About to play a long-range fighter, need help

[RabanoDOOM]

So, here's the sitch. I'm a part of an IRL group, and we're starting a 2nd level campaign. I decided I was going to do something that I've literally never done in any D&D game I've ever played, and roll up a dedicated archer. You can see the character sheet here:

http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheet.html#id=797320

We started out with a bunch of gold and a +1 weapon of our choice, so that's an explanation for all the stuff. I intend to take battlemaster for my archetype, but I don't know if I'm going to be multiclassing later down the road or not.

I make this thread to ask...multiple questions. As a player who's never played an archery-based character in D&D before, what sort of general advice would you give to me for tactics, character building, and party roleplay? As a player playing an archery-based character in 5e SPECIFICALLY, what sort of advice would you give for that?

And, probably most importantly, what advice would you give for playing this specific character? I know it's D&D, and it's my job to roleplay out how he'd act and perform in and out of combat, but I also don't want my character to fall flat or become a gary sue. :smalleek: Tactic, Roleplay, and Character Growth advice for this specific character would be greatly appreciated.

My deepest thanks to anyone who responds! :smallbiggrin:

[BW022]

Just some general advice...

In 30+ years of D&D, I've never seen that character concept actually work. The nature of the game is that encounters take place in dungeons, ships, buildings, castles, city streets, forests, etc. Encounter distances are typically starting at 50' maximum. Most 5e games tend to be played on battlemaps (which max out at about 20x20 one-inch squares). In reality... 99% of encounters, range beyond 100' is meaningless and 90% of the time, creatures will close within a round or two. Unless you have another character (or characters) to block... you may not be able to used ranged attacks after the first round or two.

Even if you could get 500' away and start attacking... the rest of your party will likely refuse simply because (unless everyone is a long-range concept) everyone else will be bored of not being able to attack and it takes forever for one PC to drop a typical monster over 10-15+ rounds. They'll all want to move up so they can attack and get the fight over faster.

Playing a ranged character is fine. Fighter is great also. Just remember most combats will be are relatively short ranges. You need a concept/method of staying out of melee (other characters block, you can fly, your party has really strong crowd control spells, etc.)

[SMac8988]

I partially agree with the post above me, partially. I think a primary range class can work very well, I don't have 30 years under my belt but have been story telling for about 7 years and have a couple of players who favor ranged combat and a few who only fight up close.

The biggest advice I could give from what I've seen is, pick up mobility so you can keep slightly ahead of most anything you will run into. And just be prepared for someone catching up to you.

The battle master can help greatly for that second part. With the ability to knock someone prone or give them fright so they can't get to you will help significantly.

Also your party design will help. The DM should focus people the mobs would be concerned about. AT range typically a caster will be have more of a draw to hit than you, and someone in their face will hopefully hold aggro kinda well.

I am in the process of building a ranger/rogue who focuses on riding his wolf and fighting at range. So I'll probably be a stalking your post to see advice people give. :)

[Crgaston]

My first 5e character was pretty much this... Champion Archer. Dex>WIS=Con>Str. Spy background with proficiency in Acrobatics, perception, deception and stealth. In a party with 2 clerics, a rogue, a sorcerer and an NPC fighter. We were running a 5e conversion of Tomb of Horrors, so I expected him to die. We started at 9th and he had +2 studded leather, bracers of archery and a bow +1 for his 3 magic items with a scimitar for melee. The Champion archetype is great for a Dex build because of the expanded crit range plus the remarkable athlete gives you half proficiency rounded up on initiative, which meant he was usually going first. Standard tactics were move to an advantageous position and attack the most immediately threatening enemy. This would tend to draw aggro away from the party, or else he'd be dealing unanswered damage. Fun to play if you enjoy tactical movement and combat. He's level 13 now and with 3 attacks crits about every other round.

Have fun!

Edit: He did take the Tough feat... Should have taken resilient WIS. And his second Combat Style was Close Quarters Shooter from UA which lets you keep using your bow in melee without disadvantage. So at L13 with 20 Dex and a +1 Bow he has +14 to hit ànd a +8 initiative. The rest of the players were like "yawn" when I brought him to the table, but now there's respect for the Archer. He's not a rock star, but he will save your bacon when it needs saving.

