This.

Implementing this is definitely possible and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a06hAe747Do&feature=related supports it really well but I see extremely limited need ingame (for a fantasy RPG). So what happens when you break a chair an NPC is supposed to sit on?

How about PhsyX? If Bethesda is indeed using Light Speed as I strongly suspect they are, Havok is out and PhysX is in.

I really hope it doesn't, Physx fries any card if it isn't EVGA.

Given that we are getting a new engine i would expect it to have some things that can be destroyed in combat but i don't expect to see anything wild like buildings collapsing.

would be cool, but far from important and very unlikely

I want soem thigns to be destructable. Like a cliff overhang to kill a group of people, but not like afull building.

So I'm walking into a magic shop, and accidentally bump a few potions onto the floor. They proceed to shatter, spilling the potion everywhere. Does the policy " you break it, you buy it" apply here?

While I think it would be cool, I also think it would be more of a nuisance than anything. It'd make decorating houses that much harder too.

Seems to me that people keep thinking of all of these new ideas that they think should be thrown into the game. While some are cool and neat, for the most part, many seem to be either way overcomplicated or just extremely irrelevant to the actual gameplay. We can't build a real world, no matter how hard you try, it's always going to be a game. Let's focus on the important things that make the game good, not super realistic.

Being able to break small items like clay pots and baskets would be interesting, though I think even that would fit better in a Fallout game. As for stuff like buildings, absolutely not, and most likely not possible since building interiors will probably be there own cells like they were in Morrowind and Oblivion. Not to mention stuff would most likely never get rebuilt, so in the event that a building does get destroyed, it would probably stay like that forever.

it does not seem likely at this point for Skyrim, but a true sandbox fantasy game world would be fun.

by 'Sandbox', the environment must be destructible, alterable, and constructible. Because of story interference, the game 'story' but be purely emergent wrt the game goals. Otherwise exploitable/immersion breaking issues result. a Tamriel version MineCraft is what I am thinking of here.

Seems very few people actually read the first post before replying. That's quite annoying.

If it doesn't take too much time or bog down my PC, then sure I wouldn't mind destructible environments.

Then he shouldn't have written "destructible environment".

As the OP said, mundane things, pots, barrels, crates...basically stuff that has been destructible since Ocarina of Time came out. This is the first step, and the next logical step in the series. In MW all items were static, and swinging your weapon at a table or shelf did nothing. In OB, the items were knocked around. The next step is to have those items (and hopefully the furniture they are on) destructible to some extent. It represents a commitment to making the world more believable.

I mean, how necessary are weather systems, really? Do they affect your character? No, but they make the world a more charismatic place. Eventually, I would like to see trees you can cut down, deformable terrain, and destructible buildings. But I don't expect that in Skyrim. However, I would expect that if I drop a clay cup, or swing my sword through a shelf of glass that they will break.

You can burn down a house with an arrow

Not so much a point of not liking destructible environments, I just don't need them.

Not too interested

It would be nice to have it but there's also a lot of other stuff to think about. How will NPCs react, how will it effect the storyline if at all, and will it take away from other resources in the game?