I like the fact that its slightly less valuable than hunter's mark but almost as useful. It might even be better in limited circumstances. It means each ranger can decide which trade offs to make. Dont want HM you have an option. Running out of spells slots, you have an option. Don't need favored foe then Get favored enemy. At one point wizards said they didn't want overshadow old choices. I think it achieved a Decent ballance.
Agreed. My favorite neat synergy is to keep original favored enemy, but take Deft Explorer. Stack that on the Anthropologist background, and you are a language expert. You could have 8 languages by level 8. And if you want to keep it going drop in a level of Knowledge cleric for two more, and linguist for 3 more. 9th level you could have 13 languages.
Why would you want to? I don't know, but sounds like fun in a planescape or spelljammer game.
I like the fact that its slightly less valuable than hunter's mark but almost as useful. It might even be better in limited circumstances. It means each ranger can decide which trade offs to make. Dont want HM you have an option. Running out of spells slots, you have an option. Don't need favored foe then Get favored enemy. At one point wizards said they didn't want overshadow old choices. I think it achieved a Decent ballance.
In that mindset, yes, I agree. I still favor Favored Enemy over Favored Foe in most circumstances, but you amke a good point that it does a good job of being a useful ability in its own right... and at the very least the fact that it's optional means that players going forward will only take it if they feel it's the right choice for their character.
I like the fact that its slightly less valuable than hunter's mark but almost as useful. It might even be better in limited circumstances. It means each ranger can decide which trade offs to make. Dont want HM you have an option. Running out of spells slots, you have an option. Don't need favored foe then Get favored enemy. At one point wizards said they didn't want overshadow old choices. I think it achieved a Decent ballance.
In that mindset, yes, I agree. I still favor Favored Enemy over Favored Foe in most circumstances, but you amke a good point that it does a good job of being a useful ability in its own right... and at the very least the fact that it's optional means that players going forward will only take it if they feel it's the right choice for their character.
Which is fair but also Favored Enemy has such limited ability that creating something that is on par with it is actually a mistake IMO.
Ranger needed a fix not another subpar option....and while Favored Foe is fine its definitely pretty lame in comparison to what UA offered.
I like the fact that its slightly less valuable than hunter's mark but almost as useful. It might even be better in limited circumstances. It means each ranger can decide which trade offs to make. Dont want HM you have an option. Running out of spells slots, you have an option. Don't need favored foe then Get favored enemy. At one point wizards said they didn't want overshadow old choices. I think it achieved a Decent ballance.
In that mindset, yes, I agree. I still favor Favored Enemy over Favored Foe in most circumstances, but you amke a good point that it does a good job of being a useful ability in its own right... and at the very least the fact that it's optional means that players going forward will only take it if they feel it's the right choice for their character.
Which is fair but also Favored Enemy has such limited ability that creating something that is on par with it is actually a mistake IMO.
Ranger needed a fix not another subpar option....and while Favored Foe is fine its definitely pretty lame in comparison to what UA offered.
I mean, you have the option to trade an exploration and knowledge set of skills for an ability that can be used directly in combat. Is it as good or better than hunter's mark? No. Is it another option and resource to use with the ranger's combat toolkit? Yes. Have you looked at the ranger's damage output? (That is a rhetorical question. I know you have.) You could take away favored enemy and replace it with nothing and still be fine. This optional ability saves a ranger spell slots. Period. It does it at the cost of not having quite as much damage output as hunter's mark.
I like the fact that its slightly less valuable than hunter's mark but almost as useful. It might even be better in limited circumstances. It means each ranger can decide which trade offs to make. Dont want HM you have an option. Running out of spells slots, you have an option. Don't need favored foe then Get favored enemy. At one point wizards said they didn't want overshadow old choices. I think it achieved a Decent ballance.
In that mindset, yes, I agree. I still favor Favored Enemy over Favored Foe in most circumstances, but you amke a good point that it does a good job of being a useful ability in its own right... and at the very least the fact that it's optional means that players going forward will only take it if they feel it's the right choice for their character.
Which is fair but also Favored Enemy has such limited ability that creating something that is on par with it is actually a mistake IMO.
Ranger needed a fix not another subpar option....and while Favored Foe is fine its definitely pretty lame in comparison to what UA offered.
