Rage Counterpart/Nidbane replacement

[zaramoth]

So ive been thinking for a while now about nidbanes and how lackluster (nonexistent) i feel Ranging has become since the game made its big 2d >3d transition and all the changes that came with it. With the newest addition being that players who dont learn the "Rage" skill can't die in regular combat. I felt like this change made a definitive split in the skill tree where you can choose to do really bad things (vandalism battery murder) or live a life of relative peace but it leaves a space open that i feel needs filling. And now that i've finished typing everything below and have searched the forums i see that a similar idea has come up before and believe even more strongly that it should be in.

I believe there should be a new combat skill for Ranging.

Learning it excludes your character from buying Rage (and therefore the skills behind it) and buying Rage excludes you from buying Ranging. Buying Ranging means your character still cannot be the instigator in a typical combat situation, but can enter combat under certain conditions. It would also remove the ability to perform violent criminal acts, only allowing you to steal, attack and kill conditionally.

Ranging would unlock the ability to craft a Judgement using scents collected at crime scenes. As well as a combat maneuver.

Judgements would replace the use of nidbanes, or be used instead of them to pursue criminal scents. These Judgements can range from a Judgement of Repossession (for theft), to a Judgement of Execution (for murder) and when crafted give you a screen marker similar to that of a Quest giver that leads you to the perpetrator and will last a duration depending on the type and quality of Judgement crafted or until the Judgement has been fulfilled.

There would be a Judgement for all scents above trespassing where the idea is justice, sometimes in the form of an eye for an eye. For example a Judgement of Repossession for a theft scent will allow the ranger to "Steal" the item the scent refers to as stolen, a Judgement of Execution would allow a ranger to enter combat with and kill the person who left the murder scent originally used to craft the Judgement.

When entering combat with a criminal by using a Judgement crafted from their left scents, the Ranger may use the ranger specific combat maneuver which forces single combat between the Ranger and the Criminal.

The appeal of these Judgments is that the player using them will not leave scents, or be penalized in any way (criminal logout timers) for meeting Judgement. They should also be able to enter visitor gates without receiving the debuff as there shouldn't be anything "Criminal" they can do in your town anyway. That means if a Ranger tracks down a murderer using a Judgement of Execution and then kills that murderer, the Ranger will leave no scent, and not have any criminal debuff timers.

In addition to this, i would suggest that these be given personal benefit beyond bounty payments or fun. Meaning, a Ranger who successfully completes a Judgement of Execution should receive a portion of the total LP the character they Executed had. How much and how this factors into skulls and such i've not worked out but i think it would be important to incentivise a pseudo LP bounty system where highly threatening targets are more worth their potential trouble.

[Jackwolf]

Bypassing visitor gates is definitely too strong.

[Vigilance]

i really like this idea in theory but it needs polish from the suggested implementation. i dislike the idea of bypassing visitor gates as well, but i do really enjoy the idea of vigilante shit getting a new system aside from just tracking, especially if its parallel to rage.

[Jackwolf]

Yeah I'm in agreeance with Vigi above, but I have no grand input on it.

[zaramoth]

I know that bypassing visitor gates is strong but I couldn't think of a decent way of allowing the ranger to reach his target under any circumstances without vandalism.

I thought of summoning into a cellar like arena for combat scent crimes but wasn't sure about that because it also eliminated the tracking/hunting down of the person.

[loskierek]

perhaps some sort of a warning when the perperator is outside claim with arrow?

[zaramoth]

the more i think about it the more im unsure of the problem with bypassing visitor gate debuffs.

The Ranger wouldn't be able to attack anyone he doesn't have a combat related Judgement for and couldnt steal/rummage/vandalize anything and as long as they're not in combat with their specific target, can still be targeted by others in the town. Really it just means that if you have some dickhead in your town who murdered someone they'd need their own place or run the risk of having to fight someone

[Kaios]

the more i think about it the more im unsure of the problem with bypassing visitor gate debuffs.

If a Ranger has any opportunity to use scents to summon players to a specific location then I can certainly see how that would be abused. I also think you will be hard pressed to find many players willing to run the risk of walking straight in to a village of criminals, or they will simply use low effort alts with only the skills that are necessary to perform the Ranging.

Another problem I see is that it’s difficult, sometimes impossible, to differentiate a “good” scent and a “bad” scent. Presumably the reason for this suggestion is to allow law abiding hearthlings to track down dangerous criminals but I suspect it would also be used in the opposite fashion. For example you get attacked and murder the aggressor but later on someone else tracks you down, maybe not even from the same village, and kills you without really knowing what you did or why you did it. Interactions that leave scents are not always so black and white in this game.

[zaramoth]

the more i think about it the more im unsure of the problem with bypassing visitor gate debuffs.

If a Ranger has any opportunity to use scents to summon players to a specific location then I can certainly see how that would be abused. I also think you will be hard pressed to find many players willing to run the risk of walking straight in to a village of criminals, or they will simply use low effort alts with only the skills that are necessary to perform the Ranging.

Another problem I see is that it’s difficult, sometimes impossible, to differentiate a “good” scent and a “bad” scent. Presumably the reason for this suggestion is to allow law abiding hearthlings to track down dangerous criminals but I suspect it would also be used in the opposite fashion. For example you get attacked and murder the aggressor but later on someone else tracks you down, maybe not even from the same village, and kills you without really knowing what you did or why you did it. Interactions that leave scents are not always so black and white in this game.

AH right i forgot about that bit, knew i'd forgotten something.

So the partial point of the idea of making Ranging be the counter action to Rage is that Rage and the skills locked behind it are "bad guy" skills in that in most scenarios a player using them would be doing so in order to hard another player or their property. Ranging is supposed to be the "good guy" and should mean that a player in the middle (someone without rage or ranging) who gets forced into combat by a player with Rage should not leave scents for battery/murder if the combat comes to that point because it was self defense.

I dont know how an Arena summon could be abused, where both players are summoned into a cellar like area with no objects or terrain variance and have to fight to the death to leave, but i still prefer the entering towns side instead.

Part of why a Ranger would feel better/safer about entering a town of criminals is that the maneuver they have is designed to allow them to 1v1 the target of violent crimes. You could even potentially give them a grace period after leaving combat with their target where they could hearth without being attackable

[Granger]

Another problem I see is that it’s difficult, sometimes impossible, to differentiate a “good” scent and a “bad” scent. Presumably the reason for this suggestion is to allow law abiding hearthlings to track down dangerous criminals but I suspect it would also be used in the opposite fashion. For example you get attacked and murder the aggressor but later on someone else tracks you down, maybe not even from the same village, and kills you without really knowing what you did or why you did it. Interactions that leave scents are not always so black and white in this game.

I suggested once that a different set of scents should be generated on your actions when you're in posession of scents from your opponent - and also a different set of scents should be generated in case you defend against an attacker.

Wasn't that liked by the PvP players for some reason they were unable to clearly express.