I was looking through uesp to decide which race I will use for which playthrough. Since there are a lot of "Which race should I pick" threads, I decided to share my thoughts. I will briefly discuss each races traits and skills (* indicates the +10 skill).

Generally, when picking a race, I would look for traits that fit the playing style I am planning, and check the skills only as a decision helper. I you have any remarks or corrections, please share them.

Altmer
+50 Magicka
A trait that does not scale with level. A Breton mage could catch up in five levels (if the Altmer chooses to spend more points in HP or SP), but it still gives you a good head start. Do we know the starting Magicka? Starting Magicka is 100, so it's a 50% bonus at level one.
Highborn: Once per day, tenfold magicka regeneration for 60 seconds
Now we are talking business. When you run out of MP in a long fight, this can save your ass. Could be covered by Alchemy as well, but this is a nice extra.
6* Magic Skills
Optimal for a full mage.

Argonian
Resist Disease 50%
I never regarded diseases as a problem, and this trait still doesn't save you from carrying cure potions.
Water Breathing
Neat when exploring underwater dungeons, otherwise useless.
Histskin: Once per day, tenfold health regeneration for 60 seconds
I'm not sure whether this will make a difference during battle, depends on how fast it is. Might be worth multiple health potions, though.
2 Magic, 4* Stealth Skills
Okay for sneaky styles, I'm not sure how usefull Alteration and Restoration will be.

Bosmer
Resist Disease 50%
See above.
Resist Poison 50%
Does this include all poisons (i.e. drain health), or just poison damage? If the former, this might be really good.
Command Animal: Once per day, force an animal to be your ally for 60 seconds
Might be handy if there are animals in dungeons, I don't think you'll need this often in the open world. Except when facing a dragon, but 60s might be a bit short for that.
1* Combat, 5 Stealth Skills
I'm suprised they don't have magic, since they are elves and all. On the other hand, my assassins in Morrowind and Oblivion both were Bosmer. The skills are exactly what I would choose for an assassin again, so it seems to make sense.

Breton
Magic Resistance 25%
Seems good to me.
Dragonskin: Absorb 50% of the magicka from hostile spells for 60 seconds (once per day)
With this, the protection against magic is quite high. Absorb is a nice gimmick, but spells that will refill a significant amount of MP will probably also kill you.
4* Magic, 2 Stealth Skills
They are not as magicy as Altmer, get it ? No points on destruction, but for a mage this will level fast anyway, so I don't see a problem.

Dunmer
Resist fire 50%
Nice feature, will give you an advantage in some battles, but nothing to build a strategy upon.
Ancestor's Wrath: Once per day, shroud self in fire for 60 seconds, causing nearby enemies to take 8 points of fire damage per second.
This doesn't seem to scale with level. I don't know if 8 points damage is making any difference at lvl 50.
4* Magic, 2 Stealth Skills
I'd have expected a combat skill as well. They seem to be less spell-swordy and more sneak-magicly this time.

Imperial
Increased gold from containers
Wait, what?
Voice of the Emperor: Once per day, calm nearby enemies for 60 seconds.
Handy when you are surrounded by too many enemies.
3 Combat, 3* Magic Skills
No speech? Skills seem like a good spellsword to me.

Khajiit
Khajiit claws do 15 points of damage
Does not scale with level, but H2H doesn't scale anyway. I know we can punch others to get information, so here Khajiits have an advantage. I don't know if H2H is feasible for real combat. Even if it is, you would need heavy armor. That doesn't fit into a playing style I would expect for a Khajiit.
Eye of Night: Improved night vision for 60 seconds.
Nice, but unless Skyrim is darker than Oblivion, mostly useless.
2 Combat, 4* Stealth Skills
Good assassin. If you're really good at killing, you won't need armor. I don't know how dragons think about this, though.

Nord
Resist Frost 50%
See Dunmer.
Battlecry: Once a day, cause target to flee for 30 seconds.
This targets only a single enemy? So flee is supposed to be better than calm (since Imperials can calm a group). Don't know what to make of that.
4* Combat, 2 Stealth Skills
With +10 in 2handed, the +5 in 1handed seems a bit wasted. I wouldn't have expected Light Armor and Speech, but overall fits a light warrior.

Orc
Berserker: Once a day, deal double damage while taking half damage for 60 seconds.
Nice.
5* Combat, 1 Magic Skill
Heavy warrior w/o Archery. I like enchanting idea.

Redguard
Resist Poison 50%
See above.
Adrenaline Rush: Once per day, tenfold stamina regeneration for 60 seconds.
In Oblivion, with zero stamina you would only do 50% damage. This trait is usefull if you do a lot of special moves.
4* Combat. 2 Magic Skills
Redguards with magic? WTF? Interesting concept, though: Alteration instead of armor.

