I started my 2nd character and am playing similar to this. If you want to be Non-Combat then you really need a Follower from the very start as you get attacked by bandits and wolves often When I arrived in Riverwood I recruited the elf guy by lying to the girl in the Riverwood Trader. It was for her own good, that Sven is a horrible guy.

So me and the elf walked from Riverwood to Riften and were attacked by 12 wolves and 12 bandits (not all at the same time lol), so a follower is a must really if you want to be Non-Combat. Igot the Amulet of Mara and after I get a Mammoth Tusk I'm going to marry Ysolda. (Off topic, but I can't believe that Bard guy in the book 'A Gentlemans Guide To Whiterun' didnt mention Ysolda lol)

You can't walk from Riverwood to Riften in one go without breaking roleplay (sleeping 6-8 hours) unless you stop at Darkwater Crossing and sleeping in a bedroll there. You can help out in the mine there too. I never met Annekke in my first playthrough. She is cute. And you can go for a swim in the lake next to the camp fire, no slaughterfish. It's just offroad before you start going around the hugd mountain to Riften.

It's fun playing this way. I've already met lots of characters (30+) that I never encountered in my first playthrough (107hrs) because I always used fast travel. I've read a lot more books too.

I usually try to let my characters have one "profession" outside of the whole adventuring, like my first character, a mage, makes money selling potions he made, the second one, archer, sells pelts and likes goldsmithing and will also help on farms he comes by. The third is a heavy fighter and is into smithing.

Though I'm a bit sad the whole "economy" thing turned out to be nothing but investing money in order to get the shop owners more septim to buy your loot. I don't even know what these books are for where you can manipulate the figures of the shops.

TC, if you have to get into dangerous places from time to time, maybe you could hire a mercenary to accompany you?

Try to get the transmute spell. Smiths usually have iron ore for sale, which you can then turn into gold and make jewelry of. That should generate a nice income

You started playing with this character yet Varadil? Something that would be good in the next Elder Scrolls game would be if you could pitch your own tent. If you arecaught out in the wild, far from an Inn or major city, you should be able to get a few hours sleep in your own tent! It would also be good if you could sit down around a camp fire.

play an orc -> most orc strongholds have mines attached allowing you to do your blacksmith thing as well. and also descovering and possibly unlocking? ( do orcs get in automatically?) by traveling to them will net you a nice chunk of alchy mats.

There is an ebony mine filled with orcs but they wont fight you. They just tell you to get out but to wussy to start anything. There is around 40-50 ebony ore in there. Its called gloom something north of Riften along the morrowind mountains

Also, i love this idea myself and id refuse to use any sort of magic like transmute as I feel that spell breaks immersion.

Blacksmith but mine your own ore and slay bandits and marauders

oh and well killing wolves and such because you need leather (atleast where im at) for smithing

If you want to get a husband, you can't be Redguard either. For some stupid reason, the only marriageable Redguard in the game is female.

I'm going to go on a trek and find as many Inn's as I can and all the mines. Any mines containing hostiles I will quickly exit as I dont want to fight if I dont have to.

There are about 20 Mines in the land of Skyrim. Of those, around 12 can be entered without a bodyguard as no hostiles lie within.

If you venture over all of Skyrim and enter the 12 'friendly' (No Hostiles) Mines then you should be able to gather up roughly 82 (iron, silver, gold, ebony etc)

I might try this out, later when mods arrive.


My main catch for this would be boosting up difficulty so much that direct combat is simply not feasible. Thus forcing me to gather my currency peacefully until I mass up good enough equipment to go adventuring.

Thanks, guys! I've started this character now, a female Imperial that hails from Bruma. I've given her a bit of a backstory and am writing a sort of journal-like summary of her days. I won't be completely non-combat, seeing as it seems logical that she would be able to defend herself from a wolf or two, considering her background and her race. But she won't go to dungeons or bandit lairs, and will only use a bow in self-defense (and probably the occasional deer hunting).

IIf you want to read how it goes, my journal can be found here: http://www.zanshaadocks.net/forums/index.php?topic=116.msg828#new

I got a plan or two up my sleeve for her future, but apart from that I'm taking it as it comes - and am still open for suggestions.

first bard's college quest involves heading through a dungeon so no luck there, haven't progressed further myself, too much a dissapointment for the first quest to be violent.

back on topic
-alchemy is usually your best bet for earning gold, plus it's fairly safe, don't need to venture out of sight of town if you don't want to.
-most farms will pay you to help harvest their crops, some mines will even pay you to mine ore
so an alchemist who lends a hand at farms for some extra money would be my pick. I'd also reccomend marrying relatively young, you can get a place to stay, a loving partner, and once they open a shop, 100 gold per day. I generally prefer to marry someone who can also be taken as a companion, you could be the wandering alchemist and he the wandering merchant perhaps?

edit: darn should have read that last post, ah well, I wish you luck!

Yeah, pyro_monkey, that's the gist of what I will be doing. I will marry (but not to a follower) for a steady income, and I will marry another craftsman. So his home will be my base and homestead, while I will do some travelling - gathering herbs, travelling to mines, doing fetch quests etc. I will craft armour, jewellery and potions from what I can find, and will it all to merchants for profit.

