Segev
2020-04-20, 08:35 PM
From discussions in this thread (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?610713-Ranger-I-think-it-s-fine-but&p=24462270), I was inspired to write this up. It's meant to encourage more of a strong exploration sense, and a sense of mastery of the wilderness, with the things you choose to be extra good in as more ribbons than the core features. Comments are welcome, and requested.
Ranger
Tracker
Beginning at 1st level, you have significant experience studying, tracking, and even talking to the beings that traverse or dwell in the wilderness. When dealing with beasts, dragons, elementals, fey, giants, humanoids, monstrosities, oozes, or plants, you have advantage on Wisdom (Survival) checs to track them, as well as on Intelligence checks to recall information about them.
When tracking such creatures, you also learn their exact number, their sizes, and how long ago they passed through the area. In addition, in any dealings with or observations of such creatures, your study of their traits, quirks, and body language has given you an insight into what they mean or do. Even if you cannot hear or understand their language, when watching such creatures talk, you can get the basic gist of what they’re saying and talking about. If they can see and hear you, you can use a combination of exaggerated gestures, pidgin speak, and vocal sounds to convey simple concepts and messages, albeit up to 4x as slowly.
Any creatures of the type to which you’re communicating, as well as other Rangers, will be able to pick up the same meaning. Nuance and detail cannot be conveyed in this fashion. You might be able to convey, “How do I find town?” or “The bugbear camp is a long way down that road,” but not how many bugbears there are or necessarily which town you’re looking for.
Favored Enemy
At 1st level, choose a kind of alien or unnatural being with which your experiences in the wild have familiarized you, for better or for worse. Aberrations, celestials, constructs, fiends, and undead are valid choices. You gain the benefits of Tracker with these creatures in addition to those above.
Natural Explorer
You are at home in the wilderness and are adept at traveling and surviving away from civilization. You gain proficiency with Survival. If you are already proficient, you gain Expertise in it, and double your proficiency bonus on checks related to it. This does not stack with other effects which double your proficiency bonus.
When traveling in the wilderness, you gain the following benefits:
Difficult terrain doesn't slow your group's travel.
Even when you are engaged in another activity (such as foraging, navigating, or tracking), you remain alert to danger.
If you are traveling alone, you can move stealthily at a normal pace.
When you forage, you find twice as much food as you normally would.
You are adept at finding ideal sites for various activities, from defensive stands to camp sites (and these are not mutually exclusive). When you spend an hour (which may be done during travel) searching for such a site, the location you find is easily defended and comfortable for a medium or long-term stop.
The site will be useful for an intended purpose, if it is feasible to find such in the environment.
If combat breaks out in or around this site (within a 1000 foot radius outdoors, or within a single room or hall indoors or underground), you may use a reaction to declare up to your Wisdom modifier in five-foot-square regions to be difficult terrain. You may do this once, plus once for every five levels of Ranger you have, for any given site you scout out. Creatures you designate may ignore this difficult terrain.
You are particularly familiar with one type of natural environment and are more at home in those areas than most civilized creatures are in their own houses. Choose one type of favored terrain: arctic, coast, desert, forest, grassland, mountain, or swamp. When you make an Intelligence or Wisdom check related to your favored terrain, your proficiency bonus is doubled if you are using a skill that you're proficient in.
While traveling for an hour or more in your favored terrain, your traveling companions enjoy the following benefits:
Your group can't become lost except by magical means.
You can guide your group to move stealthily at a normal pace.
While in your favored terrain, you also gain the following personal benefits:
Your speed is increased by 10 ft.
You gain a climb and swim speed equal to your walking speed.
You do not suffer disadvantage for attacking at long range with a ranged weapon.
You are not impeded by difficult terrain.
You are proficient in athletics, acrobatics, and stealth. If you are already proficient in any of these, your proficiency bonus is doubled for those in which you are already proficient. This does not stack with other things which double your proficiency bonus.
Expert Stalker
At 1st, 6th, 10th, and 14th level, you may choose one of these options:
You learn hunter’s mark as a ranger spell, and gain the ability to cast it once, recovering the ability after a long rest. When you gain the Spellcasting feature at level 2, you may also expend spell slots to cast it as normal. You may choose this multiple times; each time you do, you may cast hunter’s mark without using a spell slot one more time.
If you know hunter’s mark, you do not need to Concentrate on it as long as you use it only on creatures to which your Tracker ability applies. You may choose this only once.
Choose an additional Favored Enemy. You may choose this as many times as you like.
Choose an additional Favored Terrain. You may choose this as many times as you like.
Fighting Style
At 2nd level, you adopt a particular style of fighting as your specialty. Choose one of the following options. You can't take a Fighting Style option more than once, even if you later get to choose again.
Archery. You gain a +2 bonus to attack rolls you make with ranged weapons.
