You’re a defender of nature, a region, the concept, or a nature deity (Mielikki, Silvanus, Chauntea, or even gods like Malar, Umberlee). You’re a defender of the natural order and you seek to protect the aspects of nature that cannot defend themselves. If you need this to be super on the nose for a standard archetype, play like a paladin. You can even pick one of the oaths and live by those tennents, but filter it through the lens of nature (oath of ancients would be the least creative option, but do your thing). There’s no need to multiclass into paladin to play this way.
Mechanics Gimmick
You’re a ranger with the beastmaster subclass. There are multiple variants possible with options like taking sentinel at level 4 to weaponize your reaction or working with thrown weapons or dual weapons, heavy weapons, or a weapon and shield.
This character takes advantage of the beastmaster subclass’s medium animal companion and the small species to have a mount that never really dies (it takes a minute to bring it back to life an unlimited number of times per day). This also effectively gives the player 40 movement speed.
This immediately weaponizes your bonus actions with attacks as you can command your companion to attack. The bonus action pet attack will also make players thinking about staying back less effective (unless they’re not mounted).
There are variants for this that are more offensive focusing on hunter’s mark and two weapon fighting to burn down single targets, and there are variants that are more defensive in nature taking advantage of your mount to remove the two handed property from the lance to give you a one handed 1D10 weapon and shield.
You’ll be capable of up to 4D6 damage per round from hunter’s mark alone at level 4. This can increase to 5D6 at level 5 with extra attack. That’s from a spell that may not even cost a spell slot and will last round after round. It’s worth a slot and it’s worth concentration.
An example of a possible round after level 5 (assuming standard array and 16 Strength and 16 Wisdom):
Attack action:
Attack action attack with a dagger/light hammer with nick weapon mastery. 1D4+1D6+3, then stow this weapon
extra attack with halberd/greataxe already in your other hand with cleave mastery. 1D10+1D6+3
cleave mastery attack with halberd/greataxe 1D10, then draw a light weapon.
nick attack (can be a melee attack, a thrown weapon attack, can also potentially be a hand crossbow attack) then stow weapon 1D6+1D6+3
bonus action command your pet to attack OR if you have dual wielder feat you can use your bonus action to attack. If you attack you can get more hunter’s mark damage. Once you reach level 11 your pet does two attacks with your bonus action and one of these attacks can benefit from your hunter’s mark. 1D8+5
Reaction attack from sentinel halberd/greataxe 1D10+1D6+3
Reaction attack from cleave mastery 1D10
or
Attack action:
Attack action lance attack 1D10+1D6+3
extra attack with lance 1D10+1D6+3
bonus attack with companion 1D8+5
Reaction attack with lance 1D10+1D6+3
or
Attack action:
attack action with longbow 1D8+1D6+3
attack action with longbow 1D8+1D6+3
That’s 7 attacks in a single round of combat. Spread out over two targets with 5 of those attacking the same target and 4 of those 5 can benefit from hunter’s mark allowing a first level spell to reliably deal 4D6 damage each round. This averages 63.5 damage at level 5 with no magic equipment (assuming somehow every hit lands, no critical hits happen, and things aren’t dying before the end which limits hunter’s mark). This doesn’t take fighting styles into account or things like savage attacker which would further increase this into the 70s.
Or, it’s 45.5 damage from a couple simple attacks with a lance. This doesn’t take fighting styles into account or feats (dueling would add 6 to that and savage attacker could add another 3.3).
Or it’s just not very good as a ranged attacker. You’re better off using two weapon fighting or even throwing fighting style to throw daggers, axes, hammers, and use hand crossbows. Doing this dramatically limits the effectiveness of the companion unless you dismount.
There are more mechanics that can help out. The rules for barding in the player's handbook mean you can get armor for your mount to further increase the AC of your companion.
