Scout Archive

I know, I know, to many posts on the stupid MS that got nerfed and not fixed. Even though the Devs way back when said they would not nerf anything, and if they had to make a change, they would immediately make change to make it fair and NOT NERFED. So much for that.

Anyway, I run around with MS on, maybe "they" say its not what its supposed to be used for, but for Scouts only viable use. I only get xp from Agressive mobs, ie red on my radar. Problem is, non agressive mobs, ie yellow on my radar can detect it and make it shut off. This is not only counter productive, but really unfair and unbalancing for the Scouts. As many have said, we have few ways to make Scout xp, and the one way that got nerfed, doesn't even work fairly.

Bottom line, NON AGRESSIVE MOBS SHOULD BE DETECT/SHUT OFF YOUR MS. ONLY THE AGRESSIVE ONES THAT GIVE YOU XP.

Also, the fact that I have seen Devs say that MS was only to "sneak up on agressive mobs and not to run around with out getting agroed" is lame. That's all fine for a creature handler, but a pure Scout like me, doesnt do me much good. The main thing about the Scout is they can run around and explore. You know, how we get terrian movement, hightened burst run etc. Well I do this a lot and its nice to not have to worry about the agro mobs, to often, because of my MS. Well the delay is bad enough, and having the non-agro mobs cancel it really sux.

In EQ the Rangers and Druids had a spell to keep them from being agroed on by mobs, so they could run around in the wild with less worries. It just makes sence for MS to do the same thing for the Scout/Ranger, since they are the masters of the wild.

What do the rest of you think?

Who ultimately decides the difference between a "nerf" and a "fix"? The difference is purely subjective.Seems like if you like the change you call it a "fix" and if you don'tlike the change you call it a "nerf". There are far too many compaints about supposed "nerfs" on these boards. I think /maskScent is fine the way it is now, but then again it is a subjective topic isn't it? You have the right to complain, of course, and I'm not even going to begin to tell you not to, I'm just wanting to know if there is some "Nerf Judge" out there that I don't know about that officially declares what changes qualify as "nerfs" and which do not.

LOL, you are correct that is subjective. So lets forget I called it a nerf.

Now, how about the fact that scouts have very little ways of making scout xp, and few ways that make them unique and usefull as masters of the wild.

Any ideas on those thoughts?

I think it was simpler for them to just make your success rate 0% around non-aggressive mobs than it was for them to reduce the XP.

Frankly, I get plenty of scouting exp just from harvesting. I was actually surprised to see the +50xp message float up while sneaking past something. Didn't even know about MaskScent and scouting exp. I use MaskScent _just_ to avoid getting attacked. Unfortunately now that it's been gimped, its usefulness is in question.

I'd much rather they removed the exp gains from MaskScent entirely but made it much much harder to break, and faster (or preferably instant) refresh. It's a -tool- to sneak around unseen. It shouldn't be considered a "quick and dirty" way to get scouting exp. Harvesting is something you'll do every kill ANYWAY, and you can use the hides / bones for -something- (even if you just sell them).

Now, what I wouldn't mind, is if Foraging gave Wilderness xp.... standing in place, not moving, while I scratch around on the ground for (a) nothing, (b) ONE jar of bugs - yum! or (c) yet more fishing bait..... there's not a lot of incentive to do it. If I got a little bit of Wilderness Survival exp, though, I might Forage more often.

Sorpa, I agree with forage. I posted on the petetion for it to give Survival xp.

As for the MS xp, I have no problem if they get rid of the xp for it, or lower it. As long as it's useful, as you said. Drop the xp for it all together, and make it a little more powerfull and not so easy to break.

And as I first stated, Not to be broken by Non-Agro mobs at all. Why should they be able to break it, they are not the ones I'm trying to avoid. Am I alone in this thinking? No has said anything about that prart of it.

Some good ideas here. I also believe that foraging should give some experience. I mean, artisans get experience from harvesting, foraging is essentially the same thing.

I also agree with the mask scent. Make the non-aggressive mobs 0. A scout knows what and what not to mask his scent from, that's part of being a scout. I also think one of the defining abilities of a scout should be the ability to explorer. We have a title of explorer even and of hunter. Hence, we should be able to move around virtually undetected in the wilderness.

I was testing it out last night again and was very disappointed. Even green mobs were detecting me. I would be more than happy if they removed the experience (we don't get any from it anymore anyways) and made the timer shorter and the success higher. I also noticed on the rare chance it did work (I was able to walk through a camp of 3 swarming dewbacks), I wasn't gettting experience. For 2 hours of running around last night I only got one hit of experience for 97 scouting points.

Just my 2 credits on this topic again.

Not to sound like I know everything, but.... Isn't the purpose of MS to successfully navigate around and/or through agro mobs without being attacked? Therefore the only answer I can surmise is that MS is not supposed to be used around non-agro mobs that will not attack you anyway.

I know there are several arguments to my statement. Such as, "Well, what if a single non-agro mob is next to a group of 15 agro mobs?" A: You're screwed? I know there's nothing I can do about it, but I'm just giving a possible reason why this was done. My answer to pretty much every question would be "I don't know." And that's just because I don't really know, I'm just guessing as to a possible reason. I'm not saying that I agree with this at all. I personall wouldn't care about gaining exp from it, especially if I was using it to get back to loot my fresh corpse without being killed repeatedly by agro mobs.

And the exp for it seems silly, too. From what I gather, if you use it and a creature just ignores you and doesn't try to detect you, then you get no exp. If it tries to detect you and does, then you get no exp. But if it tries to detect you and fails, due to your amazing skill at hiding your natural scent, then you are rewarded with a pittance of exp.

Yea... seems pretty FU to me.

Robo, I guess my problem is that I run around with MS on all the time. When I encounter a bunch of yellow dots/arrows on my radar, my MS is sometimes detected. I guess I could leave it off, and only turn on when I see some red dots/arrows on my radar. But that is a step that should not be neccassary.

Just my 2 creds.

Some of you Scouts may be feeling the pinch of MS failing alot (or at least more than you want it to) but realize that Rangers continue to get points in camouflage that aids in MS working better. By the time you get up the Ranger Wayfaring tree MS doesn't fail often. Compare the points in camo at Master Scout (+50, or +30 for less than Master) with that at Master Ranger (+100). If the devs made MS work at least 70% for you Scouts, what would Rangers have left?

Lets think about this. In the the real wild, what are the most alert animals? The hardest to sneak up on?

Answer: Non-aggressive animals such as deer, rabbits, etc...

Why? Because there always being hunted by predators. Do you think even a very good hunter in RLcan sneak up on a deer? Of course not.A deer is always on the lookout for threats, and will bolt in an instant.

Non-aggressive animals are food for aggressive animals, so what does an aggressive animal need with highly acute senses? Of course they need good eyesight to see there prey, but they don't need to be sniffing all the time to make sure there is not a predator behind them.

Its called evolution, those that spend there life watching there back all the time will develophighly tuned senses. Those that are at the top of the food chain get lazy in a way.

It is correct the way it is.

Your right its fine the way it is cuz a gorg i trip over coming out of bestine should always detect my +70 camo.

Plz its majorly gimped right now, making rangers that much more of a broken elite class than before. I don't care one way or the other about the xp i get from aggros but the nerf bat hit mask alittle to hard and its broken now.