pure ranger idea

[disastro]

an interesting idea for pure rangers came up today in conversation with another player: some kind of aoe unhide capability, or buff to party spot. basically something that would make rangers the ultimate tracker for a party: if you need to find a hider you'd be like "hey thank god we have a pure ranger."

perhaps a large aura that does -hide, or an ability that buffs party spot. possibly an additional restricted power that lets the ranger apply a -hide when using a bow, if he hits. call it "Call of the Tracker" or "Eyes of the Hunter". extra penalty if you hit a favored enemy. the basic idea is to go beyond personal track abilities and transcending into a spotter for the party.

another idea was +30% move while in outdoor areas. (call it 'Trailblazer')

[LinuxPup]

I've been interested in doing something involving tracking for Rangers too... we'll see.

[Blystos Re]

Wow...I came here to post an idea for ranger pure class bonuses, too. Weird. I like the tracking idea a lot, disastro... maybe something like:

Hunter's Mark: The Pure Ranger has honed their tracking skills to aid their companions in detecting hidden enemies, and can use an attack to "mark" their target, making it easier for allies to spot them. (Target takes half damage from the attack and receives a -X(x being the decided number) penalty to their hide and/or move silent rolls.)

To help with the spot/listen check:

Intuitive Sight: Through experience the ranger has honed their skills to predict where an enemy might try to hide and to detect subtile hints in their surroundings, making it easier to spot an ambush. (The pure ranger doubles their wisdom bonus to spot and listen, as well as doubling their favored enemy bonus to spot and listen where applicable.)

Also, I don't know if this is possible to do, but I've been thinking this would be really cool for a while now:

Nature's Eyes: Using their animal empathy, a ranger can see through the eyes of a creature that they have bonded with, willing them to move about and scout ahead for danger. A hostile action will break this link and the ranger will lose some of their life force. (This would work similarly to the Sorc/Wizard "posess familiar" ability, but causing the creature to attack or if the creature is attacked would break the link. The ranger then takes X% of damage to their life total.)

One last thing. Between the collapse of my last favorite NWN PW and coming to Neversummer I stopped briefly at World of Darksun. They had a system that would tell you who the last person was that passed a specific point on a map and how much game-time had passed since they had passed. You could do something like that, but make it so it was limited to pure ranger and toss a couple of checks in, make it tell you the race of the player, etc.

Thoughts?

[disastro]

dont know if this is possible but perhaps if the ranger makes a bow called shot: legs attack they need to beat a reduced discipline check to see if it sticks.

so pure ranger bow called shot to the legs->target must make discipline - (ranger level/2) to avoid.

called shot always seemed like such a rangery thing to do to an enemy.

[Blystos Re]

Maybe just take away the penalty for called shot? I don't know, that might be impossible if it's hard wired.

How about the addition of Called Shot: Head

[-BannyD-]

Wow...I came here to post an idea for ranger pure class bonuses, too. Weird. I like the tracking idea a lot, disastro... maybe something like:

Hunter's Mark: The Pure Ranger has honed their tracking skills to aid their companions in detecting hidden enemies, and can use an attack to "mark" their target, making it easier for allies to spot them. (Target takes half damage from the attack and receives a -X(x being the decided number) penalty to their hide and/or move silent rolls.)

To help with the spot/listen check:

Intuitive Sight: Through experience the ranger has honed their skills to predict where an enemy might try to hide and to detect subtile hints in their surroundings, making it easier to spot an ambush. (The pure ranger doubles their wisdom bonus to spot and listen, as well as doubling their favored enemy bonus to spot and listen where applicable.)

Also, I don't know if this is possible to do, but I've been thinking this would be really cool for a while now:

Nature's Eyes: Using their animal empathy, a ranger can see through the eyes of a creature that they have bonded with, willing them to move about and scout ahead for danger. A hostile action will break this link and the ranger will lose some of their life force. (This would work similarly to the Sorc/Wizard "posess familiar" ability, but causing the creature to attack or if the creature is attacked would break the link. The ranger then takes X% of damage to their life total.)

