Guild Wars 2

Please add the option to change a character race when using the Total Makeover Kit. I’ve seen quite a few people asking in map chat if it’s possible to change race.

The only warning that should be attached to this, is that obviously cultural armor will not be usable on another race.

Other than that I don’t really see any other issues. Let’s say you start an Asuran. You play the game and then find that you don’t like the way armor looks on an Asuran, but love the look on a Human. By using the Total Makeover Kit, you can simply select to change your Asuran to a Human.

I know you can simply delete your existing character and create a new one. This is not ideal if your character was created a long time ago however.
I, for example created a Norn Guardian at launch. I love the Guardian, but absolutely hate the jumping animation on the Norn. I would love it if I could change my Norn to a Human, without having to delete and re-create it and so lose-out on birthday gifts.

I really wish we had this, I’d pay big gems for an item that lets us do this! I know right now the team is working on the HoT release (I see this excuse everywhere..) but some time after would something like this be possible? Please

I don’t want to delete my characters and remake them, and lose all the time and items invested into them, and to prevent any story problems, just make it reset and let you rechoose them for the new race you pick.

Previous responses from ANet staff

1) I am afraid that the team does contemplate different possibilities and new features for the future but this one is not among those. Source
2) There are a lot of far-reaching consequences of allowing one character to play through every race’s personal story or equip any cultural armor/weapons. For now, we feel that it would take away from the experience of Guild Wars 2 for the majority of players. Source
3) Thanks for asking. To change the race in the Gem store will not be an option in Guild Wars 2. Source

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Previous responses from ANet staff

1) I am afraid that the team does contemplate different possibilities and new features for the future but this one is not among those. Source
2) There are a lot of far-reaching consequences of allowing one character to play through every race’s personal story or equip any cultural armor/weapons. For now, we feel that it would take away from the experience of Guild Wars 2 for the majority of players. Source
3) Thanks for asking. To change the race in the Gem store will not be an option in Guild Wars 2. Source

Oh doody, they could just unequip the stuff that is racial when you change! And this game is so casual friendly and convenient I don’t see why not. But ehhh, thank you for giving me such a nice response with sources.

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Previous responses from ANet staff

1) I am afraid that the team does contemplate different possibilities and new features for the future but this one is not among those. Source
2) There are a lot of far-reaching consequences of allowing one character to play through every race’s personal story or equip any cultural armor/weapons. For now, we feel that it would take away from the experience of Guild Wars 2 for the majority of players. Source
3) Thanks for asking. To change the race in the Gem store will not be an option in Guild Wars 2. Source

Darnit, you beat me to it

But yeah, OP. It’s a hotly discussed topic on the forums. Many people want it. Aside from the technical issues though, A-net has a stand-point that it would detract from the game. A-net want you to have sense of story with your character (and that choices are important ones)- being able to undo your story and existence so much ruins that a little.

TerminalMontage.5693:

Just a flesh wound.3589:

Previous responses from ANet staff

1) I am afraid that the team does contemplate different possibilities and new features for the future but this one is not among those. Source
2) There are a lot of far-reaching consequences of allowing one character to play through every race’s personal story or equip any cultural armor/weapons. For now, we feel that it would take away from the experience of Guild Wars 2 for the majority of players. Source
3) Thanks for asking. To change the race in the Gem store will not be an option in Guild Wars 2. Source

Oh doody, they could just unequip the stuff that is racial when you change! And this game is so casual friendly and convenient I don’t see why not. But ehhh, thank you for giving me such a nice response with sources.

Equipment is the LEAST of the problems. First and foremost, if it’s not in any of those 3 sources, Anet has stated that profession and race are both hardcoded values to your character. That means Anet has 2 options, spend weeks/months chasing code to make sure values arent changed where they shouldnt be, still get something buggy, or to basically delete your character, recreate it of what your choices are, and auto-level it to 80. Both basically would run the risk of exploding your character due to some previously unseen bug.

