I'm building a Human Drakewarden Ranger for a Strix campaign, and I was wondering if I should use the Tasha's optional rules or the rules from the player's handbook.
I'm building a Human Drakewarden Ranger for a Strix campaign, and I was wondering if I should use the Tasha's optional rules or the rules from the player's handbook.
It depends on what your focus is. A mix is more likely to hit the sweet spot for the majority of players, Tasha's will probably hit the spot for campaigns that are more focused on combat, and PH will likely hit the spot more for exploration based campaigns.
Deft Explorer will outperform Natural Explorer in campaigns that involve a reasonably wide variety of terrains, and is generally preferable. Both Favored Enemy and Favored Foe are kind of marginal, I would pick favored enemy if I have a concept that supports it and I have reason to think it will be applicable (talk to your DM), favored foe for a generic bonus.
Deft Explorer will outperform Natural Explorer in campaigns that involve a reasonably wide variety of terrains, and is generally preferable. Both Favored Enemy and Favored Foe are kind of marginal, I would pick favored enemy if I have a concept that supports it and I have reason to think it will be applicable (talk to your DM), favored foe for a generic bonus.
It’s worth noting that OP mentioned they were building a Drakewarden. The main reason Favored Foe is lackluster is it requires concentration and therefore competes with most Ranger spells, most notably Hunter’s Mark. However, Hunter’s Mark requires a bonus action to operate, so it competes with the ranger commanding their Drake Companion. Favored Foe, meanwhile, does not use an action or bonus action.
I like Deft Explorer over Natural Explorer... even in a game that tracks all the things that Natural Explorer focuses on more minutely, Deft explorer is just more exciting overall.
Primeval Awareness was always a garbage feature... the range is too massive to be useful, plus the fact that it doesn't reveal anything beyond just "at least one of these things exists within 1 mile of you). Primal Awareness, meanwhile, gives you some great spells that you might not have taken as a Ranger since you have so few spell slots, but lucky you, you can cast these spells once a day without consuming a slot.
Hide in Plain Sight is such a niche, difficult to use feature that most players will never use it. If you're looking for ways to take advantage of it, there might be times where it comes in handy, but Nature's Veil will come into use very regularly.
Favored Enemy vs. Favored Foe, however... I'm not sure that either is 100% better than the other. Favored Enemy is great for roleplay, as it informs a lot about your character... what motivates them, what their backstory could be, what their goals are... it's also potentially incredibly useful... assuming that your DM lets you know ahead of time what kind of creatures you're going to be facing extensively in their game. DM'ing a group through Tyranny of Dragons, the Ranger with Dragons as a Favored Enemy has been indespensible in passing history, nature, or arcana checks to guide the players on what to do next. When facing off against a White Dragon, the Ranger got a Nat20 on a Nature check to recall information about White Dragons, so I just literally showed them the character sheet for an Adult White Dragon, since they basically knew all that info.
However, Favored Foe is a lot more universally applicable. If your campaign has a large variety of enemy types or if the DM doesn't make many uses for those kinds of checks, then Favored Foe is probably going to get used a lot more. The downside, though... is that it's kind of just a worse version of Hunter's Mark, which is a spell that most Rangers are already going to want. To be fair, it's got a lot of positives versus Hunter's Mark... it doesn't cost a spell slot, it's triggered by landing an attack, freeing up your bonus action for other things... and that's about it. You still have to concentrate on it as though it were a spell, it only lasts one minute, and you can't move it to a different target after the first one dies like you can with Hunter's Mark.
I'll throw in my support for "take all the Tasha's options except Favored Foe." FF is just disappointing in multiple ways. Favored Enemy doesn't have as much of a mechanical impact as I'd like, but at least the flavor is cool.
Go all the way with Tasha’s. Although PHB Rangers were perfectly fine since the beginning, Tasha’s made specially level 1 features more useful in combat and overall gameplay. Favored Foe is still a damage bonus that do not disturb your action economy; I would get that all the time instead of Favored Enemy. Deft Explorer can make you great in a given skill, so it’s more effective than Natural Explorer.
All the other features are mostly ribbon in my opinion, but as I said, Rangers were doing great since PHB. Don’t forget your amazing spell list that shouldn’t be restricted to Hunters Mark only. Absorb Elements, Goodberry, Entangle, Ensnaring Strike, Zephyr Strike, Aid, Pass Without a Trace, Silence, etc. These are our competitive edge in battle.
