[Work in progress] Frontiersman - a new ranger kit.

[Annúgil]

Salutations!

 

I've been playing BG II for a long time now and have recently tried all the mods I could - this game is still damn fun! But to be frank, I had trouble finding a kit that I'd enjoy - so I though I'd make a new one

 

I have a few ideas, but the whole thing is still in the planning (pre-production if you will) phase. That's what I have got so far :

 

Frontiersman - Those rangers serve in the farthest reaches, protecting the borders and keeping an eye out for any possible excursions. It is not uncommon for this skilled trackers to engage the interlopers in combat. Though not as disciplined or skilled as regular soldiers, they can stop any hostile force in their tracks.

 

Concept - I wanted this class to be a combination of a ranger/warrior, focusing on martial skill with ranger flavour. As per its description, I want it adapt at detection, tracking and slowing down his enemies. As for the weaponry - I think that the spears, halberds and longbows are most fitting choices.

I plan to make this kit full of interesting abilities (hopefully), so that there'll always be something to gain when the player grows in power.

 

Advantages

 

1. Can put three stars in halberds, spears and longbows.

 

2. Two stars in two-handed weapons.

 

3. Abilities (attacks), which would slow enemies :

 

- bow attack with entangling or slowing effect.

- melee weapon attack with similiar effect.

 

4. +1 to hit and damage every 5 levels.

 

5. Truseeing ability (I think it makes sense, given the background).

 

 

Disadvantages

 

 

1. Only one star in other weapons and styles.

 

2. No spells.

 

3. No stealth. Not sure about that, I think stealth fits the class description, actually.

 

4. Cannot use ranger's animal charm ability.

 

5. -2 to charisma (since he's not accustomated to cities). I was also thinking (don't know if it's possible) he should have bonuses when fighing in the wilderness and problems when fighting in the cities.

 

6. Low starting reputation. I think it makes sense, given the background. Not a particularly well know hero.

 

I think that the class is a bit unbalanced now and should have stronger disadvantages, any ideas? I also need your help with kit specific abilities.

 

Should the mod work I plan to add some nice items to go with it (since spears and halberds are scarce in BG II).

 

Feedback would be appreciated!

[Miloch]

I think it looks ok as far as balance... no spells is a pretty significant penalty for rangers. You could also limit armour to leather, etc.

 

You could probably do the wilderness bonus/city penalty via script, but it might be potentially laggy. Just try not to put it in baldur.bcs whatever you do, where everyone else puts their stuff, bogging down the whole game.

[Annúgil]

I think it looks ok as far as balance... no spells is a pretty significant penalty for rangers. You could also limit armour to leather, etc.

 

You could probably do the wilderness bonus/city penalty via script, but it might be potentially laggy. Just try not to put it in baldur.bcs whatever you do, where everyone else puts their stuff, bogging down the whole game.

 

 

Updated version :

 

Advantages :

 

1. 1. Can put three stars in halberds, spears and longbows.

 

2. Two stars in two-handed weapons.

 

3. Combat bonus in the outdoor areas (+20 % to stealth, +2 to hit)

 

4. +1 to hit/damage every 6 levels.

 

Disadvantages :

 

1. Can put only one star in other weapon proficiencies.

 

2. Disadvantaged when fighting in a city.(-20 % to stealth, -2 to hit)

 

3. No spells and charm animals ability.

 

4. Limited to chain armour and cannot use shields (I think that chain armour fits the class best as far the description goes).

 

I think that might be still too powerful. I'd really like to add a unique disadvantage, one which would fit the class description.

And what do you think about the city/wilderness combat modifiers? I don't want this class to become godlike in the woods and pathetic in the cities, just to add a bit of flavour. What about modifiers would make sense?

 

Abilities :

 

1. Hamstring

 

Melee attack, slowing and bleeding effect when applied. Gets stronger with levels.

-Inital stats : +1 to damage 1 damage every round for 10 rounds.

 

2. Crippling shot

 

Ranged attack, entangling effect.

 

3. Detect illusion and trueseeing at later levels.

 

4. Freedom of movement - at level 20.

 

More to come.

[Guest LoveWarCoffee]

I think it looks ok as far as balance... no spells is a pretty significant penalty for rangers. You could also limit armour to leather, etc.

 

You could probably do the wilderness bonus/city penalty via script, but it might be potentially laggy. Just try not to put it in baldur.bcs whatever you do, where everyone else puts their stuff, bogging down the whole game.