Anet you could make a lot of money if you had a change race item in gem store similar to makeover kits.

I know it might mess with personal stories, but pretend like you’re smart and figure it out. It would be win / win.

Sparrow.5936:

I know it might mess with personal stories, but pretend like you’re smart and figure it out. It would be win / win.

I don’t think insulting the developers is a good way to request a new feature.

That said:

http://bfy.tw/16Ln

Copying and pasting the forum-posters favourite answer for these threads (Thanks again to Astral Projections):

“1) I am afraid that the team does contemplate different possibilities and new features for the future but this one is not among those. Source
2) There are a lot of far-reaching consequences of allowing one character to play through every race’s personal story or equip any cultural armor/weapons. For now, we feel that it would take away from the experience of Guild Wars 2 for the majority of players. Source
3) Thanks for asking. To change the race in the Gem store will not be an option in Guild Wars 2. Source”

There’s at least one of these threads every week. The topic has been thoroughly discussed yet has never gained any real traction. There are technical issues and bugs that it could bring up, and then there is the issue that A-net think that it could “cheapen” the decisions you make for your characters.

Then everyone in the game would only need one character slot.
not signed

Sure it something I would like to see but it will make up the first part of the personal story of would they simply turn it into a tick box panel upon the changed race? Yeah that would ruin the experience.

At this point I pretty much compent with my character despite I did felt regret at the start (made a Charr guardian but reconsider the guardian to be Asura and vice versa of my Asura Engineer). If I wanted to see them wearing different armours like my Asura engineer to be an Guardian, that what the wardrobe is for.

Yikes. With that kind of approach. . . good luck getting ANYTHING you want.

Reroll.

I’ve done it twice so far and it’s not that big a deal. I even did it the hard way by map completion, no tomes or writs, but that was a personal choice. You get 10 tomes every 28 days. If you do the PvP dailies you’ll get a tome a day. It doesn’t take that long to get enough tomes to either get to level 80 or get a fair amount of leveling.

Did you post while drunk, OP? I really hope you’re posting while drunk, because nobody sober should think a backhanded insult is a good way to ask for something.

Hello!

I know (atleast what i got told from before) that you don’t do race changes, but i thought of a way
that might work. I really gate to be stuck on a race i regret on a 80 character, I’ve made 3 guardians and leveled them
to 80 just to have different races. But what if you made an gem item that lets u re-create your character and
restart the story quest? I really don’t wanna have 5 guardian just to switch my race, so if this would be possible
I would be very happy!

thanks in advance

Best Regards

Marcus Borén

This gets discussed from time to time and it seems unlikely: it’s nearly impossible to reset a character for just the story; there are all sorts of internal checks & balances that get altered as a character levels and completes elements of the story. So the programming would be tricky and the QA would be nearly impossible — look how many accidental bugs were created by simply re-ordering the personal story bits that are the same for everyone and had not yet been completed when ANet introduced the NPE.

And there’s already a decent alternative: buy a new toon slot or re-roll an existing one.

• New toon has the advantage that you get a storage toon who can be parked at a rich platinum vein or a JP chest.
• Re-rolling is cheaper, while losing the extra storage/income.
• Both have the disadvantage of requiring re-leveling to 80, although that can be bypassed with tomes and/or crafting.

tl;dr it’s possible to do this. Unfortunately the costs of adding the feature far exceed the limited benefits.

I see.. Thanks for the info!

Also asceneded gear and legendary items are account bound so you can just move all of your gear bags and items over to your new toon no problem. Also the more toons you have the more Queen Jennah mini’s you will get in the long run.

I have one main myself but I learned in Gw1 is good to have multiple toons as not only does that mean multiple birthday presents but certain achieves are easier to unlock that others depending on the class.

Also Living story chapters can be skipped around with alts so you can either redo them all for keys and loot or go straight to paths of no return to get ready for HoT.