Because you are playing a drakewarden in Strixhaven you want a mix of features. If your DM will give you some clues as to what to take - especially at L1- FE Grants advantage on tracking and info checks against your favored enemy(s) along with 1 language. FF grants 1D4 on one hit each round for 1 minute if you can hold concentration against 3 foes a day. Deft explorer grants expertise in 1 skill and 2 languages at L1. At L1 expertise represents a +3 to the roll, advantage from FE typically works out to a +4 so you get +3 for 1 skill and 2 languages or +4 for tracking AND info along with 1 language. Given Strixhaven I would take humanoids which grants 2 races one of which should probably be humans. Natural Explorer only grants you 1 terrain and in Strixhaven that is a significant disability. You do want to take the extra ranger spells from Tasha. For most folks the spells from primal awareness is probably better than primeval awareness as well. Similarly many folks misunderstand Hide in plain sight thinking you have to set the cammoflage immediately before trying to hide which makes the ability useless. You don’t, you do need to take a minute to set it but you can set it hours before then touch it up immediately after combat to be ready for the next time. Because of this Many folks think nature’s veil is better even tho you can only do it PB times while HIPS is unlimited. Properly used they are a toss up. In your shoes I would take FE, DE, primal, The extra ranger spells and your choice HIPS or Nature’s veil.
My ranger is a mixture; when I made her I didn't use any of the Tasha's stuff (because I didn't know it was available) but my DM let me swap out some stuff later on.
Because you are playing a drakewarden in Strixhaven you want a mix of features. If your DM will give you some clues as to what to take - especially at L1- FE Grants advantage on tracking and info checks against your favored enemy(s) along with 1 language. FF grants 1D4 on one hit each round for 1 minute if you can hold concentration against 3 foes a day.
Strixhaven is levels 1-10, so FF is 2-4 foes per day, no idea where you got 3 from. FE will level up at levels 1 and 6, so you can have up to 2 types selected (or you can pick subtypes of humanoid up to 4 times) and learn up to 2 languages. I have no idea what you're likely to face at Strixhaven, but generically speaking, within CR 1-10, the most creatures in the game by type aside from humanoids are monstrosities, so my generical advice would be to pick monstrosity. I believe the most commonly spoken monstrosity language is Abyssal.
FF is very bad but you don't need to cross any fingers to hope that you guessed the correct type/subtypes.
Deft explorer grants expertise in 1 skill and 2 languages at L1. At L1 expertise represents a +3 to the roll, advantage from FE typically works out to a +4 so you get +3 for 1 skill and 2 languages or +4 for tracking AND info along with 1 language. Given Strixhaven I would take humanoids which grants 2 races one of which should probably be humans. Natural Explorer only grants you 1 terrain and in Strixhaven that is a significant disability.
Expertise at level 1 is +2 to the roll relative to proficiency and +4 relative to non-proficiency. There is no context in which advantage is worth +4; in a world where a higher roll is always better (i.e. not D&D), rounding to the nearest integer it's worth +3. The 5E rule for +5 to passive checks is the end result of assuming all DCs are multiples of 5, you have to roll them on the dice, and you're picking the DC with uniform probability.
I have no idea what the demographics are of the Strixhaven student or faculty body, but my eyebrows would go very far up if picking humans was remotely useful, as there's generally nothing to remember about humans that the PC won't already know, like that they grow hair and can't breathe water. Human is just a bad pick for FE, not that I understand exactly why you're talking about DE vs FE. You can take DE and FE and stack them. In any case, as I mentioned above, the generically best choice is monstrosity if you're taking FE for this level range.
If you take NE, you will end up with 3 biomes chosen, and you'll be better at overland/strategic movement in them. If you take DE, you will eventually get the whole thing: being better at a skill at level 1 (the languages aren't very important, in general), tactical movement upgrades at level 6 for being more mobile in combat, and at level 10, being harder to kill overall and being resistant to exhaustion.
My generic advice here is DE, with Expertise in Perception and Primordial and Sylvan as your languages, as these are the languages the party is most likely to count on you to know.
You do want to take the extra ranger spells from Tasha. For most folks the spells from primal awareness is probably better than primeval awareness as well.
Primeval Awareness will definitely depend heavily on DM interpretation. In the Strixhaven level range the bonus spells are Speak With Animals, Beast Sense, and Speak With Plants, so their utility depends on the campaign setting, but generically, I hard agree.
Similarly many folks misunderstand Hide in plain sight thinking you have to set the cammoflage immediately before trying to hide which makes the ability useless. You don’t, you do need to take a minute to set it but you can set it hours before then touch it up immediately after combat to be ready for the next time. Because of this Many folks think nature’s veil is better even tho you can only do it PB times while HIPS is unlimited. Properly used they are a toss up. In your shoes I would take FE, DE, primal, The extra ranger spells and your choice HIPS or Nature’s veil.
