Ranger Archive
Thread: [Focus Thread] Can Ranger be accepted versus creatures only?
AragornSoS wrote:
Or to put it in simple, CL terms... if what Phen says is true, and a ranger limited to 1/3 of the game would therefore in balance terms tend to be approximately 3x "better" than any other character in that 1/3 we were limited too... that's like saying for everyone else fighint krayts, they are CL80 to the krayts CL88 or 90-something, but for Rangers, it's like the Ranger is CL240 vs the krayt being still CL88-92 or whatever they cap out at. Massively and completely unbalanced, and actually not all that fun for us Rangers.
Um.... Ranger gives you a CL of 54 doesn't it? CL 80 is double template, so it would be more like CL 242 hehe. Now, a Master Bio Engineer is only CL 17. With Master Ranger that is either CL 62 or CL 64, I can't remember which. However, a Master Bio Engineer / Master of a Jedi profession will be CL 80. CL 80 is the cap, but it represents the skills in the boxes that are used to obtain that status in comparison to less-developed creatures / npcs / players.
A big part of the thrill for me personally is using my skills to win a tough fight (against stuff like the Gorax, krayts, kimos, etc) - I don't want to have a CL-induced "1 shot kill" since I'm so massively overpowered in the PvCreature game that *nothing* can challenge me. I know that's not exactly how it would end up being implemented, but if we WERE forced to be the only profession even remotely related to combat that was forcibly gimped into only being viable in 1/3 of the game, making us so much stronger for that 1/3 to make the cost to Master Ranger (or even dabble in it) would be massively out of whack.
I'm very much opposed to having Ranger continue to be forcibly limited to only PvCreature. I'd much rather at least see our skills be applicable in ALL facets of the game. Phen's post on the "combat enhancer" sums up very nicely how I guess I've thought about Ranger for a while... the Ranger part of me supplements the side of me and lets me do more damage, more precisely, when and where *I* decide to. His latest concept just really fleshes that out, a lot. And with the SL changes really pushing them into a very active, literally leading the troops into the middle of combat role, there's a lot of space for Ranger to pick up a complimentary "role" in the game that revolves around stealth, enhancing combat and toughness to set traps and scout areas in advance of those squads, etc. There might EVEN be some Master-level synergy that allows a MR to camo a squad and concel the whole squad from radar or something, but all of those skills and mods should go to making the Ranger one tough, stealthy and hardy mofo... NOT an uber tanker necessarily, or a nuker or anything like that... but someone who has the master level skills, then uses Ranger to enhance them, either making the skills a little stronger / hit a littler harder (by applying states w/traps) or by being a little bit tougher than your average person wandering about in the wild, and able to withstand just a little more punishment than the average person.
If it comes to pass that Ranger is "redone" yet still bears the limitation of skills that only working against creatures, I'd be much more likley to move to SL or CH or BH or Smuggler, keeping some scout, and live the Ranger lifestyle, since that is not likely a profession that I'd want to continue to play over the long term (unless they make it so ONLY Rangers can loot the good stuff - pearls, tissues, scales, etc). And that will never happen.
Other than that, nicely put.
I would not like to see our profession restricted either. Unfortunately, my opinion is that every one of our skills aids us to be able to make use of the creature harvesting tree, and that is pretty much it. We are too involved in the economical aspect of this game to be taken seriously as a combat profession, and they still arguably call is anything related to combat (outside the scope of the combat upgrade, then considered a combat profession when entertainer buffs were getting revamped, so they haven't really stated what we are.)
BioEngine wrote:
Um.... Ranger gives you a CL of 54 doesn't it? CL 80 is double template, so it would be more like CL 242 hehe. Now, a Master Bio Engineer is only CL 17. With Master Ranger that is either CL 62 or CL 64, I can't remember which. However, a Master Bio Engineer / Master of a Jedi profession will be CL 80. CL 80 is the cap, but it represents the skills in the boxes that are used to obtain that status in comparison to less-developed creatures / npcs / players.
