new race

[welshdemon]

ok this is mor efor me personally but i would like to see the orcs.the reason why is because i love orcs and i have always dreamed (i know sad but hey) of being an orc brcause they are vicious,built strong wise and they are fearious beings.
so please devs please i would love to have orcs in the game.

[Hoberton]

I could post the thread links that have alredy been brought up on this subject but I also agree that Orcs should be brought into game. They are, by the way, part of the Lore:

Age of the Sorcerer

The Age of the Sorcerer is named after the dark sorcerer Torrin Macalir. Macalir, a patron of the dark arts was at one point the leader of the Human intelligentsia and the foremost magical practitioner in Istaria. Then through his experimentation with necromancy he became corrupted and twisted into the evil leader of the Withered Aegis. His ascension to power went greatly unnoticed for sometime due to the petty feuds between the living races of Istaria. During this time Istaria was a hotbed of tension.

The Elves and Dryads sought total communion with nature, and were on the verge of waging war of cleansing against their life-long rivals, the Orcs and Goblins. The Dragons of both factions began to ally themselves with opposite sides of this conflict, hoping to use other races to settle centuries old disputes amongst themselves.The odd Welger sought to expand their influence against the control of Dwarven and Gnomish held lands. The Satyr found themselves in the unique position to broker both diplomacy and warfare material between the Welger, the Dwarves, and the Gnomes in exchange for more influence in all courts.

Even the Humans were involved in a feud with a race that has become known as the Fiends. Many Istarians forget before the Age of the Sorcerer there was no such race as Fiends. In many accounts we can relate what happened to the Humans during this time period to the Great Schism of the Dragons. Human society emulated that which had been Dragon society at the height of the Age of the Dragon. Humans were at the forefront of almost every major endeavor in Istarian life, and had certainly made many advances in the realm of magical study and practice. With such a leadership position in Istarian life, it became very easy for the Humans to forget the lessons they learned in shaking off the reins of Dragon domination in their life. Some feel that the Humans during this time coveted too much magical power, while others feel that Human society simply became too lax. If we compare what happend during this time period with the Great Schism we can see that actually, the secession of the Fiends from the Human race was in fact, a much darker event.

The creation of the Fiends and their forced removal from Human society says as much about the Human psyche of this time as anything else. Humans sought to unlock some of the greatest secrets of the use of magic ever... powers and concepts that are lost to us even during this day and age. A significant and sizable cadre of mages decided to tap into the powers of Necromancy and Mental Domination in order to achieve the ends they sought. The powers that be during this time balked at the use of hitherto shunned magical practices in order to achieve those ends, though some think that fear, rather than a sense of honor, drove the leading mages to ostracize their less scrupulous brethren. Many in Human society became embroiled in the growing social unrest, choosing one side or the other.

As with all of the great social dilemmas in Istaria, war ensued. Those who favored the forbidden practices of magic were outnumbered from the start, but managed to flee Human lands when the war pressed on. In order to secure a future for themselves, they chose subservience to a new Istarian deity, earning her guidance and protection. Such fiendish actions certainly earned the name given to them by the Humans and adopted by themselves, but the new Fiend civilization vowed to never be restrained by the shackles of what they considered to be the weaknesses of morality. In turn, they swore to teach the descendants of those who had ostracized them a lesson on, as the Fiends call it, "the virtues of revenge."

The Fiends went on to create the city of Kirasanct to the frigid north. The city is a testament to the Fiendish desires of seclusion from outsiders, while displaying their ostentatious sensibilities. Kirasanct is a walled fortress of metal and stone, with a massive central tower in the heart of the city. Spindly frames circle the city wall, giving the city a fearsome silhouette at a distance. Kirasanct proper lies on a plateau in the center of a vast valley, allowing for a significant distance around the city to be surveyed from the central tower and the high, arching walls of the city. It is clear that the purpose behind the city is to keep unwelcome visitors out, and considering the Fiends for who they are, that means just about all the other Living Races. Even today, when cooperation amongst the Living Races is at a virtual pinnacle, Kirasanct remains an inhospitable place for those save the Fiends.

It is said that either under the icy bedrock of Kirasanct, or perhaps in a nearby cavern, lays a dormant portal to the Realm of Twilight. It is rumored that before the onset of the Lament, the Fiends were actively trying to re-engage the portal, creating a gateway between the Prime and the Realm of Twilight, where it is said that the Fiend's patron deity, Niatha Moraven, dwells. The Fiends have never made a secret of their desire to strengthen the connection they have with their chosen goddess; in fact, the Fiends chose to found Kirasanct over a source of potent magical essence in the hopes that it would fuel their rituals and sorceries to achieve said goals.

