Favored Foe always. Nothing against Favored Enemy, it’s flavorful, but situational at best.
One of my DMs loves Gritty Realism rules and Favored Foe have been wonderful since spell slots are so precious. It’s also great when you want to use your bonus action for other things than Hunters Mark or something.
I'd say sometimes to both; the fact that Favored Enemy is so situational matters because it's better in campaigns where you can reasonably expect to get good use out of it. It also depends on the character; sometimes it's just more in character than Favored Foe, so I wouldn't say I prefer one over the other as such.
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I'd say sometimes to both; the fact that Favored Enemy is so situational matters because it's better in campaigns where you can reasonably expect to get good use out of it. It also depends on the character; sometimes it's just more in character than Favored Foe, so I wouldn't say I prefer one over the other as such.
I'm Very Sometimes on both as well. Both for Flavor of the Character, Flavor of the Campaign. And both have different strengths and weaknesses. Favored Foe can be nice on builds that I want to kind of forgo Hunter's Mark Alot but the flavor of the character doesn't match the enemy trend in a particular campaign. Which I do sometimes.
I lean towards Favored Enemy on this one as Favored Foe is not great about 90% of the time.
Rangers have so few spells known it kind of helps if you don't want to have Hunter's Mark but at least mark is able to be kept up for a long time even after a fight and provides a benefit outside of the damage.
Foe would have been great minus the concentration or at least given you a rider on it like you have ADV on recalling information on the marked creature.
I lean towards Favored Enemy on this one as Favored Foe is not great about 90% of the time.
Rangers have so few spells known it kind of helps if you don't want to have Hunter's Mark but at least mark is able to be kept up for a long time even after a fight and provides a benefit outside of the damage.
Foe would have been great minus the concentration or at least given you a rider on it like you have ADV on recalling information on the marked creature.
Just being able to switch it to a new target after the first gets to zero hp would have upped its value enough for many people I think.
I lean towards Favored Enemy on this one as Favored Foe is not great about 90% of the time.
Rangers have so few spells known it kind of helps if you don't want to have Hunter's Mark but at least mark is able to be kept up for a long time even after a fight and provides a benefit outside of the damage.
Foe would have been great minus the concentration or at least given you a rider on it like you have ADV on recalling information on the marked creature.
Just being able to switch it to a new target after the first gets to zero hp would have upped its value enough for many people I think.
As a long time player of the D&D brand but new to 5th Ed, I was initially taken back by the change to Favored Enemy but after thinking on it some for a Ranger it makes some sense being able to track your foes, and in a party be able at times to help keep the group on track when thrown for a loop by a cantankerous DM wanting to possibly throw the group into a side adventure or to protect the tracked party leading to alternate paths.
Im hoping to see how it plays out in the greater campaign that my DM is setting up.
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In practice I have found it useful to have favored foe, but only when the number of encounters per day had crept up to the point where I needed it as a resource. If you are only getting into 1 combat per day then you might never use it.
In practice I have found it useful to have favored foe, but only when the number of encounters per day had crept up to the point where I needed it as a resource. If you are only getting into 1 combat per day then you might never use it.
I'm sure we've talked about this before, but favored foe (I'm really warning up to it as time goes on) is fantastic for adding onto other ranger spells that don't need concentration after activation. It is also fantastic for adding a ton of value for two weapon fighting rangers. No more need for a two turn hunter's mark combo.
I remember having some discussions/arguments about it when it came out. Its not as flavorful as favored enemy, but it does some nice simple things for damage. I have used it as a mini smite whenever I crit. One time I burned through all my uses in one fight and the paladin who hadn't critted all day got mad. I also like stacking it with some of the ways to get damage like dreadful strikes or the swarm damage. Then you can concentrate on something other than Hunter's Mark.
In general learning ways to wean your Ranger off of Hunter's Mark is a good thing.
In practice I have found it useful to have favored foe, but only when the number of encounters per day had crept up to the point where I needed it as a resource. If you are only getting into 1 combat per day then you might never use it.
I'm sure we've talked about this before, but favored foe (I'm really warning up to it as time goes on) is fantastic for adding onto other ranger spells that don't need concentration after activation. It is also fantastic for adding a ton of value for two weapon fighting rangers. No more need for a two turn hunter's mark combo.
Wait, there are Ranger spells that don't require Concentration?!? :)
In all seriousness, I'd probably stick with Favored Foe. Using some combo of Deft Explorer, Skill Expert and/or a level of Rogue can get you double proficiency in skills like Survival, Nature etc. which should help with tracking and creature knowledge. Getting a few uses of Favored Foe to let me save my spell slots for emergency healing or other nifty stuff seems like the better trade-off for me. Others may have different priorities, obviously. If they'd given us something akin to the Favored Enemy from the Revised Ranger UA, where it included a combat benefit, I definitely would've taken that. Though instead of a +2 and later +4 to damage, I would've rather seen the bonus split, so we'd get +1 to attacks & damage, later bumped to +2. I'm not opposed to the idea of Rangers specializing in certain types of monsters, I'm just not thrilled with the way they implemented it in the PHB.
I tend to select which to take based on what I know about the campaign, if I know the ranger is going to be be working in an exploration rich campaign I take favored enemy and try to select enemies appropriate to the campaign. So when doing Storm king’s thunder I ran a ranger that took giants as a enemy type. I’m in a campaign now that has very little exploration except of the dungeon sort so I’ve taken favored foe. The combat benefits make up for the losses from the change. I am saddened by the lack of exploration but favored foe provides a good replacement for combat heavy, exploration lite campaigns.
Sorry guys, but while creating my Ranger i couldn't find "Favored Foe" to choose, it only allow's me to pick "Favored Enemy". Why is that?
