Racial Traits, Traditions, and Abilities (Revamp)

[Waruri]

I've been playing EQ2 since beta before the original release. One thing the the Developers clearly stated on the boards before release is that EQ2 will be a game where the race of your character will not effect the class you choose in any major way at all. Because of this statement I chose a High Elf over an Erudite for my wizard since the High Elf (in my opinion) looks cooler.

Up until the release of RoK and the new racial abilities this was true. However with the release of the new racial abilities have drastically effected some of the classes in the game. 

For example.

Erudites get +5% increased spell casting speed (passive)

Please look at this...

 

The wizard TSO fabled raid setgear forearms have 5% passive cast speed as one of their main attributes. Essentially this is like saying if you play an erudite you can start the game with a level 80 endgame raid item for free and it won't even take up an equipment slot. (Obviously there are other stats on the forearms and I realize that but you get my point.)

Same thing with Dark Elf Assassins, so much so that a friend of mine level 80 with raid gear started over from level 1 just to get the Dark Elf Racial ability.

Possible ideas for revamp part below.

I don't want to nerf or get rid of the abilities because I think they are a good addition to the game. However, I would like to do something about the imbalance. Some ideas I have are...

1) Maybe add a craftable item to the game that allows us to switch our race. Similar to the mirror that lets us change appearance. So that those who care more about gameplay than looks can have the option to change.

or

2) Instead of having different abilities for different races, make a huge pool with every racial ability to choose from and keep the system as is with only letting us choose one every 10 levels so we can choose the abilities we want. (This however may allow people to mix and match some crazy combinations and might not be desirable)

All I'm really asking for is an option for those of us who have been long life customers to change our choice since the development direction of the game has changed and us not be penalized for an unforseeable change to the game. (ie. do not make us lose all of our gear and spells etc  and start over from level 1)

Please feel free to discuss but keep the thread civil and do not flame each other.

[Aeralik]

Waruri wrote:

I've been playing EQ2 since beta before the original release. One thing the the Developers clearly stated on the boards before release is that EQ2 will be a game where the race of your character will not effect the class you choose in any major way at all. Because of this statement I chose a High Elf over an Erudite for my wizard since the High Elf (in my opinion) looks cooler.

That really still holds up.  At the end of the day, it doesnt really matter what race you are.  Some races are slightly skewed to an offensive role or perhaps a defensive role but the gains are really minimal at the high level.  High levels characters have access to a number of different gear selections which effectively reduce the gain to something really small if at all.  If anything like in this case the erudite might be able to swap in a crit item instead of the set item but overall one item or a small boost doesnt make or break the character its the player behind it.

[Thundy]

Aeralik wrote:

Waruri wrote:

I've been playing EQ2 since beta before the original release. One thing the the Developers clearly stated on the boards before release is that EQ2 will be a game where the race of your character will not effect the class you choose in any major way at all. Because of this statement I chose a High Elf over an Erudite for my wizard since the High Elf (in my opinion) looks cooler.

That really still holds up.  At the end of the day, it doesnt really matter what race you are.  Some races are slightly skewed to an offensive role or perhaps a defensive role but the gains are really minimal at the high level.  High levels characters have access to a number of different gear selections which effectively reduce the gain to something really small if at all.  If anything like in this case the erudite might be able to swap in a crit item instead of the set item but overall one item or a small boost doesnt make or break the character its the player behind it.

Easy for you to say, mr. dark elf assassin.

[Waruri]

Aeralik wrote:

Waruri wrote:

I've been playing EQ2 since beta before the original release. One thing the the Developers clearly stated on the boards before release is that EQ2 will be a game where the race of your character will not effect the class you choose in any major way at all. Because of this statement I chose a High Elf over an Erudite for my wizard since the High Elf (in my opinion) looks cooler.

That really still holds up.  At the end of the day, it doesnt really matter what race you are.  Some races are slightly skewed to an offensive role or perhaps a defensive role but the gains are really minimal at the high level.  High levels characters have access to a number of different gear selections which effectively reduce the gain to something really small if at all.  If anything like in this case the erudite might be able to swap in a crit item instead of the set item but overall one item or a small boost doesnt make or break the character its the player behind it.

