Ranger Skill Boost does not seem to work

[Therigar]

See photo. I built a character that has the Ranger Skill Boost from the Stalkerr tree but am unable to use the skill boost. If I highlight the skill boost it has the message Requires: Skill Boost.



Not sure if this is a bug or if I've done something wrong with the character.

BTW, the other Skill Boost in the hotbar is from Human enhancement tree.

[WeiQuinn]

I have the same problem... I'm not aware of a pre-requisite Skill Boost needed to qualify for actual use.

At least they fixed the Displacement from greater dragonmark of shadow!

[Therigar]

Well, I bug reported it. Might be useful if others who have same problem do so as well.

[BOgre]

My problem is still Rgr Sprint Boost. It was discussed earlier that it may be some kind of exclusivity bug between Sprint and LD-Haste. It seemed to be greyed out if any part of LD was twisted, or if LD was active, wheter or NOT LD haste had been trained. Now it seems worse: If Ranger Sprint is trained, it will not work in any way, LD twisted/active or not. What's more, if Ranger Sprint is trained, ANY switch in active destiny causes the entire Tempest tree to reset to zero.

Bug reported.

[Therigar]

Well, the only reason I notice the skill boost bug was because you were saying you could not get an equivalent Tempest Trapmonkey. I have to say that unless you have some really atypical feat and skill selections that your Ranger 18/Rogue 1/Fighter 1 should be able to do MORE than whatever you have on live right now.

Any problems that exist are bugs in the code preventing things from working. The sprint boost is one example, the skill boost is another. IMO these are the things that we are suppose to be uncovering and reporting. And, IMO, these bugs getting through to live will be more legitimate reasons for the complaints about Turbine than the issue of whether the reincarnate allows class swapping or not.

Unfortunately, Turbine has a huge history and rather bad reputation for releasing updates to live because of a schedule even though the Lamannia testers have adequately documented and reported the bugs -- and discussed them in some detail here on the forums. So, I have a very low expectation that the bugs will actually get fixed prior to release.

Note that completely reworking characters is a knee-jerk response to problems that the failure to fix the bugs causes. If Turbine fixed the bugs I wonder if there would be any reason at all for players like you to want to LR their characters.

My test character has higher search and disable, higher hide/move silently, equal bluff and UMD plus dual wields <insert favorite exotic weapon here> (I chose bastard sword because it was available on the floor of the dojo with eFang, and I took all 3 dragon marks to make the eFang +10.... ).

The only thing I wasn't able to get to work was the +6 skill boost.

[BOgre]

unless you have some really atypical feat and skill selections that your Ranger 18/Rogue 1/Fighter 1 should be able to do MORE than whatever you have on live right now.

Most "typical" Tempests have both Heal Amp and Devotion. Yeah, we've been told to "wait for it" re:devotion, but even excluding that, there's toughness, (Greater)Human Adaptability, Human Vers IV, Attack boost/Damage boost, Favored Enemy enh's, and many many more class/race enhancements that will simply be out of reach, or made into an either/or AP spent choice.

Yes, there are specific areas that my 18/1/1 will improve significantly, but overall the changes are a net loss in DPS, Self-healing, and versatility.

More to the point, every single class I've seen has had to make narrowing choices, resulting in net losses in exchange of specific, situational gains. It feels VERY much like an attempt to mitigate power creep (tinfoil hat not required).

[Thrudh]

Most "typical" Tempests have both Heal Amp and Devotion. Yeah, we've been told to "wait for it" re:devotion, but even excluding that, there's toughness, (Greater)Human Adaptability, Human Vers IV, Attack boost/Damage boost, Favored Enemy enh's, and many many more class/race enhancements that will simply be out of reach, or made into an either/or AP spent choice.

Yes, there are specific areas that my 18/1/1 will improve significantly, but overall the changes are a net loss in DPS, Self-healing, and versatility.

You can get positive spell power from deepwood sniper... If you want devotion back as a ranger, you can get it... You don't need toughness enhancements... you get hit points for free. My hp totals were basically the same on live and on Lamannia. Favored Enemy damage is really the only thing that's hard to get.

You should be able to get Greater Human Adaptability and Damage Boost no problem.

More to the point, every single class I've seen has had to make narrowing choices, resulting in net losses in exchange of specific, situational gains. It feels VERY much like an attempt to mitigate power creep (tinfoil hat not required).

Weird... Every single character of mine GAINED from these enhancement changes... I was able to get nearly everything I had before, plus a few new things.

[Therigar]

Every single character of mine GAINED from these enhancement changes... I was able to get nearly everything I had before, plus a few new things.

Although the 3 of us are discussing on other forums, this is the bottom line for me as well. The enhancement pass did not mitigate power creep for me -- it increased it dramatically. As a simple example, my L25 monk goes from 71 AC and 0 PRR to 133 AC AND 95 PRR with the changes. Not only that, but Dodge went from 20% (of 25% max) to 22% (of 28% max). It is so ridiculous that I'm considering converting every character I have to monk -- at least enough to gain the benefits.

