I have been thinking of backup char, or a char to make if i have to start a new play session. The idea is a Lizard folk gloomstalker. As you have to pick a fighting style at level 2, it somewhat matters what you build for. Plus in one of the groups i'm in, we didn't start out with much gear. The group it might be a replacement for consist of a barbarian, a cleric, a wizard, another gloomstalker (though he uses the stand ranger feature, where as i would use the optional). Ther other group i'm in, is a druid, ranger and bard. This is without my character. So i'm curious what the pro's and cons for going each rute is. Fun talking build, etc can be interesting
Range: Pro: - Being ranged. Makes it easyer to attack people - Either higher chance to hit, or with feat, more damage
Cons: - Keep track of arrows. Constantly have to buy or find them. Make sure you have them - Need a feat for the higher damage. From what i gathered, it's often better to max out primary stat. I assume that applies even more, with a feat like Sharpshooter that reduces your chance to hit. So it might take longer to get the extra damage. Or you might have a hard time to hit. - If mobs get close to you, you get disadvantage.
Melee: Pro: - Higher ac, as i would pick up a shield (- More damage, if you don't pick up sharpshooter as ranged, or until then, due to dueling. I read that going duel wield, isn't that good for rangers, due to their bonus action being used for other things.)
Cons: - Need to get to the mobs. Thought at level 6, you can get +5 feet, with the optional class features. And gloomstalkers get +10 feet, for the first round of combat. I would also consider picking up mobile.
I also thought about the feat: Defensive Duelist. But is it good?
I would say, being melee doesn't really mean you get attacked more. That really depends on what people are up against
TLDR: If you go to ranged route, I recommend you to get Crossbow Expert and keep both a Hand and a Heavy Crossbow in your back pocket. You can solve the arrow/bolt issue by getting proficiency in Woodcarver’s Tools and then you can produce / fix arrows by yourself. If you go to melee route, whether Dueling or TWF, just increase your DEX (if you have a 17, this opens up space for nice half-feats like Slasher, Piercer and Skill Expert!). Defensive Duelist is horrible, don’t bother. It’s a trap feat.
.:.
Overall, ranged is better in D&D by the points you brought but also because you can protect yourself better through cover and positioning. As you mentioned, it’s also easier to attack and select a better target. A cunning DM would of course abuse cover to counter you, but you can always choose another target that offers a clean shot. Archery is also the best fighting style by far, +2 to hit is big.
Before going directly to Sharpshooter, I would recommend you to get Crossbow Expert. This feat mitigates the problem you might have whenever facing enemies at melee distance and grants you an additional bonus action attack with Hand Crossbows. A hidden perk on this feat is that you can also attack more than once with other crossbows. So at level 5, being a Gloomstalker, you could have an opening turn casting Hunters Mark and attacking with a Heavy Crossbow three times for 1d10 + 1d6 + DEX damage. It’s insane.
In terms of comparison, although it seems Dueling might impact direct in damage, Archery actually has a better performance because it helps you to be more accurate and hit more your enemies. +2 in damage is nothing if you miss your attack. A general rule of thumb in D&D implies that bonus on to hit is always better than bonus on damage.
I’m not saying melee is bad, it’s actually a quite viable option and TWF is the best one from levels 2-4, falling behind a little bit once you get extra attack at 5, but overall ranged has more flexibility, better feat support and it’s defensively superior because of how D&D combat design was done around grids with cover rules.
Melee Gloom Stalker: I played a PAM based Gloom Stalker through Icewind Dale. Its very strong. The biggest issue is that if combat starts outside of your ability to get to the enemy then you lose your main damage feature. Your need to run up and get in the thick of it means that you can get ahead of the rest of the party pretty badly. While your AC is good Med+2dex+2shield+1def ~ 19 you still can get hit and if you run up into a mob to get off your first round burst you can easily get surrounded and a couple of good rolls by the enemy can ruin your day. I had one encounter where the enemy had a low chance to hit, but I got hit once normal and critted twice and had to retreat quickly.
