Has anyone had any success with playing a stealth character Agi/Intellegence (or Willpower) stats and use Marksman and Sneak as my main means to kill but also have magic to amplify damage with Destruction and Alteration/Mysticism for defensive capabilities? My current stealth character is Agi/Str and focuses on Marksman/Sneak and Blade/Block for melee combat, but I find myself never using melee combat skills since my Marksman is good and also have poisons from Alchemy. I am not a fan of Speed because I find run-shoot-run-shoot extremely repetitive. I play a modded game so I am not restricted to Oblivion vanilla but I am curious for anyone who may have tried Stealth/Magic combo.

My mystic archer looks sort of like this:

Kill stats: 90% bow, 6% illusion spells (enemies killing their friends), 2% summons (mostly distractions), 2% touch damage spells

Basic tactics for differing situations look like this:
-Normal: Long range poisoned sneak shot.
-Dispersed crowds: Snipe the farthest first and stay in the shadows. Repeat.
-Tight crowds: Mind control spells to get the crowd to thin itself to one. Snipe the survivor.
-Underwater: Block with bow and cast touch damage spells.
-If cornered: Block with bow and immobilize foe with a spell (command, calm, paralyze…), then open fire with bow.
-If charged: Stop the charge with an illusion spell, then open fire with bow.
-Panic button: Invisibility, slip away and reapproach for the snipe (combining a cheap summon with invisiblity spell makes this both easier and more fun).

Important capabilities (Nothing to do with major skills): Bow, poisons, weakness to poison, drain speed, detect life, a slow and methodical patient playstyle, mind control spells, invisibility, Cobra's Dance (from the Serpent Birthsign Stone), blocking with a bow, touch damage spells (she favors absorb health).

She is capped at level 20. Her endurance and strength are capped at 30. She dresses only for fashion and most of her choices are roleplay related.

How does she fare? Well she is a blast, has played for 700 hours with no end in sight and has never been killed, despite her tiny red bar. :foodndrink:

Hmm, interesting... It DEFINITELY sounds more interesting than any stealthy archer I have played before that was mostly hide n shoot, hide again keep shooting and never was any sword play since i would die fast. I really have not played much Illusion mainly because it is Personality. lol. But I like destruction/alteration/mysticism. My worry is neither of the 3 will be effective enough while being specialized as Stealth. Maybe I could change my birthsign to better fit spell casting but archery is still going to be my primary means of damage.

Sure, my mystic archer is a wood elf born under the mage birthsign. Her illusion spells tend to cost a fair amount of blue to cast, but each one really causes havoc and she has plenty of time to regenerate her magic before needing to cast again. The only thing she uses destruction for is drain speed and weakness to poison. If she needs up close damage (like if fighting underwater), she uses restoration (absorb health).

I think I may go for something similar to Witchhunter. I was trying to make stealth my specialization and then magic skills as my secondary, but that really just wont work so I am going to switch it around. Agi/Int... Marksman/Sneak/Light Armor/Alteration/Mysticism/Destruction/Alchemy. Dont really need Restoration because I will just make potions, and I am not a fan of Conjuration for the most part. Guess I really am going to need a better hotkey set up. Enhanced hotkeys might do the job if I can get it working.

I've played with an Agent for 80 hours now, only killing with bow (except Flame Atronachs that are easier to deal with Chillrend) and using Illusion magics. Mostly like Acadian described above, Bow for single or far apart enemies, Frenzy or Command spells for large groups. Very succesfull, and hilarious Being a member of the Dark Brotherhood also gains her access to some quite powerful spells only M'raaj-Dar sells.

BTW, any hints for using Frenzy stealthily? Many times it only seems to reveal my position to the enemy, despite having 70+ sneak skill with 20% chameleon Most of these have happened in the Oblivion towers, though :shrug:

This type of character is usually my favorite to play. If you took out Light Armor and just use alteration's shield spells, you have what I call an Arcane Archer.