Ok, D&D 2024 is the best version ever from my pov. Easy to make really great build with all class and most of subclass, except for Rogues and Rangers. Without heavy multiclass, they heavily suck somewhere... Bah i think Rogue are the most F tier from lvl 1 to 20, but that s another story.
For Rangers, they are tier S at tier 1, tier A at tier 2... And begin to fall to tier D at level 9...
But when you dig a little bit, you can still do some great things with 3 of the 4 subclass and the right build.
1- For really good DPS, go look d4 coby hunters mark 2 weapons fighting beastmaster build on YT. Really good DPS !!! And you still get all the Rangers utilities..
2- With a heavy darkvision stealth team, go gloomstalker asimar or dragonborn range with 3 (4) warcleric multiclass. Gloomstalker is nerf from 2014 but still get a perma like invisibility at night (with no moon depend on dm...)... And invisible flying sniping from 120 feet is not bad. Or drow for 180 feets darkvision...
3- and hunter lore can be one of the greatest skill of the game for new players (less if the pkayers know all the monsters manual ...), also depending of the dm.... This said a hunter build on push mechanics, maybe with team help, using an maul heavy weapon build and horde breaker, will get 3 attacks per round most of the time at level 5... And also augment chance to get bonus attack from heavy weapon mastery... And push mechanics also go really well with many spells... Spike growth. I did a 3 sessions build with this and a push mechanics team... The Dpr is awesome !!!
Sure if your table house rule hunters mark concentration removal at level 13... Ranger now become really better at later tiers, but even without, you still can do really fun and really powerfull build on par with the others class.
Funny. The best build I could come up with was the one subclass you didn't mention. Fey wanderer. I think a druidic warrior wander is pretty good. It has an easy combat style. Round one is summon fey and shillelaghgh. Round to HM attack. This character can be a face too and a true skill monkey
Gloom The one I have the most trouble with. I find the fear effects and invisibility effects to be anti-synergistic since a creature can't fear what they can't see.
Yeah Treadmonk did fey build on YouTube but it sucks. You ll go with better dps with coby dual weapon, and it s cool you have 2 pets :). I still think from few experimentation that maul hunter is a really great dps. Agree with your gloomstalker point, but i still think this invisible combine with stealth is great.
DPR assumptions that only look at single target (when Rangers have a multitude of multiple target spells), but also assume that you start in melee range are only modestly useful.
You have to have certain assumptions to play with, but if you rerun many DPR scenarios but make turn 1 out of melee the Ranger improves by using that turn to setup something. The Archer starts looking a ton better because they can damage in turn one
TMs build isn't that great. He tries to make a Fey which is face subclass into a damage subclass. It's not a damage subclass. Lean into its strength, skills, not DPR
I find that the new ranger still didn't fix the classes biggest issue - its damage doesn't scale nearly as well as other classes. Other that perhaps the Beastmaster, most ranger's would be better off multiclassing into Fighter or Rogue at levels 5 or 6 that just staying straight-class, and that saddens me. Rangers are lots of fun, but they just don't scale up nearly as well as they should on their own.
Rangers are great as-is. If all you look at is damage, maybe they fall behind, but unless your game is all dungeon crawls, that should only be a part of the game. Both as a player and a DM, I find rangers extremely valuable. They’re top tier for the exploration pillar at all phases of the game. Usually have a good survival, perception and stealth often with expertise in at least one of those (not to mention swim and climb speeds) for scouting. And I can not tell you how much use I’ve gotten from speak with animals/animal handling to help answer questions about different areas — come upon a strange scene and can’t figure out what happened, well there’s a squirrel over there who saw the whole thing.
And while my damage output isn’t very high, it’s reliable. Between archery fighting style and sharpshooter removing the cover penalty, a ranged ranger will hit more reliably than most anyone else. Other classes might be able to do more damage per hit, but my ranger hits more often.
People often say, out loud, how good is it to have one in the party.
Rangers are great as-is. If all you look at is damage, maybe they fall behind, but unless your game is all dungeon crawls, that should only be a part of the game. Both as a player and a DM, I find rangers extremely valuable. They’re top tier for the exploration pillar at all phases of the game. Usually have a good survival, perception and stealth often with expertise in at least one of those (not to mention swim and climb speeds) for scouting. And I can not tell you how much use I’ve gotten from speak with animals/animal handling to help answer questions about different areas — come upon a strange scene and can’t figure out what happened, well there’s a squirrel over there who saw the whole thing.