But, that's the thing of it. It isn't that my other characters have been harmed in any way. It is just that the pass makes other builds even better choices -- and I want those. Turbine does not owe it to me to make that possible. I can TR and build them from the ground up. If I can get there with a LR20 then so much the better. It is a bonus to me but certainly not something I'm entitled to just because Turbine is releasing an update to the game.

Some of the changes being mentioned are adjustments, I'll grant that. But, they are not build specific changes and simply rebuilding the character won't alter the impacts. Changes like Human Versatility affect every human/half-elf build in the game. Should Turbine give a free race respec as a result? I don't think so. If you want that then TR.

Still, I don't think people who are complaining have really made a legitimate effort to look at their character in light of the enhancement pass. I think they are just taking a knee-jerk reaction to something they don't understand and cherry picking the things that have changed. They are not looking at the total character and its abilities.

Let's take devotion as an example. Try choosing Heal as a skill instead. There are ways to achieve the same effect even thought the means are different.

In the case of Tempest how about the fact that you no longer need 3 feats. I was able to take an exotic weapon proficiency and had 3 feats that I could play with (I took dragonmarks to go with bastard swords for eFang, but most people can find better choices). How about spending one of those feats on Empower Healing or Mental Toughness -- or just take extra Toughness feats.

The real truth, as far as I can tell, is that the vast majority of people will have better, stronger characters as a result of the pass. I know that mine all improve significantly. I can hardly wait to play a Pale Master Archmage. The changes are just sick -- and I mean that in the most positive way possible.

[Therigar]

Bug reported.

If there is any negative, IMO, with the pending enhancement pass it is this. There are, in fact, several bugs that need to be fixed before release.

If I were going to be cynical, and I tend to be in most things, I would expect Turbine to stick to a release schedule rather than fixing the known and reported bugs. This is what they normally do, deploy to Lamannia, get player test results and bug reports, release anyway, listen to the players moan and complain, fix the bugs eventually two or more patches down the road.

If the bugs were fixed the enhancement pass would be the best thing that Turbine's done for the game in years.

[BOgre]

Although the 3 of us are discussing on other forums, this is the bottom line for me as well. The enhancement pass did not mitigate power creep for me -- it increased it dramatically. As a simple example, my L25 monk goes from 71 AC and 0 PRR to 133 AC AND 85 PRR with the changes. Not only that, but Dodge went from 20% (of 25% max) to 22% (of 28% max). It is so ridiculous that I'm considering converting every character I have to monk -- at least enough to gain the benefits.

But, that's the thing of it. It isn't that my other characters have been harmed in any way. It is just that the pass makes other builds even better choices -- and I want those. Turbine does not owe it to me to make that possible. I can TR and build them from the ground up. If I can get there with a LR20 then so much the better. It is a bonus to me but certainly not something I'm entitled to just because Turbine is releasing an update to the game.

Some of the changes being mentioned are adjustments, I'll grant that. But, they are not build specific changes and simply rebuilding the character won't alter the impacts. Changes like Human Versatility affect every human/half-elf build in the game. Should Turbine give a free race respec as a result? I don't think so. If you want that then TR.

Still, I don't think people who are complaining have really made a legitimate effort to look at their character in light of the enhancement pass. I think they are just taking a knee-jerk reaction to something they don't understand and cherry picking the things that have changed. They are not looking at the total character and its abilities.

Let's take devotion as an example. Try choosing Heal as a skill instead. There are ways to achieve the same effect even thought the means are different.

In the case of Tempest how about the fact that you no longer need 3 feats. I was able to take an exotic weapon proficiency and had 3 feats that I could play with (I took dragonmarks to go with bastard swords for eFang, but most people can find better choices). How about spending one of those feats on Empower Healing or Mental Toughness -- or just take extra Toughness feats.

The real truth, as far as I can tell, is that the vast majority of people will have better, stronger characters as a result of the pass. I know that mine all improve significantly. I can hardly wait to play a Pale Master Archmage. The changes are just sick -- and I mean that in the most positive way possible.

Okay, if all that is true, then I must just be really bad at chr building, or the new system's complexity crossed some intelligence threshold for me. That is, the 'old' Trapmonkey build was simple to understand, build, and gear. I had very little difficulty figuring out exactly how it worked and quickly modifying it to my own playstyle. In this new system I'm just not seeing what you're seeing. For example what 3 feats did you save? the TWF line? Why?
In any case, if all that's true, then the downside is actually a learning curve problem. Or will new players just have to wait for the community to post builds that work before attempting to play?

[Therigar]

For example what 3 feats did you save? the TWF line? Why?

To start, I assumed Human since it is a Tempest build so no real demand for half-elf. That gives a free feat which I initially burned on exotic weapon: khopesh -- something I think most people would do since the point of Tempest is DPS and if you're going to TWF then khopesh is the king for most players.

