I am playing a very sneaky thief/assassin and for a long time I had Lydia as a follower, then she ran in front of one of my arrows and died. I missed her for a while, but no longer. In fact the game seems much, much easier without me having to worry about someone else. Yesterday, I back-stabbed a dragon priest for a two blow kill and today I have been sneaking up on and taking out deathlords, draugrs generally and all types of riff-raff with barely a hint of trouble. Not only that but I no longer have traps going off in my face, because my companion trod on the pressure plate that I skirted around. True, I can't carry as much stuff out of a dungeon as I used to be able to do, but then money isn't really a problem and it does seem to be a small price to pay for never having to be involved in a melee.

I am currently only at level 36, so maybe I'll need a help-meet later on, but for now I would recommend going solo for any sneaky type.

I am not a sneaky type, I use 1H and sheild and I have went without a companion for a while, I am level 40 atm. I was using the steed stone for a while but changed for the lord stone yesterday since I have the heavy armour perk to make my armour weight nothing and not slow me down. Yes it would be nice to have a mule to carry some stuff for me but I like not having someone trip over all the traps lol

I find followers are helpful at lower levels, but become annoying at high levels (especially if you are a sneak-thief)

My Bretton Shadow Mage only uses a companion while traveling the wilds.

I leave them at the door of a cave etc and clear it out on my own.

In the wilds I can flank an enemy while they pound on my Tank Companion, and fire of some ranged spells.

And leaving them outside while in the caves means I dont have to worry about friendly fire, but they are still waiting to help me carry the spoils.

That's a really good idea Karniest. I forgot you can make them wait and that they are not going to die from being alone.

I use Vorstag (from Silver Blood Inn in Morkarth) as a companion/mule. He sneaks okay, but he does like to run into combat when I think he should stay out of my way and fire arrows.

Or blunder into traps a falmer could see.

Same happened to me. I shut her bedroom door so I wouldn't have to think about it. For a couple of days I was a little down, but like you, I found I was enjoying the game more. I like being able to jump off a mountain and not have to worry about a follower. I might bring Mjoll to return the lexicon. I call them follower booty calls. I was stuck in Dawnstar waaaay overencumbered and I got some drunk to carry loot back home. He even fought a dragon. So it was exciting for him. I even let him keep some decent gear.

My general rule is that if I rely on sneaking, I don't use a follower. For some reason followers decide it's a lot of fun to blow cover every time an enemy is even remotely close, while I'm still readying my bow for a silent takedown. Instead, my follower alerts the whole tomb, and 5 Draugr charge us. Not good.

On my Nord, where I never use sneak, I find a follower very handy, as there is no problem with sneak. Instead they provide extra offence, carryability and they are good tanks.They still do that when you sneak, but generally sneak > all in that situation.

Followers as a gameplay matter are a liability, but I feel better with someone to walk with, someone to watch my back.

Shadow warrior is the most extreme example. In order to land a sneak attack your target must be out of combat, if you have any kind of allies around your enemy won't drop from combat totally negating your stealth tree perks - assasin's blade, shadow warrior and thus practically ALL of your damage. No companion on the planet can compensate for the loss of damage output

I find that they notice attacks which I miss. Curiously, with my sword and shield Reguard, Lydia often uses a bow. I'll finish a fight with something unpleasant, wondering what has happened to her and find the death lord has several of her ebony arrows in his inventory. With my stealth character, she was always rushing to block my arrows. Now she holds back more often than not.

My character got a habbit of murder my companions, he got a need for blood.

For magic type users I find them helpful as a meat shield early on until I can get decent summons. For melee type chars, I find that I usually end up killing them accidentally in combat, as I tend to just flail about wildly and swing at everything in front of me.

Melee followers are the biggest PITAs from my experience. Right now I use Erandur and I almost never have to worry about him. He follows me everywhere, doesn't get in my way, and if he gets lost for a while, oh well, I can do without him. I used Farkas for a little while and it was MADDENING. I literally couldn't walk 10 feet without him getting stuck behind some kind of rock. It takes him forever to realize he is in combat, run towards an NPC, and damage them, so by the time he gets halfway to them I've already killed them. I got Erandur back and am happy that way.

After level 30 or so followers just get in the way and ruin sneak attacks. (IMO Only)

My thanks to all those who have contributed their thoughts to this thread.

I take Karniest's point about using a follower as cover when travelling in the open, but leaving them outside when going dungeon crawling. Lydia did serve me well when outside, especially when random Dragons turned up on our path. Now that I have sneak maxed-out I do seem to be able to glide through most outdoor problems, so I am not sure that the benefit of a follower is worth the effort - they might help in a fight but then, probably, the fight wouldn't have happened if they weren't there.

That said Lydia served me well for twenty-odd levels, so Aphaea is probably correct that the usefulness of a follower tails off with experience. I am sure Ryuujin_0, has hit the button when it comes to a high-sneak character - the companion just becomes a liability.

That said, I intend my next character to be a big, heavy-armour, in your face, fighter without an ounce of sneakiness in his body. I can see with that sort JoelTD will be correct a follower of similar ilk will be more than useful. However, for the moment I shall continue to revel in my freedom and adventure alone.

[Edited for typos]

IMO, I realy miss just being able to leave my followers in my house. This especialy goes for the dog. I want followers, I just dont want followers to follow me. I at least wish they would give you the option to set your home as your dogs default place like they did with spouses.

I mean come on bethesda, realy? You could code that for 50+ people you could marry, but not for the only three possible dogs you can have?

I haven't bothered with them at all. I might level a bit slower (due to having to take things slower as to fighting etc.) but that's fine. I've never appreciated the need of game publishers to foist "companions" on players, rather than just making the game work for a solo player to begin with.

This, although I strongly prefer mage followers.

Id use followers if they made them essential. Otherwise, they are useless cannon fodder cause I use AOEs. No point in having someone who mindlessly walks into my spells.

Heh, yup. Beth needs lessons in how to set "immune to friendly fire".

there is nothing worse than having your companion do the opposite of what you want.

i took lydia's bow away and guess what she has a default one that i cannot take away.

so she uses the bow instead of melee and melee instead of the bow.

when you add having to wait for her because she can't jump off hills....ugh.

My Redguard just rushes in with her 2 handed sword and takes names just like her follower, Jordis the Shield maiden.

I can totally see where sneak skilled players would want to be alone though.

Melee fights are much better with a follower, but yes, stealth combat is much easier without. I tried Jenessa, who's supposed to be a stealth specialist, and to be fair she did pretty well. Her main problem was that as soon as an enemy started to suspect someone was around then she'd decloak and attack - while I was still manoevering for a backstab. It's less of a problem with a bow/stealth character because you kill before your follower does anything silly, but massively annoying for blade/stealth. I've tried the "leave them at the door" approach as well, but I wasn't keen on that either. My current blade/stealth does without, but some fights I wish there was one there.