Non-Magical Ranger and Bard class variants

Do any of you know where I can find some good non-magical ranger and bard variants? For the campaign world I am creating I want magic to be fairly rare i.e. no class that isn't dedicated to magic will have it. Bards won't have it, Rangers won't have it, and I am going with the Paladin Prestige Class from UA so Clerics can eventually become a Paladin but they'll have spell casting abilities anyway.

There's a good non spellcasting Ranger in Complete Warrior. As for a non magical bard I'd change around the rouge: alter the class skills, swap out some of the abilities for the bard ones, expand upon the bard abilities using Path of Magic.

Crothian said:

There's a good non spellcasting Ranger in Complete Warrior. As for a non magical bard I'd change around the rouge: alter the class skills, swap out some of the abilities for the bard ones, expand upon the bard abilities using Path of Magic.

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Cool... I haven't picked up Complete Warrior yet but some of my players have. I was thinking about using the Shantyman Class from Skull & Bones as a Bard replacement. Hopefully someone has some other options because the Shantyman has a distinctive "Sea Faring" feel to it.

Keep in mind that the ranger, and the paladin I beleive, in the Complete Warrior have spell-like abilities, though they don't cast spells. That may not fit your desired 'non-magical ranger' class.

Well I do have a Low magic class based onthe Bard posted inthe houserules forum here:

http://www.enworld.org/forums/showthread.php?t=78248


He does use spell like abilities and is based around deception and manipulation. I used the Mentat's and the Bene Gesserit sisterhood from Frank Herbert's DUNE for inspiration.

Here's a quick solution that I heard (and liked)...each time your non-spellcasting variant class would have gained spells of a new level -- they get a bonus feat instead. this meanst, of course that, through 20 levels bards get 6 o4 7 additional feats, while paladins and rangers get 4.

The campaign that I heard that used had bards, rangers etc pulling feats from the general list...I'd be inclined to create a thematic list of feats (social feats for bards, survival feats for rangers) to keep these bonus feats linked with the other class features.

On the balance -- this fix might be a little underpowered (4 bonus feats in place of a list of spells?), but not all that much so. It could be 'powered up' by adding a list of 'class only' feats that can be taken at these levels (similar to a rogues's 'special abilities') -- the Complete Warrior style powers could be added there, as well.

On the plus side -- it enhanced flexibility...for which the lack thereof is a recurring complaint for rangers & bards as is.

If you want a class that fit into the ranger niche without being it without spells per see, check out Midnight Wildlander, it is a very interesting non magical version of it, as tehre are no spell like abilities and no magical abilities at all. if you don't have acess to Midnight, I may send a OGL portion of it.

http://webs.lanset.com/johno/rpgs/dnd/rangerproject/ is a source of a fair amount of good alt.rangers, including several that are non-spellcasters. The Wheel of Time d20 Woodsman is a good one as well, as is the Midnight Wildlander. Ken Hood's Bushfighter is another favorite, which was available as a free two or three page pdf for a while (and I still have a copy of it on my other computer at home, I believe.)

I'm not aware of any alt.bards, but then again, just let characters pick up ranks in a Perform skill and a few knowledge skills (maybe Bardic Knowledge can be re-envisioned as a skill?), allow characters to take it as a class skill, and you're set. The Gleeman prestige class from The Wheel of Time game might work to top that off.

Calico_Jack73 said:

Do any of you know where I can find some good non-magical ranger and bard variants? For the campaign world I am creating I want magic to be fairly rare i.e. no class that isn't dedicated to magic will have it. Bards won't have it, Rangers won't have it, and I am going with the Paladin Prestige Class from UA so Clerics can eventually become a Paladin but they'll have spell casting abilities anyway.

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There's a non-magical ranger in Into the Wilds and Into the Wilds: Digital Bundle and both are currently on sale.

There is a non spellcasting bard in Dark Sun fansite athats.org, although it has some poison focus that might drop the feel of it for some people.