What is the redeeming quality of the Wraith race?

There isn't one.  The faction is pretty good, but the race is shit.  The -1hp per level is really painful with nothing to balance it out.  The 3hp per kill is somewhat useful to a new, low level Sov/Champ, but it soon becomes worthless and the hp penalty becomes quite a burden.  And for troops, the 3hp per kill is nothing and the -1hp is devastating.

Resoln gets demons with each shard. They are really cool. A different sort of demon for each shard type. In the early-mid game these are quite powerful. By the later game you should have more powerful magic units being drafted from your cities.

That's a feature of the Resoln faction though, not of the Wraith race.

Nothing, they suck.

Wraith blood also unlocks some unit traits but they suck as well.

Zealot: +3 initiative. -1 hp per level.

Thereby reducing the unit's hp per level to 0. Enough said.

Hallowed Rite: +5 mana per kill.

A half decent reward but your probably better off taking a trait that helps compensate for Wraiths being so weak. You also actually have to have the unit get the final blow, which can be very inconvenient.

The Wraith get two unique unit-traits, but they are not strong enough to balance out the -1 HP per level. Hallowed Rites grants +3 Mana per kill, which is quite decent, but Zealot is just painful. +3 Initiative in exchange for another -1 HP per level. Really? Is +3 Initiative really good enough to give up all Bonus-HP from levels? I don't think so.

I think it will be better if the +3 hp is per hit, not per kill. Thus wraith units can replenish their puny health whenever hitting enemies. Consider them sucking the life energy out of the enemies

ALSO, make Hallowed Rite +mana per hit. If +5 is too much, make it +1 or +2.

Fixing the Wraith is as simple as removing the -1 hitpoints per level. There. Done. Their bonus ability will still be kinda suck, but they have a couple of unit-traits (one of which will now be vaguely usable instead of utterly pointless). At least then they won't be any worse than Tarth, who immediately have no trait at all as soon as you have the audacity to have more than a measly three units.

Recently i've been RP'ing a reanimated dead faction (as best the in-game tools allow).

Wraith
Binding - free shard monsters
Cult of a Hundred Eyes - Three teirs of spider units with one being available on turn 1
Enchanters - a couple unique weapons and Scrying Pond which adds +1 essence

i take the no armor penalty to RP the weakness of old dead bodies. This race already gets -1hp. One thing i do to make up for that is to found a couple cities with 2 or more essence. Then select the Conclave city upgrade for the free +1 essence. Scyring Pond give +1 more. i've had up to 5 essence in one city. Then there is the Arcane Forge which grants +1 Material per essence! In my conclave cities i'm getting at least +4 Materials. Can crank out uber units to somewhat make up for HP and armor weakness. 

Early game i get mass mana, commerce, and/or research all dependent on what kinds of magic Heros get me. When time to war, ideally i have the city spells which give +1 fire attack per essence, +1 defense, +1 initiative. i've tried with Amarian blood as well. Lots of synergy there. But the wraith fit better my imaginings here. And Zealotry ain't too bad a trait on ranged staff units. And sometimes i'll use it on suicidal fodder units.

The early spiders are huge help. As are the shard monsters. The extra essence is very significant with the right spells. Fun build for now. Not the most competitive set-up perhaps, but when playing for imagination versus pwnage, it works for me. 

For Sovereign i've been picking Warlock and Brilliant, with Death II and Water I. Then choosing the Path of Mage. i'd use Fire magic but thats not how this RP'd faction rolls. Ideally i pick up a Fire using Hero by time i need the +1 fire attack per essence. Adds a quest like aspect to the play.. trying to recruit Air, Fire and Earth heros for their +1 per essence modifiers. 


 

No this is definitely the wrong way to go. I don't want another bland race with no real strengths or characteristics. Why not just take away all racial abilities while your at it. I would rather Wraiths got a good ability that was stronger then their weakness, like true health drain or something. Wraiths have a lot of potential that is unrealized. They could be an awesome vampiric team.

I would like them to have +1 dodge per level and +25% to all elemental resistances to balance them out.  

I don't really agree with resistance to all elements. I would say resistance to water, earth, and death. 

i think a blanket 25%magic resistance makes sense since they have shattered their physical selves for raw magical power. Procipinee has the knowledge of high ritualistic magic backing her up, but resoln has used dark, transformative magic to reach places of power that procipinee can't imagine. Magic should indeed be a dull blade when used against resoln.

What is this earth, water and death damage? All I know is fire, cold and lightning...

I think the dodge is pushing it, but I might be wrong a nice idea though.

Sincerely
~ Kongdej

A Wraith race makes me think of wispy near ghostly creatures, hard to hit and damage. But i've yet to learn much Elemental lore so don't know their e-cannon. i agree with those who think the -1HP/level is harsh as things are now. The only thought i've put into tweaking the Wraiths is to give them some minor dodge perks while keeping the HP weakness. 

