[Suggestions] Racials

[MaxQuest]

Here's the list of all current racials:

 

 

 

Also here's the list with descriptions included.

 

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As you can see some are more useful than the other; be it because some are more useful due to encounters we have to face, or as in case of moon and fire godlikes: lack of scaling.

I have assembled a few suggestions in this regard, grouped in 4 sections (from important to optional):

 

Suggestion Group 1: Scaling

• Silver Tide:
  • currently restores only 10 hp per proc, and doesn't scale. This makes it a really weak racial.
  • in PoE1 it was restoring 10 + 3 * (CL - 1).
  • average health pool in Deadfire is 40 + 10 * CL.
  • thus proposing the following scalling: 6 + 2 * CL. This way it will heal for 8 at level 1, and for 46 at level 20
• Battle Forged:
  • currently deals only 2-4 burn damage per proc, and doesn't scale.
  • in PoE1 it was dealing ~ 2 * CL.
  • proposing the following scalling: 1..3 + CL. On average it will take ~11 hits for a 240 hp enemy to kill himself against Battle Forged.

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Suggestion Group 2: Double racials for godlikes

 

During Q&A #7 Josh told that godlikes will have two racials. One on par with the rest of the races. And a second one that will be on the same power-level with headgear we'll be able to find:

 

 

 

A: Will the changes to how the bonuses from items work, headgear will presumably be a bit more important to characters. Do you plan on rejiggering races with this in mind?

JS: Yes. Almost all of the racial passives have been changed. Usually made more powerful. For the Godlike they all have two bonuses instead of just one. That is to make up for the fact that they can't wear headgear, and headgear, not that you find a ton of it, but when you do find it it tends to be pretty good.

(source)

 

 

I do find this to be a nice idea and would like to see it implemented.

Out of playable races, Moon and Nature godlikes are the ones who lack a second racial. Here's my suggestion for them:

 

 

As for Avian and Marine, their current racials are already quite strong, so they could be just split in two. For consistency.

 

 

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Suggestion Group 3: Optional minor tweaks

 

Some racials could get a few minor changes to make them either more appropriate or a bit more comfortable to capitalize on.

For example I do find it strange that Fire Godlikes have lower +AR bonus vs burn than Pale Elves. Thus proposing:

• Elemental Endurance: +4 Burn AR, + 4 Freeze AR -> +2 Burn AR, +2 Shock AR, + 4 Freeze AR
• Ashen Skin: +2 Burn AR -> +3 Burn AR

The next thing is human's racial. In PoE1 it had a duration. In Deadfire it is active indefinitely while you are below 50% hp. I understand that this one is a matter of taste, but I liked more the PoE1 version. Plus, if I want to make use of Barring Death's Door and akin effects, human choice kinda clashes with Death Godlike. So:

• Fighting Spirit (Before): +7 Accuracy and +15% Damage Done, while Bloodied or near Death
• Fighting Spirit (After): +7 Accuracy and +15% Damage Done for 10s upon reaching Bloodied. Can trigger twice per encounter.

And lastly the Hearth Orlan's racial:

• Minor Threat (Before): +10% hit-to-crit while attacking same target as an ally
• Minor Threat (After): +5% hit-to-crit. While attacking same target as an ally get +5% more.

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Suggestion Group 4: Feat-alike, selectable racials that are partially decoupled from races

.. in progress..

 

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So these are the suggested changes to current racials so far. Thoughts?

Edited August 24, 2018 by MaxQuest

[Boeroer]

Nice list.

 

I would suggest racial abilities that are easy to implement (e.g. being passive or no UI elements needed) so the chance of implementation is higher.

 

Because of that I think that your proposal for Nature Godlikes may be too complicated. I also don't think they should be pushed towards healing with extra power levels. Else we will see only Nature Godlike healers in the future.

 

I think the minor change of Minor Threat is unnecessary. Pun intended...

 

The suggestions for Avian, Moon, Fire and Marine Godlikes are nice. Maybe the second racial ability for Moon is a bit to complicated (would need UI element if it's not passive)?

[MaxQuest]

Regarding Nature Godlikes and wilderness check: fair point

Also regarding healing.

