Any ”All Arounder Build” advice/guide?

[Benchwarmer]

I have played Skyrim since xbox 360 era but I have never finished the game or used any build guides. Last time I played was in 2020 on PC and I used some elf with mace and shield and some firebolt magic and bows when needed.

Im starting another run now and I was thinking about to do my first proper build and follow some guide. Spellsword or Stealth archer is my type of stuff but then I was thinking why not combine them, sort of.

Is there some kind of ”All Arounder Build” I could follow? maybe use Redguard that seems to be best for that role?

The setup would be pretty much similar to my 2020 run:

One handed melee
Shield
Destruction and healing
Archery

[DragonMaster]

Originally posted by Benchwarmer:

I have played Skyrim since xbox 360 era but I have never finished the game or used any build guides. Last time I played was in 2020 on PC and I used some elf with mace and shield and some firebolt magic and bows when needed.

Im starting another run now and I was thinking about to do my first proper build and follow some guide. Spellsword or Stealth archer is my type of stuff but then I was thinking why not combine them, sort of.

Is there some kinds of ”All Arounder Build” I could follow? maybe use Redguard that seems to be best for that role?

The setup would be pretty much similar to my 2020 run without any byild guides:

One handed melee
Shield
Destruction and healing
Archery

I'm currently using a female redguard which she is a Thief/assassin for my current run through of the game. She is dual wielding short swords and a crossbow. Now as for a build guide are you referring to mods or what? if your referring to mods my current play through has around 400 mods installed.

[Benchwarmer]

Just a vanilla friendly all arounder build guide/advice. I’ve tried to search one but most of the links are just to some discussion forums with no actual guides. I understand that most of the build sites are just focused on popular builds with few skills.

(I only use few mods from the creation club to make the game look better plus some followers)

[fauxpas]

Lets be honest... "builds" don't really exist in Skyrim as in the end you'll need up as master of everything.

So just pick whatever race looks cool, and start using the weapons / magic you wish to be good at, alternating between whichever standing stone is useful at any given time.

[Benchwarmer]

Originally posted by fauxpas:

Lets be honest... "builds" don't really exist in Skyrim as in the end you'll need up as master of everything.

So just pick whatever race looks cool, and start using the weapons / magic you wish to be good at, alternating between whichever standing stone is useful at any given time.

That’s pretty much I’ve always done before. I guess I’ll just run that way again. ”Redguard allarounder” go with the flow build.

[fauxpas]

Originally posted by Benchwarmer:

Originally posted by fauxpas:

Lets be honest... "builds" don't really exist in Skyrim as in the end you'll need up as master of everything.

So just pick whatever race looks cool, and start using the weapons / magic you wish to be good at, alternating between whichever standing stone is useful at any given time.

That’s pretty much I’ve always done before. I guess I’ll just run that way again. ”Redguard allarounder” go with the flow build.

That's because Skyrim is the moment where Todd stripped away the last remaining RPG elements and went full action game, which makes 'builds' meaningless as any character can do anything and the only thing that you can't change is your health / mana / stamina bars.

[Steelfleece]

If you wanted to go with that setup, my suggestion would be to focus on the magic. Those skills, without cheesing, generally go up slower than the others - especially Destruction. Keep a good bow, one-hander and shield on you, and sneak when it feels like it would be advantageous. When you get in close, swap to sword-and-board. Low on magicka at range, use the bow. Or save up magicka to nuke down something dangerous if you know it's coming up.
As a suggestion, snag Zephyr when you can for a bow. It's one of the best bows for damage per second anyway, and it isn't absurdly heavy. Will go through arrows pretty quick, but ancient nord arrows can be used for most targets and they drop like rain. If you have Dawnguard installed, vampires often have caster enchantments on their armor, so there's a nice low-level source of spellcaster-enhancing light armor.
Make sure to put a little work into the other trees as needed - Alteration gets some nice protective perks like magic resistance and absorption that'll serve well.

[hawklaser]

Originally posted by Benchwarmer:

Just a vanilla friendly all arounder build guide/advice. I’ve tried to search one but most of the links are just to some discussion forums with no actual guides. I understand that most of the build sites are just focused on popular builds with few skills.

That's mostly because there really isn't a wide array of perks that are competing with each other. Its pretty cut and dry for every tree. Combine that with the fact you are not really locked out of anything if you put in enough time, there really isn't much point to go indepth on most perks.

