What are Barbarians and Rangers, really?

[Schwann145]

Not a question of power or effectiveness, but one of identity.

The quintessential Barbarian is probably Conan - a Fighter/Thief.
The quintessential Ranger is probably Aragorn - a Fighter very skilled in tracking.

What are these classes really supposed to be? What about them makes them deserving of their own base class chassis, rather than being extensions of the Fighter (or maybe Rogue)?
When I look at the Core Barbarian, the "primal rager" is 100% represented and could very easily be turned into a Fighter subclass. When you start looking at subclass options outside of the PHB, it gets wild - there is no rhyme or reason to any of it! It's magical fighter after magical fighter and almost none of it has anything to do with the traditional theme of a Barbarian (probably because, as I said, it was already completely covered!)

Ranger has the same issue really - what is it, if not just a Fighter (or Rogue) with the right Background and a strong Survival skill? Even the PHB subclasses (regardless of power level) feel bland and uninspired - "you, uh, fight certain things better... like a specialized Fighter... kind of." Is that really all there is to it? And when you go outside the PHB you run into the same issue the Barbarian does! Everything flies off the wall in wild directions - Fey Wanderer, Horizon Walker, Swarm Keeper... how are these even tangentially related?
At least with the Ranger you can make the argument that, "it's the Pet class." Except you really can't because that only applies to one subclass.

[PhoenixPhyre]

You can always play the reductionist game. But you lose a lot.

Rage, by itself, is not something you can stuff into a subclass without seriously distorting things.

----------
Barbarians, rangers, druids. The three "primal source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Monks, Paladins, Clerics. The three "divine source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Fighters, Artificers, Wizards/Sorcerers. Four "arcane source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Rogues, Warlock[**], Bards. Three "skilled-source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Is it a perfect description? Nope. Is it a formal distinction? Nope. But as one way of looking at things, it works pretty well. So Barbarians are to Fighters are to Rogues as Paladins are to Rangers are to Artificers.

[**] Yeah, this one's a bit of a stretch. It's not really a full-caster in the same way the others are, despite getting 9ths. But it's also clearly not a half-caster like the other middle-slot ones. The scales aren't exactly the same, to be honest.

[Dork_Forge]

These threads pop up from time to time, if you really wanted you could get reductionist on the whole system up until you're left with a thief, fighting man and magic user, where the game started.

The problem in my eyes is that anyone that fights with weapons could in theory be reduced to a Fighter subclass, because the Fighter is intentionally so open and flavourless to begin with. I don't think you'd ever those classes into a Fighter subclass though, it's just too much... which is why they were made whole classes to begin with.

Then you have the narrowed options, core concepts folded into a subclass? Okay, maybe... But then the archetypes tied to those classes? No chance. You can't fit all of that in a subclass, especially without forcing things upon players they probably wouldn't want to begin with.

We've had glimpses at what the subclass versions of these classes would look like though:

-The Scout Rogue

-The Brute Fighter (RIP)

And whilst they both hit on those core concepts, neither get close to fully encompassing them.

[Schwann145]

To be fair, I'm really not trying to be reductionist at all.

I can totally appreciate the value of the Paladin even while we have Fighters and Clerics, or the Bard even when we have Rogues and Wizards (or... Druids? Whatever caster makes sense here, lol). Or Druids even when we have Clerics. Etc and so on.

It's specifically the Barbarian and Ranger that stump me, and it's largely due to how their expansion into products outside of the PHB makes less and less thematic sense and feels like developers just grasping at straws. Examples like Path of the Zealot or Path of Wild Magic for Barbarian are so far left field that they could belong to any number of classes and still technically "fit." Same for subclasses like Horizon Walker and Gloom Stalker.
They seem a lil shoehorned and it feels likely because they needed content and couldn't reproduce the core of the class any longer, because the core of the class is so either poorly defined or so weak that it didn't really have enough to support itself.

IMO anyway.


We've had glimpses at what the subclass versions of these classes would look like though:

-The Scout Rogue

-The Brute Fighter (RIP)

And whilst they both hit on those core concepts, neither get close to fully encompassing them.
Again, to be fair, a lot of people really feel the Scout Rogue is a better Ranger than the Ranger... and that's kinda my point.

[Misery Esquire]

Again, to be fair, a lot of people really feel the Scout Rogue is a better Ranger than the Ranger... and that's kinda my point.

It seems like they're just working to a cross-class subclass for every class, so you can avoid considering multiclassing. Which makes sense in a way, just unfortunate for the less-liked classes who people will happily avoid via proxying.

[Dork_Forge]

To be fair, I'm really not trying to be reductionist at all.

It may not be your intention, but chopping down two of only 13 classes does kinda wander down that path.


It's specifically the Barbarian and Ranger that stump me, and it's largely due to how their expansion into products outside of the PHB makes less and less thematic sense and feels like developers just grasping at straws. Examples like Path of the Zealot or Path of Wild Magic for Barbarian are so far left field that they could belong to any number of classes and still technically "fit." Same for subclasses like Horizon Walker and Gloom Stalker.
They seem a lil shoehorned and it feels likely because they needed content and couldn't reproduce the core of the class any longer, because the core of the class is so either poorly defined or so weak that it didn't really have enough to support itself.

Wild magic is silly and I don't like it personally, but I get why they did it, some players just can't get enough of that random stuff.

Zealot makes perfect sense though... A Barbarian that hits even harder than normal and is so hard to kill that even when you succeed they don't want to stay dead.

The Gloomstalker and Horizon Walker seem pretty clear cut as well, they specialise in a certain type of environment, a pretty core Ranger theme.



Again, to be fair, a lot of people really feel the Scout Rogue is a better Ranger than the Ranger... and that's kinda my point.

Never seen or heard that claim personally, and thoroughly disagree:

-They primarily make good archers, if you're going into melee you're going to have a rough time of things (and lock oyurself out of OA Sneak, which is one of the benefits of being a melee Rogue to begin with)

-Doubling your prof in a rangery skills doesn't make you a Ranger, they have no abilities that actually pertain to surviving or navigating wild environments.

-They have zero healing ability, it may not be the first thing that pops to mind when thinking Ranger, but access to healing is one of their defining traits in 5e (and can be seen in the parallel to Aragorn)

-No connection or option to connect with animals except Animal Handling like everyone else


Scout is a Rogue with some Ranger flavour, but at the end of the day that's all you'll ever get with a subclass, some flavour. It isn't a Ranger replacement and I feel pretty confident in saying that if it were the only Ranger option in the game, people would want more.

It's already a problem when you want to play a specific concept and have to wait to pick up your subclass, but when your concept is as broad as Barbarian or Ranger it feels pretty bad.