Defense. While you are wearing armor, you gain a +1 bonus to AC.
Dueling. When you are wielding a melee weapon in one hand and no other weapons, you gain a +2 bonus to damage rolls with that weapon.
Two-Weapon Fighting. When you engage in two-weapon fighting, you can add your ability modifier to the damage of the second attack.
Spellcasting
By the time your each 2nd level, you have learned to use the magical essence of nature to cast spells, much as a druid does.
Spell Slots
The Ranger table shows how many spell slots you have to cast your spells of 1st level and higher. To cast one of these spells, you must expend a slot of the spell's level or higher. For example, if you prepare the 1st level spell animal friendship and have a 1st-level and a 2nd-level spell slot available, you can cast animal friendship using either slot. You regain all expended spell slots when you finish a long rest.
You prepare the list of ranger spells that are available for you to cast, choosing from the ranger spell list. When you do so, choose a number of ranger spells equal to your Wisdom modifier + half your ranger level, rounded down (minimum of one spell). The spells must be of a level for which you have spell slots. You can change your list of prepared spells when you finish a long rest. Preparing a new list of ranger spells requires time spent in communing with nature: at least 1 minute per spell level for each spell on your list.
Spellcasting Ability
Wisdom is your spellcasting ability for your ranger spells, since your magic draws upon your devotion and attunement to nature. You use your Wisdom whenever a ranger spell refers to your spellcasting ability. In addition, you use your Wisdom modifier when setting the saving throw DC for a ranger spell you cast and when making an attack roll with one.
Spell Save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Wisdom modifier
Spell Attack Modifier = your proficiency bonus + your Wisdom modifier
Ranger Archetype
At 3rd level, you choose an archetype that you strive to emulate, such as the Hunter. Your choice grants you features at 3rd level and again at 7th, 11th, and 15th level.
Primeval Awareness
Beginning at 3rd level, you can use your action and expend one ranger spell slot to focus your awareness on the region around you. For 1 minute per level of the spell slot you expend, you can sense whether the following types of creatures are present within 1 mile of you (or within up to 6 miles if you are in your favored terrain): aberrations, celestials, dragons, elementals, fey, fiends, and undead. It also reveals if any creature you can see is one of these beings, and gives the rough direction and distance to any congregations numbering a dozen or more of them within range.
Ability Score Improvement
When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can't increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.
Extra Attack
Beginning at 5th level, you can attack twice, instead of once, whenever you take the Attack action on your turn.
Land's Stride
Starting at 8th level, moving through nonmagical difficult terrain costs you no extra movement. You can also pass through nonmagical plants without being slowed by them and without taking damage from them if they have thorns, spines, or a similar hazard. In addition, you have advantage on saving throws against plants that are magically created or manipulated to impede movement, such as those created by the entangle spell.
Hide In Plain Sight
Starting at 10th level, when you are in your favored terrain, your habitual and natural mode of dress camouflages you sufficiently that you can take the Hide action even when directly observed. Outside of your favored terrain, you can spend 1 minute creating camouflage for yourself. You must have access to fresh mud, dirt, plants, soot, or other naturally occurring materials with which to create your camouflage. Once you are camouflaged in this way, you can take the Hide action even when directly observed, as if in your favored terrain. While camouflaged for a particular terrain, you do not gain the benefits of this in any other. This camouflage remains viable for up to one hour of travel or exploration, though as long as you remain relatively stationary it will persist until you change it.
You can also use camouflage to set up an ambush. If you spend one minute arranging your blind or camouflaging yourself for a particular spot, you can gain a +10 bonus to Dexterity (Stealth) checks as long as you remain there without moving or taking actions. Once you move or take an action or a reaction, you must camouflage yourself again to gain this bonus, though you retain the ability to Hide while observed in this environment. You can also set up blinds and camouflage for ambushes for others; they gain the benefits as long as they take no actions other than the initial Hide and don't move. They gain no other benefit of this feature from camouflage as they don't know how to use it effectively.
Vanish
Starting at 14th level, you can use the Hide action as a bonus action on your turn, and blindsight and other special senses cannot prevent you from doing so. Also, you can't be tracked by nonmagical means, unless you choose to leave a trail.
Feral Sense
At 18th level, you gain the ability to cast beast sense without preparing it or spending a spell slot. When you do, you do not need to spend an action nor maintain concentration to gain its benefits, and you continue to use your own senses as well as the target’s.
You also gain a keen sense of smell and have advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks pertaining to scent, and may detect things by scent alone which others of your race might miss.
Relentless Stalker
You cannot be evaded by those upon whom you’ve set your sights. As your movement during your turn, if you have a creature targeted with hunter’s mark or a similar effect or have taken an attack action against a creature since the start of your last turn, you may relentlessly stalk it. When you do, you appear no further from it than you were at the start of its last turn, and up to your movement speed closer to it. You do not need to traverse the intervening distance, and you appear in a safe location with as clear a line of sight to the creature as possible. If this is not possible, you can appear closer, up to and including in its space.
