Upcoming Racial Balance Changes for Update 21

TankHealz2015

1. love the changes.
2. fantastic communication and explanations ( i love to understand the how and why)


Please consider:

1 ESO plus members get X additional race change token(s) and/or a 50% discount on purchase tokens
2 improve the Wood Elf detection passive to be also useful in PvE

Excited to test and experiment!

Chicharron

I only read the part of the khajiit and i am happy that i can use a magic cat, i give a f*ck about the other races.

grannas211

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

What about this for dunmer:

- 2000 magicka
- 1250 stamina
- 1250 health
- 258 spell/weapon damage

Basically, they trade 192 magicka recovery for 1250 health. But otherwise they can hit the same DPS numbers as Altmer. Get rid of the damage reduction passives.

no. Stamina and Health are important PVP stats. Theres no trade off with your proposed changes. Not everything can be equal on the target dummy meta.

rosendoichinoveb17_ESO

What I see from a PvE Trial perspective:

Magicka DD: Highelf or Kajit (Khajit a bit less sustain and a bit lower resources)

Stamina DD: Orc or Khajit (Orc has at least double sustain bonus compared to Khajit( Comparable difference: one has 250 more resources other has an equivalent of 150 recovery to all 3 resources.)

Healer: I dont plat healers but most likely a breaton but cant be sure

Tank: Imperial or Redguard (Redguard might be better as the stamina sustain is insane and it will not be cut by blocking. The health bonus of other races is now negligible - 1k to 2k hp on a ~40k hp tank will not make any difference compared to some of the other bonuses)

The reworks to races are nice and welcome change. They just need a bit more adjustment, maybe some of the 3 stat bonues of some races need a small buff to promote diversity as in PvE noone cares if you have more stamina and magicka at the same time as one is a wasted stat.

xaraan

I was thinking about something else too...

Races that are aimed at support, especially tanking are virtually useless elsewhere.

Was talking with a friend that likes Khajiit and in looking at my choices for going all in on one races: If I'd picked Khajitt they'd be arguably BiS for 10 of my 15 damage builds and still be more than adequate for tanking b/c no raid cares if you are min/maxed race for tanking, only if you can do the job. BUT min/max does matter for damage in that situation.

So after these changes I'm left with 5 weakened tanks and 10 still bottom of racial rung DPS.

NightSquirrel

If you are revising every race, we should a free race change for every character leveled to 50. Seems simple to me. Even a time period on the change is fine, but limiting the change to one single character when you are redefining each race is super cheap. It’s not as if you would even be giving away something for free by letting us have a race change per character. It would literally just be the decent thing to do. Not that I imagine ZoS is much concerned with decency.

megasurge93

As a player who creates characters more based on concept and theme, these racial changes are great overall! Several of my characters are going to win big with these. I do agree with others about the "only 1 racial change token?". It would be better to see at least a few, perhaps based on number of characters that each account has (i.e. 1 token per 3 or 4 characters?).

MLGProPlayer

grannas211 wrote: »

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

What about this for dunmer:

- 2000 magicka
- 1250 stamina
- 1250 health
- 258 spell/weapon damage

Basically, they trade 192 magicka recovery for 1250 health. But otherwise they can hit the same DPS numbers as Altmer. Get rid of the damage reduction passives.

no. Stamina and Health are important PVP stats. Theres no trade off with your proposed changes. Not everything can be equal on the target dummy meta.

Which is why health was buffed. +600 health was useless.

Elsterchen

impressive changes

Anoregon

Regarding Argonian: I know this is likely not a very popular idea, but at this point I feel like they just need to drop the potion mechanic of Resourcefulness entirely. Attempts to keep it balanced are hamstringing any efforts to actually bring Argonian racials in line with everyone else. As it's the only racial that is both intelligently/manually triggered as well as having a gold/resource cost it has to be very strong in order to seem worthwhile at all, but making it strong enough to be attractive at large means it's going to be overpowered when used to its max potential. As we can tell from the various tweaks to it over the past few major updates, ZOS has been having a hard time trying to find a sweet spot here, and I doubt such a sweet spot actually exists that would be satisfying to both the players and the devs.