If you have a tank brother on the front line it can be pretty fun if they have interception or protection. In general though it can be some work.
My recommendation for 5e in general is go ranged. Archery style is great. With a Gloom Stalker Ranger you don't even need sharpshooter to do good damage. Due to Stalker's Flurry you will match or exceed Warlock's baseline of EB+AB+Hex with Longbow+dex bonus+HM due to archery fighting style increasing chance to hit up until Warlock gets a 4th beam at 17th level. At that point you will probably have picked up Xbow Expert or sharpshooter. Every ranged Ranger I have seen in play has been absolutely devastating and Gloom Stalkers even more so. Longbows have a short range of 150 ft and frankly most encounter maps aren't even that big. The ability to rain arrows 150 ft away without disadvantage (600 if you grab sharpshooter) is just way overtuned.
The real decision is which version you want to play. As Ironsoul and elf done have pointed out there are ways around most if not all of the problems Of either build.
missile you want CBE and SS and woodcarver ( to make your own arrows, don’t forget you can also recover half the arrows used after each combat). Melee has more options with shields, TWFing, PAM, fighting initiate: great weapon fighting, and dueling as possibilities. Remember you can do TWF without the fighting style if you use light weapons which opens up the defensive fighting style (+1AC in Armor), add medium armor master (+3 Dex bonus to AC) and either Mithril half plate or a magic breastplate and you don’t loose stealth while having an 18 or 19 AC before magic bonuses. Better yet (if you can get it) is serpent scale mail that grants full Dex bonus.
Just an interesting detail to complement Elfdope: PAM has a great synergy with Colossus Slayer from Hunter.
Since this extra damage is triggered at every turn and not rounds (like Sneak Attack), your OAs would always have the juicy +1d8 (assuming enemies are already damaged) and PAM increases big time the chances of having an OA. Add Zephyr’s Strike to the account to enable better positioning and you’ll have a blast with lots of off-turn attacks boosted by Colossus Slayer.
if you are taking a shield with melee, take dueling fight style and a rapier and you have the option to either stay at range or engage in melee.then at level 4 take heavy armored feat and try to get a plate, at level 8 mobile feat and level 12.defensive duelist.level 16 take alert. level 19 take heavy armor master.now you get -3 non magical damage and an ac of 26.with that, when forced into close combat, start this way:
cast zephyr strike, stab them with your rapier, run the full 85 feet
this way you can make hit and run and return to safe range easy. with a 1d8 damage without bonus and +6 hit chance the chance of taking damage is 5*0,625%=3,125% per enemy more than the stabbed one.this means statistically you must have 33 enemies within melee range of you at start to get hit.that probably will never happen, maybe when surrounded you have 10 ones, which means 28,125% chance to get hit
Going back to the original post - some further thoughts for consideration: Gloomstalker: the advantage on initiative is great but it may be the best feature. The second attack on round 1 is nice but it’s just the one round so it’s a nova strike not dpr and the extra damage ( to me at least) reads like it is only on the second attack of round 1 IF it hits., the other nice feature ( when it’s not redundant) is darkvision. For a lizardfolk those 2 may be sufficient but you might want to take a second look at other subclasses. They don’t have the round one ova but they are generally far more consistent over a fight. Lizardfolk:if you have the choice take th mord’s version, nature’s intuition is a much better feature than cunning artisan. Get your Dex up to 18 ASAP the +4 gives you an AC of 17 - as good as wearing half plate with a Dex of 14(+2). Then add a shield if you want for a melee AC of 19. You won’t have to consider armor ti the magic stuff stats showing up. Archery style: at tier 1 you want hunters mark up for the extra damage then the +2 to hit is roughly equivalent to a +1 to damage each hit ((4.5+3.5)*.1=0.8). The big question here is what Dex you have- it should be a 16+ (18+ even better). Then you can use the L4 ASI for a feat not raising your stat. You also need to decide between