Bethesda hasn't added new playable races to The Elder Scrolls in two decades, but the slowly approaching Elder Scrolls 6 presents a new opportunity - and the developers should allow players to create Sload, a strange and rare species of sentient creature. Elder Scrolls' Tamriel has a deep history, and the larger Elder Scrolls world of Nirn is stuffed full of weird lore and unexpected finds. Among this largely untapped material, Sloads are certainly one of the more obscure things players are aware of, though they do appear occasionally.
Sloads are amphibious creatures from the islands of Thras, notorious for their brutal coastal raids and mastery of necromancy and widely despised across Tamriel for atrocities committed by their civilization. They appear several times in history to varying extents - ruins of their coral structures can be found in the Summerset Isles, and numerous great heroes and warriors of legend are known to have fought or encountered Sloads. Ysgramor, known for bringing the first humans to Tamriel and the leader of Skyrim's original Five Hundred Companions, supposedly had a Sload-skin wine sack. More infamously, Sloads orchestrated a genocide-scale plague that spread west across Tamriel in the First Era and lasted for 80 years. A powerful coalition of navies eventually invaded Thras in an event known as the Fall of the Sload, ending the plague and casting the Sload into relative obscurity as their islands sank - though the Sload likely did this deliberately. Despite this victory, the plague had already ravaged Tamriel, killing more than half the continent's population. Most recently, several Sea Sload can be found in various dungeons in The Elder Scrolls Online: Summerset.
Tamriel's historians, and perhaps Bethesda's writers, have depicted the Sload entirely as Elder Scrolls villains, all equally responsible for the various atrocities they've historically committed. Little is known about Sload politics, but it seems unlikely that all Sload belong unilaterally to the faction responsible for the Thrassian Plague. In a moment of racial essentialism, all Sload are described as cautious, quick-thinking, selfish, scheming, amoral, and incapable of displaying sincere emotions beyond greed. Painting an entire group of (ostensibly) people in this negative light is a bad look, and Bethesda could rehabilitate their image of the Sload by letting players play as them in the next Elder Scrolls game.
Elder Scrolls 6 - What Playing Like A Sload Could Look Like
There are numerous reasons why players might want to be able to play as a Sload - first and foremost, Sload culture is based around different kinds of Elder Scrolls magic, especially necromancy. Sload are also said to possess incredible memories, though most are unable to read. And, without water, various life stages of the Sload are highly immobile. Playing a giant water-bound illiterate toad-mage who can't read tomes to learn new spells truly sounds like the height of fun, especially if they're despised by every NPC.
Realistically, Bethesda won't add Sload to The Elder Scrolls 6. Any serious push from the audience to include them would be highly surprising. Additionally, Tamriel's 10 races are fairly well-established, unlike the obscure Sload - and other races are far more human-like and less likely to cause gameplay or lore issues. Based on when the game takes place, playable Kothringi or even Aldmer somehow seems more likely.
At the end of the day, The Elder Scrolls 6 is a long way away - Bethesda put it on hold to focus on Starfield, which itself has received delays. Until the game leaves pre-production, however, it's likely that nothing is set in stone regarding the game's playable species. The studio has lots of time to deliberate on the wisdom, or foolishness, of adding playable Sload into The Elder Scrolls.