John Cooper
Explorer
The Quintessential Ranger
By Ian Sturrock
Mongoose Publishing product number 4019
128 pages, $21.95
Like the others in the "Collector Series," The Quintessential Ranger adds all sorts of options for those players wishing to play that particular race or class (in this case, rangers). Unlike many of the previous books in the series, The Quintessential Ranger was written using the 3.5 rules. The book is laid out as follows:
Ian does a great job with the ideas in this book. I was particularly impressed with the vast numbers of character concepts and prestige classes in The Quintessential Ranger: if you count all of the Animal Champions as separate prestige classes, you end up with 49 different options for your ranger character! (In theory, you can choose three of them for each PC: one character concept at 1st level and probably two different 5-level prestige classes, should you wish it.) This really goes a long way toward customizing your PC to make him different from all of the other rangers in the game. I really like the Animal Champion prestige class, too: I'm seriously tempted to try out a Snake Champion or Dinosaur Champion as my next PC! The Briar Archer is another interesting prestige class, kind of a ranger-equivalent to the arcane archer.
The new feats and spells all seem very appropriate to the ranger, and it looks like great care was taken not to expand the ranger's spell ability to overlap that of other spellcasters - while the ranger finally gains a direct-attack spell, it's only usable against one of his favored enemies, thus "reining it in" to line up with a ranger-specific class ability. The new weapons, armor, and magic items similarly make a lot of sense, although if I was a ranger there's no way I would ever don a suit of living bark armor - sure, the +5 natural armor bonus sounds good, as do the at-will tree shape and speak with plants spell-like abilities, but I think the fact that it covers your entire body and can never be removed without resulting to wish-level magic might put a bit of a damper on any enthusiasm I might have for it. If I can be excused a couple of comic-book references, it sounds like a cross between the Rhino's costume (a traditional enemy of Spider-Man) and the Swamp Thing. You get to become a plant, but no more...uh, physical intimacy. (Is there a better explanation why the Rhino is always so frustrated?)
Getting back to The Quintessential Ranger, I think some of the book's best bits are the details about the ranger's abilities. Anyone playing a ranger is running a character who knows all sorts of stuff about living off the land and "roughing it," but I'm sure I'm not the only player who doesn't know a whole lot about that stuff in real life. The salient details about creating overnight shelters, latrine pits, tree houses, and all of the various new nuances of tracking not only make for interesting reading, but they greatly expand the role of the ranger and provide usable game mechanics for the DM to determine success. Likewise with the expanded animal companions; these were a most welcome addition as I always encourage new monster statistics. (Plus, I've always wanted a sabretooth as an animal companion.) I smiled at the dire mongoose stats, but even this is much more than a "company mascot" in-joke; it's a relevant addition to the ranks of the animal creature type. The new fighting style options and favored region options are great ideas as well, expanding a ranger's options ever further.
Furthermore, I appreciate the fact that many of the ranger abilities are tied into the Survival skill rather than a ton of new and different skills. Rangers should be pretty much maxing out their Survival skill ranks anyway, and this way they're actually getting more mileage out of it. Craft (wood) and Profession (woodcutter) are also important, but in many instances the three skills can be somewhat interchangeable, or at least play almost as big a role in a given task.
Sadly, the editorial job is a bit sub par again this time - the book is riddled with more than just the traditional typos and incorrect grammar and punctuation usage; this time we also get a half-page "Woodcutter" chart repeated on the page after its initial appearance! There are also a great number of "see p.XX" annotations scattered throughout (I counted at least 5); these are "placeholders" that the editor is supposed to go back and plug in with the correct page numbers after the book has been laid out. Apparently the editor (Matthew Sprange himself) never bothered to do this and the proofreader (Ashley Tarmin) didn't catch it. (I'm assuming that the proofreader gets to look at the book again after it's been laid out; of course, it's possible Ashley only gets to read through it before that stage, when there'd be no way to plug in the correct page numbers.) In any case, the many times this sort of thing happens - including all of the times a header should have been bold-faced and wasn't - give this product a less professional appearance.
