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Lupines are inferior to their Felidae counter parts.
Thats something many agree on.
1.) One of the main arguments is how The instincts of the Felidae are Arguably better than the Instinct of the Lupine.

Str, Wil, Def, Res for the Lupine
Ski, Cel, Luc, Guile for the Feliade

Both good but the fact that they count to the maximum limit of stats boosts you can have quickly reduce the effectiveness of both (Str and Will buffs are universally more common aswell from items and skills. Making it much sooner not even apply the full bonus and making building San less desireable.) if they happen to use any other buffs. With a 40 San build both gain 10 in each stat, which is already half of the maximum you can have. I'd argue that both could need their instincts be adjusted to work like Vampires stats, and not count to the maximum 20 points of buffable stats you can have, as its technically racial stats.
However Felidae is universally more useful with their stats as almost every build needs Ski or Luc, while Str and Wil can be missing entirely and Def/Res are at a certain thereshold only "Nice to have" and a rather minimal boost.


2.)
What makes Felidaes however undiniably better is Fleetfoot. Movements is an insanely powerful as a stat. War cry absolutely pales in comparision. Not only does War Cry cost a valuable skill pool slot (Make it a trait instead and not cost a skill pool slot). Its effects are underwhelming and still costs 10FP even with 40 San (it costs 50-Scaled San FP, which also makes it unuseable for new players.)
The level of hunted in can maximally apply is less than bloody palm does passively for dealing magic damage. That alone makes it super unattactive but it also needs an infliciton check so you have to actively build for it, for a minimal effect and minimal damage. Over all? Warcry is in an insanely bad position and can't hold its candle to the what the Felidaes get.

While instincts are just arguably better and kinda depend on their user, their secondary skill is without a doubt better for Felidaes....So I was thinking to maybe give the Lupines something that seems to fit their offensive and long living nature more...

Could they maybe get instead something that increases their armor and magic armor, in the same way the instincts raise stats? (1+10% San at 50% HP and doubles at 25%)
This would give them a little edge again and make them a bit more tanky.


3.) The Prayer for the Lupines also lost a bit of it's appeal now that it's buffed physical resisatnce got lowered to effectively just 2% instead of 5% and War Cry is still terrible even with it. So could the Lupine part of the trait maybe increase the Lupines Instinct level or if we get the added Armor/Magic Armor added, increase that instead? I think this would lift Lupines up a bit again to make them able to compete with their counter parts again.


Bonus: Grimalkins should get their own instinct, which is like Felidaes just that they get Wil instead of guile.

The only gripe I have with Lupine is that their prayer buff isn't very good for specifically them anymore and you're always better off going Chimeric warpaint on them.

I'd rather Lupine's warpaint give something other than Phys. DEF, that'd be the most logical path I'd take for them, their instinct stats are fine as is, and their Warcry is pretty trash considering how much FP it costs for such a mediocre effect and low damage, the effect on it could definitely stand to be better.

Yop Chimeric Paint is actually better for Lupines, which is funny.

My idea was mainly to make them more tanky via Armor/magic armor, since being hard to bring down kinda seemed to be their theme.

Fleet foot is just so much better to have than War Cry can currently ever hope to be. And its Passive. So giving them passive armor instead would have been my approach.

But I am up for better ideas, I personally am Also fine with how their instincts work, minus the fact it counts to the maximum boostable stat cap, making me regret building too much San.

I could see War Cry being a buff to the lupine as well, while still being thematic to what it is, a war cry.

War Cry bestows 1 + (1 per 10 scaled SAN) STR, Armor and Magic Armor for x rounds, scaling multiple times per enemy hit with War Cry. (x = Scaled SAN/10)

So Eg. you run up to a group of people, hit like 4 or 5 targets, and gain stat capped STR (20) and 20/25 Armor and Magic Armor.

If it's not a super short duration, I can see it working but then again. It would basically screw over a part of your instinct again. Building San shouldn't have theeffective turnout of certain skills reduced.

I could also see, thematically, War Cry giving you fear immunity for X rounds. As well...You are War crying, so you are facing death basically anyway. War cry certainly needs alot of fixing to make it even worth a skill pool slot.

I more or less consider my main characters a few Lupines, and a Felidae. While it's true that war cry is useless even built purely for sound damage and Felidae get +move instead of it, the existing racials combined aren't that bad for a Lupine aside from that. I can hit 110 str at low health from the instinct, and that really buffs the Sharp Claws and makes me feel pretty in tune with my character in that regard.

If a lot of people are of the opinion it needs buffed, I'de suggest looking to make war cry more appealing to slot.

Currently you get a free (Depending on your sanctity, each SAN lowers the FP cost by one I believe and it starts at 50) two tile wide aoe that does around 40 damage if you're being optimistic and built for it. It then rolls against their status res for inflicting Fear and a negligible hunted that is outscaled by equipping bloodypalms instead.

TLDR Examples

Example 1 (Indirect Method (Racial Prayer Tool Focus)): Lupine prayer tool now gives LV*10 extra damage on War Cry and reduces its FP cost by LV*2 - And possibly change the 5% physical DR. (I would LOVE the felidae sharp claw LV*2 buff, I'm not sure how people feel about the races claws though.)

Example 2 (Direct Method (Racial Skill Focus)): War cry now always applies Hunted and Fear if the target is not at max health, with increasing duration and LV based on their missing health.

Example 3 (Alternative Approach (Something else entirely)): Toss on some predatory instinct baby version of fallcall racial trait to Lupine that gives them 10% Damage buff to feared people or something.


What do you guys feel could be done to make Lupine more appealing to you?

I definitely do agree that the prayer tool is extremely weighted towards Chimeric. Faster ramping up of your tank stats is too good to pass up, and if your IC involves hunting you'll want the extra hunt LV for your bloody palms.