Thoughts on Inventory Management

[Grenfell]

So one of my mains (I have too many chars for any one to qualify as The Main) is Steffon, my Rogue/Ranger. He suffers something terrible from lack of inventory space. A str-based Rogue/Ranger is actually the worst in this case: melee weapons for every situation (and as a TWF'er, we carry more weapons than just about any melee class, doubling up on everything), 3-4 bows, ammunition, thieve's tools, +skill items, and a variety of scrolls (Raise Dead, Heal, Restoration, etc.) and of course potions that every character should have.

It is not unusual to start a quest with maybe 3-4 backpack slots available. Seems to me that this is a problem that is endemic to the Ranger population.

Recently, I undertook an inventory purge. Sacrifices had to be made. This is where I ended up.

Weapons:

I elected to drop all greater banes (except Construct) in order to save space. I know I'm making a sacrifice on DPS vs. that targeted enemy type, but it was really unreasonable to carry Greater Giant, Undead, Construct, Dwarf, Monstrous Humanoid, Elf, Evil Outsider, Chaotic Outsider, etc. around.

The hardest was to drop my Greater Dragon and Giant banes -- those are raid bosses after all. But sacrifices had to be made -- and I could do just as well with +5 transmuters.

So I ended up with these:

WoP (x2)
Banishing (x2)
Vorpal (x2)
Smiting (x2)
Transmuting (x2)
Disruption (GT of Disruption - dualed with GT of Greater Undead Bane)
DPS set (Holyburst of PG rapier, Treason)
Greater Construct Bane (x2)
Paralyzer (x1) <-- I rarely use this, btw.

Getting rid of the second disrupter was a difficult choice, but I wanted ghost touch as well -- and by going with two GT anti-undead weapons, I saved having to waste a slot.

All of my elemental weapons are now gone. All of my Greater Banes. Second disrupter, gone. The +5 backstabbing, gone. The second paralyzer, gone. All told, I banked over 10 weapons.

Bows:

I never did carry a lot of bows, as I'm a Strength Tempest build. But I pared down even further. Now I carry three:

Silver Bow
Transmuting Bow
Wounding Bow (don't have a WoP, and I don't have IC: Ranged, so not sure it'd be worthwhile)

I got rid of the Smiter, the Banisher, the Paralyzer, the Cursespewing, the Shattermantle, etc. I can see the value of the paralyzer, the cursespewing and the shattermantle bows for a build that is more of an archery build that does party support, but that isn't my build. So I banked those. I'm seriously flirting with the idea of getting rid of the Wounding bow and the Silver Bow and just going with Transmuting, but can't bring myself to do that just yet.

I have no arrows besides House D returners, and silver arrows when fighting the Pit Fiend (I delete them after each run).

Gear:

I used to carry a bunch of Greater Resist cloaks/rings, etc. despite being able to cast the spell, because I wanted to be Dispel-proof. I can't afford the space hit. All of those are now on my Barbarian or my Fighter. I banked the Marilith Chain, and will have to do without built-in Seeker bonus. I used to have both Chaosguarde and Steadyhanded Armbands to flip from defensive mode to offensive mode -- I got rid of both and replaced it with Green Steel bracers.

A lot of the "often useful" items had to go, and I downgraded. For example, no more Spot +15 goggles -- instead, Blindness Ward of Spot +7 is in its place. Big hit, but choices had to be made.

Concordant Opposition from the Shroud is an absolute MUST for my build -- and I suspect most Ranger builds. That item alone saved six slots --> Wisdom item, Mana item, anti-fear, anti-poison items. That also meant I dumped my Remove Fear and Neutralize Poison potions, as I'm now immune to them. Disease Immunity of GFL belt was also a critical find.

I dumped my +6 Dex item, electing to lose 1 from Reflex, and ranged To-Hit, and I go with Madstone Boots fulltime.

Scrolls & Potions

As a UMD build, I have and continue to have a large number of these. I dumped as much as I could of random scrolls (Divine Power, Stone to Flesh, Displacement, etc.) but I still have a bunch I have to carry.

Raise Dead
Heal
Restoration
Dimension Door
Teleport (I know... luxury, but still...)

Potion-wise, I still have these:

CSW (Healing potions are a must, of course)
Haste
Rage
Remove Blindness
Remove Curse
Lesser Restoration

Thankfully, my other items cover Fear, Disease, and Poison. I am considering dumping Lesser Restoration, since I have Restoration scrolls, but haven't done so yet. There's too much utility in just drinking a potion if I get hit with Waves of Exhaustion or something.

Add in the Thieve's Tools, CSW wands (I'm not quite at no-fail Heal scrollage yet), Planar Girds, Stoneskin wand, and the +Disable, Search, Open Locks items. And arrows. And spell components.