And while my damage output isn’t very high, it’s reliable. Between archery fighting style and sharpshooter removing the cover penalty, a ranged ranger will hit more reliably than most anyone else. Other classes might be able to do more damage per hit, but my ranger hits more often.
People often say, out loud, how good is it to have one in the party.
What level are you playing at? When I read the 2024 Ranger, all I could think of was how much better they are and how their damage is going to be a very consistent, reliable thing, in addition to all the other things they can do now. Personally, I am of the mind that if someone only cares about damage, they should play the classes that focus on dealing damage. Damage dealing classes like fighter can't just pop an invisibility as a BA, nor can they get blindsight to 30ft at the higher levels. The way I see the ranger is that they can 'go do the thing', whatever that might be. They are solid from what I can see and their given abilities definitely are worth giving up S-tier damage for.
Rangers are great as-is. If all you look at is damage, maybe they fall behind, but unless your game is all dungeon crawls, that should only be a part of the game. Both as a player and a DM, I find rangers extremely valuable. They’re top tier for the exploration pillar at all phases of the game. Usually have a good survival, perception and stealth often with expertise in at least one of those (not to mention swim and climb speeds) for scouting. And I can not tell you how much use I’ve gotten from speak with animals/animal handling to help answer questions about different areas — come upon a strange scene and can’t figure out what happened, well there’s a squirrel over there who saw the whole thing.
And while my damage output isn’t very high, it’s reliable. Between archery fighting style and sharpshooter removing the cover penalty, a ranged ranger will hit more reliably than most anyone else. Other classes might be able to do more damage per hit, but my ranger hits more often.
People often say, out loud, how good is it to have one in the party.
What level are you playing at? When I read the 2024 Ranger, all I could think of was how much better they are and how their damage is going to be a very consistent, reliable thing, in addition to all the other things they can do now. Personally, I am of the mind that if someone only cares about damage, they should play the classes that focus on dealing damage. Damage dealing classes like fighter can't just pop an invisibility as a BA, nor can they get blindsight to 30ft at the higher levels. The way I see the ranger is that they can 'go do the thing', whatever that might be. They are solid from what I can see and their given abilities definitely are worth giving up S-tier damage for.
We had started at 1 with the ‘14 rules. Switched to ‘24 around level 4. Just hit 8 as a player. FWIW, I’m a drakewarden. It has been a bit annoying having to choose between using my class feature with casting/moving hunters mark, and my subclass feature having my dragon attack. I still get good use from both, so not frustrating, just annoying. In the game I’m DMing started at 1 with the ‘24 rules. Now they’re around 3. Swarmkeeper. It’s more nautical, and she’s been the navigator on land and sea so far. The party would probably have been very lost without her.
Rangers are less of a combat numbers problem and more of a class problem. The game has less breadth of appeal in 2024. Meaning classes play the same rather than appeal to different playstyles. People who want a fighter/survivalist or steathy nature expert can get that play from other builds.
What 2024 doesn't have is a unique reason/mechanic to exist and to top it off 2024 undermines themes ranger character narratives want. It encourages specific features (at the detriment of others) rather than providing them as tool options.
At least 2014 had unique abilities and diagetic interactions with the game mechanics. Now it could have used some clarity and cleanup but with a good group it actually functions fine.
Rangers are less of a combat numbers problem and more of a class problem. The game has less breadth of appeal in 2024. Meaning classes play the same rather than appeal to different playstyles. People who want a fighter/survivalist or steathy nature expert can get that play from other builds.
What 2024 doesn't have is a unique reason/mechanic to exist and to top it off 2024 undermines themes ranger character narratives want. It encourages specific features (at the detriment of others) rather than providing them as tool options.
At least 2014 had unique abilities and diagetic interactions with the game mechanics. Now it could have used some clarity and cleanup but with a good group it actually functions fine.
I agree. I don't think the Ranger's issue as a class is single target damage, dps, or multi target damage. The Ranger's issue is that it lacks a unique and interesting class feature that people want to play. Barbarians Rage. Bards Inspire. Clerics Channel Divinity. Druids Wildshape. Fighter Action Surge their multi-attacks. Monks Focus on Martial Arts. Paladins Smite in their Aura. Rogues Sneak Attack. Sorcerers Meta their Magic. Warlocks Invoke Patron powers. Wizards Ritual cast from their extensive Spellbook. Even Artificers Infuse magic items (or whatever the UA is calling it for now.)