Atm all my healers are pale elves. Wanted to give them some competition)

 

Minor threat change is indeed unnecessary. At least if that's your main or if you micro. But looking at my wayfarer/skald on AI,.. she rarely attacks enemies that are threatened by somebody else. And I couldn't blame her. It's often indeed better to hold the line than to send her to attack a threatened enemy and leave a gap. Also there are a sort of assassin builds that specialize on dealing solo with enemy backline. At the moment I make such hirelings as humans or pale elves; even through would benefit more from Minor Threat (if it had decent uptime).

 

Regarding second racial for Moon Godlikes: it's an active ability. You target an ally, and if he has any Might or Resolve afflictions, it transfers them (with their remaining durations) to the godlike. So if Moon uses Lifted Burden on stunned team member, Moon becomes stunned instead. That is, unless he had a Might inspiration.

Edited August 23, 2018 by MaxQuest

[InsaneCommander]

Why didn't they keep the scaling for PoE2? I want to play as a Fire Godlike in the future, but Battle Forged is really bad.

[Boeroer]

Regarding second racial for Moon Godlikes: it's an active ability. You target an ally, and if he has any Might or Resolve afflictions, it transfers them (with their remaining durations) to the godlike. So if Moon uses Lifted Burden on stunned team member, Moon becomes stunned instead. That is, unless he had a Might inspiration.

Yes - and that would need a button to activate. Those are the things that make it less likely to get implemented by mods or developer I think. A passive without UI element might be easier? What about doing a short-lived AoE-tier-1 inspiration when getting hit by an afflicton? 1/encounter? It would remove the afflicton and any other of the same stat on your party members.

[omgFIREBALLS]

The great minds have spoken. Implement everything agreed upon by MaxQuest and Boeroer.

 

 

You don't want to disagree with MaxQuest and Boeroer. You want to go home and rethink your life.

 

[BalkothTheFeared]

A choice to get rid of the racial abilities on godlikes and allow us to equip helmets.

[Manveru123]

Why didn't they keep the scaling for PoE2? I want to play as a Fire Godlike in the future, but Battle Forged is really bad.

Probably forgot. Or nobody tested it.

 

A choice to get rid of the racial abilities on godlikes and allow us to equip helmets.

This is actually a very good suggestion. If my Godlike can't wear helmets because they don't fit his head, how come my Aumaua and Dwarf can use the same armor?

[gkathellar]

 

A choice to get rid of the racial abilities on godlikes and allow us to equip helmets.

This is actually a very good suggestion. If my Godlike can't wear helmets because they don't fit his head, how come my Aumaua and Dwarf can use the same armor?

 

Because it's a standard trope, and it's easy to overlook given the same basic body shape. If you want a good rationalization, you're not going to find one - any half-decent suit of armor is fitted to an individual, and wearing poorly-fitted armor (read: any suit that hasn't been made or modified for you, specifically) makes it difficult to walk, run, stand, sit, ride, climb, roll, fight, and breathe. However, since stripping corpses and wearing their stuff is one of the things people love about this genre, it's not really worth questioning.

 

Meanwhile, the mechanical premise of godlike is and has always been, "you can't wear a hat but you get minor superpowers." Changing that up because we want to be consistently surreal doesn't really strike me as desirable.

Edited August 24, 2018 by gkathellar

[Dr <3]

If silver tide and battleforged start to scale properly i think we will be ok.

 

That said:

 

A proper working silver tide will be well worth the standard "double racial", anyway i'll don't mind to get another minor racial eventually.

For stay in ondra/defensive theme it could be something like

"moon blessed" :5% chance to resist a spell or 5% chance to resist a melee attack ( like a minor lucky talent).

 

About human racial: i actually like it much more now as in poe1. In poe1 it was 1 per encounter AND even related to int, so a low int human was really a bad choice. Now you get a buff without duration and can trigger multile time in the same combat. High five to devs for this!

 

About nature godlike: now you only get +1 pw level if you have a body inspitation, it feels a bit left "behind". Since it is galawain themed, i would like to get also a modern version of the poe1 racial: +2 to might, con, dex if you have a body inspiration. Or even better:

- body inspiration : +2 to mig, dex, con

- mind inspiration : +1 pwr lvl

 

The simpler the changes, the better

Edited August 24, 2018 by Dr <3

[MaxQuest]

 

Regarding second racial for Moon Godlikes: it's an active ability. You target an ally, and if he has any Might or Resolve afflictions, it transfers them (with their remaining durations) to the godlike. So if Moon uses Lifted Burden on stunned team member, Moon becomes stunned instead. That is, unless he had a Might inspiration.

