Subguild w/ Ranger 'Vision'

[eska]

No elf would ever want to have a subguild nomad or caravan guide.

Elves have a reason to be "guides."

1. Tricking non-elves into letting them be 'guided' by an elf.
2. Leading raiding parties.

Bendune, pilot and ride?? Come on, which elf would want to have these three?? Besides, as most of the people against this idea would suggest, there are ranger elves who can lead the raiding parties, guide the slaves to Nak or that tricking. To me, this thread is meant to make your uber-warriors (or magickers) more uber with adding them the ability to move to wherever they wish to go.
PS: I hate being unable to navigate through a storm. I lost a few of my favorite warriors or magickers because of that. And when they died, I just thought about the very same idea mentioned under this topic.

[FantasyWriter]

This isn't a hack & slash... you CAN ignore skills on your skill lists or even send in a request to have them removed.
More than once, I have chosen a guild or subguild and not used some of the skills because it wasn't IC, but I needed the guild or subguild for a skill that was IC.

[AmandaGreathouse]

And YAY! for scavengers having the "forage food"

Yay indeed, my friend. Yay indeed. God I love that subguild.

[IntuitiveApathy]

And YAY! for scavengers having the "forage food"

Yay indeed, my friend. Yay indeed. God I love that subguild.

I think scavengers getting 'forage food' would allow for grittier concepts.  It just fits, is not overpowering, and expands potential for gameplay - I can't see any negatives.

I'm also in favour of giving caravan guides capped stormvision.  I'm sort of curious which subguild is the least chosen by PC's and my guesses are caravan guide or house servant (the latter, which can also drive wagons, certainly shouldn't be getting stormvision).  I mean, at least tinker gets haggle.

[Fathi]

Scavengers can already forage for food. It's just not in the helpfile for whatever reason.

I'm not sure when it was changed.

[jmordetsky]

Well, here is my personal take on ranger "direction sense" in relation to other subguilds.

Just because you live in the desert doesn't mean that you're a tracker. If you're a member of your tribe who has been spending his whole life wandering the wastes by yourself to the point where this don't really bother you, then you're a ranger. If you're a scavenger who doesn't let something as inconsequential as this get in your way, then you're a ranger. If you're a caravan guide who can keep the caravan moving through one of these, then you're a ranger. If you're a caravan guide who says "holy fuck look at that storm - circle the mounts and get under cover until it passes!" then you're still a caravan guide. You're just not a ranger.

That's all well and good, but I think most people are asking the question:

Why is it that being able to "navigate in a sandstorm" automatically means that you're unable to say, "disarm an opponent" or "craft a tent?"  Why can't I have a tribal burglar who routinely travels through heinous sandstorms in order to loot things from the city and return them to his tribe? Is it unreasonable to suspect that someone with extensive combat training -also- has extensive experience traversing the desert?  Especially since persons with extensive combat training are pretty much the best at killing shit out in the desert?

I know it's basically a function of the class system, but one of the purposes of subguilds is to somewhat smooth the rough edges of the class system.  Sandstorm navigation is -hardly- a powerful subguild ability on its own, especially if it were made an actual skill, and was capped as low as most other subguild skills are.  You might have a 30% chance to successfully move in the right direction, on top of your 25% chance to randomly get it right...so now you're up to moving the right direction 55% of the time.  Not awesome, but definitely an improvement worth spending a subguild on, if you plan on say, living in Red Storm.

Further, if you tacked the ability only on nomads and caravan guides, I still strongly suspect that it wouldn't make those subguilds so overpowered that people would flock to them.  What's the big deal about adding a 30% capped sandstorm travel on top of bendune, tribal accent, spearmaking, and haggle?  Would anyone really be jizzing in their pants over that?  Would adding sandstorm navigation to pilot, increased ride, bendune, and value really make anyone totally rethink their min/max calculations?

With the new weather code, this would be only intermittently useful, and it's obviously something players have long since adapted to, because I've never heard anyone say, "Damn, I -have- to be a ranger, because this character concept -relies- on sandstorm nav."

Boom! Truth.

[Cerelum]

No elf would ever want to have a subguild nomad or caravan guide.

Elves have a reason to be "guides."