I don't agree with this. While it may seem that 5% cast speed is minimal it can be the edge that you need from having all your skills cast fast enough such that they are all on reuse timers just long enough to get an extra skill in that you would not normally cast allowing you to do more damage with each rotation. Being a wizard one extra spell such as solar flare or ro's coil which normally I wouldn't use extremely often because I usually have something else up, would be an increase of 4000-7000 damage if it crits.

How is it fair that someone else would have the Option of replacing that cast speed item with a different item such as a crit item giving them more crit chance or whatever when at the start of the game we were told it would not effect us. I would have gladly chosen an erudite if not for that statement.

You have people completely rerolling there entire toon over the whole Dark Elf Assassin issue because of the difference.

I don't think it is too much to ask to at least let us respec our race once per account or once per charater.  It would be a nice benefit to those who have been around since day 1 and couldn't forsee this change to make an informed deciscion.

Thank you for the response.  I do appreciate the feedback.

 One of my points was exactly what you pointed out that the erudite would be able to swap that 5% cast speed item for something else making them more powerful over all.

For instance maybe they put on Najena's Ring of Readiness for the Negative Energy Channeler Ring because they don't need the cast speed. (For arguments sake lets say that the cast speed is actually better than the clicky from the ring and would otherwise be more desirable if you were not very high already.)

(For arguments sake lets

You would be gaining a significant boost in dmg by the single item swap because as an erudite you didn't need the cast speed. This is just one example of how it can play out. Another example is with the DE Assassin situation. In a group with a troub and illy you can stay permanently capped on hast whereas you cannot if you're a different class without those buffs.

Anyway those are just some of the thoughts I had. I got the idea out there. It's up to you guys what you decided to do and I do appreciate the response.

[Rahatmattata]

So dark elf

5% Melee and Spell Crit,+10% Casting Speed+35 Attack Speed, -Parry, -Defense

For 30 seconds makes little difference in the end? 35 haste? really? 35?  Honed Reflexes ad3 is 37 haste for 1min with the same 5min recast.

Pretty nice clicky to go along with a permanent 2% dbl attk, extra poison charges, stealthed run speed, slow fall, and a pbaoe deaggro.

Arasai are very similar.

How about half elves? 1% crit, 5 parry.  5% out of combat speed.  Single target deaggro.  A small physical mitigation debuff. Neat.

Why wouldn't ratonga for example get the dps clicky? They are more scout/thief/rogue like than any other race. Where is the +ranged double attack and dps mod temp buff for wood elves? Wouldn't it make more sense for wood elves to have feather fall than dark elves?

I was going to roll a half elf coercer until I realized how lame it would be next to an arasai. But I don't like the look of arasai so I'm stuck with chosing a race I don't like with a ton of good stuff or a race that looks OK and has trash racial traits. Why weren't the traits spread out a little bit? Half elves could have had the Fury of Innoruk or Dark Envy buff and dark elves and arasai would still have plenty of good things for their race, and half elves would have 1 kinda OP thing with a bunch of garbage.

I'm for yet another racial trait revamp. Some of the traits are nice, like ogre stun immune and troll fear immune clickies, the human soothe spell... but they get a lot of garbage or fluff to go along with it. Other than arasai and dark elf I can't think of another race that has so many combat beneficial traits.

[Nerphon]

Oh come on! Quit min maxing and just play the game already!!! HAVE FUN! its a game! You don't suck at life if you don't have a 5% casting increase. Life will go on, you'll see.

[Dominuss]

This is something that really bothers me.  I rarely post but this is a topic that I am pretty upset about.  Years ago I rolled a Woodelf Dirge because like the OP, I just thought they looked really cool.  When the racial revamp came along I could not believe how bad any Melee based Wood Elves had it.  No melee crit , no DA, no casting speed , no haste, no deaggro, we basically got nothing but a blue aoe that actually lowers your dps.  I could go into how it makes no sense that a Rat or DE should be superior to a WE at Melee but I wont....I will just say that  I would love to see a one time racial respec/revamp.  When I picked my race it did not matter what I went with and now it can make a big difference. 

Some will argue that it doesnt make a big difference.  Well if thats the case then what is the harm in allowing a one time respec.  The fact that you would see 0 melee based Wood Elves running around should tell you that you have a problem(or that there would be a lot more DE's running around). 

I sent my only PM ever to a dev (aeralik) about this and never got a response so I am happy to see that he is at least reading this thread as it is an issue that constantly comes up in my guild.  You could make a lot of people happy by allowing us to choose from the pool of abilities or allowing a one time respec.  I ask again, If it really does not matter than why don't you allow us to make a change??