 

 

Updated version :

 

Advantages :

 

1. 1. Can put three stars in halberds, spears and longbows.

 

2. Two stars in two-handed weapons.

 

3. Combat bonus in the outdoor areas (+20 % to stealth, +2 to hit)

 

4. +1 to hit/damage every 6 levels.

 

Disadvantages :

 

1. Can put only one star in other weapon proficiencies.

 

2. Disadvantaged when fighting in a city.(-20 % to stealth, -2 to hit)

 

3. No spells and charm animals ability.

 

4. Limited to chain armour and cannot use shields (I think that chain armour fits the class best as far the description goes).

 

I think that might be still too powerful. I'd really like to add a unique disadvantage, one which would fit the class description.

And what do you think about the city/wilderness combat modifiers? I don't want this class to become godlike in the woods and pathetic in the cities, just to add a bit of flavour. What about modifiers would make sense?

 

Abilities :

 

1. Hamstring

 

Melee attack, slowing and bleeding effect when applied. Gets stronger with levels.

-Inital stats : +1 to damage 1 damage every round for 10 rounds.

 

2. Crippling shot

 

Ranged attack, entangling effect.

 

3. Detect illusion and trueseeing at later levels.

 

4. Freedom of movement - at level 20.

 

More to come.

[Guest LoveWarCoffee]

I think it looks ok as far as balance... no spells is a pretty significant penalty for rangers. You could also limit armour to leather, etc.

 

You could probably do the wilderness bonus/city penalty via script, but it might be potentially laggy. Just try not to put it in baldur.bcs whatever you do, where everyone else puts their stuff, bogging down the whole game.

 

 

Updated version :

 

Advantages :

 

1. 1. Can put three stars in halberds, spears and longbows.

 

2. Two stars in two-handed weapons.

 

3. Combat bonus in the outdoor areas (+20 % to stealth, +2 to hit)

 

4. +1 to hit/damage every 6 levels.

 

Disadvantages :

 

1. Can put only one star in other weapon proficiencies.

 

2. Disadvantaged when fighting in a city.(-20 % to stealth, -2 to hit)

 

3. No spells and charm animals ability.

 

4. Limited to chain armour and cannot use shields (I think that chain armour fits the class best as far the description goes).

 

I think that might be still too powerful. I'd really like to add a unique disadvantage, one which would fit the class description.

And what do you think about the city/wilderness combat modifiers? I don't want this class to become godlike in the woods and pathetic in the cities, just to add a bit of flavour. What about modifiers would make sense?

 

Abilities :

 

1. Hamstring

 

Melee attack, slowing and bleeding effect when applied. Gets stronger with levels.

-Inital stats : +1 to damage 1 damage every round for 10 rounds.

 

2. Crippling shot

 

Ranged attack, entangling effect.

 

3. Detect illusion and trueseeing at later levels.

 

4. Freedom of movement - at level 20.

 

More to come.

[Guest LoveWarCoffee]

A +2/-2 to hit won't make your ranger godlike or awful; and without druid spells he can't really buff himself which is a perfectly fair tradeoff for having no ranger spells (I'd go as far as to say giving him a bonus -1AC would still be fair). You might consider tweaking the +1h/d a bit, perhaps +1h/d every 12 levels starting on the 1st [or zeroth, really] and +1 damage every 12 levels starting on the 6th, that way at level 18 you have +2 to hit, +4 to damage. Generally it's specials that have the most unbalancing effect (Arcane Archer for instance can go ahead and make arrows of various obscenely destructive types, it's fun, but "oh hai firkraag ur dead" is a bit suspect on the 'balanced' front).

 

As for an additional "flavor" penalty, two things come to mind. One, in the same script that you give +2/-2 to hit in a city or outside, you can tweak the movement modifier as well, making him slower in cities (more cautious). You can also give him a penalty to certain saves (say, spells and wands) since mages are more common in cities, where he rarely ventures.

