The Nymph Races
All Nymph races have the following abilities.
Magical Body
The Nymph is a creature of magical being, she is composed of magic just as much as flesh and blood. As a consequence, weapons whose materials do not contain some magical essence will have little ability to harm her flesh.
This grants a very large resistance to any damage caused by weapons that are made of iron or steel. This will completely negate the damage caused by weaker enemies with smaller weapons, such as iron arrows or daggers. A very strong enemy with an iron two-handed weapon will still be able to make a dent in the Nymph, but this damage will be greatly reduced, even without armor.
This includes Riekling weapons, Imperial weapons, and Forsworn weapons.
It does not provide any protection whatsoever against draugr, falmer, elven, dwarven, orcish, nord-steel, glass, dragonbone, daedric, or ebony weapons.
It also does not provide any protection against attacks from animals such as wolves, trolls, or dragons.
This does offer a significant benefit during the Civil War part of the story, since all soldiers use some type of steel, iron, or imperial weaponry. However, depending on your level, these soldiers already get a very large damage bonus as part of the vanilla game, and your Nymph protection alone will likely not be enough to prevent them from injuring you.
Whimsical Mind
The Nymph is a flighty and carefree creature that, once fully grown, will never grow old nor ever die of natural causes. She has all the time in the world to do whatever strikes her fancy, and there is little pressure to grow and learn new things. She thus has a harder time focusing her mind in order to improve her skills.
This results in a 25% penalty on all experience gained.
Which technically means she requires 33% more experience to increase her skills than normal, since all experience is multiplied by 0.75, and this is how the in-game description reads.
Keep this in mind when spending money on trainers, as they will not grant a full skill level per session.
It will also keep skillbooks from providing a full level, though you will still get the experience.
Even with the relevant Guardian stone, you will still have a 10% penalty (0.75 * 1.2 = 0.9) and require 11.1% more experience to increase your skills. If you are also well rested, you will gain experience at 99% of normal for the skills boosted by the Guardian stone (0.75 * 1.2 *1.1 = 0.99). Lover’s comfort instead of well rested, results in a net 3% bonus (0.75 * 1.2 * 1.15 = 1.035).
Thus, this number was both mathematically and thematically chosen to enhance the flavor of the Nymph and her desire to find a mate, by ensuring that Lover’s Comfort combined with a Guardian stone is the only way to negate the penalty using vanilla modifiers.
This might sound like a fairly small penalty in exchange for the great power the Nymph races have to offer, but it will slow down leveling far more than it would seem at first glance, and should have quite a noticeable impact on gameplay.
“Naked Abilities”
Four of the subtype-races possess one or more powers that is only active active while they qualify as naked, according the game definition and the criteria the game uses to determine if NPCs will comment “You’re naked!” upon seeing you. This means no equipment in the main torso slot, whether armor or clothing.
The relative strength and diversity of this “naked power” depends on the Nymph subtype-race, and it relates to the background and behavior of that subtype.
You can think of it as a hierarchy, with the Wood Nymph having the strongest predisposition towards the “natural state,” followed by the Beast Nymph, then the Desert Nymph, and lastly the Night Nymph, who almost always lives discreetly within city environments, and so has the smallest benefit, as it is rather difficult to conceal your true nature if you regularly stroll naked through a city.
*Due to how the game scales damage by difficulty level, it is strongly recommended that you do not attempt to play a Nymph on any difficulty setting below Adept, unless you are also using another mod which changes combat damage calculations.*
The Blended Nymph
A blended Nymph is a Nymph whose ancestors have mated with enough different species of males that they lack particular distinct characteristics of any nymph subtype, being blessed with a mixture of minor magical traits. Besides possessing inhuman Nymph beauty, Blend Nymphii are virtually identical to mortal races in appearance, and many live secretly in mortal society. Some may even be unaware of their true nature and simply believe themselves mortals that are "special" or "gifted" in some way.
They have as their racial trait a mild protection to just about everything: a small resistance to every form of damage, along with a special ability that reduces all damage of every kind, and of course the universal Nymph protection from iron and steel.
The overall theme here is that they represent the most complete dilution of magical essence that Nymphii obtain from mortal males, looking and acting for the most part just like mortal women. It is hard to define this subtype as having any particular background or tendencies. They run the full range of behavior of any of the mortal races, and very often they behave just like the mortal race they most closely resemble. They are the only Nymph race that has an armor skill as a racial bonus, and unlike just about every other kind of Nymph imaginable, they don't have an instinctual tendency to go prancing around naked wherever they travel.
That's not to suggest they are less sexual creatures than other Nymphii however. Nearly all Nymph subtypes would be considered "hyper-sexual" by human standards, with the caveat being that they are extremely selective in choosing mates, in order to ensure the most potent magical essences will pass to their offspring. Blended Nymphii share this same powerful drive, but they do not possess nearly as much selective instinct. A quirk of the Blended Nymph pedigree means that just about any male she chooses will contribute positively to the magical energy of her offspring and the offspring will not be weakened by any racial or individual essence, there are no wrong choices!
Add this to the fact that these “Highly Motivated” Nymphii will very often live within human or mer society, sometimes believing they are a human or mer woman, and the results are best left to your imagination.
Though it might sound like the Blended Nymph is an overly-diluted and thus weaker form of Nymph, they possess a unique property borne of variety. In the Blended Nymph’s case, the whole really is greater than the sum of its parts, for in her being all of these different types of magical essences become woven together like threads in an intricate tapestry, or perhaps like an unbreakable mesh-work layered from thousands of individually fragile fibers. This property makes her significantly more durable than any other kind of Nymph, and she takes less damage from everything, no matter whether blade or magic.
As mentioned above, they are one of the only Nymph Race sub-types that does not have a strong instinctual preference for nudity. Think of it as a mental reflection of the intertwining of their many magical essences. They tend to look at things in terms of layering of different components, armor over skin, metal over cloth, plates, chain-links, and padding, and thus they get more benefit out of armor than almost any Nymph subtype or even mortal race. They also have a greater proficiency for working materials into weapons or armor, and have a slight bonus to smithing improvements.
The Blended Nymph has a natural aptitude for both the path of the Warrior or the Mage, though she might be slightly more suited for Combat. The followers Mystra and Kayellie are both examples of the Blended Nymph, and are a good representation of how diverse this subtype can be.
The Blended Nymph has the following skill bonuses
One-Handed 10
Smithing 10
Light Armor 5
Heavy Armor 5
Alteration 5
Destruction 5
Restoration 5
For a total of 45, the lowest of any Nymph Race, due to the significant number of combat-related skills she starts with.
The Blended Nymph has the following as her racial abilties, in addition to Magical Body and Whimsical Mind
Blend Nymph Poly-Resist
10% resistance to fire
10% resistance to frost
10% resistance to magic
10% resistance to disease
10% resistance to poison
10% resistance to shock
Equipment Mastery
All weapons and armor can be improved 10% more with smithing
All armor provides 15% more armor rating
and finally Woven Magical Threads
a 7% reduction in all damage taken from melee or magic