PTS Update 21 - Feedback Thread for Racial Passive Changes

Chubarov_S

Well done ZOS, these changes are really beautiful, and finally managed to level the races in damage and support!

But there are several proposals:

Imperial-When you deal Direct Damage you have a 15% chance to heal for 1750. Reduces the cost of your Block and Bash abilities by 10%
Since 5% - it is very small, and it is difficult to feel this bonus.

Nord-Increases your Max Stamina by 1500. When you deal damage, gain 5 Ultimate. This effect can occur once every 10 seconds.
Otherwise, the Nord bonuses are too small for DD, because of what it will be used only as a tank.

I would also like to mention the "immunity to status effects", the fact that this is a very strong bonus (all representatives of which are in the EP).
There are some builds that are tied to status effects, and in combat against a player with full immunity, this "little race bonus" becomes a big problem.
I propose to change "100% immunity" for "reducing duration of a status effect by 30%"

@ZOS_GinaBruno

Jim6270

Without testing it and only seeing it. I must say I realy like the changes over all. It simes like the most fair and well balanced changes ever and still have a lot of deference and unikeness to them.
Most of the people that think Orc is too week comparet to what they was before is not thinking about that before they was a bit too OP comparet to the other classes race bonuses.

I think they all look awesome (and yes I have a magicka and a stamina character of every class, so I am not favoring one race over another).... I think some of my characters need a race change, but thats just money in the pocked for the creaters.

The balance of the races is just awesome.

Kalle_Demos

silvereyes wrote: »

I feel like the wood elf changes are wasting an opportunity to do something fun and unique with the race while improving the game.

Instead, you gave them a speed boost that's similar but better than Orc's and probably completely breaks PVP, while taking away their stealthy nature.

A couple lore-friendly alternatives:

• Bosmer are often associated with command of simple-minded animals. A bonus to summoned animal pet damage and/or healing, would synergise well with Warden and Sorc classes (especially if Sorc ever gets any stamina pet morphs ... hint hint). Necromancer and Nightblade "pets" would be exempt, not being animals. Creature-oriented proc sets like Selene, Kra'gh, Maw of the Infernal, Shadowrend, Tremorscale and Defiler could also be buffed by the passive ... maybe.
• Bosmer affinity for archery is unrivaled in lore. It would be nice to have a passive geared at bow/bow setups. Perhaps reducing the cast time for bow abilities by 50% and granting resistance when taking damage from more than 1 enemy.

I agree but with one point of criticism: Deadra may look/behave beastly but they aren't animals.

Samsquanch

Jim6270 wrote: »

Without testing it and only seeing it. I must say I realy like the changes over all. It simes like the most fair and well balanced changes ever and still have a lot of deference and unikeness to them.
Most of the people that think Orc is too week comparet to what they was before is not thinking about that before they was a bit too OP comparet to the other classes race bonuses.

I think they all look awesome (and yes I have a magicka and a stamina character of every class, so I am not favoring one race over another).... I think some of my characters need a race change, but thats just money in the pocked for the creaters.

The balance of the races is just awesome.

Orc was definitely not OP. That’s laughable.

ccmedaddy

Thank you ZOS for finally making Orc a competitive stam DPS race.

As for those who are still crying about Orc changes, boo hoo.

Yamenstein

Lord_Dexter wrote: »

@ZOS_Gilliam

I have two imperial characters,

If Imperials do not improve kindly give me 2 race change tokens.

I can not DPS on them anymore.

Imperials have always been bad at DPS. Why did you make two of them...

themaddaedra

THEY GOOD

Minno

here's my feedback for the races I feel need little extra work (based on dsign intent and the uniqueness that zos wanted to bring to races):
-

satanio wrote: »

Imperial Red Diamond passive is applied in a same way as Sturdy trait.

