Your vision blurs back to life. Your head is pounding. You are vaguely conscious that you are sitting on a bench, heavy manacles on your wrist chaining you to a massive oar. You are wearing only a scant few rags, your mostly exposed skin, raw from lashes, exposed to the sun. The stink of sweat and saltwater is everywhere.

“Oh good, you’re finally awake.”

You glance next to you. A Khajiit sits there, arms rolling back and forth as he rows the oar you instinctively realize you should be rowing as well. His brown, black-etched fur is filthy, and he has clearly seen better days, but you catch a mischievous glint in those yellow eyes of his.

“This one had been afraid that the oar master’s last blow might have concussed you. It would not have been a pleasant voyage chained next to someone who was sleeping on the job. Or chained next to a corpse. Granted, this is not going to be a pleasant voyage either way.”

You vaguely remember your confrontation about the galley master, but you don’t remember what it was about. Your head is still pounding, and you reach a hand to touch the back of your skull…

“No, don’t move too much. This one knows you must be feeling dizzy: the oar master struck you quite hard. You really should not have provoked him like that. If you had died, they simply would have thrown you overboard for the slaughter fish, and brought some other poor unfortunate to be chained to this oar. These Thalmor, they have slaves to spare.“

You blink rheumily. You remember little; your name escapes you, as well as why you are here on this Altmer galley, or where you are going. You mumble some of these questions to your feline companion.

“What? No, this one does not know where we are going. Perhaps we are sailing along the coast to raid Skyrim, or going into Iliac Bay to be traded off in Hammerfell or Daggerfall. Or perhaps, if we are really lucky, we will be going to the Summerset Isles. This one always wanted to visit the Summerset Isles. They have such shiny things there. Such beautiful creatures to hunt.”

The Khajiit pauses, as a partially armoured Altmer strides down the length of the galley, barking orders at the row upon row of prisoners rowing the oars. The Khajiit regards the Altmer warily, and waits until he is out of sight before turning back to you, his wily grin returning.

“Ah, perhaps introductions are in order. This one’s name is Tammaz, and that large oaf behind you is my brother, Parzival–“

“Why did you tell him where I was?”

You glance behind you towards the source of the new voice. There, in the row behind you, is another Khajiit: this one has orange fur, and its hugely powerful body practically looms behind you. Despite his size, though, this Khajiit regards you with surprisingly soft, nervous yellow eyes.

“You cannot see me.”

“Brother, you lack witted ja’khajiit, everyone can see you. You are hard to miss.”

“You cannot see Parzival.”

Tammaz makes a sound that is halfway between a sigh and a retching hairball.

“Var var var var var, what can be done with that one? Anyway, we have been thinking of a way to end our indentured oarsmanship prematurely. This one knows a way off this boat, one that hopefully get us all out alive and intact. The problem is, the plan requires three people, and as my brother and I are only two, we need a partner in our daring venture.”

Tammaz pauses and glances up, seeing a seabird above them, arcing with a restrained ease against the greying clouds. He smiles, as though seeing an omen only he can interpret, before turning back to you.

“So, friend…what do you say? Shall we do a jailbreak together?”

******

Name: Tammaz

Race: Khajiit (Suthay-Raht)

Sex: Male

Class: Hunter Ranger

Alignment: Chaotic Neutral

Level: 3

Background: Outlander (Tribal Nomad)

Constellation: The Thief

Abilities:

Strength	Agility	Endurance	Intelligence	Willpower	Personality
14 (+2)	17 (+3)	13 (+1)	12(+1)	9 (-1)	13 (+1)

Hit Points: 23

Proficiency Bonus: +2

PROFICIENCIES:
Armor: Light Armor, Medium Armor, Shields
Weapons :Axe, Blunt, Hand-to-Hand, Long Blade, Marksman, Polearm, and Short Blade
Tools: Herbalism kit, Esraj (musical instrument)
Skill Proficiencies: Athletics, Survival. Intimidation

Saving Throws: Agility, Endurance

Skills: Athletics, Nature, Perception, Stealth, Survival

Languages: Ta’agra, Tamrielic, Daedric

EQUIPMENT: Leather armour, two short blades, an explorer’s pack, a longbow and a quiver of 20 arrows, a staff, a hunting trap, a trophy from an animal you killed, a set of traveler’s clothes, and a belt pouch containing 40 septims

TRAITS AND ABILITIES:

Attribute Score Increase. Your Agility score increases by 2, and your Endurance increases by 1. (Included above)

Speed: Your base walking speed is 35 feet (40 with sign of the Thief)

Eye of Fear: You know how to use your cat-like eyes to demoralize others. You gain proficiency in the Intimidation skill. (Included above)

Eye of Night: Your khajiit ancestry grants you superior vision in dark and dim conditions. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.

