Thanks that was a well reasoned answer to the original question. I also appreciate you breaking down the merits/benefits of Tasha's new features. I agree that the text is bland compared to the flavor of the original. I miss the favored enemy concept and how it shapes your character (even if I didn't like how it was laid out in this edition).
The benefit I see in the new bland abilities and even the spells is that I find they situationally flavor your character more towards being a Ranger than they did before through play and rolling. I guess I find they play more flavorfully than they are written.
VERY well spoken sfPanzer. I think at this point the various opinions have been expanded upon well enough, and I will only add that I too, really dislike Favored Foe. I think I like the new options more than you as a whole, but Favored Foe was a huge a miss for me both in flavor and function. I cannot stand they made it Hunter's Mark lite.
The benefit I see in the new bland abilities and even the spells is that I find they situationally flavor your character more towards being a Ranger than they did before through play and rolling. I guess I find they play more flavorfully than they are written.
THIS. For me bland abilities that I use are much better than flavorful abilities that I almost never use. How much flavor can an ability realistically add to the feel of a character if you rarely, if ever use it.
And I love that second sentence. I think that's a lot of DnD. A rogue's expertise is not particularly flavorful. It's just a mechanical increase. What you say those mechanics means about your particular character and their story is where the flavor comes from.
Natural Explorer. As others have already mentioned the first half is not as situational as it might seem on the first glance once you put some thought into it. However my main issue with this one is the second half. It lets you skip the majority of the exploration pillar when in your favourite terrain instead of making you feel like you are good at it. That's terrible design. Imagine Fighters being able to skip the majority of the encounters or Bards being able to skip the majority of the social stuff.
Deft Explorer (replaces Natural Explorer). Once again I feel like it takes away a lot of the flavour of the feature it replaces. Instead of having an interesting mechanic you simply get generic Expertise in one of your skills. At leve 6 you get +5 movement speed as well as climbing and swimming speed which is something that mainly comes into play during combat. The level 10 bonus is absolutely laughable though. Using your Action for 1d8+WIS temp HP is terrible and while removing a level of Exhaustion with a Short Rest is nice in itself, Exhaustion is so punishing that most DMs hesitate using it too much anyway.
I personally like the fact that they took away the flavor from natural explorer and favored enemy. The very first time i opened a PHB to read what classes in this new and exotic game were all about, i read the ranger and thought: "Damn, i like this natury jack of all trades class, but why the hell do i need to choose one specific type of enemy i want to focus on?" I love the versatile feel i get from this class but those features take away from that rather than adding to it. I don't want my ranger to be a forest specialist. I want my ranger to be an exploration specialist. I don't want my ranger to specifically have studied orcs for ten years. I want my ranger to have travelled the frontier and encountered a whole diverse slew of monsters without specialising in one. Basically, i feel like the old features were trying to force me into a very specific backstory which i didn't like at all, despite liking the class and what it stood for. The simple expertise this feature provides (which i immediately put into survival) encompasses this flavor much more for me. Similairly, i love the different movement options. When standing infront of a cliff, i want my ranger to be the first one scaling it. When attempting to cross a fast flowing current, i want my ranger to dive into it to test the waters and tie a rope to a tree on the other side for the others to use. I agree that the level 10 feature feels like it is largely a ribbon, but do remember that it comes at the same time as the new nature's veil, which, to me, seems like an extremely strong ability. While i do recognize that it will probably never come up during a campaign, i love the fact that a ranger can basically track a group of orcs for weeks, occasionally taking a short rest to keep himself standing, while spending the rest of the night shooting random arrows at the orc camp with the only purpose being to make sure that not a single one of them will be able to sleep. This feature, albeit a ribbon, turns the ranger into the ultimate pursuit predator. It immediately reminded me of the following short story I once read. It was promotional material for Guild Wars 2, but it really stuck to me.
The fire blew sparks toward the heavens like stars seeking to return to their high, dark home. But there was no joy in this blaze, no celebration. What had once been a proud lodge was now little more than piles of ash huddled in the shadows of flickering, ember-lit logs. "I'm sorry, Viskar." The old skaald placed his hand on the boy's shoulder. "There's nothing we can do. Your father lost the house, and everything in it, on his last wager with Grimhilde. She had the right to do whatever she chose with her winnings." "She cheated. She cheated, but I can't prove it. What of my father, Fiach?" The youth snarled the words, biting off the syllables like a wolf gnawing its leg out of a trap. "Did she have the 'right' to kill him, too?" Old Fiach sighed. "He was wrong to attack her. There will be no retribution from the Wolfborn of Hoelbrak for Grimhilde's actions. Nor should you seek vengeance upon her, Viskar. You are a new hunter, barely old enough to bear your own blade. Grimhilde is powerful, and legends of her cruelty are told at the moot to frighten children and humans." Shaking his head, the skaald pulled a leopard-fur cloak closer about his weary bones. "Put away your anger, young one. Bury your father. Leave this matter to the crows." "No." Viskar wiped away his tears with the back of his hand, leaving soot stains across pale cheeks. "I may be young, Fiach, and I may be inexperienced." "But I am still norn." — The stars above the Shiverpeaks were cold and bright, crowned by the iridescent borealis of the northern sky. In the Great Lodge of Hoelbrak, a youth stood before the shamans and sought lessons of revenge. "No," said the shaman of Bear. "Learn strength, Viskar. Learn wisdom. Grimhilde does not seek victory. She seeks the utter annihilation of her enemy. I will not teach you to throw away your life." "I am sorry," said Wolf's followers. "We would gladly help you avenge your family, but what you propose is suicide. Think of your pack. If you attack Grimhilde, she will punish those you love.' The Havroun of Raven shook his head when Viskar asked. "You cannot even tell me how she cheated. Grimhilde is clever, and she always has a lethal surprise for her enemies. If you do not know more than she does, she will destroy you." Viskar clenched his fists. "Will no one help me?" A shadow moved in the corner of the lodge, and yellow eyes gleamed. "You haven't asked me yet," murmured the Speaker of Snow Leopard, Valharantha, her movements smooth and graceful. "Will Snow Leopard teach me to take vengeance?" he asked. "If I follow her path, will she show me how to defeat Grimhilde?" "More." Valharantha lowered her eyes and smiled. "She will turn your vengeance into legend." — Grimhilde knelt, studying the tracks. She'd been following them for six days, since the skaalds in Hoelbrak sung the legend of Whisperclaw, a fierce young mountain cat. Soon, she would challenge the beast, and— "Grimhilde!" a voice called from the mountainside above. With a start, she reached for her weapon. Had someone come before her? Was her prey dead by another's hand? In anger, the warrior straightened and peered up into the crags. She did not have to wait long to see her enemy. "Who are you?" she asked cautiously, fingering the blade on her axe. If this stripling had stolen her prize, she would make him pay...with pain. "I am your death, walking." The youth stood on a high ledge, balancing effortlessly. "Four years ago, you cheated my father of his life. I am here to avenge that debt." "I remember you now." Grimhilde stepped backward and swept her axe from side to side. "Your father was a weak little thing—as are you. I should have slain you as a child, but that old man talked me out of it. No matter. I will deal with you, and when I return to the Great Lodge, I will end that relic of a storyteller as well." The youth snarled, eyes bright with cold, bitter revenge. "You've come here to hunt," he said, "but you're the one being hunted. It is six days back to Hoelbrak over ice and snow, with no safe haven, no lodges or campgrounds along the way." "You think to fight me?" she laughed. "Kill me, Grimhilde the Ferocious? The mightiest axe-wielder among the norn? You will die mewling like a kitten, young one. You're not powerful enough!" "You're right. I'm not powerful enough to face you on your terms, so I'll face you on mine." The young hunter smiled wickedly. "Snow Leopard trained me in stealth and tracking. She also taught me to steel my mind against slumber. I can go five days without resting. I'll die after six, but I'll do it if I must. But you...you have to sleep sometime. And I'm willing to bet my life that you'll rest before I do." Grimhilde stared at him, the blood draining from her face. "You would kill me in my sleep?" "I will wait until my prey is at her weakest, and then I will strike." The young hunter smiled grimly. "And by Snow Leopard, I swear—you will never hear me coming." — "Let me tell you a tale." Old Fiach the skaald raised his hands to the sky as the fires of the moot crackled and leapt. "The story of the hero known as Viskar Whisperclaw. Hail the honor-son! Rightful rage-tender, shadow-striker, slayer of treasonous Grimhilde. Viskar, who despite all challenges, was willing to give his life to claim blood-debt from the one who had done him harm..."