Nonetheless, I now have almost a full backpack of space, where I literally had 3 slots. Yes, I'm no longer QUITE as effective vs. some mobs as I was before. Yes, I do a little less damage using plain transmuters when I could have used holy byeshk or cold iron or what-have you. But inventory management is a must.

I thought I'd share this with you guys, because I know all Rangers everywhere suffer from inventoryitis. Sometimes, you need to just say, "I'll bank this Greater XXX Bane and just use plain +5's" in order to have room for all your lootz.

What are your experiences? How are you managing inventory?

/gren

[Turial]

I'll start by indicating that I am a primarily ranged based ranger, so I typically have 3/4 to a full page of house D returning arrows.

Melee weapons:
I sword and board it most of the time. I have found that I save a lot of space by going for alignment burst of pure good weapons rather then greater banes. Am I less effective that way...yes but it was worth the space. So I have a +3 anarchic burst scimmy of pure good and a +2 axiomatic burst scimmy of pure good for my typical damage dealers. I also have a +4 holy scimmy of pure good for fleshy undead and a basic +1 holy burst mace of pure good for skellies. I still keep a muck doom for slimes and cubes. I then have a smiting scimmy, banishing shortsword, and pair of vorps for quick killers. I then have my healing set, Sup potency 4 club and green blade.

Bows:
I have a tier 2 holy and tier 2 acid bow to cover my alignment and elemental needs. Toss in the power 4 bows for situational use. A WOP bow and a distructer for raid bosses.

I don't carry potions or scrolls as I self heal well and have 5 per day clickies for curse and lesser restore. I wear the lion head belt from DQ to avoid fear, as well as the jerky for removing poison and a few other ill effects. I have the torc for regaining hp and use stoneskin clickies and the DQ cloak to keep incoming damage low. I also have the Sandstorm goggles to protect against blindness and for true seeing.

In the end inventory managment on rangers is about trying to combine gear as much as possible while still mainaining a decent level of self protection and damage out-put. If I had a pair of WOP weapons for melee I would likely ditch all but a pair of holy of pure good weapons for red names, melee wise, but that isnt going to happen. If they add scimitars to the crafting list I'll make a tier 2 holy and tier 2 acid scimitar and bank/sell off about 4 to 5 weapons which would be nice.

[JFeenstra]

if you've got dual WoP you don't need to carry vorpals

99% of the time WoP will kill in less than 20 hits, and is therefore much, much more effective than a vorpal

don't really need the banishers either for the same reason

with the introduction of quivers in mod 7 that should free up a load of your inv slots as well

[Melkor_The_Mighty]

You mentioned you use blindness ward goggles of Spot +7 but then further along you mention you carry remove blindness potions. Was this an oversight? If it was you just saved another slot by ditching the Blindness removal potions. All in all you did a sound job in downsizing equipment to make room for almighty loot! I kinda went the same route on my UMD Paladin/rogue and my cleric who had 37 weapons alone in inventory and spend 10 minutes of every quest standing in front of a chest trying to figure out what items to keep or destroy, not fun.

Ps. Turial mentions he has Torq to regain HP but if its the DQ one it restores Sp's, the Demon consort's bracers do occasionally upon being hit grant 30 temporary hp's.

[Zenako]

I can empathsize completely with my Ranger/Rogue. I decided to drop all but Acid Resist Cloak (IIRC) since most other effects are instantaneous and Evadeable. Finding good combos is a must, like the GFL Belt with Disease or Poison Imuune kickers. As someone who has feats for ranged attacks and melee attacks, have tons of both types of weapons. Still always want to pull the right tool for the job if possible. I did go and bank all the +5 elemental weapons a while back as being to limited in use. (Melee and Bow). I was able to find some useful bow combos too, like Banishing of Shattermantle.

Paring down is even harder if you want to run things solo as well. I often cut short the ammo supply then. Quivers may/will/hopefully help this out a lot. One thing it will do is probably open up a lot more bank space to store things I won't be needing on a given quest or play session. mmmm Running Shroud...not a lot of need for all those undead weapons...stuff like that.

I also have to hope you dropped the Pendant of Time on the ground somewhere, IF you really want another, they give you one. Did that on most characters with storage issues.

[Gol]

What I carry on my Ranger... Note, this was typed when I did not have access to log in, so it might not be 100% right.

