How do you fight in Skyrim?

[Torrasque]

Yes, its another Skyrim thread. Deal with it.

I am interested in how my fellow Escapists deal with combat in Skyrim. Not because I need tips, but because I am curious as to how you do things. So, I will present you with several combat scenarios, and you can tell me how you would deal with each. Please treat each scenario as if it is your character (or your favorite/main character) in the scenario. Also, unless specified, you are allowed to place your character wherever you want (can be a really advantageous position, or really bad one. Its up to you). One more thing: unless the scenario puts you in a combat situation, you are allowed to just walk away (if you are so inclined). I would like it if you say you just walk away though.

You come across a giant on a highway. He sees you, but does not attack you since you are about 100 yards away. He WILL attack you if you get close, but you can both go on your merry way without having to engage in hostilities.

You are in a crypt where you can hear several undead walking around near you. You know there are at least 2, but there could be 5 for as well as you know. You do not know the type of undead, or how tough they are, just that they are undead (since that is all you have encountered thus far). You enter the room they are in, and see they have the elevation advantage, but have not detected you yet.

Having just killed a challenging dragon, your health and magick is low. You stand still for a couple seconds waiting for your mana to replenish itself so you can heal, but are attacked by a frost mountain cat and 2 ice wraiths.

You are sneaking around in a fortress, trying to get the stealth bonus on a particularly tough bandit. Just as you are about to strike, one of the bandits sees you and all 12+ bandits in the fortress are alerted to your presence. Your escape route is cut off, and you are in a medium sized room with 2 ways out. The tough bandit you were about to strike down turns and attacks you right away, and you see the other 2 bandits in the room are a mage and an archer.

Well? How do you get yourself out of these situations?
Please don't say you run away in every scenario >.>
And yes, I have had every one of these happen to me (I embellished a few of them). I will share how I dealt with these if you ask.

 

[Handbag1992]

1- Stay out of the way, I had one encounter with a giant at a low level and decided to leave them and their mammoths alone.

2- I use my detect life shout, then I hit the two I see with a double-power firebolt. My perks cause my double destruction spells to stagger any opponent they hit. I continue cycling through foes keeping them at a distance with spells until one gets close enough to be a threat. I equip chillrend and begin chopping what remains of them to pieces.

3- Potions, unrelenting force to give me a breather.

4- First I get out of the mage's line of sight, if that isn't an option I sprint at him with a sword. I turn to face the other bandits and disarm them with my shout. To even the tide of battle I summon my Spectral Assassin, and begin throwing spells as fast as I can cast them. Hopefully Lydia has some of them distracted at this stage. I wade in again with chillrend and melee anything and everything until my magicka regenerates. I then return to spellcasting.

 

[Larmo]

1: Go to a higher elevation and attack him with a bow while sneaking at night, he never even saw me.

2: Use my bow to pick them off one by one the numbers matter not.

3: Quickly chug down the multiple potions I carry on me and add poison to my weapons for good measure.

4: Crouch in a dark corner so most of the bandits loose sight of me killing those who do spot me with combination of bow and glass sword, drinking health as needed. Once I'm hidden again I attack them from a distance this time.

 

[Deadyawn]

1: I would likely attempt to sneak up on it and see if I could take it down with A fullpower sneak attack. I've only run into one giant before at level 5 (I'm now 26) and well...Let's just say I'm pretty sure my corpse made it home to blackmarsh a lot sooner than is usual.

2: Just sneak attack them all with a dagger. My sneak is high enough that it's extremely unlikely they would notice me and I am able to kill all but the toughest of enemies in a single hit.

3: Activate histskin (argonian power, quickly regen health) and hit them with a pair of swords until they die.

4: Swear at my bad luck and run off into the next room where there hopefully isn't any enemies. If there is continue fleeing till I am alone. Then use shadowcloak of nocturn, making me invisible for 2 minutes, easily long enough to silently dispatch all the bandits.

 

[Tharwen]

1-Stealth kill
2-Stealth kill
3-Fuck healing spells - stealth kill
4-Stealth kill

Seriously. That 15x bonus is too good to ignore.

 

[Vrach]

Well, I'm still fairly low level and I deal with everything using a combination of stealth, archery and sword/magic (last resort).

1. Depends. If I can go around him and he's tough, I likely will. If going around would mean too much fucking around, I'll attack him.
2. Bow-snipe as many of them as I can until they notice me, mop up the rest with a blade and a flamethrower, using Unrelenting Assault and Death shouts.
3. Yell "save me Jebus!!!", chug down a few potions. If it didn't work, potion of invisibility and GTFO of there.
4. I'd likely just chug a potion of invisibility to get out of this one tbh, 12+ bandits vs me is not how my character does battle. Maybe go invisible, get a good position to snipe from, then start thinning their ranks.

