lol sorry i just had to have a moment of childlike victory okay back to being grown up.

Because they are generally the less human like and it makes them look more unique from other races I guess. :shrug:

That is the conclution I reached. Hope a lorebuff can clearify this soon.

Only if you assume they associate their gender with their six organs.

Not saying this is necessarily accurate lore, but there's no reason whatever happens to be between their legs should affect a name specifying he or she.

Maybe Argonians are herms, just like snails.

Um, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parthenogenesis

Argonians are also fish related, so this applies too: http://www.suite101.com/content/many-fish-change-six-a108291

Heheh. Yeah. And argonions now rule morrowind. Funny how it works. Good thing Nords are still awesome.

The thing about licking the Hist tree is all speculation IMO. All that it is based on is some character who says "My parents told me not to lick the Hist tree until my Naming Day, so I did. My parents caught me and a boy from my nest in a soft-leaf patch right before the naming ceremony." To me, this would indicate that licking the tree is kind of like drinking booze, and she did it when she was too young and started making out with a boy Argonian. However, somehow this gets turned into Argonians licking the tree and changing their physical form. I think it is "original research" i.e. made up.

I find that piece of lore to be held into suspect. Most information pertaining to argonians tends to be quite...odd.

If all else fails, the Hist did it.

That's not even the in-game description, it's from the manual.

Problem too, is that this has never been explored or really mentioned at all in the games.

As I said about your post, if all else fails, a Hist did it.

The UESP article cites the in-game description from http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Argonian#In-Game_Description. Here's that text:


Here's the one from http://www.imperial-library.info/content/races-tamriel-argonian, taken directly out of the game:



Some salt might be needed here.

While I normally disagree with using the UESP for... well, anything at all, as far as I know this is accurate lore, and that at certain points in their lives Argonians can change six.

HOWEVER!

It's a big "however," too, There are a few things about this we don't know:

1. Some Argonians are apparently born nonsentient lizards who become anthropoid when they "lick the Hist" in a special ceremony. It is unknown if this happens to Argonians outside of Black Marsh or if the lack of such a thing accounts for the more humanoid appearance of Argonians in newer games.
2. It is possible that the six-changing life phase may also be related to and dependent upon proximity to the Hist, so don't expect them to wake up and say "I think I'd prefer to have a wang today" any given time.

furries for one

Yes, it may just have been a whim of whoever was writing the manual that day and needed some variation from "Males of race X are like this, and females of race X are like that". It doesn't seem an important part of the race concept, which is kind of exotic religious mystical Amazon tribesmen.

Well they certainly did in Morrowind, but Bethesda could have changed their minds...

Morrowind in game description of Argonians -

t home in water and on land, the Argonians of Black Marsh are well-suited to the treacherous swamps of their homeland, with natural immunities protecting them from disease and poison. The female life-phase is highly intelligent, and gifted in the magical arts. The more aggressive male phase has the traits of the hunter: stealth, speed, and agility. Argonians are reserved with strangers, yet fiercely loyal to those they accept as friends. Like the Khajiit, Argonians are limited to some headgear and no footwear.

hey, hey, hey, not all fans of argonians are furries.

It can't be declared "accurate lore" because it doesn't appear anywhere in any of the games and has not been word-of-god confirmed like their ovoviviparity has. Those last two points you making are based on nothing at all.

They're unique but not as cool as the lore in High Rock, Morrowind or Summerset Isles to be honest.

I guess it's because they're unique to this particular fantasy. I personally would be a Tsiscii fan if they were in the game and if they really are snake people, not just asians.

I imagine them as giant golden snakes. Their torsos have the shape of a man (but still covered in golden scales) and their head is that of a giant golden snake.

If what the article cites is true, we then need a better understanding of what a "life-phase" is. For example, one could assume that Argonians are born in a hermaphroditic state or "life-phase". As they grow up, depending on several factors such as number of Hist licks or http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Temperature-dependent_six_determination, they reach a permament male or female "life-phase".

That sounds much more likely.

Maybe they just belive in reincarnation, and they think they alternate sixes each time. Probly not, but at least i'm contributing.

I'm sure Everquest had a Cat-man race and a Lizard-man race as well, but that's beside the point.

I don't really have a favourite race to be honest. I like every race equally for their interesting cultures and lore.

Actually, it's based on character dialogs. One Argonian in Morrowind talks briefly about the tree-licking ceremony and its place as a coming-of-age ritual that could be literal, figurative or both, but doesn't go into detail with its relation to the Hist aside from the fact that there is one. Modryn Oreyn and others comment that licking the Hist sap is something argonians do. Someone on TIL once gathered a bunch of the various dialogs and in-game books information on Argonians.

Ah, found it copied out http://z8.invisionfree.com/People_of_the_Beasts/index.php?showtopic=10 Good thing too, as the original is missing.

And again with the word of god thing. We are permitted to do simple math with the information present, or were last time I looked. Seriously, the worst that happens if we take multiple circumstancial items together and assume what they loosely indicate is true, the worst thing that can possibly happen is that we're wrong about a species that does not exist being able to swap out six organs. Whoop dee [censored] doo.

Lol. This.