Though for general build advice, the bigger thing is how are you planning on allocating the early level attribute points, and even then it mostly comes down to are you planning to use spells or weapons as your primary way of dealing with encounters. If planning on weapons, you can pretty much only put points into health. If going on spells, you will likely be putting the vast majority into magicka. Stamina can pretty much be entirely ignored unless you are constantly power attacking. Later on, they all become rather moot once hit certain thresholds between the stats and gear. So really, the only advice can give for attributes is raise health to a comfortable level first, then build for comfort after that, though a mage character is likely going to want several levels into magicka early on if planning on avoiding weapons as much as possible.

For perks, pick a handful of core skills for a character, and put nearly all of your perk points into those skills. You've listed out 5 skills already, which is a good amount to work with for perks. Try and keep the vast majority of your perks within those skills. I usually pick out a primary offensive skill, a defense skill, and a utility skill to focus on first. Once the character is more established, and I have perk points to spare, then I'll start branching out and putting perks in more supplemental skills. Sometimes I'll even just sit on perk points instead of putting them into skills that don't get used often while waiting for used skills to improve further and unlock other options there.

[Benchwarmer]

Thanks everybody for the responses. I decided to start a new run with a breton "witchhunter" type character that I found in some build site and youtube and it looked fun. Focusing on magic and archery with sneak. Stat spread evenly 1-1-1. I'm already having more fun with this character than my previous "all arounder" go with the flow and with no focus. I almost started a "pathfinder" build (archery and melee) but "witchhunter" looked more cool with the magic abilities.

[Ilja]

If you want more meaningful "build" then you could always try this one:

Disparity - Player Character Class - Race and Gender Diversity
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/63354

I am using it with full body weight features with Disparity, going from zero to hero with these two:

Pumping Iron - Dynamic Muscle Growth
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/29476

Stay In Shape - A Pumping Iron Addon
https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrimspecialedition/mods/50371

People above are correct in that builds barely matter in vanilla game. I am using Ordinator, focusing heavily on Restoration. My character is sort of a shaman/mage type, nuking undead enemies and actively healing companions. He can hit, but often finds himself standing behind Inigo's back...

[Fitness Lauch]

There aren't really builds in this game because you just end up being able to do everything anways (sadly). However some tips would be to just focus at one weapon at the start instead of mixing up several ones (like using both bow and melee weapons instead of just focusing at one of them). Would also recommend to make use of magic, even if you want to play with weapons, restoration (and also alteration to some extend) work extremely well with a melee character and will make it much stronger than avoiding magic entirely - restoration doesn't even require a lot of investment to be extremely good.

Would also recommend putting most stats into health and some into magic (like 5-2). Stamina isn't really that important, especially not early on while health prevents you from getting oneshotted and stacking magicka also increases the amount of magicka which you recover per second.

Lastly don't forget to work on your armor and magic resist ratings, these are extremely important. Either pick light or heavy armor (both work fine) and stick to it, the way damage mitigation is calculated in this game means that stacking armor (and magic resist) becomes stronger depending on how much armor you already have. Like going from 0 armor to 100 won't make that much of a difference but going from 460 to 560 makes a MASSIVE difference.

[Steelfleece]

Stamina is a little more important than that. If you're not specifically going mage, 2-1-1 or 3-1-1 health-stamina-magicka isn't a bad idea. Every time you add 10 stamina, you also add 5 carry capacity; stamina's also used for blocking with a shield, shield bashes, power attack and sprinting away from (or into) danger. That carrying capacity can be pretty useful if you're a packrat.

As for how armor rating works, every point is 0.12% physical damage resistance, with an extra 3% bonus for each armor slot that's actually armor (potentially body, helmet, gauntlets, boots, shield). Technically it's a straight line when graphed, so on paper it takes just as much of a rating increase to go from 40% to 60% as from 60% to 80%. You do feel it more at the high end though, as going from 20% to 40% damage reduction means incoming damage is effectively reduced by 1/4, while going from 60% to 80% means incoming damage is halved.

[Benchwarmer]

Originally posted by Steelfleece:

Stamina is a little more important than that.

I'm lvl 40 now and still going with that 1-1-1 style (I have couple extra capacity gear and a backpack) but I don't follow a build guide totally 100%. For example I rather use blacksmithing perks than enchanting perks.

https://skyrimbuilds.com/build/breton-witchhunter