One last thing. Between the collapse of my last favorite NWN PW and coming to Neversummer I stopped briefly at World of Darksun. They had a system that would tell you who the last person was that passed a specific point on a map and how much game-time had passed since they had passed. You could do something like that, but make it so it was limited to pure ranger and toss a couple of checks in, make it tell you the race of the player, etc.

Thoughts?

Hunters Mark - bad unless its something thats unlimited or close to unlimited uses/day....-skills can easily be removed with a lesser restore pot.

Intuitive Sight - bad because this would most likely be added in the form of +skills, like an item. and since items/buffs can only raise your base bonus of a skill by 50, this wouldnt actually raise the max you could achieve...just help you reach that max. id rather have something that increases the max you could achieve because with a bard you can come pretty damn close to maxing your spot if not fully maxing it.

Natures Eyes - well, dont know if its possible...but i think this is the main reason familiars where done with...the ability to possess your familiar and scout an infinite distance.

good ideas in theory, but there has to be a better way to implement them

[disastro]

for natures eyes how about a high hp/high ac/low damage summoned animal that has killer spot/listen and can move at full speed while in detect mode?

while the summon is around you buff the ranger's spot too, or activate other party spot buff.

Make it tough enough so it wouldnt be instantly slain after level 30, low damage output since that's not it's purpose.

good ranger gets celestial bear
neutral ranger gets dire wolf
evil ranger gets panther

water genasi gets land shark!

[Blystos Re]

Hunters Mark - bad unless its something thats unlimited or close to unlimited uses/day....-skills can easily be removed with a lesser restore pot.

Probably make it like 25 uses per day, assuming that it's a flag or bells or bright paint that the ranger is using, and can't carry an unlimited amount/has to stop to make more.

Intuitive Sight - bad because this would most likely be added in the form of +skills, like an item. and since items/buffs can only raise your base bonus of a skill by 50, this wouldnt actually raise the max you could achieve...just help you reach that max. id rather have something that increases the max you could achieve because with a bard you can come pretty damn close to maxing your spot if not fully maxing it.

True, but this gives a ranger more skill points to focus elsewhere. I think a pure ranger should have an uncanny spot/listen, as you seem to agree, just how it gets implimented. I'm no scriptomancer, so I will let LinuxPup speak to this one...I agree with you, but let's not write it off just because it could be implemented poorly.

Natures Eyes - well, dont know if its possible...but i think this is the main reason familiars where done with...the ability to possess your familiar and scout an infinite distance.

I was thinking about this and you are right, and it seems implausable for a ranger to maintain that mental link over vast distances. What if it were restricted to 1 map away per 10 ranger levels?

[-BannyD-]

i was thinking about that intuitive sight thing, and although not very cool...it would be convenient to just make it a mock true seeing spell.

howbout this:

Intuitive Sight - +20 spot at all times, see invis when in wilderness areas

this would eliminate the need to carry around true seeing helms...but to make it worthwhile it would last pretty much forever once activated (much like the barbarian speed token)...it wouldnt be one of the key abilities of the pure ranger, maybe like a lvl 23 power or something...

another things i was thinking of in similar regards to this, is a dragon fear size aura that does -hide/ms of 1/per 2 ranger lvls (-20 at lvl 40) to any -enemies- entering it. im sure that cant be too hard to script, ive seen the Invisibility Purge spell set to the dragon size aura and any enemy entering it had their invis stripped. come to think of it, that would be cool too .

im still puzzled over what kind of +damage things they should get...cause while tracking is nice, it doesnt help you actually kill anything.

maybe some kind of enhancement in the form of elemental damage thats based on how many favored enemies you have...kind of an addition to the damage Bane of Enemies gives.

say 5 favored enemies (min for bane of enemies) = +2d6 elemental damage (something not common on weapons already please)
6 favored enemies = 2d8
7 = 2d10
8 = 2d12
more = +20

yea 2d12 + elemental damage is damn powerful, but not many rangers are going to take more than 5 favored enemies...you can, but those are feats that can be well spent elsewhere.

call it...Favored Wrath or something

[cRaZy8or5e]

Here's what I think about a pure ranger. Tokens for True Seeing are nice and all but I don't really believe that giving rangers more spells is such a good idea, even though it would be cool. Instead, give pure rangers 'keen senses' a la an elf. Its a very powerful feat, but won't make rangers uber spotters without someone to buff and help them.

