The biggest release in Achaea's history will be happening

Devran

Mathilda said:

we're going to find out that Imperian is just a continent to the east of Sapience.

I'm coming for you Antioch!

Now that, is something I would freaking -love-.

But that means Achaea gets all the Imperian classes too. Zomg.

Prythe

Cooper said:

Prythe said:

Dochitha said:

open PK area please...

Oy. Don't we have enough of those? (I do love seeing you kill everybody in sight, however!)

No? 

There is one pk bashing area. 

Why was I thinking there was more than one?

Annwyn.

The place where you go through the stones to support the barrier comes to mind, no? But I guess that does not count.

And I guess UW is not going to count until it's open again.

But you're right, that's not a lot, there should be at least one more. I can see why some would want one. My only hope would be that if it has great Hunting there is a new equivalent Hunting spot that is not open PK in addition.

Farrah

Only inner Underrealm is open pk. That's not where you reinforce the barrier. It's the area beyond the barrier that the city that reinforces the barrier the most the previous year can open. It's not usually accessible.

Also not much of a hunting ground in the typical sense.

Rinkel

Thinking outside the box, im going with achaean film of book franchise.........

Keorin

While I'm personally in favour of just divorcing stats entirely from race, I think that in some cases, it's less a problem with the system, and more with which races got which stats.

I've played strength classes as a siren before, and to be honest, it didn't feel so bad, because at least I got to know that my character was going against the grain in a certain way. While the mechanics were annoying, given how central pvp is to the game's roleplay, it did make for a more interesting roleplay situation, I felt.

And then you have Atavian, which feels like it only has its stats because there was a missing array to be filled. Atavian went from being -dex and otherwise like human (which made the most sense rp-wise) to being +dex, -str, for no discernible reason. If you look at established Atavian lore, almost all atavians fit either strength or intelligence archetypes (see: the royal guard knights, the stormshaper, atavian conflict with Kashari on Therophage, atavian priests/philosophers). The most they have that would reinforce dexterity is their archers, but archery is tied as much to knights as it is serpents. So in playing an atavian with a strength-based class just feels sucky, since I'm playing to what the race appears to be good at in the world, and just being mechanically punished for it.

I think just divorcing them would be better overall, since the hugely uneven distribution of what classes use which stats means that certain races are always going to be better/worse then others more often, particularly when it comes to multiclass, but I think just fixing outliers that don't make sense like atavian would make things feel better, rp-wise.

Krypton

I just want it to be unambiguous that people choose Rajamala to be yiffers, and not b/c they want a Dex+dodge bonus.

Kaden

Keorin said:

And then you have Atavian, which feels like it only has its stats because there was a missing array to be filled. Atavian went from being -dex and otherwise like human (which made the most sense rp-wise) to being +dex, -str, for no discernible reason. If you look at established Atavian lore, almost all atavians fit either strength or intelligence archetypes (see: the royal guard knights, the stormshaper, atavian conflict with Kashari on Therophage, atavian priests/philosophers). 

While the shift from negative dex to suddenly being a dex race was jarring, I always felt like dex was more natural for Atavians anyway, especially in the Achaean context of dex being more dodginess than the D&D/video game context of aim. Flighty birds and all that.

That and I now just assume that Atavians have hollow bones like actual birds. :P

Keorin

Have you seen birds outside of flight? They're kind of ridiculous.  I always thought negative dex made perfect sense for a race that had to lug around huge, feathery wings while trying to dodge and shift their weight about on the ground. Heck, plenty of birds aren't even all that agile in the air (and birds are built far more aerodynamically then atavians), let alone compared to most achaeans that fly about with a magic ring.

Wings are a hindrance on the ground, humanoid bodies would be a hindrance in the air. Obviously it's a fantasy game, but it definitely doesn't work out if real-world logic is applied.

Kaden

Nope, never seen a bird in my life. 

Was thinking more the lightness, rather than anything to do with aerodynamics  when I made the comment about hollow bones, rather than any hard line observations about real-world logic. That and I think it's a funny image.

There is also a lot of pop culture assumptions that favor grace and light movement especially if you consider the almost angelic imagery.

Kiet

I've never seen a winged race in any other game get a dex or equivalent bonus.

Asani

Truly, the splitting image of grace.

More seriously, wings would require incredibly well developed musculature to use. Probably doesn't make sense for Atavians to get a strength hit when honestly they probably have more muscles than Trolls or Xorans would have or need.

Athroseilon

Asani said:

Truly, the splitting image of grace.

More seriously, wings would require incredibly well developed musculature to use. Probably doesn't make sense for Atavians to get a strength hit when honestly they probably have more muscles than Trolls or Xorans would have or need.

Birds aren't nearly as strong as mammals of comparable size. The musculature of birds is almost entirely devoted to flight, which really prohibits them from doing much else (except biting and digesting things). It's strong, yes, but it's strong for its weight. Birds are very light animals.

Aralaya

I mean yeah. But if you scale that up to a 5ft-6ft person? Pretty sure that person is going to be pretty strong.

Shirszae

Sure, but we are talking about winged Mammals that can sometimes come pretty close to Trolls or Xorans with wings huger than any bird might otherwise. They are bound to be strong.

