Does Race Matter?

So, my question is this, "Does a character’s starting attributes (or race) really matter?"

I have a Saris and her starting stats were Health=50, Strength=40, Power=40, Focus=40, and Dexterity=80. Now it seems like the logical thing to do is pick an adventure class that her high dexterity would be useful… or does this not matter once she has a few trade schools maxed out?

Would her lack of Power and Focus make her a poor choice as a mage? Likewise, does her natural abilities with LIFE predestine her to be a better Healer than some other races would be? Or does this all not matter in the end or should I say "later game"?

I hope I have made the question clear enough... picking an adventure class has been a daunting task.

Krit

Starting stats make no difference, however racial abilities can make a huge difference ;)

One of the more useful racial abilities is going to be Dwarven Toughness. It gives you invulnerability. Not many other racials can come close to that, so it's not surprising to see so many dwarves running around. I would be a dwarf if I could, but unfortunately by the time I could recover my old characters, I had already invested so much time into my Human I did not want to be set back, so I play a Human.

I think Dryads or some such get a useful racial as well, same with Elven bow skill/damage.

Gnomes have nice racial abilites aswell, +10 % boost to evasion and Gnomian Powress -50 % delay for 30 sec, gives a huge damage output combined with other abilities ;)

Saris have a nice extra sprint.

Humans get a nice spell damage increase...

But to answer you question no as far as stats go.. start race base stats become almost irrelevant. To put it in perspective towards end game chars starts can be in excess of 1000 so a difference of 10 is 1%

Wow, thank you all for such WONDERFUL feedback! You answered my question just perfectly!!

Istaria`s set up so bipeds multiclass. so it realy doesn`t matter much about race. But each race does have their own nice abilities. ;)
The main thing is, what would you like your character to be? You can spend skill points however which way you want. all depends on what attributes you personaly want your character to have.