Solution to Having to Play a Race for Passives!

Conquistador

Here's a great suggestion to absolutely let you play how you want without being gimped by your own racial passives: Racial morphs.

Before you get all cannon on me, realise this: the imperials are supposed to be great mages and sword and board warriors. How can you make a great mage as an Imperial right now?

Racial morphs would be a balanced way to let you place the race you want, but morph those racial abilities to better fit how you want to play. Redguards would morph their stamina recovery passive into health or magicka recovery based on how they play. An Adrenaline Rush equivalent for magicka (Energy Rush)or HP (Bloodlust) would be awesome and can totally be balanced. It would allow you to play any race, any way at any time. No RE-ROLLING because a patch broke your balls.

It would cost you a skillpoint to morph the racial passive, but it would be cool for anyone to customise their heroes.

xxslam48xxb14_ESO

They went way too far in making some races EXTREME at certain builds. Like why would you not play altmer for a mage build and a redguard for stamina. In the real elderscrolls games though you would only really start weaker by picking a bad race for a certain build, but you would always finish roughly about as strong as the best races for that build. So yeah the morph idea is nice because just like in the real games you could mold your character to be what you want to be by the time you get high lvl and you would no longer be screwed by potion and swim speed buffs.

Volkodav

I play an Imperial for Stamina.He's a Nightblade.You can be anything you want to.There's no need to pay such close attention to he passives.They do help.but it isnt totally important.

Vaoh

I was going to create a thread about this sometime today, but you beat me to it. I have a suggestion that I think 90+% of players would love to see happen! Right now you can't pick the race you want unless you're okay with heavily gimping your build at endgame. I love the lore of TES, but this NEEDS TO BE DONE:

Each race has 4 racial passives. One is the 15% innate bonus skill line experience and the other three are stat increases. The stat increases are the ones that make the difference. We should be given the option to pick and choose between these stat racial passives from a list containing the first, second, and third stat passives of each race.
EX (images courtesy of @Deltia website):

High Elf Racial Passives
1.
2.
3.
4.
Redguard Racial Passives
1.
2.
3.
4.
Argonian Racial Passives
1.
2.
3.
4.

You would be allowed to pick any of the secondary(2), tertiary(3) , and quaternary(4) passives. However, you cannot pick more than one of secondary/tertiary/quaternary passives. Only one of each.

This means a Redguard can't use both Adrenaline rush and Quick to Mend. Only one of them can be picked since you only have one secondary slot. This allows a ton of variety and races with bad passives (Argonian) to be 100% viable. This automatically creates build diversity+complete balance between all races. You can pick whichever you want and enjoy the game.
Barber Shop will include a race change option meaning it would be easy to add this as an option along with it..

HairyFairy

I play a Dark Elf because *** your fire.

scorpiodog

I think the original reason behind Racial passives is to help evenly distribute races among the three Kingdoms.

Since only a portion of people are willing to buy the Adventurer upgrade, racial passives for population control work.

If the system you suggest were implemented, it would surely be at an additional cost. Since the system currently works, it would be a high risk no reward for the company if they did not charge for your suggested new feature. But hen people would make the "pay to win" accusation.

Conquistador

This is how I would change the Redguard racial morph for Adrenaline rush

Nerouyn

I think the solution is just to do away with racial passives. Or reduce their significance so they're comparable to the single-player games. If Altmer only got +50 magicka there wouldn't be a plague of Altmer sorcs.

Valrien

Nerouyn wrote: »

I think the solution is just to do away with racial passives. Or reduce their significance so they're comparable to the single-player games. If Altmer only got +50 magicka there wouldn't be a plague of Altmer sorcs.

Lol, you think the magicka is what makes it OP? It's the shock damage.

Lenikus

..what
Morphs for passives... ... really?
...okay, I understand the "BUT I WANNA MAX NUMBERZ BECAUZE I SUX TOO HARD TO BEAT V3t MEALZTRUM OTHRWAIZE !! one ! " but really? all this qq for freakin' 10% raw stats and x% regen ? Yez, i know that does make a difference in hardcore endgame competitive gameplay or whatever, but really, if you NEED that in order to achieve something, you suck in this game. I'm sorry, it's a fact. if your build or gameplay DEPENDS on a 10% boost that gets you at most 5k of magicka, you kinda blowz.

