I was level seven when I fought and killed my first giant... I had to use about six potions of healing... but I never got tossed.
Currently level 32, and have got Smithing to 100 so I could make proper use of my dragon scales/bones and now have dragon armor, boots and gauntlets (still using my weird enchanted mask helmet hood thing... I forget the name). Got to the point that I could have Heavy Armour not weigh anything when I'm wearing it, and am pretty happy with that. Have killed a giant, although it's still a tough fight with a lot of running and healing. It was for a bounty, so I'm not sure if he was leveled more than the standard giants or if he was a standard giant. Either way, felt good to finally down one! Have killed roughly 17-20 dragons and have got a lot of shouts, but am eager to collect more.
Finished the Companions questline some time ago and have now started on the Magic College questline while still chipping away at the main story. Have joined the Thieves Guild, too, but not actually done much since. Will do that later, I guess.
Haven't figured out Enchanting yet, it seems different to what it used to be. Do I have to buy enchantment items or something? I should probably look into it a bit more, I've not really browsed the internet just yet and have been happily kicking butt regardless. Can only imagine how much better it will be when I can enchant a bow so that it paralyses enemies... I wonder if that will work with a flying dragon? >=]
Still love the game, but am eager for story now, so hopefully the rest of it will be good. I think after playing this I'll focus a lot more on a story-based RPG. All this sandbox-ness is making me crave a good group of characters.
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
Actually just got Smithing to 100 myself, and found out that the Daedric Heavy Armour is actually better than the Dragon Armour - except it weights more. I don't mind though, since I think the Daedric armour look better anyway.You learn enchantments by "disenchanting/destroying an enchanted piece of equipment in your inventory. For example... if you have a shield with 20% fire resistance, you can destroy that shield at the "enchanting altar" in order to learn the "fire resistance" effect. Once you've learned the effect, it can be applied to any other non-enchanted shield you posses. Your enchantment skill and the size of the soul used (petty/common/grand etc) will determine the power of your enchantments.
At early levels, and when using a petty soul gem, the fire resistance effect you put on a new shield will probably be like 1-2%, and totally useless. But at high levels and with Grand souls, you can get over 50% resistance bonus etc. Some effects can be applied to many different kinds of equipments ( like fortify magicka ), while other effects can only be applied to specific kinds.
As for the paralyze thing, I've actually tried that. But the dragons seem to be immune to paralyze, as they have managed to resist it every single time so far. Paralyze is awesome against other things though, and selling iron daggers with paralyze is a good way to earn money (even when petty souls are used, Iron Daggers with paralyze are worth like 300-400 gold).
I also just encountered my first Elder Dragon. It beat the crap out of a Giant, then killed two Ice Trolls. And after all that, about half its health remained, and I still had some trouble taking it down since it would two-hit me with pretty much anything it could do. It was awesome.
Money's no real concern for me now that I have 100 Smithing... Legendary Dragon Armour sells very well. I can only imagine how well it'll sell when enchanted! But yeah, I will definitely make use of that info, cheers. I loved my enchanted gear in Oblivion and I hope to come up with yet another fire+ice+shock damage with fire+ice+shock weakness with soul trap. That little equation was brilliant. If I can add another Azura's Star (or whatever) and paralyse to that? Unstoppable me~
Bow before the mighty Javoo!
If you want to make bank, enchant your trout with Banish.
Any tips on levelling up my smithing skill or do I literally just have to keep making the crappy armour & level up slowly?
Make iron daggers. What you make doesn't matter, an orcskin condom gives the same skillup as a diamond-encrusted buttplug, and iron daggers are just 1 leather + 1 iron ingot. Run around buying up ores, ingots, leather, and hide, and you'll race through the levels.
Hey it's not for me to judge if you like The Lusty Argonian Maid
Killed a dragon near Mistwatch & for some reason didn't get it's soul?
Just started smithing... I now need to scour the lands for Dwemer ruins as my character has found some dwarven items and is obsessed!