So I recently picked up Dawnguard and Heartfire on steam as it was on sale for 50%.

I have yet to complete the Main Quest and the Civil War quests and I have barely scratched the surface when it comes to the game (just haven’t had the time of late) such as quests, guilds and exploring.

I am going to be RP an Archer/Ranger (think Legolas and Aaragorn).with Blacksmithing and Enchanting. I don’t want to rush with the main quest/civil war and Dawnguard.

What difficulty would be more rewarding? I’ve been playing on Adept. Should I go one level higher? I wouldn’t mind a challenge but is there a big difference between Adept and next difficulty?

I really want to “experience” and “live” in Skyrim before I get into the mayhem. So I was wondering how should I go about playing the game and unlocking the main aspects.

Like should I do the Main Quest, then the Civil War Quest and then focus on Dawnguard before building my own house and then moving on matters more pressing and urgent when Dragonborn gets released?

Also I heard of the exploit in Dawnguard with the “unlimited arrows”. Well it is not an exploit technically considering its basically crafting. But does it directly relate to your skill in Blacksmithing or can you not take Blacksmithing and still be able to craft arrows?

Thanks all.

You can change the difficulty whenever you like, even in the middle of a fight. If you think it's too easy, set it to Expert. If it's too hard, go back to Adept. If it's still too easy, try Master. It's hard to recommend a difficulty because it really depends on your build and you skills as a player, so experiment a bit to find the one that is best for you.

Doing the Civil War before the MQ skips one particular quest. Some people like it, and some don't. If you like the political aspect of the Civil War (or if you haven't picked a side yet) then you might be interested in that quest; in that case, do the Main Quest first. You need something for Dawnguard related to the MQ, so if you are going to do the MQ do Dawguard later. There's really no "best time" to build you Hearthfire house, do it whenever you want.

As for Blacksmithing, I believe you need the respective skill perks to be able to craft arrows of that material (Elven for Elven Arrows, Ebony for Ebony Arrows, and so on...)