Figured I would just get this out there. If anyone has further evidence for or against feel free to add. I think this sums it up though.

All this cold blooded warm blooded talk is tiring me. The Lore either contradicts itself or the Argonians are an endothermic species that does not like the cold very much. The warm blooded comments make it appear that they are less efficient endotherms or exothermic. However there are many things that make it seem like the Argonians are both Exo and Endothermic. Which is a possibilty with the Hist apparently. Many also assume there is anything related to our worlds biology in this fantasy world called Nirn. It could be as simple as Hist magic. They do not like the cold because they naturally do not live in that environment.

Btw argonians fans. The Hist cant make your entire race super amazingly awesome just like that. They can probably tweak the argos only so much. Though this is just conjecture. Turning and saying the Hist did it for nearly every answer is kind of short sighted. None of us understand how powerful or weak the Hist really are.

My opinion.

Argonians are an exothermic-ish reptilian species that just is not used to the cold. The Warm blood comments may disprove this somewhat though. So far we have small evidence of the Argos being cold blooded AND warm blooded if you choose to use that terminology. Comments by Argonian NPCs saying they are cold and calling other races 'warmbloods' is the evidence for cold blooded and briasts on female argonians, that are there for no reason as far as I can tell, and the fact that the Argonians were not dead is evidence for them being warmblooded. Seriously that Argo would be dead in an hour or so in Solstheim or Bruma if it was cold blooded and outdoors for any long period of time.

Consensus. Warm blooded and does not like the cold. I am sure once we hit the desert areas of Tamriel we will see few Nords there, as its very hot. They can live there they just do not like it very much.

Agreed.

They live in the jungle. Course they don't like the cold.

I know this might seem unneccesary but there seems to be a constant state of confusion between the less...informed fans of the series. This has been hotly debabated many times and usually to no result. I figured some logic would finallly bring this argument to an end. Really it only exists because of contradicting lore and misconceptions that Nirn is anything like our world. Which it is in some respects but that does not mean as everyone here is fond of saying, equal a 1-1 comparison just because there are some similarities.

Lord of Souls suggested a number of times that Hist tweak individual argonians to fit particular purposes or climates. I might have imagined it, but I think something was said about a more cold-tolerant version.

The other point of reference is Biography of the Wolf Queen, where an army of argonians from Black Marsh (so presumably mostly of a baseline type) functioned fine in Skyrim summers but had to retreat in the winter.

Then again, everyone retreats from Skyrim in the winter; it'd be like Napoleon trying to fight Russia during the winter.

Bare with me here, as this may be a bit far fetched, but maybe they have some characteristics that resemble fish. Weather it being the blood or methods to block cold whatever they could be. I can also back this up by the fact that reptiles can't breathe underwater.


I did however give that poor argonian by the docks a pair of nice warm fur boots... Not that he could use them... It's the thought that counts right?

Do not doubt the power of the Hist to mutate the argonians into something that'd allow them to visit other places, environments, and tasks.

After all, the argonians were changed by the Hist for the purpose of fighting and driving away the forces of Mehrunes Dagon, and so on.

I like this. I know practically nothing about the fish with resistance to cold thing, apart from something I heard in a nature documentary about certain fish having "natural anti-freeze" in their blood. Pretty sure that's ultra-laymans terms.

I tend to prefer the idea of either all argonians are cold blooded or that the hist holds sway on whether an individual argonian is warm or cold blooded, citing "BATW" when logic gets in the way