 

Special Abilities:

 

I like the ideas, but perhaps you should flesh them out a la the Monk kit that gets a new ability every few levels. Once daily abilities. Something like (and these are just ideas, so take as many or as few as you'd like):

 

Lacerating Blow/Shot ("Hamstring")

+1 (per 10 levels) damage, +1 bleeding damage per round for (5*charlvl/10) rounds

 

Winding (pronounced win-ding, not wine-ding) Blow/Shot

Entangle for (charlvl/2) rounds, chance to make opponent fatigued

 

Crippling Blow

+1 (per 10 levels) damage, strength drain (-2 str); [or enfeeblement spell]

 

Dooming Blow

On successful hit, target receives -4 to saving throws

 

Fearsome Blow

For the next (2 rounds/5 char lvls), every opponent hit must save vs (something) or be affected by fear for (1 round/5 char lvls)

 

Devastating Blow

For the next (2 rounds/5 char lvls), every opponent hit must save vs (something) or be affected by emotion for (1 round/5 char lvls)

 

Stunning Blow

On successful hit, target is stunned for (1 round/15 char lvls)

 

Confer Elements

For the next (2 rounds/10 char lvls), all attacks made by char do an additional +1 fire, cold, poison, electric, acid, and magic damage (and if I'm forgetting anything, +1 of that, too)

 

 

I hope you like some of the ideas. Either way it sounds like a great kit, so tell us when you're done, I'd like to play it through.

[Annúgil]

As for the city/wilderness bonuses - yeah, that's the point. I want it to be noticeable (I'm not sure it'd be with such modifiers, probably not), but not gamebreaking. Ideally, this kit will have more traits in this vein. As for the speed modifier - it makes sense, but I'm not sure if it would've been fun for the player to be constantly lagging behind when in a city. Needs testing, I guess (so do the damage and to hit bonuses, but I think that every 12 levels wouldn't be very noticeable). I'm not sure about the saves, though.

 

I like your abilities, especially the winding (whineding? shot and confer elements (great idea, but that'd be harder to justify lore wise). They require some penalties though, I reckon.

 

I think it'd be great to somehow represent the frontiersman's lack of proper military training and discipline. Lovered AC is one idea, perhaps lower morale (easier to rout?).

 

And thanks for the kind words, I'll post the beta version here for testing purposes once I'll finish the preliminary sketch.

[Guest LovewWarCoffee]

I really should buckle down and register...

 

Anyway, if you want to represent the ranger's lack of training and expertise, I would recommend the following. One: The Fighter class has a comparatively low save vs. death and save vs. spells. Since fear, hold, emotion, and other effects that one might consider a 'disciplined' or 'trained' character to be able to stave off tend to have require save vs. spell, if you gave the kit a penalty to spell saves it would, I think, help to represent this.

 

Another, much more complicated, thing you might do is alter the kit's thac0 progression table (and I don't think you can do this directly) to space it out a bit more. If the thac0 progression for ranger is already slower than that of a fighter, then this is already taken care of.

 

At the very least, all the +hit + damage bonuses should be made strictly +damage bonuses: it sounds like what you're aiming for is a lack of training resulting in less skill with a weapon, but enough experience with hunting, tracking, and killing allows the frontiersman to aim blows to vital spots.

 

Something else you might consider is giving an AC penalty but some innate resistances (maybe fire, cold, and piercing, 10%). Lastly, if you want the city/wilderness dichotomy to be felt, how about the following:

 

-4 to hit, -1 saving throws in cities

+2 speed modifier outside of cities

 

You can also modify the HLA tables and remove some of the more training-specific items as you see fit.

[Guest LoveWarCoffee]

A +2/-2 to hit won't make your ranger godlike or awful; and without druid spells he can't really buff himself which is a perfectly fair tradeoff for having no ranger spells (I'd go as far as to say giving him a bonus -1AC would still be fair).

 

Christ. I have recently lost the ability to write coherently. This SHOULD read:

 

"and without druid spells he can't really buff himself, which is a perfectly fair tradeoff for the +1 hit/damage every six levels (I'd go so far as to say that giving him an extra -1AC would still be fair)"

 

Bah!

[Annúgil]

Yeah, you should register

 

The saves idea is a pretty good one, I was thinking of lowering the magic resistance too. But then again it wouldn't be very consistent with other ranger classes, since they don't get such penalties.

I think that the ranger's thac0 progression table is indeed slower.

As for the lack of military training - what I meant is that while the frontiersman is the best soldier among the ranger, he still isn't a line infantryman, if you know what I mean.

 

AC penalty would be reasonable, I think.

About the city/wilderness dichotomy - that sounds just about right, I'll take a better look at the possible effects and will try to find out more about possible penalties.

 

I plan to completly revise the HLA table, we shall see if that's possible and if I can do it

 

Edit : I think I found a way to represent the indiscipline of the class : what if the frontiersman would berserk should he suffer severe wounds? Just like Minsc does, which means he'd uncontrollable when he's in such state.

[Guest LoveWarCoffee]

Yeah, you should register

 

The saves idea is a pretty good one, I was thinking of lowering the magic resistance too. But then again it wouldn't be very consistent with other ranger classes, since they don't get such penalties.

