Is it possible to successfully play Skyrim as a pure tank type fighter? Someone who doesn't know the word 'sneak'; someone who would walk with reckless abandon through caves or dungeons fighting toe-to-toe with any foe (or multiple foes) that he/she would come across? But more importantly, someone who travels alone, without any companions?

I'm currently playing a sneaky-thief-assassin character which I am finding to be a tad overpowered. I would like to try a pure fighter, but I'm afraid if he has to fight more than one opponent at a time he will get killed almost everytime, which would be extremely frustrating.

i am playing like this now and i think it is great fun. i do have some kind of companion, my dog . i also started off with a sneaky thief assassin and eventualy got stuck in an thieves guid quest, and didn′t want to start over. i am very happy with my new build an think it is defenetly worth trying for everybody.

greetzzz, atefco

Sure
Multiple foes can be difficult
Battlecry or Berserker Rage are a big help if you face a situation where numbers might overwhelm you

I would imagine high levels in alchemy, enchanting and smithing would be extremely helpful.

Actually I am playing like this at the moment, my advice is to not level anything at all but your chosen weapon skill (i'm doing 2H) and Heavy Armor, if you do crafting early game you will level up too fast and find yourself struggling hard in combat. I did nothing at all till my 2H skill was 80 and Heavy armor was 65, you can do a bit of smithing fairly early on to get Steel upgrades. You will struggle pretty hard against anyone with magic so my advice is to pick a Race with some early resistance ability (I recommend Nord because Frost Resistance gives you some protection against the slow down affect of frost spells enabling you to get into melee range before death!). I'm level 30 now with all my perks into 2H, Heavy Armor or Smithing, some of these perk points are spent in so called "useless" perks because I do not intend to do any alchemy on this character at all (crafting is what makes these perks "useless" because you can bypass their affect with craftables).

At level 30 there's not much that can kill me if i'm sensible, I do go quite low on some boss fights (mainly due to magic damage that my armor can't negate) but i've yet to die, and you can always chug a health potion if you wish (something I keep forgetting to do). For groups of Magic Users I advise prioritising the hardest one first, one power attack with a 2H weapon will have them staggered and unable to fight back before you can kill them. I suspect I would struggle immensely vs dragons so I have so far avoided the main questline.

I intend to never spend perks on Smithing past Steel Plate as I intend to use this as a late game armor, currently I am wearing Steel Plate with 350ish Armor, which I will increase later on with HA perks/smithing and my weapon is a Nord Greatsword upgraded to hero status via the skyforge (same damage output as skyforge steel but weighs less so I can carry more items). I suspect however that Enchanting will be needed at some point unless I farm like crazy and hope to get lucky with useful magical items dropping. I'm playing on default difficulty (adept). One other thing to add, Draugr Deathlords are quite annoying pre-30 due to disarm, it can be quite hard to find out where your sword has landed, post 30 they stop using Disarm on you.

Of course it's possible. What is strategy? Grab a weapon and slash your way trough.

That would be me.

heavy armor with sword and board. Blocking is an awesome skill in this game. Its how i played my first character for 75% of the game (later added conjuration for something different). Also perking alteration can get you 30% spell absorption along with the 50% from the atronach stone you should be set to deal with the hardest enemies in the game, mages.

Me too I'm fighting like this. I have just reached level 77 and from the beginning till now I never had followers apart during some Companions' quests and later at level 40 my dear Meeko. But I was the one to protect him.. I'm a one-handed warrior with light armor. I put all perks in Smithing, Enchanting, Alchemy, Speech, Light Armor, 5 in Restoration, 3 in Lockpicking, 6 in One-handed, 7 in Block. I do NOT sneak nor pickpocket. I don't want to be a thief or assassin. I always went straight toward the enemies with my blade, my war axe or my dagger. No destruction but candlelight in my right hand switching quickly with my shield. I always put points in Health and Stamina. Very few in Magicka. No Archery. Use Dragonrend and fight the dragon with blade, axe and now my dagger only. I always face my enemies. I find my char. very easy to play.