BucMan55

Lenikus I think he is referring to the way you are perceived in groups when you have a less than ideal race for your build...Not being looked down upon for being an Altmer Tank for instance....

Lenikus

BucMan55 wrote: »

Lenikus I think he is referring to the way you are perceived in groups when you have a less than ideal race for your build...Not being looked down upon for being an Altmer Tank for instance....

I know, i did read the stuff (this time, at least)
But really, pleeaaaase stop all the race stuff.. they WILL give us race changes in the future and then we'll be able to swap our toons to teh meta races every 2 weeks when they start tweaking the passives for us to buy teh 7k crowns racial change.

Yinmaigao

Or maybe someone rolled a character with a race they liked originally, and later the character "matured" while adventuring/PvPing/ERPing/crafting and took on a different persona.

It isn't outside of the realm of possibilities, and if people want a feature, why does it matter to you? Their choices will have little-to-no impact on you, so eff it! Let them eat cake!

Zanen

Racials matter quite a lot for anything competitive, silly to pretend otherwise.

I'm pretty sure the reason there's an "any race, any alliance" option at all is because they realized in beta that AD wasn't going to have any tanks, you know... back when people had tanks. I'm not sure Imperial wasn't a result of the same thing.

I like the racials and the flavor they give builds, and the cue race gives to what build you're likely to be facing, but it's far beyond time to allow people to change race.

A choose your own racials setup will just result in everyone being the same except for class and stamina/magicka, it would take people about five minutes to crunch the numbers and pick out the optimum setup.

BucMan55

Lenikus wrote: »

I know, i did read the stuff (this time, at least)
But really, pleeaaaase stop all the race stuff.. they WILL give us race changes in the future and then we'll be able to swap our toons to teh meta races every 2 weeks when they start tweaking the passives for us to buy teh 7k crowns racial change.

I'm for whatever allows for more customization and less elitism....

TheGrayChangeling

I'd love to see Donceilius or Conquistador's suggestions or as I've suggested elsewhere make racial passives just about flavor/utility and create three new passive skill lines for Stamina, Health, and Magicka.

Not overly picky about how we reach the destination...but removing the pressure to match class and race would make a lot of people very happy...and probably result in a lot of race changes once that feature (inevitably) appears in the crown store.

kendellking_chaosb14_ESO

Volkodav wrote: »

I play an Imperial for Stamina.He's a Nightblade.You can be anything you want to.There's no need to pay such close attention to he passives.They do help.but it isnt totally important.

You have more Health letting you take more damage also granting a bigger heal from mark and killer's blade as they are percent of user health. 12% more health and 10% more stamina makes a big difference, don't try to underplay your OP race.

I best way to fix this race problem is simple have three path you get to pick one path Warrior, Mage and Rogue. This would make your passives fall in line that path current Redguard would be the Rogue path do a reset and the stamina passives change to magic or health depending on where you spend that point.

Nord current would be The Warrior path, but in Lore and ingame Nord make powerful mages the most power mage to ever join the Mage's guild was a Nord letting players take the other path to their races powers would be awesome.

kendellking_chaosb14_ESO

Lenikus wrote: »

BucMan55 wrote: »

Lenikus I think he is referring to the way you are perceived in groups when you have a less than ideal race for your build...Not being looked down upon for being an Altmer Tank for instance....

I know, i did read the stuff (this time, at least)
But really, pleeaaaase stop all the race stuff.. they WILL give us race changes in the future and then we'll be able to swap our toons to teh meta races every 2 weeks when they start tweaking the passives for us to buy teh 7k crowns racial change.

Having players playing one of two races would be beyond sad they need to fix the problem not say pick a better race.

KhajiitiLizard

Huge differences in racial passives is fine for the single player games, but that fact that you can play any race in any alliance kinda kills any sense of immersion in that faction... WHY ARE THERE SO MANY KHAJIIT IN EP? YOU LIKE BEING SLAVES?

In some MMOs race is mostly cosmetic with some racial active abilities. I like it this way because it's your class that determines your skills and passives.

Many of the races not min/max suited (max magicka/regen) in this game actually make great mages in lore. Khajiit, Argonians, Nords, heck there's been great mages in all the races.

I will never changes races for passives though... I will play the races that I like. In the single player games I always played a Khajiit or Argonian. The fact the fully hybrid builds are the best in those games pretty much makes the racial buffs/debuffs pointless.