If you are struggling to see their standalone identity, start by trying to condense their core mechanics into subclasses without them being overloaded compared to their peers

[Composer99]

The Barbarian
The barbarian class doesn't really strike me as Conan. It's more like a synthesis of Viking berserkers and elite hunter-warriors from small-population societies (i.e. not big enough to support armies trained in Eurasian warfare).

The barbarian has three broad themes throughout D&D:
- Hardiness in combat and when surviving in the wilds.
- Harnessing the power of their rage, both in nonmagical and magical ways.
- Being something of an uncontrollable and dangerous force in combat and perhaps even out.

I don't really see post-PHB subclasses as being thematically all over the place. I don't recall whether 3.X had alternate class features, but many barbarian prestige classes in 3.X, and alternate class features and archetypes in Pathfinder, had magical themes. Heck, Pathfinder even had a barbarian-sorcerer hybrid class.

The Ranger
The ranger has three broad themes throughout D&D, save, if memory serves, for 4th edition:
- being particularly skilled at fighting a particular set of enemies, sometimes a broad set (the "giant class" creatures of 1st edition AD&D), sometimes a narrow set (2nd edition AD&D restricts it to specific enemies, such as orcs, trolls, or lizardfolk).
- a capable and crafty survivalist (with enhanced abilities of tracking, avoiding surprise, and stealth).
- perhaps, animal companions. (The 2nd edition AD&D ranger introduced the idea of animal companions, albeit at high level (they were among the followers one could acquire), which transformed into 3.X and 5e's low-level animal companion.)

I don't really see post-PHB subclasses as being thematically all over the place. Both Horizon Walker and Fey Wanderer clearly fall within the second broad theme. Gloom Stalker is a take on the first theme.

I guess you could argue that the ability to create several different characters who share themes with the ranger as a diluting of the ranger, but I daresay that there are several ways to implement many character concepts in D&D. I don't see that as being a problem for the ranger.

Where I think the ranger falls short, at least in its PHB implementation, was the way those themes were represented - Natural Explorer and Favoured Enemy, at least IMO, were very poor features.

[Tanarii]

I dunno, I felt all of the Barbarian subclasses in the PHB and XTGE were extremely appropriate thematics. Berserker and Zealot the most so for not-D&D inspirations, but Totem, Storm and Ancestor were totally on point thematically.

For Ranger, Hunter (fighting "style"), Beastmaster, Gloom Stalket and Monster Slayer all make perfect sense too.

(None of this is about how powerful or effective the subclasses are. )

Anyway, as to what Rangers are, they are a D&D Fighter subclass that had the following:
- favored enemies (of civilization)
- thief sneaking skills
- wilderness skills (esp. Tracking)
- ambush/surprise expertise
- spellcasting (esp Druidic)
- rugged frontiersman weapons use (esp hatchets/daggers & bows)

Pretty much all D&D rangers have had this full list, except ambush expertise, which has gotten rolled into thief sneakin skills in wotc D&D. And for some weird reason 4e dropped spellcasting.

Barbarians were very tough Fighters that had wilderness skills and out of combat nature skills. I like the wotc Barb focus on raging far more. I really miss 4e Primal Rages though, Storm Barbs just don't do it justice to the awesome feel of channeling Primal Power like Macetail Rage, Black drake Rage, or Winter Phoenix Rage.

[strangebloke]

What are they?

Damned fun, that's what.

Look, at the end of the day, everything you're saying is correct/factual/true. But these arguments apply equally well to bards and sorcerers for example. Or Wizards and Warlocks. Or artificer and wizard. Or clerics and druids. And yes, these argument also work easily well for reducing all martials down to "fighting man" and all casters down to "magic user." If that's not your intent, fine, but that's the natural progression of the argument. It works just as well in those cases.

The reason why more classes exist, is because its fun. People like playing barbarians. "The dumb warrior who hulks out" is absolutely a core style of play that people in every single type of game enjoys. The "woodsy archer with nature magic for utility" is more niche admittedly but still exists in a host of media. It's not just an Aragorn thing.

In fact if anything its the broad-concept classes like fighter and wizard that need to justify their existence more. Why do we need fighters if Paladins and Barbarians and Rangers and Monks and Rogues exist? Don't they cover any concept that could be called a "fighter?"

[Tanarii]

The "woodsy archer with nature magic for utility" is more niche admittedly but still exists in a host of media. It's not just an Aragorn thing.
Yeah, this archetype in particular is strongly associated with elves ina lot of fantasy. Same with beastmasters or shapechanging. Although those are two seperate classes in D&D.

[strangebloke]

Yeah, this archetype in particular is strongly associated with elves ina lot of fantasy. Same with beastmasters or shapechanging. Although those are two seperate classes in D&D.

Elves most commonly, but its all over the place. WoW had the 'hunter' class and had dozens of dwarves, trolls, and orcs that fit the name alongside the obligatory night and blood elves. Elven shapechangers exist but you also have Beorn. You also have the druid class from WoW which included more named characters beyond just elves. You also have Morrigan from Dragon Age and animagi in Harry Potter and... a whole bunch of stuff.

At some point we need to accept that an archetype doesn't need to call back to some fantasy novel from the 50s to be relevant. It's just fine to pull from stuff that's "only" fifteen years old. Sure, some of this stuff only exists because of dnd in the first place, but whatever, all the more reason to include it.

[Witty Username]

These threads pop up from time to time, if you really wanted you could get reductionist on the whole system up until you're left with a thief, fighting man and magic user, where the game started.

I think it was fighting man, cleric and magic user originally, with thief added later. still agree with your point though.

[Kane0]

The quintessential Barbarian is probably Conan - a Fighter/Thief.
The quintessential Ranger is probably Aragorn - a Fighter very skilled in tracking.

Are they? Plenty of people would have no association with those characters, or even know of them.
The original inspirations for the classes three editions ago, but since then they have taken on their own life.



What are these classes really supposed to be? What about them makes them deserving of their own base class chassis, rather than being extensions of the Fighter (or maybe Rogue)?

There are enough mechanics accumulated to be beyond the scope of a subclass to another class.
They are supposed to be survivalists, explorers, self sufficient tribalists, etc. something like expanding the outlander concept expanded into a class just like scholar expanded into wizard or acolyte into cleric.



When you start looking at subclass options outside of the PHB, it gets wild - there is no rhyme or reason to any of it! It's magical fighter after magical fighter and almost none of it has anything to do with the traditional theme

Yeah, as you expand in any edition you do have to do further and further afield over time in order to remain novel and cover new ground. You can only get so many flavors of ‘shaman’ before you want some new options for your druids. The same happens for all classes in some way or other.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Are they? Plenty of people would have no association with those characters, or even know of them.
The original inspirations for the classes three editions ago, but since then they have taken on their own life.




