I asked WAY back in my Emrys days of playing a h-elf ranger in sylvan under eshlina. (back with bears....)

I did get an imm to respond to that question. I think it was Nepenthe that answered....I don't remember clearly who, it was a long time ago, but I remember the reasons.

There were two reasons, of equal importance.

1) Game balance.

2) Arials aren't connected enough with the whole idea of Nature/Mother earth to produce a personality able to dedicate their time to the life of a ranger.

Sure, Elves and humans have become "civilized" in large part, but they still maintain their "connection" with the earth. Arials have become just as civilized....but with their flight, and their floating city and society above nature...their connection with the earth has been broken in a large sense.

And, in my non-imm opinion, with the inclusion of the "wilderness familiarity" skill to the ranger class....#1 has gotten so much bigger. 25 dex with a high wilderness fam would be just too sick.

Also, in my non-imm opinion, I urge you to think of this....

My past two human rangers both perfected bearcharge. With both of them...with wilderness fam at 100....with enough time in forest to have fast creep, fast camo, and a lagless waylay....enlarged and wearing over 400 lbs of eq....my bearcharge NEVER lagged an opponent longer than one full round. Never. (Right here, let me insert my version of Nepenthe's quote "'No can defense' my ass old man" by saying "'rangers who possess an intimate knowledge
of the wilds are notoriously adept at this skill' my ass old man")...If bearcharge from an enlarged human is that useless..immagine how useless it would be from an arial who's bones are light and who's flying keeps them from having a firm grounding for leverage. I would also think that an arials lower weight, weaker bones, and less leverage that comes from flying would also lessen the damage from their ambushes (which has already been nerfed enough in the most recent changes to ambush).


As an aside. I *STILL* think Gnomes should have ranger as a playable class.



"Death awaits ya all, wit nasteh big pointeh teeth!"

I was trying to imagine a gnome ranger ambushing an enlarged giant...
Hummm...yum yum, that ankle taste soooo goooood.

nt

Early bird gets the worm, Second mouse gets the cheese!

If it was not answered by an imm and just picked at by players, and answer that does not make.

I want to hear an official responce.

POSTER'S DISCLAIMER: "Of course....I don't play anymore, but its just my 2 cents."

As an arial, you spend your life flying in some aspect or another. Some might claim it to be leaping and using wings, but, for the most part, they are flying. The ability to creep as an arial is not possible for that. It would also make it very hard for them to use quiet movement or gain any benefits from pathfinding. This in turn would make it improbable to gain any benefits from wilderness familiarity. The difference between cloud giants and arials is that the arial has wings and is required to use them for movement. Large flapping wings would rustle many a leaves in the forest.

Honestly this discussion reminds me of similar about dwarf paladins before they came out.

I would love to see arial ranger... and my guess many other players as well.


My main argument - why arials CAN be druids... everything you said applies to them as well.
Btw birds can walk... just not as good as none-flying animals.
And arials are something in a middle between humans and birds. They cant really fly high (think that area Above Thera), they hop.

Rangers have affinity to Nature (even if they are evil aligned), not Earth. Earth is svirfni domain.

Scratch quiet movement, creep and bearcharge. Nerf wild_fam in forests for arials.
Pathfinding I am not so sure about. It is more of terrain knowledge rather how you walk/hop.

But please give arial rangers a chance.

Regards,

-NNNick-

PS Idea for arial inherent - allow them to walk if they want to. There are situations when it is useful.

>I would love to see arial ranger... and my guess many other
>players as well.

Ya, it would be a neat addition, but nothing I can't do without. Now felar druids, that's another thing.

>Scratch quiet movement, creep and bearcharge. Nerf wild_fam in
>forests for arials.

Bearcharge, ok, who cares. But nerfing the rest just takes away any reason to play a ranger. Wilderness fam isn't as badass as some people seem to make it out to be, even with a felar. Plus it takes ages to go up.

>Pathfinding I am not so sure about. It is more of terrain
>knowledge rather how you walk/hop.

Let's just take out ambush, camp and fashion staff too.