I'd much prefer just scrapping the mechanic entirely and moving the freed up "racial budget" to the more consistent and, yes, more mundane options that all the other races possess. Now that Argonian tank strength has been nerfed, why not give them a little something to make them more attractive options for stamina or magicka damage roles?

DawnWarrior

Sarcasm alert: [early whining system]
WHAT! Ask ZOS to give you a race change token for all your toons!!!! I only have one toon!!!! I demand that ZOS give me enough gifts to equal the max number of toons.
End alert.

Actually, race change tokens are on sale now, and ZOS will (I'm sure ) have them on sale when U21 comes out.
What I would like to see is an increase in the max number of transmute crystals per account.

(Full Disclosure: I have fifteen toons.)

xaraan

Anoregon wrote: »

Regarding Argonian: I know this is likely not a very popular idea, but at this point I feel like they just need to drop the potion mechanic of Resourcefulness entirely. Attempts to keep it balanced are hamstringing any efforts to actually bring Argonian racials in line with everyone else. As it's the only racial that is both intelligently/manually triggered as well as having a gold/resource cost it has to be very strong in order to seem worthwhile at all, but making it strong enough to be attractive at large means it's going to be overpowered when used to its max potential. As we can tell from the various tweaks to it over the past few major updates, ZOS has been having a hard time trying to find a sweet spot here, and I doubt such a sweet spot actually exists that would be satisfying to both the players and the devs.

I'd much prefer just scrapping the mechanic entirely and moving the freed up "racial budget" to the more consistent and, yes, more mundane options that all the other races possess. Now that Argonian tank strength has been nerfed, why not give them a little something to make them more attractive options for stamina or magicka damage roles?

At this point I'd agree.

I like the passive, but if it's going to hamstring the balance, scrap it and give them other bonuses. The nord ulti bonus would have fit better for this race IMO, but cats out of the bag on that now.

In the end, support passives are less powerful than dps passives in the end game. If you can do the job of support that is all that matters, bonuses or not. But for DPS, if you are missing out on those passives, then you will always be behind another equally good player.

Cundu_Ertur

MassTerror23 wrote: »

Ive

Xvorg wrote: »

Funny thing? ZoS decides to go full lore with the race changes in the same patch they deliver necromancer...

Inconsistency at its best.

Vehemorth wrote: »

I suggest you add a Name + Race Change token instead of a Race Change. Some characters are bound to their name. For example, I have a Magicka DPS Sorcerer that is a High Elf named Mithrandir. This won't make any sense to roll a Breton, as it won't fit the name and I really don't want to spend money to change the name too.

Why? Because Mithrandir means The Gray Wanderer in Elvish. Derivative of the elvish words "mith" meaning grey and "randir" meaning pilgrim or wanderer.

This is a name made up by the elves as an endearment to the wizard Gandalf from Lord of the rings. This name won't really work for a class that's not an Elf. Also, race changing enables the ability to change the gender and in case the player doesn't like how a race looks like, it will be stuck with a name of the opposing gender.
__________________________________
Regarding the bonuses: I am happy with how the game changes. It doesn't affect how I see things, only make what I already like better. You only need one character for each role.
- Stamina DPS: Red Guard Nightblade (Vampire)
- Magicka DPS: High Elf Sorcerer (Vampire)
- Healing: Breton Templar (Vampire)
- Tanking: Imperial Dragonknight (Vampire)

Buffs: High Elf, Breton, Imperial, Red Guard
Neither: Argonian, Khajiit, Nord
Nerfs: Wood Elf, Dark Elf, Orc

Explain how wood elves are nerfed.

