Ranger Archive
Thread: Ranger Revamp: The Focus (Tier Names)
Owen-Lars
Sun Dec 26, 2004 12:58 pm
#79
Sounds good, ill be waiting to see it.
We arnt arguing or anything, just discussing how we see rangers. We clash on a few things i think because alot of us know uniqueness and new definition is required. Our primary role NEEDS to be unique in order for us to develope as a profession. Hands up who wants to be a super scout? I want to be a ranger, through and through, thats it. I want to be recognised for my skills and have people think, thats a ranger over there, they do something like noone else, they are my heros. Well leave off the end part but you get my picture 
Waste93
Sun Dec 26, 2004 4:39 pm
#80
Owen-Lars wrote:
Waste it just seems to me that you are basing your opinionsabout thefuture developements of ranger based on the current ranger skill set and orientation. Forget the direction we have now, the main problem we have is the current orientation is bad, we dont have uniqueness.
Of course. Because unless you are also changing the base pre-reqs which is what all elite professions have their skills based upon.
Being a recon unit steps on no-ones toes,reconcan be well justified to being a ranger role mainly because the current ranger role is not unique. Forget what ranger is now, this is not just a revamp that is needed, its a redefinition. We are combat orientated so there is no reason for us not to have a combat related role such as recon. Survival is key but isnt unique therefore should SUPPORT the primary role, not have other roles support it.
You can have a recon role. But nor a recon primary focus. You also forget that as part of the revamp we can make survival unique.
So just to sum up:
- Military means you fights for an army or cause. A commando isnt military in swg, nor is Bh, smuggler, rifleman, sl, carb, tk, pike or any other class for that matter. Why should it be a factor in ranger development if it hasnt for anyone else.
That is where you are wrong. Three professions are nothing but military. Combat Medic, Commando, and Squad Leader. Those very terms indicate they are military. As do a number of tier names including Sniper, Gunner, Soldier, Assaulter, Grenadier and a host of others. They indicate that those skills are military in nature. The list is even longer if you include the para-military or dual use names. Rifleman itself can be a military name for Infantry. Carbineer has a similar dual use.
- Rangers are the masters of concealment and stealth already, no other class comes close so a stealth therefore recon role is justified.
Another error. You are equating stealth to recon. They aren't the same thing. They are completely seperate. It's quite possible to do recon with no stealth what so ever. Is it useful? Sure, in some instances. And this is why I say stress the Hunter angle for these skills. Military stealth skills are great vs people. But they are much less useful vs creatures. Reason being that military camo is about sight and sound. Creature camo is about sight, sound, and smell. Creatures are much easier to spook and have better senses, in general, than people. Even in SW. So if you are good enough to hide, stalk, etc a creature, you are well within your rights to be able to do so vs a person.
Waste93
Sun Dec 26, 2004 4:44 pm
#81
RohmEnari wrote:
Having been in the military and gone through Ranger training, I kinda take exception to that comment. They mostcertainly can be defined as skills available to a Ranger.
The word Commando comes from the Dutch and came into use during the Boer wars. The meaning is lightly armed fast moving units that operate behind enemy lines. Ranger is a more American word that means roughly the same thing and came into use during the French and Indian War. Where the present Ranger Creed comes from.
Perhaps if we were to start looking at things from a perspective contrary to what we know and also look at things outside the box, then we may open our minds up to the idea that these are Rangers from a different UNIVERSE. The definition of what a Ranger is in the Star Wars Universe is now ours to define. Why limit ourselves to what we know as the Rangers here in the Real World? Allow for some new ideas to creep into your heads and create a NEW vision for what a Ranger can be. The possibilities are only held in check by the conceived notions of what we believe a Ranger HAS to be.
The reason is because the word has a specific meaning. We use the word Ranger in SWG because of its Real World meaning to convey that meaning in SWG. There are two meanings for Ranger. Based on the skills and the pre-req of Rangers in SWG it indicates which version is meant.
