D&D General What is appropriate Ranger Magic

[Vaalingrade]

I miss Sandstorm, Stormwrack, and Frostburn.

The terrain books were super sweet. I kind of wish that was the treatment of the planes.

 

[Corinnguard]

I miss Sandstorm, Stormwrack, and Frostburn.

It would have been neat if WoTC had gone beyond these three.

 

[Horwath]

This is my favorite kind of characters!

Take a dex-based ancient paladin as a ranger, or a fighter with skulker and poisoner as an assassin.

Scout rogue with a level of fighter for weapons, armor and fighting style

 

[CreamCloud0]

Does anyone else consider Find Familiar to be a better representation of the ranger animal companion idea than any of companion subclasses?

Edit: less so because of the specific mechanical implementation(the mind link) to perform that representation but instead how it serves to be able to scout and ‘report back’ to you rather than just being ‘a body’ to help fight

 

[Minigiant]

Does anyone else consider Find Familiar to be a better representation of the ranger animal companion idea than any of companion subclasses?

Edit: less so because of the specific mechanical implementation(the mind link) to perform that representation but instead how it serves to be able to scout and ‘report back’ to you rather than just being ‘a body’ to help fight

No because it's the same problem.

A scout companion
A battle companion
A tracking companion
A flanking companion
A pet companion
A mount companion

Are different companions.

Find Familiar and Beastmaster only touch one of them each.

Ideally you'd want 5-7 ranger subclasses/spells for companions alone.

 

[CreamCloud0]

No because it's the same problem.

A scout companion
A battle companion
A tracking companion
A flanking companion
A pet companion
A mount companion

Are different companions.

Find Familiar and Beastmaster only touch one of them each.

Ideally you'd want 5-7 ranger subclasses/spells for companions alone.

I mean companions aren’t exactly high on my list of essential ranger traits, you make a good point but I’d prefer a dedicated companion-summoner-beastmaster class to be able to explore the concept in full rather than struggling under fairly tight budgetary restrictions being a partial fragment of the ranger.

Though I don’t know why they couldn’t put a half dozen varying archetype statblocks in the beastmaster subclass

 

[Minigiant]

I mean companions aren’t exactly high on my list of essential ranger traits, you make a good point but I’d prefer a dedicated companion-summoner-beastmaster class to be able to explore the concept in full rather than struggling under fairly tight budgetary restrictions being a partial fragment of the ranger.

Though I don’t know why they couldn’t put a half dozen varying archetype statblocks in the beastmaster subclass

Because (trying not to be against) the designers of 5e in 2014 nor 2024 were of RPG generations when companion characters were major aspects of D&D.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Does anyone else consider Find Familiar to be a better representation of the ranger animal companion idea than any of companion subclasses?

I don't even find Find Familiar a good representation of familiars.

 

[Micah Sweet]

I don't even find Find Familiar a good representation of familiars.

I miss familiar being real animals.

 

[Arilyn]

I miss familiar being real animals.

Me too. And I miss the little bonuses they granted wizards in 3e. Having a hedgehog granted an armour class boost, a cat gave a boost to stealth, I think a pig gave boost to diplomacy? That was fun.

It meant something if your familiar or animal companion got killed. Now you can just resummon the same spirit, or use a spell slot to resurrect your fallen "wolf" buddy.

Do animal companions or familiars improve as you level up any more? Or do you just get to summon a tougher critter with higher spell slot?