You guys think it would be cool to have kit that you can change your race? Kinda like a self identity kit or a hairstlye kit but for changing your race, idk what do ya think?

It would be cool yes, but entirely unfeasable with the way personal stories work, so no, it likely won’t ever happen. Sadly you’ll either have to buy a new character slot or re-roll.

Ahh thats right, story mode would make things complicated, i just dont want a norn for an ele any more, I have 2 crafting profession on 500 and 60% map completion, just dont like using Norn for an ele profession haha

It’d be technically pretty difficult to do. There’s a lot resting on your race, and it’s not just a number which can be changed in the database.

No, not cool imo. Everyone would have the most popular race atm…. Just reroll a new character.

Frostfang.5109:

No, not cool imo. Everyone would have the most popular race atm…. Just reroll a new character.

Humans will always be the MMO masterace.

BrooksP.4318:

Frostfang.5109:

No, not cool imo. Everyone would have the most popular race atm…. Just reroll a new character.

Humans will always be the MMO masterace.

Maybe so but they are still “2 leg” “bookahs”. And this is coming from someone with 5 humans out of 9 chars. :P

There is a lot more to change then amour.
Personal story for one thing.
The devs have stated before that it is simply not possible due to how had coded he player race is.

This has been asked before and they’ve said there there are too many problems with it for them to do so. Problems with how the personal story is tied to race on the hero panel and cultural armor being two of them.

As others have said, ANet says no.

i have always said that changing race is to hard, however, changing profession should be easy.
so….why not at least have a prof change token?

HardRider.2980:

There is a lot more to change then amour.
Personal story for one thing.
The devs have stated before that it is simply not possible due to how had coded he player race is.

Then why not make the char an honorary “Norn” or “friend-of-the-Norn” for example, in order to continue the story line?

Race should not be an issue, except for cultural armor.

Leiard.4532:

Then why not make the char an honorary “Norn” or “friend-of-the-Norn” for example, in order to continue the story line?

Race should not be an issue, except for cultural armor.

The people who actually know say it is an issue. It’s not like they wouldn’t make an item that would sell in the gem store if they could, especially one that has been requested over and over again for three years like this. If they keep saying it’s not possible, I’m going to have to believe them.

Buy another character slot and get leveling, 80s not that far away.

Leiard.4532:

HardRider.2980:

There is a lot more to change then amour.
Personal story for one thing.
The devs have stated before that it is simply not possible due to how had coded he player race is.

Then why not make the char an honorary “Norn” or “friend-of-the-Norn” for example, in order to continue the story line?

Race should not be an issue, except for cultural armor.

ANet have said it is, funny thing is, it’s there game. If anyone knows how hard something is to do. it’s going to be them. Accept that your request is not going to happen and move on.

think about the voices for one, they need to redo every single voice acting if they do it one way or another.
if they change it flat out, you will be lost because you start in the middle of a story, if they do it the “honorable” or “friend of” then the ammount of voice overs they need to redo is gonna be a hell of a thing to do.

the only single thing they can do is remove everything you got in result of your PS and let you do it all over again, which is again a ton of work.

It would be too much work for too little output. This isn’t Tera where the story is the exact same regardless of your race.

Another idea for the wardrobe is a chance to view a total make over kit, so you can preview before you buy the kits

Time for this old chestnut:

Astral Projections.7320:

ANet so far has said no.

Race changes:
1) I am afraid that the team does contemplate different possibilities and new features for the future but this one is not among those. Source
2) There are a lot of far-reaching consequences of allowing one character to play through every race’s personal story or equip any cultural armor/weapons. For now, we feel that it would take away from the experience of Guild Wars 2 for the majority of players. Source
3) Thanks for asking. To change the race in the Gem store will not be an option in Guild Wars 2. Source

Crimson Clouds.4853:

Time for this old chestnut:

Astral Projections.7320:

ANet so far has said no.

