Im doing smithing...im just not making 500 iron daggers and breaking the game.

My skills were selected after years of playind elder scrolls. Normally 7 or so skills are doable. I plan on only doing 5 to 6, maxing archery, one hand, light armor. Sneak only to get muffle steps, and sneak bow attacks (still gonna max the skill). Alchemy for health and stam and resist pots (also it is barbarian rangerish to be able to live off the land).

That said I should be able to light armor dual wield I hope. When I do the druegh in bleak barrow with a 2handed barbarian (restarted this same toon like 50 times...) I had a harder time then dual wield. I found how to time strikes and dance around the battlefield now. I think this is going to work, but if you say I wont make it I WILL make it but it will be a challenge...which is good. Besides sneak archery attacks are gonna be baller baby, that's how I plan on winning. I'm a barbarian, I DON'T WEAR HEAVY ARMOR, I CATCH BLADES WITH MY PECS!!!

This is exactly why it's been my favorite to play so far. I'm on Expert, and it's still viable once you get the hang of dodging, running around, and exploiting weaknesses and opening in your enemy to the fullest extent. If an enemy with a 2h weapon is doing a power attack, and you're using dual swords, your power attacks are fast enough to hit him with one and still move out of the way before he hits you. It's a lot of fun doing that.

Dude, you look awesome! I need to post my toon now. I made mine a redguard for that sweet adrenaline stamina regen...seems very berserker style just behind the orc which I don't lilke playing as. Really i'm doing smithing for my armor like you said, i dont want to break my weapons and make the game crazy easy from what I've been reading. I am torn on what to dual wield though...swords or axes (maces not for me, dual wielding them seems silly). Is that extra bleeding good or would crits be better?


Side thought, I do want to get saviors hide as that is totally barbarian armor! And possibly stay a werewolf after the companions quests.

This. As redundant as it may seem, alternating between Axes/Maces is what I found worked best.

7 or so skills are NOT viable on master m8, you simply do not have the perks to use on them, and you simply wont be able to have them at high lvl enough to engage the harder mobs.

you have to focus on 2-3 main ones and 1 or 2 secondary ones tops, otherwise you spread your groth and perk points too thin.
picking 3 overall skills to focus on and let the others "passive leveling" is theb est way to go, only when you reach 75+ with those should you focus more on others, important thing is you have 1 offence(destruction/conjuring/onhanded/twohanded/archery) and one defence (block/heavyarmor/lightarmor/sneak/illusion/alteration) that are both very strong. and a third that is either support or complementive.

if you do want a heavy handicap of a challenge tho, ye go for it, but why stop there? you can just go all into pickpocketing, lockpicking and speech >_<

On default difficulty (adept) you can basically do whatever you want and be successful with it.

Just go for it

Jeez I hate questions like this. Why not try it and find out? Are people really that frightened about making a mistake in a single player game? Give it a shot, if you don't like how it's turning out, start over. It's not as if you're going to lose anything!

you dont need to exploit, by high skills i meant normal =)

i personally like swords, the crits seem to hit very hard and the finisher animations are pro. I really havnet run into anything were im like damn.. wish i had some bleed effects right now.

well ive enjoyed answering some questions because it directly reflects the character im playing now.

sure is better than another stupid balance mages thread.

Well, that's true and it doesn't bug me that people answer, mostly that people are afraid of experimenting or just trying things out. Maybe they're new to the series, but Bethesda does everything they can when they develop a game to make sure that everyone wins, no matter how they play!

I just started a dual wield with light armour guy last night and I got smoked. I was level 9 when I reached the first dragon and holy crap. I think I died around 30 times and beat it with very little health left. Playing on master and don't plan on turning it down or using the exploits to make myself a god. I will use smithing, alchemy and enchanting but I won't do all those neat tricks I hear about. I think my Breton has a lot of catching up to do also though.

Well to an extend. For me, the forums do reflect the new route the games are taking. There seems to be a bigger demand for min-maxing than roleplaying currently. A bit sad.

But on-topic:
I play this build simply because it's incredibly badass and it works well with the tiny backstories I have for pretty much all my characters (I'm not really imaginative.). I'm only level 12 currently but don't seem to have any major issues.
Thinking of upping smithing though, I need the armour upgrades. Dragons bite 1/3rd of my health off on expert and if a bandit leader hits me 2/3 times I'm dead.

