[Ricky Rayner]

Another thing a lot of people who moan bout the difficulty don't seem to realise is that there is the Difficulty Slider....

I certainly found that harder at the beginning of the game, when I was low levels!

And role play? It means you can't be a ridiculously powerful warrior, who also happens to every single spell in the game who is ALSO a Master Archer....need I go on?

[Tiff Clark]

This is nonsense. What are you talking about? Ive never been faced with the dilemma of having to figure out ways to handicap myself to make a game more challenging. It's always been the other way around. This is backwards. Just stop. All of you. Im willing to bet the devs are looking at all these silly apologetic comments and laughing at you people. They have already acknowledged there are balance issues with the difficulty.

That was a silly post wasn't it. I'm just an average gamer, I've not finished many games before and Skyrim is the first game I've ever played on master difficulty, all other games I play on default and I still can't complete most of them and those that I do complete like Batman Arkham Asylum I do so with hundreds of deaths so I certainly don't blast through it without a challenge.

Skyrim is just dumb in terms of difficulty. I just charge straight in and whack the enemies with my sword, no challenge in that. Basically if I set a game to master difficulty setting then only expert players should be able to complete it, I certainly shouldn't be able to yawn my way through battles I should be on the verge of dying with every blow I take!.

[REVLUTIN]

...Human element will always overcome difficulty no matter how hard something is.

This^.

Like you, I've been playing video games since sometime around 1979. I remember in the early 80's when the first books on how to beat arcade video games came out. The writers of the books had figured out the patterns used in the games and if you applied that knowledge you could literally play Pac-Man on one quarter until the manager made you leave becaus other kids wanted to play the game too (and they wanted to make money). And when you can play Pac Man that long on one quarter, it's not very fun after the first few times you do it.

Therefore BY THE AGE OF 12 I learned that abusing any video game's system so badly that it took away the challenge made the game not worth playing.

Even if the difficulty was cranked up to 50 times Master level in Skyrim, people would still find a way to take the game down. The only way that wouldn't happen is if it wasn't within the realm of possibility to do so. IOW, the game wouldn't be able to be conquered no matter what you did. And that's about the equivalent of standing in your back yard flapping your arms up and down for hours in an attempt to fly. If that's one's idea of good time, have at it. But don't ask me to do it.

[carley moss]

I finally was able to break this thought of a god-like character, but firstly I want to say I dislike the work god-like because nothing can compare to god. What I did was this:

I kept saying my character was too powerful compared to anything in the game, I felt bored from everything being too easy, now I have countered that by making a character that will be the enemy of the current one, I created a good vs evil. Two Dragonborns, one holy, the other unholy, vampire vs paladin type deal, do you get the picture? So as I am leveling the next character I will be focused on skills that would potentially defeat the other character. Though I won't be able to pit the two in an arena, I can use my imagination to, lucky me. Maybe I can use this imagination and create some kind of novel or maybe even a game

[Scared humanity]

Dual wielding alone is too much. Shadow Warrior is just a toy you dont need. It is very useful for evading Mages and Archers though. Just repeatedly vanish and then silent role in for the kill.

You're better than me. I never use dual weilding because without the ability to block, its plain suicide for me.. I admit I don't have a character with shadow warrior.. Bandit bosses especially seem to kick my butt a lot. I think they could probably kill ALL their followers at one time. I do have a mod that buffs the dragon's defense but otherwise I'm pretty good. I actually most other games easier than Skyrim because of the weird difficulty spikes.

[Dark Mogul]

This is nonsense. What are you talking about? Ive never been faced with the dilemma of having to figure out ways to handicap myself to make a game more challenging.

You're kidding right. There's always something. For example In any game with AI based enemies there is always a way to cheesily exploit the AI if you look hard enough. I've been playing video games since original Doom and I've never found any game you can't find plenty of ways to exploit and make way easier if you look at it from a gamist viewpoint. What's nonsense is saying this is the one game in all your gaming history that you've ever had this problem with.

[kirsty williams]

Powergamers live to break games. No matter how a game is designed, someone will find a way to game the system. I would think that overcompensating for power games to ensure they can't breeze through the game would make it too difficult for a majority of gamers to complete.

If you are playing a dual wielding mage with heavy armor and a sneak of 100 with the most powerful weapons, then perhaps you over did it a bit before completing the main quest. Try reaching the end of the game before level 40 on Master instead of gathering every possible thing and leveling every possible skill before attempting it.