Let's be clear: both abilities will only be useful at the tail end of the campaign.
Nature's Veil will be 4/day turn invisible until the beginning of the next turn, i.e. you're invisible during your movement, action, reaction (if any), and enemy turns for 1 round.
HIPS is not remotely as clear-cut as you just described it. I'll try to cover everything, including the interpretation you just presented, which is novel to me.
You need to spend 1 minute "creating camouflage for yourself" from "fresh mud, dirt, plants, soot, and other naturally occurring materials". Creating the camouflage means you are "camouflaged in this way". Furthermore, "Once you move or take an action or a reaction, you must camouflage yourself again to gain this benefit."
In other words, HIPs gives you rules for creating camouflage, then refers to creating camouflage as camouflaging you (even though this is not how camouflage works), then tells you under what conditions you need to camouflage yourself again, implying that it means creating the camouflage again.
Contrariwise, WildBill is interpreting the camouflage as an object you only ever have to make once (and it takes 1 minute), and then you always have the camouflage on tap, meaning you never have to spend the 1 minute again for the rest of your Ranger's life. I have never in my life met a DM willing to agree with this, but I suppose you should ask your DM.
I have personally had DMs who have thrown out the "for yourself" part of HIPs and allowed the Ranger to camouflage things other than themselves, radically upgrading the utility of HIPs. This explicitly violates the RAW but may be the RAI.
There is no listed amount of time between creating the camouflage and attempting to hide. I have met DMs who rule that the entire process is one thing - you spend a minute and then you have the +10 - but this isn't how HIPs is worded. Per HIPs, you can camouflage yourself outside of combat, and then you have your camouflage until you make the specific HIPs hide attempt, which consumes the camo to let you make the check with a +10 bonus, and then you'll need another minute to re-up. Forcing the entire thing to be one process is certainly a nerf which violates RAW, but may be RAI.
My generic advice is Nature's Veil. Because you can't move or act during HIPs even without the issues surrounding the minute-long process to make camo, it behaves like it's the level 5 Eldritch Invocation One With Shadows only worse, and you don't get it until level 10 on top of the minute-long creation process. That's not a great feeling.
Because you are playing a drakewarden in Strixhaven you want a mix of features. If your DM will give you some clues as to what to take - especially at L1- FE Grants advantage on tracking and info checks against your favored enemy(s) along with 1 language. FF grants 1D4 on one hit each round for 1 minute if you can hold concentration against 3 foes a day.
Strixhaven is levels 1-10, so FF is 2-4 foes per day, no idea where you got 3 from. FE will level up at levels 1 and 6, so you can have up to 2 types selected (or you can pick subtypes of humanoid up to 4 times) and learn up to 2 languages. I have no idea what you're likely to face at Strixhaven, but generically speaking, within CR 1-10, the most creatures in the game by type aside from humanoids are monstrosities, so my generical advice would be to pick monstrosity. I believe the most commonly spoken monstrosity language is Abyssal.
FF is very bad but you don't need to cross any fingers to hope that you guessed the correct type/subtypes.
Deft explorer grants expertise in 1 skill and 2 languages at L1. At L1 expertise represents a +3 to the roll, advantage from FE typically works out to a +4 so you get +3 for 1 skill and 2 languages or +4 for tracking AND info along with 1 language. Given Strixhaven I would take humanoids which grants 2 races one of which should probably be humans. Natural Explorer only grants you 1 terrain and in Strixhaven that is a significant disability.
Expertise at level 1 is +2 to the roll relative to proficiency and +4 relative to non-proficiency. There is no context in which advantage is worth +4; in a world where a higher roll is always better (i.e. not D&D), rounding to the nearest integer it's worth +3. The 5E rule for +5 to passive checks is the end result of assuming all DCs are multiples of 5, you have to roll them on the dice, and you're picking the DC with uniform probability.
I have no idea what the demographics are of the Strixhaven student or faculty body, but my eyebrows would go very far up if picking humans was remotely useful, as there's generally nothing to remember about humans that the PC won't already know, like that they grow hair and can't breathe water. Human is just a bad pick for FE, not that I understand exactly why you're talking about DE vs FE. You can take DE and FE and stack them. In any case, as I mentioned above, the generically best choice is monstrosity if you're taking FE for this level range.
