If i spend the whole game with a sword ONLY in my right hand, and then i put one in my left hand, I don't think it should be just as powerful and easy to use. I remember the old pixelated final fantasys had a left-hand right-hand proficiency, and i hope Skyrim does the same.

It should take a while to become ambidextrous when using dual-wielding (IMO a couple levels consistently dual-wielding) and until you do become ambidextrous I think you should suffer a penalty. You should suffer the same penalty if in the middle of the game you decide to start using your shield in your right hand and your sword in your left for some reason when you've been right handed the whole time.

Solution: don't swap your weapons/shields from left hand to right hand.

I don't think you need the game itself to enforce this, because, AFAIK, there won't be any need for the game to enforce this. It might be an issue if, for example, there was a way to damage one hand but not the other, in which case you might have to swap your sword from your damaged hand to your healthy hand. But, I don't think that will ever happen (might be wrong, but I doubt it).

well lets say for a long time you have a very good sword/shield combo, but you find a weapon that you'd like to replace the shield with.... then you'll all of a sudden be just as good with your left handed weapon as your right??? i hope not...

My guess (and that's all it is) is there'll be no penalties based on which hand you're using, since the new combat system is pretty much "all about dual-wielding" from the get-go, even if it's only a weapon in one hand and a heal spell in the other. Any restrictions or penalties for "off-hand/right-handed/left-handed" will probably be modder fodder.

Just a guess, but I'd be rather surprised to see things done otherwise. Pleasantly surprised, to be sure- but surprised still.

Oh, right, I forgot about moving from sword/shield to dual wielding.

Yeah, I suspect you will be as good with one hand as you are with the other.

I guess one thing you could do is, if you're using a sword/shield combo, is regularly swap them between your hands. Which is a clunky workaround, but it's the best idea I've got.

All dragonborn are inherently ambidextrous? That sounds more plausible than just throwing you in the game as such.

RP yourself to be right, left, or ambi.

well if they have a system like i hope they do stated in the OP then i would hope you could choose at the beginning: left-handed, or right-handed, and ambidexterity is just something you have to practice with.

If any version of this is added, it should be that you are inefficient with two weapons until you get a certain perk, but there should be no minuses for using one hand instead of another if you only have one weapon.

oh yeah completely forgot about perks. "Perfect Ambidexterity" should definitely be one, but you should only have a minor penalty without it if you've practiced with it. Kinda like Baldurs gate 2 two-weapon proficency slots

@Liu Bei~ well, know how you go through a time of heightened character growth at the beginning? maybe depending on which hand you use more during that time the game auto assigns our left or right handedness?

Yes i originally thought this, but the character at the beginning isn't a baby. He/She is an advlt so their handedness should already be decided IMO.

but if it was like you propose i wouldn't be adverse to it at all.

AH! :foodndrink: dont know why i didnt think of that! where would the perk for Perfect Ambidexterity go? as far as i know EVERY perk fits under a perk tree for a skill, so it would cancel out the magic oriented classes if it was under a combat/stealth tree?

well :foodndrink: as i said i originally thought the same thing as you. I'm sure you would of thought of it if you were thinking about this as long as i have.

but yeah, I dont think there absolutely needs to be a Perfect Ambidexterity perk, cause my proposed system doesnt really require it, but if there was one I'd imagine it'd be stealth... but it could also be combat. my bet would go with stealth though, because it just seems like a more rouge-like thing to do.

Dual-wielding reminds me of the "Ranger" class from most D&D inspired RPGs, and i always felt like rangers walked the line between Combat and Stealth so it's hard to say.

Psh, Khornanites will carry more than 1 weapon on them at all times, unless it's a really big and heavy weapon weapon. Really big fists, guns, and mutations count.

Warrior constellation- One-handed weapons Skill- preferably under a branch focusing on dual wielding, this being a prerequisite.
(The weapons skills now seem to be two-handed and one-handed rather than blade and blunt)

For those who don't know already skills now work like this:
_____Warrior____________________Mage_________________________Thief
_______|_________________________|_____________________________|
_____1 Skills___________________1 Skills_______________________1 Skill
_______|_________________________|_____________________________|
---------------- ___--------------------____-----------------------
|_____|______|______|____|____|_____|_____|_____|____|_____|_______|______|_______|
___Perk trees_________________Perk Trees___________________Perk Trees

Or at least that is what I got from the gameinformer article on the UI.

Edit that did not work like i imagined it would oops
Edit: Underscores for the win!

And the modders say, "IT SHALL BE SO."

I'm still i little bit confused by this... I have been thinking of the talent from WoW whenever someone mentions perk trees

here's an example http://www.incgamers.com/images/screenshots/18489orig.jpg.

Of course it'd be Combat, Magic, And Stealth though, and i'd imagine more "arrows" in Skyrim. In WoW you had to spend a certain amount of in a specific group to advance down the tree.

sorry if thats what you were trying to articulate Grimblade.

Much different than WoW, more like this
__________One-handed Weapons
_________________|_____________________
|``````````````|``````````````|``````````````````|``````````````````|
Sword```Mace````Hammer`````````Axe`````````````Other
|
Sword Perks available from start
|
Sword Perks with requirements (Level, other perks, etc.)

It will probably look something like this for each skill branch(In this case different types of weapons):

_______________|___________________
|`````````|```````````````|```````````````|``````````````````|
1```````2```````````````3`````````````4``````````````````5

Then 1 branches off into three more, which branch off into three more.

I really hope you will be ambidextrous, as else a perk (or gasp! a skill) will be wasted with this.

Think about it like a family tree. The original parents (in this case only one) is the perk system
The perk system then has The warrior constellation, the mage constellation, and the thief constellation, which all represent the main three categories.
They all have 6 children, the skills, some of which move between families. (alchemy is borderline stealth and magic now)
Each skill has main sub categories such as weapon types in one-handed's case.
Each subcategory has any number of perks under it which may also branch so that you must have one perk to unlock 3 other perks etc. (at this part think in terms of D&D feats)

Yeah i get it now. the talent TREE in WoW didn't really have BRANCHES, and your idea does. I would like something more like your vision of it.

Basically there are only 16 skills, but 4-5 branches that might as well be called skills under each. This was a clever way to have more skills. Think of it as there being 64-80 skills with a few perks each rather than thinking of it as 16 skills with 20 each.

Oh and my numbers are not imaginary, Todd said in the Gameinformer podcast that there were nearly 250 perks and still many more being added.

I thought there was 18 skills...

Forcing hand dominance would be completely superfluous. Let's not forget something too: your character is an advlt. It would make absolutely zero immersion sense to have the actions of your character in game influence which hand is dominant, or if they are ambidextrous. They should just leave it as ambidextrous by default.

I'm right handed but I think right handed only is a grave insult to the left handed. For example, Link from the Zelda series was always left handed from the beginning. Suddenly all because of the Wii controls Nintendo arbitrarily started making him right handed, with the exclusion of any left handed option. My left handed nephew feels snubbed that one of his favorite game characters has been changed just to reflect the majority. What is this, backwards 1950 where people thought being left handed was evil?