Larian Studios Forums Divinity: Original Sin 2 Divinity - Original Sin 2 - General Racial stat bonuses

This is something that has bugged me in pen & paper, MMORPG's, and most other RPG type games.

I've always thought racial stat bonuses limit your game play options and prevent you for making a character you might want to make without really adding anything to the experience.

If I want to make a dwarf wizard or lizard rogue I miss out on primary stats.

All this does is limit my race / build choice combinations and I've never seen what it adds to any game other that limiting my choices. On the other hand I do like races having special skills or abilities because that generally doesn't take away from the core of your build but still makes each race feel different.

I'm not a min/max player so I still make what I feel like making based on the character I'm going for but don't like that picking a race takes away from the core stats.

I haven't really been a fan of like half the racial abilities. The stat bonuses are whatever, but like you said it does feel like it pigeonholes things. The actual abilities are another thing entirely. I hated the lizard firebreath from the very beginning for both looking tacky and scaling poorly, and apparently not having all that much to actually do with the lizard's racial culture and background.

I am usually a fan of racial bonuses when they are smaller additions. This games racial bonuses however do tempt players too much, in some cases its extremely punishing. Looking at the dwarf caster in particular, the difference in comparison to a lizard or elf is far too massive. On the flip side melee physical damage dealers get the benefit of one of the best single target ccs in the game for picking dwarf and absolutely nothing from lizards.

Not to mention elves are blatantly overpowered and has large merit as a selection for any build a player can think of. *I heard you wanted adrenaline and first aid without any points in scoundrel or marksman.*

Edit: I guess something else that makes a good racial bonus system is making sure that regardless of whichever race you pick for whatever build it provides some merit. Pen and paper RPGs usually make sure you get something regardless of racial selection. This game doesn't do that.

I mean, +2 in a primary stat is basically nothing by level 8. But a lot of people still don't like wasting those attributes. I might end up nixxing the attribute bonuses in my bard mod, maybe find some other way to differentiate the races that's more equal across the board.

That's too funny. I was actually reading your bard mod when I jumped back over here to look at comments.

I'm planning on converting my D&D campaign and if I could figure out enough to take away racial stats I would probably do it. I prefer having the races just for looks and roleplay i.e I will have major cities spread out in the world and a dwarf might start with +10 with other dwarves etc.

Planning on trying out the bard when I get home later. Love the idea from what I read. Wish it was in vanilla so I could have some an NPC's in a campaign.

Actually I would think it a lot better If the class you picked determined your starting stat bonus and equipment. Maybe +1 based on each ability or just make starting stats a straight buy in that you choose.

I always added some reasons when adjusting stats for a race for my players in D&D. So you're a dwarf but maybe you were a little undersized and picked on so you spent your time alone studying the arcane instead of doing whatever it is young dwarves so.

As it was told, current attribute bonuses (as well as social abilities) just limit your choices. It will be better to link races with stats that are useful for anyone: initiative, protection, speed, regeneration, dodge, vitality, trap/secret detection, etc.

As for active skills, only Elf's ones are good (I did not test dwarves) because they are rooted in their culture and seriously change gameplay - however skills you get from cannibalism should be randomized imho.

I believe the racial skills should scale with level only, optionally - with weapon. Elf skill does not need such scaling, of cause.

I really liked that Lizards can dig without a shovel. Such small details are much more important than flat stat bonuses and I wish we will see more of them.


Yes, firebreath looks grotesque and scaling with Int is a bit strange and limiting.

Lizard's speciality of digging without shovel can be replaced by a 10 gold item called shovel, meanwhile elves can gain abilities that require skill books and a point investment for free.

Truely balanced. Did i even mention flesh sacrifice provide 10% damage boost in addtion to 1ap cap? wtf is this?

You can't compare an actual trait of an elf to just a "flavor" of another race. That's exactly what "digging without a shovel" is for a lizard, a flavor.

I am glad they added this bc it makes them unique, gameplay wise and storywise, and i hope they add more cool things to other races, just small things like this makes the game and story better. But yeah, you can't compare a "flavor" to a trait. And no, this is not me saying its balanced. Not speaking in terms of balance.

I dont understand what are you saying here, isnt corpse eater a flavor of elf atm? And right now it is brokenly overpowered compared to other "flavor" to the point where other race stood at a disadvantage.

Cyka, the idea is that digging is just a small purely lore-wise detail while cannibalism a full-scale racial gameplay feature, therefore you don't need to compare them. Digging is even not mentioned in the character creation screen.

Elves have a very cool and strong feature Cannibalism while the other races have a miserable +1 to a social ability instead. Here is the disbalance (and a fundamental game design mistake imho) to be fixed.