Thu Jan 8 21:30:45 2004


At 4 o'clock PM, Day of the Moon, 21st of the Month of Winter
on the Theran calendar Mahar perished, never to return.

Race:	human
Class:	ranger
Level:	44
Alignment:	Neutral
Ethos:	Chaotic
Cabal:	None, None
Age:	54
Hours:	254
PK Ratio:	100% (closer to 100% is better)

They are overall a great class, well balanced except for the upper ranks. Specifically, hero ranks. You have very few options to land a kill as a ranger at hero. Bearcharge doesnt lag enough, from my experiments in PK, to make any serious difference. Its WAY too heavily size dependent, given that fact that rangers dont have enough combat skills at hero to compete with most fighting classes. They are too limited to go toe to toe with a warrior unless the warrior is pretty sucky.

That onslaught needs tweaking past rank 40 or so. I probably landed only 1 or two in PK out of a hundred or so, even on snared or sleeping people. Never used it after i realized it sucked so bad. Of course it landed all the time against mobs.

Something that might balance rangers just a bit at hero is to allow them to waylay with a certain type of ambush. 2 round lag on ambush disarm or cripple almost guaratees that your prey will flee right off the bat, if your ambush is successful. You could make some stringent wilderness requirements for this skill, such as very high wilderness time. Maybe require a ranger to improve in the ambush disarm/cripple/onslaught/drive ambushing + wilderness time.

Allow rangers past rank 40 or so to creep follow each other. That stepping out is pretty stupid when they can obviously see each other and follow each other easily.

Maybe consider changing snares around a bit to give the ranger a bit more variety. Maybe have the normal snare, a spike pit and a couple of tree truks swinging and catching their prey in the middle.
A spike pit would act a bit like briars but also do some damage, maybe reducing the movement points of the target significantly. Tree truks would do crushing damage, but have huge lag on setting up and give constant echos in the room while its being set up. Both spike traps and trees would only catch the first person to walk in that room. Targets with high dex have a chance of dodging the trees and jumping over the spike pit. Trunk snares would have a very high timer on them, like 50 hours. All these would be rank 40+ skills.

Thought that rangers could use a bit of work at hero. They are just too damned limited and get too damned boring at hero compared to all other classes.

Well, so much for this one. I rolled Mahar to try out a ranger
and to see how well they did given the changes to ambush. Also
wanted to see how mean rangers could get. I gotta say that
i could get a lot meaner a second time around.

Mahar was sphere Deception. Played him as such. Didnt have any
funky emotes or anything. To me thats what not what RP is about.
To me it was about how i acted and reacted. Played Mahar to be
savage, ruthless and cruel a deceiver, liar and betrayer. He
could be a friend one moment and kill you the next, depends on
what he gained from it. He was a hunter, indiscriminate killer
and saw deception a huge part of landing the kill. Only the
hunter had to know the truth. His motivation for killing was
none other than the nature of the beast. As far as nature was
concerned, I had no ties or interests in it. I didnt care for
trees, animals etc. At times i thought I should have gone
scarab but my sphere of deception was more likely to get me
turned into a frog or slayed. Was wondering if i could pull it
off since Mahar like truth but only he should know it, he wasnt
about opening up the eyes of the blind.

Spent most of my time in the Past, Kiadana, Udgaard mountains,
arial city and siverwood. Didnt really have the time on sessions
to run around too much so i was rather sedentary. As far as preps
go, fly and enlarge were my usual preps. Used haste/shield/stone
skin etc when i had a tough opponent. Overall i was careful about
when i struck. To me there was no point in attackin someone if
i could not land the kill. So i waited and watched until i
thought the time was right. 99% of the time it paid off. If I
realized that waylay gave me 1 round lag on a snared person, i would
have had quite a few more kills. Bearcharge sucks bad even in the
woods and when enlarged so my options were very limited.
I multikilled and attacked again and again the same people, only
when people went ooc on me or talked crap, or really pathetic
characters such as Rahlidean or whatever that assassin was.
On the roads i was very very careful and always flying and enlarged.
Having played a few thieves i knew what they could do. Moved
fast on the roads or used the longer but safer road. I saw no reason
to fight out of my domain.

After some time people just stopped coming in the woods and it got
really boring, so mahar had to resort to other methods. Getting
people who were being chased by groups to bring them into my snare.
Anathemas and lone goodies were favorite bait. I used lots.
These people would get the groups to chase em in the woods where
they would all get ripped up.

What i hated the most was lowbie rangers asking me for a staff. OOC
i saw it as a totally unfair advantage over everyone at their ranks.
Having a 10/10 staff avg 31 or whatever, at rank 15 especially when
it was not earned, was ####. IC i said that i will not give
some weakling a weapon imbued with my essence.

As far as traveling companions go, I hunted with a few people.

Toward the end i started attacking every imperial i thought i could
kill. I was disgusted by how neary every friggin evil was an imperial.


Goodbyes

Andrlos - My favorite hunting buddy and groupmate. You were awesome
from both rp and Pk point of view. I liked your Wolf RP and that you
hunted indiscriminately, like Mahar did. You were strong and mostly
alone like me. I rarely grouped with anyone, you were those rare
ones. Together we were sick, i dont think anyone ever survived us.
Much respect.