Message Edited by Waste93 on 12-26-2004 05:09 PM
Owen-Lars
Sun Dec 26, 2004 6:48 pm
#82
"Three professions are nothing but military. Combat Medic, Commando, and Squad Leader. Those very terms indicate they are military. As do a number of tier names including Sniper, Gunner, Soldier, Assaulter, Grenadier and a host of others. They indicate that those skills are military in nature. The list is even longer if you include the para-military or dual use names. Rifleman itself can be a military name for Infantry. Carbineer has a similar dual use."
Bah i wrote up my reply but all i seem to be doing is repeating the same points because they dont seem to be 'clicking' with you, you just dont seem to get my way of thinking. So ill start again and just summarise in a few short sentances:
There are no 'Military' professions in swg no matter how much you want them, they just dont exist. Training is done outside of ANY militart organisation or army in swg therefore you cant be a military person just for having skills. To do so you would need to join the gcw for a side, or role play a side, but again this is player choice, not profession need.
What you mean is combat orientation. There are combat orientated professions out there, some more combat orientated than others, some less than others, thats all. There are weapon speacialisations, simply allow you to adopt a role specific to that weapon and learn to fight using that weapon. Not having a firearm or melee weapon specialisation as a pre-req does not mean in any way at all that you cannot be combat effective. It just means you have not learn how to wield that specific weapon type correctly.
Scout IS combat orientated, therefore can justify a combat role (without firearms or melee weapons of course)
Ranger should be based off the scout concepts only not the skills themselves. The concepts are stealth, information gather, analysis techniques, hunting, wilderness survival, specialist weapon, exploration. The primary role for ranger cannot be one of these, it wont be unique, not matter what you do, it will be better granted but never unique. The primary role needs to be one that allows the player to use the concepts to perform the primary role. For instance recon.
I dont know why you have so many issues with recon being one of alot of roles. No other profession is suited more to it than rangers, and no toes would be stepped on. When we do get our revamp and if it involves recon skills then it sounds like you are expecting ranger to be a recon unit always and none stop. We are making 4 tiers that allow us to do lots of unique things under one all encompassing heading, ranger. The roles that our profession allows us to do are simply due to the skills we will have. Thats why we are planning the roles. If ranger actually had a universal meaning then we would have ranger as our primary role, but there isnt so recon skills come top of the list as stealth, hunting, information gathering, trapping and pathfinding all point towards it as areas an sw ranger would cover.
Phenix1050
Sun Dec 26, 2004 6:54 pm
#83
The problem, in my mind is in the definition of Ranger. This trumps all other issues. Because some people really believe what Waste said-- something along the line of "Rangers should be hunters." But many of us don't want to be just hunters.
Waste-- you say that the word Ranger is a term that basically means the same thing as Commando-- but you also say that we should be hunters. Something is very wrong if that's the case. We have commando's in the game. But they aren't military-style commando's. They are more "Rambo" style warriors-- big guns, lots of damage-dealing. and we know that they're not going to drastically change that. So there is room in the game for a "true" commando-- one that is a light assault troop.
Now before we get into what is "military" and what is not, let's look at something very important-- this is an MMORPG. One of the dificulties in creating an RPG is skill balance. You can't make someone into a "soldier" and give them all the skills of a soldier. An Army Ranger has training in several different skills. First of all, they are masters of several weapons. They are also in extremely good shape, and able to traverse hills with ease. They aslos know how to survive in the wilderness.
Now you can't give all these skills to one profession. So the issue becomes where to break tke skills. Which skills go best together?
In my mind, it's broken down like this: weapons professions are the "combat" aspect of a military unit. Think of a combat profession as a person who has spent their entire time in the military on the firing range. They can shoot with the best of them. Now think of Ranger as a person who spent their entire military training in running through the mountains, learning how to survive by killing animals and harvesting their componants, learning how to hide and learning how to make traps from nature. That's a Ranger.