Rangers have Hunter's Mark. It doesn't scale well. And some of the features they added for 2024 to try to improve it come into effect at very late levels, and they are of questionable mechanical value (Advantage at level 17, after level 14 gives you momentary Invisibility, for example.) Of course, there's the issue with it consuming your concentration resource.
I'd like to see the Ranger have a feature that allows them to assist their party members in either skills, or attacks/damage, or both. Idk if this would manifest as some kind of Aura, like the Paladin, only for skill checks? Or if Hunter's Mark would have a feature that grants the next attacker Advantage? I'm not sure. But some kind of feature that would let the Ranger, in effect, tell party members how/where to attack monsters, like Legolas telling those around him where the orc's armor is weak at the Battle of Helm's Deep. (I understand this is the theme behind the Hunter's "Hunter's Lore" feature, but I was thinking about something that would give Advantage to the party or to an ally, or perhaps a damage boost or an attack bonus?)
Idk. I really don't know. But I think there's more to Ranger than just Hunter's Mark and single target damage. But it's difficult to pin down what they should be. Are they the quintessential Archer? But people also want them to be melee fighters. Are they the archetypical woodsman- tracking, scouting, and hunting? But how can that translate into environments like towns, tombs, and dungeons (where many, if not most, adventures take place)? Rangers are difficult to define and even more difficult to define mechanically. I think WotC did a decent job on the 2024 base class with features like Expertise, Roving, & Tireless. I think adding features to Hunter's Mark wasn't the worst idea, but I think they could have found more interesting (and mechanically effective) ways to implement it.
Rangers do just fine in the damage dealing. No they aren’t #1 in any category but they are right up there in all of them. Part of the problem is that many players don’t recognize just how much they can do with many of their spells. Steel wind strike attacks 5 different foes dealing an average of 33 points of damage in a round - without subjecting the ranger to OAs. That is as much ndividulally as a fireball and fireball frequently doesn’t hit 5 foes. No you don’t get hunters mark damage - but do you really need to? the problem with the wilderness pro version (my personal fav) is that few tables play wilderness exploration/travel/activity campaigns so those abilities are close to useless. That won’t change until WotC publishes some solid wilderness campaigns and that might not ever happen. providing aide to the party in and out of combat is already done by bards, Druids, clerics and even wizards - do we really need one more? where they could be improved, potentially, is skills, something as simple as giving them 2 expertises instead of 1 at low level would certainly help. Then, I’m not really clear on why the bard, who should be focused on casting, music and knowledge gets jack of all trades. I could see giving them skilled as an extra feat to go with their expertises but jack? Meanwhile if the ranger is supposed to be the loner in the wilderness who can survive and deal with anything that comes their way then they should (and realistically have to be) Jacks of All trades why not give it to them next iteration. rangers are weapon oriented in tiers 1&2 but become spell oriented in tiers 3&4. Another possible way to change the ranger is to let it become a true Gish - medium armor, weapons and mastery and evocation spells as well. Let them have cantrips ( take Eldritch blast and rename nature’s arrow or something). Maybe not fireball but things like lightning bolt, Melf’s meteors, Snillocs Snowballs, etc should be available to rangers IMHO.
This is only because they don't have a good use of their high level spells lots, especially level 4 . There's like nothing to do with them except upcast
I find that the new ranger still didn't fix the classes biggest issue - its damage doesn't scale nearly as well as other classes. Other that perhaps the Beastmaster, most ranger's would be better off multiclassing into Fighter or Rogue at levels 5 or 6 that just staying straight-class, and that saddens me. Rangers are lots of fun, but they just don't scale up nearly as well as they should on their own.
This is only because they don't have a good use of their high level spells lots, especially level 4 . There's like nothing to do with them except upcast
Really?.??? The biggest problem is that the vast majority of ranger spells are concentration based so you can only have one at a time and you only have a few slots. The Spells are fine and have lots of uses but with only2 slots either hunters mark needs to be concentration free in tiers 3&4 or most of the level 3-5 spells should be concentration free.