Formula is as follows
Block Cost = (( 1730 - Shield-Play ) * (1-Shadow Ward) (1-Sturdy) ( 1-Fortress) *(1-New Red Diamond)) * (1-Defensive Posture)

So 2 shieldplay enchants, 23% in shadow ward, 4 Sturdy items on live makes your block cost = 502
With new passive ON PTS it makes it to 477. So Imperial tank gains 25 stamina per 0,5 sec at best scenario.
Non-tank players get the cost of block from 1730 down to 1643 stam cost, which is not great either.

@ZOS_Gilliam
Please, I suggest to change the Red Diamond block cost % reduction to flat value of 203 block cost instead, basically make it like Shield-Play enchantment. It would make it far significant, I mean cmon, Imperial really needs some love.

There was an idea of changing it to a proc chance to return 1750 stam on blocked direct damage. I support either changes!

Another idea is to give them max mag so they are all around powerhouses.

silvereyes

Kalle_Demos wrote: »

silvereyes wrote: »

• Bosmer are often associated with command of simple-minded animals. A bonus to summoned animal pet damage and/or healing, would synergise well with Warden and Sorc classes (especially if Sorc ever gets any stamina pet morphs ... hint hint). Necromancer and Nightblade "pets" would be exempt, not being animals. Creature-oriented proc sets like Selene, Kra'gh, Maw of the Infernal, Shadowrend, Tremorscale and Defiler could also be buffed by the passive ... maybe.

I agree but with one point of criticism: Deadra may look/behave beastly but they aren't animals.

Ah, good point. But then only Wardens would benefit! Oh, and werewolves that choose the ulti pet morph, but still too niche.

Maybe sorcs could get a stamina morph that possesses an animal with a daedra or something. Kind of a stretch, I know....

Faulgor

ccmedaddy wrote: »

Thank you ZOS for finally making Orc a competitive stam DPS race.

As for those who are still crying about Orc changes, boo hoo.

Yeah, boo hoo. Screw everyone who used Orcs for anything else than stamDPS, right?
We all know DPS is all that matters anyway.

wheem_ESO

One thing that I've not seen anyone mention yet, is that the new changes make Nords completely immune to Wall of Frost roots in PvP, and with how things have been in PC-NA Battlegrounds over the last few months, that's a really big deal. Like, too much of a big deal, considering how one can be chain rooted for such a lengthy period of time - I made a thread about this not long ago on the PvP forum.

I don't really like the idea of complete immunity to status effects in PvP, based on race, but with how things are right now this Nord version is definitely too strong. If some changes are made to how frequently one can be rooted by Wall of Elements - which needs to happen, in my opinion - then the racial won't be as big of a deal, though it'll still make one immune to the Minor Maim debuff that comes tied to the status effect.

PS
I'm assuming that the immunity prevents the Chilled status effect from being applied at all; if it actually does put the debuff on, and simply doesn't allow Minor Maim to take effect, then Nords will still be able to be rooted by Wall of Frost just like everyone else.

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO

@wheem_ESO make Nords completely immune to Wall of Frost roots in PvP,

Been like that the whole time bud, zos is just making it explicit in the description and if any other race enchants one of their jewelry with frost resistance, they too are immue to chilled.

wheem_ESO

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

@wheem_ESO make Nords completely immune to Wall of Frost roots in PvP,

Been like that the whole time bud and if any other race enchants one of their jewelry with frost resistance, they too are immue to chilled.

I don't recall Nords being labeled as explicitly immune on live (and it's not mentioned in the patch notes), but I could be mistaken. And if resists are granting full immunity to the status effect, that would seem to not be working as intended.

Either way, there aren't very many (any?) Nords at all in the high MMR PC-NA Battlegrounds right now, but if the currently proposed changes go through there just might be. While I'm not a fan of total immunity to status effects for any races, I think the bigger issue is roots being too frequent, with too little counter options (especially for Magicka builds).

Silver_Strider

wheem_ESO wrote: »

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

@wheem_ESO make Nords completely immune to Wall of Frost roots in PvP,

Been like that the whole time bud and if any other race enchants one of their jewelry with frost resistance, they too are immue to chilled.

I don't recall Nords being labeled as explicitly immune on live (and it's not mentioned in the patch notes), but I could be mistaken. And if resists are granting full immunity to the status effect, that would seem to not be working as intended.

