How do you play skyrim

[Knobody13]

I have always had this problem with Bethesda games where I get super bored after little while. The combat is extremely dumb and the leveling of your character and enemies either makes fights stupid easy or stupid hard. I never felt like anything I did in combat was a result of me and not my numbers from leveling. That being said, the exploration, atmosphere and everything else in the game are so great that i find myself constantly wanting to come back and play Skyrim.

So my question to you, escapists, is: how do you play Skyrim? Is there any sort of interesting, or odd way you play Skyrim that makes it more fun for you? Are there any mods, you use, that drastically alter the way the game is played?

 

[janjotat]

Have you tried playing the game pacifist yet? That mixes up the way you think about the game.

 

[Knobody13]

how do u play it that way?

I mean like I know people play new vegas that way but how do you beat skyrim without killing anything?

 

[shrimpcel]

Search for the "Felix the peaceful monk/cat" videos on Youtube. It's an excellent example of how to do exactly this. Basically focus on sneaking and illusion magic a lot. And choose the right quests of course.

 

[Tanis]

Crank the difficulty up to the max.
Focus on playing a dual character.

For Skyrim I played as a Destructive Magic plus assassin/thief.

Also:
Chose a race that's going to have a hard time.

Cat people, lizard people, and most elven races.

 

[Joccaren]

I play it heavily modded.

Better graphics and sound so its more immersive, I personally upgrade the AI so its harder to beat, slightly change around how stamina, food and sleep works, change potions a bit - and then I play the game alongside role playing.

There are a lot of mods online that alter the difficulty/mechanics of Skyrim, and they do it in a number of different ways. Its probably worth looking into them, as they can improve the experience a lot. At the same time they often have little features that annoy me, or don't work the way I want them too - which is why I make my own mods.

 

[White Lightning]

Naked while hanging upside down from my ceiling with one arm tied behind my back and wearing a Luchador mask.

 

[Occams_Razor]

I try and do some form of role playing, to a degree. Like you said, the exploration and the atmosphere are better than anything, so I try and play into that. I come up with stories in my mind. Why was I to be executed? What is my characters goals? What are his thoughts of Skyrim? When approaching a guild, why would he want to join this guild? Trying to go a bit beyond the game mechanics, it helps to build that atmosphere and immersion.

Its fairly evident that the combat is....lacking at best. So I try and build my own experience, where the combat isn't really the centre.

 

[kyogen]

I tend to play vanilla for a long time and only ease into using any sort of mods. To keep things interesting, I start characters, run them through specific guild quests, do a few miscellaneous quests and a bit of exploration, and then delete them in favor of starting a new build.

Skyrim is great to goof around in with just enough structure to give me a little direction. I like it as a palate-cleanser between other games.

 

[Knobody13]

I play it heavily modded.

Better graphics and sound so its more immersive, I personally upgrade the AI so its harder to beat, slightly change around how stamina, food and sleep works, change potions a bit - and then I play the game alongside role playing.

There are a lot of mods online that alter the difficulty/mechanics of Skyrim, and they do it in a number of different ways. Its probably worth looking into them, as they can improve the experience a lot. At the same time they often have little features that annoy me, or don't work the way I want them too - which is why I make my own mods.

Any specific ones you can recommend?

 

[kingthrall]

Dont spam on blacksmithing or enchanting, you can only mine and smelt your own ingots and find them. Not allowed to purchase ingots or daggers.

I found the game extremely easy even on the hardest difficulty if you just steal ingots all the time and spam daggers.

 

[KoudelkaMorgan]

I don't play it anymore, but there probably isn't a way I DIDN'T play it at some point.

I'm rather partial to Destruction, but I've gone back and forth about 70 times on 1 or 2 handed, Shields, Light/Heavy Armor, and Archery.

I have no fun with Conjuration, Alteration is useful but Paralyze isn't as much fun as an Icy Spear, and Illusion is fun but only in small doses.

Restoration is compulsory, and I wish dual casting were actually useful for it. It doesn't affect the Turn Undead spells at all.

Alchemy I use for money making, and Enchanting I use to make magic viable. Smithing I get up to Glass, because even though I really like Dragon Scale (not the helmet though) I loath dragons, so it does me no good because they don't exist in my Skyrim.

More often than not I go with Destruction, One handed/Blocking, Alteration to get 2 perks in Magic Resist (I'm a Breton with Lord Stone and Mara Agent), Enough Restoration to get MP Regen perks and Stamina restore/decent Healing spell, Light Armor, Enchanting/Alchemy, Enough Sneak to get the odd throat cut.

I prefer War Axes overwhelmingly but most of them look off to me, and they get almost no finishing/stealth killcams so I end up using Swords. the character I actually did everything with used Battle Axes, but I hate how the handle extends like 3 feet above your head while stowed and the new "headbutt" kill is SO FUCKING STUPID LOOKING. So I no longer use 2 handed other than greatswords.

I would use daggers, but the double power attacks just ruin it for me. It looks wrong, and feels like cheating lol.

I like archery, but HATE looking for arrows that miss, and using bound bow even more than that. I usually miss due to being able to see an enemy at a range beyond where my arrow can hit a valid target.

i.e. I see a mammoth about 80 yards away, I loose, the arrow passes through the mammoth doing no damage, the mammoth gets aggroed and I find my arrow in the ground right behind where the mammoth was if at all. The ground eats about 1 in 7 arrows. Its especially annoying with deer.

That's why I prefer fireballs for all my free leather procurement.

 

[TehCookie]

Drunk. Or so tired I can't think straight. Sometimes when I role play heavily I can get into it but most of the time I'm playing it while watching anime or listening to some new music I got.

If I play it awake and serious it's clumsy combat and repetitiveness annoys me, but if you chill out it's great.

 

[Joccaren]

Any specific ones you can recommend?

I generally make my own modifications to the game for complete control, rather than using ones online, but I have heard a mod called 'Duel' recommended.
Skyrim nexus has an entire section on Combat though, so you should be able to find something there that might interest you.