The bulk update request #11304 is pending approval.

create implication alfiq (133) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication alfiq-raht (1) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication cathay (5) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication cathay-raht (2) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication dagi (5) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication dagi-raht (2) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication ohmes (4) -> the_elder_scrolls (13317)
create implication ohmes-raht (1) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication pahmar (2) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication pahmar-raht (7) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication senche (6) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication senche-raht (25) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication suthay (1) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication suthay-raht (13) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication tojay (4) -> khajiit (6212)
create implication tojay-raht (1) -> khajiit (6212)

Reason: Implying the various Khajiit breeds to khajiit.

A couple of these tags were previously aliased to Khajiit, dating back to about 10 years ago, which I unaliased to make this request. The reasoning given at the time was that they were only tagged on a handful of posts, most of which apparently contained a different kind of Khajiit and were thus mistagged, but I don’t think that’s a good solution as opposed to simply fixing the mistags.

Source: https://en.m.uesp.net/wiki/Lore:Khajiit

The article lists a 17th breed, "Mane", but that sounds more like a title than an actual distinct breed, so probably irrelevant to us.

Also, leaving out ohmes from the implication because they are just elves, and they lack any felid features, which would make the felid implication incorrect. Maybe removing the implication would be the more correct option, but very inconvenient since Ohmes are only represented in four posts to date and felid would have to be manually tagged on the thousands of other Khajiit posts, so… nah

Other issues included the different breeds not being clearly defined, with people assuming certain post-Daggerfall games have different breeds based on the games' visual design differences despite no official mention of whether they're supposed to be different, and some breeds being neigh-impossible to distinguish from each other. Has that really improved in the last few years?

watsit said:
Other issues included the different breeds not being clearly defined, with people assuming certain post-Daggerfall games have different breeds based on the games' visual design differences despite no official mention of whether they're supposed to be different, and some breeds being neigh-impossible to distinguish from each other. Has that really improved in the last few years?

post #4843368
This image nicely depicts the different breeds, though it may be either really old official art or speculative fan art based on early descriptions before any official visual depictions existed. Hard to say since there’s no source or artist listed.

The major inconsistencies between this image and current lore seem to be that Dagi/-raht and Pahmar/-raht are anthro rather than feral, and Tojay/-raht are plantigrade. Also, certain forms are now designed to resemble specific felid species - for example, the Pahmar look like tigers and the Tojay look like lynxes and so on. Some are feline and some are pantherine.

… people assuming certain post-Daggerfall games have different breeds based on the games' visual design differences despite no official mention of whether they're supposed to be different…

As far as I’m aware, this current breed system was retroactively created specifically as a way to explain why Arena, Daggerfall, Morrowind, and Oblivion all had such different Khajiit designs. Later Elder Scrolls games do explicitly name and even depict each of these different forms, so they are all canon now, even if they didn’t used to be.

… some breeds being neigh-impossible to distinguish from each other.

The only thing that seems potentially indistinguishable here is the fact that all of the -raht forms are basically just their non-raht counterparts but bigger and bulkier - with the exception of Ohmes-raht, which have tails and fur that regular Ohmes don’t. All of the -raht/non-raht pairs seem to have some anatomical differences, at least, so they should be more easily visually distinguishable.

This is based on current TES lore as far as it’s known, which was not necessarily the same 10 years ago. In particular, The Elder Scrolls Online (released in 2014) is the most recent major game in the series, but more importantly the Elsweyr expansion released in 2019, which was the first time in the series (that I’m aware of) that the game included multiple different Khajiit breeds as NPCs in the game; and The Elder Scrolls: Legends, released in 2017, which has official artwork depicting many Khajiit breeds. The artwork from Legends seems pretty consistent with depictions in Online, so this seems to be the solidified form of this bit of lore that the games are probably going to use going forward (which will probably not be particularly relevant until/if the Elder Scrolls series ever releases an Elsweyr game, since most Khajiit breeds are very rare outside of Elsweyr, but still).

