Talk:Beginner's guide to playing a ranger

Initial Discussion

Hi, everyone.

I'd like to start a discussion about a cooperative ranger guide directed at inexperienced players.

First, I'd like to compile a list of quality material already in existence, and while there is a lot of good information out there, it seems to be pretty vastly spread out. There also seems to be a lack of existing ranger guides (I imagine a lot were lost as player owned websites discontinued hosting services), and those that can be found are old/too technical/too specific for a newbie guide. Perhaps some of you have some of the older ones tucked away in your long-lived GS directories, so please post them somewhere and give us a link in this discussion. Below is a small list of items I found with a quick cursory Google search.

Ransom's GSIII Ranger Guide:
http://www.tamcon.com/GS3/ranger1.html
Nuadjha's "The Art of the Bow":
http://forum.gsplayers.com/showthread.php?49785-quot-The-Art-of-the-Bow-quot-GSIV-Archery-Guide

Second, I'd like to talk about the organization of the guide. I'm not entirely sure how I envision the whole thing laid out, but we can (and will, I'm sure) make alterations to the general layout as the guide progresses. Some basic modules that comes to mind are:

-a conceptualized description of what a ranger is and how they can be reasonably expected to function

Started on this last night, forgot to make a note here. Anyone who wants to fiddle with it and make it sound nicer is free to go ahead. SARAH3 (talk) 04:43, 13 February 2015 (CST)

-a guide that follows the character creation process (e.g. choosing your race, stats, skills)
-a basic hunting guide using the skills a typical ranger may be expected to have (we should probably avoid suggestions like "fletch till you 15, then go hunt" or "use this script to level to X" as this should remain a guide showing newbies how to roll up and play a ranger.
-helpful links (preferably within the gswiki) to more specific guides and other useful information
-notes on roleplaying and character development
-basic information about societies and choosing a society

I'm not sure if we should get overly technical about specific training options (such as crit/DF tables, etc), though we can certainly provide links to such things while stressing that a complete understanding of these topics is not necessary for success. We should stress a basic concept of what a ranger is while also focusing on character customization by suggesting that there are a wide range of options available for a ranger where training/playing styles are concerned. Players need not follow an ideal perfectly to have a viable character.

I can take care of that, I've had many requests for a ranger guide... Now that I'm putting down my newbie guide to you all, I can handle the advanced numerical outlook on rangers, if you guys want to stick to the basics. I may bug you in game for information and fact checking though! -Whirlin HJELTE (talk) 11:11, 11 February 2015 (CST)

Feel free to hit me up if you need any specific help. You know where to find Sepher. Regarding a more advanced mechanical outlook, such a guide like that would very much compliment one such as this, as there are always players that like to get deeply involved with the mechanical side of the game. I look forward to it. -Sepher --PENNINGTONB1 (talk) 18:42, 12 February 2015 (CST)

So, before getting into the meat of the guide, what suggestions or ideas would you like to see in such a guide? If you're a new player or a new ranger, what sorts of questions do/did you have about playing a ranger? Let us know.

~Brian, Sepher's player

I'm relatively new to GS overall, so I'm not sure about mechanics and general advice for being a ranger part since I've only played one ranger. I can provide text edits and add all of the links to other parts of GS wiki for people who just want to write text and not worry about that though.

Oh, and I have a buff spells guide in the works so I'll try to figure out a way to get some sort of floating page so the relevant information can be presented here so new rangers have a good sense for which spells they should be liberally applying to themselves. -Astru SARAH3 (talk) 11:10, 12 February 2015 (CST)

I am happy to leave the linking and general "Wikifying" part of editing to someone who knows what they're doing. It would just be a trial and error process for me and not something I'm interested in putting forth the effort into at the moment.

I'm not super awesome at all things wiki, but after playing around a bit, I'm at least pretty good at linking stuff. I'll try to go through at the end and cut out excessive links at the end. Everything is supposed to be linked once per page when it's first mentioned, but who knows how things end up getting organized when we're done. SARAH3 (talk) 04:43, 13 February 2015 (CST)

Regarding the buff guide: I don't know what a floating page is, so I wouldn't know if I necessarily want it on this particular page, but at the very least a link in the hunting module of the guide may be inserted. Ideally, I want to keep things as tight as possible. -Sepher --PENNINGTONB1 (talk) 18:42, 12 February 2015 (CST)

Well, in principle, when DAID and I get the floating pages working, they should be easy to add and remove from different pages, so if nobody likes it on this page and we just want to run with a link, it can be removed without losing the work. SCRIBES is actually the one who suggested adding a buff spell section to the beginner profession pages when I asked on the officials, but we can certainly see how it works here. :) -Astru SARAH3 (talk) 04:43, 13 February 2015 (CST)

