Karate-cat anecdote. I have the Immersive Armour mod on, and crafted myself a Barbarian set. It looks rather nice indeed, and has decent stats. It did not impress a guard I met, however.
-"Wörd åf advise, friend. Dat armour wånt gif mutch protektion in a real fight."
-"But Khajiit feels pretty... And Khajiit do not do 'real fight'..."
-"Well, to eech der åwn. Suppose it hälps your agility, does it?"
-"No, but it turns heads. Now let go of your wallet."
It is fantasy, after all, and more to the point, it is Elder Scrolls. I shall laugh at your arrows, absorb them and fire them right back!
Unarmed damage as Khajiit starts off very good, at 22 damage at level 1 vs most weapon, magic and ranged options come nowhere near that until a couple of perks are invested.
Of course, your unarmed damage never goes up, unless you wear heavy armor, and take Fists of Steel, which increases your unarmed damage by 0.5x Gauntlet armor rating. I believe it caps at something like 42, normally.
Some mods, especially perk mods, attempt to overhaul unarmed into a viable build. Ordinator is a good example. Here are the perks available that affect unarmed in Ordinator:
- 20 - Iron Fist (3) - Increases unarmed damage by 5/15/25% of your current Stamina, and you gain Light Armor experience when using unarmed attacks in combat. Requires two free hands.
- 40 - Sweeping Wind - Unarmed power attacks do 25% more damage. Additionally, if your movement speed is increased, they do 2% damage per 1% movement speed. Requires two free hands.
- 50 - Rushing Tide - Unarmed attacks grant 10% increased Stamina regeneration and 5% movement speed for 8 seconds. This effect stacks. Requires two free hands.
- 70 - Hissing Dragon - You may choose a damage type (fire, frost, shock, poison, disease or sun). Unarmed attacks unleash a shockwave that deals the chosen damage type to all targets in front of you. Requires two free hands. Does not activate while sneaking.
- 90 - Breaking Waves - Unarmed attacks have 15% chance of a critical strike that deals critical damage equal to 40% of your current Stamina. If you are affected by Wardancer, every hit is a critical strike. Requires two free hands.
- 40 - Dynamic Entry - Performing a silent roll increases your damage with one-handed weapons by 50% and unarmed damage by 40 points for 2 seconds.
That is an idea. I am rather worried about slotting in such a big mod in a running game, however. Next time, perhaps. For Karate-Cat Mk. II. I will lose out on skill points, but it is not exactly difficult to level up in Skyrim.
I think there was also a punching enchantment that increases unarmed damage.
Though I think you can only get it from one or two unique items in the game, so if you've already sold them (instead of disenchanting them) you're out of luck.
Yes, that was my idea, sort of. Load up the game editor, make a little mod with a few rings with that enchantment on and spread them out, so I can scale it upwards as I please. There are still the magic punch gloves in Riften, but unless you invest early, it takes a while for enchanting to be very reliable, I find.
They also have an orphanage where you can murder an old lady and nobody cares you did it.
I assumed they hate her, too. They can probably hear it all accross town when she gets the belt out. Poor little children.
I usually wear my Thalmor 'disguise', but I doubt anyone would be fooled.
I must say, come to think of it, that the Special Edition actually was worth the effort to update. Not something I'd pay for, mind, but the nice new effects did quite the difference to me. It looks awfully more pretty and colourful now. Particularly boring old Riften. It is a minor facelift, but it does make the difference. It's odd, I usually do not notice things like that.