I should also point out that the conversion of The Quintessential Ranger to 3.5, while a much better attempt than some previous Mongoose books that claim to be 3.5 compatible, isn't fully complete - I noticed at least one polymorph other spell reference (as opposed to baleful polymorph, as the spell's been renamed in 3.5), and all of the new animal companion stats are in the 3.0 format (without the broken down "touch" and "flatfooted" AC, or the "Base Attack/Grapple" entries, for example). However, the important stuff has been converted, especially all of the ranger class abilities (like the fact that the ranger can either be a two-weapon fighter or an archery expert), and the book refers to "Survival" and "Sleight of Hand" rather than "Wilderness Lore" and "Pick Pockets," making me suspect that The Quintessential Ranger was written with an advance-peek copy of the 3.5 Player's Handbook but not necessarily an advance-peek copy of the 3.5 Monster Manual.
I think The Quintessential Ranger is one of the better of the "Collector Series" books I've seen, doing an excellent job at covering its topic and expanding the abilities of the class in question without going off the deep end into the ultra powerful. This is one of the "juiciest" books of its type that I've seen, devising a great number of character options. Some poor editing gaffes drag it down a bit, but I still rank it as a strong "4 (Good)."
By Ian Sturrock
Mongoose Publishing product number 4019
128 pages, $21.95
Like the others in the "Collector Series," The Quintessential Ranger adds all sorts of options for those players wishing to play that particular race or class (in this case, rangers). Unlike many of the previous books in the series, The Quintessential Ranger was written using the 3.5 rules. The book is laid out as follows:
- Introduction: explaining the concept of the "Collector Series"
- Character Concepts: 12 standard backgrounds for your ranger PC, plus an additional 6 racial-based character concepts
- The Prestige Ranger: 7 ranger-based prestige classes, one of which (Animal Champion) has 31 different variations so it's really like getting 37!
- Tricks of the Trade: forestry, archery (including archery contests, trick shots, and massed archery), traveling, walking and running, riding horses and camels, and flying mounts
- Ranger Feats: 17 new ranger-based feats
- Tools of the Trade: 15 weapons, 6 types armor, 19 new items of equipment, and 10 new magic items
- The Lay of the Land: favored regions (as opposed to favored enemies), advanced tracking, hunting, trapping, and foraging
- Fellow Travelers: ranger allies, animal companions (including game stats for 7 new animals), and new tricks you can teach your animal companions
- Ranger Combat Styles: instead of choosing between two-weapon fighting or archery, now you can choose mounted combat, skirmishing, staff combat, stamina, or unarmed combat
- Ranger Spells: 8 new ranger spells
- Every Forest a Fortress: constructing shelters (overnight and permanent), caches (food and equipment), hides and sniping posts, locks and secret locks, tree houses, and elevated or underground houses
- Designer's Notes: Ian's thoughts on the 3.5 ranger and why he wrote this book
- Index: a 2-page index
- Ranger Character Sheet: a 4-page character sheet for your ranger PCs
Ian does a great job with the ideas in this book. I was particularly impressed with the vast numbers of character concepts and prestige classes in The Quintessential Ranger: if you count all of the Animal Champions as separate prestige classes, you end up with 49 different options for your ranger character! (In theory, you can choose three of them for each PC: one character concept at 1st level and probably two different 5-level prestige classes, should you wish it.) This really goes a long way toward customizing your PC to make him different from all of the other rangers in the game. I really like the Animal Champion prestige class, too: I'm seriously tempted to try out a Snake Champion or Dinosaur Champion as my next PC! The Briar Archer is another interesting prestige class, kind of a ranger-equivalent to the arcane archer.
