Ranger Path (Preserver, Pathfinder, Seeker, etc.) of the Steel Realms

Posted on January 18, 2023 in Feature

Core Ideas of the Incarna Multiverse

The Incarna Multiverse ('iVerse™') is a structure of reality based on the Incarna Game Mechanics. This reality unfolds in the multitude of Setting as "The Pattern".

• Your Game Group has chosen a specific Settings; It's Character page constrains what options you may have... it is from this point that you can realistically work with your Character Concept (though many Game Masters will allow just about anything with the right Character Story elements).

Rangers, ‘Those who Range‘, seek fulfillment through a path of broad experiences woven in a mixed context of untamed wilderness and the organized achievement of civilization. Ranging is a calling to wisdom and vigilance as an agent of the living world itself. They embrace an authentic connection to the natural order as vital and imperative in creating a stable, healthy and sustainable civilization alongside it. As an Agent of the world, they form an essential mystical bond to it, to experience life in a primeval state without much regard for the barrier of materialism. The strength and nature of this bond allows them to directly commune with principals and spirits of nature and the wyld. They share their perception directly with their principal, even to the extent of allowing them to be possessed and forged into a weapon by need of circumstance. Rangers constantly travel far and wide with their senses open, tracing the interactions of natural features, beasts and organisms, as well as community leaders and organizations of settled lands. They collect, analyze and share information of the happenings which are likely to disturb the relative harmony between the sides. They facilitate understanding to prevent greater imbalances, conflicts, and threats which could destabilize populations and resources. They combine the ideas of Druids and Warriors pathways.

Ranger Details

• i20™
• iCore™

i20™ Archetype/Path Details

i20 assumes you are familiar with DnD 5.0 SRD™ (ref ver 2014 DnD Wikidot) and the ©PHB it is based off of.

Best Practice starting (@Character Inception) i20 Characters begin play with a PC Race/Species, a Background, and a Pathway of Experience all appropriate to their setting and no other CP unless noted by the Game Master.

=> The following Replaces "SRD multi-class requirements"

Multi-Classing: Unless the GM approves: They must meet the Accomplished Attribute Dispositions in all archetypes; Spell Casting is by individual class, not combined; Familiarity with Martial Weapons & Heavy Armor and the Foundational Power are not gained until 2nd level; Does not gain the benefits marked as "@Character Inception".

This corresponds to the RANGER (Class)

Foundational Power: NATURE’S WARDEN

The following aspects deviate from, replace, and/or add to the base d20/PHB, though may also vary by setting, back story, and/or cultural experience; 'Baseline' values are just average/defaults to be used * without specific reference checks. *

Making a Ranger Character @1st Level

Are you using Best Practice guidelines? (ask your Game Master)

Is your Game Master allowing a Committed Pathway?

Select your character's Race/Species and Background (and/or choose from a some other Character Experience) from those available in your Setting (ask your Game Master); Note that these may set or adjust all other aspects of Character Creation.

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Pathway Character Creation Parameters

Default Aptitude	Minimum Aptitude	Optimal Aptitude
Kinetic 3, Divine 1	Kinetic 1 Baseline if Aptitude is not emphasized.	Kinetic 2, Divine 2 = Begin play with Chi Reservoir (if Aptitude is emphasized)

1. Sworn & Pledged: They choose a Divine Principal for their Setting or the Cosmic Principal of Nature (“The Wyld”)
   

   Signifiers of Faith: An Empowered Bond COST = 1 Essence; It is common for the Follower to mark their Rite of Passage or signify their state of State of Grace; Tattoos, scars, personal grooming and fashion styles, symbolic adornments, etc. should become part of the character's description.

   @Character Inception they get or are inspired to make a “Sacred Focus” (Focal Point Object) – a symbolic charm, tattoo or scar with embedded materials, etc. from their purification and indoctrination.

2. Essence is by race/species @Character Inception (baseline = 7 for most).
3. The standard 8 Character Attributes, generate them using the preferred method allowed by your Game Master.

   @Character Inception, Characters gain an Attribute Score Increase (ASI) from either their Background's Vocational ASI OR as their Archetype's/Class Pathway ASI. These will be specified as either explicit or chosen from a Attribute Group(s):
   PATHWAY = In either Power or Body groups

   Accomplished Attribute Disposition = 13 in: 1 from Body and 1 from Emotion; Additionally, they gain:

   • +1 Perception
4. Health (Hit) Points: (HP) Average HP only at 1st; Health is Recovered at a standard rate ("Hit Dice" are not used).
   Wounds can temporarily reduce the character's normal maximum.

   Rested Healing: Applying healing immediately after a Rest and before any other activity is taken normally assures a major result (full amount).

5. Skills are something you can do in ALL situations, activities are what you run them through to get outcomes.
   Grants proficiency in and/or adds the indicated level(s) to…
   Survival +2, Divine Phenomenology +1, Botany +2, Zoology +2, Stealth +1, Animal Handling +1, +1 in either Climbing OR Swimming
   i20 REPLACES d20 skill proficiency > Check = skill level + modifiers (Prof. Bonus not used).

   i20 Skills REPLACE d20 skill proficiency: Add the skill level + modifiers to the check ( Proficiency Bonus not used).

   A single Result Check to assess Success or Failure AND quality which may be impacted by conditions which indicate a Lack of Capability (Unfamiliar, Unproficient, etc.). The GM can { } Narrate it, and players may request an appropriate impact when anything other than a basic outcome is indicated. Character Points are Rewarded by the GM to improve Skills (and other Features). > i20 Skill Map

6. Accomplished Activity: Stalking
7. Combat Activity for Defense: Light Armor Familiarity, Medium Armor Familiarity, Simple Shield Familiarity, and Brace Familiarity.
8. Combat Activity for Offense: Simple Melee Weapon Familiarity, Simple Ranged Weapon Familiarity, Martial Melee Weapon Familiarity, and Martial Ranged Weapon Familiarity. All core Fighting styles are approved, all others (UA, etc.) by GM approval.
9. The character must choose a Pathway Mystic Aspect:
   NATURE’S WARDEN: => Replaces “Explorer” and “Primeval Awareness” powers
   The character gains a mystical bond that grants them Primordial Awareness (1/Long Rest cycle) as well as Natural Explorer and choses a Favored Habitat. While in a Natural Habitat, they gain the following benefits:
   • You gain Advantage on Initiative.

   Traditional Spell Caster Gets a Spiritual Reservoir from an Inspired Tradition using the Minor Mystic Progression to manipulate divine capabilities, without any Arcane Recovery. These characters have no Ritual capability. Using Charisma: As a quasi-agent (Hand of the Principal), they have the opportunity to fully embrace this militant empyrean perspective of a greater calling wherein they use the force of their character, rather than the more ethereal inspired Wisdom. This manifests as the Will of the Principal’s Hand.

   Non Spell-Caster (Relieved Theurgist) Natures Champion: Improves the “Nature’s Warden” Feature… Any Rest within Natural Habitats that alleviates a level of Exhaustion alleviates an additional one. Command Position: If the Natural Habitat they are in allows for it, the Ranger can use their Bonus Action to gain Minor Cover for themselves if they use 5′ of movement; From this place, they gain Advantage with their first attack on any creature that has not acted yet in the round. The Ranger can use their Bonus Action to ignore Minor Cover for a single target as long as they use 5′ of movement. Primordial Awareness can be triggered using ANY action type as ‘Focused Discernment’ by spending 1 Essence. Nature’s Aegis: Whenever they activate their Primordial Awareness, they may choose between the following (no Concentration is needed): Protection vs. Good/Evil OR they are encased in a Fog Cloud that they and their allies can see through and is centered on them and moves with them as if cast through a spell slot of the highest level they would normally be able to cast through.

10. Rangers gain the Health and Body Conditioning feature.
11. NOT USED = Favored Foe (Optional) & Deft Explorer (Optional)
12. Membership in an Order/Institution/Brotherhood, etc. appropriate to their Setting.
13. Equipment: Each iVerse Setting has a Cost Portion which a character starts with to buy goods with; Also see the "Characters" document for the setting. In addition to general purchasable gear, PC characters are assumed to come from "Middling" circumstances and begin play with equipment (portable Toolkits and/or stationary Work Stations) related to their capabilities granted by Race/Background/Archetype/Cultural experiences.

    Additionally, the character begins play with a setting appropriate Basic Wilderness Stalker’s Kit.

14. Remaining CP to spend on Features:
    Accomplished Attribute Disposition: Exceeds = +2 @Character Inception
    > Usually taken as a level or two in a Lore (ex: regional history) of choice.
15. A Ranger’s Actuated Threshold (subclass choice) happens at 3rd level.

Further Developing a Ranger Character

Currently Supported Subclasses: (Others are at GM discretion/approval.)

ALL subclass choices gain
Grants proficiency in and/or adds the indicated level(s) to… Craftwork: Hide, Tissue, & Bone +1 AND Improvised Hidesmith Materials: If the character spends a Long Rest cycle in Natural Habitat they can either improvise their own Basic Hide Workers Kit or improve a full kit to Advanced at no cost.

