(Note: The OP is from more than a month ago. With new info now, I wanted to revive, since the first part came true.)

It’s been indicated that the player can choose a bump in health, magicka, or fatigue each time their character levels. By extension, it might be extrapolated that the character’s health, magicka, fatigue, and encumbrance are no longer “derived” attributes, which means they are no longer calculated from the character’s main attributes (i.e. from strength, endurance, willpower, etc.). This opens the door for elimination of attributes… or at least a minimized role in the character’s creation and development.

Further, one of the many reasons Redguard has been my preferred race has always been due to the useful racial bonuses, which are partly reliant on attributes:

Adrenaline Rush (Greater Power)--
All of the following for 60 seconds on Self, once per day…
Fortify Agility 50 points
Fortify Endurance 50 points
Fortify Speed 50 points
Fortify Strength 50 points
Fortify Health 25 points

Resist Disease – 75% on Self, constant
Resist Poison – 75% on Self, constant


This is true of Orcs also:

Berserk (Greater Power)--
All of the following for 60 seconds on Self, once per day…
Fortify Fatigue 200 points
Fortify Health 20 points
Fortify Strength 50 points
Drain Agility 100 points

Resist Magic – 25% on Self, constant

__________

What do you think will be the role of Attributes? How might the racial bonuses look for the races affected by changes to attributes? What other information/ ideas/ thoughts/ concerns do you have regarding these topics?

One thought: It’s been indicated by Todd Howard that Bethesda wants to make each race more distinct and meaningful – to make it a more important decision when you start the game. Could attributes still exist, but remain static? That is, each race has pre-determined attributes that cannot be changed. I think this would actually work and would help to make each race (and gender) play differently. This would also allow attribute-based bonuses to function as normal, wouldn’t it?

Would like to hear other peoples thoughts and ideas…

All great ideas and points in my opinion.

I would, however, be extremely dissapointed if different genders got different stat bonuses. This isnt because of some idealistic feminist reason but simply because I dont want to be forced into male/female simply because of the statlines, but because of what I want to be.

Btw, did Oblivion and/or Morrowind have different stats based on gender? I cant remember...

Yes, there were slight differences between gender within each race. Typically, the male has a slightly higher starting strength, etc. I always thought it made sense and wasn't that restrictive overall.

My favorite was Breton because they really had the best scaled racial of all.

constant: 50% resist magic (Mundane Ring is all that's needed to become immune to magic)
constant: fortify magicka 50 points
greater power: Dragon Skin (50% shield for 60 seconds)

Greater powers were a let down in my opinion, a racial toggle would have been better but a toggle that had a few negative side effect. I say this because ~60 second buffs that you can only use once per day aren't really great as they are inconvenient, once you have used them you will not get that advantage back for 24 hours...

Really if Magicka is not reliant on Intelligence, that'd kill off Intelligence. Rather what I think might be more on the cards is that Health, Magicka and Fatigue could still be increased by related attributes but that you don't get bonus health off of endurance like you did in Oblivion (each level you got 10% of Endurance as an extra maximum HP boost). Rather you choose what you get a bump on, yet to see if this is a static number of if that boost itself is based on something, possibly even attributes. Personally I'd like to see Attributes remain, because it'd be removing a major part of enchanting items in my opinion, go for blunt or strength? get strength and it's more balanced between weapons and you can carry more, while blunt is a bit more dedicated to a certain type of damage...

Berserk should go to nords, berserking is a widely known ability that supposedly originates in scandinavian countries. iceland, norway, finland and sweden to be precise.

Agreed. Never liked the 24-hour cool down. (For starters, it just doesn't make any sense that something mythical/magical works on a clock.) But, overall, Adrenaline Rush has saved my skin in a tough situation more than once! I really like it as a Greater Power. But, yes, please fix the 24-hour mess to something that makes more sense. I don't expect to be on adrenaline constantly, but there must be something better.

What about essentially giving you a daily allotment? Say...30 in-game minutes per day, allotted throughout the 24 hour period as you wish. The time does not stack if you don't use your whole 30 minutes for 2-3 days or however long. Seems like a logical enough solution in my opinion.

Another alternative with Adrenaline would be that stats increase over say 30 seconds going from 0 to +50, you get the full effect for 2 minutes, and then for the next minute it dies down until rather then being fortified your stats get drained, so you are weakened (say by -25 and with a damage fatigue effect) with that weakening lasting say another minute. This leaves a final minute or two of stat normality before it can be used again... so the negative effect comes in after the adrenaline rush has finished. It's not a toggle but an alternative. It's an idea I just had... it would mean you'd have to use it wisely, you can't use it in long drawn out fights unless you use it tactically/strategically .

Breton's were my favorite too. I usually always went with a Breton Spellsword. My first character in Skyrim will be a Nord Warrior though. I think racial bonuses will remain but I'm not sure what has become of the attributes.

you absolutely right bretons rule (i hope they will not be nerfed)

I like the idea of making it an actual "rush" with a period of exhaustion. Or maybe it could be a power that kicks in automatically under certain circumstance (regardless of the last time used) rather than making it a discretionary power to be used every 24 hours. Like, say your health and fatigue reach a certain threshold... or a battle lasts for a specified amount of time... or some other threshold that means your adrenaline "kick ins" as they say.

