D&D (2024) 2024 Player's Handbook reveal: "New Ranger"

"More than any other class, the ranger is a new class."

​

It has been a year (less a day) since we last saw the Ranger in UA Playtest 6. There still could be a lot of change. My sense is that they are more or less happy with three of the subclasses (Fey Wanderer, Beastmaster, and Gloom Stalker), but many questions remain: Will anyone be happy with the favored enemy/relation to the land abilities? Will Hunter's Mark be foregrounded in multiple abilities? Will rangers at least get a free casting of the Barrage/Volley spells? For the Hunter, will the "Superior" abilties at levels 11 and 15 continue to be things you didn't choose at lower levels? For the Gloom Stalker, will they pull out 3rd level invisibility from "Umbral Sight"? Any chance for a surprise substitution of the Horizon Walker? Let's find out.

OVERVIEW

• "widely played, but ... one of the lowest rated"
• Spellcasting and Weapon Mastery at 1 (as with Paladin). Spellcasting can change spells after long rest (not every level)
• NEW: Favored Enemy: Hunters Mark always prepared, and X castings per day. (was level 2 in PT6, where it was WIS times/day)
• NEW: Fighting Style at 2 (no limits on choice). or you may choose two cantrips (again, like Paladin).
• NEW: Deft Explorer at 3: expertise in a proficient skill, +2 languages. NO INTERACTION WITH LAND TYPES. This is a nerf from PT6, where at least you got a bonus to Intelligence (Nature) checks.
• Extra attack at 5, Roving at 6 (+10' move, Climb Speed, Swim speed).
• Two more expertise options, at 9, presumably. Compared to the playtest, this is a nerf: PT6 gave 1 expertise, the spell Conjure Barrage always prepared, and +2 land types for Explorer. These had problems, but it's a lot to lose for one additional expertise.
• At 10, Tireless (as in PT6) -- THP and reduced Exhaustion.
• NEW: At 13, Damage no longer breaks concentration with Hunter's Mark.
• At 14, Nature's Veil -- invisibility. At 18, Blindsight.
• NEW: At 17, advantage vs person marked with Hunter's Mark.
• NEW: Damage of Hunter's mark increases to d10, not d6. (This too is a nerf from the playtest, which gave +WIS to hit, and +WIS to damage.)

The clear expectation is you are using Hunter's Mark, occupying your concentration and taking your first Bonus action every combat, from levels 1-20.

SUBCLASSES
Beastmaster

• command Primal Beast as a bonus action, and higher level abilities as in PT6, apparently.
• stat blocks level up with you (as in Tasha's and PT6). Beast gets Hunter's Mark benefits at 11.

Fey Wanderer

• vague on specifics; apparently just as in Tasha's.

Gloom Stalker

• as in PT6, Psychic damage bonus a limited number of times per day. +WIS to initiative (cf. Assassin and Barbarian)
• Umbral Sight, darkvision bonus, and invisible in the dark.
• NEW: psychic damage goes up at level 11. Mass fear option of Sudden Strike mentioned, nothing about Sudden Strike.

Hunter.

• Hunter's Lore at 3: know if there are immunities/resistances of creature marked by Hunter's Mark.
• NEW: Hunter's Prey at 3: you have a choice and can change your choice every short/long rest.
• NEW: Defensive Tactics at 7: you have a choice, and again can choose after a rest. The choices are Escape the Horde, Multiattack defense (not Evasion, Uncanny Dodge, and Hunter's Leap, as in PT6).
• NEW: At 11, Hunter's mark now "splashes" damage onto another target.
• NEW: you can choose to take resistance to damage, until the end of your turn.

 

[WanderingMystic]

Oh, absolutely. I just wouldn't want to miss out on the style, but I love giving cantrips to my Ranger. Most of the other origin feats I also find... less flavorful. I can do less fun things with Tough or Lucky than I can by gaining some spells to toss out.

I would go with skilled personally, if you want to be knowledgeable about all types of monsters you are looking at nature, history, arcana and religion. Then survival, perception and stealth and I am already over my limit.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

EDIT: Seems like the ranger is still a mixed bag. I like that they've incorporated the optional rules from Tasha's, but I don't like the emphasis on hunter's mark or the inclusion of the gloomstalker in the PHB. I currently ban that subclass from all my games, and I always feel more conflicted about banning stuff from the PHB than I do from supplements. (I also tend to ban the assassin and necromancer, but at least one of those isn't in the PHB now.)

I dunno. This, along with the new dragon designs (which I really dislike), is pushing me into a "wait and see" mode, whereas I was previously excited about this revision. I may end up just cherry picking stuff I like from the revision and running some sort of hybrid 2014/2024 game.