Favored Foe was added as an optional class feature in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything.
To access to it you need to have that book purchased on D&D Beyond (or shared with you through a campaign with content sharing enabled), in the character builder you also need to enable Optional Class Features on the Home tab, then under Class you should see the Optional Feature Manager where you can enable additional features and choose which features to replace with alternative versions.
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Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Multiple choices allowed.
I tend to lean heavily towards Favored Enemy by a country mile, but there have been characters I've built that have used Favored Foe.
Favored Foe always. Nothing against Favored Enemy, it’s flavorful, but situational at best.
One of my DMs loves Gritty Realism rules and Favored Foe have been wonderful since spell slots are so precious. It’s also great when you want to use your bonus action for other things than Hunters Mark or something.
Losing the buffs to tracking doesn't make up for the action economy/spell slot usage for me, especially factoring in the amount of damage.
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I'd say sometimes to both; the fact that Favored Enemy is so situational matters because it's better in campaigns where you can reasonably expect to get good use out of it. It also depends on the character; sometimes it's just more in character than Favored Foe, so I wouldn't say I prefer one over the other as such.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
I'm Very Sometimes on both as well. Both for Flavor of the Character, Flavor of the Campaign. And both have different strengths and weaknesses. Favored Foe can be nice on builds that I want to kind of forgo Hunter's Mark Alot but the flavor of the character doesn't match the enemy trend in a particular campaign. Which I do sometimes.
I lean towards Favored Enemy on this one as Favored Foe is not great about 90% of the time.
Rangers have so few spells known it kind of helps if you don't want to have Hunter's Mark but at least mark is able to be kept up for a long time even after a fight and provides a benefit outside of the damage.
Foe would have been great minus the concentration or at least given you a rider on it like you have ADV on recalling information on the marked creature.
Just being able to switch it to a new target after the first gets to zero hp would have upped its value enough for many people I think.
Yeah agreed... That would have helped for sure.
A few folks from the ranger forum are currently playing side by side comparisons of these features online.
As a long time player of the D&D brand but new to 5th Ed, I was initially taken back by the change to Favored Enemy but after thinking on it some for a Ranger it makes some sense being able to track your foes, and in a party be able at times to help keep the group on track when thrown for a loop by a cantankerous DM wanting to possibly throw the group into a side adventure or to protect the tracked party leading to alternate paths.
Im hoping to see how it plays out in the greater campaign that my DM is setting up.
I'm honestly very surprised by how many folks don't like favored foe.
In practice I have found it useful to have favored foe, but only when the number of encounters per day had crept up to the point where I needed it as a resource. If you are only getting into 1 combat per day then you might never use it.
I'm sure we've talked about this before, but favored foe (I'm really warning up to it as time goes on) is fantastic for adding onto other ranger spells that don't need concentration after activation. It is also fantastic for adding a ton of value for two weapon fighting rangers. No more need for a two turn hunter's mark combo.
I remember having some discussions/arguments about it when it came out. Its not as flavorful as favored enemy, but it does some nice simple things for damage. I have used it as a mini smite whenever I crit. One time I burned through all my uses in one fight and the paladin who hadn't critted all day got mad. I also like stacking it with some of the ways to get damage like dreadful strikes or the swarm damage. Then you can concentrate on something other than Hunter's Mark.
In general learning ways to wean your Ranger off of Hunter's Mark is a good thing.
Wait, there are Ranger spells that don't require Concentration?!? :)
In all seriousness, I'd probably stick with Favored Foe. Using some combo of Deft Explorer, Skill Expert and/or a level of Rogue can get you double proficiency in skills like Survival, Nature etc. which should help with tracking and creature knowledge. Getting a few uses of Favored Foe to let me save my spell slots for emergency healing or other nifty stuff seems like the better trade-off for me. Others may have different priorities, obviously. If they'd given us something akin to the Favored Enemy from the Revised Ranger UA, where it included a combat benefit, I definitely would've taken that. Though instead of a +2 and later +4 to damage, I would've rather seen the bonus split, so we'd get +1 to attacks & damage, later bumped to +2. I'm not opposed to the idea of Rangers specializing in certain types of monsters, I'm just not thrilled with the way they implemented it in the PHB.
I tend to select which to take based on what I know about the campaign, if I know the ranger is going to be be working in an exploration rich campaign I take favored enemy and try to select enemies appropriate to the campaign. So when doing Storm king’s thunder I ran a ranger that took giants as a enemy type. I’m in a campaign now that has very little exploration except of the dungeon sort so I’ve taken favored foe. The combat benefits make up for the losses from the change. I am saddened by the lack of exploration but favored foe provides a good replacement for combat heavy, exploration lite campaigns.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
Sorry guys, but while creating my Ranger i couldn't find "Favored Foe" to choose, it only allow's me to pick "Favored Enemy". Why is that?
Favored Foe was added as an optional class feature in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything.
To access to it you need to have that book purchased on D&D Beyond (or shared with you through a campaign with content sharing enabled), in the character builder you also need to enable Optional Class Features on the Home tab, then under Class you should see the Optional Feature Manager where you can enable additional features and choose which features to replace with alternative versions.
Former D&D Beyond Customer of six years: With the axing of piecemeal purchasing, lack of meaningful development, and toxic moderation the site isn't worth paying for anymore. I remain a free user only until my groups are done migrating from DDB, and if necessary D&D, after which I'm done. There are better systems owned by better companies out there.
I have unsubscribed from all topics and will not reply to messages. My homebrew is now 100% unsupported.
Favored foe is from Tasha’s, if you haven’t purchased the book you don’t have access to it.
Also, you have to have optional features ticked on to get it.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.