The only thing bugged me about Skyrim is the smithing mechanics, especially irritating for one that plays Dwarf Fortress.
For one, the material names. Before someone says "Oh, it's a fantasy, reality is thrown out the window," or "they use names differently," I have to say my problem is with inconsistency. IRL, there is no process for making steel using corundum. Like ebony, you might say that it's just a unique material that happens to use the name of a real life material that has different properties. However, TES does not have ebony trees, but it does have sapphires and rubies. Those are gemstone-quality corundums.
Another is the Orichalcum. Now, orichalcum is a mythical metal said to have been only available in Atlantis, so that's perfectly fine for a name of a fantasy metal. What bugs me is that previous games stated that Orcish armor was made of steel, just with superior Orcish design and methods. Now they have it made of Orc-ium, which means that it's no longer the craftsmanship that's important but the material. Same thing with elven armor; now it's made of Elf-ium. Granted that we never knew what it was made of anyway, but with moonstone being readily mined everywhere you have to wonder why only the Altmer make armor out of it.
And the third thing is that somehow you can learn to craft these armors stated to require special methods without learning those methods from someone. Particularly glaring is that you can smith Daedric armor, which is supposed to be something that only the Daedra know how to do. Maybe if you got a Daedra to teach you the secret in a quest it would make more sense. Also, making Dwemer armor. Have the secrets of precise Dwemer mechanics just become common knowledge to all blacksmiths immediately after Morrowind? Having the material =/= knowing how to work it or what designs it works best in.
In short, it's just inconsistent. Ninja'd 3x