 

[DEAD34345]

1. Stay out of the way, or if I decide I need a giant's toe for some reason hide in some nearby shadows and sneak attack him with bows. Maybe go for a X60 damage dagger attack if it's night-time and I think I can get away with it.

2. Use Aura Whisper (works like a detect life spell) and then creep around killing each of them in turn with backstabs. Undead are ridiculously easy to sneak around.

3. Something has seriously gone wrong at this point, since my enemies have actually spotted me. If I can see an easy escape route I'll most likely give the frost mountain cat a power attack to the face (to stumble it) and then leg it. I might come back and kill them all once they lose sight of me. If there is no escape route, I'd attempt to use a combination of shield-bashes and power attacks to kill the cat without letting it hit me once, and Ice-Wraith attacks are pretty easy to dodge.

4. Power attack/shield bash the bandit about to strike me, and then run for one of those exits. If I can lose them I'd do so, and then come back later to stealth kill them all successfully this time. If I couldn't lose them, I'd draw them all to somewhere where I have an advantage, preferably somewhere where I can kill them from a range before they can reach me, but if not a long corridor that they can't all fit down at once would probably do. Then I can deal with each bandit one/two at a time, and in that kind of situation I can easily take them down without losing any health.

This kind of thing is one of the many reasons I love the game. Even my standard assassin character can often end up doing wildly different things to deal with varying situations.

 

[MiracleOfSound]

1-Stealth kill
2-Stealth kill
3-Fuck healing spells - stealth kill
4-Stealth kill

Seriously. That 15x bonus is too good to ignore.

You kinda missed his point... he was asking how you would deal with certain situations, some of which do not allow for stealth.

Personally I find multiple opponents challenging even with a melee/shield guy... so I can't imagine how tough it must be taking on a room full of Electromancers and Fire Wizards as a light armour sneak char.

 

[CowboyfromHell666]

1. I let the guy pass, unless I am feeling murderous. In that case, I just charge in shield/mace in hand and fuck it up.

2. I get Chain Lightning ready and have Dawnbreaker equipped. I use my Chain Lightning as much as my mana will allow, use Fire Breath or Unrelenting Force, then go back to shield/mace and pick off the rest.

3. If I have health/frost resistance potions, I use those first, then proceed to Shield Bash and attack them.

4. Well since I based the first 3 on my main character, this will still apply even if the scenario had me sneaking around. If I can, I will use a Destruction AoE spell to weaken the bandits and use a Shout of some kind. Then once again, go back to shield/mace. Whenever needed I will use potions or healing spells.

Sorry my first post was me being an ignorant fuck and not actually reading because I assumed it was about how we usually go about fighting. So I edited it

 

[gigastrike]

1: I don't mess with giants. I'd walk away and keep my feet on the ground.

2: I see that they're probably normal or slightly stronger than normal zombies. I enter sneak, equip my weaker arrows, and fire a few at the closest one. After it goes down after 2-3 I move on to the next. It should die in the same amount of time due to my distance, but the remaining 3 should be close to me by now. I dual-cast Stoneskin and use a max-power Unrelenting Force to knock down at least 2 of them. I run up to one of the already dead zombies and resurrect it. From there I'll just gain distance and fire arrows while my zombie ally takes aggro.

3: ...God damn it. I pop an invisiblity potion and run for it.

4: I hit him with my daggers anyway (not doing a whole lot) and use a max-power Unrelenting Force to create some distance. I then dual-cast Stoneskin, equip my best bow and arrows, summon a Fire Atronach, and focus on the stong bandit. With him down the other melee bandits should be on me. I'll bash the closer one with my bow and attack him while backpedaling. When he goes down after about 5 arrows I'll pop a few health potions and reanimate him. The second melee bandit should go down in a similar fasion. During this time I should have been able to dodge the archer, but the mage may be giving me trouble. I'd use a damage health/weakness to poison combination poison on my next arrow and shoot the mage, then I'd hit him with a damage health/damage magicka regen poison. A few more arrows should bring him down. I'd cast 2-3 Fast Healings and overpower the ranger. I'd then become hidden ad sneak attack the rest.

 

[AnarchistFish]

You come across a giant on a highway. He sees you, but does not attack you since you are about 100 yards away. He WILL attack you if you get close, but you can both go on your merry way without having to engage in hostilities.

Walk around the giant to avoid a confrontation.

You are in a crypt where you can hear several undead walking around near you. You know there are at least 2, but there could be 5 for as well as you know. You do not know the type of undead, or how tough they are, just that they are undead (since that is all you have encountered thus far). You enter the room they are in, and see they have the elevation advantage, but have not detected you yet.

