This post is inspired by a thread on Dioxide concerning retrieval from
outlanders.

I will begin by briefly stating the cons for each cabal attempting to
retrieve. This is mostly a rehash of a post of Death_claw's which I
happen to agrieve with. I argue that outlanders could use a little
help and I end with a suggestion which I believe will help the
outlanders without taking the fun from tribunals.

Tribunals retriving from outlanders :

Difficulties in assessing the numbers of defenders. You cannot bring
your special guards with you. Wilderness, so wilderness strong classes
such as druids and rangers are at their "meanest". Trepidation wears
you down a bit as it is likely that someone who can trepidate is
around (it can be used out of PK range).

Outlanders retrieving from Tribunals:

The following three powers can be employed out of PK-range: Special
guards (low level special guards is not a problem for high level
characters, but high level special guards is a big problem for mid
level characters), manacles, sequester. The latter power makes quick
hit and run strategies difficult to pull off. In addition, wilderness
classes are not on their own turf, and some suffer fighting penalities
for this.

Furthermore you have to go through a protected city that has a
summon-into-locked-room available, the Enforcer, and cityguards which
while not dangerous in themselves hinder movement. Finally it is
difficult to utilize the element of surprise as your enemy is simply
more likely to be in their cabal or very close to it, since that is
their job.

It would seem to me that Outlanders who are wanted have the short end
of the stick and depending on your role, you are very likely to be
wanted.

Don't get me wrong, I actually think that tribunals' powers are just
right. And I also like the sequester addition. It makes perfect sense
that they are very hard to fight on their own ground. And protected
areas should be just that, protected.

The problem is that you have a cabal where a lot of the members are
_bound_ to retrieve/fight outside their own ground. The old
if-you-dont-like-being-wanted-don't-commit-the-crime argument hardly
applies here.

So, I would like to suggest that outlanders retained the ability to
subvert special guards despite them not having the fetish. It needs no
RP justification, it reduces the effectiveness of
out-of-range-tribunals, but it doesn't cripple tribunals since it
doesn't affect their ability to fight the casual criminal,
i.e. non-outlanders. Furthermore it doesn't change the balance between
outlanders and other cabals/non-caballed.

Comments are welcome.

How many of the current outlanders are wanted? A small minority.

That means no manacles. No out of pk guards (not that in pk guards are insignificant, but beastcall is nasty too).

That locked room has a key. I'm not totally sure if outlanders have a source of passdoor though. I think I can think of a couple, but they are a bit of a pain in the ass to get if I remember right.

Outlanders not wanted can (and do) sit just outside the spire, using the city for protection, when resting.

Personally, I don't like sequester. In fact, I consider it overpowered. I'd remove it, were I top god. Other than that, I think that since most current outlanders don't get themselves wanted (this from an outlander fan I was literally just talking to), things are perfectly balanced for retrieving purposes. Sure, it would make for better rp if they were willing to become wanted, but is a certain fear of the law bad rp? I'm not convinced.

However, they aren't as balanced for raiding purposes, because it only takes one lowbie trib to be on and all the raiders get wanted. Sadly, this means that right now, one lowbie trib is all it takes to put most outlanders off from raids that they would pull off successfully.

All that said!!!! I would think it reasonable that a WANTED outlander could still use subvert without the fetish. Not one who isn't WANTED, since the latter kind of outlander hasn't proven his belief in his cause to the guards' satisfaction. That even gives some kind of incentive to become wanted. Of course, it means outlanders can't send in unwanted lowbies.

If Tribunal has the fetish we can't flag outlanders for trying to retrieve. So it's not really that big a deal for them to retrieve
since they seem to have a #### load midrank chars that are never
flagged and always retrieve. Retrieving from outlander can be psychotic. Stupid beastcalls.

I know outlanders are allowed to retrieve. I thought my post took that into account.

If you think it's harder to retrieve from Tribunal than Outlander, you should try playing an Outlander sometime. Do that and let me know what you think then.

Imagine walking into an area that appears to be emtpy, until you attack the inner, and suddenly the entire forest explodes.
That's if you don't get snared on your way in. Beast calls come out of nowhere, you are suddenly not fighting who you want to be, and to top it off, your corpse get's butchered so you get nasty looted.

I was usually on the outlander side of that one, er sylvan, as it were.

