[crossfire] races

[Mark Wedel]

On 05/22/10 04:22 AM, Nicolas Weeger wrote:

>>    There are a couple good races for thieves, but IMO crossfire does not
>> have good thief support yet.  Until such time it does, I don't think I
>> want to present those choices (and so likewise, thief type classes will
>> get removed). Simply put, I don't want to present players with what may
>> amount to be a very difficult to play combo, or a combo which you play as
>> something different (eg fighter), at which point you are better off as a
>> fighter.
>
> If the combination is clearly indicated as difficult, then let the players use
> it :)
> "since your birth, you have been a rebel, disregarding many rules and customs.
> Therefore it is not surprising that you, a Fireborn, choose to work as an Ice
> Mage in the Arctic region."

  I think there are two different points here:
1) Option for players to choose a race/class combo that is difficult to play - I 
don't see anyway to present that, other than to make it fairly obvious it is a 
bad combination.
2) Races/classes, which even with the best choices, are very difficult to play. 
  Eg, anything thief right now, and races for those.  That is my bigger concern 
- I'd rather pull out the thief type classes and races that go along with it 
until such time we can make thieves a real playable class - I'm not even sure 
how to do that right now.

  The basic concern I have for point #2 is that if you present it, players will 
try it and get frustrated/upset and just quit playing the game (they may not try 
another race/class).  In a sense, since we are talking about significant changes 
and rebalancing efforts, I'd rather limit that scope to fewer races/classes, and 
then once we consider those good, start adding more than having a huge number 
right now which become impossible to get right.


>>    Other interesting thing to note is that a lot of the classes make good
>> fighters (by my count, any of 6 races would make for excellent fighters),
>> but there are only 2 really good choices for clerics.
>>
>>    The one issue with all of this is that if you take the 3 main classes
>> that work well in crossfire now (cleric, fighter, mage), for almost every
>> race, you could assign what class you should play.
>>
>>    Dwarf:  Fighter/Cleric combo.
>>    Elf: wizard Fighter/wizard combo
>>    Fireborn: cleric/wizard combo
>>    gnome: cleric
>>    Dragon: fighter or fighter/wizard
>>    half orc: fighter
>>    Quetzal: Fighter
>>    Serpentman: Fighter
>>    Troll: Fighter
>>    Wraith: wizard
>>
>>    I almost wonder if maybe one of the fighter races should get pruned out.
>
> I'd rather try to balance those out too - but well, that's a really hard part
> :)

  It' a tricky issue - the fact there is a near 1:1 mapping from race to class 
is fairly understandable - if you are giving stat bonuses/penalties, it is 
clearly going to influence what class it is good for.  But if you don't give 
stat bonuses, then they blur together a lot.  OTOH, a lot of the races adjust 
all the stats one way or another, which really fences them in.

  However, that is perhaps less true now than way back when, since many monsters 
have more unique abilities/bodies (what a serpentman can wear is a bit different 
than a human).

  I'd be tempted to drop the Quetzal - it predates the dragon playable race, and 
I think the dragon race takes a lot that the Quetzal used to have and extended 
it - the dragon is certainly a unique playing experience.

  Likewise, there have been lots of additions over time, and each addition tends 
to be more extreme - Troll certainly isn't one of the original playable races, 
but is now, but is an fairly extreme fighter.  fireborn is a pretty extreme 
cleric/wizard.  But you look at some of the older races, like Dwarf, while it is 
aimed to be a good fighter (but dex penalty hurts), it has minimal disadvantage 
for a cleric, and while a bit handicapped, could do an ok fighter/mage combo 
(there are better choices, but a dwarf could pull it off).  But for something 
like the Quetzal or Troll, can't imagine being anything by a fighter.