I play the 360 version and I attempted to clear Kvatch at level 13 or so, as a pretty straight up Fafhrd style Fighter with Sneak. It was impossible until I turned down the difficulty slider by one notch. Then I was able to do it through judicious potion and scoll usage, and a TON of fleeing while casting heal spells on myself.
It was painful, and I easily died 40+ times before dipping down the difficulty slider, but I finally caved and pussied out. As soon as Kvatch was clear, I returned the slider to normal.
I’ve been playing it clean. No min/maxing. I took the major skills I expected to use as majors, and the minors as minors. I typically get a +2 or +3 to the attributes I value. I built a real hitpoint monster, and it still didn’t help.
Interesting that your allies don’t level with you. The way I beat that area was by kiting the bad guys back to the quest guy and letting him kill them.
Which specific mods are you using for this? I was a bit worried that it would make the lower levels (where I am) unplayable due to very powerful enemies showing up too early.
I would recomend doing Kvatch as soon as possible. I think it is the hardest part of the game due to it’s layout and the number of guys you have to fight at once. I also did this around 20 and found it very very hard. However, once I got past that I didn’t have too much difficulty. In fact at level 32 and being done with the main quest I now find the game mostly too easy at default difficulty level. Kvatch constantly comes up when people are complaining about the scaling, but in reality it’s just Kvatch being bitch hard more than the scaling being out of contorl for the rest of the game.
So when is “too late” to start on the Main Quest line and go to Kvatch?
It just feels wrong to me to go straight to Kvatch from the Sewers. I was figuring on getting a full set of armour, some nice weapons, a loot depot (house) and be say around Level 5 for Kvatch.
I did Kvatch at around level 13 or so, without touching difficulty or mobs. My solution? Potions + kiting. Restore Health / Magica while backpedaling around in circles and casting fireballs. Poisons are great too against non-Daedric foes.
I’ve been using all my enchantable equipment slots for +magica… but stackable stuff sounds interesting too. I wonder whether +fire shield or +reflect damage on all my gear would let me just get crazy… I haven’t found too much screw stuff I can do with the spell creator though maybe I’m just not used to exploiting Bethesda’s balance enough. :)
As one of the leaders of the whinging brigade, here’s my obligatory “told you so.” :-P
Now that that’s out of the way, I’ll chime in with those who advised you to boost your conjuration to either 75 or 100, and to enchant yourself some truly uber gear. At this stage, it’s pretty much your only hope. Otherwise, you’ll probably need to reroll. Kvatch is crazy hard with leveled foes and worthless allies.
Definitely the hardest part of the game for me. I did it at lvl 16 and was getting daedroths and clannfears, and I dropped the difficulty down a couple of notches for that quest only. The rest of the game was done on the default diff setting. Those full-grown clannfears pack a hell of a wallop. Even outside Kvatch, and later on they were a pain.
Oh, one other suggestion. Do all the Daedra quests–go to all 15 (?) shrines, make the right offering, and then play errand boy. You’ll get some great gear, and some of those quests are among the best in the game for humor, challenge, and general interest. Azura’s Star (a reusable grand soul gem) will be especially useful to you as you try to bring your equipment up to snuff.
I don’t think that’s nescesary. I managed to get through it (with a lot of difficulty) without doing any of that. Just drop the slider for Kvatch if it’s really killing you and set it back after Kvatch. It really is the hardest part of the game IMO.
Also abuse the bed in the burning building. Note too that clanfears wont follow you into buildings like humanoid monsters (at least I dont think they do) So go outside and try and widdle down the foes falling back to the chuch to get some monsters in more manageable numbers, rest, repeat. That’s pretty much what I did.
Baby, it’s all about Acrobatics. Jump up on some part of the world out of melee range, and the moronic AI will just swarm at your feet, begging to die by your arrows/spells.
Oh, another hint for Kvatch – Daedra (generally) hate lightning. Use a weapon with lightning damage (enchant one yourself or just save one you find in a dungeon), or buy some lightning spells/scrolls/staves.
The reason Kvatch sucks so bad is because group combat AI sucks in general. Your allies are dumbasses and targeting is impossible when enemies are teleporting at light speed around the map. I made it about halfway through the Kvatch battle before saying “screw this” and sticking with side quests. They’re infinitely more interesting and fun.
Yes, they stack. Also I have found a couple of +30 chameleon items (a Crystalline cuirass, and a ring I enchanted with a sigil stone). But even using vanilla grand soul enchants, you can get +100 chameleon with 5 items of armor.
Yeah, it’s easy at a low level. I haven’t encountered the horror stories of playing it at higher level, as I did Kvatch around level 3 and then left pretty much the rest of the main quest until 20 levels later.
I actually enjoyed the Kvatch sequence… it had intensity and a “Call of Duty” feel. I also found myself marveling at the graphics on the burning buildings. I appreciate that they were trying to have a big setpiece early on in the quest chain. I was apparently lucky to have done that bit at a low level.
The remainder of the main quest didn’t interest me much. Occasionally it infuriated me. I did rather like the very very ending. I’ve gotten the most enjoyment out of the Mage’s Guild stuff and sundry sidequests (Collector and Vampirism cure, for instance). Still haven’t done Dark Brotherhood, reserving that for my sneaky-thief toon.
Kvatch is a pain in the ass at medium levels if you get caught up fighting half a dozen Clannfears at once (one of the reasons is that Kvatch’s guards are wearing light armor, but are only skilled in heavy armor). Just slide the difficulty all the way down and tough it out. Don’t worry, the rest of the main quest doesn’t have this problem.