Quick Claws: Because of your claws, you have a climbing speed of 20 feet. In addition, your claws are natural weapons, which you can use to make unarmed strikes. If you hit with them, you deal slashing damage equal to 1d4 + your Strength modifier, instead of the bludgeoning damage normal for an unarmed strike.

Natural Bandit: You are able to use your claws as thieves’ tools. You can add your proficiency modifier
to any check using your claws in this way, even if you are not proficient in thieves’ tools.

Feline Agility: Your reflexes and agility allow you to move with a burst of speed. When you move on your
turn in combat, you can double your speed until the end of the turn. Once you use this trait, you can’t use it again until you move 0 feet on one of your turns.

Languages. You can speak, read, and write Tamrielic and Ta’agra. Ta’agra script combines unique and fluid motions. Artistic interpretation is praised and varies greatly between authors

Favoured Enemy (Beasts): Beginning at 1st level, you have significant experience studying, tracking, hunting, and even talking to a certain type of enemy commonly encountered in the wilds. Choose a type of favored enemy: beasts, humanoids, monstrosities, or undead. You gain a +2 bonus to damage rolls with weapon attacks against creatures of the chosen type. Additionally, you have advantage on Willpower (Survival) checks to track your favored enemies, as well as on Intelligence checks to recall information about them. When you gain this feature, you also learn one language of your choice, typically one spoken by your favored enemy or creatures associated with it. However, you are free to pick any language you wish to learn.

Natural Explorer: You are a master of navigating the natural world, and you react with swift and decisive action when attacked. This grants you the following benefits:
•You ignore difficult terrain.
•You have advantage on initiative rolls.
•On your first turn during combat, you have advantage on attack rolls against creatures that have not yet acted.
In addition, you are skilled at navigating the wilderness. You gain the following benefits when traveling for an hour or more:
•Difficult terrain doesn’t slow your group’s travel.
•Your group can’t become lost except by magical means.
•Even when you are engaged in another activ ity while traveling (such as foraging, navigating, or tracking), you remain alert to danger.
•If you are traveling alone, you can move stealthily at a normal pace.
•When you forage, you find twice as much food as you normally would.
•While tracking other creatures, you also learn their exact number, their sizes, and how long ago they passed through the area

Fighting Style: Two Weapon Fighting- When you engage in two-weapon fighting, you can add your ability modifier to the damage of the second attack.

Skirmisher’s Stealth- Beginning at 2nd level, you combine speed and stealth in combat to make yourself hard to pin down. You are difficult to detect even if you attack or otherwise take actions that would normally reveal your presence .At the start of your turn, pick a creature you are hidden from. You remain hidden from that creature during your turn, regardless of your actions or the actions of other creatures. As a bonus action at the end of your turn, you can make an Agility (Stealth) check to hide from that creature again if you fulfill the conditions needed to hide. Otherwise, creatures are aware of you at the end of your turn

Poultices- At 3rd level, you can create special herbal poultices that have healing power comparable to some potions. You can spend 1 hour gathering herbs and preparing herbal poultices using treated bandages to create a number of such poultices equal to your Willpower modifier (minimum 1). You can carry a number of poultices at one time equal to your Willpower modifier (minimum 1). The poultices you create cannot be applied by anyone but you. After 24 hours, any poultices that you have not used lose their potency. If you spend 1 minute applying one of your poultices to a wounded humanoid creature, thereby expending its use, that creature regains 1d6 hit points for every two ranger levels you have (rounded up).

