Races

Eight of the nine races in Ashes of Creation.

Five of the nine playable races in Ashes of Creation. From left to right: Dünir female, Dünir male, Niküa male, Vek male, Ren'Kai male, Kaelar male.

Ashes of Creation offers nine playable races.

Parent race	Races
Aelan Humans	Kaelar.	Vaelune.
Dünzenkell Dwarves	Dünir.	Niküa.
Kaivek Orcs	Ren'Kai.	Vek.
Pyrian Elves	Empyrean.	Py'rai.
	Tulnar.

Verra is a world with rich and diverse cultures. Much of its important history has been dominated by the major races. Humans of the coast and plains, Orcs within the hills and the marshes, Elves in the forest and the riverlands, and the esteemed Dwarves of the mountains. The major races have held dominance through countless wars and skirmishes between the lesser races of Verra. Decades may pass between these flareups of violence. There are many minor races on Verra. Some of the minor races exist in makeshift villages or tribes if you will. Some of the major villages among the minor races are comprised primarily of the Giants, less reputable sects of Human, Gnomes, and Halflings. The Halflings are not Halflings in a traditional sense but actually half-bloods of different races. – Steven Sharif

Wandering the darker places in the world lie truly sinister abominations of creation. The great churches of civilization often dispatch heroes of the state to eliminate these threats to mortals. There currently exist four great nations on Verra. This is 25 years roughly before the fall: The Aelan Empire, Pyrian Kingdom, the Kaivek Protectorate, and the nation of the Dünzenkell. There was not always only four great nations. Long ago the races were more divided into many nations and city states. – Steven Sharif

In the 7,000 years of recorded history, wars upon wars were fought. Some for land, others for resources, many for beliefs. Royal houses stood and fell over the years. Some now long bereft of lordship. Many city states exist in Verra. Some self-governed bastions of democracy and republics alike. Others are vassal states at the behest of their benefactors. – Steven Sharif

Racial appearance

Tulnar character model concept art of the three base influences.

There's a number of minor races and major races that all sought refuge within the Underrealm and we talked about how this particular player character race was going to have a pretty unique approach when it comes to character customization because with that background there comes different species influence in the race itself and we want players to be able to dial up or down those influences as they see fit between the humanoid, the simian or mammalian, and the reptilian influences; and as you dial those things up, your base body- if it exceeds a certain percentage threshold- will assume the form and stance of one of three primary types of influences that exist for the Tulnar. And now what you're going to see is those three distinct influences and you can be of course a hundred percent in one if you wish and you'll be very similar to what you're going to see here from the concepts; or you can mix-and-match and you can blend between the different influences. – Steven Sharif

The Tulnar race does not have sub-types. Instead, players will be able to significantly customize the appearance of Tulnar characters based on three base influences; or blend between these different influences.

• Simian (or mammalian).
• Bestial/feline.
• Reptilian.

Gare are primarily humanoid in appearance.

• There are feline and bestial components that can be scaled up when creating a Tulnar character but Tulnar do not equal furries.
• Catgirl and Loli Tulnar are not able to be created.

Tulnar do not equal furries, but there are definitely some bestial components that you can scale up when you're creating your Tulnar character, so you could max that setting I guess. Whether or not that would give you what you would think of as a furry, I guess it's going to be up to your interpretation of what a Furry is. – Steven Sharif

• The Tulnar do not have avian characteristics. The sentient avian races (such as the Sladeborne) did not take refuge in the Sottorealtà.

Q: Will character creator allow us to make Tulnar that might look somewhat like Kobolds from Pathfinder or DnD?

A: I wouldn't say exactly, but there's definitely elements of Kobolds that you could incorporate in a character creator with the Tulnar, yes. – Steven Sharif

Alcune delle seguenti informazioni non sono state confermate di recente dagli sviluppatori e potrebbero non essere nell'attuale roadmap di sviluppo.

• Mammalian Tulnar may have snout features, fur and inverted knees.
• Reptilian Tulnar may have more circular eyes and head shape, and scaly skin.

Racial weapons and armor

Armatura racial appearances in early Alpha-1.

Violet light and myself are wearing exactly the same armor set right: Same stats, same everything, but it drops for her it looks one way, it drops for me it looks another way; and... a small part of that is gender, but then the other part of it is race. So because I was a Vaelune in that playthrough my armor was in the Vaelune style; and when she picked it up it was in the elven style because she was an elf. So that gives you an example of sort of the breadth of looks that we're going for and how we try to capture like who you are as as a character and allow you to build your look that way. – Jeffrey Bard

Dünir and Empyrean racially styled armor concept art by Keith Kovach.

