So is ghost.. does ghost have a power cost? And dont give me that crap about willpower cause it isnt that bad if you do stuff right. Places like faethorn and stewartsville and other outdoor stuff they can just walk out. Lets just nerf every damned skill that exists.

Well, since you didn't read the last two pages, you failed to see MY opinion on the matter. So don't tell me why *I* am complaining, because you said yourself you didn't read it. Had you actually read it, you'd see that I did in fact say that, as unlikely as it would be, if you took Gregori's wording at face value, it would indeed make it seem like he wanted transmitigation to be downgraded without something replacing it. Furthermore, *I* never asked for our familiars to be turned into falcons or whatever you're on about, I said that they now offer not one single advantage on any level of play, including rp'ing being a spy of some sorts.

Once again, I did read every post here, I did see what Gregori wrote. I admitted that it could be taken the wrong way. However, seeing this as an upgrade is just silly. I can 1) Use 18 power, deepbond, leave my familiar in my manse, and if I die, be safely transported to my manse, at no loss of experience from any plane (pre-nerf), or 2) Trans another skill to get conglut, use 10 power to put it up, die OFF plane, and then experience on top of that, as small as that may be. Also, if I happen to be killed on prime, guess what, I'm praying. Yay. There's my upgrade.

*My* post was simply trying to point out that this was simply a miscommunication, and that perhaps it could be rectified in some way, as the way it stands now, it makes familiars entirely pointless. I don't know who you are, but obviously you're not a druid. Transmitigation across planes was, in my mind, the sole reason to not only have a familiar at all, but to trans the skill at all.

As has been stated, Tracking is meant to revolve around traps, not your hound.

And the change to require eq for bond abilities is VERY handy to stop us dying. Before, as soon as the force went through, we had to run or die, because there is no way to stop recall. Now, they have to catch us with equilibrium before they can force that.

What proportion of quests require you to find something that could be in multiple areas?

Don't nitpick and then act like you scored a point, please, its annoying. And, actually, I bet I could find a pixie in Serenwilde by WALKING in a shorter time than someone could seek/unite it. So, its more of a slackers tool, not actually a shortcut.

And for the bit Xenthos edited out, if you try to seek out the clubs, your wolf ends up in a storage room. I actually sought out the leather scroll in Stewartsville while I was holding it and my wolf got stuck. There's actually a post in this forum that shows someone's wolf trapped when tracking to the Heartstopper club, or whatever.

Okay, let's take a second and...breeeaathe...good.

I'm not trying to nerf moonbeam, I'm trying to show that unite is sucky now compared to other similiar abilities. Maybe I'm not doing a good job but whatever just chill kay?

It's 3 power to ghost.

So, since tracking to items/mobiles is useless, you'd be happy losing that ability in exchange for no power cost?

And calm down, there's no need to be insulting.

Edit: Anyway, I do like the RP aspect of our familiars, it just seems we can't find a moderate balance between being keys to immortality and being utterly useless except as a cuddly little amusement.

It isn't useless, it lets you move around areas quickly - going to the forge, to the nexus, to a desk.. those things are useful, but not worth power.

Moving quickly to rockeaters, cows, sharks, whatever, its useful, but it shouldn't cost power, especially since Mimic, a skill in the BASE hunting set, should negate the need for that anyway.

As mentioned before, Smudges, fetish, ecology doesnt revolve around your ent. The primary benefit from deepbond is that you dont lose exp pretty much on prime. Granted, those that dont have conglut, theres a lot more to whine a bitch about, but in the case of a licher, they dont have a prime-conglut. If they were in a situation whereupon they could be killed the first time, they are even moreso in a situation to be killed the second time without lich up. Your skill completely gets you out of trouble on prime if you die. That alone makes the skill useful. Sucks that it no longer works off prime, but the only real danger you are normally in is astral, or if your on earth, in which case you throw yourself in harms way willingly. But aside from that, unite costing power AND needing balance/eq is the major loss. One or the other would be fine, but its a bummer it is now both.

Also, our new addition to Retrieve is based around seeking to items.. which is funny.. cause there are basically no items to actually seek to that aren't locked in Divine store rooms.

Bond shouldn't have ANY abilities besides deepbond, because they're all absolutely worthless. You can still use unite and such. We have absolutely no reason to use anything beside deepbond, and even without deepbond, if you want to spy, you learn Dreamweaving. It's nothing but a tiny bit of flavor.

Ah well. Since Ecology lost transmigration... can AnimalGrowth do something now? And can city hunters get some kind of ability that justifies Ecology?

Stop being so melodramatic! It's not the end of the world. It's not even the end of the usefulness of the skill. They were nice enough to keep you from being able to summon the bond off-eq, weren't they?

Edit: Taken to a more appropriate thread.

Forcing + Deepbond = Death.

And if they force it, you deserve to die. Not before they rob you blind, though.

Avaer his point is that your example isnt exactly a shortcut because to him a shortcut is when you by pass parts of the quest. Like not doing comm quests to get the pills in Estelbar or not having to do the monument to get the tomb of remembrance. All your example proves is a tracker doesnt have to walk instead they unite (woopiedoo?), its not exactly skipping parts and to me that doesnt really hold much ground.

For moonbeam needing a partner, is that really a hindrance? Unite was deemed strong, yes. But guess what most of everything we could do with unite you can do with moonbeam too. Needing a partner hardly negates the fact that you are able to take advantage of so many things with the skill. Also having a person as a target has its advantages too as opposed to having an ent. It could be said that at least the target is switchable(not exclusive to just your ent). Also could be said the person is probably tankier than our ents which die to what 2 cudgel blasts... etc.

As for the traps being the main focus... read the quote again. Also honestly traps arent really all that, the companion was a major part of the skillset's functionality. Any tracker will tell you that.

A good combatant is never forced in combat? I don't know maybe you're right, I've always had one or two pookaforces go through - but then I'm not a great combatant. Maybe forcing is impossible to do in real combat. :shrug:

And Alger, fair enough. You don't have to do comm quests to get the pills in Estelbar though.

How about make our hound/wolf cost power and gold, and then switch Unite back? I mean, if the hound cost 10 power and 5,000 gold, we'd be more careful with it when it came to players, but it wouldn't stop us from doing the useful but not gamebreaking actions? I wouldn't care if the wolf had a cost like in Ecology if we just got our basic usefulness for the skill back! :cry: