Rangers are not the least powerful class in the PHB.
Saying rangers aren't underpowered is one thing. But this? The sheer lunacy of even trying to evaluate which classes are more powerful than others aside, how would you even begin to measure this?
Rangers have the most player dissatisfaction this edition. Go figure :)
I doubt that. I certainly don't think there's any kind of meaningful data to support this assertion to begin with.
There was enough for WotC to comment on it and make a 'revised' version...
That was dumped.
My point still stands. They commented on the player dissatisfaction, and tried to fix it, but it was turned into CFV as Third said
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
The ranger class is played poorly by players and dungeon masters. I’m not trolling. I am as unyielding in my belief as you are in yours. It’s not the ranger.
The ranger class is played poorly by players and dungeon masters. I’m not trolling. I am as unyielding in my belief as you are in yours. It’s not the ranger.
I actually laughed at this. All of the players who play rangers and feel it is underpowered are playing it badly?
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
There was enough for WotC to comment on it and make a 'revised' version...
My doubts about that stem from the fact that for all their information, this revised version barely touched on any of the issues I've seen people bring up.
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Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
There was enough for WotC to comment on it and make a 'revised' version...
My doubts about that stem from the fact that for all their information, this revised version barely touched on any of the issues I've seen people bring up.
'scuse me? it made the ranger competitive damage wise, completely fixed the beast master with a scaling beast and was INSANELY fun to play. What didn't it fix? also, the point was there is a lot of player dissatisfaction and even WotC noticed
The ranger class is played poorly by players and dungeon masters. I’m not trolling. I am as unyielding in my belief as you are in yours. It’s not the ranger.
I'm a powergamer. Do you think that it is likely that I, one who makes sure to know all the rule combos and exploits, would not be aware of a way to make rangers be good? The fact of the matter is, rangers are much more dependent on the campaign, the DM, and other characters than all of the other classes.
Should a wizard with Teleportation Circle or Teleport allow the ranger to walk them through the woods instead of teleporting to their destination because it's their favored terrain and they want to feel useful? Should the DM cater to the benefits of playing a ranger just because they chose to play that class? Should the DM change the terrain of Chult to a Desert if the player chose the Desert as their favored terrain instead of the forest? Should one player not play a ranger because the party already has one and the one that is already playing doesn't want to feel redundant?
The ranger class is comparatively objectively bad. I've said it multiple times, and will say it again. Whether or not you intended to troll, you did.
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Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
The ranger class is played poorly by players and dungeon masters. I’m not trolling. I am as unyielding in my belief as you are in yours. It’s not the ranger.
I actually laughed at this. All of the players who play rangers and feel it is underpowered are playing it badly?
The ranger class is played poorly by players and dungeon masters. I’m not trolling. I am as unyielding in my belief as you are in yours. It’s not the ranger.
I actually laughed at this. All of the players who play rangers and feel it is underpowered are playing it badly?
Yes.
0.o
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
The literal creators of the game said this in 2018: "Over the past year, you’ve seen us try a number of new approaches to the ranger, all aimed at addressing the class’s high levels of player dissatisfaction and its ranking as D&D’s weakest class by a significant margin."
The ranger class is played poorly by players and dungeon masters. I’m not trolling. I am as unyielding in my belief as you are in yours. It’s not the ranger.
I'm a powergamer. Do you think that it is likely that I, one who makes sure to know all the rule combos and exploits, would not be aware of a way to make rangers be good? The fact of the matter is, rangers are much more dependent on the campaign, the DM, and other characters than all of the other classes.
Should a wizard with Teleportation Circle or Teleport allow the ranger to walk them through the woods instead of teleporting to their destination because it's their favored terrain and they want to feel useful? Should the DM cater to the benefits of playing a ranger just because they chose to play that class? Should the DM change the terrain of Chult to a Desert if the player chose the Desert as their favored terrain instead of the forest? Should one player not play a ranger because the party already has one and the one that is already playing doesn't want to feel redundant?