If you take NE, you will end up with 3 biomes chosen, and you'll be better at overland/strategic movement in them. If you take DE, you will eventually get the whole thing: being better at a skill at level 1 (the languages aren't very important, in general), tactical movement upgrades at level 6 for being more mobile in combat, and at level 10, being harder to kill overall and being resistant to exhaustion.
My generic advice here is DE, with Expertise in Perception and Primordial and Sylvan as your languages, as these are the languages the party is most likely to count on you to know.
You do want to take the extra ranger spells from Tasha. For most folks the spells from primal awareness is probably better than primeval awareness as well.
Primeval Awareness will definitely depend heavily on DM interpretation. In the Strixhaven level range the bonus spells are Speak With Animals, Beast Sense, and Speak With Plants, so their utility depends on the campaign setting, but generically, I hard agree.
Similarly many folks misunderstand Hide in plain sight thinking you have to set the cammoflage immediately before trying to hide which makes the ability useless. You don’t, you do need to take a minute to set it but you can set it hours before then touch it up immediately after combat to be ready for the next time. Because of this Many folks think nature’s veil is better even tho you can only do it PB times while HIPS is unlimited. Properly used they are a toss up. In your shoes I would take FE, DE, primal, The extra ranger spells and your choice HIPS or Nature’s veil.
Let's be clear: both abilities will only be useful at the tail end of the campaign.
Nature's Veil will be 4/day turn invisible until the beginning of the next turn, i.e. you're invisible during your movement, action, reaction (if any), and enemy turns for 1 round.
HIPS is not remotely as clear-cut as you just described it. I'll try to cover everything, including the interpretation you just presented, which is novel to me.
You need to spend 1 minute "creating camouflage for yourself" from "fresh mud, dirt, plants, soot, and other naturally occurring materials". Creating the camouflage means you are "camouflaged in this way". Furthermore, "Once you move or take an action or a reaction, you must camouflage yourself again to gain this benefit."
In other words, HIPs gives you rules for creating camouflage, then refers to creating camouflage as camouflaging you (even though this is not how camouflage works), then tells you under what conditions you need to camouflage yourself again, implying that it means creating the camouflage again.
Contrariwise, WildBill is interpreting the camouflage as an object you only ever have to make once (and it takes 1 minute), and then you always have the camouflage on tap, meaning you never have to spend the 1 minute again for the rest of your Ranger's life. I have never in my life met a DM willing to agree with this, but I suppose you should ask your DM.
I have personally had DMs who have thrown out the "for yourself" part of HIPs and allowed the Ranger to camouflage things other than themselves, radically upgrading the utility of HIPs. This explicitly violates the RAW but may be the RAI.
There is no listed amount of time between creating the camouflage and attempting to hide. I have met DMs who rule that the entire process is one thing - you spend a minute and then you have the +10 - but this isn't how HIPs is worded. Per HIPs, you can camouflage yourself outside of combat, and then you have your camouflage until you make the specific HIPs hide attempt, which consumes the camo to let you make the check with a +10 bonus, and then you'll need another minute to re-up. Forcing the entire thing to be one process is certainly a nerf which violates RAW, but may be RAI.
My generic advice is Nature's Veil. Because you can't move or act during HIPs even without the issues surrounding the minute-long process to make camo, it behaves like it's the level 5 Eldritch Invocation One With Shadows only worse, and you don't get it until level 10 on top of the minute-long creation process. That's not a great feeling.
I can’t remember where I got the 3 from either at this point 🤪 maybe as an average. The point with FE is that it enables tracking and (especially at L1-5) you may be tracking humans and another humanoid more than needing info on a monstrosity. At L6 monstrosities are a good choice. If you notice I actually recommend taking FE and DE as they do combine nicely. My point with FF was that (for most of the campaign) you’re limited to 2-3 uses a day totaling 2 to 3 minutes/2-3 foes each day. Taking FE and hunter’s mark (at level 2) is generally superior even with the bonus action interference between HM and commanding your drake. For Strixhaven, because of the wide range of environments built into the setting all close to each other NE’s 2 environments by L10 is the wrong choice - DE is a better choice for this campaign by a long shot. Similarly, while primeval Awareness can be a strong ability in the right campaign/situation/ for the right player, primal awareness with its communication spells will be a better choice in strixhaven. If your taking both DE and FE then the expertise vs advantage is really a moot point but even at +3 at levels 1-4 that is better than the expertise’s +2. L5-8 they are the same and only at L9/10 is expertise somewhat better.