So Ranger is 1/2 of a true military training. It isn't a full military unit by itself. Just like a rifleman shouldn't be the same as infantry-- infantry is also trained hard physically to improve stamina and the ability to cross varied terrain.
Besides, Waste-- rifleman have conceal shot-- explain to me where riflemen learn to conceal themselves. Answer: they don't. Shooting a rifle all day doesn't teach you how to conceal yourself. Get rid of conceal shot for rifleman and make it something that only someone with master ranger and rifleman can do and I'll actually listen to you. Because right now, your own skill set proves that you don't always need the pre-reqs to get skills. Riflemen need no scout whatsoever. They don't need camoflage and yet they can shoot animals all day without getting aggro'd. Where are the pre-req's for that? If you don't want to sound hypocritical then you should insist that Riflemen lose /concealshot-- or they have a pre-req of getting the camo line from Ranger.
Being in the military is about more than shooting a gun. Even for infantry. Even for special forces. Even for real Rangers. What a SWG Ranger should be is the other half of military training-- evasion, recon, tracking. Not hunting. YES, we can be hunters too-- but more in a "hunt for survival" way. Collect more resources, yes-- but as a result of military trainig designed to keep us alive in the wilderness. Two people each kill an animal-- the one able to retrieve more meat, bone and skin is going to last longer. Harvesting should just be part of our role-- not the focus.
Basically Waste-- the problem with Ranger is with people who think like you: creature-centric. And that's not saying anything bad about you. But you can't have a profession that is one-sided. If you want to call riflemen the "infantry" well then I say that infantry aren't trained to shoot deer or any other animal. They don't shoot targets shaped like bears, do they?No, they shoot human-shapedtargets.So you shouldn't be able to hunt animals. Or you should only have skills that apply to killing NPC's and PC's. See how crappy an idea that is?
Rangers are the recon and survival training that combat professions are lacking. So Recon is a perfect focus for us. We are the evaders, the shadows, the people who have trained their bodies to survive. and yes, they have learned how to use combat against animals more effectively.
Like I said, in an RPG, you have to split skills up. You can't just have "soldier". Because there are so many things a soldier is good at. Most infantry are trained to use several different weapons-- machine guns, rifles, pistols, shotguns, knives. They are also trained to run long distances up mountains, and to cook rations in the wilderness AND how to survive. But you can't make rifleman have all those skills. You need to divy them up.
So Pistoleer is where you pick up those pistol skills, rifleman is where you pick up the rifle skills, fencer is where you'd pick up the knives skills-- and as for Ranger-- that's where you pick up the equivalent of military training.
By the way Waste-- Rifleman doesn't equal infantry. Rifleman = guy good with rifles. a serial killer can be good with a rifle-- doesn't make his infantry. YOU are the one who insists on trying to put military terms to all the professions. So please, stay consistant and realize that if you want to think of combat classes as military units, then Rangers will be too. As will chefs, doctors, armorsmiths, weaponsmiths and every other profession.
Owen-Lars
Sun Dec 26, 2004 6:59 pm
#84
Doh er ya what phen said ............
"Based on the skills and the pre-req of Rangers in SWG it indicates which version is meant"
This is exactly what is wrong with ranger as it stands. The role that was picked out is far too restrictive, so different from the sw ranger, so generic and un-unique. Its this that needs to change and its that what you cant seem to grasp.
The problem is not what skills ranger has or doesnt have, its that the skills are aimed in a direction that was limited from the start, that never had any potential and one that only provided oportunities to enhance scout skills.
You see scout as a complete house, all you want to do is dress the interior up, the walls are already in and add the rest of the stuff to make it look prety. We truth is the base profession is only the foundation, you build the house on top of those and the foundations support the building. In the same way scout is where you learn the basics, ranger is a completely other profession, one which should move off in its own direction whilst still taking into acount the 'ideas' covered in the foundations, scout.