If it unfolds that way on you, it's generally your own damn fault.

Honestly, one of the reasons I wouldn't play Arbiter/Tribunal for years at a stretch was because I missed that fun down-numbers raid defense. That one Warlock vs. three Battle at the archmage kind of thing. Back in the day you could easily age die an Arbiter and never see your cabal raided because the price was just too high.

Now with Outlander encouraged to raid them, it's a little better, but I think it's hard to argue that one beast for every Outlander in your range (that has that power, some don't) is worse than two special guards for every Tribunal in your range. If the person raiding Tribunal is wanted, it gets much worse. I'm still pretty sure I wouldn't get to do many raid defenses at the Tribunal inner if I played one, though. For every person who's willing to take the flag to raid, there are ten who aren't. Keeps the numbers down nicely.

There's a lot you can do to discern who's lying in the leaves to defend Sylvan/Outlander.

Oh. And really, how would butcher/get all if a ranger's on be any worse than order all get all corpse regardless of who's on?

I'm willing to accept there might be an angle I'm not seeing here, and definitely, if wall-of-thorns era Sylvan was still in the game, that was a mean ass cabal to raid. Only Empire would even be in the running with that.

I love outlander, this is pretty well known.

I'm sure I'll play another, but something I would like to point out...

The whole manacles/sequester thing was supposed to be a downward tweaking as I understand it, but from everything I have heard, and going by the helpfile to Sequester, it sounds like an actual upgrade.... Mini insects against wanteds...

Part of the fun about playing an outlander is being the scrappy underdog, but at the same time, now raiding them means going to the inner means getting wanted means getting sequestered means huge huge huge risk... And outlanders allready have big restrictions (coins), well that all sounds unfun to me.

*shrug*

I want to stress here that you get flagged as wanted if any Tribunal are on when you raid them. At hero, being wanted is annoying, but easy enough to deal with. At pretty much any other level, it's a serious disadvantage in game. Ok, sure, Ancient Instincts help avoid guards, but really you have to know this game in and out to really be able to deal well with being wanted.

Outlander is clearly not a newbie cabal. And that's ok.

Also, I have a small problem with higher up Tribs being able to use guards in raids against enemy cabals. Sure, they don't get to use their skills for much outside of their cities, but it seems to me guards might be like...why are you taking me out in the middle of a forest to beat on an un-wanted chick with a bow?

Couple of opinions to keep this discussion rolling, that's all!

>Outlander is clearly not a newbie cabal. And that's ok.

I think a newbie ranger could pull it, as rangers can cope in wilderness without the need of money.

>Also, I have a small problem with higher up Tribs being able
>to use guards in raids against enemy cabals. Sure, they don't
>get to use their skills for much outside of their cities, but
>it seems to me guards might be like...why are you taking me
>out in the middle of a forest to beat on an un-wanted chick
>with a bow?

These higher up Tribunals who raid with guards are called Provost and Vindicator and there are usually no more than two of them (though the number or Vindicators can be higher, it often isn't).

I've played a Tribunal, and I know this, but thanks for talking down to me anyways! Awesome.

My point was the RP justification. I had thought that Vindicator had those guards outside cities to kill criminals with them, not raid cabals. I thought Provost had the same powers because Provost has (I think) all the same privaleges as Vindicator.

When Outlanders can beast call in cities, then I think it'll be even.

Also, newbie ranger can play Outlander, I'll give you that. But newbie ranger Outlander doesnt have anything for Tribunal really, they hardly ever leave the cities. All fear Tjok.

Seriously, the guy is scary. I'm a pretty cautious player, I guess. I would literally start sweating when walking towards the Outlander's hideout by myself worrying that he was camo'd with his snare. He always beat me up, and that was before apparent Outlander boosts after I deleted. The dude should get a mental assault quest skill :)

Provost doesn't have the same powers as Vindicator. They don't even have any special powers to help them in pk* as opposed to a normal Trib except for taking their overpowered guards out with them.

*One, I guess, but it wasn't very useful for me. Perhaps it's because it was never explained to me, and it seemed to have drawbacks that weren't worth it.

I'm sure it is no conincidence that the first time we are seeing complaint about Outlander being "overpowered", is the first time the cabal has actually had a competitive cabal roster.