How did you find your fancy weapons? How did your sneak get that high through 'normal game play'. I call comlete shennanigans on this... if you play the game normally (i.e. not power leveling sneak, and cherry picking Daedra quests for your perfect build), you will find Master level to be quite challenging.

It's like you're breaking the system on purpose and saying, "Oh! Look at that. It's broken. Shame on them." Of course it's broken! You set out to break it, then broke it then whined about it being breakable!

"I should be able to play the game any way I want and still be challenged!" Yeah. That's true, but not if you are on the uppermost fringe of completely overpowered purposefully. No one gets that overpowered without specifically trying to min/max beyond what the game is meant to handle. In short, you had to spend time researching the loopholes to "one shot Alduin". No one is doing that in the course of a normal playthrough.

It's like saying "I toggled on God Mode and the game is too easy. BROKEN!"

Go play Diablo 3 in May if you want impossible no matter what. This game would be completely pointless if balanced to meet your wacked out standards.

[lucile davignon]

You're kidding right. There's always something. For example In any game with AI based enemies there is always a way to cheesily exploit the AI if you look hard enough. I've been playing video games since original Doom and I've never found any game you can't find plenty of ways to exploit and make way easier if you look at it from a gamist viewpoint. What's nonsense is saying this is the one game in all your gaming history that you've ever had this problem with.

Go play Ninja Gaiden and find your exploit. Besides, Im not talking about using exploits. Take Final Fantasy VII for example. Arguably one of the best rpg's of all time. I spent 3 months or more leveling up my materia so I could have some chance at beating/surviving Emerald Weapon and Ruby Weapon and I had to figure out exactly what materia I had to use and who to give it to. When I did beat Emerald Weapon the fight lasted THREE HOURS and I loved every second of it. That game required far more commitment than any Bethesda game and it didnt scare casual gamers away. It did the opposite. It made FF the #1 rpg at the time. Gamers were conditioned to expect to be challenged in those days and it was the norm.

Ive noticed that more and more people are wanting their Xbox achievments to practically be given to them. They dont want to actually overcome a challenge to earn them. Over at the Xbox achievments forums they cry if an achievement requires the slightest bit of skill to earn. This is a small symptom of an overall trend with this generation. We are raising our kids to become of a bunch of wusses.

You're better than me. I never use dual weilding because without the ability to block, its plain suicide for me.. I admit I don't have a character with shadow warrior.. Bandit bosses especially seem to kick my butt a lot. I think they could probably kill ALL their followers at one time. I do have a mod that buffs the dragon's defense but otherwise I'm pretty good. I actually most other games easier than Skyrim because of the weird difficulty spikes.

They die before you sustain any significant damage most of the time.

Powergamers live to break games. No matter how a game is designed, someone will find a way to game the system. I would think that overcompensating for power games to ensure they can't breeze through the game would make it too difficult for a majority of gamers to complete. If you are playing a dual wielding mage with heavy armor and a sneak of 100 with the most powerful weapons, then perhaps you over did it a bit before completing the main quest. Try reaching the end of the game before level 40 on Master instead of gathering every possible thing and leveling every possible skill before attempting it. How did you find your fancy weapons? How did your sneak get that high through 'normal game play'. I call comlete shennanigans on this... if you play the game normally (i.e. not power leveling sneak, and cherry picking Daedra quests for your perfect build), you will find Master level to be quite challenging. It's like you're breaking the system on purpose and saying, "Oh! Look at that. It's broken. Shame on them." Of course it's broken! You set out to break it, then broke it then whined about it being breakable! "I should be able to play the game any way I want and still be challenged!" Yeah. That's true, but not if you are on the uppermost fringe of completely overpowered purposefully. No one gets that overpowered without specifically trying to min/max beyond what the game is meant to handle. In short, you had to spend time researching the loopholes to "one shot Alduin". No one is doing that in the course of a normal playthrough. It's like saying "I toggled on God Mode and the game is too easy. BROKEN!" Go play Diablo 3 in May if you want impossible no matter what. This game would be completely pointless if balanced to meet your wacked out standards.

No loopholes or exploits to increase damage/defense. I used legitimate means and limted myself to Thief/Assassin perks trees including Speech.

[tiffany Royal]

Go play Ninja Gaiden and find your exploit. Besides, Im not talking about using exploits. Take Final Fantasy VII for example. Arguably one of the best rpg's of all time. I spent 3 months or more leveling up my materia so I could have some chance at beating/surviving Emerald Weapon and Ruby Weapon. When I did beat Emerald Weapon the fight lasted THREE HOURS and I loved every second of it. That game required far more commitment than any Bethesda game and it didnt scare casual gamers away. It did the opposite. It made FF the #1 rpg at the time. Gamers were conditioned to expect to be challenged in those days and it was the norm.

