Master Difficulty

I'm going through my first master playtrhough at the moment, and I have stuck it out and am now level 39. I just have one problem. Ahzidal is undefeatable.

As a small preface, my build is, again, a sneak archer. At the moment I have:
maxed smithing w/ most of the perks (immerive armors)
I have enchanting at 65ish with two perks, just to make my skill enchants stronger
my archery is at 89, with every perk but the final critical one, and the paralysis perk.
Sneak is at 93 with the appropriate perks.
Light armor is around 53 with some protection perks.
one handed is at around 39, just from backstabs with daggers.

Restoration is low, because if I am getting hit AT ALL and need to heal, the slight delay when switching+using it is an insta death.

Early on, it was very difficult, but this was to be expected, and I treaded very lightly through my early levels, and had to run from more than my fair share of fights. As a matter of fact, my first encounter with the dragon at the Western Watchtower was basically just me hiding to avoid being one-shotted while my follower and the guards took care of him.

I usually would have to throw everything I had at the stonger drauger, the spriggans, and anything other than a normal dragon would kill me, almost instantly. If I didn't have a follwer, I would have had to lower the difficulty, as even with sneak up there, once I fire that fist arrow, it seems like everything thing in the dungeon runs right to my position, unless my vantage point it extremely far away, and I have time to hide and lose them.

I'm considering just buying training in light armor, and throwing my remaining perks in there for a few levels, just to see if it improves my survivability.

My biggest problems come with enemies that aren't really affected by unrelenting force. I was able to line of sight miraak, and was fortunate enough to have a legendary ebony bow w/ daedric arrows that were sufficient enough to push him through his phases (it did take some time however) and finally get him down. But Ahzidal is another story.

His flame spell is nearly unavoidable and one shots me even with Dragon aspect and resist fire pots. Not to mention the drauger that spawn take 2-4 shots to kill and interrupt my zoom with power attacks at every opportunity, and those power attacks do quite a bit more damage on Master difficulty.

At the moment, I am going about the world, visiting mines, and vendors, and am attempting to create an identical set of armor but this time, enchanting it with as much fire resistance and health bonuses as I can.

I know many of you play on this difficulty, and some have even claimed to play a dead-is-dead style on Master. Maybe I just suck, but had I done that, I would have resterted my character twice in Embershard Mine :/

Any advice?

Master is easy, try Legendary difficulty instead

I'd consider myself a pretty damn good gamer, and it's hard for me to believe it's easy without using a specifically overpowered build or the enchanting/smithing/alchemy loop.

Either that, or you spend 90% of your time kiting around most of the stronger enemies.

At this point in my playthrough, not much gives me trouble, but every now and again, an enemy shows up and wrecks my face. The other dragon priest I ran into, the one with the researcher from Skaal, was a piece of cake. Ahzidal is just unbeatable for my archer at the moment.

tx12001 said:

Master is easy, try Legendary difficulty instead

Click to expand...

Sure, Legendary might be easy for you with your godlike, undead, triple-digit level characters - but it makes some of us (ok, me) whimper like a lonely puppy. Master provides enough challenge for me, and seemingly the OP as well.

I feel like part of playing a higher level of difficulty than you have previously (especially if playing permadeath) requires mastery of combat and defensive techniques. Not just the skills or perks, but techniques. Knowing when and how to disengage for the few seconds needed to use a resto spell or potion, buying a few seconds with a block or shield bash, or using a slow or paralyse potion/spell when appropriate. And of course having the appropriate skill level and perks for the armor you are wearing. For enemies or bosses you struggle with, think about ways to defend against their specific attacks. Do you need fire or frost mitigating jewelry or armor enchantments? A weapon enchantment or poison that will drain their magika or stamina, whichever they rely on most?

And shouts are one of your most powerful weapon as a Dragonborn. Roll through them as needed. Fus Ro Dah is not a one-size-fits-all solution.

Good luck, walk with the shadows.

I'll never understand the want to play on a difficulty that makes you 5x more vulnerable and them 5x stronger. Challenge be derned! I can barely survive on Adept most of the time.

Kudo's to those of you who play on Master and Legendary on a regular basis. You have my admiration and make me so jealous that I could just PLOTZ!

Please, I'm playing Dragon Age now on casual and am stalked by death constantly (and that's with 3 followers!). Skyrim on Legendary? Yikes!