Primal Instincts- Beginning at 3rd level, your mastery of ranger lore allows you to establish a powerful link to beasts and to the land around you. With this feature you gain the following benefits:
PRIMAL CONTACT- You have an innate ability to communicate with beasts, and they recognize you as a kindred spirit. Through sounds and gestures, you can communicate simple ideas to a beast as an action, and can read its basic mood and intent. You learn its emotional state, whether it is affected by magic of any sort, its short-term needs (such as food or safety), and actions you can take (if any) to persuade it to not attack. You cannot use this ability against a creature that you have attacked within the past 10 minutes.
PRIMEVAL AWARENESS- You can attune your senses to determine if any of your favored enemies lurk nearby. By spending 1uninterrupted minute in concentration (as if you were concentrating on a spell), you can sense whether any of your favored enemies are present within 5 miles of you. This feature reveals which of your favored enemies are present, their numbers, and the creatures’ general direction and distance (in miles)from you. If there are multiple groups of your favored enemies within range, you learn this information for each group.
PRIMAL MARK- As a bonus action, you can choose a creature you can see within 90 feet of you and mark it as your quarry for up to 1 hour, as though you are concentrating on a spell. You have advantage on any Willpower (Perception) or Willpower (Survival) check you make to find it.

Companion of Hircine- At 3rd level, you learn how to conjure a powerful beast from The Hunting Grounds, Hircine’s plane of Oblivion. With 8 hours of work and the expenditure of 200septims worth of magical components, you call forth a daedric beast from the Hunting Grounds to serve as your faithful companion. You normally select your companion from among the following animals: an ape, a black bear, a boar, a giant badger, a giant weasel, a panther, or a wolf. However, your DM might pick one of these animals for you, or an animal based on a creature appropriate for the campaign setting. The creature looks identical to the beast it takes the form of, but it’s creature type is considered to be a fiend (daedra). At the end of the 8 hours, your daedric companion appears and gains all the benefits of your Companion’s Bond ability. You can have only one daedric companion at a time. If your daedric companion is ever slain, the magical bond you share allows you to return it to life. With 8hours of work and the expenditure of 100 septims worth of rare components, you call forth your companion’s spirit from the depth’s of oblivion and use your magic to conjure a new body for it. If you use this ability to return a former daedric companion to life while you have a current companion, your current companion leaves you and is replaced by the restored companion.
COMPANION’S BOND- Your animal companion gains a variety of benefits while it is linked to you. The animal companion loses its Multiattack action, if it has one. The companion obeys your commands as best it can. It rolls for initiative like any other creature, but you determine its actions, decisions, attitudes, and so on .If you are incapacitated or absent, your companion acts on its own. When using your Natural Explorer feature, you and your animal companion can both move stealthily at a normal pace. Your animal companion has abilities and game statistics determined in part by your level. Your companion uses your proficiency bonus rather than its own. In addition to the areas where it normally uses its proficiency bonus, an animal companion also adds its proficiency bonus to its AC and to its damage rolls. Your animal companion gains proficiency in two skills of your choice. It also becomes proficient with all saving throws

Constellation: The Thief (Evening Star): You were born under the Birth sign of the Thief and gain the following benefits:
•Your Agility score increases by 1, to a maximum of 20 (included above).
•Your speed increases by 5 feet.
•You gain one Luck Point. Your Luck Point is a d6. You can add your Luck Point to one ability check, attack roll, or saving throw you make. You can wait until after you roll the d20 before deciding to use the Luck Point, but must decided before the DM says whether the roll succeeds or fails. You regain your expended Luck Point at the next dawn, and you can never have more that one Luck Point from this feature at a time.

Wanderer- You have an excellent memory for maps and geography, and you can always recall the general layout of terrain, settlements, and other features around you. In addition, you can find food and freshwater for yourself and up to five other people each day, provided that the land offers berries, small game ,water, and so forth.

