One thing I have learned from both personal experience and from reading a lot at Oblivion boards: there's a sort of 3-step process a lot of long-time Oblivion players go through.

First the game's new and you just do whatever. Good times.

Then you really figure out what the game's about, how the guilds work, how to do (or avoid) the main quest, and how leveling and gear works. If you're a power-gamer/micro-manager, you may stay at this point, happily, forever, eventually making a "perfect" character with maxed stats and best-in-slot gear.

However, there's a third level of play a lot of long-time vets get to. In the third level of play you've done all that and don't care about perfect anymore, in fact you may find it boring and too easy in terms of in-game challenge. So you intentionally roll characters that will not be perfect, and which may in fact never level beyond level 20 or level 25 (by picking some majors you will never use). You don't worry about efficient leveling, you just let the game come to you, using skill and cleverness (especially with regards spell creation and item enchantments) to overcome what perfect stats used to make mindlessly easy.

The best advice I think I can give a new player is to just play. It is an awesome game. You don't need to be "perfect" to progress in it. If things get to a point where it seems too hard you can always nudge the difficulty slider a step or two to the left. That is not a crime. This is a single player game, meant for you to enjoy however you like. It's also not a game where you can see, learn, and do everything in a day, or a week, or even a month. It's a big game, with a lot to it.

I posted this in response to a new player's question (on a different message board, after first answering his question about how efficient leveling works). This thought of a 3-step approach hit me recently, both because of comments I have seen some of you make here, and in how I am approaching my latest character. I've realized I am far from new to this game, and than I'm also been-there/done-that when it comes to "perfect" leveling. Having learned how the systems work, I'm now using them not to be perfect, but to be rewarded for playing as I like (via careful choice of majors pre-start and then just playing the game as it comes to me thereafter).

Do you share this view? Do you have a different way of looking at it? Let me know, I'm curious.

I voted "pure RP." I kind of feel that there's a "step 4" (or maybe it's a "step 3-B" ) where the whole thing becomes character-driven, and you stop considering the whole leveling thing at all. It no longer matters if you level or not, or how high your character might go, because it's all about the story that's happening now. I have a couple of characters who are "eternal level 2's," simply because they aren't doing anything that causes them to increase skills significantly at all. Some characters just aren't "interested" in getting into mischief, or going into dangerous places. They hang around in town, interacting with the locals, and living "ordinary lives." I don't play with them often, but I look in on them from time to time. (I have other characters who like to "adventure," so it balances out.)

kind of agree with you, i suppose. i did go through the steps of blundering through the game first-time, and then roleplaying. efficient levelling never really appealed to me. i mean i power-gamed on some earlier characters, but i never carefully chose my majors or anything. and now, with skyrim coming, im just playing through it all again. not really roleplaying or power-gaming; just want to feel like ive 'done' it by the time i have skyrim.

voted dont worry about leveling style

The only thing I do that concerns "power levelling" anymore is allowing more training sessions in beteween levels, My playing character will spend thier money training in Skills that are not Majors, but may be useful down the road...
I have my characters try to stick to a few rules relating to RP, but they are not held to beyond level ten. I do have some characters like glarggs that have been created and have begun the game, but they are waiting for me to actually use them. These "starters are the ones that I will use to test mods, but I always end up playing a Main Character until they become overpowered, or just annoying to try and keep alive with my current modlist. I then recruit one of the "starters" and begin again.

I don't fit in any of the categories. I use mods that change the leveling so that natural play is the only logical way to play.

With my latest character, Ashe the Frost Archer, I'm testing a self-made mod that introduces the following changes:
- doubled number of skill increases required to level up (slows down leveling, reduces natural maximum level, avoids high level health bloating issues)
- favored attributes bonus increased from +5 to +20 (makes it an important choice)
- attribute multiplier can't be higher than 2x (no more hunting for high multipliers, can't have more than 3 maxed attributes)
- minor skill increase notably slower than normal (encourages selecting skills I want to use as major skills)

I'm not completely happy with the way attribute increases work becasue it's theoretically possible to only increase an attribute by 16 points before you max all 3 skills that are governed by it, but overall I'm quite happy with the results so far.

A mixture. I am in a pure RP, with my level capped at 30. I have only two skills at 100: Marksman and Conjuration. The rest will stay where they are... some in the 90s, Mysticism is an annoying 99. The rest of my skills are in the 50s and 60s.

I am in RP mode, but I am actually doing things a bit different than most people here.

What I do is use a mod called Progress to artificially cap my skills at certain mastery ranks to prevent my level from going too high. It works like this:

Major and Specialized skill: can train to Master rank.

Major and Unspecialized skill: can train to Expert rank.

Minor and Specialized skill: can train to Expert rank

Minor and Unspecialized skill: Can train to Journeyman rank.

Once I hit the mastery rank that I would limit that skill to, I use progress to ensure that I can no longer advance that skill, and I also cannot purchase training for it anymore. I have hit the limit of my character's knowledge, so to speak.

I heavily encourage specialization in my characters now, and this gives very specific benefits for thinking my character's skillsets through and figuring out exactly what it is I want them to be.

I use nGCD to distribute my attribute bonuses smoothly as I play, and essentially eliminate the need for my character to "level up" (though she still does so the leveled lists can still function). I use Race Balancing Project to make sure my characters have ample strengths and weaknesses, and the birthsign is chosen to supplement her skills.

My current character, who I simply call Sera Dresden, is a Dunmer assassin-type (though she would never join the Brotherhood). She kills from the shadows, at range, and more often than not with a single arrow. If things get dicey, she can hold her own with a blade one-on-one, but is quite weak in melee combat (she can't use shields), and if she gets swarmed, she will likely lose. Therefore, at that point, she will simply dig into her knowledge of Illusion magic and let things cool down a bit.

Her major skills are a bit "jack of all trades"ey, but as she is a Dunmer, this behavior is encouraged and helps her to keep up with the rest of the game (Had I been playing a Bosmer or an Altmer, they would be much more specialized, but Dunmer encourage variety and unpredictability). The specialization is still there, but not as much as if I were playing a Bosmer or Altmer. Racial benefits include total immunity to Fire (thanks to the combination of her race and The Shadow as her birthsign, both tweaked by RBP), but the price is a massive weakness to Shock magic.

I am allowing unlimited rings and amulets, but I think I might actually limit myself to eight rings and two amulets to be worn at a time, because limitless does get cheaty after a while.

All of the above depending on my current char!

I'm in pure RP mode now. I'm done with super bad-ass characters and just want to live my characters life. I don't care about leveling either, I don't mind staying at Level One or advancing to Level 50, just as long as I'm playing a good character.

I'm in 100% role-playing mode now. I've seen what the game technically has to offer a multitude of times... so I don't really worry about leveling at all anymore.

Option for: REALISED ALCHEMY FIXES EVERYTHING, STOPPED WORRYING ABOUT END GAME CREATION RESULTS.

Also where is the BRETON-MAGE Character Stage?