I like Lydia. She's totally loyal "unto death". But how do you keep the girl alive? It seems I'm spending huge amounts of gold, and many extra hours of time, just trying to keep my loyal Lydia alive and with me as I wander. It's frustrating to look back and see her running in place, stuck behind a tiny rock I just bounced over. No cross-country exploration for Lydia, it seems, I can't take her most places where roads aren't involved. Heaven forbid the grade is too steep or the terrain too rocky, no matter I can handle both.

The Lydia problem gelled when I actually chose Ebony over Glass crafting as my Smithing perk. I needed Glass for my Light Armor character, but Ebony might better help keep Lydia alive. While it's true you have the choice of leaving Lydia behind at the house, you pay for it. Whenever I go into my bedroom, there she is, sitting at the little table despondently munching on a hunk of bread, casting morose glances in my direction, obviously crushed at being spurned by her thane. Whatever happened to "they also serve who only stand and wait" and the steadfast attitude that goes with that philosophy?

As the final straw, when I take Lydia with me to work more-or-less as a pack horse, the girl can't carry much of anything, especially now that she's all in Ebony. If I take her into a dungeon, she runs ahead into the fray, intent on killing or being killed. Discretion is definitely not her longsuit. So, she stirs the hornets' nest and sets them all on me, or she dies and sets them all on me. Great choice. I park Lydia outside if I plan on a bit of finesse in my play-style. Further, how to fill soul gems with my over-protector around? Before I can get my bow aimed, she's killed the critter. Frustrating.

I have some suggestions that might actually make Lydia and her ilk an asset: 1) Lydia (or any follower) should be able to maneuver any terrain you can maneuver; 2) add the command "Stay behind me!", which will make her stay... well, you know... BEHIND you; 3) increase her carry-capacity, wearing Ebony shouldn't max-out her weight-limit; and 4) if you no longer want her following you around, no sad-faced, overly-dejected moping when you release her to stay and guard your house.

Like I said in the beginning, I like Lydia, she just needs to be something other than a huge drag on my game... either as someone, incapable of carrying much, who I must constantly spend time, gold and personal safety on to keep alive, or as an emotional guilt-trip, should I give up and leave her at the house. How do either of those things enhance game-play, Bethesda people?

Just left her on your house at Dragonsreach.Lydia is weak because you found her at the beggining of the game.And companion's are level-based.So if you find a companion at level 1 he will have everything that a level 1 player have.

Awe
When u said taking care of Lydia I thought it was going I be a video of you killing her.

After Lydia died in a hard dungeon in my first run through, on the way to getting the horn or jurgen wind caller I havnt had a companion since.

My 2 housecarls and wife stay at home now. Don't want anyone else to die.

Healing Hands is a good spell to have so you can regenerate your followers health, personally I don't use the housecarls because I prefer the smaller female Breton Eola in scale armour or the miner Annekke, they carry a fair amount of loot. When traveling I don't worry about my follower being lost, they suddenly show up or will show up on a fast travel. I lose them in the mountains but then they take some route to catch up with you.

Most followers in other games level up with your character, at least when they're with you, are you saying Bethesda didn't use that standard?

I think it's a bug actually. If you're on PC you can fix it by using console commands.

Probaly.Also the most disturbing thing is that you can't kill some of your companions.But when an hostile npc atacks them....they die..This svcks when you want them at your side.

She does have a very alluring voice doesnt she?

Healing Hands was one of the first spells I bought, specifically for keeping Lydia alive. LOL I discovered the Fast Travel thing early on but, in some situations, I don't know if Lydia is lagging or dead, so I worry. Skyrim is an immersive game, and the storyline is what I'm after, so I get immersed.

Also, if you want to keep using her as a mule, merely enchant the 3 things you can to increase her carry weight. If she is merely going to be a mule, she doesnt need to have ebony either...just give her some leathers or even just the default gear she has. That will give you some extra capacity.

I am on the PC, but have never used console commands much... and not at all with Skyrim yet. Is there somewhere I can find a listing of them? hmmmm... perhaps there's a mod...?

Strange, my Lydia never seems to die. I let her take the worst of the hassle first before going in - and this is on expert level. Although I`m glad she needs care. I like them to be Human, not unkillable robots.

I do like her devotion though... ah, if all women could be like that!

