I've been playing the game on master difficulty for a while now, because I enjoy a challenge, and I think it's much easier to judge the balance of a game when you pit various play styles against the toughest possible scenario, as opposed to an easy one. (For example, lots of people maintain that shields are useless and melee is easy because they play on easy difficulties, where your armor easily does all the work, or that destruction magic is overpowered, because on easy difficulties it burns through any number of foes with ease)

The issue I see with Master difficulty is that the way the difficulty is raised in the game is in the absolute lamest, most unimaginative, and cheesy way possible. All the game does is simply increase the damage and hitpoints of enemies, in many cases to an absurd degree.

This leads to two things happening:

1. Enemies can shrug off blows like they are nothing, you can smack them with a power attack from a great hammer and they just don't really care all that much, it takes a couple millimeters off their life bar, but they keep right on rolling. That completely screws up the game however, because it destroys the way a lot of mechanics work. For example, shield bashing someone to open them for a flurry of attacks - useful if the enemies is gravely wounded as a result, pretty much pointless if they still have a mountain of HP left, but it still costs a good chunk of your stamina. Using Fus Ro Dah on an enemy is even significantly cheapened by their inflated hitpoints, because while lying on the floor helpless for a few seconds might be a big deal in regular difficulty, on master difficulty the enemies will simply get back up and keep fighting, since they can take a couple dozen wacks from a decent weapon.

2. Enemies do insane ammounts of damage. This is also gamebreaking in a lot of ways. For example, the first "miniboss" you will encounter in Skyrim on a usual play-through is the big spider in bleak falls barrow. It has a poison attack. Poison attacks ignore armor and blocking. On regular difficulty this spider is a pretty mean foe, no doubt, but on master difficulty it's one bite and you're dead. The only way to survive its poison attack is to instantly pause the game and throw half a dozen health potions in your mouth. The same is true for dragon breath, enemy mages, and high end enemy fighters as well. They end up doing so much damage that your defenses become meaningless.


The result of those changes are that certain play styles become infinitely more potent than others. Stealth becomes incredibly powerful, since the enemies are no better at detecting you. Conjuration becomes an easy way to avoid taking blows, and of course all the various cheese and exploits with alchemy, smithing and enchanting can easily turn master difficulty back into a cakewalk.


I think it's a shame that the difficulty setting in Skyrim are so uninspired. Sure, they make for much harder fights, trying to play through master difficulty as an unsubtle fighter without ludicrously enchanted gear is damn near impossible, since every other enemy takes a minute long beating to kill and can do more damage to you through your shield than you can do to them with a well placed hit. Ultimately the difficulty setting utterly fails at making things more difficult in all areas though. The vendors have the same prices, locks are equally easy to open, enemies are still unable to detect a semi competent stealther.

I really hope Bethesda will take a look at the difficulty setting and reevaluate how they work. Master Difficulty should be more than just making fights absurdly hard for characters that aren't made of cheese and lols, it should make the whole game harder. Bribes should be steeper, vendors prices harsher, locks harder to pick, enemies harder to trick. Playing through master difficulty should mean that skills are more meaningful as a whole, not that everything is skewed towards characters with high DPS and avoidance. If you want to be rich on Master difficulty you should have to invest in some merchant perks or lockpick skills for example. Every individual aspect of the game that is confronted by a skill should be harder to some degree, not one singular aspect that is best confronted by only a hand full of skills harder by an insane amount.

Perhaps we can get the moders on creating a "Genuine Challenge Mode" and not just an "Inflated Enemy Numbes Mode".

Im having no trouble surviving on master. My thief is level 45 and played master exclusively. I dont have uber gear, just equipment Ive found and upgraded a bit. I dont use enchanting or alchemy, and I havent perked Smithing except for steel smithing and arcane smith so I can still upgrade those found items.

Instead of complaining about it, how about you learn to play the difficulty. If its to hard for you turn it down.

No matter what beth do, no one is happy. Hate to sound like a loyal really devoted really devoted fan, but it's true.

he did admit it is easy for stealth players. you do know that your post is senseless?

stealth is free win anyways

Not if Bethesda made the combat actually good like Dark Messiah was. That game puts Skyrim to shame. Honestly, more you play Skyrim and go back to games like Gothic 3, more you realise just how bad Skyrim is in it's game mechanics.

Yeah and? I still have no problems in direct combat on master either, because I dont stand still like an idiot. Just because my character is a thief doesnt mean I sneak 24/7.

The combat is fine, it can be improved upon, but it's fine. Stop over reacting. Anyway most people, including myself, havn't played those games, so thats sort of irrelevant.

maybe you should turn down the difficulty instead of whining about it. your character is obviously not ready for it yet

Gothic 3 was crap, badly made, and had pathetic character progressing. Using that as a basis for anything is fail.

I think you make a good point with prices and such, and i also wish the enemy AI was better/smarter sometimes.
I play as warrior on master and without sneak I felt like i had to get enchanting to do some resist magic enchants, wouldnt describe it as an exploit though, merely had to use more of the games resources

I play on Master after I hit about 25 + levels once the game starts to get too easy. I start on Expert. I agree with the OP completely. It is so uncreative and I hate that the game forces me, the player, to balance my gameplay in that order I don't break the game. They should've really put some limitations on crafting skills. I never thought I'd say this, but I miss Oblivion's enemy level scaling now. The game was a challenge from start to finish. I wish they just put more enemies for higher difficulty levels if nothing.