>As an arial, you spend your life flying in some aspect or another. Some might claim it to be leaping and using wings, but, for the most part, they are flying. The ability to creep as an arial is not possible for that. It would also make it very hard for them to use quiet movement or gain any benefits from pathfinding.
The difference between cloud giants and arials is that the arial has wings and is required to use them for movement. Large flapping wings would rustle many a leaves in the forest.

How in the hell do you pricture a huge floating giant creeping around in the forest, and well they also fly all the time. Arials can fly around in the forest, think large birds silent and nice,

an arial would have a wing span of 14 foot, being conservative.

That's rather a lot for flying around a forest.

Also, there are a lot of movable noisy objects in a forest and I think big wings would cause trouble, even folder into the body.

Druid hides using treeform. That's motionless.

>an arial would have a wing span of 14 foot, being
>conservative.

And a cloud giant is about that height.

>Also, there are a lot of movable noisy objects in a forest and
>I think big wings would cause trouble, even folder into the
>body.

Depends on the forest. Arial assassins have no trouble sneaking/hiding in some forests, but they supposedly wouldn't be able to creep? Ya right.

>Druid hides using treeform. That's motionless.

Creepings isn't exactly rapid movement. Unless of course you do some macro reconfiguration or whatever. Either way, cloud giant creep at 100% sucks, and so would no doubt arial creep.

1. Creep IS rapid movement. You cannot figure in typing c-r-e-e-p--w into slowing it down. Its fast, and its invisible. Ya, giants suck at it.

2. The entire arguement that arials cannot be rangers due to creep is silly because of arial thieves and assassins......hide? Better yet, assassin hide...in the forest.



I mean if game balance is the issue then I just want to hear it. There are plenty of race/class combos that are far more powerfull and overused then this one would be. If arial became a viable option I can see plenty of reason to continue to play the races (that people choose to play currently for rangers). I can think of plenty of reasons NOT to play an arial ranger, and yet a few reasong FOR an arial ranger. Ya, they would tank nice but so do sword and staff spec arials, assassins, and arial bards. All of them have crap HP 2 nasty vulns, low str, and race specific gear.

POSTER'S DISCLAIMER: "Of course....I don't play anymore, but its just my 2 cents."

Okay, an assassin hide in the forest is like camo. It is not like creep. Creep requires that you be able to move. If an arial assassin moves in the forest while hidden, they step out. Yes, cloud giants are big and they fly, but, they fly magically. They are at a disadvantage when trying to creep because of their size. Not due to erratic movements of wings trying to avoid certain types of foliage. Picture this, a successful creep requires that you stay within a certain parameter of foliage. An arial just couldn't use the foliage to their advantage because their wings are too great of a disadvantage. The same would go for quiet movement and wilderness familiarity. As far as druids are concerned with arials and quiet movement, I can see this because they are much more attuned to the forests than a ranger. A ranger is a warrior who uses the forests to his advantage, whereas the druid uses his abilities to become one with the forest. You can roleplay it anyway you like, but, a ranger is not a druid with warrior abilities.

>Okay, an assassin hide in the forest is like camo. It is not
>like creep. Creep requires that you be able to move. If an
>arial assassin moves in the forest while hidden, they step

Not in every forest.

>out. Yes, cloud giants are big and they fly, but, they fly
>magically. They are at a disadvantage when trying to creep

Magically? What about cloud giant ragers?

>because of their size. Not due to erratic movements of wings
>trying to avoid certain types of foliage. Picture this, a

Just as felar assassins learn to sneak despite their claws, so too would arial rangers learn to control their wings better, for quiet movement.

>successful creep requires that you stay within a certain
>parameter of foliage. An arial just couldn't use the foliage
>to their advantage because their wings are too great of a

To compromise, one could implement the land command for arials, and thus enable creeping. cree w 'But your wings are in the way!'. land 'You land.' cree w. You begin creeping west.