Level 3
Primeval Awareness. The flavour is great however the mechanic is largely useless. You get basically no useful informations for the spell slot you use. Not the direction of the creatures, not the amount of creatures, not how far away they are. You only get to know if they are within 1 mile/6 miles, period. That's information you can usually easily get by other means already anyway. You have few spell slots and can make better use of them by casting actual spells.
Primal Awareness (replaces Primeval Awareness). It's a LOT more useful than the feature it replaces. However by giving free Druid spells per day it pushes the Ranger more towards being a wannabe Druid. Especially since they kept the super druidic spells like speak with animals and beastsense and took away the better fitting spells for a Ranger like locate animals or plants from the UA version. Also simply giving out free spells of another class is very bland and generic compared to having a mechanic unique to the Ranger.
Well, the spells are also on the ranger classlist so i wouldn't really call them druid spells, although i get where you come from. The only spell i don't really like in this section is beast sense. The flavor seems out of touch with feeling nature in order to gain information. I would have much rather had locate animal/plant. Then again, that would have become redundant once yo get locate creature so... guess it's ok? I might have also preferred detect magic but there are already a lot of other classes who have a high chance of taking this so guess it's fine as well. From the few times i have played the variant ranger, i can already say that these spells come in very handy and made me feel much more adept at exloring than i expect primeval awareness would have done.
Let me just quickly get my own stance of the ranger out of the way: The PHB Ranger seems to be doing fine balancewise but I do feel like the PHB ranger has some very niche and specific features where i feel like the features would fit better if they were broader, even if that meant they would lose a bit of power. I really love the new variant Ranger and will be playing it a lot.
PS: Oh god, i finally officially entered the PHB Ranger good/bad discussion.
VERY well spoken sfPanzer. I think at this point the various opinions have been expanded upon well enough, and I will only add that I too, really dislike Favored Foe. I think I like the new options more than you as a whole, but Favored Foe was a huge a miss for me both in flavor and function. I cannot stand they made it Hunter's Mark lite.
Favored Foe is an interesting thing. First, its something designed to stack with the weak Foe Slayer. So instead of only being able to use Foe Slayer with three types of monsters now you can use it during any combat in conjunction with Favored Foe. So instead of a very situational capstone you get a capstone you can use every combat.
In function I have used it to stretch spell slots. There are certain fights where you don't need the full Hunter's Mark and don't want to burn a spell slot. If it gets kicked off by failing concentration its less of a big deal when you have few spell slots remaining. At low levels, 2X a day you can do that. I don't think it would cause me to replace HM in my spell list, but at higher levels that might make sense. Theoretically it can't be dispelled via spell.
Design wise FF and Deft Explorer were meant to be taken together, or at least they seem to me. Existing favored enemy granted bonuses to track, knowledge of the creature, and a free language. Two of those languages are now found in Deft Explorer (the third at 14th you just lose). The tracking bonuses can generally be gotten from Expertise in Survival from (Deft Explorer), but you aren't locked into that selection. The rest of Deft Explorer adds mostly crunch to help offset the ribbon losses from Natural Explorer. Taken together you lose the specificity and flavor of Favored Enemy but functionally if you Expertise in Survival you get a better tracker. The knowledge of the enemy piece was lost, which is a shame. In exchange you gain Favored Foe which can stretch your spell slots and at 14 when the die jumps to a d8 may have some utility over Hunter's Mark.
Forgot something on FF. The fact it kicks in on a successful hit means you don't burn a spell slot, miss the entire round, and then get damaged without ever using it. Every time you use FF you will do damage since it turns on with a hit.
Wow. A lot of you are throwing around words like “specialist”. That has never been what the ranger is. That’s not the idea behind the thematic design. That’s not the mechanical design. That is not the point of the base class at all.
"Warriors of the wilderness, rangers specialize in " Its the first sentence of the character description. But you are right about the mechanical design. That disconnect between is part of the problem people have with the PHB Ranger.
If you are calculating damage output factoring in to-hit chance, especially with sharp shooter, foe slayer is great!
I agree with you here. The ability to add wisdom to the attack bonus, turning a miss into a hit, or adding a little damage, for free, every round, is pretty good. What made this ability bad was Favored Enemy. If you weren't fighting a favored enemy, this literally does nothing. They should have just given this ability without the favored enemy requirement and I'd say it was probably in the top 50% of level 20 abilities. The favored enemy requirement though... sucks. Bad. You only get 3 favored enemies, or 4 if you took 2 humanoid races. How many humanoid races are there?! There are 30+ playable races and I think they're almost all humanoid. That's not to mention there are 13 classifications for creatures other than humanoids. You have to either cheat and pick what you know you'll use or get lucky. With all the options, I'd be real surprised if you got to use this ability more that 15% of the time without cheating to pick the favored enemies.
The scout rogue is terrible as a ranger. It is a subclass that dabbles in outdoors travel. Expertise in two skills doesn’t compare to the ranger’s abilities and spells. Plus, what little the rogue has in this department only helps them. The ranger helps the entire party. It’s not even close to a replacement.
I think they meant that it gives expertise in the two skills that a ranger should be better at. Obviously the scout rogue doesn't have spells or other things. However, it's more consistently better at nature and survival skills than the Ranger and thus actually better equipped to track a foe or do rangery skill based things.
Much of the ranger’s spells are concentration. This is a good thing, contrary to popular belief. A ranger keeps up concentration on one spell to step in time with paladins, fighters, barbarians, and rogues in combat. They don’t need as many spells known or prepared casting. It would be too much.
It wouldn't be too much. That doesn't make any sense. It's not too much for Paladins, the class most in common with the ranger. And the paladin has more ubiquitously useful abilities outside of spells and a WAY bigger spell list. They have the same number of spell slots and can use those slots to smite for added damage. The added functionality for spell lots that rangers get? They can know if a creature type is within a mile. How often will that be used compared to smite? They could have made this better by making it similar to druid spellcasting and it wouldn't have pushed rangers into "too much" territory at all.
Hide in plain sight requires a minute of work beforehand. But then you can walk around with it ready to go when you need it. You lay flat against a surface and can hide with a +10! That’s amazing! By this level rangers aren’t slowed by difficult terrain and they remain alert while traveling so they can take this one minute of prep and easily keep up with the group. Any time a spellcaster casts a ritual spell or the party takes a short rest the ranger can do the prep for hide in plain sight.
Is this still useful? Sure. However, this doesn't really add anything to the kit that the Ranger can't already do and is thus not something I find super appealing. You lose the effect if you do pretty much anything. You know what else grants +10 to stealth? Pass Without Trace. It works for your whole party and you can even move. That's not the only spell that aids in being stealthy either. Yes, I know this probably stacks with Pass Without Trace, but it doesn't add anything new.
I agree that the ranger can do a lot. The spells are useful, he can dish out some fairly good damage, can take a beating, and even do a little bit of healing. He has some useful skills and abilities. Many of them are so situational that it's dumb though. But saying that it's versatile doesn't mean that all its features are good features. Take away all these situational abilities and what are you left with? A ranger that's basically just as good.
In summation (because we're once again going in circles on the subject): Ranger is good but has some real dumb situational filler abilities. Some subclasses are good, some are not. Tasha's gave a bunch of optional features that gave those of us that see problems with the Ranger a way to better enjoy the class.
To the OP: You will have fun with your ranger. The problems of the class won't necessarily detract from the fun you'll have. If you want to fulfill that ranger fantasy, you can do it and you'll love it. Check out Tasha's optional features (especially if you want to play Beast Master). Then at least you'll be able to pick which group you're in and better enjoy the class.
We are going around in circles. I wish we could all play together so we could see how each other approaches the class and the game.
I read, play, and see the ranger (beast master included) being more than fine. Being great. And not being an issue at all. I will admit that I get frustrated when folks dog-pile on the class just to point out the "bad stuff". This makes for a self fulfilling prophecy as far as I am concerned. Maybe some day someone will give me an argument, complaint, or evidence that it (the ranger and beast master) is as bad as they believe it to be. But until that day...
Don't worry, sfPanzer, I won't repeat those dreaded words. I'm not here to upset anyone or anything.
sfPanzer I like your explanations very much. Especially you taking more time to make your presentation easier to read than mine. When I read my posts back I worry that my arguments may be hard to follow.
Comparing a bad capstone to another bad capstone is not a good argument. It is generally well received that most capstones are lacking. It is no great thing to say that Foe Slayer holds up to another disappointing capstone. It would be a completely different scenario if the rest of the Ranger wasn't also poorly designed because then the only complaint would be a bad capstone on an otherwise well-designed class which can be said of most of the classes.