These ideas would be:
- Stealth
- Survival
- Information Gathering
- Hunting
- Trapping
- Exploration
If ranger only required survival line the fair enough, we could become the survival rangers, but we are not, we are more, we need stealth, exploration and all the others in too and one of many roles would be recon. Think about it, some of your skillslearn how to go unnoticed, you learn how to survive on your own for long periods of time, how to gather information and how to trap. What is the next progression from that? A sneaky, behind enemy lines, intel gathering, trapping, unit. A recon unit or the perfect representation of how i percieve the ultimate sw recon unit, a ranger. The ranger would also have other skills to, all that fit and give depth to the profession.
Message Edited by Owen-Lars on 12-27-2004 02:06 AM
Nemo0
Sun Dec 26, 2004 10:07 pm
#85
Waste93 wrote:
That is where you are wrong. Three professions are nothing but military. Combat Medic, Commando, and Squad Leader. Those very terms indicate they are military. As do a number of tier names including Sniper, Gunner, Soldier, Assaulter, Grenadier and a host of others. They indicate that those skills are military in nature. The list is even longer if you include the para-military or dual use names. Rifleman itself can be a military name for Infantry. Carbineer has a similar dual use.
Ever hear of a lone sniper shooting innocent civilians in a town? They might have military training but the military will not claim responsibility for that person's actions. Similar examples can be pulled up for most of those, especially in the context of the game.
A purely military role would indicate that you could only use your skills in the service of the military. That is exactly why players can't sign up to be Storm Troopers--they are military units that don't get a personal life. Yes, they might get a bit of leave but they are usually on the job and have to do what they are told. Players are not meant to be military. Their skills or titles might be used in a military fashion (they can even get military ranks) but they are not sitting around, forced to do what the Empire/Rebellion tells them to. That wouldn't be fun.
On the other hand, you seem to be making this a discussion of semantics. The main point of a game is to have fun. The titles are there to add flavor to the game and give some idea of the types of skills a player might have. Many Rangers believe a role centered around Recon would be fun. There is no balance reason why we cannot be given that role and our prereqs are not completely divergent from that role (significantly less than a smuggler's skills stemming from pistols and unarmed, I would argue). That is enough of a reason to implement a role. Having semantically accurate titles is a bonus--this thread does ask for title ideas so that this can be achieved. The Ranger tree needs a complete revamp, not just a few upgrades. There is no reason we can't push the Devs towards any role that we believe is justifiable, fun, and balanced. A single role is not enough for an elite profession but it helps discussion to think of one driving role and several sub roles. The Ranger community (at this time) appears to believe that Recon sounds like a more fun role than Survivalist. Being that this is a game based in a fictional universe, that is a reasonable argument.
As for the titles, they don't completely define the skills. Just because we have a recon focus doesn't mean that all the recon skills in the game must go to us. Commandos are not the only heavy weapons users, even if they are heavy weapons specialists. But we would like to be the best suited for recon and there is no current reason why we can't ask for such a role. There is also no reason we can't use something like the High Tech Field Base as a recon post with all sorts of sensor feeds from satellites and everything (have you seen that thing?). On the other hand, we would still need a slicer to hack into an enemy computer system.
Owen-Lars
Mon Dec 27, 2004 5:44 am
#86
Again that is hinting at class interdependancies which i love. We would be able to get certain info, by visual analysis, research and satalites but then you also have smugglers who could use our htfb to gain more insight into more specific intel areas via slicing.
Such areas could include finding vuln times for bases, the stats on a certain weapon, the skill layout of the players at the base, id even go as far as to say listening in on conversations, now that would be fun. Two different intel roles from two extremely different professions, i like that idea.
Huntseeker
Mon Dec 27, 2004 9:12 am
#87
Ok time for my 2 cents on what the rangers teirs ought to be.