(Artwork by Erwin Melchor)

Name: Parzival

Race: Khajiit (Cathay)

Sex: Male

Class: Nightblade (Shadowmage)

Alignment: Lawful Good

Level: 3

Background: Outlander (Tribal Nomad)

Constellation: The Thief

Abilities:

Strength	Agility	Endurance	Intelligence	Willpower	Personality
16 (+3)	18 (+4)	14 (+2)	14 (+2)	9 (-1)	15 (+2)

Hit Points: 31

Proficiency Bonus: +2

PROFICIENCIES:
Armor: Light armor
Weapons: Marksman, Short Blade, and Long Blade
Tools: Thieves’ tools, musical instrument (flute)

Saving Throws: Agility, Intelligence

Skills: Acrobatics, Athletics, Perception, Stealth, Survival

Languages: Ta’agra, Tamrielic, Bosmeri

EQUIPMENT: A staff, a hunting trap, a trophy from an animal you killed, a set of traveler’s clothes, and a belt pouch containing 40 septims.

SPELLS:

Cantrips: Friends, Mage Hand
Level 1 Spells: Armour of Agathys, Charm Person, Expeditious Retreat
Level 2 Spells: Invisibility

Spellcasting Attribute: Personality is your spellcasting attribute for your Nightblade spells, so you use your Personality whenever a spell refers to your spellcasting attribute. In addition, you use your Personality modifier when setting the saving throw DC for a Nightblade spell you cast and when making an attack roll with one.

Spell save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Personality modifier

Spell attack modifier = your proficiency bonus +your Personality modifier

TRAITS AND ABILITIES:

Attribute Score Increase. Your Agility score increases by 2 and your Strength by 1. (Included above)

Speed: Your base walking speed is 35 feet (40 with sign of the Thief)

Size. Cathay Khajiit are similar in size to most menand range from 5 feet to 6 ½ feet. Your size is medium.

Languages. You can speak, read, and write Tamrielic and Ta’agra. Ta’agra script combines unique and fluid motions. Artistic interpretation is praised and varies greatly between authors

Powerful Build. You count as one size larger when determining your carrying capacity and the weight you can push, drag, or lift.

Eye of Fear: You know how to use your cat-like eyes to demoralize others. You gain proficiency in the Intimidation skill. (Included above)

Eye of Night: Your khajiit ancestry grants you superior vision in dark and dim conditions. You can see in dim light within 60 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.

Quick Claws: Because of your claws, you have a climbing speed of 20 feet. In addition, your claws are natural weapons, which you can use to make unarmed strikes. If you hit with them, you deal slashing damage equal to 1d4 + your Strength modifier, instead of the bludgeoning damage normal for an unarmed strike.

Savage Attacks: When you score a critical hit with a melee weapon attack, you can roll one of the
weapon’s damage dice one additional time and add it to the extra damage of the critical hit.

Cunning Action: Starting at 2nd level, your quick thinking and agility allows you to move and act quickly. You can take a bonus action on each of your turns in combat. This action can be used only to take the Dash, Disengage, or Hide action

Shadowhand: Starting at 2nd level, you learn the mage hand cantrip .If you already know this cantrip, you learn a different cantrip of your choice from the nightblade spell list. This cantrip doesn’t count against your number of cantrips known. When you cast mage hand, you can make the spectral hand invisible, and you can perform the following additional tasks with it:
•You can stow one object the hand is holding in a container worn or carried by another creature.
•You can retrieve an object in a container worn or carried by another creature.
•You can use thieves’ tools to pick locks and disarm traps at range.
You can perform one of these tasks without being noticed by a creature if you succeed on an Agility (Sleight of Hand) check contested by the creature’s Willpower (Perception) check. In addition, you can use the bonus action granted by your Cunning Action to control the hand.

Nighteye: At 3rd level, you have naturally adjusted to being in darkness. You gain darkvision and can see in dim light within 120 feet of you as if it were bright light, and in darkness as if it were dim light. You can’t discern color in darkness, only shades of gray.

Drain Essence: Starting at 1st level, your study of the dark arts allows you to extract vitality from another creature as it nears its demise. When you reduce a creature within 5 feet of you to 0 hit points, you gain temporary hit points equal to your Personality modifier + your Nightblade level (minimum of 1 temporary hit point).

Child of Darkness: Also at 1st level, you find yourself being the most comfortable while surrounded in darkness. While you are in dim light, darkness, or magical darkness, you
gain the following benefits:

• On your first turn during combat, you have advantage on attack rolls against creatures that have not yet acted.
• You ignore difficult terrain.
• You have advantage on initiative rolls.

