I'm playing a lvl 23 Imperial battlemage. One-Handed, Heavy Armor and Destruction somewhere around 50. And I'm stuck in Saarthal facing a Draughr Dreadlord in a room where he comes down from a platform on either left or right side. I have Unrelenting Force fully developed and 8 other shouts at the first level that don' seem particularly useful, and Kharo (sp? - the Khajit) as a follower. I can use Fireball and Firebolt effectively, but the Fireball tend to hurt my follower as much as my foe, as he won't stay back.

The Deathlord has this unnerving unarming shout, and my follower tends to rush him and get beaten up - killed if I'm unlucky.

I can't find any potions in my inventory that will help, and summon scrolls are hard to find or buy. I can summon an Atronach, but it takes most of my Magicka.

Perhaps I should use the Wabbajack? It approaches cheating, as I will need to reload until it gives me a useful result. I defeated another Dreadlord with that earlier, it simply killed him after a few tries (first time it turned him in to a rabbit, but it transformed back when I hit it again - I guess I should have left it alone).

I must be overlooking something and any advice is appreciated.. It would be nice to find out if there's a tactic that I'm overlooking. Defensive spells, perhaps? Is there a defense against that unarming shout?

That Draugr goes back and forth between fire and ice immunity. When he's cloaked in ice, fire works and ice spells are useless. When he's wearing a buncha fire, the opposite is true.

Also, assuming you're on the College of Winterhold quest, you gotta wait for Tolfdir to make him invulnerable. If you console commanded your way around it theeeeen yeah that's not good. Also, for the disarming shout, you can't do much aside from avoiding it or carrying a dagger or something on you in case you get disarmed.

If you have the impact perk you could always just stunlock it with firebolt spells.

This is before Tolfdir makes his reappearance. And the Dreadlord does take damage from fire spells. I do not have the specific fire spell perk, but I do have at least one general destructive spell perk.

I do have a second weapon, but it's not as good as my primary weapon. And this guy has a lot of health. There's no way around him. He's guarding the exit from the room.

Sounds like the Wabbajack may be the way to go. I did earn it, after all.

Lower the difficulty?

Temporarily, of course. I knew I was overlooking something.
But I'd like to find a straight solution if possible. Should I have focused my skill development differently? I have put some points into Alchemy, Enchantment and Smithing. And Stealth, Speech and Lockpicking move up steadily. I'm wondering if a skill set of ca 50 in the primary combat skills at level 23 is comparatively low.

Edit: Oh, I'm on the PS3, so console commands are out (they would be a last resort anyway).

OH. I KNOW WHICH ONE YOU'RE TALKING ABOUT! Yeah I had the same difficulty on my archer! God I must've been in that room for an hour. The Draugr is like, on a raised platform and there's stairways on either side of it, right? I remember it so damn clearly...

What I did to help me was err on the side of caution. Rather than standing my ground and just firing arrows hoping it died, I found it much safer to err on the side of caution. I'd use Unrelenting Force, fire hours until it got back up, then run around and use the wall to break line of sight. When I was able to shout again, I did the same thing, just used Unrelenting Force to knock him back a bit and fire relentlessly. Whenever he was on his feet, I'd run. I'd also apply Marked for Death each time that fell off. I still got my bow knocked out of my hand but I was able to get it back quickly. Another thing is not to not constantly sprint, even though it seems kinda panicky as all hell. I just would just move as fast as I could, and if he was on top of me, THEN I would sprint.

Just gotta be patient and keep on your toes. I don't know what about that fight was impossible...well aside from my under-level gear but you just gotta keep at it!

Yes, that's it. One of my problems is that I have a bit of trouble navigating, especially in the dark and in combat. I keep pressing the right stick on the PS3 controller, taking me from first person perspective to third person. I guess I could turn up the light in the settings menu, but it's already up a bit. Candlieight is by far the most used spell I have.

But I guess patience is another way to go. And hope that my follower can stand it. Or just tell him to wait outside, perhaps. I do have an amulet that cuts the time by 20% or so - that should be useful with this tactic. But it would cost a frightful number of magicka potions.

How do I know that a shout has recharged?

I was a Khajiit archer, so I had Night Eye, but quite frankly after spending so long on that damned fight I felt like I could just run the room with my eyes closed.

And when the compass at the top of the screen goes from white back to normal, that means you can shout again. When you shout it glows white, then the glow slowly recedes from the center of the compass down to both ends. When it's totally faded and looking typical again, you're able to shout again.

You should start kiting, using the environment.
Running while getting some strikes

Running around gets me confused. Doesn't work for me. I still struggle a bit with the PS3 console thingy.

A combination of lowering the difficulty one notch and saturating him with Firebolts did the trick.

I can't find that Shout recharge on the PS3. I'll check the manual (what little there is) and ask in the PS3 forum if I can't find it.

Haha, some people view that as exploitation of the AI -- I have to say, though, a few things picked up in a couple multiplayer matches go a LONG way in Skyrim

As for the OP, I do not recall what fight you're referring to, unless it is the final fight with the dragon priest. If so, yes, that was a tough one (I did it ~lvl12 or so) for my most recent mage character. If not, I don't remember anything being of any trouble inside Saarthal besides that one fight.

