I have 8, I play 1 main, then have a tank, healer and PVP toon. I also have 2 dps magblade and stamblade that I leveled for the hell of it and rarely use, aside from once a day random dungeon for the xp bump. The last 2 are just bank alts, but they do have full saddle bags so I made sure they were combo's I might play eventually, will likely make them crafters just for the extra writs.
--- HuntGod ---
Officer of the Unrepentant
www.unrepentantgaming.com
I have 12 characters. Stam/mag dd of each, a tank and an extra sorc. I try to gold out bis gear for my top 6 dd's, 3 stam and 3 mag. The rest have the ok gear on them so that they can manage pledges and such.
As a self diagnosed Alt aholic, I promised myself I would only make 1 character. I started with a Sap tank from console release and I made my first Alt a Stam sorc when IC was released.
Once they removed vet rank grinding the flood gates opened. I made one of everything except mag sorc and I became a jack of all trades and master of none. I didnt have the time to grind out all the BIS gear or the money to gold every build out. It became a burden.
This August I created a new account and left my max CP account with the hopes of creating only 1 character and sticking with it. I went back to my first love, nightblade tank.
One or two at one time. Most characters exist to explore ideas.
Tasear sorc healer
Sinful the innvcible shield tank watches other healers.
Wind Caller my mistake on were wolf tank.
Gift of the moonlight my defensive healer
Taintless Shadow my killer healer
Faithless Keeper valyire healer
Moonlight Saint my caving to meta healer but in own style... this time.
2-3. I have two PvE characters (a healer and a dps, because I'm not interested in tanking), and a third PvP character seems like it might be different enough from the previous two for me to not feel redundant playing it. I feel like making more characters than that will result in using them for content that's repetitive enough compared to what I use the others for that I wouldn't be interested.
@Be11amy
PC | NA | CP340
Rhase | Dunmer | Magplar DPS
Jo'lli | Khajiit | Warden Healer
Regularly used and first in line to get new gear:
1. Mag DPS - Altmer Sorc (Main + Crafter)
2. Tank - Orc DK (Secondary crafter - Writs only)
3. Healer - Breton Templar (Tertiary crafter - Writs only)
4. Stam DPS - Bosmer Sorc - BattleGrounds Toon
Sometimes used..
5. Thief - Khajiit NB - Only for Motif Farming. May convert to Cyro Gankblade
6. Healz tank - Argonian Magden - Still sorting this guy out. Aim is to get him to a situation where he can do VHM 4 man content with 3 coordinated DPS.
Never used
7. DPS - Altmer Magden - Initally thought to be made into cryomancer with gimmick build using Winterborn and IA.. did not work.
8. DPS - Redguard Stamdk - Still leveling.. still sitting at 33. Honestly have no idea whether I am going to level him, delete him, or race change him to Dunmer for MagDK depending on the next update.
Two, used to be six but I retired them, quality over quantity, besides, my magic Templar and stam...ish dk just have by far and away the coolest looking skills
I made a DPS templar when I got the game. I didn't like the idea of a melee magicka character, but I stuck with it since it was the only archetype I enjoyed in the game and because templars were strong at the time.
Then warden came out. With druid being my favourite RPG archetype, I made the switch to warden DPS as my main. I intended to turn my templar into a healer, but that never happened. I just turned them into a dedicated farmer by respeccing into a stamina build.
I just don't have time to deck out two characters in BiS gear. Just logging out of one character and onto another makes me want to close the game due to all the loading (even with my relatively quick SSD load times). All the work needed to get a character to end game level is also grueling. Mages Guild, Fighters Guild, Undaunted, mount training, skill point farming, etc. take forever and are insanely boring since you've already done them before.
Respect to everyone who has multiple characters. I don't know how you did it.
I've got >15 max level and I regularly take the majority of them to dungeons. One of them is my dedicated quester+crafter that will probably always see regular use while I still play the game. As for the rest... I have a favorite tank-heal that rarely idles for long and I try to keep 1 dedicated tank, heal, and 1 dps ready for difficult PVE content as well as at least 1 able to hit vma leaderboard. In this way, I can run just about any PVE content in any role well enough to carry a pal who might otherwise find the content difficult while maintaining the freedom to pop onto a far greater variety of roles to fill specific group niches or craved playstyles in easier content.
The ones I don't play varies with buffs, nerfs, and personal preference, but I'd say there's are always at least 3 sitting around unplayed for weeks or months at a time. One or two are always an experimental build that flopped but I haven't abandoned the idea of tweaking (even if I've clearly abandoned the reality of that!) and the other is a dps that feels too repetitive compared to a stronger build.
I had five for a while, now six. When I first started the game, I thought it may be fun to have a stam/mag version of each class, but it was WAY too much to manage. I now have one character for each type of PVE role, and a PVP character for each type of PVP mode (AvA Cyrodiil, solo/small group Imperial City, Battlegrounds). The PVP characters still need Undaunted maxed out, and the Battlegrounds sorc is new/levelling; otherwise, all six are fully geared and ready to go for the content they were designed for. Since I’m focusing on roles, each character feels very different.
OP, if you’re struggling (and I don’t blame you — fifteen characters!), I suggest doing a cull. Try playing with one character for each role you want to fulfill.