I just wanted to get an idea of what people think about this subject.


Do you prefer to specialize, or diversify?


Or, in this case, would you rather stick with just one thing (Warrior, Assassin, Mage, etc.) or diversify, become a hybrid class or even a jack-of-all-trades?


Also, what are your thoughts and opinions on the subject?


Personally, I like the freedom to do what you want. I don't like being limited, or limiting myself in most cases. I encourage the "Do-it-all-with-one-character" option.

I like how you worded the answers

Basically, I am a hybrid kind of player. But I am not all about "freedom!"

I appreciate restrictions RPGs may employ for their worlds.

The worst systems, though, limit the ways things can be accomplished. Take Skyrim, for example. A Mage or Warrior character can NOT get into anything locked, because there is only one way to unlock anything that does not need a specific key: Lockpick. If I can play a Warrior that can bash doors in or bust locks open with a warhammer, then I would rather have Specialization over Diversification. Since fewer and fewer RPGs are doing this anymore, I vote for overall Diversification.

Did that make any sense?

I like to specialize, but it would be considered more of a hybrid, imo. For example, my current character specializes in archery, and that is her best skill. However, to survive she knows there will be times that she may need a hand to hand melee skill, so that's #2. Also her rp includes a very high skill in alchemy, #3. She also knows a few spells, but rarely uses them, such as lighting spells, healing, etc.

This works very well for the kind of game I prefer to rp.

EDIT: AlB, makes sense to me, and you said it better than I did, lol.

I'm seriously in the "specialization" camp. Now, it depends on the girl WHICH spec is what..... but each girl has her thing. And I'm really happy with that!

I'm not sure how to answer the poll questions but I definately prefer specialization. I like to play many different characters who feel very different from each other and are able to approach problems differently. That does not mean they are all "pure" builds that follow a particular archtype.


Currently I am playing two characters that are a hybridization of a few skills.


I've got Halthur, a nord barbarian who is skilled at 2H, light armor, marksman, alchemy, smithing and sneak and a little block Those are the only skills he uses and he particularly abhors any kind of magic.


My other character is an Imperial sword and board heavy armor battle mage that uses only restoration and alteration magic, and smithing and enchant. Sometimes he uses a crossbow (unperked) if he needs a ranged attack. He uses no alchemy.


Playing these two characters is a very different experience. Even though they are both primarily melee focused, it feels very different to play one vs the other. Part of that is te mod setup I have that makes heavy armor much different than light armor and really differentiates between the weapon types.

I do whatever is appropriate for the character I'm roleplaying. If that means specialization, we specialize. If it means diversifying, we diversify. Iron-clad, one-size-fits-all rules imposed by the player on every character is not my idea of roleplaying.

It depends on the Role-play.

For example, lets call a character Arcturus could have originally been a blacksmith from the Imperial Province of Cyrodiil and when entering Skyrim was forced along a path to become sneakier, to have to think more, gain new skills, ect. Whereas I could have another character, lets call him Dave, who could have been a Knight from High Rock and did not need to learn many new skills as the skills he did have allow him to thrive in the land of Skyrim.

It seriously depends on the character and what one call's specialization. My current character Akemmi is a hybrid, she uses magic more, but also melee skills, smithing and enchanting ( I do keep them well balanced). I would call my next character Kurdan a specialist: dual wield, archery, light armor, smithing, unperked speech. But if a some point it makes sense for Kurdan to learn Alchemy or Restoration, then he will... For me though it can't just be because ummm Stendar's Arua is an awesome tool to use fighting Vampires or a Paralyze potion would make getting through XX dungeons soooo much easier, those things have to make sense... would he use them? Why? Can he learn?

The skills my characters have must fit into their lives, into their story... personality...education...etc. I generally set a "guideline" in the form of a backstory for my characters, that doesn't mean they can't grow and learn... they just have to have valid reason's why they would do so. As I live in a college town, I could go take a course in....land management... why would I do that though? Yes I live on a ranch... I rent space... but my job is in retail management.. their is no Earthly reason for me to take a Land Management course... except for the heck of it.... a complete waste of money. That is what I mean when I say my characters have to have sound reasoning.... if they are a few egg's short of a dozen, then nothing they do is rational.

Edit: I prefer no limit's except what I give my characters. Now on the other hand.... quest limitation would be fine with me... meaning my Melee, heavy armor, no magic using Dragonborn, shouldn't be able to be Arch-mage or Listener. I think one should have to have high skills in those fields ...but that would be a limit and if it couldn't be implemented well, then.. I can use my imagination to limit myself.

Yup, could not put it better myself.

Some of my characters do specialize but it's not rare for them to look into other alternatives when they had some bad experiences.

