Homebrew: Mountain Guide (Ranger Subclass)

Hello everybody, I want some balancing feedback an general first impressions for my Ranger Subclass.

Mountain Guide

Mountain Guides are adept at balancing along narrow paths or avoiding falling stones. Due to them rarely having the privileg of beeing able to keep their distance to beasts, wandering along mountain paths, they had to adopt a rather close proximity figthing style, sometimes even relying on their bare muscles to deal with threats, while still keeping a steady aim to hunt down deers or mountain goats as steady foot supplies.

Level 3: Proximity Aim

When attacking an enemy within 5ft. of yourself, you can ignore Disadvantage weapon properties such as Heavy or Ranged would impose.

Level 3: Tought by Danger

You are always on your toes, as the dangers of the mountains never sleep.
When you take damage, you can take a Reaction to
either roll 2d4 an gain Temporary Hit Points equal to the result,
or immeadiately cast Hunters Mark on an enemy you can see.

The dice for rolling the Temporary Hit Points increase as you leven up (2d6 at level 9; 2d8 at level 16)

Level 7: Tread Ligthly

You feel at home at the highest of highs and falling of your feet doesn´t even seem to be an option for you.
You gain Advantage to Strength Saving Throws.
Additionally you don´t consider *heavy snow, ice* or *rubble* Difficult Terrain.

Level 11: Mountains Secrets

The live in the mountains has revealed many things to you. You can see weaknesses in enemys defenses hidden to everyone else and always find the fastest way to and away from your prey.
While an enemy is affected by Hunters Mark your speed increases by 10 ft. and that enemies´ AC decreases by 1. Additionally moving out of the enemies range won´t provoke opportunity attacks.

Level 15: Safe on your feet

Long walks along narrow paths have trained you to walk fast, but still steady and never once slip.
I still need something for this here???

So these are my current ideas, If you have some feedback, please share

An interesting idea and some of the features a pretty good, but overall it feels like it doesn't really achieve the vision in the description.

For: Level 3: Quick Strike - your unarmed strikes are going to do very little damage so what's the point here? Similarly 1d4 temporary hit points is basically nothing, I could see using it at level 3, but as soon as I get either Defensive Duelist or Sentinel I'm not going to bother with this reaction. 

Level 3: Proximity Aim - This one makes the class confusing, it seems to encourage you to use ranged weapons, but focusing on ranged weapons makes many of the later features kind of worthless..

Level 7: Tread Ligthly - this one is also a mishmash of different stuff. Strength saving throws are what is used vs prone, and why is this so specific to being knocked prone? Just give them blanket Adv on STR saves. What does Con-save proficiency have to do with rest of this ability? Feels like you should split this into two different things, some kind of Sure-Step type thing giving STR save proficiency and immunity to non-magical difficult terrain. And another with Con save proficiency and immunity to negative effects from environmental extreme temperatures.

Level 11: Mountains Wrath - this one is pretty good! Thumbs Up.

Level 15: Safe on your feet  - this is extremely lame as a level 15 ability. Rogues and Monks get something almost akin to this at level 3, and you're saying a ranger should be excited to get it at level 15!

I agree with Agilemind that Quick Strike isn't great. Maybe it could be something like this: The ever-present dangers of the mountains have made you alert and watchful to danger. You have Advantage on initiative rolls, and whenever you roll for initiative, you can move up to your speed."

Tread Lightly is fine, although it should say you have advantage on saving throws against being knocked Prone.

Mountain's Wrath is oddly magical when the rest of the subclass is based on simply knowing how to survive in the mountains.

Safe on your Feet should definitely come earlier, maybe added to Tread Lightly.

Thanks to both of you for the ideas.

I rewrote the Quick Strike ability to be Taught by Danger. I hope that with this change the Health Increase will at least somewhat stay relevant at all levels, while the Unarmed Strike, that probably wouldn´t even have hit is out the window, with a buff to the health gain from the get go.

Tread Lightly lost the bonus to Con Saves, replacing it with general Advantage to all Strength Saves, not just those being knocked prone.

Mountains Wrath got changed to Mountains Secrets to make it more thematically aligned, loosing the magical aspect and replacing it long time experience. This also got buffed with the disengage feature from Safe on your Feet being moved here.

That only leaves that last ability to be changed into something useful, question leaves, into what.

Oh yeah, and I didn´t touch Proximity Aim (yet) as I still really like the idea of the ability. Rather than encouriging Ranged Weapons it´s purpose is rather to encourage a mixed playstile fighting both in close quarters, as well as from long range. I guess, the last ability will be something that encourages that even more.

Proximity Aim encourages only using ranged weapons, by allowing you to use them equally effectively in melee or at range. So there is no benefit at all to using a melee weapon (except maybe better feats for melee weapons vs ranged??). In contrast, when you have disadvantage on ranged attacks while in melee it encourages you to swap to a melee weapon when you are stuck in melee vs just continuing to use your ranged weapon.  * Note: there is nothing wrong with this feature, I'm just trying to explain what play style it encourages because I think you were trying to design for something else.

Taught by Danger is much better now, but similar to Proximity Aim, it again encourages specialization in ranged weapons, because Defensive Duelist is still just going to be a better option if you are using melee weapons. Whereas if you are using a ranged weapon then you don't have another option for your reaction so Taught by Danger is great. Again this isn't really a problem perse, it works just fine and you could build one that uses melee weapons and it wouldn't be bad, it's just that this feature works best if you are using ranged weapons.

Suggestions for Level 15: 

Mountain Tough. Exposure to the hostile mountain environment has toughened your skin, you gain resistance to fire and cold damage. 

Knock off-balance. You use your understanding of uneven terrain to throw your enemies off-balance. When you hit a creature affected by your Hunter's Mark with a weapon attack, that creature has disadvantage on attacks against you until the start of your next turn. 

Polycythemia. You are adapted to the low-oxygen environment of high altitudes. You gain proficiency in Constitution saving throws, and your Constitution score increases by 2 to a maximum of 22. You can hold your breath twice as long as normal.

Independent Spirit. Mountain living has instilled a strong desire for independence, and self-sufficiency. You gain proficiency in Wisdom saving throws, and you are immune to being charmed. 

Close-quarters. Fighting in narrow spaces of the mountains had made you adept at fighting in close quarters. When the first time on a turn that you hit a creature that is within 5ft of you with a weapon attack, you deal additional damage equal to your Wisdom modifier. You can use a ranged attack to make Opportunity attacks when a creature leaves the reach of your unarmed strikes.