Race changes:
1) I am afraid that the team does contemplate different possibilities and new features for the future but this one is not among those. Source
2) There are a lot of far-reaching consequences of allowing one character to play through every race’s personal story or equip any cultural armor/weapons. For now, we feel that it would take away from the experience of Guild Wars 2 for the majority of players. Source
3) Thanks for asking. To change the race in the Gem store will not be an option in Guild Wars 2. Source

And all issues are still rendered moot with 5 minutes worth of creative thinking:

- Only level 80 that has completely finished personal story can racechange.
- Story arc 1 change to “You are a NEWRACE raised by ORIGINALRACE as one of their own”. The story itself remain completed.
- Any racial armor for your previous race equipped or in inventory become uneqiupped and set to accountbound/soulbound on equip/still normal race limited.
- Racial elites/skills are changed the new race.

Done. There you go. Race change implemented. If you race change again, its the same procedure. Originalrace will be set the first time you use makeoverkit, so say if you are Norn that change to Asura, you will first be an Asura raised by Norn. If you then change to Charr, you will be a Charr raised by the Norn. This is the “explanation” for having a Norn personal story. Even then its just cosmetic. You could replace the personal story page with a picture of a Quaggan saying “I dont even know you anymore!”. It doesnt matter for anyone but the player.

But Anet wont spend the time of course. Its never been about the way they coded it – they can easily recode it if they want to. Its the fact they want you to spend gems on another character slot instead.

Dawdler.8521:

But Anet wont spend the time of course. Its never been about the way they coded it – they can easily recode it if they want to. Its the fact they want you to spend gems on another character slot instead.

So, you say that Anet only want players to buy gems to get things (ie. character slots) from the gem store. If it were truly an act of Anet only wanting player money (and not a coding/other technical issue that they’ve said is the real issue), don’t you think they would have put in a race changer on the gem store for 800+ gems?

Leiard.4532:

Then why not make the char an honorary “Norn” or “friend-of-the-Norn” for example, in order to continue the story line?

Voice-overs missing for certain story moments.

It could be done. But it would have to reset the personal story to a new beginning, leaving you with a lvl 80 noobler for which none of the rewards would be useful for. Also any racial armor that was already acquired might take a hit with the change over.

Dawdler.8521:

Crimson Clouds.4853:

Time for this old chestnut:

Astral Projections.7320:

ANet so far has said no.

Race changes:
1) I am afraid that the team does contemplate different possibilities and new features for the future but this one is not among those. Source
2) There are a lot of far-reaching consequences of allowing one character to play through every race’s personal story or equip any cultural armor/weapons. For now, we feel that it would take away from the experience of Guild Wars 2 for the majority of players. Source
3) Thanks for asking. To change the race in the Gem store will not be an option in Guild Wars 2. Source

And all issues are still rendered moot with 5 minutes worth of creative thinking:

- Only level 80 that has completely finished personal story can racechange.
- Story arc 1 change to “You are a NEWRACE raised by ORIGINALRACE as one of their own”. The story itself remain completed.
- Any racial armor for your previous race equipped or in inventory become uneqiupped and set to accountbound/soulbound on equip/still normal race limited.
- Racial elites/skills are changed the new race.

Done. There you go. Race change implemented. If you race change again, its the same procedure. Originalrace will be set the first time you use makeoverkit, so say if you are Norn that change to Asura, you will first be an Asura raised by Norn. If you then change to Charr, you will be a Charr raised by the Norn. This is the “explanation” for having a Norn personal story. Even then its just cosmetic. You could replace the personal story page with a picture of a Quaggan saying “I dont even know you anymore!”. It doesnt matter for anyone but the player.

But Anet wont spend the time of course. Its never been about the way they coded it – they can easily recode it if they want to. Its the fact they want you to spend gems on another character slot instead.

Or it’s not that simple. I do love it when people think they can just give out an idea and it can be made so.

So I like others will say it again. ANet have said it can not be done. So guess what. It can not be done.