I don't know about the other things, doubling their fav enemy bonuses and stuff like that seem pretty fun, the aura seems like a great idea, all in all there are many great ideas for a pure ranger. The scaled damage seems overpowered imho, but is still an interesting proposal and maybe it could be translated into something else. I always thought that rangers should get ki critical against favored enemies, though that is a really powerful ability too. Actually strike the ki critical, that would make them too powerful. The standard +9 +2d6 to damage against favored enemies that a lvl 40 pure ranger gets is quite a bit on a low magic server such as NS4.

I'd like to see rangers get some sort of march ability but I can't justify them getting haste, though that would be fun .

Oh well, lots of good ideas. Here's my two cents.

[Binkyuk]

I actually quite like the True Seeing in wilderness areas. The idea of a ranger so in touch with his surroundings that he can see effortlessly through clumsy magical invisibility by the rustle in the trees and the alarm of forest creatures appeals to me.

Giving them the Keen Senses feat is an ok idea, but then what do we give Elves?

[disastro]

re: keen senses: yeah i'd recommend against anything that makes a race or other feat useless, it goes against the spirit of all the other development that's gone on here so far.

if you do standard summons instead of animal companion, it would be cool if that could be integrated with their tame animal ability. i.e. tame a critter, and it morphs into a more powerful animal under your command (per ranger level etc.) since you are training it. "Spirit of the Wild."

it would have to be pretty badass since you lose it on rest (it goes hostile, unless that can be fixed) and you can't get another one until you go back to some wilderness area.

but it would give rangers a pretty good advantage in the wild if it was powerful enough. and totally in character.

[Aarkon Draco]

as i said to charles when this thread started the main things rangers need IMO are AC ( or DR lack of a shield most times makes either a nice perk) some bow bonuses of some kind ( tho not solely bow perks as half dont use ranged ) the 30% speed outdoors as stated in the starting post ( they have vast knowledge of the wilderness and avoid brambles divits holes on the ground making them faster than normal folks altho most take the blinding speed feat ) some form of extra damage perk would be nice as most arent str based and have low damage due to light weapons and low str or a ability damage perk ( natural toxins ect ) con would be my vote on this ( poison dart frog style) and the anti SD token ability ( as stated in origional post something that either adds to your spot listen or a aura that helps a party if one is with the ranger )

return of the animal companion would be realy nice since their summons are almost useless but im not getting my hopes up.

[Nyeleni]

SNIP
if you do standard summons instead of animal companion, it would be cool if that could be integrated with their tame animal ability. i.e. tame a critter, and it morphs into a more powerful animal under your command (per ranger level etc.) since you are training it. "Spirit of the Wild."

it would have to be pretty badass since you lose it on rest (it goes hostile, unless that can be fixed) and you can't get another one until you go back to some wilderness area.

but it would give rangers a pretty good advantage in the wild if it was powerful enough. and totally in character.

Actually resting and keeping the animal shouldn't be a problem, I've seen it on many worlds. Kinda henchman...
Well I like the increased animal friend idea. Gives the animal empathy something to look forward to. Till now almost no druid or ranger is investing in that primordial skill.

[Aarkon Draco]

another suggestion is extra attack at lvl 21 and 35 this would represent the greater two weapon style and perfected two weapon style that rangers get in PnP this would also apply to ranged IE at lvl 35 the ranger using 2 weapons would get 8 attacks and using a ranged 7 attacks ( 6 if they dont have rapid shot)

this would be a relay in style ranger boost IMO and is in line with 3.5 edition rules.