I mean, you have the option to trade an exploration and knowledge set of skills for an ability that can be used directly in combat. Is it as good or better than hunter's mark? No. Is it another option and resource to use with the ranger's combat toolkit? Yes. Have you looked at the ranger's damage output? (That is a rhetorical question. I know you have.) You could take away favored enemy and replace it with nothing and still be fine. This optional ability saves a ranger spell slots. Period. It does it at the cost of not having quite as much damage output as hunter's mark.
Mostly I point the fact ranger was the only class to get completely new abilities at pretty much every milestone...
It's because the original options were terrible.
Favored enemy was least interesting and least impactful class feature in 5e and that's basically the only reason favored foe is something I would take.
Not terrible. Just not used at most tables. Played [in a campaign that features a lot of wilderness exploration and survival, language barriers, and knowledge checks], D&D 5E ranger’s (and their abilities) are great. Now we have options for different play styles!
And favored enemy was at LEAST as good as thieve’s cant. LOL!
Not terrible. Just not used at most tables. Played correctly, D&D 5E ranger’s (and their abilities) are great. Now we have options for different play styles!
And favored enemy was at LEAST as good as thieve’s cant. LOL!
Theives cant is a pure ribbon and the rogue gets expertise in 2 skills at level 1 and sneak attack die.....ranger by comparison at level 1 is god awful.
Theives cant is a pure ribbon and the rogue gets expertise in 2 skills at level 1 and sneak attack die.....ranger by comparison at level 1 is god awful.
Post Tasha's you now get 2 languages, expertise in 1 skill, and favored foe. Not as good, but a reasonable direct comparison.
Please don't use the phrase played correctly. There are multiple play styles for classes, characters, and campaigns. What you deem correct isn't possible in some by campaign based opportunity, or even allowed by some DM's. Your implication is people don't love the Ranger and critique it because they don't know what they are doing because they are wrong. I love your passion though.
I have switched to favored foe, but 5 levels in I have still not met my original favored enemy. Natural explorer was fine, and I used it great before swapping it out, but favored enemy is simply too niche. I love the flavor but there are simply too many instances where it is 100% useless for many levels. Making it a level 1 core ability was terrible design.
Theives cant is a pure ribbon and the rogue gets expertise in 2 skills at level 1 and sneak attack die.....ranger by comparison at level 1 is god awful.
Post Tasha's you now get 2 languages, expertise in 1 skill, and favored foe. Not as good, but a reasonable direct comparison.
Oh yeah full agree there....Ranger needed the buff which is nice to see they get a lot more at 1st level now.
Not terrible. Just not used at most tables. Played correctly, D&D 5E ranger’s (and their abilities) are great. Now we have options for different play styles!
And favored enemy was at LEAST as good as thieve’s cant. LOL!
Theives cant is a pure ribbon and the rogue gets expertise in 2 skills at level 1 and sneak attack die.....ranger by comparison at level 1 is god awful.
Sarcasm, dude.
And why can't I say things like "played correctly" but others can say things are "god awful" with no recourse?
Optimus, your distain for the ranger is not as infectious as you would believe. It's just shouting your opinion.
I like the fact that its slightly less valuable than hunter's mark but almost as useful. It might even be better in limited circumstances. It means each ranger can decide which trade offs to make. Dont want HM you have an option. Running out of spells slots, you have an option. Don't need favored foe then Get favored enemy. At one point wizards said they didn't want overshadow old choices. I think it achieved a Decent ballance.
In that mindset, yes, I agree. I still favor Favored Enemy over Favored Foe in most circumstances, but you amke a good point that it does a good job of being a useful ability in its own right... and at the very least the fact that it's optional means that players going forward will only take it if they feel it's the right choice for their character.
Which is fair but also Favored Enemy has such limited ability that creating something that is on par with it is actually a mistake IMO.
Ranger needed a fix not another subpar option....and while Favored Foe is fine its definitely pretty lame in comparison to what UA offered.