At some point we need to accept that an archetype doesn't need to call back to some fantasy novel from the 50s to be relevant. It's just fine to pull from stuff that's "only" fifteen years old. Sure, some of this stuff only exists because of dnd in the first place, but whatever, all the more reason to include it.

These. Claiming "well, it doesn't match some 1e/OD&D-era archetype, so it's not valid is just not so. Modern D&D, to be honest, owes very little to those early books. Yes, even Tolkien. It's become its own thing, feeding off of itself and the media earlier editions spawned, plus the popular perception of things now. History is not destiny. Tolkien never played D&D; Gary Gygax hasn't been part of D&D for decades. In fact, he's been out of D&D longer than he was in it originally. It's become something else. Something that stands or falls on its own.

Basically, arguments from past history just don't mean anything to me when discussing 5e. Heck, arguments from past-edition lore don't mean much either. Each edition is its own game--if it didn't have the immense value of the name, it'd have been renamed each time.

Heck, I doubt most people these days even really know about Conan much. What was the last Conan IP use? The game that failed quickly? I see there was a 2011 movie. IE a decade ago. And the movies and comics have drifted considerably from the books. So if you say Conan, people think the movies if they think about him at all. And other than the name, there's basically no connection between Conan and 5e Barbarians (the class).

[Arkhios]

And for some weird reason 4e dropped spellcasting.

Not really. IMO, it was more like 4e gave "spells" or "spell-like abilities" to all classes, in the form of a unified power system.

Utility powers especially included some very spell-like powers for pretty much every class.

That said, going forward from 3.X rangers and paladins, their spellcasting was little more than a joke, anyway. For example, for every spell level they obtained they actually couldn't cast any spells of those levels for a long time unless they had invested heavily on their spellcasting ability score (wisdom)
all the while both relied heavily on either strength and charisma (paladin) or strength and dexterity (ranger). Not to mention constitution for hit points (especially ranger) or intelligence for skills (especially paladin).

In short, 3.X Paladins and Rangers were the quintessential examples of MAD classes, and essentially a player had to roll insane stats to even consider playing one. Using point buy only, I would've never recommended either to anyone.

That rant aside, what I'm saying is that 4e didn't really change whether paladins or rangers had spells or not.


More on topic, I really don't have anything to add. The most relevant argument has already been said.

Barbarians and rangers both represent the more primitive warriors who either embrace the beast within (traditional berserkers) or accompany themselves with beasts (beast masters); funnily enough, I believe both tropes actually have at least some origins in Norse or Germanic myth and legends. Some Norse king (forgot the name) for example allegedly had tamed a bear and kept it in their home like a modern day people would keep a dog.

Barbarians and rangers are basically those people who have the skills to fight for living without having a more formal training to do so (unlike fighters, monks, and paladins)

[Dienekes]

In fact if anything its the broad-concept classes like fighter and wizard that need to justify their existence more. Why do we need fighters if Paladins and Barbarians and Rangers and Monks and Rogues exist? Don't they cover any concept that could be called a "fighter?"

Mundane knight seems difficult. Rank and file soldier seems antithetical to every one of the classes listed here. Swashbucklers that can attack more than once with their damn rapier per turn. Seriously WotC. The thematic of the fighting style is making many quick attacks in rapid succession. Why would you give it to the class that fights with one massive smack each turn?

As to the original question, the Barbarian is the class that focuses its combat ability around a central Rage mechanic. Any warrior type that is best represented by an encounter long combat boost gets slotted to that class. From the usual rage of a Berserker, to an elemental titan, to a werewolf.

Now would more concepts be available if we renamed the class Berserker or Rager and divorced it from the -honestly kinda insulting- connotation that this fighting style was only for the uncultured? Yeah. Probably. Will they do that? Probably not. Because it’s been called a Barbarian for decades, and D&D has a very strange relationship with continuity that I can’t blame them for after the reaction to 4e, but I do think is holding them back a bit.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Mundane knight seems difficult. Rank and file soldier seems antithetical to every one of the classes listed here. Swashbucklers that can attack more than once with their damn rapier per turn. Seriously WotC. The thematic of the fighting style is making many quick attacks in rapid succession. Why would you give it to the class that fights with one massive smack each turn?

Attack roll =/= in universe attack. Abstractions are abstract. Their sneak attack may be actually a flurry of attacks as they see an opening.

But honestly, I'm fine with fighters. Wizards...I personally think they're the worst designed class. Spell list as the majority of your class features and not even a very thematic one at that is, IMO, bad design. And the 8 schools of magic are vestigial at best. I'd rather break out a couple of more tightly bound classes or actually make the subclasses represent real, in universe schools of thought. If that means cutting some legacy ties, all the better.

[Dienekes]

Attack roll =/= in universe attack. Abstractions are abstract. Their sneak attack may be actually a flurry of attacks as they see an opening.


Then that is a bad abstraction. When in other places it very much is one attack. And we’re left with the hulking brute with the greataxe being able to determine how they’re handling opponents with more finesse.

It’s not like this is 13th Age where they are very clear that the single attack is meant to represent all the nonsense you’re doing in a round.

Admittedly, this is all tangential to the topic, and a quibble besides. But still, irks me.

I more or less agree with Wizards being poorly designed. Which is a bit sad for me since taking the time to learn spells through study and books and having a mechanic to actually make people search out new spells is cool design space.

[Luccan]

I'm starting to think it's not helpful to imagine D&D classes as general fantasy archetypes all the time. At this point, most D&D classes are based on themselves. That said:

Barbarians are intended to evoke any sort of "primal warrior" character, like Viking berserkers. Their subclasses represent a number of mystical ideas about what happens when a warrior enters their battle state. Are you guided by something sacred to you? By ghosts? Your god? Or just super angry?

Rangers represent the fantasy woodsman. Flawless at moving in their own terrain, a deep understanding of their prey, and a magical way with the natural world (represented mostly by D&D's biggest special ability mechanic: spells). It just so happens that 5e implements this terribly. AFAICT, the main reason some people think Scout Rogue is a better ranger is because it gets to just boost its ranger-like skills generally, rather than being tied to a terrain. The rest of its abilities don't say Ranger specifically, at least to me. Given Tasha's now makes that sort of an option for Rangers, it seems pretty clear Expertise should've been available to them in the first place. Rangers also probably shouldn't be limited by Spells Known. By description Rangers should easily be the best pick for something like a vampire hunter or a Witcher, but it wasn't implemented properly in mechanics.

[Droppeddead]

Not a question of power or effectiveness, but one of identity.

The quintessential Barbarian is probably Conan - a Fighter/Thief.
The quintessential Ranger is probably Aragorn - a Fighter very skilled in tracking.

What are these classes really supposed to be? What about them makes them deserving of their own base class chassis, rather than being extensions of the Fighter (or maybe Rogue)?

