If you're anything like me, you probably had expectations about how you'd like to play your first Skyrim playthrough and had a character in mind. Lots of people were discussing their character concepts and builds, but now it's here and we've seen the new gameplay (and the old), did your character work out as expected?

I know mine didn't. I was expecting to roll an artificer, a character who crafts magical devices, armour and enchantments and uses enchanted tools as their primary skill. So I was expecting to use a shield and a staff, have alchemy and enchanting and I'd take alteration as my one "true" magic school (Seeing I'd designed the character to have only a very narrow range of actual magic skill. They would use enchantments and potions to give them a wider skill base. I was also absolutely certain that I would NOT be dual wielding due to it's lack of defensive capabilities.

http://i41.tinypic.com/dw3slj.jpg



When the game arrived, I immediatly hit a snag: You can't craft staves, and they're so rare it's a joke (I was level 30 by the time I finally found my first reasonable offensive staff!)... so there went that plan. Still I had strong enchantments, so I figure I'd use enchantments on all weapons and not really specialise in any single weapon class, but use their enchantments as a main source of damage. Next, I found that blocking was slowing me down and actually putting me in more danger than it was preventing... so before i knew it, I was doing the one thing I was sure I wasn't going to do, and dual wielding (pairred enchantments!).

When I got to around level 20 and really started to think outside the box on enchantments, my alchemy strength shot through the roof... between alchemy, smithing and enchantments I was becoming invincible - so I swiftly dumped those schools before it went too far (With the help of the console) and chose to make enchantment my ONLY craft skill to keep the game balanced (I'm still playing in master difficulty >.>).


http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/630731953270700552/4FBB693F2797A7329770CD7B82457D196A4659CA/



I bet I'm not alone on this ;p

I didn't have any plans for Skyrim, as I didn't want to be rerolling new characters all day because one thing went wrong.
But I ended up rerolling new characters all day because I spent 1 perk wrong.

I'm always hovering around Light Armour, Light Weapons and Bows though. Dual Wielding/Blocking differs per character.

Nice "doodle" by the way. Your screenshot wont show though. - Nvm, it does now.

Your second poll doesn't have "No armour" as an option. Which I would've ticked.

I expected 1h+destruction+conjuration+alteration with light armor.

I wound up 2h+alteration+archery+enchant with no armor.

oops, fixed

Enchantment and alchemy are grouped but alchemy was one of my main disappointments even though I still use enchant(though it also has issues, it's kind of an irreplaceable skill).

Alchemy ended up being not fun due to the skill potions being broken, poisons being relatively worthless, and instant healing potion spam is just dumb.

First character was to be a Destruction magic based character in Heavy Armor that did not use summons or companions. Was one of the first (of those who post) to realize and vocalize a broken magic system. Got fed up doing more damage with my fists than spells and decided that if I was going to be forced to play like a Warrior, that I may as well play as the real thing. I also then quickly discovered how utterly broken the crafting skills were. I was hoping that Smithing and Enchanting would be worth the investment and that you could make gear that was better than most that you could find, but not so good as the best 10% that you could find, especially rare uniques. Sadly, Smithing on it's own produces superior items compared to anything you can find and with Enchanting just trivializes the entire game, on any difficulty.

So far, I've been having the most fun with my Conjuration/Archery with a two-handed weapon for backup Orc that dumps every single point into Stamina and none into health or mana. I also do not specialize in any specific armor type, and I will also not be using Shadow Warrior. It's been both somewhat challenging, yet also very rewarding compared to other characters I've played. However, I am looking forward to the mods that will greatly overhaul/fix the currently broken magic system. It's completely awful outside of Conjuration.

Your "little doodle" turns me green with envy of your superior artistic abilities.

Largely the same here: stealth, light armour, one-handed weapons, marksman etc. The only real changes were bits that were either not well implemented (IMHO) or somewhat pointless, in my case mostly enchantments and speechcraft respectively. I think I'd seen myself as being more of a caster than I am, but... dunno, really, it doesn't appeal for some reason but I can't quite put my finger on it. If I had to blame anything, I guess the way the perk system works.

I wanted to create a magic using khajiit thief like in every other Elder Scrolls game... and I did.

Looking at the numbers then, it seems a lot of folks took a shine to bows. Not many people expected to use them but everyone ended up with them =p

Also, the destruction-weak-at-endgame-paradox shows. Big drop from plan to implementation on magic offence.

My original plan was to make a Bosmer Arcane Archer/Spellsword. Basically, Sneak, Archery, One-Handed (Dual-Wielding), Alteration, Illusion, and some Destruction, Light Armor, and Enchanting. I ended up favoring an Orc with heavy armor, thinking I would use two-handed weapons, destruction magic, and archery. I ended up pla ing an Orc with Heavy Armor, One-Handed, Block, and minor Smithing.

For my second character (the first has "retired" in Whiterun), I'm playing a Dark Elf assassin, who's put perks in Sneak and One-Handed only. I'm really trying to stay away from using Archery while being a thief/assassin, so I'm playing on Novice for now. I'll raise that once I get my One-Handed to a feasible level. But on-topic, I tried the Bosmer again, and then an Altmer, but the Dark Elf just fit better in my head somehow.

For my mage, which I'll play after I finish the Companions, Thieves Guild, and Dark Brotherhood quests, I'm planning on creating either an Argonian or a Khajiit, but we'll see how that works. Lol. I'm really loving this game and the rewards of letting the characters play for me.

My plan was armour, shield, restoration, Paladin of Talos, and very distantly related to the bloodline.

As it happens, I entered the world, intending to continue my holy duty to wipe out necromancy wherever I found it in service of Stendarr and the Nine Divines, upon searching the land for signs of the undead, I achieve my goals, and found foul corruption and evil throughout the land.

As I increased my standing with the preeminent lords of the land, I found greater evil in the heart of man, that necromancy and evil were basic and easy to counter, and slowly I realised that evil was present in the heart of all men.

I am now coming to a dilemma in how to best serve my gods, despite the evident facts that Talos was raised to become a deity, his denial by filthy non-humans and Mer people, and their just punishment in the form of the return of dragons, kin to my distantly related ancestor Tiber Septim, only proves the sin of denial.

Where I go from here, I haven't decided.

Skills... they potter along quite happily, dragons are my friends. I even help show them where to burn the sins of Talos deniers.

My plan was to use bow for distance, and dual for close range confrontation, I ended up shifting into full time archer

When I created my character I already knew that I wanted him to be a warrior that didn't believe in Gods or stones (still true 51 hours in). As a half blind (he's only got one eye) former warrior he hadn't really planned on using bows as much as he has (kinda hard to aim with only one good eye), he had however planned on using sneak quite a bit even though he's only got one good eye. He really needs the element of surprise in order to soften them up a bit before he goes hackin' and whackin with those swords he's so fond of.

For the most part Charlie has turned out the way I expected him to..including the fact that he's got an intense hatred for Imperials and the Empire.

I was going to go Imperial Mage, and ended up with a Nord archer.
I chose "I found a new and even more fun approach to playing than I had expected" but it actually means: "I fell back on an old favorite and even more fun approach to playing than i had expected" since I always end up rolling (stealthy) archers as my first (and usually favorite) character in RPGs.

I wanted a Stealthy Breton Mage (Sneak, OneHanded, Destruction, Robes)
I started wearing armor, went into smithing, speard my points too thin
Deleted that character

Made a Orc Heavy
Armor Dual Wielding Tank with archery