Elder Scrolls Races

[BisectedBrioche]

I just felt like doing this for some reason, so here's D20 stats for all the playable races in the Elder Scrolls games. Remember that Imperials, Nords and Redguards use the base stats of humans, Alsmer, Dunmer and Bosmer are based on Elves, Bretons are half-elves and Orcs are...Orcs;

Imperial

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• Medium: As Medium creatures, Imperials have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
• Human base land speed is 30 feet.
• 1 extra feat at 1st level.
• 4 extra skill points at 1st level and 1 extra skill point at each additional level.
• Automatic Language: Common. Bonus Languages: Any (other than secret languages, such as Druidic). See the Speak Language skill.
• Favored Class: Monk, Fighter, Barbarian

Imperials originate from the country of Cyrodiil. They have managed to form a vast empire based on the skills as both traders and invaders specialising in both diplomacy and light infantry based attacks.

Racial abilities

All imperials have a +1 bonus to diplomacy checks in addition to the following abilities;

Star of the West Once per day the Imperial may make a ranged touch attack up to 30 feet away. If hit the target must make a will save or be immediately fatigued if they are not already. If they are already fatigued they become exhausted.

Voice of the Emperor Once per day the Imperial may make a touch attack against a target. If successful the target's attitude is raised by one level.

Nord

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• Medium: As Medium creatures, Nords have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
• Human base land speed is 30 feet.
• 1 extra feat at 1st level.
• 4 extra skill points at 1st level and 1 extra skill point at each additional level.
• Automatic Language: Common. Bonus Languages: Any (other than secret languages, such as Druidic). See the Speak Language skill.
• Favored Class: Barbarian

Nords are tall and fair haired, their home province is called Skyrim and is found in a cold northern climate. They are excellent sailors and barbarians as well as being resistant to the cold environment they originate from.

Racial abilities

Nords have damage resistance to cold/10 and a +1 on survival checks made in cold environments. In addition to this they have the following abilities;

Thunder Fist Once per day a Nord may make a touch attack to deal 1d20 points of cold damage.

Redguard

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• Medium: As Medium creatures, Redguards have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
• Human base land speed is 30 feet.
• 1 extra feat at 1st level.
• 4 extra skill points at 1st level and 1 extra skill point at each additional level.
• Automatic Language: Common. Bonus Languages: Any (other than secret languages, such as Druidic). See the Speak Language skill.
• Favored Class: Fighter

Redguards are dark skinned humans from Hammerfell. They are noted for being natural warriors and their independent nature as well as an impressive ability to withstand diseases and poison.

Racial Abilities

Redguards gain a +3 bonus to constitution for the purpose of resisting poisons and diseases. They also have the following abilities;

Adrenaline Rush Once a day a Redguard may use this ability to gain the following for 1d10 rounds: +2 bonus to Con, Dex and Str and 1d6 bonus hit points.

Altemer (High Elf)

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• +2 Dexterity, -2 Constitution.
• Medium: As Medium creatures, elves have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
• Elf base land speed is 35 feet.
• +2 racial bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot checks. An elf who merely passes within 5 feet of a secret or concealed door is entitled to a Search check to notice it as if she were actively looking for it.
• Automatic Languages: Common and Elven. Bonus Languages: Draconic, Gnoll, Gnome, Goblin, Orc, and Sylvan.
• Favored Class: Wizard, sorcerer

Altimer's are considered the most arrogant of Tamriel races. This is, in part, due to their culture's significance, with most magical arts and even the land's lingua franca being derived from their traditions. Despite this they tend to be hard to bare for most of the other races and their impressive talents in magic are offset by their inherent weakness to it.

Racial Abilities

Altimers have a +2 bonus to checks to resist disease.

Weakness to Magic All magical attacks deal an extra 25% damage to a High Elf. This does not apply to ability damage or healing effects.

Magical Sensitivity A High Elf adds 25% extra to the effects of any spells they cast (e.g. 25% extra health is healed, duration is 25% longer, damage is increased 25%, etc). This does not apply to ability damage.

Bosmer (Wood Elf)

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• +2 Dexterity, -2 Constitution.
• Medium: As Medium creatures, elves have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
• Elf base land speed is 30 feet.
• Weapon Proficiency: Wood Elves receive the Martial Weapon Proficiency feats for the longbow (including composite longbow), and shortbow (including composite shortbow) as bonus feats.
• +2 racial bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot checks. An elf who merely passes within 5 feet of a secret or concealed door is entitled to a Search check to notice it as if she were actively looking for it.
• Automatic Languages: Common and Elven. Bonus Languages: Draconic, Gnoll, Gnome, Goblin, Orc, and Sylvan.
• Favored Class: Ranger

Most Bosmer's live isolated lives in their forest, they are held in suspicion among many due to their (quite literally) religious belief in cannibalism. However they will never eat or harm plants, despite being willing to use wooden equipment created by none Bosmer. Despite these tendencies they are peaceful and have never been known to wage war, although defense of their homes is a different matter and you'd be hard pressed to find more skilled archers.