Well, people have already pointed out that you are being reductionist, so I'm not going to dwell on that. But what you are saying can be applied to pretty much every class. Why have Warlocks, they're just wizards who get their magic from a pact rather than studying. Paladins are just clerics with better fighting skills, bards are just multiclassed rogue/wizards, etc.

As for the identity of the classes, Luccan probably said it best:

I'm starting to think it's not helpful to imagine D&D classes as general fantasy archetypes all the time. At this point, most D&D classes are based on themselves.

Or to put it differently, rangers and barbarians are archetypes that people like enough to warrant their own classes. Whereas fighters are professional warriors who rely on superior skills, barbarians get their fighting prowess from within (or from their zeal, or ancestral spirits, or what have you) and rely on instinct and emotions. People want hardy outdoorsy survival types that can treck through the wilderness, track their prey for miles and miles and miles, living of the land. Trying to stuff all three of these (and more) into the same class will quickly get messy.

As for the argument that Rogue Scouts can mimic Rangers? Sure. And in some ways a Fighter Samurai can mimic a Barbarian, Arcane Tricksters aren't all to different from Bards and if you choose the right feats even Fighters can be pretty good skill monkeys. Being able to build similar characters in many different ways is a good thing since it means that if you want a face you don't always play Class X/Race Y and so on.

[DwarfFighter]

The quintessential Barbarian is probably Conan - a Fighter/Thief.
The quintessential Ranger is probably Aragorn - a Fighter very skilled in tracking.


Barbarian: I think many go to Conan for the visual of a barbarian, a huge hulking savage with little regard for the trappings of civilization. Conan as a character is a lot more than this, he is the solo protagonist of his stories so by necessity he is complex. I would too call Conan an Fighter and Thief, because that's the sort of adventure roles he assumes. But I don't think he holds up to the 5e Fighter class or the 5e Rogue class very well.

The 5e Fighter is a disciplined warrior, Conan is skilled but a brute.

The 5e Rogue is a sneaky and elusive back-stabber, Conan is mobile and stealthy, but he's a stand-up fighter.

I guess if you wanted to play Conan in 5e without using the Barbarian class, I guess an mix of Ranger and Monk (ignoring the calm and meditative aspect!) might fit the bill better?

Ranger: Yeah, well. I'm blaming Drizzt for this one. It's like they're trying to do everything he does. I feel the "standard" Ranger should be the best archer and fieldcraft in the game, that dual wielding stuff should be its own subclass entirely.

-DF

[sophontteks]

Basically we had to combine classes to roughly approximate what these characters were while today we have specific classes that more adequately represent these ideas. Returning to the old system just looks like a big step backwards.

If we combine fighter and rogue do we get anything similar to a ranger or a barbarian?
No. They are completely different things.

Combining those classes approximated an idea, but it didn't get fully realized until they got their own unique classes. Multi-classing in itself isn't really friendly to newer players either, and 5e is all about making things smoother and more straight forward. One of the best things about 5e is how strong the classes are on their own. Furthermore, with all the great subclasses out for both we have expanded on the ideas well beyond the original concepts.

There is nothing to be gained here, and a whole lot to lose if we revert this.

[Morty]

These threads pop up from time to time, if you really wanted you could get reductionist on the whole system up until you're left with a thief, fighting man and magic user, where the game started.

These threads pop out from time to time because barbarians and rangers both have major thematic problems that people can't help but notice. And since the reason for their existence is more or less "they've existed for long enough to become fixtures", people are going to get confused.

That being said, I also do not understand why the suggestion that they're not good classes is always somehow extrapolated to "but you'll end up with just fighters and rogues". Why can't it be a different set of classes?

[JackPhoenix]

Then that is a bad abstraction. When in other places it very much is one attack. And we’re left with the hulking brute with the greataxe being able to determine how they’re handling opponents with more finesse.

You do realize nothing stops you from making a dex fighter with a rapier, right? Or do you think that because there's a rogue subclass named swashbuckler, nobody else can use that fighting style?


Barbarian: I think many go to Conan for the visual of a barbarian, a huge hulking savage with little regard for the trappings of civilization. Conan as a character is a lot more than this, he is the solo protagonist of his stories so by necessity he is complex. I would too call Conan an Fighter and Thief, because that's the sort of adventure roles he assumes. But I don't think he holds up to the 5e Fighter class or the 5e Rogue class very well.

Conan's problem is that his common perception comes from the Arnie movies (and the art on the books' covers), not from the actual content of the books.

[Dienekes]

You do realize nothing stops you from making a dex fighter with a rapier, right? Or do you think that because there's a rogue subclass named swashbuckler, nobody else can use that fighting style?

Context, my good phoenix. PhoenixPhyre and I were discussing what would happen if we remove the Fighter. At that point the only mundane warrior classes left are Barbarian and Rogue. Barbarian is out for a few reasons. Rage does not fit the swashbuckler concept as a mechanic, nor does Reckless Attack which are the mechanical pillars of the class. Fluff is also a complete mismatch. Rogue gets closer and has a Swashbuckler subclass already which is why I focused on that for my comment. Since if I just put a swashbuckler style warrior someone else would then answer “you can do that with a Rogue.” And then I would have to explain why that is unsatisfactory which would have just slowed down the conversation on a tangent I thought I could head off easily.

But now we’re on this tangent, so I see my plans are ultimately futile.

But yeah. If I wanted to play an actual Errol Flynning swashbuckler. I’d play a Dex Fighter, which would be hard to do without a Fighter or Fighter-like substitute that some are arguing for removing.

[stoutstien]

These threads pop out from time to time because barbarians and rangers both have major thematic problems that people can't help but notice. And since the reason for their existence is more or less "they've existed for long enough to become fixtures", people are going to get confused.

That being said, I also do not understand why the suggestion that they're not good classes is always somehow extrapolated to "but you'll end up with just fighters and rogues". Why can't it be a different set of classes?

It doesn't help that they also have flaws mechanically that made them feel clunky which is worse IMO. They did get some needed help in TgtE that smoothed out some rough spots.

Not saying they are unplayable or bad classes but they feel almost forced.

[Morty]

Conan's problem is that his common perception somes from the Arnie movies (and the art on the books' covers), not from the actual content of the books.

And comparing Conan from the books to D&D martial classes mostly goes to show the latter's shortcomings and lack of versatility compared to both their real and fictional counterparts.


It doesn't help that they also have flaws mechanically that made them feel clunky which is worse IMO. They did get some needed help in TgtE that smoothed out some rough spots.

Not saying they are unplayable or bad classes but they feel almost forced.

It's hard to make particularly good mechanics on top of flawed thematics. 4E ranger gets closest to being solid, but even then the thematic flaws shine through - it's basically a mobile skirmisher class, only with a forced "wilderness survival" theme and a requirement to dual-wield in melee. 4E barbarians did seem solid as "primal strikers", but it's been a while.

