ArzyeL Gaming just came out with a video. A guide for the various races and argues that they are NOT very well balanced.

https://youtu.be/cND3nvv379s

Wood Elves are directly addressed as being a not great endgame race choice for both PvE and PvP.

Haza_212 wrote: »

The races are a major part of the Elder Scrolls lore. They should have obvious differences in capability and skills

Skill? Some races should be “harder” to play than others? I don’t think there should be any “skill” differences in the races. I think playstyle plays a part, but if a player wants race “x” to be a mage or stam based character they should be able to do so without being hindered by their race choice.

Also, it’s odd to make a lore argument about the current racial passives when the current racial passives are not lore accurate (Example: Argonians).

colossalvoids wrote: »

BlueRaven wrote: »

ArzyeL Gaming just came out with a video. A guide for the various races and argues that they are NOT very well balanced.

Wood Elves are directly addressed as being a not great endgame race choice for both PvE and PvP.

It's opinion of just one person and not really well though out one to be honest. Redguard is a good choice and bosmeri are "decent"? Can't tell if it's just salty bias or serious note.

ArzyeL builds has pretty extensive guides, saying it’s just one person is not doing the site justice.

https://arzyelbuilds.com/

But fine, how about Alcast?

Stamina Damage dealer:

“As a stamina damage dealer Orcs have the best stats, followed up by races like Redguards, Dark Elves and Khajiits. All are viable choices, so you can pick whichever race you like the most.“

Notice a missing race?

So now it’s two people I guess.

Okay so by using your logic, an orc who hits 100 in destruction will still never be as good of a mage as a breton who hits 100 because bretons have passive spell absorption and magic resistance.

Redguard has adrenalin rush which was extremely powerful.

The single player games racial abilities translate poorly into eso, but you cant cherry pick examples from the single player games to suit your argument.

The bottom line is, the races have always had specialties, and they have always had strengths and weaknesses.

IronWooshu wrote: »

Deathlord92 wrote: »

IronWooshu wrote: »

SydneyGrey wrote: »

I was happy when they made it so Dark Elves and Khajiits could be either stamina or magicka. I'd love if more races were like this, actually.

They can be, you just need to get past the idea of min/maxing. I have done all vet trials as DPS on a Magicka Imperial.

That’s true but wouldn’t it be nice if your imperial had that max magic passive and my Breton has that max stamina everyone wins then. I would never of imagined before khajiit getting max magic always thought they was 100% thieves assassins etc.

Personally I could careless. I dont play for score in trials and in PVP I rather be an Magicka Imperial because that extra life helps big time and that extra stamina gives me a few extra blocks or roll dodges, survivability is more important than having a little extra damage.

I get it I’m not gonna lie my Breton magic sustain is amazing really helps keeping my shade up and with cloak really good in 1vx situations.

BlueRaven wrote: »

colossalvoids wrote: »

BlueRaven wrote: »

ArzyeL Gaming just came out with a video. A guide for the various races and argues that they are NOT very well balanced.

Wood Elves are directly addressed as being a not great endgame race choice for both PvE and PvP.

It's opinion of just one person and not really well though out one to be honest. Redguard is a good choice and bosmeri are "decent"? Can't tell if it's just salty bias or serious note.

ArzyeL builds has pretty extensive guides, saying it’s just one person is not doing the site justice.

https://arzyelbuilds.com/

But fine, how about Alcast?

Stamina Damage dealer:

“As a stamina damage dealer Orcs have the best stats, followed up by races like Redguards, Dark Elves and Khajiits. All are viable choices, so you can pick whichever race you like the most.“

Notice a missing race?

So now it’s two people I guess.

Yes, exactly two. Even a godslayer can have info that is biased or not well though at least as he have better stuff to do instead of calculating or theorycrafting. Would not comment Arz as it's personal opinion on other person that doesn't matter at all but Alcast is/was 90% optimised and competitive pve and website is ctrl+c/ctrl+v approach now mostly as he's quite a busy person. You can met more knowledgeable people in various endgame pve and pvp discords to get an opinion of spreadsheet peeps instead of media figures that partially using their work. Or you can also play the game and actually see what's underperforming and what's not, how exactly etc. Or watch your tuber of choice to reinforce your opinions

Deioth wrote: »

and if racial passives became universal and offered genuine build altering choice they could do so with their aesthetic or roleplay preference of chosen race rather than feel compelled based on the passives they really want.