1. Beast Master
   Grants proficiency in and/or adds the indicated level(s) to… Zoology +2, Animal Handling +1
2. Hunter
   Grants proficiency in and/or adds the indicated level(s) to… Toughness +1, Martial Shield Familiarity,

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1. At the moment of their significant Actuated Threshold (gaining their subclass at 3rd level), they may chose the Subordinate Actuation capability – allowing them to have less personal agency and surrendering it to their Divine Principal; If they do not, they may choose to do so whenever they gain a level in their Ranger Archetype/Path.
2. Primordial Awareness can be used a number of times per Long Rest cycle equal to the character’s Proficiency Bonus.
3. Martial Versatility (Optional) @ASI levels is available.
4. When using the Health and Body Conditioning after 4th level, it only takes 1 Long Rest cycle if done in a Natural Habitat.
5. Honed Observer @4th: The character gains a measure of Observant (+1)
6. Another Favored Habitat at 4th, 8th, 12th, and 16th levels
7. Improved Stalking Materials @5th: If the character spends a Long Rest cycle in Natural Habitat they can either improvise their own Basic Stalking Materials or improve a full kit to Advanced at no cost. Gains Advantage when Stalking in Favored Habitats.
8. Ambush Defense @6th: When using ‘Command Position’ of Nature’s Champion feature, the character may spend 1 Essence against a target they attacked with Advantage for a use of 1 Resilience as the Natural Habitat deflects the blow.
9. Nature’s Veil (Optional) is for the Spell Casting Ranger; Hide in Plain Sight is for the Non-Spell Casting Ranger.

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LEVEL-UP: The GM rewards a character a level based on Merit. By default, i20™ assumes by campaign milestone and limited by Experiences using Improvement Limits. Multiclassing follows i20 multi-class parameters in addition to the base requirements. Sanity increases by 1 every 4 character levels.

iCore™ Archetype/Path Details

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Becoming a Ranger

Green Passage

They will, growing up, typically have spent a lot of time outdoors and felt a kinship with the beasts who have freedom of the open spaces and the community of natural locales wherein many species of flora and fauna live together, and often symbiotically. They will feel a deep draw, an uncontrolled urge to connect more and have a stake in the natural world around them. Rangers will either find (or be found by) a Druid who will guide them, or lose themselves in a wild place; Either way, they will make their “Green Passage”. They will spend a great deal of time, sometimes years or more, experiencing the wild places, communing with nature and the soul/essence of the world they are on, binding themselves to it in heart and mind. They temper their bodies and minds in extreme privation of sustenance, weather, and company. Their senses will become acute in strange ways, ‘feeling’ the world around them like previously unimaginable. They learn the ways of fighting, like the predators they observe and will mimic. They will learn to see the natural order in things, keenly aware of the cycle of life.

• Green Passage
• Sworn to Service: The ranger will use their powers to safeguard their world as a loner, through loose associations of the like-minded, or a formal order. Divine followers generally use Conviction and progress through the States of Grace. The later must balance out their duties to their faith with the greater ones of their sworn oath to ‘protect the land’ in various forms.

Continuing as a Ranger

Although their Green Passage takes them from civilization and makes them feel like outsiders and loners initially, they often acclimate over time. Learning their role as a communicator between nature and civilized folk exposes them to many cultures and diverse customs and people. Rangers range far and wide to cover everything around them, like the wind and rain. Traveling and remaining constantly vigilant for unnatural threats, disasters, calamities, and violence take their toll though. They have a hard time forming closer bonds, though collaborating with a group to achieve goals becomes easy enough. A ranger will never take up a cause that conflicts with their bonds to the world. When presented with the choice between siding between the needs of the natural environment and the constructs of civilization, nature will always win. A ranger will always feel more comfortable and safe sleeping and foraging in the outdoors over civilized means. They are rarely evil or malicious (unless righting a great wrong against Nature), eschewing codes of conduct which dictate specific values or outlooks that conflict with their primary connection of protecting the land.

Unabating Hatred of the Undead: The undead have broken the natural cycle of life, and are unnatural in their very existence. Every effort must be made to remove this blight, or at least to ensure it does not spread. Those willingly made this way who cannot be redeemed must be destroyed. The Ranger is the ‘natural predator’, ordained by nature itself, to discover the means to accomplish this. Animations are just obscene magic, repulsive but not a flagrant interruption of the natural cycles/passage; even the dead in nature have a purpose to aid the living – just usually as food.

Return to Nature: A Ranger must make Offerings to reinforce the enhanced benefits of their bond through the Green Passage. Offerings can be accomplished in many ways:

• Destruction of Material Wealth (buried, sunk, etc. – returned to its ‘natural state’ somehow).
• The buying and freeing of animals (assuming they can return to the wild safely and without starving). A Ranger will not have a multitude of ‘pets’.
• The purchase of or negotiation for setting aside land.

