During the discussion of whether or not each race in this game should have unique perks (as they have in past es games), the primary opposing factor was one of balance: if each race has unique perks, players will feel forced into playing specific race/class combinations to maximize effectiveness.

The fact that each alliance has different races also created issues - like the dominion or covenant not having the tactical advantage of a race that can breathe underwater, or bretona having heavy magic resist and altmer being weak to magic, creating an imbalance between the two in pvp.



So, the idea struck me - why not forgo racial perks and simply allow players to choose their character's birthsign, as we've been able to in past es games? this would mean that ever race has access to the same potential perks - both a nord and a high elf could pick the tower sign, for example.

Of course, because we have so few action bar slots, all of the birthsigns which use active effects would need to be altered into passive bonuses (for example, the shadow sign - which normally grants invisibility for 30 seconds - could be changed into a passive stealth bonus). The effects of each sign would also have to be lessened to have less influence on combat, and balanced out to one another.