Either way, there aren't very many (any?) Nords at all in the high MMR PC-NA Battlegrounds right now, but if the currently proposed changes go through there just might be. While I'm not a fan of total immunity to status effects for any races, I think the bigger issue is roots being too frequent, with too little counter options (especially for Magicka builds).

No, it's working fully as intended though I can't remember exactly when it was confirmed by ZOS that Resistance = Status Immunity. Pretty much, every race with a resistance (other than Physical/Spell Resistance) via their racial passives have had full on immunity to the status effects of their resisted passive.

Nords have always been immune to Chilled from Ice
Dunmer have always been immune to Burn from Fire
Argonian and Bosmer have always been immune to Defile from Disease and Poison from Poisons

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO

wheem_ESO wrote: »

Lightspeedflashb14_ESO wrote: »

@wheem_ESO make Nords completely immune to Wall of Frost roots in PvP,

Been like that the whole time bud and if any other race enchants one of their jewelry with frost resistance, they too are immue to chilled.

I don't recall Nords being labeled as explicitly immune on live (and it's not mentioned in the patch notes), but I could be mistaken. And if resists are granting full immunity to the status effect, that would seem to not be working as intended.

Either way, there aren't very many (any?) Nords at all in the high MMR PC-NA Battlegrounds right now, but if the currently proposed changes go through there just might be. While I'm not a fan of total immunity to status effects for any races, I think the bigger issue is roots being too frequent, with too little counter options (especially for Magicka builds).

I am telling you it has been like this since the beginning of the game, they are just making it clear in the Tooltip. Not a bug, a feature.

https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/comment/4463894#Comment_4463894

You talk about nords being immune being a problem. I say any race can be immue with a simple glyph change. Not a problem.

pocketdefender

Regarding Bosmer Changes (mainly)

So... first off, I want to say that I found the methodology Gilliam & co used to balance the stat-based racial passives to be very clever! While I'm not a min-maxer and I understand why others are upset that their chosen race isn't the best for their playstyle anymore, I think the races are probably more equal than they used to be. I also think the change from percentages to flat boosts was a great idea. However, I don't think the "unique" racial passives - the ones that aren't just stat increases - work with the balancing system you used, because they are a lot more situational. This leads to them feeling a ton more "slapped on". For example, as you've probably seen already, a Khajiit in full stealth gear is literally undetectable to guards with the passive changes. If that had been tested at all before being unveiled, it wouldn't have made it as far as PTS. Similarly, the Bosmer changes actually acknowledged in the commentary that PvE enemies don't stealth... and then gave us stealth detection, which only works for PvP enemies in close combat. That's so situational it is basically completely useless.

The Bosmer speed boost is really cool, and I've been having tons of fun zipping all over the place with my Swift jewelry and Steed mundus and Hasty Retreat bow passive. But I'm still very disappointed with the stealth changes, and I would gladly give up my new zippiness for feeling like a Wood Elf again.

I have a couple specific complaints with the changes:

1. The stated goal of these changes was to make more playstyles viable for each race. However, with the swapping of stealth to stealth detection, we have essentially been pigeonholed even more completely into a PvP stamina race. Both the stealth radius decrease and bonus stealth damage were useful in solo questing, PvE (a little), and PvP (a lot). Stealth detection, as I mentioned, is so situational that I doubt anyone who doesn't play IC will get any use out of it at all. And while Bosmer have always been a stamina race, I'm bummed that the changes still give magicka Bosmer nothing at all to work with.
2. Bosmer culture highly values stealth. Lorewise, there are several examples of this: The Rite to Theft, a cultural practice of essentially taking others' belongings hostage as a game. Forest-coupling is the innate Bosmer skill to disappear in the shade of a single tree. Our most famous work of literature literally translates to "The One Thousand Benefits of Hiding". Hiding, not sneaking.
3. The new speed boost has precedent in Oblivion, where Bosmer got a +10 to the Speed attribute. But there is no precedent to Bosmer having increased detection abilities, and indeed lorewise that fits better with Khajiit's Night Eye ability that they have had in the past three single-player TES releases. The roll dodge speed boost is also really similar to the Orcs' sprint speed boost, removing some feeling of identity from both of them.