Racial Skills

Wood Elves gain a +2 bonus to saving throws to resist disease.

Beast Tongue Once per day a wood elf may use command creature as a spell like ability with a duration of 1 hour.

Dunmer

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• +2 Dexterity, -2 Constitution.
• Medium: As Medium creatures, elves have no special bonuses or penalties due to their size.
• Elf base land speed is 30 feet.
• Weapon Proficiency: Dunmer receive the Martial Weapon Proficiency feats for the longsword, short sword, longbow (including composite longbow), and shortbow (including composite shortbow) as bonus feats.
• +2 racial bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot checks. An elf who merely passes within 5 feet of a secret or concealed door is entitled to a Search check to notice it as if she were actively looking for it.
• Automatic Languages: Common and Elven. Bonus Languages: Draconic, Gnoll, Gnome, Goblin, Orc, and Sylvan.
• Favored Class: Ranger, Fighter, Wizard, Soceror

Dark Elves (known among themselves as Dunmer) are notoriously xenophobic, disliking even other Dunmer who have been raised outside their own lands. All Dunmer have dark skin and red eyes and are noted for a good balance of magic, bows and swordsmanship as well as a resistance to fire.

Racial Skills

All Dunmer have fire resistance/5 and a +1 bonus to all survival checks made in hot (or burning) environments).

Ancestor Guardian Once per day a Dunmer may either summon and ancestor spirit (a ghost with half their own HD) or protect themselves from melee attacks (half all damage from normal weapons) for one minute.

[Sir Conkey]

ironic that the creators of the elder scrolls games based it off of their campaign world.

[BisectedBrioche]

ironic that the creators of the elder scrolls games based it off of their campaign world.

I'm a fan of irony. With the exception of karma, that always comes around to bite me on the arse.

[Bayar]

I generally prefer Dunmer(dark elves) because i mostly am a spellcaster. Tryed playing with orc barbarian, he is tough but cant quite cast hearth heal.

[ocato]

I would feel obligated to give most or all of these races a LA unless used at the complete exclusion of other races. If you wanted to try to integrate them into a mixed campaign, I'd consider dropping some of their 'original' racial abilities a little to compensate for such things as 1d20 frost on touch, which is feasibly pretty dangerous, especially at lower levels. Also I believe you mean to say +3 to saving throws vs poison/disease in the Redguards? If not, that is a very odd but probably somewhat balanced choice. Over all I like this and think an Elder Scrolls campaign might be kinda fun until you found the Mind Flayer in the lost temple or the vampire den on the coast.

[RTGoodman]

I've actually done basically this same thing (though I'm not quite finished), and I think this is a pretty good conversion. Are you planning on doing Khajiits and Argonians?

One thing though - I don't like the whole percentage bonus/penalty for Weakness to Magic and Magical Sensitivity. I'm not sure that there's a precedent for this in D&D or d20 in general. I think that a better system would be a -2 (or maybe -4) penalty on saves and AC against spells (for Weakness to Magic) and a +1 caster level for one arcane spellcasting class (for Magical Sensitivity).

[Hazkali]

You've used "Damage Resistance/X" in some of the entries, where X is an energy type, e.g. DR10/Cold for the Nord. In 3.5, this is actually Energy Resistance- i.e. Resistance to Cold 10. As written, Dr10/cold actually means the opposite to what you appear to think it means- the Nord gets Dr10, which is only overcome by cold attacks, which if I recall my Elder Scrolls correctly, is the opposite to what is truly the case.

[Thexare Blademoon]

From what I've seen in Morrowind, your Elves are a bit off.

Firstly, Dunmer (males, at least) weren't all that fragile - 40 Endurance (again, for the males, I'm not fond of sex-based stat differences...) seems to be about the average there. If anything, it should be a Wisdom penalty, as that seems closest to Morrowind's Willpower, which both sexes of Dunmer had 30 in.

Secondly, Altmer should definitely not have a Dexterity bonus; 40 Agility and 30/40 (m/f) Speed do not indicate naturally high Dex. It seems even stranger that they have a higher base land speed than Dunmer, when Dunmer started with 50 speed...

I could go on, but the short form is that it seems you just tacked on a few bonuses to the core races, without looking into proper attribute adjustments. =/