Which would make a better ranger? Half-Elf or Human?

[Zhentarim]

I'm making a Ranger with the Gnoll Killer and Pesh Addict traits. His backstory concept so far is that when he was a boy, his father, mother, and two brothers were Pesh farmers and they got slaughtered by Gnolls while he hid under the steps of the farm porch. I'm wondering from a flavor and mechanical point of view whether human or half-elf would be a better choice. I'm leaning towards half-elf and a true neutral alignment, but since there aren't too many elves in katapesh, I was wondering how to make a native half-elf work.

One thought I had was a family of half-elves, but I'm not sure how to backtrack and make that work either. Any suggestions?

[P.F.]

From a game rule perspective it's hard to beat the human's racial perks.

[Troacctid]

The answer to "Which would make a better X, half-elf or human?" is always human. Half-elf is an embarrassingly underpowered race, and the only circumstance where you'd prefer it over human would be if humans aren't allowed.

[Gildedragon]

Human. I second troacctid with the caveat of bard. Bard might be the one class half elf is better than human... And generalist wizard (because elven generalist class)

But with ranger in particular even the Ranger racial sub levels for Helfs suuuuck. Urban ranger is vastly better and has the same schtick

[Blackhawk748]

Human, unless there is something particular that requires you to be a Half Elf (ie Bard stuff and Elven Generalist)

[Troacctid]

Human. I second troacctid with the caveat of bard. Bard might be the one class half elf is better than human... And generalist wizard (because elven generalist class)
I was counting those as "Humans aren't allowed" scenarios, but sure, half-elf bards are legit.

FWIW, I also believe there is no scenario where I would choose half-elf over elf if given the option.

[Zhentarim]

Hmmm. I thought sleep immunity and having low-light vision, skill focus, and a perception bonus would beat out normal vision and just an extra skillpoint and feat.

My thoughts as far as stats go are:
20 str
12 dex
14 con
7 int
14 wis
12 cha

Those are good ranger stats, yes?

Come to think of it, a dwarf might even make a good ranger. What are your thoughts?

[Troacctid]

Sleep immunity is mostly useless, half-elves don't get Skill Focus in 3.5, and the perception bonuses pale in comparison to extra skill points and a bonus feat.

[P.F.]

Sleep immunity is mostly useless, half-elves don't get Skill Focus in 3.5, and the perception bonuses pale in comparison to extra skill points and a bonus feat.

Low-light vision isn't great either: you still can't see in the dark, and in a dungeon your (dim) light will still give away your position to enemies with darkvision.

[Zhentarim]

You sold me on human

[grarrrg]

Hmmm. I thought sleep immunity and having low-light vision, skill focus,...
Sleep immunity is mostly useless, half-elves don't get Skill Focus in 3.5, and the perception bonuses pale in comparison to extra skill points and a bonus feat.

There's a "Pathfinder" tag thingy in the title.
Please disregard most of the above reasons for not going Half-Elf.

Half-Elves in 3.5 were generally junk.
Half-Elves in PF are notably better.

Suggest edit first post to make PATHFINDER more visible (or remove it from the title altogether if it was a mis-click).

[Psyren]

The answer to "Which would make a better X, half-elf or human?" is always human. Half-elf is an embarrassingly underpowered race, and the only circumstance where you'd prefer it over human would be if humans aren't allowed.

They're fine in PF, which is the tag on this thread. Not as strong as humans obviously, but nothing is; that doesn't make them underpowered though.

[Zancloufer]

First I'm 99% sure almost everyone missed the PATHFINDER tag here. They where arguing the 3.5 Half-Elf vs Human. Which unless you REALLY need to get into human AND elf restricted things, or really want a ohgawdwhy Diplomacy is really no contest.

I would swap the Int and Cha personally. As a ranger having +1 skill point a level and a Cha penalty is much better than -2 skill points/level and a cha bonus.

Also worth looking into in some of the alternate racial features. There are quite a few things that you can swap out for that might put you ahead of a human. I'd look at those and maybe see if you can get ahead of a Human that way. Few I noticed off the top of my head that a ranger could use:

Ancestral arms gives you a free proficiency feat in exchange for skill focus (which makes it worth the Human's bonus feat in that case).

Dusk Sight replaces the +2 perception with a chance to re-roll any ranged attack that missed because of concealment.

Blended Sight and Fey Magic trade your multi-talented (which is useless if you don't take more than one base class) with Dark Vision and two new class skills repsecivly.


It's really in those alternate racial features. There are some gems there and I honestly think you can make it work as well as a human if you really like the half-elf angle

[Troacctid]

There's a "Pathfinder" tag thingy in the title.
It was added after my posts.

Half-elves are more reasonable in PF. Humans are still generally better because bonus feats are so great.

[Arc_knight25]

Sounds like someone is about to start a Legacy of Fire campaign. We had a lot of fun in ours. It spanned 3 years, but a lot of added content.

I personally would go with Half Elf. Using the Alternative racial options to trade away things you don't need/want.

Also Half Elves are just more flavourful in my opinion. I always find Humans to be so bland.