The protection fighting style is very strong defensively. Not only can you use this to defend your allies but your companion will basically always be within 5ft of you and will always be available to help. It's also a medium sized scary animal who is also attacking people while you're a much smaller humanoid riding it. The intelligence of the target will determine who the most likely target is. But, if you leave a space it's your mount that provokes the opportunity attack. Protection works by giving disadvantage for ALL attacks until the start of your next turn. Interception is solid. It's effectively a free heal every singe round to prevent damage from happening. But, it only works for one attack per round. If you use any fighting style that works with reaction you'll need to think about your feat selection as well. If you have this and also the sentinel feat you can only use one of these abilities with a reaction each turn.
Dueling fighting style is solid for extra damage if you're using a shield and a weapon. It doesn't work for thrown weapons though. For this style of character it can offer 2-6 damage per round. It's possible to have a weapon in hand then attack and stow, then with the next attack draw and attack to make use of multiple properties and only use one hand and not throw anything. It will be tricky. This is very reliable and very simple, it's also reasonable damage!
Great weapon fighting is solid if you're going to focus primarily two handed weapons. You're able to turn attack rolls of 1 into 3 and attack rolls of 2 into 3. This can work for your attack action attack, extra attack, cleave attack, bonus attack (great weapon fighter feat), and your reaction attack and reaction cleave. This ALSO includes all of your attack dice, not just the weapon dice so it would include hunter's mark. With a halberd on a primary target with hunter's mark you would gain 7 damage per round. This is one of the rare options that scales up as you get magic weapons and such. However, there will be (a lot of ) instances where you don't have cleave targets to also hit. Without the extra damage this does about 6 damage per round (the same as two weapon and dueling, or a thrown weapon player throwing 3 weapons per attack action) ... it's almost like these guys are professional game designers balancing mechanics for a living!
1D6 increases by 21.4% for a boost of 0.75
1D10 increases by 9.1% for a boost of 0.5 per D10.
1D12 increases by 7.7% for the same boost of 0.5 per D12.
2D6 increases by 11.9% for a boost of 0.83 per 2D6.
Thrown weapon fighting style is easy to make use of if you're planning to do a lot of weapon swapping and trying to take advantage of both nick and cleave after level 5. Throwing a weapon is an easy way to draw a weapon with your attack and effectively get it out of your hand for free so you can draw another weapon at the start of your next attack (this doesn't apply to bonus attacks and reaction attacks).
Two weapon fighting is the basic standard for this build. It will offer a very steady 3 damage per round (assuming 16 strength or dexterity). With dual wielder this becomes worth 6 total damage in a round as you get a nick attack and also a bonus action attack. But, that bonus action attack will replace your companion's attack. It does maximize your damage at lower levels because it can include hunter's mark damage for an extra 1D6 damage. This is a pretty steady and reliable amount of damage.
Your spirit was split and a portion of yourself lives within an animal that you can magically call to your side. And, as long as you live, you can always bring your companion back. Give the animal the aspect of this part of your personality and your companion should embody this, while you lack that aspect entirely.
You were selected by your deity to defend her domain. She’s blessed you with a small fragment of herself which has taken the shape of a mighty beast and it guides you as you fulfill her will.
You were raised to worship nature. Not just in the small region you lived, but everywhere. You range the lands defending nature. When you reach the right time a ceremony will be performed and the spirit of one of your ancestors will take the shape of an animal and help protect you while you protect the natural order.
Species Variants (gnome, halfling, aasimar, and human can be small):
Gnome is the most defense oriented with advantage for most types of magical attacks. Forest gnome is a bit more thematic than rock gnome. Feel free to role play through your free speak with animals casts as you have conversations with your animal companion. Let these be one sided where your companions only hear what you say and cannot understand your companion.
Aasimar is the most thematic for a character that leans into the divine aspects. This is very well rounded with a heal, a cantrip, and the once per day transformation. You can flavor this as your character taking on divine animal aspects with a transformation that changes your features dramatically (think celestial werewolf ... but with any animal you see fit).
Halfling is probably the most offensive in nature. The rerolls on D20 tests (which includes all your skills, initiative, attack rolls, saving throws, death saves) is a big deal. This increases both your accuracy and the odds of a critical hit (slightly). Builds with more D20 rolls get more out of this, and this can really be designed to focus on attack rolls. Just remember your pet doesn’t get the benefit of the rerolls.