Daelon DuLac said:

I'll never understand the want to play on a difficulty that makes you 5x more vulnerable and them 5x stronger. Challenge be derned! I can barely survive on Adept most of the time.

Click to expand...

I understand the desire to to prevail against the biggest challenges possible. You can never truly be the best if you shield yourself from the higher difficulties, you will always know that you backed down and chose an easier path. That's not an acceptable choice for many people, in games or in life.

Note, I say that I understand why people choose the most difficult settings on games, not that I do it. I'm ok feeling a little wimpy. I'd rather beat a game at a level that is challenging, but not frustrating. I get really worked up when I cannot beat a boss after countless attempts using every tool at my disposal. That's not enjoyable for me, and defeats my reason for gaming.

Lucid said:

Daelon DuLac said:

I'll never understand the want to play on a difficulty that makes you 5x more vulnerable and them 5x stronger. Challenge be derned! I can barely survive on Adept most of the time.

Click to expand...

I understand the desire to to prevail against the biggest challenges possible. You can never truly be the best if you shield yourself from the higher difficulties, you will always know that you backed down and chose an easier path. That's not an acceptable choice for many people, in games or in life.

Note, I say that I understand why people choose the most difficult settings on games, not that I do it. I'm ok feeling a little wimpy. I'd rather beat a game at a level that is challenging, but not frustrating. I get really worked up when I cannot beat a boss after countless attempts using every tool at my disposal. That's not enjoyable for me, and defeats my reason for gaming.

Click to expand...

Sometimes I wish my reflexes were back to what they were when I was 14... They just ain't what they used to be, sonny!

Well, my fire resistance armor was helpful, and after a couple of wipes I was able to get him down. I got major help from Glover Mallory, I totally forgot that once you get his bonemold recipe, he allows you to raid his stash, there are 3 or 4 really powerful poisons in that basement, and they were very helpful. I also gave my follower a new weapon and changed my strategy up a little bit. I used a fire scroll that engulfs everything in melee range in flames, and it seemed to do quite a bit of damage to the drauger, which made me wonder, like atronachs and followers, do scroll not succumb to the player damage nerf? I swear that thing nearly one-shotted the normal drauger and put a significant damper on the others. I also seemed to stagger Ahzidal and land a critical on every shot, and I found a creative place to line of sight him.

A satisfying win, to say the least.

I could honestly see how I could have possibly survived a dead is dead playthrough up until this point, albeit with clever use of game mechanics, but without the prior knowledge of his oneshot spell, I don't think I could have gotten past this one without a death.

TheNatural said:

I'm going through my first master playtrhough at the moment, and I have stuck it out and am now level 39. I just have one problem. Ahzidal is undefeatable.



Any advice?

Click to expand...

Not sure if you've solved your problem yet or not.... but if not, here's my advice to you:

Get your enchanting and smithing up all the way if possible ASAP. Get your armor rating to the cap of 567 (I believe that's the number). Having your armor there will allow you to resist 80% of physical damage. Now with your enchanting at 100 (get the perk that allows you to have 2 enchantments), put fire resist on a two or three pieces (depends if you're using an enchanting potion as well). Your magical resistance caps out at 85% I believe. For the rest of your pieces of attire, put enchantments for sneak and whatever other skills you use frequently.

Once you get all that done, you will now have 80% resistance to his physical damage and 85% resistance to all his fire damage. Trust me, it will make a huge difference and will lead you to victory my friend! You just need to up your defense here. Also create a good bow with good enchantments to deal out some good damage.

Best armor: Deathbrand armor actually has the highest rating because it adds 100 points to armor if wearing all pieces, downside is that it already has enchantments on it so you cannot put your own, only on jewelry. Aside from Deathbrand armor, the highest for heavy armor is indeed Daedric armor, not Dragonbone. For light armor, your best bet is Dragonscale armor. However! I've gotten lower armor to the armor cap, such as Dark Brotherhood armor and Thieves guild armor, so don't get stuck in that you have to use a specific set of armor.

Best weapons: Dragonbone weapons have the highest base damage, with Daedric following closely behind. Dragonbone weapons do weigh more however. Just an FYI, again, it really doesn't matter. Use what you like!

Gigapact said:

TheNatural said:

I'm going through my first master playtrhough at the moment, and I have stuck it out and am now level 39. I just have one problem. Ahzidal is undefeatable.



Any advice?

Click to expand...