Ranger
Tracker
Beginning at 1st level, you have significant experience studying, tracking, and even talking to the beings that traverse or dwell in the wilderness. When dealing with beasts, dragons, elementals, fey, giants, humanoids, monstrosities, oozes, or plants, you have advantage on Wisdom (Survival) checs to track them, as well as on Intelligence checks to recall information about them.
When tracking such creatures, you also learn their exact number, their sizes, and how long ago they passed through the area. In addition, in any dealings with or observations of such creatures, your study of their traits, quirks, and body language has given you an insight into what they mean or do. Even if you cannot hear or understand their language, when watching such creatures talk, you can get the basic gist of what they’re saying and talking about. If they can see and hear you, you can use a combination of exaggerated gestures, pidgin speak, and vocal sounds to convey simple concepts and messages, albeit up to 4x as slowly.
Any creatures of the type to which you’re communicating, as well as other Rangers, will be able to pick up the same meaning. Nuance and detail cannot be conveyed in this fashion. You might be able to convey, “How do I find town?” or “The bugbear camp is a long way down that road,” but not how many bugbears there are or necessarily which town you’re looking for.
Favored Enemy
At 1st level, choose a kind of alien or unnatural being with which your experiences in the wild have familiarized you, for better or for worse. Aberrations, celestials, constructs, fiends, and undead are valid choices. You gain the benefits of Tracker with these creatures in addition to those above.
Natural Explorer
You are at home in the wilderness and are adept at traveling and surviving away from civilization. You gain proficiency with Survival. If you are already proficient, you gain Expertise in it, and double your proficiency bonus on checks related to it. This does not stack with other effects which double your proficiency bonus.
When traveling in the wilderness, you gain the following benefits:
Difficult terrain doesn't slow your group's travel.
Even when you are engaged in another activity (such as foraging, navigating, or tracking), you remain alert to danger.
If you are traveling alone, you can move stealthily at a normal pace.
When you forage, you find twice as much food as you normally would.
You are adept at finding ideal sites for various activities, from defensive stands to camp sites (and these are not mutually exclusive). When you spend an hour (which may be done during travel) searching for such a site, the location you find is easily defended and comfortable for a medium or long-term stop.
The site will be useful for an intended purpose, if it is feasible to find such in the environment.
If combat breaks out in or around this site (within a 1000 foot radius outdoors, or within a single room or hall indoors or underground), you may use a reaction to declare up to your Wisdom modifier in five-foot-square regions to be difficult terrain. You may do this once, plus once for every five levels of Ranger you have, for any given site you scout out. Creatures you designate may ignore this difficult terrain.
You are particularly familiar with one type of natural environment and are more at home in those areas than most civilized creatures are in their own houses. Choose one type of favored terrain: arctic, coast, desert, forest, grassland, mountain, or swamp. When you make an Intelligence or Wisdom check related to your favored terrain, your proficiency bonus is doubled if you are using a skill that you're proficient in.
While traveling for an hour or more in your favored terrain, your traveling companions enjoy the following benefits:
Your group can't become lost except by magical means.
You can guide your group to move stealthily at a normal pace.
While in your favored terrain, you also gain the following personal benefits:
Your speed is increased by 10 ft.
You gain a climb and swim speed equal to your walking speed.
You do not suffer disadvantage for attacking at long range with a ranged weapon.
You are not impeded by difficult terrain.
You are proficient in athletics, acrobatics, and stealth. If you are already proficient in any of these, your proficiency bonus is doubled for those in which you are already proficient. This does not stack with other things which double your proficiency bonus.
Expert Stalker
At 1st, 6th, 10th, and 14th level, you may choose one of these options:
You learn hunter’s mark as a ranger spell, and gain the ability to cast it once, recovering the ability after a long rest. When you gain the Spellcasting feature at level 2, you may also expend spell slots to cast it as normal. You may choose this multiple times; each time you do, you may cast hunter’s mark without using a spell slot one more time.
If you know hunter’s mark, you do not need to Concentrate on it as long as you use it only on creatures to which your Tracker ability applies. You may choose this only once.
Choose an additional Favored Enemy. You may choose this as many times as you like.
Choose an additional Favored Terrain. You may choose this as many times as you like.
Fighting Style
At 2nd level, you adopt a particular style of fighting as your specialty. Choose one of the following options. You can't take a Fighting Style option more than once, even if you later get to choose again.
Archery. You gain a +2 bonus to attack rolls you make with ranged weapons.
Defense. While you are wearing armor, you gain a +1 bonus to AC.
Dueling. When you are wielding a melee weapon in one hand and no other weapons, you gain a +2 bonus to damage rolls with that weapon.
