The initial idea of inquisitor sounded like they were afraid of making them "too powerful".. But with those buffs, they seem to be headed in the correct direction. I also have no doubt that we'll eventually see Wheel of Time references from people in-game now. Which honestly, Im completely fine with. I love the Whitecloaks ruthlessness.
Deep dwarves are probably quite a ways out. It's DE and DG coming in the first batch. Then Trolls and ?Lizzards? maybe in the second. That's all i've seen mentioned for races release scheduling. I could maybe see HE and DD being thematic enemies and releasing in the last batch. Plus rats and mandrake people whenever. Heh.
"Deep" Elves look fantastic. Deep Gnomes I think they need to get away from the big, blank looking yellow eyes. Reminds me of like Nightmare Before Christmas cartoon character. Like listening to Goblin talk yesterday about how some races look monstrous and should be locked away from the rest of the player base, hard coded like WoW Alliance/Horde - (he was talking about Orcs for example) - that is a race that looks monstrous and "wicked" to me. Marvin the Martian on crack.
All that's left is Wood Elf and Human. Wood Elves have the figure of a meth addict / crackhead (but I still made my druid one). So for the public test I pretty much have all humans but would have been mostly High/Deep Elves and Lizards if they were available (and Ogre/Trolls if shrink was easier).
I think Humans will end up being a good choice. But again.. they just need a second pass from someone that isnt partial to the other races. They really need to think about their world and lore. Humans "look" to be the dominant race in that world and they need to decide "why" the Humans are the dominant race without it relating purely to stats. I pulled the traits of gaining more exp per kill, or higher faction per hit from other games and thats because traits seem to be the most reasonable/logical reason they are dominant and survived in a world where an Ogre has twice the strength and stamina as they do "on average." Or how they survived against races that are twice as smart or wise as they are on average.
We were talking about server rulesets on a TLP one time and I had the idea that they could make gear All/All for the entire server. This would be interesting in a "niche" way because the BIS would be completely different for almost everyone. But, unfortunately with early EverQuest - the BIS would roughly end up being the same for just about everyone, which is boring. But the reason I bring this is up is because I think it would be a neat trait to have for a specific race to have as an innate trait. Not necessarily all/all - but that Humans are able to survive because they have the ingenuity / resourcefulness to be able to use any weapon/armor/item that is specific to any other race. That armor that is Wood Elf only, with lots of Dexterity and Agility? They can use that. That armor thats Ogre only that has high Str/Sta? They can use that. That Ratkin only Rapier that has a poison proc on it? They can use that. "The true reason that Humans can survive in this world is because they are able to turn each races advantages into disadvantages."
Just to specify, Im not suggesting that a human can wear just any classes gear. But just racial specific gear. Any gear that they design to be Wood Elf only, would show up under the description as "CLASS: Fighter - RACE: Wood Elf, Human" for example.
Starting stats probably won't matter much in the long run, especially if the game ends up with hard stat caps like EQ. What will matter are the innate racial perks. That's exactly why, in EverQuest, any class that could be an Ogre basically should have been an Ogre. Frontal stun immunity was absurdly strong, and most classes didn't get an AA to compensate for it until way later. Even stuff like ultravision will likely get put on spells, items, etc.
Nick addressed the stats last night that "they" as in the team, dont like Hard Caps on anything. Not even stats. So the most we could expect is a soft cap on stats / diminishing returns that are hopefully designed for the long term. But I agree, if stats are the only thing that ends up setting races apart - then you'll just look like a clown if you choose anything but Ogre as a Fighter (for example.)