D&D 5E More Interesting Archers (+thread)

[Charlaquin]

An interesting concept but.... why?

Horse archery is a very demanding pursuit - you have to thinks about so many things at once. If you go bezerk, your horse is going to freak out for one. Why would a horse archer be a barbarian? Is it because they are "barbarians" in the cultural sense? (as in the Greeks, who called barbarian anyone who wasn't Greek...)

I just think it’d be cool. You could have a fighter or Ranger mounted Archer too. I just like the idea of one that’s strength-based, gets unarmored defense, etc.

 

[Ancalagon]

I've been thinking about this thread more, and I have thoughts...

1: Archery is OP in 5e, in part because dex is OP. That Kensei monk I mentioned? I was in a group where our fighter was a dex-based battlemaster, so we had two excellent archers in the party (and the rogue was not slouch either). We were doing the Dragon of Icespire Peak adventure, and the GM was newish and not used to "ranged parties". We also had a druid that would use control spells to pin/delay the foes from reaching us and... it was murderous. And if we were forced in melee well... the BM and Monk were preeety decent in melee as well!

I fear an archer focused class would only make things worse.

(the reason why ranged is too strong in 5e is a: too many monsters are melee only b: dex adds damage to some melee weapons c: a number of ranged penalties that are very realistic (firing into melee...) are gone in 5e, or can be avoided with the sharpshooter feat)

2: The battlemaster is an excellent archer platform, and a number of BM maneuvers are not exclusive to melee. You can trip with an arrow for example (which is devastating vs flying creatures). I just took a look and most maneuvers are not melee-specific!

3: If you separate archery from the fighter, the fighter is not a fighter anymore. They are a swordsman, an axewoman, something...

 

[Stormonu]

Some more things

• Strength bows (reverse Finesse for those archers with high Strength)
• More Battlemaster manuevers for ranged attacks
• More love for Thrown weapons (hand axes to spears)
• A paladin subclass that can do ranged smiting (like the demon hunter from Diablo III)
• Zen archery for monks
• Disarming shot, ala Lone Ranger and other old westerns
• Staking shot, shooting through cover or multiple targets in a line
• Bending shot, ala Wanted
• Archer subclass for several classes

—Barbarian (Hunter) ; uses Strength bows trade rage for multi shot or power shot
—Bard (Fletcher) ; trick shot and arcane arrow tricks
—Cleric (Sun Domain) ; proficiency with bow, fire arrows and healing arrows
—Druid (?)
—Fighter (Archer) ; archery tricks, range improvement, no penalty firing into melee
—Monk (Zen archer) ; flurry/ki powers with bow
—Paladin (Insquisitor) ; ranged smite, crossbow use?
—Ranger (Deepwood Sniper) ; skirmisher and bow sniper; maybe William Tell skill with crossbow
—Rogue (Sniper) ; improved sneak attack with ranged weapons, shoot & hide options
—Warlock (Pact of the Bow/Hexbow) ; uses bow instead of Eldritch blast; carrier attacks by arrow akin to Arcane Archer (think of Hank & his energy bow)

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I've been thinking about this thread more, and I have thoughts...

1: Archery is OP in 5e, in part because dex is OP. That Kensei monk I mentioned? I was in a group where our fighter was a dex-based battlemaster, so we had two excellent archers in the party (and the rogue was not slouch either). We were doing the Dragon of Icespire Peak adventure, and the GM was newish and not used to "ranged parties". We also had a druid that would use control spells to pin/delay the foes from reaching us and... it was murderous. And if we were forced in melee well... the BM and Monk were preeety decent in melee as well!

I fear an archer focused class would only make things worse.

(the reason why ranged is too strong in 5e is a: too many monsters are melee only b: dex adds damage to some melee weapons c: a number of ranged penalties that are very realistic (firing into melee...) are gone in 5e, or can be avoided with the sharpshooter feat)

I think the main issue is the lack of published ranged enemies, and it's fairly easily solved by just...giving bows and the like to more enemies. The other fix I'd make is to make bows finesse.

2: The battlemaster is an excellent archer platform, and a number of BM maneuvers are not exclusive to melee. You can trip with an arrow for example (which is devastating vs flying creatures). I just took a look and most maneuvers are not melee-specific!

It's fine, but tbh the BM is very unsatisfying to me, in general. Too few maneuvers known, mostly. If there were a couple special attacks with ranged weapons in theDMG alongside stuff like trip and overrun, I'd probably be more into the BM as an archer.

3: If you separate archery from the fighter, the fighter is not a fighter anymore. They are a swordsman, an axewoman, something...

IDK, I never heard anyone make that complaint about the 4e Fighter, which was melee only, but I'd also be fine with basically spliting the fighter into a heavy and a light fighter.

 

[TwoSix]

Spheres of Might has some pretty interesting archery talents here: Sniper - The Spheres 5E Wiki . The Barrage sphere has some decent ranged attacks as well.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Spheres of Might has some pretty interesting archery talents here: Sniper - The Spheres 5E Wiki . The Barrage sphere has some decent ranged attacks as well.

Nice! I'll check that out!

I wonder if Kobold Press' "Beyond Damage Dice" series has archery stuff...I'll have to check that as well.

I wonder if I actually could build an Archer class for 5e, honestly. What class would make the best chassis to build from? I use Monk a lot, but I do like the primary thing being to choose to either enter a sniper's focus stance, or a quick draw stance, or something, where you either increase your crit chance and short and long range, or you can attack as a bonus action, or whatever, which would work well on the same basic model as martial arts.

OTOH, Rogue might work really well, too.

 

[Stormonu]

Rogue is probably the best - damage spike from sneak attack, ability to disengage as a bonus action to get away from melee and expertise on sneak (and ability to hide as a bonus) make for a really good sniper. Take Assassin subclass probably don’t need any special subclass.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Rogue is probably the best - damage spike from sneak attack, ability to disengage as a bonus action to get away from melee and expertise on sneak (and ability to hide as a bonus) make for a really good sniper. Take Assassin subclass probably don’t need any special subclass.

Rogue is a great archer, but has very little room for impactful trick shots, so it definitely doesn't cover much more than the sniper archer.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I will say that rogue/fighter or rogue/ranger can make a really excellent general archer, though. A Hunter Ranger/Inquisitive Rogue makes a really good skirmisher archer, especially with Hordebreaker at level 3 Ranger.

 

[Stormonu]

Yeah, rogue would be the sniper of archery; if you want variety in trick shots or multiple targets and the like, you need the extra attacks a fighter or ranger would grant.