I mean, you have the option to trade an exploration and knowledge set of skills for an ability that can be used directly in combat. Is it as good or better than hunter's mark? No. Is it another option and resource to use with the ranger's combat toolkit? Yes. Have you looked at the ranger's damage output? (That is a rhetorical question. I know you have.) You could take away favored enemy and replace it with nothing and still be fine. This optional ability saves a ranger spell slots. Period. It does it at the cost of not having quite as much damage output as hunter's mark.
Mostly I point the fact ranger was the only class to get completely new abilities at pretty much every milestone...
It's because the original options were terrible.
Favored enemy was least interesting and least impactful class feature in 5e and that's basically the only reason favored foe is something I would take.
I'll be one of the first to say that I do not like Favoured Enemy, mostly because it is far too niche to be of value in certain campaigns, plus I think the whole design of having a favoured enemy is a little bit lazy. When Tasha's had an optional replacement for Favoured Enemy I was pretty excited, here was going to be something great! However, it is just a combat thing, bland, boring and uninteresting (for me), I'm reasonably confident that 10 times out of 9 I will take Favoured Enemy over Favoured Foe because at least FE actually has some interesting theme and backstory/frontstory opportunities, whereas FF is just a combat buff. I feel maybe I'll be in the minority though.
Unfortunately I like Natural Explorer and Deft Explorer...
Not terrible. Just not used at most tables. Played correctly, D&D 5E ranger’s (and their abilities) are great. Now we have options for different play styles!
And favored enemy was at LEAST as good as thieve’s cant. LOL!
Theives cant is a pure ribbon and the rogue gets expertise in 2 skills at level 1 and sneak attack die.....ranger by comparison at level 1 is god awful.
Sarcasm, dude.
And why can't I say things like "played correctly" but others can say things are "god awful" with no recourse?
Optimus, you're distain for the ranger is not as infectious as you would believe. It's just shouting your opinion.
Actually it seems it was a pretty popular opinion considering the 7 different iterations of ranger we have had.....
With the release of Tasha, it's just funny to note that we are now up to 7 different versions of the same class.
I like the fact that its slightly less valuable than hunter's mark but almost as useful. It might even be better in limited circumstances. It means each ranger can decide which trade offs to make. Dont want HM you have an option. Running out of spells slots, you have an option. Don't need favored foe then Get favored enemy. At one point wizards said they didn't want overshadow old choices. I think it achieved a Decent ballance.
In that mindset, yes, I agree. I still favor Favored Enemy over Favored Foe in most circumstances, but you amke a good point that it does a good job of being a useful ability in its own right... and at the very least the fact that it's optional means that players going forward will only take it if they feel it's the right choice for their character.
Which is fair but also Favored Enemy has such limited ability that creating something that is on par with it is actually a mistake IMO.
Ranger needed a fix not another subpar option....and while Favored Foe is fine its definitely pretty lame in comparison to what UA offered.
I mean, you have the option to trade an exploration and knowledge set of skills for an ability that can be used directly in combat. Is it as good or better than hunter's mark? No. Is it another option and resource to use with the ranger's combat toolkit? Yes. Have you looked at the ranger's damage output? (That is a rhetorical question. I know you have.) You could take away favored enemy and replace it with nothing and still be fine. This optional ability saves a ranger spell slots. Period. It does it at the cost of not having quite as much damage output as hunter's mark.
Mostly I point the fact ranger was the only class to get completely new abilities at pretty much every milestone...
It's because the original options were terrible.
Favored enemy was least interesting and least impactful class feature in 5e and that's basically the only reason favored foe is something I would take.
I'll be one of the first to say that I do not like Favoured Enemy, mostly because it is far too niche to be of value in certain campaigns, plus I think the whole design of having a favoured enemy is a little bit lazy. When Tasha's had an optional replacement for Favoured Enemy I was pretty excited, here was going to be something great! However, it is just a combat thing, bland, boring and uninteresting (for me), I'm reasonably confident that 10 times out of 9 I will take Favoured Enemy over Favoured Foe because at least FE actually has some interesting theme and backstory/frontstory opportunities, whereas FF is just a combat buff. I feel maybe I'll be in the minority though.
Unfortunately I like Natural Explorer and Deft Explorer...
