What's so great about Iksar?

[pasi]

Originally Posted by Brut [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Rly need some EverMath-wiz to tend to this whole AC talk, since I'm not sure if the difference does anything whatsoever. Kunark-era ikkys got their plate handicap so they have no advantage going on yet, and come Velious there's still gonna be a softcap for it, and I'm pretty sure you're gonna hit the cap regardless of your race choice.

Have about 400 days logged as an iksar SK on live, was a fairly big contributor to shadowknight.org and TSW, and also parsed monk/sk/warrior frequently.

Anyhow, the general consensus on the iksar racial AC up until about 2008 or so was that it was only displayed AC. By that, I mean the racial provided literally no benefit other than your character's displayed AC on the character sheet being higher. It was actually Rashere (one of the more active developers at the time) who mentioned the racial behaving this way.

There was a lone parse around 2008 when the level cap was 85 that did manage to show the iksar AC bonus was in fact discernible. However, the catch was that it was a comparison between 2 level 51 characters. The effect of the racial at max level on well-geared characters was never shown. The racial was definitely not anything real-AC (PoP+ shield AC) or an extension on the AC cap as these are very observable in a parse.

Keep in mind the time frame here, on P99.

AC is hardcapped right now and until late Velious. A softcap is eventually added for melee classes only, but the returns on this softcap are almost nothing until the pre-PoP patch that made post-cap AC have a decent return.

Now whether or not the AC code here mimics live, I have no idea.

With that said, iksars are sweet looking. Having to give 0 fucks about faction is a blessing. Greenmist isn't all that great, but forage is amazing.