And even easier in Oblivion. After stepping out of the tutorial dungeon, you'd obviously go up the hill to that freakin' huge Imperial City to sell off the junk you picked up that you don't need..... and what's there in the Market District? Dozens of boxes/crates/barrels filled with 0-4gp junk & clothing plus the occasional repair hammer, lockpick, and gold coin.



Yeah, that seemed kind of silly in Fallout: New Vegas. Fallout games are "survival" games - why would you want a bunch of starting bonus items?

(Meanwhile... the Mass Effect 2 bonus armor wasn't terribly powerful.... and was uglier & less useful than the default armor. And the Dragon Age 1 bonus armor was.... useless, since it had a strength req that you couldn't fulfil until you'd gained a bunch of levels. So it was either some starting cash - somewhat overpowered - or a white elephant taking up some of your valuable limited inventory space.)

Yep - don't really bother installing "bonus" starting items anymore.

If it's anything like Fallout 3, i'll be happy. I struggled to get enough caps for cool stuff and ammo/decent weapons were hard to come by. Granted, it was a wasteland but I really felt like i had to "make my way", and that's how I want to feel in Skyrim... gotta earn it.

Seconded.

thirded

I like that sort of feeling, as well... I like having to work for my belongings...

A lot of people complain about the Oblivion starting dungeon. However, in my opinion, one of the good things about that dungeon was the player character pretty much starting with nothing but the clothes on their back, some bread and water, and a couple starting spells, depending on character.

Then as the player character wandered through the dungeon, many items were found, enough to get them started when they exited the tunnel into the world.

Although perhaps not a dungeon, I expect a similar start, with perhaps Esbsern maybe providing something.

For me, it will fun, regaradless.

What if esbern gives us a spoon and a boiled egg and sets us on our merry way, now that would be hardcoe

Here's a dagger, cloaked robe and 50 gold, get out of here before someone sees you!

I don't think there will be any opportunity to ask for your stuff back, or even be offered your stuff back. I think it's going to be more like a major event like a battle starting that causes you to escape. Not them letting you go.

I guess it would depend on the manner of your release. If you are released in the chaos of a battle of some sort (be it with a dragon or because of the civil war) I doubt they would think to give you any of your possessions back. Secondly, you are a prisoner scheduled for execution. Any possessions you might have had before your arrest were probably forfeit long ago.

I kind of like starting with nothing and needing to find my own basic things from the start, actually, it always annoys me when some games have items that are utterly worthless because your basic starting equipment is already better than them. Although in some games you start with nothing even when you'd expect to have at least basic equipment from the start, but since you begin as a prisoner being executed, that's not really a factor here, and since from what I've been able to gather, you are saved from execution as opposed to your captors deciding to release you, there's no reason they should give your items back to you, though I suppose it might make sense for Esbern to give you a weapon during your escape, but in that case, it should either be something like the Akaviri katana you get in Oblivion's tutorial dungeon in that it's taken from you later, or it should be a very basic item, just so you have some way to fight at the start before you can get anything better.