[Waruri]

@ Rahatmattata

Thank you for the response you showed some very good points.

Please try not to make short jabs at the devs though.

They have been good enough to respond to the thread and would like them to continue to read it even if they don't add another response at a later date.

[Boyar]

While I agree there is definite disparity between the races, it will never be enough to make a poor player better than a good one.

The differences between best and worst for a class is maybe one or two stats worth on a single piece of gear. Sure it helps, and for the min/max crowd it might even be "important." Sure I'd love better traits for my frog and wood elf, maybe my rat swash isn't as OP as Aeralik's DE Assassin, but he gets along just fine. I love my ogre illy, not because there's some great advantage in the combo, but because he's an ogre... and an illusionist. He makes a fine illusionist as is. Sure, an erudite might DPS a little more, but then I'd have to put up with looking like an erudite(bleh), and it isn't enough DPS to make one able to accomplish what the other cannot.

Sure it's not perfectly fair, but if they tried that hard to make everything that fair and balanced, we'd all be shades of the same grey blob rather than vibrantly diverse and colorful. Sure frogs are somewhat lame if you look at nothing but traits, but a good player can overcome those limitations, and by doing so becomes more unique and eye-catching in a sea of monotone grey dark elf/arasai/erudite min/maxxers.

[Daron]

Iksar (for brawlers): 5 defense, 5 parry, 5 defense, 3% max health

Are you kidding me?

[Lethe5683]

I think race should make far more difference than is does currently.  My main issue with race traits, etc are that many of them make absolutly no sense.

[Lethe5683]

Daron@Najena wrote:

Iksar (for brawlers): 5 defense, 5 parry, 5 defense, 3% max health

Are you kidding me?

That is exactly the sort of thing I mean by racial traits that make no sense.

[MagicWand]

Every time I see a dark elf assassin, I just think they are total tools.    Last thing we need is a respec for races, then every freaking assassin out there will become a dark elf.  

But there has to be something that needs to be done.   It's really unfair that some races, including the over-powered Dark elf assassins get more charges from their Poisons triggers.   They get an extra Offensive buff, which translate to more over all dps in a raid.   As they can cycle in more temp buffs to increase their dps.   They also make decent alchemists to boot.   And the increased stealth movement and takes no damage from falling damage.   Why do dark elves even need this?!   And of coures the +2 Double attack.

I can't see how anyone can say Racial Traits are balanced.   Thanks to these dumb racial traits, all I see is dark elf assassins.  The one thing that I love about EQ2 is that we didnt get pigeon-holed into any given race like we did in EQ1.  So we could see a diverse collection of racial/class selection.  But now its just sick what has happened in this game.

There are only 2 fair options.   Either do away with  racial traits all together or just make a Racial Trait Tree where we can choose from a list of abilities.   If someone wants to specialize in Melee crits then he can.  If he wants to specialize in a given crafting trait, he can and etc.   It can even be made into a Mini  AA line for Racial Traits that can be upgraded as people gain levels, or as new expansions come along.

[Seomon]

Aeralik wrote:

Waruri wrote:

I've been playing EQ2 since beta before the original release. One thing the the Developers clearly stated on the boards before release is that EQ2 will be a game where the race of your character will not effect the class you choose in any major way at all. Because of this statement I chose a High Elf over an Erudite for my wizard since the High Elf (in my opinion) looks cooler.

That really still holds up.  At the end of the day, it doesnt really matter what race you are.  Some races are slightly skewed to an offensive role or perhaps a defensive role but the gains are really minimal at the high level.  High levels characters have access to a number of different gear selections which effectively reduce the gain to something really small if at all.  If anything like in this case the erudite might be able to swap in a crit item instead of the set item but overall one item or a small boost doesnt make or break the character its the player behind it.

Haha you said slightly skewed, when you meant to say the class you have is overpowered and everyone else can get over it.

[Gisallo]

well since they have decided to do away with the fact that race means nothing here is my proposal.

first the stats are not "fixed".  The base stat for ALL characters is 20 across the board.  You then take the % of the current stat differences.  This +,-% is then applied to the end stat of the classes AFTER gear is applied.

Sorry but I DO think the 7 foot tall hulking Barbarian should be DANG stronger than the Ratonga or fae.