I will read your journal Although I would be prepared for more than 'a wolf or two', I'm only 19 days into my character and I've already killed 50+ wolves walking along the roads lol My character is a miner who is trying to make enough money so that he can buy a new house for his wife Ysolda (she only has a single bed in her house in Whiterun)

for mining the mines that you can safely visit are:

Whistling Mine (South of Winterhold)
Steamscorch Mine (In Kynesgrove, just South of Windhelm)
Gloombond Mine (just up the hill from Steamscorch Mine, has looooads of ebony. Orcs are unfriendly but do NOT attack you)
Goldenrock Mine (At Darkwater Crossing, between Windhelm and Riften, there's a silver vein outside near the waterfall too at the camp)
Lost Prospect Mine (North East of Riften, three gold veins are hidden behind the waterfall)
Left Hand Mine (South East of Markarth)
Dushnick Mine (South East of Markarth)
Sanuarach Mine (At Karthwasten, near Rorikstead)
Fenm's Gulch Mine (North West of Karthwasten)
Iron Breaker Mine (Dawnstar)
Quicksilver Mine (Dawnstar, straight from docks)
Rockwallow Mine (East of Morthal)

If you follow them in that order it makes a nice little circle around the map lol Some of the spelling may be wrong, I can't read my handwriting. There are plenty of Inn's along the way too.Nightgates Inn is South of Winterhold, The Frozen Hearth is in Winterhold, Candlehearth Hall and New Gnisis Corner Club are in Windhelm, Braidwood Inn is at Kynesgrove, there is a sleeping bedroll at the camp at Darkwater Crossing (long journey from Kynesgrove to Riften), The Bee and Barb in Riften, Vilemyr Inn in Ivarstead, Sleeping Giant in Riverwood, Dead Man's Drink in Falkreath, Silver Blood Inn in Markarth, Old Hrolden Inn (near Rorikstead?) and the Frostfruit Inn in Rorikstead, Four Shields Inn at Dragons Reach, The Winking Skeever in Solitude, Moorside Inn in Morthal, Windpeak Inn in Dawnstar, and the Bannered Mare in Whiterun.

Stay away from Bileguich Mine, Embershad Mine, Halted Stream Mine, Cidhna Mine, Kolskeggr Mine, Northwind Mine, Redbelky Mine (Bandits, Skeletons, Foresworn and Spiders)

I am unsure of Mor Khazgur Mine, West of Solitude and North East of Markarth, are the Orcs friendly?

Just did my first circle around Skyrim, with no fast travelling, visiting mines and staying at Inns. Took me 18 ingame days. My save file is around 35 hours, although included in that is my first period of stay in Riverwood lumberjacking and marriage to Ysolda (long walks to Riften and back!, first for the Amulet of Mara then for the wedding) also walk with Jenassa to mine north of Whiterun to get me a mammoth tusk for Ysolda.

Next circle will probably be quicker because I know where I am going now (mines are on the map) and I know where the Inns are too. The mines will take 30 days to respawn (I got greedy and cleared them, or else it woulda been 10 days)

I decided to break my non-combat policy for Kolseggar mine (or whatever its called) because 1) I wanted to help the people of Left Hand Mine and 2) all that gooooold!

I didn't do it on my own though, I took Vorstag along from the Silver Blood Inn iin Markarth. He killed the small bunch of Foresworn that were in the mine. As a bonus, when I returned to Left Hand Mine an orc said he would tell all the Orc Camps that I'm an Orc friend.

made it to level 46 but haven't advanced hardly any quests yet.. I PLAN TOO however. I just wanted to make my character powerful first. Just wandering the world collecting ingredients is enjoyable to me, it's how I started the game.. getting alchemy to 100.. then smithing, then enchanting, then conjuration, then restoration (well actually it's about 65-70 right now) , then heavy armor/block (it's about 80, and block 55 or so) by allowing giants and mammoths to wail on me for awhile while I sat there healing myself. Now I'm ready to play the quests, all of them, read all the books, explore all the lore.. without wasting time looting corpses and picking up every little thing, because I have no use for any of it anymore. Just alchemy ingredients from time to time.

Can't decide to go with a follower or solo... first attempt did not go well.. did not use my sanguine staff, spammed low level junk destruction spells (J'zargo) .. I hear Illia uses better spells.. but if they don't summon daedras with the staff, they are useless to me. Probably go solo, because I like to scale cliffs and cross rivers. Dremoras can just be resummoned with ease.. don't have to babysit them.

You still there Varadil? I have run into a problem with my current 'Non Combat' character. I cant buy anywhere to live!

I am currently living with my wife in her house. I really wanted to buy the house in Solitude, but apparently I have to go to a cave and kill a whole bunch of necromancers. Not happening. And before I can buy Breezehome in Whiterun I have to go to Bleak Falls Barrow? Too scary.

My main thing with this character is that on the Stats screen for Combat, Magic and Crime I want to keep everything at 0's (eg Murders = 0). Does anyone know if it's possible to buy a House while also keeping everything at 0's on the Combat, Magic and Crime Stats screen? Please help.

There's at least one house you can "acquire" - though it's certainly not optimal. You can use the Alchemist's Shack between Haemar's Shame and the junction that takes you to Ivarstead; it's pretty "open", and there's not much storage. There may be other places like this.... don't know for sure. Good luck.

[Uh. No. You're not going to be able to buy a house and keep all the violence stats at 0. At least not until the modders crank up for pc when the CK comes out. If you're on console platform.... well, you may be playing the wrong game.... This is a combat-based game for the most part.... just like all the rest of them have been.]

Thanks for the reply. I lived there for 342 days with a mage character. The main thing is the House needs a double bed and safe containers. I think only the 5 Main Houses that you can buy and a spouses House have 'safe' containers?

Don't forget that you cannot ask your spouse to move into any house you didn't purchase... and as far as I remember, they all require combat to be eligible to purchase them.

I thought I remembered that the end table drawer is safe. I don't know for sure, I've no need for it. Was something I remember from just reading around this forum for a while now....

I can't see why the house needs a double bed.... *shrug*