Here is the text for hide in plain sight:
Hide in Plain Sight
Starting at 10th level, you can spend 1 minute creating camouflage for yourself. You must have access to fresh mud, dirt, plants, soot, and other naturally occurring materials with which to create your camouflage.
Once you are camouflaged in this way, you can try to hide by pressing yourself up against a solid surface, such as a tree or wall, that is at least as tall and wide as you are. You gain a +10 bonus to Dexterity (Stealth) checks as long as you remain there without moving or taking actions. Once you move or take an action or a reaction, you must camouflage yourself again to gain this benefit.
Yes it’s only at the end of the campaign so arguing over it may be moot point but …
Notice - the camouflaging and hiding are not only not in the same sentence, they are in different paragraphs so - think of a special forces operative, before the mission they put on the appropriate fatigues, ghillie suit, skin paint etc to be able to disappear and hide when they need to latter in the mission. Then, later in the mission when they have a need to hide they do so. Are they always successful? No - that’s why you have the hide check roll. But because of the cammoflage they put on earlier they are better able to hide (+10 to the check) than an uncammoflaged individual. As with all hiding you can’t move or act without ending the hide. Then, before hiding again you need to make sure everything is still in place touching things up as needed before the next attempt. Trying to require you to spend a minute immediately before hiding putting on cammoflage makes no sense to me while this read makes perfect sense. I never said it’s good forever only that the minute of prep and the act of hiding don’t have to be be contiguous in time. What HIPS does is give an unlimited number of +10 hide attempts (even out in the open ground ( a solid surface) ) as long as you spend a minute prepping for it ahead of time vs the 4 times/day invisible for 1 round of Nature’s veil. Quindraco prefers Nature’s Veil, I prefer HIPS. The choice is the OP’s.
The PHB can be better for exploration-focused campaigns but it is tricky to optimize in terms of skill proficiencies unless you are sure how much you will be in favored terrain.
Starting at 10th level, you can spend 1 minute creating camouflage for yourself. You must have access to fresh mud, dirt, plants, soot, and other naturally occurring materials with which to create your camouflage.
Once you are camouflaged in this way, you can try to hide by pressing yourself up against a solid surface, such as a tree or wall, that is at least as tall and wide as you are. You gain a +10 bonus to Dexterity (Stealth) checks as long as you remain there without moving or taking actions. Once you move or take an action or a reaction, you must camouflage yourself again to gain this benefit.
Yes it’s only at the end of the campaign so arguing over it may be moot point but …
Notice - the camouflaging and hiding are not only not in the same sentence, they are in different paragraphs so - think of a special forces operative, before the mission they put on the appropriate fatigues, ghillie suit, skin paint etc to be able to disappear and hide when they need to latter in the mission. Then, later in the mission when they have a need to hide they do so. Are they always successful? No - that’s why you have the hide check roll. But because of the cammoflage they put on earlier they are better able to hide (+10 to the check) than an uncammoflaged individual. As with all hiding you can’t move or act without ending the hide. Then, before hiding again you need to make sure everything is still in place touching things up as needed before the next attempt. Trying to require you to spend a minute immediately before hiding putting on cammoflage makes no sense to me while this read makes perfect sense. I never said it’s good forever only that the minute of prep and the act of hiding don’t have to be be contiguous in time. What HIPS does is give an unlimited number of +10 hide attempts (even out in the open ground ( a solid surface) ) as long as you spend a minute prepping for it ahead of time vs the 4 times/day invisible for 1 round of Nature’s veil. Quindraco prefers Nature’s Veil, I prefer HIPS. The choice is the OP’s.
I don't think unlimited +10 is that powerful, especially since you can do it for an hour with a 2nd level spell, while also extending the benefit to the rest of the party.
Yes pass without trace is a powerful spell and at L10 you have a max of 5 uses of it but Pw/oT and HIPS serve very different purposes. Pwot is all about moving your party without been seen or disturbed. Hips is all about surveillance and scouting. Further while pwot can last for 5 hours it is still a limited resource, hips is only limited by how long you can hold still, even then you can move and rest as many times as you need/want in that sense it’s an unlimited resource. The proper comparison is not PWOT It’s Nature’s veil - 4 rounds/day of invisibility. For that I think Hips is superior. Similarly while we have to compare FE and FF because they replace each other the real comparison is FF to hunter’s Mark. FF’s big advantage there is that you get it at L1 while HM comes online at L2 (300 EXP later-whoopee). FF does 1D4 damage on 1 hit each round for up to 2 minutes a day and it can be activated on a hit. That is a DPR increase of roughly 1 for those 2 minutes - useful but not extremely so. HM gives you a DPR increase of 3-5 ( depending on how often you hit using TWF) for upto 2 hours (3 hrs at L3) on multiple targets. Yes there is bonus action roadblock with your drake but it’s significant enough. My typical spell selection is HM & goodberry at L2 then adding zephyr strike at L3 and PWOT at L5.