The ranger class is comparatively objectively bad. I've said it multiple times, and will say it again. Whether or not you intended to troll, you did.
You are making claims counter to my claims. Neither of us are trolling. Rangers are a class made for the other 80% of the game that makes D&D what it is, and more importantly, what it isn’t. Power gaming is a joke. A fallacy. The DM can murder every power gamer’s character with a mere thought.
The ranger class is played poorly by players and dungeon masters. I’m not trolling. I am as unyielding in my belief as you are in yours. It’s not the ranger.
I actually laughed at this. All of the players who play rangers and feel it is underpowered are playing it badly?
Yes.
This sounds very much like a "blaming the victim" situation. A new player chooses to play a ranger with their group of friends for the first time, and they also have a wizard, rogue, and paladin. The Ranger notices that all of their beginner features are useful almost all of the time (divine smite, spells, sneak attack, cunning action, lay on hands, arcane recovery), but theirs (natural explorer, primal sense, favored enemy) are basically useless the majority of the time. Then, they come online to see if anyone else has bad experiences playing rangers and find this thread. Then, they read one person stating multiple times that if you're having a bad time playing a ranger, it is your fault for playing it badly. Wow. I've never met someone with so much empathy and such an open mind.
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Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
You are making claims counter to my claims. Neither of us are trolling. Rangers are a class made for the other 80% of the game that makes D&D what it is, and more importantly, what it isn’t. Power gaming is a joke. A fallacy. The DM can murder every power gamer’s character with a mere thought.
Can you point to me on this list of fallacies where it says "powergaming?" Also, I have been making claims backed up by evidence to support my opinion, which you have been doing very little of.
Also, like I've said a dozen times, you cannot balance combat features against non-combat features. Imagine a class that got no level 1 features other than "Thieves' Cant, Druidic, and Magical Tinkering." They got no weapons, no armor, a d4 hit die, and no combat features throughout all of their levels. Sure, they might not deal damage, but they get a ton of roleplay and utility features! Certainly they're not underpowered, as they can do all of these things, sometimes!
No. Those are all non-combat features, and D&D 5e is balanced around combat. You cannot balance non-combat features against combat features. That's literally like trying to compare the usefulness of a sword to an iPhone. Apples and Oranges.
Third, at this point I think he will say that an iPhone is more useful. I am unsubscribing from this thread and leaving it to die, in the full knowledge that some people refuse to listen to anyone.
everyone else, have a nice life.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
You are making claims counter to my claims. Neither of us are trolling. Rangers are a class made for the other 80% of the game that makes D&D what it is, and more importantly, what it isn’t. Power gaming is a joke. A fallacy. The DM can murder every power gamer’s character with a mere thought.
Can you point to me on this list of fallacies where it says "powergaming?" Also, I have been making claims backed up by evidence to support my opinion, which you have been doing very little of.
Also, like I've said a dozen times, you cannot balance combat features against non-combat features. Imagine a class that got no level 1 features other than "Thieves' Cant, Druidic, and Magical Tinkering." They got no weapons, no armor, a d4 hit die, and no combat features throughout all of their levels. Sure, they might deal damage, but they get a ton of roleplay and utility features! Certainly they're not underpowered, as they can do all of these things, sometimes!
No. Those are all non-combat features, and D&D 5e is balanced around combat. You cannot balance non-combat features against combat features. That's literally like trying to compare the usefulness of a sword to an iPhone. Apples and Oranges.
Very early on I tried asking you to look at some specific scenarios comparing fighters, rangers, and paladins on a level, simple, straightforward metric. Sword and board melee combat, levels 1 through 10, just DPR talk. Never happened. If we start comparing out of combat class abilities of the fighter, ranger, and paladin, well, that’s a different conversation again.
There was enough for WotC to comment on it and make a 'revised' version...