If I can get through without avoiding detection, do that. If not, take the advantage and attack with fire, whilst trying to get up there so I can hack them all down with my axe.

Having just killed a challenging dragon, your health and magick is low. You stand still for a couple seconds waiting for your mana to replenish itself so you can heal, but are attacked by a frost mountain cat and 2 ice wraiths.

Run, use potions to heal myself, and if I can still run away then do.

You are sneaking around in a fortress, trying to get the stealth bonus on a particularly tough bandit. Just as you are about to strike, one of the bandits sees you and all 12+ bandits in the fortress are alerted to your presence. Your escape route is cut off, and you are in a medium sized room with 2 ways out. The tough bandit you were about to strike down turns and attacks you right away, and you see the other 2 bandits in the room are a mage and an archer.

Kill the tough bandit with fire breath and axe first, run so I can heal myself and then pick off the rest, starting with the mage by using electricity.

 

[Azarhac]

3rd person Dual-Wield fighting, always... With 2/3 of the attack speed boost shout, shit gets raped so fast it's hilarious, Though I do like to go all beast on people as a werewolf from time to time, and obviously I should up my magic and bow eventually (and maybe 2 handed will see) since leveling at 44 is pretty darn hard...

 

[DanielBrown]

1) Walk around him. I tend to charge in and slaughter any giant I see though.

2) Try to get to their level as fast as possible. Since I wear heavy armor odds are they'll discover me the moment after I've entered the room.

3) Use potions. If I would be out I'd run away, dull answer as it is.

4) FOS RO DAH! Then go for the mage first, then the archer. Afterwards I'd pick them off and try to block as much as possible.

 

[NooNameLeft]

1. x30 sneak attack to victory.

2. Use the life detection shout and try to hunt them down one by one.

3. Run and pray.

4. FUS RO DAH on the bandits blocking the escape route then run for a while untill I become hidden again.

 

[DannyJBeckett]

I keep a healing spell in one hand, a silver sword in the other, the atronach power (so I absorb 50% of damage as magicka regen) and the restoration perk that lets me heal twice as fast.

It's gotten me through 3 Dragons single-handed, and whenever it hasn't been enough, the fully-powered Unrelenting Force shout certainly helps.

I've got this game sorted.

 

[The Lugz]

Yes, its another Skyrim thread. Deal with it.

You come across a giant on a highway. He sees you, but does not attack you since you are about 100 yards away. He WILL attack you if you get close, but you can both go on your merry way without having to engage in hostilities.

slice his toes off with my ebony sword of giant-slaying +260

You are in a crypt where you can hear several undead walking around near you. You know there are at least 2, but there could be 5 for as well as you know. You do not know the type of undead, or how tough they are, just that they are undead (since that is all you have encountered thus far). You enter the room they are in, and see they have the elevation advantage, but have not detected you yet.

corner pull them one by one with my bow, then one-shot them, because 90% of undead in this game are total panzys 1 on 1

Having just killed a challenging dragon, your health and magick is low. You stand still for a couple seconds waiting for your mana to replenish itself so you can heal, but are attacked by a frost mountain cat and 2 ice wraiths.

i presume i have potions? else run in a circle spamming heal spell till i have enough health to.. wait they don't hurt me, so stab them in the face!

You are sneaking around in a fortress, trying to get the stealth bonus on a particularly tough bandit. Just as you are about to strike, one of the bandits sees you and all 12+ bandits in the fortress are alerted to your presence. Your escape route is cut off, and you are in a medium sized room with 2 ways out. The tough bandit you were about to strike down turns and attacks you right away, and you see the other 2 bandits in the room are a mage and an archer.

i shout run at the mage, then knock it down and own it in the butt before it can respond
then abuse my rediculus armour value to kill off the physical bandits
( i have pretty nifty magic resist too, but slowing spells annoy me )

Well? How do you get yourself out of these situations?
Please don't say you run away in every scenario >.>
And yes, I have had every one of these happen to me (I embellished a few of them). I will share how I dealt with these if you ask.

DDDDDdomination! or die trying

 

[The Diabolical Biz]

Giant? Summon Flame Atronach, activate 'Highborn', and dual cast 'Chain Lightning' for the stagger, repeat until toast.
Undead? Stealthily summon a, you guessed it, Flame Atronach in the middle of the room, and try and fireball em while they're preoccupied.
The third, I'd activate 'Highborn', hit em with an 'FUS RO DAH', and while they're preoccupied spell them like crazy.
Finally, rune the room up while retreating, and chain lightning the tough guy.

 

[BlastedTheWorm]

I twat shit with a giant sword.