A Ranger’s Roles: For those living amidst the wilderness or traveling through it, they can be very valuable – providing safe exploration, safe hunting, and safe traveling. Rangers will befriend travelers, assisting with advice to stay safe and healthy, even traveling with them if need be. They carry word of disasters, wars and violence, unnatural disturbances, provide reconnaissance for and vehemently oppose (through advice and action) the over-exploitation of natural resources and pollution of natural places and unchecked expansion of settlements. Ignorance is met with education, meanness is met with sabotage and violence if need be. They are always bound to assist in communication between Druids and civilization when they can, and are a balance to the (often) narrow minded zealotry of the Druids in dealing with their perceived sleights. Ranger’s are always interested in hearing from ranchers and farmers on new ways of doing things, and spreading such knowledge (sometimes preventing it from being uttered near by the jealous or greedy) if it benefits (e.g. the knowledge of crop rotation, a local fungus being more effective at healing, easier source of water, etc.). For the natural places and creatures, they are the protectors against unnatural effects and entities seeking to assault or exploit them. They ensure the natural order is not disturbed, while recognizing that creatures, like humans, are driven by natural urges to seek to control and ‘civilize’ the areas around them.

• The Shepard: Protecting and secluding, guiding and enjoining.
• The Seeker: Searching for and finding those lost and uncovering unnatural destructive influences.
• The Hunter: Provider of sustenance, husbanding and planter of wild resources.

The Green Temperament: A Bond to the World

Once the “Green Passage” is complete, the bond (a minor Green Temperament for them) with the land is secure. From that moment forward, as long as they are standing upon a natural feature/surface, they very land around them will support them and enhance their survival as long as the bond is adhered to. Some world souls are greater than others, and may grant additional capabilities. A ‘passage’ only applies to the world on which it was taken. A character can have an active bond with no more worlds than their Divine aptitude. They are not driven strictly by the precepts of law, chaos, good or evil. For the most part, they are benign and helpful, though gruff and aloof to most. Like Druids, they can seem enigmatic and inscrutable because their oaths take them away from civilized ways and outlooks. Rangers takes oaths to serve others and ask for little themselves, though often the world provides in some form or another.

• Sworn and Beholden oath: One with the Land (a Code of Conduct)
• Sworn and Beholden oath: Tied to the Wyld Ways (a Code of Conduct)

While they do not take any official vow of poverty, they are travelers. They eschew wealth and property (unles as a refuge or set aside to remain wild), taking only what they need and helping others and safeguarding nature with the rest. They carry enough wealth for their dealings with the folk of the lands they range in that use such, but never enough to attract attention.

Advantages of the Green Temperament

Speech of Snout and Leaf: The ability to communicate using Leafspeech – a subset of [Ut] Sylvan. A ranger will often befriend domesticated animals wherever he goes to get a consistent source of information as they travel from town to town.

Supported Footing: When making any checks to resist being knocked prone, check Initiative, move through difficult or unstable terrain

Safe Respite: The Ranger will be automatically alerted in their sleep if some natural flora or fauna is about to attack them, in anger or in self-defense. This includes flash floods or unstable ground. They will always have a chance for themselves to avoid the worst outcome, though it does not affect others or provide much time for warning.

Warm Reception: Food, rest, shelter – all these things are likely to be provided in exchange for information and the safety of their company. Rangers prefer the common folk though, as the intrigue and deceptions of politics often lead to information distorted and/or incorrect. Some rangers actually develop skills at story-telling, nothing epic like a poet or rhymist may trade in, but to amuse and couch lessons for youngsters in.

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Primeval World Senses

Divine Connections: If the world bond is with a specific Divine Principal. With Conviction, this class can use Divine Connexion to call on small intercessions and counters.

Animus Sensitivity: If the world bond is a Primal Bond. Powerful Anima Fonts, anima manifestations, etc.

Land Bond Connections: Others who are similarly primevally bonded – druids, rangers, etc. can also be detected by they are great in power (fantastical creatures of natural places such as Unicorns, Basilisks, Dryads) or share tenets or litany.

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The Ranger in Your Game

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Cultural/Literary/Historical Examples:

Primary Setting Types: Fantasy

An Archetype character can come from any experience, background, culture/social norms, gender, race, or regional issue unless prohibited by Settings or Game Master.

This Character Pathway is commonly found in associated Settings as a Class/Path option. A Setting may implement this with changes that align with the setting's flavor and properties - including the title by which it is known. GMs and Players may customize as needed. Knowledge of this Pathway as it appears in a Setting is covered under the Lore of the setting's World History and/or more specific Lores, if applicable.

Story Emphasis: It is strongly suggested that all Players have a full set of Stories for the important elements of their characters; These can explain any feature that deviates from normal rule/play limits. GMs often reward this.

Need ideas for role-playing this? See the Roleplaying your Character's Capabilities or ask the Game Master how it is best expressed in your Setting.No matter what restrictions exist in the setting you use, many GMs will allow anything with the right context or character backstory.