1) I think frist thing is stop using conjuarion,enchanting,and smithing because they making game too easy. Especially conjuration.

2) Stop using another second "overpowered" abilities is 1handed+shield.

3) Using worst possible gear and weapons in game

4) Going to high level locations with low level char

5) (Master difficulty since 1lvl,and no cheats like abusing bad AI pathfinding in some place)

For example i died 10-15 times vs some group of mobs (when i was low lvl), but i learned that with perfect block/run/hit timing i still kill them.

Any other suggestions?

Use Destruction but don't take the impact perk.
Go unarmored and only use the mage armor perks for boss fights

Try RP a 100 HP Stage 4 Vamp on Master difficulty lots of fun and challenging I have to save quite often.

No armor, no weapons, no skills, dead is dead, Shouts only.



I kid. Dont take any Enchanting/Smithing/Alchemy Perks, use everything you find/buy/cook, don't use Followers, Dogs are fine though. Dont take any Sneaking perks. Master difficulty all the time. Limit your perks is the major one really...

This, I find unarmoured makes a massive difference to the difficulty.

Try the lonely commoner. You wear clothing not armor, 1 sword to be passed down through the family,and skilled in archery(for hunting).Don't fast travel, carry what you need and once you run out, your out untill the next stop.No magic what so ever and play on master, I have been running my commoner for 250hr and it's a blast!!! It changes you combat tatics altogether, I normally play a tank but once I tried this it was sooooooo much better, it forces you to play more realistically and not run head first into the fight.

set your level higher using the console advlevel. This ensures you a higher level, which ensures a higher level monster, but u still keep ur original stat. set it 15 levels higher than ur previous level and play on master.
Wear leather armor all the way. Not many people in skyrim have daedric u noe...DO U WANT TO GET ROBBED BY SOMEONE WHO WANTS TO STEAL UR DAEDRICCCC????

Mods (If you're on a PC, that is)

- "Hypothermia" mod makes the cold Skyrim environment as much a challenge as in RL;
- "Darwin's Nightmare" mod (or "Better Food and Sleep" mod) requires sleeping, drinking, and eating, otherwise there are penalties.
- "Darwin's Nightmare" mod also can increase the difficulty in obtaining money.

J.

My last character was a 2-Hand Warrior. She wore light armor, did not use spells, scrolls, shouts, enchantments or Guardian Stones and did not do Alchemy. She wore Hide Armor the entire game. She did not wear a helm. All perk points went into 2-Hand, Light Armor and Smithing. All Attribute points went into Health.

It could be very difficult at times, especially in the early levels, but it was not impossible.

Just wear no armor and don't put any points into health. I did this on my mage and it didn't matter what I did I could always be one shot by a single arrow or stroke of the sword. It was very challenging from start to finish. Knowing you can die at any moment from a random occurance or unforseen attack really changes how you play. I was always stressed going into situations with multiple enemies knowing that one mistake ment going back to a previous save. How far back the save is you decide.

Dead is dead is going too far for my taste. I would be so stressed out over that I would be afraid to leave town. Not fun to me.

No leveling master difficulty. That means you never enter the skill menu, never get perks and never increase your health.

This is hard but possible. My character is already 30 hours into the game. Finally, if you ever get bore of it, just go to the skill menu, boom, instant new character for any build you wish.

Why not play dead is dead.... now that's tuff.

You view to make the game "challenging" also makes the boring. I've found ways to make the game both challegning and fun without sacrificing the games features. I've written a couple forums disscussing this but to support your topic instead of being a jerk i'll add to what your saying.

From my experience from finding the balance in this game there is one point i cant stress enough and that is not exploiting the enconomy with every character you make. Sure, i've played the theif/assassin type and became a bill gates in skyrim, the problem is, it makes everything worthless. I'm on my 4th character now with 350 plus hours in and i can tell you i've found the perfect balance in almost every aspect, not only the economy. For instance, assuming you are the kind of person that adheres to rules that are common sense, which is a whole other disscussion, my Khajit is a pure DPS class. As such, he can put out a good enough amount of damage but can't go heads up with anyone one. Thus, i have a variety of different followers that i have equiped with enchanted weapons and armor for different occasoins. And having to rehire/fire them is a reasonable money sink i have placed in the game. Also, His job as an enchanter makes things interesting because i'm too weak to soul capture anything beyond a common soul in gems so i must loot in order to make money. I never loot garbage either (i.e., mobs weapons and armor) i usually only take things from chest or those special things laying about. I obviouly dont use FT either. Thus, in order for me to get a nice shining new weapon for my duel-weilding cat i need to save and spend my money wisely and am thus forced to explore the beautiful world that has been created by the brilliant minds of Beth.

Moreover, sticking with a true class and not creating a god-like charater means that i get my ass kicked by bosses and enemys i dont have proper resistence towards. Thus far, every boss i encounter it takes a creative approach to beating. And even though i dont put perks into alchemeny, i rely on it. Also, i am a good cook as well. Therefore, i use every aspect of the game to help me get by every encounter by the skin of my teeth. Also, my khajit only has placed attribute points into stamina, and has no perks in light/heavy armor. So he dies A LOT. In addition, since my Khajit is not rich i have fun making tough choices on what to invest into to compensate for his weakness of not being able to take a lot of damage, since he has low health but a high stamina. And not only do i have fun fine tuning him but also all the compaions i have that come a long with me.

