Easy enough, and it doesn't even have to be homebrew. Take Humanoids as your Favored Enemy and learn some languages. Then take Deft Explorer from Tasha's Cauldron of Everything instead of Natural Explorer and learn two more languages. When you hit level 3 choose the Fey Wanderer Conclave. Now you have social skills and eventually five extra languages from your class to make an urban ranger focused on social skills to navigate humanoid society. If you keep taking Humanoids as your Favored Enemy you will have six different humanoid races you can be an expert on eventually.
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Canto alla vita alla sua bellezza ad ogni sua ferita ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
What is the "nature" of a "City Expert"? I would assume it is to know who is trustworthy and where to find the trouble. But if you want someone to combat city threats, that is something else. Then it is just about any PC because fighting enemies is the same in a city as out.
So a City Expert is someone that is on very good terms with the populace and can sense when something is amiss. It is even better if they have the trust of the common people so they come tell him when something goes wrong and who did it. Then he gets his posse together and goes and fixes things.
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Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
Unless you really really want to be a ranger, I'd be a "city ranger" by choosing rogue as my class. To me it's like asking what a city druid would be like. The concept of the class is tied to wilderness. Take that away and you've just got a few mechanics to make better skill checks, and more languages I guess. Just seems to sit right on top of the rogue archetype.
I could easily see a Swarmkeeper ranger working for this. Make it an "urban wildlife" swarm like rats or pigeons
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
What is the "nature" of a "City Expert"? I would assume it is to know who is trustworthy and where to find the trouble. But if you want someone to combat city threats, that is something else. Then it is just about any PC because fighting enemies is the same in a city as out.
So a City Expert is someone that is on very good terms with the populace and can sense when something is amiss. It is even better if they have the trust of the common people so they come tell him when something goes wrong and who did it. Then he gets his posse together and goes and fixes things.
I'll admit my immediate reaction was "why not just go rogue?" That said, conceptually I could see someone sort of inverting the default lore of Ranger and treat "the city" as the wilds threatening civilization. By no means a courtier, urban "society" is literally monstrous to rangers of this sort, I could see a Ranger sort of eeking out (maybe as a swarmkeeper, pardon the rodent pun) a vagrant existence on the margins of urban life ... sorta like at least the early days of Image's Spawn and the Maxx comics. Cities, especially large fantasy cities are complicated ecosystems with a lot of "living aspects" that are overlooked by most citizenry.
So seeing the city as a sprawling monster that preys on the meek and others trying to live with dignity against the city's exploitive machinery, I could see a ranger of a lot of types setting to work. In D&D, of course, the city could very well be a sprawling monster too.
As for the Druid mention, city-based druids aren't entirely alien from D&D. I'm actually 98% sure besides the Urban Hermit background (also possibly useful for the city ranger), BG: DiA makes mention of Druids who live and do their druid thing inside the walls of the city, probably tapping into the whole cities are complex ecosystems thing I already mentioned.
I'm now envisioning some sort of urban ranger, a urban druid, and an urban oath of ancients paladin teaming up to protect say, to get a little real, a tent slum of good people beleaguered and oppressed by a mega city's vision for "progress."
Possible inspiration, though the movie may not have aged well and it's been a while, Terry Gilliam's The Fisher King. It's set in the late 1980s but might help with the tone of such characters.
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Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.
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So some generalized ideas about a ranger but his favorite train is City so how would you make a city wise Ranger. So any ideas???
this would be a home brow ranger
Easy enough, and it doesn't even have to be homebrew. Take Humanoids as your Favored Enemy and learn some languages. Then take Deft Explorer from Tasha's Cauldron of Everything instead of Natural Explorer and learn two more languages. When you hit level 3 choose the Fey Wanderer Conclave. Now you have social skills and eventually five extra languages from your class to make an urban ranger focused on social skills to navigate humanoid society. If you keep taking Humanoids as your Favored Enemy you will have six different humanoid races you can be an expert on eventually.
Canto alla vita
alla sua bellezza
ad ogni sua ferita
ogni sua carezza!
I sing to life and to its tragic beauty
To pain and to strife, but all that dances through me
The rise and the fall, I've lived through it all!
Human variant, feat: skulker, skill: choose one, language Common + A
ranger, deft explorer, language B & C, expertise stealth, proficiencies: stealth + 2 more
blind fighting, gloom stalker
favored enemy: humanoid, language D
urban bounty hunter or urchin
Gives you 6 skill proficiencies and 5 languages and lots of stealthy action
What is the "nature" of a "City Expert"? I would assume it is to know who is trustworthy and where to find the trouble. But if you want someone to combat city threats, that is something else. Then it is just about any PC because fighting enemies is the same in a city as out.
So a City Expert is someone that is on very good terms with the populace and can sense when something is amiss. It is even better if they have the trust of the common people so they come tell him when something goes wrong and who did it. Then he gets his posse together and goes and fixes things.
Cum catapultae proscriptae erunt tum soli proscript catapultas habebunt
Unless you really really want to be a ranger, I'd be a "city ranger" by choosing rogue as my class. To me it's like asking what a city druid would be like. The concept of the class is tied to wilderness. Take that away and you've just got a few mechanics to make better skill checks, and more languages I guess. Just seems to sit right on top of the rogue archetype.
My homebrew subclasses (full list here)
(Artificer) Swordmage | Glasswright | (Barbarian) Path of the Savage Embrace
(Bard) College of Dance | (Fighter) Warlord | Cannoneer
(Monk) Way of the Elements | (Ranger) Blade Dancer
(Rogue) DaggerMaster | Inquisitor | (Sorcerer) Riftwalker | Spellfist
(Warlock) The Swarm
I could easily see a Swarmkeeper ranger working for this. Make it an "urban wildlife" swarm like rats or pigeons
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
I'll admit my immediate reaction was "why not just go rogue?" That said, conceptually I could see someone sort of inverting the default lore of Ranger and treat "the city" as the wilds threatening civilization. By no means a courtier, urban "society" is literally monstrous to rangers of this sort, I could see a Ranger sort of eeking out (maybe as a swarmkeeper, pardon the rodent pun) a vagrant existence on the margins of urban life ... sorta like at least the early days of Image's Spawn and the Maxx comics. Cities, especially large fantasy cities are complicated ecosystems with a lot of "living aspects" that are overlooked by most citizenry.
So seeing the city as a sprawling monster that preys on the meek and others trying to live with dignity against the city's exploitive machinery, I could see a ranger of a lot of types setting to work. In D&D, of course, the city could very well be a sprawling monster too.
As for the Druid mention, city-based druids aren't entirely alien from D&D. I'm actually 98% sure besides the Urban Hermit background (also possibly useful for the city ranger), BG: DiA makes mention of Druids who live and do their druid thing inside the walls of the city, probably tapping into the whole cities are complex ecosystems thing I already mentioned.
I'm now envisioning some sort of urban ranger, a urban druid, and an urban oath of ancients paladin teaming up to protect say, to get a little real, a tent slum of good people beleaguered and oppressed by a mega city's vision for "progress."
Possible inspiration, though the movie may not have aged well and it's been a while, Terry Gilliam's The Fisher King. It's set in the late 1980s but might help with the tone of such characters.
Jander Sunstar is the thinking person's Drizzt, fight me.