A few quick gripes:

[Ya]

<DIV>Ok, the rat pet at 20 is a little strange considering that I'm a Ratonga -and it is larger than I am. Most classes get very cool abilities for their level 20 eyecandy skill (brigands get to smack and knockdown players, for example), but eh... the huge rat is kind of hideous. If it can't be cahnged to something else, I'd like to see its model changed to the tiny rats that follow you around Freeport. I'd much rather get an ability that took a little bit of effort to program in, though.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Second gripe. As a Ratonga Assassin Provisioner (RAP), the racial traits I have to choose from are pretty narrow.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Stationary Hide: Got better as a scout.</DIV> <DIV>Hate Reduction: Have TWO hate-reducing skills already as an assassin.</DIV> <DIV>Poison Proc: Would need to be a **mods 4 teh win!!1!** good proc to beat the poison I can use right now.</DIV> <DIV>Scrounged food and drink: Get real -I'm a provisioner I carry the good **mods 4 teh win!!1!**.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>and etc... etc...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I took the +5 agility for a complete lack of other useful abilities. Come on now -my Iksar buddy gets to breathe underwater or regenerate faster. How cool is that? Ratonga ought to be able to track resource nodes or something else useful that doesn't double up on the abilities that most Ratonga (scouts) will already have...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>My next problem is with the 40 and 50 eyecandy ability for most scout classes. Wood-elf Shape? Dark-elf Shape? Ok. Not only would those abilities really suck if you were already a member of that race -but I've already seen activatable items (Petrified Eyes) ingame for sale that have unlimited uses and can transform you into the race the eye belonged to. Lame.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Great game. Great class. But some things really have me wondering.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV>

[khalysta]

<DIV>Pet rat - was never meant to be anything substantial at all or even game breaking.  My theory is we only got the rat because rangers get pets so they kept it fair and gave us one pet too.  None of the skills really do anything substantial though with the exception of the knight horses which are a hair faster than pathfinding.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Racial traits - again they arent supposed to be game breaking at all.  They are just flavor and good for any class of that race not necessarily only good for assassins.  Like the poison proc would be good for ratonga fighters or even ratonga bards for example.  Scrounged food is again general but your choices made it not so great but to many other ratonga it might be good.  When it comes to racial traits think more along whether its good for anybody and not just you which is why they give you a wide variety of traits to choose.</DIV>

[Ya]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> khalysta wrote:<BR> <DIV>Pet rat - was never meant to be anything substantial at all or even game breaking.  My theory is we only got the rat because rangers get pets so they kept it fair and gave us one pet too.  None of the skills really do anything substantial though with the exception of the knight horses which are a hair faster than pathfinding.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Racial traits - again they arent supposed to be game breaking at all.  They are just flavor and good for any class of that race not necessarily only good for assassins.  Like the poison proc would be good for ratonga fighters or even ratonga bards for example.  Scrounged food is again general but your choices made it not so great but to many other ratonga it might be good.  When it comes to racial traits think more along whether its good for anybody and not just you which is why they give you a wide variety of traits to choose.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> <P>I understand what the pet is for. Hence why I referred to it as "eye candy". I still think it is uninspired and even disingenius to take the model for a very common enemy and slap it on as a pet, when the eye candy for *most* other classes obviously had a bit of work put into it.</P> <P>I understand that racial traits are supposed to be general. The problem is that for Ratonga Assassins (and if you're a provisioner it gets worse), none of them are useful at all because they are weaker replicas of abilities we receive as Assassins. So yes, a Ratonga fighter can get a little rogueish with the racial traits. I imagine an ogre scout can get a little fighterish with the ogre racial traits. My problem is that the only useful racial trait as a Ratonga Assassin was the +5 agility. Now, between here and 50 I have to choose 3 more racial traits. Unless they let me pick +5 Agility again, none of the abilities will be used at all ever because I have more powerful Assassin abilities already.</P> <P>I would love to see the racial traits made a bit more general. Right now all of the Ratonga racial traits give low-grade scout abilities.</P>

[Istaril]

<DIV>Personally I'd really like to see the pet become something far more like a set of eyes and ears - a raven or crow. An intelligent animal - capapble of, in lore, gathering information and an omen of bad things to come.</DIV>

[Ya]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Istaril wrote:<BR> <DIV>Personally I'd really like to see the pet become something far more like a set of eyes and ears - a raven or crow. An intelligent animal - capapble of, in lore, gathering information and an omen of bad things to come.</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> Quoted for goodness.

