A lot of people forget that you can only smith a weapon or armour 'so far' before you need the appropriate perk to take it to the highest level.

It's funny, and ironic, but the only people who grizzle about being able to smith things to the point of uber-powerful are people who have actually done it...and therein lies the problem. It's not an issue of the 'smithing' is too powerful, it's an issue of someone doing something and not liking the end result, or simply complaining because they don't like the way the game is designed.

There is one set of heavy armour that can't be smithed past the reputed point of maximisation, and I believe that all others can, but out of all the complainers, have any of them limited themselves to that one set of armour? I doubt it.

Regardless of anything else, some people will go to extremes...if it isn't smithing, it will be standing in front of a giant and blocking with a shield to boost block, or it will be running along casting magelight to boost up alteration, or it will be casting 'pacify' onto a bunch of chickens. Some people will power-level just because they can.

As this is a single player game, is there an issue with smithing, or is the issue with how some people have used it? Skyrim is non-competitive, it's not a multiplayer game where the current exploit fad is the be-all to end-all. Just because someone says "Hey, I can make uber-armour and level up quickly" on the forums should not be the governing motivation in a person's playing style, but there's plenty of people who have taken that path.

Certainly, the question of 'un-improved' loot and shop stock is a bit of an anomaly, but what is the other side of the coin? We go to a blacksmith, and can't purchase that ebony sword early in the game because it now costs 5000 septims? We suddenly find that there's a lack of base level weapons and armour out there? My view is that the system works as it is now...you can smith without taking perks, but you can only take it so far...you can find plenty of weaponry and such out there, and the ability to dispose of it is balanced against the money in the shopkeepers inventories, if you add another 500 to 1000 septims on the cost of loot then the economy will really go haywire, or players will not be able to dispose of the bulk of what they come across or win, or everyone will be forced to take speech perks simply to be able to hock off their (ill) gotten gains.

No-one has to 'take' smithing, and no-one has to power-level or abuse it, a minority of players will, and a minority of players who think that it's overpowered is not a valid reason to change or alter a valid and workable game process.

We should remember that the big argument that the 'smithing is overpowered' faction has been using in response to the obvious "Well, don't do it then" response, is "don't tell me how to play my game"...that's fair enough, but why then post that smithing is overpowered and try to tell Bethesda how the rest of us should be playing our game? It's utter hypocrisy...and it doesn't just sit in the field of smithing either.

I suppose... but if you use Paralysis enchants, that becomes a bit of a moot point..... though I usually go for raw damage on my weapons and trust in Ice Spears to slow enemies down if necessary.

And yet despite that... I'd still rather get good at sword-fighting by hitting things with swords. Not once have I thought to myself that I ought to rely solely on Enchanting in place of actually having the skills...
Besides... that extra boost doesn't help unlock perks for those particular skill trees.... which is where the real fun is.

Play on master difficulty, and blacksmithing is mandatory. Besides I have my own rule when I play because blacksmithing is way overpowered to a ridiculous extent.
I can only improve items and armour, can not build past orcish and can only mine iron ore to spam daggers. However I can buy any ingot to build with properly.

I do not think there is a problem with blacksmithing skill tree, I think there is a problem with a ridiculous abundance of iron ingots and experience bar goes up way too fast.

Spoiler:

If you dont believe me how OP blacksmithing is, steal all the iron ingots from the blacksmith tables, go into Whiterun for example there is a whole box of steel or silver ingots, and just keep buying
iron ingots and spamming daggers.

The point is more that the increases in damage given by adding Alchemy and Enchanting to Smithing reach insane levels when compared to Smithing alone. Here's an example for bows:

Legendary Daedric Bow

Base- 58 damage; this is with 100 Smithing and no other buffs
+130% Fortify Smithing potion- 125 damage
+116% Fortify Smithing gear- 195 damage
+188% Fortify Marksman gear- 562 damage

Add +130% Fortify Marksman potions, and you get 1293 damage, which is a tad excessive. If you also fight from concealment, that goes up to 3879, which can one shot everything on Adept. The mod Imp uses reins in most of the excesses (it doesn't touch Sneak, that I know of), so that stacking crafting isn't an auto-win against anything not a Master-difficulty Ancient Dragon. Basically, that 562 isn't really going to be reached even with stacking, unless you're sneaking at the time. Some melee weapons will exceed it without stealth, but then they have a special cost factor- you have to get your head beaten in to use them.

http://cdn.hometheaterforum.com/9/99/99c9bcde_75543.jpeg

that so reminds me of this comic!

its actually faster and cheaper with hide bracers

Those are playstyle choices though, they're going to be different for each player. A good goal should be to create a challenging but fair game for as many playstyles as possible. One thing that Skyrim really has going for it, in my opinion, is that it more or less drops the conventional, restrictive warrior/rogue/mage classes, so you can really get creative when it comes to putting together a character.

you shouldn't be able to craft weapons with better base stats than daedric artifacts

Saying smithing is overpowered on the basis of what a player can potentially achieve, through the use of enhancements, is like saying that an olympic sprinter is a cheat because he can run faster than most of the rest of the population...

The point is, as I've said above, that people don't have to take extreme behaviour in a game simply because they can...and taking the extreme approach in smithing or enchanting is no different to the players in the early days of Fallout 3's release who used to pop onto the forums to loudly declare that they had killed everybody and now couldn't finish quests or the game and their game was 'broken' (note: that in-game behaviour didn't make them bad or evil, it made them psychopathic)

I personally love its there if you wish to use it, I like improving lesser gear so its useful at later levels and my character can wear what they like without a massive penalty. It is boring if you grind the skill, I never do that I just take my time with the skill.