Hey everyone , I like most get bored at lvl 40 with my warrior , rogue , mage characters , but I found a way I think is incredibly fun , stop being a well-balanced character , play with a serious disadvantage , it is waaay more fun , you have to kite , use the environment to your advantage , its awesome !

One of my characters uses heavy armor , block and destruction , no weapons but magic and a shield , it's actually quite fun

My other character is light armor , speech and archery , very under powered and not an easy class to play , you really gotta think about what your doing , ( i don't use any sneak perks so to keep it balanced )

My third character is one handed , light armor , sneak and pickpocket , very fun to play but you really have to limit your perks in sneak and one handed so not to become overpowered , I only ever increase the perks if the game becomes unplayable at my lvl which never really happens at all

note: I have crosshair off for all of these , especially my archer , so much more fun and immersive

Anyway I'm sure you all figured that out ages ago but what do you have ?
do you have any characters that are under powered but fun to play , when do you cut off a skill from further perk enhancements

No HUD, no armour, no weapons, only magic and staffs (sometimes) for my Healer character.

The others have normal aquipment but still no HUD.

My character rarely wears armor. When he wears armor he rarely wears a helmet.
Oh...and my character is fat and moves with 70% movement speed. Running away from attackers is hard.
Screenshots: http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b148/ActionDragon/Skyrim/Fish-Breath/Fish-Breath167.jpg, http://i18.photobucket.com/albums/b148/ActionDragon/Skyrim/Fish-Breath/Fish-Breath172.jpg

And I've disabled most aid features from the HUD: No crosshair, no sneak eye indicator, no enemy dots etc. in compass.

no hud interesting

Hmm underpowered, yeah actually i had a sneak archer who only had all stamina every level up and no health, he was extremely squishy but for a real challenge it might be better to do the same with a straight up melee fighter instead now i had huge damage on the other hand.

So far in Skyrim I have been limiting my characters to just three perk trees per character. My warrior put perks into Light Armor, 2-Handed and Smithing. My current dual-wield thief/assassin puts perks into Sneak, 1-Handed and Lockpicking.

At level 54 my warrior was still wearing the Hide Armor she got at level 1. My thief/assassin wears only clothes, no armor at all. Neither character has done any enchanting and neither character has ever used a spell, or a scroll. My warrior used the Lord Stone, but my thief/assassin isn't using any stone.

I wish they would bring back advantages/disadvantages from Daggerfall.

Yeah...They were very interesting, but not very well balanced. Many (too many) things have been cut to make balancing easier. Now there's a lack of choices.

Many things can still be changed with mods, or by using console commands. You can also just restrict yourself from doing some things.

A fat Lizard-man. Oh God, my eyes!

In expensive clothing, no less.

Hmm maybe someday i should try getting by without smithing or enchanting? But i hate getting one shotted especially in places where there are many enemies (some forsworn camp or whatever) where the archers pelt you with arrows from high up places.

I like when we have base abilities that we role at the beginning of the game that determine how good we are going to be at any one skill or group of skills. That way we can gimp our characters in interesting ways. Be the brainiac mage who wants to be a heavy armored swordsman. Or, try to be dumb mage, or a clumsy thief. It is harder to svck at a skill in this game if you use it. Although not choosing Perks can provide this effect, kind of.

My self imposed ruleset usually involves:

5-6 skills maximum. Not a single other spell/ability/weapon used outside those in the selected skills and, of course, not using any potion during combat (only before or after).

Once, I tried a thief without lockpicking (only tower stone) and I could still climb to the top of the thieves guild.

He isn't just fat, he's obese.

Once a fight has begun there can be no switching of equipped/unequipped gear... start the fight in clothes with an iron dagger... finish it in clothes with an iron dagger.
Hotkeyed potions are considered to be "on the belt" and are allowed but once they're gone, no inventory diving... basically no "stopping time" during battle.

This can make a fight go downhill very quickly, but as OP says when you are at a disadvantage you learn how to manipulate the battlefield with kiting and environmental obstacles (pillars are great), it also makes you less reckless when a situation could escalate into open combat if you chose.

It also makes fighting as a vampire during the day (my current char is a dedicated vamp) really something you try to avoid, which is imo as it should be.

After reading about peeps playing with no HUD I'm thinking I might like to try it, sounds like combat becomes even more serious.

You have no idea how pleasant it is.

I wish they would bring a lot of stuff back from daggerfall, The huge randomized dungeons, the huge world, Climbing walls, Levitate spell, Carts, and all that other stuff.

Back to topic. One challenge a friend of mine is doing, Playing a mage with no armor, only clothes/mages robes. Can only use spells/enchanting/alchemy, No followers/companions to help you.

Personally, I don't think I could play without a HUD. I have disabled my compass, though. It's great not having that Star Trek bar across the top of my screen. The only time I see my HUD now is during fights.

I've also installed a mod that permanently removes all markers from my map as well. I see a name if I mouse over a location I've been before or if it's been marked on my map as part of a quest, but there's no icon and I can't fast travel there.

It's a good beginning; all you have to do now is completely disable the HUD. You won't even notice the difference; that's how I proceded.

My only concerns are how good the "heartbeat" is as a warning I'm getting pwned and how difficult archery will be without a crosshair.
Compass is only for north/south/east/west orientation purposes for me, I already play without floating and location markers (I HATED those floating arrows over people heads).

I'm also thinking I'll disable all the interaction prompts, I remember back in the day rpgs didn't have those very often... pressing the action button was the equivalent of "searching" or "examining" something to see if it could be interacted with.

I'd like to play with no HUD but I don't see how I'd ever hit anything with a bow and arrow.

I too play with No HUD, gotten so used to it, I hate playing WITH it on.
for my Character, I cannot get myself to wear Armor or use the Alteration Spells for Armor, he Uses Two-handed Swords and Frost Destruction.
It's an interesting build and I never really intended for it to be hard but I love it anyway

Edit : Keep playing with it Off and you can get really good with a Bow, I did that with my Female Khajiit and I'd say i'm just as good as someone who does have it on.

That's true. I've played all the Elder Scrolls games exclusively in 3rd person and that meant I had to learn to shoot without a reticule for ten years. It does take a little practice. But after awhile it becomes second nature. When I first tried to use a bow in Skyrim I actually found crosshairs distracting, lol.

Excellent thread I think I may try that unarmoured 2-handed war maiden character. Dunno about the no HUD tho' !

I'm playing the whole game on level 1. No perks, no shouts, never level up.
http://www.gamesas.com/topic/1359145-staying-at-level-1-and-never-level-up/

I'm having a blast!

That's the thing, i don't think you should have to restrict yourself. It should already be in the game mechanics.