1. Tricking non-elves into letting them be 'guided' by an elf.
2. Leading raiding parties.

Bendune, pilot and ride?? Come on, which elf would want to have these three??

An elf who wants to be stored for violating documentation that's who!

[number13]

If you're a caravan guide who says "holy fuck look at that storm - circle the mounts and get under cover until it passes!" then you're still a caravan guide. You're just not a ranger.

With respect--

If someone in-game purported themselves to be a 'guide' and offered their services to a 'caravan', but then was unable to navigate a sandstorm, leaving a group of players potentially stranded or unable to arrive at their destination, the characters involved would be justifiably homicidal.  In the case of an RPT or the like, the players themselves would have a reason to be upset.

Obviously, this scenario doesn't play out (very often) (as far as I know) because everyone more or less understands that the caravan guide subclass doesn't do what says on the tin.

[Cerelum]

Okay I'll be a little useful rather then sarcastic or witty.

The reason that I think Caravan Guide is in is for folks who want to start the game with pre-determined knowledge of travel routes and such.  Because really we are all sorta cheating when we know that we have to go n n n n n e e e n e n E instead of N into the pit without one look command being entered.

Caravan guides would know this stuff and be able to transport in ooc knowledge accordingly.

[Cavaticus]

Why is it that being able to "navigate in a sandstorm" automatically means that you're unable to say, "disarm an opponent" or "craft a tent?"

You know the answer to this. You just said it. It's a function of the class system. It's the same reason that being able to, say, "pick a lock" automatically means that you're unable to say, "disarm an opponent" or "craft a tent."

Why can't I have a tribal burglar who routinely travels through heinous sandstorms in order to loot things from the city and return them to his tribe?

You can. It would be a special apped ranger with a few burglar skills thrown in. Write up an awesome backstory and convince whomever's doing special apps at the moment that it's a great concept.

[Eshael]

If you're a caravan guide who says "holy fuck look at that storm - circle the mounts and get under cover until it passes!" then you're still a caravan guide. You're just not a ranger.

I agree with number13.  Anyone who did this IC would be skinned alive.  You might still be a caravan guide, but you'd be a dead one.

"Circle the mounts and get under cover until it passes ... we don't have desert quit and the storm could last RL hours so we may not all be able to be online together again for a few RL days ... but we'll be fine just idling here link dead, right guys?  Guys?  Why do you have those sharp butcher knives out, guys?"

[Synthesis]

Why is it that being able to "navigate in a sandstorm" automatically means that you're unable to say, "disarm an opponent" or "craft a tent?"

You know the answer to this. You just said it. It's a function of the class system. It's the same reason that being able to, say, "pick a lock" automatically means that you're unable to say, "disarm an opponent" or "craft a tent."

Why can't I have a tribal burglar who routinely travels through heinous sandstorms in order to loot things from the city and return them to his tribe?

You can. It would be a special apped ranger with a few burglar skills thrown in. Write up an awesome backstory and convince whomever's doing special apps at the moment that it's a great concept.

Good job cherry-picking a quote and replying to it without taking into account the rest of what I said.  We have classes, but we also have subguilds to round out our character concepts without having to resort to the special application system.

[Lizzie]

The skills of "Caravan guide" are pretty useless to most of the people who own wagons, because most of the people who own wagons are class_merchant, which already comes with pilot. And if they're class_ranger, they can get their pilot skill up fast enough that they'd still not need to hire someone who's offering themselves as a caravan guide.

I agree caravan guide should -definitely- come with ranger-vision. Pilot is not a useful skill by itself. I mean sure you can get a wagon from point A to point B, assuming you know in advance that there's no hole in the ground, or raiders on the road. OR, assuming you have..A GUIDE, who can give you this information a few minutes before you get to the next spot. That's what guides do. They guide. They lead those who are unable or unwilling to lead themselves, from point A to point B. If a guide isn't capable of leading himself from point A to point B, then he's useless as a guide.

[jmordetsky]

Why is it that being able to "navigate in a sandstorm" automatically means that you're unable to say, "disarm an opponent" or "craft a tent?"

You know the answer to this. You just said it. It's a function of the class system. It's the same reason that being able to, say, "pick a lock" automatically means that you're unable to say, "disarm an opponent" or "craft a tent."