We have essentially sets that exist across all races; and each race that dons those armor sets is going to have their own racial influence on the presentation of those particular sets. So that's something that's unique in how each of the races get diversified. – Steven Sharif

Armi and armor are not race locked, but armor will take on a racial appearance.

The customization of equipment per race is really focused on Armor sets not Weapon props. Weapon props will, from a model standpoint, will translate pretty one-to-one across the races. – Steven Sharif

• Racial appearance of gear is focused on Armatura. Armi will not change in appearance but will scale in size based on race.

Let's say for example you have the Eagle set or something, right: The Eagle set has in art, it has a thematic design that's going to include certain attachments to the armor. It's going to include color palette and theme. It's going to have some aspects to it that define it as the Eagle set, right. When a Elf wears the Eagle set or when an Orc wears the Eagle set, you obviously have two different cultures there; and you don't want to stomp out that culture by assigning a de facto 'This is the Eagle set and this is how it looks on everybody.' What we want to have is cultural influences play a role in showing how that set looks. – Steven Sharif

• Racial appearance of gear sets is tied to the character model of that race.

When you say, what if I'm an Orc but want to look like an Elf and I want my Eagle set to be the Elf representation? Well the issue becomes there that Orcs have a different organic model. You know, their body is different than that of the Elf. So, from a scope-creep standpoint, it's one thing to add different influences that represent the cultures that are donning the armor; it's another thing to adapt each influence as a matrix that can be worn pretty much by everything. From a scope perspective, that's a very difficult task for the character artists to tackle. So instead what we've done is, in order to facilitate a variety of cultural representation between the races but allow for the sharing of assets like different armor sets, we give different representations of those armor sets to each race. – Steven Sharif

Q: Since a single armor set will look different on each race, how will we have large varieties of in-game achievable gear for each race if we have to make nine different looks for each set?

A: The approach for that is to create a modular piece set for armor creation; and the way we achieve that is by two steps: So, on the modeling side, each race has these geo sets basically where you're creating pieces of the armor for heavy plate armor, for medium, for robes; and you get to grab those modular pieces and mix and match as design makes a request for a particular set to the art teams. So, design comes along and they say, "hey we have a theme for a set that we want to create", so let's use Carphin in that example; and that theme from design's standpoint is going to include color, it's going to include materials, it's going to have an etymology for the set to give a background so that they can incorporate certain types of attachments- whatever they want to include on the art side. Then, the character team says, "okay let's take our base sets of geo and let's mix and match those pieces to create the Carphin set and then we're going to do a materials pass on it, and then we're going to do a color pass on it"; and that way we have a lot of essentially pieces of the puzzle to create these many different unique sets. Now we can also deform pieces across from race to race. So, even if we create unique geo on a per-race basis, we can grab the pauldron from the Human set and put it onto the Vek representation; and the end game there is that we have a particular set, for example Carphin, and that Carphin is communicating the theme; and when you don the armor for the Carphin set- you've acquired the Carphin set and you put it on- it is going to look Vek if you're a Vek. It is going to look Kaelar if you're a Kaelar, but it is still going to have the identity and the theme of the Carphin set. – Steven Sharif

Racial abilities

Personaggio benefits in Ashes of Creation are tied to that character's background rather than their race.

We want players to have the freedom to choose the race they want to play because they're excited about it, and avoid situations where players feel forced to play a specific race because of gameplay benefits.

• Gare are not gender or class locked.
• Race likely won't affect the artisan system.
• Race does not affect a character's base stats.
  • Previously it was stated that race "seeds" a player's base stats.

Alcune delle seguenti informazioni non sono state confermate di recente dagli sviluppatori e potrebbero non essere nell'attuale roadmap di sviluppo.

• Some classes may work better with certain races but nothing is enforced.
• A player's choice of race will influence their racial augments.

Stat growth

• Stats can be improved based on gear, tattoos, and other enhancements, such as socketed items.
• Players will have significant agency over the allocation of their stat progression.
• Gear has approximately a 40-50% influence on a players overall power in the game.
• Artisan profession does not affect a player's stats.
• Previously it was stated that race "seeds" a player's base stats, then the primary archetype grows the base stats. Any contribution by the secondary archetype was later removed.

