After Helgen and you follow Ralof or Hadvar, how does your character pursuit its first few levels? Personally i usually clear out the mine you walk past on the way to Riverwood, then over to whiterun and start doing the bounty quests in order to get some few levels. But more then often, am trying to fit all this into a roleplay perspective, and at times it feels like "Yeah doing this really dont seem to suit my character, but i need it in order to gain some levels". How do you guys go about with this? Any advice is appreciated

It depends on the character. All of my characters are different. So, naturally, they all start their stories differently. I let my characters guide me. Some of them don't want to do the main quest, others can't wait to deliver that message to Whiterun.

If I were writing a book of short stories I wouldn't dream of starting them all the same way. It's similar here too. Every game is a different story. Every story has a different beginning.

***Warning, A Long Detailed Wall Of Text In-Coming***

Embershard mine, that's how. Follow Hadvar into the Main Keep for your first time in the main quest. When you leave, immediately go to the three stones. Choose the stone that suits you, if this is your first time, Mage stone is the best even though destruction magic is mediocre, because you need to raise your Restoration powers up. Go to the blacksmith's house (Alvor? I think that's his name), politely accept his supplies that he grants you, sell excess weapons and armor to either Alvor the blacksmith or Lucan Valerus at the general good's store. Rather than follow the main quest immediately, go to Embershard Mine, it's inbetween the Three magical stones (Dragonstones?) and Riverwood. Kill all the bandits inside Embershard Mine, maybe mine some iron ores and grow your smithing skill. Inside Embershard mine, the most important thing you will find there is a small treasure room guarded by one bandit.

At first most weapons you find there will be iron, but the treasure actually levels with you. One thing that is important to get this early in the game is the Clairvoyance spell, which helps you find important routes you need to take in order to follow the main objectives in your journal. This spell is an important spell and although you don't need it, it WILL be a great help to you for a few aggravating quests. Embershard Mine is also important because the bandits stay easy to fight throughout the whole game, but will always have at least one treasure room, the one with the clairvoyance tome, with leveled equipment you can use or sell at your leisure. (There are two additional important chests to be found as well, but I've found the most important one to be the very first treasure room in EMbershard mine).

After clearing Embershard Mine, return to Riverwood, if you haven't talk to the Wood Elf named Faendal. He is a skilled archer and a teacher. If you plan to be a rogue or warrior, archery is very important. Archery will be important period if you have Dawnguard loaded in your data files. Try to train in archery with Faendal as much as you can, and then complete his quest by giving the fake note to Camilla so she dumps Sven. Faendal is now your friend and will be your defender if you take him on quests with you. Tell Lucan Valerius and Camilla that you will return their Golden Claw, and head off to the Bleak Falls Barrow, preferably before making it to White Run. (But not necessarily).

Complete Bleak Fall's Barrow, return to Riverwood, give Lucan his claw back and you now have a love interest with Camilla. (Purely optional). If you want to play the game more like a Warrior or Rogue character, you could return to the Dragon Stones if you want through fast travel and then choose to go to White Run, with all the loot you are using or have sold at Riverwood, you might be able to afford one handed weapon's skill training with Amren, a Red Guard former mercenary who wanders the streets of White Run. Or you might afford to buy weapons/armor from the Adrienne, the Red Guard Smith at the Entrance of White Run.

You can either continue through the main quest at this point or you can head to the wagon ride near the Stables of White Run and head off to Markarth. Stop the murder attempt when you enter Markarth, but don't read the letter or follow Eltry to the Shrine of Talos yet. Speak to Margret to receive expensive jewelry for saving her life. Now, with hopefully improved weapons and armor and a medium or kind of high Restoration skill level, with perks spent in Restoration, make your way up the road, take the right bridge at the cross roads and up north, somewhat along the road, you might run into Forsworn tribesmen who, truth be told, might have fancy weapons at this point in the game for you. Or not, they might still be worth selling to Merchants for a lot of gold. Off the the path of the road, to the North East of Markarth, up a large hill you will find one of the most important benefits to any player of Skyrim, the Lover's Stone. It grants fifteen percent extra experience for ever skill, not just 25 percent to Mage, or 25 percent to Rogue, or 25 percent to Warrior. . . 15 percent to every single skill is a lot of power. Simple Math states that it's actually granting you 20 percent higher advantage by spreading your skills out. Don't worry though, if you're worried about becoming a jack of all trades and master of none, you can fast travel to both the original three Dragon Stones and the Lover's Stone at your leisure. At this point, make sure to put one Smithing perk into Steel.