A capstone should feel like I have reached the quintessential archetype of a class. So many capstones fail to do this, rather they instead just feel like another decent feature that in many cases could have been swapped for another low-level feature. But in other cases, the Druid, Redemption Paladin, and Wizard for example, all have mechanics that are not only powerful but reflect the idea of their archetypes in a huge way.
On top of that, you need to compare how a capstone compares to the low-level features of other classes seeing as multiclassing is such a powerful option. This is generally an argument against all bad capstones, but focusing on the Ranger for now. The ONLY thing a Ranger gets at level 20 is Foe Slayer. It is ONLY useful against a favored enemy. They've even maxed out their spell progression.
Without magic items, you have a maxed WIS Ranger giving +5 to the attack OR damage to a specific type of creature each turn. One level of rogue gives me Expertise and a d6 to every single creature and all I have to do is set myself up for advantage. Thieve's cant is nice. That on its own is comparable, its usage is not dependent on the DM's story but on my own strategic positioning and the party's coordination.
If I'm a Wizard, when I sacrifice my signature spells in order to multiclass into Cleric, I genuinely feel like I am losing something valuable for not maintaining that dedication to the class. But I am likewise gaining something valuable in return because a level 1 Cleric's features are so strong.
If I take one level of Rogue, Fighter, Bard, Wizard, pretty much any class instead of level 20 Ranger. I'm not sacrificing anything because the level one benefits of the next class are so great. Again, this isn't unique to the Ranger, it is a problem with most capstones, but a bad capstone on a bad class is worse than a bad capstone on a good class and makes the weaknesses of the class that much more prominent.
I read, play, and see the ranger (beast master included) being less than fine. Being subpar in many areas and inadequate in far too many. It is a big issue. I will admit that I get frustrated when folks put the class on a pedestal just to overhype the "good stuff". This is a serious case of confirmation bias as far as I am concerned. Maybe someday someone will give me an argument, complaint, or evidence that it (the ranger and beast master) are as good as they believe it to be. But until that day...
Korbin_Orion, why do you hate the ranger so much? It’s fun to play, has great mechanics (mathematically sound), fits well with any party, fills a couple of roles other classes don’t, and great thematically. Why do you compare the best parts of other classes and say the ranger doesn’t come close to them? The rogue’s ability and skill checks, the wizard’s (I don’t know why wizards are being involved) capstone ability, the fighter’s damage output, the paladin’s tankiness and healing resources, and the druid’s spell casting. Those classes don’t have to be held up to one another in comparison, do they? It’s like you are bent on convincing others the ranger is garbage, and do so by arguing each little part of their kit sucks compared to a whole basket of “comparable” parts from 5 other classes. If the ranger is the worst class, either by opinion, math, or otherwise, it’s not like it would be the worst by a long shot, off the charts, should never be played, or deleted from the game. The ranger touches on so many abilities and roles. Master of none, and all that. Why is that a bad thing? I hope the fighter is good at fighting. I hope the rogue is good at skill checks. I hope the paladin can sit on the front lines to dish out damage and heal folks. They have to. That’s what they do. Sure, the ranger isn’t the master of one thing in the game it can call it’s own. Why is that a bad thing to you?
On top of that, you need to compare how a capstone compares to the low-level features of other classes seeing as multiclassing is such a powerful option. This is generally an argument against all bad capstones, but focusing on the Ranger for now. The ONLY thing a Ranger gets at level 20 is Foe Slayer. It is ONLY useful against a favored enemy. They've even maxed out their spell progression.
Without magic items, you have a maxed WIS Ranger giving +5 to the attack OR damage to a specific type of creature each turn. One level of rogue gives me Expertise and a d6 to every single creature and all I have to do is set myself up for advantage. Thieve's cant is nice. That on its own is comparable, its usage is not dependent on the DM's story but on my own strategic positioning and the party's coordination.
If I'm a Wizard, when I sacrifice my signature spells in order to multiclass into Cleric, I genuinely feel like I am losing something valuable for not maintaining that dedication to the class. But I am likewise gaining something valuable in return because a level 1 Cleric's features are so strong.
Upon rereading the Ranger capstone, i am actually not that sure it is as bad as you give it credit for. Sure, a level of rogue can give you 1d6 extra damage while foe slayer will give 3-5 extra damage so in that regard, it seem bad. However, you completely skip over the fact that it can actually increase your to hit bonus AFTER you have rolled! That is comparable to a free advantage every turn that is only consumed if you actually needed it. And what if you didn't need it? Well, in that case it is translated into a small damage bonus, comparable to sneak attack. It is also very comparable to one of the crazy powerful new monk features, only it doesn't require any resource at all to use it.
I do agree that the ability certainly isn't very flashy and doesn't compare to the fighter, barbarian, cleric or druid capstone. Still, I wouldn't call it a bad feature that is worse than a single level in another class.
Now i do have to give in and agree that the fact that it only triggers against certain enemies is a huge dent it in. With this, it falls into the same line of specialiation that i hated with the original PHB ranger. With the new variant ranger... i'm not actually sure where this ability stands. It suddenly does become tied to a resource and to concentration on top of that...
So yeah, in conclusion i think i'd say it is not as bad as you say but it still has some glaring issues that might warrant fixing.
Just as a quick sidenote, how powerful is the wizard capstone? I never actually played a spellcaster to such a high level but me and the players in my group all agree that we find it pretty bland to get two extra 3th level spell slots at that level (Ok yes, and spells tied to them and recharge on SR but you get my point). Are 3th level spellslots really still that big of a deal for a level 20 caster? Genuinly asking btw, not trying to contradict you.
Wow. A lot of you are throwing around words like “specialist”. That has never been what the ranger is. That’s not the idea behind the thematic design. That’s not the mechanical design. That is not the point of the base class at all.
Then what would you call the favored enemy and the favored terrain features? I do agree with you that i want my ranger to be a generalist but these two features explicitly ask me to pick a terrain type and a monster type to specialise against. That initial choice would be my biggest complain about the PHB ranger. (Explained my standpoint regarding this in more depth a bit higher up).
If the ranger didn’t have them (or primeval awareness) they would still be able to take proficiency in nature and survival. Proficiency is almost as good as expertise at lower levels. Like a 10 or 15 percent difference. Their spells supplement these proficiencies by allowing the ranger to speak with plants and animals, move unseen and unheard, teleport from tree to tree, hunt and track creatures, etc. The ranger chooses an entire subtype of creatures to know a lot about. All fiends, all monstrosities, etc. Yes, they can track them better. That’s fine. But the knowledge checks (any and all intelligence checks, proficiency not required) associated with them is the real strength of the ability. They aren’t only a killer of these creature types. They study them and know all about them. Their customs, their habits. They speak their language. Where they live. What they eat. Their vulnerabilities and strengths. Then they pick one of the, what, eight land types in the game sans underwater and urban, to be extra familiar with. Anything related to that terrain, plants, animals, weather, food and water resources, traveling, they have expertise in without having to be in the land at all. They just know it. They can be in a city and have expertise in checks about animals or plants from that land. They can be in mountains with a favored land of forests and know things (expertise) that are in both (related to). There is cross pollination there. If they are actually in that land they get these stupendous abilities, much more than simple proficiency or expertise in two skills. As the ranger moves on they get more and more types of entire creatures types and additional land types to gain these benefits with. Of the eight land types, really four or five are going to be seen in a given adventure, and all creatures fall into on of the creature subtypes.
If the ranger didn’t have them (or primeval awareness) they would still be able to take proficiency in nature and survival. Proficiency is almost as good as expertise at lower levels. Like a 10 or 15 percent difference. Their spells supplement these proficiencies by allowing the ranger to speak with plants and animals, move unseen and unheard, teleport from tree to tree, hunt and track creatures, etc. The ranger chooses an entire subtype of creatures to know a lot about. All fiends, all monstrosities, etc. Yes, they can track them better. That’s fine. But the knowledge checks (any and all intelligence checks, proficiency not required) associated with them is the real strength of the ability. They aren’t only a killer of these creature types. They study them and know all about them. Then they pick one of the, what, eight land types in the game sans underwater and urban, to be extra familiar with. Anything related to that terrain, plants, animals, weather, food and water resources, traveling, they have expertise in without having to be in the land at all. They can be in a city and have expertise in checks about animals or plants from that land. If they are actually in that land they get these stupendous abilities far and away more than simple proficiency or expertise in two skills. As the ranger moves on they get more and more types of entire creatures types and additional land types to gain these benefits with. Of the eight land types, really four or five are going to be seen in a given adventure, and all creatures fall into on of the creature subtypes.
