Elves need some love.

[AestorTheKnight]

Its a fact - Elves are the least powerful race.

Their most serious disadvantage is the -2 Con. If the -2 Con was removed but they kept the +2 Dex, they would almost be balanced with the other races.

But I completely agree with Licho and the rest of the posters here, the worst thing about Elves is that their
Racial Enhancments are really not good enough, and they dont combine in interesting ways with various classes.

I really like a lot of the suggestions that have been written in this thread of how to boost Elf racial enhancements to balance them with the other races. If some of the ideas written here were actually implemented it would make Elves equal to the other races and enjoyable to play again.

I especially like the idea of an Elven Haste Boost enhancment line. Perhaps for both Attack Speed and Movement Speed. I think this is a brilliant idea and perfectly suits Elves as the fast and agile race they are!

For the last couple of months ive been mega frustrated by my Elven Paladin. She has been my main character since i started playing DDO in 2006, and shes always been an Elf. But more and more these days I think of TRing her into a different race, because basically Elves are gimped.

Its clear as daylight that Elves are totally underpowered as a race, and it would be nice to see them buffed in the future, to make them enjoyable to play again, other than just for Role Playing purposes.

P.S. Oh yeah, Hammers as Dwarven Racial weapons is an awsome idea too!

[Zachski]

I especially like the idea of an Elven Haste Boost enhancment line. Perhaps for both Attack Speed and Movement Speed. I think this is a brilliant idea and perfectly suits Elves as the fast and agile race they are!

I think this is the most sensible solution. And don't port it over to Half-Elf, either, HE already has enough advantages.

I can see Elven rogues with Elven Haste Boost and Rogue Damage Boost running around now.

P.S. Oh yeah, Hammers as Dwarven Racial weapons is an awsome idea too!

THIS! Hammers and mauls!

Also make it so that all dwarves know how to use battle axes and hand axes, if only for simple flavor.

[Terebinthia]

My completionist is on her second Elven life mainly because she looks fierce in the Resonant Guard Suit. And the plus to Falchions (which most of my greensteel is) doesn't hurt. I can still get her HP up to respectable numbers with some planning.

But then Max DPS OMG isn't really my mindset. I prefer self sufficient jack of all trades sort of toons.

[pipboy1]

I hope I don't anger a lot of people, but I do not see how you feel elves are the least powerful race. I mean it just depends the build you are making. I mean for favored souls they get a bonus on scimitars on top of the scimitar bonus from the class. Nobody else gets a bonus spell penetration and it is cheap. Scimitars and falchions are not bad weapons. Sure they are not khopeshes but seriously they are not bad. I don't get the argument here. I know warforged and half-orcs get some nice bonuses for power attack and 2handed weapons, but they should be hitting harder than an elf in my opinion. I would of course like to always see better stuff for them available, but they are not total underpowered than the other races at the present.

[Crystalizer]

elves are free, they won't receive any boost
mmo devs need to see their work paid otherwise ddo would die
otherwise, elves are great-looking characters, especially females, i love them, at some point all my characters were elves, and now i have none since they are behind most other races and the game is so much about min/maxing now that if you roll a new character or TR this is to have a more powerful character, not a "nice looking gimp"

[licho]

I hope I don't anger a lot of people, but I do not see how you feel elves are the least powerful race. I mean it just depends the build you are making. I mean for favored souls they get a bonus on scimitars on top of the scimitar bonus from the class. Nobody else gets a bonus spell penetration and it is cheap. Scimitars and falchions are not bad weapons. Sure they are not khopeshes but seriously they are not bad. I don't get the argument here. I know warforged and half-orcs get some nice bonuses for power attack and 2handed weapons, but they should be hitting harder than an elf in my opinion.

Ok i will try to explain step by step why Elves perks are weak.
The problem with FvS and scimies is that single 1h weapon style is no existing, and S&B is not useful for fvs. Generally 2H>1H, this is the reason why WF FvS has a great synergy for somehow melee.
Elven Scimies are similar to Khopesh, but other races get own bonuses, so Human with Khoepesh >> Elf with Scimies.
Same goes for eSoS and Falchions.

elves are free, they won't receive any boost
mmo devs need to see their work paid otherwise ddo would die

This kind of thinking is a trap.
Since VIPs/Premium still buy other content like adventure packs. And most ppl will prefer to have 8 good races and 12 good classes to choose and combine. Not just 3 good races and 4 good classes. Sure some ppl will be happy just running WF fvs (just example) to the end of the days, others will fed up after a while and once they figure out that other combinacions are not so fun they will quit.

Ok so whats bad with Elves, and how it could be fast fixed:

+2 Dexterity, -2 Constitution
This is bad split, since constitucion is a useful stat, and dex most often not:
- the AC do not work in long run
- ranged combat is weak
- the weapon finease style was cut off in every posssible way
- reflex save could be raised in many ways.
But... its split to live with. This con hit is just 20hp out off 400-600 (depending of build, hp magic and grind).

- Immunity to sleep spells and effects
This is useless, since after level 9 (and rare before) mobs do not cast such spells.

+2 saving throw bonus against enchantment spells or effects
This is fluffy, FoM mimincs or holds so it leaves only dances. (not so popular)
Fix: It will be easier if elves just get +2 Will save, since this will open more uses, and also make sense.

