Joined the Dark Brotherhood in my Skyrim playthrough.

I've just been going around leveling up, and getting new words of power before I face Alduin.

Why? You could face Alduin with only Dragonrend and be fine.

But I went to Soverengard and got utterly annihilated, because I was underleveled.

Dragonrend against Alduin is just like fighting any old dragon (literally).

You were underleveld, not because you didn't know shouts. Almost every shout in the game is completely useless.

Kyne's Peace
Animal Allegiance
Ethereal
Storm Call

Basically every shout is useless outside of three or four.

Unrelenting Force
Marked for Death
Dragonrend

And maybe Whirlwind Sprint, that comes in handy if you have to move and you're carrying to much. But everything else I don't even bother with, to be honest. I don't even bother with my main storyarch at all outside of learning Unrelenting Force and the first word in Sprint.

I find aura whisper to be really useful in dungeons. Find where the enemies are then take them out.

I know that, but I just wanted more shouts, and going through dungeons and fighting Dragons is a good way to level up. :lol

You don't miss out on much if you skip Skyrim's main story, it ends as soon as it begins and never captures the dizzying heights of its premise. Although honestly I'd say the side missions aren't much better.

Skyrim always felt unfocused and sprawling, you could play hours on end and never actually achieve anything. At first I loved getting lost in the world, but after a while it just grew to boredom as I didn't have any real goals.

Tomb Raider presents an island you can get lost in, but there are limits, goals and points to what you're doing in Skyrim you could literally play the game for 12 hours straight and in that time maybe you get someone some groceries and that is it.

Some would argue that's part of the fun, but I can understand...different strokes for different blokes as they say.