In reality, the possiablity are endless. It's almost like how in Oblivion you had endless choices on making spells. Thus, the balance is in the game if YOU want it to be without having to sacifice the games features themselves, cause when you do that in order to make the game "balanced" you're left with a feeling a very narrow sense of gameplay. People should understand, that thier sense of shallowness of the game is not the games fault, it is rather born from a lack of understanding and creativity. You get what you put into this game. Thus if you not getting a rich gameplay experience it's because your poor into investing into the game, plain and simple.

The thing's I do make it harder is not for reasons to make it harder (Besides putting the difficulty on Expert)

I turn the Hud Opacity all the way down for immersion reasons, which makes it harder because you Can't see your magic, Stamina, health , enemies health, Cross-hair or Compass.

I do not wear Armor on 2 of my most used Characters, because I think Robes and Clothing looks cooler

and I refrain from being Cheap because I hate being cheap (Ex : Dual wielding a Dagger and Sword = Turbo speed and dead dragon in 5 seconds)
:|

Only use 1/2 the perks.

Well I play on adept difficulty but have a very strict set of self-imposed rules;

1. Eat, sleep etc. (to make it feel real-life)

2. I carry only what I could logically carry; one suit of armor, one (max 2) weapon(s), a few lockpicks

3. When I loot, I only take thing I could logically carry; soul gems, gemstones, gold, books etc.

4. Iron is the highest quality armor I will use no matter what

5. No companions

6. No magic of any kind

7. No potions, scrolls, enchanted weapons/armor or any other self-boosting except racial abilities

I find this makes the game challenging at times, but I can usually retain my laid-back attitude towards lesser foes.

Bah!
You need one thing and only one thing to make the game at the right difficulty:

NO RELOADS.

At adept difficulty already, surviving a no-reloads game is a significant challenge.
Most things will feel like a cakewalk, but if you screw up you may loose 200+ hours of your investment.

I dare you.

(And it's so much more immersive. Oooooh.)

This is what I am doing. No armor or mage armor spells or perks. Just robes, me, and destruction. I have thrown in sneaking for fun in case they ever add in touch magic spells and sneak attacks!

I playing on harder difficultys because because i find it more fun. I dont feel fun when i kill evryone in game with closed eyes without using sprint/block/timing/running etc

I dont undersant how people can feel fun in Skyrim when npcs have absolutly zero chanse vs player and bosses die from 2-3 hits. I like dying sometimes. Im not forcing anyone to use worst possible gear in game or something else, but enchanting/smithing/conjuration making game too easy i would suggest evryon to stop using them if they want to feel more fun in game.

in my opinion master level without using exploits and no heavy armor can be enough.
I'm enjoying playing my thief (light armor) and mage (robes) a lot

Adept difficulty (the default) is ridiculous.
The enemies you face are so inept, so clueless, it's fairly unlikely you'll be killed.
You realize this quickly once you switch to Expert difficulty.
It just feels much better right away (more normal and real-life).
But probably not until you're Level 10+ or so, especially if you're new to these games or are playing a softened character.
(Then dopey AI becomes a blessing, heheh...)
But you guys are right, these characters can be so much fun.
They're real. I myself have my own little restrictive rules etc.
Anyway:
For most players there is another significant milestone reached.
This is when you become able to blacksmith enchanted items.
Once this happens all bets are off and there's an enormous leap in your PC's capabilities.
Enchanted weapons and armor! What a concept.
At this point I switch to Master difficulty.
It's still pretty easy (but your Block skill will go through the roof).
Regards

Thats why i never use enchanting and smithing. With random gear without enchants player can kill npcs fast and npcs also kill player if they are highter level then player.

Adept difficulty will kill you dead, if you play NO RELOADS and without munchkining.
It is a non-trivial challenge to survive a game as a 'normal' (no power game, no do-overs for mistakes) character.

Stupidest original post I've seen around here in a while. Ignore Conjuration? Lol....

I had played my first character to Level 56, and because he was very powerful I was using Master difficulty.
I wanted to start a new guy, to do the Thieves Guild and Dark Brotherhood (my first guy was a real goody-goody, and you know, you're not likely to join the TG as a Level 56 hero-type).
As a result, my new guy inadvertently played from the beginning, his execution, through to Level 10+ on Master difficulty!

This was not in the plan, and the result was striking.
What I noticed was that I wasn't making any money - and as a brand-new character, that's fairly important, heheh...
The game UI on Master difficulty apparently controls more than just the direct fighting.
All of my rewards and the pricing on everything were really harsh.
I was struggling and hadn't figured out I was on Master difficulty yet...

I figured it out while trying to retrieve Volundrung for Malacath - that giant just wouldn't die!
The way his health was dropping, it was gonna take 40 days and 40 nights to finish him off...
It hit me like a thunderclap all at once - Lord, what difficulty am I on?
Yikes.

Falling back to Expert difficulty made an enormous difference. Huge!
I carry Volendrung.
Falling back farther (to Adept) turned my foes into children. [censored] children... no fun. (Understatement).
So everything is relative, y'know?

Re: difficulty level affecting financial rewards/merchant interactions/etc. (beyond combat)
Can anyone confirm this? Confirm or deny?

Epilogue -
The New Guy is now Level 62, and still levelling up rapidly.
(There's SO MUCH MORE to the game when you start off 'bad' and head to Riften right away...)
And needless to say, he's been back on Master difficulty ever since he started to smith enchanted items - I think Level ~25 or so.
Regards