Forums » Pantheon Races

Should all races have the same knowledge?

    • 2419 posts
    January 3, 2016 7:47 PM PST

    What we have are 9 races from 9 different dimensions/planes which now find themselves crashed together into this world called Terminous.  As they are radically different races with drastically different histories, outlooks and mindset it might stand to reason (and this is confirmed by VR) that not every race can be every class.  Beyond that, why would every race have the same set of knowledge as all the other races?  If we accept that the races also do not all get along it could be entirely possible that knowledge held by one race would not migrate to other races.

    What this means, then, is that spellbooks and abilities would have gaps in them.  What one race teaches its clerics might not be the same as another race's clerics. (Thought just for simplicity sake lets just accept that same spells have same names, strengths, etc).  So if you wanted a complete spellbook you might find yourself having to gain faction with another race that has your same class so you can learn their spells.  And to avoid trivializing this you cannot even scribe the spell if you do not have the correct standing and/or completed a specific quest to get the spell.

    The same could apply to class abilities, one race's monk could have focused on foot attacks and limited hand attacks so if you wanted both you'd have to raise standings to train from their masters.

    This would naturally fall to the wayside as you level up because higher level spells are usually dropped or otherwise obtain from non-vendor sources.  Still, it would add yet another dimension of play. 

    Thoughts?

    • 109 posts
    February 1, 2016 7:56 AM PST

    I like the idea that say, clerics, of different races on Terminus would have different flavor spells. Sure all doing much the same thing but maybe different particle effects etc. Can take it a step further and figure that since the races have been sharing the world for awhile theyve all tapped into the magic of Terminus and share those spells, leaving just a few holdover racial spells that are still remembered and passed down. From a game design standpoint it may be a problem balancing who get what flavors (dont want every cleric to be a gnome because they get THAT racial spell). Interesting ideas tho.

    • 10 posts
    February 25, 2016 4:38 PM PST

    I've got to say - I actually kinda like the idea of race-specific skill knowledge.

     

    I think it could even be carried into weapon skills.  If we assume that classes are only given a lock of "Two-handed weapons" or "One-handed weapons" (rather than saying you can only use a sword and you can only use a greataxe) then you could easily have one race having superior knowledge of axes, while another has superior knowledge of swords and another has superior knowledge of maces. You can progress to a certain degree in any direction with any trainer, but to become a true master you need to go learn from the race with the mastery of the weapon in question.