I'm mostly playing as a Paladin-ish type of character. I use heavy armor, mostly blunt weapons and defensive magic(when I'm not playing the pre-made Crusader class, because then I also use destruction).

What about you? In detail if you want.

I rarely play anything other than sneaky-type characters. It's a bit difficult for me to face some types of monsters face-to-face, because they tend to be a bit scary sometimes. So I'd rather snipe them from as far away as possible. Also, I play exclusively dead is dead characters, and that's a bit easier if I don't get relentlessly pounded by enemies.

I prefer Up close and personal. I don't know why, but it's satisfying to cut a bandit down, than just sneak attack him.

I do pretty much all of them. sneaky archer, sneaky melee assassin, up-close sword and board, up-close two-hander, pure mage, magician-melee combo (battlemage/spellsword), etc...

Elven Mystic Ranger- Focus on Blade sneak and Marksmen( Evlen stuff only). So its many a Ranger class who can blow your a** up. Birth sign with the extra magic but no regen( forget what it is called) and when i need to cast a spell it usuually costs me 250-425 magica because they murder everything and get used rarely!

My latest character is sort of like a Roadwarden; Imperial, light armor, blade, block (No shield), marksman. Never use any spells, and Atronach as my birthsign.

Also have some skill at sneaking and security, because sometimes you need to break the law to get to the bottom of things.

Mostly ranged assassin. Although I have characters of all types, I enjoy my assassin the most.

My favorite character is a mixture between a mage and a warrior. I use more of the magic than the up-close fighting, but if things get out of control, I can use a sword just fine.

Fragile glass cannon mystic archer. No melee, just a bow and some magic (mostly illusion). If things go well, her foes are just distant pink glows that yield to her bow. Crowds are dealt with by mind control spells. If things don't go well, she disappears, leaving a clannfear in her place.

Stealthy, yet heavy hitting. Soft armor, a tin can is too immobile. Spells are used as frequently as all kinds of weapons, and once the attack has been initiated it won′t stop until either one is dead which of course is the opponent.
Good guy, although when seeing an opportunity doesn′t let it slip away. Sometimes poor, sometimes rich, but wealth is not an issue as much as usable enchanted stuff or rare scrolls.

And when someone with a pure heart needs help, that person also gets it without too many questions. However helping an empire which has incorporated their ways into other countries and eliminated their own way of living, is not something to be concerned with at all.

Recently I have been playing mostly melee characters, but my favorites are the sneaky types, usually assassins or thieves.

While I play all kinds of characters, my favourite skills are Destruction, Illusion, and Sneak.

well i have tried every single playing style, and i am right now just about to get Ruby's marksman from 47 to 50, she is level 8 bosmer and she owns with her full leather set (i like it dunno why... apart from helmet) and madness bow!, because at 50 marksman i can zoom in ! :dance:

so i am finding marksman probably most fun yet.

I generally play as a battlemage, but with a few adjustments. I'm running several mods, so I use a race with a huge bonus to magicka. Running http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=21104, I choose the Ritual birthsign for an even bigger magicka bonus (COBL overhauls birthsigns along with a bunch of other things). For combat, I choose armorer and blunt or hand-to-hand, and choose the following magic skills: Restoration, alteration, illusion, mysticism, and destruction. (Since alchemy is so easy to level up, I intentionally make it a minor skill but give it high priority.) Strap on some heavy armor and let a mudcrab whale on me in the early game to raise my health. What I like to do is get my armorer skill to at least level 50, then start making enchanted weapons and armor--I'll wait till I'm at a higher level to close Oblivion gates, then keep save-scumming until I get a sigil stone that has 40-50 pts. Fortify Magicka, clone it a few times, and stack it on several pieces of armor. Weapons? I'll take a mace and stack the following enchantments: Drain Fatigue 100 pts and 100% weakness to magicka for 4 seconds on target, soul trap, and maybe silence, burden, and damage strength. (Then use Azura's Star to recharge my mace.) As for shields, Spell Breaker's the last one I'll ever need.

That's what Oblivion describes the Crusader class as, and that's exactly what I typically play as. Heavy armor, sword-and-shield, restoration spells. That's all I need.

Over the years most of my characters have tended to be melee warriors. But I'm starting to branch out. For my last Oblivion character I created a pure Mage. I'd never played a Mage before in an Elder Scrolls game. It felt like I was playing a different game. It was fascinating.

When playing Morrowind a couple weeks ago I created my first-ever thief character. I had the same experience there. I saw interiors and NPCs I'd never seen before. It amazes me that all this content could be in the game all this time and I've never seen it. I am impressed all over again with how immense and detailed the Elder Scrolls games are.

If anyone is feeling bored with the game I recommend playing a different 'archetype.'

Judging by your avatar and username I would have expected you to use Dominate spells more than anything.

Well said Pseron! I concur wholeheartedly. The archetypes I've played more or less in order of frequency (I play dead is dead, so I tend to restart a lot, particularly now that I'm OOO + MMM, etc.)

Thief
Pure Mage
Battlemage/Spellsword
Paladin
Marksman/Mage
Assassin

Generally i play a typical warrior with a little magic. My most prominent character is kind of like a paladin I guess. If you crossed a WoW death knight with a paladin you'd get him.

I play pure mages, sometimes unrepentant villains others virtuous ingenues, but I tend to discard stocky characters for ones with faults. I RP'd one mage as crippled, and took longer to travel in Morrowind. I rarely play a sword'n'board type character and if I'm not feeling overly magical I just play a thief who uses a dagger and bow. My chars are usually neutral.

Melee warriors rounded out with supplimental magic. My characters often look like Mages but in reality its only because I like to sprinkle in diferent magics, the warrior is the core of my character.

I mostly play the barge in and kill stuff type. Usually a heavily armored, long sword, male...which is the opposite of reality, being a rather short, female, geek...
I'm trying to see if I can play the sneaky type next

Archer.... falling back on destruction when all else fails.... Bow only, fingers of fire and paralysis.....

LOL I should do that! Max out my illusion skill, then make some dominate spells at the maximum settings. Then cast these Geass spells on every NPC in Cyrodiil, Elsweyr (Yes, I've got Elsweyr: The Deserts of Anequina installed), and the Shivering Isles! XD

Now, if there were mods to add Pizza Hut and Knightmare Frames...

Oh, I also chose intelligence and willpower as my favored attributes, while using Korana's http://www.tesnexus.com/downloads/file.php?id=30304 mod. Thanks to that mod, I can never go back to using the vanilla races. Use the Tribal variant to get the alchemy and marksman bonuses of a Bosmer combined with the magicka bonus of an Altmer. I intentionally bork my personality until I do Namira's shrine quest, since you can get by with low personality anyway (Cheap, overpowered charm spells render speechcraft moot), and overcome the low starting health by letting weak enemies pound on me while wearing heavy armor. Nothing like doing some min-maxing instead of playing normally. (It also helps that I'm running Francesco's overhaul--no more crap with the leveling system actively wanting you dead!)

Companions? I never use them. Other people just get in the way. And they talk, talk, talk.

A sneaky, speedy warrior. Fond of poisons and stealth attacks to start a melee. Enhanced by shield and destruction spells. Carries a bow for sniping when an opportunity can be found.

As for personality... vicious, avaricious, utilitarian, ambitious, cruel, malicious, vindictive. Not the type to let compassion stand in the way of profit. E.g.: If he sees a frail old lady begging for alms in a deserted area, he'll rob/murder/mutilate/immolate her quite happily for the 0-5 septims she has. Probably not in that order.

Aims to Rule and/or Destroy Tamriel. Preferably simultaneously.