Read the Weapon Skills to get an idea of what you’ll do. When selecting a race for optimization, first decide a Weapon focus for your playstyle.Do you want to be an unbreakable wall of indisputable power? Then you’ll be looking for Health and Stamina boosts. Are you looking to manipulate the elements and command minions? Then you’re looking at Magicka and spell buffs. Do you want to use a bow or a greatsword? Then you’ll be focusing your points into Stamina. If this is the route you’re taking, it starts by thinking “What is my playstyle?”. The second part of race selection is optimization for the best possible build. If you are picking your race for roleplay, you can still try to optimize it by selecting a Class that matches its strengths, so in that case you’ll want to look at our Classes article and our many, many builds.Maybe you want to roleplay a fierce Dunmer Warrior, or maybe you are trying to make your character match your own looks, and discover High Elves don’t have dark hair so you have to pick a Wood Elf or human instead. On one side, there’s Roleplay purposes – maybe you want to roleplay an unusual Khajiit raised by High Elves who has discovered an aptitude for Magic. There are two parts to selecting your character’s race. You may also unlock “ Any Race, Any Alliance” for 1500 crowns in the crown store – but be mindful you cannot change faction after character creation! This is not a big issue for most newcomers, but you should check out the Factions page to familiarize yourself with what they stand for, just so you know the company you’ll keep!. The alliance you belong to has only one effect in modern ESO: locks you into that faction’s group in PvP (in Cyrodiil). Each Faction has 3 races, and Imperials are also available as a special buy that allows you to join any of the Alliances. It is also important to know that Races are locked into Factions in ESO. While you can change your Race later if you really want to, it will cost you money, and a bit of investigation could save you nearly 30 USD. For this reason, it does make some sense to spend time researching what Race to play, even if you don’t anticipate playing in any serious capacity. Many players start out not knowing what commitment level they will have to the game, and often times they become much more “hardcore” than they originally intended.
While Race is not the most important component of your Build in ESO, their Passives do have an impact, particularly in more challenging content or PvP. Should I worry about Race and Racial Bonuses?