Jake

My answer is pretty much the same as yours. I prefer PvE, but with everyone leveled to 50 in ESO PvP areas, and therefore no grinding required to compete, I'm sure I will have a fun time with it. That's if I actually get the game, of course.

When you get down to it, there are 3 things that determine the best race choice: 1. Starting stats 2. Racial powers 3. Racial passive effects You shouldn't care about starting stats, because those will be increased in the long run. Therefore, there are 2 races that are the "best." 1. Breton 2. Orc Why are these the best? The Breton has a natural 25% resistance to magic. This is incredibly useful both early and late game. With it, you can hit the 85% magic resistance cap without even wearing armor. You have the Breton's 25% Magic Resistance, plus 15% from Agent of Mara, plus 20% from the Alteration tree (can get up to 30% from this,) plus 25% from the Lord Stone. This makes them great for any build. They also have the Dragonskin power, and if you use it in combination with the Atronach perk and Atronach stone, you can reach 100% spell absorption. Not quite as useful as the magic resistance, but icing on the cake nonetheless. On the other hand, the Orc doesn't have a passive effect. Now, you must be thinking that the Orc power must be incredibly effective if it ties for best race and has no passive. This is correct. The Orc's Berserker Rage ability grants 60 seconds of dealing double damage while taking half damage. In a sticky situation? Activate this perk, and everyone will be dead in no time. If you don't mind cheating a bit, you can just wait 24 hours after using the ability, and use it again in your next battle. I use Bretons myself, as I always forget to utilize my racial powers at the right moments. As for the worst race, that would go to either Wood Elves or Khajiits. Sorry, Blexun. Wood Elves get a natural 50% resistance to poison and disease. Disease becomes non-existant as a werewolf, and neither disease nor poison are a problem as a vampire. Even if you don't choose to be either, poison and disease hardly ever give much trouble. As for their power, they can control an animal to fight for them. Most of the trouble you'll come across is in dungeons, where there aren't any animals. On the off chance this could be useful, there's a shout that does the same thing, anyway. Khajiits do extra unarmed damage. This is only useful for two things. First, when you are in very, very early game. Your claws will be more powerful than the starting weapons. Second, if you are going for an unarmed build, because then you'll need all the extra damage you can get. The second reason is only for a specific, low damage build, and the first isn't NEARLY a good enough reason to choose Khajiit. Their racial power is to see better in the dark. Vampires have that power. If you don't want to become a vampire, then get the candlelight spell. If you don't want to use magic, get a torch. If you want your hands free, turn up the brightness on your TV. Useless race, when you really look at it. To make a long story short, Bretons have the highest defense potential, and Orcs have the highest offense potential.

Admit it, you find the female argonians hideous as well. At least the males look somewhat attractive.

Nor I for this one.

Necromage affects Fists of Steel. Considering that very few perks increase unarmed damage, you need to get the most out of the ones that do.

