Revised Ranger update

[Jefe Bergenstein]

This is my experience as well. The Paladin on the other hand...

The ranger is such a joke compared to the paladin. It's like they come from different editions. The paladin essentially gets more bonus spells prepared than the ranger KNOWS. They have an aura that breaks bounded accuracy... who thought handing out +3 to 5 to saves was remotely OK? Their summoned mount is a better animal companion than the useless lump that is the beastmaster's main subclass feature. I'd almost put a paladin with no oath features over a PHB ranger.

 

[Henry]

5e is now the most popular RPG ever and it is currently selling better than it did at launch.

Those sales are not coming from old hobby gamers...

(I also think that XGtE did a great job of giving the Ranger some good stuff. I love the Monster Hunter subclass and Zephyr's Strike is fantastic too)

Mike Mearls spoke about this very thing in a DM round table with Matt Colville, Matt Mercer, and Adam Koebel. The audience according to their demographics has been tilted STRONGLY in favor of new players since 2015. Paraphrasing, he said it was almost like half the audience started playing more than 3 years ago, and the other half since 3 years ago. Maybe not exactly half, but the way he spoke it was massive.

 

[MechaTarrasque]

Adding new spells, fighting styles (companion fighter, if you animal companion attacks an enemy, you can use your bonus action to make a melee weapon attack against the same enemy), or feats (transference--when you are positively affected by a spell with range self, you can transfer the effects of the spell to your familiar or animal companion) could all improve the ranger (particularly the BM) without actually changing the class.

Edit: I forgot the ranger doesn't get a lot of chances to pick up fighting styles, and I wouldn't want that to be a required style, so maybe make companion strike a feat:

If you are within 5 feet of an ally that made a melee attack against an enemy, you can use your bonus action to make a melee attack against that enemy.

That seems useful for the low level beast master, not to mention many gishes and melee types. I thought about making it "make a melee attack or cast a cantrip" against that enemy, but giving a midlevel bladelock two stabs and eldritch blast seemed a bit much.

 

[lkj]

You know, I hope at this point if they do alternative class features, that they aren't done so much as a fix but more as really adding new ways to play the existing classes. In some ways, an errata clarification that makes the existing beastmaster work better is a great idea to do first, so that any alternatives are truly just different ways to play in stead of strictly better.

The question I suppose is at what point would a new subclass cover that ground just as well, without the potential confusion. And I guess it's when there are either core class features that would be nifty to alter. Or when an existing subclass already covers the niche and you just want another way to play it.

AD

 

[CapnZapp]

Lots of talk here justifying WotC. As if we needed corporate mouthpieces in our discussion.

The animal companion absolutely must have its own action. It absolutely must be survivable much like a player character.

Why not simply acknowledge how playing two figures will always be inherently unbalanced?

Why not design the subclass the way it needs to be designed, and then slap a sidebar onto it saying you need DM approval to play it?

This is nothing different than the Wild Mage in the PHB.

TLDR Any Beastmaster with a "balanced" pet is a useless Beastmaster. So make a class that works, and require DM opt-in so groups can choose:

If balance is a primary concern, tell the player to play something else.

If everyone is okay with having a pet beast that actually contributes and doesn't need to be saved all the time, then a Beastmaster it is.

 

[Hussar]

Lots of talk here justifying WotC. As if we needed corporate mouthpieces in our discussion.

The animal companion absolutely must have its own action. It absolutely must be survivable much like a player character.

Why not simply acknowledge how playing two figures will always be inherently unbalanced?

Why not design the subclass the way it needs to be designed, and then slap a sidebar onto it saying you need DM approval to play it?

This is nothing different than the Wild Mage in the PHB.

TLDR Any Beastmaster with a "balanced" pet is a useless Beastmaster. So make a class that works, and require DM opt-in so groups can choose:

If balance is a primary concern, tell the player to play something else.

If everyone is okay with having a pet beast that actually contributes and doesn't need to be saved all the time, then a Beastmaster it is.

In your opinion of course.

In my games, the halfling beastmaster with a wolf pet worked perfectly fine and was probably one of the highest damaging characters, including the paladin. Note, we were using the revised beastmaster from the UA. Had zero problems with it. I'm again, frankly baffled why people are having such issues with it.

Is this an issue at higher levels? I'll admit, we only played to 8th level with that character, so, maybe I just didn't see the issues coming up. But, frankly, for the five levels that we had the beastmaster it was more than certainly holding its own.

 

[CTurbo]

In your opinion of course.

In my games, the halfling beastmaster with a wolf pet worked perfectly fine and was probably one of the highest damaging characters, including the paladin. Note, we were using the revised beastmaster from the UA. Had zero problems with it. I'm again, frankly baffled why people are having such issues with it.

Is this an issue at higher levels? I'll admit, we only played to 8th level with that character, so, maybe I just didn't see the issues coming up. But, frankly, for the five levels that we had the beastmaster it was more than certainly holding its own.

I thought it was generally agreed that the UA Revised Ranger was a little OP. It doesn't surprise me at all that the Revised Beastmaster was one of the highest DPR character in the group.

 

[Olrox17]

How disappointing. My players have been enjoying the revised ranger, as opposed to the lame PHB one. Looks like I'll have to finish designing the revised ranger myself.

 

[OB1]

In general, I think the PHB Beastmaster does a fine job of telling the story of a Ranger who has animal companions, as opposed to animal weapons. My 11 year old niece loves the class and would have words with anyone who told her that her PC was useless.

I do make one change at my tables for Beastmasters. I don't require an action for the beast to take the dodge, disengage or dash action, and it begins each combat with dodge active. That last part is probably a bit too much for an errata change, but moving dodge, disengage and dash to verbal might be small enough to sneak through and would be consistent with the goal of making the companion a primarily out of combat utility that can come into the fray in dire circumstances and with the unique player challenge of having something to protect.

 

[Laurefindel]

I thought it was generally agreed that the UA Revised Ranger was a little OP. It doesn't surprise me at all that the Revised Beastmaster was one of the highest DPR character in the group.

It is? (Generally agreed I mean). I haven’t heard that many complaints in The DPR department, mostly how it trivializes exploration and makes the Survival skill just as useless for the ranger as the Healing skill for a cleric.

Personally, I dislike the companion’s mechanics because it is so different from any other ally mechanics. Summoned creatures have their own actions, figurines of wonderdrous power have their own actions, familiars have their own actions, even regular, store-bought pets, so to speak, have their own actions. For me, the lack of consistency bugs me more than the quest for balance. I don’t have a problem with allies taking your own action per say, but I wish everyone would have the same.

I don’t always agree with CapnZapp’s strong opinions, but I agree that dev admitting that characters who want a pet should buy a dog is an avowal of resignation and a slap in the face for those who were looking forward to an official alternative.

But as much as I like designing RPGs and such, I would never work at WotC. No matter what you do, there will always be “fans” that tells you over and over that you’re the worst person on earth and that you have ruined their hobby for life...