A Gnomenal Conversation

[Fool_Hardy]

I would like to open a thread to discuss the gnomes in Aabahran. I would like to hear everyone's thoughts on exactly what is good and what id bad about this race.

As I see it the gnomes can only excel at the invoker class. While we have added bonuses to the melee classes for gnomes specifically, we still do not see them played.

A gnome battle mage has the lowest des of any battle mage. Great mana, be glad for the extra health, because your getting hit.

But in reality, that's the issue. Your getting Hit. The gnomes need the ability to avoid damage. 

Other small races cover this with quick reflexes or high con. The theory is that the gnome will purchase the HP to be on par with the dwarf.

The trouble with that theory, is the actual low con means you do not regenerate those extra HP like the dwarf would.

I have given this some thought and a couple of Ideas to improve gnomes have come to mind. 

I will reserve posting a suggestion however, because I would like to hear the frustrations or enjoyments of others that my suggestion may be globally accepted.

@Tantangel write me a novel.

@Celerity I would love to hear your thoughts.

[Manual Labour]

They can be good psionicists too.

Problem is they can be many classes but there is almost always a better race choice.

I don't think the extra hp from pracs makes up for their size and stats as any non pure mage.

[Celerity]

Gnomes are just a bad race. A lot of bad points and nothing really to gain from it PK-wise. If you do get an edge in PK with one, you'll have trouble due to racial RP being not the most aggressive.

On top of it all, I don't really like their racial RP. So, I'm probably never going to like gnomes, but maybe some people will.

You want to improve in such a way that helps them both in melee and in casting. They need some serious perks to catch up with other races. You need to think about what gnomes should be good at. How can you get them to compete with ogres in melee (in their own way)?

Their RP is largely based around tinkering with technology, so I'd frame it around that.

You could have them improve their abilities/equipment, but that leads to inflation when we generally want to tend towards stat deflation.

Without much thinking, my first thought about how to improve gnomes:

Allow them to tinker with a torso piece, making it gnome-only and their choice of:

• autofly
• autosneak
• +2 size

This torso piece loses its special ability (and the gnome-only) after 18 ticks. The gnome has a 24 tick cooldown on tinker. This would allow the gnome the ability to choose their 'racial perk'. Gnomes gain some flexibility as they can switch it, but also suffer from the item being lost and inflexibility of some of the best torso pieces (it must be removable if the gnome wants to tinker it more than once). Plus there is a timing vulnerability.

Even if a gnome is as big as a giant, I'd still rather play a giant due to their perks + better melee stats, so the gnome needs more than just tinker. Instead of making the gnome stronger, let's give a fun support skill:

Gnomes gain a skill called hook which has two uses:

1. Hook <target> (direction): Pulls the target in the direction specified. Same rules as push, except the gnome doesn't move if it fails.
2. Hook <target>: Triggers automatically when the target flees, pulling them back to the room with the gnome (but not into combat). If the gnome flees first, the target is pulled in the direction of the gnome. Same mob limitations as push, of course.

• Lags the target for 2 rounds on the 'pull'.
• Lags the gnome for 2 rounds when used.
• Does damage similar to lightning bolt.
• Costs 20 mana.
• Can open with it or use it in combat.
• Dodge, two-handed and dual wield are reduced by 50% for 0 ticks on the target.
• 2 tick cooldown on the target for the 'hooked' affect (which pulls them and reduces skills). No cooldown for damage.

--

Would I play a gnome with tinker and hook? Probably not, and I don't think these would make them competitive. But it certainly would make them more fun. I'd combine it with other changes, but perhaps not gnome-specific, such as:

Give all classes with dodge a general melee improvement against an enemy that is 2 or more sizes larger than them. For example, for the small size: replace the first successful hit against them with a dodge each round and give them a free melee attack that is very hard to block.

This would apply essentially to gnome/faerie/halfling thieves, warriors, blademasters, etc. vs giants (against most opponents for faerie thieves). It would make enlargement for giants situational against mid-sized opponents as well (and give something interesting to shrink....).

[Tantangel]

Honestly I used to love Gnomes as a race to play Invokers/Battlemages. After coming back though, I can't for the life of me pool up HP like I used to be able to and the last one I played was sitting just under 860 or so as a base and that was after pushing in 90% of my saves towards HP. It doesn't even make a good race to use to explore with, and as pointed out there are other races to use to make those classes better. I'd choose an Avian at this point over a Gnome for an Invoker because of flying and medium sized is better than anything a Gnome gains. There's a lot of things that would make them more appealing outside of the changes implemented recently. About the only thing I'd be interested in is a Gnome Bard at this point, and mostly because it may be interesting to RP and that's the only extent of it.

@Celerity has made some decent additions that may make them more appealing, but I wouldn't mind going a step further and have them automastered with things like 'enchant armor/weapon' and make it so that anyone with 106%+ would not be able to blow up those items ever or less than a 1% chance of doing so, and always gain the max roll for improving it for AC, hitroll, and damroll. Once you can't enchant them anymore, it just stops doing anything to the item in general so that you can't boost it to insane levels. It would make Gnome Invokers more popular for Merchant as they can sell these services then.

In the case of Rangers, they should be capable of making a specialized arrows as archers that hit for mental vulns. That would give them a leg up against Giant sized races that will pose the most threat towards them.