This should be a very interesting build indeed. Shall we begin? Race: Khajiit (Higher unarmed damage) Sex: Male (Agent of Dibella means more melee damage to women. With this build, that's hilarious) Level: 32 Health: 320 Magicka: 100 Stamina: 200 Now for perks: As with my assassin build, we will need Necromage from... RESTORATION Novice Restoration (For Regeneration) Regeneration (For Necromage) Necromage (For the exploit) Once again, I will be putting an asterik (*) next to any perks affected. ARCHERY Nope, don't need it. HEAVY ARMOR Juggernaut (1/5) (To unlock the rest of the tree) Fists of Steel (More unarmed damage)* Well Fitted (For Tower of Strength) Tower of Strength (Stagger could ruin you in combat. Let's reduce it.) Matching Set (For Reflect Blows) Reflect Blows (Useful for close combat, which is your only method of fighting) BLOCK You can't block with your fists. TWO HANDED Your fists are not a greatsword. ONE HANDED Unfortunately, it seems perks from One Handed do not affect Unarmed. Such a shame. SMITHING Steel Smithing (To unlock the rest of the tree) Arcane Blacksmith (To get that armor enchanted as soon as possible) Dwarven Smithing (For Orcish Smithing) Orcish Smithing (For Ebony Smithing) Ebody Smithing (For Daedric Smithing) Daedric Smithing (To make the highest damage gauntlets in the game) LIGHT ARMOR You've already spent perks in Heavy Armor. SNEAK Stealth (1/5) (This will give you a 20% increase to sneak, which is huge. Investing more points only gives a 5% increase, which isn't worth it, and the rest of the tree won't benefit you.) LOCKPICKING Worthless, as I've said. PICKPOCKET While Heavy Pockets* might be useful to make up for your armor weight, it isn't worth the perks. Maybe after you finish this build. SPEECH If you REALLY want to get into character, pick up Intimidation. Otherwise, skip this tree. ALCHEMY Alchemist (5/5) (For Alchemy/Smithing/Enchanting exploit) Physician (For health potions) Benefactor (For Alchemy/Smithing/Enchanting exploit) ILLUSION/CONJURATION/DESTRUCTION I'm just gonna get these out of the way. We won't be using magic, so there's no need for them. RESTORATION Covered at the top. ALTERATION While the build doesn't account for the perk spending, you can pick up the Magic Resistance perks if you want to. I would wait until the build is finished, though. ENCHANTING Enchanter (5/5) (For Alchemy/Smithing/Enchanting glitch, and unarmed enchantment) Insightful Enchanter (For Alchemy/Smithing/Enchanting glitch, and unarmed enchantment) Corpus Enchanter (For Extra Effect) Extra Effect (Great perk that any build should get) VAMPIRISM Max it out. Hey, you're a vampire for this build; might as well make the most of it. LYCANTHROPY You don't need anything here. Once again, max it if you want to, but there's no point. Now for equipment... Head Piece: Daedric Helmet (Waterbreathing, Fortify Lockpicking) Chest Piece: Daedric Armor (Fortify Health, Fortify Stamina) Leg Piece: Daedric Boots (Muffle, Fortify Sneak) Hand Piece: Daedric Gauntlets (Fortify Unarmed, Fortify Sneak) Ring (w/ Dawnguard): Ring of the Beast Ring (Vanilla game only): Silver Ring (Fortify Unarmed, Fortify Health)Amulet: Silver Necklace (Fortify Health, Fortify Stamina) NOTE: I realize the enchantments on the helmet are crap. They are the most relevant you can place on it. Now for Powers and Active Effects. I will put the ones I believe are most helpful, though you should obviously try to collect them all. Dreak Cloak (Vampire Power) Nightingale Strife (Reward from Darkness Returns) Summon Spectral Assassin (Reward from Bound Until Death) Agent of Dibella (Reward from The Heart of Dibella) Agent of Mara (Reward from The Book of Love) Claws (Khajiit racial bonus) Dragon Infusion (Effect from Esbern's Potion, glitch makes this unobtainable, patch 1.09 should fix this) Force Without Effect (Meditation of the Words of Power) Sinderion's Serendipity (Reward from A Return To Your Roots) And that's it. This should have you destroying enemies...with your fists. Enjoy!

What I find interesting about Argonians is that they are the only race in which I find the males to be "hotter" than the females, so to speak. The males have smooth voices and calmer, more prominent facial features, while the females are just hideous all around.

Nope, sorry. If you have Dawnguard, trying to access the Skills/Magic/Items/Map screen will just bring up the werewolf perk tree. If you don't, it does nothing. Yeah, I don't think werewolves are that good. Go vampire if you want to actually take advantage of powers. Go werewolf otherwise for its disease resistance.

Dwarves went extict, don't you know the lore? Many speculate that they tried to become gods and were destroyed by the Daedric Princes. As for differences between races, you seriously think it's hard to tell the difference between Dunmer, Altmer, and Bosmer? As for the human races, I can see why people would get Breton and Imperial males confused, but the females have a noticeable height difference, and Redguards and Nords look COMPLETELY different. I like the different races, personally. They easily outclass the human/elf/dwarf layout of most fantasy. In fact, they've inspired me to make my own races in my D&D world Cicigia. So, far, I've created three. Humans. They have different skin colors depending on the region. Pretty typical. The Birdlinx Race is, as you would expect, a mix between man and bird. They are asexual, but they resemble human males in appearance. They have high pitched voices, aerodynamic bones, and are good with elemental magic. In fact, their society runs almost completely off of magic, consisting of platforms on top of towering pillars. The Jacrionic Race is a bit closer to humans. Mating is polygamic, with 1 male for every 5 females. Their body structure is also very different. The females are, on average, 5'3'', and are very muscular. They are stronger than the males. The males are, on average, 6'6'', and are tall and thin. The males are among the most intelligent of any race on Cicigia. The culture is on a continent away from the other races, and they therefore do not know about the magical arts that the Humans and Birdlinx have discovered. Instead, they have discovered a method of magic that involves runestones. The brainpower needed is so great that only the Jacrionic males can pull this type of magic off. Not even the Birdlinx can use runestone magic. In case you're wondering, the traditional magic system in Cicigia involves males using elemental magic and the females using necromancy. I came up with this by studying the differences between the male and female anatomy. Elemental magic requires thick bones to channel energy, and men have thicker bones. Necromancy requires a strong connection with the sides of the brain, and women have stronger connections between the left and right sides. (The male brain is a bit more structured, focusing its energy on one side at a time.)

