RP Ranger Template Help

[johttenn]

Going for a woodsy, self-sufficient Ranger, more an RP/challenging char for a good fun alt when not running on run-of-the mill maxed out chars. Template has been going up and down as I play and readjust, but let me know what you think.

GM Archery
GM Tactics
GM Hiding
GM Stealth
GM Tracking
65 Magery - Recall/Heal/Cure without spending so much on Anatomy/Healing
50 Bowcraft - Make arrows and decent chance of exceptional bow, cut and go in the woods
50 Lumberjacking - with high str/dex this gives me a little bit of a boost so lj is not so tedious
10 Camping - May have to click the kindling a few times, but more than enough to log in the woods

Have a few spare points that need something done with (25), what shoiuld I buff up, LJ? Would 25 resist actually do anything? I thought of 25 Taming just for mounts, but even with the stat bonuses that may not be enough? 25 Med just to have a little passive med? Cooking to eat?

I really would like to use the extra points in something useful, but since it's only 25 I need a cost-benefit analysis.

[Mikel123]

Forget points in Camping. Once you hit the stat cap, you should have 0.0 real skill in Camping but you'll have like 34.0 skill displayed. Camping is the most heavily stat-induced skill in the game.

25 points is useless in taming; you don't need it for riding a horse, though I guess you're going for the RP angle, but still... at 0.0 real taming and 100 STR, you'll have a displayed taming skill of over 10.0, so I think that satisfies your interest in having *some* taming skill to legally (in the RP-sense) ride a horse.

As for magery, you only need 60 skill (maybe 61) to never fail a recall. So anything over that and you're just improving your heals and greater heals. Nothing wrong with that, just pointing it out.

25 resist is pretty much useless in my opinion.

For the most powerful template, I'd suggest dropping camping to 0 and using that plus your extra unused skills into GMing Magery. You can go with 100/75/50 stats (STR/DEX/INT) and you can drop an energy vortex and put arrows into monsters while the EV distracts the monster from coming after you. With Leather armor, your mana gain rate is going to be bad, but not as bad as with plate armor on.

You could also make a bunch of exceptional bows, then ultimately drop bowcrafting and lumberjacking and put those points into Meditation, change your stats to 100/25/100, and become a stealth archer mage. It's somewhat of a RP-viable progression. Once you become a grandmaster mage, it probably gets tiresome chopping wood and carving bows all day to earn some coin when you can slay beasts with magic and arrows

[Commodore Axavious]

I'm constantly trying to figure out uses for low amounts of skill points, so I feel your pain on this one. 25 resist would not accomplish much - it would really only take a damage or two off the top of most spells. I remember reading somewhere that Tracking is useful at lower skill points... perhaps you could drop that down from GM? That would give you more to work with than a mere 25.

[Mikel123]

Tracking is useful around 20-25 if you're just trying to figure out where someone is on your screen while they're hidden or stealthed. But it's only useful if you already know they're on your screen.

Tracking at 100 will allow you to track people up to around 120 or 130 tiles away, which is like 8 screens or more. With 100 Tracking, you find people you never knew were there. It is, in my time here, the most fun skill in the game to have at GM.

[benny-]

Plus, for a RP template, how badass is it to have the title "Grandmaster Ranger"? Def go with the GM Tracking.

Funny that you posted this, I'd been thinking about the same thing just a few weeks back, a way to do a traditional ranger character. For me, I'd go..

100 Tracking
100 Archery
100 Swords
100 Tactics
80 Healing
80 Anatomy
80 Hiding
60 Resist

Def some drawbacks, but a little bit of everything here...while the heal/anat and resist aren't the best, I'd assume this character is more for pvm than straight pvp anyway and this template would give you enough to cure/res with your healing and have a little bit of resist to reduce some spell damage.

With some hit and run tactics, using archery and hiding, I think you'd get by just fine. I liked the idea of having swords on the char, as a ranger needs a sword. But stealth'd be good too, hmm...

[Mikel123]

Benny, why not just drop Resist and GM the Healing, Anatomy, and Hiding?

Resist is mostly used for PvP anyways, and the gains in Healing and Anatomy well outweigh the benefits of resist.

Though, I don't really see the point of Hiding on a template, unless you're RPing a ranger that likes to ambush people

But with this template (GM Tracking, Archery, Swords, Tactics, Healing, Anatomy, Hiding) that's what I'd see you doing - kind of being an evil ranger. Ride around on a horse and track people, get near them, and hide. Arm a heavy crossbow. When they get in sight, attack them, instantly shooting your heavy crossbow, then arm a katana and run after them and slice 'em up.

For more serious PvP though, you'd be much much better off with GM resist instead of Hiding, and use Invisibility items instead of hiding.

[benny-]

I was thinking more along the lines of pvm actually...take potshots, break los, hide, repeat...plus with a weaker char like that, the hiding is a good way to break out of the heat of things to finish a heal, or if a suspected pk comes in on your tracking...Dunno, I find hiding to be a useful skill to have for hunting/pvm purposes, esp on a build not designed for strictly pvp.

Most of the replies here seem to focus on 7x chars, or chars designed for pvp, but personally, for such a char, I'd go 8-9 skills and have fun with it rather than go perfect build/all gm skills.

[uofuntime]

Going for a woodsy, self-sufficient Ranger, more an RP/challenging char for a good fun alt when not running on run-of-the mill maxed out chars. Template has been going up and down as I play and readjust, but let me know what you think.

GM Archery
GM Tactics
GM Hiding
GM Stealth
GM Tracking
65 Magery - Recall/Heal/Cure without spending so much on Anatomy/Healing
50 Bowcraft - Make arrows and decent chance of exceptional bow, cut and go in the woods
50 Lumberjacking - with high str/dex this gives me a little bit of a boost so lj is not so tedious
10 Camping - May have to click the kindling a few times, but more than enough to log in the woods

Have a few spare points that need something done with (25), what shoiuld I buff up, LJ? Would 25 resist actually do anything? I thought of 25 Taming just for mounts, but even with the stat bonuses that may not be enough? 25 Med just to have a little passive med? Cooking to eat?

I really would like to use the extra points in something useful, but since it's only 25 I need a cost-benefit analysis.

I used to RP a sort of ranger character--chopping wood, fletching your own arrows and bows--it was really fun. You can basically roam the lands like that, then log out on a bedroll. Kill an orc for their axe if your axe broke! Very self sufficient.