Elfdope, fantastic answer and great insight, loved it. Although on a Strength Ranger you probably don’t need to worry so much about managing your hands with bows and crossbows and reloading as those use dexterity.
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It has less to do with dexterity and more a question of what to do when you can't close the distance in round 1. Its not uncommon for a combat to start out at long range, and without a bow you feel kind of useless. Hand axes and hammers have extremely limited range, so what do you do when you end up 80 feet from an enemy. If the rest of the party decides to do ranged attacks and not close you get to sit still or close with no support.
I chose to burn a level on arcana cleric so I could have chill touch, or guiding bolt (range is in some ways better than a bow). Part of me regrets not going with knowledge Cleric since the expertise in Nature would have been a nice synergy. The cleric cantrips top out at 60 feet though.
A level of cleric also gets you healing word, Arcana gets you magic missile and ritual detect magic always prepared. It also allows you to do some dipping into the pool of a prepared caster which even with just first level spells is a wealth of choices that expands the Ranger's toolbox.
I've been running Str Rangers for most of 5E, tend to go with Mt. Dwarf and start with a 17 Str and 14 Dex and at level two I take the Archery fighting style. This way I can have the best of both worlds in terms of attack, usually an axe or halberd for melee and swapping to a heavy crossbow for range when needed. At level four I'd generally take a feat to boost Str one more, fav for a wile there was Squat Nimbleness though after Tasha's I'm thinking of going with Skill Expert as I'd love to get more expertise without having to multiclass.
I love Skill Expert on a Strength Ranger. It solves the +1 to strength, and the lack of expertise you want out of a Ranger. Putting expertise in Stealth or Perception after taking Survival just feels like you got your skills right.
I have just started building a same kind of character... My stats are a bit screwed so it's a good way to go
Strength 17+3
Dexterity 20+5
Constitution 18+4
Intelligence 13+1
Wisdom 15+2
Charisma 8-1
Im going to go ranged, but able to jump in and hit hard when the need comes, I went wood elf for the extra dexterity.. Will use cure wounds, hunters mark and then go collosus slayer, then will multiclass with warrior think
I think if you're going to make a strength ranger who wants to be in melee and you don't want to multiclass, your favorite feat is going to be heavily armored. I don't think I've seen anyone mention it which surprised me. If you're playing, as an example, the strength based horizon walker half orc taking heavily armored as your feat at level 4 will make your strength an even 18 (assuming a 15 with point buy) and you'll get a higher AC with plate armor. That and the defense fighting style means even with a two handed weapon you'll have a pretty damn good AC of 19. The only thing that sucks is the disadvantage on stealth checks, but you would still have that with halfplate and even if you went with a breastplate your stealth is not going to be anywhere near as good as a dex based ranger.
The other cool thing about strength rangers is that with the optional Deft Explorer, they get two super cool features at 1st and 6th level. The first is expertise and the second is a small movement boost as well as climbing and swimming speeds. The reason I bring this up is that, even with a climbing or swimming speed, you sometimes need to make athletics checks when climbing or swimming. So by taking expertise in athletics, you can be an expert at climbing and swimming. You know, stuff you'd expect from someone who traverses the forest all the time! It also opens up super cool grappling builds for rangers, some sort of ranger rune knight multiclass sounds really cool. OH! I almost forgot, throwing builds are now much more viable thanks to the thrown weapon fighting style. The other thing you'd expect rangers to be super good at.
So I think strength rangers are honestly pretty damn good at this point, even a strength based beastmaster could be done pretty effectively.
So I’ve been considering a Strength based ranger for a long time and I finally come to the conclusion of building a VH with +1 Str/Con and most importantly.... the mobile feat.
This allows me to zoom in and blast with my great sword then dance a few feet back and avoid being front line.
I was torn between subclass options, but eventually went with Gloomstalker (for 1 specific reason). The additional 10ft of movement at the beginning of combat allows me some maneuverability to step back off the front line. With the additional +10ft from the mobile feat I can zoom in and out again with risking a OA every turn. It has actually worked pretty well in combat.
My recently retired strength Ranger was a gloom stalker and the extra movement is absolutely great. In general I loved the features. Rope trick is also a sneaky way to manufacture a short rest in a dungeon.
STRanger enables good combination with PAM, for instance. If you play your cards right (Zephyr Strike for instance), you will be able to proc Colossus Slayer damage bonus at every OA. Against strong enemies, cast Hunters Mark at round 1 and then multiple attacks synergize super well.
STRanger enables good combination with PAM, for instance. If you play your cards right (Zephyr Strike for instance), you will be able to proc Colossus Slayer damage bonus at every OA. Against strong enemies, cast Hunters Mark at round 1 and then multiple attacks synergize super well.
Nice. Colossus Slayer on the AoO for the win!
Never forget that that if you are going strength and two weapon fighting pick hand axes instead of swords as they can be thrown to proc ensnaring strike, hail of thorns, and lightning arrow. Also hunter's mark with two weapon fighting is fantastic for big single target damage over 2+ rounds.
