D&D 5E Why Are Rangers Arcane Spellcasters?

[AmerginLiath]

Nothing quite makes one feel old as a gamer as when others refer to the use of ‘divine and ‘arcane’ as keywords with specific meaning for classes as “the old days”…

 

[EternalRain]

SkidAce, you missed I'm a Banana's point, and shintashi sums it up nicely. Rangers are declared to be divine casters, but the word has no meaning anymore, and it is now like it was in the old days, were each spellcasting class had different lists and cast under different rules.

Grouping those quotes together was helpful - thank you!

I see the connection to an older way of doing it, but I must admit I am glad my DM lets me choose and spell I want.

 

[schnee]

They're a Sorcerer-mechanic 1/3 divine caster.

They cast in an innate way, from a Druid-based list. With a few uniques that make sense for a hunter... i.e., instead of getting Entangle, a crowd control spell, they get Ensnaring Strike, a single-target version.

 

[Warmaster Horus]

Why not? Just because they use Wisdom as their spell casting attribute doesn't mean their spells spring from a divine source. Rangers pass secrets of manipulating the weave in nature among others in their creed.

 

[WayOfTheFourElements]

I use the fact that rangers have to "choose" their spells to differentiate between orders(groups) of rangers in my world.

There is one group, The Lightning Rangers, that use arcane spells exclusively (house group / house rule).

Are you sure you don't want to call them the Power Rangers?

 

[Jester David]

As mentioned, the question is "why do rangers have spells known rather than access to the full list?"

I imagine that was a complexity issue. Not everyone likes rangers with spells, so picking one or two spells and sticking with it (or picking the least magical of spells) makes it easier for people who don't play spellcasters to manage the fighter.

 

[Valetudo]

Why dont bards use INT as a spellcasting stat. Their spells are taught, not innate?

 

[BookBarbarian]

There's nothing quite like seeing a thread necroed and all the same arguments brought up again.

 

[Staffan]

Why dont bards use INT as a spellcasting stat. Their spells are taught, not innate?

Because bardic magic is about persuading and tricking the universe to do your bidding, not about finding the hidden levers that force it to.

 

[Gwarok]

I think the real question is why can Rangers cast spells at all? Like, what character from any genre that would be described of as a ranger can cast spells? I assume they wanted to give them a little bit of extra customization and a few abilities. As to limiting them to spells from any pre existing classes, that doesn't bother me at all, its the effects we want to represent that are important. I've always taken their spells known to represent less magic they cast and more tricks and skills they've picked up over the years.