Weapon Proficiency: Elves are automatically proficient with the longsword, rapier, longbow, composite longbow, shortbow, and composite shortbow.
This is totally useless, since every build which is going to use this weapons will get proficiency with class.
How to fix: The feat Bow Stranght could be added to elves for free. So some idk clerics could use it instead of sword. (still not optimal but makes minimal sense)
Even better remove bow streanght from game completly, since the only point of this one is to make life of melees more miserable.

+2 racial bonus on Listen, Search, and Spot checks.
This is useless, since if build care about this skills, having extra 2 added to already +50 do not change much.

So generally racial granted abilities are either bad, useless or just fluffy.

Ok, maybe Racial Enchantment will be useful:

So we have 3x weapon styles, but:
- Most build will specialize in only one, so 2 others will be useless (maybe some rangers will pick 2)
- Elf can choose to spend feat for Khopesh instead of 6AP (fair trade) and have similar dmg output. Other races can boost their hkopesh with own dmg boosters like Power Attack or action boost. Or has free will in picking whats most cool weapon atm (like eSoS).
Fix: Add one more tier and adjust the cost to 1/2/3 for all styles, and some seeker style enchantment. So for elves racial weapon will be really the best choice.

Spell Resistance
- this one is little fluffy, since similar effect could be mimic with fom, pae and boosting will saves. But whatever, eevery race got enchantments with more fluff than power.

Arcane Spell Failure Reduction
- This useless since armour is useless.
Fix: Make it work on shields, so at least shield blocking will get boost (but im not sure if its tactics worth boosting) or bards will have some use.
- Fix Armors (hahaha) for example attaching % dmg reducion to each armour type.

Racial Spell Enhancements
- This is not bad, however most wizards do not have problems with spare feats for spell penetracion, and once you TR once from Wiz or FvS SP is less a issue.
This is the only line which is good as is. Since have some niche to be useful.

Racial Ability increase is not much useful due to already mentioned issues with Dexterity.

Racial Tougness is ok, its a flaw, but its good kind of flawn.

Arcane Archer line is hard to evaluate, its good that exist, but HE has it as well and do it better. Also in long term every race will have own racial PrE and then it will be more situacional than jugernaut or Defender (which is ok , but good to know)

So to summarize, elf enchantment is not only little behind but also short since AA and 3x weapons make ilusionary crowd. If i go human i know that will have some use from Recovery, versality or stat imrpvments not to mention skill point and feat. Going elf do not grant anything to justify race choice.

Note: Part of the Elven Weakness has a root in wrong implemented aspect of game like: ranged combat, AC, finease builds. FIxing that wil help elves too. But will not be enought.

THIS! Hammers and mauls!

Also make it so that all dwarves know how to use battle axes and hand axes, if only for simple flavor.

Well Warhammers have some background in Eberron Lore, not know much about mauls :-/
Also Warhammers could be just added to the current list without touching balance of all things much.
Otherwise it will have to end with second Weapon set: something like Warhammers, Mauls, light & Heavy Picks. Which is also nice.
I can agree with granting all Dwarves some weapon proficiency, especially not top dps weapons like Handaxa, Baxes, and Warhammers.
It would be fluffy, but will increase versality of game.

Generally i think that racial weapons are more cool than bonus across the board. Stuff like PA or 2H enchantment just grants that every HOrcs walkt with eSoS/Lit Khopesh. Racial weapons adds some rapiers/scimies/Gaxes users to the game.

Also if smbd choose to make flavor build like monk with longsword he should have race with some minimal synergy.

[Emili]

Scimitars and falchions are not bad weapons. Sure they are not khopeshes but seriously they are not bad. I don't get the argument here. I know warforged and half-orcs get some nice bonuses for power attack and 2handed weapons, but they should be hitting harder than an elf in my opinion. I would of course like to always see better stuff for them available, but they are not total underpowered than the other races at the present.

Elves are actually one of the best race to use a falchion... only horc and I suppose helf with a 10.5 sa surpass them in that respect.

If the game had a very nice falchion available which competed with an eSoS we'd all be speaking a different tune.

I do not know if any of you tested this or not but here is an elf bard just standing songed and at a plain 36 str with PA on and songed nothing more... I could have rrage and madstoned but makes little diff as what I want to show here is simply Valenar Falchion or I mean the difference between Valenar scimi vs Valenar Falchion.

For comparison a GS scimi alone:


And for comparison a GS Falchion:


Note nothing is changed but the weapons +5 scimi vs +5 falchion, obviously the *1,5 of the 2-hander come into play but more than meets the eye here... +13 difference while a human with same str and buffs would only get +8 diff going from a +5 GS Scimi one hander to a +5 Falchion 2hander.

Do you know why? I certainly do, and it's in the enhancement (this is true of dwaves also with a Gaxe). I am not sure this is wai?

Likewise ... an elf with eBrigands will out-perform a human with eBrigands - well until next update.

[Aesop]

Do you know why? I certainly do, and it's in the enhancement (this is true of dwaves also with a Gaxe). I am not sure this is wai? A bug?

Seems the enhancement is only granting the +2 instead of what the HOrc Two Handed Weapons get. Which I kinda figured would be the case...

Aesop

[Emili]

Seems the enhancement is only granting the +2 instead of what the HOrc Two Handed Weapons get. Which I kinda figured would be the case...

Aesop

Lol, you cannot compare anything to a horc in such things as damage perks... especially when many one year+ players are on thier 2nd TR on them. Then again that's what the players demanded they be.