Track

Yonna · Post by **Yonna** » Sun Jul 10, 2005 4:21 am

Today I was looking over my skill list to choose which skill would be best to learn next in my training, and I realized I hadn't learned to track my foes...I was sadly surprised to realize that it wasn't there anymore! I believe rogues/thieves would be masters of attaining the whereabouts of people through asking crowds, looking for clues, etc. I know that it would be very IC for my thief to learn this skill.

Kregor · Post by **Kregor** » Sun Jul 10, 2005 5:25 pm

While I understand wanting to have some skills in scouts that thieves don't have, and vice versa, I also question the removal of track from the thieves guild file, for two primary reasons:

1) The spies guild is built off of chars using the thief guild file. One of the skills a spy would have would be tracking -- the ability to tail and/or locate a subject of one's spying. While existing thieves still have the ability as an "other" skill, this means that future chars who would join said organization, would be without a skill that could arguably be a primary skill for that group. Short of putting the skill back into thieves, the solutions would be making a separate guild file for spies (more work than really necessary, IMHO), or making spies use the scouts file (also not a desireable affect, IMHO, as spies are often *not* treehuggers), or else, add a skill for tailing another char/mob, rather than tracking (I know this was discussed in a thread, and I can't find it on search, for the life of me) to reflect following at a distance... perhaps more thief/spy like.

2) By removing track, we are taking the skill almost totally out of the hands of any guild that can have evil members, short of malarite priests -- and those are few and far between. Because scouts and rangers are both good-only guilds, they will now corner the market on being able to track. Thieves were the evils' main resource for getting someone with this skill.

Perhaps instead of docking thieves for this skill, what about other skills added to the scout that a thief does not get, and make it even more like the rogue/ranger hybrid it seems intended to be... like pathfinding or slice?

Just my two cents.

Yonna · Post by **Yonna** » Sun Jul 10, 2005 6:36 pm

2) By removing track, we are taking the skill almost totally out of the hands of any guild that can have evil members, short of malarite priests -- and those are few and far between. Because scouts and rangers are both good-only guilds, they will now corner the market on being able to track. Thieves were the evils' main resource for getting someone with this skill.

I am going to have to say that I strongly agree with Kregor on this one. This skill was very useful to not only the thief, but the thieves allies. If we remove it, it will wind up being a good exclusive.

Bugoron · Post by **Bugoron** » Sun Jul 17, 2005 10:20 pm

I think it is being forgotten that, in order to expand the game, sacrifices sometimes need to be made.

Personally, I don't see the everyday rogue being motivated, let alone trained, to track someone. Rogues are, well...rogues. Thieves have better things to do than track someone. In their profession, they should seek to, and be proficient in, keeping their target in sight and NO less than earshot at all times. If anything, I see tracking being used *against* a thief more than *by* a thief.

Also, keep in mind that, like all other classes, the scout class is going to need hooks, reasons for people to choose that class. Another thing to remember is that, with additions such as this, the distribution of certain skills to specific classes forces RP, because certain classes are capable of certain things. Need to find someone? Guess you need to find a ranger or a scout to RP with in order to track them.

I don't expect everyone to agree with me, but at least as far as FK goes, I don't see why any classes beyond the Rangers and the Scouts would need to have tracking (keeping in mind that *needing* the skill is different than *wanting* the skill).

Glim · Post by **Glim** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 2:16 am

I can see a class besides rangers and scouts than would need track.

As to track by thieves, I beleive that the whole reason that they should have it, is that it is hard to tail someone on a mud interface without actually using the follow command. Track allows them to simulate watching from a distance where their mark goes without actually having to type look e, look n, look s. Those are things that would be natural IRL but take enough time in the mud to do that by the time you do it, whoever you are following is gone, making it nearly impossible to follow someone without using the track skill or the follow command.

But anyways, what is really the point behind the scout class? Why not just give thieves more skills, and allow those thieves who want to RP as scouts their right to just not choose to train those "evil" skills. That is what you have to do if you want to RP a scout in D&D. If its the whole fact that to become a thief you need to use "evil" skills, then why not just add a guild that doesnt require you to use them to become a thief. Ahh well, that was just my two cents.

Kregor · Post by **Kregor** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 2:38 am

If anything, I see tracking being used *against* a thief more than *by* a thief.

With all respect, Bugoron... that statement makes a very confining statement about a "thief's" RP in FK, lumping all thieves as being cutpurses who steal and hide in alleyways to get away.

This is far from the case, as other threads in this same board have discussed before -- the term "thieves" is a holdover from the 2nd edition title, since "rogue" is already used to term an unguilded bard/thief/scout etc. in FK. "Thieves" the FK guild, is supposed to be a very loose broadly defined class as far as RP is concerned. Just substitute "rogue" in place of "thief" when you think about an FK thief. There are good rogues, there are evil... there are rogues that are cutpurses, there are rogues that are swashbucklers, there are rogues that are bounty hunters, spies, etc. You don't even have to train steal to be a "thief" in 2nd edition speak.

And a spy, of all those who are guilded thieves in FK, would have a perfectly good IC justification for tracking, but I seriously doubt the spies guuild will ever get a separate coded guild file, so basically we just stripped it from any future hopefuls of said guild. Of course, for all I know, we may be declaring the spy guild DOA.

Another thing to remember is that, with additions such as this, the distribution of certain skills to specific classes forces RP, because certain classes are capable of certain things. Need to find someone? Guess you need to find a ranger or a scout to RP with in order to track them.