I like FF and FE (thought I think FE requires work with DM or could be a waste of class feature) and I like NE and DE. I sort of wish or maybe I'll homebrew some sort of feat a Ranger can take to have both. You choose one feature and you have the option of taking the other en lieu of ASI, leveling of the out of synch feature needs to be worked out. Not sure whether explorer and foe/enemy would be separate feats or combined. If the latter maybe call the feature "Complete Ranger get up."
I'm imagining someone's probably done this already in the past month.
Rollback Post to RevisionRollBack
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Optimus, I’m not saying the ranger fits the type of game most D&D 5E players play. It doesn’t. Square peg. Round hole. I’m saying the ranger is wonderfully designed for a different type of D&D game. I don’t know what to call it. Older? Grittier? More immersive? Outdated? Something. I think the designers made assumptions about how most players did or would play the game they made, but were wrong. Then you add profit seeking on top of that... You are making blanket statements based on your opinions about the ranger’s abilities, but from what I can tell you don’t play a game or in games that use the ranger. It would be like playing a paladin that uses a longbow and leather armor and complaining they don’t get to use their smite or lay on hands very often. Rangers work really well. Their abilities work really well. Tasha’s was made as an option for certain types of games and players. Think of it as a personal gift from WotC to you!
Optimus, I’m not saying the ranger fits the type of game most D&D 5E players play. It doesn’t. Square peg. Round hole. I’m saying the ranger is wonderfully designed for a different type of D&D game. I don’t know what to call it. Older? Grittier? More immersive? Outdated? Something. I think the designers made assumptions about how most players did or would play the game they made, but were wrong. Then you add profit seeking on top of that... You are making blanket statements based on your opinions about the ranger’s abilities, but from what I can tell you don’t play a game or in games that use the ranger. It would be like playing a paladin that uses a longbow and leather armor and complaining they don’t get to use their smite or lay on hands very often. Rangers work really well. Their abilities work really well. Tasha’s was made as an option for certain types of games and players. Think of it as a personal gift from WotC to you!
Funny thing is that they knew that the game did not support this type of play for some time after the PHB ranger came out but it took them 6 years to come up with a solution that stuck....
For ranger it is much more about fitting these terrible features from the ranger into the game as the DM vs. the other classes features just naturally fit into the game a lot easier.
I feel like Favored Enemy rewards a Ranger more than Natural Explorer. Obviously, the biggest problem with NE is that it rewards the Ranger on checks that a large number of tables simply ignore... group travel is often arbitrated to move faster, food is often tracked loosely, and all benefits of the Class Feature only apply if the players are in the specific terrain the Ranger specializes in. In my own campaign with a Ranger it mostly just manifested as the player having expertise in Perception specifically in their favored terrain... and I'm realizing now that I also gave them advantage on stealth in their favored terrain as well, but that's not actually something the class feature adds. The player got the same benefits, and more, when I let them switch to Deft Explorer and they simply took expertise in Perception in general and went out of their way to find a Cloak of Elven Kind.
FE still has the problem of only applying to specific enemy types, but if you know going into the campaign what kind of enemies to expect you'll at least get more use out of it, since it rewards checks that are more likely to come up in an average game of D&D. Getting advantage to track an enemy type is useful at times, but more useful than that is having advantage on knowledge checks related to the enemy type. As a DM, I almost always want my players to succeed on knowledge checks... because I have a bunch of information written down and if they fail those checks I can't really do anything with that information. Plus it's always nice to have an additional language on hand... I've actually been caught off guard a few times because I forgot that a character spoke a language I was trying to use, so it's not just something that comes up when the DM caters the game to their players' specific abilities. Still, there's always the risk of the ability never once coming up in a game... there's gotta be someone out there who excitedly came up with an interesting backstory for why their character's favored enemy was Oozes only to maybe run into one gelatinous cube in a cave somewhere... or even to go through a large chunk of an adventure fighting undead, reaching level 6 just before defeating the necromancer organizing an Undead invasion, and then never running into another Undead for the rest of the campaign.
Still, I like the RP potential of Favored Enemy enough to think it's worth being suboptimal compared to other class abilities at level 1. Within my campaign, the Ranger was raised with a zealot-like adherence to the natural order, which Undead are in direct defiance of. Their favored enemy helped to decide who their character was, what their backstory was, and what was important to them. The same character also took mountains as their favored terrain... because they knew the particular adventure they were going on involved a lot of time spent in mountains. I threw them a bone and had their favored terrain apply to ruins as well... any large, mostly stone structure, really. But that was a lot harder to extrapolate interesting character details from, other than just establishing that they grew up in a mountainous area.