Human is the most versatile. The extra skill can be a big deal for exploration or social encounters. It’s great on a ranger who already gets more skills than most classes. The extra feat is obviously powerful.
alert is never terrible
healer can make you a much more effective healer if your party is lacking a dedicated healer
lucky is always good
magic initiate is powerful. Assume your concentration will be taken up by hunter’s mark most of the time. You’re not likely to want to attack with a cantrip. Any first level spell you get should be useful at least once per day. You should rarely go a whole day without wanting to use the first level spell this grants. Don’t forget your ranger spell slots can be used to cast this known spell.
wizard
for a defensive style or skirmisher style hunter’s mark can be less effective. Blade ward becomes an absolutely huge option to reduce incoming damage. It’s basically +2.5 to your armor class. Cheap non magical armor can bring you to 19 with a shield and protection fighting style with this to effectively bump you to 21.5 at low level.
shield is never a bad spell
grease is very useful, especially with all the 2024 ways to push and pull. Keep in mind ranged attackers have disadvantage to hit a prone target.
cleric
guidance is always huge. The party only really needs one person with this spell.
for a defensive style or skirmisher style hunter’s mark is less effective. Resistance can be a reasonable way to use your concentration to play defensively.
bless is always huge, but it’ll eat up your concentration. This decreases your personal damage in favor of a solid boost to both offensive and defense for the party. Increasing accuracy doesn’t feel as exciting as increasing raw damage output, but a missed attack does 0 damage.
healing word is an outstanding addition to boost party healing capability
druid
thorn whip can be situationally great if your party is focusing on manipulating characters into effects. Spending an action on a cantrip in this way is an extremely substantial drop in your damage output even if you’re pulling it into an effect. But a spike growth or whatever else your party may have may be a tactically sound option for your action once in a while.
guidance as above.
shillelagh can occasionally be useful. The slow from club isn’t often useful, but the topple from quarterstaff can be good. It’ll cost a bonus to turn this on, and if you’re dropping both dexterity and strength to focus on wisdom and this cantrip it means you won’t have options to switch to two weapon fighting to maximize hunter’s mark to burn down targets or things like cleave to get free extra attacks. Trading all of that feels like a lot. To make the most of your companion you’ll generally always want to be in melee range and losing a bonus to use this, and losing bonus action to move hunter’s mark around means you’ll rarely be getting the companion’s attack.
faerie fire is huge but it means no hunter’s mark for the fight which will mean trading some of your personal damage output to increase the damage output of the party. Can be great!
thunderwave provides an easy AOE option that ranger’s generally lack. It also provides a way to push enemies back which can move them into various effects (think spike growth). If you can hit 3+ targets it’s generally strong.
skilled is very impactful to help with exploration and social encounters. It’s very easy for a dexterity based ranger to function like a rogue with slight of hand and stealth and proficiency in lockpick kits. You can get that from your background, or you can get it from this feat. More history/arcana/religion/nature to understand clues is always appreciated. You should already have perception from your ranger skills.
savage attacker can be huge if you build for it. It’s one per turn (like cleave) so if you can weaponize a reaction that takes place in another character’s turn you get to apply this feat twice per round. It also only impacts weapon dice (not things like hunter’s mark), but if you get a weapon that itself has extra dice (like a vicious weapon or flametongue) those are weapon dice and savage attacker would increase your damage output. Once per turn gaining 1.5 damage on a longsword attack may not sound incredible. But, it adds up! And, it can be doubled with reaction attacks. And, adding 7.6 total damage per round using a vicious greatsword and weaponizing your reaction for two hits is obviously great.
1D4 gains 32.4% for 0.81
1D6 gains 27.8% for 0.97
1D8 gains 33.7% for 1.52
1D10 gains 30% for 1.65
1D12 gains 26.8% for 1.74
2D6 gains 27.4% for 1.92
tough is a solid choice. This character will always be in the mix to be in range for the companion to get their attacks in.
Personality
There is room for a variety of personality types with this character based on the way you’ve decided your companion works and based on your connection to nature and if there is a divine connection and which (if any) deity you’re connected to.
