as long as people aren't saying 'skimmy' I'm happy.

This made me  Very well written and funny as hell, well done James!

Wait until you see what I have planned for the next article, I'm hoping my next discussion will change the way people play a certain style of character.

Played a bit on Legendary but found I still needed at least one crafting skill to really make do.  I smithed a twohanded sword (only used smithing, no fortify) and with MD I was able to get by, albeit barely at higher levels.  On higher dificulty (master+) and at a combat level higher than probably 40, you will still struggle against stronger enemies or if gang banged.  The weakness of this style was getting jumped by numerous enemies and only hitting some of them with the shout.  If you hit them all then things are perfect and they will be nice and softened by the time you get to them, however if you don't hit some enemies things can get hectic; thankfully the cooldown for MD is extremely short for a shout this powerful.

your application to a viable monk class blew my mind

I'm going to spend this weekend working on a full build, so far it is amazing.  I'm combining a lot of what is in this discussion (as well as some of what was in my Drain Vitality discussion) along with something else that I am completely amazed hasn't been used on this site, as far as I can tell anyways.  If you like the monk class you'll probably love this.

Good to know the right pronunciation. I actually thought it was 'shmitar', lol 

yes

I couldn't find any comprehensive information on this shout on any sites I looked (all major Skyrim sites) and there is a large amount of misinformation in regards to how certain weapons interact with it.  I also could not find anything on using the shout to replace skills and/or save character perks.  I would definitely not call it a 'simple shout', it's probably one of the most complex ones.  Thought it was a worthwhile thing to post but to each their own.

There is also another use for this discussion that will hopefully come out in the near future.

I used to think that this shout only decreased the AR by 75 overall, not 75 per second. This actually makes a Smiter build (beating stuff down with your shield basically) seem a bit more viable.

That was actually one thing I didn't try, i've never really used shields (or weapons to block) so it didn't cross my mind. I'd hazard to guess it will work but it's something I'll have to look into. Some bashes may be classed as spells (shield charge is a spell) so they might not work.

Incredible write-up, James. My apologies for not liking it before; I've been pretty busy and haven't had a chance to sit down and read through it properly until today. I knew the MfD reduced AR on a per second basis, but had no idea it could get that crazy when you do into the negatives (whenever I've used the shout, I tend to kill the enemies within a second or two and not ask questions  ). Really fascinating stuff; I hope someone puts it into practice in a build soon. Great writing style too; this is as amusing as it is informative.

One point of feedback that I forgot to note: It might be worth mentioning that bug with Drain Vitality and Marked For Death. I forget exactly what it is, but something like if you pick up any words of Drain Vitality before learning all three words of Marked For Death, you get a second bugged Marked for Death shout. That's one of the more irritating bugs in the game for someone who values organized menus. The easiest way to avoid it is to uninstall Dawnguard, then play a new character until you've found all three words of Marked for Death, then reinstall DG.