In previous games, Bosmer have had bonuses to a few different abilities that would work well with ESO's systems: Marksmanship, Stealth, Acrobatics, and Alchemy, with a characteristic racial trait of Command Animals. With that in mind, here are some suggestions for Bosmer racial passives to replace Hunter's Eye:

Stealth

I understand why giving Bosmer and Khajiit the same racial passive bonus is problematic from a flavor perspective, especially since they're both AD races. But stealth has been a cornerstone of the Bosmer race for ages. They've had a boost to stealth in every game since it became a skill. And I firmly believe there are far better ways to distinguish the two than what is currently on PTS.

1. Equalize stealth radius between Bosmer and Khajiit, but have it work on only other players for one race, and only NPCs on the other.
2. Decrease cost of sneak and increase sneak speed slightly.
3. Make the sneak bonus situational - Bosmer bonus to stealth when outdoors, and Khajiit bonus when indoors, with ambiguous edge cases like dungeons and tunnels counting for both. This would also keep either of those two races from becoming too strong in PvP.
4. Reduced stealth radius for both races. Bonus to ranged damage done in stealth for Wood Elves, and melee damage done in stealth for Khajiit. (The bonus for Wood Elves would have to be higher to account for all weapons being able to attack from melee range but only bows and staves being able to attack from long range. This would also help fit with the "Bosmer as archers" concept that isn't currently fleshed out in the racial passives.)

Marksmanship:

The 15% increased XP in the bow skill line is a nod to Bosmer proficiency in archery, but I think there's ways to integrate it even more. Bosmer should be the best race for archers, and right now, they aren't. As shown above, marksmanship also integrates really well with stealth.

1. Increase XP gained when killing an enemy with a bow
2. Provide a small amount of resources on bow light attacks
3. Increase damage on all ranged attacks
4. Return a small amount of resources on all successful ranged attacks
5. Increase range of all attacks by 1 or 2 meters
6. Increased critical rating, and change Khajiit to increased critical damage only.

Acrobatics

Acrobatics is pretty well represented with the reduced fall damage, stamina boosts, and now the speed on dodge roll. However, I would love for the reduced fall damage to be slightly buffed, especially since the speed boost is probably going to need to be nerfed a little before Live. Decreasing the cost of roll dodge, instead of boosting speed, would also be a good solution, and would fall into line with other racial passives like the Imperial block/bash cost reduction.

Alchemy

Bosmer have a bonus to alchemy in Skyrim, Oblivion, and Morrowind. An Alchemy ability would be another interesting way to differentiate them from the other races. (In order to do this, max stamina boost would be bundled into Y'ffre's Endurance, and this would take its place with the poison resistance.)

1. Decrease potion cooldown slightly
2. Increase the length of time potions and poisons "tick" for damage and resource return over time (i.e. "every 1 second for 5 seconds" -> "every 1 second for 6 seconds")
3. Increase potency of potions and/or poisons slightly
4. Increase the frequency with which alchemical poisons "fire"

Command Animal/Beast Tongue

This is the unique Bosmer racial ability in the last three TES titles. It allows the player to cause an animal to fight on their side for 60 seconds. Obviously, that's not feasible in this game, but the flavor could be used. Some people have suggested a boost to damage done with combat pets, but that seems a bit too class-specific to me. Here are my ideas:

1. Increase damage against Beast enemies.
2. Reduced aggro radius against beasts.
3. Slight boost to mounted speed.
4. Slight boost to health recovery or damage when a non-combat pet is active. (If this one is chosen, there would need to be a few easily-accessible pets added to the base game so newbies could access the perk without buying crowns or DLC. Maybe move the two pet rewards for leveling up to a lower level.)