Here’s an example:
You’re jovial and affable (please don’t be another edge lord, loner hunter). You’re unfamiliar with some of the customs of people who spend their time in highly populated areas, and while you’ve spent time learning in villages, and have small towns, larger cities produce anxiety and unease. While death and decay are a part of the natural order you’re angered by large scale waste of nature and you have severe and strong negative reactions to monstrosities and aberrations which go against the beliefs you were raised with (this may provide room for growth if there are party members with aberrant power sources like the psi warrior, soul knife, and aberrant sorcerer).
You’re well disciplined and spend a lot of your downtime tending to your equipment, and holding conversations with animals in the area, and also with your beast companion. Feel free to pick a small animal as a pet. Something that can interact with your beast companion, possible antagonistically in funny ways.
Attributes
Set these up as you like. Wisdom will be very important as it impacts your animal companion in so many ways (AC, hit modifier, damage modifier). You’ll want to focus on either strength or dexterity. Decide if you want to use weapons like the lance or things with cleave. If you do, you’ll need a strength based build. It’s possible to build this out with a focus on dexterity and not do the cleaving. This would give you more initiative and would work better if you also needed to function as the party rogue with that skillset. It will be tempting to try and build out the character with true strike and/or shillelagh. True strike builds really only work for valor bards and eldritch knight fighters who can replace a single attack with a cantrip. Upgrading a quarterstaff to a D10 weapon at level 5 and losing out on the ability to make extra attacks with nick and cleave isn’t really worth it you can only have one Shillelagh weapon and would need dexterity or strength to make two weapon fighting feasible.
For example:
Action
attack with quarterstaff or club. 1D10+1D6+3
extra attack with quarterstaff or club. 1D10+1D6+3
Bonus attack could be companion for 1D8+5 or polearm mastery haft attack for 1D4+1D6
Reaction attack from sentinel or polearm mastery 1D10+1D6+3
This averages 45 with the companion and 42 with the polearm mastery attack. This is a very reasonable damage output and it would still likely be more than most characters at this level. It’s certainly more than someone dropping a 2D8 cantrip for their turn with no bonus or reactions.
Spell Suggestions
A lot of people really struggle with ranger spells because concentration will mostly be spent on hunter’s mark and people still want to be able to use things like ensnaring strike and entangle and whatever else. You get two at level 1 and you’ll have 5 by level 4.
Hail of thorns is generally the most important offensive spell to grab. If you can hit 3 or more target with the AOE damage this becomes a solid way to spend a bonus action.
Fog cloud combined with blind fighting style is the classic warlock/darkness combination. Think about your party though. They’ll still be blind, and so will your companion.
Cure wounds is outstanding to let yourself be an offhealer.
Detect magic is a great way to add utility to the party. Talk to the group before taking it. It doesn’t really help a ton if several people all have the same spell. But, you can cast this as a ritual and not burn the slot.
Jump is a solid option when cast on your companion. There’s not much you won’t be able to avoid with 40 movement speed and a 30ft jump that costs 10ft of movement. This is the range of a misty step as a jump in every round for a minute.
Entangle is tricky. This will hinder your companion. This is situationally outstanding if you can catch groups of melee attackers and hold them in place as sitting ducks. This is also concentration so you would need to decide on this or doing more damage with hunter’s mark. If targets die really fast you may not be gaining a ton with hunter’s mark.
Ensnaring strike is occasionally really good. This is best holding down something that isn’t terribly strong (think enemy caster) and holding them in place while the team focuses them down. This is a concentration spell so you’re deciding between this and hunter’s mark. The biggest difference between this an entangle is entangle is still difficult terrain when people make the saving throw, and entangle doesn’t do damage, but can impact everything in a 20ft square instead of a single target.
I appreciate the kindness. The plan is to post one every month or so. The goal is for each to be a foundation that can be built out in a variety of ways.
Hey I uploaded a character twice because the first one cut off his head in the view picture, and I couldn't delete or edit the first one. It's under Kim Dokja, you will notice which one lol if you wanted to clean that up :D thank you for the website!!!