If they feel forced it's because their design process starts "we need a class named ranger and a class named barbarian" and works from there, rather than try to make sure they fit well into the game.

[strangebloke]

It doesn't help that they also have flaws mechanically that made them feel clunky which is worse IMO. They did get some needed help in TgtE that smoothed out some rough spots.

Not saying they are unplayable or bad classes but they feel almost forced.

This is the actual problem. People don't complain about Warlocks or Paladins because they feel great to play. The PHB ranger for contrast is strong as heck but has many totally dead levels that break multiclassing and just feel poopy compared to other classes. The Barbarian is a total feast-or-famine class where you either can get into melee (and you wreck stuff) or you can't get into melee (and you can't do anything). It also basically stops getting class features after level 8 or so which, lol, doesn't endear people to it.

The issue isn't thematics at all. If you wanted to find an "archetypal warlock" you'd end up with... gosh, one of Conan's villains and even then they'd be better represented as a sorcerer or wizard.

Note: people also complain about the thematic role of the sorcerer. Once again this has nothing to do with their actual thematics and everything to do with sorcerers being kind of flawed.

[JackPhoenix]

And comparing Conan from the books to D&D martial classes mostly goes to show the latter's shortcomings and lack of versatility compared to both their real and fictional counterparts.

To be fair, it's not just a D&D problem. RPGs in general fail to properly portray literally (and other non-RPG) characters, as the authors don't need to adhere to a set of mechanics that are limited due to balance concerns and out of the basic impossibility to cover everything in a system that needs to be playable by humans. More free-form games come closer, but even then, there are still limitations if the game is anything but a bunch of people sitting around table, telling stories with no regards for rules.

That's (one of the reasons, another is "why just copy something else") why every time I see thread like "How would you make [fictional character unrelated to RPGs] in [system], my first thought is "I wouldn't". And not just in 5e.

[Dork_Forge]

I think it was fighting man, cleric and magic user originally, with thief added later. still agree with your point though.

I knew I should have googled it!


These threads pop out from time to time because barbarians and rangers both have major thematic problems that people can't help but notice. And since the reason for their existence is more or less "they've existed for long enough to become fixtures", people are going to get confused.

I don't think either have thematic problems, the concept of them not having a strong enough identity to standalone never occurred to me before I saw the occasional thread about it. If anything, I think the consensus so far in this thread seems to be that it's too much to fit into a single subclass/their identity is their own, not based on source material before many (most?) 5e players were even born.

I strongly disagree with what you think their reason for existing is.




That being said, I also do not understand why the suggestion that they're not good classes is always somehow extrapolated to "but you'll end up with just fighters and rogues". Why can't it be a different set of classes?

Because the same logic applied to the Ranger and Barbarian just spirals down to where the game started?

Are you proposing that the Ranger and Barbarian be replaced with other classes or that the class cull stop with them?

I think the answer to your question (if it's that why not replace them) is it's never really presented as an option by the people that start these threads, it's usually just fold them into subclasses.

I'd rather see more classes added to the game, rather than toy with the idea of classes being replaced or removed. Besides firmly believing that the two in question have their own identity (mechanically and thematically), I think that 5e is at a critical mass where just new subclasses aren't doing much to drive the game forward. The Artificer brought entirely new concepts and mechanics, we need more of that, and with the onslaught of player Psionics that Tasha's brought, I think more classes is what we'll see.

[Dienekes]

It doesn't help that they also have flaws mechanically that made them feel clunky which is worse IMO. They did get some needed help in TgtE that smoothed out some rough spots.

Not saying they are unplayable or bad classes but they feel almost forced.

I actually think Barbarian has a pretty good foundation. At least at first. It does fall off pretty hard as the leveling goes. But Rage and Reckless Attack is a pretty good start for a unique playstyle. And even Danger Sense has a strong thematic element to it. There are ideas there that could be expanded on and developed to make a class that feels unique and powerful to play.

It just seems that they completely run out of ideas what to do with it. But that does not seem unique to only the Barbarian. Honestly a lot of the classes feel that way. Most the casters get off a bit easy since a lot of the mechanical incentives at higher levels is taken over by spells. But for Barbarians, Fighters, and Rogues seem kinda barren at the tail end of the levels resting very heavily on how good their subclass choices were to do anything interesting.

Rangers I'm more iffy on. Of all the classes they don't really have a clear thematic mechanic to focus around. With maybe the exception of Hunter's Mark but that's pretty debatable if it should count. It leads it into being kind of a mess of expectations. It can do cool things. But I struggle to think of a way it distinguishes itself on a round for round basis in combat.

Which isn't to say that it can't get made to have one. Stalker who focuses down one enemy at a time either in a focused duel or a sniper is a useful enough basis for a fighting style. But as is, that's just one optional spell that doesn't particularly work well with one of the premier fighting styles of the class. While most everything else in the class ignores it or just does fairly generic useful things with -maybe- a smidgen of survivalist fluff over the top of it.

[Tanarii]

Ranger: Yeah, well. I'm blaming Drizzt for this one. It's like they're trying to do everything he does. I feel the "standard" Ranger should be the best archer and fieldcraft in the game, that dual wielding stuff should be its own subclass entirely.Unfortunately Drizzt came out only a year before 2e, which is where TwF & Archery for Rangers became the gold standard. So it should have been well into play testing and design by then. And Rangers already required focusing on TWF (daggers/hatchets) and Archery (bow/crossbow) weapon proficiencies as of 1e Unearthed Arcana publishing (as well as Drow PCs being just awesome at TWF naturally).

Don't get me wrong, I still blame Drizzle. :smallamused:


This is the actual problem. People don't complain about Warlocks or Paladins because they feel great to play.Point of order, people complain about warlocks all the dang time!

About the only classes I don't see regular complains about are Paladins, Druids, Rogues, and Wizards. (Druids and Wizards get complaints but mostly that they're a bit too complicated for brand new players.)

Barbarians - high level features lacking, berserkers sucks
Clerics - high level spells lacking
Bards - spells known too limited, too squishy
Fighters - martials vs casters (code for Fighter vs Wizards), champions sucks
Monks - too squishy, nothing but stunning strikers, 4-eles sucks
Rangers - fE & NE are ribbonz, Rangers should be spellless, beastmasters sucks
Sorcerers - spells known too limited, spell points too limits, they aren't Wizards, they are Wizards what's the point?
Warlocks - I don't understand short rests


That's (one of the reasons, another is "why just copy something else") why every time I see thread like "How would you make [fictional character unrelated to RPGs] in [system], my first thought is "I wouldn't". And not just in 5e.Yup. There's a lot of reasons for that, not the least of which is TTRPGs aren't books or movies.

As an aside, it also commonly has the same impact as too long a backstory does: it ends up limiting room/player desire for exploring the character and finding out who they'll turn out to be. But that's mostly me being a fan of slightly tabula rasa characters.