With all these events weighing heavily on the minds of Istrians the actions of Macalir were largely unnoticed. How much harm could a lunatic necromancer cause? Only when it was too late did the races of Istaria realize that it was not flesh and blood that would be their downfall, but the twisted forces of undeath itself. How foolish we were, but we only realize this in hindsight now.

It was at the end of the Age of the Sorcerer when Macalir united the different sects of undead in the common goal of destroying the Living. Macalir held a firm grasp on the Withered Aegis, and through his leadership they began their march over Istaria.

[Takora Drakan]

Orcs have been removed as Amon stated in my quote.

[welshdemon]

well i think they should be put in this brillant game,maybe not all players like them but they are part of the game in many ways but if they ar enot in it then fair play

[Velea]

I'm sorry, but as has already been stated by Amon, they aren't.

[Mearis]

Orcs, Goblins, Mermen (don't remember what they were called), an insect race, angels and devils/demons along with half a dozen other races were part of the initial plan for Horizons (when it was going to be a PVP game), but was cut down to Dragons, Dwarves, Elves, Humans, Halfgiants, Saris, and Sslik for release. After that the Satyrs and Dryads were freed. It would be great to be able to unlock other playable races, but the amount of coding for those would likely be a monster not to mention the graphic side.

[welshdemon]

oh well not a problem i understand that there would be alot of work in coding and so once again thnks

[velveeta]

(just kidding, o mighty and beloved gods of istaria! )

[Favoran]

I don't think we need any more playable races until the rest of the game has been tuned up a bit. There's plenty of large projects that are being worked on already, and plenty more that must be considered before they start adding new content that has no connection to any other aspects of the game (yet). A larger player-base would be good, too; otherwise, there wouldn't be many Orcs running around.

I wouldn't be one of them, either. Yay for new content and all, but I'm sticking with my dragons, thankyouverymuch.

[LaughingOtter]

One point about lore sources: a lot of the early lore released about the game used pre-blackout information that was dropped by the time the game went live. Anything that mentions Jarl being the first human settlement, for example, most likely has good many other things in it that are no longer part of the official lore.

Aside from needing new art and all that for new races, the basic question that would have to be answered is, "what would this race bring to the game that the existing races don't bring already and can't be made to bring?" The same question has be applied to new classes, BTW.

Orcs are big, strong, and barbaric - we have half-giants & sslik that are big, strong, and barbaric. Orcs are green. Sslik are greener. Orcs hate humans - well, no, we all get along as one big happy Empire. Orcs bathe once a year whether they need it or not. Satyrs bathe regularly but - OK, I better stop there.

I know that I'm really oversimplifying here, but the point is made. A new race needs to fill a need that cannot be met any other way in order to be able to offer something unique to the game. That's hard to do when, in all honesty, we aren't using the races we have to their fullest.

That, however, is another topic...

[Justa Mirage]

That's all we need; another bi-ped race to complain that dragons get too much love

j/k

[Salama]

Hehe yeah, some new races would be nice, but not really the top priority at the moment. But I absolutely love Hz because of Dragons (*is a huge dragon fan* ) Finally I can actually PLAY as a dragon instead of killing them as an epic monster.
Long live Istaria!

Hehe, maybe we could have playable gryphons or centaurs somewhere in the future? They would be kinda interesting too.

[Skirnir Ouija Glada]

I orginally came to this game for a single race and a single structure. The aquatic race called the Lemurians and castles. No other game I know of had/has a purely player aquatic race complete with environment and those things that go along with it along with true blue castles on land.

The whole idea of istarian world was to be a 3 tiered enviroment. These environs were water, air and land. Dragons for the air, various bipedal races for the land and Lemurans for the water enviroments.

What would this race bring to the game?. Let em bring what they were orginally going to bring. What were they supposed to bring in?, Why the ultimate magical metal(s) that could ONLY be mined, smelted, UNDER water.

The Lemurians would mine and smelt it, then trade to the land races for other needed items. This metal was supposed to be primarily for weapons, tho armour and other items were argued about at the time.

This was part of the reason I proposed the cargo disk in the first place. After all, since it was magical, and could be used by any race why not therefore as an airsupply for the bipeds? Some were yammering about UNfair advantage for a single race to have this monoply. This point was conceded, tho it as pointed out, that only the least pure of the these metals would be avial to the landlubbers using a disk.

