Ratzkifal wrote: »

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

I think that's a bit disingenuous of you.
Want to play a mage in ESO? Feel free to pick whatever you like.
Want to play a mage and get on the leaderboard? Then you have 4 choices instead of 10.

People keep confusing exceptions with the rules. Shalidor has cold resistance like any other Nord and if he was a Highelf he would have achieved the same feats and fame faster (not to mention that he would have lived longer to do even more crazy magic). Or perhaps he wouldn't because he wouldn't be all that special among fellow Altmer.

Racials passives are innate to every member (or a majority) of that race. Of course not every individual is the same as the rest. It's not a "planet of hats" and it shouldn't be either. The more freedom the system allows the better, but not at the cost of the world building and the uniqueness of each race.
Allowing different races to be more effective at their speciality than others makes the games choices feel more meaningful, brings the world to life, and creates diversity among the player characters. Otherwise everyone would be a Breton, Highelf or Darkelf because those look the best.

Race doesn't matter nearly as much in the single player games, which are the benchmark for the series' lore. The system in ESO is the aberration.

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

Funny. And here I thought the game would see even less racial variety because only three races actually look good while more than three are good in the meta.

You think all the people who just happened to create the same Altmer woman as everyone else would make characters of other races if they could make an Altmer for everything instead?

And "boring" would be removing that depth from the game or taking the flavor away and have it be "choose your destiny" in character creation.

Racial passives don't give the game depth. You just pick whatever is the best race for what role you want to play.

Like I said before, ESO is an MMO, not a single player game. It has to serve different needs than the single player games do.
In an MMO, characters should feel different from one another so that nobody plays exactly the same.
That's also why we don't have a magic system where there is only three master level spells, otherwise at the end of the game everyone would play an identical character to everyone else, just like in Skyrim when all your skills are at 100.

It's a good thing that the races in ESO matter as it increases the replayability of the same class, because of the depth of the system. Whatever is best, heavily depends on "what you want to play", which is a very subjective thing.
You can play a Stamblade and only use weapon abilities, in which case a Redguard might be ideal for you or you go for 100% crit chance in which case Khajiit is your best pick. Both characters will feel very different from one another and allow people to have fun playing in a different way. It's really only when you try to get into serious hardcore hardmode achievement hunting that it boils down to the most effective tactic(s) available.

Oh and, no I don't pick whatever race is best for what role I want to play. I pick the race that fits thematically the most to what I want and because the racial passives are based in lore, this often aligns with the most effective one, but not always. Like when I picked a Bosmer for my Bow/Bow Stamden back when Redguard was the only "correct" choice.

Eso states it’s an mmo RPG so role play still matters. I like playing a Breton stamblade and aren’t the reachmen made up of Bretons and nords and are very savage warriors. There are strong nord mages shalidor and there’s a very strong Breton rogue the one in the trailer. Point is I seen every race in the fighters guild and mages guild so there should be a way to pick what path you want to go down warrior stam mage magic.

Deathlord92 wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

I think that's a bit disingenuous of you.
Want to play a mage in ESO? Feel free to pick whatever you like.
Want to play a mage and get on the leaderboard? Then you have 4 choices instead of 10.

People keep confusing exceptions with the rules. Shalidor has cold resistance like any other Nord and if he was a Highelf he would have achieved the same feats and fame faster (not to mention that he would have lived longer to do even more crazy magic). Or perhaps he wouldn't because he wouldn't be all that special among fellow Altmer.

Racials passives are innate to every member (or a majority) of that race. Of course not every individual is the same as the rest. It's not a "planet of hats" and it shouldn't be either. The more freedom the system allows the better, but not at the cost of the world building and the uniqueness of each race.
Allowing different races to be more effective at their speciality than others makes the games choices feel more meaningful, brings the world to life, and creates diversity among the player characters. Otherwise everyone would be a Breton, Highelf or Darkelf because those look the best.

Race doesn't matter nearly as much in the single player games, which are the benchmark for the series' lore. The system in ESO is the aberration.

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

Funny. And here I thought the game would see even less racial variety because only three races actually look good while more than three are good in the meta.

You think all the people who just happened to create the same Altmer woman as everyone else would make characters of other races if they could make an Altmer for everything instead?

And "boring" would be removing that depth from the game or taking the flavor away and have it be "choose your destiny" in character creation.

