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alot of great info here, well done my friend!!It is really related to your own level of experience on Skyrim. If you feel like you understand the fighting mechanics and can use tactics and strategy, you'll be fine. The "too spongy" myth is mostly carried by casuals who don't use tactics at all. It's not an insult: if you're not experienced enough to realize that your first perk points should go toward delivering damage, then of course enemies will seem spongy from the start!
I have a long breakthrough of early game strategies, I'll put it under spoiler tags:
If you're more experienced, you know that you must raise your damage output from the start. Ex: you decide to play an archer-thief. Your first perk point will go into archery and you'll do everything to make it level up fast. Why? Because it will take a while before your daggers / sword attacks can deliver sufficient damage on Master / Legendary. So what you'll do is go directly to Riverwood from Helgen and immediately recruit Feandal. Now you have 2 routes: the easy cheaty one or the real route. Feadal is a archery trainer that will become your follower when you help him. If you pay him to train your archery, you can ask him to trade things with you and take back your money.
Since the training sessions are more expensive the higher lvl you get, you wont be able to do it 20 times! Besides, as an adept trainer, he wont take you over lvl 50 anyway. But it will be enough to make your bow deadly. Now keep in mind that if you're playing Master / Legendary, the enemies will be very powerful: very little chance to one-shot kill anything. If you don't want to "cheat" Feandal, pay for each training session and don't take your money back. Focus on acquiring money and spend it all on training: damage must be raised as fast as you can.
If you're experienced enough, you know that once your bow damage has been enhanced, it's time to focus on Sneak, Backstab, Deadly Aim and such perks that raise your damage even further when you sneak. It's really all about damage for the first 10-15 levels.
When you start realizing that you can kill everything as long as you don't blindly run screaming into battle, you can start investing in convenience perk. But remember that the higher lvl you reach, the longer it takes to move another level. You never want to have to wait before gaining perks and raising your damage! So in a nutshell, Master and Legendary are not for casual players but they make the game very interesting. Tactics become paramount and you have to develop your own strategies based on your build. For example, again:
My current build is a 2-hand Redgard Rebel that never wears armor. Very restricted build, created to make the game even more challenging. I started on Legendary and had to "adjust" difficulty one or two times in the first 5 levels. No more after that. The build is all based on speed and DPS. I went to get the "Bound Bow" spell and "The Longhammer" weapon before reaching lvl 10.
Then, I go kill my first dragon and immediately go see the Greybeards to unlock Fus. Just after that, I go get the "Elemental Fury" shout and kill the Dragon nearby to unlock the shout. From that point forward, I am beastly: I'm around lvl 12-13 and my damage output is sufficient. My bow can already kill dragons because it is the "Bound Bow" spell and I have raised my archery lvl with Feandal. Remember that I'm a two handed fighter so most of my damage output must go toward Two-handed. But I'm experienced enough to know that without armor, it will be a while before I can melee attack a Dragon without fear!
So my first perks have gone toward Archery and Sneak,. Even if they become less important as my game advances, it is primordial that I raise the archery damage fast if I want to kill the first Dragon around lvl 10. Of course, I could always "drop difficulty to novice" to kill my Dragon but I have no need to do that anymore. I am experienced enough to know how to get to that point with minimum exploit. I do still exploit flaws and I like to play without the "official patch" mod to make the game more similar to Vanilla Skyrim. But even if you play with the "official patch", you will be good. Official patch will "kill" the Restoration Potion exploit. You don't need it anyways!
It is just fun to exploit it: it makes your leveling go faster. Nobody likes having to brew 1000 cheap potions to raise Alchemy. Especially when you realize that the more expensive the potion you brew, the higher your level will progress when you brew it. So with the Restoration glitch, you brew a dozen of Restoration potions and use them to boost your Alchemy items. Then you brew Fortify Health potions and each of them make you level up Alchemy 4-5 levels at once!
It is cheating? Maybe it is. But this is Skyrim: there is no other rule than "have fun". There are no leaderboards, no ladder, no speed run and no hassles. You're not "cheating" anyone: you're making the game more fun for you. And if you're like me, you will minimize your exploits as you rack more experience.
Nowadays, I only brew 20 - 25 Restoration potions and never use the glitch again. It is enough to give me the boost needed to make the game still challenging and fun but not tiresome. I do not have to throw a hundred arrows to kill my first dragon. But I need at least 20-25 arrows, a good follower by my side and a couple of buff spells to enhance my survivability. And I must stick to my strategy, hide behind the tower walls when the Dragon spots me and never, ever rush toward him to finish him: HE's the one who will be doing the finish if I do that!
I know, I am experienced enough: I've been eaten by Dragons a hundred times, I know the feel.
The main point is to boost your damage output for your favorite weapon by any means necessary. Spend your first 5 to 10 perk points on damage only. You can keep convenience perks for later: if you're playing Master / Legendary, convenience is a luxury you cannot afford anymore.
Have fun!
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Here's Taarna, my Redguard Rebel in her fighting gear apparel. Lvl 25, already mighty and no need for armor or robes anymore! Legendary build for Legendary difficulty:
I have written a complete guide for this build. I will not publish it yet but a video might appear some time, somewhere...
bows are for sissies 
your redguard is sexy
get your speech up and pick up a masque of clavicus vile your prices will be alot better & allow you to give merchants more gold for their inventory. you can also wait 48hours and they will refresh. whenever I come home with lots of loot I sell until they have 0$, wait 48 hours and keep repeating until everything I need to get rid of is sold. it doesnt take long
