Cloak and Dagger.

Anybody else play a stealthy character? I'm a level 45 argonian with 100 in Archery, Sneak and Smithing so far. 99 in Lockpicking and 60-ish in pickpocketing

I just wanted to share a few pointers that have made it easy for me:

• Like I said, 100 in Archery and Sneak help a lot. The Thief Guardian Stone will help you get there faster. It makes all stealth skills go up faster, and it's the first Guardian stone you come across when you come out of the cave at the beginning of the game. I can sneak up to a bandit in front of his or her face and still get a Sneak Attack with 100 sneak. The Sneak Perks aren't all useful, so don't waste your perks like I did. Don't bother with the silent roll. I've honestly never used it once. The x15 dagger sneak attack is a must. I'll elaborate on that a bit more in another point.
  
  
• Don't find weapons, make them. Pump perks into Blacksmithing. I have all the light armour perks and I'm working on getting to the Daedra for the weapons. Daedric Bows are ridiculously powerful and it's easier to make them than it is to find them. Not to mention you'll have a stockpile of Dragon Scales and Bones by the time you get to 100 that will allow you to make a shit load of dragon armour to sell.
  
  
• Join the Dark Brotherhood. When you do, you get the Shroud armour. As with the thieves guild, the boots muffle your movement, which is invaluable to a stealth character. But the Gauntlets are the important part. They double your backstab damage. Coupled with the x15 and x6 Dagger/Blade sneak damage I have, this now means I do x30 with a backstab from a dagger and x12 damage with a backstab from a blade. Using a bow for a Sneak Attack is good, but your enemies will instantly start searching for you if you sneak attack with a bow or sword. This doesn't happen with a dagger, and the daggers have a much faster attack, so you can get 2 sneak hits in before you're found, meaning you basically have x60 damage on your dagger if you do this. Ridiculously useful.
  
  
• Throw Voice. This is a shout you can learn from a wall where Krosis, the Dragon Priest can be found. You fight the Dragon at the Wall and the Dragon Priest too, but if you beat both, you get a treasure chest, a Dragon Priest Mask and all 3 words of the Throw Voice command. It's a whisper that makes your enemies think you're coming from wherever you shoot it. Perfect for distracting them while you sneak attack their shit :L And it regenerates in 5 seconds. As far as I know it's the only shout where the time gets less with each level. I could be wrong there though.
  
  
• Finish the Thieves Guild. The Shadowcloak of Nightingale you get for finishing the main thieves quest is great. It allows you to be invisible while sneaking for 2 minutes a day.

That's all I can think of right now. If anybody has any other tips, fire away.

Sneak is so useful in this game. Last night I decided to finally do the quest for the college of Winterhold where you recover the books. So the last part of the quest sees you enter a room with 'The Teller' standing there and you begin to talk to her. So, I said that I'm not leaving here without the books and when the dialogue ended and she was trying to attack me, I noticed I was in sneak mode and she couldn't find me. Ended up 1 hitting her with my bow then laughing.

quote swk3000

Finally, getting Daedric weapons requires you to waste Perk Points. You're picking up the perks for Dwarven, Orcish, and Ebony equipment, but you never use them, so the perks are wasted. Frankly, I'd stick with Glass weapons, since they're the best you can get without blowing 3 perks that are going to do absolutely nothing for you.

Can I just say that the ebony perk is far from wasteful. Before I made a daedric bow, I had an ebony one for a good 8/9 levels which served me fantastically, not to mention the dual ebony swords I'm using right now which pretty much obliterate most enemies within a few swishes.

Or you know, you could do away with hunting/blowing perks and time for weapons. Just level up your Conjuration and use Bound Bow like I do. I got the idea from someone here, who can probably explain it better than I do, I think it was Twilight?

I took Illusion for the Silent Casting perk so I can summon the bow anywhere without alerting people, but it isn't necessary, if you get the perk that allows you to use Bound Bow with both hands, the bow lasts for 3 minutes, more than enough time.

The Bound Bow, is a base level Daedric Bow that is summoned with 100 Bound Arrows, which are Daedric arrows. The Bow's damage takes ranks from Conjuration and Archery, so it does more damage than a fully upgraded Daedric Bow regardless.

My Bound Bow does a base damage of 96 with a Conjuration of 54 and an Archery of 78, that's without the x3 bonus from Sneak Attack. Imagine what it'll be when my Conjuration and Archery are 100?

I think it becomes available for purchase when your Conjuration is at 50.

I bought it in Understone Keep in Markarth.

I use a bow. I only use a bow. Right now it is an ebony bow with 20 shock damage. It's good enough for everything. I've got 100 sneak and about 97 archery.

I make sure to stay far enough away from dudes that I can sneak around a corner or into a deep shadow after hitting them. I take my time and work out the best places to hide before starting a rumble. The aura detection shout is useful for finding out where dudes are first, but can alert them if you're close. I only have the first level of it though.

Marked for Death is also good if you get detected by a boss-level dude for a stand up fight that you can't escape. And against dragons.

another item you can get to help your stealth is the ebony armor that you can get from a bandit leader when you finish a daedric demon quest . when you kneel down it turns you into a black shadow and also muffles your movement . and on top of that it poisons people who attack you . i upgraded it to legendary which ended up providing the same armor number as my dragon bone armor at legendary .

well that sucks .

now that makes sense