D&D General What is a Ranger? A miserable pile of secrets! (+)

[payn]

then what should the ranger be then what makes it sufficiently different that it should not become a sub-class?

Pretty obvious to me. Its a melee focused cousin to Druid like the Pally is to Clerics. Then again, I dont have these Ranger identity problems that folks seem to have. The fighter on the other hand...

I am ok with an animal companion being a "glorified familiar" if its just a class or feat. I think it should be for everyone with the Druid and Ranger maybe being able to do it a little bit better. If you want a pet class make it the summoner or something that entirely focuses on it. Though, the Cavalier in PF1 is a good study on this. Shut down their one trick (mount) and its easy to toss them from 2/3 of campaigns. Which is why I like options to make different types of class archetypes. If all Rangers are pet guys, then thats pretty limiting in many ways. Not sure why one thing has to be an entire identity thing?

 

[Mind of tempest]

Pretty obvious to me. Its a melee focused cousin to Druid like the Pally is to Clerics. Then again, I dont have these Ranger identity problems that folks seem to have. The fighter on the other hand...

I am ok with an animal companion being a "glorified familiar" if its just a class or feat. I think it should be for everyone with the Druid and Ranger maybe being able to do it a little bit better. If you want a pet class make it the summoner or something that entirely focuses on it. Though, the Cavalier in PF1 is a good study on this. Shut down their one trick (mount) and its easy to toss them from 2/3 of campaigns. Which is why I like options to make different types of class archetypes. If all Rangers are pet guys, then thats pretty limiting in many ways. Not sure why one thing has to be an entire identity thing?

given the hunger for a spell-less ranger your point is not self-evident.

 

[Yaarel]

Yes D&D's Fighter design is too broad. That's a problem, but it's not a problem for today. Any future Fighter design should be narrower. You should not be able to make a Walmart Ranger with the Fighter class, really.

If the Fighter splits into two classes,

• Heavy infantry Knight
• Light infantry Skirmisher

I can see the athletic Skirmisher class having a Ranger subclass.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

It predates anime

?
I was watching Marine Boy and Battle of the Planets way before I ever heard of D&D.

 

[Minigiant]

That's gibberish. Ranger is a real archetype that exists in fiction and media far beyond D&D. The key elements, when it comes down to it, are Nature, Archery and Stealth, and Fighter doesn't cut it, because none of those are key things for Fighters.

Yes D&D's Fighter design is too broad. That's a problem, but it's not a problem for today. Any future Fighter design should be narrower. You should not be able to make a Walmart Ranger with the Fighter class, really.

The Fighter does Archery well. The issue is the Nature, Stealth, and Monster Hunting.

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But again one of the bigger issues is that the inspirations many have of Rangers are from low level, lower magic settings.

Even in the LOTR, the highest level you can even attempt to say Aragorn is 11. And he is the highest level ranger on Middle Earth. And Faramir the second highest level ranger is a few level lower. That's if you are using 1e rules. In 5e, Aragorn is level ~7 and Faramir ~5.
Jon Snow? Level 6?
I don't even think Katniss is a ranger but she be'd lucky to be over Ranger level 4.
Goblin Slayer is maybe level 6 with bad stats traded for feats.

 

[Minigiant]

the problem of ranger is it has no core no single basic idea to build off.

It does though. People just tend not to like it
So they play either RP fighters, rogues, or summoners in green cloaks.

 

[James Gasik]

If it's not in the PHB, it's not workable, and I don't expect sidekicks to be in the PHB. On top of all that, it doesn't even make sense to use the sidekick rules for pets, because pets should be simpler than that.

I'm sorry, could you explain this comment, please? It sounds like you're saying "unless a class is in the PHB it doesn't work". I didn't think the Artificer was a bad class?

 

[James Gasik]

Oh man, please don't make the ranger a pet class.

You misunderstand, I think. I'm talking about making a separate from the Ranger pet class that has a "Ranger-esque" Subclass for people who want that fantasy, as opposed to trying to figure out how to make a pet Subclass that works.

More design space that way.

 

[CreamCloud0]

given the hunger for a spell-less ranger your point is not self-evident.

Even without magic, i could definitely see a ranger class that does basically everything the druid does thematically except by using ‘mundane’ skills and class abilities rather than magic, plus leaning a little more into weapon based combat and stealthing.

 

[James Gasik]

Even without magic, i could definitely see a ranger class that does basically everything the druid does thematically except by using ‘mundane’ skills and class abilities rather than magic, plus leaning a little more into weapon based combat and stealthing.

Although the "spells are better than skill checks" trope is deeply embedded in D&D design. Many threads have been made on this subject. So this spell-less Ranger would need some kind of "skill unlocks" to allow them to do much more than normal skill use allows for.