True. I was going under the assumption of a character who was Master Ranger + Master <Combat prof of your choice> here, since the only MR / MBE I knew left the game a while ago (tho she just came back recently as a MDoc now I think). I don't think any Master Ranger would go up against a krayt as JUST a Master Ranger... even if you didn't die, trying to kill one of them with a CDEF pistol or rifle.... ouch. I don't have that many days to waste, it would be like a race to see what happens first, do you get the beastie or does the server reset! 
So yah, you could play with it any number of ways and end up with a Master Ranger / <some other profession combo> and not be quite CL80, but you get the point. Either way, if I'm theoretically CL200-ish to a krayt being CL88 or 92 or 94... that's just crazy and unbalanced.
BioEngine wrote:
Other than that, nicely put.
I would not like to see our profession restricted either. Unfortunately, my opinion is that every one of our skills aids us to be able to make use of the creature harvesting tree, and that is pretty much it. We are too involved in the economical aspect of this game to be taken seriously as a combat profession, and they still arguably call is anything related to combat (outside the scope of the combat upgrade, then considered a combat profession when entertainer buffs were getting revamped, so they haven't really stated what we are.)
I would actually debate how true that particular point is these days. Prior to the CU, and even just after, I was raking in boatloads of cash in hunting contracts. I generally had more requests for my serivces than I could fill. I went nuts on creature loot wh0ring (GDK scales FTW! Woolamander bones! Gurk Hides, get your Gurk King Hides here!), and generally made money hand. over. fist. Once things started to settle down post CU tho... the resource market just seemed to drop out. I haven't gotten a single request for any large-scale harvesting in probably a month or more, the most recent things I've seen are a couple requests for milk and eggs from a chef I like to help out from time to time, and other than that... nada. I think it's a combination of a bunch of the long time AS and tailor types leaving the game in disgust with the changes the CU brought and the multi-publish-spanning catastrophic crafting mess with BE tissues and the like, and the fact that now even folks with novice scouts can pull in just insane amounts of organics in record time. I generally hunt solo or with one or two other Master Rangers (or did until they quit), but right after the CU, I was still seeing some calls for organics on the trade forum... and when I'd contact the requester a couple hours to a day later in game to see how much they'd like of what I'd gotten, would find out that they'd already been SWARMED with a bunch of novice scout-types dropping off literally MILLIONS of units of hide or whatever in the first few hours.
AragornSoS wrote:
BioEngine wrote:
Other than that, nicely put.
I would not like to see our profession restricted either. Unfortunately, my opinion is that every one of our skills aids us to be able to make use of the creature harvesting tree, and that is pretty much it. We are too involved in the economical aspect of this game to be taken seriously as a combat profession, and they still arguably call is anything related to combat (outside the scope of the combat upgrade, then considered a combat profession when entertainer buffs were getting revamped, so they haven't really stated what we are.)
I would actually debate how true that particular point is these days. Prior to the CU, and even just after, I was raking in boatloads of cash in hunting contracts. I generally had more requests for my serivces than I could fill. I went nuts on creature loot wh0ring (GDK scales FTW! Woolamander bones! Gurk Hides, get your Gurk King Hides here!), and generally made money hand. over. fist. Once things started to settle down post CU tho... the resource market just seemed to drop out. I haven't gotten a single request for any large-scale harvesting in probably a month or more, the most recent things I've seen are a couple requests for milk and eggs from a chef I like to help out from time to time, and other than that... nada. I think it's a combination of a bunch of the long time AS and tailor types leaving the game in disgust with the changes the CU brought and the multi-publish-spanning catastrophic crafting mess with BE tissues and the like, and the fact that now even folks with novice scouts can pull in just insane amounts of organics in record time. I generally hunt solo or with one or two other Master Rangers (or did until they quit), but right after the CU, I was still seeing some calls for organics on the trade forum... and when I'd contact the requester a couple hours to a day later in game to see how much they'd like of what I'd gotten, would find out that they'd already been SWARMED with a bunch of novice scout-types dropping off literally MILLIONS of units of hide or whatever in the first few hours.