While you certainly succeed in making the features look much better than i originally gave them credit for, it doesn't change the fact that it is still a specialisation towards that one type of environment or monster. You can apply it in a broader way, sure, but is more trickle over from the specialisation than actual generalism. Simply the fact that you have to pick a terrain you prefer at all puts me off. While it might fit in the ranger i am currently playing, it doesn't fit at all in some of the other ranger concepts i have.
I feel like these feature would be much better at home if you could pick them up as half a feat on anyone who wants them, not just rangers. I might even see a watered down version of them appear as background feature. It might even be tied to a specific subclass, just not to the class in general. Actually, now that i think of it, some parts of these features are stuff that i just give my PC's for free anyway. If one of my players plays a wizard who has a backstory where he hunts dragons, i am not gonna have him make a check to determine if a footprint comes from a dragon or not. He would damn well recognize it as a dragon. The other party members would have to roll though.
I feel like one of the large differences between you and some other peoples on this topic is how the DM in your group rules the "related to your favored terrain" aspect. It is just so subjective how related something has to be to count. A mountain can be cold, have some grass, and have a few trees. Does this mean that a ranger with mountain terrain also has bonusses in arctic, forest and grassland? I suspect the answer to this question depends a whole lot on who you ask.
There is one more thing i want to point out about something you said earlier. Raw, you cannot use your favored enemy to use insight while dealing with a favored enemy as the feature explicitly states that it concerns intelligence checks to recall information, not gather information.
As a final note, I would like to ask you: "How do you feel about the tasha variant features? Especially deft explorer." Because for me, that one feature clearly steers the ranger away from a specialist towards a generalist.
Never said I hated the Ranger. The Ranger archetype has been my favorite ever since my very first Ranger was discovered naked in a barrel in a haunted mansion in my very first DnD game for a 3.0 campaign. I have made it very clear that I have played multiple Rangers and had fun doing so (and this is across multiple editions, including 5e).
The questions in your entire post have been explained not just by myself in two very long posts but by many others here.
I can literally copy/paste every other post I have made in this thread and it would answer just about every question you just posited clearly and concisely. It is you who refuses to accept my arguments.
Wannyboy, the latter half of your post sort of answered the question you asked me in regard to multiclassing Rogue, but I can clarify.
Usage:
Foe Slayer only works against one of your three types of Favored Enemies. I cannot force this, I cannot enable the feature myself. I have to hope my DM has one of my favored enemies in this combat. Otherwise, as I have expressed earlier, I need to go out of my way to derail the campaign just to hunt some orcs in order to "force" the feature.
Sneak Attack can be forced, and easily forced every single combat. Most commonly through an enemy engaged in combat with an ally, but also through hiding or having an enemy subject to some sort of condition that grants advantage and a plethora of other spells or class features.
The only other limitation to Sneak Attack is your choice of weapon, which is inconsequential.
So Sneak Attack is objectively more versatile, far easier to use than Foe Slayer.
Benefits:
Foe Slayer gives a bonus to the attack OR the damage role. This is a static bonus, so always your WIS mod. Without magical assistance, that means a maximum of +5. There are some factors that require forethought and luck to get this max bonus, however.
If you're rolling your character's ability scores, you can get unlucky stats. This is generally not an issue as it is incredibly rare not to have at least one good ability score.
If you take a standard array, You need to find some combination of picking the right race and feats/ASI throughout your progression to reach 20 wisdom. Harkening back to a common issue of the Ranger being that "if you play the Ranger THIS way" then they are very good. So the capstone inherently removes the freedom for me to make any combination of choices I want leading up to level 20 or I risk not getting the full benefit.
Sneak is always extra damage, always a d6 (average 3 or 4 I forget how that works) at level 1. On critical hits, dice get multiplied, not static modifiers.
Like Foe Slayer, you get to decide AFTER you hit if you apply Sneak Attack.
Damage-wise, max wisdom Foe Slayer pulls ahead. Except you may have sacrificed the freedom of customization on your character to do so. Bad luck or a less than optimal character for the sake of max wisdom means the abilities are comparable in damage output, without consideration for critical hits.
I did mention the hit bonus for Foe Slayer but I didn't provide any detail. If you use Foe Slayer for the hit bonus, it is very nice to have a little extra guarantee that you hit. Especially once you have figured out the enemies AC. But you are now sacrificing damage.
In the case of unknown AC, let's say you are trying to hit. Foe Slayer gives you the chance to make that questionable die roll into a hit, or in the very least to narrow down the threshold of the creature's AC. But then you are sacrificing the bonus damage whether you hit or miss, especially if you don't know whether you would have hit anyway without the bonus. In a situation where you choose bonus damage over bonus to hit, the only thing that matters when comparing both abilities is whether or not you hit.
In this sense, FS has a little bit more versatility. Especially in instances where you know the AC and you know that the bonus to hit would exceed the AC, then FS has great use here.
Against your Favored Enemies.
A 20th level Beast Master Ranger increases it's Beast Companions hit points to the maximum of 80 HP. Losing this is not a huge sacrifice in any way seeing as a big complaint about the (original) Beast Companion is how little it has in terms of HP/defense at all levels of play. And it is only 4 HP in any case vs a level 19 Ranger.
Even if that was all of the benefits of multiclassing, Sneak Attack pulls out ahead significantly due to the ease of use and versatility of the ability. If Foe Slayer could be used as often Sneak Attack, I would definitely put Foe Slayer on par with Sneak Attack, if not surpassing the ability.
But that is not all of the benefits you get with multiclassing.
On top of Foe Slayer being even at best only slightly less powerful (power rating determined by ease/frequency of use AND damage output combined) than a d6 Sneak Attack that can be easily forced every single combat, you also gain Expertise, Thieve's Cant, a free proficiency in ANY Rogue skill PLUS proficiency in Thieve's Tools.
All of these benefits combined far outweigh taking that last level in Ranger, assuming you haven't already done so long before level 20. The closest thing to a sacrifice is the CHOICE between extra damage or an extra chance to hit. You don't even lose spell slots. (on level up you could say you lose the option to change a known spell with another spell)
I don't see how there is any subjective determination here. A level in Rogue vs the 20th level in Ranger has objectively more value with minimal and/or inconsequential sacrifice.
Foe Slayer has a lot of "ifs" and "buts" associated with the ability. Again, another representation of "if you play this way, it is good."
Sneak Attack has exactly two "ifs." Did I hit the enemy? Did I have advantage or were they within five feet of their own enemy? (again weapon type being inconsequential)
Reiterating again what sfPanzer said, Foe Slayer is not bad, it is a bad capstone. Earlier I expressed multiple options for where it could be placed along the Ranger's progression and be well suited, depending on the level you can move it very low as is or in other cases you would need to remove some restrictions if it were placed at a mid to mid-low level.
Why does this compare to multiclassing out of Wizard?
Signature Spells
When you reach 20th level, you gain mastery over two powerful spells and can cast them with little effort. Choose two 3rd-level wizard spells in your spellbook as your signature spells. You always have these spells prepared, they don’t count against the number of spells you have prepared, and you can cast each of them once at 3rd level without expending a spell slot. When you do so, you can’t do so again until you finish a short or long rest.
If you want to cast either spell at a higher level, you must expend a spell slot as normal.
The first question is why is this so good. The simplest answer is that there are a lot of good, quality 3rd level Wizard spells that remain useful even without upcasting them. You get to choose ANY two and cast each of them once. You get to cast them again after every rest. Getting to choose any two is incredibly versatile. There are 50 to choose from.
You can tailor this capstone to your liking in so many ways. Do I want extra damage? An extra fly spell? Extra zombies, illusions, mental protections, whatever it doesn't matter. Counterspell and dispel magic, two spells considered incredibly broken even without upcasting.
20 of these spells last for an hour or more. Take a short rest, do it again.
It is important to note, I am not just saying Signature Spells is a good capstone. I am also saying that the 20th level of Wizard as a whole is a good thing to take. (And subsequently reflects why the 20th level in Ranger is so disappointing to take).
A 20th level Wizard ALSO gains 2 free spells added to their spellbook. They also gain an extra recovered spell slot through Arcane Recovery. Scratch that Arcane Recovery is rounded up so a level 19 vs 20 Wizard gains the same number of recovered spell slots once a day after short rest.
