Setting style of UITableViewCell when using iOS 6 UITableView dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:forIndexPath:

I know you said you didn't want to create a subclass, but it looks inevitable. Based on the assembly code while testing in the iOS 6.0 simulator, UITableView creates new instances of UITableViewCell (or its subclasses) by performing

[[<RegisteredClass> alloc] initWithStyle:UITableViewCellStyleDefault reuseIdentifier:<ReuseIdentifier>]

In other words, the style sent (UITableViewCellStyleDefault) appears to be hard-coded. To get around this, you will need to create a subclass that overrides the default initializer initWithStyle:reuseIdentifier: and passes the style you wish to use:

- (id)initWithStyle:(UITableViewCellStyle)style reuseIdentifier:(NSString *)reuseIdentifier
{
    // ignore the style argument, use our own to override
    self = [super initWithStyle:UITableViewCellStyleValue1 reuseIdentifier:reuseIdentifier];
    if (self) {
        // If you need any further customization
    }
    return self;
}

Also, it might be better to send registerClass:forCellReuseIdentifier: in viewDidLoad, instead of doing it every time a cell is requested:

- (void)viewDidLoad
{
    [super viewDidLoad];
    [self.tableView registerClass:<RegisteredClass> forCellReuseIdentifier:<ReuseIdentifier>];
}

dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier isn't deprecated so you aren't required to use the new dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:forIndexPath:.

Use the new way along with the appropriate register method (in viewDidLoad) if you are using a custom cell class but use the old way if you want to use one of the UITableViewCellStyle enums.

You can avoid an extraneous subclass by using the storyboard interface builder:

1. In the Storyboard view, select the table view cell prototype cell (on the table view)
2. In the Utilities view, in the Attributes inspector, modify the Style value
3. (Optionally) Modify other values such as Selection and Accessory

The new iOS 6.0 dequeueReusableCellWithIdentifier:forIndexPath: does use those values when allocating new cells and returning them. (Tested on an iOS 6.0 compilation using Xcode 4.5.2)