An earlier post I made. Word. For. Word. I'm so flattered.

Bretons and Orcs were popular Skyrim classes among the min-maxers, having the best racial bonuses. At least move Orc to medium tier.

Is this a serious ranking based on the beta, or did you create this just to piss off Blake?

I used your suggestions for which I should remove, though. I explained in the guide why I didn't use Arcane Enchanter, and this build doesn't rely too much on poison. Believe me, your suggestions were actually a huge help in redesigning my build.

You can, as a matter of fact. If you have a follower with you, you can command them to sleep in a bed and feed on them, as well! If you have Dawnguard, you make a choice of siding between vampires and vampire hunters. (I know it's a spoiler, but c'mon, everyone knows that already.) If you side with the vampires, they offer potions of blood that you can drink on the go, though I still prefer joining the vampire hunters.

You wait until nighttime, sneak into someone's house, and feed on them. That resets you to level 1 vampirism, which means people won't attack you until you reach level 4 again.

Do you guys think this is article worthy?

Okay, so I decided to create yet another new character in Skyrim. I already made a topic about this, but I believe I need to go more into detail. This character is focused on becoming the ultimate assassin, 1-shotting nearly everything if he can get close enough without being noticed. Without further ado, here is my plan: Race: Breton (Their 25% magic resistance is useful for any build) Gender: Male (Females get better Agent of Dibella bonus, but Breton males run faster due to taller height, and I prefer playing as a male overall) Level: 52 if you have Dawnguard, 53 without it. Health: 350 Magicka: 250 Stamina: 100 Obviously, there will be points left over. Invest these into whatever attribute you feel you are lacking in. Now for the bread and butter of any Skryim build; the perks. We should start with the most important tree, which, believe it or not, is Restoration. RESTORATION Novice Restoration (For Regeneration) Regeneration (For Necromage) Necromage (For the vampire exploit) Recovery (2/2) (For your illusion spells)* Get these in that order, and as soon as you get Necromage, contract Vampirism, or Vampire Lord if you have Dawnguard. Make sure you complete the Dark Brotherhood and Companions questlines before you do this, as you cannot be a vampire for those questlines, and you have to be a vampire for the rest of the game or else your perk bonuses will disappear. Why do you need to go to all this trouble, you may ask? Simple. Necromage makes all your spells more effective against undead. As a vampire, you are, according to the game's code, labeled as undead. Not only does this make your healing spells stronger, but potions, enchantments, and even some perks count as "spells." For this reason, you want to pick up Necromage as soon as possible. Recovery is one of the perks affected, so don't pick it up until you are a necromage vampire. At 2/2, instead of recovering magicka 50% faster, you recover it about 57% faster. I will put an asterik (*) next to any other perks that are affected, so you know to wait for Necromage to get them. Now, let's go to the other trees. ARCHERY Overdraw (5/5) (Your bow is your best friend against dragons and similar enemies) Eagle Eye (What's the point of a bow if you can't snipe?) Steady Hand (2/2) (This will make sniping a breeze)* NOTE: Steady Hand is affected by Necromage, but do NOT use the exploit for it! Steady Hand slows time while you aim, and Necromage slows it down to such an extent that it's unusable. HEAVY ARMOR Please tell me you're joking. BLOCK Your primary weapons will be dual daggers; you won't need a shield. TWO HANDED See Heavy Armor. ONE HANDED Armsman (5/5) (More damage on your dagger.) Fighting Stance (Get the most out of your sneak attacks.) Dual Flurry (2/2) (EXTREMELY important in open combat)* SMITHING (w/ Dawnguard) Steel Smithing Elven Smithing Advanced Armors Glass Smithing Dragon Smithing SMITHING (Vanilla game only) Steel Smithing Dwarven Smithing Orcish Smithing Ebony Smithing Daedric Smithing Dragon Smithing NOTE: Why does Dawnguard matter? The left side of the Smithing tree is shorter, requiring less perks to get to Dragon Smithing. However, this means you miss out on Daedric Smithing, which means you cannot make Daedric Daggers, the best daggers in the vanilla game. If you have Dawnguard, however, you can use Dragon Smithing to create Dragonbone Daggers, making the left side more efficient. You may also be wondering why I didn't include Arcane Enchanter. If you really feel like you need it, take it, but I'd rather save a perk by smithing BEFORE I enchant. LIGHT ARMOR Although you will be using Light Armor, you shouldn't be getting hit very often, and it's therefore more beneficial to spend perks elsewhere. Put perks here after you get all the other perks in my guide. SNEAK Stealth (1/5) (Use muffle and fortify sneak on your armor. You just need this perk for the other perks) Backstab (For Deadly Aim) Deadly Aim (When facing bosses you cannot backstab, your first attack will usually be a sneaky bow shot. Maximize that damage.) Assassin's Blade (This is very important. With this perk, if you can sneak behind an enemy, you can one shot almost anything but bosses.) LOCKPICKING None of these perks really matter, honestly. Just buy as many lockpicks as you can. PICKPOCKET Once again, none of these really matter. If you pickpocket enough to reach 100, you