Racial passives don't give the game depth. You just pick whatever is the best race for what role you want to play.

Like I said before, ESO is an MMO, not a single player game. It has to serve different needs than the single player games do.
In an MMO, characters should feel different from one another so that nobody plays exactly the same.
That's also why we don't have a magic system where there is only three master level spells, otherwise at the end of the game everyone would play an identical character to everyone else, just like in Skyrim when all your skills are at 100.

It's a good thing that the races in ESO matter as it increases the replayability of the same class, because of the depth of the system. Whatever is best, heavily depends on "what you want to play", which is a very subjective thing.
You can play a Stamblade and only use weapon abilities, in which case a Redguard might be ideal for you or you go for 100% crit chance in which case Khajiit is your best pick. Both characters will feel very different from one another and allow people to have fun playing in a different way. It's really only when you try to get into serious hardcore hardmode achievement hunting that it boils down to the most effective tactic(s) available.

Oh and, no I don't pick whatever race is best for what role I want to play. I pick the race that fits thematically the most to what I want and because the racial passives are based in lore, this often aligns with the most effective one, but not always. Like when I picked a Bosmer for my Bow/Bow Stamden back when Redguard was the only "correct" choice.

Eso states it’s an mmo RPG so role play still matters. I like playing a Breton stamblade and aren’t the reachmen made up of Bretons and nords and are very savage warriors. There are strong nord mages shalidor and there’s a very strong Breton rogue the one in the trailer. Point is I seen every race in the fighters guild and mages guild so there should be a way to pick what path you want to go down warrior stam mage magic.

Of course it's an RPG, just like Dungeons and Dragons were races also got stat boosting passives and you can determine which race is the best for which build. But guess what, in DnD, it's a bit frowned upon by roleplayers to minmax and only play the most effective way there is. Same situation here. If you are here for the RPG, let go of the 8% damage and pick whatever race you want.
Also, the Reachmen are also known as the "Witchmen of Highrock". They use a lot of hedge-magic, compared to Nords were you rarely see big fancy magic usage beyond the occassional Thuum which is not traditional magic in that sense anyway. Even the Briarhearts who are the savage warriors you are referring to are created with magic.
The Reachmen are almost exclusively Bretons as they see the Nords as invaders, which is good for you because if they were a mix, then you could bet that the Nords among them would be the fighters and the Bretons the mages.
As for Shalidor, I hate repeating myself but Shalidor would easily win a fist fight against Divayth Fyr or Iachesis and last longer in a snowstorm without resorting to magic. But if Shalidor had been an elf, then he would have been an even greater mage! You can't just point at the exception and proclaim it the rule. If you don't believe me, let's look at the College of Winterhold in Skyrim. Should be many Nords there, right? There are so many Nord mages around after all. Spoiler alert, there are only two but four Bretons and two Imperials (who are more adept in magic than Nords).

Oh and, about your Breton Rogue, he found his true calling as a magicka Necromancer recently.
But feel free to choose the path of the rogue on your Breton. It's there, it's open, nobody is stopping you - but don't demand to be the very best like no one ever was if you are to blame for your own choice. Besides, the difference is not that great anyway and even games like WoW where the racial passives and actives matter even less have "recommended races" and tell you which is best in slot. That's nothing you will ever escape unless races are cosmetic only.

Ratzkifal wrote: »

Deathlord92 wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

I think that's a bit disingenuous of you.
Want to play a mage in ESO? Feel free to pick whatever you like.
Want to play a mage and get on the leaderboard? Then you have 4 choices instead of 10.

People keep confusing exceptions with the rules. Shalidor has cold resistance like any other Nord and if he was a Highelf he would have achieved the same feats and fame faster (not to mention that he would have lived longer to do even more crazy magic). Or perhaps he wouldn't because he wouldn't be all that special among fellow Altmer.

Racials passives are innate to every member (or a majority) of that race. Of course not every individual is the same as the rest. It's not a "planet of hats" and it shouldn't be either. The more freedom the system allows the better, but not at the cost of the world building and the uniqueness of each race.
Allowing different races to be more effective at their speciality than others makes the games choices feel more meaningful, brings the world to life, and creates diversity among the player characters. Otherwise everyone would be a Breton, Highelf or Darkelf because those look the best.

Race doesn't matter nearly as much in the single player games, which are the benchmark for the series' lore. The system in ESO is the aberration.

