Choosing a Race

There are not enormous functionally differences between races, ewspecially since Velious (high-end Velious gear ends up maxing out many stats regardless of your starting values in those stats).

You'll want to consider the following factors when picking a race for your character:

Class

Each race can only play certain classes, so this is a major limiting factor when choosing a race.

TODO: Add class/race options table (hopefully wiki has one already that can be copied?)

Size

There are five race sizes, as defined by what size armor they can wear. In terms of the Shrink spell there are less (eg. an Ogre is shrunk to "Human size" after one casting, not "Barbarian size").

Race Armor Options

There are three armor sizes, small/medium/large ...

• Small: Dwarf, Gnome, Halfling
• Small/Medium: High Elf, Wood Elf
• Medium: Erudite, Human, Iksar
• Medium/Large: Barbarian
• Large: Ogre, Troll

The in-between sizes will have the most clothing options when leveling up, but all races can find wearable gear if they hunt the right zones. Also high level gear typically fits all classes, so size matters much less for gear later on.

Race Size Perspectives

In EverQuest you literally see the world from your character's perspective, so if you choose a small character you will be staring at everyone else's knees for the rest of your EQ career. Conversely if you pick a large character, you will likely want to acquire a way to Shrink yourself someday, simply because of the inconvenience of being large in small dungeons.

Stats

Each race has certain starting statistics, and an amount of bonus points to spend to increase them. This means that (for instance) an Ogre Warrior will be stronger than a Halfling one, and may do an extra point of damage on average per hit as a result (although "a point" is an example: the exact amount will vary, as many other factors go into damage than just Strength).

However, this does not mean Ogre Warriors will always be stronger. Gear can raise characters stats, and all stats have both "soft caps" (eg. raising a stat above 200 provides less value than raising it from below that) and "hard caps" (no stat can be raised above 255). As a result especially later in the timeline (ie. on Blue) or if you get high-end raid gear, racial stats will be far less relevant at high levels.

= Spending Starting Stat Points

Every class page on this wiki has a guide that provides recommendations for how to spend your stat points, and you should use them as each class needs different stats.

In general every class can benefit from Stamina, since no one wants to die, but the exact amount varies by class. Casters want their casting stat (Intelligence/Wisdom) high, while melee characters want Strength and possibly Dexterity.

Although Charisma can lower prices slightly for everyone, it's only worth spending points (possibly) for Bards, Clerics, and Enchanters. And Agility is not really worthwhile for anyone, except that if your race starts with less than 75 Agility it's worth spending points on it, as having less adds a significant AC penalty.

Faction

The thing to know about faction is that most cities fall under the category of "good city", "evil city", or "Cabilis" (the Iksar city), and members of one of these three groups tend to be killed if they try to enter a city of another of the groups. This is not absolute, and it can be fixed with sufficient faction work, but basically, there are more good cities than evil cities, so a player rolling a good race/class will find it easier to get around in EverQuest.

The basic run-down is class-wise, Necromancers and Shadow Knights are always evil, Paladins are always good, and other classes can be either (depending on race and deity); race-wise, Dark Elves, Ogres, and Trolls are always evil, Dwarves, Barbarians, Wood Elves, High Elves, Half Elves, and Halflings are always good, and other races can be either (depending on deity), and of course Iksars are in their own category, hated everywhere except their home city of Cabilis. The full listing of what each race has is at races page.

Vision

Because of Titanium client limitations, vision used to be less import on Project 1999. However, recent innovations by the staff have restored classic darkness, or close to it.

This means that racial vision features are once again meaningful, and there are three vision levels possible:

Night Blind

Barbarians, Erudites, and Humans are all "night blind", and all but require a light source to navigate at night

Infravision

Dwarves, Gnomes, Half-Elves], High Elves, and Wood Elves all have "infravision". This gives them significantly better vision in low-light conditions, although still not as good as Ultravision, and will likely still find benefit from having a light source.

Starting Areas

Every race has a unique starting city, except for Erudites/Humans/Half-Elves, who get to choose (based on their religion) between two cities (Erudites can choose between Erudin/Paineel, while Humans and Half-Elves can choose between Freeport and Qeynos).

The locations of these cities result in new players falling into certain starting "hubs". These hubs only really matter for the first few levels, because once you level up travel becomes easier. But if you want to start out playing with friends, you should all pick races with the same hub.

Odus (Minor Hub)

Only Erudites start on Odus. On Blue this hub has Paineel and The Warrens, but on Green at launch the only leveling areas will be Toxxulia Forest and Kerra Isle.

Because these two zones are considered to be some of the worst options, many Erudites take the boat to the Qeynos hub instead (in theory Qeynos hub players can do the same in reverse, but Odus is less popular).

Qeynos (Major Hub)

Humans and Half-Elves can start in Qeynos or (for Druids/Ranger)s nearby Surefall Glade. Barbarians start in nearby Halas, but will have to level up a little (maybe level 5?) before they can safely run through Blackburrow to join their Qeynos friends. Erudites can safely take the boat to Qeynos at level 1.

Because of Qeynos Aqueducts, Qeynos Hills, Western Karana, Everfrost, Permafrost, and especially Blackburrow, players starting in this hub have many great leveling options.

Swamp (Minor Hub)

Ogres and Trolls start in the "swamp hub", at Grobb and Oggok respectively, with adjacent Innothule Swamp and Feerrott as starting areas. After a few levels (5?) players can safely run through the Desert of Ro to reach the Commons Hub (and vice versa).

This hub has South Ro, Oasis, Rathe Mountains, Temple of Cazic Thule and Upper Guk for low-level players to level in.

Commons (Major Hub)

Humans and Half-Elves staring in Freeport, Dark Elves starting in Neriak, and Halflings starting in Rivervale can all access the East Commons and West Commons fairly easily to join each other. Also, players from the Faydwer Hub can easily reach this one via boat, and vice versa (although Dark Elves will find it slightly more difficult).

With both Commons, Nektulos Forest, Kithicor Forest (Daytime), Misty Thicket, North Ro, Befallen, Oasis, Lavastorm Mountains, Sol A, Runnyeye Citadel, etc.

Faydwer (Major Hub)

Wood Elves from Kelethin, High Elves from Felwithe, Dwarves from Kaladim, and Gnomes from Ak'Anon can all reach each other fairly easily. They can also easily join Freeport hub players (and vice versa) via the boat.

Players at this hub can share Greater Faydark, Lesser Faydark, Butcherblock Mountains, Steamfont Mountains, Crushbone, Dagnor's Cauldron, and Unrest.

Kunark (Minor Hub)

Iksar alone start on Kunark. They have the choice of several starting zones, and a nice progression of zone options after that. Many players consider these zones (and dungeons such as Kurn's Tower to be better than earlier starting areas, because the devs had learned lessons from building those earlier zones.

However Iksar are somewhat isolated, and need to level up or rely heavily on ports (and SoW and Invisibility) to be able to join non-Iksar players.