Some Wizard subclasses have features, such as Arcane Ward for the School of Abjuration, that get stronger depending on your Wizard level.
If you were to multiclass into a full caster, you retain the same spell slots you would as a level 20 Wizard, but multiclassing in any other class you sacrifice a 7th level spell slot.
I don't believe I have missed anything in regard to the value of benefits when going 20 levels in Wizard vs 20 in Ranger.
And as per my previous example, let's say I choose to take one level in Cleric.
You gain armor and shield proficiencies.
You gain 3 Cleric cantrips of ANY choice.
You retain your maximum spell slots for being a full caster in all of your classes.
You prepare a number of 1st-level cleric spells equal to your Wisdom modifier + your cleric level (minimum of one spell). This does make your multiclassing MAD which may come with some sacrifice in freedom of character customization.
All of your Cleric spells can be upcast as high as you have spell slots available.
And then you get your Divine Domain and its first feature. These always come with two free, always prepared spells on top of the ones you prepare every day.
I can't go into every single Divine Domain option, but the trade-offs without consideration for that feature essentially boil down to casting more spells per day, with more, higher-level spell options vs the same amount of spells per day but with many many more low-level options that can be upcast, and then extra cantrips. But then you throw in the Divine Domain feature, and you have a pretty nice trade-off. You are sacrificing a lot for a lot.
Except, in this case, there is no clear, objective determination between which choice is better. The 20th level in Wizard vs. the 1st level in Cleric seems to be pretty on par with each other, Even if we can find a definitive "best 20th level Wizard" vs "best Wizard19/Cleric1" you're making reasonable sacrifices in choosing one over the other.
The same cannot be said when choosing not to take that 20th level in Ranger. You are not sacrificing anything substantial that would make you question if you really, really want to multiclass. Unless of course you just really want to make sure that Githyanki is dead.
EDIT: I had to change a lot of instances where I said Favored Enemy instead of Foe Slayer.
There is one more thing i want to point out about something you said earlier. Raw, you cannot use your favored enemy to use insight while dealing with a favored enemy as the feature explicitly states that it concerns intelligence checks to recall information, not gather information.
I wholly disagree. I don't think you can call it RAW. Recalling information is defined as part of intelligence checks.
The game doesn't seem to subdivide memory from deduction. The mechanics actually group them together. I think it makes more logical senses that any time you use intelligence memory is a factor. Even if its deduction you still need to rely on basic knowledge of the subject you need to recall. Rangers that have more basic information giving them a benefit. This seems like basic forensics specialization to me.
All the time, I see dm's specifically give advantage for having a reasonable understanding of the subject. History or investigations for a town you grew up in. Sometimes they just give it out for free. A ranger it gives you class related justification for doing so. Its still up to dm adjudication.
I think the reason it states it that way is to refence back to your knowledge of the enemy in a flavorful way reminding you it can only be used if a Favored enemy is involved. It also allows for the weird rules about "using other ability scores" such as medicine checks with intelligence which would rely more on knowledge than instinctive skill.
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Thanks that was a well reasoned answer to the original question. I also appreciate you breaking down the merits/benefits of Tasha's new features. I agree that the text is bland compared to the flavor of the original. I miss the favored enemy concept and how it shapes your character (even if I didn't like how it was laid out in this edition).
The benefit I see in the new bland abilities and even the spells is that I find they situationally flavor your character more towards being a Ranger than they did before through play and rolling. I guess I find they play more flavorfully than they are written.
VERY well spoken sfPanzer. I think at this point the various opinions have been expanded upon well enough, and I will only add that I too, really dislike Favored Foe. I think I like the new options more than you as a whole, but Favored Foe was a huge a miss for me both in flavor and function. I cannot stand they made it Hunter's Mark lite.
THIS. For me bland abilities that I use are much better than flavorful abilities that I almost never use. How much flavor can an ability realistically add to the feel of a character if you rarely, if ever use it.
And I love that second sentence. I think that's a lot of DnD. A rogue's expertise is not particularly flavorful. It's just a mechanical increase. What you say those mechanics means about your particular character and their story is where the flavor comes from.
I personally like the fact that they took away the flavor from natural explorer and favored enemy. The very first time i opened a PHB to read what classes in this new and exotic game were all about, i read the ranger and thought: "Damn, i like this natury jack of all trades class, but why the hell do i need to choose one specific type of enemy i want to focus on?" I love the versatile feel i get from this class but those features take away from that rather than adding to it. I don't want my ranger to be a forest specialist. I want my ranger to be an exploration specialist. I don't want my ranger to specifically have studied orcs for ten years. I want my ranger to have travelled the frontier and encountered a whole diverse slew of monsters without specialising in one. Basically, i feel like the old features were trying to force me into a very specific backstory which i didn't like at all, despite liking the class and what it stood for.
The simple expertise this feature provides (which i immediately put into survival) encompasses this flavor much more for me.
Similairly, i love the different movement options. When standing infront of a cliff, i want my ranger to be the first one scaling it. When attempting to cross a fast flowing current, i want my ranger to dive into it to test the waters and tie a rope to a tree on the other side for the others to use.
I agree that the level 10 feature feels like it is largely a ribbon, but do remember that it comes at the same time as the new nature's veil, which, to me, seems like an extremely strong ability. While i do recognize that it will probably never come up during a campaign, i love the fact that a ranger can basically track a group of orcs for weeks, occasionally taking a short rest to keep himself standing, while spending the rest of the night shooting random arrows at the orc camp with the only purpose being to make sure that not a single one of them will be able to sleep. This feature, albeit a ribbon, turns the ranger into the ultimate pursuit predator. It immediately reminded me of the following short story I once read. It was promotional material for Guild Wars 2, but it really stuck to me.
The fire blew sparks toward the heavens like stars seeking to return to their high, dark home. But there was no joy in this blaze, no celebration. What had once been a proud lodge was now little more than piles of ash huddled in the shadows of flickering, ember-lit logs.
"I'm sorry, Viskar." The old skaald placed his hand on the boy's shoulder. "There's nothing we can do. Your father lost the house, and everything in it, on his last wager with Grimhilde. She had the right to do whatever she chose with her winnings."
"She cheated. She cheated, but I can't prove it. What of my father, Fiach?" The youth snarled the words, biting off the syllables like a wolf gnawing its leg out of a trap. "Did she have the 'right' to kill him, too?"
Old Fiach sighed. "He was wrong to attack her. There will be no retribution from the Wolfborn of Hoelbrak for Grimhilde's actions. Nor should you seek vengeance upon her, Viskar. You are a new hunter, barely old enough to bear your own blade. Grimhilde is powerful, and legends of her cruelty are told at the moot to frighten children and humans." Shaking his head, the skaald pulled a leopard-fur cloak closer about his weary bones. "Put away your anger, young one. Bury your father. Leave this matter to the crows."
"No." Viskar wiped away his tears with the back of his hand, leaving soot stains across pale cheeks. "I may be young, Fiach, and I may be inexperienced."
"But I am still norn."
—
The stars above the Shiverpeaks were cold and bright, crowned by the iridescent borealis of the northern sky. In the Great Lodge of Hoelbrak, a youth stood before the shamans and sought lessons of revenge.
"No," said the shaman of Bear. "Learn strength, Viskar. Learn wisdom. Grimhilde does not seek victory. She seeks the utter annihilation of her enemy. I will not teach you to throw away your life."
"I am sorry," said Wolf's followers. "We would gladly help you avenge your family, but what you propose is suicide. Think of your pack. If you attack Grimhilde, she will punish those you love.'
The Havroun of Raven shook his head when Viskar asked. "You cannot even tell me how she cheated. Grimhilde is clever, and she always has a lethal surprise for her enemies. If you do not know more than she does, she will destroy you."
Viskar clenched his fists. "Will no one help me?"
A shadow moved in the corner of the lodge, and yellow eyes gleamed. "You haven't asked me yet," murmured the Speaker of Snow Leopard, Valharantha, her movements smooth and graceful.
"Will Snow Leopard teach me to take vengeance?" he asked. "If I follow her path, will she show me how to defeat Grimhilde?"
"More." Valharantha lowered her eyes and smiled. "She will turn your vengeance into legend."
—
Grimhilde knelt, studying the tracks. She'd been following them for six days, since the skaalds in Hoelbrak sung the legend of Whisperclaw, a fierce young mountain cat. Soon, she would challenge the beast, and—
"Grimhilde!" a voice called from the mountainside above. With a start, she reached for her weapon. Had someone come before her? Was her prey dead by another's hand? In anger, the warrior straightened and peered up into the crags. She did not have to wait long to see her enemy. "Who are you?" she asked cautiously, fingering the blade on her axe. If this stripling had stolen her prize, she would make him pay...with pain.