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Knight of the Wilds
Personality Gimmick
You’re a defender of nature, a region, the concept, or a nature deity (Mielikki, Silvanus, Chauntea, or even gods like Malar, Umberlee). You’re a defender of the natural order and you seek to protect the aspects of nature that cannot defend themselves.
If you need this to be super on the nose for a standard archetype, play like a paladin. You can even pick one of the oaths and live by those tennents, but filter it through the lens of nature (oath of ancients would be the least creative option, but do your thing). There’s no need to multiclass into paladin to play this way.
Mechanics Gimmick
You’re a ranger with the beastmaster subclass. There are multiple variants possible with options like taking sentinel at level 4 to weaponize your reaction or working with thrown weapons or dual weapons, heavy weapons, or a weapon and shield.
This character takes advantage of the beastmaster subclass’s medium animal companion and the small species to have a mount that never really dies (it takes a minute to bring it back to life an unlimited number of times per day). This also effectively gives the player 40 movement speed.
This immediately weaponizes your bonus actions with attacks as you can command your companion to attack. The bonus action pet attack will also make players thinking about staying back less effective (unless they’re not mounted).
There are variants for this that are more offensive focusing on hunter’s mark and two weapon fighting to burn down single targets, and there are variants that are more defensive in nature taking advantage of your mount to remove the two handed property from the lance to give you a one handed 1D10 weapon and shield.
You’ll be capable of up to 4D6 damage per round from hunter’s mark alone at level 4. This can increase to 5D6 at level 5 with extra attack. That’s from a spell that may not even cost a spell slot and will last round after round. It’s worth a slot and it’s worth concentration.
An example of a possible round after level 5 (assuming standard array and 16 Strength and 16 Wisdom):
or
or
That’s 7 attacks in a single round of combat. Spread out over two targets with 5 of those attacking the same target and 4 of those 5 can benefit from hunter’s mark allowing a first level spell to reliably deal 4D6 damage each round. This averages 63.5 damage at level 5 with no magic equipment (assuming somehow every hit lands, no critical hits happen, and things aren’t dying before the end which limits hunter’s mark). This doesn’t take fighting styles into account or things like savage attacker which would further increase this into the 70s.
Or, it’s 45.5 damage from a couple simple attacks with a lance. This doesn’t take fighting styles into account or feats (dueling would add 6 to that and savage attacker could add another 3.3).
Or it’s just not very good as a ranged attacker. You’re better off using two weapon fighting or even throwing fighting style to throw daggers, axes, hammers, and use hand crossbows. Doing this dramatically limits the effectiveness of the companion unless you dismount.
There are more mechanics that can help out. The rules for barding in the player's handbook mean you can get armor for your mount to further increase the AC of your companion.
The protection fighting style is very strong defensively. Not only can you use this to defend your allies but your companion will basically always be within 5ft of you and will always be available to help. It's also a medium sized scary animal who is also attacking people while you're a much smaller humanoid riding it. The intelligence of the target will determine who the most likely target is. But, if you leave a space it's your mount that provokes the opportunity attack. Protection works by giving disadvantage for ALL attacks until the start of your next turn. Interception is solid. It's effectively a free heal every singe round to prevent damage from happening. But, it only works for one attack per round. If you use any fighting style that works with reaction you'll need to think about your feat selection as well. If you have this and also the sentinel feat you can only use one of these abilities with a reaction each turn.
Dueling fighting style is solid for extra damage if you're using a shield and a weapon. It doesn't work for thrown weapons though. For this style of character it can offer 2-6 damage per round. It's possible to have a weapon in hand then attack and stow, then with the next attack draw and attack to make use of multiple properties and only use one hand and not throw anything. It will be tricky. This is very reliable and very simple, it's also reasonable damage!
