Hi, I'm looking to do just that.

I've decided I'd rather be a Breton than a Nord since I'm essentially a battle-mage.

My issue is how to change my race without messing with the appearance sliders? I really love the way my character looks, so I'm not sure how I'd get the same face structure and what not.

I know that pressing ~ and typing showracemenu works, but you lose your current skill set up to that point.

I also heard you can type player.setrace (race) to avoid the skill loss, at least.

Any help is greatly appreciated!

-Ashley

Just start a new character, you will be better off in the long run. You have only scratched the surface of the mayhem that is going to come crashing down on your character by attempting this shortcut.

Agreed

It's not a wise move.

@StarryEyedDreamer

Why wouldn't a Nord make a good Battle mage? Most of the spell casters in Skyrim shell out frost magic, so your racial resistance will benefit you greatly. A Nord can cast magic just as well as a Breton, I really see no need to change your race outside of Rp preference but even then it doesn't really make much sense to change race

What Carrots and CCNA said holds true. I changed my race once like that, through the console. Whole hosts of issues later.

save the numbers of the sliders on a paper and change the race simple

Hmmm, I have to say I wasn't aware of the issues involved with using the showracemenu. I opened it once, just to see the changes contained in the RaceMenu mod I downloaded. I moved some sliders around but didn't apply any changes. Am I still safe or should I start from scratch? I have just started a new playthrough anyway.

By the way, I see there are some mods that try to fix the crashing associated with showracemenu, like Show Race Menu Precache Killer. Are these also risky in your opinions?

I almost always play Bretons but I have played a Nord and I used pretty much the same skillset for both. Besides the once-a-day power, it's possible to make the Nord's skills just like the Breton's by choosing Magic Resist in Alt. My 1H/Blocking Nord was actually more Battlemage than my Bretons, who use mostly magic.

showracemenu will sometimes mess with your sliders' locations so don't do it. The surest but most mind numbingly boring way is to see the Riften face-changer in the Dawnguard DLC. Agree to change your face, enter the menu, and count how many positions each slider is from the left of right. The creation kit experts can probably tell you of a much shorter way that involves creating a new mod with your dragonborn's looks as one of the defaults.

Anyhow, my attempts at creating characters that have the same sliders but different race have usually ended in failure. The races have unique facial features and proportions (e.g. Dunmer eyebrows, Breton forehead lines, Altmer have longer faces). Only changing the race will get you an odd looking dragonborn. Much better to do as others here have said and start from scratch.

DON'T DO IT. Listen to them warnings above