I'm not coming at this from a story perspective, but rather that of someone who wants the game to be newbie friendly.

Imperials have traditionally been the race to pick if you weren't sure what you wanted to be, having average stats. This is an ideal position to have a 'beginner' race in an MMO, something with no real weaknesses, but no real strengths either, as such nearly every MMO with races has one (generally as the 'human' race of the game).

This isn't a cliche to throw off, but rather a useful tool to help people get acclimated to the game.

As such it's odd to see that they're going to be unplayable in the game.

So, I'm curious as to why throw 'em out, not for story reasons, but for gameplay ones?

Story-wise, you could probably get away with a handwave about having Imperial Refugees available to one or all of the factions.

Story and Lore Wise it doesn't make much sense that the Imperials are non playable. But I don't really play them anyways so while it doesn't bother me I am sure it bothers others.

Imperials were first introduced in Morrowind. Arena, Daggerfall, and Battlespire all did not have Imperials as a playable race.

As those were the first three titles of TES, and that TES Online takes place in the 2nd Era, it makes loads of sense. So, basically it's purely for story reasons.

Besides, the Dark Elves already fill the role of an "all around" race. They traditionally have skills in combat, stealth, and magic. They were pushed away from this role as Imperials were introduced.

The playable Imperials we are used to in the core series are the Empire of the Septim dynasty. TESO takes place roughly 364 years before Tiber Septim takes the throne. So at the start of TESO we are looking at an Empire that will be extinct long before the one we are accustomed to comes to power.

That doesn't mean there are not people who live in Cyrodiil at this time. They would be the Imperial race. During the reign of the Septims the Imperials were not playable and were not conceived of as a race in Arena, Daggerfell and Battlespire despite those games being set in the Septim Empire.

Races do not just pop out of nowhere, so we can just pretend that because they were reinventing a lot of the lore when Morrowind was released that Imperials in some form or another always existed. Even though thy were not mentioned in those games prior to Morrowind. The Reman dynasty and the Allesian Empire consisted of Imperials. Even though there is no real empire at this time the humans who normally inhabit Cyrodiil would still be a race and they WOULD object to Daedra and undead traipsing around their homeland. Besides other Imperials could easily be residing in other provinces at this time. They may not be called imperials but thy would be the same group of people who rose up and defeated the Ayleids and created the Nine Divines.

Because it's hard to implement the ability to talk down a monster.

LOL

yah by the looks of their racial "abilities" in skyrim, Bethesda/Zen don't like them anymore XD

Orcs were also introduced with Morrowind as a playable race.

A tenth race doesn't fit well with the three faction. The dev could just split Cyrodiil in three and put them in the factions as antagonist cyrodiil knigdoms but it' be lame. Better to be a non-playable-faction IMO

this !!!

That's part of the problem. The factions should not be race restricted. Imperials could fit into all the factions in any case as a neutral race that decides who they join while the other races get to pick who they want to be as well. The races do not stay put in one place and people do turn against their own. There should be a mechanic that lets you switch factions at least once albeit through a difficult and complex quest or series of quests. To ensure the factions mostly have their appropriate races as the majority make a small penalty for other races to be in that faction. That's realistic. Initially a starting penalty of increased prices and disposition drops for NPCs that decreases as you rank up in that faction or something similar. That makes sense. People would be distrustful of someone from a race they are at war with. Instead of this kindergarten idea of all the people in x race belong to x faction because since they look similar they must think the same.

Maybe they are saving them for the first expansion?

Most probably.

Why save the generic 'human' race for the expansion, then? It's supposed to be the one most balanced for beginners, so they pull it out and save it for people who've played the game long enough to want an expansion?

Wouldn't the best races to save for expansions be something like the Khahjiit or Argonians?

Maybe, but as soon as the choice is made, you don't have much choice? You can't split them in three, and Cyrodiil being the pvp central ground, it makes much more sense for imperials to be non-playable (but central foes). Gameplay+lore made this decision.

Something to do with that Daedric asshat Molag Bal and Mannimarco the 'Incredibly easy to 1 shot' King of Necromancy.