TheShadowScout

Not another "let us cherry-pick our passives" thread...
It may be a good idea from a min/maxxer point of view. But it is an awful one from an ESO point of view.
The TES racial benefits have always been a little skewed in some direction. Redguards have always been better fighters then mages. Altmer have always been better with magica then with physical prowess. Nords have always been tough and cold resistant. Dunmer have always had a thing for fire... (well, not always, but ever since they were turned into dunmer I suppose)

The idea to let people "morph" their passives to their playstyle is one that will disgust people like me who love the TES lore, and came to the game for the lore and nothing else.
The point is, some combinations are -supposed- to be less then super-effective. Consider it an slight handicap for those people who whine about how everything is too easy for their super-advanced mad ESO skillz.

If anything, I would like to see a secondary racial passives line, a la Character "Backgrounds", with, say, three different options to pick from... mixing some combat and some non combat passives, perhaps?
Say, for bretons... you could have the choices between "noble house background" and "city commoner background" and perhaps "countryborn serf background".
Nobles might get an extra bonus to magica stuff, because of their families being able to afford extra mage tutoring, and perhaps some advnatage in buying and selling due to their status, and possibly also a speed bonus for riding, because they are used to horses... commoners might for example gain a bonus in stamina though growing up as hard-working servant class, and maybe some bonus in, say, crafting and maybe also a bit of extra carrying capacity due to knowing the value of additional hidden pockets... while the country folk might get a bonus in health for they breed them tough out in the country, and possibly some bonus for hunting and gathering, and perhaps also one in running speed due to growing up walking a lot...
Something like that...

TheGrayChangeling

TheShadowScout wrote: »

Not another "let us cherry-pick our passives" thread...
It may be a good idea from a min/maxxer point of view. But it is an awful one from an ESO point of view.
The TES racial benefits have always been a little skewed in some direction. Redguards have always been better fighters then mages. Altmer have always been better with magica then with physical prowess. Nords have always been tough and cold resistant. Dunmer have always had a thing for fire... (well, not always, but ever since they were turned into dunmer I suppose)

The idea to let people "morph" their passives to their playstyle is one that will disgust people like me who love the TES lore, and came to the game for the lore and nothing else.
The point is, some combinations are -supposed- to be less then super-effective. Consider it an slight handicap for those people who whine about how everything is too easy for their super-advanced mad ESO skillz....

Did you play Daggerfall? If you took full advantage of the customization options it really almost didn't matter what race you chose as far as bonuses went because you could *cherry pick* what you wanted. In fact cherry picking what you want for your character is a time honored tradition of the franchise. If anything, ESO breaks with that tradition by denying the option to cherry pick abilities to make your own class. (Something I and others, argued against them excluding as soon as it was announced they wouldn't be allowing it).

And yes, racials have been a little skewed in the titles after TES II, but 1) arguably not as much and 2) this is not a single player ES title. We can neither mod it to suit our playstyle nor ignore that there are other players who we must satisfy in group pve content or compete against in pvp.

Finally, as has been pointed out, in the LORE there are great exemplars of all nearly all classes in nearly all races even if some races are deemed to *generally* be better than others at various pursuits. But we aren't playing the general folk. We are playing the Hero who is reborn again and again to save Nirn. It's not unreasonable to think said champion might rise above the commonplace expectations of their people.

AshTal

Something needs to be done I like racials but the gap in power is insane in the current build its basically 1 or 2 races for each class.

TheShadowScout

TheGrayChangeling wrote: »

Did you play Daggerfall? If you took full advantage of the customization options it really almost didn't matter what race you chose as far as bonuses went because you could *cherry pick* what you wanted. In fact cherry picking what you want for your character is a time honored tradition of the franchise. If anything, ESO breaks with that tradition by denying the option to cherry pick abilities to make your own class. (Something I and others, argued against them excluding as soon as it was announced they wouldn't be allowing it).

