Races (Skyrim)

In The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, the class system may be more appropriately called a classless system, as players are not required to select classes during character creation.

Starting Skills by Race
The following table shows the starting Skill statistics for each Race. The higher the number (over the base level of 15) the better. Values of 20 indicate this is a favored skill of the race. Values of 25 indicate this is a Primary Skill of the Race. Skills can be improved to a primary group - Skyrim strategy guide

Every race has their own unique skill which they excel at and will start at level 25 with that particular skill. For Example: Bretons start at level 25 Conjuration as they are naturally skilled at it.

Starting Spells by Race
The following table holds all of the basic spells for each race.

Unique Race Power
These powers can be used only once per day.

Unique Race Perks

 * Altmer: +50 Magicka
 * Argonian: 50% Disease Resistance, Waterbreathing
 * Bosmer: 50% Restance to both Poison and Disease
 * Breton: 25% Resistance to Magic
 * Dunmer: 50% Resistance to Fire Damage
 * Nord: 50% Resistance to Frost Damage
 * Redguard: 50% Resistance to Poison
 * Khajiit: +15 Base Unarmed Damage, Night Vision
 * Imperial:Find More Gold Than Usual

Stats affected by character size
Characters' races impact their jump height and run speed. Physically taller races can cover more ground while running and have a greater vertical jump height.

Melee Damage
Using the console command  to change the height of the character will increase the size of a character in addition to increasing their movement speed, jump height, and damage output. Because changing the player scale in the console increases and decreases melee damage accordingly, there is a misconception that taller races do more base melee damage. Without console modification, however, the default scale of all races in the console is 1.00, regardless of physical height. Therefore, all races do the same melee damage at the time of character creation. For further explanation, see the screenshot displaying the actual player scale (1.00) used in calculations and the base scale, which is displayed parenthetically.

The  command shows that races all have their own unique base scale, which can be used to determine their height and related run speed and jump height. The base scale for all races are as follows:

Changes from previous games
Character creation has been dramatically changed in The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. Previous games had the player choose from a list of classes that would determine the starting skills for the player's character and in some cases, how the player's character would level. The player also had the option of creating a custom class, selecting each skill individually. This system had a very large impact on player effectiveness in the beginning of the game, though Oblivion's system was able to lessen that impact. A player could spend hours working out the most effective way to build a character.

In Skyrim, however, that system has been removed, meaning that though the player will still select a race, the player no longer has to select a class. Skill set specialization is still possible in Skyrim, but instead of permanently selecting this during character creation, this is now done using the skill perks earned by leveling up (both skills and player level, as perks are earned by overall level while skill level is required to select any but the most basic perks). The birth sign system has been replaced completely with guardian stones, which can be changed at any time by visiting and activating a new stone.

Level 81 is the highest, meaning there are 80 (no perk can be chosen at level 1) possible perk points to choose from (out of over 250 possible places to spend them) however a typical player will not max out all skills to 100, and will instead reach only around level 50 or so. A character designed around 30 perk points is a reasonable build that can be reached in-game fairly quickly and is a great starting point for those who want to design the character before playing.

Controversy
Arguably, Skyrim has not lost any complexity in its system due to its skill growth mechanic and its new perk system. Although this system still allows the player to focus on a certain play style, it has the potential to allow more of the player to shine through than ever before. Many fans didn't like the new system however, the main complaint being that the game was "dumbed down."

This does, however mean that "cheating" the system is no longer possible, whether to keep level low or increase it too much over actual skill sets as in previous games. The removal of primary stats also means that you won't end up with dud levels, whereby you may be high level but still relatively weak due to getting bad stat selections.

Without attributes there are fewer ways to differentiate between characters in this simplified game. For example, will a Wizard who trains with a sword in his spare time and who has equal skill with the Warrior, be as strong as him? No, there is no strength stat so the warrior will have a higher weapon skill (which allows for more perks from those trees), health and stamina while the wizard would likely be focusing on magicka and magic skills. The Luck attribute has also been removed and is therefore impossible to increase. Skills have been further reduced from a total of 21 to 18. There are no acrobatics/athletics or speed attributes so it is not possible to increase your jump height or your character's running speed through stats. (However, Altmer for example, have a naturally faster running speed than the other races.)