Selecting Races: Begin With Class

First in a series of posts discussing the selection of a race.

When evaluating the race choices, the obvious choice is to evaluate the player's concerns vis-à-vis his or her class characteristics. The class itself must first have its mechanics evaluated, and only after a person's framework of class abilities, strengths, and weaknesses, can a thoughtful choice of race be made.

After all, a race is a selection of attributes, attacks, and special bonuses that for the most part affects not the overall abilities of a character, but rather the effectiveness of those abilities. Race is the clothes with which we choose to dress our characters up in; and therefore we look to the body of the class before we choose our clothes.

The first step we make in this direction is to establish how a class is evaluated. Keeping in mind that our primary goal is the selection of race, we are not concerned with how a class compares to another class, but only with how it functions with respect to the bonuses that a race provides: attributes, attacks, special bonuses. Furthermore, in evaluating the desirability of a particular attribute, we must focus on the bonuses that stat provides to each class. For example, agility provides quickness to all classes, and therefore, agility is not considered unless it provides some bonus particular to that class, because it has, for example, dodge.

While it is true that quickness has varying benefits for each class depending on the presence or absence of other forms of defense, such evaluation is perhaps too advanced for a series of blog posts and often too small/remote of a consideration to warrant specific mention. Mention will be made of notable exceptions, but on the whole, the reader that objects is perfectly capable of conducting his or her analysis without a detailed breakdown from me.

It is with these basic principles in mind that we will begin our discussion. I cannot guarantee the usefulness of my posts, but I can promise that the rest of this series will be less dry.

Chewing Loudly

I've been toying with the idea of doing a generalized review of races, and taking each one and evaluating its merits. However, this game is a class-based game, where a race is merely the uniform in which you perform your duties as a stealthy deliverer of stabby goodness.

At the risk of excessive navel-gazing, it's possible for me to begin by evaluating the ninja class's overall strengths and weaknesses, with an eye towards race selection. This method would allow me to cycle through the various classes and suggest races for each. If either of you (my faithful readers) has any input, I will consider your suggestions carefully.