We can explain it to you, but can not understand it to.you.

BrotherBel with all due respect (and I mean that), entire worlds can be created with code. Little is beyond the reach of talented code wizards. It is doable. But its a matter of time, available resources, and cost to make it happen, and “if” it would be cost effective in the end. Not to mention there would have to be a serious discussion concerning how it would impact achievements already acquired.

I’ve worked with developers. They are an odd little bunch of mad hatters, but never doubt what they are capable of doing in the realms they create.

Some1 would actually change race just cause he don’t like how armor looks like on he’s race ;o.Wow….

I want mounts and capes in make over kits as well.

Kamara.4187:

BrotherBel with all due respect (and I mean that), entire worlds can be created with code. Little is beyond the reach of talented code wizards. It is doable. But its a matter of time, available resources, and cost to make it happen, and “if” it would be cost effective in the end. Not to mention there would have to be a serious discussion concerning how it would impact achievements already acquired.

I’ve worked with developers. They are an odd little bunch of mad hatters, but never doubt what they are capable of doing in the realms they create.

I know this, I really do, and I know where you are coming from. But it will not change the fact ANet have said no. It can not be done, for what ever reason that might be.

Ok, I gave you dev responses on the matter, but here are other ideas why it’s not going to happen.

-As what’s already been said, surely if they could easily profit from this, they’d have introduced it by now. Considering that isn’t the case, something is holding them back, whether it be technical or because of their views/standpoint on the matter.

-I believe that Devs aren’t pushing this as it “cheapens” the experience by making personal story decisions less important. They want each character to have a realistic background and story. I think there is even more weight on this regarding HoT and the “sylvari hate”. How would NPC interraction make sense if you were non-sylvari and turned into one, or vice-versa?

-Character customisation has always been intended, early on in development. Because of this they made all coding regarding racial aesthetics easily accessible. If it was never intended that race-chance would be made possible, the code could be “buried” with lots of knock-on effects and conflicting factors that would make it difficult to single out. I’m not a coder or developer, but I’d imagine that trying to make such a feature accessible would require a huge amount of back-tracking and bug-fixing.

So, the time-investment and story-conflictions doesn’t make it an easy case.

BrotherBelial.3094:

Kamara.4187:

BrotherBel with all due respect (and I mean that), entire worlds can be created with code. Little is beyond the reach of talented code wizards. It is doable. But its a matter of time, available resources, and cost to make it happen, and “if” it would be cost effective in the end. Not to mention there would have to be a serious discussion concerning how it would impact achievements already acquired.

I’ve worked with developers. They are an odd little bunch of mad hatters, but never doubt what they are capable of doing in the realms they create.

I know this, I really do, and I know where you are coming from. But it will not change the fact ANet have said no. It can not be done, for what ever reason that might be.

/respect

I’d be happy if they made a gem purchase to make all the gear on one character account bound (minus cultural gear of course).

but i really would like to see character slots on sale more frequently. It use to be two-three times a year. This year just once back in jan…

RoseofGilead.8907:

Dawdler.8521:

But Anet wont spend the time of course. Its never been about the way they coded it – they can easily recode it if they want to. Its the fact they want you to spend gems on another character slot instead.

So, you say that Anet only want players to buy gems to get things (ie. character slots) from the gem store. If it were truly an act of Anet only wanting player money (and not a coding/other technical issue that they’ve said is the real issue), don’t you think they would have put in a race changer on the gem store for 800+ gems?

Actually, no. Because Anet knows that just a character isnt enough, you’re going to want inventory slots, cosmetics for your new character, maybe be suckered into buying more infinite gathering tools because you are lazy, etc and so on. And that’s not even mentioning the extra gold you put into the character, that you need to farm somewhere (and more players is more buisness). The more characters you have, the deeper they got you hooked.

That is the reason they arent doing it. Not because they cant.

this horse has been dead for some time, will you stop beating it?