UngeheuerLich
Legend
Natural Explorer, Primeval Awareness, Land’s Stride…
I hope you mean the abilities from tasha. The PHB abilities of similar name were very underwhelming...
Natural Explorer, Primeval Awareness, Land’s Stride…
multi attack used to be:
now it's
- Volley. You can use your action to make a ranged attack against any number of creatures within 10 feet of a point you can see within your weapon’s range. You must have ammunition for each target, as normal, and you make a separate attack roll for each target
You now always have Conjure Barrage prepared, and it doesn’t count against the number of Spells you can prepare. You can also cast the Spell with 1st- and 2ndlevel Spell Slots. When you do so, the Spell’s damage is reduced
You throw a nonmagical weapon or fire a piece of nonmagical ammunition into the air to create a cone of identical weapons that shoot forward and then disappear. Each creature in a 60-foot cone must succeed on a Dexterity saving throw. A creature takes 3d8 damage on a failed save, or half as much damage on a successful one. The damage type is the same as that of the weapon or ammunition used as a component
With smite, you at least have a "Pelor powers my strikes" kind of logic you can apply.I really hate it when they design abilities that are just buttons you have to push in order to push other buttons. Like, what actually is a hunter's mark? Or a smite, for that matter? It's a button youh push to make numbers go up. There's no flavour, and no interaction with the fictional world.
But that's the problem. Rangers shouldn't be relying solely on Hunters Mark and trying to stack on everything and always have it up..
IMHO (which may change) The spell casting changes help the ranger a lot. Remember that they are restricted by school.This was always going to be a big one.
The ranger ceases to be a "spells known" class and has now become a "spells prepared" class with two cantrips. Favoured enemy means they also always have Hunter's Mark prepared - and hunter's mark no longer takes concentration.
Natural explorer has been replaced by Deft Explorer - but the two languages at L1 have been replaced by a second expertise.
Rangers no longer have access to the Dueling fighting style. It's just Archery, Defense, or Two Weapon Fighting (which no longer uses a bonus action but is otherwise seemingly unchanged).
Hide in Plain Sight and Banish have both been dropped for Nature's Veil.
The Hunter's been done dirty. At level 3 they all get Colossus Slayer. At level 6 they now know immunities, resistances, and vulnerabilities of the target of their mark. And the Multiattack has become "Always have the awful Conjure Barrage spell prepared and can undercast it", somehow making it worse; I don't care if it is a 60ft cone, a 1d8 damage spell is a waste of an action at level 11.
In summary giving the Ranger Spells Prepared is a boon in terms of strength but IMO will lead to less interesting characters. Giving the ranger cantrips is good. (Especially given that this means Rangers can go the Shilleleagh approach and there's even a potential for Magic Stone). And it's otherwise tweaks on the Tasha's version that appears equivalent but slightly blander
With smite, you at least have a "Pelor powers my strikes" kind of logic you can apply.
Hunters Mark, you go from:
"I'm watching you.." to..
"I'm magically watching you"..
I'd rather see something like the UA Ranger's favored enemy bonuses, but maybe be able to switch them out after a long rest or something. Flavor it as something like:
"When you start your day, choose a creature type from <creature type list>. You make subtle modifications to your weapons and armor to more effectively counter the foes you plan to face. This may include dipping ammunition in holy water, coating blades with special toxins, etching runes onto the face of a shield, etc. Until you finish a long rest your weapons do <pick a die size or flat number> additional damage, you gain <pick some kind of protection saves, AC, damage resistance, etc.> and <pick some exploration benefit> against the selected creature types. At levels <..pick some levels> you can select an additional creature type as part of these preparations and/or the resulting benfit increases to <..pick reasonable benefit increase>"
Like, it could be an ability that functions very similarly to how real hunters plan their loadouts for the type of wild game they are hunting.
They actually don't anymore..If rogues get expertise in thieves tools
IMO the change to prepared casting actively hurts the ranger thematically. Fundamentally they mean that a newbie ranger is going to spend much more time and focus on their spells - and they have fewer non-casting abilities to go with it. The Ranger, rather than being a wilderness focused ranger is now basically a pretty much pure jack of all trades. If I were trying to create a "Generic (high magic) Adventurer from the School of Hard Knocks" class it would look very like the ranger, roving and all.IMHO (which may change) The spell casting changes help the ranger a lot. Remember that they are restricted by school.