Ive noticed that more and more people are wanting their Xbox achievments to practically be given to them. They dont want to actually overcome a challenge to earn them. Over at the Xbox achievments forums they cry if an achievement requires the slightest bit of skill to earn. This is a small symptom of an overall trend with this generation. We are raising our kids to become of a bunch of wusses.



They did before you sustain any significant damage most of the time.



No loopholes or exploits to increase damage/defense. I used legitimate means and limted myself to Thief/Assassin perks trees including Speech.

What level were you? How high were your skills? What weapons?

[dav]

What level were you? How high were your skills? What weapons?

Level 81. Skills at 100. My weapons are a Blades Sword, the Blade of Woe and Nightingale Bow. Dont even say it man. 81 is the level cap that the developers set. Not me.

[stevie critchley]

This is what you need to do

1) Dead is Dead
2) Classical Classes: Kind of blend these two links together for a strict build concept
- http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Classes
- http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Classes

Also, you should not stack life every level!

[Angela]

Level 81. Skills at 100. My weapons are a Blades Sword, the Blade of Woe and Nightingale Bow. Dont even say it man. 81 is the level cap that the developers set. Not me.

So? You're the one who maxed out. You want them to make the rest of us miserable so that you can be challeneged when you intentionally maxed out? Or maybe they should have made a difficulty level called "Min/Max Gamebreaker". I'd be down with that.

You can't possibly suggest balancing a game to the 0.01% who top tier before finishing the game... Come on. That's not balance, that's overkill.

And you know what? Play on PC and use mods. They know that the insane hard core crowd can use mods to overcompensate for their godlike awesomeness. The series has always been about player developed content catering to many different crowds.

So, get the PC version, install some hardcoe mods and enjoy.

If you only play console, well, you get what you pay for. Go play a game built for the console. You're asking Bethesda to alienate their customers to cater to your playstyle.

[Baby K(:]

I will admit that the shout that knocks you down gives me trouble sometimes but that's all. They knock you down and you bathe in arrows untill you finnally get up. That's about the only time I have to use a potion.

[Stefanny Cardona]

So? You're the one who maxed out. You want them to make the rest of us miserable so that you can be challeneged when you intentionally maxed out? Or maybe they should have made a difficulty level called "Min/Max Gamebreaker". I'd be down with that.

No. I just expected them to scale with me to 81. Silly me.

You can't possibly suggest balancing a game to the 0.01% who top tier before finishing the game... Come on. That's not balance, that's overkill.

And you know what? Play on PC and use mods. They know that the insane hard core crowd can use mods to overcompensate for their godlike awesomeness. The series has always been about player developed content catering to many different crowds.

So, get the PC version, install some hardcoe mods and enjoy.

If you only play console, well, you get what you pay for. Go play a game built for the console. You're asking Bethesda to alienate their customers to cater to your playstyle.

I would but there are other more important things I have to spend money on than a new PC. Bethesda already said they plan on fixing the balance issues with the difficulty.

[Liv Staff]

No. I just expected them to scale with me to 81. Silly me.

Yeah, silly you. The scaling has to stop at some point to allow players of lesser skill to earn a high enough level to beat the main quest. If it scaled to 81, only super awesome players could beat the game.

Now, maybe it could have had a setting that scaled all the way up, sure, but they set the mark at 51, assuming players going beyond that either needed more levels to triumph, or would mod for high end game play.

You don't need a new PC to play it. I have way below the minimum and it runs perfect on the lowest settings and looks just as good as my brother in law's XBox does. I have a crap vid card, crap ram, and I play on a non gaming laptop. You could easily run this game.

[Skrapp Stephens]

Yeah, silly you. The scaling has to stop at some point to allow players of lesser skill to earn a high enough level to beat the main quest. If it scaled to 81, only super awesome players could beat the game.

No, they wouldnt continue to scale unless you leveled. That's what scaling with you means.

[Richard Thompson]

No, they wouldnt continue to scale unless you leveled. That's what scaling with you means.

Uh, that's what I said. If you leveled to 81 and everything scaled, like you want it to, then it would be impossible to beat unless you were very very good at the game. Understand?

[Adam Kriner]

They die before you sustain any significant damage most of the time.
.

