Spontaneous Casting Ranger (help needed)

[kanachi]

Hiya everyone,

I just wanted to ask a quick question as my initial searches have yielded little in the way of results.

I am running a campaign for some players who have never played before and one of them wants to play a ranger. He’s not overly keen on the idea of having to prepare magic ahead of time and I myself have always preferred the no fuss nature of spontaneous casters (even if they sometimes loose out a bit in terms of power).

I know the ranger does not have to worry to much about his/her magic as its not a huge part of their class, they are hardly wizards after all. None the less do any of you have any good ideas on how to turn the ranger into a spontaneous caster? Also if you were to write up a recommended list of spells known (I have quite a wide range of splat books to draw from, including the spell compendium) what would you recommend?

Thanks for all your help!

[Forged Fury]

Take a look at the Spirit Shaman in Complete Divine and adapt that mechanic for a half-caster like the ranger. It should work pretty well and provides them with flexibility during the day.

[OverdrivePrime]

The idea of a charismatic ranger is one I enjoy. I'll second Forged Fury's vote on cribbing notes from the Spirit Shaman class. My only suggestion would be to make spellcasting purely dependent on charisma rather than charisma and wisdom. A ranger's life is hard enough without needing to boost multiple casting stats.

[Dusk Eclipse]

The idea of a charismatic ranger is one I enjoy. I'll second Forged Fury's vote on cribbing notes from the Spirit Shaman class. My only suggestion would be to make spellcasting purely dependent on charisma rather than charisma and wisdom. A ranger's life is hard enough without needing to boost multiple casting stats.

Wouldn't it fit better to key it to Wisdom (to avoid hassles)

[Person_Man]

The Ranger is a weak class. You could honestly just let him cast any spell of the appropriate level off of his list equal to the number of spells of that level that he could memorize. Alternatively, you could let him take Ranger spells as Spell-like abilities that he could cast at will, like Warlock Invocations. That way he would only pick a small number of spells, but could use them whenever he needs to without any further bookkeeping.

[FMArthur]

I'll second giving normal Rangers full-list spontaneous casting. If you don't allow it on Mystic Rangers, it's probably even a good way to balance the Normal against the Mystic.

[OverdrivePrime]

Wouldn't it fit better to key it to Wisdom (to avoid hassles)

Yeah, but spontaneous casting screams out for Charisma.

[FMArthur]

Yeah, but spontaneous casting screams out for Charisma.

It's just a mechanic through which they access their spells. :smallconfused:
Not all spontaneous casters are Charisma-based, anyway. Beguiler is Int, and the spontaneous divine casters from CD are both Charisma and Wisdom based. All of Psionics is spontaneous, and very little of it is Charisma-based.

[Firechanter]

Just stick to Wisdom, that's at least useful for a couple of skills, and also more in-theme imho. I'll also second to just allow them to cast any spell on their list spontaneously.

You could also improve the spells per day by +2 slots per spell level, since spontaneous casters often have more spells per day than prepped ones. This is in exchange for a limited list -- but face it, the Ranger's list is already VERY limited to begin with.

Many Ranger spells are quite a slap in the player's face. The ability to heal ~11 HP at level 12? Laughable.
Most of the Ranger's spells come in too late, and their caster level is atrocious. The latter you can fix by simply giving them full class level as caster level; or maybe class level -3 if you want to keep them on a shorter leash, but 1/2 class level is too much of a gimping.

Same goes for animal companion btw.

Long story short, you can upgrade the ranger's spellcasting by quite a bit without ever running the risk of making the class too powerful. As others have said, it's a weak class. It really needs some love.

[FMArthur]

Even the Ranger spells considered good, coming out of the Spell Compendium and such, are no better than ToB maneuvers. Makes me feel like I should be running three Ranger variants: full-list spontaneity Ranger, learn + cast spells as maneuvers Ranger, and Mystic Ranger.

...if any of my players actually cared about that. Their eyes gloss over when I explain Mystic Rangers and other class variants as it is.

[ShneekeyTheLost]

You can always apply Spontaneous Divine Caster (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/spontaneousDivineCasters.htm) variant to them... will need a bit of fudging for it to work right, though, as it is really intended for clerics and druids.

Personally, I let my rangers trade in spells for four bonus fighter feats. Get a new bonus feat whenever they'd get access to a spell level.

Honestly, I'm working on a ToB variant Ranger, since maneuvers seem to be much more their style.

[Jude_H]

Spellthieves and Hexblades have the same half-casting thing as the Ranger. Just hork their spells known progressions. Spellthief is on the WotC website (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/ex/20050107a).

I've had groups tack the Bard spell progression onto the Paladin and Ranger, just to bump them up into the same game as Tome of Battle. It didn't come close to breaking anything.

[Coidzor]

Take a look at the Spirit Shaman in Complete Divine and adapt that mechanic for a half-caster like the ranger. It should work pretty well and provides them with flexibility during the day.

I'd say go with this option of adapting Spirit Shaman style mixing of preparation and spontaneity myself, though it's not going to hurt anything if you just take a page from the Beguiler, Dread Necromancer, and Warmage for Paladins and Rangers... Or, heck, Duskblades wouldn't become OP either if they got Beguiler-style knowledge of their spell list.

About the only downside I can think of would be that it'd mess with Sword of the Arcane Order, and, well, if he doesn't wanna prepare and memorize Ranger spells, doesn't seem like he'll be cool with doing it for Wizard ones either.

[FMArthur]

I'd say go with this option of adapting Spirit Shaman style mixing of preparation and spontaneity myself, though it's not going to hurt anything if you just take a page from the Beguiler, Dread Necromancer, and Warmage for Paladins and Rangers... Or, heck, Duskblades wouldn't become OP either if they got Beguiler-style knowledge of their spell list.

About the only downside I can think of would be that it'd mess with Sword of the Arcane Order, and, well, if he doesn't wanna prepare and memorize Ranger spells, doesn't seem like he'll be cool with doing it for Wizard ones either.

SotAO has its own wording on preparing your wizard spells and using a spellbook, so it actually doesn't interact with this houserule in any meaningful way. 'Twas the first thing I thought of when making the decision to add it to the Charter of Houserules Which No Players Shall Ever Bother to Read.