The +3 mana per kill perk is quite nice. Unfortunately, it's hardly worth the health penalty.  I do not how hard it would be to change it, but if both the +3 hp and the + 3 mana perks were made 'per individual killed' as opposed to 'per unit killed', I think they would be useful the whole game long.

The +3 initiative, 0 hps on level up perk should be fixed, period.  It's ridiculous.

Now, a +3 initiative, +1 initiative per level perk would be interesting, with the 0 hps per level.  I can see myself trying it, combined with the +3 mana per kill.

i don't know why people expect the races to be individually balanced against each other. imo, the faction creator is basically cheating, premade empires, with their race, exist for a reason.

Clearly, the wraith are simply a cursed people. And Oracle Ceresa is the one to unite them, to help overcome their weaknesses. 

heh, just playing against the AI is cheating Faction Creator is cool, fun things come from it.

Wraith chicks are hot man

Wraith is for a spell caster sovereign/hero focused empire. Make sure you have either fire or death, or both. Water/Death helps of course too (if you've played Resoln you'd know for sure). Have your champions blow mana and deal plenty of initial damage to take out key targets, or weaken the enemy with spells like mass curse. Then have your trained units finish off the targets to replenish mana and health. Pretty good when they have ranged staffs.

Having lower HP custom wraith races should focus on either ranged attacks or high armour values. High armour values mean you take less damage making that 3 HP gain effectively 'more' HP. EG if 10 damage was reduced down to 3 damage due to armour, then your hp gain from kills would be 'worth' ten HP. By this definition having Earth could help too (Cloak of Nature+Stone skin, mana upkeep replenished by Rite), but I don't think its as effective as avoiding taking damage by killing the amount of men in each troop before damage is exchanged.

You can work around the -1hp/level weakness, the question is why would you? Thing is normal trained units, for all races, are on shaky ground already - they're generally outshined by champions and whatever special units your faction/sovereign/race get (binding demons, henchmen, juggernauts, tamed animals, spiders, etc.). Most games I only use trained units if I get a bonus to them, say Gilden's excellent +1hp/level and armor bonus, or Magnar's fast and cheap slaves; without something like that, it's debatable if unmodified trained units are worth bothering with at all.

For a race that not only gets no meaningful bonus to its trained units, but actually gets the crippling -1hp/level (not to mention lack of armor), why would you waste time training them at all? Why would you look for ways to get around that weakness? There are better things to focus your production/gold/research on - champions, demons, spiders, assuming you're Resoln (no custom faction would choose wraiths). Resoln's racial weakness isn't an extra challenge to overcome, it's a reason to forget about trained units and never look back, it's that bad.

This. [Although, I'd be polite call the faction creator a sandbox, rather than cheating]. As it stands, the game is more a toy, to play with, rather than a game to win. Both options are good, but providing options for one usually detracts from the other. The more interesting strengths and weaknesses you put in the game, the more broken builds you're going to find. You can easily fix this, by taking away the faction and unit designers.. that helps make factions distinct and you can tell more of a story just through faction design (see Sins and Civ:FfH2 for good examples. Maybe SC2 too?). 

Of course, if you do this, you remove one of the central pillars of the game: all the customization stuff. The game is a big toybox and some of those toys in the box are less awesome than others.

(personally, i'd prefer a more "designed" game, as I tihnk that would play more to Kael's strengths, as evident from his previous work, but hey, Ele:FE is what it is. Cant please everybody)

Perhaps the best way to balance the Wraiths would be to give them a 10% tactical spell casting discount. They can remain as fragile as they are today, but their Sovs and Champs will suddenly have a very specific niche: spellcasting glass cannon. Then there would actually be a reason to make a custom faction featuring Wraiths.

The reason that races should be balanced, is it would be more fun.  Think about it.  Making the Wraiths worthy to play, makes the game have more options and more fun to play.  I have eliminated the Wraith race as an option for custom factions.  Why use a faction that provids nothing but a penalty, when I could create the same faction with a race that has bonuses.  

Maybe I want to recreate Resoln.  Resoln has Adepts, Binding, Spiders, death magic, and No Armor.  Not bad at all, but why take a -1hp penalty to my troops when instead I can have trogs and get +20 weight and Juggernauts?  

I want the options to be hard.  Do I want Men's Henchmen, or Ironeers +1hp and magic resist, or Quendar's slaves, or maybe Yithril's strength and jugs?  I sure as fuck don't want a penalty with a shit ability in return.

And saying creating custom factions is cheating is ridiculous.  

Haven't tried them. Are they just melee? +5 mana per kill sounds like a recipe for arcane archers to me. I have monks as per somebody else's suggestions Monk Staff, Monk Robes with all the dodge traits and built in a well enchanted buff fortress city. They kick butt. As the Pariden race I get -1 hp per level I think, doesn't seem to bother these guys.

Sounds good. Make it so. 

Though I also like the idea of making their mana mean more to them. Somehow tie in mana to the overall might of the race itself. The more magic they have stored up, the tougher they are, or stronger, faster etc. Giving the race whos all about magical energies real power behind having an abundance of said magical energy.