Companions - Does Difficulty Affect Them

[Cremdogz]

I am not quite sure whether it does. I'm currently playing with my difficulty counter set on maximum, and I got myself the companion Zoe from Midas Magic Companions. Now, I have not given her any other items, she simply has her dress with no enchantments and a Silver Longsword. However, despite the difficulty being put on maximum, she still an incredible force for enemies to reckon with. Why is she doing so much damage with a simple sword? How is it that I die from a few hits but she can take a lot of them despite the fact she has no armour?

 

I'm wondering whether the difficulty slider does anything to companions, and if not (or at least not the way I want), is there a mod that does?

[MichikoUnknownFox]

Difficulty affects all NPCs, meaning if difficulty increases NPC damage and defense, your companion is also affected and won't take or deal the same damage as you.

 

If you're trying to make the game more difficult by making it easier to get killed, I recommend you try Phitt's Damage Multiplier. It's a very good mod, using some nice math functions to recalculate damage. And as far as I can see, NPCs are also affected by a different but similar-effect algorithm. So whatever your damage settings are set to, you'll see your companions doing about as much damage as you, and NPCs will do the same (if the difficulty slider is set at the middle, even if it doesn't say 50%).

 

Warning! Setting this to a high value of 250% or more (I use 250%) will make the game extremely difficult. Bandits can kill you in one strong hit even if you block, and Bandit Bowmen are likely to kill you before you get close enough to attack them unless you know how to deal with it. But in exchange, you can also kill enemies very quickly, as 1 or 2 well-placed power attacks will kill most enemies (unless they're much higher level than you).

 

Personally this is exactly the way I like it, and it's pretty exciting in combat with me, 1 or 2 companions and a room of 6 Bandits or Marauders. It never gets boring, because if I slack off I'm surely gonna lose the fight. :P