What is your preferred/strongest follower?

[miyel19]

At level 37 right now, using a build that mixes up magical schools and one-handed + shield depending on the context, I had Lydia, who died.
Then Uthgerd the Unbroken who died too but was stronger.
Another mercenary who died too.

Currently I have Argis the Bulwark from Markath.
He never died in my different re-runs of Skyrim.
I love him. You can marry him too, independantly of your character gender which is great for LGBT acceptance, and that's another reason why I love this game!
He has scarce dialogue lines, all in a typically deep male voice, lol.

I heard that Teldryn Sero in the Dragonborn expansion is even more stronger and has more fun dialogues.
Never used him yet but waiting to test him.

Of course I give my followers all armor and weapons that I don't use anymore.
But the question is: who is the strongest one with his base armor and weapons?

[Vlad 254]

Yes, get Teldryn Sero.

in the mean time Jenassa in Whiterun is good, so is Mjoll the Lioness in Riften, as is Aela the Huntress (Companions). I hear Vilkas with the companions is good but never really used him as a follower.

Teldryn Sero is a tough fighter and a hoot.

[Turtleswatter]

Vilkas is good but he has morals. We usually end up parting ways after about 30 seconds. I tend to stick with Lydia. I like her psycopathic tendencies and she's a real tank. I sneak while everyone tries to kill her. She's also a whiz with the Sanguine Rose.

[FauxFurry]

In the base game, J'Zargo, mostly because he levels up with the main character to a fairly high level, Teldryn Sero in the Dragon Born expansion and, if one counts mods, Inigo (with his MCM add-on installed).

[Vlad 254]

Lydia died so she's out and yes, forgot about J'Zargo at COW.

I use Lydia and Inigo but I must say Serana from Dawngaurd DLC is an outstanding follower if you can put up with all her necroing and she can get you in trouble with her destruction magic in cities especially when fighting dragons. Friendly fire is her downfall. But I've been using her alot lately while testing all the dialogue add-on mods (she now has a bunch) which make her like Inigo and Lucien as far as her commentary is concerned.

[FauxFurry]

Originally posted by Vlad 254:

Lydia died so she's out and yes, forgot about J'Zargo at COW.

I use Lydia and Inigo but I must say Serana from Dawngaurd DLC is an outstanding follower if you can put up with all her necroing and she can get you in trouble with her destruction magic in cities especially when fighting dragons. Friendly fire is her downfall. But I've been using her alot lately while testing all the dialogue add-on mods (she now has a bunch) which make her like Inigo and Lucien as far as her commentary is concerned.

The Vampire Lord Serana mod makes her even more effective.
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/10105/

[Vlad 254]

Originally posted by FauxFurry:

Originally posted by Vlad 254:

Lydia died so she's out and yes, forgot about J'Zargo at COW.

I use Lydia and Inigo but I must say Serana from Dawngaurd DLC is an outstanding follower if you can put up with all her necroing and she can get you in trouble with her destruction magic in cities especially when fighting dragons. Friendly fire is her downfall. But I've been using her alot lately while testing all the dialogue add-on mods (she now has a bunch) which make her like Inigo and Lucien as far as her commentary is concerned.

The Vampire Lord Serana mod makes her even more effective.
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/10105/

interesting indeed. Somehow I missed that mod, never seen it before. I'll be trying that one out but won't be asking Serana to cure herself on that playthru

[miyel19]

Mjoll the Lioness seems good to me too according to her attitude that I like!
Never used her yet though, might give it a try :)

Don't even know about Jenassa, but thanks for the tip.

Didn't use followers from Winterhold yet, neither from the Companions.
Gives a large choice before trying Teldryn Sero and starting the Dragonborn quests, thanks!

[Vlad 254]

Originally posted by FauxFurry:

Originally posted by Vlad 254:

Lydia died so she's out and yes, forgot about J'Zargo at COW.

I use Lydia and Inigo but I must say Serana from Dawngaurd DLC is an outstanding follower if you can put up with all her necroing and she can get you in trouble with her destruction magic in cities especially when fighting dragons. Friendly fire is her downfall. But I've been using her alot lately while testing all the dialogue add-on mods (she now has a bunch) which make her like Inigo and Lucien as far as her commentary is concerned.

The Vampire Lord Serana mod makes her even more effective.
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/10105/

I do see 6 bugs on the mod page and I don't really see the mod author as active on the page anymore. I was thinking about maybe adding this mod to my Guide but I'll look into it further at a later time.

[alexander_dougherty]

Originally posted by Vlad 254:

Originally posted by FauxFurry:

The Vampire Lord Serana mod makes her even more effective.
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/10105/

I do see 6 bugs on the mod page and I don't really see the mod author as active on the page anymore. I was thinking about maybe adding this mod to my Guide but I'll look into it further at a later time.