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I'm building a Human Drakewarden Ranger for a Strix campaign, and I was wondering if I should use the Tasha's optional rules or the rules from the player's handbook.
Only spilt the party if you see something shiny.
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It depends on what your focus is. A mix is more likely to hit the sweet spot for the majority of players, Tasha's will probably hit the spot for campaigns that are more focused on combat, and PH will likely hit the spot more for exploration based campaigns.
Deft Explorer will outperform Natural Explorer in campaigns that involve a reasonably wide variety of terrains, and is generally preferable. Both Favored Enemy and Favored Foe are kind of marginal, I would pick favored enemy if I have a concept that supports it and I have reason to think it will be applicable (talk to your DM), favored foe for a generic bonus.
It’s worth noting that OP mentioned they were building a Drakewarden. The main reason Favored Foe is lackluster is it requires concentration and therefore competes with most Ranger spells, most notably Hunter’s Mark. However, Hunter’s Mark requires a bonus action to operate, so it competes with the ranger commanding their Drake Companion. Favored Foe, meanwhile, does not use an action or bonus action.
I like Deft Explorer over Natural Explorer... even in a game that tracks all the things that Natural Explorer focuses on more minutely, Deft explorer is just more exciting overall.
Primeval Awareness was always a garbage feature... the range is too massive to be useful, plus the fact that it doesn't reveal anything beyond just "at least one of these things exists within 1 mile of you). Primal Awareness, meanwhile, gives you some great spells that you might not have taken as a Ranger since you have so few spell slots, but lucky you, you can cast these spells once a day without consuming a slot.
Hide in Plain Sight is such a niche, difficult to use feature that most players will never use it. If you're looking for ways to take advantage of it, there might be times where it comes in handy, but Nature's Veil will come into use very regularly.
Favored Enemy vs. Favored Foe, however... I'm not sure that either is 100% better than the other. Favored Enemy is great for roleplay, as it informs a lot about your character... what motivates them, what their backstory could be, what their goals are... it's also potentially incredibly useful... assuming that your DM lets you know ahead of time what kind of creatures you're going to be facing extensively in their game. DM'ing a group through Tyranny of Dragons, the Ranger with Dragons as a Favored Enemy has been indespensible in passing history, nature, or arcana checks to guide the players on what to do next. When facing off against a White Dragon, the Ranger got a Nat20 on a Nature check to recall information about White Dragons, so I just literally showed them the character sheet for an Adult White Dragon, since they basically knew all that info.
However, Favored Foe is a lot more universally applicable. If your campaign has a large variety of enemy types or if the DM doesn't make many uses for those kinds of checks, then Favored Foe is probably going to get used a lot more. The downside, though... is that it's kind of just a worse version of Hunter's Mark, which is a spell that most Rangers are already going to want. To be fair, it's got a lot of positives versus Hunter's Mark... it doesn't cost a spell slot, it's triggered by landing an attack, freeing up your bonus action for other things... and that's about it. You still have to concentrate on it as though it were a spell, it only lasts one minute, and you can't move it to a different target after the first one dies like you can with Hunter's Mark.
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I'll throw in my support for "take all the Tasha's options except Favored Foe." FF is just disappointing in multiple ways. Favored Enemy doesn't have as much of a mechanical impact as I'd like, but at least the flavor is cool.
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Tasha's all the way
Tasha's with everything but Favoured Foe. I think Favoured Enemy is a lot more interesting from a roleplaying perspective.
Tasha’s hands down is better.
The more options to choose from the better but if you ask me i prefer Tasha's.
I dont know if any class had more reviews and update options than the ranger between UA PHB, TCoE etc
Go all the way with Tasha’s. Although PHB Rangers were perfectly fine since the beginning, Tasha’s made specially level 1 features more useful in combat and overall gameplay. Favored Foe is still a damage bonus that do not disturb your action economy; I would get that all the time instead of Favored Enemy. Deft Explorer can make you great in a given skill, so it’s more effective than Natural Explorer.
All the other features are mostly ribbon in my opinion, but as I said, Rangers were doing great since PHB. Don’t forget your amazing spell list that shouldn’t be restricted to Hunters Mark only. Absorb Elements, Goodberry, Entangle, Ensnaring Strike, Zephyr Strike, Aid, Pass Without a Trace, Silence, etc. These are our competitive edge in battle.