"I am your death, walking." The youth stood on a high ledge, balancing effortlessly. "Four years ago, you cheated my father of his life. I am here to avenge that debt."
"I remember you now." Grimhilde stepped backward and swept her axe from side to side. "Your father was a weak little thing—as are you. I should have slain you as a child, but that old man talked me out of it. No matter. I will deal with you, and when I return to the Great Lodge, I will end that relic of a storyteller as well."
The youth snarled, eyes bright with cold, bitter revenge. "You've come here to hunt," he said, "but you're the one being hunted. It is six days back to Hoelbrak over ice and snow, with no safe haven, no lodges or campgrounds along the way."
"You think to fight me?" she laughed. "Kill me, Grimhilde the Ferocious? The mightiest axe-wielder among the norn? You will die mewling like a kitten, young one. You're not powerful enough!"
"You're right. I'm not powerful enough to face you on your terms, so I'll face you on mine." The young hunter smiled wickedly. "Snow Leopard trained me in stealth and tracking. She also taught me to steel my mind against slumber. I can go five days without resting. I'll die after six, but I'll do it if I must. But you...you have to sleep sometime. And I'm willing to bet my life that you'll rest before I do."
Grimhilde stared at him, the blood draining from her face. "You would kill me in my sleep?"
"I will wait until my prey is at her weakest, and then I will strike." The young hunter smiled grimly. "And by Snow Leopard, I swear—you will never hear me coming."
—
"Let me tell you a tale." Old Fiach the skaald raised his hands to the sky as the fires of the moot crackled and leapt. "The story of the hero known as Viskar Whisperclaw. Hail the honor-son! Rightful rage-tender, shadow-striker, slayer of treasonous Grimhilde. Viskar, who despite all challenges, was willing to give his life to claim blood-debt from the one who had done him harm..."
Well, the spells are also on the ranger classlist so i wouldn't really call them druid spells, although i get where you come from. The only spell i don't really like in this section is beast sense. The flavor seems out of touch with feeling nature in order to gain information. I would have much rather had locate animal/plant. Then again, that would have become redundant once yo get locate creature so... guess it's ok? I might have also preferred detect magic but there are already a lot of other classes who have a high chance of taking this so guess it's fine as well. From the few times i have played the variant ranger, i can already say that these spells come in very handy and made me feel much more adept at exloring than i expect primeval awareness would have done.
Let me just quickly get my own stance of the ranger out of the way: The PHB Ranger seems to be doing fine balancewise but I do feel like the PHB ranger has some very niche and specific features where i feel like the features would fit better if they were broader, even if that meant they would lose a bit of power. I really love the new variant Ranger and will be playing it a lot.
PS: Oh god, i finally officially entered the PHB Ranger good/bad discussion.
Favored Foe is an interesting thing. First, its something designed to stack with the weak Foe Slayer. So instead of only being able to use Foe Slayer with three types of monsters now you can use it during any combat in conjunction with Favored Foe. So instead of a very situational capstone you get a capstone you can use every combat.
In function I have used it to stretch spell slots. There are certain fights where you don't need the full Hunter's Mark and don't want to burn a spell slot. If it gets kicked off by failing concentration its less of a big deal when you have few spell slots remaining. At low levels, 2X a day you can do that. I don't think it would cause me to replace HM in my spell list, but at higher levels that might make sense. Theoretically it can't be dispelled via spell.
Design wise FF and Deft Explorer were meant to be taken together, or at least they seem to me. Existing favored enemy granted bonuses to track, knowledge of the creature, and a free language. Two of those languages are now found in Deft Explorer (the third at 14th you just lose). The tracking bonuses can generally be gotten from Expertise in Survival from (Deft Explorer), but you aren't locked into that selection. The rest of Deft Explorer adds mostly crunch to help offset the ribbon losses from Natural Explorer. Taken together you lose the specificity and flavor of Favored Enemy but functionally if you Expertise in Survival you get a better tracker. The knowledge of the enemy piece was lost, which is a shame. In exchange you gain Favored Foe which can stretch your spell slots and at 14 when the die jumps to a d8 may have some utility over Hunter's Mark.
Forgot something on FF. The fact it kicks in on a successful hit means you don't burn a spell slot, miss the entire round, and then get damaged without ever using it. Every time you use FF you will do damage since it turns on with a hit.
Wow. A lot of you are throwing around words like “specialist”. That has never been what the ranger is. That’s not the idea behind the thematic design. That’s not the mechanical design. That is not the point of the base class at all.
"Warriors of the wilderness, rangers specialize in "
Its the first sentence of the character description. But you are right about the mechanical design. That disconnect between is part of the problem people have with the PHB Ranger.
I agree with you here. The ability to add wisdom to the attack bonus, turning a miss into a hit, or adding a little damage, for free, every round, is pretty good. What made this ability bad was Favored Enemy. If you weren't fighting a favored enemy, this literally does nothing. They should have just given this ability without the favored enemy requirement and I'd say it was probably in the top 50% of level 20 abilities. The favored enemy requirement though... sucks. Bad. You only get 3 favored enemies, or 4 if you took 2 humanoid races. How many humanoid races are there?! There are 30+ playable races and I think they're almost all humanoid. That's not to mention there are 13 classifications for creatures other than humanoids. You have to either cheat and pick what you know you'll use or get lucky. With all the options, I'd be real surprised if you got to use this ability more that 15% of the time without cheating to pick the favored enemies.
I think they meant that it gives expertise in the two skills that a ranger should be better at. Obviously the scout rogue doesn't have spells or other things. However, it's more consistently better at nature and survival skills than the Ranger and thus actually better equipped to track a foe or do rangery skill based things.
It wouldn't be too much. That doesn't make any sense. It's not too much for Paladins, the class most in common with the ranger. And the paladin has more ubiquitously useful abilities outside of spells and a WAY bigger spell list. They have the same number of spell slots and can use those slots to smite for added damage. The added functionality for spell lots that rangers get? They can know if a creature type is within a mile. How often will that be used compared to smite? They could have made this better by making it similar to druid spellcasting and it wouldn't have pushed rangers into "too much" territory at all.
Is this still useful? Sure. However, this doesn't really add anything to the kit that the Ranger can't already do and is thus not something I find super appealing. You lose the effect if you do pretty much anything. You know what else grants +10 to stealth? Pass Without Trace. It works for your whole party and you can even move. That's not the only spell that aids in being stealthy either. Yes, I know this probably stacks with Pass Without Trace, but it doesn't add anything new.
I agree that the ranger can do a lot. The spells are useful, he can dish out some fairly good damage, can take a beating, and even do a little bit of healing. He has some useful skills and abilities. Many of them are so situational that it's dumb though. But saying that it's versatile doesn't mean that all its features are good features. Take away all these situational abilities and what are you left with? A ranger that's basically just as good.
In summation (because we're once again going in circles on the subject): Ranger is good but has some real dumb situational filler abilities. Some subclasses are good, some are not. Tasha's gave a bunch of optional features that gave those of us that see problems with the Ranger a way to better enjoy the class.
To the OP: You will have fun with your ranger. The problems of the class won't necessarily detract from the fun you'll have. If you want to fulfill that ranger fantasy, you can do it and you'll love it. Check out Tasha's optional features (especially if you want to play Beast Master). Then at least you'll be able to pick which group you're in and better enjoy the class.
We are going around in circles. I wish we could all play together so we could see how each other approaches the class and the game.
I read, play, and see the ranger (beast master included) being more than fine. Being great. And not being an issue at all. I will admit that I get frustrated when folks dog-pile on the class just to point out the "bad stuff". This makes for a self fulfilling prophecy as far as I am concerned. Maybe some day someone will give me an argument, complaint, or evidence that it (the ranger and beast master) is as bad as they believe it to be. But until that day...
Don't worry, sfPanzer, I won't repeat those dreaded words. I'm not here to upset anyone or anything.
sfPanzer I like your explanations very much. Especially you taking more time to make your presentation easier to read than mine. When I read my posts back I worry that my arguments may be hard to follow.
Comparing a bad capstone to another bad capstone is not a good argument. It is generally well received that most capstones are lacking. It is no great thing to say that Foe Slayer holds up to another disappointing capstone. It would be a completely different scenario if the rest of the Ranger wasn't also poorly designed because then the only complaint would be a bad capstone on an otherwise well-designed class which can be said of most of the classes.