I guess you're just that much better at playing and power character design than me because that's not how it works for me. Die die die because no defense. I really would like to see something to get you challenged in Skyrim but not if I had to deal with it also.


I guess you can blame old guys who apparently haven't gained much video game skill in decades od playing with relatively poor reflexes ( despite being a fencer, Martial artist those reflexes have never transfered to the keyboard for me) on the too easy games. maybe I'm just too much what the pen andpaper folks call a "real lifer" to design competative characters.

I do agree it would be nice for the game to satisfy us both but I guess I'm the lucky one here.

[Milagros Osorio]

I guess you're just that much better at playing and power character design than me because that's not how it works for me. Die die die because no defense. I really would like to see something to get you challenged in Skyrim but not if I had to deal with it also.


I guess you can blame old guys who apparently haven't gained much video game skill in decades od playing with relatively poor reflexes ( despite being a fencer, Martial artist those reflexes have never transfered to the keyboard for me) on the too easy games. maybe I'm just too much what the pen andpaper folks call a "real lifer" to design competative characters.

I do agree it would be nice for the game to satisfy us both but I guess I'm the lucky one here.

Here's the secret. Just power attack with both weapons at the same time and then light attack and then power attack again with both weapons at the same time. If you built up your stamina efficiently you should be able to do it all day and everything will be destroyed. Most oponents wont survive the first power attack though. Skill has very little to do with it.

[Jennifer May]

i keep banging on about this but i really think it'd work.....

......difficulty 'sliders' for each skill. You can set the balance yourself then.

[Richard Dixon]

copying and pasting bc i beleive this answers alot of questions and complaints.


the game is designed so that when u are all perked out and lvled up u are a badass beyound badasses. its not poor game design, thats how the game was desgined all all before it. thats how this series plays out. Thats hwo they wanted it and hwo they made it, its not poor game design to make it and the end result rend up how u intended. GET IT IN YOUR HEAD. This is a rpg that has first person action to it, but mainly focuses on the the rpg, exploration and immersion. it added soem challenge leveling up, it did not have to. If the game wasnt challenging enough or that u disagree with the end result, then the game IS NOT BROKEN, you have a different OPIONION on how the game shoulda been like. You paid 60 bucks for an excellent game that does nto boast to be difficult but so that u can play any role and explore and have all this [censored]load of content............where di they say its gonna alsio give game sliek "darksouls" a run for their money and that players are gonna have to bang their keyboards and controllers and get stuck at parts that are sooo insanley difficult. Where? they didnt design it to be difficult, they dsiseigned it to explore, rp, and dugeon crawl and look good whiel doig that. You wanting the difficulty to maxxed out after all perked and lvled up and it nots cattering to ur needs at higher lvls, its not bad game design because it wasnt ever entented to be difficult game in the first place, just challeneging. They designed it so that when ur maxxed lvl just like in other RPGs like FF, DA, ME, and so on that inthose games when ur the maxxe dlevel, theres no challenge in for ya...except FF7 ands the ruby weapon but then it wasnt difficult as in motor skils just that u had to sdo the same damn combo for 30 mins to an hour to beat it, just liek in this game.

game aint broken because u disagree that when ur lvled up and perked out that the game is easymode and no longer challenging when they designe dit that way. Your opionion differs to what Bethesda thought the game shoudl be but just because yal have different opionions, dosent mean game is broken or whatnot sinces that whats they intended. if ya dont like, buy a computer and change it urself and put it up on steam and nexus....because really, thats were bethesda gets most of thier ideas as far as combat and what to put in, they use ideas fromt he mods and see hwo popular certain mods are and base alot on those. Hell why u think thye give us pc players a kit to change what we want? So they can look and use our ideas and see what was needed to be changed, how many people changed it, and etc.

And if ur ont he console, to [censored]ign bad. the game is how Bethesda designed and intended it to be and such and because sony and microsoft dont give options to change the games on thier consoles, ur stuck with how this awesoem excellent game is. You wanna change it? Well lesson learned, go out save up money for a pc and u can change what u dont like. It'll take time btu by the next TES or FO game comes out, bam u have the tools to do what YOU want, not what was inteneded.