The new feats and spells all seem very appropriate to the ranger, and it looks like great care was taken not to expand the ranger's spell ability to overlap that of other spellcasters - while the ranger finally gains a direct-attack spell, it's only usable against one of his favored enemies, thus "reining it in" to line up with a ranger-specific class ability. The new weapons, armor, and magic items similarly make a lot of sense, although if I was a ranger there's no way I would ever don a suit of living bark armor - sure, the +5 natural armor bonus sounds good, as do the at-will tree shape and speak with plants spell-like abilities, but I think the fact that it covers your entire body and can never be removed without resulting to wish-level magic might put a bit of a damper on any enthusiasm I might have for it. If I can be excused a couple of comic-book references, it sounds like a cross between the Rhino's costume (a traditional enemy of Spider-Man) and the Swamp Thing. You get to become a plant, but no more...uh, physical intimacy. (Is there a better explanation why the Rhino is always so frustrated?)
Getting back to The Quintessential Ranger, I think some of the book's best bits are the details about the ranger's abilities. Anyone playing a ranger is running a character who knows all sorts of stuff about living off the land and "roughing it," but I'm sure I'm not the only player who doesn't know a whole lot about that stuff in real life. The salient details about creating overnight shelters, latrine pits, tree houses, and all of the various new nuances of tracking not only make for interesting reading, but they greatly expand the role of the ranger and provide usable game mechanics for the DM to determine success. Likewise with the expanded animal companions; these were a most welcome addition as I always encourage new monster statistics. (Plus, I've always wanted a sabretooth as an animal companion.) I smiled at the dire mongoose stats, but even this is much more than a "company mascot" in-joke; it's a relevant addition to the ranks of the animal creature type. The new fighting style options and favored region options are great ideas as well, expanding a ranger's options ever further.
Furthermore, I appreciate the fact that many of the ranger abilities are tied into the Survival skill rather than a ton of new and different skills. Rangers should be pretty much maxing out their Survival skill ranks anyway, and this way they're actually getting more mileage out of it. Craft (wood) and Profession (woodcutter) are also important, but in many instances the three skills can be somewhat interchangeable, or at least play almost as big a role in a given task.
Sadly, the editorial job is a bit sub par again this time - the book is riddled with more than just the traditional typos and incorrect grammar and punctuation usage; this time we also get a half-page "Woodcutter" chart repeated on the page after its initial appearance! There are also a great number of "see p.XX" annotations scattered throughout (I counted at least 5); these are "placeholders" that the editor is supposed to go back and plug in with the correct page numbers after the book has been laid out. Apparently the editor (Matthew Sprange himself) never bothered to do this and the proofreader (Ashley Tarmin) didn't catch it. (I'm assuming that the proofreader gets to look at the book again after it's been laid out; of course, it's possible Ashley only gets to read through it before that stage, when there'd be no way to plug in the correct page numbers.) In any case, the many times this sort of thing happens - including all of the times a header should have been bold-faced and wasn't - give this product a less professional appearance.
I should also point out that the conversion of The Quintessential Ranger to 3.5, while a much better attempt than some previous Mongoose books that claim to be 3.5 compatible, isn't fully complete - I noticed at least one polymorph other spell reference (as opposed to baleful polymorph, as the spell's been renamed in 3.5), and all of the new animal companion stats are in the 3.0 format (without the broken down "touch" and "flatfooted" AC, or the "Base Attack/Grapple" entries, for example). However, the important stuff has been converted, especially all of the ranger class abilities (like the fact that the ranger can either be a two-weapon fighter or an archery expert), and the book refers to "Survival" and "Sleight of Hand" rather than "Wilderness Lore" and "Pick Pockets," making me suspect that The Quintessential Ranger was written with an advance-peek copy of the 3.5 Player's Handbook but not necessarily an advance-peek copy of the 3.5 Monster Manual.
I think The Quintessential Ranger is one of the better of the "Collector Series" books I've seen, doing an excellent job at covering its topic and expanding the abilities of the class in question without going off the deep end into the ultra powerful. This is one of the "juiciest" books of its type that I've seen, devising a great number of character options. Some poor editing gaffes drag it down a bit, but I still rank it as a strong "4 (Good)."