[stoutstien]

I do think the whole primal concept should have been used to strengthen the identity of barbarian, ranger, and druids so they didn't fall into the "just an angry fighter" or "it's a wizard who can turn into a bear".
As content has been added I think subclasses started to bring some focus to it such as the AG barbarian or swarm ranger feeling more raw and deeper than one who likes just channels nature.

[Tanarii]

I do think the whole primal concept should have been used to strengthen the identity of barbarian, ranger, and druids so they didn't fall into the "just an angry fighter" or "it's a wizard who can turn into a bear".
They did that for Barbarian and Druid.

Unfortunately when the edition was replaced, some really fantastic concepts were lost in the process of rolling back to something most of the player base would recognize as D&D.

[Sigreid]

The barbarian represents the "civilized" man's stereotype of the wild tribal warrior. The embodiment of everything about the wilds that scares them.

The ranger represents the civilized man that voluntarily walks out to face the wilderness and all its terrors.

[Morty]

To be fair, it's not just a D&D problem. RPGs in general fail to properly portray literally (and other non-RPG) characters, as the authors don't need to adhere to a set of mechanics that are limited due to balance concerns and out of the basic impossibility to cover everything in a system that needs to be playable by humans. More free-form games come closer, but even then, there are still limitations if the game is anything but a bunch of people sitting around table, telling stories with no regards for rules.

That's (one of the reasons, another is "why just copy something else") why every time I see thread like "How would you make [fictional character unrelated to RPGs] in [system], my first thought is "I wouldn't". And not just in 5e.

Other systems at least manage to avoid the arbitrary distinction between "fighters" and "rogues" (or rangers), the former of whom struggle with anything that doesn't involve breaking things and the latter of whom have fairly specific combat roles on top of being "skill experts". And make it easier to create a character who is both exceptionally strong and stealthy.



Are you proposing that the Ranger and Barbarian be replaced with other classes or that the class cull stop with them?

I think the answer to your question (if it's that why not replace them) is it's never really presented as an option by the people that start these threads, it's usually just fold them into subclasses.

That's a fair point. The suggestion is usually to just make them fighter subclasses, but that's not an answer, because it makes the fighter even more of an overstuffed all-purpose class. I do indeed propose replacing them. Possibly with a single class that rolls rangers and barbarians together. I also do not think they're the only classes that deserve to be put on the chopping block... just perhaps the most deserving.

[Dienekes]

So this is sort of a tangential point. But does anyone else think that “Wilderness Survivalist” makes more sense as a feat? Pretty much any class can say they lived out in the wild and picked up some tricks to aid the exploration and travel parts of the game. It doesn’t really effect the round per round combat playstyle that the base classes focus on (though as a tangent, if WotC went the other way and fleshed out every classes non-combat options that’d be fine too).

Honestly, you could probably give the rough equivalent of Natural Explorer in every non-urban terrain, and I doubt it would even be considered an overpowered feat to pick.

[strangebloke]

Unfortunately Drizzt came out only a year before 2e, which is where TwF & Archery for Rangers became the gold standard. So it should have been well into play testing and design by then. And Rangers already required focusing on TWF (daggers/hatchets) and Archery (bow/crossbow) weapon proficiencies as of 1e Unearthed Arcana publishing (as well as Drow PCs being just awesome at TWF naturally).

Don't get me wrong, I still blame Drizzle. :smallamused:
It's not just drizzt, but also legolas, who was rocking TWF + Archery for decades before Drow were ever conceived. Aragorn is also relying on (broken) sword + dagger or bow in his 'strider' persona which is when he's most like the modern conception of a ranger, and even after, with his gift from galadriel being a long magical knife.

I'd take criticism of archetypes more seriously if people actually knew what they were talking about (not directed at you, just a problem in general)

Point of order, people complain about warlocks all the dang time!

About the only classes I don't see regular complains about are Paladins, Druids, Rogues, and Wizards. (Druids and Wizards get complaints but mostly that they're a bit too complicated for brand new players.)

Barbarians - high level features lacking, berserkers sucks
Clerics - high level spells lacking
Bards - spells known too limited, too squishy
Fighters - martials vs casters (code for Fighter vs Wizards), champions sucks
Monks - too squishy, nothing but stunning strikers, 4-eles sucks
Rangers - fE & NE are ribbonz, Rangers should be spellless, beastmasters sucks
Sorcerers - spells known too limited, spell points too limits, they aren't Wizards, they are Wizards what's the point?
Warlocks - I don't understand short rests

Yup. There's a lot of reasons for that, not the least of which is TTRPGs aren't books or movies.

As an aside, it also commonly has the same impact as too long a backstory does: it ends up limiting room/player desire for exploring the character and finding out who they'll turn out to be. But that's mostly me being a fan of slightly tabula rasa characters.

These are mechanical complaints, which yes, abound for every character, but I was speaking to thematic criticism. I've see people complain about the warlock thematics sometimes but I've seen people complain about barbarian, ranger, and sorcerer thematics an order of magnitude more. Nobody complains about monk thematics AFAIK, nor do people complain about Druids.

This is pure conjecture on my part but my theory is that most people who complain about mechanics are newbs who don't understand what they're saying, and that most people who complain about thematics understand the mechanical deficiencies, but try to extend these problems to thematics as well because "feels bad to play" must equal "is bad on even a conceptual level."

There's a discussion to be had about what could be done to make barbarians better to play at high levels for example, but that's different from saying they have no thematic niche.

[Morty]

So this is sort of a tangential point. But does anyone else think that “Wilderness Survivalist” makes more sense as a feat? Pretty much any class can say they lived out in the wild and picked up some tricks to aid the exploration and travel parts of the game. It doesn’t really effect the round per round combat playstyle that the base classes focus on (though as a tangent, if WotC went the other way and fleshed out every classes non-combat options that’d be fine too).

Honestly, you could probably give the rough equivalent of Natural Explorer in every non-urban terrain, and I doubt it would even be considered an overpowered feat to pick.

Wilderness survival certainly isn't enough to hang a class on, which is why rangers have struggled.

[diplomancer]

It's not just drizzt, but also legolas, who was rocking TWF + Archery for decades before Drow were ever conceived. Aragorn is also relying on (broken) sword + dagger or bow in his 'strider' persona which is when he's most like the modern conception of a ranger, and even after, with his gift from galadriel being a long magical knife.

I'd take criticism of archetypes more seriously if people actually knew what they were talking about (not directed at you, just a problem in general).