A Gnome Thief already gains brambus needler as a learned trap, but maybe add in the bonus of automastery in edging and  throwing. By edging they'd also be able to create more daggers out of items than any other race by a factor of say 5.

A Gnome Warrior would gain feign and any additional Warrior Lore assuming they meet the requirements for the additional Lore. It's not overpowered, and  it lets others experiment more with the race as a Warrior.

As a Battlemage, maybe their reflective shield would reflect magical attacks rather than mundane. It may have a huge impact both negatively and positively depending on who they're fighting. Or we could go a step further and give them the ability to reflect either or which makes people second guess what weapons they should be wielding going into battle against them.

Due to their knowledge overall they should have mastery in Lore (which I've never played a Gnome melee, so they could and I just don't know it). In that case Lore would act like identify for a Gnome, and Identify would have the added benefit of also showing where the location of those items are in the game. This gives the added benefit for newer players or returning players to get a general idea of locations and identifies objects regardless of whether they're a melee or a mage.

I doubt any of it would be implemented, but it's an idea. I don't care to play them anymore myself because outside of an Invoker, they lack a lot for any other class they can be. I'm not saying it can't be done, but they're pretty much strictly an RP race for me anymore, and I don't see myself playing another any time in the near future.

[Fool_Hardy]

I believe gnomes suffer from what I will call hidden numbers.

Such as the numbers associated with the low stats, dex, str, and con.

The low dex of the gnome means that the gnome needs the armor spell just to match a humans AC naturally. -20 AC for 18-20 dex. Hodden numbers.

The low con means he will have 50 less HP (without trains) than an Avian of the same class. Hidden numbers.

The low str means that he will never achieve the high hit and dam rolls needed for melee classes. Hidden numbers.

As far as what we can do to improve them;

First lets address their dexterity. Think about the legends, the gnomes were always a sneaky lot rarely ever seen by a human. Yet we say they are less graceful than a human.

Addressing their low dex, to perhaps the highest human dex 21, will eliminate some of the frustrations of getting hit. As well as make gnomes more viable when compared to other races of the same class.

Second, lets look at giving the gnomes a quasi-blur effect. Something akin to the ogres ability to ignore pain, the gnomes may blur out of existence to avoid a heavy blow.

Third, lets give gnomes a bonus like the humans once had where consumables last longer for them. Make it so that their magical nature is simply ideal for the addition of magic.

-------------------------------

Side note. Still think we should open Druid to the gnomes.

 

 

 

[Magick]

25 minutes ago, Fool_Hardy said:

The low dex of the gnome means that the gnome needs the armor spell just to match a humans AC naturally. -20 AC for 18-20 dex. Hodden numbers.

I can't argue that the difference between 18 and 20 DEX is -20 AC.  It's true, you need the armor (or shield) spell to even it out with your standard human.  But how much does -20 AC matter when you're hitting upwards to -700 AC?  In this aspect, the AC difference doesn't matter.  It's the OTHER things that DEX affects that has more of an impact.  Like parry.  But they weren't exactly built with melees in mind, but mages, and so the defenses are minimal anyway.  Hence the high INT and unparalleled WIS.  Un-hodden numbers.  Yes, I'm going to pick on this typo.  

 

16 minutes ago, Fool_Hardy said:

The low con means he will have 50 less HP (without trains) than an Avian of the same class. Hidden numbers.

And with trains, it's 40 hp more.  Almost 50.  Un-hodden numbers.

 

20 minutes ago, Fool_Hardy said:

The low str means that he will never achieve the high hit and dam rolls needed for melee classes. Hidden numbers.

The 18 STR gnomes get gives them a base 3 to hitroll and 4 to damroll.  Average STR across all races is about 20.  A STR of 20 has 4/6 and the highest non-giant sits at 21 with 6/7.  A difference of 3/3 in an age where one can easily get 40/40 without breaking a sweat isn't going to matter.  Strength is going to impact weapon choice more than hit/dam.  Un-hodden numbers.

 

 

I love me my gnomes, and their high int/wis gives them the third highest mana behind illithids and faeries, and the extra pracs into hp is a bonus.  But as Manual Labor said, there's pretty much a better choice out there in all the classes they can be.
I'm having trouble coming up with suggestions that could improve them, but I can't think of any currently.  Celerity has some interesting ideas.  Only a few, I think, have merit though.

[Fool_Hardy]

Thanks @Magick

I forgot that point.

Dex affects parry.

Another argument to improve their dex. 

An avian with 900 HP will parry more often than a gnome with 950.

I love gnomes too, they just aren't playable in the current environment.

Maybe we should scrap them completely and bring in neutral faeries with gnome int and wis. People would play that.

[Tantangel]

Bumping their DEX to 21 isn't a bad idea. They're a small race with an 18 DEX which means they're the lowest of all small races considerably for creatures who should easily run in between a Giants feet without being caught (unless maybe accidentally sat on). With a Giant's ability to attain high hit/dam far more easily than any other race, they're have barely more dexterity than those races and when it comes to affecting defense, that's not doing much of anything. This makes them a bit weaker to melee races and with their vuln to charm/mental, they're weak to the strongest of mage classes.

They are severely lacking though, and could definitely use a boost. I preferred their old vuln over the newer one though (yeah, it's over a decade that it's been in place, but I still prefer the 'old' one). Maybe it's time we make Gnomes great again? They'll be the greatest Gnomes.