can steal pretty much anything, anyway. If you REALLY feel like you need the extra space, you can spend 3 perks to get Extra Pockets*, but it's not really necessary. SPEECH Fence and Investor are moderately useful, but they're soooo high up the tree. It isn't worth wasting the perks. ALCHEMY Alchemist (5/5) (Potions are crucial to ensuring your survival on Master mode. Whenever you can, create potions of Fortify Health, Restore Health, Fortify Sneak, and maybe some resistance potions.) Physician (For stronger health potions, obviously. You're screwed if you run out of health potions.) Benefactor (For the Alchemy/Smithing/Enchanting loop, which I will post videos of at the end of this guide) ILLUSION Novice Illusion (For Illusion Dual Casting and Animage) Illusion Dual Casting (You can squeeze a lot more life out of your spells with this before buying new ones.) Animage (For Kindred Mage) Kindred Mage (For Quiet Casting) Quiet Casting (This will allow you to cast Invisibility and Muffle spells without attracting attention.) CONJURATION It's a great school of magic, but doesn't fit with the character I'm aiming for. DESTRUCTION See Heavy Armor. RESTORATION We already covered this at the top. ALTERATION As a Breton, Atronach* would be incredibly useful in combination with the racial power Dragonskin. However, considering it's the LAST ability on the tree, it isn't worth it. Magic Resistance* is also nice, but not worth the perks. Invest in it after the build is finished, if you like. The rest of the perks are for pure mages, which we are anything but. ENCHANTING Enchanter (5/5) (For the Alchemy/Smithing/Enchanting loop, covered at the end.) Fire Enchanter (Adds a bit of extra punch to your weapons) Insightful Enchanter (Great for enchanting armor with Fortify Sneak, also useful for the Alchemy/Smithing/Enchanting loop) Corpus Enchanter (For Extra Effect) Extra Effect (This doubles your enchantment slots. Do I really have to explain why you want this?) VAMPIRISM (Dawnguard only) Max this tree out, obviously. It doesn't cost level up perks to do so. LYCANTHROPY (Dawnguard only) Considering it requires no level up perks, I guess you can max this tree if you want to, but there isn't much of a point. That's all the perks. On to equipment... EQUIPMENT Right Hand: Dragonbone Dagger (Fire damage, your choice for 2nd) Left Hand: Dragonbone Dagger (Fire damage, your choice for 2nd) Bow: Dragonbone Bow (Fire damage, Paralysis) Head Piece: Krosis or Dragonscale Helmet (Fortify Archery, Fortify Illusion) Chest Piece: Dragonscale Armor (Fortify Light Armor, Fortify Illusion) Hand Piece: Ancient Shrouded Gloves Leg Piece: Dragonscale Boots (Fortify Sneak, Muffle) Ring: Silver Ring (Fortify Sneak, Fortify Archery) Necklace: Silver Necklace (Fortify Sneak, Fortify Archery) Okay, now for the Alchemy/Smithing/Enchanting Loop And we will end this with Powers and Active Effects. Powers: Dragonskin-Absorb 50% of magicka from hostile spells for 60 seconds (Breton racial power) Dread Cloak-For 60 seconds, opponents in melee range take 8 points frost damage and stamina damage per second. (Vampire power) Embrace of Shadows-You can become invisible. Improved night vision for 180 seconds. (Vampire power) Nightingale Strife-Instantly absorb 100 points of health from the target. (Complete Thieves Guild questline, other two power choices can be achieved with illusion.) Summon Spectral Assassin-Summons the ghost of the legendary assassin Lucien Lachance to fight by your side, until he's defeated. (Complete Dark Brotherhood questline) Vampire's Seduction-Creatures and people up to level 8 won't fight for 30 seconds. (Vampire power) Vampire's Servant-Reanimate a dead body to fight for you for 60 seconds. (Vampire power) Vampire's Sight-Improved night vision for 60 seconds. (Vampire power) Vampire Lord-Transform into a Vampire Lord. Use the Revert Form power to change back.(Vampire Lord power, Dawnguard only) Now for the passive bonuses listed under Active Effects. I am not sure if Necromage affects these, so play it safe and get these bonuses after you become a vampire. Agent of Dibella-You do 10% more melee damage to the opposite sex. (Reward from The Heart of Dibella) Agent of Mara-15% Resist Magic (Reward from The Book of Love) Ancient Knowledge-Knowledge gained from the Lexicon gives you a 25% bonus while wearing Dwarven armor and Blacksmithing increases 15% faster. (Reward from Unfathomable Depths) Champion of the Night-Illusion spells cast by a Vampire are 25% more powerful (Vampire bonus) Dragon Infusion-Dragons do 25% less melee damage. (Effect from Esbern's Potion. Currently glitched and will not give you effect, wait for patch 1.9 to fix this before obtaining this bonus.) Force Without Effort-You stagger 25% less and foes stagger 25% more. (Meditation on the Words of Power) Prowler's Profit-Anywhere gems might be found, members of the Thieves Guild always seem to find a few more. (Reward from No Stone Unturned.) Resist Poison-Your Vampiric blood gives you 100% resistance to poison. (Vampire bonus) Resist Disease-Your Vampiric blood gives you 100% resistance to disease. (Vampire bonus) Sailor's Repose-Healing spells cure 10% more. (Reward from Frostflow Abyss) Sinderion's Serendipity-There is a 25% chance of creating a duplicate potion when using your alchemy skill. (Reward from A Return To Your Roots) And that's my entire ultimate assassin build. Even on Master, the game should become incredibly easy after this. How will it fare when Legendary Difficulty is introduced? We'll have to wait and find out!