Swimming is a DONE deal, developed but not implemented. At one time there existed underwater plots. We bootstrappers found em after being given permisson to use those abilities, on the sea bottoms using GM abilities when you did not have to worry about an air supply. LOL ..... after all an INgame gm can be likened to a god........ and THEY can walk the lands ANYwhere! (This was back in early, early beta. We were asked by the staff to go exploring and we did)

I have seen a castle (thanks to a borked plot and the orginal trailor showing one. GADS what a statment they make!!) and a few of us were always convinced we saw a Lemurian long, long ago in the days of alpha. The gill movement was magnificent, long webbed feet and webbed hands for swiming and definately NOT .....human looking, but was only in place for a few hours, before replaced with another race.

Imo to be on the cutting edge of the mmpogs and bring in more customers would require a near radical uniqueness. We have dragons for the air, and races for the land. Isn't it time for this game to look at a true 3 tiered enviroment for races and fully corner a huge potential market base? Orcs someone said? Bah...you can have em....but for me? I would favor swimming the great deeps and fighting the monsters therein while looking for the most vauled metal in the world....

see yall in a few months maybe.........

orginal late Alpha 1?/Alpha 2 name:
My email address

Humble Harry
(when names were avial later on)

[AmonGwareth]

Skirnir,

You are perhaps confused by the original vision of Horizons. That vision was tossed out and was not retained after the black out. Lemurians were never part of the new design.

Swimming is a DONE deal, developed but not implemented. At one time there existed underwater plots. We bootstrappers found em after being given permisson to use those abilities, on the sea bottoms using GM abilities when you did not have to worry about an air supply. LOL ..... after all an INgame gm can be likened to a god........ and THEY can walk the lands ANYwhere! (This was back in early, early beta. We were asked by the staff to go exploring and we did)

Swimming doesn't exist. No animations exist for it, the client/sim tech for it doesn't exist. Any underwater plots you saw were likely plots that had been placed and then a water plane placed on top. They weren't special or anything.

I have seen a castle (thanks to a borked plot and the orginal trailor showing one. GADS what a statment they make!!) and a few of us were always convinced we saw a Lemurian long, long ago in the days of alpha. The gill movement was magnificent, long webbed feet and webbed hands for swiming and definately NOT .....human looking, but was only in place for a few hours, before replaced with another race.

A single castle asset does indeed exist. But it is very very large, contains an insanely high number of polys, and really doesn't fit with the current art design of the game. Plus it has a lot of graphical issues in the form of broken textures and stuff.

I've seen every raw asset that exists and I've never seen any lemurian assets. Sorry to say.

I think LO addressed the issue of a new race perfectly. It really comes down to what would a new race bring to the game that we don't already have.

[Drakarr]

What could a new race bring that we don't already have?.....


more cowbell....nuff said.

[Teto Frum]

LOL, well as far as new races are concerned, with one being the top priority, this would have a number close to the U.S. deficit in front of it.

[StalePopcorn]

Amon - out of interest, I assume it is completely out of the question to let players/volunteers fix up the Castle graphics so it could be used? Reducing polygons, creating new textures, etc. could be done by a small team of volunteers I imagine. I know the Dev team are plenty busy with other "stuff" (auctions, dungeons, standard balance/fixing stuff, upcoming events, etc) so is this something that could be done out-of-band? Plenty of things stand in the way of this being possible like:
- IP of graphical content
- Access to tools
- Skill of people making changes
- Maintaining consistency of graphics
but if you don't ask...

Then with some testing, a quick zap of the Magic Wand of Castle Plot Making, and we could have a great new world project to complete with the promise of insane amounts of resources required for construction *grins insanely* I often thought that outpost north of Harro could use an "upgrade"... after all, that area is the closest to the EB and we need a serious location if the Gifted are going to launch/counter an invasion of any sort!

I have absolutely *zero* skills in this BTW - just floating the impossible dream

Sorry to derail the thread!

[Knossos]

Hmmm - there are such skills on Order Shard - bet some stuff could be done if made available...

Knossos

[Vlisson]

a great varity of races is a great advantage over other MMORPG´s

especially Asian ones (with very very limited races/classes )

so IF it would not a lot of work (human textures/armors... are already ingame and only the face would have to been added) it would be cool

[Shian]

a great varity of races is a great advantage over other MMORPG´s

especially Asian ones (with very very limited races/classes )

so IF it would not a lot of work (human textures/armors... are already ingame and only the face would have to been added) it would be cool

Right, but what Amon was saying, they need a purpose first.