Combat Role as a Ranger

Can someone tell me what my role is as a Ranger (during combat)? Maybe compare it to a class type from an mmo (tank, dps, range, etc)? Also, what type of weapons/armor do rangers generally have? Any and all help is appreciated :)

That all depends on your skills.

Rangers have an incredible diversity of options available to them, with a wide array of weapons, spells, and tag skills, even at low level. Weapon profs and Master Florentine can make you a striker, druid spells can make you really good crowd control, sword and board can put you on the front line, cloak of the green and traps give you good ambushes...

Have at, basically.

Your role as a ranger is really what you think your character would do. If you choose to be a shield fighter, you can use a shield and 1H. If you want to be an archer you could do that.
I know of a ranger that only does archery. Meanwhile I am a ranger that is in a shield wall as a front line fighter.
Rangers also get 1st and 2nd rank druidics, so if you wish to focus on that you can put a lot of work towards that.

As nate said traps and cloak of the green could make you good at ambushes. The ways to take your character is ultimately up to you.

From experience I use my druidics joined with my shield and sword as an offense and protections.

So I suppose if you want to put it under a broad spectrum, I would say rangers fall under the classification of Range/Close combat/Trapper, as you can do either.

As for armor, that is up to you personally, I use chainmail but that doesn't mean that a ranger couldn't use plate, or leather. Just make sure your armor works for YOU. That is the most important thing.

If you'll be at this event, find me before registration, or after new player training. If you want we could even talk IG about this. I have no problem discussing this with you.

Thanks! I can't come in oct either unfortunatly. November and december are my best bets for now.

Keep in mind that how your character acts, fights and looks like all depends on your interaction with others IG. Sometimes people will have a set plan of very specific guidelines they want their character to follow, but for your first PC its best to let the gameplay guide them. From there you can shape how your character will remain.

For example, remembering back to recent discussions we've had about fighting styles, I came in with a bastard sword and did well with it for a while. I didn't really think I'd ever change my fighting style until I began noticing that it was slowing me down. My character started off wanting the big guns to do more damage, but now, after experiencing different battles, she realizes that its not always about how hard you hit, but how fast. Thus, I've been making the change to florentine fighting :) (I'm a ranger too, if you remember!)

With other things like armor, that goes into a slightly more personal perspective. Honestly, I only wear what is needed, and what's comfortable for my character. (Which reflects on her personality anyway) You have to think about what your character would think about and want. Maybe he wants to better protect his arms while swinging a sword, so he has arm bracers. Or maybe, from being a ranged fighter, close encounters are a weak point, so he has to protect his torso. If its a type of armor you're worried about, that is all up to what you like best, or what you think looks best for your character. (Afterall, we're all a little vain when it comes to our characters haha)

Just remember LARP fighting isn't the same as MMO or TT fighting. We're "LIVE ACTION". That means your real-life skill, reflexes, abilities do come into play. What everyone else has posted is correct, & you should take into account most importantly of what you see for your character.

Best bet is to NPC a lot your first event, get a chance to fight in a lot of different styles, & see how you fair/gauge yourself. Be brutally honest with how you feel with each type of fight & then make you decision then.

I support the above whole heartedly. NPCing gives you a real sense of where your strengths lie in a system, teaches you to work within it, and really challenges, if you're throwing yourself wholly into it, your performance skills. It'll also show you how much you have to learn in terms of the combat system. Embarassing true story: I've studied weaponry, practiced martial arts, grew up around it, have made my own weapons and tools, all that jazz. I'm -leagues- from being a grandmaster or some such (I prefer the term, eternal whitebelt, because you've always a world left to learn), but I thought I'd be fine boffering my first time-fully believed I'm be fairly brilliant. After all, I was going in against mainly untrained people, right? Sure, they'd been boffering since forever, but how may had to spend hours every day repeating drills?

I. Was. Destroyed. And it wasn't just that it was the switch to boffers that did it. Experience Boffer LARPers have often told me that they suffer similar annoyances when switching to a drastically new system. So my opinion: NPC a game, then decide what you want to play.

Or be a warrior. (Kidding, kidding )

I'm with you in that I'll likely not make a game until Nov, Dec, or January at the latest, but I plan to NPC for months, if not a full year.

But, as you hit on the class I was considering, let me share my reasoning for picking Ranger as well. I may not plan to bring a PC for a while, but I've already pretty much fully developed him (well, I'm almost certain they'll be a 'him')! See my character lives in the woods, completely. To the extent I've been doing a lot of planning into how I'll Roleplay that during game, since I will absolutely refuse to step inside buildings (And that is, in and of itself, a major RP obstacle I've been wrestling with in my head, trying to make work. It'll depend heavily on being extremely sociable and likeable from the onset). It sounds much simpler than I'm making it, believe me (Incidentally, if anyone wants to know how to make snowshoes with conifer boughs and rope...)

So, given that, I looked at the professions. There are a few that can play well with a survivor out in the wilds alone, but Ranger is very much, and this is true in many systems, what I call a "buffet class;" pick a little of this and that, mix and match to your heart's content. Knight Realms actually narrows Ranger down a bit, which I like. I've played a few games where class was virtually irrelevant. But if you're thinking of combat, look at quite a few of the classes. I'd considered building a Ronin, Bounty Hunter and a Cavalier, but I decided I really didn't want to go combat heavy. That's -great- with Ranger, because while I'm looking at grabbing the Bow and bumping proficiency with that something fierce as I am extremely happy holding a bow (I used to hunt, so I can pull, nock, draw, and loose an arrow while running), as well as a One-Handed Edged and Shield Small (those later), I'm also going for Lore, Druidic, Befriend Animal, Germinate and Cure Minor Wounds. While I intend my character to be combat capable as a ranger, his first two Druid spells are going to be healing, and three more will be to temporize and possibly stop combat, and to work with animals.

I'd played with going more combat: Florentine, Florentine Master, Parry (which I may still run after), Small weapon instead of shield, Weapon Proficiency galore. I could have used the Druidic spells to really go crazy, and I could have added traps like crazy. So Ranger can be many different things, even well-focused as it is for Knight Realms.

As for armor, roll with what you'll end up doing after you get a good eye on the game. Front of the line? Tanks need armor if they're gonna be big and slow heavy-hitters. DPS needs to move fast, so they need to drop weight and be in and out. Ranged... well, as long as it doesn't effect the draw, armor is fine. But I'll be going light, if at all, simply because archers tend to be squishies, and berserkers tend to know that and enjoy the particularly delicate *crunch* our bones make O_o So I tend to skip the armor and stick to running. But if you wanna go archer with a melee backup and a lot of hit points and armor... ROCK IT. I don't see that often, it could be fun-if you can pull that off.

Because, remember, you've got Build limiting your build. Our characters rarely start out as big and bad as we imagine them being. Another good reason to do an NPC game or two! (or six, or twelve) A year of NPCing would get me most of the build for my PC's wish list, which means just dump stating after that. Admittedly, I tend to stop spending on my characters once I'm happy, as I'm not big on the numbers (Lib arts major, sue me).

So know the limits physical, mental, and system, and NPC a lot, even if you don't NPC Weekend!