Legolas had only one knife, and it was a backup weapon; he's an archer. And Aragorn... well, Aragorn is weird; the book really gives the impression that the only thing he carried around were the shards of Narsil (though that's hard to accept); he fights off the Nazgul with flaming brands, though it's true he DOES dual-wield them; and once he sets out on the Ring Quest the book clearly states that his only weapon was Andúril. His gift from Galadriel was a scabbard that made it impossible for Andúril to break again, not "a long magical knife". Looks like you are mixing up the book with the movie (and the movie probably WAS influenced in its decisions by D&D).

Considering all this, there is some irony in that second paragraph of yours.

[Morty]

Legolas had only one knife, and it was a backup weapon; he's an archer. And Aragorn... well, Aragorn is weird; the book really gives the impression that the only thing he carried around were the shards of Narsil (though that's hard to accept); he fights off the Nazgul with flaming brands; and once he sets out on the Ring Quest the book clearly states that his only weapon was Andúril. His gift from Galadriel was a scabbard that made it impossible for Andúril to break again, not "a long magical knife". Looks like you are mixing up the book with the movie (and the movie probably WAS influenced in its decisions by D&D).

Considering all this, there is some irony in that second paragraph of yours.

It'd also be a stretch to call Legolas a ranger, as opposed to a wood elf fighter who specializes in archery.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Wilderness survival certainly isn't enough to hang a class on, which is why rangers have struggled.

But who said rangers were "wilderness survival, the class?" I see rangers as being the primal magic equivalent of paladins. They are to druids as paladins are to clerics. More martial, less caster. But in a way, they're inverses, reflecting the very different nature of divine vs primal. Where paladins have orders, mostly, rangers are (more) solitary. Where paladins are dogmatic, rangers are pragmatic. Where paladins force the universe into compliance with their oath, rangers adapt to the flow of nature. Where paladins are more focused on good and evil, rangers balance civilization and nature, being the enforcers of the boundaries in both directions.

Wilderness survival is a required superpower, but it's not their identity. RANGING is. In the old meaning of being the one who polices the boundaries. Another term might be warder.

[Silly Name]

So this is sort of a tangential point. But does anyone else think that “Wilderness Survivalist” makes more sense as a feat? Pretty much any class can say they lived out in the wild and picked up some tricks to aid the exploration and travel parts of the game. It doesn’t really effect the round per round combat playstyle that the base classes focus on (though as a tangent, if WotC went the other way and fleshed out every classes non-combat options that’d be fine too).

I'd argue that the original flavor of the rangers, heavily borrowing on Tolkien's rangers, wasn't "wilderness expert". They were the first line of defense of civilisation versus wilderness. They were the silent, unsung heroes of the cosy urban settlements, making sure the brunt of monster hordes and strange horrors lurking at the borders of the kingdoms of men (and elves and dwarves and so on) didn't breach past. This heroic endeavour also set them apart from the very people they were protecting, creating a contrast between the sedentary inhabitants of the hinterlands and the always-on-the-move rangers.

This meant that they also were all pretty good at surviving in the wilderness, following tracks, etc, but it was a consequence of their nature as wandering hunters and peacekeepers, not the idea on which the class was founded.

Also hard agree on the last part: 5e's biggest flaw to me is how poor it is at exploration and discovery, which also shafts the ranger hard because most of its features about being hardy, tough experts of the wilds turn into pointless ribbons.

[diplomancer]

It'd also be a stretch to call Legolas a ranger, as opposed to a wood elf fighter who specializes in archery.

True. Everything special about Legolas seems to be more to do with his being an Elf; and, though he is hundreds (thousands?) years old, there's no indication that he'd ever left Mirkwood before being sent to Rivendell by his father; definitely not very Ranger-y.

The archer rangers in LotR are better represented by Faramir and his company. Tolkien's description of their ambush of the Haradrim and the way they melt in and out of the woods has a very strong rangery taste. They also fulfill the "Ranger function" as defined in the post right above this one.

[Dienekes]

I'd argue that the original flavor of the rangers, heavily borrowing on Tolkien's rangers, wasn't "wilderness expert". They were the first line of defense of civilisation versus wilderness. They were the silent, unsung heroes of the cosy urban settlements, making sure the brunt of monster hordes and strange horrors lurking at the borders of the kingdoms of men (and elves and dwarves and so on) didn't breach past. This heroic endeavour also set them apart from the very people they were protecting, creating a contrast between the sedentary inhabitants of the hinterlands and the always-on-the-move rangers.

This meant that they also were all pretty good at surviving in the wilderness, following tracks, etc, but it was a consequence of their nature as wandering hunters and peacekeepers, not the idea on which the class was funded.

Also hard agree on the last part: 5e's biggest flaw to me is how poor it is at exploration and discovery, which also shafts the ranger hard because most of its features about being hardy, tough experts of the wilds turn into pointless ribbons.

Sure, but we're talking about the mechanical level here. Aragorn and all the other Rangers that we see are your average (if heroic) men who fight with sword (Aragorn), axe, and bow (Rangers of Ithilien) but know how to track, and can tell how to use herbs to clean some wounds and aid in healing. Was their goal to expand and protect civilization? Yes, of course. But how did they go about doing that? By fighting like everyone else, armed with the knowledge of how to survive in the wilderness.

From a purely mechanical standpoint: That's a Fighter trained in the Survival, Nature, and Medicine skills. Probably got Expertise in them as well. Playing with a GM who took a lot of time and energy to make up how to make Survival, Nature, and Medicine checks relevant to the campaign, because heaven knows WotC didn't flesh their skill system out.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Sure, but we're talking about the mechanical level here. Aragorn and all the other Rangers that we see are your average (if heroic) men who fight with sword (Aragorn), axe, and bow (Rangers of Ithilien) but know how to track, and can tell how to use herbs to clean some wounds and aid in healing. Was their goal to expand and protect civilization? Yes, of course. But how did they go about doing that? By fighting like everyone else, armed with the knowledge of how to survive in the wilderness.

From a purely mechanical standpoint: That's a Fighter trained in the Survival, Nature, and Medicine skills. Probably got Expertise in them as well. Playing with a GM who took a lot of time and energy to make up how to make Survival, Nature, and Medicine checks relevant to the campaign, because heaven knows WotC didn't flesh their skill system out.

Mapping any fictional character into a D&D world (yes, even ones from D&D fiction) can always be done in many different ways. Especially where you have a fictional system that has essentially no human-accessible magic and try to map it into D&D. That's because there's a fundamental mismatch going on here. D&D!Rangers take inspiration from those characters, take their basic goals and methods and expand them through explicit connections to nature and primal magic. Aragorn doesn't cast spells...because humans in LotR can't cast spells. In fact, the only people who can are explicitly divine creatures (fallen or otherwise).

[Silly Name]

Sure, but we're talking about the mechanical level here. Aragorn and all the other Rangers that we see are your average (if heroic) men who fight with sword, axe, and bow but know how to track, and can tell how to use herbs to clean some wounds and aid in healing. Was their goal to expand and protect civilization? Yes, of course. But how did they go about doing that? By fighting like everyone else, armed with the knowledge of how to survive in the wilderness.