Skill wise my characters tend to be lean toward diverse, like many people here they tend to be hybrids. I rarely make what I would call a 'pure' warrior/mage/stealth but most characters will have a focus on one area and combine in skills from other schools.


However in terms of quests I would say I am very much a specialist. Each character is made to do a specific questline and then their story is over. Occasionally they might do a couple, I recently had a character join the companions but he was then sent by Kodlac to aid the Dawnguard, but they only join appropriate factions, none of this ridiculous warrior hacking their way through the CofW quests. Unfortunately as I have recently been playing DiD and I'm not very good, finishing a questline is yet to happen!

Hard to answer because like most others here, for me it depends on the character. What I don't like is being able to do all. I prefer having limits in game that make sense. If you haven't reached a certain level of skill, you can't progress further. A warrior who can cast low level spells all of a sudden becomes Archmage. That makes no sense to me. If I have a character that strictly is a mage, I don't want to have to use a lockpick to get into chests.

In an effort to fix this I impose these rules on my characters and only do what makes sense for that particular character.

My lady specialises in being a scout.....which is an all rounder with abilities in steath and archery, but good melee if she has too.....which is often. She doesnt do magic, until the mid game where she learns basic spells, then the late game where she starts to get good at it.


What does that mean?.......Well, she grows as she goes!


How do I back that up with RP?........I don't. Adella is not RP in the traditional sense.....except a good dose of imaginitive RP elements help to humanise her personality and flesh out the lack lustre parts of her existence (drinking, arguing etc. and throwing the odd moody at me). But she doesn't adhere to a RP storyline, the game provides that and she would laugh at me giving her a backstory which she knew was a false construct!


Like all well developed characters.....she lives not in the computer, but within the player. Her personality experiences Skyrim within me as I play, and as a result she enjoys the freedom of expressing her desires within my mind. Her wishes translate to real game descisions which I enact for her on screen in tandem with my conscious direction. Simple really.

My (one and only) character is a very specialized hybrid – a stealthy, mystic archer who uses support magic instead of melee or armor. Such a build is really a round peg trying to fit into a square hole. As such, it requires basically no limitations on what can be done. I have jettisoned many games because they preclude or penalize mages shooting bows or archers casting spells. Only by having basically no limits can I achieve the blend of magic-supported archery that she requires.

That said, she is certainly not a generalist. She is fabulous with just a few skills, passable with a few more and totally unskilled with most skills. Indeed, the list of skills she does not use at all is longer than the list of skills she does use.

So I’m definitely part of the ‘give me no limits crowd’. I’d ever so much rather craft my own limits and enforce them via willpower/rp than have limits imposed by well-intentioned developers who cannot possibly foresee what my character requires.

I chose Diversification, Hybrid and Don't take my options

Essentially I think if you want to be a jack of all trades, master of none, go for it. Not for me, though.

I want to keep my options open to be an assassin who uses illusion to make a target's friends kill him, a thief who summons atronachs for protection, a warrior who paralyses the room with a spell then flattens everything with a mace and fireballs for anything left standing.

The core selling point of Elder Scrolls games from my perspective is having the opportunity to go anywhere you can see within that worldspace and have a choice of how you build your character to take on enemies. Locking you in to just magic or just stealth or just melee combat only works if you're in a party and you can have someone else doing the jobs you're restricted from.

That said, more choices next time would be grand....I liked having my mages able to magic a lock open and not have to pick it and the ability to smash a lock open (possibly at risk of item damage/loss) would be appreciated also as such things are referenced in in-game books

I was thinking about this earlier and thought, "How much is needed to be considered 'diversified'?" Each character I play chooses a weapon and armor. That is 2 skills already. All pick up lockpick so they can get loot. That's now 3 skills.

What I don't do is double up. I won't go Light AND Heavy armor. I won't choose 2-handed AND 1-handed. I will do a ranged and melee weapon, though. Depending on the character, I may pick up some magical use, like Restoration (for healing) or Conjuration (for summoned helpers). If I choose no armor, Alteration is taken. Also, candlelight is possibly my most used spell (or healing) amongst all of my characters.

So my point is, are "different skill areas" just like "2 melee weapon skills" or "2 armor skills"?

I have no answers that properly fit the poll. I make multiple different characters, and they employ different combinations of skills. They are certainly "hybrids" in the sense that they don't match any traditional "archetypes." They are people with different talents.

They certainly don't "do everything." I dislike roleplaying games that expect a single character to be alternately evil and good, and Skyrim is somewhat guilty of this. (But I don't let the game steer my characters into doing uncharacteristic things.)

I like choice, which means that I don't "do everything." In my opinion, "doing everything" does not involve any character choices other than the one-time choice to "do everything." If you "do everything," you are not really roleplaying a character in the game; you are just playing the game.

Exactly! This is my opinion as well.

Exactly! This is my opinion as well.