Yeah. The problem isn't a lack of good spells. 4th has Conjure Woodland Beings, Grasping Vine, and Summon Elemental. Those are all great.
Unfortunately they all require concentration and thus compete with hunter's mark. In fact they compete quite favorably. Spreadsheet optmizers hate it because they can't attack in turn 1 and use those spellsAND they can't use HM at the same time. I am not sure its that big of a deal. Most combats are more complicated than the spreadsheets take into account.
Rangers do just fine in the damage dealing. No they aren’t #1 in any category but they are right up there in all of them. Part of the problem is that many players don’t recognize just how much they can do with many of their spells. Steel wind strike attacks 5 different foes dealing an average of 33 points of damage in a round - without subjecting the ranger to OAs. That is as much ndividulally as a fireball and fireball frequently doesn’t hit 5 foes. No you don’t get hunters mark damage - but do you really need to?
There is no comparison there. Spellcasters will get fireball at level 5, while rangers get steel wind strike at level 17. At level 17, spellcasters will get spells like meteor swarm, hitting way more enemies that steel wind strike and doing way more damage.
Of course ther is no comparison between a L9 spell and a L 5 spell. But comparing L5 spells - cone of cold is L5 and does 8D8 for an average of 36 points of damage before the save. With luck you can get 5 foes in the cone but at least 2 should save so 3*36+2*18 =144 damage, vs steel wind strike doing 6D10 to each of upto 5 foes of which you’ll probably miss one so 4*33=132 if all 5 hit 5*33=165 ( off all fail the cone save then 5*36=180) so slightly less but solidly comparable damage. The shame is that you can’t add HM damage to that or that would add 5*3.5=17.5 for 182 or 198 damage for the ranger. That is what I mean about needing HM to be concentration free at tier 3/4. Then the damages are truly comparable or slightly better.
Of course ther is no comparison between a L9 spell and a L 5 spell. But comparing L5 spells - cone of cold is L5 and does 8D8 for an average of 36 points of damage before the save. With luck you can get 5 foes in the cone but at least 2 should save so 3*36+2*18 =144 damage, vs steel wind strike doing 6D10 to each of upto 5 foes of which you’ll probably miss one so 4*33=132 if all 5 hit 5*33=165 ( off all fail the cone save then 5*36=180) so slightly less but solidly comparable damage. The shame is that you can’t add HM damage to that or that would add 5*3.5=17.5 for 182 or 198 damage for the ranger. That is what I mean about needing HM to be concentration free at tier 3/4. Then the damages are truly comparable or slightly better.
The problem is not the spell level but the character level needed to cast a spell. but still not bad to have conjure barrage at tier 3, better aoe than others martials. This said i still think the 3 éléments of the original post, relied to the subclass , are a good start to choose a ranger or not. Second argument, expertise is not bad, especially on perception or stealth, and the ranger. Spells come in third position, because good ones are later as half caster. The ranger still have some really great spells to cast all day long at tier 3... D&D 2024 is the first edition from my perspective that tone down martial/caster divide. Many godly spells were nerfed, and full martials like monk &, Barbarian receive great buffs. Fighter still really good, but maybe less attactives now, even if the extra feats are better then ever Paly, still OP, with aura, mega dps and spell adaptability. Good thing also, gish now almost need multiclass or 1 dip and are less frontload. So Rogue and Rangers are last tier of this version... But every version have their last tier and 2024 ranger is S tier compare to the 2014 monk for sure. This said, i think you have a good argument and half caster still get a panoply of options you cannot underestimated.
If you try to compare a half caster to a full caster you will always come up short, just as you will trying to compare a full caster to a melee martials in melee combat. The point of the half caster is not to beat either the full caster at casting, or the full martial at melee but to get most of the best of both worlds. This the ranger does quite well. Folks problems with it come when they try to make one of the mistakes above.in creative hands using both its martial and magical abilities the ranger is a top tier class. It might not have the dpr of a Paladin or the blasting ability of a sorceror but it can do both jobs when it has to and can switch from one to the other as needed by the round, no other class can do this as well. If what you want is AoE blasting then no it’s not the class for you, neither is it your class if you want to just charge in swinging your sword/melee weapon. It’s the solo artist dong both jobs well enough which also means it’s the thinking persons class as you have to recognize when each ability is the best and switch modes.