Not sure if you've solved your problem yet or not.... but if not, here's my advice to you:

Get your enchanting and smithing up all the way if possible ASAP. Get your armor rating to the cap of 567 (I believe that's the number). Having your armor there will allow you to resist 80% of physical damage. Now with your enchanting at 100 (get the perk that allows you to have 2 enchantments), put fire resist on a two or three pieces (depends if you're using an enchanting potion as well). Your magical resistance caps out at 85% I believe. For the rest of your pieces of attire, put enchantments for sneak and whatever other skills you use frequently.

Once you get all that done, you will now have 80% resistance to his physical damage and 85% resistance to all his fire damage. Trust me, it will make a huge difference and will lead you to victory my friend! You just need to up your defense here. Also create a good bow with good enchantments to deal out some good damage.

Best armor: Deathbrand armor actually has the highest rating because it adds 100 points to armor if wearing all pieces, downside is that it already has enchantments on it so you cannot put your own, only on jewelry. Aside from Deathbrand armor, the highest for heavy armor is indeed Daedric armor, not Dragonbone. For light armor, your best bet is Dragonscale armor. However! I've gotten lower armor to the armor cap, such as Dark Brotherhood armor and Thieves guild armor, so don't get stuck in that you have to use a specific set of armor.

Best weapons: Dragonbone weapons have the highest base damage, with Daedric following closely behind. Dragonbone weapons do weigh more however. Just an FYI, again, it really doesn't matter. Use what you like!

Click to expand...

Yeah I ended up just going with an alternate set of fire resist armor. I'm trying to go through this playthrough without just getting the best stuff asap, and capping everything out, I'm trying to grow my character organically, if that makes sense. I just get frustrated when I am doing just fine, and enjoying the higher difficulty, then run into a freight train that insta-kills me. It really throws strategy out the window.

I like the higher difficulty, but I am really trying to figure out why people use the overhauls that make things extremely difficult. Take for example requiem, a power attack from a 2H Sword will kill you almost every time, yet when you shoot an enemy in the head, it's damage is minimal. I get that people like a challenge, and want more realism in combat, but for god's sake, I don't want to wait until I'm level 60 to not run away from Ice Wraiths.

TheNatural said:

Gigapact said:

TheNatural said:

I'm going through my first master playtrhough at the moment, and I have stuck it out and am now level 39. I just have one problem. Ahzidal is undefeatable.



Any advice?

Click to expand...

Not sure if you've solved your problem yet or not.... but if not, here's my advice to you:

Get your enchanting and smithing up all the way if possible ASAP. Get your armor rating to the cap of 567 (I believe that's the number). Having your armor there will allow you to resist 80% of physical damage. Now with your enchanting at 100 (get the perk that allows you to have 2 enchantments), put fire resist on a two or three pieces (depends if you're using an enchanting potion as well). Your magical resistance caps out at 85% I believe. For the rest of your pieces of attire, put enchantments for sneak and whatever other skills you use frequently.

Once you get all that done, you will now have 80% resistance to his physical damage and 85% resistance to all his fire damage. Trust me, it will make a huge difference and will lead you to victory my friend! You just need to up your defense here. Also create a good bow with good enchantments to deal out some good damage.

Best armor: Deathbrand armor actually has the highest rating because it adds 100 points to armor if wearing all pieces, downside is that it already has enchantments on it so you cannot put your own, only on jewelry. Aside from Deathbrand armor, the highest for heavy armor is indeed Daedric armor, not Dragonbone. For light armor, your best bet is Dragonscale armor. However! I've gotten lower armor to the armor cap, such as Dark Brotherhood armor and Thieves guild armor, so don't get stuck in that you have to use a specific set of armor.

Best weapons: Dragonbone weapons have the highest base damage, with Daedric following closely behind. Dragonbone weapons do weigh more however. Just an FYI, again, it really doesn't matter. Use what you like!

Click to expand...

Yeah I ended up just going with an alternate set of fire resist armor. I'm trying to go through this playthrough without just getting the best stuff asap, and capping everything out, I'm trying to grow my character organically, if that makes sense. I just get frustrated when I am doing just fine, and enjoying the higher difficulty, then run into a freight train that insta-kills me. It really throws strategy out the window.

