Seriously, I love a good dungeon crawl as much as the next, but bandits shouldn't always be hiding in some cave or camp in the middle of nowhere. I reckon it would be great to have some small but lawless towns in which you can get into some pretty crazy battles. Perhaps if your an evil character you can even do quest for them? I would also love to see some organized groups of baddies with fortresses or castles! Just some ideas that I hope the developers will see.

I think it would be cool to see a small, run-down town used as a base for a group of bandits or other criminals.

I always thought that was basically Bravil.

A Bravil-esque, seedy establishment for the criminal sort would be welcome in my book.... :foodndrink:.

That would be an interesting side quest...or maybe even part of the main quest. I.e. have a large group of defectors/traitors organize in a large stronghold to take over the kingdom in the midst of the chaos after the king's death. You ally with neighboring nord houses and set out to crush the coup...

I found it silly that bandits always hid out in the wilderness, they should hang in shady parts of the major cities.

I agree with this, as well... They should be hanging around the darker parts of the more seedy towns...

We should also be able to witness hold ups on people, and can choose to intervene or not.

I for one love the idea of bandits having their own little base outside of a crappy cave or little tent in the middle of no where. Your idea is exactly what i was thinking every rpg is missing. Thank you good sir/ma'am.

Fallout NV sometimes has a really brave freeside thug coming at your player character decked out in full power armor with two other companions with a knife. He basically goes down in one hit from Rex.

So if they implement it, I rather they (the robbers) be smart enough not to try robbing the slayer of Alduin, archmage of winterhold, master of companions guild.

That would be great, secretly watch someone you suspect is a bandit.

He starts his morning in the pub hunched over the bar soaking up liquid courage. After he's good and brave he stumbles out, cursing at guards and kicking dogs on his way out of town. When he's a good distance away, he puts on his bandit mask, pulls out his dagger, and then finds a nice cozy spot next to the highway.

The fact that they're bandits, marauders, and raiders means that they are openly making their living by killing people and taking their [censored]. They don't do it in secret. They're not organized criminals, they're highwaymen, and they hide in caves because they have to. If they don't, they'll be hunted down and killed by the Imperial Guard, by local militiamen, by bounty hunters, and by adventurers (who are like raiders in that they kill people and take their stuff but restrict themselves to killing people who kill other people or killing people who are monsters [even if they're people too]). Encampments? Sure. Better to have them roaming around in the wilderness rather than just taking refuge in caves and the like. But a town? An entire town of murderers and thieves, operating openly? Unless it's smack in the middle of the no-man's land of the civil war it shouldn't exist for the reasons I just outlined.

The Guards cant be everwhere at once, murderers often hide out in small towns or seedier parts of cities, unless they are ridiculously notorius, based on the communication level in Tamriel, they could live in obscurity (or wear masks to rob people) and still live in a town.

Also create new versions of the highwaymen in Morrowind and Oblivion in the shady areas of dark towns.

That's not what the OP is describing, though. He wants bandit towns, like that one in Fable. What you're describing may well already exist in the game.

A town overrun by outlaws or criminals of some sort would not be a bad idea. Very fitting for a harsh, rugged, and probably very lawless place like Skyrim. Why not look to the films Yojimbo (1961) or A Fistful of Dollars (1964) for inspiration, and have two opposing bandit gangs residing in the same town, competing for the racketeering business?

This would be good. Most people in the town law abiding but bad dudes now run the town and extort the people. Good quest in that to remove the bad guys from the town and let the good people live their lives again. Or join the bad guys in extorting the town I guess...