same here...

Nope and i hope never will. If game will become easy like on expert i will load old save.

The game on expert is still pretty tough...now adept and lower is cake-walk and can be blasted through.

Sneak is a big part of it I think. If you sneak around a lot, you gain skill like mad and inflate your level. It seems to go up faster than most things.

If you don't fast travel of those 40 hours you have played or whatever how many of those hours will be just running across the map? Whereas if you fast travel you are getting to a place where you will be fighting or doing something that will cause you to level.

First thing i did was bringing pocketpicking up to 100 before doing any quests beside 2 mainquests to get the random dragons spawning.
This alone brought me to lvl 18 in about 10-12 hours. After that i have played "normally" and am 30 hours in now, at the moment at lvl 24.

I only fast travel from white run to riverwood. I level with warrior stone, well rested bonus & no training just dungeons. 37 hours lv26! Also play on Master & with my character build I die in 1-3 hits from pretty much anything expect 2 animals so I'm pretty good in melee combat & timing. I just pick fights with everything I can lol.

I think at times adept is hard enough, for example trolls and cave bears are strong enough at this level, however when fighting imperials/stormcloaks, bandits wolves and dragon etc. They need more health. Wolves just need 20 more or so, soldiers maybe 50 more, dragons 300 or more...

Lol that was pointless. The game was designed so you cant powergame it like that. You just gimp yourself.

However, if you walk around you run into a lot more wolves and bears, etc, meaning you really should level just about as fast. Perhaps you just play more conservatively? I'm at about 45 hours and at level 26 or so, but I don't feel like I'm leveling all that quickly.

Walking around isn't everything, though. I have a slow computer, so i tend to fast travel a lot more than I would otherwise. But if you walk around, you also find many more alchemy ingredients, so you should level alchemy faster! It really all should balance out before the end.

Its simple - on expert ppl doesn't die often = no challenge.

If ppl die on expert its good thing that means they got a job and dont have alot time to play. But if they dont die they on expert they should switch to master for more fun.

Lol a bear trying fighting a high level giant on master....without high investment in shield block..1 hit kills..

the amount of times iv'e run out of stamina...and dreaded the possiblity of a giant bum rushing me...was astounding...and oh yea lydia is dumb as fu** she always get me killed

Oh and about 60 hours in total but i made 3 characters, my most advanced is about level 14 with about 25 hours

Power leveling.

Im level 28 at 32 hours. Im not really going to fast, my only really high skills are Heavy Armor, 1H, and Blocking

There is no such thing as rushing this game, its called playing at your own pace, some people may not like the way you play, but it doesnt mean they are rushing or doing it wrong

Dying does NOT equate to challenge, that's a fps mentality. The real challenge is keeping in character as you play the game, and doing what your character would do. This is an Elder Scrolls game, not some fps with a 2 second respawn. Please take your "elitist" mentality back to MW3 and all the other crappy games, where it belongs.

Its easy I think, I got to 26 in 30 hours.
Blacksmith will raise levels fast, and I trained skills often along with using the standing stones.
Hoard a lot of alchemy items then slam out a lot of potions, same with blacksmith. Along the way speech will raise as a side effect of buying/selling.

thing i find a bit annoying is the fact..training skills like alchemy, smitthing and enchating levels you up alot of faster than just doing quests and killing mobs...unbalanced

Well, i didn′t know about the levelscaling issues when i started doing that. But right now i haven′t encountered "unbeatable" enemies beside the one
Automaton (i think) in Shimmering Grotto. We will see what the future will bring

Yes, its unbalanced for you because the enemy will level up, while you have a low combat skill rank.

I'm playing on default difficulty, 40 hrs in and at level 24. And I never fast travel. I'm just always building skills between locations (getting alchemy ingredients, sneaking up on prey).

Evryone who switched to master at low lvl saying that game become more fun. And im agree with them.

Role playing is fun, but role playing on master difficulty is even more fun.

Well if your spending an hour making 500 iron daggers then you are unbalancing the game itself. Not saying you are /justsaying.

By and large it has virtually nothing to do with fast travel, power-gaming, or difficulty.

The truth is that you will level faster or slower depending on character archetype, which is then offset by how often you fight. While the game is classless, it's not so much what you play as how you play that's important. Some characters, such as the classic rogue archetype, will skyrocket through levels simply because the sheer amount of skills they use in conjunction. Meanwhile, a mage with a limited spellbook (as is the case with virtually all early game mages) will be subject to a much slower rate of progress because their repertoire will likely consist of a few destruction and restoration spells for some time, and even after they expand it they will likely only use a few key spells to progress.

Point is, it's all subjective. The more skills you use or choose to incorporate in your playstyle the quicker you will progress. That doesn't mean you're missing anything, or that you're a powergamer, or that you're cheapening the experience. Why? Because for better or worse, the game scales with you.

Im 24 with 50 hours racked up.