A capstone should feel like I have reached the quintessential archetype of a class. So many capstones fail to do this, rather they instead just feel like another decent feature that in many cases could have been swapped for another low-level feature. But in other cases, the Druid, Redemption Paladin, and Wizard for example, all have mechanics that are not only powerful but reflect the idea of their archetypes in a huge way.
On top of that, you need to compare how a capstone compares to the low-level features of other classes seeing as multiclassing is such a powerful option. This is generally an argument against all bad capstones, but focusing on the Ranger for now. The ONLY thing a Ranger gets at level 20 is Foe Slayer. It is ONLY useful against a favored enemy. They've even maxed out their spell progression.
Without magic items, you have a maxed WIS Ranger giving +5 to the attack OR damage to a specific type of creature each turn. One level of rogue gives me Expertise and a d6 to every single creature and all I have to do is set myself up for advantage. Thieve's cant is nice. That on its own is comparable, its usage is not dependent on the DM's story but on my own strategic positioning and the party's coordination.
If I'm a Wizard, when I sacrifice my signature spells in order to multiclass into Cleric, I genuinely feel like I am losing something valuable for not maintaining that dedication to the class. But I am likewise gaining something valuable in return because a level 1 Cleric's features are so strong.
If I take one level of Rogue, Fighter, Bard, Wizard, pretty much any class instead of level 20 Ranger. I'm not sacrificing anything because the level one benefits of the next class are so great. Again, this isn't unique to the Ranger, it is a problem with most capstones, but a bad capstone on a bad class is worse than a bad capstone on a good class and makes the weaknesses of the class that much more prominent.
I read, play, and see the ranger (beast master included) being less than fine. Being subpar in many areas and inadequate in far too many. It is a big issue. I will admit that I get frustrated when folks put the class on a pedestal just to overhype the "good stuff". This is a serious case of confirmation bias as far as I am concerned. Maybe someday someone will give me an argument, complaint, or evidence that it (the ranger and beast master) are as good as they believe it to be. But until that day...
LOL! Well, we have reached a point of total disagreement on the subject.
Korbin_Orion, why do you hate the ranger so much? It’s fun to play, has great mechanics (mathematically sound), fits well with any party, fills a couple of roles other classes don’t, and great thematically. Why do you compare the best parts of other classes and say the ranger doesn’t come close to them? The rogue’s ability and skill checks, the wizard’s (I don’t know why wizards are being involved) capstone ability, the fighter’s damage output, the paladin’s tankiness and healing resources, and the druid’s spell casting. Those classes don’t have to be held up to one another in comparison, do they? It’s like you are bent on convincing others the ranger is garbage, and do so by arguing each little part of their kit sucks compared to a whole basket of “comparable” parts from 5 other classes. If the ranger is the worst class, either by opinion, math, or otherwise, it’s not like it would be the worst by a long shot, off the charts, should never be played, or deleted from the game. The ranger touches on so many abilities and roles. Master of none, and all that. Why is that a bad thing? I hope the fighter is good at fighting. I hope the rogue is good at skill checks. I hope the paladin can sit on the front lines to dish out damage and heal folks. They have to. That’s what they do. Sure, the ranger isn’t the master of one thing in the game it can call it’s own. Why is that a bad thing to you?
Upon rereading the Ranger capstone, i am actually not that sure it is as bad as you give it credit for. Sure, a level of rogue can give you 1d6 extra damage while foe slayer will give 3-5 extra damage so in that regard, it seem bad. However, you completely skip over the fact that it can actually increase your to hit bonus AFTER you have rolled! That is comparable to a free advantage every turn that is only consumed if you actually needed it. And what if you didn't need it? Well, in that case it is translated into a small damage bonus, comparable to sneak attack.
It is also very comparable to one of the crazy powerful new monk features, only it doesn't require any resource at all to use it.
I do agree that the ability certainly isn't very flashy and doesn't compare to the fighter, barbarian, cleric or druid capstone. Still, I wouldn't call it a bad feature that is worse than a single level in another class.
Now i do have to give in and agree that the fact that it only triggers against certain enemies is a huge dent it in. With this, it falls into the same line of specialiation that i hated with the original PHB ranger. With the new variant ranger... i'm not actually sure where this ability stands. It suddenly does become tied to a resource and to concentration on top of that...
So yeah, in conclusion i think i'd say it is not as bad as you say but it still has some glaring issues that might warrant fixing.
Just as a quick sidenote, how powerful is the wizard capstone? I never actually played a spellcaster to such a high level but me and the players in my group all agree that we find it pretty bland to get two extra 3th level spell slots at that level (Ok yes, and spells tied to them and recharge on SR but you get my point). Are 3th level spellslots really still that big of a deal for a level 20 caster? Genuinly asking btw, not trying to contradict you.
Then what would you call the favored enemy and the favored terrain features? I do agree with you that i want my ranger to be a generalist but these two features explicitly ask me to pick a terrain type and a monster type to specialise against. That initial choice would be my biggest complain about the PHB ranger. (Explained my standpoint regarding this in more depth a bit higher up).
I look at those two class features like this.
If the ranger didn’t have them (or primeval awareness) they would still be able to take proficiency in nature and survival. Proficiency is almost as good as expertise at lower levels. Like a 10 or 15 percent difference. Their spells supplement these proficiencies by allowing the ranger to speak with plants and animals, move unseen and unheard, teleport from tree to tree, hunt and track creatures, etc. The ranger chooses an entire subtype of creatures to know a lot about. All fiends, all monstrosities, etc. Yes, they can track them better. That’s fine. But the knowledge checks (any and all intelligence checks, proficiency not required) associated with them is the real strength of the ability. They aren’t only a killer of these creature types. They study them and know all about them. Their customs, their habits. They speak their language. Where they live. What they eat. Their vulnerabilities and strengths. Then they pick one of the, what, eight land types in the game sans underwater and urban, to be extra familiar with. Anything related to that terrain, plants, animals, weather, food and water resources, traveling, they have expertise in without having to be in the land at all. They just know it. They can be in a city and have expertise in checks about animals or plants from that land. They can be in mountains with a favored land of forests and know things (expertise) that are in both (related to). There is cross pollination there. If they are actually in that land they get these stupendous abilities, much more than simple proficiency or expertise in two skills. As the ranger moves on they get more and more types of entire creatures types and additional land types to gain these benefits with. Of the eight land types, really four or five are going to be seen in a given adventure, and all creatures fall into on of the creature subtypes.
While you certainly succeed in making the features look much better than i originally gave them credit for, it doesn't change the fact that it is still a specialisation towards that one type of environment or monster. You can apply it in a broader way, sure, but is more trickle over from the specialisation than actual generalism. Simply the fact that you have to pick a terrain you prefer at all puts me off. While it might fit in the ranger i am currently playing, it doesn't fit at all in some of the other ranger concepts i have.
I feel like these feature would be much better at home if you could pick them up as half a feat on anyone who wants them, not just rangers. I might even see a watered down version of them appear as background feature. It might even be tied to a specific subclass, just not to the class in general.
Actually, now that i think of it, some parts of these features are stuff that i just give my PC's for free anyway. If one of my players plays a wizard who has a backstory where he hunts dragons, i am not gonna have him make a check to determine if a footprint comes from a dragon or not. He would damn well recognize it as a dragon. The other party members would have to roll though.
I feel like one of the large differences between you and some other peoples on this topic is how the DM in your group rules the "related to your favored terrain" aspect. It is just so subjective how related something has to be to count. A mountain can be cold, have some grass, and have a few trees. Does this mean that a ranger with mountain terrain also has bonusses in arctic, forest and grassland? I suspect the answer to this question depends a whole lot on who you ask.
There is one more thing i want to point out about something you said earlier. Raw, you cannot use your favored enemy to use insight while dealing with a favored enemy as the feature explicitly states that it concerns intelligence checks to recall information, not gather information.
As a final note, I would like to ask you: "How do you feel about the tasha variant features? Especially deft explorer." Because for me, that one feature clearly steers the ranger away from a specialist towards a generalist.
Never said I hated the Ranger. The Ranger archetype has been my favorite ever since my very first Ranger was discovered naked in a barrel in a haunted mansion in my very first DnD game for a 3.0 campaign. I have made it very clear that I have played multiple Rangers and had fun doing so (and this is across multiple editions, including 5e).
The questions in your entire post have been explained not just by myself in two very long posts but by many others here.
I can literally copy/paste every other post I have made in this thread and it would answer just about every question you just posited clearly and concisely. It is you who refuses to accept my arguments.