[DeAnno]

Picking up Crossbow Expert is really good at level 4, since it not only adds DPR but lets you function in melee; along with fighter HP this lets you be very versatile when it comes to engagement range. With regards to Mobility (the feat and in general), I tend to view it as more of a priority for melee, since they absolutely need to keep up to be effective. As a dex focused ranged character I do like to carry a scimitar and a sling as my backup weapons in case of situations where Piercing damage won't work.

[Sigreid]

I wouldn't multi-class. With Archery Fighting Style, Crossbow Expert and Sharp Shooter, the fighters increased rate of fire will eventually turn you into a damage dealing monster of ridiculous proportions. I'd have some fun and refuse to use melee weapons, just for kicks. Keep a longbow for out door/potentially long ranged combat and a hand crossbow for that extra attack when spelunking through a dungeon. With CE you will be able to use both effectively in melee range. Remember with sharp shooter each attack is a potential Die+Dex+10 damage so the more attacks the more you get out of that feat, and your dex and bow bonus for that matter.

If you go battle master, look for the maneuvers that will let you mess with the opponents going after your pals, or slow a powerful opponent advancing on you. Personally, I think this is where the champion fighter's extra crit and regeneration would really shine.

I also think you will do fine as a tanking role. "That guy in the robe, may be dangerous, but he's not really been up to anything much yet and he may not believe us to be worth expending his impressive but limited power. That guy with the bow? He's a one man machine gun nest. If we don't get him down, we're all going to die, and we can't even really try to kite him."

[NewDM]

I'll second Mobility and throw in a few ranger levels for the Hunter's Mark spell, and other features.

Alertness feat is worth grabbing so you act first in combat and move far away, or take cover. You should always be in cover and move out long enough to shoot, then move back into cover.

You'll want to max your Dexterity as fast as possible.

Lucky is another feat worth getting. You can turn disadvantage into super advantage and turn misses into hits.

Possibly Skulker feat for advantage on your attack when coming out of stealth and not losing stealth on a miss.

[djreynolds]

Archery style is huge, for early level play where spells slots are at a premium.

But once you reach a certain level, after those 3 attacks your power can wane.

Rogue is a great dip but the damage is only one attack per turn and you must invest in rogue.

I'm in the camp that grabbing cleric or bard to expand your utility is awesome. Having three attacks and bonus action healing word is nice. Casting you own bless or haste is really good.

[Iris]

Well, I'm currently playing a Battle Master Archer. I started at level 5, am now level 7, and I have not yet lost a single hit point. (To be fair, we have been fighting zombies and hellhounds and such, not many ranged weapons or much intelligence there. Still.)
I've been letting the rest of the party go into melee range and block me off while I shoot from behind. It's been working really well so far. I have a rapier as backup - you may want something with a decent damage die as your backup weapon so you can be useful in all kinds of combat. The Mobile feat may be helpful; I have it, haven't used it yet, but am anticipating lots of use out of it. Crgaston has a point with the second fighting style that Champions get, but I don't think there's a problem with being a Battle Master. You can take Menacing Attack and rely on your party members to kill everyone before the enemy can recover and get to you. You could even take Goading Attack and enjoy the fact that the enemies can't reach you AND now have disadvantage on their other attacks. Trip Attack knocks them prone for your party members to beat on. And you can take all of those next level if you want to.

As for the roleplaying side, I'd say maybe tone down the vitrolic/critical side just a bit when interacting with the other PCs, since there's sometimes confusion about in-character and out-of-character dialogue, or at least make it clear that it's your character speaking, not you. Feel free to be super in character with NPCs, though, since the DM can usually tell. :) Maybe think about what your character is getting out of his job - why did he join the mafia? On the one hand, he seems very independent and a loner-type, but on the other hand, he has to follow orders and stay in line to keep his job. How does that work out for him? Consider his past, too. Where's his family? Any friends (or enemies) that he's made personally? Why does he feel he has to follow the Mask? Does he get benefits from that, or is it just a 'whatever, everyone else does it' kind of thing?
I think you'll probably play him fine. You seem to have a good idea of what he's like. The only thing that makes a flat character is not knowing enough about them or not caring, and the only thing that makes a Gary Stu is trying to make them perfect or Super Special Snowflake. I think with this level of character knowledge, plus trying not to make a Gary Stu, you'll be able to pull it off.