I like the higher difficulty, but I am really trying to figure out why people use the overhauls that make things extremely difficult. Take for example requiem, a power attack from a 2H Sword will kill you almost every time, yet when you shoot an enemy in the head, it's damage is minimal. I get that people like a challenge, and want more realism in combat, but for god's sake, I don't want to wait until I'm level 60 to not run away from Ice Wraiths.

Click to expand...

If they just would have made the damage matrix more even handed I might have been more enamored of the higher difficulties. At least on adept you deal the same damage that your enemies deal to you. It just isn't fair that they deal 5x more damage than you do using the same weapons. I agree with you that, being one shotted by an archer using exactly the same bow as you, the same level (or less) of skill as you and using the same type of arrows while you need to hit them with 1/2 a dozen times just to make a dent in their health just doesn't appeal to me. Now on dragons! Absolutely I crank up the difficulty. It just doesn't seem realistic that a 20 ton animal that can breath fire and use magic can be one shotted by some yahoo like me.
That's why I'm learning to, and enjoying games like Dragon Age and Dragon's Dogma where the damage ratios are so much more believable.

Daelon DuLac said:

TheNatural said:

Gigapact said:

Not sure if you've solved your problem yet or not.... but if not, here's my advice to you:

Get your enchanting and smithing up all the way if possible ASAP. Get your armor rating to the cap of 567 (I believe that's the number). Having your armor there will allow you to resist 80% of physical damage. Now with your enchanting at 100 (get the perk that allows you to have 2 enchantments), put fire resist on a two or three pieces (depends if you're using an enchanting potion as well). Your magical resistance caps out at 85% I believe. For the rest of your pieces of attire, put enchantments for sneak and whatever other skills you use frequently.

Once you get all that done, you will now have 80% resistance to his physical damage and 85% resistance to all his fire damage. Trust me, it will make a huge difference and will lead you to victory my friend! You just need to up your defense here. Also create a good bow with good enchantments to deal out some good damage.

Best armor: Deathbrand armor actually has the highest rating because it adds 100 points to armor if wearing all pieces, downside is that it already has enchantments on it so you cannot put your own, only on jewelry. Aside from Deathbrand armor, the highest for heavy armor is indeed Daedric armor, not Dragonbone. For light armor, your best bet is Dragonscale armor. However! I've gotten lower armor to the armor cap, such as Dark Brotherhood armor and Thieves guild armor, so don't get stuck in that you have to use a specific set of armor.

Best weapons: Dragonbone weapons have the highest base damage, with Daedric following closely behind. Dragonbone weapons do weigh more however. Just an FYI, again, it really doesn't matter. Use what you like!

Click to expand...

Yeah I ended up just going with an alternate set of fire resist armor. I'm trying to go through this playthrough without just getting the best stuff asap, and capping everything out, I'm trying to grow my character organically, if that makes sense. I just get frustrated when I am doing just fine, and enjoying the higher difficulty, then run into a freight train that insta-kills me. It really throws strategy out the window.

I like the higher difficulty, but I am really trying to figure out why people use the overhauls that make things extremely difficult. Take for example requiem, a power attack from a 2H Sword will kill you almost every time, yet when you shoot an enemy in the head, it's damage is minimal. I get that people like a challenge, and want more realism in combat, but for god's sake, I don't want to wait until I'm level 60 to not run away from Ice Wraiths.

Click to expand...

If they just would have made the damage matrix more even handed I might have been more enamored of the higher difficulties. At least on adept you deal the same damage that your enemies deal to you. It just isn't fair that they deal 5x more damage than you do using the same weapons. I agree with you that, being one shotted by an archer using exactly the same bow as you, the same level (or less) of skill as you and using the same type of arrows while you need to hit them with 1/2 a dozen times just to make a dent in their health just doesn't appeal to me. Now on dragons! Absolutely I crank up the difficulty. It just doesn't seem realistic that a 20 ton animal that can breath fire and use magic can be one shotted by some yahoo like me.
That's why I'm learning to, and enjoying games like Dragon Age and Dragon's Dogma where the damage ratios are so much more believable.

Click to expand...

Aaannnd I just got wrecked by Karstaag. Going to have to wait for better weapons and armor to get him down. That frost wind thing he does that drains your stamina is brutal, I can't outrun him. I might have to go get 5 followers and just keep using Invis pots when I get aggro. lawl.

Take a different approach for tough enemies. Ignore all of the advice above (including mine). It all involves thought or work. Instead, toss back a bunch of sleeping tree sap and type the three most powerful letters in Nirn: TGM

TheNatural said:

But Ahzidal is another story.