My doubts about that stem from the fact that for all their information, this revised version barely touched on any of the issues I've seen people bring up.
'scuse me? it made the ranger competitive damage wise, completely fixed the beast master with a scaling beast and was INSANELY fun to play. What didn't it fix? also, the point was there is a lot of player dissatisfaction and even WotC noticed
The ranger has always been competitive in with its damage, dealing it more consistently than most other classes at higher levels. A tier-3 ranger with TWF and hunter's mark is only consistently outpaced by barbarians and GWF fighters (barring Action Surge). Paladins can, but they need divine favor or [spell[elemental weapon[/spell] active and must use Improved Divine Smite once every turn. I'm not even including archetype features. In tier-4, a GWF paladin who isn't smiting needs a greatsword or maul and a 5th-level elemental weapon spell for the +2d4 damage just to edge out a Beast Master with a longbow and wolf who isn't even casting any spells. And even then, they're only beating them by an average of 1 point of damage.
When someone says the ranger cannot compete at dealing damage, they unequivocally do not understand how the various classes work. The ranger just doesn't do burst damage as the fighter or paladin can. If you want to put up big numbers on the regular, then play a barbarian or fighter.
do you not understand the meaning of "underpowered?" One of the key parts of being underpowered in 5e is DPS, because if you can't carry your own weight as a martial class in 5e, you're underpowered.
And yet you haven't, not once, established that a Ranger cannot "hold its weight as a martial class", you just keep repeating the claim over and over again, just as you keep claiming to be objective when you clearly aren't. You've also accused me of being biased yet all I've really said it's that it's pointless to try to compare classes as you keep insisting on doing; it's unproductive, is utterly failing to prove anything and just makes you look like a stubborn ass with an obsessive need to be right about Rangers being "bad".
Paladins and Rangers have several fighting styles in common, also some that are not. If you assume that both choose the same fighting style and play in the exact same way (which they shouldn't) then they can do around the same damage and have around the same AC, leaving aside that a Ranger shouldn't really just be wading in and taking hits (they're not tanks). A Ranger that chooses the archery fighting style will easily outclass a Paladin at range, while a Paladin that goes all in on tanking can tank real good.
Rangers can use Hunter's Mark while Paladins can use Divine Favor, both gaining bonus damage over time. Divine Favor is radiant, while Hunter's Mark does more damage. While a Paladin's damage is reduced by radiant resistance, a Ranger's is reduced by more common physical damage resistance, but this can be overcome in most cases by a silver weapon/ammunition.
Beyond that in combat Paladins can burn spell slots on Divine Smite for 2d8 radiant damage in bursts (or more with higher spell slots), meanwhile Rangers get access to a bunch of area of effect damage and control spells such as Ensnaring Strike and Hail of Thorns, as well as a bunch of spells they can (and should) use to prepare ambushes and control the battlefield, such as Snare. Xanathar's Guide also adds Zephyr Strike which supports a more mobile Ranger build by disengaging at high speed plus an advantage attack with d8 force damage. Paladins get other forms of smite spell which can be used to overcome radiant resistance, or exploit vulnerabilities.
For 2nd level spells neither class has many new combat options, it's more about up-casting the 1st level spells, though Rangers do get Spike Growth which can do some serious damage if positioned well, and Silence does add a new control option for Rangers, handy for stealthing, countering thunder damage or interfering with casters. Pass Without Trace is also a stealth highlight.
3rd level spells are where it gets more interesting; Paladins still don't get many more in the way of direct combat spells, though Crusader's Mantle gives you Divine Favor in a radius, and Aura of Vitality is good for doubling down as a healer. But this is where Rangers get a lot of good damage spells with Conjure Barrage, and Lightning Arrow being favourites (the latter can do 4d8 to multiple targets, 6d8 to one on top of regular damage, the former does 3d8 and doesn't require concentration). They also get yet more control options such as Plant Growth, Wind Wall etc.
