Thoughts Enemy Scaling?

[KillerHappyFace]

Now, I personally think the scaling in Skyrim is broken in more ways than just this, but the character scaling is being addressed by other threads.

 

I want to see what everyone else thinks about the way enemies scale in Skyrim. Not just damage-wise, but mostly in terms of outward appearances. At low levels, everything's just a plain old Bandit, Draugr, Falmer, or Bear. At higher levels, everything is what would normally be a boss earlier.

 

For instance, in the first barrow I explored, the dungeon was finished with an epic fight against a Draugr Deathlord. This was no ordinary Draugr; his weapon could cut through me like a stick of butter. Even worse, it had Voice powers! Now, at level 50, every single casket opens for one of these guys. Every one of them has Voice powers, and my poor Dark Elf has taken quite a blow to the ego knowing now that his ability to throw around an Unrelenting Force is nothing special at all.

 

I'm not having any trouble at all with the difficulty of the scaling, but I think it's more than a bit immersion breaking to have enemies scale this way; it feels like WoW or Final Fantasy, where enemies scale by being replaced with upgraded versions.

 

What I would have hoped for is a method of scaling where regular enemies like Draugr would be around your same level, Restless Draugr would be a little over your level, and Deathlords, Scourges, Liches, etc would be highly leveled above you to an equal degree, but each have their own unique skillset and equipment preferences. Bosses would remain bosses.

 

TL;DR: Enemies are all basic at low levels, and what would have qualified for an early boss at later levels. I think it's a little weird.

 

Thoughts?

 

EDIT: oh god...that's a pretty bad title typo *facepalm*

Edited November 20, 2011 by KillerHappyFace

[Btasty]

While sometimes annoying I think enemy scaling was done pretty well in this game. It's a pretty hard line to draw and I think bethesda managed to do a decent job with it. If you dont have scaling you have low level characters restricted to certain dungeons which can get very frustrating (Kinda like how you need certain quests to clear certain dungeons or have to join certain guilds to even go in them....). Or you have a high level breezing through dungeons meant for low levels. Trust me godmode is fun for about 10 seconds. Of course there is the flip side aka Oblivion in which enemies completely scale with you and you feel like you have accomplished nothing. There probably could be some minor tweaks here and there but I dont see anything major being needed.

[wait what]

I agree, there must be a better way to manage scaling. I think it would be cool if the enemies unlocked new abilities as they leveled up - they could still be the normal, veteran, elite, boss ranks which correspond to your level, but their levels determine what abilities they have. Maybe normal draugrs become highly resistant to arrows, or their movement speed increases, or you have to kill them two times or they regen quicker etc. etc.

[shardiru]

I do agree that the scaling is kind of poopy in this game, but not because of their abilities or looks. It's just an utter lack of diversity, as is the norm with bethesda games. When some ambitious modder releases a monster mod for skyrim, I will likely have to change my underwear, as those have always been my favorite mods in all bethesda games.

[marharth]

The first big mod is probably going to have to do with UI. The second big mod will do with enemy scaling.

 

That's what I think anyways, I hate the way enemies scale.

[Szimitar]

Actually the way it is right now is as far from WoW as it could be. In World of Warcraft, you slay some bandits at level 5, and then at level 85, you slay some level 85 bandits. While it doesn't matter to much in a game such as WoW, it would be ridiculous in a TES game.

If I spent fifty hours or so getting my Character to max level, just for him to still struggle with the same opponents because suddenly they've become stronger would break Immersion for me. I like that as you get stronger, you can tackle stronger foes, and challenges that once seemed impossible are now a child's play for your seasoned veteran.

[galzohar]

To be honest, I think fixing scaling of difficulty is more important. Fixing immersion problems can wait until the game is actually balalnced. The way the enemy looks is merely asthetics. What's important is how much damage they deal, how many HPs they have, and what abilities they use. What they look like is much less important, and can be tweaked once everything else is cool.

 

Also, I think it's OK that you still struggle with the same enemies even after you reached max level. If you didn't, what fun would you have? You'd just steamroll through everything. As already said, that doesn't stay fun for longer than 10 minutes (and for me doesn't even last 1 minute).

Edited November 21, 2011 by galzohar