a crossbow (works in and out of water and your aquatic) or a longbow (at disadvantage in the water). You know the campaign so you decide. But, that controls the feat you take at L4. Crossbow=CBE, LONGBOW=sharpshooter first (either way you want both eventually). Archery rangers are very powerful, they don’t need really high AC and they transition to spellcasting in tier 2/3 more easily. Armor: your natural armor as a lizardfolk forces a discussion of armors that will affect melee fighting (but not missile). With a 14 Dex your natural armor +Dex=15. With a 16 Dex it’s 16 and with an 18 Dex it’s 17, and your stealthy, can hide in water without possible problems etc.. with a shield it can be as high as 19 matching the best nonmagical medium armor and shield can do. Chain shirts and breastplates don’t have disadvantage on stealth checks while scale and half plate do. Assuming you are taking stealth as a gloomstalker, the best you can do with armor while keeping stealth without stepping into “magic” armors is 18 (breastplate:14 + Dex (+2) + shield (+2) = 18) so you may very well want to skip armor until you can step into some sort of Mithril scale/half plate or serpent scale armor ( full Dex bonus and no stealth disadvantage - the ideal ranger armor) Melee Ranger: 4 options. 3 focus on strength more than Dex and generally call for actual armor not the lizardfolk natural armor+ dex (although starting with that might not be bad). A) TWF - this could be a Dex build using light weapons (I always take short sword and scimitar just to have both damage types in case) taking the fighting style gives you the stat bonus to hit and damage for the bonus attack. The other option here is to take defensive style for the +1 AC. At tier 1 it’s excellent even with losing 2 attacks a fight for activating/moving Hunter’s Mark in a 4 round fight that leaves you 6 attempts for 2d6+stat bonus damage. At L5 it becomes 3 attempts a round but by the end of tier 2 it’s falling behind even if you take dual wielding. All rangers start transitioning to spellcasting during tier 2 so this fall off isn’t a real problem. B) PAM - sadly rangers don’t get the great weapon fighting style so you are stuck with either dueling or defense. Of the two, I think defense (+1 AC) is probably better than the dueling (+1damage). You might speak to the DM to see if they will count the Ykla as a spear for PAM giving you a D8 weapon to go with taking a shield. Another consideration is what armor you want and are you stealthy. Once you get PAM ( at L4 instead of an ASI) you do get the butt strike bonus action but the damage is no better than TWF (((4.5+3.5+3)+(2.5+3.5+3)= 20)for PAM vs (2(3.5+3.5+3)=20) for TWF) and that is with the Yklwa a regular spear is 1 less (19). Personally I’m not convinced that PAM on a ranger is superior to TWF. C) “Sword and Board” - gives you he best AC since it calls for the shield. Again defense or dueling styles - your choice. The problem is only one attack until level 5 so damage is less so you need that AC more. D) the wild choice - Druidic Warrior - do as a wisdom build with the primal savagery and shillelagh cantrips giving you a leveled scaling xD10 acid attack (melee spell attack) for normal and a magical attack (shillelagh) when you need it. You won’t get multiple attacks after L5 and hunters mark won’t help with damage but it is an interesting alternative that certainly fits for a lizardfolk for roleplay. Level 4 Options: at L2 I would recommend archery along with the natural armor and carrying 2 light weapons for TWF when forced into melee. At L4 it gets interesting, you could ( and may have to) take an ASI to boost a primary stat to 16+. If you don’t you could take PAM to get the bonus action butt attack. Other options include taking the fighting initiate feat to take either TWF ( my choice), great weapon fighting, or Druidic warrior of these my favorites are TWF and Druidic Warrior. Both turn your ranger into a full spectrum fighter able to get the best from both missile and melee combat as well as spell casting.
When you're constantly fighting at range, AC is rarely an issue because you're usually less attacked than those fighting in melee. So distance is an advantage greater than AC bonuses.
So range is a win win. To me it comes down to heavy crossbow 1d10 vs hand crossbow 1d6 with the usual suspect in Sharpshooter, Crossbow Expert feats.