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

Funny. And here I thought the game would see even less racial variety because only three races actually look good while more than three are good in the meta.

You think all the people who just happened to create the same Altmer woman as everyone else would make characters of other races if they could make an Altmer for everything instead?

And "boring" would be removing that depth from the game or taking the flavor away and have it be "choose your destiny" in character creation.

Racial passives don't give the game depth. You just pick whatever is the best race for what role you want to play.

Like I said before, ESO is an MMO, not a single player game. It has to serve different needs than the single player games do.
In an MMO, characters should feel different from one another so that nobody plays exactly the same.
That's also why we don't have a magic system where there is only three master level spells, otherwise at the end of the game everyone would play an identical character to everyone else, just like in Skyrim when all your skills are at 100.

It's a good thing that the races in ESO matter as it increases the replayability of the same class, because of the depth of the system. Whatever is best, heavily depends on "what you want to play", which is a very subjective thing.
You can play a Stamblade and only use weapon abilities, in which case a Redguard might be ideal for you or you go for 100% crit chance in which case Khajiit is your best pick. Both characters will feel very different from one another and allow people to have fun playing in a different way. It's really only when you try to get into serious hardcore hardmode achievement hunting that it boils down to the most effective tactic(s) available.

Oh and, no I don't pick whatever race is best for what role I want to play. I pick the race that fits thematically the most to what I want and because the racial passives are based in lore, this often aligns with the most effective one, but not always. Like when I picked a Bosmer for my Bow/Bow Stamden back when Redguard was the only "correct" choice.

Eso states it’s an mmo RPG so role play still matters. I like playing a Breton stamblade and aren’t the reachmen made up of Bretons and nords and are very savage warriors. There are strong nord mages shalidor and there’s a very strong Breton rogue the one in the trailer. Point is I seen every race in the fighters guild and mages guild so there should be a way to pick what path you want to go down warrior stam mage magic.

Of course it's an RPG, just like Dungeons and Dragons were races also got stat boosting passives and you can determine which race is the best for which build. But guess what, in DnD, it's a bit frowned upon by roleplayers to minmax and only play the most effective way there is. Same situation here. If you are here for the RPG, let go of the 8% damage and pick whatever race you want.
.

DnD is incomparable. DnD is a roleplaying experience where a small group of close-knit players create their own story, especially through quirky interactions. Perhaps you could attend a veteran dudgeon, or a trial as a mismatched race to your class, and tell them: "Race doesn't matter, just look at DnD!" Then return to us and tell us has it had gone?

Let us be completely real here. As much as we wish races were cosmetic as in most games, it simply is not. Even in games such as WoW where races have different starting stats, the stats make absolutely no difference by the end-game, and the main importance is the different utilities that races bring via their racial abilities. This means in WoW, your race will have a less than 1% effect in your performance as a tank or DPS.

Compare this to ESO. If I were to race change my Magicka-based Bosmer to an Altmer, I'd see about a 7% increase in the main resource, Magicka. I'd see a 35% increase in Magicka recovery, and I see a 24% increase in the Spell Damage stat. Each of these traits are significant, boosting both damage as a result of the Magicka and Spell Damage, and keeping sustain high as a result to let me keep using my comparatively higher-damaging abilities.

Now, someone said earlier in the thread "Racial differences are needed to highlight player differences". To me, this is asinine. In fact, the current system encourages homogenization, by pushing players to make the same builds with the same races. Instead of seeing a spread of all races across all the classes, you instead see the same races taking up the same roles. This is why I disagree with such a sentiment.

waswar292 wrote: »

Now, someone said earlier in the thread "Racial differences are needed to highlight player differences". To me, this is asinine. In fact, the current system encourages homogenization, by pushing players to make the same builds with the same races. Instead of seeing a spread of all races across all the classes, you instead see the same races taking up the same roles. This is why I disagree with such a sentiment.

@waswar292 I agree with what all you wrote really. I think it is interesting that you point out that the current system encourages homogenization.

Just like RL it would seem. People who are short are not encouraged to push for Pro-basketball, Sumo, US astronaut, or anything else with a height limit. People horrible at math are not normally pushed be Mathematicians. Though you will find some folks out there who struggle to be what they are not naturally endowed with. Just those people don't make up the majority.