Also those perks and such, hell most of them are flavor perks that are just there because of Rp value and peopel who wanna be all OP. Of course they break the game and make it easy, its what they were designed to do. The person who RPs as an assassin that can go in and outta shadows, bam go into a shadow and uve "disappeared". The Op player that dotn want a challenge from mages and archers, bam go into sneak mode pull out ur weapon or arrow let it rip, when they spotted ya run away and sneak again. they put alot of this [censored] in here for RP purposes, not to make the game challenging. You wanna make a game that was nto design to be challenging to be challeneging, then thats ur responisbility. Not the game if it wasnt intended for that. Get a PC and get soem mods, or change up ur playstyle. Theres a [censored]load of mods to fix ur problem and if ur on the console, well u learned a lesson that so many of us have learned. that the games are fun on the console, but u have the power to change and have more options on PC.

[TWITTER.COM]

I prefer it when these threads are presented as a discussion and not a statement. Different strokes. So,stated another way, how do you play that makes the game fun for you?

I mostly agree with the OP. My primary character is level 51. I play on default difficulty. I still die sometimes.

My weapons are modded ones, but they pretty much amount to ebony. They are improved by smithing.
My character wears modded armor that amounts to TG armor.
No enchanted anything.
Only health potions and poisons, no buffs.
Combat mods that deal more damage.
No regeneration.

Keeps it fun. I also create and use mods that make the economy more difficult, eliminate compass markers, etc.

[Jeff Turner]

copying and pasting bc i beleive this answers alot of questions and complaints.


the game is designed so that when u are all perked out and lvled up u are a badass beyound badasses. its not poor game design, thats how the game was desgined all all before it. thats how this series plays out. Thats hwo they wanted it and hwo they made it, its not poor game design to make it and the end result rend up how u intended. GET IT IN YOUR HEAD. This is a rpg that has first person action to it, but mainly focuses on the the rpg, exploration and immersion. it added soem challenge leveling up, it did not have to. If the game wasnt challenging enough or that u disagree with the end result, then the game IS NOT BROKEN, you have a different OPIONION on how the game shoulda been like. You paid 60 bucks for an excellent game that does nto boast to be difficult but so that u can play any role and explore and have all this [censored]load of content............where di they say its gonna alsio give game sliek "darksouls" a run for their money and that players are gonna have to bang their keyboards and controllers and get stuck at parts that are sooo insanley difficult. Where? they didnt design it to be difficult, they dsiseigned it to explore, rp, and dugeon crawl and look good whiel doig that. You wanting the difficulty to maxxed out after all perked and lvled up and it nots cattering to ur needs at higher lvls, its not bad game design because it wasnt ever entented to be difficult game in the first place, just challeneging. They designed it so that when ur maxxed lvl just like in other RPGs like FF, DA, ME, and so on that inthose games when ur the maxxe dlevel, theres no challenge in for ya...except FF7 ands the ruby weapon but then it wasnt difficult as in motor skils just that u had to sdo the same damn combo for 30 mins to an hour to beat it, just liek in this game.
~Snip~

~Edit, well, most of what he said rang true, I don't agree with his tone though...

Quoted for the "HELL YEAH" effect..The whole point of leveling up is to get stronger, and with an open sandbox game such as this, that can also be played for a couple hundred hours it is an extreme inevitability that you will be much more powerful than your average giant! I can understand the need for an eternal challenge, and realistically, if you want to maintain a challenge without having enemies that level with you, you will have to have stop leveling up your character...Either that, or you could easily download the thousands of mods that address this issue, or design your own, hows that for challenge?

And that's what I'm doing because the skeletons were easier to beat than a wet paper bag! ....Oh, and if you're on the console...I feel for you, I would seriously invest in a gaming rig.

[Laura Wilson]

Yeah, it's looking like I'm going to have to implement an overhaul mod in order to retain challenge while making highly optimized characters, since playing on Master isn't enough by itself past the early levels. My current character will not use Alchemy when making gear (will use it to make money instead), and another will handle Enchanting the same way, so I can see what I have to change and by how much. Might even tweak the AI, although that's a bit tricky to do properly.

I still wish they'd balanced combat 'properly', though, as I shouldn't need to do that.

[Jessie Rae Brouillette]

I can't think of many Rpgs that are truly 'difficult'. Linear action/adventure games can be difficult because developers know the limited path that will be followed, but being that you can do anything practically in Skyrim, there will be ways to become overpowered. I'll admit that i play on Apprentice mode, using skills that i try to keep balance and i already was killed once and had many close calls. I can't imagine Master being easy, and if it is, you wouldnt be using some skills fully being that you'd want to dodge most attacks instead of using armor or block, and you'd feel like the most pathetically weak 'hero' of all time...why play an rpg if everyone is going to be tough and challenging?