I'm still concerned about the role of attributes and the relation to some of the Greater Powers, though. If there are no attributes (or if they have a more limited role that would no longer make sense in these terms), then what stats will get bumped? Would they come up with completely new powers?

Conversely to the argument for Bretons, I enjoyed playing Altmer in OB partly because of their elemental weakness, it alters the way you play, and is a defining characteristic of the race. I would like to some minor weakness for more races, eg Agonians are cold blooded, 5 or 10% weakness to cold, etc. If every race had strengths AND weaknesses, you already have more distinction between them, and your choice of race counts for more. This would give everyone a number of enemies or situations which are more deadly, altering the whole game experience.

I posted this originally more than a month ago, and the first part of the OP has indeed come true... an elimination of attributes as we knew them!

I just thought I'd revive the thread to see if there are any new thoughts or ideas regarding the other elements of the topic in light of what we now know.

Look forward to hearing any ideas!

I think with the new info about the attributes we can asume that racial powers will be changed quite a bit(mostly for Ra Gada and Orsimmer). Anyone got a clue on how they might do that?
Anyway I'm glad they have removed the source of grinding

Well they will likely use racial perks.. basicaly multipart perks you gain the instant you pick your race...

I dont expect them to be basic.. I expect some interesting bonuses for various races. Things like altmer doing a bit more damage with magic and using a bit less magicka on each spell.. Things like an altmer setting stuff on fire longer then others do or draining more magicka from tyargets with lighthning or slowing/freezing longer with ice spells.

Also more interesting things like a breton gaining longer healing effects from healing spells altmer gaining more magicka regen and or longer regen from potions and from soul gems.

Nords might gain extra bleeding duration from axe attacks and extra armor pen from blunt weapons while khajiit gain extra bleed damage from axes and extra crit damage from swords...

Anything is possible.

I have been a big proponent of attributes and lament them being removed. However, I would applaud them returning in a static manor. That would be a compromise between the left and the right as I think there should be differences between the races and genders. Males generally being stronger while females more intelligent.

Well removing of attributes was wrong idea, there was many ways to fix them instead of axing them completely, its like axing half of fundamental basis to much classical TES features depend on them, interesting how devs will find out of dead end in which they put themselves?

After all, the only difference between the races is appearance. Take for example: In first two Fallout games, all the things that you could do in the game were dependent on SPECIAL system and how you shaped your character. There should be more profits for certain races like Khajiit should not get like +5 sneaking but something like permanent significant boost to sneak. For me, in Oblivion races were tooooo similiar. Just saying

It was an chance to try something very new and different and bethesda likes to try new things. I like that even when in some cases it goes a tad wrong.. its still interesting.

I just hope khajiits run 1.1 or 1.15 times as fast as other races and argonians swim 1.1 or 1.2 times as fast as other races. The rest I don't really care about, bethesda has surely everything under control

me likes

I like the idea of having racial powers like Adrenaline Rush activate automatically under certain conditions. It could make it so it's always affecting how you play rather than only a once a day thing. Maybe other powers like Orc's Berserk could work like that too, like have a damage bonus that increases as you attack but goes away if you wait too long. Breton's Dragon Skin could be an armor and magic resistance bonus that depends on their current magicka remaining.

In general I would rather have more abilities and less stat adjustments. If the difference between an Altmer mage and another race is just that an Altmer does all of the same things but better it isn't really interesting. Race and skills are are two main choices, so I think it would offer more options to treat them separately. For example, if that Orc Berserk power affected magic damage as well as melee, picking an Orc wouldn't just say "you should pick fighter skills", but "you should play aggressively" regardless of what your skill picks were.

racial bonuses likely wont be that awesome. I know I'm being a Debbie Downer here, but as Todd stated, he doesn't want the beginning of the game to determine how the player plays. Something i think choosing a race should guide you to do. there's no reason for someone to pick an Altmer and not play a mage, or a Nord and not play a warrior (save RP purposes.) but because they believe (or seem to believe) race should basically be a skin, then the racial bonuses prolly wont be that cool... the only thing that worries me about this whole game is races becoming nothing but skins. it scares me to death because it leaves out sooo much replay value. i hope bonuses make races unique, and i hope the races themselves are unique even without the racial abilities, but i'm skeptical. :sadvaultboy:

I like the core of this comment; racial perks are a great idea, and... very likely, I think.

I'm all for ways of making each race very distinct from the others.

First, I'm leaning toward liking the idea of having static "attributes" -- or what we knew as attributes. For example, a Nord is always much stronger than a Wood Elf regardless of the stage in player development, a Khajit is always more agile than an Orc, etc. I thought it was a flaw that every character could end up maxing out every attribute. (I know there are others on the opposite side of this debate, but it would have been more realistic and given me stronger motive to replay with all the other races.)

Secondly, the racial perk suggestion here to start the game is a great idea. This will vary even more the differences between races. Also in this scenario, Adrenaline Rush and similar powers could still be viable, albeit with slightly altered affects. Could it also mean that certain perk trees are only available to certain races? This could be interesting as well.

Paraphrased from one of the podcasts: It’s also been indicated by Todd Howard that Bethesda wants to make each race more distinct and meaningful – to make it a more important decision when you start the game. But I understand your point also. Hopefully, they have come up with a means to make race a more important decision, while still leaving open the option to play the game any way the player desires through the course of the game.