Referring back to my other point in my previous post... that's a great intention, but, honestly, it's not going to be very IC for the High Priest of Bane to go to a scout or ranger to get someone else tracked. Bear in mind, both scouts and rangers in FK are good. Like 2nd edition, there are no non-good treehuggers, so evil dieties do not have their own set of rangers and scouts. So then, it becomes a balance issue.... do you give tracking to a class that is open to evils, or do you open up the rangers and scouts to evil dieties, or do you just say tough luck for the evils?

Kelemvor · Post by **Kelemvor** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 4:31 am

The track skill is not currently limited to only rangers and thieves and therefore will not become further limited to old characters and good aligned only when the Scout guild comes in.

If you browse through the guild skills on the website, I'm sure that you'll find that this is case.

Kregor · Post by **Kregor** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 7:10 am

From the guild files, track is now available for:

Rangers, Scouts, Mielikkan Druids, and Priests of Malar. That would be three goods, and one evil class that has, that I know of, one active char.

That said, if I am the one person with the biggest issue over the change of skills, then it's not worth a continued debate. I respectfully disagree with the change, but I won't persue it further.

Tandria · Post by **Tandria** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 11:45 am

I will have to agree with Kregor in this situation.

As Bugoron noted, thieves shouldn't be able to lose their target . . . however, codewise, that isn't exactly possible. Unless a new skill called "tail", that would allow the thief in question to follow their victim from a distance, were to be implemented, "track" would be a thief's absolute best chance at following someone from afar; however, I'm uncertain as to how codeable "tail" would be in this situation, nor whether it would be really be worthwhile to code with track being in the game already.

One might argue that thieves are most at home in a city and that it is nigh impossible to look for tracks in a city, but track doesn't necessarily involve the footprints of the trackee, and a great number of things can come into play while tracking someone. Scent, scraps of clothing/dropped objects, and even subtly asking others could be implemented ICly (if not codewise, which I know would take a very long time and would be more worthwhile to just RP out).

Anyway, just my two cents on the situation

.

Eamane · Post by **Eamane** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 3:02 pm

Actually, I think the track skill shouldn't be given to thieves. I had a thief and functioned perfectly well without it, by actually picking up on things within the game. Thieves have a unique lovely wonderful skill called Peek. Why does a theif have to track a certain person when there are plenty of pockets to pick around? Peek is a skill that allows you to pick up on certain things in a crowd, while track is for hunting down someone, which I agree is a better used skill for a spy. Honestly, any thieves here? How often do you actually use the Track skill for thievery and not just easy location?

Glim · Post by **Glim** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 8:07 pm

Eamane, your still sticking to the idea that the thief class has to be thieves and pickpockets. They dont. Also, just because you RP your thief a certain way, doesnt mean that is the only way to RP one. There are many different kinds of thieves and such, and many of them WOULD need to tail someone. It happens all the time in the thievin world.

Also, you mentioned a spy, the spy guild is almost exclusively for good aligned thieves. They would need track.

Kregor · Post by **Kregor** » Mon Jul 18, 2005 9:45 pm

This digresses the original topic, and probably will end up spurring another thread, but:

Eamane wrote:Why does a theif have to track a certain person when there are plenty of pockets to pick around? ... How often do you actually use the Track skill for thievery and not just easy location?

I have a "thief" that doesn't steal. It's not in his RP. "Why did I make him a thief?" Some will ask? Because a rogue is the closest thing to his intended RP that the game offered. I'm not going to go more into his desired RP than that, else risk giving away some IC background that some people shouldn't have.

A "thief" doesn't have to steal. And rogues that don't steal and kill for a living shouldn't have to be bards or scouts. There are plenty of rogues who don't have the gift of arts, and who prefer city streets, that still make their trade (ethical or not) in other ways than filching a purse.

This is actually one of the things I *liked* about 3E D&D (Yes, you can quote me, I actually like something about 3E), was the change in name from "thief" to "rogue" to finally get away from this assumption. Alas, the title remains in FK, and there is no easy way around it, since a "rogue" in FK speak is a base class with no guild (and no real ability), so instead, we continue to fight the assumptions that all thieves steal for a living.

Zilvryn · Post by **Zilvryn** » Thu Jul 21, 2005 6:25 pm

What about evil rogues who wish to RP a scout like char? There is no functionality for them if the scout guild is good only..

Jerilim · Post by **Jerilim** » Thu Jul 21, 2005 6:36 pm

What is the basis behind not allowing evil scouts though? And the whole bit about not catering to everyone's whim... There's be numerous occasions where there's been rules bent and special measures taken to favor certain players/characters and when it affects a player that isn't as well known or highly regarded we get responses like that.

Zilvryn · Post by **Zilvryn** » Thu Jul 21, 2005 6:43 pm

I'm not complaining about it, I have no need for such a char and it's not something I particularly want.

I just don't think it's particularly fair to have only goods in the class, as it's equally as viable for evil chars to have the same skillset.

"We do not cater to all.", when you quite easily could (with regards to this guild), not only unbalances the game even more in the favour of the good aligns, but just seems like a pretty poor reason to me. I do not see how it can be a sensible idea to make this guild good only.

Ed

p.s. I know that it is your game and you will do with it as you wish, but this is an open forum for discussion of the game, and that is what I am doing.