More attacks per turn means you can also maximize your chance to use extra damage from things like Favored Foe, Sharpshooter and Hunter's Mark if you want.
TLDR: If you go to ranged route, I recommend you to get Crossbow Expert and keep both a Hand and a Heavy Crossbow in your back pocket. You can solve the arrow/bolt issue by getting proficiency in Woodcarver’s Tools and then you can produce / fix arrows by yourself.
May want to talk to DM about Woodcarver. I been in a group where DM ruled Woodcarver lets you make shaft but you still need a forge and blacksmithing to make the heads or maybe the DM doesn't require you to track ammo.
Back to original question gloomstakers get that extra attack on first round and with melee you may not get it as often as you would with range. For rest of party do they have darkvision?
TLDR: If you go to ranged route, I recommend you to get Crossbow Expert and keep both a Hand and a Heavy Crossbow in your back pocket. You can solve the arrow/bolt issue by getting proficiency in Woodcarver’s Tools and then you can produce / fix arrows by yourself.
May want to talk to DM about Woodcarver. I been in a group where DM ruled Woodcarver lets you make shaft but you still need a forge and blacksmithing to make the heads or maybe the DM doesn't require you to track ammo.
Back to original question gloomstakers get that extra attack on first round and with melee you may not get it as often as you would with range. For rest of party do they have darkvision?
Another option is to get the Mending cantrip via Magic Initiate, the Druidic Warrior fighting style, a level dip etc. I believe the general guidance is that an archer can normally recover half of the arrows they shoot during a fight, but if you have Mending you can repair the ones that got broken. But honestly, arrows/bolts are pretty cheap, if you stock up with extras you can go for an extended period away from civilization before it becomes an issue.
For a Gloomstalker ranged is generally better because it easier to find darkness in ranged engagements. Melee usually tends to be in areas that are at least dim light.
If your DM plays RAW as far as cover I would get sharpshooter before anything else, not because of the +10 damage but to ignore cover. Over half of ranged attacks in combat are going to have some amount of cover unless the DM is handwaving it.
TBH though I would not add a second Gloomstalker to a party where other characters are a Wizard and a Barbarian. If I was focused on Ranger I would go for something a little more flexible like a Drakewarden, Beast Master or Fey Wanderer. Fey Wanderer would be particularly good in that party if none of the other players are good face builds.
I have been thinking of backup char, or a char to make if i have to start a new play session. The idea is a Lizard folk gloomstalker. As you have to pick a fighting style at level 2, it somewhat matters what you build for. Plus in one of the groups i'm in, we didn't start out with much gear. The group it might be a replacement for consist of a barbarian, a cleric, a wizard, another gloomstalker (though he uses the stand ranger feature, where as i would use the optional). Ther other group i'm in, is a druid, ranger and bard. This is without my character. So i'm curious what the pro's and cons for going each rute is. Fun talking build, etc can be interesting
Range:
Pro:
- Being ranged. Makes it easyer to attack people
- Either higher chance to hit, or with feat, more damage
Cons:
- Keep track of arrows. Constantly have to buy or find them. Make sure you have them
- Need a feat for the higher damage. From what i gathered, it's often better to max out primary stat. I assume that applies even more, with a feat like Sharpshooter that reduces your chance to hit. So it might take longer to get the extra damage. Or you might have a hard time to hit.
- If mobs get close to you, you get disadvantage.
Melee:
Pro:
- Higher ac, as i would pick up a shield
(- More damage, if you don't pick up sharpshooter as ranged, or until then, due to dueling. I read that going duel wield, isn't that good for rangers, due to their bonus action being used for other things.)
Cons:
- Need to get to the mobs. Thought at level 6, you can get +5 feet, with the optional class features. And gloomstalkers get +10 feet, for the first round of combat. I would also consider picking up mobile.
I also thought about the feat: Defensive Duelist. But is it good?