For the Dunmer, it seems as though Ancestor's Wrath might actually be useful. Huge improvement from previous games.

Starting magicka and health and stamina is at 100 points. So the altmer bonus of 50 pts is seemingly quite huge.

On the whole, eh, idk.. Seems like the Altmers are perfectly suited for a mage build - far far more so than any other race (the bretons seem kinda 'meh' with just 25% resistance, and the two magics the Argonians get are pretty bad schools), but then again the Altmer are extremely unappealing from lore & appearance viewpoint.

Thinking of either a Breton or Imperial for a spellsword. I might just go with the Imperial and hope for the best.

I am very stoked to play my Axe and Board / Master Smith Orcish Warrior now. Definitely wasn't expecting a boost to Enchant, but it's awesome to see.

I'm going to be silly and say Dunmer are still balanced warriors. Balanced by lack of buffs. So really, they could pick whatever they want, if pure-Destruction wasn't their playstyle forte.

iirc, Redguards hate specific magics: Soulstealing, Daedraloving, and Mindcontrolling. basically Conjuration and Illusion. I can't handwave why they're suddenly buffed with the others, but ... yeah.

Yeah, I not sure yet what my mage will be. Will depend on how weird altmer look, they don't seem to be so yellow this time, that's a plus.

That should be 4 magic and 2 Stealth - Alchemy is now considered a stealth skill.

im gonna be doing a altmer with heavy armour and one handed blade


u mad?

I do love how altmer have none of that silly elemental weaknesses. A highelfen battlemage feels a lot safer to use now.

Altmer OP >_<

Right. I'm still getting used to this.

Good Thread

Im making a Nord battlemage.
They are naturally talented warriors so that's not an issue, however I think ill be concentrating on leveling my magic in order to keep up from what ive seen up there ^^^

Still rolling my orc shaman, woooh!

So does this mean you are limited to the 6 skills associated with your race or are those just bonuses? Example: Can a Breton use combat skills?

Redguards have been gimped since Oblivion. I don't know why Bethesda decided to muddy up their lore. You take the most martial race and give them magic abilities more so than Orc or Nord? Alteration and Destruction? I can see maybe 1 magic skill like Nord/Orc but two? When they were known to detest magic? Then water down their racial bonus and take away their disease resist. Alteration should have been an Armour skill.

Yeah, I am saying foul.

Seems like they improved a lot

Well you started off nice describing the benefits of the racial skills and traits then you branched off in what your opinion is of what they should have and totally showed disregard for what are some very good combinations of traits which you didn't even give a thought to mention especially Redguards. Well I shouldn't complain I didn't click on this thread expecting any less but it would be nice to have someone make a thread on all each race brings to the table instead on the usual "oh this isn't what I'm used too and change is bad". Sorry if i sound like I'm attacking you but that's just my opinion.

Edit: As for what I think of the races I think Orc hands down is out of every races league. I mean double damage and half taken, Jesus and if this includes magic which i think it does for 60 seconds, wow. The heavy armor is nice but both 2hand and 1hand is kinda bleh. I think the lore makes them out to be very good enchanters but u need the school to enchant right? So restoration the buffing skill would be nice for them instead of both 1and2handers. No magic resistance, sadface. I like that they have both smithing and enchanting because I plan on having both. Block is ok, I like that blocking with a weapon still slows time with the perk as a shield does, but having to equip your magic instead of using it with weapon in hand before makes me shy away from the skill. Guess I'll have to wait and see how fluid it works out.

Let me clarify on my skills evaluation:

I am discussing the skills as if the player chooses exactly the skills of the race. As already said, the skills are only of minor importance when choosing a race. If you plan a playing style, it totally doesn't matter if your race doesn't buff your favorite skill. If you use a skill very often, it levels fast anyway. If you want to power level, it might even be better if your race doesn't increase your main skills.



You can choose all the skills you want.

My mage is going to be and always Breton.

That's why I said "please share your remarks", I can't think of everything. I did not say that the Reguard skills were bad, but, as others said as well, it's quite surprising.
So if you have anything to add to this list, please do.

Seriously, why is everyone complaining that Argonians are overpowered?
I don't think the 1-2-handed think is bad. It's just 5 points wasted, but this way you can choose your favorite.

I would never consider playing orcs, redguards, or argonians, regardless of stats/skills/abilities.
I would consider bosmer, altmer, breton, imperial, and khajiit.
I prefer nord or dunmer, and dunmer are ugly this time around.

Nice thread. But personally for me I don't care about racials, I'll pick the race which looks the way I want my Character to look.

Oh you Orcs, you beautiful green juggernauts. I wonder if the double damage also effects spells as well?

So they are specialising the skills you can choose now?

I have seen this "playstyles"-thread, will it even be possible to play all of those?
At least not with any race, amirite?