Because you are playing a drakewarden in Strixhaven you want a mix of features. If your DM will give you some clues as to what to take - especially at L1- FE Grants advantage on tracking and info checks against your favored enemy(s) along with 1 language. FF grants 1D4 on one hit each round for 1 minute if you can hold concentration against 3 foes a day.
Deft explorer grants expertise in 1 skill and 2 languages at L1. At L1 expertise represents a +3 to the roll, advantage from FE typically works out to a +4 so you get +3 for 1 skill and 2 languages or +4 for tracking AND info along with 1 language. Given Strixhaven I would take humanoids which grants 2 races one of which should probably be humans. Natural Explorer only grants you 1 terrain and in Strixhaven that is a significant disability.
You do want to take the extra ranger spells from Tasha. For most folks the spells from primal awareness is probably better than primeval awareness as well. Similarly many folks misunderstand Hide in plain sight thinking you have to set the cammoflage immediately before trying to hide which makes the ability useless. You don’t, you do need to take a minute to set it but you can set it hours before then touch it up immediately after combat to be ready for the next time. Because of this Many folks think nature’s veil is better even tho you can only do it PB times while HIPS is unlimited. Properly used they are a toss up. In your shoes I would take FE, DE, primal, The extra ranger spells and your choice HIPS or Nature’s veil.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
My ranger is a mixture; when I made her I didn't use any of the Tasha's stuff (because I didn't know it was available) but my DM let me swap out some stuff later on.
It's a pretty sure bet OP made their character and doesn't need advice anymore, but ok.
Strixhaven is levels 1-10, so FF is 2-4 foes per day, no idea where you got 3 from. FE will level up at levels 1 and 6, so you can have up to 2 types selected (or you can pick subtypes of humanoid up to 4 times) and learn up to 2 languages. I have no idea what you're likely to face at Strixhaven, but generically speaking, within CR 1-10, the most creatures in the game by type aside from humanoids are monstrosities, so my generical advice would be to pick monstrosity. I believe the most commonly spoken monstrosity language is Abyssal.
FF is very bad but you don't need to cross any fingers to hope that you guessed the correct type/subtypes.
Expertise at level 1 is +2 to the roll relative to proficiency and +4 relative to non-proficiency. There is no context in which advantage is worth +4; in a world where a higher roll is always better (i.e. not D&D), rounding to the nearest integer it's worth +3. The 5E rule for +5 to passive checks is the end result of assuming all DCs are multiples of 5, you have to roll them on the dice, and you're picking the DC with uniform probability.
I have no idea what the demographics are of the Strixhaven student or faculty body, but my eyebrows would go very far up if picking humans was remotely useful, as there's generally nothing to remember about humans that the PC won't already know, like that they grow hair and can't breathe water. Human is just a bad pick for FE, not that I understand exactly why you're talking about DE vs FE. You can take DE and FE and stack them. In any case, as I mentioned above, the generically best choice is monstrosity if you're taking FE for this level range.
If you take NE, you will end up with 3 biomes chosen, and you'll be better at overland/strategic movement in them. If you take DE, you will eventually get the whole thing: being better at a skill at level 1 (the languages aren't very important, in general), tactical movement upgrades at level 6 for being more mobile in combat, and at level 10, being harder to kill overall and being resistant to exhaustion.
My generic advice here is DE, with Expertise in Perception and Primordial and Sylvan as your languages, as these are the languages the party is most likely to count on you to know.
Primeval Awareness will definitely depend heavily on DM interpretation. In the Strixhaven level range the bonus spells are Speak With Animals, Beast Sense, and Speak With Plants, so their utility depends on the campaign setting, but generically, I hard agree.
Let's be clear: both abilities will only be useful at the tail end of the campaign.
My generic advice is Nature's Veil. Because you can't move or act during HIPs even without the issues surrounding the minute-long process to make camo, it behaves like it's the level 5 Eldritch Invocation One With Shadows only worse, and you don't get it until level 10 on top of the minute-long creation process. That's not a great feeling.
Only spilt the party if you see something shiny.
