell. I tried the spider about 6 times on Expert without success. I eventually dropped the difficulty back down to Adept just for that encounter.

The problem I had there is similar to the problem my level 29 has in general: most mobs die nearly instantly on Adept but boss level mobs can instantly wreck me on Expert.

Despite his failure against the Expert Spider my new Altmer did manage to defeat a Restless Draugr and the Bleakfalls Barrows Draugr Overlord on Expert. I have since decided that I will change the difficulty to meet my tastes.

Man kudos to you for trying that difficulty out.I can't even get past Adept without getting my Nord butt kicked. The afraid of skeevers part made my day.

Dual-Wielding 1H Axes kills most everything. It's the highest DPS in the game as the Bleed stacks, and can make things fairly trivial without increasing difficulty.

I play master, and don't drop the level anymore, but switched between expert and master between levels 15 -30 or so. I don't cheat, I have a fairly perk-gimped character from experimenting rather than trying for an optimal build, and I have even played wearing heavy armor (blades) while I was only skilled in light armor.

Depending on where my skills and perks were at the moment, there were times when I thought master was too easy (killing my first couple of dragons), and times where I felt like I had to "cheat" (potion spam) in order to survive boss fights, which is when I would switch to expert. The way level-scaling works, and the way that non-combat skills influence levels (equally) means that difficulty varies much more than just whether you're playing on Expert or Master or whatever.

Play whatever you have the most fun at. But don't underestimate other people, and claim that they're cheating. A few are min/maxing, but many of us go out of our way to avoid it (because it's not fun). There was a guy who just pulled off a dead is dead fight on master against a dragon with a pickaxe, and IIRC, no armor.

I like the challenge expert gives me, i'll stick with it

Yeah, 2H/HA on Master is not very fun. You die so quickly that block levels faster than HA and 2H outlevels both of them by a vast amount. It gets to the point where your 2H skill is so high you 1-3 shot most enemies and potion spam on bosses because they 2-shot you.

I keep saying this.

You do not need to abuse anything to take on Master difficulty.

I've played a Heavy Armor, Two Handed character so far to level 28 on Master difficulty and I rarely struggle. No smithing, no enchanting, no alchemy, and I impose a further penalty in that I can only use new armor if I complete the entire set.

I'm not trying to brag, I'm just trying to clear up the misconception.

You're also not bad if you don't play on Master difficulty. It's really a to each their own sort of thing.

EDIT: I don't chug potions either.

I do however have to learn fights sometimes and reload a few more times, I can admit that.

My problem is, if I didn't play on Master difficulty, I'd find the game mindless. The quests aren't challenging, the combat wouldn't be challenging and I'd personally be bored. I RP to a point, and that also gets me by.

I moved from playing Adept to Expert, because people kept saying how easy things are.

While some enemies are easy some are extremely hard on Adept or expert, unless maybe if you game the system.

For example just today, my level 17 Nord ran into a Spriggan Matriarch. It was exceedingly tough to defeat even on Expert. I may not be the greatest in a fight like this, but I can't believe that even someone more skilled than me could find it easy on Master at level 17.

Maybe if you get like 100% magic resist sometime, but it's ranged spell is devastating.

So I have to wonder about all those that say that Master is easy. Unless maybe you're very high level with incredible equipment - and if that is the case, wouldn't you expect anything to be easy?



I'm also two handed heavy armor, with smithing (I have exquisite steel no echantments). So how would you take down a Spriggan Matriarch at level 17?

And are you sure you're not trying to brag?

Sorry but this just either right with this, or I'm playing the game wrong.



So with a Spriggan Matriarch and may other "bosses" getting close doesn't matter because they have ranged attacks. And very high armor ratings doesn't matter because they use powerful magic.

So either there is a trick I have not figured out, or there is something very wrong with claims about being very easy with Master difficulty, low levels, and little to no enchanting, smithing, or alchemy. That just factually doesn't add up to me at all. But maybe I'm missing the trick, if so please let me know.

Hey everyone,

I've said this TIME and TIME AGAIN:

IF a person uses a companion on ANY difficulty, Skyrim is easy...Why? You, the player, can use the companion, Ex. Lydia, as a human shield.

The rest of the game takes you by the hand and walks you around.

Master level IS easy when played with a companion.

It shows me the lack of effort insofar as Bethesda's "single player" mindset is concerned......Non-Existent

A LOT of patching is needed for this game and I for one am very disappointed, thinking that Skyrim would be "smarter" when in fact it's more watered down
then past titles especially Morrowing, the TES gold standard!

Finis

I play on expert, it suits me.

because at later levels some skills get so ludicrously powerful (without exploiting) that anything but Master isn't remotely fun , imo.

But what about at lower levels as I say here:



I'm I just missing something or maybe just really bad at the game, to have trouble against "bosses" at level 17?

the only character that i had to drop to expert level simply because it was unplayable on master was my destruction specializing mage. even with perks in the fire and frost schools he still svcked balls. i had to keep chugging potions just to make him powerful and it got tedious. once you play any level for awhile you willl get good at it simply because you are playing against AI and you can eventually read AI. i play all my stalker games on master as well, however i recently bought dirt three and had to play on normal because im so out of practice with racing games that i had to relearn some stuff. eventually ill get back up to the expert level though with enough practice.

im curious to know if alot of people that played dark souls or demon souls play on master as well because skyrim on its hardest difficulty is infinitely easier than the dark/demons souls games.