Elf/Human Affinity Debate

elves already exist.

 

Kambrius said;

If there was a quest (I know others have mentioned quests as opposed to rolling an Elf) that causes all players to turn into Elves and the player is presented with the opportunity to stay as an Elf or work to become Human again, then that gives a compelling reason to introduce Elves into the game. Affinity to certain skills as well as NPC reactions might help to cement that decision, but it needs to happen as a permanent choice afterwards and the consequences need to stick. Along with this, there should be no option for multiple character slots. This way, a player can experience and decide for him-/herself whether or not to pursue their avatar existence as an elf or not. As I said in another thread before it got squelched moderated, this is not Shroud of Dissociative Identity Disorder.
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~TL~
As far as multiple character slots, I think that nothing short of a nuclear holocaust is going to have any change in the current direction of development. Though what you say about opening up different lines of quests for other races does go in line with what I feel needs to be in our game, which is that our different than human races provide us with a more challenging game if those quests are more difficult. But as well, I do enjoy the idea of different lines of race specific quests, if our game is to accept balancing these new races with humans (which I totally do not agree with because I want them to provide a uniquely more skill challenged game).
Being "locked into" any specific race class has an intriguing line of thought to it, if your, "then" extra character slots were forced into Elf or whatever as well. but then this would cut off the enjoyment of any human specific quests, which I do not agree with because of free access for everyone to all the enjoyment our game has to offer as options.
~Time Lord~

 

Playable elves is what I meant.

 

One thing I haven't seen mentioned here is one of RG's original arguments against races (or classes) that are chosen at character creation: Before you've started playing the game, you don't know enough about the systems to make an informed choice. Forcing a permanent choice at this point is forcing an uninformed permanent choice that the player might regret. I agreed with RG's reasoning back then, and I have the same worry now.

I am assuming race selection will occur at character creation time, that it will be permanent, and that the implications (the affinities) will be permanent.

One possibility that would make me much happier is if the affinities didn't affect the strength of certain skills, but just made them easier to learn. So the skill cost for learning archery as an elf is a bit lower, but you'll still max out to be just as good as a human with maxed out archery. I think this would address a lot of the gameplay/balancing concerns people have here.

 

well playable elves would just be a logical evolution from the created elves.

 

This is exactly the argument I have against selecting anything at character creation. Lord British was even against us taking the time to set our appearance when first entering the world, in favor of a more natural entrance and learning, then making those choices once you could make an informed decision. Adding races (or skills, or anything else) at character creation means that entire concept, which is part of why I backed this game, has been abandoned.

 

Still following this thread with much interest since I see elves as the precursor to other races that may be introduced. Personally I prefer more brutish races like minotaurs, orcs & bear-like races as below. Perfectly willing to live with the disadvantages ( & advantages of course) with such a choice.



This is the Shardik race as conceptualized by Joey Lindsay on this page : http://metalvsskin.blogspot.com/2012/10/shardik-semi-random-bear-raceclass-for.html

 

In regards to PVP Balance, this is precisely why...

1) PVP should be active now in the pre-alpha and run parallel to the PVE combat system.

2) PVP and PVE combat should be designed like Chess and not be just a set of random "cool" stuff that people thought up, trying to balance them later when huge issues come up.

 

Baron Drocis Fondorlatos Though I see where this would be a fun idea, I'd rather wait until the PvP though the combat system is more robustly full as in a close to final PvP product. To let loose it now would only serve to heighten the trolling saying that it sux, because it would in being an incomplete system. Even when we do get a dressed out PvP implemented, I'd like to see it first in special areas as in tournament where we could have multi player with an ever increasing number of players participating to begin fully testing it. Then we could let it loose onto the world as in a free for all before we implement boundaries and choices to opt in or out.

Test, Test, test..
~Time Lord~

 

I don't have a problem with affinities for certain characters. I think it adds interest and challenge to playing a particular race. I always liked playing whichever race I wanted and then skillfully overcoming whatever there was to overcome. I like doing the unusual

 

Time Lord, it has nothing to do with fun. It's about properly testing the game and balancing pvp.

Also, the last thing anyone should be thinking about is what the trolls would think. Who cares? They're trolls. This is pre-alpha, it's not supposed to be good or fun. It's supposed to be tested. You can't just delay testing because of what the trolls might think or that it wouldn't be good. You have to start somewhere and if it's a core element of the game you need to start as soon as possible.

 

Baron Drocis Fondorlatos,

You are very correct. I have an assumption that may be false, but I assume there are very knowledgeable programmers and that there is somewhere a few test PvP models beating each other up before we get it.
If there is not and even if there is, I think if one town instance is set open for PvP non-consensual, then we could see something to talk about when it comes to PvP issues.
My only concern is that issues dealing in PvP always seem to meet our forums in a most non-productive way for any decent ideas or bad ideas to ever be spoken about. I love talking about and encouraging ideas, yet I don't want to subject my eyes to reading so many "crap posts about who said what and everything sux".
I'm in search of encouraging current or new ideas and not just hearing some whiner gripe that he's not getting his/her way and not producing anything in the way of productive PvP thought.
"Protests abound by anything that does not resemble a game before it".
Some can be very set in their ways with no thought of anything "new"...

I think I'm more interested right now, in how and in what procedure we use to test PvP to gain maximized potential
Anyone's thoughts on a procedure or needed area designations?
~Time Lord~