Stealth went from a 3m better at not being seen radius to a completely useless-in-PVE 3m buff to seeing hidden things. Wood Elves now have no bonus to stealth at all. This is apparently how the Wood Elves get to keep part of their previous stealth mechanic -- by keeping exactly none of it. It is not clear if the movement bonus would stack with the bow line skill Hasty Retreat (I don't think it should, and I don't think it will), so Bow using wood elves don't really get anything to make up for what they lost if it doesn't stack. The stam and stam regen will probably be slight buffs for those who don't spec everything towards maximizing those things, but I'm not sure how those numbers all shake out. Bosmer lose disease resistance entirely, but get a buff to poison resistance, so that's kind of a wash.

edit to add: If I'm reading some other comments correct, the stam regen is a buff even for an optimized regen build.

ZeroC

Interesting changes!

Typical_T_ReX

@ZOS_Gilliam I want to highlight you because you specifically are good with numbers and just want to bring this to your attention.

Dark Elf gains:
- Max Health by 600
- Max Stamina and Magicka by 1250
- Weapon and Spell Damage by 258.

Orc Gains:
- Max Health 500
- Max Stamina by 500
- Healing Received by 4%
- restore 380 Health and Stamina from weapon abilities
- Weapon Damage by 258.


I can understand making Dark elf more viable by making it appealing, but should it be MORE damage than the class renown for its brawling? Dark Elf has MORE health, more then TWICE the max stam, and the SAME weapon damage ( twice as much if you consider some hybrids can make use of the spell damage as well. )

Sure the Orc gains restore health and stam, but those are under specific conditions where Dark Elf comes out of the box stronger for a stam dps.

My only suggestion is boosting at least the max health of orc to 1,000. This is not out of line with any other changes, but makes it a clear deciding factor between Dark Elf and Orc.

You can choose more damage with the jack of all trades class in Dark Elf ( see the problem here? ) or the class built for getting in the thick of it with orc.

Eweroun

great they are starting to work on balancing and seeing a lot of stuff happening. But over the last years people have been adjusting their race already to min-max. I'm totally fine with the idea that sometimes a change has to be made.

But this is like a extremely big chance, an overhaul of everything.
What I would do if I was ZOS is giving not a single race changing token, but just give a pop-up on the first connection with every char in a way like "do you want to change your race or not"?
--> no > everything stays like it is
--> yes > you go to race selection screen, chose your new race and done

@ZOS_Gilliam 1 race change token is just laughing at people, my dear. We deserve more than that. make it one token for every level 50 char or something like that or 5 tokens per account and then it's fine to me. I don't need 14 or 15; but pls don't laugh with people by changing everything and then let us pay for these changes.
(or make a super-extremely-nice budget crown sale of those tokens; and not the 15% off discount)

CatchMeTrolling

Imperials should be part of the base game by now, I’m perplexed after so many years they aren’t. It’s also weird that the race that you have to buy is average at best as a whole.

ezio45

Not too bad lol feedback: @ZOS_Gilliam

highelf: The gain resources back ever 6 seconds is pretty weak That mean roughly every rotation your getting 1k resources backs. I dont see myself investing in this perk. Id prefer something like when you use a class ability you gain x amount of recovery for x seconds. Or if your really trying to gimp highelf recovery and it seems like you are. Maybe do an attack buff instead to gain x damage from class abilitys for x seconds.

Also I think you kinda shot yourself in the foot on this one lol zos stated one of the goals was to give more effective options for roles. Highelf was an effective option for healers along with argonian and breton. The nerf to recovery for highelf essentially rules it out as a healer whose most important stat is sustain. so you went from 3 healer options down to 2.

Argonian: Not bad, I think i was expecting worse tbh, good job

Woodelf: I think this is one of the weaker classes from these changes, it really doesnt seem like it has a purpose. It needs passives that are more clear cut. Really the stam recovery and 2k stam are the only useful passives.

Dark elf: Again not bad, I would say its an effective option for stam or mag dps now

Imperial: good

khajiit: I dont like the recovery passive. Its very underwhelming. 75 to recovery is basically a full set of invigorating and that is also a weak buff. It needs work, id say out of all the passives so far this is the worst.

