Varicite wrote: »

My problem is that due to game mechanics involving potions changing entirely in update 1.6 on top of Argonian racials themselves being outright changed w/out warning left Argonians FAR worse than they were when many of us created our characters.

It has absolutely nothing to do w/ how powerful they were in previous TES games. It has everything to do w/ them being nerfed into the ground w/out any compensation, and were already widely regarded as one of the worst races in the game prior to that nerf.

They had literally one real niche, and that was potion spamming as a NB Alchemist. But potions were changed (cooldown used to be 30 seconds, able to get it down to 15 seconds w/ potion speed glyphs), the NB passive Catalyst was changed (used to be potion strength +30%), and the Argonian racial itself was changed to be much worse overall than it used to be.

This completely killed the only real strength of an Argonian, which was being able to choose where they were strong as long as you had the gold to pay for it. Not stronger than races like Imperials, Bretons, and Redguards, mind you, but comparable.

Now they are not. They just heal 6% better than some races (big whoop) and swim faster. They bring almost nothing at all to the table outside of their aesthetics (and they do still look pretty cool).

They took almost everything away from Argonians a year after many of us created our characters, w/out warning and w/out so much as a reason. And they never gave anything back.

That's my problem.

Bookwyrm wrote: »

dodgehopper_ESO wrote: »

This may very well be, but can you honestly say that the argonian passives as they exist, truly fit what they've been in Elder Scrolls games past?

Pre-apology for the long post, but I became curious about Argonian passives in the past, so I had to look and analyze.

Well now, that's hard to say, although I'd like to note that I do say that all racials should be balanced in my post (not equal, but balanced). I'm not saying that they're balanced now, though I'm not claiming that they aren't either, because I don't really look at passives much.

But as for fitting what they have been, let's take a look.

ESO (going by wiki, not in-game because I can't log in right now so these may have changed):

Restoration Expertise: 15% increase in Restor. Staff experience
Amphibious: Increase of swim speed and potion efficacy by % based on skillpoints (up to 50%/15% respectively)
Argonian Resistance: Increase of Maximum Health & Poison/Disease resistance by % based on skillpoints (up to 3%/21% respectively)
Quick to Mend: Increase healing received by % (up to 6%)

Skyrim:
Histskin: Invoke the power of the Hist to recover health ten times faster for 60 seconds. Can only be used once per day. (useless as is in online game since it is only once per day, could be modified but it's also an active skill not a passive)
Resist Disease: Your Argonian blood is 50% resistant to disease. (Get a portion of this in online and is boosted by additional resistance to poison)
Waterbreathing: Your Argonian Lungs can breathe underwater. (No underwater breathing necessary, swim speed instead).

Oblivion:
Resist Disease - 75% (Seems Argonians become more resilient against disease and then less resilient as time goes on)
Resist Poison - 100% (Much too much for an online game)
Water Breathing - can breathe underwater indefinitely (Again swim speed instead)
Disposition - +5 when speaking to other Argonians. (Unnecessary)

Morrowind:
Waterbreathing for 120 seconds (Swim speed instead)
Resist Poison - 100% (Again, too strong for online)
Resist Common Disease - 75% (As above)

Not going further back than that since most people haven't played Arena and Daggerfall and Argonians weren't exactly the same as we know them today back then.

SO, in short, the passives are actually very similar to what they were, just the efficacy is different, which is something you're going to see across all races since it's an online game. They could boost the poison resistance a fair bit and I think that would make them excellent werewolf alter-egos, even if were-zards are a bit odd (no odder than my werewolf Khajiit!) I think the disease resistance is fair comparatively, and the swim speed is a nice replacement for water breathing since the latter isn't necessary.

I think most peoples' problem is that they think that Argonians should have certain passives that make them better at a particular class, because some other races do, but historically Argonians don't have any passives like that. Now, if you take into consideration skill-buffs (the skills they start out being better at), that changes things, but no one has those advantages in the online game because skills don't work that way in ESO. Some races have been able to have their skill-bonuses translated into other aspects of the online game, but for Argonians that's harder, because the things they're good at aren't necessarily "combat-based" (at least for the way the game is now).

For instance, in Morrowind they gained bonuses to: Alchemy (non-combat), Athletics (pointless), Illusion (...), Medium Armor (could be useful), Mysticism (...), Spear (lol), and Unarmored (lol).

Oblivion: Alchemy, Athletics, Blade, Hand-to-Hand, Illusion, Mysticism, and Security.

Skyrim: Lockpicking, Light Armor, Alteration, Pickpocket, Restoration, Sneak.

They don't have a lot of "unifying" features over past games, and since they already have two sneaky races (Khajiit and Bosmer) in ESO it would have been fairly redundant to add all sneaky passives to Argonians, so they chose the restoration staff and some other classic passives. Is it perfect? No, not really, but is it appropriate given their history? Yes.

EDIT: Edited to point out that historically speaking, Argonians should be better at magicka-based builds than sneaking builds. Yes, I know all about Shadowscales, but they are a specific sect of assassins and are born under a specific constellation (the Shadow) and are trained from birth...so not your every-day Argonian.

dodgehopper_ESO wrote: »

Junkogen wrote: »

I would accept this if Imperials were treated the same way. In past games they had luck and a calming ability. So why must Argonians be gimped in a game to satisfy previous games but Imperials can be completely changed because in this game what they had before would be weak? It's clear that this game is different from previous Elder Scrolls games and therefore the racial passives should reflect that. If Imperials can be changed then so should Argonians to make them more useful in an MMO where these things matter more than in single-player games.

The problem with Imperials is that I do think they represented past character, but more in the sense that they had a boost to Luck (which was a general boost to all stats) and because they've always been strong as Fighter (Sword and Shield) types. One must look at the racial bonuses as well as starting skills to compare racial themes. The biggest problem with the Imperial race in TU/1.6 is the Soft Cap issue. As for bringing 'luck' into the situation, what would that equate to? A flat Dodge chance?

I don't want Argonians gimped any more than you do. My first ever elder scrolls character was an Argonian, and I have very fond memories of playing argonians. I have 4 main characters. My argonian nightblade is a v14 and one of them. He was also a 'potion build' character in the old system. Even with that, I've never felt that their stats quite suited them. To truly make me happy argonians, they'd really need to give them 'Stealthy' and bring polearms into the game, because honestly THAT weapon is Argonian. The Argonians are first and foremost what this game could consider 'medium armor wearing guerrilla combat spearmen'. They use spears for hunting and fishing, as well as for war. This is what they are known for, every bit as much as Imperials are known for being Sword and Shield phalanx formation combatants, and Altmer are known for flinging lightning bolts. I grant they are just themes, but those themes have always effected racial bonuses in TES.