You’re walking through the woods, enjoying the lovely spring day, the tinkling brook peacefully drifting nearby, the leaves rustling in the pleasant breeze, not a care in the world, when all of a sudden BAM!!! someone steps out from camouflage and ambushes you, putting you in a world of pain! Before you can even react he has hit you with a quick serpent strike, or charged at you like a bear to knock you down and keep you from fleeing, or called a swarm of mosquitos to bite you viciously. Quicker than you can imagine, you’re dead, and your corpse has been butchered into tasty steaks.

Who is this killer of the natural world? This denizen of forests, deserts, mountains, caverns, and all places wild? He is the Ranger, and in the world of Thera at Carrion Fields, he is a force to be reckoned with. A ranger is a natural kingdom warrior, a fighter most at home in the wilds and less so in civilized places like cities and roads. Adept at fighting in natural terrain of all types, rangers satisfy the cool calculating calm of the player seeking a patient stalker as well as the lust for instant and exciting action. Like a true warrior, most rangers can dual wield weapons, offering excellent power in straight up combat.

But a ranger is not a ranger is not a ranger, and no two will be exactly alike. Each ranger at cf has not one but two major decisions to make upon creation, choices that allow the player to pick and choose exactly the type of character most desired. Smear mud on yourself and strike savage blows while slipping away from your foes’ grasp. Shriek a deafening howl to shatter your enemies’ morale as you rebound from the cave wall and strike back. Sit back and speak to the winds, calling forth your kin among the bears, a true and loyal companion. Cast a net on the open sea and pull in your prey. Only rangers can do these things, and it needs only you to create one right now.

First, choose your terrain. Are you a desert mercenary, guarding caravans and sultans in the sand? Then Bedouin is for you. Do the deep caves and caverns of the world below the surface appeal to you? Caverndwellers were designed for you. Love the crisp air and scraggly beauty of the hilltops? You were born to be a mountaineer. Mariners, Plainsrunners and Marshdwellers round out the terrain choices with water, plains and swamps, allowing you a diversity found nowhere else.

But you’re not done yet, you get to specialize your very own ranger even more, by choosing your expertise. Perhaps you want to be a forest mage, using your years of life in the wilds to educate yourself in the ways of nature magic? An animist does exactly that. Or maybe you’ve always wanted to be the hunter, firing your bow with deadly accuracy. Then a hunter you shall be! Perhaps wanderlust grips your soul, with an undeniable urge to see the world in all its wonders, both beautiful and grotesque. Explorer rangers are uniquely adept for such travels. Beastmasters and Savages round out the list, offering unprecedented variety in character building.

As a ranger, you enjoy great special benefits, such as pathfinding, allowing you to cross terrain with the ease of crossing a dancefloor, while most others must tire quickly, and spend valuable seconds negotiating their more difficult steps. You will be hearty as you grow, because rangers are among the highest in hit point gains per level. And you will be able to heal yourself in natural settings by gathering potent medicinal herbs. Few if any are as resilient and capable of surviving alone as the ranger!

But just as in nature, all things must be balanced, and a ranger is no different. Chief among the ranger’s weaknesses is the difference between being in the wilds and being in civilized places. Step outside your natural setting and you will find that you fight less well in all regards, and some of your abilities simply do not work at all. And one of the great strengths of all rangers, the ability to conceal in camouflage, is rendered useless when walking in plain sight on the streets of the cities and roads. Also, like many fighters, rangers are not as well taught in the ways of magic as true mages, and so will need to rely on outside sources for basic but important support such as the ability to see the invisible, or a potion to send you home or teleport away from a fight gone bad. And last but not least, like many of the fighting classes, the ranger has little in the way of damage reduction as part of his arsenal of abilities, and so must often seek help from others, or use patience to strike at just the right time....