Nord is cool, i like it

Orc is a little underwhelming too

redguard pretty good

ezio45

zyk wrote: »

My initial impression is that I don't like it. I didn't like the preamble about freedom, and there's a lot of things that instantly rub me the wrong way like:

Spell Recharge: Restore 575 Magicka or Stamina, based on whichever is higher, after activating a Class Ability. This effect can occur once every 6 seconds.

I don't have a high elf character, but this description is what I hate about building characters in ESO in a nutshell: stupid arbitrary conditions: why tie racial recovery to using a class ability?

I would have much preferred it if the current system was tweaked.

ya I dont really like that passive either, I think this change pretty much rules out highelf as a healer. So now theres only argonian and breton

KuroDark

Aren't Imperials naturally good with both magic and weapons?

rosendoichinoveb17_ESO

Additionally again looking from PvE perspective:

Set stat bonuses such as weapon and spell damage were a bit better than bonuses such as max stanima and max magicka. Now the max stamina and max magicka stats are even 10% worse. Therefore, people will look to avoid having any magicka or stamina bonuses unless the 5 piece bonus is very good. They loose those stats as % resource racial bonuses were removed.

Iarao

Previously Argonians offered far too many stats and they were mathematically twice as good as some races.
i'm not buying it. you KNEW what you were doing when you consistently nerfed other races, imo. no oopsies.

i smell race&name change token sale churn with this whole thing. some of us play several toons. ONE free race change per acct is wrong. we need one per toon. AND A NAME CHANGE AS WELL. for each toon. otherwise this just smells like a money grab to me.

Weper

I think racial passives should be removed so we can play with our favorite race. With the racial passives we are forced to play with the meta or at least with a viable race. Or maybe they could nerf the passives so they give only low stats like 1% Stamina Regen, 1% Magicka regen, etc ...

ezio45

iCaliban wrote: »

Regarding pet sorcs: this batch of changes looks like a massive nerf to max mag stacking pet sorc dps toons.

problem: Pets do not benefit in any way from max spell power.

Currently pet sorcs are ~10-15k dps behind other mag dps specs. This will further become a problem after these racial changes (assuming most pet sorcs are high elves)

its only like a 2k difference, ill take it. I really dont like the recovery loss as a sorc we already have terrible sustain but maybe theyll fix that this pts, hopefully

mav1234

I don't understand how this could be seen as breaking the homogeneity of magicka pve dps. Altmer is simply better than every other option. Sure, Breton has cost reduction, but the extra spell damage while still maintaining some sustain puts them far ahead of Breton. And not to mention dark elf, which has both lower dps and no sustain compated to altmer.

Imo, Altmer needs to lose entirely or see a serious reduction in the sustain passive they have OR a reduction in the damage passive or max mag passive.

Davadin

ezio45 wrote: »

Not too bad lol feedback: @ZOS_Gilliam


Nord is cool, i like it

literally.

Matthros

Honestly I am fine with the changes so far but since there will be PTS cycles these values may be adjusted so I will decide when the final values go live.

I can still switch my dark elf DK to Stam or Mag when I feel like it.

Maybe I will switch my Kahjiit NB to Mag and my Dark Elf NB to Stam to switch it up.

I am pleased with the changes for my Orc Stamsorc, Breton Magplar, and Imperial DK Tank.

Somber97866

DARK ELF MAGDK............it was fun while it lasted. But leave it to ZOS to want to make you pay more money for everyone else fun. We'll everyone, hope you like Altmer and Redgaurds in pve this patch.

Lord_Eomer

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

What about this for dunmer:

- 2000 magicka
- 1250 stamina
- 1250 health
- 258 spell/weapon damage

Basically, they trade 192 magicka recovery for 1250 health. But otherwise they can hit the same DPS numbers as Altmer. Get rid of the damage reduction passives.

When Dunmer had magicka recoevery passive?

trowlk

I you intend to transform Dark Elf's passive, Ruination should increase their Spell and Physical penetration, instead of increasing their Spell and Weapon damage