To me the pre-order Bonus in both the Imperial and standard edition is terrible, this 'Play any race in any alliance' is going to ruin the some of the game-play in my mind. I love the idea of the imperial being able to play any race as Imperials as a race are not exactly skilled in anything specific as such which means they are more easily balanced. The PARIAA defeats the whole purpose of having factions since the majority of players will be able to run around in what ever race they want until new players begin to join after all the Pre-order and special editions have sold out.

Obviously it is too late for ZeniMax Online to remove this Pre-DLC, but its none the less a bad move on their part.

https://content.ebgames.com.au/website/images/detail/bannertesoPCstandard_v2.jpg

You can be a Principe player and refuse to play with races that don't belong to your faction. That would complicate things dramatically, but it is an option.

That sounds racist.

Sounds like Elder scrolls to me....

You can be sure it will have in the store the option to play as any race. Of course, paid for. And if the game don't do well financially, they will announce everyone can do it for free, to attract players back. One way or another, having races and politics split opens up for a whole rp level, I'm glad they got rid of this restriction, is not like all races born exactly in their majority of people's place.

I understand what you guys are saying, but they generated so much effort into the whole alliance thing

The developers did....this whole thing smacks of the publishers distorting the developers intended vision.

He might be the first online gamer RPing an racist

Oh wait, are the Goons still around?

But the alliance thing still stands tall. This can even help balance, so people won't be in an specific alliance just because the members are "pretty" like Aion.

I have to agree that it was probably somebody in Softworks upper management and not the developer that came up with this decision. I'm not angry with the publisher at all, I'm disappointed that they would go this route. The pre order bonus is so anti consumer and it's nickel and diming when you really get to it. To be fair the Imperial race is my only criticism and that's a big one IMHO. Everything else even any race within an alliance is fine although you could consider it roleplay breaking. The race though, crosses a line and it's one that I'm not going to cross.

I wanted ESO to succeed but I have my doubts that will happen.

It certainly still stands, but it doesn't create that decision of having to chose whether you'll have a faction that you love and possibly the race you want, or the race you want but have to settle with a alliance your not too fond of

A specific race just for pre-order after subscription and everything ? I thought subscription's purpose was to have all content unlocked, maybe i can overlook some pets and mounts that are not that much of a deal but... a WHOLE race and the ability to play in any alliance (this is a huge perk) as for me just a mortal subscription payer of 15$ those will be unavailable. Bonus treasure maps for those who pre-order is a P2Win in itself.

WTF Eso ? If you can do this day one i am expecting locked dungeons in 6 months or money for every update you make. I start to think ESO is a project just to chug a bunch of money fast in Zenimax Media's pocket and not a game made with passion.

You raised a very good point. I didn't think of the treasure maps as pay to win when I bought the game because I didn't have the chance to test the maps in the beta so pretty much have no idea what they are about. Now I think of it is quite worrying. But they included it in the standard edition that you would have to purchase anyways, so not that bad.

Elder Scrolls and racism are practically synonymous. I can't really think of one conflict in the game that is in no way racially charged.

I personally dont think that the extra mount/pet/maps are anything major, but that extra Race.. Luckily i was able to get preorder an Imperial Edition at Ebgames before they were completely sold out, but even so this is a massive kick in the gut for anyone who didnt check their email at just the right amount of time or didnt happen to go onto the website. For none Australian citizens, Ebgames is the AUS/NZ version and is owned by GameStop, and the imperial edition was stricly limited to Ebgames within Australia and New Zealand

But how can it stand tall when one Alliance itself's only purpose was literally to stop specific races from getting the Ruby Throne.

The literal only reason the AD is formed right now, the absolute only reason, is because they want to stop a human from taking the throne. Full stop. There wasn't any other point, no other concession. That is the ONLY purpose. Not for political advantages, not for military advantages. Nothing else. why am I repeating it so much? Because I know people will try to wiggle out from under that.

THE ONLY REASON THE AD FORMED IS TO STOP A HUMAN FROM EVER GETTING ON THE RUBY THRONE AGAIN.

THERE IS NO OTHER REASON.

THAT IS ALL.

And then in the off chance that a human in the AD becomes emperor, Queen Ayrenn scratches her head and says to herself "Hey! Didn't I start this whole alliance thing to stop a human from ascending? Like, wasn't that literally the only point? Yeah...so why did I just help it happen?"

Meanwhile the entire NPC Altmer army is just as confused while the thousand Nords who are for some reason fighting for the AD which was designed to keep them out of power are cheering.

And then magical sparkle ponies because you know who gives a [censored] anymore.

AD wants the throne, they would use every asset available, especially the Thalmor manipulating even Ulfric Stormcloak, a nord. If you point standed correctly they wouldn't add beast races to the alliance, slaves, mercenaries, makes no difference the race in the branch of the alliance, what matters is the head, the Queen.

The Emperor point you make is extremely valuable, and it was something that bothered me since it was revealed to us. Would you really want an Altmer called Egg or Supertiks being the Emperor? Because usually the best pvp players have stupid nicknames for some reason, so the right would be we all join the army of irrelevant races and put the queen on the throne.

The Aldmeri Dominion of ESO and Skyrim are two completely different entities. The Thalmor didn't even exists back then. Hell, Talos didn't exist back then o_O

Hello? Altmer has always been altmer and they will always be altmer and we all know how altmer are.

http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Thalmor_(Online)

The Thalmor are a faction that serve the http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Aldmeri_Dominion_(Online) in http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/The_Elder_Scrolls_Online.^{http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Thalmor_(Online)#cite_note-Map-0}

Thalmor representatives can be contacted in the city of http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Marbruk. Worship of the http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Daedric_Prince http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Hircine, whose cultists have been seizing unwary travelers in http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Greenshade, is not tolerated by Thalmor authorities.^{http://elderscrolls.wikia.com/wiki/Thalmor_(Online)#cite_note-Map-0}

Why should the open it for free? its an special service for an pretty small group of people who want to play with friends of other races.

Its not something random causal players care about. Yes some serious roleplayers might want to play an in other factions but for most they want to find an race they like an play it without thinking of factions.

In short have they moved Khajiit to the Ebonheart pact I would not care much even if I dislike the smelling lizards, Nords are far more smelly at lest Argonainas bath.

Yes we probably get an option to pay to change faction after start later. Also because playing with friends. it will be far more expensive than selecting at start.

In short this is an important option for some people. the rest don't want lots of other races in their faction.

Best compromise is to make it available for an cost. I would prefer an small xp debuff say -10% below level 20 instead. but the cash shop work well enough for this.

The means they were willing to use in Skyrim and thousands of years prior are far different. In Skyrim the Thalmor want to wipe humans off the face of the earth. In ESO they want to stop the younger races from ruining the earth by keeping them from power.

In Skyrim it made sense because the end goal was something pitting humans against each other only helped. In ESO, the entire goal as stated by the lore, the definition of the AD, and quotes by Ayrenn herself; the only purpose, the ACTUAL ONLY PURPOSE of the union was to stop humans form sitting on the throne because of what they did when sitting on the throne.

The one concern that I have is race-specific dialogue. There wasn't much of it in Skyrim, and I think this more-or-less confirms there won't be much of it in Elder Scrolls Online. If everything were kept faction specific, NPCs could react accordingly if you were playing as a high elf or a khajiit. I don't mean in radiant dialogue. I mean in actual conversations. With only three races per faction, they could afford to spend a bit more time to flesh that out. But I very much doubt a khajiit in Skyrim would be treated any differently than a nord.