How many classes can use ranged weapons effectively?

[Derren]

Also, what do you mean by 'good archer'? Do you mean 'as good as any other character at archery'? Or do you mean 'archery is as good as any other attack form choice for that character'? Or do you mean both, or something else entirely?

By "good archer" I mean something like "Being able to use a bow for a good portion of your attacks when you could also do something else and not making the other players mad at you for using crappy attacks and endangering the party".

I have the fear that ranged weapons will play a very minor role in 4E as you can either "shooter lasers" or are very craptastic with them so you should (must to not endanger the party?) use melee weapons and that only one class really benefits from having a ranged weapon and whenever you want to be good with them you have to take a power/multiclass with that class.

 

[Majoru Oakheart]

In 4E, unless the other classes also get good ranged powers (not only at will but also encounter and daily ones) it means that to be a good archer you are limited to a single class.

Yes, 4e is more class and more archetype focused than 3e. There will almost always be a clear choice of one class that is the "best" at one thing. If that's what you want to do, I'd pick that class.

It is more like 2e in regards to the role of classes. Yet, it is also a decent amount more versatile than 2e at the same time.

 

[Lacyon]

While the ranger's at-will powers are, strictly speaking, better than basic attacks, they don't do any more damage than a basic attack, nor do they attack a defense other than AC. We haven't seen all his options, but the guys who built the pregen seemed to think those weren't bad picks.

Also, the only at-will powers we've seen anything like a complete write-up for are the rogue's, which only increase in damage at 21st level.

So, I'd say that anyone with a Dex modifier as high as their main attack stat modifier would be a competent archer. They might be missing per-encounter and daily powers to use with the bow, if they choose to build their character in such a way.

 

[Ulthwithian]

Derren: Well, I guess my point is that in 3.X, unless you specialized in archery, you couldn't be a 'good archer'.

I believe your counterpoint is that you could do this in 3.X, correct? You then acknowledge that apparently you can do this in 4E, but must do so using Ranger abilities, correct?

Well, so far as we know currently, it would seem you are correct. However, we have seen very few Feats in 4E.

You seem to be unenthusiastic about the much tighter class/power ties in 4E rather than 3.X. In 3.5, you could read the Fighter and Ranger class descriptions and immediately pick up that they had Ranged specializations available. However, this is not true in 4E (presumably).

I think it might help to slightly decouple the 'Ranger' class from the 'Ranger powers'. If anyone can (for example) take a feat to gain a 'Ranger power', then specialization is still possible, even if you have to use 'Ranger powers'. This is a guess, but it would seem that you would have preferred something more akin to the Bo9S approach where the powers were not explicitly tied to classes, yes?

At this point, whether or not your concern is addressed would depend on how easily it is to take powers from other classes. Or would this not effectively help the situation?

 

[Ximenes088]

The important word is choice. You could choose to be good with ranged weapons by selecting the right feats. Want a archer without all that ranger baggage? Fighter with ranged weapons. A sniper? Rogues with a ranged weapon. With the right builds even a cleric could be a good archer and barbarians could use their strength increase with thrown weapons.

In 4E, unless the other classes also get good ranged powers (not only at will but also encounter and daily ones) it means that to be a good archer you are limited to a single class.

A 3.5 fighter who resolutely plowed everything into bow feats and Dexterity would become a light-armored, highly effective bow fighter that had no meaningful use for sword-and-board heavy armor fighting. In 4e, we write "ranger" instead of "fighter" in the class blank and produce the exact same character.

Rogues were miserable bow snipers in 3.5. They'd get one shot from ten paces away, and good luck killing anything that matters with one sneak-attack arrow.

Clerics could be splendid archers with their buff spells and domain powers. Clerics could be splendid _anything_ with their buff spells and domain powers, and that's why they've been intentionally nerfed in 4e. Playing a holy archer in 4e is intended to demand more than a simple opportunity cost in domain picks.

Barbarians could use their strength increase with thrown weapons, yes. Exactly like fighters, warlords, or any other class can do in 4e, to my understanding.

In 4e, if you want to be the _best_ archer, you pick the class specifically designed to be that. Unless you find some objective value in spreading bow skills more equally among the classes, this is exactly how it ought to be. I find no value in having two perfectly-balanced archer PCs that differ only in class name, and I find positive harm in having one of them be a great archer while the other's a great archer and great defender too.

