Do you ever get to a certain point where you hang up your ebony and put on some iron armour to go adventuring with? This is something I've had my character do - after all the battles have been won, I walk amongst the common folk and pretend to blend in. Of course I don't but it puts a bit of challenge back into the game. I still have all my perks et. al. but the lower armour (which often looks better) is fun to play with again. If the challenge is too great I'll enchant the crap out of it.

So, anyone else gone basic?

How about starting out basic and keeping like that till late levels -if changing armor at all? That's what I've done during a couple of playthroughs.

How about just starting out nekkid on Master or Legendary and just staying that way? My current character is playing Master with Deadly Dragons/Monsters, and her main armor is... unenchanted ragged trousers. She's currently at level 17 and being played DiD. I don't know how much more basic I can get, eh?

She has some really good steel armor, but she doesn't like to wear it, and half the time I can't get her to even put on the ragged trousers.

If it's a sneak/illusion/conjuration + ranged damage based build, why not? It's quite possible.

Deadly dragons & Immersive Creatures... not my thing. And before you ask me, IF you ask me, "difficulty" is not the reason -not even close

Not exactly a high level character here since I tend to restart too much, but I've been trying to play with clothing instead of armor all the time. No alteration either, and just the lord stone occasionally. Now to just switch off of swords or one handed for something else for a change.

ACtually, I wouldn't have asked. I know there are reasons not to use those mods that aren't associated with difficulty. For me, I use those mods because I've always felt that dragons should be deadly, and fighting one should be a major undertaking not entered into lightly. ...and I like the variety of flavors of dragon they introduce as well.

I am trying with my current character to hold off on dungeon diving and major quests almost entirely until level 30 or more. In the meantime, she just tackles what she encounters in the wilderness while prospectorating (no that's not an error) for ore or gathering ingredients. She lives in a tent high on the mountain behind Fort Dunstead...

I'm a pure mage and caster, fooling around at lvl62 with Iron Banded armor (with dual enchants on every piece). It's really tough, many times I get killed by a single arrow, but It's fairly fun to try to survive.

My latest character, http://imgur.com/9k4yWnv, wore basic fur armor throughout all her 55 levels

I usually pick an armor early on and keep it throughout. Nightingale Armor would be an exception if I go through the Thieves Guild.

That's why I love PC. So many great armor mods from nice simple armor to more flashy stuff. I tend to lean towards more simple armor.

Haven't really used "endgame" armors, past my 2nd character. Even when I wouldn't go for iron/banded iron, I'd usually run around in steel plate, wolf armor or dwarven -i love that set.

Only now I broke the "rule". I used ebony, to match it with the Ebony Mail, part of my "Power is what I want and I don't give a damn where it's coming from" playthrough

Im really new to this but after grinding my way to the point where im 1 hitting with my bow and 3-4 hitting with my great sword ive turned the difficulty up 1 notch and im now focusing on majicka and let me tell you that it is something else.

Im at level 57 and the last 2 levels being focused on destruction have taken about the same amount of time as the prior 55 hacking and sneak shooting.

Now I fully appreciate what people say about the bow OP'ing the whole game.

Yes. I love the low-level armors. I have a high-level Dragonborn barbarian character who wears hide armor most of the time and a mostly-melee battlemage type who has gone back to iron armor with a partial set of steel plate for special occasions. I like for my characters to hit hard but also get hit hard in return, and the best way I know to do that is use level-appropriate weapons (not highly improved or super-enchanted) and keep a low AR. I tend to spread out attribute points and keep perks more focused, and that helps too.

It’s also fun to reach a point where characters can travel in a mix of armor and clothing or robes for comfort rather than clanking around in a full set all of the time. I remember a dragon fight on the streets of Rorikstead with my character in her favorite dress. She had stopped to freshen up at the inn before heading over to flirt with a certain red-headed farm boy and got surprised halfway there. That scene would have been just another forgettable scuffle if she had been wearing ebony or (shudder) daedric.

I like the guard comments about armor and weapons. If my hero is trying to pass for a regular guy but has an ebony sword on his hip, it’s fun to have the guards notice.

Many of my characters never got to wear higher tiered equipment, cause RPing.

I like the lower lvl'd armors, for my PC, though I have smithed all the way up to Dragonbone ... Vorstag looks pretty good in it. Since getting my pc I have more or less used mod armor's, but they to tend to be "lower lvl" armor.

My main character (Nord (werewolf) warrior "Vargr Dragonslayer") is kinda basic in that he wears the Companion's wolf armor that you get access to early in the game. To me, it's the best looking heavy armor in the game beyond the fact that it fits perfectly with my character concept. I do think that Ebony and Daedric armor look pretty cool and all, but they really only fit "black knight" type characters. I would have liked a variant in terms of quality for paladin types. In terms of looks, I really like Dragonscale armor but don't like Dragonplate's look at all. The helmet is perfect, but only having the option of white kinda of svcks.

Of course if you take Smithing, it's all moot, as you can make even low-grade armor as good as base level high level armor. Unless things have changed, the cap is 526 AR right? I still don't understand the point of being able to raise AR higher than that on the character screen if the cap is 526. In retrospect I like this because it allows you to elevate a low-level piece of armor that looks better than higher level gear.

I'm strongly considering creating a character later on just for the Bard's College and I'll probably play him/her wearing standard clothing befitting a bard.

I'm going on with my heavily armoured mage (with banded iron armor though) but I die a damn lot. A. Damn. Lot.

OT: I stumbled tonight for the first time across a brief funeral, whose priest sent me around for another quest. After 1057 hours of gameplay I still find something new, even if it is very rare. Amazing. If only followers weren't so incredibly goofy and stupid...