Gameplay: The Difference Between The Races: There isn't any. :(

Playing a human is no different from playing a Floran, the only thing that changes is the appearance of everything and the 'lore'.

I was hoping that with each different race there would be drawbacks and benefits to them and would make the players have to adapt to the race and learn how to play it.

I was hoping at the very least that Hylotl's would breathe underwater, Apex would have extreme strength, Avians could fly or glide for short periods of time (I know the lore with the lost wings and everything, but even giving them some kind of short gliding and not flying would be awesome), Florans could use unrefined wood as fuel in their ships only, maybe be able to plant themselves in the ground wherever and begin healing quickly when in dirt and other little details like that among the races.

Maybe even different races need special space suits or gear to visit certain planets that are toxic to their species or don't have the right kind of air that their species would breathe, maybe Hylotl's can wear a helmet full of water on desert planets etc....

Instead, they're all pretty much the same. What do you think? Should they all have little details that differentiate their gameplay from the other races or are you happy with the vanilla across the board gameplay?

What would be your suggestions for making gameplay different among the races?

 

INB4 BETA.

But yes I'm on the beta side for once. This is a beta and racial bonuses have not been implemented yet.

/thread.

 

The differences are basically all in the story, how NPCs react to you, and how you describe objects when you investigate them. Based on tooltips, there may eventually be different reactions to certain foods as well, which I am looking forward to.

I think it was intended that there be no real gameplay difference, though, so it would not be a big factor in choosing race.

 

If you play a floran the sssame way you play a human prey, you're playing wrong.

 

I know this is Beta, I just wasn't aware that they were doing racial bonuses and all that, that's great news! I really love this game, it's brilliant!

I'm looking forward to all the different details in the different races. I realize this game is in beta still and isn't nearly finished, but it's already swept me off my feet! It's amazing! I can't wait to see all the future improvements they're doing! I'm hoping that they do race specific mounts!

Well, I can see the point in making there no real gameplay difference so that people would choose whatever race they wanted based on lore and story rather than abilities, that's interesting. However the game makers decide to do it would probably be great! They've already blown me away so much with this game in it's beta stage.

I do like the idea of little differences between the races though, it would make gameplay super interesting to me. Can't WAIT for underwater cities!! I'm really hoping Hylotl's can breathe underwater, or maybe a new scuba diving item for all the races.

 

I think the intention is to not implement any bonuses tied to race. Any special abilities would be tacked onto racial armors, which any character can use.

My understanding is that the devs are doing it that way so they don't force players to favor certain races over others.

 

Right here is allegedly the race armor bonuses.
http://starbounder.org/Armor

Really the Glitch bonus is kinda lame. I mean, digging faster is great. But doesn't really help you aside from saving time. Maybe melee speed increase as well.
I can only hope Novakid armor increases gun damage or firing speed.

 

i look forward to seeing how the races are further diversified as the game grows. id love it if the foods started to really matter as my human eating robomatos is kinda funny sounding

thompson's teeth! the only teeth strong enough to eat other teeth!

 

I kind of feel like tying racial traits to armor is really really weird. While armor that does the things that the listed racial bonuses do makes sense, having all races be the same from a mechanics perspective and forcing you to use specific sets of armor to get your race's flavor is really... nonsensical, to be honest. Underwater breathing armor? Sure! The fish race being just as incapable of surviving underwater without it as everyone else? Smashing the immersion in the face a bit. In my opinion, racial differences should exist, but not impact gameplay heavily. Then we can have non-race specific armor that can apply similar effects, which in the terms of a race whose bonus ability meshes with the armor, will be amplified.

For example, let's say Apex can jump 2 blocks higher than everyone else. Then there's a pair of boots that makes everyone jump an extra two blocks; this means everyone can go up 2 blocks higher than normal, but Apex players can go an extra 4 blocks. It's not going to be this massive bonus that totally ties you down to the Apex race like the Devs are trying to keep from happening.

TL;DR- Make racial bonuses noticeable but minor. We don't want every race to be SUPER SPECIAL SNOWFLAKE +10 TO AMAZING GAME-BREAKING ABILITY, we just want some added flavor to our species of choice.

 

The difference between the races is lore/roleplay-based; there are no gameplay advantages/disadvantages by picking one race over another but if you're a roleplayer, there are cultural/backstory pros and cons for each.