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Elfdope, fantastic answer and great insight, loved it. Although on a Strength Ranger you probably don’t need to worry so much about managing your hands with bows and crossbows and reloading as those use dexterity.
Check out my Disabled & Dragons Youtube Channel for 5e Monster and Player Tactics. Helping the Disabled Community and Players and DM’s (both new and experienced) get into D&D. Plus there is a talking Dragon named Quill.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCPPmyTI0tZ6nM-bzY0IG3ww
It has less to do with dexterity and more a question of what to do when you can't close the distance in round 1. Its not uncommon for a combat to start out at long range, and without a bow you feel kind of useless. Hand axes and hammers have extremely limited range, so what do you do when you end up 80 feet from an enemy. If the rest of the party decides to do ranged attacks and not close you get to sit still or close with no support.
I chose to burn a level on arcana cleric so I could have chill touch, or guiding bolt (range is in some ways better than a bow). Part of me regrets not going with knowledge Cleric since the expertise in Nature would have been a nice synergy. The cleric cantrips top out at 60 feet though.
A level of cleric also gets you healing word, Arcana gets you magic missile and ritual detect magic always prepared. It also allows you to do some dipping into the pool of a prepared caster which even with just first level spells is a wealth of choices that expands the Ranger's toolbox.
I've been running Str Rangers for most of 5E, tend to go with Mt. Dwarf and start with a 17 Str and 14 Dex and at level two I take the Archery fighting style. This way I can have the best of both worlds in terms of attack, usually an axe or halberd for melee and swapping to a heavy crossbow for range when needed. At level four I'd generally take a feat to boost Str one more, fav for a wile there was Squat Nimbleness though after Tasha's I'm thinking of going with Skill Expert as I'd love to get more expertise without having to multiclass.
I love Skill Expert on a Strength Ranger. It solves the +1 to strength, and the lack of expertise you want out of a Ranger. Putting expertise in Stealth or Perception after taking Survival just feels like you got your skills right.
I have just started building a same kind of character... My stats are a bit screwed so it's a good way to go
Strength 17+3
Dexterity 20+5
Constitution 18+4
Intelligence 13+1
Wisdom 15+2
Charisma 8-1
Im going to go ranged, but able to jump in and hit hard when the need comes, I went wood elf for the extra dexterity.. Will use cure wounds, hunters mark and then go collosus slayer, then will multiclass with warrior think
I think if you're going to make a strength ranger who wants to be in melee and you don't want to multiclass, your favorite feat is going to be heavily armored. I don't think I've seen anyone mention it which surprised me. If you're playing, as an example, the strength based horizon walker half orc taking heavily armored as your feat at level 4 will make your strength an even 18 (assuming a 15 with point buy) and you'll get a higher AC with plate armor. That and the defense fighting style means even with a two handed weapon you'll have a pretty damn good AC of 19. The only thing that sucks is the disadvantage on stealth checks, but you would still have that with halfplate and even if you went with a breastplate your stealth is not going to be anywhere near as good as a dex based ranger.
The other cool thing about strength rangers is that with the optional Deft Explorer, they get two super cool features at 1st and 6th level. The first is expertise and the second is a small movement boost as well as climbing and swimming speeds. The reason I bring this up is that, even with a climbing or swimming speed, you sometimes need to make athletics checks when climbing or swimming. So by taking expertise in athletics, you can be an expert at climbing and swimming. You know, stuff you'd expect from someone who traverses the forest all the time! It also opens up super cool grappling builds for rangers, some sort of ranger rune knight multiclass sounds really cool. OH! I almost forgot, throwing builds are now much more viable thanks to the thrown weapon fighting style. The other thing you'd expect rangers to be super good at.
So I think strength rangers are honestly pretty damn good at this point, even a strength based beastmaster could be done pretty effectively.
So I’ve been considering a Strength based ranger for a long time and I finally come to the conclusion of building a VH with +1 Str/Con and most importantly.... the mobile feat.
This allows me to zoom in and blast with my great sword then dance a few feet back and avoid being front line.
I was torn between subclass options, but eventually went with Gloomstalker (for 1 specific reason). The additional 10ft of movement at the beginning of combat allows me some maneuverability to step back off the front line. With the additional +10ft from the mobile feat I can zoom in and out again with risking a OA every turn. It has actually worked pretty well in combat.
My recently retired strength Ranger was a gloom stalker and the extra movement is absolutely great. In general I loved the features. Rope trick is also a sneaky way to manufacture a short rest in a dungeon.
STRanger enables good combination with PAM, for instance. If you play your cards right (Zephyr Strike for instance), you will be able to proc Colossus Slayer damage bonus at every OA. Against strong enemies, cast Hunters Mark at round 1 and then multiple attacks synergize super well.
Nice. Colossus Slayer on the AoO for the win!
Never forget that that if you are going strength and two weapon fighting pick hand axes instead of swords as they can be thrown to proc ensnaring strike, hail of thorns, and lightning arrow. Also hunter's mark with two weapon fighting is fantastic for big single target damage over 2+ rounds.