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Ok, D&D 2024 is the best version ever from my pov. Easy to make really great build with all class and most of subclass, except for Rogues and Rangers. Without heavy multiclass, they heavily suck somewhere... Bah i think Rogue are the most F tier from lvl 1 to 20, but that s another story.
For Rangers, they are tier S at tier 1, tier A at tier 2... And begin to fall to tier D at level 9...
But when you dig a little bit, you can still do some great things with 3 of the 4 subclass and the right build.
1- For really good DPS, go look d4 coby hunters mark 2 weapons fighting beastmaster build on YT. Really good DPS !!! And you still get all the Rangers utilities..
2- With a heavy darkvision stealth team, go gloomstalker asimar or dragonborn range with 3 (4) warcleric multiclass. Gloomstalker is nerf from 2014 but still get a perma like invisibility at night (with no moon depend on dm...)... And invisible flying sniping from 120 feet is not bad. Or drow for 180 feets darkvision...
3- and hunter lore can be one of the greatest skill of the game for new players (less if the pkayers know all the monsters manual ...), also depending of the dm.... This said a hunter build on push mechanics, maybe with team help, using an maul heavy weapon build and horde breaker, will get 3 attacks per round most of the time at level 5... And also augment chance to get bonus attack from heavy weapon mastery... And push mechanics also go really well with many spells... Spike growth. I did a 3 sessions build with this and a push mechanics team... The Dpr is awesome !!!
Sure if your table house rule hunters mark concentration removal at level 13... Ranger now become really better at later tiers, but even without, you still can do really fun and really powerfull build on par with the others class.
Funny. The best build I could come up with was the one subclass you didn't mention. Fey wanderer. I think a druidic warrior wander is pretty good. It has an easy combat style. Round one is summon fey and shillelaghgh. Round to HM attack. This character can be a face too and a true skill monkey
Gloom The one I have the most trouble with. I find the fear effects and invisibility effects to be anti-synergistic since a creature can't fear what they can't see.
Yeah Treadmonk did fey build on YouTube but it sucks. You ll go with better dps with coby dual weapon, and it s cool you have 2 pets :). I still think from few experimentation that maul hunter is a really great dps. Agree with your gloomstalker point, but i still think this invisible combine with stealth is great.
DPR assumptions that only look at single target (when Rangers have a multitude of multiple target spells), but also assume that you start in melee range are only modestly useful.
You have to have certain assumptions to play with, but if you rerun many DPR scenarios but make turn 1 out of melee the Ranger improves by using that turn to setup something. The Archer starts looking a ton better because they can damage in turn one
TMs build isn't that great. He tries to make a Fey which is face subclass into a damage subclass. It's not a damage subclass. Lean into its strength, skills, not DPR
I find that the new ranger still didn't fix the classes biggest issue - its damage doesn't scale nearly as well as other classes. Other that perhaps the Beastmaster, most ranger's would be better off multiclassing into Fighter or Rogue at levels 5 or 6 that just staying straight-class, and that saddens me. Rangers are lots of fun, but they just don't scale up nearly as well as they should on their own.
Rangers are great as-is. If all you look at is damage, maybe they fall behind, but unless your game is all dungeon crawls, that should only be a part of the game.
Both as a player and a DM, I find rangers extremely valuable. They’re top tier for the exploration pillar at all phases of the game. Usually have a good survival, perception and stealth often with expertise in at least one of those (not to mention swim and climb speeds) for scouting. And I can not tell you how much use I’ve gotten from speak with animals/animal handling to help answer questions about different areas — come upon a strange scene and can’t figure out what happened, well there’s a squirrel over there who saw the whole thing.
And while my damage output isn’t very high, it’s reliable. Between archery fighting style and sharpshooter removing the cover penalty, a ranged ranger will hit more reliably than most anyone else. Other classes might be able to do more damage per hit, but my ranger hits more often.
People often say, out loud, how good is it to have one in the party.
What level are you playing at? When I read the 2024 Ranger, all I could think of was how much better they are and how their damage is going to be a very consistent, reliable thing, in addition to all the other things they can do now. Personally, I am of the mind that if someone only cares about damage, they should play the classes that focus on dealing damage. Damage dealing classes like fighter can't just pop an invisibility as a BA, nor can they get blindsight to 30ft at the higher levels. The way I see the ranger is that they can 'go do the thing', whatever that might be. They are solid from what I can see and their given abilities definitely are worth giving up S-tier damage for.