Mekantos - i respected you for playing an arial AP and not being a damn
imperial. You were strong, cunning and smart. You were as ruthless and
savage as me. I was weary of you and never trusted you, but i helped you
if there was not too much risk to myself. CHeers on imming and you were
great.

Wayhleth - pity we never got to put our little plan together. It woulda
one nasty duo.

Chuha - I hope you learned a thing or two :P

Dralith - another of the thieves i wanted to kill but somehow always
got away.

Atreiu (sp) - One time i had a perfect trap set up and friggin villagers
walked in and spoiled all my stuff. I knew i couldnt kill you with ambush
alone. I had to make you flee into a snare after an ambush and then ambush
you again. Set it up and waited for you and damn villagers ran into it :(
Was very weary of the roads when you were around.

I think the most fun was in the mid 20's to mid 30's when i managed to kill
a few groups of three without snare. That was one hell of a rush.

I havent played in a while so i probably forgot a lot of people. If you
interacted/hunted with me or got something to say about Mahar, feel
free to post.

I might try another ranger later i think, they are pretty powerful and
very very hard to kill if played well.

PS
One thing i really didnt like is people bitching about me OOC, especially accusing me of cheating. Also what I didnt like is people who went out of their way to find out who the player was then telling
everyone on Dio and even posting it on the battlefield. Some of these players were Uncle Vinny and Zhesus. I will post their names now since
my character is deleted.

We talked quite a bit in my younger days. We interacted some later. I respected and liked you but never trusted you. When i started killing every imperial i found, and got hunting parties after me in the past, i thought you were an enemy.
That deal with the boots and staff was a nice test for both of I suppose. I was hoping that Aikosooso or whatever wasnt going to show up and quicksand.
I regret i didnt have the chance to come around and see if you held up your end of the bargain. Well played.

The two of us would have been sick.. but I get delete happy when I start getting bored. Guess that's why I haven't played a ranger since about '96. Wayhleth liked you but never fully trusted you. I guess the fact that you were decked put my mind at ease, knowing that I didn't have anything you wanted :P Good job never dying in the amount of hours played.

I found it funny that our friendship started with you doing a fireball on me and Chuha while we were talking and then nearly dying. I dont really know why Mahar took a liking to you, but thats how it turned out. About boredom, yeah, you gotta have sick patience to play a mean ranger, and you have to pick your fights. Unless you know a zillion staves/potions and scrolls which i dont. :(

Yea, I figured unless I caught you out on the roads I wasn't ever going to be able to finish you off in the woods. I did, however, consider coming back and trying to blackjack you after one of your ambushes just north of the eastern (good spot for me, 50% chance of fleeing into centurions there) . I had a warrior ally around but with blackjack at 85% at the time I didn't feel like chancing it since I was slow on the spam flee and ended up eating a couple demos bringing me down to 300hp. Also, you shouldn't have given up on bearcharge so readily. I was fighting some ranger in the bf and he hit 2 in a row on me for a pretty decent amount of lag. At some point either via message boards or ic I got the impression you weren't going to try bearcharging ever again and I was pretty pleased. In the near future I believe i'll be going with some directional traps and cheapshot so I can have a more rangerlike ability to affect people when i'm not in the area. And FYI, all the ooc stuff is prolly cause you talk a lot of ####. For instance, don't go around telling people you "almost had me" if I walk off at 300 hp. The rest of the malice is prolly partially just a general dislike of rangers. A lot of the playerbase, myself included, just dislike the class. Things would be different if evils had more areas to rank in, but we don't. At this point rangers are essentially specialized in killing people while they're levelling. I had absolutely NO fear of solo rangers when I was at full hp. The exception would be level 40 rangers while i'm still around 35. By 40 I had enough hp to eat two ambushes but I suppose that had a lot to do with my set. Anyways, next time you get a chance to seriously play a char.... if you want to silence the critics tear some #### up with with a non hiding/camo'ing class, there will be nothing left to say.

what is what i was most scared of.

I had enough bad luck with bearcharge not to try it too often. The lag on a missed bearcharge is 3 rounds and thats plenty of time for you to flee/return/jack and flee if you missed without me being about to do anything. Being close to the road as i was while waiting for you, and getting jacked meaning almost certain death since the entire empire woulda shown up, was not a risk i was willing to take. Somewhere in the middle of the woods, I would have done it. If i was a cloud giant would have turned things around significantly.

You play a very good thief, and i knew what good thieves can do. :)

Yes, when i have time i might try a serious char. The practicing on warriors just gets me bored to death.

Go duergar shaman, good transitionary character when you're used to classes that have a very easy time staying alive. Also requires very very little practice and summon allows you to take on like 3 people at once.

Mekantos - i respected you for playing an arial AP and not being a damn
imperial. You were strong, cunning and smart. You were as ruthless and
savage as me. I was weary of you and never trusted you, but i helped you
if there was not too much risk to myself. CHeers on imming and you were
great.