I think that the ranger's thac0 progression table is indeed slower.

As for the lack of military training - what I meant is that while the frontiersman is the best soldier among the ranger, he still isn't a line infantryman, if you know what I mean.

 

AC penalty would be reasonable, I think.

About the city/wilderness dichotomy - that sounds just about right, I'll take a better look at the possible effects and will try to find out more about possible penalties.

 

I plan to completly revise the HLA table, we shall see if that's possible and if I can do it

 

Edit : I think I found a way to represent the indiscipline of the class : what if the frontiersman would berserk should he suffer severe wounds? Just like Minsc does, which means he'd uncontrollable when he's in such state.

[Guest LoveWarCoffee]

You know, you don't have the text box selected and you hit carriage-return and BOOM, a post made entirely of a quotation. Bah!

 

Anyway, on to stuff.

 

I think I found a way to represent the indiscipline of the class : what if the frontiersman would berserk should he suffer severe wounds? Just like Minsc does, which means he'd uncontrollable when he's in such state.

 

You could actually make your own rage. The problem with berserk with this kit is that it's somewhat focused: +2 hit +2 damage and immunities, the barbarian 'rage' seems much more along the lines of 'unfocused energy': +4 str and con, -2 AC Penalty, and immunities.

 

It doesn't make sense to me why the frontiersman should gain immunities to hold, fear, imprison, etc. from a skill, but I could be wrong. My suggestion is to tweak the above a little, dropping the immunities and adding an extra attack per round for the duration, followed by a 'fatigued' period or/and damage when it wears off.

[Annúgil]

I did some digging in the game files to see what kind of effects are there.

 

So, how do you like the rage idea? Does it make sense?

There's the Morale modifer, not entirely sure what it does, but I'm guessing when it's low enough, the player loses the control of the character. This could work well with the rage.

 

Other fun stuff I found :

 

1. Unconsciousness effect - could be used as one of the special attack effects.

2. How about an attack which lowers target's slashing/piercing resistance?

 

What does the tracking skill do anyway? I found a modifier, could work well with the city/wilderness mechanism.

 

One more thing - I think that only humans, elves and half-elves should be able to use the kit.

[Guest LoveWarCoffee]

I did some digging in the game files to see what kind of effects are there.

 

So, how do you like the rage idea? Does it make sense?

See above post

 

1. Unconsciousness effect - could be used as one of the special attack effects.

2. How about an attack which lowers target's slashing/piercing resistance?

So the Unconsciousness effect is normally used in conjunction with bare fists (non-monk), color spray, and command. I'm not entirely sure if it's the same as "sleep" but it could be. I could see using it as a special attack if the ranger was devoted to blunt weapons, but not slash/pierce. As for an attack that lowers resistance to its own attack type, that just sounds borken. An alternative might be 'apply toxic barbs', the frontiersman spreads an odd concoction he's developed over the years that adds acid, poison, and splinter damage for the next few rounds.

 

What does the tracking skill do anyway? I found a modifier, could work well with the city/wilderness mechanism.

No idea. It could be one of those things that was a good idea but was never implemented.

 

One more thing - I think that only humans, elves and half-elves should be able to use the kit.

Your kit, your call!

 

LWC

[Annúgil]

See above post

 

Yeah, I've read that, but do you think that it fits the class? Disregard the technicalities for now.

I want to be both an advantage and a disadvantage and something that the players must be aware of. Not entirely sure it's the best way to represent the indiscipline, though.

 

So the Unconsciousness effect is normally used in conjunction with bare fists (non-monk), color spray, and command. I'm not entirely sure if it's the same as "sleep" but it could be. I could see using it as a special attack if the ranger was devoted to blunt weapons, but not slash/pierce. As for an attack that lowers resistance to its own attack type, that just sounds borken. An alternative might be 'apply toxic barbs', the frontiersman spreads an odd concoction he's developed over the years that adds acid, poison, and splinter damage for the next few rounds.

 

I really like that "confer elements" or "toxic barbs" idea, but it's hard to find a viable explanation for it. I'll try to fiddle with it. I agree about the unconsciousness and resistance, that wasn't a good idea.

 

No idea. It could be one of those things that was a good idea but was never implemented.

 

I know there's a tracking ability in the HLA table, I think it reveals the enemies' location on the map. I'd really like to include something like that, but perhaps it should do something more?

 

Your kit, your call!

 

Yeah, but I want to hear your opinion