That said, what is the alternative here? Alias all of these species to khajiit? At the very least, Alfiq/Senche/Cathay/Ohmes-raht are all very visually distinct from one another, and fairly consistent across games (even if their names and reasons for existing were retconned into the series after the fact), so not being able to search for them would be a major detriment, I think. It may be true that Cathay can hardly be distinguished from Cathay-raht in most cases, but disallowing any of these forms from being tagged as a result doesn’t seem like a useful solution to that. Rather, we may either have to guess based on apparent size in comparison to scenery/other characters or take the word of the artist/character owner - basically, handle it the same way we handle real-life visually indistinct species such as ravens and crows. If we’re going to have tags for some forms, we may as well have all 16 of them for the sake of consistency - especially since some posts actually will depict the bigger -raht forms in a way that visually distinguishes them from their smaller counterparts such as the post I linked at the top.

spe said:
post #4843368
This image nicely depicts the different breeds, though it may be either really old official art or speculative fan art based on early descriptions before any official visual depictions existed. Hard to say since there’s no source or artist listed.

My impression is it's speculative/fan art. I'd expect such an image to appear on UESP if it was official (not that UESP is free of speculative info, but such a concise chart would be a good visual aid, if it was canon). It definitely doesn't line up with what UESP shows for the different breeds.

spe said:
As far as I’m aware, this current breed system was retroactively created specifically as a way to explain why Arena, Daggerfall, Morrowind, and Oblivion all had such different Khajiit designs. Later Elder Scrolls games do explicitly name and even depict each of these different forms, so they are all canon now, even if they didn’t used to be.

They were created to explain why Arena, Daggerfall, and Redguard/Morrowind had different designs. With Oblivion, some people started arguing they were different yet again, primarily because Oblivion bad they wanted them to be separate and didn't like Oblivion's overall design, giving them a more puma or lion-esque design along with plantigrade feet; a technical necessity to work with the footwear and animations shared by all playable races (the only reason Morrowind had digitigrade legs and unique animations (shared with Argonians) was because they weren't originally intended to be playable, and were only made so later in development after enough fan outcry, which is also why Khajiit and Argonians can't wear boots/shoes in that game because the NPCs didn't need to and the devs didn't have time to fix it when it became something players could try), which other people argue against saying it was just visual/technical design differences and not a lore difference. And as mentioned, the plantigrade/digitigrade difference between Morrowind's and Oblivion's Khajiit are also mirrored in Argonians, which aren't given separate breeds like that (they both also lack breasts in Morrowind, and have them in the other games). AFAIK, there's been no official statement about whether the Khajiit in Morrowind, Oblivion, and Skyrim are different breeds. Though to be fair, I haven't really kept up with the series since a few years after ESO released (which was created by a different studio, FWIW), and who knows what that game has done with the lore; not that Elder Scrolls is great at maintaining canon or consistent lore to begin with, but ESO wouldn't affect Morrowind, Oblivion, or Skyrim's interpretation of Khajiit.

spe said:
The only thing that seems potentially indistinguishable here is the fact that all of the -raht forms are basically just their non-raht counterparts but bigger and bulkier - with the exception of Ohmes-raht, which have tails and fur that regular Ohmes don’t. All of the -raht/non-raht pairs seem to have some anatomical differences, at least, so they should be more easily visually distinguishable.

Going by what UESP has, apparently these are the same breed (Cathay):
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/File:OB-npc-J%27bari.jpg
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/File:SR-npc-Dro%27marash.jpg

while these are different:
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/File:ON-npc-Samari.jpg (Dagi)
https://en.uesp.net/wiki/File:ON-npc-Ri%27Atahrashi.jpg (Pahmar-raht)

If I was forced to say, I'd have guessed Dro'Marash and Samari were maybe of one breed, and maybe J'bari and Atahrashi another. But from just looking at them, I'd have no clue if any were intended to be different or not, let alone that J'bari and Dro'marash were the same breed while Samari and Atahrashi were different from them and each other. With fan art, a lot of differences can also be chalked up to art style, different artists drawing the same character and being interpreted as different breeds just because of the way the given artist draws anthros.

spe said:
That said, what is the alternative here? Alias all of these species to khajiit? At the very least, Alfiq/Senche/Cathay/Ohmes-raht are all very visually distinct from one another, and fairly consistent across games (even if their names and reasons for existing were retconned into the series after the fact), so not being able to search for them would be a major detriment, I think.

That is true. Alfiq, Senche, and Ohmes(-raht) are pretty easy to distinguish (not so much -raht vs non-raht outside of Ohmes, as it would basically be muscular or size_difference), and having them would be helpful. But the rest are easy to clump together and confuse for each other, with people tagging based on what they want it to be or their own interpretation of the lore instead of any clear standard (the aforementioned chart being a prime example), and I don't see how to deal with that.