I play for fun, not to "Work" like that, and there's no way that I can, or will, try and compete with a bunch of kids who do nothing but hunt and harvest all day to make a huge haul and grab for credits anywhere they can, and flood the market to the point that nobody is buying ANYTHING these days really. Most of my income at this point comes from the odd tracking or resource request for a good friend or something, and they decide to tip me 'cause we're buddies after all. Or from JtL. There's insane money to be made with JtL between duty missions, looted credits, and selling parts that are otherwise worthless (But keep the goodstuff for RE, check before you sell!!). I think my "looted credits" chip in my inventory is about to go over 1million credits (I'm 3/4 of the way thru my 3rd squadron mastering pilot) and I'm not stopping or cashing it in any time soon - I want to see how big I can get it, and it's kind of nice to know that I can get a quick cash infusion in no time.
That is what I am hoping, that organics are no longer scarce and we are no longer needed for creature harvesting. The same thing happened on our server, and now not even our "I buy everything in no limit at 5 cpu for organics" guy has stopped posting on the forums.
I also use JTL for my credits, sadly enough. When Ranger's state gets me down, I go blow up some Imp ships. Unfortunately, I am cautious because once I CTD'd in space and my starship was only viewable in my datapad, I couldn't use it, and CSR tickets returned "We cannot verify the loss of items due to server crash" so I just deleted it. My Advanced X-Wing has taken damage because I CTD while doing the Debris Cult duty missions from Yavin IV.
I can't wait until the POB upgrade and Capitol Ships. I am considered a space veteran in our guild, because I really enjoy that aspect of Star Wars. There isn't any "Rangers don't fly ships" nonsense to deal with, hehe.
It feels too off to have to play a triple mastery and still get killed by lvl 80 NPCs but not lvl 80 animals. I understand the reason, with traps and all, but realistically speaking if we're all CL80 why not make it at least a bit more enhancement related so we can take down both types of "creatures" equally? Focusing mainly on animals will put us at an advantage over all animals of a certain CL, which is fine when they're below 80, but it'd unbalance the game far too much to go making us able to kill animals quicker because; realistically, it'd seem like "Well, you can kill that gubbar quick, so why can't you use the same skills to kill that soldier?"
I see what you're saying about needing higher powered traps and us being harvesting kings, but to limit our profession to mere traveling threshers of ranger ability seems rather off. Just because I can kill and skin a bantha in 3 minutes flat doesn't make me any less able to kill and skin a rebel in any less time. Just seems like if we're to keep with the balance of the CU and how the world works around us, we must go towards an enhancing methodology that makes us equally good against creatures and npcs, although we'll obviously have more options against animals with traps and all, it still ought to remain an equal leveled system so that the world doesn't have to change to better meet our new standard of ranger, but that we can change to make the world conform to our new roles.
How can you balance Rangers to be more powerful than any other profession without imbalancing PvCreature combat? Simply put, I don't think you can.
I have to agree with Phenix on this point. To a degree I agree with Owen-Lars' take as well, although for slightly different reasons.
We have three major obstacles:
1) There are disperate views of what a "Ranger" is. What are we?
2) How do you justify the skillpoint cost regardless of these views?
3) Where will the profession fit in regards to others.
Unfortunately these are closely related to each other. The more skillpoints, the more power, usefulness, fluff we should be entitled to.
If the profession continues to have a creature-centric focus, it should be extremely effective against creatures for its current costs. If that happens, what occurs when say a Bounty Hunter decides to add Ranger? You potentially end up with a horribly unbalanced template that is very good against NPCs and insanely powerful against critters.
If the profession goes as a more generic survivalist and combat support, it might be easier to balance. You can give some general combat bonuses like any other combat profession, a few utility abilities like harvesting, camps, and traps, then some fluff.
There are a ton of directions to take this, but until we know what the profession will be, even trying to narrow down the options will be painful.
As to the original question of "Can the Ranger be accepted versus creatures only", I say maybe.
It can be boosted a little bit against creatures, but to keep it within a reasonable balance it can't be too good, and the current skillpoint cost cannot justify it.
I think it would be easier to turn it into a spec-ops, survivalist, guerrilla-like profession to give it better balance. At least if it is going to keep the same skillpoint cost.
Me personally, I have always considered Ranger a big game hunter type. That being said, I think if the Creature-to-hit bonus we are granted actually made a difference, I would be pleased with that small improvement. That would then make us more effective against creatures, (wether through a small damage increase, a shot at landing more critical hits, improved attack speed against creatures, etc.)without unevening things as far as I can see.