[Foxhound438]

just a mechanical nit-pick, you might want something a bit more effective than a dagger for in melee. Flavor wise it's fine, but a rapier or a pair of short-swords would do you wonders.

For multiclassing, rogue 2 at some point past level 5 in fighter gets you the ability to disengage as a bonus action, as well as giving sneak attack damage on one hit per turn. Having 2 attempts on attack rolls for the extra damage is actually pretty good, especially when it gets upwards of 3d6 thrown in. For the rogue dip, the best way of doing it is probably go fighter 5 ->rogue 2 or 3 ->fighter 11 ->rogue x

Alternatively, 3 in ranger gets you hunter's mark (damage per hit is good for multiple attacks) and colossus slayer (slightly worse sneak attack). The trick here is to get crossbow expert and use hand crossbow for a 3rd/4th attack when you don't have to re-target the mark. Anything past 3 in ranger is pretty non-stellar, so probably go fighter 5 -> ranger 3 -> fighter x in this case. You already have the prequisite 13 wis, so it's certainly doable

Third option is to start taking cleric levels after 5 in fighter for utility/buffing/spell power. Honestly I'd recommend going fighter 5 ->cleric x and never look back if you want to go that route.

RP wise your bond and flaw kind of clash, but it's certainly workable. Really the biggest advice here is to not work directly against the other party members (ie cleptomania, abandoning the team, etc). It's a group game, and that should carry some weight regardless of what the character sheet says your personality is.

[Malifice]

Go Vuman. Max Dex. Dump Str, Int, Cha. Wisdom and Con of at least 13. Take Sharpshooter for your feat at 1st level, and select the archery style.

Take Fighter to 6th. Do not pass go. Do not collect 200 bucks. If the Scout archetype is allowed from UA take this instead of BM. Its more thematic and just as good.

If not, select BM as your archetype and then select precision attack, menacing attack and pushing attack at 3rd level for your manouvers. Take Crossbow master for your feat at 4th level, and bump Dex by 2 points at 6th level.

Take 5 levels of Rogue (Assasin) at this point for (cunning action) disengage and dash. Now you can kite like a boss. Expertise in perception and stealth are just gravy. Sneak attack +3d6 adds to your damage, and if you get the drop on a creature you can nova like a boss. Uncanny dodge helps when you do get hit. Bump Dex to 20 at 4th (or if already at 20, consider Alert, Lucky or Resilient [wisdom])

Head back to fighter for six more levels to 11th (for extra attack [2]). Select whatever feat out of [Alert, Lucky and Resilient Wisdom] you dont already have at 8th level. From there on take 4 of Ranger for your final 4 levels (for colossus slayer/ horde breaker and hunters mark).

[djreynolds]

^^awesome build above^^^^

The scout from the UA, is awesome. You get 3 extra skills, and can add your SD dice to precision, add SD to a special parry maneuver that is a combo of defensive duelist/uncanny dodge, and add SD to your skills.

Imagine expertise in stealth, and then adding say 1d8 on top the roll. Surprise should be much easier to obtain. And ranger favored terrains.


But I like, a good old cleric/fighter say Battle Master 12/ Cleric 8. More support and buffing, could go BM 12/ Bard 8. In the back, stay upright, barely roll for concentration checks, have bless up and running for you and your companions, can move in and heal or even tank.

And another forgotten combo is EK and sorcerer, same 12/8. EK is for all your defensive spells. Sorcerer is for twinning haste and other buffs for team-mates while you stay in the back just firing arrows and concentrating.

And ranger/cleric/monk is sweet.

[DeAnno]

As an alternative to UA Scout, UA Monster Hunter is also pretty good. 2 extra skills, and one of his extra superiority dice effects is to add to Int/Wis/Cha saves. A no action defense like that can be a big deal, especially because you will pump Dex and have Str/Con proficiency, making it so you have no truly "weak" save.

[Rhaegar14]

Just some general advice...