The only real problem with the Ranger mechanically is the competition for concentration which means you can't keep Hunter's Mark up and use some of the other spells, though some of the spells that you'll want to use are actually very strong when used properly so it actually balances. In the 2019 UA class variants WotC trialled eliminating concentration for Hunter's Mark on Rangers, which I actually would argue is overpowered (as it then stacks with Lightning Arrow etc., and would stack with Divine Favor or Hex if you can get these). They also gave a number of free castings of Hunter's Mark which is really all they need to bring it back up again quickly, and is what I'm hoping for from Tasha's Cauldron.
So what we've got are two half caster martial classes that do basically the same basic damage, with Paladins doing more spike damage, and Rangers being more about ambush, control and area of effect. In other words, we've got two very different classes that play very differently and do different things. Paladins have some more in-combat utility with extra healing and short range aura bonuses, while Rangers have more non-combat utility. So is Paladin a bit stronger overall? Probably, but then Paladin is arguably the best martial class hands-down if all you care about is damage (as you seem to), but that doesn't make Rangers bad, or underpowered, nor does it necessarily make Paladins overpowered. Which raises some of the hypocrisy in this thread btw; if your argument is that Rangers are underpowered because paladins exists, then your argument is also that Paladins are overpowered and should be nerfed.
But in reality, both are good at what they're good at, and both are good overall. Damage is not the only metric of a classes' capabilities, as sometimes doing no damage can be far more valuable if it reduces enemy numbers, gives your party boosts, or opportunities to regroup/react etc. The only real difference to performance is that a Paladin is easier to use (just wade in, spam attack and add divine smite, rinse and repeat) while a Ranger should always be trying to lure enemies into traps, get them with AoE while bunched together and so on. Rangers are a perfectly good martial class, that does more than enough damage to hold their own against any other martial class both in terms of raw damage and everything else they can do, and this is objectively the case. 20 pages of subjective nonsense does nothing to change that they have a good spell list, on top of being perfectly good martial fighters even by your own ridiculously narrow metrics.
Now there's almost certainly some specific situational stuff I've not mentioned, and I haven't even touched sub-classes, which would take forever to compare, but I'm pretty sure I'm clear on the general issue. I've also not even touched on party composition which is often the biggest deciding factor in whether a build is going to be a good fit in a campaign or not, though even in an all martial classes party a Ranger can still do things the others won't be able to, just as a Paladin can, which is why ideally you'd have both if your party doesn't have a full-blown Fighter.
And lastly, I say all of this as someone that has no particular bias towards Ranger or against Paladins; I've played both, and love both, and will likely play both again at some point as I've far from exhausted the sub-classes, but what I cannot stand are people who hate on classes or sub-classes that they've probably never even played, never will, and yet are unreasonably obsessed with relentlessly rubbishing at every available opportunity.
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.
My god. I NEVER said rangers were underpowered. They are just the least powerful class in the PHB (note, there HAS to be a least powerful class), and not only that, but as I have said many times the ranger has the highest level of player satisfaction. 80% of the players I know dislike the class due to the feeling of being underpowered past level 3. WotC noticed enough dissatisfaction to try to fix the class in multiple ways.
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
GoodBovine, what do you mean by least powerful? Do you mean least output of damage in combat? Do you mean least powerful in other areas of the game? I will admit I don't understand the definition. At least not by the numbers I use.
GoodBovine, what do you mean by least powerful? Do you mean least output of damage in combat? Do you mean least powerful in other areas of the game? I will admit I don't understand the definition. At least not by the numbers I use.
It is not as good as fighter in DPR, it is not as good as rogue in utility, it is worse than druid in magic. It is not even any good as a mix. Having played a ranger from 1-20, I never once used hide in plain sight, rarely used favoured enemy, which basically just gives you a language, and granted I did use Natural explorer sometimes but it was an exploration focused campaign (west marches). I felt that everything I could do could be done better by a scout rogue.