 

[Cadfan]

Actually, what makes the pregen character a good archer is 1) high dexterity, and 2) the Hunter ability. Which is a class ability, not a power.

It really depends on what you consider a "good archer."

If a "good archer" is someone who prefers using a bow to using other weapons, then everything we've seen suggests that your "good archer" needs to be a ranger.

If a "good archer" is someone who uses a bow as an effective way to round out their character, then the game probably has lots of good archers.

The simple fact is that the decision to make martial abilities into powers instead of feats spelled the death of the non ranger archery specialist. It meant that the cool archery tricks had to go together into one class, to help define that class, and by definition would then no longer be freely available to other classes. I like this decision, a whole lot, even if it means that I won't be playing archery based fighters.

It also means that archery based fighters (or most other classes for that matter) in 4e are kind of unnecessary. What does being a fighter add to your character if you're doing ranger tricks that you wouldn't get by just being a ranger? Access to a bunch of non synergizing fighter powers that function only if you wield an entirely different set of weapons and armor? In 3e an archery fighter made some kind of sense, because he could accumulate feats faster than a ranger. But what does the fighter class add to an archer nowadays, considering that its a class built primarily around a non archery weapon portfolio?

 

[JohnSnow]

Sounds like a spurious complaint to me. Mostly, I think some people are ticked because they won't be able to make the killer cleric archer or the archer fighter who's a bow expert but never goes outdoors.

Traditionally, expertise in archery involved training in the various skills connected to it, like woodcraft, stealth, perception, and the like. The bow, as a weapon of war, was mostly utilized by people who were trained in its use as a weapon of survival. Alternatively, bows and crossbows were used as backup weapons by soldiers.

Basic attacks handle the latter just fine. If you want your character to be an archery expert, that requires training with an expert archer, and probably acquiring some of the skills that go along with it...like stealth and other "ranger-y" things. In other words, any character who wants to be an expert archer should probably have the equivalent of ranger training anyway.

But I imagine that most fighters (and other characters) will carry hurled weapons, or a sling, crossbow, or other ranged weapons for when they need to attack at range.

 

[Bishmon]

At this point, whether or not your concern is addressed would depend on how easily it is to take powers from other classes. Or would this not effectively help the situation?

For me, the rogue I most identify as a rogue, is Garrett from the Thief video games. He was a thief, sneaking into places, hiding in shadows, and killing people with his shortbow. In 4E, this is what it looks like I'll have to do to play that seemingly simple and common character.

First, I'll need to take a feat to even use the shortbow, since rogues aren't even proficient with it.

Then, I'll need to take a feat to be able to use sneak attack with the shortbow, since sneak attack explicitly says which weapons it applies to, and the shortbow isn't one of them.

Now, since my rogue powers are probably useless (the one rogue power we've seen that works with a ranged weapon doesn't work with the shortbow), I've gotta use another feat to get access to ranger powers.

Best case scenario, that feat will allow me to just pick ranger powers in place of my rogue powers. Worst case scenario, it'll give me one ranger power, and I'll need to spend another feat in a couple levels to get another ranger power.

So even in this best case scenario, I've spent three feats and probably five levels (assuming one feat every other level) to even get to the level of proficiency the other classes had with their weapons at the beginning of the game.

Alternately, I could just use the ranger, since that's got the bow proficiencies and the necessary powers. But then I'd have to rip out any woodsman flavor from the class, change the skill list, and modify class features to get rid of the 'hunter' vibe and add a 'sneak attacker' vibe. That's no small task.

Like I said, the narrower focus of 4E classes has certain advantages and disadvantages. It's already easy to see examples of each.

 

[WhatGravitas]

But then I'd have to rip out any woodsman flavor from the class, change the skill list, and modify class features to get rid of the 'hunter' vibe and add a 'sneak attacker' vibe. That's no small task.

But then, we also have no clue if there's an "Assassin" Paragon Path or something like that. And perhaps *some* class abilities are also snaggable with class training feats. Until we see them, it is really hard to see how good "dabblers" will work.

Cheers, LT.

 

[Evilhalfling]

You are aware that the Ranger's at will powers are hella lame right?

+4 to hit is lame? yes the damage has been errta'd but in my test run this made the ranger
very effective in every fight.