Racial Skills Reworked into Racial Specialisations (Core)

[Lily.1935]

@derd.6413 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@derd.6413 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@derd.6413 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@derd.6413 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@derd.6413 said:

@Lily.1935 said:

@"LaGranse.8652" said:The problem with anything racial is that if it has a large enough impact on how a profession is played, like in this case being an entire trait line, it will not be enough to be "X class", people would start asking for "X race X class" because that race performs better on the class because of the racials in some way or another. This is why the racial skills are slightly underwhelming compared to class skills, they are there for flavor.

If you in order to solve this gives the racials to all classes, they are not racials anymore.

If they're not meant to be good why have them in the game? If they're not meant to be used what good are they to the players? Why have them at all? Personally, having them as common skills wouldn't be a problem. People could still use them as a means of role play or flavor for their character. Having them open to other races could be that "X character of the Sylvari race was so captivated by the norn culture she wanted to study and learn from them and practice in their arts." or something like that. I feel that this argument isn't that convincing since the skills are in the game, the races were supposed to have differences. But Arena net can't have it both ways. They can either make the skills good and give players a reason to play something aside from Human, make them good and keep them open to all races, or Keep them garbage and players annoyed at them and questioning why arena net introduced races in the first place.

or they could rework them into non-combat skills

And how would that work exactly? You're going to need to explain it because that has no in game equivalence.

have the skills work like tonics or things you'd find in the toy category of the gem store

This sounds like you're sucking all the fun out of the game to replace it with something superficial. And having to use a skill slot for it makes it even worse than just a tonic.

it's a bare bones suggestion but one i believe has potential since "doesn't affect combat" is a minor limitation and i wouldn't call everything non-combat related superficial

also a ui change wil probably be necessary no matter what you do given the revenant unless all of them get's turned into passive abilities

I'd really like all the new skills be accessible to revenant as well.. They desperately need better customization and them being allowed to use potentially 10 different cultural/racial skills sounds like a build tester's dream to me. You point it out as a bad thing, I just see fun.

I don't see it as a bad thing but if you want to misconstrue half my arguments and ignore the rest thats fine too

I'd suggest trying to explain it better than, because if I'm getting something wrong, its not intentional. Its on you to make sure you are clear and concise.

you replied to my suggestion that it would be annoying to have to slot the racial skills into skill slots in place of combat skills (aka a ui issue)

having to use a skill slot for it makes it even worse than just a tonic.this is what i was replying to with:a ui change wil probably be necessary no matter what you do given the revenant unless all of them get's turned into passive abilitiesthe argument being that you can't really use ui issues as an argument since it would need change no matter what you didrevenant was just one of the reasons (and the easiest one to explain) that a ui change is inevitable

but pls do point out where i said this was a bad thing because i don't see it.

I'm still not following your reasoning on why that would have to happen. You're going to need to explain it a lot better because right now you're making assumptions.

[Fireline.6093]

@Artyport.2084 said:I’d like them if they performed more like traits that affected your character during combat but didn’t really effect your skills.

For instance.Norn. When critically hit transform into the wereform of your spirit animal.Sylvari. As an engineer you summon plant based turrets and bombs. Could change aesthetics based on raceAsura. Jump into your golem when under 25 percent health

I really like this idea.I was thinking along with the 3 profession traitlines add a 4th racial passive line.

It'd be nice to have racials be trigger casts or passive. We never see them anymore. Don't allow them to interrupt attack rotations, but in addition to them.

I'd be fun to to shapeshift mid-combat or drop Hounds of Balthazar randomly during wow or raids.

[Artyport.2084]

@Fireline.6093 said:

@Artyport.2084 said:I’d like them if they performed more like traits that affected your character during combat but didn’t really effect your skills.

For instance.Norn. When critically hit transform into the wereform of your spirit animal.Sylvari. As an engineer you summon plant based turrets and bombs. Could change aesthetics based on raceAsura. Jump into your golem when under 25 percent health

I really like this idea.I was thinking along with the 3 profession traitlines add a 4th racial passive line.

It'd be nice to have racials be trigger casts or passive. We never see them anymore. Don't allow them to interrupt attack rotations, but in addition to them.

I'd be fun to to shapeshift mid-combat or drop Hounds of Balthazar randomly during wow or raids.

Seriously fighting monsters during a fight getting critically hit and suddenly become the bear form.Having Asuran turretsflowery aura when you receive regeneration as a sylvari.

[Dragana.1497]

Going to shamelessly quote myself from another thread:

_"They should just remove all racial skills and replace them with one 'skill'. If you click it as a Norn you transform into the shape of the spirit you chose at character creation. For humans it will be the god you picked. Asura a Scruffy (that doesn't die on you or tries to kill you) in the colour of their college. Something connected to the cycle of day for the Sylvari and the Legions for the Charr.

Something that's purely cosmetic and only for racial flavour.