We play on different platforms, so maybe it's a specific issue?

Fenyx, I think it's a levelled opponent. I'm level 23 - you met him at level 12. So he was probably weaker in your case. It is not the boss fight of that dungeon.

I know the one you mean, I used runes to kill him. Drop runes behind you and use the two stair cases to avoid direct combat.

I hate Draugr on my illusionist... They aren't like bandits who stand around and let you Mayhem them. Gotta get them out of the coffins... And Aranea kept ruining my stealth. I swear that invisibility doesn't break combat, they're practically psychic and know exactly where you are... Even when they use a [censored] bow.

Alright, I'm on ps myself, and I recommend that You give it a try.

Multiplaying games like i.e Wow has actually tought me a lot combat-wise

And correct, kiting isnt an exploit, it's just good tactics

When you're out of that dungeon and just walking around (safe) in Skyrim use a shout like Kynes Peace or Ethereal and watch what the compass does at the top of the screen. Like Gallariachiban said, it will flash white and slowly cool down. Once the "white" has gone away, your ready to shout again. Don't wait until combat to check out shouts and spells for the first time. This is why I gave up on master-level spells. I found out that they took too long to cast (and both hands). I'm ducking and diving too much in dungeons to burn that kind of time casting. And yes, I had a tough time with that draugr too, for the same reasons you did!

There are two niches filled with pottery on either side of the room where you can hide. The Deathlord won't let you take potshots at it and will run for cover, but since it has no ranged attacks, you should be able to heal yourself.

Summoned atronachs are little more than a distraction for it; if it takes that much magicka to cast it, don't bother.

Kharjo should be "protected" which means that he can't die except by your hand. As a melee fighter, he should be able to at least distract the draugr. With a little skill, you should be able to aim Firebolt around him, but Fireball is a no-no.

Bound weapons can't be disarmed; if you have a bound weapon spell and your normal weapon is stronger, why not give it to Kharjo? Then he can do more damage; if you keep to ranged combat, you won't miss your weapon.

Rune spells are supposed to be used as traps, but if you have them, they'll work for shorter-ranged damage if you cast them at the draugr's feet so it trips it immediately, but watch out for Kharjo.

Kharjo may also have bugged low stats; you can dismiss him and hit him with the Wabbajack until he transforms, which will fix him and should pump up his damage and defense, but save, since you may accidentally kill him. There's a room with a grate a little before the Deathlord that would be perfect for this. The re-recruit him.


At least you aren't in the situation my little brother was in -- had to become a werewolf to kill the draugr, and he though he was in the clear, but then Tolfdir showed up, shouted "Oh no you don't!" and killed him with a fireball.

Build up your archery. It makes taking down Deathlords much easier. Especially later in the game.

These fights are really hard for my altmer mage but really easy for my battle axe nord. As soon as i see a coffin at the end of a dungeon, i know either a deathlord or a dragon priest will emerge so i shout elemental fury and rush them as they wake up, many times cutting them down before the fight begins.

It sounds like you should seek out the slow time shouts, it comes in handy against strong fast moving enemies for distance fighters or marked for death to weaken them

Tnanks everyone. As I stated earlier, I'm past this challenge now.

PrinceShroob, are you saying that I myself inadvertently killed the followers that I have lost in combat?
I'm pretty sure I have seen situations where a follower gets killed simply from receiving too much damage over a short time - and not from me.

If it's not the final fight, please forgive me. I can't, for the life of me, recall which particular draugar you're referring to? I've done Sarthaal 4+ times and have very little idea what you're getting at. Not your fault, I'm just sorry I couldn't be of more help

For the shout cooldowns on PS3:
When you perform a shout the compass bar the top of the screen turns blue. As the shout cools down it fades from the center outward from blue back to white. When the compass bar is back to white and the diamond filigree at the ends is normal you can shout again. The diamond filigree ends will flash brighter white right before going to normal, but basically the compass bar goes from blue to white during cooldown.


About 95% of the time the follower will have died because of us (player characters). There are rare occasions where one enemy has downed a follower and another enemy has already started an attack and kills the follower by finishing it's attack or if there is a DoT on the follower (fire or poison) when the follower takes a knee. Basically the enemies stop attacking your follower when they go down to one knee and it is either us or one of the above rare occasions that finish them off.

I've sort of covertly been collecting data on follower deaths by system. I can tell you that on PC, I've run a number of tests that tell me that protected actors don't die unless hit by the player, regardless of being hit when downed as the wiki says. I do know that protected actors can be killed by poisons and poisoned dart traps, though.

But there are enough reports of followers dying without player interference that I'd bet there's something screwy going on by system. I have some friends who play on Xbox -- perhaps they'd test for me?

Is there a list of "protected actors" (essential tags I guess)? I don't use followers generally because I kill them too often with my spastic slashing style so I don't have any firsthand data - however I have taken Lydia and Mjoll with me a few times recently with my chick because they look so cute in the Ancient Nord Armor and Falmer Armor respectively. Even then I've usu killed whatever is in front of us before they even catch up.