So I was wondering, since Zenimax had the brilliant idea of completely wiping the Imperial off the playable character list, what race would be the closest equal to Imperial culture and way of thinking? I was thinking breton....but Im not sure. Really wish they would just let us use them as a race of refugees......

Nord? I dunno.. They're fairly generic.

No one has the exact same views but ideally it would be the Nords. Possibly the Bretons but then again that is a whole other bag of cookies.

So yeah, go Nord.

The Imperial culture and way of thinking takes a lot of ideas from the ancient roman empire, their culture, way of thinking, everythin, they are no more generic than the nords, which are based off of the ideas from vikings and germanic peoples.

Redguard

Thats what I was thinking too....Nords are more barbarian / germanic, breton are more like the knights in france and england.....hrm.....

Sigh...This is why I hate the aesthetics applied to the Nords and Imperials.

They actually have very little in common with the Romans or Vikings and Germanic people when you get down to it. No more than the Nords are similar to the Egyptians or the Imperials the Chinese. There are similarities across the board. The thing borrowed the heaviest from the Romans and Vikings was aesthetic and little else.

Generic does not apply to a single race in TES. However the games tend to only give a cursory surface level representation so I cannot blame people for being ignorant of the true depth of the various races in TES, which tend to be found in books and dialogue.

Which is why I love the Dunmer. Good luck nailing them down to one or two cultural inspirations and being even remotely right...

Dunmer = Aztecs. And Im sticking to it. No giant mushroom houses, but sacrificial ceremonies and the lot, yep. Just throwing it out there =P.

Say what?

I suppose they are like the Italians because they have a criminal element?

lol. Mobster elves. Could be a ridiculous mod for skyrim

This thread can't end well. Too many lore nerds.

But this guy is asking about the aesthics, and imo redguards are most similiar to imperials, really the only differences you come across in the games i can think of is that their skin is a bit darker, they don't really like magic and they aren't as good traders. Most players don't choose their races depending on how they handle their politics and religions

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Camonna_Tong. Not ridiculous at all actually.
Ahem...there is only one big one. You silly MMO nerd.

Ahem...
@Zeppo, is your avatar from Legend of Grimrock by any chance?