It will remove any balance issues and the Norn can finally shapeshift at will (as they should). Even the Norn Revenant so I won't have to rename mine Jora afterall. ;) "_

Also, racial skills in any form or shape should remain RACIAL skills. The idea that every race can use any and every racial skill makes me shudder.

[LucianDK.8615]

Yep, it would open a can off worms, by making some races more desired than others for some proffessions. Some races would most certainly get discriminated because of this. If anything racial skills needs to be axed.

[derd.6413]

given the changes of noveltie items, we could change some skills into racial novelties and add some new ones

[RabbitUp.8294]

@"derd.6413" said:if every race can use them then they kind of loose most of their purpose.

also you can't brush aside lore problems with "lol, why not"

That's how it worked in gw1, the human pc could increase their reputation with the races and use their skills.

[Ceit.7619]

GW1 also let you learn the skills from other professions, too. I doubt this is a road anet is ever going to want to go down. This would be too much work for either significantly increased complexity in builds, or making them sub-optimal (See: a lot of work for no benefit beyond 'flavor', which the current system is already in place for, however flawed.)

[Opopanax.1803]

I like my icewurm as my clutch tank! Don't make it just cosmetic!!

[Euthymias.7984]

I could see this as a thing, albeit simpler.Each race can have a 4th specialization just for them like an elite spec (but much weaker) centered around their identity.

For example, a Warband spec can have traits related to Ash (top row), Iron (middle), and Blood (bottom) with minor passives that can work in tandem with the utilities. As they occupy the third slot, they cannot be used with elite specs (or in pvp and wvw) for balance purposes while still shoring up some core builds as an alternative in general PvE.

[derd.6413]

@Euthymias.7984 said:I could see this as a thing, albeit simpler.Each race can have a 4th specialization just for them like an elite spec (but much weaker) centered around their identity.

For example, a Warband spec can have traits related to Ash (top row), Iron (middle), and Blood (bottom) with minor passives that can work in tandem with the utilities. As they occupy the third slot, they cannot be used with elite specs (or in pvp and wvw) for balance purposes while still shoring up some core builds as an alternative in general PvE.

so racial elite specs.

[Euthymias.7984]

@derd.6413 said:so racial elite specs.

Yeah, more or less. Just not as -Elite- since they dont add new weapons or mechanics while making those utilities a bit more practical for core professions.

[Castigator.3470]

So, racial specialization would either be a functionally idencitcal specialization with five different names and five graphical flavours per ability, or there'd have to be a different game.In the original Guild Wars, Pyre could not transfer disease debuffs to non charr partymembers, same with Vekk. This was a nice detail of the kind, that I feel is missing in GW2. Then again, imagine our charr could not profit from vegetarian or vegan cooking recipes, but as a tradeoff were stronger than all races exept Norn, who'd be absolutely ridiculous?Or if centaurs could outrun humans? Or the other way around?

[Warobaz.9543]

Why not something purely cosmetic? The example that came to my mind was imagining an idle animation (maybe an emote?) of my charr camping with his warband, meat roasting, beerkeg, a handful of charrzookas lying around. Just for the visual flavor. Would be deactivated like minis if there are too many ppl on a map, no impact to gameplay.For the norn it could be something like talking with their spirit through meditation, the sylvari with a druid spirit and a sylvan hound, for asuras their krewe, some field lab tech and a golem, and humans... group prayer? I have no good idea :sweat_smile:and then some non consequential skills (i like the idea of using F6-10) with little to no effect combat wise.And there's the new novelties tab. adding a tonic like option that could contain:

• norn shapeshifting form,
• human "light avatar form",
• asuras golems,
• sylvaris' dawn/noon/dusk/night aspect or something like that,
• charr's legion apparatus.

[Laughing Bat.1570]

@"Warobaz.9543" said:Why not something purely cosmetic? The example that came to my mind was imagining an idle animation (maybe an emote?) of my charr camping with his warband, meat roasting, beerkeg, a handful of charrzookas lying around. Just for the visual flavor. Would be deactivated like minis if there are too many ppl on a map, no impact to gameplay.For the norn it could be something like talking with their spirit through meditation, the sylvari with a druid spirit and a sylvan hound, for asuras their krewe, some field lab tech and a golem, and humans... group prayer? I have no good idea :sweat_smile:and then some non consequential skills (i like the idea of using F6-10) with little to no effect combat wise.And there's the new novelties tab. adding a tonic like option that could contain:

• norn shapeshifting form,
• human "light avatar form",
• asuras golems,
• sylvaris' dawn/noon/dusk/night aspect or something like that,
• charr's legion apparatus.

I think replacing racial skills with racial cosmetics would go a long ways towards achieving the original goal of racial skills. In my dream world we would see a lot of special skill animations based on player race(while the skill would functionally be the same) i.e. engineer turrets would look different on a charr compared to an asura or sylvari.