If you have Skyrim, Legendary Edition, you should head off on a wagon ride to Riften (I'll explain why in just a little bit). In the Riften docks/fishery area you will find an Argonian woman named From Deepest Fathoms. She will grant you a Lexicon, take it. Then head off to Avensheft(?) the Dwemer Ruins. Complete the Quest and you now have access to a very powerful passive ability. Ancient Knowledge. Make sure to put one point in Dwarven Smithing, even if you don't want to wear Dwarven Armor. Ancient Knowledge makes Dwarven Armor 25 percent more protective AND, grants 15 percent faster experience in Smithing as long as your wear Dwarven Armor, so even if you don't want to wear Heavy Armor, you only need the Armor for the faster smithing experience.

It's important to note that should you choose the Warrior Dragon Stone at this point or before reaching Riften, that you have a 40 percent bonus to smithing. This will come in handy VERY advantageously. If you can find items with grant any bonus to Smithing at all below 16 percent, disenchant them at an Arcane Enchanter. Then put on the Smithing Fortifying Enchantment on every piece of extra equipment you can afford. Go ahead and make the best weapons and armor you can put together at the moment, strengthen your weapons and armor at grinding stones and benches, and sell whatever weapons and armor you feel like selling. This should rake in a lot of cash, especially since not only are your weapons and armor extremely powerful, but Dwarven items like armor and heavy weapons are very expensive just by themselves in the early game.

When you've made so much money that you sweat melted gold and spit silver saliva, you are more free to bounce between all four Dragon Stones to maximize your power at earlier levels. Also, another reason to reach Riften Early is to speak with Maramal the Priest of Mara. If you buy an Amulet of Mara after speaking with him, you can marry a Spouse. Spouses grant 100 gold a day, each day you are away from a spouse, or even with them (Without talking to them about profits from their store), you are receiving an addition 100 gold profit, also, sleeping in the same house as your spouse grants "Lover's Comfort". It's the same bonus as the Lover's Stone, but Warrior Stone users, Mage Stone users and Rogue Stone users receive an additional 15 percent bonus with a Spouse.

If you plan on becoming a Werewolf for long term, or a Vampire/Vampire Lord for long term, you can receive the Lover's Comfort bonus just by using the Lover's Stone. Lastly, Legendary Edition Skyrim owners, once a skill has reached level 100, can be brought back down to 15, becoming "Legendary". What's so Legendary about a VERY crappy stat? Well, you can respend all of your perks, so it refunds all the Perks you've spent. This means that you can boost other Skills with all the perk points you've been building the Smithing Tree with. As long as you already have your awesome weapons and powerful armors, along with your Ancient Knowledge Bonus, Warrior Dragon Stone + Spouse, it will be very easy to rebuild the Smithing Tree, and thus raise in levels indefinitely.

See, originally the highest level in Skyrim you could get was 81, because you could only reach 100 in any skill, but resetting certain skills you don't need as much as you used to allows you to build characters with extremely high level caps. Way more than level 100 is the maximum level, I think it's something like 157, but I don't remember exactly how high you can go. Now, on that note, back to Embershard Mine, yes. Along with Embershard Mine, you can re visit any cleared area once a certain amount of in-game days have passed, open the same old treasure chests, and many will be leveled gear that you can just loot, use, disenchant or sell.

As a mage, loot the dead mage in the torture room and get the atronach stone. If you're an altmer, that's 230 magicka already.

Depends on the character, they might hang around Riverwood for a couple days, doing odd job's ( just to get their bearing) or they might high-tail it to Whiterun to take the carriage to where ever it is they wanted to go. They could of course as a couple have done, just wander around hunting or gathering herb's til they can carry no more and have to go to the closest town to sell them off.