Now, if you have some of the newer weapons that won't be true. So that is a feat you can use for something else completely. I ultimately changed it to ew: bastard sword because eFang was just laying on the dojo floor.

The three feats I no longer need are dodge, mobility and spring attack. They are required for Tempest in the current system but not required at all in the new one. They do give dodge which is useful to defenses but the new enhancements include several ways to pick up dodge. That means that these 3 feats are no longer really necessary to the build and you can swap one or more of them for things that might be more valuable. In my case, because of the eFang, I took dragon marks. That's really a complete waste -- but it was fun.

The TWF line is free with 18 ranger and, because I no longer need dodge/mobility/spring attack I have the option to not spend any build points in DEX. That lets me put more into INT if I want more skills or into STR if I want higher DPS. I have enough feats to take insightful reflexes and use my INT modifier instead of my DEX modifier for reflex saves if that's what I want to do. In other words, I have lots more options.

In my case there were enough feats to take skill focus: search, sf: disable device and sf: UMD.

So, on a human with 9 feats (including the 1 from fighter) at L20 my feats look like this:

• Power Attack (from fighter)
• Skill Focus: Search
• Skill Focus: Disable Device
• Skill Focus: Use Magic Device
• Nimble Fingers
• Exotic Weapon: Bastard Sword
• Least Dragonmark of Sentinel
• Lesser Dragonmark of Sentinel
• Greater Dragonmark of Sentinel

You can throw away the last 4 of these feats and take Toughness, Empower Healing, whatever else seems good to you....

Here is what the build looks like with +2 tomes. Note that in this case I went with enough DEX to get the dodge tree if I wanted it.

[BOgre]

The three feats I no longer need are dodge, mobility and spring attack.

I never would have noticed that. TY.

You can throw away the last 4 of these feats and take Toughness, Empower Healing, whatever else seems good to you....
Yes, I have candidates for at least 2 right away. That's very helpful.

So then it's more a matter of re-learning the entire feat/enh/prereq system in order to repair all my toons. I'm obviously still making assumptions based on the old system. I'm both relieved and saddened at the same time.

[Therigar]

Well, TBH, even though I knew that I didn't need dodge/etc. I still built with the DEX for it.

We all have some rethinking to do.

But the important message is that we shouldn't let our immediate impressions guide us. We need to poke around a bit to see what works and what doesn't.

I think you'll find that in most cases what you are looking for is going to be there -- even if it is in some other form or isn't immediately intuitive and obvious. And, once we learn the new system it will seem as easy and straight forward as the one we have now -- with the added plus of us looking back and wondering why we were happy with the old system.

[BOgre]

Well, I rebuilt again. On paper he looked better, mostly. Lost a bit in saves, gained a bunch in dodge and prr. gained 2str. gained some extra sneak attk. whatever... on paper. Took him out to eGH wildy and he sucked worse than he did pre lvl20. lost at least 20% base damage, 50% self heals, the loss of saves really really showed, etc. Plus there seems to be some extra broken stuff in the EDs now, like Cocoon dunt work no mo'... So either some/many/?? of the enhancements are bugged, and/or my build skills just plain suck. though honestly i didn't do anything radical, just took the basic stuff i needed to return more or less to normal, so ... dunno. Plus I still hate the top 2 tiers of Tempest clickys. A Lot. Rediculously short durations and long cooldowns.

So for now my opinion remains overall meh. Maybe someone smarter'n me will come up with a working Trapmonkey in the new system, and I'll attempt to rebuild by that. Till then my main toon feels and plays broken and unfun.

[KookieKobold]

bringing this back to it's original purpose:

Read by QA

[ArcaneArcher52689]

Well, TBH, even though I knew that I didn't need dodge/etc. I still built with the DEX for it.

We all have some rethinking to do.

But the important message is that we shouldn't let our immediate impressions guide us. We need to poke around a bit to see what works and what doesn't.

I think you'll find that in most cases what you are looking for is going to be there -- even if it is in some other form or isn't immediately intuitive and obvious. And, once we learn the new system it will seem as easy and straight forward as the one we have now -- with the added plus of us looking back and wondering why we were happy with the old system.

You also don't need to take exotic weapon prof: khopesh. You can gain khopeshes and bastards swords with one level of fighter and 5 Action points in the kensei tree



As for making a better trap monkey, Dodge still gives you "reed in the wind" which might be useful, the deepwood sniper tree offers lots of decent melee abilities to compliment your tempest abilities (sneak attack dice, a couple nice strikes with bonuses to crit range/multiplier), deepwood sniper also offers somewhere arorund 60-70 positive spellpower for 6AP, as well as 6 uses of a no-ap lesser vigor spell.

[Therigar]

bringing this back to it's original purpose:

Read by QA

Man, you kobolds have no sense of humor. I remember Waterworks too.

So, have you fixed the skill boost yet?