Or I'll just have to keep heavily house ruling the ranger like I currently do ...

Out of curiosity, why do you ban those subclasses? I can understand banning evil characters - I can even understand heavily discouraging emo ones - but those subclasses have no need to be either of those things.

 

[pukunui]

Out of curiosity, why do you ban those subclasses? I can understand banning evil characters - I can even understand heavily discouraging emo ones - but those subclasses have no need to be either of those things.

My gloom stalker ban is purely mechanical. I don't like the way the subclass works. I allowed one in a game once, and I didn't like it.

The assassin and necromancer bans are a combination of mechanics and flavor. With respect to the latter, I don't think you can be a non-evil poison-wielding assassin or undead-commanding necromancer. I know other people disagree, but that's just how I see those classes. I would rather they were in the DMG along with the other NPC-only subclasses, like the Death cleric and the poorly named* Oathbreaker paladin. From a mechanical standpoint, the 2014 assassin is wonky, and I'd rather it just not be an option than have to explain to my players why I don't think they should pick it, while the necromancer can bog down the game with all its undead minions.

I also ban the Twilight cleric for mechanical reasons, and I ban the Moon druid purely because I'm sick of it -- it's the only druid subclass I've ever seen in play.

Oh, I also ban the fiend warlock. I had one of those in an early 5e game and decided that that sort of Faustian bargain thing wasn't something I wanted to explore in my games. (I sometimes like to tempt my players with other sorts of devilish bargains in game, but they generally understand that they're expected to resist the temptation.)




*I've never understood why breaking your oath gives you a whole new set of paladin abilities. It ought to just be an unholy/evil oath rather than a "here's a reward for breaking your oath!"

 

[Vincent55]

these don't impress me, like many things each time they lose more of what they have to the point that the ranger is just a woodland fighter now, and in the past, they were far more, they were guides and survivalists of the wilds. Oh well.

 

[ProfessorDetective]

A spell-less magic-less ranger is pointless and redundant if you design the fighter class right.

Hell, we HAD that with the Scout Rogue. A lot of folks preferred it to the 2014 Ranger, If I'm remembering correctly.

 

[Vincent55]

My gloom stalker ban is purely mechanical. I don't like the way the subclass works. I allowed one in a game once, and I didn't like it.

The assassin and necromancer bans are a combination of mechanics and flavor. With respect to the latter, I don't think you can be a non-evil poison-wielding assassin or undead-commanding necromancer. I know other people disagree, but that's just how I see those classes. I would rather they were in the DMG along with the other NPC-only subclasses, like the Death cleric and the poorly named* Oathbreaker paladin. From a mechanical standpoint, the 2014 assassin is wonky, and I'd rather it just not be an option than have to explain to my players why I don't think they should pick it, while the necromancer can bog down the game with all its undead minions.

I also ban the Twilight cleric for mechanical reasons, and I ban the Moon druid purely because I'm sick of it -- it's the only druid subclass I've ever seen in play.

Oh, I also ban the fiend warlock. I had one of those in an early 5e game and decided that that sort of Faustian bargain thing wasn't something I wanted to explore in my games. (I sometimes like to tempt my players with other sorts of devilish bargains in game, but they generally understand that they're expected to resist the temptation.)




*I've never understood why breaking your oath gives you a whole new set of paladin abilities. It ought to just be an unholy/evil oath rather than a "here's a reward for breaking your oath!"

WOW thought i was the only one who sees the warlock as problematic as his patron holds control over him as he is given power but in the game doesn't seem to be any drawback. I enforce this in my games, so want to have the fiend patron then well your radiate evil and are detected as such no matter how you try and act, also the patron would require you to reaffirm your dedication to his power to commit acts or carry out his will in the world. This is much like a priest in some ways but the power is more directly connected on a personal level, not in general.

 

[Vincent55]

Hell, we HAD that with the Scout Rogue. A lot of folks preferred it to the 2014 Ranger, If I'm remembering correctly.

yes that was a great class

 

[Gladius Legis]

yes that was a great class

No, it is not.

The Scout Rogue's level 3 feature is a reaction that hardly ever gets used because Uncanny Dodge is better 99% of the time. You can't even move away until the enemy has finished its turn next to you (not just moved, but taken its whole turn). Which means you very likely got pummeled by their melee attacks before you could even do it. And if you were getting pummeled in melee, again, you likely already used your reaction on Uncanny Dodge.

After that, all they get at level 9 is 10 feet more speed. Meh.

The level 13 and 17 features are good, but they're level 13 and 17, which most tables just won't see.

