When do actually become dragonborn? is it when you harvest the first sould in dragon rising or is it when the greybeards officially call you it through that wierd ass ceremony where they shout at you? im trying to do the civil war quest, i know im screwed when it comes to dragons appearing, i just dont want to be dragonborn. is that possible?

You are dragonborn at birth.

I use a mod that starts me off in one of 400+ random locations in Skyrim. This lets me play as though I'm not the Dragonborn.

Officially, you're only recognised as the Dragonborn after the quest at the Whiterun tower. (Quest is called Dragons Rising I believe.)

Dragons don't spawn in the game before this quest, and nor can you do shouts. (You can still 'learn' them at walls.)

Without mods? I guess just don't start the MQ.

Once you complete Dragon Rising, your character is officially a dragonborn. So basically if you want to kill dragons at all, you will have to bite the bullet.

I usually like to create my own characters and I hate it that they are forced to be dragonborn... Like my main character is a werewolf, it doesnt make much sense to be a wolf and dragonborn.. or my mage alt, a Dunmer... probably wouldnt be dragonborn.

Worse case scenario is start a new game and dont talk to the jarl of whiterun. That way you dont have to worry about dragons attacking and being dragonborn until when/if you decide to do so.

You don't become dragonborn, you already are dragonborn, hence the word dragonborn.

I just roleplay that my character is not dragonborn. I avoid the war and the MQ for non dragonborns.
I did have a non dragonborn go through the war. I was recognized as dragonborn but I never used shouts or visited the greybeards. I just pretend I killed the dragon but didnt absorb the soul. all of skyrim thinks my character is dragonborn but it is not. Its what I have to do because bethesda's terrible become dragonborn to finish the war thingy.

Yes, but until the Dragon Rising quest, you are totally unaware of it so you might as well not be Dragonborn as far as the game goes; nothing Dragon related will ever happen except a few comments about Helgen.

Using Live Another Life is even better since it stops the Dragon in Helgen too.

You act as if you don't have a choice. Just don't be the Dragonborn.

as the others have said your character is already born as dragonborn (it's just he or she doesn't know that until going to whiterun and see the jarl then goes to see the greybeards to be offically called dragonborn).

Sometimes it just doesn't seem like you should be dragonborn. I mean, take being a thief for example;

• You steal from everyone regardless of race, gender or social standing
• You couldn't care less about how that begger over there is doing.
• All you care about is three things, You, your guild, and how much coin you make.

Hardly the dragonslayer of legend who saves Skyrim and possibly all of Tamriel and Nirn.

Bethesda really buggered it up in not allowing us to not do the main quest and still do the civil war. Damn dragons are a massive pain in the backside, especially the random encounters.

They didn't bug anything up. They wrote it that way intentionally.

When misrule takes its place at the eight corners of the world (Arena)

When the Brass Tower walks and Time is reshaped (Daggerfall)

When the thrice-blessed fail and the Red Tower trembles (Morrowind)

When the Dragonborn Ruler loses his throne, and the White Tower falls (Oblivion)

When the Snow Tower lies sundered, kingless, bleeding (Civil War)

The World-Eater wakes, and the Wheel turns upon the Last Dragonborn. (Skyrim)

Until Ulfric kills Torygg there is no Alduin. No Alduin, no LDB, no Main Quest.

What I think the devs were going for is starting the Civil War, discovering you're Dragonborn, then dropping that to pursue the Main Quest.

Yep. I only feel truly Dragonborn when I'm playing a good character. The hero of Skyrim.

Then again, as long as the job gets done nothing else matters.

And the game actually emphasizes that Dragonborn mortals can be either good or evil. In Arngeir's words, "Will you be a hero whose name is remembered in song throughout the ages? Or will your name be a curse to future generations? "

He said 'buggered' not bugged. Two different words and meanings. For Australians, the term 'buggered it up' is a generic statement of getting something wrong or incorrect. While the legal definition of the word is quite specific and would get me banned for stating it here, it's used quite a lot in australia, and while not totally acceptable in polite society, most people use it and everyone understands it - i.e. "I'm buggered", meaning you are exhausted, or injured, etc. Or it can be used in future tense, as in "We're buggered here"...being unable to complete a task, or foreseeing impending doom.