Sena

Atavians would almost certainly have strong, well-developed muscles to support their wings/flight, but that has nothing to do with strength in the traditional sense. For example, it's not likely to matter much for lifting weights (unless you're lifting with your wings), punching someone, or swinging a sword.

I think low con (due to hollow bones or just generally being more lightweight to be suited for flying) makes more sense than low strength though. Not that it would help with improving atavians at all.

Nazihk

Atavians can only fly because of magic.

They're roughly the size of an adult human, and there's just no way to put functional wings on a human. They'd have to be huge, and because of that they'd also be heavy, and no reasonable human musculature could get that into the air.

Hataru

Nazihk said:

Atavians can only fly because of magic.

They're roughly the size of an adult human, and there's just no way to put functional wings on a human. They'd have to be huge, and because of that they'd also be heavy, and no reasonable human musculature could get that into the air.

Well this, physiologically speaking, comes down to whether or not you want to apply Earth physics to Achaea. On a planet with different gravity than Earth this actually isn't true. Everyone is applying Earth gravity to Achaea/Sapience and there's not reason to assume its the same.

I understand that this was probably not something put into thought of the race creations, but if you look at a show like The Expanse - you actually see what this can do to 'normal humans'. The Belters are normal in many ways, but they became thinner and taller to deal with the change in gravity.

A gravity difference on Sapience could absolutely explain why Atavians are able to exist.

Edit: Able to exist without birdy bones. Bird bones are cool. Teach your kids about flight on holidays where you eat bird people, break open that wishbone and talk about how hollowness of the bone allows for fliiiiight (you also see it in reptiles and amphibians for water-dwelling).

Nicola

Popping in to say that I really loved that difference between the earth, belters, and martian folks in the Expanse, especially the Martian Marines on Earth and their training in higher gravity suits in case war ever came to a head.

Hataru

Nicola said:

Popping in to say that I really loved that difference between the earth, belters, and martian folks in the Expanse, especially the Martian Marines on Earth and their training in higher gravity suits in case war ever came to a head.

GAVE ME A BIOLOGY BONER.

Its such a wonderful show, and the language is/linguistics are amazing too!

Antonius

Hataru said:

Nicola said:

Popping in to say that I really loved that difference between the earth, belters, and martian folks in the Expanse, especially the Martian Marines on Earth and their training in higher gravity suits in case war ever came to a head.

GAVE ME A BIOLOGY BONER.

Its such a wonderful show, and the language is/linguistics are amazing too!

Surely all boners are biology boners?

Thalak

re: atavian stuff ..

I always assumed atavians were human-like beings. With gigantic wings(at least double the length of the persons height, and always figured they had birdy bones on their back/shoulders. I guess I always referred to the x-men version of bird-dude(forgot name)

Hataru

Angel.


But also, NO @ANTONIUS SOME ARE JUST LADY BONERS. WUT DO U KNO.

Sena

Even if we say Achaea has 70% Earth's gravity, Atavians have 30% less mass than humans on average, and Achaea's air is 50% denser than you'd typically find on Earth, Atavians flying would still be unrealistic. An 18 foot wingspan with wide wings (basically as wide as your torso can support, with the wings connected all the way from your shoulders down to your waist) could make it plausible to generate enough lift, if you seriously sprint for a while in order to take off (we're talking 20mph/32kmh).

The main problem though is that there's nothing about the human body that's streamlined for flying. It wouldn't really be plausible to hold your body horizontally like birds do (or like superman does, for a humanoid example) while flying, you'd basically have a heavy, bulky body just dangling there while you fly. The drag from that is a bigger problem than the huge wingspan or the speed you'd need.

Most importantly, the wings would have to be shaped in such a way that they can be held perpendicular to the ground while standing vertically, which would look silly. You would also need a much larger torso to make room for the musculature needed to support the wings, so you'll look even sillier from that.

Caelan

It's almost like this whole game is only loosely based in the realms of reality, physics, time, magic, and fantasy or some weird shit.

Kiet

and yet people still freak out at the idea of a siren being strong, lol.

Xaden

I personally like the choice they have to make; All the strength vs All the dick.

Kiet

Xaden said:

I personally like the choice they have to make; All the strength vs All the dick.

y u think this is a good comment

Kogan

At this point I'd settle for a relatively cheap artifact that allows for any of the stat templates regardless of race.

Edit: To not be misunderstood. Something like this should not step on the toes of gem owners too much. As in the artifact would stay in your inventory and not be one time use and poof, but if you didn't own a gem and wished to go from strong grook to intelligent troll you'd either need to use a free reincarnation, buy a dagger, or buy a gem. Meanwhile gem owners could swap from strong grook to intelligent troll freely as the cooldown allows.

Krypton

Strength-specced siren:

Xaden

Kiet said:

Xaden said:

I personally like the choice they have to make; All the strength vs All the dick.

y u think this is a good comment

Here's how I reason out whether or not to post something that comes into my head:

a) Does it amuse me?
b) Do I think it will amuse others?
c) Do I think it will add information to the conversation?
d) Will it get me a snarky comment from some cunt?

If it satisfies any of these criteria then I click post comment.
Even better when it satisfies more than one.