How many classes can use ranged weapons effectively?

[Bishmon]

It's true, but the bonus has been +1 or +2 so far. I don't think we've seen anything higher than that so far, so the difference is much smaller in 4e than it was in 3e.

They've mentioned a few weapons get up to +3. As for how that compares to 3E, that's pretty irrelevant. We've got absolutely no way of knowing how a 4E +2 compares to a 3E +4. There's just way too many variables, and most of them are unknown.

My question is, how much woodsiness have we seen tied to the ranger class?

None that I know of. We've seen very little of the ranger class.

 

[Nikodemus]

If you want a character who is an expert with a bow and sneaky, you may be going about it the wrong way. It sounds like you want a Ranger who has access to the thievery skill. He can then sneak, hide in shadows and kill people with a bow.

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.

 

[Stalker0]

And, in this, is this so much different from 3.X? Only those who really chose to specialize in ranged weapon attacks were all that effective at it (Rangers and Rogues, mainly)

Which begs the question, how many 4e classes can specialize in ranged attacks? In 3e, the fighter, ranger, rogue, and cleric all made pretty good archers (we'll just use base classes for now).

In 4e, so far it seems only the ranger is a true ranged specialist, the rogue can dabble at it. This is of course COMPLETELY a view based on INCOMPLETE information.

I think the multiclassing rules will ultimately determine who can be good at archery. If a fighter can pick up some of those nice ranger powers, then its a brand new ball game.

 

[Bishmon]

But your bonus is based on your prime attribute- Dexterity. You'll be about 2 points shy of maximum if you don't take the feat, whereas if the feat-to-use-rapier-with-sneak-attack model applies, you spend one feat to use sneak attack with a shortbow. If you're trying to model Garrett, that's exactly how it works. He's always shooting at flat-footed, unalert targets, and if he tries to plant an arrow in someone who's aware of the danger, he does trivial damage. If you want to succeed at the hardest game level for Thief 3, if I recall correctly, you can't cause any deaths at all- so the character designers pretty clearly see the quintessential Garrett as being so good he doesn't have to snipe anybody.

1) Or the game designers felt that was the easiest and most logical way to increase difficulty.

2) Garrett does little damage if the target is aware of him? Well, yeah, because the whole point to those games was to keep targets unaware of Garrett, so it would have been foolish for the designers to implement mechanics that would have run counterproductive to that.

You're simply taking the comparison too far. D&D and Thief are different games designed for different purposes. What works in D&D might not work in Thief and vice versa.

My reference to Garrett was for the concept: a sneaky thief who snipes from the shadows with a bow. That's it. Whereas in Thief, that might mean you kill the guy if he's unaware, but you've gotta retreat if you're discovered, in D&D that could mean you get a sneak attack or two off right away, and then once the mob discovers you, you stay in back while the fighter closes to melee, the wizard puts up a wall of force, and the cleric smites an enemy with divine fire.

 

[Dr. Strangemonkey]

Is it worth pointing out that there is a melee build for the Ranger? We've seen it referenced a couple of times and I'd hate to see the Ranger as pegged solely for ranged attacks.

Conversely, I'm pretty confident that we will see ranged attack options for other classes.

Isn't Feather Me Yon Oaf a ranged warlord power/feat?

 

[Harshax]

Garrett fought with a bow?

I thought he used it chiefly as a utility tool and only tried to snipe people when he ran out of good options. And he was certainly never to be found at the rear, potting a dozen arrows into a melee scrum. No, Garrett just had his regular +Dex to hit with bows, which made him perfectly good with one since nonproficiency is no longer a penalty. He also spent a feat gaining sneak attack benefits with the bow- benefits he could never have in 3.5 unless the target was less than 10 paces distant. I believe such a sneak-attack feat has been mentioned for rapiers already. Given those assumptions, I find a 4e rogue a perfect match for Garrett, right down to his willingness to fight with a dagger.

Garrett only shot minions with his bow. All the tough encounters had to be taken out with a sap or a sword. [or a holy water arrow]

EDIT: This brings up an interesting encounter design idea. In Thief, Garrett could drop guards with his bow pretty often. If the became alerted to his presence, they were far tougher. I wonder if we'll see encounters where unaware creatures have the hit points of a minion, but are tougher when actively engaged in combat.

 

[hong]

I have the fear that ranged weapons will play a very minor role in 3E 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.

Hmmm.

 

[HeinorNY]

Hmmm.

Seconded.

 

[small pumpkin man]

These are some serious hurdles in the rules as written for a very mundane character concept. It's not like I'm asking to play a fighter who likes to dance while hurling bottles of liquor at his enemies in order to kill them.

You can play a sneaky thief with a bow with one feat (skill training theivery) you can play a sneaky thief with a crossbow who gets combat bonuses from being sneaky with one feat (weapon prof heavy crossbow) which may not even be necessary (since it may only give +1).

My point is, you're actually asking for something fairly specific, you're asking to get a specific bonus (extra damage because you're hiding) with a specific weapon (shortbow) based off a specific character (garret), it's annoying that it can't be done, but it's not as big a deal as you're making it.

 

[Harshax]

My point is, you're actually asking for something fairly specific, you're asking to get a specific bonus (extra damage because you're hiding) with a specific weapon (shortbow) based off a specific character (garret), it's annoying that it can't be done, but it's not as big a deal as you're making it.

And if it really is that annoying (eg. world shattering), then their is always Rule 0.

Because of little things like this, I've often used class & sized based weapon damage.

Oh, you're a fighter, and you want to swing a big mangly club but hate that it doesn't do as much damage as a sword? No problem, for cinematic gaming. Just say a medium weapon in the hands of a fighter does 1d10 damage, and be done with it.

Or in the case of Garret: you can sneak attack with a light or tiny ranged weapon.