The struggle is real, just not everyone must to struggle.

waswar292 wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

Deathlord92 wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

I think that's a bit disingenuous of you.
Want to play a mage in ESO? Feel free to pick whatever you like.
Want to play a mage and get on the leaderboard? Then you have 4 choices instead of 10.

People keep confusing exceptions with the rules. Shalidor has cold resistance like any other Nord and if he was a Highelf he would have achieved the same feats and fame faster (not to mention that he would have lived longer to do even more crazy magic). Or perhaps he wouldn't because he wouldn't be all that special among fellow Altmer.

Racials passives are innate to every member (or a majority) of that race. Of course not every individual is the same as the rest. It's not a "planet of hats" and it shouldn't be either. The more freedom the system allows the better, but not at the cost of the world building and the uniqueness of each race.
Allowing different races to be more effective at their speciality than others makes the games choices feel more meaningful, brings the world to life, and creates diversity among the player characters. Otherwise everyone would be a Breton, Highelf or Darkelf because those look the best.

Race doesn't matter nearly as much in the single player games, which are the benchmark for the series' lore. The system in ESO is the aberration.

MLGProPlayer wrote: »

Ratzkifal wrote: »

Funny. And here I thought the game would see even less racial variety because only three races actually look good while more than three are good in the meta.

You think all the people who just happened to create the same Altmer woman as everyone else would make characters of other races if they could make an Altmer for everything instead?

And "boring" would be removing that depth from the game or taking the flavor away and have it be "choose your destiny" in character creation.

Racial passives don't give the game depth. You just pick whatever is the best race for what role you want to play.

Like I said before, ESO is an MMO, not a single player game. It has to serve different needs than the single player games do.
In an MMO, characters should feel different from one another so that nobody plays exactly the same.
That's also why we don't have a magic system where there is only three master level spells, otherwise at the end of the game everyone would play an identical character to everyone else, just like in Skyrim when all your skills are at 100.

It's a good thing that the races in ESO matter as it increases the replayability of the same class, because of the depth of the system. Whatever is best, heavily depends on "what you want to play", which is a very subjective thing.
You can play a Stamblade and only use weapon abilities, in which case a Redguard might be ideal for you or you go for 100% crit chance in which case Khajiit is your best pick. Both characters will feel very different from one another and allow people to have fun playing in a different way. It's really only when you try to get into serious hardcore hardmode achievement hunting that it boils down to the most effective tactic(s) available.

Oh and, no I don't pick whatever race is best for what role I want to play. I pick the race that fits thematically the most to what I want and because the racial passives are based in lore, this often aligns with the most effective one, but not always. Like when I picked a Bosmer for my Bow/Bow Stamden back when Redguard was the only "correct" choice.

Eso states it’s an mmo RPG so role play still matters. I like playing a Breton stamblade and aren’t the reachmen made up of Bretons and nords and are very savage warriors. There are strong nord mages shalidor and there’s a very strong Breton rogue the one in the trailer. Point is I seen every race in the fighters guild and mages guild so there should be a way to pick what path you want to go down warrior stam mage magic.

Of course it's an RPG, just like Dungeons and Dragons were races also got stat boosting passives and you can determine which race is the best for which build. But guess what, in DnD, it's a bit frowned upon by roleplayers to minmax and only play the most effective way there is. Same situation here. If you are here for the RPG, let go of the 8% damage and pick whatever race you want.
.

DnD is incomparable. DnD is a roleplaying experience where a small group of close-knit players create their own story, especially through quirky interactions. Perhaps you could attend a veteran dudgeon, or a trial as a mismatched race to your class, and tell them: "Race doesn't matter, just look at DnD!" Then return to us and tell us has it had gone?

Let us be completely real here. As much as we wish races were cosmetic as in most games, it simply is not. Even in games such as WoW where races have different starting stats, the stats make absolutely no difference by the end-game, and the main importance is the different utilities that races bring via their racial abilities. This means in WoW, your race will have a less than 1% effect in your performance as a tank or DPS.

Compare this to ESO. If I were to race change my Magicka-based Bosmer to an Altmer, I'd see about a 7% increase in the main resource, Magicka. I'd see a 35% increase in Magicka recovery, and I see a 24% increase in the Spell Damage stat. Each of these traits are significant, boosting both damage as a result of the Magicka and Spell Damage, and keeping sustain high as a result to let me keep using my comparatively higher-damaging abilities.