Racial augments

Alcune delle seguenti informazioni non sono state confermate di recente dagli sviluppatori e potrebbero non essere nell'attuale roadmap di sviluppo.

Racial augments are based on a character's race and are available to each class.

• These apply to abilities on a character's primary archetype.
• They affect how the ability works and can also apply cosmetic effects.

Racial influence on nodes

Racial architecture of the same Village (fase 3) node on different servers. Dünir Dwarven influence (top). Kaelar Human influence (bottom). Alpha-1 Non-NDA immagine dello schermo.

The layout and architecture within a Node’s development area are determined by influential race. For example, a stage 3 Node with the majority of player contribution being Py'rai would have a Py'rai village with Py'rai architecture. Most NPCs would be Py'rai elves, and offer questlines within the Py'rai narrative. – Margaret Krohn

Each player’s contributed experience is flagged with their character race and other identifiers. When a Node advances, the race with the highest experience contribution determines the Node’s style and culture. This style and culture change can happen at every Node Stage. For example, if a Node advances to Level 2 - Encampment Stage and 51% of all experience was earned by Ren’Kai players, the Node will be a Level 2 Ren’Kai Node. If that same Node advances to a Level 3 - Village Stage Node, but the Py'Rai contributed 62% of all the experience earned, then the Node will be a Level 3 Py'Rai Node. – Margaret Krohn

Node layout and style is determined by several factors:

The way that the node system is built is that they can exist across a spread of 18 biomes, but at the same time have to represent the cultural influence of these cultures that are intrinsically a part of a specific biome. – Steven Sharif

• Environment (biome) and location of the node.
  • Nodes will adjust the local topography to fit the aesthetic and mechanical requirements of the node.

Currently the way that the platform system is set up, is it's capable of adjusting the topography of the node's footprint, regardless of the surrounding terrain. So the reason for that is we want to have flexibility in the presentation of the node's layout and how it is essentially both from an aesthetic standpoint as well as a mechanical standpoint with node sieges- how it's constructed and that construction should have the ability to take on a variance of different types of topography. So it shouldn't be dependent on the surrounding area. Now that's not to say that the surrounding area isn't going to have some influence over. So for example... we're experimenting a little bit with the platform tech and putting up a node up against the side of a mountain or on the edge of a cliff or something that has a beautiful vista. Those are things that we're going to test out obviously as we continue to work on the node tool and how that platform system works, but the idea is to have the node independent of the surrounding terrain. – Steven Sharif

• Node type.

Some parts are determined by the area it's in. Some parts are determined by the type it is. Some parts are determined by the race it is; and then the rest of it is determined by the mayor. – Jeffrey Bard

• Race that contributed the highest percentage to the node's advancement will alter the racial appearance of its buildings, NPCs, and props.
  • Parent races do not combine their cultural influences. For example, Py'Rai and Empyrean count as different cultures. Their parent race, the Pyrian, no longer exists.
  • This style and culture change happens at every stage.
  • This applies to all nodes, including castle nodes.

All nodes, whether they're associated with a castle or associated with normal node structure, has cultural influences that replicate over to the buildings that are produced and the NPCs that are present. – Steven Sharif

• The rest is determined by the node's mayor.
  • It should be possible for a node to complete several building projects within a mayor's one month term in office.

Q: How long would you say it will take players on average to fill/build up a node completely from wilderness to metropolis?

A: It's one thing to get a node to a certain level: it's another thing to develop the node; and I can't really give you an on-average expectation, because there's a lot of variables at play. There's how many citizens does the node have attracted to it; what's the type of traffic that the node is attracting to it based on things like its tax rates, or the specialization that it chose to spec into, based on the building types it's chosen to build. All of those things are variables that can affect the quote-unquote "average build-out time" of a particular node. So it's difficult to give you an average when there's so many variables along those lines. But the idea is that if there is a particular project that players are interested in in developing based on the node stage, that they would have the ability to complete several of those projects as within a single term of a mayor; and a term of a mayor is one month. – Steven Sharif

Starting areas

Alpha-1 early preview starting area.

There is no railroaded driven theme park experience here. You will have the opportunity to create your own destiny in that regard, which means you don't have to necessarily follow the quest line nor do you have to participate in events or experiences around the starting area. Now it may be more beneficial to do that; and in that regard I guess there could be a meta around doing that, but you could branch out proceed to other areas and do different content. – Steven Sharif

Alpha-0 Empyrean starting area concept art.

Starting areas (starting zones) are located in the ruined cities of the four ancient races of Verra.