If the ranger can't keep up with the paladin and the fighter then it doesn't deserve its d10 hit die.
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“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
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My point still stands. They commented on the player dissatisfaction, and tried to fix it, but it was turned into CFV as Third said
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
The ranger class is played poorly by players and dungeon masters. I’m not trolling. I am as unyielding in my belief as you are in yours. It’s not the ranger.
I actually laughed at this. All of the players who play rangers and feel it is underpowered are playing it badly?
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
My doubts about that stem from the fact that for all their information, this revised version barely touched on any of the issues I've seen people bring up.
Want to start playing but don't have anyone to play with? You can try these options: [link].
'scuse me? it made the ranger competitive damage wise, completely fixed the beast master with a scaling beast and was INSANELY fun to play. What didn't it fix? also, the point was there is a lot of player dissatisfaction and even WotC noticed
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
I'm a powergamer. Do you think that it is likely that I, one who makes sure to know all the rule combos and exploits, would not be aware of a way to make rangers be good? The fact of the matter is, rangers are much more dependent on the campaign, the DM, and other characters than all of the other classes.
Should a wizard with Teleportation Circle or Teleport allow the ranger to walk them through the woods instead of teleporting to their destination because it's their favored terrain and they want to feel useful? Should the DM cater to the benefits of playing a ranger just because they chose to play that class? Should the DM change the terrain of Chult to a Desert if the player chose the Desert as their favored terrain instead of the forest? Should one player not play a ranger because the party already has one and the one that is already playing doesn't want to feel redundant?
The ranger class is comparatively objectively bad. I've said it multiple times, and will say it again. Whether or not you intended to troll, you did.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
Yes.
0.o
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
The literal creators of the game said this in 2018: "Over the past year, you’ve seen us try a number of new approaches to the ranger, all aimed at addressing the class’s high levels of player dissatisfaction and its ranking as D&D’s weakest class by a significant margin."
ARE THE DEVS PLAYING THEIR CLASS WRONG?
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
You are making claims counter to my claims. Neither of us are trolling. Rangers are a class made for the other 80% of the game that makes D&D what it is, and more importantly, what it isn’t. Power gaming is a joke. A fallacy. The DM can murder every power gamer’s character with a mere thought.
This sounds very much like a "blaming the victim" situation. A new player chooses to play a ranger with their group of friends for the first time, and they also have a wizard, rogue, and paladin. The Ranger notices that all of their beginner features are useful almost all of the time (divine smite, spells, sneak attack, cunning action, lay on hands, arcane recovery), but theirs (natural explorer, primal sense, favored enemy) are basically useless the majority of the time. Then, they come online to see if anyone else has bad experiences playing rangers and find this thread. Then, they read one person stating multiple times that if you're having a bad time playing a ranger, it is your fault for playing it badly. Wow. I've never met someone with so much empathy and such an open mind.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
Can you point to me on this list of fallacies where it says "powergaming?" Also, I have been making claims backed up by evidence to support my opinion, which you have been doing very little of.
Also, like I've said a dozen times, you cannot balance combat features against non-combat features. Imagine a class that got no level 1 features other than "Thieves' Cant, Druidic, and Magical Tinkering." They got no weapons, no armor, a d4 hit die, and no combat features throughout all of their levels. Sure, they might not deal damage, but they get a ton of roleplay and utility features! Certainly they're not underpowered, as they can do all of these things, sometimes!
No. Those are all non-combat features, and D&D 5e is balanced around combat. You cannot balance non-combat features against combat features. That's literally like trying to compare the usefulness of a sword to an iPhone. Apples and Oranges.