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We had started at 1 with the ‘14 rules. Switched to ‘24 around level 4. Just hit 8 as a player. FWIW, I’m a drakewarden. It has been a bit annoying having to choose between using my class feature with casting/moving hunters mark, and my subclass feature having my dragon attack. I still get good use from both, so not frustrating, just annoying.
In the game I’m DMing started at 1 with the ‘24 rules. Now they’re around 3. Swarmkeeper. It’s more nautical, and she’s been the navigator on land and sea so far. The party would probably have been very lost without her.
Rangers are less of a combat numbers problem and more of a class problem. The game has less breadth of appeal in 2024. Meaning classes play the same rather than appeal to different playstyles. People who want a fighter/survivalist or steathy nature expert can get that play from other builds.
What 2024 doesn't have is a unique reason/mechanic to exist and to top it off 2024 undermines themes ranger character narratives want. It encourages specific features (at the detriment of others) rather than providing them as tool options.
At least 2014 had unique abilities and diagetic interactions with the game mechanics. Now it could have used some clarity and cleanup but with a good group it actually functions fine.
I agree. I don't think the Ranger's issue as a class is single target damage, dps, or multi target damage. The Ranger's issue is that it lacks a unique and interesting class feature that people want to play. Barbarians Rage. Bards Inspire. Clerics Channel Divinity. Druids Wildshape. Fighter Action Surge their multi-attacks. Monks Focus on Martial Arts. Paladins Smite in their Aura. Rogues Sneak Attack. Sorcerers Meta their Magic. Warlocks Invoke Patron powers. Wizards Ritual cast from their extensive Spellbook. Even Artificers Infuse magic items (or whatever the UA is calling it for now.)
Rangers have Hunter's Mark. It doesn't scale well. And some of the features they added for 2024 to try to improve it come into effect at very late levels, and they are of questionable mechanical value (Advantage at level 17, after level 14 gives you momentary Invisibility, for example.) Of course, there's the issue with it consuming your concentration resource.
I'd like to see the Ranger have a feature that allows them to assist their party members in either skills, or attacks/damage, or both. Idk if this would manifest as some kind of Aura, like the Paladin, only for skill checks? Or if Hunter's Mark would have a feature that grants the next attacker Advantage? I'm not sure. But some kind of feature that would let the Ranger, in effect, tell party members how/where to attack monsters, like Legolas telling those around him where the orc's armor is weak at the Battle of Helm's Deep. (I understand this is the theme behind the Hunter's "Hunter's Lore" feature, but I was thinking about something that would give Advantage to the party or to an ally, or perhaps a damage boost or an attack bonus?)
Idk. I really don't know. But I think there's more to Ranger than just Hunter's Mark and single target damage. But it's difficult to pin down what they should be. Are they the quintessential Archer? But people also want them to be melee fighters. Are they the archetypical woodsman- tracking, scouting, and hunting? But how can that translate into environments like towns, tombs, and dungeons (where many, if not most, adventures take place)? Rangers are difficult to define and even more difficult to define mechanically. I think WotC did a decent job on the 2024 base class with features like Expertise, Roving, & Tireless. I think adding features to Hunter's Mark wasn't the worst idea, but I think they could have found more interesting (and mechanically effective) ways to implement it.
Rangers do just fine in the damage dealing. No they aren’t #1 in any category but they are right up there in all of them. Part of the problem is that many players don’t recognize just how much they can do with many of their spells. Steel wind strike attacks 5 different foes dealing an average of 33 points of damage in a round - without subjecting the ranger to OAs. That is as much ndividulally as a fireball and fireball frequently doesn’t hit 5 foes. No you don’t get hunters mark damage - but do you really need to?
the problem with the wilderness pro version (my personal fav) is that few tables play wilderness exploration/travel/activity campaigns so those abilities are close to useless. That won’t change until WotC publishes some solid wilderness campaigns and that might not ever happen.
providing aide to the party in and out of combat is already done by bards, Druids, clerics and even wizards - do we really need one more?