Other Lore Abilities

Spinners and Pod-Singers could be used as flavor for some sort of Bosmer magicka buff, although I'm having trouble coming up with an idea.

vesselwiththepestle

Bosmer are really strong right now. The Stealth thing has to be changed (I don't care so much for lore, but making a race ability PVP only is kinda stupid), but adding more abilities would be to much. What you are suggesting sounds more like a new ranger class. Also you are forgetting that Bosmer already get the strongest race ability FOR FREE: being cute.

Aethereal'Golden

Aren't Bretons too strong in PvP now? With their resources and resistances, this race is now far better than others in terms of forgiving gameplay and opportunities to manage sets.

ToRelax

Aethereal'Golden wrote: »

Aren't Bretons too strong in PvP now? With their resources and resistances, this race is now far better than others in terms of forgiving gameplay and opportunities to manage sets.

They are very similar to Altmer, Breton can go for highest sustain if they want to, Altmer can go for highest damage if they want to, most players will just mix it anyway. Altmer can only make good use of their damage reduction passive as Templars or with liberal use of Meditate, but it's a relatively small factor.

Lord_Eomer

Yamenstein wrote: »

Lord_Dexter wrote: »

@ZOS_Gilliam

I have two imperial characters,

If Imperials do not improve kindly give me 2 race change tokens.

I can not DPS on them anymore.

Imperials have always been bad at DPS. Why did you make two of them...

Good question? may be I like Imperial race but now its worst among other races.

vesselwiththepestle

Yamenstein wrote: »

Imperials have always been bad at DPS. Why did you make two of them...

Imperials had 10% on Stamina, which made them equally strong to Redguards if you could sustain your rotation... With Redguard I am over-sustaining most of the time...

Now Bosmer got the same Stamina buff as Imperials and they keep their sustain. Orcs got buffed, Dunmer got buffed. If Dunmer and Orcs wouldn't have gotten buffed, Imperials would have a chance to stay third place as Stam DD. Now they are what, fifth place?

The only thing which speaks for Imperials as Stamm DD right now is you might not need a health glyph on your armor, if your trials group requires minimum health... You might end up with a bit more stamina, helping you with your dps output. Most of the dps parses I've seen so far are either simulating raid buffs by using sustain food or are doing raid parses with max health/max stamina food but not looking at minimum health... How much health does a Redguard Stamsorc have in full medium / 7 stamina enchants?

Katahdin

dovakiin5574 wrote: »

The only thing I would personally change is Khajiit Robustness passive. I propose cutting the health recovery down to 75 or 50 and bumping up stamina and magicka recovery to 125. This would take away some of the sustain issues while also not unbalancing their dps. It would also be more beneficial for those who tank or heal with their Khajiit.

I have personally found it much harder to sustain on Khajiit stamina Nightblade, to the point it is uncomfortable. Magicka Nightblade was slightly better in terms of sustain, but I still felt pressure and had to heavy attack much more often than expected. My Templar tank Khajiit is also facing minor sustain issues on PTS.

I agree with this 100%. Sustain on Khajiit is already difficult enough as it is and needs a buff. You gave most if the stam options huge increases in main stats ie 1000 to 2000 more stam and regen or cost reduction.

Khajiit gets a measly 75 increase to regen and 750 more stam?

As we have seen from testing done on the pts, this puts Khajiit in last place or almost place for stam dps.

I have several Khajiit stam characters made because Khajiit WAS viable for stam and because I like khajiits.

I love all of them and WILL NOT buy race change tokens nor will I switch them to magicka.

So much for making players feel they have a choice......

Vertilvius

Please do not go through with the Imperial changes. As PvE tanks are concerned we will be losing roughly 1500 health while gaining 200 stamina (the health is way more important). You will be taking them from 2nd best tank race to 4th or 5th. Imo they should be the best tank class due to the fact that you have to purchase them and the lore of sword and shield. The heal is pretty much worthless since in trials you have two healers. Really the only thing that made them viable was the max stats. Oh yea and the 5% block cost reduction is completely useless since block cost reduction glyphs and cp give you more than enough ( plz dont nerf them to help the Imperials, you have tendency to do stupid stuff like that). You will also be taking any chance away from them as a stam dps ( Rip my Imperial Stamden dps will have to race change him smh). Although obviously not the best race for a stamdps they where somewhat viable bc of the max stam and the health was always nice for survivability. As for PvP the heal buff your giving them is nothing, 750 health with the debuf. Your pretty much taking an average race and nerfing them for what ever reason.