Unlike werewolves, vampires have disadvantages as well as advantages. There are four stages of vampirism, and you progress to the next stage each day you go without feeding on a sleeping NPC. Don't worry, it doesn't harm them. When you feed, you return to level one. Each level, your powers grow stronger, but so do your weaknesses.For advantages:Frost Resistance (Current vamp lvl x25%, with Dawnguard it's 10% + current vamp lvl x10%)Life drain destruction spell (stronger with each vamp lvl)Stronger illusion spells (Current vamp lvl x25%)Night vision (unlocked at stage 3)Once a day zombie spell (stronger with each vamp lvl)Once a day illusion spell (unlocked at stage 2)Once a day invisibility spell (unlocked at stage 4)100% disease resistance100% poison resistance (passes cap, it's actually about 85%)Harder to detect while sneaking (Current vamp lvl x25%)Vampire Lord form (with Dawnguard)Now for disadvantages:Weakness to fire (Current vamp lvl x25%, with Dawnguard it's 10% + current vamp lvl x10%)No regeneration in sunlightPenalty to health, stamina, magicka while in sunlight (stronger with each vamp lvl)NPCs attack you on sight at stage 4 (not with Dawnguard)

Uh oh! Looks like they're launching a preemptive strike!

Not everyone. As I said, my internal voice is lower. I'm guessing my brother's is as well, because he says he thinks he sounds like a baby when he hears himself.