The problem with using her only as a mule and limiting her armor to the basics is the getting-there-with-her-alive thing. You can encounter some rather nasty, Lydia-killing surprises along the road.

I was under the impression that followers could only be killed by friendly fire or bosses. in regular combat they just go down on one knee and get ignored by enemies.

Perhaps that's what I'm doing wrong! I should just let her do her thing so she levels... if she does level... now I'm no longer quite sure Bethesda used that old RPG standard.

She definitely has a personality, and she does say a lot of totally devoted things I enjoy hearing. (Must indicate a personal void that needs filling. ) Plus, for some perverse reason, I get a kick out of her gripy response to my trading her some things, "I have sworn to carry your burdens." Yup, yup, yup, Lydia, you did, so here ya go. LOL

Nope. Lydia dies well and often, if you don't make keeping her alive a priority. Then it's Reload and do it again time, if you really don't want to lose your Lydia.

I don't use housecarls because they would just get in my way.

Aye, true that. I don't like to fast travel, you miss out on too much content....and she can definitely be a pain travelling. I actually use the 'snagging' that happens to my advantage. I go straight line as I move and she has to go around. The advantage is that when I come across something to deal with, I can kill it or whatever before she gets there. She just gets there to help clean up or to get loaded down. The only time this really wont work is on a crawl, and there, I just park her and periodically move her up if it is a large one. Otherwise I just leave her by the front.

Sounds like your play-style is similar to mine. The only parking problem is if I accidentally park her too close to the action with no door between. Then, even if I've commanded her to stay, she wades in anyway, usually alerting every baddie in the area to her and then my presence. She definitely can't handle many of the resulting attacks my Lvl 26 Battlemage character can handle.

I learned the hard way not to use a Chain Lightning staff around her, even though she was behind me and I was firing at a mob of spiders in front, the lightning chained to her and killed her stone dead. Paid a lot of gold for that staff, but now, for Lydia's sake, it's just a wall decoration.

It would help a lot if they weren't so depressed when you leave them to guard your house. I've had 3 so far, and only the one in Riften didn't sit around all gloomy and depressed to be left at the house.

If you are on a console you are hosed unless they patch it so Lydia levels with you.

On a PC Lydia is a studdette if you do the following.

Tell her to leave and then hit ~
Click on her and type disable (she goes poof)
Close the console
Open it again and type enable.
Shes back.
Tell her to follow.
Shes now your level.

As for her dying, no she does NOT simply die because shes hit in normal combat. Every Lydia death I've had can be traced back to me, either a spell or a hit or a shout. I found out the hard way that using unrelenting force on a boss while Lydia was on her knees will kill her. I've seen her in a fire trap SLOWLY crawling out of it on her knees while surrounded by flame. I've seen her take arrows on her knees (dont' say it) from guys who could one shot my mage. EVERY one of my Lydia "oh crap she died" was my fault, though sometimes I didn't realize it at the time. You have to be careful with fireball, runes, etc. Even power attacks because she does like to jump in front of you and the rather odd 'range' of weapons means it easy to hit something that it doesn't look like you could hit on screen.

Only time she's ever died on me was from jumping in front of my spells- which she does well and often.

Maybe it depends on difficulty settings? I play on 'adept'.

Giving her a few healing potions help with her survival, she can even summon creatures if you give her the staff for it. I Prefer to adventure alone tho..

It's weird how so many players actually keep Lydia. Its almost like she is synonymous with the word follower. There are so many followers to pick and choose from, so why do people keep the first one they come across?

Personally I rarely use followers so I don't have much advice to give, but Erandur was a cool character and wasn't constantly kneeling when I used him (unlike the warrior followers). Maybe try a mage follower?

I tend to really like the first followers I meet and stay loyal to them. (Boone).

Lydia's been with me for 39 levels now and I'm going to try and take her through to the end. Her health level is only at 158 (sadly) and my Restoration level increases because I keep her going. She's a good fighter, gets lost a lot but always finds me again and while she's missing, I fight alone. She has died but I reload. She's in ebony armor now and that's helping. She relies heavily on staves which I give her and we both have soul-trap bows and plenty of soul gems to keep them recharged. She loves conjuring up that Frost Atronach. It's been quite the experience with her, something I'll always fondly remember about my first game. Maybe I'll travel with Erandur next time.