Primary role:
Woodsman: This role places us as survialists, hunters, terrain negitiators. We live in the wild, have the ability to live off the land and negotiate large distances. By being woodsmen we have the largest ability to be both efficent at creature harvesting and foraging (wither that includes medical forageing it's a disscussion for another time) as well as building camps, hides (camaflage that s in the form of a temp structure similar to camps), camoflage, traps as well as other equipment we are required to use.
Secondary role:
Recon: This role comes with the use of rangers as a robust character in any party, wither it is to advance infront of a party giving vital information back to the leader of a party, or wither it is tracking down a large creature for hunting. In cases of hunting people we provide detailed information as to their party size, and what they are equiped with (could be a faction war?). With creatures it could be the statics, how much of a challenge it is to kill.
Teir 1: Concealment ability (ghost)
box 1: Basic Camoflage
box 2: Basic Camo Techniques
box 3: Advance Camo
box 4: Adv Camoflage Techniques
Ok with this Teir the aim is concealment, wither it's from players or animals the ability not to be sensed is vital for the rangers. With concealment, this can work in the form a ghilie suit, to masking their own scent, to building a hide, or just simply blend in with the outdoor enviroment . (before wasted get's on my case about ghilie suit (anyone calls them a gila suit and I've got a few nightsister rancors to meet them) they are used by scottish game wardens and were NOT used by millitary until WWII, and before you ask yes they are still used in places by scottish game wardens (more in the protection of endangered wildlife)).
Teir 2: Terrain negotiation and Tracking: (pathfinder)
box 1: Basic Tracking and terrain movement
box 2: Improved tracking and Terrain movement
box 3: People tracker Adv terrain movement
box 4: Exceptional tracking and terrain movement
The idea behind the pathfinder is that they are able to move through terain with nearly or none at all terrain negotiation. Also with this tree our ability to track anything in the area or on a more specific mannor if hunting a spectific prey able to zone on on that target and follow the trail, though this may wearout with time and elements.
Teir 3: Outdoor Artistian (Outdoorsman)
box 1: Basic items
box 2: improved items
box 3: electronic items
box 4: adv items
The idea behind this teir is that an Outdoorsman is able to construct a wide varitey of items which a ranger is required to use as well as experiment on their quality, wither this is traps, constructions, hunting equipment (blow darts, bows, whatever), camoflage, and the list can go on. As the outdoorman goes through the teirs they receive more adv toys to play with. Also Camps become reusable, meaning while their up they will lose condition points as well as general wear and tear from basic use (similar to verichles atm). Also to increase the usefulness of rangers we have portable dataterminals which allow those of the Roguish\military proffessions the ability to gather information wither it is faction detectors, local area stalite detection, or simply allow last known position of targets or send false information across the network of datapads extra.
Teir 4: Hunter/trapper (HUNTER)
Box 1: Novice hunter
box 2: Improved hunter
box 3: Good Hunter
box 4: Exceptional Hunter
The idea of this teir is the combat section of rangering, here we benifit through trapping and our combat abilities against animals (and yes in general combat abilities. As the ranger progresses through the hunter teir, he learns about creatures, what are their habits etc, and about the kills, what are the prime choices of meat, and what are the best hides. As the ranger progress this ability increases the ammounts of units types increase, as well as when group hunting, the ranger also gets an increase of the ammount they harvest (for example basic group harvest atm requires 40% given out therefore a ranger should be able to expect a better harvest even grouped. Also in this skillset the ranger is able to use a combination of traps/weapons to create traps of larger scale and or capible of effect NPC's and players. also on the side of exceptional hunter a sudden kill option could be brought in to make it more worthwhile, the sudden kill means exactly that, takes the fun out of combat but instead it give's better quality meats, not allowing the animals to tense up extra, this would either effect a ranger specific weapon if ever brought in) or just a general combat weapon. As well as that we would also various combat bonouses (defenses etc, well combating animals is pretty much like fighting 13 yrold jedi )
Primary role:
Woodsman: This role places us as survialists, hunters, terrain negitiators. We live in the wild, have the ability to live off the land and negotiate large distances. By being woodsmen we have the largest ability to be both efficent at creature harvesting and foraging (wither that includes medical forageing it's a disscussion for another time) as well as building camps, hides (camaflage that s in the form of a temp structure similar to camps), camoflage, traps as well as other equipment we are required to use.
