I haven't tried it yet, but I think if I ever play through the game again i will go unarmed. there is no more unarmed skill tree so any advice on what to do? or just not do it at all ?

I do it for fun. Get gloves of the puglist from the ratway in riften, that would be the first thing i do.

And since there isn't no unarmed skill tree focus on getting enchantments that help with unarmed. Disenchanting the gloves, and then enchanting rings, necklaces, gauntlets, etc.

So really I would go with the enchanting skill tree. And I don't think there are any skills at all that help with unarmed but then again I haven't played in a while.

spose you could disenchant the gloves of the puglist and make some better ones?

I've never tried.

There are one or two ways to go about, from what I have sen on here. But omitting the unarmed skill is another bad move.

Yep, that's what I always did... After I got a decent enchanting skill level, doing it when you only have 20 or so in enchanting won't have any benefit at all. I usually wait until I have about 50 in enchanting.

Specialize in heavy armor, use a lot of health & fatigue enchantments. Along with the gloves of the pugilist effect.
And remember that unarmed damage is based off of your gauntlets armor rating.

Khajiit also get a small, but worthwhile bonus to unarmed damage.

The best skills to invest in are smithing, heavy armor, & enchantment though.

My Orc's an unarmed fighter, he's pretty tough to bring down.
Pop off the slow time shout, & you can wipe out whole groups before they know what happened.

With Fists of Steel perk, Daedric gauntlets, and Fortify Unarmed enchant, you can get 10 + 18 + 12 = 40 damage per hit. 52 if you are Khajiit. That should be enough to carry you through all the way. I've been playing with a 32 damage Sword and I find it to be adequate at level 50.

yeah as kajiit

Watch this video by some Swedish guy named robbaz... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhBiNx749Zw

It's possible but it's tedious and makes you level up way slower, since you won't have a weapon skill. I tried it out before but I've never done a whole playthrough that way.

It's definitely tough.

Robbaz is amazing, I love watching his vids a long time ago, time to rewatch them!

Good point. Only combat skill you get is heavy armor. And rest of it is crafting. I think I'll add unarmed combat to my warrior. I heard that unarmed finishing moves are sweet.

[Edit] I just tried it. I enchanted a new pair of Steel Plate Gauntlets with Fortify Unarmed and went to clear out Fort Neugrad. A random fort I haven't been to before. I was able to kill regular bandits with a single power punch or two regular punches. The fight with bandit chief was a bit long and a bit hard as usual and I had to heal myself in the middle of the fight once. It feels pretty strong compared to the 38 damage sword I've been using. Some cool finishing moves. There is one where you knee them on the stomach and flip them over wrestling style. And there is one where you hold their head and punch them in the face repeatedly until they die. It was worth the perk just to see these new finishing moves. My current level is 49 and playing at adept difficulty.