In 30+ years of D&D, I've never seen that character concept actually work. The nature of the game is that encounters take place in dungeons, ships, buildings, castles, city streets, forests, etc. Encounter distances are typically starting at 50' maximum. Most 5e games tend to be played on battlemaps (which max out at about 20x20 one-inch squares). In reality... 99% of encounters, range beyond 100' is meaningless and 90% of the time, creatures will close within a round or two. Unless you have another character (or characters) to block... you may not be able to used ranged attacks after the first round or two.

Even if you could get 500' away and start attacking... the rest of your party will likely refuse simply because (unless everyone is a long-range concept) everyone else will be bored of not being able to attack and it takes forever for one PC to drop a typical monster over 10-15+ rounds. They'll all want to move up so they can attack and get the fight over faster.

Playing a ranged character is fine. Fighter is great also. Just remember most combats will be are relatively short ranges. You need a concept/method of staying out of melee (other characters block, you can fly, your party has really strong crowd control spells, etc.)

I'd like to counter this with my own experience right now; our dedicated archer Eldritch Knight is extremely effective in my current 5e group. I can't speak for 1st or 2nd edition, but one big problem with archers in 3rd edition (so, possibly, in older editions) was that it was very difficult to get them to deal damage. That is no longer the case in 5e.

Now, admittedly, our campaign doesn't have a ton of dungeon crawls, but he's still rarely getting shots from his maximum 600 foot range (the one time he did, he killed something like eight harpies before they could close). He does an absurd amount of damage, and my Paladin (with Sentinel) makes a point of trying to keep enemies off of him, but he also has his own means of doing so; the Shocking Grasp cantrip, and a scimitar if he's forced into melee. Even in melee, he's far from helpless, though not nearly as effective as at range. I SHUDDER to think what he'd be capable of if he took Crossbow Expert (as it stands, he never will; he uses a bow for style points, and a flintlock pistol is our Bard's shtick, so he'd kinda be stepping on his toes).

[Specter]

Worth noting that if you take 2 levels of the spell-less Ranger (from Unearthed Arcana) along with Battlemaster, by RAW you will be getting tons of superiority dice and maneuvers!

[MaxWilson]

So, here's the sitch. I'm a part of an IRL group, and we're starting a 2nd level campaign. I decided I was going to do something that I've literally never done in any D&D game I've ever played, and roll up a dedicated archer. You can see the character sheet here:

http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheet.html#id=797320

We started out with a bunch of gold and a +1 weapon of our choice, so that's an explanation for all the stuff. I intend to take battlemaster for my archetype, but I don't know if I'm going to be multiclassing later down the road or not.

I make this thread to ask...multiple questions. As a player who's never played an archery-based character in D&D before, what sort of general advice would you give to me for tactics, character building, and party roleplay? As a player playing an archery-based character in 5e SPECIFICALLY, what sort of advice would you give for that?

Learn how to conduct overwatch and get your team on board with taking advantage of it. Seek out high ground (climb trees, etc.). Get comfortable with the idea that an archer's power comes from exploiting distance. There is no point to being an archer if you and your whole party and the monsters are all within 30' of each other. However, if your party is Dashing madly away from the half-dozen hobgoblins who are chasing them back through the trees towards your overwatch position while you pelt the hobgoblins with arrows... everybody is wasting their turns Dashing except you, which means free attacks for the party.

This may sound at first like it only works in wide-open spaces, but in fact it works pretty well in any terrain where you can set up movement obstacles. For example, in a dungeon environment you could potentially set up a short corridor with caltrops all down its length and a pit trap (thanks, Mold Earth) in the middle. Caltrops force a DC 15 Dex save or you stop dead (unless you're moving at half speed) and lose 10' of movement until healed for at least one HP; a pit trap will do some damage and make you go prone (because that's how falling damage works in 5E, you go prone after taking it). So if you can find a 40' long corridor and prepare it properly, you can have a defensive position that the other party members can fall back on at need. Any enemies who pursue them into that corridor will take multiple rounds of Sharpshooter fire to the face, possibly some extra damage from caltrops and pit traps, and then because the corridor is narrow they'll only be able to get at one PC at a time, and that PC will be the heavily-armored Paladin or Fighter who is busy dodging while the Sharpshooter shoots the enemy in the face at no penalty for cover (thanks, Sharpshooter). Your defensive position might also have partial or total cover to help with Dex saves and counterfire.

