Non-Core Class Survivor: Round 17 (Final 3)

[Sammael]

a commando

BLING! There's the crux of your problem. Rangers ARE NOT commandos. They are guerrila warriors, trained to fight against certain types of opponents and to use the terrain to their advantage, with hit-and-run techniques. There is no single D&D base class that can or should emulate the Navy SEAL/ Marine/ US Army Ranger stereotype.

 

[Desdichado]

Disclaimer: Ranger may be the most divisive archetype in the game. What follows is based on my opinion, alone.

I agree with your basic opinion of where the Ranger should be, however. I'm curious if you have a favorite alt.ranger, then?

I have actually, despite initially not liking it (a lot) warmed up to the idea, a bit, that the d8 is OK for a rangerish class, mostly because I've seen some good alt.rangers that use it, notably the Wildlander from Midnight and the Ranger alternatives in Wildscape by FFG that provide for at least half a dozen more alternate combat paths as well as an option to replace spellcasting with further development of the combat path.

Prior to warming up to those, my favorite alt.ranger was probably Ken Hood's Bushfighter (which has no 3.5 update, but one wouldn't be hard; just swap out a few skill names) which is very similar to what you describe.

 

[Desdichado]

BLING! There's the crux of your problem. Rangers ARE NOT commandos. They are guerrila warriors, trained to fight against certain types of opponents and to use the terrain to their advantage, with hit-and-run techniques. There is no single D&D base class that can or should emulate the Navy SEAL/ Marine/ US Army Ranger stereotype.

Who says that's a problem? The idea that no class can or should emulate that archetype is more problematic in my opinion than the idea that I might want to Ranger to do so. Or at least have the ability to do so. Not only that, by stating that, you've played right into his original argument all along; if that's what the Ranger is supposed to do, then the Scout is redundant and unnecessary.

 

[Mercule]

guerrila warriors

Same difference.

I see your point, though. Makes me want to play a Ranger to see if I can really pull it off.

I still don't like the druid/ranger connection, the d8 HD, or virtual feats, though. I also think the scout is trying to fill an extremely narrow niche.

 

[Ron]

I voted for the Duskblade, not that I have anything against it, as a matter of fact, I never read it. However, after I helped getting rid of the psionics abominations, I finally can concentrate the class I really like in this list -- the scout. Although a few posters see it as bland, I am inclined to agree with Imp that argues that to many bland is about not having magical powers. Although I had several rangers characters, the scout is actually closer to my concept of wilderness warrior than the ranger class. A very cool class in my book.

The elimination system is surely funnier than any other alternative, however, I wonder if we voted for the favorites wouldn't have a more consistent result, decreasing the amount of strategical voting.

 

[Sejs]

There is no single D&D base class that can or should emulate the Navy SEAL/ Marine/ US Army Ranger stereotype.

Okay, I'll bite.

Why shouldn't there be a class that can cater to that stereotype, Sammael? Why should the spec-ops soldier be sacrosanct?

 

[Mercule]

I agree with your basic opinion of where the Ranger should be, however. I'm curious if you have a favorite alt.ranger, then?

No real favorites. Most of them seemed to "botch" it in some way. Ultimately, I decided the 3.5 Ranger is a perfectly playable class, if misnamed. I have other variant rules to manage, and ranger, while grating, doesn't seem to have an easy fix.

I somewhat like the Woodsman (is that right?) from Wheel of Time. I've heard good things about the Wildlander, but haven't seen it. I may have to check out the Bushfighter, though.

 

[Nyeshet]

Duskblade again.

I am a little surprised that the Scout and Duskblade are running to closely with each other (63 each at current count), but not at all surprised that the Warlock is coming in last (which, in a way, is first, at 28 current votes). I'm guessing the warlock will be the ultimate survivor of this poll. Not too surprising reallly.

 

[Jefe Bergenstein]

Also, this isn't just about which is the best PC class, it's about building NPCs as well, and Warlock allows for some very flavorful designs that work a lot better with savage humanoids than 'traditional' arcane casters. Orc Warlock > Orc Sorceror, and Gnoll Warlock > Gnoll Wizard.

I actually voted against the warlock because they make mediocre NPC's. An NPC warlock is a weak adversary. Its strength lies in his unlimited supply of invocations. Given the short lifespans of NPC's in combat, the warlock is somewhat weak. An npc cleric or wizard is substantially tougher.

 

[Glyfair]

The elimination system is surely funnier than any other alternative, however, I wonder if we voted for the favorites wouldn't have a more consistent result, decreasing the amount of strategical voting.

But, ultimately boring, at least in my opinion.

Since people's favorite class won't change (you don't get performances each day from all the classes to judge them by), the top vote getter would stay pretty consistant. You'd get almost the same effect by starting a poll that asks "what is your favorite class?" There is a dynamic in elminating choices, but I doubt it's that significant.