Now, someone said earlier in the thread "Racial differences are needed to highlight player differences". To me, this is asinine. In fact, the current system encourages homogenization, by pushing players to make the same builds with the same races. Instead of seeing a spread of all races across all the classes, you instead see the same races taking up the same roles. This is why I disagree with such a sentiment.

Veteran dungeons are not hard. You can get away with everything there.
Veteran trials are a different story. Some people struggle to reach dps requirements and race change is an easier way to boost your damage than getting good but I know people who pull 100k dps on a raid dummy and if they played the wrong race that 7% difference would still not get them below the threshold of the dps requirement. If you want to be a non-optimal race, you can still be that and be effective.

To be honest, I don't know a whole lot of games were races are only cosmetic. And if we look at WoW again, Lightforged and Vulpera have racial abilities that definitely increase your dps if you include them in your rotation. That does make a difference at endgame, more than 1% in fact even in the case of the Vulpera.

If you changed your Bosmer to an Altmer, you'd see 2000 max magicka, whatever that is in % to you, NO increase in magicka recovery (unless you are a stam spec) and 258 spell damage, which if it really is 24% to you already tells you what you are doing wrong. 1000 spell damage is just way too little even without racials. Get a better weapon and upgrade it to gold quality. Maybe if your build and rotation were better you wouldn't struggle with being a magicka Bosmer.

That the current system encourages homogenization is indeed kind of true as we don't have a whole lot of races that are considered good at more than one role. In Wrathstone, during the last racial passive overhaul, one of ZOS' stated goals was to open up the races to more playstyles, but they didn't exactly achieve that. As it stands most races can only do one or two roles well. This is something I agree should definitely be looked at again.
But even if I agree that the current system is flawed doesn't discredit what I said earlier in this thread, even if it appears asinine to you. Ideally these differences are there to make characters feel different. That is something that an update to the racial passives should achieve and do better than it currently does.
We do have small differences like Altmer and Breton using different food and one needing to heavy attack more than the other, but those are not the kind that are meaningful or fun. Bosmers' rolly-poly passive, despite how badly thought-through it is, and Argonians' potion passive (if people weren't already spamming potions) are better examples for how racial passives can translate to different gameplay patterns and differences even among the same class.

Mitrenga wrote: »

Are you really sure? I would not want this combat & balance teams to touch any core features.

This current combat team are the ones who changed it last year. They already mucked it up, what does it matter now if they muck it up further? 25 years of precedent they threw out the window.

barney2525 wrote: »

Udrath wrote: »

Yes, server performance should be priority but these racial passives should be updated.

Elemental Talent
Rank III - Unlocked at Altmer (High Elf) 50
Increases your Spell Damage by 258
This should also increase Weapon Damage by 258

Rank III - Unlocked at Orsimer (Orc) 50
Increases your weapon damage by 258
Reduces the cost of Sprint by 12% and increases the Movement Speed bonus of Sprint by 10%
This should also increase Spell Damage by 258

Rank III - Unlocked at Breton 50
Reduces the Magicka cost of your abilities by 7%
This should reduce the cost of both magicka and stamina abilities by 7%


There are orc shamans in game and a orc holding a staff in ESO related artwork. There is a high elf getting knocked off a cliff using a sword in the Summerset cinematic and High Kinlord Rilis uses a two-handed sword. The Breton assassin in the cinematic who rerolled necromancer never seems to have sustain problems with stamina or magicka. Fits the lore and will make these races more viable in other departments and isn't game breaking. The rest of the races are fine.

Thanks for reading! Feel free to comment.

Not sure why you are trying to remove some of the 'Flavor' and logic of the game. Altmer, as a race in the game, are supposed to have a high focus on magic, and thus major major damage. Why would they have a weapon damage bonus that other stamina focused races do not have?

Same with Orcs in the reverse. Flavor-wise they are the big brute melee combat race. Why would they have heavy spell damage that other magicka strong races such as Breton do not?

I think the person you quoted was trying to address a problem with how the racials are currently done. Right now they are a hardwired permanent advantage, instead of a head start like they were in the regular es games.

The concept that you quoted was a way of opening up the races to more diverse builds. Not all orcs are melee focused. Not all high elves cast magic. (Etc) It would be great if the game can open up so that players can play the race they want for the build they want, instead of feeling hampering by choosing the “wrong” race.

Personally I would burn the current race passive system completely and redo how the passives are done from scratch. But the poster was working with what is already here.