Regardless, the idea that the Scout Rogue was ever a proper Ranger substitute is laughable.

 

[Vincent55]

No, it is not.

The Scout Rogue's level 3 feature is a reaction that hardly ever gets used because Uncanny Dodge is better 99% of the time. You can't even move away until the enemy has finished its turn next to you (not just moved, but taken its whole turn). Which means you very likely got pummeled by their melee attacks before you could even do it. And if you were getting pummeled in melee, again, you likely already used your reaction on Uncanny Dodge.

After that, all they get at level 9 is 10 feet more speed. Meh.

The level 13 and 17 features are good, but they're level 13 and 17, which most tables just won't see.

Regardless, the idea that the Scout Rogue was ever a proper Ranger substitute is laughable.

what ever

 

[Horwath]

Is this a joke?

These two are just self congratulating about a big, fat nothingburger.

1. Ranger spellcasting:
why does it still have Verbal components on it's spells?
Hard to be stealth, guerilla warrior when you need to use your class abilities by shouting from top of your lungs...

2. Hunter's mark, as above, plus Concentration?? Really? We are still doing this?
Let's give core class feature to the class, but that feature prevents bunch of other possible features(spells) to work together with it. And let's give it extra free usages so we make sure that other features are not being used.

how about we steal a good idea from SW5E?

Star Wars 5e

sw5e.com

Spoiler: Ranger's quarry

Ranger's quarry;
Scout: 1st, 5th, 9th, and 17th level
You learn how to effectively read and track your prey. Once on each of your turns, you can choose a creature you can see within 120 feet and mark it as your quarry (no action required). For the next hour, you gain the following benefits:

• Once per turn, when you hit the target with a weapon attack, you can deal 1d4 additional damage to it of the same type as the weapon’s damage. This die changes as you gain scout levels, as shown in the Ranger’s Quarry column of the scout table.
• You have advantage on any Wisdom (Perception) or Wisdom (Survival) check you make to find it while it’s on the same planet as you.

You can only have one creature marked in this way at a time. Beginning at 5th level, you can use your reaction to mark a creature when it enters your line of sight, provided it is within range of your Ranger’s Quarry.
The duration increases to 8 hours at 9th level and 24 hours at 17th level.

Is this really that hard to do?

3. Spellcasting from 1st level, but no cantrips at 1st level or none at all unless you spend extra class features for them?
How can 1/3rd casters(EK&AT) manage to learn few cantrips when they get spells, but half-casters(that should in theory be better at it than 1/3rd casters) and homehow too dumb to learn few tricks with spells from the start?

4. Deft explorer: would it kill you that it gives 2 instead of 1 expertise at 1st level. Wow, but you got 2 extra languages. Great...

5. You get nonbreakable Concentration on HM at 13th level.
well, how nice that they included that about 12 levels too late for class to have working mechanics.

6. Nature's veil or whatever that invisibility thing.
Why return to using ability modifier for number of usages again?
Do we really need people to pump their ability scores to max or can we give them options to take feats that are more fun and more versatile thing in the game instead of supreme boring "+1 to certain things".
Return to prof bonus per long rest, +1 usage on short rest and reduce the level needed to 7 or something maybe even lower.

7. Advantage on attack on the target of HM, wow something done right. Almost. Still uses your concentration, so forget about using something cool alongside this one. And it's 17th level so good luck seeing this one in 99% of campaigns.
Maybe lower it to 13th or 17th level?

8. Capstone ability. +1d6 damage improved to +1d10.
And we have come to the main punchline of this half hour comedy attempt.

+2 to damage? So this is it? This is what WotC brain trust can conjure up?

getting +2 damage for using your 1st level feature and your concentration?
Maybe if it removes concentration, it would be somewhat salvageable.


How to quickly and simply fix this cluster #$%&?

1. Hunter's mark uses Ranger's quarry mechanics or if it needs to be a spell it must lose spell components and Concetration and be castable as Bonus action or as free action when you hit with an attack. Same for changing targets.

2. Deft explorer gives 2 instead of 1 expertise.

3. Nature's veil, returned to prof bonus per long rest, +1 usage on short rest, maybe level lowered a little.

4. Advantage on attacks for HM target moved to place of non breaking concentration for HM

5. instead of 17th level advantage on HM target's we can get maybe something boring but reliable here, maybe 3rd attack, maybe rogue's reliable talent, maybe more expertise and move speed?

6. Capstone; if we need to go with improving 1st level spell as a capstone, make it +3d6 at least then. Maybe give possibility to add 2nd weapon mastery effect to the target of HM.