And honestly, that's the way it should be.

 

Care to give reasons as to why there should be no gameplay difference at all between the races?

 

It leads to one(or a few) being "better" than the others.

 

That is subjective, and also depends on how it is implemented. Strictly speaking, "it might not be perfectly balanced" is not a good reason to avoid implementing features.

 

Sure. It allows me to choose a race based on things like appearance and culture without having to sacrifice traits. There's nothing worse than having to play an ugly race because it has the best traits, or playing the race you like the most but having to settle for the worst traits.

Think about this from an economist's point-of-view: Let's say that Starbound only had three races: Humans, Avians, and Apexes. Humans run faster, Avians can fly, and Apex can jump higher. Let's also say that in this scenario, the player thinks the Apex race looks the coolest.

In this scenario, I think it's pretty easy to argue that Avians have the best racial bonus. Flying would allow them to traverse the overworld with more easy, and they could find resources faster. They would also be able to save themselves from fall damage. However, they would miss out on the ability to run faster, which is more useful for being underground, and they would also miss out on being an Apex, which is the coolest-looking race according to our hypothetical player. From an economist's point-of-view, the cost of playing an Avian is being able to run faster or jump higher and look awesome. That's quite a hefty cost, and the player will have to make the frustrating decision of deciding whether flying is worth playing with a character that they might not really enjoy looking at.

Of course, they could roll as an Apex, but the cost of playing as an Apex in this scenario is being able to run faster or fly. Sure, the player gets to look cool, but compared to being able to fly or run faster... is it really worth it?

When racial bonuses are applied to armors and not to the races themselves, the "costs" of each race are reduced significantly, allowing the player to make more choices that they will be satisfied with and make for a more enjoyable experience.

Does that make sense?

 

The Hylotl aren't actually fish by the way. They're amphibians and based on the Axolotl.

 

It does make sense, but the problem inherent with this example is that you're designating one race with a strictly better racial trait than another; While an Apex might in this scenario could travel faster than a human vertically, a human could travel faster horizontally. However, the ability to jump higher is completely dwarfed by the Avian ability to fly. In an example like this, Avians should receive a different trait, like the one that has been stated to be given to their racial armor, the ability to glide.

In this altered scenario, A human can move fastest horizontally, and an Apex can move the fastest upwards, but an Avian can travel over potentially difficult terrain or enemies provided they have a high point to glide from. They're not faster like the other two races, but their specific form of transportation is safer.

Now the player can with a sound mind take Apex as a choice because their ability isn't worse than another race's at a specific thing; they will know that they can climb up a mountain faster than anyone else, but a human will beat them in a footrace and an Avian can descend from the top of said mountain with ease.

As for armors, I'm all for armor sets having cool abilities. That sounds great to me and makes a lot of sense. I just feel like the races shouldn't have purely aesthetic and lore differences, and that armor sets should provide an extra layer of character ability, rather than being the only layer. That way I get to have, say, a water-breathing Apex who is good at jumping, instead of an Apex who is good at jumping or can breathe underwater depending on what he decided to wear this morning.

 

Tiy basically stated that he and the other devs want your choice of race to be cosmetic at endgame. In the early/mid game, your racial choice still has significance due to having constant access to tier- appropriate armor with your race's ability, but if you can get a friend to craft his race's armor for you, or find the blueprints from a merchant, you can have whatever bonus you want without having to sacrifice your appearance.

 

AFAIK, there won't technically be "racial" bonuses. The bonuses come from the armor, and everyone can find blueprints to craft the armor for the "racial" bonus they want. You would just automatically have those blueprints if you are that race.

 

My problem with this is, it makes my choice of character mostly pointless from a gameplay perspective, and there doesn't seem to be much of a solid reason that we can't use both systems; having characters with species-defined abilities AND armors that grant race-focused abilities.

 

While yes it would be "subjective" we are human beings, we tend(as a whole) to find the paths of least resistance(you see this happen all the time in other games with so called Optimal builds or choices.). Now even if it is only one or a few races as being "perceived" as better there will be a shift. Heaven forbid that there would be an actual imbalance because then there would be a larger shift and seeing as how "balance" is annoying hard to(if not impossible) to achieve this would more than likely be the case.