where they could be improved, potentially, is skills, something as simple as giving them 2 expertises instead of 1 at low level would certainly help. Then, I’m not really clear on why the bard, who should be focused on casting, music and knowledge gets jack of all trades. I could see giving them skilled as an extra feat to go with their expertises but jack? Meanwhile if the ranger is supposed to be the loner in the wilderness who can survive and deal with anything that comes their way then they should (and realistically have to be) Jacks of All trades why not give it to them next iteration.
rangers are weapon oriented in tiers 1&2 but become spell oriented in tiers 3&4. Another possible way to change the ranger is to let it become a true Gish - medium armor, weapons and mastery and evocation spells as well. Let them have cantrips ( take Eldritch blast and rename nature’s arrow or something). Maybe not fireball but things like lightning bolt, Melf’s meteors, Snillocs Snowballs, etc should be available to rangers IMHO.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
This is only because they don't have a good use of their high level spells lots, especially level 4 . There's like nothing to do with them except upcast
This is only because they don't have a good use of their high level spells lots, especially level 4 . There's like nothing to do with them except upcast
Really?.??? The biggest problem is that the vast majority of ranger spells are concentration based so you can only have one at a time and you only have a few slots. The Spells are fine and have lots of uses but with only2 slots either hunters mark needs to be concentration free in tiers 3&4 or most of the level 3-5 spells should be concentration free.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
Yeah. The problem isn't a lack of good spells. 4th has Conjure Woodland Beings, Grasping Vine, and Summon Elemental. Those are all great.
Unfortunately they all require concentration and thus compete with hunter's mark. In fact they compete quite favorably. Spreadsheet optmizers hate it because they can't attack in turn 1 and use those spellsAND they can't use HM at the same time. I am not sure its that big of a deal. Most combats are more complicated than the spreadsheets take into account.
There is no comparison there. Spellcasters will get fireball at level 5, while rangers get steel wind strike at level 17. At level 17, spellcasters will get spells like meteor swarm, hitting way more enemies that steel wind strike and doing way more damage.
Of course ther is no comparison between a L9 spell and a L 5 spell. But comparing L5 spells - cone of cold is L5 and does 8D8 for an average of 36 points of damage before the save. With luck you can get 5 foes in the cone but at least 2 should save so 3*36+2*18 =144 damage, vs steel wind strike doing 6D10 to each of upto 5 foes of which you’ll probably miss one so 4*33=132 if all 5 hit 5*33=165 ( off all fail the cone save then 5*36=180) so slightly less but solidly comparable damage. The shame is that you can’t add HM damage to that or that would add 5*3.5=17.5 for 182 or 198 damage for the ranger. That is what I mean about needing HM to be concentration free at tier 3/4. Then the damages are truly comparable or slightly better.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
The problem is not the spell level but the character level needed to cast a spell. but still not bad to have conjure barrage at tier 3, better aoe than others martials. This said i still think the 3 éléments of the original post, relied to the subclass , are a good start to choose a ranger or not. Second argument, expertise is not bad, especially on perception or stealth, and the ranger. Spells come in third position, because good ones are later as half caster. The ranger still have some really great spells to cast all day long at tier 3... D&D 2024 is the first edition from my perspective that tone down martial/caster divide. Many godly spells were nerfed, and full martials like monk &, Barbarian receive great buffs. Fighter still really good, but maybe less attactives now, even if the extra feats are better then ever Paly, still OP, with aura, mega dps and spell adaptability. Good thing also, gish now almost need multiclass or 1 dip and are less frontload. So Rogue and Rangers are last tier of this version... But every version have their last tier and 2024 ranger is S tier compare to the 2014 monk for sure. This said, i think you have a good argument and half caster still get a panoply of options you cannot underestimated.
If you try to compare a half caster to a full caster you will always come up short, just as you will trying to compare a full caster to a melee martials in melee combat. The point of the half caster is not to beat either the full caster at casting, or the full martial at melee but to get most of the best of both worlds. This the ranger does quite well. Folks problems with it come when they try to make one of the mistakes above.in creative hands using both its martial and magical abilities the ranger is a top tier class. It might not have the dpr of a Paladin or the blasting ability of a sorceror but it can do both jobs when it has to and can switch from one to the other as needed by the round, no other class can do this as well. If what you want is AoE blasting then no it’s not the class for you, neither is it your class if you want to just charge in swinging your sword/melee weapon. It’s the solo artist dong both jobs well enough which also means it’s the thinking persons class as you have to recognize when each ability is the best and switch modes.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.