I like the fact that its slightly less valuable than hunter's mark but almost as useful. It might even be better in limited circumstances. It means each ranger can decide which trade offs to make. Dont want HM you have an option. Running out of spells slots, you have an option. Don't need favored foe then Get favored enemy. At one point wizards said they didn't want overshadow old choices. I think it achieved a Decent ballance.
Agreed. My favorite neat synergy is to keep original favored enemy, but take Deft Explorer. Stack that on the Anthropologist background, and you are a language expert. You could have 8 languages by level 8. And if you want to keep it going drop in a level of Knowledge cleric for two more, and linguist for 3 more. 9th level you could have 13 languages.
Why would you want to? I don't know, but sounds like fun in a planescape or spelljammer game.
In that mindset, yes, I agree. I still favor Favored Enemy over Favored Foe in most circumstances, but you amke a good point that it does a good job of being a useful ability in its own right... and at the very least the fact that it's optional means that players going forward will only take it if they feel it's the right choice for their character.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium
Which is fair but also Favored Enemy has such limited ability that creating something that is on par with it is actually a mistake IMO.
Ranger needed a fix not another subpar option....and while Favored Foe is fine its definitely pretty lame in comparison to what UA offered.
I mean, you have the option to trade an exploration and knowledge set of skills for an ability that can be used directly in combat. Is it as good or better than hunter's mark? No. Is it another option and resource to use with the ranger's combat toolkit? Yes. Have you looked at the ranger's damage output? (That is a rhetorical question. I know you have.) You could take away favored enemy and replace it with nothing and still be fine. This optional ability saves a ranger spell slots. Period. It does it at the cost of not having quite as much damage output as hunter's mark.
Mostly I point the fact ranger was the only class to get completely new abilities at pretty much every milestone...
It's because the original options were terrible.
Favored enemy was least interesting and least impactful class feature in 5e and that's basically the only reason favored foe is something I would take.
Not terrible. Just not used at most tables. Played [in a campaign that features a lot of wilderness exploration and survival, language barriers, and knowledge checks], D&D 5E ranger’s (and their abilities) are great. Now we have options for different play styles!
And favored enemy was at LEAST as good as thieve’s cant. LOL!
Theives cant is a pure ribbon and the rogue gets expertise in 2 skills at level 1 and sneak attack die.....ranger by comparison at level 1 is god awful.
Post Tasha's you now get 2 languages, expertise in 1 skill, and favored foe. Not as good, but a reasonable direct comparison.
I edited my response.
Oh yeah full agree there....Ranger needed the buff which is nice to see they get a lot more at 1st level now.
Sarcasm, dude.
And why can't I say things like "played correctly" but others can say things are "god awful" with no recourse?
Optimus, your distain for the ranger is not as infectious as you would believe. It's just shouting your opinion.
I'll be one of the first to say that I do not like Favoured Enemy, mostly because it is far too niche to be of value in certain campaigns, plus I think the whole design of having a favoured enemy is a little bit lazy. When Tasha's had an optional replacement for Favoured Enemy I was pretty excited, here was going to be something great! However, it is just a combat thing, bland, boring and uninteresting (for me), I'm reasonably confident that 10 times out of 9 I will take Favoured Enemy over Favoured Foe because at least FE actually has some interesting theme and backstory/frontstory opportunities, whereas FF is just a combat buff. I feel maybe I'll be in the minority though.
Unfortunately I like Natural Explorer and Deft Explorer...
Actually it seems it was a pretty popular opinion considering the 7 different iterations of ranger we have had.....
With the release of Tasha, it's just funny to note that we are now up to 7 different versions of the same class.