I would say, being melee doesn't really mean you get attacked more. That really depends on what people are up against
TLDR: If you go to ranged route, I recommend you to get Crossbow Expert and keep both a Hand and a Heavy Crossbow in your back pocket. You can solve the arrow/bolt issue by getting proficiency in Woodcarver’s Tools and then you can produce / fix arrows by yourself.
If you go to melee route, whether Dueling or TWF, just increase your DEX (if you have a 17, this opens up space for nice half-feats like Slasher, Piercer and Skill Expert!). Defensive Duelist is horrible, don’t bother. It’s a trap feat.
.:.
Overall, ranged is better in D&D by the points you brought but also because you can protect yourself better through cover and positioning. As you mentioned, it’s also easier to attack and select a better target. A cunning DM would of course abuse cover to counter you, but you can always choose another target that offers a clean shot. Archery is also the best fighting style by far, +2 to hit is big.
Before going directly to Sharpshooter, I would recommend you to get Crossbow Expert. This feat mitigates the problem you might have whenever facing enemies at melee distance and grants you an additional bonus action attack with Hand Crossbows. A hidden perk on this feat is that you can also attack more than once with other crossbows. So at level 5, being a Gloomstalker, you could have an opening turn casting Hunters Mark and attacking with a Heavy Crossbow three times for 1d10 + 1d6 + DEX damage. It’s insane.
In terms of comparison, although it seems Dueling might impact direct in damage, Archery actually has a better performance because it helps you to be more accurate and hit more your enemies. +2 in damage is nothing if you miss your attack. A general rule of thumb in D&D implies that bonus on to hit is always better than bonus on damage.
I’m not saying melee is bad, it’s actually a quite viable option and TWF is the best one from levels 2-4, falling behind a little bit once you get extra attack at 5, but overall ranged has more flexibility, better feat support and it’s defensively superior because of how D&D combat design was done around grids with cover rules.
Melee Gloom Stalker: I played a PAM based Gloom Stalker through Icewind Dale. Its very strong. The biggest issue is that if combat starts outside of your ability to get to the enemy then you lose your main damage feature. Your need to run up and get in the thick of it means that you can get ahead of the rest of the party pretty badly. While your AC is good Med+2dex+2shield+1def ~ 19 you still can get hit and if you run up into a mob to get off your first round burst you can easily get surrounded and a couple of good rolls by the enemy can ruin your day. I had one encounter where the enemy had a low chance to hit, but I got hit once normal and critted twice and had to retreat quickly.
If you have a tank brother on the front line it can be pretty fun if they have interception or protection. In general though it can be some work.
My recommendation for 5e in general is go ranged. Archery style is great. With a Gloom Stalker Ranger you don't even need sharpshooter to do good damage. Due to Stalker's Flurry you will match or exceed Warlock's baseline of EB+AB+Hex with Longbow+dex bonus+HM due to archery fighting style increasing chance to hit up until Warlock gets a 4th beam at 17th level. At that point you will probably have picked up Xbow Expert or sharpshooter. Every ranged Ranger I have seen in play has been absolutely devastating and Gloom Stalkers even more so. Longbows have a short range of 150 ft and frankly most encounter maps aren't even that big. The ability to rain arrows 150 ft away without disadvantage (600 if you grab sharpshooter) is just way overtuned.
The real decision is which version you want to play. As Ironsoul and elf done have pointed out there are ways around most if not all of the problems Of either build.
missile you want CBE and SS and woodcarver ( to make your own arrows, don’t forget you can also recover half the arrows used after each combat).
Melee has more options with shields, TWFing, PAM, fighting initiate: great weapon fighting, and dueling as possibilities. Remember you can do TWF without the fighting style if you use light weapons which opens up the defensive fighting style (+1AC in Armor), add medium armor master (+3 Dex bonus to AC) and either Mithril half plate or a magic breastplate and you don’t loose stealth while having an 18 or 19 AC before magic bonuses. Better yet (if you can get it) is serpent scale mail that grants full Dex bonus.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
Just an interesting detail to complement Elfdope: PAM has a great synergy with Colossus Slayer from Hunter.