I do think though the racial abilities are skewed to the max and that these should at some point be changed a bit BUT, while I think all of this should be addressed, they don't mess up the game half as bad as 100 other things I can think of that should be addressed first.

What I did find funny in all of this is that Aeralik was the first to jump in.  Almost as if he had a guilty conscience or something especially in light of the fact that Dark Elves were not mentioned by the OP, so there isn't the "well Darkelves were mentioned so I saw where this was going" excuse.

[Noaani]

Waruri wrote:

The wizard TSO fabled raid setgear forearms have 5% passive cast speed as one of their main attributes. Essentially this is like saying if you play an erudite you can start the game with a level 80 endgame raid item for free and it won't even take up an equipment slot. (Obviously there are other stats on the forearms and I realize that but you get my point.)

The only reason to wear that item is the crit mit, the rest is basically junk.

Your complaining that a few logical classes get a bonus to some effects that equate to the minor effect of 1 out of 21 item slots. Its not the major effect, its not the stats, its simple one of two minor effects on the item, and is an effect that can be capped by a lot of players to boot.

My personal opinion about the racial revamp (from 15 months ago!) is that there was a sligh shift in thinking from SoE. Not in a way that makes some class/race combos impossible (which is the only official statement about this made by SoE), but in a 'the lore of the game says erudites are the best mages, so they will make the best mages, even if it is only by a very small amount'.

Thats the thing about design decisions, they change over time.

When the revamp was done, players were upset about the crit on offer, because at the time it was the new hot stat (even after 2 years). Players were sitting at less than 50% crit at the best of times, and even at the end of RoK beta no one knew we would be seeing 100% crit rates as fairly common on top geared players by the end of that expansion. Now the complaints have shifted to casting skill increasers... which are already able to be capped, and will only continue in that direction.

I would have personally been happier if they have have slapped a restriction on new class/race combos, and given more focused and more powerful racial traits to each race.

[Rahatmattata]

So you think the difference between a dark elf and half elf are fine? Everything is all balanced and peachy in your world as far as racial traits?

[Novusod]

Didn't we have this discussion two years ago when they first proposed racial revamps. /yawn

The only problem I have with the racial traditions is there are not enough options to choose from. There are only ten options to pick from and you get to choose eight. That is kind of pointless imo especially if the level cap gets raised again so racial traditions become pick the "ONE" you don't want. SoE should add more choices for the players so they don't feel pigeon holed with racial envy. Every race should offer something for each of the arch-types.

For example tank races: All races should have some tradition that benefits tanking. Think about it. Small races would get base avoidance while large races would have base damage reduction.

For mages: So what if erudite gets casting speed. Give other races reuse speed while another race would have base damage.

[Noaani]

Rahatmattata wrote:

So you think the difference between a dark elf and half elf are fine? Everything is all balanced and peachy in your world as far as racial traits?

I didn't say they were balanced, just that the differences are so minor that it should no longer be an issue.

[Noaani]

Novusod wrote:

Didn't we have this discussion two years ago when they first proposed racial revamps. /yaw 

The racial revamp thread in the RoK beta forums was the largets thread in that beta iirc.

[Rahatmattata]

I guess the thing is some of us don't think the differences are that minor. Spin it any way you want but if I'm an assassin playing a half elf I'm going to be doing less dps than if I had picked a dark elf. And spending more on poisons. And not have any good fluff spells like feather fall and stealthed run speed which btw is really handy for stealth pulling named. Basically they put all the good stuff on 2 or 3 races and give the rest an assortment of crap with 1 or 2 decent things.

[liveja]

Noaani wrote:

Rahatmattata wrote:

So you think the difference between a dark elf and half elf are fine? Everything is all balanced and peachy in your world as far as racial traits?

I didn't say they were balanced, just that the differences are so minor that it should no longer be an issue.

Taken individually, for most races I would agree with you.

For Dark Elves, I think that the "total package" of racial traits they have is imbalanced & over-powered. & if Fury of Innoruuk is irrelevant at end game, why does every DE pop it on raid names for the DPS boost? Do you really want to tell me that Bayle's Strike, at 80th level, is going to do as much for a Human Swashy as FoI will do for a DE Swashy? FoI is an over-powered racial, particularly when added to all the other nifty toys that all Dark Elves get for free.