Now to gain more levels I train archery, 2-handed. Pickpocket 20 will remain the same as well as sneak 49 (I paid a few training). So now I'm afraid for me level 77 is the dead end.

Shake hands my friend..

To protect me against mages' spells and dragons too I had the shield Spellbreaker. With good enchantment on me and lots of health I could ignore alteration and other schools of magic. Only a bit of Restoration.

Haha, yeah dude. My main is a jack-of-all trades, but initially was a tank.
Orc, smithing, enchanting, alchemy, heavy armor, one handed, and blocking. Leveled up only health the entire game.
Eventually I had extra perks to spend, so I used them on archery and sneak, but that's only an afterthought. Now he can do anything. What about magic? Well I could enchant some armor to reduce a schools cost by 100%, or use the staffs or scrolls I collect. The only thing he can't do is pickpocketing.
I use ebony mail and the spell breaker so I can sneak silently in heavy armor, and block spells. The Lord's stone helped at first, but I now use the atronach to I can absorb spells. Unstoppable even on master.

No. Strategy is to be smart. To have a look at your enemies and avoid the arrows. still fighting, by hiding behind a pilar or else, or by turning around the one you fight with so that it's he who get hit by arrows. Also when a mage start casting spells to you, just ignore the others and rush toward him first. In fact, being smart means eliminate first the strongest.

You can certainly build a fantastic straight up melee fighter, but does that qualify as a tank? I thought the definition of a tank was somebody who would draw all the attacks and thus protect squishy squad mates from damage. Are you really a tank if you are on your own?

Generally, I destroy the weaker enemy horde before focusing on the tougher monsters. I find myself overwelmed in ruins if I try to take down the draugr lords first.

'tis what one of my characters is. He's a nord with heavy armor, restoration, 2handed, enchanting, and smithing.

I use a steel warhammer (superior) with the firey soultrap enchantment and wear steel plate armor (Exquisite)(I think)

It's pretty fun just running in and making a mess of things

It's actually pretty easy to. Use most of your level ups to bulk up your health.

I think this is what I'm going to do on my next play-through. A Nord or Orc pure tank who will also rely heavily on shouts.

It really is exhilarating fighting up close and personal with all you run into, including giants, trolls, mammoths and dragons. You still have to quickstep if you want to survive.
Orcs are superior for this "tank" style character with the berserker ability.

Your best bet would probably be to use a shield and when faced with multiple enemies you'll have to keep all of them in front of you and time your blocks as they attack hopefully in sequence. I've done it on my Heavy Armor guy, but it's annoying to me so I went back to dual swords and just slashed the $*** out of the enemies popping healing potions as necessary.

Fairly straightforward build. I'm going a step further with my current Heavy/2H build and not using any magic of any kind: no spells, no scrolls, no enchanting, no alchemy (I'm treating alchemy as magical rather than pharmacy).

I played an Orc like this. Heavy armor kept him safe from harm mostly. He'd just rush mages and it would be over pretty quick. However due to HA weight (until you get perked) you almost have to have a companion to help carry loot, otherwise you are barely able to carry the bear necessities, armor, weapon, few potions, etc.

I've done this build myself, and you're going to love iiiit. It's extremely satisfying, makes you feel like you could one-shot the world.

Also, advice for anyone doing this sort of build, use The Lord stone. It adds to the tank aspect of it.

Thanks for all the replies. Playing a pure fighter sounds fun and challenging.

My current Nord warrior has never put a single point into sneak, he doesn't believe in it. He believes sneaks are cowards who couldn't survive five seconds in a fair fight face to face, therefore they must resort to hiding in the shadows like a bunch of sissies.

I play on normal difficulty, but then I've never been the greatest TES fighter...Fallout 3/New Vegas on the other hand...