Ranged-heavy parties (at least two effective ranged attackers) tend to be much better at leveraging this kind of situation than parties with only one ranged Sharpshooter. I know you probably can't influence your party composition at this point, but one tank + two Sharpshooters/Warlocks is 50-100% stronger than two tanks + one Sharpshooter/Warlock in a chokepoint situation, because the second tank can't fit in the chokepoint (unless he's using a polearm, and then he has to deal with partial cover from his buddy).

Remember though, none of this works unless your party is willing to take advantage of your overwatch capabilities and the fact that you can provide them a secure rear area. If they just charge ahead and roll attacks, and then complain to you for "not helping" when that approach gets them killed, give them a Darwin award.

BTW, Expeditious Retreat is a killer spell for an Eldritch Knight. Will let you solo things that would normally be out of your league.

[LordVonDerp]

Take the feat that lets you shoot in melee without a penalty.

[Crgaston]

Methinks MaxWilson may be an IRL veteran.

[Saeviomage]

Learn how to conduct overwatch and get your team on board with taking advantage of it. Seek out high ground (climb trees, etc.). Get comfortable with the idea that an archer's power comes from exploiting distance. There is no point to being an archer if you and your whole party and the monsters are all within 30' of each other. However, if your party is Dashing madly away from the half-dozen hobgoblins who are chasing them back through the trees towards your overwatch position while you pelt the hobgoblins with arrows... everybody is wasting their turns Dashing except you, which means free attacks for the party.
Good tactics? Sure. Fun? Hardly. "Hey guys, how about you spend all of combat taking the dash action while I kill everything?"

That and the fact that hobgoblins are armed with longbows.

The simple fact of the matter is that unless you are in melee, ranged attacks work just fine even if everyone is within 30' of each other.

You are only going to experience problems if everyone in the party is ranged AND sacrifices their defensive statistics.

Now that said, being able to climb or fly is a great ability for a ranged combatant (so maybe consider athletics?), and certainly traps like caltrops, pits and that nasty bear trap have their place. No need for 5 zombies to eat face in melee when you could cut that down to 1 or 2.

Additionally while there are nice things to be grabbed from multiclassing... the simple fact is that there are perks to be gained from going straight fighter too. Taking anything but fighter is delaying feats, maneuvers, save rerolls and above all, your third attack, which likely out damages most of the alternatives, especially with sharpshooter.

Also - remember that as a dex-based BM, all your maneuvers work in melee as well, and losing +2 to hit is probably preferable to having disadvantage.

[MaxWilson]

Good tactics? Sure. Fun? Hardly. "Hey guys, how about you spend all of combat taking the dash action while I kill everything?"

Different people have different kinds of fun I guess. I enjoy Combat As War more than Combat As Sport. For me, the actual "rolling attacks and damage rolls" is actually pretty boring, and in the last session we actually skipped over two of the combats instead of playing them out in detail.

On the other hand, you know it's time to panic when you think this combat is in the bag and yet the DM wants to keep on playing. "There's still one kobold behind cover... do you guys want to chase him down?"


That and the fact that hobgoblins are armed with longbows.

When there's a Sharpshooter involved, that's just another way of losing. I've seen it tried, and so far it's never worked out all that well for the hobgoblins. Maybe it could if they were smarter (and maybe next time I will make them go prone to counter Sharpshooter, if they can guess that a Sharpshooter is involved), but so far it hasn't ever.

Besides, that's why the enemy is called The Enemy, because he likes to mess up your plans. A battle with no play/counterplay isn't much of a battle--see aforementioned comments about boring attack rolls.


Methinks MaxWilson may be an IRL veteran.

Not so much. I did enlist during my quarter-life crisis, but it turned out during OSUT that I was a terrible shot, had awful night vision and was really noisy in night exercises, and while great at PT I didn't do so well in actual ruck marches, so when I came down with exertional compartment syndrome and they sent me home early I doubt they were missing out on much from me. I'm just not a valuable soldier. So I was technically 11-B for just under a year, but half of that was spent in DEP and the other five months was spent in OSUT... in short, I cannot claim to be anything like an IRL veteran. But I did give it a shot.