Since this extra damage is triggered at every turn and not rounds (like Sneak Attack), your OAs would always have the juicy +1d8 (assuming enemies are already damaged) and PAM increases big time the chances of having an OA. Add Zephyr’s Strike to the account to enable better positioning and you’ll have a blast with lots of off-turn attacks boosted by Colossus Slayer.
if you are taking a shield with melee, take dueling fight style and a rapier and you have the option to either stay at range or engage in melee.then at level 4 take heavy armored feat and try to get a plate, at level 8 mobile feat and level 12.defensive duelist.level 16 take alert. level 19 take heavy armor master.now you get -3 non magical damage and an ac of 26.with that, when forced into close combat, start this way:
cast zephyr strike, stab them with your rapier, run the full 85 feet
this way you can make hit and run and return to safe range easy. with a 1d8 damage without bonus and +6 hit chance the chance of taking damage is 5*0,625%=3,125% per enemy more than the stabbed one.this means statistically you must have 33 enemies within melee range of you at start to get hit.that probably will never happen, maybe when surrounded you have 10 ones, which means 28,125% chance to get hit
Going back to the original post - some further thoughts for consideration:
Gloomstalker: the advantage on initiative is great but it may be the best feature. The second attack on round 1 is nice but it’s just the one round so it’s a nova strike not dpr and the extra damage ( to me at least) reads like it is only on the second attack of round 1 IF it hits., the other nice feature ( when it’s not redundant) is darkvision. For a lizardfolk those 2 may be sufficient but you might want to take a second look at other subclasses. They don’t have the round one ova but they are generally far more consistent over a fight.
Lizardfolk:if you have the choice take th mord’s version, nature’s intuition is a much better feature than cunning artisan. Get your Dex up to 18 ASAP the +4 gives you an AC of 17 - as good as wearing half plate with a Dex of 14(+2). Then add a shield if you want for a melee AC of 19. You won’t have to consider armor ti the magic stuff stats showing up.
Archery style: at tier 1 you want hunters mark up for the extra damage then the +2 to hit is roughly equivalent to a +1 to damage each hit ((4.5+3.5)*.1=0.8). The big question here is what Dex you have- it should be a 16+ (18+ even better). Then you can use the L4 ASI for a feat not raising your stat. You also need to decide between a crossbow (works in and out of water and your aquatic) or a longbow (at disadvantage in the water). You know the campaign so you decide. But, that controls the feat you take at L4. Crossbow=CBE, LONGBOW=sharpshooter first (either way you want both eventually). Archery rangers are very powerful, they don’t need really high AC and they transition to spellcasting in tier 2/3 more easily.
Armor: your natural armor as a lizardfolk forces a discussion of armors that will affect melee fighting (but not missile). With a 14 Dex your natural armor +Dex=15. With a 16 Dex it’s 16 and with an 18 Dex it’s 17, and your stealthy, can hide in water without possible problems etc.. with a shield it can be as high as 19 matching the best nonmagical medium armor and shield can do. Chain shirts and breastplates don’t have disadvantage on stealth checks while scale and half plate do. Assuming you are taking stealth as a gloomstalker, the best you can do with armor while keeping stealth without stepping into “magic” armors is 18 (breastplate:14 + Dex (+2) + shield (+2) = 18) so you may very well want to skip armor until you can step into some sort of Mithril scale/half plate or serpent scale armor ( full Dex bonus and no stealth disadvantage - the ideal ranger armor)
Melee Ranger: 4 options. 3 focus on strength more than Dex and generally call for actual armor not the lizardfolk natural armor+ dex (although starting with that might not be bad).
A) TWF - this could be a Dex build using light weapons (I always take short sword and scimitar just to have both damage types in case) taking the fighting style gives you the stat bonus to hit and damage for the bonus attack. The other option here is to take defensive style for the +1 AC. At tier 1 it’s excellent even with losing 2 attacks a fight for activating/moving Hunter’s Mark in a 4 round fight that leaves you 6 attempts for 2d6+stat bonus damage. At L5 it becomes 3 attempts a round but by the end of tier 2 it’s falling behind even if you take dual wielding. All rangers start transitioning to spellcasting during tier 2 so this fall off isn’t a real problem.