Two-Weapon Fighting. When you engage in two-weapon fighting, you can add your ability modifier to the damage of the second attack.
Spellcasting
By the time your each 2nd level, you have learned to use the magical essence of nature to cast spells, much as a druid does.
Spell Slots
The Ranger table shows how many spell slots you have to cast your spells of 1st level and higher. To cast one of these spells, you must expend a slot of the spell's level or higher. For example, if you prepare the 1st level spell animal friendship and have a 1st-level and a 2nd-level spell slot available, you can cast animal friendship using either slot. You regain all expended spell slots when you finish a long rest.
You prepare the list of ranger spells that are available for you to cast, choosing from the ranger spell list. When you do so, choose a number of ranger spells equal to your Wisdom modifier + half your ranger level, rounded down (minimum of one spell). The spells must be of a level for which you have spell slots. You can change your list of prepared spells when you finish a long rest. Preparing a new list of ranger spells requires time spent in communing with nature: at least 1 minute per spell level for each spell on your list.
Spellcasting Ability
Wisdom is your spellcasting ability for your ranger spells, since your magic draws upon your devotion and attunement to nature. You use your Wisdom whenever a ranger spell refers to your spellcasting ability. In addition, you use your Wisdom modifier when setting the saving throw DC for a ranger spell you cast and when making an attack roll with one.
Spell Save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Wisdom modifier
Spell Attack Modifier = your proficiency bonus + your Wisdom modifier
Ranger Archetype
At 3rd level, you choose an archetype that you strive to emulate, such as the Hunter. Your choice grants you features at 3rd level and again at 7th, 11th, and 15th level.
Primeval Awareness
Beginning at 3rd level, you can use your action and expend one ranger spell slot to focus your awareness on the region around you. For 1 minute per level of the spell slot you expend, you can sense whether the following types of creatures are present within 1 mile of you (or within up to 6 miles if you are in your favored terrain): aberrations, celestials, dragons, elementals, fey, fiends, and undead. It also reveals if any creature you can see is one of these beings, and gives the rough direction and distance to any congregations numbering a dozen or more of them within range.
Ability Score Improvement
When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can't increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.
Extra Attack
Beginning at 5th level, you can attack twice, instead of once, whenever you take the Attack action on your turn.
Land's Stride
Starting at 8th level, moving through nonmagical difficult terrain costs you no extra movement. You can also pass through nonmagical plants without being slowed by them and without taking damage from them if they have thorns, spines, or a similar hazard. In addition, you have advantage on saving throws against plants that are magically created or manipulated to impede movement, such as those created by the entangle spell.
Hide In Plain Sight
Starting at 10th level, when you are in your favored terrain, your habitual and natural mode of dress camouflages you sufficiently that you can take the Hide action even when directly observed. Outside of your favored terrain, you can spend 1 minute creating camouflage for yourself. You must have access to fresh mud, dirt, plants, soot, or other naturally occurring materials with which to create your camouflage. Once you are camouflaged in this way, you can take the Hide action even when directly observed, as if in your favored terrain. While camouflaged for a particular terrain, you do not gain the benefits of this in any other. This camouflage remains viable for up to one hour of travel or exploration, though as long as you remain relatively stationary it will persist until you change it.
You can also use camouflage to set up an ambush. If you spend one minute arranging your blind or camouflaging yourself for a particular spot, you can gain a +10 bonus to Dexterity (Stealth) checks as long as you remain there without moving or taking actions. Once you move or take an action or a reaction, you must camouflage yourself again to gain this bonus, though you retain the ability to Hide while observed in this environment. You can also set up blinds and camouflage for ambushes for others; they gain the benefits as long as they take no actions other than the initial Hide and don't move. They gain no other benefit of this feature from camouflage as they don't know how to use it effectively.
Vanish
Starting at 14th level, you can use the Hide action as a bonus action on your turn, and blindsight and other special senses cannot prevent you from doing so. Also, you can't be tracked by nonmagical means, unless you choose to leave a trail.
Feral Sense
At 18th level, you gain the ability to cast beast sense without preparing it or spending a spell slot. When you do, you do not need to spend an action nor maintain concentration to gain its benefits, and you continue to use your own senses as well as the target’s.
You also gain a keen sense of smell and have advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks pertaining to scent, and may detect things by scent alone which others of your race might miss.
Relentless Stalker
You cannot be evaded by those upon whom you’ve set your sights. As your movement during your turn, if you have a creature targeted with hunter’s mark or a similar effect or have taken an attack action against a creature since the start of your last turn, you may relentlessly stalk it. When you do, you appear no further from it than you were at the start of its last turn, and up to your movement speed closer to it. You do not need to traverse the intervening distance, and you appear in a safe location with as clear a line of sight to the creature as possible. If this is not possible, you can appear closer, up to and including in its space.