ATM I'm playing a DW crazed orc who lost all his armor at the last dice table lol. Yeah, I'm playing with zero armor at all, it's fun actually. Only on expert atm, not sure if I can do masters haha. Light armor can go as high as heavy so it makes no difference. Heck you can stop at elven if you want and get that to cap even. Infact the light armor tree overall is likely better. Real Orcs wear nothing but a loin cloth though

PS: My first encounter with a sabre cat was a bit scary lol. svckers are fast!

just normal high smithing gets my weapon damage high enough for my taste, so besides gloves. i enchant what i can with fire and ice resist. brings dragons quite a few notches down the predator scale

I'm playing a hunter-type build at the moment which focuses on light armour with dual wield swords and archery. In most cases, as I don't level sneak, I end up in melee combat, and as long as you level smithing it's a perfectly viable option. Ideally you should obviously level light armour as the top perk allows you to avoid damage completely 10% of the time IIRC.

My opening roll has been: Sneak, Archery, 1H (mains) with Light Armor, Alchemy (subs). I dual-wield with sword/dagger when sneaking but I have had to fall back to using a shield against tougher enemies. I have not leveled smithing yet which might be the issue - playing even on Adept I am dying a lot. I don't use any magic, only rely on potions.

Might be my tactics too though. I cannot take out a dragon at all. I'm Level 12 right now and even standard Trolls smack me around.

The key is to use shouts (particularly 'Marked for Death') and potions a LOT; especially if you haven't levelled smithing to make your weapons and armour more potent. Also, if you see the enemy from a while away, put as many arrows in them as you can before they get to you so you're more likely to survive. I'm currently doing this on Master and I still die, but not that often anymore.

Dragons are simple if you use the marked for death shout and find scenery to take cover from the dragon's breath.

Dual wielding in light armor is def viable, probably the most fun of any character I've played so far. It's great on easier difficulties, might take lil min/maxing for Master though. Potions and improving your gear is a must, plenty of health and stam. Power attack through everyone!!

I'm playing a Bosmer knife fighter, dual daggers with some Alchemy and Illusion thrown in for control. Haven't really had a single problem expect when I'm fighting over-leveled enemies.

I play on expert, dual wielding, plate wearing, only hit stuff with maces orc character !

It can be hard to be honest, on the harder boss I need to bull rush into proximity and start with a power attack to stagger them then keep bashing. Often and I need to back of and dual heal myself.

For mage bosses and stuff like whispmothers (they are such a pain) I soften them up with my bow then do the previous tactic and I always barely survive the fights !

Other than healing I only use magic to summon undead only... if there is no body around im screwed !!!

I'm currently playing a Breton ranger-type DW'er with war axes and wearing fur armour. With Lords stone and a couple of +magic resist items, the only thing difficult about mages is catching them as they try to run away. I've died quite a few times to archers and guys with two-handers when I didn't move fast enough, but it's been a lot of fun.

I think we are miscommunicating. I am maxing the skills in these trees and not the perks. With one handers, im only going to take either axes or swords for the focus which saves perks, nor am I taking all of archery. Light armor will be maxed, but stealth will not. It really ends up being only 2-3 skills being maxed perk wise, not necessarily skill wise. I'm certainly NOT going to use enchanting...barbarians do not enchant [censored] unless it is imbueing a weapon with my enemies blood.

Thank you for the help though.

I'm a non sneaking character, here is my perks if you wish you wish to take a look, I always plan ahead lol: http://www.jayzar.co.uk/#Zy0000e2w001V400W50000000000000000001s00

Tl:dr
I'm more or less maxed out, at 36. My suggestion would be: Go for HP until you get some decent gear, then stamina else you will (at least on master difficulty) die a lot from suprise attacks or those crazy two-handed crazy guys and some archers and ofc a lot of seriously overpowered magic guys.
Also I would suggest to wear a bow to counter dragons and archers/mages if needed, they will be hard to begin with and sertain ones very hard later on without a bow.


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Aight then:

I'm currently lvl 36 (if I remember correctly)
Running in full legendary dragon armor light.
With daedric x2 swords and a daedric bow, yep maxed smithing for some stupid reason right away... (stamina enchants only)

anyway, as you can see I'm more or less maxed.
And I do get beaten up pretty badly now and then, playing at master tho.
But I usually have some fair fights, and two-handed npcs still hit like trucks (most of them).

I got 400 hp, rest stamina. So I usually survive most hard encounters, but I would suggest to go for a bit of HP at the beginning until you get some gear then switch for stamina.
Since it can be quite hard, and you will loose alot of hp early on in close combats, at least without decent light armor.

I'm also into bows because dragons are quite hard without, really! they are actually a pain in the [censored].. Not the regular "dragons" but some special ones makes me waste [censored]loads and often I do end up getting eaten.

In the end, it is a really enjoyable play style. I would suggest it right away, changed once to try 1h shield and bow but got boored.
You will end up running around some npcs screaming aaaaahhhh please don't hit me and waiting for the to get ready again so you can control the fight better lol.
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