Constellation: The Thief (Evening Star): You were born under the Birth sign of the Thief and gain the following benefits:
•Your Agility score increases by 1, to a maximum of 20 (included above).
•Your speed increases by 5 feet.
•You gain one Luck Point. Your Luck Point is a d6. You can add your Luck Point to one ability check, attack roll, or saving throw you make. You can wait until after you roll the d20 before deciding to use the Luck Point, but must decided before the DM says whether the roll succeeds or fails. You regain your expended Luck Point at the next dawn, and you can never have more that one Luck Point from this feature at a time.

Wanderer- You have an excellent memory for maps and geography, and you can always recall the general layout of terrain, settlements, and other features around you. In addition, you can find food and freshwater for yourself and up to five other people each day, provided that the land offers berries, small game ,water, and so forth.

SUMMARY: Tammaz and Parzival are a pair of Khajiit twins with a knack for trouble. Originally hailing from Elsweyr, the desert homeland of the Khajiit, the two have wandered all across Tamriel, and have gotten themselves into trouble in all corners of it. Born to a clan of Bandaari wanderers, the two are used to living on the outskirts of both society and the law: clever, brown-furred Tammaz is a hunter and tracker, and is content to live out in the wilderness, stalking prey to his heart’s content. The orange-furred Parzival, meanwhile, is adept at stealth and at hiding despite his size, and despite his gentle nature, often contracts out as a thief, spy and occasionally as an assassin. Each of the brothers has a daedric patron whom they give homage to, with Tammaz committing his hunts to the Hungry Cat (also known as Hircine), while Parzival has pledged himself to the Dark Clan Mother, Mafala (or Mephala as she is known in the rest of Nirn).

*****

So for my first character(s) of 2026, I wanted to do something that I had been planning for a while now. When I was looking at RPGs last year, one thing I had discovered was that there was an Unofficial Elder Scrolls Tabletop Roleplaying Game using 5e rules; upon further examination, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that this was a VERY substantive project, with several large and elaborately written PDFs containing full rules conversions of almost anything you can think of for Elder Scrolls into 5e. Races, classes, spells, items, monsters…the amount of detail that has gone into this project is nothing short of impressive, and I was pleasantly surprised to see that the authors of this project were not only drawing from Skyrim and older titles like Morrowind and Oblivion, but also from Elder Scrolls Online (which continues to be one of my favourite MMOs, though I lament that it is still not free to play).

When first considering a character, I contemplated remaking my Argonian from Oblivion or Skyrim (yes, it was the same lizard), or one of my characters from Elder Scrolls Online. Instead, though, I decided to follow another tradition of mine, and make a Khajiit modeled after my cat. And as I currently have two cats, it had to be two Khajiit.

A few years ago, when I started on Elder Scrolls Online, I made a Khajiit modeled off of my cat Dexter: the Nightblade Dex’torr the Black was one-eyed piratical scoundrel who was a terror to the unguarded pockets of Tamriel and an erstwhile ally to the Aldmeri Dominion. Eventually, though, I drifted away from ESO and, tragically, Dexter died from leukemia not long after. Cut to a few years later, and I have not only gotten over my grief, but, in my new place, I now have two new cats: a pair of medium-hairs named Tommy and Percy, a bonded pair of brothers who have a single brain cell between them.

It goes without saying, I modeled these two Khajiit a lot on Tommy and Percy and their respective personalities. Tommy is a hyperactive doofus who is constantly chasing after cat toys, standing vigil over my balcony, and watching out for the constant threat of outside squirrels; he is also easily distracted by videos of birds on YouTube, and still hasn’t figured out that they aren’t real. As such, the Hunter subclass of Ranger seemed perfect for him. Percy, meanwhile, is large, orange, and sweet, with a personality that constantly vacillates between friendly purring and running away to find a place to hide. As such, despite his gentle nature, I figured the Nightblade was the best class to represent his reclusiveness.

Will I ever use these two, either as player characters or NPCs? I have no idea: Elder Scrolls is one of those properties with so much lore, and so much depth to its world, that I honestly feel intimidated by the prospect of running anything set within it. Perhaps I will one day find someone willing to run, or to play, with this rule set: in the meantime, I am simply happy that a fan-made project this big exists.

Next: Deathwatch