Edit Reversions

I am going to undo the recent changed to the Race section because I feel some of the purpose and organization was lost in the edit. There are also POV issues, among other grammar problems with the edit. I will borrow some of the language to reedit the section. Too much was changed to warrant minor editing repairs, thus the reversion. Also, please leave the article highlights as they are, because I want readers to go to them. These articles are filled with so many links that people can become numb to them. -Sepher --PENNINGTONB1 (talk) 20:57, 13 February 2015 (CST)

My edits repaired some of the awkward sentence constructions in the original and attempted to make the prose smoother. In addition, I made an organizational change (moving the final paragraph to the second paragraph) that highlighted an issue many people mentioned on the forums. I felt that this merited more than an "and also" tacked on to the end of the section. Additionally, I moved some of the links so that they became part of the text instead of "see also: this page" as in the original and reversion, which is unnecessary since we can add links in the text itself. Also, this is a wiki, you're supposed to link to other pages on the wiki. I was not multiply linking the same article, so the way I did it definitely falls within the style guidelines. I won't undo the reversion because other work has been done on the page since, but I'm likely to tackle the whole section again in the future.SARAH3 (talk) 07:25, 14 February 2015 (CST)

I'm not saying not to link things to other pages. I'm saying leave the highlighted articles (e.g. Main Article: blah blah, and "please see the following article: blah blah" as they are, because they're stressed for a reason. If you have other editing suggestions, please place them here and I'll author in alterations to the text as I see fit. Thank you. -Sepher --PENNINGTONB1 (talk) 12:56, 15 February 2015 (CST)

Unfortunately, I can't see that the "please see article: blah blah" is very sensible or a good use of space when it is not a template/transclusion. If the section is "Race" and one wants readers to see the main article on Race, one merely need to make the section title a wiki link, which is a standard convention on gswiki and formerly KP. Imagine if everyone used this approach how cluttered this section might look with a "see main page" under every heading! Also, anyone with editing ideas is free to implement their edits themselves as they see fit. In the case where others merely have basic suggestions but would rather not make the edits themselves, I'm sure the offer to author the changes is welcome. I'm not sure if it is intentional, but the last statement sounds like a claim of authorship to the page, which ought to be disregarded. DAID (talk) 09:41, 16 February 2015 (CST)

It's not just about wanting them to read the highlighted article; it's also about WHEN I want them to read the article. Highlighting it in this way serves that function. I want to direct the reader's attention. Concerning your incessant and ridiculous assertions that everybody should feel free to crap all over an article -- you're still wrong. Absolutely no good can come from multiple people attempting to author the same article. The last statement I made above was intentional, and I am claiming authorship of the page. If everyone thinks they're free to alter what I've written, and I feel free to alter what they've written, everybody loses. When people work together to see an article form to an idea (you seem to be more concerned with owning the territory than with creating valuable content), things tend to be more successful. The thread on the forums about this article is over 100 posts long, most of which are people contributing to the idea (to which you have contributed nothing, btw). Now I'd like to stop repeating myself, so you may consider the discussion closed. -Sepher --PENNINGTONB1 (talk) 10:34, 16 February 2015 (CST)

It's not at all about "owning territory" but making the wiki itself consistent. When I come and see that generalized statistical information is being re-syndicated from other places without any emphasis on rangers, it is in the wrong place. There is a sub-section of the new player guide which has statistical basics, and there is the general statistics page, and there are the individual pages for each statistic. I would kindly direct you to improve any of those generalized pages where you feel they are lacking, and focus on the points relevant specifically to rangers on this page. Copying a table from another page is not a good way to fill a page, since is divides future editing work to many locations. I will kindly remind you once again that wiki is a collaborative effort, and insist that you to be polite and professional to all the other editors with more objective descriptions of problems. I fail to see how replies on a topic when no consensus or middle-ground is reached might entice anyone to describe the situation as having the "discussion closed." Particularly in these kinds of situations, it is important for all editors to understand topics such as [Edit warring] which is more carefully elucidated on Wikipedia, "Note that an editor who repeatedly restores his or her preferred version is edit warring". I point this out because I will be planning to edit this article in the near future for conformity; I feel it is useful to point out that the attitude expressed here may lead you to revert any and all changes made by other editors in this way, which is unacceptable. Thank you for your patience and fast replies. DAID (talk) 11:43, 16 February 2015 (CST)

I would also really appreciate not having factual inaccuracies spread to cast my position under a false light. I have indeed posted several times in the thread in question. I have also created substantial content on the wiki outside the more mundane editing work. I would also question the application of "incessant" to a phenomena which has occurred twice (beyond the term's lack of place here for the uncivilized nature). Please refrain from making claims of further falsehoods about myself or other editors, because it is not constructive. DAID (talk) 20:06, 16 February 2015 (CST)

FYI via Scribes

Hola guys,

I will make a similar statement on the wiki (all right, I may just cut and paste, don't judge me) on the disagreements that have been boiling up and over concerning the beginning ranger's guide.