[Foxhound438]

Not so much. I did enlist during my quarter-life crisis, but it turned out during OSUT that I was a terrible shot, had awful night vision and was really noisy in night exercises, and while great at PT I didn't do so well in actual ruck marches, so when I came down with exertional compartment syndrome and they sent me home early I doubt they were missing out on much from me. I'm just not a valuable soldier. So I was technically 11-B for just under a year, but half of that was spent in DEP and the other five months was spent in OSUT... in short, I cannot claim to be anything like an IRL veteran. But I did give it a shot.

Still respectable. I hardly made it through the rucks in basic.

[Cybren]

As an aside I really wanna play in one of max wilsons games...

[Corran]

As an aside I really wanna play in one of max wilsons games...
Get in the line pal :p

[MaxWilson]

I'm not quite ready to do Internet gaming yet (I found the experience frustrating when I tried it in the past, so I'm working on tools to improve the experience first) but if you're interested in the kind of games I run, shoot me an email at [email protected] and we'll talk.

It might be fun to have a group of online players competing indirectly with my Seattle (Issaquah), WA players to see who can complete the missions first. Plus, there's Head of Vecna potential. (http://www.blindpanic.com/humor/vecna.htm)

===========================================


Still respectable. I hardly made it through the rucks in basic.

That was the thing that had me most concerned actually. I _knew_ we were taking it easy on our ruck marches (my training company was pretty messed up--the CO was more worried about getting high graduation rates so he would look good than on actually preparing soldiers for combat, and the CO and NCOs cheated on a bunch of requirements in order to graduate more people) so mentally I was measuring myself not against "will I be able to graduate OSUT?" but against actual combat missions "will I be able to hike twenty miles up a mountain in Afghanistan with a full load of combat gear every day?" And given the symptoms I experienced after every moderate-difficulty ruck march (e.g. 6-8 miles on flat ground at a 4 mph pace carrying sixty pounds) I am pretty sure the answer is "Wilson, you'd have been useless to your unit in mountain combat." Which is where all the fighting was happening at the time I enlisted.

So, instead of fighting I write software for Microsoft and pay my taxes. The country is probably better off with this arrangement I suppose. After enough years of taxes I might eventually have contributed enough to buy one missile. :-P

[djreynolds]

I like archers. But I need who is in your party. What else are you doing? What weaknesses are your shoring up for them?
Who is you big DPS guy? Who are your tanks? Ask yourself these questions?

Is there a stealth/scout build in the party? No reason there cannot be two, but are you encroaching on someone's turf.

Do you have a primary healer? Do you need at least access to healing abilities?

Who is the main caster? Sorcerers will like someone who can cast the "not flashy" stuff.

Can you adequately fill the void of the downed tank?

To me the ranger can do all of this, he may not be the best obviously. But he gets 2 attacks, archery style, a solid assortment of spells and skills, can heal, and can S&B.

And he is easily multiclassed with, but not just rogue or fighter. He can pick up cleric/druid levels. The hunter is viable combatant.

A fighter is awesome for DPR, but he may lack in other departments.

A rogue adds some nice pop to any class.

And valor bards are really good.

So find out what your party needs, and settle on whether 2 attacks or 3 attacks is enough. I find hunter's mark awesome, but the bless spell is just as good as it can make 3 party member's misses into hits and you are in the back, so concentration party buffs are good to have.

[uraniumrooster]

Go Vuman. Max Dex. Dump Str, Int, Cha. Wisdom and Con of at least 13. Take Sharpshooter for your feat at 1st level, and select the archery style.

Take Fighter to 6th. Do not pass go. Do not collect 200 bucks. If the Scout archetype is allowed from UA take this instead of BM. Its more thematic and just as good.

If not, select BM as your archetype and then select precision attack, menacing attack and pushing attack at 3rd level for your manouvers. Take Crossbow master for your feat at 4th level, and bump Dex by 2 points at 6th level.

Take 5 levels of Rogue (Assasin) at this point for (cunning action) disengage and dash. Now you can kite like a boss. Expertise in perception and stealth are just gravy. Sneak attack +3d6 adds to your damage, and if you get the drop on a creature you can nova like a boss. Uncanny dodge helps when you do get hit. Bump Dex to 20 at 4th (or if already at 20, consider Alert, Lucky or Resilient [wisdom])

Head back to fighter for six more levels to 11th (for extra attack [2]). Select whatever feat out of [Alert, Lucky and Resilient Wisdom] you dont already have at 8th level. From there on take 4 of Ranger for your final 4 levels (for colossus slayer/ horde breaker and hunters mark).