Ariendela Sneakerson, Half-elf Rogue (8); Harmony Wolfsbane, Tiefling Bard (10); Agnomally, Gnomish Sorcerer (3); Breeze, Tabaxi Monk (8); Grace, Dragonborn Barbarian (7); DM, Homebrew- The Sequestered Lands/Underwater Explorers; Candlekeep
I can’t remember where I got the 3 from either at this point 🤪 maybe as an average. The point with FE is that it enables tracking and (especially at L1-5) you may be tracking humans and another humanoid more than needing info on a monstrosity. At L6 monstrosities are a good choice. If you notice I actually recommend taking FE and DE as they do combine nicely. My point with FF was that (for most of the campaign) you’re limited to 2-3 uses a day totaling 2 to 3 minutes/2-3 foes each day. Taking FE and hunter’s mark (at level 2) is generally superior even with the bonus action interference between HM and commanding your drake. For Strixhaven, because of the wide range of environments built into the setting all close to each other NE’s 2 environments by L10 is the wrong choice - DE is a better choice for this campaign by a long shot. Similarly, while primeval Awareness can be a strong ability in the right campaign/situation/ for the right player, primal awareness with its communication spells will be a better choice in strixhaven. If your taking both DE and FE then the expertise vs advantage is really a moot point but even at +3 at levels 1-4 that is better than the expertise’s +2. L5-8 they are the same and only at L9/10 is expertise somewhat better.
Here is the text for hide in plain sight:
Hide in Plain Sight
Starting at 10th level, you can spend 1 minute creating camouflage for yourself. You must have access to fresh mud, dirt, plants, soot, and other naturally occurring materials with which to create your camouflage.
Once you are camouflaged in this way, you can try to hide by pressing yourself up against a solid surface, such as a tree or wall, that is at least as tall and wide as you are. You gain a +10 bonus to Dexterity (Stealth) checks as long as you remain there without moving or taking actions. Once you move or take an action or a reaction, you must camouflage yourself again to gain this benefit.
Yes it’s only at the end of the campaign so arguing over it may be moot point but …
Notice - the camouflaging and hiding are not only not in the same sentence, they are in different paragraphs so - think of a special forces operative, before the mission they put on the appropriate fatigues, ghillie suit, skin paint etc to be able to disappear and hide when they need to latter in the mission. Then, later in the mission when they have a need to hide they do so. Are they always successful? No - that’s why you have the hide check roll. But because of the cammoflage they put on earlier they are better able to hide (+10 to the check) than an uncammoflaged individual. As with all hiding you can’t move or act without ending the hide. Then, before hiding again you need to make sure everything is still in place touching things up as needed before the next attempt.
Trying to require you to spend a minute immediately before hiding putting on cammoflage makes no sense to me while this read makes perfect sense. I never said it’s good forever only that the minute of prep and the act of hiding don’t have to be be contiguous in time. What HIPS does is give an unlimited number of +10 hide attempts (even out in the open ground ( a solid surface) ) as long as you spend a minute prepping for it ahead of time vs the 4 times/day invisible for 1 round of Nature’s veil. Quindraco prefers Nature’s Veil, I prefer HIPS. The choice is the OP’s.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.
Overall mean bonus is 21%. If you add in 10% and 90% (either gives +9%) the average is 18.3%. Calling it an average of +4 is pretty reasonable.
Generally Tasha's.
The PHB can be better for exploration-focused campaigns but it is tricky to optimize in terms of skill proficiencies unless you are sure how much you will be in favored terrain.
I don't think unlimited +10 is that powerful, especially since you can do it for an hour with a 2nd level spell, while also extending the benefit to the rest of the party.
If you like it better though go with it.
Yes pass without trace is a powerful spell and at L10 you have a max of 5 uses of it but Pw/oT and HIPS serve very different purposes. Pwot is all about moving your party without been seen or disturbed. Hips is all about surveillance and scouting. Further while pwot can last for 5 hours it is still a limited resource, hips is only limited by how long you can hold still, even then you can move and rest as many times as you need/want in that sense it’s an unlimited resource. The proper comparison is not PWOT It’s Nature’s veil - 4 rounds/day of invisibility. For that I think Hips is superior. Similarly while we have to compare FE and FF because they replace each other the real comparison is FF to hunter’s Mark. FF’s big advantage there is that you get it at L1 while HM comes online at L2 (300 EXP later-whoopee). FF does 1D4 damage on 1 hit each round for up to 2 minutes a day and it can be activated on a hit. That is a DPR increase of roughly 1 for those 2 minutes - useful but not extremely so. HM gives you a DPR increase of 3-5 ( depending on how often you hit using TWF) for upto 2 hours (3 hrs at L3) on multiple targets. Yes there is bonus action roadblock with your drake but it’s significant enough. My typical spell selection is HM & goodberry at L2 then adding zephyr strike at L3 and PWOT at L5.
Wisea$$ DM and Player since 1979.