B) PAM - sadly rangers don’t get the great weapon fighting style so you are stuck with either dueling or defense. Of the two, I think defense (+1 AC) is probably better than the dueling (+1damage). You might speak to the DM to see if they will count the Ykla as a spear for PAM giving you a D8 weapon to go with taking a shield. Another consideration is what armor you want and are you stealthy. Once you get PAM ( at L4 instead of an ASI) you do get the butt strike bonus action but the damage is no better than TWF (((4.5+3.5+3)+(2.5+3.5+3)= 20)for PAM vs (2(3.5+3.5+3)=20) for TWF) and that is with the Yklwa a regular spear is 1 less (19). Personally I’m not convinced that PAM on a ranger is superior to TWF.
C) “Sword and Board” - gives you he best AC since it calls for the shield. Again defense or dueling styles - your choice. The problem is only one attack until level 5 so damage is less so you need that AC more.
D) the wild choice - Druidic Warrior - do as a wisdom build with the primal savagery and shillelagh cantrips giving you a leveled scaling xD10 acid attack (melee spell attack) for normal and a magical attack (shillelagh) when you need it. You won’t get multiple attacks after L5 and hunters mark won’t help with damage but it is an interesting alternative that certainly fits for a lizardfolk for roleplay.
Level 4 Options: at L2 I would recommend archery along with the natural armor and carrying 2 light weapons for TWF when forced into melee. At L4 it gets interesting, you could ( and may have to) take an ASI to boost a primary stat to 16+. If you don’t you could take PAM to get the bonus action butt attack. Other options include taking the fighting initiate feat to take either TWF ( my choice), great weapon fighting, or Druidic warrior of these my favorites are TWF and Druidic Warrior. Both turn your ranger into a full spectrum fighter able to get the best from both missile and melee combat as well as spell casting.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
When you're constantly fighting at range, AC is rarely an issue because you're usually less attacked than those fighting in melee. So distance is an advantage greater than AC bonuses.
So range is a win win. To me it comes down to heavy crossbow 1d10 vs hand crossbow 1d6 with the usual suspect in Sharpshooter, Crossbow Expert feats.
More attacks per turn means you can also maximize your chance to use extra damage from things like Favored Foe, Sharpshooter and Hunter's Mark if you want.
May want to talk to DM about Woodcarver. I been in a group where DM ruled Woodcarver lets you make shaft but you still need a forge and blacksmithing to make the heads or maybe the DM doesn't require you to track ammo.
Back to original question gloomstakers get that extra attack on first round and with melee you may not get it as often as you would with range. For rest of party do they have darkvision?
Another option is to get the Mending cantrip via Magic Initiate, the Druidic Warrior fighting style, a level dip etc. I believe the general guidance is that an archer can normally recover half of the arrows they shoot during a fight, but if you have Mending you can repair the ones that got broken. But honestly, arrows/bolts are pretty cheap, if you stock up with extras you can go for an extended period away from civilization before it becomes an issue.
Or take the woodworking skill so you can make your own bows/crossbows and arrows/bolts
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
For a Gloomstalker ranged is generally better because it easier to find darkness in ranged engagements. Melee usually tends to be in areas that are at least dim light.
If your DM plays RAW as far as cover I would get sharpshooter before anything else, not because of the +10 damage but to ignore cover. Over half of ranged attacks in combat are going to have some amount of cover unless the DM is handwaving it.
TBH though I would not add a second Gloomstalker to a party where other characters are a Wizard and a Barbarian. If I was focused on Ranger I would go for something a little more flexible like a Drakewarden, Beast Master or Fey Wanderer. Fey Wanderer would be particularly good in that party if none of the other players are good face builds.
The gloomstalker died. But it was his own fault. It was just a backup character or a concept I was toying around with.
Almost everybody has darkvision