Please check out my homebrew, I would appreciate feedback:
Spells, Monsters, Subclasses, Races, Arcknight Class, Occultist Class, World, Enigmatic Esoterica forms
Third, at this point I think he will say that an iPhone is more useful. I am unsubscribing from this thread and leaving it to die, in the full knowledge that some people refuse to listen to anyone.
everyone else, have a nice life.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
Very early on I tried asking you to look at some specific scenarios comparing fighters, rangers, and paladins on a level, simple, straightforward metric. Sword and board melee combat, levels 1 through 10, just DPR talk. Never happened. If we start comparing out of combat class abilities of the fighter, ranger, and paladin, well, that’s a different conversation again.
I’m going to sleep. We can continue arguing tomorrow.
The ranger has always been competitive in with its damage, dealing it more consistently than most other classes at higher levels. A tier-3 ranger with TWF and hunter's mark is only consistently outpaced by barbarians and GWF fighters (barring Action Surge). Paladins can, but they need divine favor or [spell[elemental weapon[/spell] active and must use Improved Divine Smite once every turn. I'm not even including archetype features. In tier-4, a GWF paladin who isn't smiting needs a greatsword or maul and a 5th-level elemental weapon spell for the +2d4 damage just to edge out a Beast Master with a longbow and wolf who isn't even casting any spells. And even then, they're only beating them by an average of 1 point of damage.
When someone says the ranger cannot compete at dealing damage, they unequivocally do not understand how the various classes work. The ranger just doesn't do burst damage as the fighter or paladin can. If you want to put up big numbers on the regular, then play a barbarian or fighter.
And yet you haven't, not once, established that a Ranger cannot "hold its weight as a martial class", you just keep repeating the claim over and over again, just as you keep claiming to be objective when you clearly aren't. You've also accused me of being biased yet all I've really said it's that it's pointless to try to compare classes as you keep insisting on doing; it's unproductive, is utterly failing to prove anything and just makes you look like a stubborn ass with an obsessive need to be right about Rangers being "bad".
Paladins and Rangers have several fighting styles in common, also some that are not. If you assume that both choose the same fighting style and play in the exact same way (which they shouldn't) then they can do around the same damage and have around the same AC, leaving aside that a Ranger shouldn't really just be wading in and taking hits (they're not tanks). A Ranger that chooses the archery fighting style will easily outclass a Paladin at range, while a Paladin that goes all in on tanking can tank real good.
Rangers can use Hunter's Mark while Paladins can use Divine Favor, both gaining bonus damage over time. Divine Favor is radiant, while Hunter's Mark does more damage. While a Paladin's damage is reduced by radiant resistance, a Ranger's is reduced by more common physical damage resistance, but this can be overcome in most cases by a silver weapon/ammunition.
Beyond that in combat Paladins can burn spell slots on Divine Smite for 2d8 radiant damage in bursts (or more with higher spell slots), meanwhile Rangers get access to a bunch of area of effect damage and control spells such as Ensnaring Strike and Hail of Thorns, as well as a bunch of spells they can (and should) use to prepare ambushes and control the battlefield, such as Snare. Xanathar's Guide also adds Zephyr Strike which supports a more mobile Ranger build by disengaging at high speed plus an advantage attack with d8 force damage. Paladins get other forms of smite spell which can be used to overcome radiant resistance, or exploit vulnerabilities.
For 2nd level spells neither class has many new combat options, it's more about up-casting the 1st level spells, though Rangers do get Spike Growth which can do some serious damage if positioned well, and Silence does add a new control option for Rangers, handy for stealthing, countering thunder damage or interfering with casters. Pass Without Trace is also a stealth highlight.
3rd level spells are where it gets more interesting; Paladins still don't get many more in the way of direct combat spells, though Crusader's Mantle gives you Divine Favor in a radius, and Aura of Vitality is good for doubling down as a healer. But this is where Rangers get a lot of good damage spells with Conjure Barrage, and Lightning Arrow being favourites (the latter can do 4d8 to multiple targets, 6d8 to one on top of regular damage, the former does 3d8 and doesn't require concentration). They also get yet more control options such as Plant Growth, Wind Wall etc.