Wannyboy, the latter half of your post sort of answered the question you asked me in regard to multiclassing Rogue, but I can clarify.
Usage:
Foe Slayer only works against one of your three types of Favored Enemies. I cannot force this, I cannot enable the feature myself. I have to hope my DM has one of my favored enemies in this combat. Otherwise, as I have expressed earlier, I need to go out of my way to derail the campaign just to hunt some orcs in order to "force" the feature.
Sneak Attack can be forced, and easily forced every single combat. Most commonly through an enemy engaged in combat with an ally, but also through hiding or having an enemy subject to some sort of condition that grants advantage and a plethora of other spells or class features.
The only other limitation to Sneak Attack is your choice of weapon, which is inconsequential.
So Sneak Attack is objectively more versatile, far easier to use than Foe Slayer.
Benefits:
Foe Slayer gives a bonus to the attack OR the damage role. This is a static bonus, so always your WIS mod. Without magical assistance, that means a maximum of +5. There are some factors that require forethought and luck to get this max bonus, however.
If you're rolling your character's ability scores, you can get unlucky stats. This is generally not an issue as it is incredibly rare not to have at least one good ability score.
If you take a standard array, You need to find some combination of picking the right race and feats/ASI throughout your progression to reach 20 wisdom. Harkening back to a common issue of the Ranger being that "if you play the Ranger THIS way" then they are very good. So the capstone inherently removes the freedom for me to make any combination of choices I want leading up to level 20 or I risk not getting the full benefit.
Sneak is always extra damage, always a d6 (average 3 or 4 I forget how that works) at level 1. On critical hits, dice get multiplied, not static modifiers.
Like Foe Slayer, you get to decide AFTER you hit if you apply Sneak Attack.
Damage-wise, max wisdom Foe Slayer pulls ahead. Except you may have sacrificed the freedom of customization on your character to do so. Bad luck or a less than optimal character for the sake of max wisdom means the abilities are comparable in damage output, without consideration for critical hits.
I did mention the hit bonus for Foe Slayer but I didn't provide any detail. If you use Foe Slayer for the hit bonus, it is very nice to have a little extra guarantee that you hit. Especially once you have figured out the enemies AC. But you are now sacrificing damage.
In the case of unknown AC, let's say you are trying to hit. Foe Slayer gives you the chance to make that questionable die roll into a hit, or in the very least to narrow down the threshold of the creature's AC. But then you are sacrificing the bonus damage whether you hit or miss, especially if you don't know whether you would have hit anyway without the bonus. In a situation where you choose bonus damage over bonus to hit, the only thing that matters when comparing both abilities is whether or not you hit.
In this sense, FS has a little bit more versatility. Especially in instances where you know the AC and you know that the bonus to hit would exceed the AC, then FS has great use here.
Against your Favored Enemies.
A 20th level Beast Master Ranger increases it's Beast Companions hit points to the maximum of 80 HP. Losing this is not a huge sacrifice in any way seeing as a big complaint about the (original) Beast Companion is how little it has in terms of HP/defense at all levels of play. And it is only 4 HP in any case vs a level 19 Ranger.
Even if that was all of the benefits of multiclassing, Sneak Attack pulls out ahead significantly due to the ease of use and versatility of the ability. If Foe Slayer could be used as often Sneak Attack, I would definitely put Foe Slayer on par with Sneak Attack, if not surpassing the ability.
But that is not all of the benefits you get with multiclassing.
On top of Foe Slayer being even at best only slightly less powerful (power rating determined by ease/frequency of use AND damage output combined) than a d6 Sneak Attack that can be easily forced every single combat, you also gain Expertise, Thieve's Cant, a free proficiency in ANY Rogue skill PLUS proficiency in Thieve's Tools.
All of these benefits combined far outweigh taking that last level in Ranger, assuming you haven't already done so long before level 20. The closest thing to a sacrifice is the CHOICE between extra damage or an extra chance to hit. You don't even lose spell slots. (on level up you could say you lose the option to change a known spell with another spell)
I don't see how there is any subjective determination here. A level in Rogue vs the 20th level in Ranger has objectively more value with minimal and/or inconsequential sacrifice.
Foe Slayer has a lot of "ifs" and "buts" associated with the ability. Again, another representation of "if you play this way, it is good."
Sneak Attack has exactly two "ifs." Did I hit the enemy? Did I have advantage or were they within five feet of their own enemy? (again weapon type being inconsequential)
Reiterating again what sfPanzer said, Foe Slayer is not bad, it is a bad capstone. Earlier I expressed multiple options for where it could be placed along the Ranger's progression and be well suited, depending on the level you can move it very low as is or in other cases you would need to remove some restrictions if it were placed at a mid to mid-low level.
Why does this compare to multiclassing out of Wizard?
The first question is why is this so good. The simplest answer is that there are a lot of good, quality 3rd level Wizard spells that remain useful even without upcasting them. You get to choose ANY two and cast each of them once. You get to cast them again after every rest. Getting to choose any two is incredibly versatile. There are 50 to choose from.
You can tailor this capstone to your liking in so many ways. Do I want extra damage? An extra fly spell? Extra zombies, illusions, mental protections, whatever it doesn't matter. Counterspell and dispel magic, two spells considered incredibly broken even without upcasting.
20 of these spells last for an hour or more. Take a short rest, do it again.
It is important to note, I am not just saying Signature Spells is a good capstone. I am also saying that the 20th level of Wizard as a whole is a good thing to take. (And subsequently reflects why the 20th level in Ranger is so disappointing to take).
A 20th level Wizard ALSO gains 2 free spells added to their spellbook.
They also gain an extra recovered spell slot through Arcane Recovery.Scratch that Arcane Recovery is rounded up so a level 19 vs 20 Wizard gains the same number of recovered spell slots once a day after short rest.Some Wizard subclasses have features, such as Arcane Ward for the School of Abjuration, that get stronger depending on your Wizard level.
If you were to multiclass into a full caster, you retain the same spell slots you would as a level 20 Wizard, but multiclassing in any other class you sacrifice a 7th level spell slot.
I don't believe I have missed anything in regard to the value of benefits when going 20 levels in Wizard vs 20 in Ranger.
And as per my previous example, let's say I choose to take one level in Cleric.
You gain armor and shield proficiencies.
You gain 3 Cleric cantrips of ANY choice.
You retain your maximum spell slots for being a full caster in all of your classes.
You prepare a number of 1st-level cleric spells equal to your Wisdom modifier + your cleric level (minimum of one spell). This does make your multiclassing MAD which may come with some sacrifice in freedom of character customization.
All of your Cleric spells can be upcast as high as you have spell slots available.
And then you get your Divine Domain and its first feature. These always come with two free, always prepared spells on top of the ones you prepare every day.
I can't go into every single Divine Domain option, but the trade-offs without consideration for that feature essentially boil down to casting more spells per day, with more, higher-level spell options vs the same amount of spells per day but with many many more low-level options that can be upcast, and then extra cantrips. But then you throw in the Divine Domain feature, and you have a pretty nice trade-off. You are sacrificing a lot for a lot.
Except, in this case, there is no clear, objective determination between which choice is better. The 20th level in Wizard vs. the 1st level in Cleric seems to be pretty on par with each other, Even if we can find a definitive "best 20th level Wizard" vs "best Wizard19/Cleric1" you're making reasonable sacrifices in choosing one over the other.
The same cannot be said when choosing not to take that 20th level in Ranger. You are not sacrificing anything substantial that would make you question if you really, really want to multiclass. Unless of course you just really want to make sure that Githyanki is dead.
EDIT: I had to change a lot of instances where I said Favored Enemy instead of Foe Slayer.
I wholly disagree. I don't think you can call it RAW. Recalling information is defined as part of intelligence checks.
The game doesn't seem to subdivide memory from deduction. The mechanics actually group them together. I think it makes more logical senses that any time you use intelligence memory is a factor. Even if its deduction you still need to rely on basic knowledge of the subject you need to recall. Rangers that have more basic information giving them a benefit. This seems like basic forensics specialization to me.
All the time, I see dm's specifically give advantage for having a reasonable understanding of the subject. History or investigations for a town you grew up in. Sometimes they just give it out for free. A ranger it gives you class related justification for doing so. Its still up to dm adjudication.
I think the reason it states it that way is to refence back to your knowledge of the enemy in a flavorful way reminding you it can only be used if a Favored enemy is involved. It also allows for the weird rules about "using other ability scores" such as medicine checks with intelligence which would rely more on knowledge than instinctive skill.