Yes, I did. Was not really impressed by TES:Daggerfall... that came with TES:Morrowind...
But I agree that in all the TES games, even before "classless" TES:Skyrim, you could always create a custom class as you liked. But then, tall those -were- solo games, and they generally did not have the "epic" magic effects we get in the ESO class skills, which would make a classless system iffy in ESO (not to mention, that this particular ship has sailed and sunk years ago)

Racial passives on the other hand... those have -never- been selectable. Not even back in Daggerfall (though I guess back then, races were just an value adjustment to your starting attributes anyhow). And even back then, Bretons or Altmer were much better mages then warriors for example.
So that is not really a valid argument to whine about wanting to cherry-pick your passives, now is it...

TheGrayChangeling wrote: »

And yes, racials have been a little skewed in the titles after TES II, but 1) arguably not as much and 2) this is not a single player ES title. We can neither mod it to suit our playstyle nor ignore that there are other players who we must satisfy in group pve content or compete against in pvp.

Considering what I remember, I'd arguena gainst 1), but would have to agree completely with 2). And I would not mind toning the passives down a bit, to have them be less of a gap... or wish that they for example gave you some preselected attribute points that people could later balance by their spending choices of the points they earn going up the levels...

TheGrayChangeling wrote: »

Finally, as has been pointed out, in the LORE there are great exemplars of all nearly all classes in nearly all races even if some races are deemed to *generally* be better than others at various pursuits. But we aren't playing the general folk. We are playing the Hero who is reborn again and again to save Nirn. It's not unreasonable to think said champion might rise above the commonplace expectations of their people.

I would agree with the notion, not with the conclusion that it would mean an argonian "hero" can trade in their racial amphibeous advantage for more magica, or a dunmer their inborn fire resistance for added stamina. That's generally not how it works. The hero thing usually -adds- to a racial basics, not replaces them with something people like more...

And that was my point about the backgrounds. I would hate for the current passives to become freely selectable like some of the min/maxxers clearly desire... but I would not mind having some -additions- to the established passives that -could- be done in an "pick one outta three according to your desired build".

TheGrayChangeling

TheShadowScout wrote: »

Considering what I remember, I'd arguena gainst 1), but would have to agree completely with 2). And I would not mind toning the passives down a bit, to have them be less of a gap... or wish that they for example gave you some preselected attribute points that people could later balance by their spending choices of the points they earn going up the levels...

A reasonable compromise I suppose. I'd just repeat what I said earlier in the thread - I don't much care how we reach the destination, but, the pressure to play certain race/class combinations needs to be significantly reduced (or removed). As it stands there are certain races that are only played because the players of those races just have such a strong affection for them but they are not *truly* competitive in PVP or a particularly welcome sight in group content (I feel so bad for Argonian players). Or from another angle, since DK's are not interesting to me there is literally no reason for me to play a Dunmer - even though I too fell in love with Morrowind at first sight and would love to play a Dunmer again (actually even my second character in Daggerfall was a Dunmer).

For me, race is a cultural and aesthetic flavor, it should not be tied hard and fast to stats. Saying there are more mages among Altmer or Bretons shouldn't mean they have no warriors worth mentioning. As has been pointed out - one of the most powerful mages we meet in the game is a Nord! Which brings me to...

I would agree with the notion, not with the conclusion that it would mean an argonian "hero" can trade in their racial amphibeous advantage for more magica, or a dunmer their inborn fire resistance for added stamina. That's generally not how it works. The hero thing usually -adds- to a racial basics, not replaces them with something people like more...

And that was my point about the backgrounds. I would hate for the current passives to become freely selectable like some of the min/maxxers clearly desire... but I would not mind having some -additions- to the established passives that -could- be done in an "pick one outta three according to your desired build".

To a certain extent I agree. Flavor and utility racials like the amphibious nature of Argonians, or the fire resistance of Dunmer etc. or (as in the single player iterations) Khajiit having night-eye, are appropriate. And I'd argue comparable, suitable flavor/utility should be added to races whose racials were always class enhancing to balance it out. Where we'll just have to agree to disagree is on having choice with class enhancing passives.

In an mmo where your ability to meet a minimum on damage meters affects your inclusion in group content or where class enhancing racials can affect your competitiveness in pvp - you don't have to be a min-maxxer to feel the strong and pervasive pressure to choose only certain race/class combinations.

So from my perspective either racial passives that affect class should be removed entirely, their affects muted, or it should be brought in line with the "Follow your own spirit and tell your own story in your own way." philosophy that's been in place since Daggerfall and let the player cherry pick it.

Because yes, selfishly, I want to play my Telvanni mage.