As far as Npc's I do like the fact that for the most part our Camoflauge works against them (atleast it does on Farstar...dont know about elsewhere) I do think that our traps should work against npcs and to some extent other players, I figure if the tranqualizer, sticky mesh, light, etc. is effective against some of the largest and toughest creatures in the game, why shouldnt they be against humanoids?
I think that with a few tweaks here and there we would be pretty set, of copurse thats just from what I have seen in my few days back in Rangerland.
Ranger as creature-centric is an old view based on how the spawn and wildlife of SWG once was. Of course the fact that a fambaa isn't a fambaa but a CL XX fambaa doesn't help.
Back when there were no vehicles, no player cities and no harvester ghettos every 500m on every planet, SWG was a lush and fertile universe.
Living the Ranger dream was fulfilling, even though our creature-to-hit mods have never worked and dizzy never had an impact on creatures, because we were gifted with wild spawns everywhere and fully functional creature AI.
You could just set of in one direction and never look back. Every creature you encountered was a potential target and nobody knew the horror of 'grey cons' that would one day ruin the lifestyle of Rangers in SWG.
Now SWG is made up of Padawans, Super Battle Droids and all sorts NPCs picked randomly from the Episode I-II-III timeframe. A few new critters have been added but most of them on the Rangers-aren't-welcome-zone-hell-from-invsible-wall-of-d00m planet of Kashyyk. Yay for Terrain Negotiation when you aren't even allowed to climb the smalles hill.
The only thing the wildlife in SWG is still good for is grinding bols on Dantooine.
If I want to roam my favourite planet, Naboo, and encounter creatures that don't die instantly due to somebody dropping them in a bucket of grey paint – I have t pull them at the candy-machien next to the starport
Oku Kee'lus
BioEngine wrote:We cannot be a single profession with power equal to a combat profession without imbalancing our skills in comparison to those other combat professions.
Nonsense. Smugglers are a combat profession and get smuggler-content, a Master Smuggler even pays 19 SP less than a Master Ranger and ends up with a fully fledged combat-character and the smuggler-content. A Master Ranger end up with Ranger-content and no firepower.
First of all, we are forced to pick up a combat profession to make use of Ranger. A Ranger-only will never match a Rifleman/Carbineer/Pistoleer-only. The 140 SP we pay to Master Ranger is for the rangerish content.
... and that's how it works in SWG. Every single profession that has content besides combat mods pays a little extra SP for that content. Squad Leaders, Smugglers, Combat Medics etc. but they pay a lot less for more and their pre-reqs are even combat skills, combat skills that we have to pay extra for after we put in 140 for Master Ranger.
If anything, we should have the same combat mods as a Squad Leader, our rangerish content and then some icing on the cake for the extra SP we invest.
I think to determine the role of Ranger, or the way it might be implemented we need to look at another similarly placed class (in my opinion): Bounty Hunter. The Bounty Hunter profession as it is implemented is not entirely self sufficient. To be very effective it needs to be paired up with some other combat related profession. Its specials are useful and mostly effective, but still complement those in other combat professions very nicely. Its requirements are such that it melds well with other professions and allows for saving some points spent in gaining the profession, and by contrast the current Ranger costs far more than any other profession and provides far less for that cost. Bounty Hunter has a sort of symbiotic relationship with the various combat professions, complimenting them effectivelly and ensuring the result is greater than the sum of the two parts. Smuggler is much the same in its own way.
I would like to see Ranger turned into a such a symbiotic profession, so that if we are matched up with certain other professions we take on various roles that reflect aspects of the Outdoorsman/Militar Ranger dichotomy. Pair Ranger up with BE and you get a naturalist, able to navigate the wilds, protect themselves somewhat and avoid aggro while engaging in scientific research. Pair Ranger up with Rifle and you get the Outdoorsman able to go hunt Big Game effectively and efficiently. Pair Ranger up with Pistol and you get the Lawman type able to track down individuals and use their specials to take them out. Pair Ranger up with Carbineer or Commando and you get the Military Scout, able to navigate amongst the enemy unnoticed and report on their activities, and equipped to defend themselves but not ready to take on the world. Drop a Ranger in the wild and they should be self sufficient, able to heal themselves from poultices made from foraged supplies, able to feed themselves and maintain their comfort in their camps, etc.