Vertilvius

Yamenstein wrote: »

Lord_Dexter wrote: »

@ZOS_Gilliam

I have two imperial characters,

If Imperials do not improve kindly give me 2 race change tokens.

I can not DPS on them anymore.

Imperials have always been bad at DPS. Why did you make two of them...

No Imperials where actually pretty good dps's til sustain got nerfed. Even in the heavy attack meta they where pretty good. In this era atm your a redguard or nothing so....

Silver_Strider

Imperial suggestion
Robust replaced with Imperial Mettle: 1k Stamina+Magic
Red Diamond: Restore 260 Health, Magic and Stamina upon using a Weapon ability. 6 second CD
Block/Bash cost reduced by 5%.

This gives Imperial more flexibility overall, letting it fill all roles effectively with decent sustain without being unbalanced in any area.

pocketdefender

vesselwiththepestle wrote: »

Bosmer are really strong right now. The Stealth thing has to be changed (I don't care so much for lore, but making a race ability PVP only is kinda stupid), but adding more abilities would be to much. What you are suggesting sounds more like a new ranger class. Also you are forgetting that Bosmer already get the strongest race ability FOR FREE: being cute.

I'm not suggesting adding anything on top of it, sorry. I just wanted to give a bunch of options to replace the two facets of Hunter's Eye with.

phantasmalD

pocketdefender wrote: »

Command Animal/Beast Tongue

This is the unique Bosmer racial ability in the last three TES titles. It allows the player to cause an animal to fight on their side for 60 seconds. Obviously, that's not feasible in this game, but the flavor could be used.

I personally would not say it's infeasible.
I mean what if there were active race skills? Bosmer could certainly have a summon random woodland creature skill.
I'm guessing the devs at one point decided against having active racial skills but I dunno, might worth reconsidering, having a racial morphable skill could mix up builds and things more so than passives.

silvereyes

Vapirko wrote: »

You’re saying you want to make snipe even more spammable? Sorry but as long as the devs choose to balance PvE and PvP together that is not an option.

Probably true, sadly, considering all the bugs / lag in PVP. I've honestly never died to snipe, but I admittedly don't PVP a ton, and I do hear the complaints from those that do.

Perhaps a buff to AOE damage to targets at long-range could work instead? Not sure. Just trying to think of ways to make bow/bow less handicapped from a PVE dd perspective.

Vapirko wrote: »

we’d all love increased restiances while taking damage from more than one enemy lol.

Not sure why it's a problem then. I guess a cooldown could be added, to prevent it being an always-on bonus. The idea would be to give some extra ability to relocate if the melee mobs catch you, without something as OP as getting the speed equivalent of over 3 gold swift jewels whenever you want.

Malkorga

I tested my Dunmer DK Vampire today

My magicka was about 1000 less than on live, my health was about 500 more than on live and my stamina about 500 more.

Additionally my spell power tool tip was up by the 258 from racial passive.

There are a few world bosses i solo on live, and fighting them on PTS the combat feels about the same, the exception being my magicka sustain feels lower, despite having the same regeneration as on live.

Overall for my own play style i think the changes are good for the Dunmer and i will continue to test out different combat scenarios.

ToRelax

silvereyes wrote: »

Vapirko wrote: »

we’d all love increased restiances while taking damage from more than one enemy lol.

Not sure why it's a problem then. I guess a cooldown could be added, to prevent it being an always-on bonus. The idea would be to give some extra ability to relocate if the melee mobs catch you, without something as OP as getting the speed equivalent of over 3 gold swift jewels whenever you want.

Thing is, it would be useless if you don't let them catch you. It would promote the exact opposite playstyle, going into them yourself.