I am trying to determine if it is my use of set timescale to 2 at the start of a new character that is causing this, or one of the few mods (basically official DLC's and the unofficial patches) that I have installed.

When I get the Golden Claw quest from Lucan to go to Bleak Falls Barrow and his sister offers to guide me, she goes outside and then just stands there by the door doing nothing. If I talk to her she just says "this way" and stands there some more, being useless.

If I move around her a bit she will eventually (after a dozen or so "this way" responses) move approximately ten feet, then proceed to stand there useless again. Rinse and repeat every ten feet to the bridge.

I remember once upon a time when Skyrim first came out this flowed naturally as it should but now it is just a chore.

I would love for this to be implemented into the console version

It could be a timescale issue because I have had this happen to me before with other NPC's, and I don't use mods.

I've read before that setting it below 5 will cause some problems with quests and the like. I stick with 5 and have yet to have any problems like that.