Prior to a couple weeks ago, the number of Outlanders hovered around 10-15 total, many of them inactive, vs their opposing cabals which numbered minimally around 30, sometimes as much as 60 or even 80 in one case.

This basically meant a good majority of the time people could retrieve from Outlander pretty much unopposed, and Outlander had the collective forces of *two* cabals to deal with (vs. Tribunal's one tiny opponant.)

Now, there's enough people in Outlander (and it's still by no means a hugely populated cabal) where you might actually get a few living, breathing people defending on a regular basis. I'd hardly call that "the forest exploding" out of nowhere. I suspect the complaint is coming more from the contrast of retrieving previously being a total walk in the park.

As they come out of camo to defend. It is easy to think that there is a forest when you cannot see all the trees. This kind of psychological advantage is typical to those who wage war in the means of guerilla warfare, such as Outlanders do.

Hey, it is not what Outlanders overpowered.
It is basically same thing happens with Outlanders which always irred me with Sylvans.

They sit on thier butts way too much.
Or 'Wait in ambush for a long periods of time.' perhaps a nicer way to say it.

Here how it goes:
Outlanders raid Tribunal or Empire.
Then they go sit in chamaleon in their stupid little forest for hours real time. Never vis-ing or moving.
If somebody tries to retrieve - Outlanders swarm this person with numbers, kill, skin corpse, grab everything, divide the loot and go back to chameleon sitting.
If nobody comes - as it is often the case with Tribunals, Outlanders quit quietly and then complain on forums how cowardly Tribunals are.

So, yes Outlander is not Sylvan. But mentality stayed the same.

===
Here is my proposal: Take 'chameleon' power AWAY from Outlanders.
This will force them to move their fat *sses.

As an alternative: Give them some kind of disguise which will help them deal with their WANTED status.

My $0.02

-=NNNick=-

>So, yes Outlander is not Sylvan. But mentality stayed the
>same.
>
>===
>Here is my proposal: Take 'chameleon' power AWAY from
>Outlanders.
>This will force them to move their fat *sses.

Here is my counter-proposal: We give Outlander wall of thorns and insect swarm for a week to make you appreciate how they are now. }(

Seriously, chameleon is one of the only formidable powers that cabal gets. You might as well be talking about taking spellbane from Battle.

nt

As an outlander who holds the item of their opponents its pretty hard to reach back to defend in time... That is why usualy one or two is closeby in case someone hits... While the tribs can just word and their more or less in the cabal... Or pop a pill for that sake. I just cant see the prob with hitting outlander... The tribs has all the possibility to live through a failed attempt... Those pills are overpowered (hehe funny and overused word). You know Empire minions are actually more gutsy who has way bigger problem getting out of there normally.

Usually if the provost or the vindicator hits the cabal to raid alone... The chance one don't even reach the cabal before its raided is huge. So there for you will see this stuff happening.

And its missinformation about the full loot. If someone raid, ofcourse the stuff is put in the tree, a mere reaction of the tribs doing the same (or rather a cabal war tradition in CF). And for empire, I allways full loot or full sack them, because they allways full loot me. I hardly ever take anything from a normal pk, and you will find many outlanders doing the exact same thing. If someone full loots me they buy themself a free full loot pastport for the rest of the ride... And eye for an eye its called.

But the years I have played this mud it's allways been so in cabal wars the fallen don't get the stuff back. Why would you give the stuff back to be raided again in 5 minutes before the outer and inner can heal again? Thats just plain stupidity.

Another thing. To set a trap and wait for their prey is what a normal hunter does RL. So what is the beef about this? I can't say I understand your critics. Its the same as tribs prefer to fight where they are strongest. Its not that its that easy to catch someone off guard in the wild, and esp. for thieves and assassins who loose some of their stealthy skills in the first place. Or for a ranger or a druid who suddently loose their versatility and some of their power if they move into civilization.

Tirach

>As an outlander who holds the item of their opponents its
>pretty hard to reach back to defend in time... That is why
>usualy one or two is closeby in case someone hits... While the
>tribs can just word and their more or less in the cabal...

This is the way I successfully retrieved from Outlanders as Agantas, as I noticed that Outlanders weren't fast enough to get to defend. Agantas was able to move from Galadon to Refuge very fast, as an air shifter, striking the Refuge on very short notice.

Is when the trappers start complaining that the prey won't walk into the trap that is usually there.