First off, obviously people are motivated and passionate. That's awesome.

Second off, per the contest rules and winning rewards, authorship is not important, it's contribution. Those two sound very similar, but someone can author a guide, but then someone else can come in and add an additional 100% of information. They've done the same thing, but they are different. As the irrational arbiter of this contest, I will be ignoring the idea of authorship and looking to contribution (obviously, authorship can be recognized as a contribution).

Third off, the essence of the contest was to inspire a communal effort to produce fantastic guides. Most of the ranger guide posts have reflected this, but this is not a contest of, "Whomever writes the BEST guide" wins. It's a contest of contribution where everyone wins, but the degree of the reward rests on how much effort they put into it.

Fourth off, the nature of wikis is one of communal ownership. No one owns an article or a page because everyone has the right to make changes or edits to it. The principle behind it is that society as a whole will land on a consensus that favors the best information over the work of any one individual. if someone wants to create a page entitled, "Joe's Ultimate Guide to Rangering" they are welcome to do so. They do not own that page, either, but it seems that KP has a history of respecting individual's efforts to present their vision unaltered within its realm. I personally do not see a problem following this tradition, either, hence my note to Whirlin on the wiki contest page. However, for the pages that were setup for this contest, no one owns them. No one has a preemptive right of edit, or prima editore or first amongst equals or whatever you want to call it. If someone attempts to build a wall around one of these articles, they will incur my wrath (stop laughing!), but consider this a fresh start for anyone(s) who may have made certain statement(s) to the contrary.

Fifth off, for those of you are having problems with seeing drafts altered in the middle of drafting. This is a problem as old as wikis and drunk 10th Century monks. It was recommended to use a sandbox. This is a great suggestion and even if you're not comfortable enough to create one on the wiki, then use the old fashion version, a word file. One potential way to work this problem out, create your guide elsewhere, and then invite others to adapt it to the existing material.

Sixth off, thank you to everyone who has spiritedly engaged in this endeavor. I know while tempers and frustrations have arisen, these are not vain glory projects, but earnest attempts to create helpful guides to new players. That's fantastic! So thank you again!

Seventh off, please feel free to contact me with any concerns or questions. I want this to be a fun, not infuriating, event. Even if you just want to blow off steam, shoot me an email or catch me on GMail Chat (GMScribes).

Thanks, guys and gals!

GM Scribes

p.s. For wiki purposes, when engaging in discussion, remember to use four ~ to sign your note! GS4-SCRIBES (talk) 15:39, 17 February 2015 (CST)

Statistics Section

The current statistics section contains way too much detail for this page and none of it is relevant only to rangers. The statistics section here seems to contain more general detail on statistics than the actual Statistics page. Some of this information should possibly be moved over there. For the rest, there is already a section on statistics in the beginner's guide, which should be linked and a description of how statistics should be set for a ranger should be added. SARAH3 (talk) 01:06, 18 February 2015 (CST)

Much of the original information about statistics from this section has been moved to the Statistics page and this section has been replaced with a description of how different statistics affect rangers in particular which is hopefully useful and relevant to beginners. If you see anything that's missing or seems out of place, don't hesitate to edit or comment on it here (if you don't feel like editing the text). -cheers, SARAH3 (talk) 09:28, 20 February 2015 (CST)

Skills

I put together a very general section on skills a ranger might wish to train heavily influenced by the way the skills section is laid out in the sorcerer guide since I thought that one was very nicely done. This is intended to give a very broad overview while also providing new players with a lot of useful information. It is not intended to serve as a replacement for guides on specific weapons. I have left a few ??s in the Additional Skills table because I'm not actually sure that there's actually a very general way to train these and it is my impression that it really depends what you want your ranger to do. If that is the case, then the question marks are probably fine (unless you think they're ugly and a blank space is better), but if there's some standard threshold (e.g. for MIU), then feel free to add it. Also, if there are skills that are important and I missed them, please add those to the tables as well (unless you don't like playing with tables, in which case, tell me here and I will add them). If you add to the Core Skill table, please update the Total at the bottom of that table to reflect these changes. -cheers, SARAH3 (talk) 02:27, 18 February 2015 (CST)

Update: I removed the ??s and left them blank. Everything else applies. -cheers, SARAH3 (talk) 04:44, 18 February 2015 (CST)