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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Rogue Agent" data-source="post: 5802575" data-attributes="member: 6673496">While that's true for Gandalf, the class abilities of the original ranger are:- Must be of good alignment.- Minor spell capabilities of a naturalistic bent.- Very good against trolls and giants.- Good at tracking.- Good at sneaking through the wilderness.- Able to use <s>palantirs</s> magic items with clairaudience/clairvoyance.- Lead a small band of ranger followers.It's a class almost entirely defined by "crap Aragorn did in LOTR (or talked about doing)", with some of it being generalized.Partly true. What you have is a mechanical journey that starts with "we'll give the ranger dual-wielding to make them distinct" (which many attribute to Drizzt, although that doesn't seem to be true -- Zeb Cook says it wasn't and Drizzt's books had barely even been in print at the time the class would have been getting redesigned for 2e) and ends with the definitive class ability of the ranger being "select a fighting style".This is probably also related to the game becoming more mechanically focused on combat compared to other aspects of gameplay. Which is something I suspect most people saying they want an Aragorn-style ranger are also hoping to see rolled back.Possibly. But I find those sections of the book work in three very specific and important aspects:(1) Although many people read it first, LOTR is a sequel. These sections provide a very necessary transition from one protagonist to another.(2) There is a deep emotional investment in the Shire on the part of the main characters. This pervades the entire book and is strongly required for the Scouring of the Shire. By spending time there, Tolkien is emotionally investing the reader in the Shire as well. (Much like he forces the reader to walk in the shoes of Frodo and Sam across the Mordor later in the book.)(3) LOTR is a work structured around a multitude of deeply engrained themes which are interwoven with each other. One is a tale of growing up -- and the Shire's embodiment of childhood is an important part of that theme. Short shrift it, and you damage a major thematic arc of the work. (The transformation of the Shire also features fundamentally in the hero's journey of the tale -- the knowledge which the heroes bring back from their adventures which transform themselves and their homeland. This theme doesn't justify the length of the Shire sections, but also factors into the equation.)Everyone is, of course, allowed to have their own opinions on what does and doesn't work for them. But describing the Shire sequences as a "mistake" would be to ignore the major structures of the work.</blockquote>

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