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

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

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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.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I remember playing an elf ranger using S&P. He used the split ability score to boost his Aim to 19, took every bonus to hit with missile weapons my class and race afforded me, and then took weapon specialization with a longbow. It was a hefty cost, but I paid for it by sacrificing followers and armor proficiency in all but "light armor". His Thac0 with his bow was a 13 at level 1 and he attacked twice per round. It only got better from there.

Yeah, the system had some kinks to work out.

I don't suppose your DM ever hit you in your weaknesses, ie, everything except ranged combat?

 

[Micah Sweet]

Skills and Powers WAS that middle ground: you were given all the abilities of your class, but could swap them out for points to buy different ones tailored to your class. A fighter could only spend points on learning certain weapons, a wizard could get points for getting additional forbidden schools, or a thief could sacrifice his backstab to get additional skills.

Of course, the big problem was that 2e was never built with that kind of granular design, so it was trivially easy to sacrifice things that wouldn't help your main focus (like followers) to hyper specialize in the things that were.

So what? You let the hyper-soecialist show off, but you also hit them where they're weak, which is increasingly large the more specialized they get.

 

[Chaosmancer]

It comes off as a patch for inflexible DMs and passive but powergamer Players who refuse to talk to each other.

Or maybe some of us like being such a bad-ass that we can alter our kit to match the challenges we face? Or maybe (with regards to the Barbarian) we like the idea of being attuned to ALL animal spirits, not just one?

No, no, it must be that player's have commitment issues and the developers want to help inflexible GMs and Powergamers who refuse to talk to their GMs. That is the only logical explanation that can exist!

 

[Chaosmancer]

8 hours and concentration free seems too much. 1 hour and concentration free seems better balanced. So under normal circumstances you use your free ability amd if you really have to make it stick. Use a 3rd level slot.

That's fair. I remember the base spell already extends to 8 hours if you cast it with a 3rd level slot (and 24 if you cast it with a 5th) so I didn't want to remove that. But it works perfectly fine to say it only lasts 1 hour without concentration.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I am glad that they have ripped off the band-aid on "favored terrain". This Ranger will rock at exploring, and combat, from the look of it. Less crufty fiddley powers, more effective abilities.

They will be okay at exploring, but hardly noticeably better than a rogue. Especially before tier 4.

Having expertise just isn’t that great, and has no focus whatsoever on exploration.

I would have loved natural explorer tied to land the ranger is in. One expertise always feels like not enough.

Yep. And two languages is fine I guess but like…hardly unique.

 

[fluffybunbunkittens]

On a positive note, at least Ranger doesn't have 'you can cast Conjure Barrage' as a class feature anymore.

I'm actually sad about the loss of Land's Stride. Ignoring difficult terrain wasn't much as a lv8 feature, but surely that is exactly something that suits a skirmisher running around wilderness?

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

On a positive note, at least Ranger doesn't have 'you can cast Conjure Barrage' as a class feature anymore.

I'm actually sad about the loss of Land's Stride. Ignoring difficult terrain wasn't much as a lv8 feature, but surely that is exactly something that suits a skirmisher running around wilderness?

Maybe they made a spell out it, since it was shared with the druid as a feature. I would not mind that.

Im warming up to the idea of this ranger. Still too reliant on vancian spellcasting instead of supernatural features, but Im getting there.

 

[fluffybunbunkittens]

Maybe they made a spell out it, since it was shared with the druid as a feature. I would not mind that.

Druid can cast Freedom of Movement by that point...

But I could totally see them removing a core class feature from Ranger, because a Druid subclass also got it.

 

[Minigiant]

Or maybe some of us like being such a bad-ass that we can alter our kit to match the challenges we face? Or maybe (with regards to the Barbarian) we like the idea of being attuned to ALL animal spirits, not just one?

No, no, it must be that player's have commitment issues and the developers want to help inflexible GMs and Powergamers who refuse to talk to their GMs. That is the only logical explanation that can exist!

Sure.

You should be able to switch class features on downtime. Communing with a new animal spirit in the wild or going through a training montage is the trope.DMs should be allowing that.

Swapping combat techniques and animal spirits and energy types is simply out of line with any trope to the point that they disallow them.

It hints to having inflexible DMs and passive players. And it also suggests that WOTC is unwilling to put DM advice in the games to allow for downtime. They're really should be a downtime section and the player's handbook that tells you how often you can switch and swap up class abilities.

"You can spend a week communing with nature and swap one of your favorite enemies or favored terrain to the another favorite terrain or favorite enemy"

Instead we get "Oh we can't balance. Player advice? DM advice? What's that? Here take more free uses of Hunter's Mark"

 

[Minigiant]

That's fair. I remember the base spell already extends to 8 hours if you cast it with a 3rd level slot (and 24 if you cast it with a 5th) so I didn't want to remove that. But it works perfectly fine to say it only lasts 1 hour without concentration.

That's another thing.

What's the point of extra uses of Hunter's mark if you can upcast it for 8 hours.

WAIT A SECOND

Is this why this Ranger is getting extra uses of Hunter's Mark? To recast it after casting another concentration spell?