His flame spell is nearly unavoidable and one shots me even with Dragon aspect and resist fire pots. Not to mention the drauger that spawn take 2-4 shots to kill and interrupt my zoom with power attacks at every opportunity, and those power attacks do quite a bit more damage on Master difficulty.

At the moment, I am going about the world, visiting mines, and vendors, and am attempting to create an identical set of armor but this time, enchanting it with as much fire resistance and health bonuses as I can.

I know many of you play on this difficulty, and some have even claimed to play a dead-is-dead style on Master. Maybe I just suck, but had I done that, I would have resterted my character twice in Embershard Mine :/

Any advice?

Click to expand...

Welll the only advice I would say is concentrate on your weaknesses and try to improve them. If you're susceptible to fire then you're probably weak to magic in general, if you're not one of those races with in-built magic resistance like Breton then you're going to have to find another way to increase it. Potions of fire reistance is the obvious one, it goes up to 55% iirc and it stacks up to 85% iirc. Otherwise you're going to have enchant everything with resist fire or magic.

Generic statements like "Master difficulty is is easy/too hard" are meaningless really as it all depends on what your strengths/weaknesses are. Once you realise them and find ways to combat them playing on Master will seem much too easy, trust me.

edit: also get a follower, they're ever so useful as a dummy/distraction. Followers, like fools, rush in where angels fear to tread so use that to your advantage. In short, use your head and play smart.

My usual stealth strategy with dragon priests (Ahzidal included) is to sneak-shoot them, then quickly move to another hiding spot and wait for them to forget about me, or, if they detect me, take an invisibility potion and then hide and wait for them to forget about me. Then, wait for their armor spell to wear off before I hit them again. Lather, rinse, repeat. It's a slow process, but can be sped up with the use of Marked for Death.

Marked for Death is actually a great tool for any boss when playing on master difficulty. It helps even the odds a little bit, though obviously Shouting gives your location away, so if you rely on sneak attack bonuses, you'll need invisibility potions or another way to get back into hiding.

Dovahkiir said:

TheNatural said:

But Ahzidal is another story.

His flame spell is nearly unavoidable and one shots me even with Dragon aspect and resist fire pots. Not to mention the drauger that spawn take 2-4 shots to kill and interrupt my zoom with power attacks at every opportunity, and those power attacks do quite a bit more damage on Master difficulty.

At the moment, I am going about the world, visiting mines, and vendors, and am attempting to create an identical set of armor but this time, enchanting it with as much fire resistance and health bonuses as I can.

I know many of you play on this difficulty, and some have even claimed to play a dead-is-dead style on Master. Maybe I just suck, but had I done that, I would have resterted my character twice in Embershard Mine :/

Any advice?

Click to expand...

Welll the only advice I would say is concentrate on your weaknesses and try to improve them. If you're susceptible to fire then you're probably weak to magic in general, if you're not one of those races with in-built magic resistance like Breton then you're going to have to find another way to increase it. Potions of fire reistance is the obvious one, it goes up to 55% iirc and it stacks up to 85% iirc. Otherwise you're going to have enchant everything with resist fire or magic.

Generic statements like "Master difficulty is is easy/too hard" are meaningless really as it all depends on what your strengths/weaknesses are. Once you realise them and find ways to combat them playing on Master will seem much too easy, trust me.

edit: also get a follower, they're ever so useful as a dummy/distraction. Followers, like fools, rush in where angels fear to tread so use that to your advantage. In short, use your head and play smart.

Click to expand...

I'm a little confused, as every point you made has been addressed multiple times throughout the thread: Magic/fire resist, enchanting, followers, etc

and

Dovahkiir said:

Generic statements like "Master difficulty is is easy/too hard" are meaningless really as it all depends on what your strengths/weaknesses are. Once you realise them and find ways to combat them playing on Master will seem much too easy, trust me.

Click to expand...

My thread and my comments made withing have been anything but generic statements like that, in fact, they could not be any further from that. I have no idea what the point of that statement is, because, as far as I can see, every single thing anyone has said here is 180 degrees from anything like what you just posted.

Whatever. Think whatever you want. Do whatever you want. I'm done with this place anyway. Bunch of elitist egotists.

Wow... that went south in a hurry.

I thought I was the only one allowed to a primadonna. I guess I was wrong.