Hey everybody.

This is my first gimped character which I hope becomes my permacharacter. I just need some minor advice, and "approvals" before I let him out of the prison

Race: Redguard (Favourite Character - goes well with my roleplaying idea)

Birthsign: Atronach

Spec: Magic

Attributes: Strength - Intelligence

Skills: Blade, Armorer, Restoration/Destruction ( Any advice?) - Heavy Armor, Speechcraft, Alteration, Marksman (Not going to be used)

Minors that are going to be used: Alchemy, Sneak, Illusion, Conjuration.

How do you plan to gimip him? A Redguard Atronach who uses some blade and magic has seriously powerful potential. I'm not trying to second guess you, just curious.

If you are going to use it a lot, I would not take restoration, you can't control your leveling with it, more important in a level maxed character, destruction makes more sense. You will start with blade 35, armorer 25 and destruction 30, giving a max level of 21, which can easily be increased by a few with a bit of alteration, so ok.

Seen a few posts using gimped to mean level capped, assumed that is what was meant.

Acadian, perhaps Dezlar means gimping his levelling. Although, I don't consider level capping as gimping a character. In fact, it's rather beneficial to characters to cap their levels, as you obviously know.

Dezlar, both restoration and destruction level stupidly slowly, so either is a good major. Perhaps swapping armourer (which levels fast) out and taking both restoration AND destruction could work.

However, they're both governed by willpower, which can cause levelling issues if you're not careful.

Edit: :ninja: 'd

Thanks, Count. I was just about to come back and edit as I suspected the same thing. Like you, I consider 'capping' a character between L20-30 as a benefit for them, not a 'gimp'. A gimp would be something like no armor or never increasing endurance. Or choosing the Apprentice birthsign. Lol. Thanks!

Oh sorry, I thought gimping meant was the official term for level capping - level capping is of course what I'm after!

On second thoughts in my first playthrough I didn't really use Restoration that much because of Alchemy, the idea was actually only to use the absorb health/magicka skill.. I've considered Alteration and Destruction aswell, but is it stupid to have major skills that governs Willpower, when I'm going to play as an Atronach?

You've got me a bit confused with that mix. You're stating that you won't use Heavy Armor, and you don't list Light Armor as a minor to use either, yet you'll have Armorer as a major to use. If you're only repairing a weapon, it won't go up very fast at all. Perhaps that's why you want to start it at 25+.

An Atronach needs to have a significant non-magical offense for when the magicka runs out, or a lot of Restore Magicka potions. You'll break even against mages fairly early, but continue to get nothing from most creatures, bandits and marauders. Without using an armor skill, you'll need to use magic to fight them, even if it's just shield spells. You won't put any points into Willpower, but the related skills are still useful. Just don't make them majors, and they won't force you to level. Alchemy will of course get a lot of use making those Restore Magicka potions, and the Intelligence will help.

But Atronach doesn't really fit an unarmored build. It works best to provide defense against magic for a character that has armor for defense against the physical. If you need magicka to provide Shield, then you really have gimped the character, rather than capped him. Higher Spell Absorption will compete with magical Shield enchantments for your Soul gems and Sigil Stones until you reach their caps.

This could work if you start by using armor, but wean yourself off it once you can replace it with enchantments. You'll get some initial levels but be able to limit how far you go. The problem will be deciding when to make the switch, as you'll have developed habits that will be hard to break.

Well, I guess I'll add Light Armor to my skills aswell - the idea was to use magic as a back-up skill, conjuration for back-up, illusion for invisibility, command etc.. So the question for my now is more what my last back-up magic skill should be.... I've never tried Alteration, Mysticism seems a bit useless after level 25 when you can soultrap, Restoration is nice but healing potions are easy to make and you can wait to heal... Absorb healt/magic is nice though ( but slow-levelling)... And Destruction is nice aswell, although I won't deal ranged damage... And also levels soooo slowly