The only real problem with the Ranger mechanically is the competition for concentration which means you can't keep Hunter's Mark up and use some of the other spells, though some of the spells that you'll want to use are actually very strong when used properly so it actually balances. In the 2019 UA class variants WotC trialled eliminating concentration for Hunter's Mark on Rangers, which I actually would argue is overpowered (as it then stacks with Lightning Arrow etc., and would stack with Divine Favor or Hex if you can get these). They also gave a number of free castings of Hunter's Mark which is really all they need to bring it back up again quickly, and is what I'm hoping for from Tasha's Cauldron.
So what we've got are two half caster martial classes that do basically the same basic damage, with Paladins doing more spike damage, and Rangers being more about ambush, control and area of effect. In other words, we've got two very different classes that play very differently and do different things. Paladins have some more in-combat utility with extra healing and short range aura bonuses, while Rangers have more non-combat utility. So is Paladin a bit stronger overall? Probably, but then Paladin is arguably the best martial class hands-down if all you care about is damage (as you seem to), but that doesn't make Rangers bad, or underpowered, nor does it necessarily make Paladins overpowered. Which raises some of the hypocrisy in this thread btw; if your argument is that Rangers are underpowered because paladins exists, then your argument is also that Paladins are overpowered and should be nerfed.
But in reality, both are good at what they're good at, and both are good overall. Damage is not the only metric of a classes' capabilities, as sometimes doing no damage can be far more valuable if it reduces enemy numbers, gives your party boosts, or opportunities to regroup/react etc. The only real difference to performance is that a Paladin is easier to use (just wade in, spam attack and add divine smite, rinse and repeat) while a Ranger should always be trying to lure enemies into traps, get them with AoE while bunched together and so on. Rangers are a perfectly good martial class, that does more than enough damage to hold their own against any other martial class both in terms of raw damage and everything else they can do, and this is objectively the case. 20 pages of subjective nonsense does nothing to change that they have a good spell list, on top of being perfectly good martial fighters even by your own ridiculously narrow metrics.
Now there's almost certainly some specific situational stuff I've not mentioned, and I haven't even touched sub-classes, which would take forever to compare, but I'm pretty sure I'm clear on the general issue. I've also not even touched on party composition which is often the biggest deciding factor in whether a build is going to be a good fit in a campaign or not, though even in an all martial classes party a Ranger can still do things the others won't be able to, just as a Paladin can, which is why ideally you'd have both if your party doesn't have a full-blown Fighter.
And lastly, I say all of this as someone that has no particular bias towards Ranger or against Paladins; I've played both, and love both, and will likely play both again at some point as I've far from exhausted the sub-classes, but what I cannot stand are people who hate on classes or sub-classes that they've probably never even played, never will, and yet are unreasonably obsessed with relentlessly rubbishing at every available opportunity.
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.
My god. I NEVER said rangers were underpowered. They are just the least powerful class in the PHB (note, there HAS to be a least powerful class), and not only that, but as I have said many times the ranger has the highest level of player satisfaction. 80% of the players I know dislike the class due to the feeling of being underpowered past level 3. WotC noticed enough dissatisfaction to try to fix the class in multiple ways.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.
Good morning, everyone!
GoodBovine, what do you mean by least powerful? Do you mean least output of damage in combat? Do you mean least powerful in other areas of the game? I will admit I don't understand the definition. At least not by the numbers I use.
It is not as good as fighter in DPR, it is not as good as rogue in utility, it is worse than druid in magic. It is not even any good as a mix. Having played a ranger from 1-20, I never once used hide in plain sight, rarely used favoured enemy, which basically just gives you a language, and granted I did use Natural explorer sometimes but it was an exploration focused campaign (west marches). I felt that everything I could do could be done better by a scout rogue.
If the ranger can't keep up with the paladin and the fighter then it doesn't deserve its d10 hit die.
“I will take responsibility for what I have done. [...] If must fall, I will rise each time a better man.” ― Brandon Sanderson, Oathbringer.