This discussion amazed me. Honestly I tough that the battlemage style would represent the majority. Instead stealth is clearly winning with brute warrior right behind! =o
In personal opinion I prefer a pure Mage! The felling I get from anticipating a battle and starting to cast protective spells, while laying runes around and summoning my fellow atronaches (or dead enemies hehe) is just amazing! Battles as a pure mage are nothing else but epic! Having the constant need to keep an eye out for you magicka bar while making sure that you keep enemies away from you (else you'll get 2 shooted) adds a interesting "brain require" tactic to the game. On the other hand playing with the mind of your enemies making them slaughter each others like puppets while you set everything and every one on fire is just astonishing...^^
My favorite character I have made was an awesome "ranger" type. I was lucky and got an Ebony Bow at an early level and enchanted it with some frost damage on top of it. I had a lot of fun sneaking into rooms and hitting for 6 times damage, taking out 4 - 5 people without even being spotted.
I will admit, now that I made a Dark Elf that is a pure mage...dual casting fireballs has been way too much fun! Taking out most enemies with a single ball of death I will admit has been pretty damn sweet. I still have to slightly favor my "Ranger" type character over the Mage...but they both are pretty fun to play.
The warrior style was how I started to play most games, and then I just got bored. Hack n Slash is fun for a while, but I like the diversity of attacks you can use with the magic. Plus, if you get good enough in conjuration, your bound swords give you the opportunity to use the hack n slash! (I only really use the bound weapons for soul trap...but thats besides the point).
They all have their pros and cons, but the stealthy style has been a lot more enjoyable for me!
I dislike warrior, mainly because they get boring for me after about level 10 (although smashing skulls in with a giant warhammer is very entertaining) and seem much too straightforward, with less opportunities for awesome power-plays. Mage is pretty fun, and the special effects make it great. However, as mages are incredibly OP imo, my favorite pure class is the stealth build. The poisons, the awesome killcams, the agility, the near-deaths... I just love them so much. Stealth ftw.
I think I either prefer the more barbarian/Nord method of fighting, where you use heavy two handed weapons and light armour for loads of power attacks, or the simple but effective sword and shield, maybe bolstered by some magic to spice things up a bit. I'd like to throw sneak into those mixes but its only really usable for that barbarian style of gameplay.
My favourite character was an assassin, and I really enjoyed playing it. It's just amazing how effective it is, from the early levels to the highers, where it was no more an assassin ^^ It slowly became a warrior, because I just had explored every side of my assassin then. So I tried other ways to play, and it became...a tank.
PS: I don't know if there's a prsentation topic, but if there is one, could someone please tell me where it is, I didn't find it...
PPS: Sorry for the mistakes I may do :)
That having been said, I think that stealth skills are the most fun in the game. The times that have made me laugh out loud or sneer in fierce self-satisfaction, have always had to do with outwitting an opponent, not with smashing them or burning them down.
I can never get away from Stealth--even when I try to build non-stealthy characters. It just seems to me that if you enter a crypt, no matter who you are, you're going to tiptoe and lower your voice. So, no matter who I'm playing, my stealth skill always creeps up.
It's very hard for me to decide, but I have found that Stealth builds keep the game enjoyable for me. There is always that chance that you could get spotted. Also, I tend to build Cloth/Alteration > Lightarmor builds when I go stealth.
That said, I have tried various Warrior and Magic build, naming a few eg, Non-Stealth-Archer build, or Dual-Axe-Lightarmor build, or even Archer-Conjurer build. In the end, doing the same hack and slash or blasting magic everywhere in a frenzy and clearing rooms in seconds, just feels a bit same-old same-old thing every dungeon.
Biggest problems with stealth for me tho, is Dragon fights, as i tend to not use followers who break the element of surprise. :D
I am currently playing a dunmer Thalmor playthrough and i must say that if u get aug fire 2/2 and fear fire perk playing is much more fun. nothing beats going into a bandit underground camp and use flames to make one bandit flee from my flames and then when the bandit goes to his other bandit friends (that are eating lunch) fleeing you zap him with lightning bolt causing the body to go flying. then the other see you and you show them why their friend was fleeing.
I am actually making a build that is a hybrid off all three trees. He is a warrior spellsword meaning he uses two handed\ real warrior weapons and destruction magic. he is also tactical (stealth) and uses illusion to make distractions to sneak by or to narrow down his key enemies.
I usually end up going stealth regardless of how I prefer to play, at least that's been the case in both Oblivion and Skyrim. In the early parts of both games I'm very cautious and end up sneaking everywhere. Sneaking also has the advantage of an "early warning system" since the crosshairs show if you're detected. And sneaking a sniping also takes usually takes out enemies pretty quickly. On subsequent play throughs I'm more comfortable with the game and then try a variety of different styles.
If you had of asked me when I first bought sky rim, I would have without a second thought said, "Stealth." Though I much more prefer playing Hybrid builds, particularly Nightblade-esque characters, being able to lob fireballs, fight with a sword or backstab brings me the most enjoyment, the one thing that remains consistent is being unable to live without stealth.
I have three mains. A straight warrior, a pure mage illusionist/conjuror and a non-combat thief. I'd have to say the warrior is the most "fun" in an adventurer sort of way as I can wade into any encounter and come out almost unscathed. Achieving his goals require grit and strength.
The thief is very enjoyable as I get to sneak into dungeons and listen to what the NPC's are doing...the conversations they have, their habits and routines. A warrior misses a lot of this as the creatures immediately react to his presence. I play this character when I feel that combat becomes a grind. I can sneak in and sneak out of a dungeon with the most expensive loot and hardly have to fight a creature at all. His high speech skill even allows him to bypass quests all together. The thief and the mage showed me that I can level and achieve my in game goals without killing if I don't want to. I use to "calm" and enemy, then summon a daedra, then lay a fire trap...but then I realized that wasn't my goal--be that a treasure, or a place, or a person, a thief and a mage can accomplish what they want without combat. Combat for the warrior is his means to his goal, which is great, but not necessary for all classes.
The wizard is fun as he can fully control his surroundings unlike either of the other two. He can calm a room full of bears and just walk on through to his objective, or he can summon a daedra and lay down a frenzy and watch his enemies do his work for him.
Quest wise, the warrior was the one who became dragon born, the thief does all the city quests and the wizard discovers lost artifacts.
My fighter became a lord and has his own plot of land and a tamed dragon. My thief runs the guild and has more gold than he knows what to do with and my wizard is an arch-mage who explores lost dwemer dungeons and is currently searching skyrim for recipes for potions and the atronoch forge.