Why can't I have a tribal burglar who routinely travels through heinous sandstorms in order to loot things from the city and return them to his tribe?

You can. It would be a special apped ranger with a few burglar skills thrown in. Write up an awesome backstory and convince whomever's doing special apps at the moment that it's a great concept.

I don't start with pick a lock at 100%, I have to build it. And in theory, if you wanted to allow pick a lock to be part of a subguild, you could. It's also possible for me to branch pick a lock. We're only arguing the you assess storm navigate under the same circumstance. I also agree that you cherry picked Syn's response.

We can break this argument down into four areas where we see conflict:



Realism - I think most of us agree that when balanced with Playability we want as much of this as possible.

Playability - We always want the game to be playable

Game Balance - we don't want to upset it

Consistency - We want the game world to be and feel consistent.

From a realism point of view - it's unrealistic that every ranger in game has a 100% success rate at navigating a storm and we have absolutely no granularity to the skill. Every skill in game with the exception of magic and possibly disarm can be included at weak levels to a character through subguild selection or branching. From a realism point of view - we're only asking that the navigation of storms and wilderness camping be treated in the same manner.

From a playability vs realism point of view - what are we really risking here? More flexibility in character creation? What I described above is unrealistic and modifying would only make the game more playable. So, where is the down side?

Game Balance - This I do get. We want rangers to be important. But - look - ranger delves are easily some of the most powerful characters in game and high levels of storm navigate has little to do with it. The level of Scan/Hide/Sneak/Poison/Archery rangers wield are incredibly potent. Rangers will remain important in the same way that Assassin remain important even though burglars can learn to backstab and the same way that burglars will remain important even though assassin's can learn to pick. It's about the concentration and highlevels of the skill. Allowing storm nav and camping in a subguild will not threaten ranger importance. It will only subject rangers to fact that they now need to realistically build the skill up.

There is also I imagine the worry that game balance will be thrown off by a flood of apps for Warrior/Nomads who can now dominate the wilds. To this I say Nay. Nay, naysayers. A desert walking nomad warrior will still be easy prey for a highly branched ranger who has mastered hide/sneak/archery/poison. Sure, they will be more closely matched now, but be sure the most highly feared creatures in the desert today have nothing to do with melee (maxed delf rangers). I would say the only real effect you will see is an increase in playability for human + elf tribals who want to play non-rangers. For example Muarki assassins should have moderate storm walking skills. Soh warriors should have moderate level of storm walking skills.

As for consistency, this is just obvious. It should be a skill. Even if you didn't give it to anyone else, make it a skill.


As for special apps - they're not a solution. They don't scale and special apps should be set aside for things that are most unusual or very much out of your reach as a player (karma) and require review. The issues here are balancing and playability and the discussion we're having surrounds the merit of including this in the game, not how we can crutch it in the current system. Even if nothing ever happens, we should still argue the merit.

[Bluefae]

>quit now
You will quit the game in 5 minutes, unless something interrupts you.
...
...
Thanks for playing!

Neat.

     Hyzhenhok . . . wow!  Elegant solution to an old, old problem, or at least one persistent aspect of it.  Well done.   

[Clearsighted]

Maxed delf rangers are the great white sharks of Arm's deserts.

[Delstro]

How about if caravan guide could navigate storms only as long as they were walking? Once they jump onto a mount, they would start losing their bearing.

[Cerelum]

Maxed delf rangers are the great white sharks of Arm's deserts.

Depends on the D-Elf, some aren't all about raiding and killing.

I have always hated that D-elves get pushed to be scary when they all aren't.

[Clearsighted]

Maxed delf rangers are the great white sharks of Arm's deserts.

Depends on the D-Elf, some aren't all about raiding and killing.

I have always hated that D-elves get pushed to be scary when they all aren't.

I can think of a couple tribes that aren't pushed near as hard as they should be.

[Xagon]

I don't have much interesting to add to the argument.

I'm for giving sandstorm navigation to a subguild, possibly even a new "Navigator" subguild.

[Gagula]

I don't have much interesting to add to the argument.

I'm for giving sandstorm navigation to a subguild, possibly even a new "Navigator" subguild.

Depends....do they have blue eyes, and float around in some orange gases?  and can they pilot heigh-liners?