Secondary role:
Recon: This role comes with the use of rangers as a robust character in any party, wither it is to advance infront of a party giving vital information back to the leader of a party, or wither it is tracking down a large creature for hunting. In cases of hunting people we provide detailed information as to their party size, and what they are equiped with (could be a faction war?). With creatures it could be the statics, how much of a challenge it is to kill.
Teir 1: Concealment ability (ghost)
box 1: Basic Camoflage
box 2: Basic Camo Techniques
box 3: Advance Camo
box 4: Adv Camoflage Techniques
Ok with this Teir the aim is concealment, wither it's from players or animals the ability not to be sensed is vital for the rangers. With concealment, this can work in the form a ghilie suit, to masking their own scent, to building a hide, or just simply blend in with the outdoor enviroment . (before wasted get's on my case about ghilie suit (anyone calls them a gila suit and I've got a few nightsister rancors to meet them) they are used by scottish game wardens and were NOT used by millitary until WWII, and before you ask yes they are still used in places by scottish game wardens (more in the protection of endangered wildlife)).
Teir 2: Terrain negotiation and Tracking: (pathfinder)
box 1: Basic Tracking and terrain movement
box 2: Improved tracking and Terrain movement
box 3: People tracker Adv terrain movement
box 4: Exceptional tracking and terrain movement
The idea behind the pathfinder is that they are able to move through terain with nearly or none at all terrain negotiation. Also with this tree our ability to track anything in the area or on a more specific mannor if hunting a spectific prey able to zone on on that target and follow the trail, though this may wearout with time and elements.
Teir 3: Outdoor Artistian (Outdoorsman)
box 1: Basic items
box 2: improved items
box 3: electronic items
box 4: adv items
The idea behind this teir is that an Outdoorsman is able to construct a wide varitey of items which a ranger is required to use as well as experiment on their quality, wither this is traps, constructions, hunting equipment (blow darts, bows, whatever), camoflage, and the list can go on. As the outdoorman goes through the teirs they receive more adv toys to play with. Also Camps become reusable, meaning while their up they will lose condition points as well as general wear and tear from basic use (similar to verichles atm). Also to increase the usefulness of rangers we have portable dataterminals which allow those of the Roguish\military proffessions the ability to gather information wither it is faction detectors, local area stalite detection, or simply allow last known position of targets or send false information across the network of datapads extra.
Teir 4: Hunter/trapper (HUNTER)
Box 1: Novice hunter
box 2: Improved hunter
box 3: Good Hunter
box 4: Exceptional Hunter
The idea of this teir is the combat section of rangering, here we benifit through trapping and our combat abilities against animals (and yes in general combat abilities. As the ranger progresses through the hunter teir, he learns about creatures, what are their habits etc, and about the kills, what are the prime choices of meat, and what are the best hides. As the ranger progress this ability increases the ammounts of units types increase, as well as when group hunting, the ranger also gets an increase of the ammount they harvest (for example basic group harvest atm requires 40% given out therefore a ranger should be able to expect a better harvest even grouped. Also in this skillset the ranger is able to use a combination of traps/weapons to create traps of larger scale and or capible of effect NPC's and players. also on the side of exceptional hunter a sudden kill option could be brought in to make it more worthwhile, the sudden kill means exactly that, takes the fun out of combat but instead it give's better quality meats, not allowing the animals to tense up extra, this would either effect a ranger specific weapon if ever brought in) or just a general combat weapon. As well as that we would also various combat bonouses (defenses etc, well combating animals is pretty much like fighting 13 yrold jedi )
Message Edited by Huntseeker on 12-27-2004 04:46 PM
Cauil
Tue Dec 28, 2004 4:32 am
#88
I think ranger is a cool profession but suffers from a lack of variety.