>disadvantage. The same would go for quiet movement and
>wilderness familiarity. As far as druids are concerned with

I don't see what wings have to do with knowing your environment better to dodge attacks. Arial wingspan could be compared to cloud giant armspan, or whatever the word is, which, according to anatomy, will be the same as his or her height. So how a cloud giant could dodge better while his arms are franticly moving around hitting branches here and there, but an arial couldn't is silly. Maybe wilderness fam should be redone for arials, so you would get similar limitations as cloud giant dex, because of your wings.

>arials and quiet movement, I can see this because they are
>much more attuned to the forests than a ranger. A ranger is a
>warrior who uses the forests to his advantage, whereas the
>druid uses his abilities to become one with the forest. You

As you mention below, it's all about roleplay.

>can roleplay it anyway you like, but, a ranger is not a druid
>with warrior abilities.

I think this whole argument is silly, as I don't much care about arial rangers, and one could logically justify anything. Why arial druids should have no trouble with quiet movement, but arial rangers would is beyond me. That's silly, it's still the same quiet movement, super nature attunement or not.

>environment better to dodge attacks. Arial wingspan could be
>compared to cloud giant armspan, or whatever the word is,
>which, according to anatomy, will be the same as his or her
>height. So how a cloud giant could dodge better while his arms

Ok, obviously arials will have different anatomical rules than giant humans. But my point still stands!

A cloud giant doesn't have to move his arms to creep though. An arial uses its wings to move from one spot to another. A ranger spends more time training as a warrior, a druid spends more time becoming attuned to the forest. The use of wilderness familiarity makes sense when you realize that the effects of it rely upon the surroundings in the wilderness. By having flapping wings, the tree one ranger might use, is going to get in the way of an arial. Whether the clouds fly magically or as an inherent ability doesn't really matter. What matters is that there are no wings keeping them afloat. If there were, clouds would not be rangers.

>>not like creep. Creep requires that you be able to move. If an
>>arial assassin moves in the forest while hidden, they step
>
>Not in every forest.

Not every forest poses the same kinds of problems for quiet movement.

I'm probably missing your point. Anyways, here's how I see it, let me know what I've got wrong: some forests are spread out enough to let an arial use their wings freely, and have enough other things going on that the breeze they create when flying isn't too much of a problem for an assassin to deal with.

As an aside, I personally think that assassins are almost technological in approaching the aspects of the world which other classes deal with using magic. There's something almost interdimensional about their vanish skill (in my mind it deals with some of the same stuff as duo and conjuration, ferinstance -- just in a nonmagical way). I wouldn't be surprised if there's something similar about the way assassin sneak works -- but I still don't get how a ranger is going to creep while flapping his wings.

>an arial would have a wing span of 14 foot, being
>conservative.
>
>That's rather a lot for flying around a forest.
>
>Also, there are a lot of movable noisy objects in a forest and
>I think big wings would cause trouble, even folder into the
>body.


It's also rather a lot for flying around, SNEAKING, in a crowded indoor hallway moving in and out of doorways into small rooms (rooms with movable noisy objects) while remaining HIDDEN the entire time -- and yet, that is exactly what an arial assassin is more than capable of accomplishing. If an arial assassin can somehow overcome the wings that your argument and Blachmanian's argument find so crucial to negating arial rangers, it logically must follow that an arial ranger can likewise overcome these wings and manage to creep and camo in a forest. In essence, the "wing" argument is readily countered by looking at analogous abilities that arials can accomplish. It's a strawman.

I have to agree with Nick - there is a game balance issue behind arial rangers, like there used to be behind dwarven paladins before they were enabled (I vividly remember plenty of shakey rationale for why dwarves couldn't possibly be paladins).

If anything, your argument only supports what I state. Arial assassins and arial thieves probably shouldn't be allowed to fly inside confined places.

Ie. Arial Assassin

Early bird gets the worm, Second mouse gets the cheese!

>Ie. Arial Assassin

Arial assasins can't creep, which was pretty much the point.

But cloud giant rangers can. What's your point again?

Blachmianan has already addressed this, I only have one other thing to say (which I'll do in a response to the post which raised that issue).