Consumables
Components for Ranger 1/2/3
Required potions
Cure Serious Wands x 4

Items (that are not worn by default)
Madstone Boots x 4
30% Striders
Dustless Boots
Kudarak Delving Boots
House P trinket
Wizardry VI Helm
Underwater Action neck
Shield Clicky x 5 Neck x 2
Haste Clicky x 5 Cloak x 2
Res Ring x 2
DQ Ring
DQ Goggles
Stonemeld Armor (for when Evasion is unimportant)
Planar Gird x 2

Weapons
Sword of Shadows
+2 Vorpal Khopesh x 2
+3 Disruptor Khopesh x 2
+3 Smiter Khopesh x 2
+2 Wounding of Enfeebling Khopesh x 2
+4 Transmuting of Maiming Khopesh x 2
+3 Ghost Touch Silver Dwarven Axes of Undead Bane x 2
+2 Greater Construct Bane Khopesh x 2 (one is crippling, other is Bodyfeeder, too)
+3 Greater Giant Bane Khopesh x 2
+1 Wounding Khopesh of Greater Elemental Bane (actively looking for a second)
Mineral I Khopesh x 2
Lightning I Khopesh x 2
No arrows/bows
Dwarven Thrower
+3 Maul of Everbright
token +5 Shield of nothing

Weapons I carry but am considering not
+5 Icy Burst Khopesh x 2
+5 Flaming Burst Khopesh x 2 (not exactly, but not the point)

[Turial]

Ps. Turial mentions he has Torq to regain HP but if its the DQ one it restores Sp's, the Demon consort's bracers do occasionally upon being hit grant 30 temporary hp's.

Correct the torq regains sp, but for me the sp is converted to hp at whole sale because I have a very efficient sp/hp cure spell ratio because I have human increased healing 3, ranger devotion 4, sup potency 4, and either the green blade or gauntlets of eternity. So a bit of an oversite on my original description.

[Grenfell]

You mentioned you use blindness ward goggles of Spot +7 but then further along you mention you carry remove blindness potions. Was this an oversight? If it was you just saved another slot by ditching the Blindness removal potions. All in all you did a sound job in downsizing equipment to make room for almighty loot! I kinda went the same route on my UMD Paladin/rogue and my cleric who had 37 weapons alone in inventory and spend 10 minutes of every quest standing in front of a chest trying to figure out what items to keep or destroy, not fun.

Ps. Turial mentions he has Torq to regain HP but if its the DQ one it restores Sp's, the Demon consort's bracers do occasionally upon being hit grant 30 temporary hp's.

Actually, I also carry remove blindness potions because my rogue skills are in the goggle slot -- I can't be 100% certain that I won't get hit with some blindness deal if I'm trying to search for a trap. What if I forget to swap back from my Search goggles? Would hate for that to happen.

I probably could ditch the potions, especially since I can scroll up a Heal if that situation does happen. Thanks.

/gren

[Vengenance]

I have the same inventory management problems and my str based rogue ranger. I've recently dumped all bows except for my w/p and a Tier 3 positive bow. I have my dual vorpal set, dual smiter set, dual disruptor set, and for DPS I pretty much just dual wield 2 dragon swords of Acid. Since my ranger is slashing specced I don't use banishers, just the vorpals. I also carry a couple of gtr banes like construct for the portals, but going with a more minimal compliment of weapons has become essential with the need to carry so many arrows for the pit fiend and also to carry all my rogue required gear.

[Kreaper]

Yes. Inventory space is a problem. It would be nice if they would remove all of the paired weapon slots and added a row to each page and then make it so that we can pair our weapons on the hot bars instead. That would help with inventory space AND the number of paired weapon choices. Then I could equip all of my pairs and not have to switch out between quests.

[direwolf33]

Just two comments on the reduction, I hang onto a fire resist item and greater elemental bane weapons for part 2. I also have a destruction bow as the str rangers to hit isn't perfect on the fiend in 4/5 when ranging.

Also, I don't even bother with carrying banishers or smiters. When running quests I know I need them in, I just grab them from the bank.

I agree with the previous poster's vorpal comments too - if you have WoP why even bring vorpals?

[Jaysensen]

If everyone vorpals, better for you to vorp than w/p

[geoffhanna]

I am a mixed ranged/TWF meleer so I need three of everything to be at my most efficient. Clearly that is not possible so I made a few rules and really only break them for very good reason.

• Smite, Banish and Disrupt are Ranged functions only. I don't bring melee versions of these weapons.
• Bane and elemental weapons are by-quest only and live in the bank except when needed.
• W/P bow + arcane arrows is enough DPS for anything except elite end game

I'm not UMD so I don't have scrolls. I do have 1 level of Wiz so have a variety of wands.

I still have more melee weapon sets than I have hot-swap slots but I am able to keep about one entire panel free at the beginning of quests.

[JFeenstra]

If everyone vorpals, better for you to vorp than w/p

not so much...

2 w/p rapiers kill in 6-7 swigs max
2 w/p ss/daggers kill in under 10
2 w/p heavy/light picks kill in like 12-15 depending more on luck (19/20s do huge damage)

if there's 2 other party members going melee using dual vorpals, w/p rapiers are still killing faster than they are as a group, ss/daggers are also faster and picks are about even vs 2 vorpalers....

it really depends on your w/p weapons, but with a pair of any there's not much point to using vorpals as they'll generally be slower than w/p 95% of the time