PHB Ranger. (2014)
UA: Spell-less Ranger. (2015)
UA: The Ranger (2015)
UA: The Ranger, Revised (2016)
Mike Mearls' Ranger. (2018)
UA: Class Feature Variants (2019)
And lastly, Tasha's Cauldron of Everything (2020)
I like FF and FE (thought I think FE requires work with DM or could be a waste of class feature) and I like NE and DE. I sort of wish or maybe I'll homebrew some sort of feat a Ranger can take to have both. You choose one feature and you have the option of taking the other en lieu of ASI, leveling of the out of synch feature needs to be worked out. Not sure whether explorer and foe/enemy would be separate feats or combined. If the latter maybe call the feature "Complete Ranger get up."
I'm imagining someone's probably done this already in the past month.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
Optimus, I’m not saying the ranger fits the type of game most D&D 5E players play. It doesn’t. Square peg. Round hole. I’m saying the ranger is wonderfully designed for a different type of D&D game. I don’t know what to call it. Older? Grittier? More immersive? Outdated? Something. I think the designers made assumptions about how most players did or would play the game they made, but were wrong. Then you add profit seeking on top of that... You are making blanket statements based on your opinions about the ranger’s abilities, but from what I can tell you don’t play a game or in games that use the ranger. It would be like playing a paladin that uses a longbow and leather armor and complaining they don’t get to use their smite or lay on hands very often. Rangers work really well. Their abilities work really well. Tasha’s was made as an option for certain types of games and players. Think of it as a personal gift from WotC to you!
Funny thing is that they knew that the game did not support this type of play for some time after the PHB ranger came out but it took them 6 years to come up with a solution that stuck....
For ranger it is much more about fitting these terrible features from the ranger into the game as the DM vs. the other classes features just naturally fit into the game a lot easier.
Opinion. Personal experience. Opinion. All stated as fact.
Well Majority opinion that lead to massive change for the class....so yeah.
I feel like Favored Enemy rewards a Ranger more than Natural Explorer. Obviously, the biggest problem with NE is that it rewards the Ranger on checks that a large number of tables simply ignore... group travel is often arbitrated to move faster, food is often tracked loosely, and all benefits of the Class Feature only apply if the players are in the specific terrain the Ranger specializes in. In my own campaign with a Ranger it mostly just manifested as the player having expertise in Perception specifically in their favored terrain... and I'm realizing now that I also gave them advantage on stealth in their favored terrain as well, but that's not actually something the class feature adds. The player got the same benefits, and more, when I let them switch to Deft Explorer and they simply took expertise in Perception in general and went out of their way to find a Cloak of Elven Kind.
FE still has the problem of only applying to specific enemy types, but if you know going into the campaign what kind of enemies to expect you'll at least get more use out of it, since it rewards checks that are more likely to come up in an average game of D&D. Getting advantage to track an enemy type is useful at times, but more useful than that is having advantage on knowledge checks related to the enemy type. As a DM, I almost always want my players to succeed on knowledge checks... because I have a bunch of information written down and if they fail those checks I can't really do anything with that information. Plus it's always nice to have an additional language on hand... I've actually been caught off guard a few times because I forgot that a character spoke a language I was trying to use, so it's not just something that comes up when the DM caters the game to their players' specific abilities. Still, there's always the risk of the ability never once coming up in a game... there's gotta be someone out there who excitedly came up with an interesting backstory for why their character's favored enemy was Oozes only to maybe run into one gelatinous cube in a cave somewhere... or even to go through a large chunk of an adventure fighting undead, reaching level 6 just before defeating the necromancer organizing an Undead invasion, and then never running into another Undead for the rest of the campaign.
Still, I like the RP potential of Favored Enemy enough to think it's worth being suboptimal compared to other class abilities at level 1. Within my campaign, the Ranger was raised with a zealot-like adherence to the natural order, which Undead are in direct defiance of. Their favored enemy helped to decide who their character was, what their backstory was, and what was important to them. The same character also took mountains as their favored terrain... because they knew the particular adventure they were going on involved a lot of time spent in mountains. I threw them a bone and had their favored terrain apply to ruins as well... any large, mostly stone structure, really. But that was a lot harder to extrapolate interesting character details from, other than just establishing that they grew up in a mountainous area.
Watch Crits for Breakfast, an adults-only RP-Heavy Roll20 Livestream at twitch.tv/afterdisbooty
And now you too can play with the amazing art and assets we use in Roll20 for our campaign at Hazel's Emporium