Camps should, in addition to getting bigger, offer increased variety. What about the ability at Master Ranger to repair vehicles at a camp? Make the requirements for making the camp include items such as power to reflect this.
Give Master Rangers the option of buying a faction camp kit that they then add to a camp so that they can, when overt, errect a faction camp complete with a small turret and recruiter. Maybe make rank mean something and allow better faction kits as the ranger's rank improves. Maybe eventaully add small fortifications, trenches, something along those lines.
Allow camping kits that produce a mission terminal.
These should not be all in one camp, but multiple choices. And the list of items needed should represent the strength of a camp.
These are just a few ideas regarding camps because camps come into play making a ranger a valuable addition to a group. But what about a small percentage reduction to encumbrance when wearing organic armor? Or ranger specific weapons, nothing uber just different.
Eh, just my two cents.
DaveG
Mon Jan 03, 2005 7:22 pm
#89
I've just read through this page of the thread, and wanted to comment on a few emerging themes. I'm splitting this up into two parts, philosphoical and practical:
As ranger is now, we shouldn't really be called Ranger, we should be called "Hunter", or even "Master Hunter", that's what we are, because are so creature orientated. The only thing we can do towards non-creature entities is /areatrack them, then additionally we can provide player service/support by means of camoflauge and camp healing (albeit incomplete; we lack battle fatigue healing).
As has been said, a strength of "ranger" is that we have no other prerequisits but scout, which means we are free to choose any other profession. This is a strength because it means you don't have to as combat orientated as most rangers are. You could go ranger/bio-engineer for example, and use your stealth to help you get your samples. To get more mainstream though, we have the freedom to go firearm or melee, which does create a big difference to how a character functions.
With this freedom in mind, if we look inwards to "ranger", we have both combative and non-combative abilities. From here, wemust start thinking of"how to think outside of the box" and to question what a ranger is.
"What IS a ranger in SWG?",
and then from this we must ask: do we want to flesh out both our combative and non-combative roles or do we want to just focus on one or the other?
The role of recon has been brought up. As has been rightly said, recon can be done with or without stealth. However, you must ask yourselves, in what SWG-related context could a character actually perform recon? (regardless of stealth or lack there of). The actual act of reconnaissance is to gather information on your ememies/opponents. Well in SWG we can already do this, you use the chat box! The only further way I think this could be realised is by a group effectively using a "recon" skilled player as some sort of "sensor probe"
Let's go back to theposts which said rangeris perhaps too creature orientated. First lets look at the combat-effective side of ranger. If we want to be less constrained to creature combat, we have a problem. Every mention in the past of giving rangers some sort of offensive capability towards NPC and/or players has been met with fierce opposition, both on this board and elsewhere. (For the record, I think we should be able to use our traps on everything, the only differences between people and creatures would be the relative chance of success, imho).
Combining the above two paragraphs, we tentatively come to the issue of stealth. At this point we have the same problem as riflemen do with conceal shot in PvP. SOE have said they'll never allow stealth against players, because players could find external programs to crack other players stealth and hence render a stealth system useless.
Progressing from thata little bit, perhaps, rather than Ranger having combat pre-requisits, we could have a whole raft of skill mods bestowed onto us as we progress (i.e. skill mods for all combat professions, only "active" once you take novice in a given combat profession). Not only would this reward people who specialise in a single combat skill, but it would also assist those who choose to split their skill points between different combat professions (for instance you take carbine or rifles, and a melee profession to finish off anything that gets up close to you). However, then we must ask, should these skill mods only apply to creature combat?
Well all of the above covers the possible combat dimensions of what we do. Let's talk about non-combat things. Personnally, I think some sort of herbalist skills should be added, this would add a whole new crafting dimension to what we are. This is possible that we'd step on territory of chefs and doctors, however other professions overlap, so why shouldn't we?
