'Challenging and realistic' Skyrim mod stops all your characters becoming stealth archers with one simple trick: Instant death
No half measures, Dragonborn.
Alright, quick show of hands: How many of us have started up approximately 30,000 games of Skyrim determined that—this time for real—you're not just going to end up maxing out sneak, archery, and annihilating all your enemies from afar? All of us? All of us.
Now, put your hands down if every single one of those attempts eventually ended with you, hunched over in a cave's dank corner, cackling as you loose dragonbone potshots at your foes for 3x damage? All of us? All of us.
Well no more, my friends, because Skyrim Special Edition's still-thriving modding scene has delivered us from our own temptations in the form of Stealth Archer Killer, a mod from, uh, SpongeBobHentaiSimulator that offers a simple yet permanent solution to the problem of stealth archer drift. Once installed, the mod will detect whenever you sneak with a bow or crossbow equipped and instantly obliterate you, conveniently preventing you from giving into your worst impulses and gravitating to Skyrim's most legendarily broken build.
It's kind of like if one of those diet-friendly cookie jars—the ones that ask if you wouldn't rather have an apple whenever you open them—decided that gently chiding you wasn't doing the job and instead just annihilated you with a tungsten rod shot by an orbiting satellite. Excellent stuff, modding. Five stars.
"If you are sneaking and If you think sneaking and shooting arrows is too easy and boring, this mod is for you," reads Stealth Archer Killer's description, explaining that "This mod adds a new feature to Skyrim: instant death when sneaking and equipping a bow or crossbow. This mod is designed for players who want a more challenging and realistic experience". Mission achieved!
There aren't any install instructions, but the mod's files consist of an .esp and a scripts folder. If my many years of modding are any indication, I'd say you just have to dump that in your Skyrim data files folder and activate it on launch. After that? Well, why not roll a mage?