In D&D, Dark Elves are also quite powerful as PCs -- but their power is mitigated by their slower leveling speed. What mechanism is there to balance out all that power in EQ2? Not any I can see. That, IMO, is a problem, & something needs to be done to correct it.

BTW, before anyone wonders: my Troubie is a DE. Let me tell you, the combination of run speed, hover, & stealth is so impossibly useful it's not even funny ... & that doesn't even add in all the other toys. If the character were able to use poison as well, he'd be a complete beast. IMO, he is over-powered compared to Troubies of other races. If racial traits aren't supposed to be so important ... if they're supposed to be irrelevant at high levels ... then why aren't the Dark Elf racials so irrelevant? Far from being irrelevant, the higher you get, the more useful they become.

[Shadowinajar]

Woodelf pvp dirge here,

and my racial traits are laughable compared to DEs or other racials, which matter even more on a pvp server.

But okay Eq2 is a PvE game.

Still painfull cause they changed them *under my bum* and  i had too watch all the great

stuff going to the DE and WE got handed all Vanilla, without a thing i could do about.

Regards

[Tary]

Someone please parse a DE assassin using FoI, and the same DE assassin not using FoI.

Several times each.Let's see how OP it really is, if you insist on rezzing this poor mare.

[Rahatmattata]

That would be almost impossible because you would need the same player (eliminate 2 different player skill/style) playing 2 different character races with the same gear/masters in the same group on the same mobs. An extra 5% crit for 30 seconds would be a small boost. The 10% casting speed would be fairly negligable I think but you would be able to get all your CAs down quicker and so get them refreshed sooner. But 35 haste for 30 seconds would be significant, especially for an assassin. It's quite convenient FoI is +haste instead of +dps as assassins already self buff dps and the haste will do more for them. Especially on mobs that don't live longer than 1min 30... use honed reflexes and then FoI and you have haste the entire fight, plus 30 seconds of 5 crit and 10 casting haste.

Whether it's OP or not, why does DE get packed with goodies and other races get their fair share of trash traits? Even their Fueled by Hate temp buff = out of combat power regen and +magic mit. You know what most other races get? Out of combat hp regen +stat. The magic mit would be more helpful to mitigate magic based aoe, and in general mp regen > hp regen.

[Calris]

Sooo....because there's a high end piece of gear that has the same bonus, the racial is unbalanced?

F the what?

[Dominuss]

I would really appreciate if a developer could respond to the following question- Since you have made a significant change to the Race I chose years ago what is the harm in allowing a one time respec???

For those that do not care about min/max they can keep their troll mage and for those of us stuck with a Wood Elf Dirge we can make a better choice.  Everyone is happy.  If the races are mostly balanced as some claim then it should cause very few problems or changes and make pretty much everyone happy.  Why would anyone be against a one time respec?? 

[Waruri]

What I don't understand is why we cannot respec or rechoose our class. When a major change is made to a class they get a free AA respec to choose which direction they want to go. We should have the choice to change our race based om the game changes.

Say what you want but not everyone is in an uber leet raiding guild with all the top gear and maxed on casting speed and crit. Not everyone gets the benefit of having 12.5% crit from a troub with 175+ AA or 38% casting speed increase from having an Illy , Troub, Sk in their group. I know I don't.

The racial traits effect the non-raiders even more so. Because they are not anywhere near the crit cap or near the casting speed cap. Not even close.

Honestly I would like the traditions to be in a tree or list such that maybe you only get to pick two of the "uber ones" like melee crit, spell crit, double attack, spell casting speed, FoI - and then have to spend the other points on the other traits.

You cannot logically argue that FoI and 2% double attack is not a noticable difference over a race that gets neither for a scout. 5% casting speed 2% spell crit is a noticable difference over a class that gets neither.

If you want to keep racials the way they are that's one thing, but at least let us rechoose our class for those of us who have been here since day 1.

If it's not a big difference then what is the harm by letting us respec? If it is a big difference then acknowlege it and do something about it.

[Waruri]

Everyone always argues that non-raiders make up the majority of the player base. Well guess what. The racial bonus differences effect the non-raiders the most. They are the most likely not to be capped on spell crit and not to have high casting speed and not to have super high double attack.

[Kiara]

I'm content to let this discussion continue and you can make whatever arguments you need to make regarding your opinons of the balancing.

However, please remember that being respectful of each other and of SOE staff is a must.

Thank you.