Lone Ranger - build without an animal compantion

[Malapterus]

I'm having trouble finding this. Does anyone know any alternate class features a Ranger can get by forgoing their animal companion class feature?

[ShurikVch]

There are:
Celestial Slayer (Exemplars of Evil): must be evil; lose wild empathy, animal companion, and woodland stride, gain SR vs. good spells/spell-likes and +4 to confirm crit. vs. good creatures
Distracting Attack (Players Handbook II): Lose animal companion. Whenever you hit with an attack, the enemy is then considered flanked.
Shooting Star 4th Substitution Level (Champions of Valor): Bonus Spells, Improved Spellcasting, replaces animal companion
Spiritual Guide (Complete Champion): Lose animal companion. As long as you're in natural settings, gain a bonus on several skills. Use commune with nature once per day.

If Dragon magazine is OK, then:
Mystic Ranger (#336): better and faster spellcasting progression; lose animal companion, Endurance bonus feat, and get one Favored Enemy less
Solitary Hunter (#347): no animal companion; your Favored Enemy bonus applies to your attack rolls against that enemy

Also: Loner flaw (#327): you're forever give up ability to get a Familiar or Animal Companion

[Elkad]

Good Grief. So greedy for more power you sent Silver off to the glue factory?

[Malapterus]

There are:
Celestial Slayer (Exemplars of Evil): must be evil; lose wild empathy, animal companion, and woodland stride, gain SR vs. good spells/spell-likes and +4 to confirm crit. vs. good creatures
Distracting Attack (Players Handbook II): Lose animal companion. Whenever you hit with an attack, the enemy is then considered flanked.
Shooting Star 4th Substitution Level (Champions of Valor): Bonus Spells, Improved Spellcasting, replaces animal companion
Spiritual Guide (Complete Champion): Lose animal companion. As long as you're in natural settings, gain a bonus on several skills. Use commune with nature once per day.

If Dragon magazine is OK, then:
Mystic Ranger (#336): better and faster spellcasting progression; lose animal companion, Endurance bonus feat, and get one Favored Enemy less
Solitary Hunter (#347): no animal companion; your Favored Enemy bonus applies to your attack rolls against that enemy

Also: Loner flaw (#327): you're forever give up ability to get a Familiar or Animal Companion

Thanks, these are great! I like the 'distracting attack' one, but it doesn't fit story-wise for this character.

Still, making an NPC team of that has a Distraction ranger and some sneak-attack fighters with high Str could be pretty nasty. Ranger pings everyone, opens them up for bonus damage.

This particular ranger is a loner, though, so that doesn't work here.

[Erloas]

I assume your just talking 3.5 rather than Pathfinder. There are many archetypes without an animal companion there. If nothing else it's a good point to start if trying to adapt one to 3.5

[tiercel]

Out of a sense of completeness, I feel I should mention the Cityscape web enhancement (http://archive.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/we/20070228a) and Urban Companion, which basically trades your half-strength Animal Companion for a more-than-full-strength Familiar that doesn’t cost you XP if it dies. With 3/4 of your hit points and sharing your array of skill points, it’s actually a nice choice for most rangers (especially because its hp/skill points keep progressing upon prestiging out).

....but if you prefer to go it alone, Malapterus has covered your bases pretty well; do you want your lone ranger to be more in tune with nature, more casting, or more focused of a hunter vs favored enemies?