Yes - and that would need a button to activate. Those are the things that make it less likely to get implemented by mods or developer I think. A passive without UI element might be easier?

 

Yes, I understood that)

 

I think actives won't be a problem for Obsidian. In the end in class abilities screen there are both actives and passives. And they all are AbilityGameData, StatusEffects, i.e. same principle.

The only problem can be for them some complex condition, like that "while in wilderness area". I.e. if they don't track this like let's say in NWN during scene loading, some kind of if (is_above_ground and zone_is_natural), developer can't really make such check.

 

While for json modders, even passives (if unique) can be a problem.

 

As for icon art, some existing could be reused with hue shifted. E.g:

 

What about doing a short-lived AoE-tier-1 inspiration when getting hit by an afflicton? 1/encounter? It would remove the afflicton and any other of the same stat on your party members.

Definitely useful. Actually even looks strong enough to me, such that Silver Tide could get tuned down to compensate.

I also like Dr<3 "Moon Blessed" variant, if going for a simple passive.

 

A choice to get rid of the racial abilities on godlikes and allow us to equip helmets.

If I understood correctly, initially godlikes didn't get hedgear because of the horns&stuff clipping through it, so character artists would have to manually adjust all head items for all godlike models. So they turned it into a feature.

 

Now that they made it possible to show the hair while wearing hats, perhaps it became possible to put hats on godlikes without clipping too?

But here's the catch:

- one thing is a hood or headband, that could theoretically be put on those godlike heads; and another thing is something like frog helmet, where the horns would clearly be a problem. And if we allow one, but not the other, there would be balancing issues.

- some players, me included, are a bit used with the fact that godlikes cannot wear helmets. It's almost like an established thing by now.

 

About nature godlike: now you only get +1 pw level if you have a body inspitation, it feels a bit left "behind". Since it is galawain themed, i would like to get also a modern version of the poe1 racial: +2 to might, con, dex if you have a body inspiration. Or even better:

- body inspiration : +2 to mig, dex, con

- mind inspiration : +1 pwr lvl

Actually not bad)

Looking at Acina's Tricorn we can easily say that a racial can be worth 5+ attribute points, and more if there is a condition to meet.

 

Btw, was also thinking how to intertwine the second racial with Galawain

Here's few variants, yours included:

 

Edited August 24, 2018 by MaxQuest

[kilay]

@MaxQuest about your last reply imho is totally doable (passive or active doesn't make difference) even UI isn't a problem .There are a lot of mods that are already adding new abilities w/o issues.
about Wilderness Area we can check all the game locations (little time consuming) and make a conditionals that activates the ability only when you are in those places.
i have to check maybe they have already a sort of classification

 

About helm i agree and btw you can already wear it on a godlike using Unity Console

Edited August 24, 2018 by kilay

[tinysalamander]

IMO, leave pale elves as is, and make fire godlikes +4 burn armor plus something else.

[Manveru123]

 

 

A choice to get rid of the racial abilities on godlikes and allow us to equip helmets.

This is actually a very good suggestion. If my Godlike can't wear helmets because they don't fit his head, how come my Aumaua and Dwarf can use the same armor?

 

Because it's a standard trope, and it's easy to overlook given the same basic body shape. If you want a good rationalization, you're not going to find one - any half-decent suit of armor is fitted to an individual, and wearing poorly-fitted armor (read: any suit that hasn't been made or modified for you, specifically) makes it difficult to walk, run, stand, sit, ride, climb, roll, fight, and breathe. However, since stripping corpses and wearing their stuff is one of the things people love about this genre, it's not really worth questioning.

 

Meanwhile, the mechanical premise of godlike is and has always been, "you can't wear a hat but you get minor superpowers." Changing that up because we want to be consistently surreal doesn't really strike me as desirable.

 

I don't want a "good rationalization" because I don't mind how this works. What I want is consistency. There is no reason to take headgears away from Godlikes. Their passives are not good enough to compensate, not even close.

[MaxQuest]

Have waited a few days to gauge the reactions.

