This. When you reach higher levels, levelling up takes longer, so I do train in skills I rarely use (pickpocketing, some magic skills, etc.). It helps levelling up faster. Plus you have more than enough money at that point.

Yes, but only in skills that I find hard to level like Speechcraft and early on in Enchanting.

Took long enough to get to this. If you ever pay for training, you're probably doing it wrong.

I do it here and there, but not on a constant basis.

I only pay my followers who are able to train, to train me. Once all done i just do a trade with them and get all my lovely gold back.........svckers!!

UnionK

I train with followers. If they help me clear a dungeon, I train with them as a way of splitting the rewards. And I DON'T steal it back. I find gold to be far to easy to come by, and this is just one of the ways I try and make the economy more realistic.

The reason someone would pay to train is because it's worth the money to them.

We do it all the time. By your theory it's nonsensical any of us are playing Skyrim right now because why pay $60 retail when you can get it next year for 50-60% off?

I'm a cheap bastard

No reason to train early on, unless you're really, really impatient. And I agree that it could make you level up too quickly.

The only time I've paid for training was at higher levels when I coveted a certain perk and was just one or two levels away from being able to get it--like those half-magicka perks in the various magic schools. By then I was pretty loaded anyway, so I didn't miss the coin.

I have been building my pickpocket skill by training. I do not want to go around picking everybody's pockets just to level up so I am getting training in that.

But those are two of the easiest skills to level up.

I pay to train somethings just because I have extra money and nothing to spend it on.

I do it so that my Destruction keeps pace with Alteration and that's it. For some reason alteration levels a bit (not much) more quickly for me than destruction does.

I buy the skills I feel I don't progress in naturally, that matches my characters desires. Like, I'm an archer, and a damned good one at that. Sneaking and archery comes natural to me, so unless I stumble upon Angi I don't train with a regular trainer at all. But I also need some protection, right? For hard weaponry, that means some training in light armor, since that doesn't progress naturally at all for a good archer. I also need something against magical attacks, so I need some alteration training. Restoration appears inaccessible for a two handed operator, which is fine by me.

I won't resort to grinding to level up my skills. Light armor and alteration doesn't progress naturally at the same speed as my sneak and archery skills, and I won't switch to combat styles (i.e. 1H+shield) that would increase them faster, if it doesn't suit the character. I'll typically stop at around 50-60 though, if that is enough to "get by", as I'll happily drink potions or use found equipment to add up to it - if it suits the character.

The prices for training should grow faster too I think. What I'm paying now from 99-100 should apply to 49-50, and anything beyond 80-90 should be practically impossible to raise the money for. For me, it's okay to strife to become better. But this race for 100 (anything) should be avoided (means no 100 skill requirement as well). Climb naturally from 25-50'ish, plus any racial or effect bonuses. After that, it should slow (due exponential growth) that even severe grinding wouldn't take you to 100. 100 seems like some magic goal. It shouldn't be.

A fair point. But it helps keep the wealth down which keeps the whole scavenging/crafting/hunting/trading mechanic
interesting.

not in this game, to expenciv and no rely need to do it.

not as important as the last 2 games when you needed the to get the lv bonus wen focus on 1 spec thing

If I feel the need I'll use training. Paying an expert to teach me something of what they know feels a lot less cheap to me than massproducing iron daggers. So far I haven't felt the need though. The skills I want to pick perks for have risen fast enough that I've not had to get any perks I didn't eventually intend to get.

Fixed. Some of us prefer to pay with money penalty that does make sense, than too easy grinding that doesn't make sense. If I ever served you a meal of mine, you'd know that my skill is on the other side of zero. I'd gain some skill by practicing making that meal, but it would stop helping me at some point - I would never become a chef doing it - not if I did it a fantazillion times. Paying for a course in culinary skills however, might actually do something, and I could try grinding challenging meals instead after that. Now, this actually makes sense. Smithing iron daggers to mastery just, doesn't. For those two don't want to put perks in it, then pay up if you still need the skill. It's pretty easy, and money is a no brainer as well in this game.

I don't know how people are able to reach those higher levels. With my last character, a chaotic neurtral sneak thief, I ran out of quests that SHE would do around level 47.

My current char is a chaotic good so I think there will be a lot more to do but I still would be shocked if I get beyond the mid 50's.

Well said.

I use it to bolster skills that I don't want to grind, but don't want falling behind either. Skills like block and alteration just don't move well by themselves with my natural play style. I never pay for skills after 50 though because of the sharp price jump.

Actually I agree with BioFringe (3 down from your original post) at lower levels say, anywhere from level 1 to 35 there's really no need to pay to level up because you can easily go into a dungeon or cave, kill a couple Spiders, Draugr, Hagravens or Sabrecats and... whalah! Level 36!
If your level 36-81 then you start having problems so it's okay.

The only skill I've really paid for training is Restoration. For some reason it always lags behind my other skills so I pay every now and again to give it a boost. Besides that I don't really bother. It costs too much and most skills level fast enough naturally.

Wether its cheap or not depends on my character and wich methods of moneymaking and skill leveling I choose to use. When I am playing on my thief I can make 100k easily via alchemy so using them on training is kinda cheap. When I am on my mage I can enchant weapons with banish and make tons of money in to time.
There are some skill that take rather long to level without purchasing skill training or using, well lets say strange ways of skill leveling, like restoration or armor skills when playing as a archer . So I think it is okay to use gold to speed up the process in such cases.

What else is gold for?