Thanks a lot man. I have to say that it must have been some kind of
bizarre alignment of the planets that caused something like 3 or 4
very strong human rangers to all appear at once. You guys made the
entire playerbase pretty jumpy for a while, myself included. I think
that you know your stuff like few others, as far as PK'ing and all-around
game knowledge. I don't know what your past characters were, but I can
say, without a doubt, that if you made a character with a heavy RP aspect
to him/her, you could probably achieve everything that you have ever
wanted to in CF (if you haven't already).

I'm glad that we got to be allies instead of enemies...because God
knows I had enough opponents :P.

Congratulations on a very strong character.

-Mek

I played Adgento and Ajoul and a few other thieves, nothing really of worth. I thought about heroing Mahar but there was no real point to it since i was not caballed and had 85% of the hero range in PK.

Yes i know i gotta work on my rp. Got some pointers lately so i'll give it to a shot. I think that most human rangers who appeared after me and Andrlos were just wannabes :P

What was interesting is that i found out from some other char that you were looking to kill me at the beginning. I thought you must be insane to try and come after me in the woods. I started out wanting to teach you a lesson about comin after me, but then talking to you, i changed my mind.

I still hope to achieve what i want in CF :)

-Played Mahar to be savage, ruthless and cruel a deceiver, liar and betrayer. He could be a friend one moment and kill you the next, depends on what he gained from it. He was a hunter, indiscriminate killer and saw deception a huge part of landing the kill. Only the
hunter had to know the truth. His motivation for killing was
none other than the nature of the beast. As far as nature was
concerned, I had no ties or interests in it. I didnt care for
trees, animals etc. At times i thought I should have gone
scarab but my sphere of deception was more likely to get me
turned into a frog or slayed.

Out of curiousity, why did you choose neutral instead of evil?

for a while imperials thought i was neutral, neutrals thought i was evil, goodies thought i was evil, then a goodie. I didnt act consistently evil or good. I killed both, without regard to align. For Mahar it was a game so to speak.

As far as nature was concerned, he used it, but didnt really have any lasting love for it. Sure, i put out fires and what not, but that wasnt because of my love for nature. Being evil or good has nothing to do with your love for nature. Savagery and brutality has nothing to do with being good or not. A storm giant warrior can be just as savage as a fire giant. Lying nd deceiving was my evil side, helping and teaching others was my goodie side.

As far as killing was concerned, out of like 80 or so kills, i would guess around 50 were evils, but does that make me good? No. Being of a beastly nature, with a thirst for hunting good or evil makes no sense to me. I was a 'friend' to both types of chars, good and evil. I did not hold their alignment against them as a goodie would do or as an evil would do.

Indiscriminate savagery and bloodlust are generally considered evil.

No offense, but this role is the same as most of your others. Kill whoever you want, whenever you want, with no regard to alignment or circumstances, lie all you want, betray all you want. Oh, but you're neutral so paladins can't wrath you and you can get past prot. vs. align.

>Andrlos - My favorite hunting buddy and groupmate. You were
>awesome from both rp and Pk point of view. I liked your Wolf RP and
>that you hunted indiscriminately, like Mahar did. You were strong and
>mostly alone like me. I rarely grouped with anyone, you were those
>rare ones. Together we were sick, i dont think anyone ever survived
>us. Much respect.

I enjoyed the time with Mahar, and certainly gave me company in the long waits for someone to stumble into our snares. I think my opinion of Mahar went back and forth from disdainful for ranksitting and jealous for your larger pk range. Andrlos was rather happy to have you as a part-time packmate, but was always just a little unsure of you. It wasn't so much as that he (or I) picked up on the betrayer nature of your role, but got little hints. The time that comes to mind is when I was going after a bard in the Udgaard mountains, and you refused to help because the bard was a friend. Andrlos could accept that, but didn't understand why you wouldn't fight the bard, but wouldn't warn him either.

I believe that only one person escaped from us, Feldim on the first snare we worked together.

>Mahar was sphere Deception. Played him as such. Didnt have any
>funky emotes or anything. To me thats what not what RP is
>about.
>To me it was about how i acted and reacted. Played Mahar to be
>savage, ruthless and cruel a deceiver, liar and betrayer. He
>could be a friend one moment and kill you the next, depends
>on what he gained from it. He was a hunter, indiscriminate
>killer and saw deception a huge part of landing the kill. Only the
>hunter had to know the truth. His motivation for killing was
>none other than the nature of the beast.

Nature of the beast, or nature of THE Beast? If the latter, it would fit nicely into a little rumor I heard from a certain someone who was asking me about various gods . I'm not really certain how our relationship would have turned out if Andrlos had known (provided there was anything to know), but I am glad it never came to blows.

Good luck with the next.

Andrlos

But you never did, you should have had me in the Void that one time and the other time I would have had you if my groupmate had been smart enough to faerie fire you. Well played once more, and yet another of your chars has a near miss on one of mine.

i wasnt about to go on the road when a good thief was about. I knew
what they could do and wasnt about to expose myself to that kind of a risk especially when you were waiting for me and i couldnt see you.
Well played on your part as well.