I had a very weird difficulty spike on Master last night. I was clearing out that mine where the miners cracked into a Nord tomb and irked the Draugr within, and I hopped down the hole to clear them out.
It was filled with regular Draugr, with some Restless, Scourge and Wights in the mix. They were tough, but using a combination Alteration defensive boots, tons of shield bashing and Shouts I could handle them. I got through the place without much trouble.
Then I run into the big bad at the end, in the room with the fire-spitting statue. It's a Death Overlord. Not a Deathlord, skipping straight to Overlord here.
My axe does about 1% damage, and he instantly kills me in one blow, even with Stoneflesh active. I eventually build a loop where I hit do a few shield juggles, then hit him with Ice Form, land four blows as he gets up, then flee to the hallway until my Shout power recharges. Then save, and repeat. I can take down maybe 5% of his health in each round.
Then, when I have him around 20% down, he starts casting healing spells, erasing the damage I would do each round, and then some. After well over an hour, I've lost ground and he's back to nearly full health. At this point it was past midnight, and I've concluded that he's literally impossible for me to kill. But I'm angry, so I dump the difficulty back down a notch and kill him in a straight up fight. Toggled it back up to Master after, where it's been for all but that moment.
It was the wildest difficulty spike I've ever seen in a game. I'm currently level 26.
