Do you go it alone, or take a companion with you?

I've found I can fight a whole lot better without someone fighting along side me. I can do more illegal things to without my follower ( that being a house carl ) protesting, and I know there are Dark Brotherhood followers who don't care if you murder or steal. But still, I like going it alone. I always feel a bit uneasy when someone in Skyrim has my back because I just feel that NPC is going to slow me down. I guess my character is confident in his own abilities that he doesn't care for the company of other Nords and other people.

It also seems that about the only reliable follower is Serana, and she manages to get on my nerves at times. Sometimes quests will have you take a follower, and I think to myself...

" Do I really have to bring you along?"

That about sums it up for me though.

It depends on the character. Some of the characters I play are social butterflies, some are not. Some characters like to be around people, to spend a lot of time in cities, to travel with as many companions as possible. Other characters are loners who tend to avoid cities and who usually travel alone.

I usually play as a mage and take a tank along with me until about level 20 when my characters are more than strong enough to go it alone.

It depends on the character but I personally get more enjoyment from the game by doing it alone. Reasons being.

1. No follower means not having to constantly stop and look back to see if the follower is still there. I don't always take the beaten path which means a follower can get stuck in the environment or decide to take the long way around. I can get to places the follower is not intelligent enough to get to without some help from console commands.

2. Rushing into battle... please remain hidden when I am. a follower should remain hidden like yourself if the eye is not fully open. But no... the enemy is looking for you? But they haven't found you? Oh don't worry. Your follower is about to pretty much shout out loudly "Think we lost em?"

3. I thank Bethesda for allowing followers to seem alive by programming them to say things during your travels. But "Oh look, a cave. Bears if we're lucky, trolls if we're not." gets old after hearing it repeated several times in a row.

4. Lining up that perfect shot... only to either be bumped from behind by my friendly follower, or have my follower step in front of my bow.

forced quest followers are the worse. like Serana. We killed that thing for a reason! Stop bringing it back to life!

I take Benor with me a lot cause i gave him the giants club and it makes things much easier

pretty much depend on what type of character i am using

for a rogie /assasin type usually i go solo , but for a pure mage is usually take a companion with me mainky to use as a tank / distraction versus any thing that can instakill my mage , ,,,, aka bears

on the other hand i m playing on a pc and there so many mods that make companions so much more usefull

^^^^THIS and then this again

From the very beginning I go it alone, as a pure mage/sorceress. No alteration at all, but only destruction, conjuration and illusion, along with sneak.

To many times has a follower stepped in front of my fireball to be incinerated instead of the enemy.

To many times has a follower rushed into battle before me.

To many times has a follower stolen my thunder and taken the points I could have earned for that kill.

To many times did I want to kill Serena for hollering "Who's there?" and goes charging into battle. And just as you go to grab the pickings, it is up and walking moaning as it moves along..

If I want a follower, that is what I use conjuration for, and there is no shortage of which ones I can use.

To answer your question, no I always go it alone, for it is harder to do so, harder to stay alive, and makes for a better play through.

Vanilla Skyrim? Mostly went alone... their AI was really, really annoying.

PC/modded? Hell yeah, you have too if you play with difficulty mods, not to mention certain mods adding in followers that are full of life and not cardboard cut-outs which vastly improve the depth of the game.

I've tried a couple, even a stray dog once, but never had one for very long. I like going it alone.

Since I cut my RPG teeth on party-driven games like KOTOR and DA:O, I personally find it lonely to dungeon-crawl by myself. Thus, my characters tend to roll with followers. The only one who didn't regularly was my burglar character since two's a crowd when breaking and entering! Still, for regular dungeons, even she brought her husband along for the ride.

My characters have usually been loners, but when I do get a spouse, she wants to get out sometimes and so she comes along to help kill dragons.

I usually go at it alone. I tried using a follower but had problems. Such as they rushed into battle when I was sneaking and they would interfere when attempting to trap souls for enchanting.

It's my experience that a follower who "has your back" is pretty likely to put an arrow in it at an inconvenient time. ...Assuming there's such a thing as a "convenient time" for that...

Only when 'm forced by quests. I don;t like to use conjuration either (for combat). I like to know i'm the one who did all the fight, even if it takes a while or die a few times.

Oh yea. My guys always have their husbands or boyfriends by their side. Battle couples are the best.