self imposed challenge

[Fidens9]

i'm playing skyrim with some rather interesting rules to spice up the game. this made me think that maybe others out there might be interested in spicing up their gameplay in the same way. and i'm also interested in hearing how others spice up their gameplay. so this topic is to discuss these things.

 

my self imposed rules is about limiting what i loot from enemies. i decided to play by this rule when i noticed how easy it was to get everything i could ever need without having to buy them. if you have an iron sword and you want to upgrade to a steel sword you're not gonna buy one. you'll either craft one or you'll loot it off the corpse of some bandit (and let's not forget how easy it is to find decent equipment from chest).

 

looting everything also makes it easy to have lots of money. for example, if you take on a radiant quest to eliminate some bandit camp you'll make way more money from looting and selling everything you can carry back from it than the quest actually offers.

 

now there's a decent amount of things to buy. like spells and crafting material (and maybe healing potions). so money isn't completely worthless. but it's so easy to have more than you actually need when looting is your main source of income.

 

by making questing my main source of income, not only do i feel like i earned every bit of gold i make, but it also makes quest feel more meaningful. even something as simple as arrows become more valuable when you can't just loot them off enemies to have an infinite supply.

 

now this isn't to say that i completely abstain from looting. rather i just limit it. i still loot crafting material, but to avoid becoming rich by simply sell what i craft i use a mod that reduces how much items sell for. and of course i also loot quest items (and notes). animals are also fair game. finally i do loot treasure chests but i use a mod that reduces the amount of items and gold i can find in them.

 

well that's pretty much what my self imposed challenge amounts to. now for you people, what do you think of my self imposed challenge? and what are yours?

[HadToRegister]

My rule that I play with is that my character can only use stuff that she crafts, armor, weapons etc.
So after I create my character, I use the mod "Live another life" and start in the prison of Whiterun, and only wear the prisoners clothes the game gives you at the beginning.

I don't bother looting ANYTHING unless it's magical, because once you get Alchemy up to a decent level you can bankrupt every potion seller, and because selling potions gets your speech up too, you can eventually bankrupt EVERY Vendor once you get the "You can sell anything to any vendor" perk.

My current character is walking around with about 177,000 gold just from potion making.

[jones177]

My Favorite & most challenging my are my healer only characters. They rely on followers to do the fighting & their job is to heal the party.

 

You learn to dodge the baddies while healing tanks in the party. If the healer falls so does the party because the odds I put them up against are too great without constant healing.

 

If the party fails & the healer survives all the healer can do is to recruit others to save the party.

 

Anyway, it is a good use of all the followers modders make.

 

 

 

Later

[Waterlily78]

I'm trying something similar right now. I got bored always playing the same human spellsword character, so I used this site to generate a random character.

 

https://roderick.tech/ultimate-skyrim/character-gen

 

I rolled a female Dunmer archer, and the challenge is that I can't loot any bodies, humanoid or animal, unless it's needed for a quest item. So I decided to RP that she has a case of necrophobia and won't touch anything dead, I don't even examine the bodies. I can only loot containers and things lying out in the open. It's an interesting way to play. I will say I've got her to level 20 and I have a lot less junk than normal!

[Deleted3897072User]

My challenge is to get through the game from starting in Helgen without accumulating any experience, staying at the bottom of Level 1. So that means getting a follower to do all the fighting (so nothing for combat skills), never casting a spell, not wearing armour (in case you get hit by a stray arrow and get heavy or light armour experience), not using Stealth, not selling anything (because you might get Speechcraft) and, basically, perversely avoiding doing anything that the game is supposed to be about.

 

It's possible to get through the main quest up to the point where you are in the Thalmor Embassy dungeon but there I'm stumped. I need the key to get the trapdoor open but if I kill or pickpocket a guard to get it, I will get experience for doing that. I can cheat, but that's not the point. There might be a shout that would do the trick (you don't get experience for shouting) but if there is, I haven't found it.

[Waterlily78]

Ha, there were a couple of mods for Oldrim that gave you a Fus type shout for unlocking doors, but I don't think they worked on the ones that needed keys. Go figure.

[Baer2x4]

Wow oldmansbeard, your patience is impressive! That would drive me crazy after a bit.

 

That's the great thing about skyrim though, there's an unlimited number ways of playing.

[steve40]

My challenge is to get through the whole game without getting the urge to make yet another mod.

[Deleted3897072User]

I believe I have the answer to my Thalmor dungeon problem - and possibly others. Killing the guard with a fireball scroll doesn't give you any experience, so I can do that with impunity.

[Baer2x4]

If you can get through the main quest this way it's nothing less than astounding. Some things I wonder about though, like can you be judged worthy to enter Sovngarde by shouting? Never tried anything but swinging a sword myself. Killing Alduin will take many followers with good weapons. Are all weapons in your game vanilla? Most enemies tend to concentrate on the DB and almost ignore followers... talk about dying a thousand deaths!