I just ran into a dunmer bandit in a fort (sorry forgot which one), and he seemed like a unique character, I snuck up on him and he was muttering to himself complaining about being bullied by the other bandits, and I just realised I have never seen a dunmer bandit before, or for that matter an altmer bandit or bosmer bandit. I can't be sure if any have been breton or imperial, can be hard to tell. They seem to always be orcs, redguards and nords. Then I thought about it and realised hostile mages are never orcs or redguards, always elves or I guess bretons.

Is this definitely always the case? Have you seen any exceptions?

http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Skyrim:Bandit

They can be any race, except Altmer.

Interesting, I'm sure I've never seen a khajit or argonian bandit, and quite sure that was definitely the first dark elf bandit I'd ever seen.

Is there at least a strong tendency for them to be more likely to be orc, nord and redguard?

Weird that you not came faced the beastmen raced types.

They are just random, no tendency (except some places with just Orc bandits like Bilegulch and Rift Watchtower).

In over 2,000 hours of playing, I've never come across an Argonian bandit.

Really? Not all the time, by any means, but I do tend to see one at Helgen and Skybound Ruin.

*look for bandit places that have a mage within their ranks.

I've seen all kinds of Bandits, except Altmer. They usually tend to be victims.

Bosmer tend to be archers, Dunmer, Argonians are usually mages, Nords, Redguards, and Imperials, are melee, and Nord, Orcs tend to be Chiefs.

I usually see mostly Nords, Redguards, Dunmer, and Orcs.

I've seen quite a few Khajiit and Argonian bandits. Most recently I've seen them just south of the bridge between Pinewatch and Falkreath and at the ambushed carriage just north-west of Whiterun.

Yeah I have seen some Argonian Bandits. Mostly some of those ones are in Caves

Argonians usually as spellcasters. Khajiit low level guards. Probably level depandant. Try the mine outside riverwood. Bandit leaders seem to be nords and orcs

the bandit sitting in the chair in the mine right outside the helgen tutorial is always a khajiit or argonian

Funny, because to me, Bosmer seems to be one of the most common bandit races. Orcs and Nords being the other most common. I've seen some Redguards and some Dunmer, I might have ran into the occasional Khajiit or Argonian, and I'm not sure about Bretons and Imperials. On Solstheim, the Dunmer bandits are more common, of obvious reasons.

The trio of bandits that have dressed up as Imperial soldiers and try to make you pay a toll usually is a male Orc, a male Dunmer and a female Imperial (or maybe Redguard?) for me - dont know if this is fixed or random.

Warlocks always seem to be Altmer or Dunmer, maybe rarely human but don't quote me on that.

Random thieves and assassins always seem to be Dunmer, Khajiit or Argonian.

Random skooma dealers by the roadside always seem to be Orc or Bosmer. Which is funny, one might have think they would be Khajiit, but no.

I've seen them as bandit mages. Bosmer are often bandits with bows and arrows. I guess the game stereotypes a little.

There are no female argonian, Khajiit or Orc bandits.

I have seen loads of Khajiit skoooma dealers.

It seems to me like female bandits are nearly always redguards, or I dunno I guess they could be really really dark skinned imperials or something, but they seem to always look like redguards. This thread is making me wonder if everyone's individual copy of the game has a unique quirky life of it's own, because I swear I know my game really really well and bandits are mostly orcs, often redguards and nords, but very rarely, practically never, anything else.

Doesn't matter to me. I don't discriminate when it comes to killing bandits.

It's also different in different playthroughs. I remember one playthrough I did, I could hardly walk from Whiterun to Rorikstead without being assaulted by one assassin, two thieves and a skooma dealer. And it was like that the entire playthrough - thieves, assassins, skooma dealers, everywhere, all the time. That character really was worried about the crime rate in Skyrim.

Khajit are rare as bandits. I've only slotted two so far in all the hours played.