This is perhaps a personal bias, but I think that whatever ranger becomes, it should ahere to two rules. Our abilities should enhance and be useful to a group, but at the same time, we should be far more self-sufficient in the wild when we're alone than any other profession. Here's my suggestion, we forage for ingredients to make poison/disease cures, however we need to be in a camp to do this. Therefore, it forces the use of camps (perhaps crafting station would be required), and it makes foraging more useful. Yeah okay, this isn't too far out of the box, it's still relying on existing skills.
That's all for now.
Message Edited by DaveG on 01-04-2005 02:25 AM
kujikiri
Fri Jan 07, 2005 8:57 am
#90
As you can tell by my post count, I dont post here much. But after reading through this thread, which started out so great, I'm inspired to comment. I've been playing the ranger since I started in swg, it's part of who I am. In RL I was an infantry soldier (86-94), 14 years ago I was a team leader for an LRS team (used to be called LRRP). We were all about stealth, our job was to sneak in, recon some critical point (for days at a time) and get out alive, which meant nobody ever saw us. Being an army ranger, to me, is not about being in a ranger bat, it's about being an elite, you don't learn to shoot a rifle at ranger school, you learn about patrolling and small unit tactics (and how to stay awake and alert when your body is telling you it's about to give out). Being a swg ranger I see myself in a similar role, in my group of friends we go hunting with me tracking for targets, and especially with tough ones like sisters I head out and get in range of them to see what's up first, using camo. Then call out to the rifles what i think is the best avenue of approach. Recon is an important skill, if it's not the ranger's job in swg, then who's is it? This is what ranger means to me, please don't anyone here lecture me on what ranger SHOULD mean TO ME. I've been so excited to see all the great ideas in this forum and hope that the devs will use them, but I also trust the devs to keep the class balanced with the other classes based on their big balance project.Sorry I wrote so much.
My comment on the tiers is that in each tier I think the level 4 box should include bonuses for the group that the ranger is in. He's the group guide and leader through the wilderness, while the SL will lead them in combat and confer bonuses to them there, the ranger should be able to give the team some skills. terrain neg may be an overlap, get a bonus from SL for efficient formations and the ranger also for efficient pathfinding.
My comment on the tiers is that in each tier I think the level 4 box should include bonuses for the group that the ranger is in. He's the group guide and leader through the wilderness, while the SL will lead them in combat and confer bonuses to them there, the ranger should be able to give the team some skills. terrain neg may be an overlap, get a bonus from SL for efficient formations and the ranger also for efficient pathfinding.
Owen-Lars
Fri Jan 07, 2005 9:29 am
#91
Kujukiri Wrote:
"You don't learn to shoot a rifle at ranger school, you learn about patrolling and small unit tactics (and how to stay awake and alert when your body is telling you it's about to give out)"
This is also how i feel about the situation. Rangers in swg have so much potential and so much room for development. I have never wanted to be a super scout and its the top concern in my eyes for our revamp. We should definatly take what we learn in scout on board but ranger should be ranger, an elite proffession in its own right.
Put it this way:
You go to scout boot camp, you learn how to trap, hunt, conceal, survive and gather information. To learn this basic skills you use them on targets and prey that are less of a threat to you, and refine your techniques.
Then you qualify for ranger camp. You take what you have learnt and learn how to become a ranger. You dont learn how to be a better scout, you learn to become a ranger. This may involve enhancing aspects of the skills you learnt at scout boot camp but they are not advanced scout skills, they are rangerskills and part of what make youa ranger.
So you get into ranger camp, you start learning how to pathfind, how to lead a group through rough the wilderness, how to gather intel, how to move without getting seen and how to use the wilderness as a weapon and tool. The skills you learnt in scout boot camp give you a basic understanding of the areas you could cover in ranger but these are ranger skills and are not designed to just enhance what you already know. They are meant to take what you know use it as a foundation to learn something else, to learn ranger.