Rift's sixth playable race, the Kelari, was recently revealed, so we decided to chat with Defiant Lore Lead Morgan Lockheart to find out more about these unique elves.

ZAM: That being said, it's no secret that certain races within Rift: Planes of Telara seem to be more suited for specific classes than others. Did you want race to play a large role in affecting the effectiveness in which a race can do its job, or is the intention more to make racial benefits nice to have, but not class-defining?

Morgan: Trying not to restrict player choice, we did try to come up with abilities that would be generally useful. We didn't want the usefulness of the racial abilities to suffer too much from the desire to make them fully generic, though. Racial lore informed the flavor of the class abilities, and so some swayed toward a calling or two if the race's lore did. We hope that there is nothing really unbalancing, however, as we don't want someone who wants to play a Bahmi and a mage to feel like they can't because it would under power them drastically.

ZAM: With the addition of the Kelari race, we now have an even balance between the Guardians and the Defiant, with both factions having an elf race (High Elves and the Kelari), a physically powerful race (Dwarves and the Bahmi) and a human race (the Mathosian and the Eth). Some players have been saddened, however, that there doesn't appear to be a more visually unique race making its way into Rift lore. Was it an intentional decision to make all races in Rift humanoid in nature, or will we be seeing more races in the near or distant future?

Morgan: For the player races themselves, it's very intentional.  Player races are critical, and supporting a vast quantity of visible gear appearances is every bit as important.   

This particular choice of races lets us ship a game that has far more distinct gear appearances at launch than any of us have worked on in the past. 

That said, you do ask about the lore - and especially in a world with such a huge focus on the planes, you'll find that there are creatures of all appearances, and who can say in which direction we'll choose to expand the game in the future!

ZAM: Has there ever been any concern at Trion Worlds about racial unbalance making its way into Rift: Planes of Telara? If any racial unbalance does occur (say, a 70% / 30% spread), are there plans to restrict faction joining (or introduce a "cool" race to the lesser faction), or do you plan to take a more "laissez-faire" approach, knowing that the issue can solve itself?

Morgan: An awareness of potential imbalance in the factions is something that certainly enters into our design decisions, and we are careful to always preserve parity in what we are doing.

We want the factional conflict to be able to be fun and relevant, which would not be possible with too much of a divide. Going so far as to actually restrict faction choice is not something we are considering, but active decisions like adding stand out mounts or races or locations is more along the lines of a course we will take.

Right now, we're focused on making both sides awesome in their own way and watching how the population split reacts during existing testing, and reacting accordingly.  It's been going extremely well so far.

ZAM: And as a final general question, it certainly does sound like development at Trion Worlds is accelerating! With your plans to launch some time in 2011 and a closed beta on the way, many players have noted that the level of polish in Rift's playable demos is pretty much top-notch; far beyond what many other MMOs even achieve at launch day! How "ready" do you think Rift is, as an MMORPG for the masses?

Morgan: That's always really good to hear!  The entire team has been working insanely hard to make sure we bring out a game that people are really going to appreciate the quality of.  Even so, we still wouldn't quite want to launch tomorrow.  We believe we can deliver something even better with our remaining development and polish time.

If what we have right now is a nine, we are striving for a ten. The fact that the dev team goes home and plays for many hours of their personal time, though, speaks to the fact that we expect this game is going to be something many people enjoy for many hours of their day, week, year… maybe even decade!

ZAM: And that's all we have for now! Thanks a lot for taking the time to chat a little about Rift's newest inducted race, the Kelari, and best of luck as things really get down to the wire!

Morgan: We appreciate the questions. When this game succeeds, it is going to have everything to do with the strong support from the MMO community. So, thank you!