puiwaihin

Please no Vancian system. I just can't understand "forgetting" a spell and having to "study" it again so you can cast it. If you want there to be some artificial preparation to force magic users to guess what they'll need, the perhaps divide up magic into different elemental types, foci, or whatever division you want to include and force MUs to choose how much of what kind of mana/spell points they want to cast. Instead of 50 mana, make that 30 exothermic mana, 10 life mana, and 10 dark mana to draw upon. Or do something like you can have X number of "fresh in your mind" spells with a base 100% chance of casting success and the rest with lower base chances of success based on spell difficulty and how much experience you have casting it. (So that eventually simple spells you've used thousands of times are as effortless as "fresh in your mind" spells.

Add me on to the pro-toolkit group

There's a reason that elves and dwarves are used so often in games. People have a connection to them. Generally, any new race will fall into one of several common archetypes anyway. Just look at Star Trek. You have Kingons, who are nothing but Barbarian clans, Vulcans who are elves but with a thing for logic rather than nature, and Ferengi who are the hobbits (short and comical) but given greed as their main motivator. So, if they don't have "elves" they will almost certainly have a pointy-eared group of erudites or mystics whose comprehension of nature or science are beyond human. And if they don't have "orcs" they'll have some other race of brutish, territorial creatures intent on killing people off who may or may not have a deep sense of honor and culture of their own that the innately racist humans have simply not yet understood.

There's a reason that elves and dwarves are used so often in games. People have a connection to them. Generally, any new race will fall into one of several common archetypes anyway. Just look at Star Trek. You have Kingons, who are nothing but Barbarian clans, Vulcans who are elves but with a thing for logic rather than nature, and Ferengi who are the hobbits (short and comical) but given greed as their main motivator. So, if they don't have "elves" they will almost certainly have a pointy-eared group of erudites or mystics whose comprehension of nature or science are beyond human. And if they don't have "orcs" they'll have some other race of brutish, territorial creatures intent on killing people off who may or may not have a deep sense of honor and culture of their own that the innately racist humans have simply not yet understood. As for scantily clad women and bare chested men....Keep in mind that sexualized characters appeal to the widest audience. It's simplay a smart move.

Is this game being made with the possibility of players creating additional content for download a la NWN, NWN2, & Dungeon Siege? Would this be a "stretch goal" or something you as developers would prefer not to get into? What sort of multi-player functionality are you looking at?