I already chose by aesthetic hence Magicka Imperial or Nord. Both can DPS any vet trial fine, my rotation I would argue is even better than a lot of players who play the sepcialized race who are weak on rotation and in PVP both Imperial and Nord work so well with Magicka or Stamina.

There is no need for making passives universal, your problem as well as others is having this belief you need to min/max a character in order to play the game when in reality you can make any race work and still enjoy the aesthetic that pleases you most.

Deioth wrote: »

Stx wrote: »

You keep referencing the single player endgame, and my point is, that is useless. Because the single player games had no endgame, you could keep playing forever and make one character the master of everything and a literal flying god.

That's not how this game works. So your argument that a breton can spend enough time to become as great a warrior as an orc is moot. If the orc spends that same amount of time, he will still be better because his DNA has shaped him into a warrior.

No, the argument isn't moot, and it seems that we're defining "end-game" differently. By end game, I mean that you are reaching stat/skill/level cap of your chosen build. This is entirely separate from the post game grind in the SP games of maxing out everything. The argument is that a Breton could hit 100 in martial skills just like an Orc, it simply took longer. Both the Breton and Orc in this example could have invested zero time in developing magic based skills or stats, they could have both focused entirely on only warrior skills, and eventually both would be equals. ESO doesn't allow this. That is the problem. A Breton warrior should be able to match an Orc warrior in ESO because in every SP game this was the case. Hitting max level as a stam build Breton should net me the potential to match the stats of a stam build orc, or redguard, or imperial, and so on. Reworking existing point costing passives into Adventurer Skills would allow for this and truly introduce choice for players as they determine the best passives for their chosen build and gear

That sounds like a major flaw in the single player games to me. You said it yourself, the orc will get there faster, meaning had the orc been allowed to continue his training for as long as the breton rather than being held back by an arbitrary level cap system he would have ended up stronger.

You keep calling a system where a race that has been bred for physical combat in the harsh mountains of wrothgar is better at physical combat than a race who has been bred for magical proficiency in the comforts daggerfall arbitrary. And you're basing this argument entirely on the fact that the single player games set a random number as a level cap. I don't think you know what arbitrary means.

And you want to carry this flaw over into ESO why? Single player games are made to allow the player to cap out and become godly if they play long enough, because a single player game is your own personal playground. An MMO has to rely more on balance with decisions that force a give and take scenario because the only thing that separates us as players is our choices and if those choices don't mean anything then what's the point of playing with other people.

Also, you're wrong about this system of yours creating diversity and meaningful decisions. Numbers would be crunched, guides would be made, and a best setup would be determined, and that's all anyone would run because it would be available to everyone. Those decisions you want to create already exist within the game, an altmer might want to add a little recovery in their kit where a breton can go full damage if they choose. Your system would completely remove those decisions by eliminating the original decision of whether to roll an altmer or a breton.

Wandering_Immigrant wrote: »

That sounds like a major flaw in the single player games to me. You said it yourself, the orc will get there faster, meaning had the orc been allowed to continue his training for as long as the breton rather than being held back by an arbitrary level cap system he would have ended up stronger.

You keep calling a system where a race that has been bred for physical combat in the harsh mountains of wrothgar is better at physical combat than a race who has been bred for magical proficiency in the comforts daggerfall arbitrary. And you're basing this argument entirely on the fact that the single player games set a random number as a level cap. I don't think you know what arbitrary means.

And you want to carry this flaw over into ESO why? Single player games are made to allow the player to cap out and become godly if they play long enough, because a single player game is your own personal playground. An MMO has to rely more on balance with decisions that force a give and take scenario because the only thing that separates us as players is our choices and if those choices don't mean anything then what's the point of playing with other people.

