D&D General What is a Ranger? A miserable pile of secrets! (+)

[billd91]

Eew, markets are terrible at everything.

Not at supplying fresh, squeaky cheese curds on a Saturday morning.

 

[Charlaquin]

If we’re pitching ranger design ideas, mine would be an outdoorsy, finesse-based martial class at base, with fighting style options like we have now, and subclass options to add spellcasting, a pet, or a monster hunting or “favored enemy” type mechanic. Include a find familiar type spell on the casting subclass’s list so you can take that if you want to cast spells and have a pet. Give the dedicated pet subclass a few broad options for a pet stat block that scales with the ranger’s level, similar to the Beasts of the land/air/sea in Tasha’s, but I’d make them “the hound,” “the raptor,” and “the steed.” Give the monster hunting subclass choices for how/what they hunt that are more general, like the playtest’s hoard breaker and giant slayer archetypes as opposed to straight damage bonuses against a chosen enemy type.

 

[Charlaquin]

Not at supplying fresh, squeaky cheese curds on a Saturday morning.

Touché

 

[Mind of tempest]

ranger: noun a class with no definition that survives out of blind tradition and the fact everyone ripped off d&d.

 

[payn]

For me, the best ranger template is 3E/PF1. I can certainly entertain arguments on the execution, but the template of it as a class is sound. It has both general combat options, and flavor options. Fighting style, nature bond/animal companion, favored enemy/terrain, etc.. Compare it to the fighter that has no flavor in just about any edition, its leagues better.

The rub that a lot of folks seem to have is about the flavor. They want a more general class that is campaign proof. I mean, who can trust a GM to run a desert campaign and not immediately take the players to sea? Though, for me I loved the fact I could both mechanically focus on combat and exploration. That I could make 4,5,6,+ different types of rangers and they would be very different based on where in the setting they come from. Some of that is afforded with 3E/PF1's plethora of feat, archetype, prestige class options, but its still all there in the base class.

 

[el-remmen]

Need a True/False option

 

[James Gasik]

Obviously I'm an outlier, but I really like animal companions for the Ranger. Tarzan, Grizzly Adams, Dar the Beastmaster- these are archetypes the game should allow for. I've always liked the Ranger as the slayer of beasts as well- the world is full of dangerous predators and monsters, and there is certainly room for a specialist big game hunter.

I'm not sure about the third option, but I'm so used to Rangers having access to primal magic, it would feel odd if they didn't have that anymore, but it's not as important to the Ranger's identity. More of a legacy thing.

Even in 4e, my Ranger could earth bend, jump through the air to attack foes, and teleport, and that's probably the most nonmagical non-variant Ranger ever!

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

I think the 5e ranger is spot-on what I want in a Ranger, its just that the execution is lacking. With the few tweaks added and the fact that archetypes carry most of the load for Rangers, I think it's getting pretty decent. If the main class was to be buffed a little, the Hunter/Monster Hunter's stuff could be inserted in some places, letting Favored Foe and Terrain be only ribbons.

 

[EzekielRaiden]

Oof. Do wish I could pick four. I picked DPS, animal companion, and archery. Dual-wielding would have been the fourth, followed by Nature (but none of that magic claptrap.)

Rangers are hunters. They make sure things get deaded. Being hunters, having a tamed or domesticated buddy is an incredibly useful thing--there's a reason hunting frequently involves dogs, and why dogs were one of the earliest domesticated animals. Now, I admit, both animal companion and dual-wielding is mostly a stylistic thing, it isn't strictly necessary, but they're solid thematic fits and (at least for the animal companion) it's hard to justify putting that particular construct anywhere else.

 

[Vaalingrade]

Wouldn't the whole "This class shouldn't exist lol" thing be outside the bounds for a + thread?

That's not the intention at all. The ranger archetype is indispensable, but I feel it could be better served via the rogue chassis rather than the ones it has been traditionally provided.

Imagine trading sneak dice for companion dice that can be used to get your companion to do different things when certain conditions are met, being really good at wilderness skills, and having a combat base that benefits sniping and TWF.