Samadhi

TheGrayChangeling wrote: »

TheShadowScout wrote: »

Not another "let us cherry-pick our passives" thread...
It may be a good idea from a min/maxxer point of view. But it is an awful one from an ESO point of view.
The TES racial benefits have always been a little skewed in some direction. Redguards have always been better fighters then mages. Altmer have always been better with magica then with physical prowess. Nords have always been tough and cold resistant. Dunmer have always had a thing for fire... (well, not always, but ever since they were turned into dunmer I suppose)

The idea to let people "morph" their passives to their playstyle is one that will disgust people like me who love the TES lore, and came to the game for the lore and nothing else.
The point is, some combinations are -supposed- to be less then super-effective. Consider it an slight handicap for those people who whine about how everything is too easy for their super-advanced mad ESO skillz....

Did you play Daggerfall? If you took full advantage of the customization options it really almost didn't matter what race you chose as far as bonuses went because you could *cherry pick* what you wanted. In fact cherry picking what you want for your character is a time honored tradition of the franchise. If anything, ESO breaks with that tradition by denying the option to cherry pick abilities to make your own class. (Something I and others, argued against them excluding as soon as it was announced they wouldn't be allowing it).
...

Daggerfall was choose Altmer for racial immunity to Paralysis,
then give the custom class a critical weakness to Paralysis for a huge pool of free points.

cazlonb16_ESO

Yinmaigao wrote: »

Or maybe someone rolled a character with a race they liked originally, and later the character "matured" while adventuring/PvPing/ERPing/crafting and took on a different persona.

It isn't outside of the realm of possibilities, and if people want a feature, why does it matter to you? Their choices will have little-to-no impact on you, so eff it! Let them eat cake!

Or maybe ZOS changed pretty much everything about how stats work about a year after the game released. Nah, that would never happen

Initially, racials were indeed not very significant. After scrapping softcaps and other changes they are. Very significant.

Edit: So heavily unbalanced races are of course just a symptom of a much larger issue: The game rules tend to heavily reward the wrong things, in this case extreme min/maxing. I don't see ZOS completely reworking stats again anytime soon though, so something has to be done about the races. Like ZOS promised when they did those initial adjustments to stats.

Daraugh

Conquistador wrote: »

Here's a great suggestion to absolutely let you play how you want without being gimped by your own racial passives: Racial morphs.

Before you get all cannon on me, realise this: the imperials are supposed to be great mages and sword and board warriors. How can you make a great mage as an Imperial right now?

Racial morphs would be a balanced way to let you place the race you want, but morph those racial abilities to better fit how you want to play. Redguards would morph their stamina recovery passive into health or magicka recovery based on how they play. An Adrenaline Rush equivalent for magicka (Energy Rush)or HP (Bloodlust) would be awesome and can totally be balanced. It would allow you to play any race, any way at any time. No RE-ROLLING because a patch broke your balls.

It would cost you a skillpoint to morph the racial passive, but it would be cool for anyone to customise their heroes.

Best suggestion I've read yet for the racials issue! I love the simplicity of it, it even has an appeal for background character stories.

Teridaxus

As breton knight who went stam heavy armour dk i would love this.

Gidorick

You see it as something that needs a solution when it doesn't

duncan_cougarpreeb18_ESO

the problem isn't with the racial passives, the problem is that damage scales also (one could say even mainly with some builds) with magicka / stamina instead of and only with spell / weapon damage.

This is what creates all the real problems and the extreme damage you see with the current mini/maxi builds

Vaoh

@scorpiodog Problem is, the current system isn't very good. ZOS is revisiting Races with the Barber Shop. Players have always asked to play the race they want but Racial Passives make this a horrible idea especially at endgame.

If Redguard is my favorite race, I'll need to make a Stamina character or I will be gimped from the very beginning.

You are right about only those with the adventure pack having access to "all races, all alliances" (Imperial not included) but in truth almost all players have this now. It was a preorder bonus for console as well plus it is cheap in the crown store.

This significantly works to ZOS's advantage. If you pick the passives, you will be restricted to your alliance's native three races. Adventure Pack provides the other alliance races, and Imperial gives imperial passives. It's a win-win for casuals, hardcore, min-maxers, and even ZOS who'll make some $$$ from people wanting to improve their build using other racial passives.