I was going to post pretty much this exact build, but Malifice did it for me. I might start with Crossbow Expert at 1st (and change out your Longbow +1 for a Hand Crossbow +1), then pick up Sharpshooter at 4th, depending on the rest of your party. If you have someone who can consistently give you Bless and/or advantage on attacks, then you can go to town with the -5/+10 from Sharpshooter and a Longbow. If your party doesn't have a good source for boosting your attack rolls, then making two Hand Crossbow attacks w/ Crossbow Expert and your full attack bonus might be a better bet.

Also, everything MaxWilson said.

[MaxWilson]

Instead of Fighter 11/Rogue 5/Ranger 4 I would find it more fun to wind up at Fighter 11/Swashbuckler 9, because Panache is awesome for taunting dragons/etc. No save = no legendary resistance applies. Note that you can Cunning Action (Hide) + move + taunt, since taunting requires only that the target be able to see or hear you.

Plus, Swashbucklers get to apply their sneak attack damage to ranged attacks pretty much always (getting advantage at long range is kind of hard, relies primarily on hiding/vision tricks) which is kind of nice; and I like their flavor.

[Foxhound438]

so mentally I was measuring myself not against "will I be able to graduate OSUT?" but against actual combat missions "will I be able to hike twenty miles up a mountain in Afghanistan with a full load of combat gear every day?"


Luckily for me I went aviation. most stressful thing that could happen there is the coffee machine not working, lol.

[Submortimer]

So, here's the sitch. I'm a part of an IRL group, and we're starting a 2nd level campaign. I decided I was going to do something that I've literally never done in any D&D game I've ever played, and roll up a dedicated archer. You can see the character sheet here:

http://www.myth-weavers.com/sheet.html#id=797320

We started out with a bunch of gold and a +1 weapon of our choice, so that's an explanation for all the stuff. I intend to take battlemaster for my archetype, but I don't know if I'm going to be multiclassing later down the road or not.

I make this thread to ask...multiple questions. As a player who's never played an archery-based character in D&D before, what sort of general advice would you give to me for tactics, character building, and party roleplay? As a player playing an archery-based character in 5e SPECIFICALLY, what sort of advice would you give for that?

And, probably most importantly, what advice would you give for playing this specific character? I know it's D&D, and it's my job to roleplay out how he'd act and perform in and out of combat, but I also don't want my character to fall flat or become a gary sue. :smalleek: Tactic, Roleplay, and Character Growth advice for this specific character would be greatly appreciated.

My deepest thanks to anyone who responds! :smallbiggrin:


In 5e, archery is actually one of the more viable high-damage builds, and will absolutely make you a monster on the battlefield. That said, if you're going to play a dedicated Archer, I'd talk to your DM and see if they'd allow the Close Quarters shooter style from the Lights, Dark, Underdark! (https://media.wizards.com/2015/downloads/dnd/02_UA_Underdark_Characters.pdf) Unearthed arcana article. If so, go Champion and never look back: taking that and eventually archery at level 10, combined with your +1 weapon, will get you +4 to attack and +2 to damage, enough to almost totally negate the penalty from sharpshooter.


I'd recommend this build:
Variant Human
Crossbow Expert feat (from V human)
16 dex (15 + 1 from race)
+1 magic Heavy Crossbow
Level 1: Archery Fighting style
Level 3: Champion
Level 4: Sharpshooter
Level 6: +2 dex
Level 8: +2 dex
Level 10: Close-quarter's fighter

That allows you to attack while in melee, ignore all but full cover, and attack multiple times with your crossbow each round. As well, if you need it, you can pull out a Hand crossbow and get an extra attack each round, which will do wonders for your DPR since you can use Sharpshooter at almost no penalty.

[Oramac]

Coming in a little late here, but since I've personally played exactly this character, I figure I'll throw in my 2 cents.