I never called the single player games arbitrary, only how ESO is handling racial passives. The single player games featured (well, Skyrim sure took away a lot of depth, but that aside) Major/Minor/Misc skills, "Classes", and other methods of choosing how you wanted to play your particular character to enhance how quickly they leveled certain skills or how much of certain skills they would start with. My idea behind the Adventurer Skills would match precisely that because it perfectly stands to reason that if I opt to be a mage, a warrior, or a rogue that my character's affinity towards those sorts of skills would be expressed. The SP games, as well as in ESO lore and quests, make it pretty clear that you didn't need to be an Altmer or Breton to be the best mages, or Orc or Redguard or Nord to be the best warrior, or Khajiit or Bosmer to be the best thief. And there is plenty to be argued over what was good design and what was bad design in the SP games, but we aren't discussing them, I've merely used them to help build my case.

The systems worked as they did in the SP games so players could feel competent in their chosen playstyle from the beginning, however they also worked such that you could master even those skills in which your character started without any affinity towards. All it took was practice and time and eventually you could match the base capabilities of any race as any other race but also match potential race to race. Adventurer Skills would make this possible again because as it is now with racial passives it'd be as if Bretons could never go above 75 in warrior skills or have warrior skills as a major, depending on the game you wanted to compare to. Since the Elder Scrolls series has always been heavy on player agency, the MMO arbitrarily hurting that agency through a rigid racial passive system should re-evaluate the current system and change it in favor of player agency. There would be no loss in meaning to choices but quite arguably an increase in choices. Since passive bonuses would no longer be restricted by race, players could then mix and match as they see fit to achieve the kind of builds they want.

Also, you're wrong about this system of yours creating diversity and meaningful decisions. Numbers would be crunched, guides would be made, and a best setup would be determined, and that's all anyone would run because it would be available to everyone. Those decisions you want to create already exist within the game, an altmer might want to add a little recovery in their kit where a breton can go full damage if they choose. Your system would completely remove those decisions by eliminating the original decision of whether to roll an altmer or a breton.

As if numbers aren't already crunched and as if there aren't already metas. This will happen regardless. If the concern is balance, that is a concern of any and every change they make, and to appear to suggest that they couldn't make tweaks to bring anything obviously overperforming in line is not a very good faith or honest argument. The advantage of my idea is twofold: 1) For those who care about those numbers, they won't feel forced into playing as a race they might not like (because as mentioned the numbers were long since crunched); and 2) For those who care about their roleplaying matching their character's capacity won't feel like the game is telling them they're wrong because they want to play a Redguard that never picks up a sword. And, your concerns about "best setup" are poorly founded when you consider there is already a wide variety in builds and gear. Stamina, weapon damage, and recovery passives would not suddenly become the be all end all of every stam build.

Further, your claim that this system would remove decisions relating to adding recovery as an altmer or full damage as a breton makes absolutely no sense. There is absolutely nothing that any race can get that another cannot other than racial passives. Any race can be any class which can equip any piece of gear and use any universal skill line with any enchantment and utilize any food buff or star sign buff. That right there is the single biggest reason why I consider racial passives as they exist in ESO to be so arbitrary, because that means an orc magicka build will never be good as an altmer of the same, or an altmer stamina build compared to the same as an orc. That is what I want to see changed.

Foefaller wrote: »

I wouldn't lose any sleep if Racials were pulled back to merely being the skill xp + silly bonus passive you get by default and the rest became "Adventure Skills" or whatever you want to call them.

I do wonder however if there could be some sort of middle ground, like sort of racial subclass (that you could respec) that gave passives that were better suit for other roles, but still thematic. For example, the current Nord passives might be a "Nord Warrior" subclass, but there is also a "Nord Skald" subclass for stam builds and a "Nord Sage" for magicka passives. Current Breton Passives might be "Breton Mystic" but you also have a "Breton Squire" and "Breton Chevalier" for stamina and health/tanking, respectively, and so on.

Just a thought.

Similar ideas have already been suggested by others in this very thread. I'd argue mine is the simplest and likely the easiest to implement, as well as balance, because then they wouldn't also have the balancing act of determining how good a nord magicka passive should be compared to an altmer's or breton's, and if they were functionally the same then they should just take the simple route and make everything universal.