It's really all about the story that they plan on telling me. Sometimes that story doesn't start until they have done a couple of things. Pretty hard having a werewolf character that ins't going to be a Companion in the vanilla ( 360 ) game. In cases like that, I might start that characters story well before I plan on actually playing it, so that I can do the complete set-up and then finish off the previous character ( a week or less usually) Then start them from a place of my choosing.

One of my characters I planned on being Shipped wrecked, and she had to have very specific gear ( for her story ). So I gathered everything that I wanted her to have and then placed her near one of the Shipwrecks and saved her for almost a month before I finished the character I was playing at the time. Her story wasn't very long, but it was specific and it was pretty much a blast to play. Dual Scimitars, wearing Hammerfell garb, she was to kill a certain assassin, revenge type thing. Then she road off into the mountains towards Hammerfell never to be seen again.

Setting up for her Story, I did things that she would not have and that is the case with some of my characters. It is the main reason I tend to set them up well before I plan on playing them. I write the story idea down and any particulars that I need to remember, those do change, but it works for me.

I usually clear out the Embershard Mine too. It is the perfect beginner's dungeon. Has a good amount of loot and a managable amaunt of enemies. I also clear out the unmarked bandit camp near the shrine of Talos to get the treasure map.

I almost always begin my adventuring at Embershard Mine as well, but with a difference. My characters almost always use stealth in one way or another, and Embershard is perfect to gain a little experience and build up sneak (and a little pickpocket). The difference is that I almost never kill any of the bandits in there at all. One of my favorite things is to pass through Emebershard from back to front without engaging in combat or even being detected at all. Leave the bandits alive, and it often pays off later on when you want to build a house.

I also like to wander around the Riverwood area, tease the bandits in the tower mercilessly by sneaking up and picking their pockets, or just fihgting them for a bit then running away, leaving them alive. Same for the bandits near the road to Falkreath by the Talos Shrine except there's no real profit in leaving them alive. When I do Bleak Falls, I don't kill the banidts there either, because I often end up counting on them to help me with the occasional dragon when I'm living in Anise's cabin.

In fact, I usually don't kill any bandits throughout the game that I don't have to. I enjoy acquiring the skills needed to take out a bandit chief for the reward, without killing any of his crew. I usually start the main quest between levels 15 and 20, but I wouldn't swear that 's any better than starting it earlier or later.

Same. Some don't avoid the main quest. Rather, they don't care if Whiterun is notified of the dragon attack or not. Others may feel it is their obligaiton to inform the Jarl. And some may want to just get as far away from what has happened as is possible.

I used to always start with Embershard as well. These days it depends on the character. My current character came to Skyrim as ehe had business in Markarth. Right after Helgen he went straight there. I often use Alternate Start Live Another Life and enjoy the variety that gives to starting new characters, especially if it's a Dead is Dead playthrough.

Ever since my very first start, I've been ignoring Helgen and running off along the road to Falkreath. Then I just wander the wilderness and dive into dungeons and see what cool stuff I can find. I remember fighting a Dragon Priest at level 3. I didn't die once but I had to keep running away, healing fast, and running back in so it took me FOREVER. I beat him with 1hp left after using [censored]tons of health potions, all the random bits of food I'd hoards, and a handy level-up which brought my health back up to full(seriously save your level ups for battles, the free health boost is so handy). But yeah, just wandering off and seeing what you can find in the wilderness makes for the funnest and craziest games in my opinion.

My problem is I feel like I'm continuously meta-gaming. Like when I'm RPing I'll purposefully go somewhere for a certain item or quest that will fit my character, but my character has had ultimately no reason to go there as they wouldn't know to go in game, and it ends up speeding the character to completion before I'm ready. It's a hard habit to break however

Unless I'm playing an evil character I find it very difficult not to progress the main quest at least as far as Whiterun. What in-character reason could you possibly have not to deliver Riverwood's message to Balgruuf, apart from being an evil jerk? That said, the next quest is an easy section at which to stop. Being asked to delve into an old nordic tomb is a pretty big ask in my opinion, so I generally split there if I'm not pursuing the main quest.

After that, Skyrim is my oyster.