Race: VHuman
Feat: Sharpshooter
Rogue 2 / Fighter X

Battlemaster archetype
- Goading Attack
- Menacing Attack
- Precision Attack
- Whatever else

Rogue 2 is for Cunning Action. Use the Hide Action to gain advantage on your attacks to go with Sharpshooter. You can take one more level of Rogue for Assassinate and 3d6 sneak attack.

Use one of your ASI's for Crossbow Expert so you don't have disadvantage in melee (yes, it works for all attacks, per Sage Advice).

Your single target damage and control are very good, but your AOE damage is terrible. I recommend running with a caster of some sort to cover the AOE side of things.

Use Goading Attack from max range while hidden so the big bad has disadvantage on all attacks, and Menacing Attack if he manages to close to melee.

[MaxWilson]

Coming in a little late here, but since I've personally played exactly this character, I figure I'll throw in my 2 cents.

Race: VHuman
Feat: Sharpshooter
Rogue 2 / Fighter X

Battlemaster archetype
- Goading Attack
- Menacing Attack
- Precision Attack
- Whatever else

Rogue 2 is for Cunning Action. Use the Hide Action to gain advantage on your attacks to go with Sharpshooter. You can take one more level of Rogue for Assassinate and 3d6 sneak attack.

Use one of your ASI's for Crossbow Expert so you don't have disadvantage in melee (yes, it works for all attacks, per Sage Advice).

If you've got Cunning Action you don't need Crossbow Expert: your bonus action is already busy, and if someone gets into melee with you, you can just Disengage and withdraw to avoid disadvantage.

[Oramac]

If you've got Cunning Action you don't need Crossbow Expert: your bonus action is already busy, and if someone gets into melee with you, you can just Disengage and withdraw to avoid disadvantage.

True. But the Fighter gets so many ASI's I feel it's worth picking up, since there will be times that you end up in melee range and still want to shoot. (fighting in a hallway, for instance)

[MaxWilson]

True. But the Fighter gets so many ASI's I feel it's worth picking up, since there will be times that you end up in melee range and still want to shoot. (fighting in a hallway, for instance)

If I know I'm going to be fighting in melee range I'll probably want a shield too, which isn't compatible with shooting a bow or crossbow. Therefore, you're still giving up something significant in melee range and still have a reason to stay out of it.

Crossbow Expert is a valid choice (gives you one more way to spend your bonus action) but it's worth considering the alternatives, which are legion, and some of them are free in terms of build resources. E.g. switching out longbow for rapier-and-shield still works pretty well and leaves you an ASI that you could spend on Lucky for negating critical hits and failed saves, or Skulker so you can hide from creatures with Darkvision in the dark. I tend to think that Skulker + Stealth expertise is a smarter and funner way to play Batman in close quarters than Crossbow Expert is, but I'm sure there are other options and some of them might be even more fun.

[Oramac]

I tend to think that Skulker + Stealth expertise is a smarter and funner way to play Batman in close quarters than Crossbow Expert is, but I'm sure there are other options and some of them might be even more fun.

Agreed. But we're not talking about playing Batman in close quarters. We're talking about playing a ranged archer. I only recommend Xbow Expert for the build because Fighters have the ASI's to spare. By no means is it required, especially for a predominately ranged attacker, but I can say from firsthand experience playing the build, it can come it very handy at times.

[MaxWilson]

Agreed. But we're not talking about playing Batman in close quarters. We're talking about playing a ranged archer. I only recommend Xbow Expert for the build because Fighters have the ASI's to spare. By no means is it required, especially for a predominately ranged attacker, but I can say from firsthand experience playing the build, it can come it very handy at times.

No, at this point we're talking about what a primarily-ranged archer who is also a Rogue 2 does when he is stuck in melee for some reason. Crossbow Expert is a valid choice, but it's worth considering a full suite of responses.

I'm not saying you're wrong.

[Oramac]

No, at this point we're talking about what a primarily-ranged archer who is also a Rogue 2 does when he is stuck in melee for some reason. Crossbow Expert is a valid choice, but it's worth considering a full suite of responses.

I'm not saying you're wrong.

Semantics.

The point is, CBE is a valid option, as are many other things.

[MaxWilson]

Semantics.

The point is, CBE is a valid option, as are many other things.

I agree. It is a valid option. I've said so in three posts now.

Agreed?

[Oramac]

Agreed?

Agreed. (10 character minimum)