Inactive author is definitely a red flag, bugs can be fixed, but not by an author who isn't active

[Perplex]

Lydia is my go to follower, for some reason she is the only Housecarl that does not have massive problems with path finding in the game and actually do what she is there for. The other Housecarls seem to have too many issues with attacking, moving around etc.

After her if i want a mage i like Teldryn Sero as he is quite good at what he does. But as he is in Solstheim it is rare i have him early on and i almost never use followers after level 35 or so.

My go to mage follower is Marcurio. You get him early and he is a beast of a follower when it comes to deal damage.


I never liked J'zargo, all he does is use Spark and after level 2 or 3 Spark is useless.

EDIT: I never use followers that tries to kill me if i steal from or murder someone.

[miyel19]

Originally posted by Perplex:

Lydia is my go to follower, for some reason she is the only Housecarl that does not have massive problems with path finding in the game and actually do what she is there for. The other Housecarls seem to have too many issues with attacking, moving around etc.

After her if i want a mage i like Teldryn Sero as he is quite good at what he does. But as he is in Solstheim it is rare i have him early on and i almost never use followers after level 35 or so.

My go to mage follower is Marcurio. You get him early and he is a beast of a follower when it comes to deal damage.


I never liked J'zargo, all he does is use Spark and after level 2 or 3 Spark is useless.

EDIT: I never use followers that tries to kill me if i steal from or murder someone.

Of course I rarely used followers neither after a certain level.

But in this re-run I'm trying to play an allround mage using the different magical schools, which is more difficult to play than the straight-forward warrior build with shield + one-handed that beats the game too early.

So thanks to let me know about Marcurio which I didn't hear about yet :)

[ShelLuser]

Aranea Lenith is my absolute favorite, here[elderscrolls.fandom.com] is her profile page on the wiki. Solely for roleplay / immersive (?) reasons: I just love(d) the way she was voice acted, she seemed so real and genuine.

This was all on PS3 when I was playing for the first time: I barely managed to survive the ice wraiths and then I came across the statue of Azura, man what a sight! Playing a 'good' character I did the mission for Azura to recover the star (also because I had learned about Deadric artifacts by then, so I wanted more!) and yeah.. it happened when I returned the star and (barely!) managed to cleanse it.

Next thing Aranea starts talking about how Azura left her and how she, for the first time in her life, suddenly felt alone! I got heart broken then and there because I could only imagine... that cold harsh environment and then only a huge statue and being all alone otherwise? I immediately sent Lydia packing and I had some awesome adventures with Aranea.

I was stunned when I gave her some Foresworn armor and suddenly discovered that she was a redhead ;) I wasn't expecting that for sure.

But yeah, she's been my absolute favorite. Because of the way she acted, the way she talked and well.. she was a lot better than whiny Lydia 😁

However....

These days I play on Steam and the SSE (finally an end to all the horrible PS3 bugs!) and obviously I modded my game ;) For good and bad I guess (ahem ). Anyway, I discovered Sophia[www.nexusmods.com] the "funny voiced follower" and really: she's awesome! Naughty too but... she actually reacts to stuff that happens in-game, which I really like.

And yah, she made potions of youth and sold 'm, until 'they' figured out what she actually did ;)

Which I suppose covers my favorites.. Aranea is my vanilla followed, and Sophia is my favorite modded follower.

[miyel19]

Wow, great story @ShelLuser, thanks!
I rather played the bad guy for now so wasn't aware of Aranea ;)

I don't play mods so Sophia is out of my range I guess.

But all in all, that makes great choices, and apparently you all want that I re-run Skyrim again till the end of my life to try all alternatives, lol

[Docsprock]

Aranea is one of my favorites, too.

For a powerful mage follower I like Illia from Darklight Tower. Just be careful because she likes area-of-effect spells.

Mjoll is a great tank, but her chatty remarks tend to get old after a while.

Ingjard from Dawnguard is probably the best tank because she has no leveling limit. I usually make her Steward of Lakeview.

[matt]

Faendal is usually my go-to guy at low levels. He gives a bit of fire support with his arrows, and his archer AI generally keeps him out of my way. Like most followers, he still likes to idle in doorways, though. In my current game, I'm playing as a Bosmer archer, same as him, so I figured we'd go through the main quest together. I was a bit disappointed to find that my Bosmer female couldn't marry him. I was too lazy to install a mod, so we stayed "just friends".

However, if you're looking for the best follower, it's certainly not Faendal. He's average at best. Frea, from Solstheim, is uncapped, buffs herself with useful spells, and dual wields Stalhrim weapons by default. She's among the best followers in the unmodded game, especially once you start hitting follower level caps. She also has a bit of dialogue during the Dragonborn quests.