I am hoping that once CK gets out we will get some great overhauling mods like it was with Oblivion (Obscuro's for example).

hardcoe gamers will never be satisfied because it goes against their "Take the hard-road" nature, otherwise it would be too easy! Like adrenaline junkies they thrive on the thrill of surviving and facing insurmountable odds...That said, I can see where the OP is coming from, instead of whacking endlessly at a wall with 2000 HPs, why not tweak this Marvelous thing called "Radiant AI" and up the NPC's block, Power attack, and dodge percentage instead? And do not take this as a crack against non-hardcoe players as I simply feel that no one should tell anyone how to play the game that they just bought! (Proudly playing on Adept!)...And yeah, color me a Beth-Devote as well!

Sneaking and Archery aren't an argument. Even on Adept difficulty, with light armor if you go to contact with a dragon, that's a free finishing move from full health. Everytime.

At least it wasn't dumbed down like Skyrim. A lot of the RPG elements in Skyrim are useless against a flawed levelling system. I'm level 38 and there is nothing that can defeat me, even Dragons and giants are no match. Gothic 3 was a real RPG game if you get over the technical issues with it, where RPG elements matter and make a difference.

It's almost written in stone that your point will be missed by those people ever looking for another opportunity to bask in the gloriousness of their mastery of master level while taking a cheap shots at you for giving them the opportunity, but it's cool. Just laugh at them for being stupid.

It's an ongoing issue with the majority of games and it's like that because it's just easier for Devs. Off the top of my head, i can't think of a single rpg which has ever done it properly and that's why i usually stick to the normal level. They need to bring back those old school customable difficulty screens with dozens of options and sliders and whatnot. A single slider doesn't cut it for most games, let alone a game as complex as TES.

Seriously? I've just started a new game under Master Difficulty and I never had a problem with this Giant Spider at all. I don't know how you played it but I keep on dodging the poison and then attack when there's an oppurtunity.

Pay attention, where did I say anything about sneaking and archery? Nowhere thats where, I stated my character was a thief, I didnt say my charactetr sneaks around 24/7 shooting everything and never getting attacked. Though yes I can do that, However my character DOES NOT. My character engages in direct combat as I said above.

The OP is just pissed that his character is crap because he didnt perk the skills properly and has crap gear.


@Above - That spider was easy, all you have to do is sidestep and retreat to the anti-room when its getting dangerous for health.

I believe the difficulty setting is the way it is due to the fact that they wanted the player to be able to modify difficulty on the fly -- in the middle of a battle, if need be. Given the constraints of the game engine, this was most easily and effectively accomplished by altering damage rates the way it is now. Playing on master difficulty is much different than playing adept or easier... it changes how you approach obstacles, due to the fact that you are so nerfed compared to the opposition. For example: the big spider you were moaning about?
The master difficulty forces you to re-anolyze how you play the game. Conserve stamina, and use it at the right moment -- power attacks are double damage. Check your environment more carefully... there are a lot of places that have oil slicks you can light on fire, and when you see a trap like the swinging blades or poison dart guns, drag your opponents over the trigger and let them get sliced and pierced before you commit to serious melee. Run away more often -- tactical retreat is an important part of military strategy for a good reason... hell, George Washington fought nearly the entire American Revolutionary War by effective retreating.

-Loth

TERRY PRATCHETT FOR THE WIN.

In other news -I don't understand this comment - because he is criticising the combat mechanics.

also, I notice on Steam there is an article criticising Skyrim's "lack of memorable characters"

me playing master vs the giant spider proof backing up these guys its easy

5:20 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OczgC3vPRRc
not hard at all you could complain i had a companion big deal or that i used a weak poison from the start of game big deal

Considering companions are there for the precise and sole reason of backing up the player, no-one can complain. A using a poison is a standard gameplay mechanic, one the OP fails to use himself and instead complains about.

This is the whole point about playing on Master! You actually NEED enchanting, alchemy and so forth. And when you encounter an enemy that's simply too hard, do other stuff and level up for a bit before coming back. That's what RPGs are about.

It would still be neat with a more realistic mode where the enemies just do more damage.

I didn't use poison.

I've played a number of dead is dead characters, including the initial blind run through.

No one has ever found that spider difficult

You are defensive when it comes to what you write, but when it's about the OP, you're very imaginative. In case you didn't read properly, the whole topic isn't about Master being too difficult for the OP because he's bad at Skyrim, but about the difficulty raising just a few numbers and not the game in general.

Messing up with the damage dealt/done is indeed the most lazy and often illogical ways of changing difficulty of a game.

I remember playing Bioshock on Easy second time around just because I wanted headshots to be instant kills no matter whether I was at the beginning or end of game.

A much better way of increasing difficulty would be simply adding a number to the level scaling formula. For example +5 for Expert and +10 for Master. That would make the game spawn stronger enemies earlier, but also give you better rewards as loot.