I think that in keeping with the rest of the CU design, we need to have 2 required prerequisite lines and not all of Scout as it is currently. This might necessitate some changes to Scout of course but hopefully thats not needed.
A Master Scout can harvest almost as effectively as we can? Okay, forget harvesting as our major feature. A Scout's traps are the most effective ones, and ours are not so effective? Okay forget traps as a major feature. A Scout's camps are pretty decent (sic, ok so camps are almost useless, fix them with scout), forget Camps as a major feature. Scout Terrain Negotiation is pretty much all thats required? I am sure you can see my trend here, lets stop viewing Ranger as some continuation of Scout. Its a separate profession, so let us go several steps beyond Scout.
Okay my suggestions (made at 2am on not enough sleep. Forgive me if it rehashes old arguments I haven't read through yet, this is off the top of my head right now):
Change the requirements to be Unarmed IV (from Brawler) and Trapping (From Scout). That puts us in a similar situation to Bounty Hunter or Smuggler, taking prerequisites from 2 other starter professions, and allowing templates to take advantage of this and share the points spent in that regard. Why Unarmed IV - well, first off because the Ranged Support line already has too many professions off it, and Unarmed only has a few, and secondly I was struck with images of Jim Booie (sp?) and Dan'l Boone suddenly, and realized that I associate brawling/knifefighting skills with Rangers too as part of survivalist type activities and Unarmed IV is as close as we get to that ingame.
Ranger the profession would have 4 lines:
* Subterfuge - this line provides stealth abilities only available to the Ranger. In effect this is our Ghillie Suit, it requires no parts, no manufacturing etc, and can be turned on at any time, but slows our movement considerably. It provides visual invisibility (as per Conceal/Force Cloak etc) when stationary, and makes us hard to see visually when moving (think the Predator in the movie), and it makes us invisible on Radar. This effect is lost if we engage in combat and there is a long timer for putting it on again. It cannot be used while mounted or on a vehicle. You can still make Camo kits for use by other people as per the current kits, they are simply not required by the Ranger unless they want no penalty to movement.
* Tracking - as per the current tracking skill line. No changes.
* Pathfinder - This line adds skills relating to the Military Role of the Ranger, chances to avoid NPC attention, substantial Melee and Ranged Defense bonuses, bonuses to accuracy and damage when fighting humanoids etc.
* Outdoorsman - This line provides abilities relating to foraging, natural medecines and cures, creature knowledge, harvesting, whatever is suitable to reflect the role of big game hunter. It probably provides some group buffs similar to those being added to Squad Leader but pertaining specifically to helping a group hunt large scale mobs. Harvest increase buffs, Luck buffs for loot dropping (similar to the Luck FS skill perhaps, adding another +4 potentially?), group accuracy versus creatures, whatever. Also provides substantial Melee and Ranged Defense bonuses, and bonuses to accuracy and damage when fighting creatures.
So with something like above in place, its possible to produce a Master Ranger/Master Rifleman/Master Scout who is the (forgive the term) Great White Hunter, and its possible to produce a Master Ranger/Master Commando with some medic skills who is a Special Forces Op type. Its even possible to dabble in Ranger and take on only say the Outdoorsman and Tracking lines if you want and spend the other points elsewhere.
Just my 2c
Phenix makes a great point about us being a combat augmenting / survivalist (if you will) profession. I love hunting critters (that's why i picked up Ranger ) I also like being a killer ( far different than a murderer )thats whyI picked up BH.
My over all goal is to make my Ranger a gun toating version of Strider (Aragorn). Well versed in wilderness survival, handling dangerouscreatures, land navigation, able to avoid detection at will, and put a blast of hot energy through any person who wants to do him harm.
That being said as long as any future changes to Ranger alow me to continue todo this are just finewith me. However if they want us to be "Gurila warriors / Army Ranger" type, then give us the skills to do so. If the over all Goal is to make us more (or keep us, depending on your point of view)Creature Combat, then give us the mods and skills to do our job effectivly.