And I think we can summarize the following for each suggestion group now:

 

1. pretty much everyone agrees that Silver Tide and Battle Forged racials need scaling.

2. majority does agree that having two racials for godlikes is a good idea. And there is a more or less unanimity regarding avian and marine godlikes. But there are different visions for 2nd racial for moon and nature.

Atm we have the following variants:

 

 

Btw, if you have an idea, feel free to post it. And also: do you want a poll for this?

 

3. The optional tweaks to Fighting Spirit, Elemental Endurance and Minor Threat are unnecessary. It's a bit unclear what to do with Ashen Skin: leave as is? or buff it +2 Burn AR -> +4 Burn AR, but let Battle Forged provide +1 AR only vs slash/pierce/crush?

 

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As for group #4: I am not even suggesting it) as it would require quite a revamp ^^

But am interested on what you think of it, just as of abstract idea:

 

- godlikes get 1 pre-defined racial (corresponding to their type)

- after selecting their race, class and attributes during character creation, players are navigated to a new screen, where they can select 1 racial trait which have different requirements. E.g:

 

 

 

The reasons for this are simple:

 

 

First: the following two points sometimes missmatch:

- player wants a specific race because of their [racial] fitting best from power-building perspective

- player wants a specific race because [role playing] or [armor x looks better on this body type]

 

For example, in PoE1 I was often making humans, removing via console their Fighting Spirit and adding Hunter's Instict instead. And pretending that they were rised by boreal dwarves, RP-wise)

 

And second: [Resistance-vs-X] racials are a bit different in their impact, due to the nature of ingame encounters and of assymetric tier-2 afflictions (e.g. paralyze is rly bad; but if it gets dowgraded to immobilize... it's no big deal for ranged casters/dps since they can continue doing their thing)

Resistances vs MIG and DEX afflictions on average are more useful. So if I want a wild orlan (because of visual or rp concerns), there is some chance I'll open the console and lets say swap their racial with Wily Step. Stuff like that.

 

 

Edited August 28, 2018 by MaxQuest

[Haplok]

Great suggestions, MaxQuest!

Hope they might be implemented.

[Dr <3]

Huge thump up for the summary!

 

I Have to admit that i always wondered in poe1 to be able to choose a second racial bonus for the godlike depending to the "body" chosen. Could actually be an interesting idea: every godlike have a base racial ability + one another from the other races, depending upon the body choosen.

 

Your suggestion to give everyone a racial dependent from race OR class/attribute is surely interesting, but a bit too much complex for my taste ( i play mostly barbarians, forgive me)

[MaxQuest]

4.0 is out, but still no love for Moon Godlikes.

Losing head slot for a plain 3x10 heal in my opinion is a bad deal past the early game.

 

So I've made a small mod to add scaling to this racial, and while I was at it, implemented a few other minor changes:

 

- Moon Godlike:

• Silver Tide: healing value is now scaling with character's level: 10 -> 6 + 2 * CL.
• Moon Blessed (new racial): during the night has a 10% chance to completely avoid an incoming attack.

- Fire Godlike:

• Ashen Skin: AR bonus vs burn damage increased from +2 -> +3.
• Battle Forged: retaliation attack now has Fire keyword.
• Battle Forged: retaliation damage has now better scaling {2..4} + 5% per PL -> {2..4} + 50% per PL.
• Battle Forged: base penetration increased from 7 + 0.25 per PL -> 7 + 0.50 per PL.

- Nature Godlike:

• Nature Sense (new racial): has +5 perception bonus while stealthed, invisible or is out of combat.

You can find the mod: here Edited December 16, 2018 by MaxQuest

[Hariwulf]

Years later, Elves still need love. They are "known for their speed and intellect". Yet, there's nothing of the latter.

 

Humans get damage boost and Acc, Elves need something for casters. Pale elves could get it, especially.

[house2fly]

Dexterity resistance is pretty strong, though I could take or leave Elemental Endurance. Racials are trivial to mod, so maybe that could be replaced with additional AOE/duration with spells, equivalent to 3 or so points of Intellect. Ooh or faster casting

[Hariwulf]

Precisely. Wood Elves get a Dex boon, Pale Elves could get something on the Int side.

Or perhaps both could mimic the Human boost, just shifted to +(?) Pen, and +15% Duration. Or Crit Chance.