• Starting areas are located near one of the four divine gateways where players spawn into the world.
  • The Tulnar have a starting area without a divine gateway. They have the same option of starting at any of the divine gateways as other races.
  • Starting areas have some distance between them.

• Starting areas are not part of the node system.

• Each race has its own starting area.
  • Players may choose their starting gateway regardless of their choice of race.
  • Punti di interesse exist that represent Tulnar NPC structures in a similar fashion to the starting areas around divine gateways.

• Starting areas include expeditionary NPC settlements that serve as initial quest origination points. Lore-wise, these settlements represent scouts that were sent ahead of the main expedition back to Verra.
  • These settlements are designed to acclimatize new players entering the world.
  • While it may be advantageous to do so, there is no requirement for players to play through any specific starter zone content.

A problem that a lot of MMOs have is that those starting areas become just vacant of players and it's so sad because the greatest aspect of an MMO is that community that you get to experience, so one of the great things about the node system is that it really works from new player acquisition standpoint, where these nodes tend to develop larger near the starting location areas around the world; and it brings these players back to those locations if they're citizens and want services within those cities. So, as new players enter the world they're going to actually be surrounded most likely by more population because people are coming back to those larger nodes. – Steven Sharif

Tulnar starting area

Points of interest will exist that represent Tulnar npc structures. In the similar fashion that the starting areas around divine gateways will include expeditionary npc settlements not tied to the node structures but serve as initial quest origination points. – Steven Sharif

Tulnar have a starting area that does not involve a divine gateway.

• Punti di interesse exist that represent Tulnar NPC structures in a similar fashion to the starting areas around divine gateways.

• Tulnar have the same option of starting at any of the divine gateways as other races.

Tulnar have the same option of starting at any of the divine gateways. Their civilization, though within the underrealm, has also begun to explore the surface. – Steven Sharif

Unlike the other races, the Tulnar won’t be returning to Verra. Instead they will be returning to the surface from the Sottorealtà for the first time in generations.

• The Sottorealtà itself does not have a divine gateway.

Racial quests

Missioni may be based on a character's race.

Different quests may relate to who the primary cultural contributor is to a node. This won't lock out content, but will add flavor to the quests.

There might even be different directories of the quest that exist for specific races, and even though you're sharing a quest to kill a boss, if you're human and I'm an elf, I will have a different arc potentially that leads in a different direction than you, even though we took the same quest; and this can relate to who the primary cultural contributor is to a node unlocking different arcs for cultures that share the primary culture of a node - not that locks out content but it gives a flavor in a different direction so that not everything is so cookie cutter. – Steven Sharif

Race matters because narratives have paths that also are influenced based on the primary contributing culture to the node... If you're a Niküa and you have you're in a Niküa node that's predominantly Niküa, you're going to have certain services and/or abilities as a member of the Niküa race that other races may not have access to... They may have alternative quest lines, but they won't have specific ones. Now those specific Niküa quests will then relate to the meta-narrative that's present in the world and they'll start to direct some of that meta-narrative; and that'll be beneficial for your kind because it will unlock certain content for your race that other races haven't unlocked yet. So there is an incentive there to see progression along that line now in order to curb the progress of a dominant race. – Steven Sharif

Missioni that are race specific, title specific, or guild specific will likely be less than 10% of the total number of quests. 90% of quests should be able to be shared by everybody.

Alpha 0

Questa traduzione potrebbe essere obsoleta

Alpha-0 civilian clothing by Keith Kovach.

Alpha-0 civilian clothing by Keith Kovach.

Non esisterà una schermata per la creazione del personaggio attiva in Alpha-0, ma esisteranno diverse opzioni di scelta per il giocatore.

• Quatto giocabili archetipi: Cleric, Mage, Ranger, Tank.
  • Gli altri quattro sanno disponibili nell' Alpha-1.
• Due scelte di razze: Kaelar, Empyrean.
• Selezione del sesso.

Alpha-0 starting area

In Alpha-0, players started at an Empyrean divine gateway.

Racial mounts

Characters are able to obtain racial mounts via a quest in that race's starting area.

Each starting area will have a different quest line that will yield a different type of starting mount. But by default you don't just choose human and here you get a horse, so to speak. Because you can be a human in our game and choose to start in a different racial area- at a different Divine Gateway- and as such then you could follow the quest line that gives you the Orc mount. – Steven Sharif

See also

• Classi
• Religioni
• Creatore del personaggio
• Combattimento
• Alpha-0