[Sapie]

<BR> <DIV>but I've already seen activatable items (Petrified Eyes) ingame for sale that have unlimited uses and can transform you into the race the eye belonged to. Lame</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>^^ is that true?for all class's?</DIV>

[Amenwes]

<DIV>You underestimate the intelligence of rats. They actaully have more intelligence, in a logic thinking way, than even cats and dogs. Rats are extremely intelligent, and you can prove this easily by owning them for a couple years. A raven or crow would be pretty cool though, but they wouldn't be as stealthy or easy to get past guards etc in a role-play type way. A snake or a spider might be interesting as well, especially for those dark elf assassins out there.</DIV>

[Salat]

<DIV>I wouldnt rule the pet rat completely useless.  More then once, in a group, my pet rat has pulled the aggro from the tank on 4 mobs.  Which the tank took less hits and the Healer saved on power.  It has also taken the aggro a few times when tanked died and everyone got to run away to safety.  Only once has he ever got aggro while soloing with me. I know I would rather have that then the ability to make people lower level then me dance.  </DIV>

[Pixieboo]

<DIV>Hmm... </DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Here's a dumb question... how do you get your pet to attack?  I've had a mob targeted, was beating on it and it the "Attack" button for my pet to go in a do some damage.  The silly rat stood there looking at me and told me it couldn't attack that target.  What am I doing wrong?  Sorry for the dumb question, but I am obviously missing something easy here...</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Thanks in advance</DIV><p>Message Edited by Pixieboots on <span class=date_text>12-14-2004</span> <span class=time_text>07:41 AM</span>

[Sapie]

<BLOCKQUOTE> <P>where can we get these "petrified eyes" ? and how much are they? </P> <P> </P> <P>beats waiting till lvl 50 to impersonate</P></BLOCKQUOTE>

[syniste]

<blockquote><hr>Pixieboots wrote:<DIV>Hmm... </DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>Here's a dumb question... how do you get your pet to attack?  I've had a mob targeted, was beating on it and it the "Attack" button for my pet to go in a do some damage.  The silly rat stood there looking at me and told me it couldn't attack that target.  What am I doing wrong?  Sorry for the dumb question, but I am obviously missing something easy here...</DIV><DIV> </DIV><DIV>Thanks in advance</DIV><p>Message Edited by Pixieboots on <span class=date_text>12-14-2004</span> <span class=time_text>07:41 AM</span><hr></blockquote>The rat can't attack. It can agro if attacked, and will start attacking, but will deal no damage. You can pull a mob with Backshot, then snare, then use Stalk when he's close to you, and he will attack your rat. From there, hit from behind with your backstab of choice. Occasionally, the rat will actually maintain agro and you can kill mobs pretty quick from behind. This of course is an exploit in the way our pet agro's, but it works sometimes and is just something fun to do. Plus, you get off that one extra big-damage attack from the Backshot pull.

[Salat]

<DIV>Pixie, our pets don't attack.  hey are our lvl 20 "Fluff" abil.  Each subclass gets an abil like this.  The only thing our pet does, is follow and say.  However, in combat,  it will once in a blue moon pull aggro.  Mine has pulled it away from the tank quite a few times.  Though, to answer your question, it won't attack.</DIV>

[Pixieboo]

<DIV>Ahh...  I get it now!  Thanks <img src="/smilies/3b63d1616c5dfcf29f8a7a031aaa7cad.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />  </DIV>

[Zeroimagination]

<DIV>I for one love the rat.  Just wish I could name it!  It's so useless that it's cool.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>On my list though is:  While I'm grateful for the additional protection, doesn't chainmail seem particularily un assassin-like?</DIV>

[NocteBla]

<DIV>I'd like to see the rat act like an EQ1 Eye of Zomm. Hell, it's called Greth's Willing SCOUT, but I'll be damned if he ever scouts anything. Eye of Zomm was a very fun, yet useful tool I'd like to use to see past mobs that can see me.</DIV>

[Istaril]

<DIV>I'm still quite partial to my raven/crow idea... more I think about it the more it seems right!</DIV>

[Nikenin]

<DIV>My little rat friend has saved my bacon on at least 2 occassions when I've had to break and run.  Poor little guy couldn't keep up and sacrificed himself for me.   A few times he's also drawn aggro just standing around after I pulled with a back shot and a double shot allowing me to get in a shadow blade.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>I think he's great although I think its a little odd he's bigger then me.</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>Belgarog</DIV> <DIV>21st Lvl Ratonga Assassin</DIV> <DIV>Antonia Bayle</DIV>

[ButcherB]

<DIV>Can you say "mini me"</DIV>

[Rivelyn Cypre]

<DIV>Khalysta!....I see you on every board how the heck do you get up to 550+ posts in just over a month?...[expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] I read these things everyday and I post as much as I can but still have very few...Do you actaully have time to play EQ2 or do you just post on the EQ boards...lol</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>By the way your a good source for info, thanks!</DIV>

[khalysta]

<BR> <BLOCKQUOTE> <HR> Rivelyn Cypress wrote:<BR> <DIV>Khalysta!....I see you on every board how the heck do you get up to 550+ posts in just over a month?...[expletive ninja'd by Faarbot] I read these things everyday and I post as much as I can but still have very few...Do you actaully have time to play EQ2 or do you just post on the EQ boards...lol</DIV> <DIV> </DIV> <DIV>By the way your a good source for info, thanks!</DIV><BR> <HR> </BLOCKQUOTE><BR> im bored at work <img src="/smilies/9d71f0541cff0a302a0309c5079e8dee.gif" border="0" alt="SMILEY" />