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.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Is 90% the cut-off for "useful ability vs ribbon"? How generous of you.

No, it isn't actually. Do you have something useful to add to the discussion?

 

[Stalker0]

Simple Spell-less Hunter's Mark:

Hunter's Focus
You have advantage on all Wisdom (Perception) and Wisdom (Survival) to find targets.

As a bonus action, you may get +1d6 damage on all attacks until the start of your next turn.


Simple, works all the time, but creates a drain on your bonus action if you want to use it constantly. And gives them a super bonus to track....because their freakin rangers just let them track for pete's sake.

 

[Minigiant]

Meh I don't care about spell less or magic less Hunters Mark.

It would just be so cool if Rangers had actual trackers that they placed on foes.

Then they could magically enhance these trackers with spells or simply target the trackers martially.

It's so weird that Hunter's Mark is not interacted with as an actual mark. A spot that only the ranger and maybe a possible companion can see or sense.

You could scry the mark or gleam info from the mark.Turn the mark into a butterfly to swap targets. Have a snake jump out the mark to bite the target.

Or just shoot the mark.

Just so not inspired.

 

[Gammadoodler]

For Hunter's Mark specifically? Maybe, maybe not. I do think Hunter's Mark would be better if it had a slightly more magical tracking effect. Even something as simple as "you know which direction the target is in" to help expand on the Advantage. But I think it can be flavored as more magical, and there are tropes that it supports.

And frankly, it isn't the only spell like this. Detect Magic and Identify have a similar problem. But I think that it is better to just slightly spice up Hunter's Mark rather than yeet it from the class. Because there are tropes it is following, it just isn't following them quite as far as it could.

So we agree about Hunters Mark. Great.

Incidentally, I never suggested that it should be yeeted from the class. It would IMO, work far better as a class feature.

My general feeling is that magic should be easily identifiable by its effects as "magical". Hunter's mark isn't.

So you get two ill effects for the price of one, a spell that isn't that "magical" and a reliance on this spellcasting to deliver nonmagical class fantasy.

 

[Gammadoodler]

They can. Shock and horror! Turn out normal hunting activities are not actually that hard for a DnD character to pull off.

Let us remember, the DC for going into the forest and getting food and water is 10. A ranger with proficiency in Survival is likely looking at a +5. That is an 80% hunting success rate. Using this list here from Wikipedia Hunting success - Wikipedia that makes them better than MOST PREDATORS. Wolves have a success rate of 20%, leopards have a rate of 38%. Jump down in the article to the section talking about humans, and you see this little gem "Hunters who hunted with bows and arrows had a hunting success of only 5%" So, a ranger, is doing SIXTEEN TIMES BETTER than modern day hunters with modern day bows and arrows.

This is without expertise which they get at level 2. This is without spells which they get at level 1.

A ranger hunting a deer with a bow? Deer have 4 hp. They can sink a shot and kill a deer with a single arrow. Consistently. Without magic!

But when you want to kill a Wyvern, a deadlier predator than just about anything on the planet Earth? Turns out a little magic is helpful in hunting those. Shouldn't really be surprising, since most humans don't use a bow and arrow to hunt tigers or bears either.

Ranger's don't need magic to hunt normal animals and track people. They use magic to hunt monsters and be BETTER at tracking than normal.

I'm not sure if you're just taking the piss here, or do you genuinely believe that when I say "normal hunting activities" in the context of D&D, that I am only referring to creatures hunted on earth? Do you truly believe I am concerned about how the game presents the ability to hunt deer??

In case you do genuinely believe this, it is not the case. In the context of a fantasy world with fantasy creatures, hunting those creatures would still fall within the purview of normal hunting activities, for me.

You say that adding a little magic would be helpful in hunting more exotic creatures. This certainly could be true, but you haven't actually made a case for when and why it is needed.. When and why does nonmagical ability fall short?

Or..it's a wyvern..so what?
If it bleeds, you can kill it.

 

[Chaosmancer]

So we agree about Hunters Mark. Great.

Incidentally, I never suggested that it should be yeeted from the class. It would IMO, work far better as a class feature.

My general feeling is that magic should be easily identifiable by its effects as "magical". Hunter's mark isn't.

So you get two ill effects for the price of one, a spell that isn't that "magical" and a reliance on this spellcasting to deliver nonmagical class fantasy.

Hunter's Mark's ability to deal damage and improve tracking is non-magical in the same way enhance ability to improve all your wisdom skill checks is non-magical.... because you keep saying it is so. Why is Owl's Wisdom or Eagle's Splendor giving advantage to skill checks magical, but Hunter's Mark giving advantage to perception and survival non-magical? They are doing the exact same thing, mechanically

 

[Chaosmancer]

I'm not sure if you're just taking the piss here, or do you genuinely believe that when I say "normal hunting activities" in the context of D&D, that I am only referring to creatures hunted on earth? Do you truly believe I am concerned about how the game presents the ability to hunt deer??

In case you do genuinely believe this, it is not the case. In the context of a fantasy world with fantasy creatures, hunting those creatures would still fall within the purview of normal hunting activities, for me.

You say that adding a little magic would be helpful in hunting more exotic creatures. This certainly could be true, but you haven't actually made a case for when and why it is needed.. When and why does nonmagical ability fall short?

Or..it's a wyvern..so what?
If it bleeds, you can kill it.

By your argument "normal hunting activities" would include killing anything in the world, from an Ancient Dragon to the Demon Prince of Undeath. I don't consider those things "normal hunting activities".

And, part of this is because people keep saying the Ranger is failing at things "any normal hunter" could do. So that is where my focus is. People seem to think that the Ranger is somehow less of a hunter than their uncle bob who goes out on deer season and catches an 8-point buck. That they are lacking in actual hunting skills. But they aren't.

Sure, a wyvern bleeds, so it can die. But it is going to be incredibly hard for a level 5 ranger to take it out with just a bow and arrow. They would be doing about 8.5 damage per hit, so we'll say 17 damage a round. Meaning they need seven rounds of combat to win. They likely have about 44 hp, meaning they will survive... one full round of attacks from the Wyvern, who can deal 46 damage in a single turn. The wyvern also has a fly speed of 80, making them much much faster than the Ranger.

How does magic help? Protection from Poison halves the Wyvern's poison damage, and makes them far more likely to succeed on the saving throw, halving it again. Now the Wyvern is only likely to do 28 damage in a single round. We've doubled the chances for the Ranger to survive with that alone. Summon Beast can get a flying companion to harrass the Wyvern, and buy the ranger another round of attacks, while also dealing damage and reducing the time the Ranger needs to win. Fog Cloud can help hide them if the Wyvern is dive bombing them, without having to use their action to hide, buying them more turns, and potentially allowing them to heal with Cure Wounds and survive another round. And if the enemy is weakened enough, then Hunter's Mark can be used to try and burn them down in a final rush to the finish line.

So, with magic I just took this from "not going to happen" to "maybe... maybe they could pull this off..."

 

[Incenjucar]

Apply this logic to a fighter or a rogue, who in the real world are beating up peasants or stealing from velvet-encrusted nobles with gout.

 

[FrogReaver]

Is the 2024 Ranger still limited to 2 attacks without TWF?

 

[Horwath]

Is the 2024 Ranger still limited to 2 attacks without TWF?

outside some spells and feats, yes. 2 Attacks at 5th level.