So I'm starting a new character. I'm gonna be an assassin, archer, sword guy. So I need to equip myself with light armor. I don't want to use a shield so my question is this: Should I use a one-handed or a two-handed sword?

one handed, dual wielding. Hurt them for a distance, and if they get close, go for a quick takedown.. you can't get involved a face to face fight with a barbarian, they are supposed to die before they get that close. Dual daggers, or dagger+sword.

Two-handed with sneak just seems wrong to me. If you want stat advice thou, I'm the wrong person to ask,

Yeah I'd go with dual wielding, granted that can be a bit tricky to get the timing right on those, I know I haven't been able to get it right.

Plan on using daggers for sneak attacks up close, but sooner or later I probably will end up in a face to face combat. I'm gonna play on Master so I might need the ability to block...?

there are different playstyles but with archer+sneak in a dungeon they will never get to you, if u are outside and something gangs you if you are full assassin ill go with daggers x30 dmg dual wield and if you have shadow warrior you can make the backstab anytime hope this helps

Sounds like a good plan. But until I get my lvl up should I use two handed or one handed sword? Not to keen on dual wielding.

i would recommend 1h weapon this will help lvl your 1h lvl which help daggers but thats great about skyrim you can try both and use what u like the most !

Think I'm gonna go for 1h sword. Thanks for the help!

In your case, I would consider dual wielding one dagger and one sword for melee combat or in close sneak attacks. The bow will be the primary weapon too and with sneak will take many and perhaps most of your early perk points over one handed.

np gluckz and have fun

Well, if you're playing an assassin, you're going to be using a dagger presumably, and that means one-handed. The base perk in one-handed and Fortify One-Handed don't affect dagger damage, but your one-handed skill level does, so you might as well make use of it.

Also of note, two-handed weapons can block, while dual wielding does more damage. Now what kind of self-respecting assassin would make a choice for survivability over MOAR POWAH?

Enjoy, and don't worry about blocking, ward spells, many of the shouts, will let you retreat to a safe distance again, and go back to the distance takedown.

Also. Run away... theres no shame in an assassin archer running the hell away from the snarling barbarian.

A live one?