Great weapon fighting is solid if you're going to focus primarily two handed weapons. You're able to turn attack rolls of 1 into 3 and attack rolls of 2 into 3. This can work for your attack action attack, extra attack, cleave attack, bonus attack (great weapon fighter feat), and your reaction attack and reaction cleave. This ALSO includes all of your attack dice, not just the weapon dice so it would include hunter's mark. With a halberd on a primary target with hunter's mark you would gain 7 damage per round. This is one of the rare options that scales up as you get magic weapons and such. However, there will be (a lot of ) instances where you don't have cleave targets to also hit. Without the extra damage this does about 6 damage per round (the same as two weapon and dueling, or a thrown weapon player throwing 3 weapons per attack action) ... it's almost like these guys are professional game designers balancing mechanics for a living!
Thrown weapon fighting style is easy to make use of if you're planning to do a lot of weapon swapping and trying to take advantage of both nick and cleave after level 5. Throwing a weapon is an easy way to draw a weapon with your attack and effectively get it out of your hand for free so you can draw another weapon at the start of your next attack (this doesn't apply to bonus attacks and reaction attacks).
Two weapon fighting is the basic standard for this build. It will offer a very steady 3 damage per round (assuming 16 strength or dexterity). With dual wielder this becomes worth 6 total damage in a round as you get a nick attack and also a bonus action attack. But, that bonus action attack will replace your companion's attack. It does maximize your damage at lower levels because it can include hunter's mark damage for an extra 1D6 damage. This is a pretty steady and reliable amount of damage.
Character Look
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D52472237/
https://www.heroforge.com/load_config%3D52986849/
Character Breakdown
You’re a gnome and you are a protector of nature.
Species Variants (gnome, halfling, aasimar, and human can be small):
Personality
There is room for a variety of personality types with this character based on the way you’ve decided your companion works and based on your connection to nature and if there is a divine connection and which (if any) deity you’re connected to.
Here’s an example:
You’re jovial and affable (please don’t be another edge lord, loner hunter). You’re unfamiliar with some of the customs of people who spend their time in highly populated areas, and while you’ve spent time learning in villages, and have small towns, larger cities produce anxiety and unease.
While death and decay are a part of the natural order you’re angered by large scale waste of nature and you have severe and strong negative reactions to monstrosities and aberrations which go against the beliefs you were raised with (this may provide room for growth if there are party members with aberrant power sources like the psi warrior, soul knife, and aberrant sorcerer).
You’re well disciplined and spend a lot of your downtime tending to your equipment, and holding conversations with animals in the area, and also with your beast companion. Feel free to pick a small animal as a pet. Something that can interact with your beast companion, possible antagonistically in funny ways.
Attributes
Set these up as you like. Wisdom will be very important as it impacts your animal companion in so many ways (AC, hit modifier, damage modifier). You’ll want to focus on either strength or dexterity. Decide if you want to use weapons like the lance or things with cleave. If you do, you’ll need a strength based build. It’s possible to build this out with a focus on dexterity and not do the cleaving. This would give you more initiative and would work better if you also needed to function as the party rogue with that skillset.
It will be tempting to try and build out the character with true strike and/or shillelagh. True strike builds really only work for valor bards and eldritch knight fighters who can replace a single attack with a cantrip. Upgrading a quarterstaff to a D10 weapon at level 5 and losing out on the ability to make extra attacks with nick and cleave isn’t really worth it you can only have one Shillelagh weapon and would need dexterity or strength to make two weapon fighting feasible.
For example:
This averages 45 with the companion and 42 with the polearm mastery attack. This is a very reasonable damage output and it would still likely be more than most characters at this level. It’s certainly more than someone dropping a 2D8 cantrip for their turn with no bonus or reactions.
Spell Suggestions
A lot of people really struggle with ranger spells because concentration will mostly be spent on hunter’s mark and people still want to be able to use things like ensnaring strike and entangle and whatever else. You get two at level 1 and you’ll have 5 by level 4.
This looks like a lot of time amd development, and sounds like a character deserving to be official, just expressing my admiral
Newbie trying to learn!
I appreciate the kindness. The plan is to post one every month or so. The goal is for each to be a foundation that can be built out in a variety of ways.
Hey I uploaded a character twice because the first one cut off his head in the view picture, and I couldn't delete or edit the first one. It's under Kim Dokja, you will notice which one lol if you wanted to clean that up :D thank you for the website!!!