From a purely mechanical standpoint: That's a Fighter trained in the Survival, Nature, and Medicine skills. Probably got Expertise in them as well. Playing with a GM who took a lot of time and energy to make up how to make Survival, Nature, and Medicine checks relevant to the campaign, because heaven knows WotC didn't flesh their skill system out.

Which is why AD&D 1st edition Rangers were a subtype of fighters. But as time passed, the ranger grew out of its origins, turning into a "D&D-ism" like the Paladin and the Druid. They gained an affinity for animals, and the ability to cast divine spells. They turned into keepers of the balance between Nature and Civilisation, the intermediaries of those two extremes.

Their existence as a distinct class is necessitated by the various mechanical signatures they accrued over the editions: fighting styles, skills, animal companions and spellcasting. They were divorced from the base Fighter for the same reasons Paladins and Barbarians stopped being a subclass of the Fighting man.

[Dork_Forge]

From a purely mechanical standpoint: That's a Fighter trained in the Survival, Nature, and Medicine skills. Probably got Expertise in them as well. Playing with a GM who took a lot of time and energy to make up how to make Survival, Nature, and Medicine checks relevant to the campaign, because heaven knows WotC didn't flesh their skill system out.

Objection here, this stuff is actually represented in the Ranger class beyond those skills. The understandable shame is that they chose to fold those things into spells:

-Treating injuries (Cure Wounds, Healing Spirit)

-Melting into the wild (Pass Without Trace)

-Superior interaction with animals (Speak with Animals et al.)

If they'd made the core chassis chunkier (and arguably clunkier) then there would be non spell abilities folded into the Ranger instead of those things. If that were the case they'd be more obvious, less stealable and I think that people would complain less about their execution.

Unfortuantely the spell wrapper is practical but not ideal.

[Dienekes]

Mapping any fictional character into a D&D world (yes, even ones from D&D fiction) can always be done in many different ways. Especially where you have a fictional system that has essentially no human-accessible magic and try to map it into D&D. That's because there's a fundamental mismatch going on here. D&D!Rangers take inspiration from those characters, take their basic goals and methods and expand them through explicit connections to nature and primal magic. Aragorn doesn't cast spells...because humans in LotR can't cast spells. In fact, the only people who can are explicitly divine creatures (fallen or otherwise).

That is technically not true. Elves and Humans can cast spells in LotR. That's part of why Sauron is able to disguise himself as a human Necromancer, Elrond controlling the river. Galadriel doing her thing. And apparently Denethor could do... something. He knew how to control the Palantir at least, and maybe a bit more. Oh and Numenor. Forgot Numenor.

The mortals could work with magic. But magic in LotR is something very toned down.

But the point remains. If I was trying to play Aragorn, I wouldn't be playing the Ranger class. Because Aragorn is a Fighter with some Wilderness Survival stuff tacked on working in a system with a lot of cool details on the exploration and survival part of the game, and barely anything in the magic. While D&D has that completely reversed.


Objection here, this stuff is actually represented in the Ranger class beyond those skills. The understandable shame is that they chose to fold those things into spells:

-Treating injuries (Cure Wounds, Healing Spirit)

-Melting into the wild (Pass Without Trace)

-Superior interaction with animals (Speak with Animals et al.)

If they'd made the core chassis chunkier (and arguably clunkier) then there would be non spell abilities folded into the Ranger instead of those things. If that were the case they'd be more obvious, less stealable and I think that people would complain less about their execution.

Unfortuantely the spell wrapper is practical but not ideal.

That is magic. Some of the Ranger's spells even have nonsensical components to worry about that doesn't even fit the fluff of it being just the cool skills a Ranger can do.

Now totally a pet peeve of mine, but if you have a concept that's not even all that difficult to make or even do in the real world, and the best you can get in the game is to slap magic onto it and call it a day. Well... man that's disappointing.

[strangebloke]

That is technically not true. Elves and Humans can cast spells in LotR. That's part of why Sauron is able to disguise himself as a human Necromancer, Elrond controlling the river. Galadriel doing her thing. And apparently Denethor could do... something. He knew how to control the Palantir at least, and maybe a bit more.

The mortals could work with magic. But magic in LotR is something very toned down.

But the point remains. If I was trying to play Aragorn, I wouldn't be playing the Ranger class. Because Aragorn is a Fighter with some Wilderness Survival stuff tacked on working in a system with a lot of cool details on the exploration and survival part of the game, and barely anything in the magic. While D&D has that completely reversed.
If you think that Aragorn doesn't have magic powers you didn't read "In the Houses of Healing." It's 'just herblore' but he's able to use it to heal people of curses and powerful esoteric effects to the point that actual herb-lore specialists are left shocked. At some point you really need to ask what counts as 'magic.' He speaks with birds and at one point tracked Gollum across an entire continent over two years after his escape.

Besides which, the dunedan and ithilien rangers are only a subset of the inspiration for 'rangers.' Elves like Legolas and Haldir were also a key part of the formative identity. Nobody would credibly argue that Legolas and Haldir are 'just fighters' given their clearly supernatural nature at times. (legolas standing on snowdrifts, Haldir's rope bridge, calling rivers to protect them, seeing for dozens of miles with pinpoint accuracy)

And yes, you could say that all these powerful abilities are "elf" abilities and not "ranger" abilities but, uh..........

can you at least see how those two ideas got confused over time? The Ranger is a woodwise hunter/tracker/fighter who calls on the powers of nature. DND is a higher-magic setting overall, so representing a character who's impressive in the same sort of ways requires more magic than Aragorn's relatively subtle gifts.

[Dienekes]

Also, people who think that Aragorn doesn't have magic powers didn't read "In the Houses of Healing." It's 'just herblore' but he's able to use it to heal people of curses and powerful esoteric effects to the point that actual herb-lore specialists are left shocked. At some point you really need to ask what counts as 'magic.'



If it's presented as a spell or medicine, mostly. The house of healing was presented as Aragorn getting the plants he needed from that **** Ioreth to start using them. Like I said, the dude has Expertise in Medicine and Nature, not just that usual proficiency nonsense.

And as to getting twisted over time. It got twisted right away. The Ranger class is old and the designers were lazy. That's really it. The Ranger class predated the creation of skills (or as they were initially called Non-Weapon Proficiencies). And when looking at the stuff Aragorn does, it was decided that it would be easier to just make them spells than develop a subsystem for it.

In my opinion a bad choice. Partially because it led down the path where we are now, where doing cool but actually kinda normal stuff got smashed into the Magic system.

[HPisBS]

I see rangers as being the primal magic equivalent of paladins. They are to druids as paladins are to clerics. More martial, less caster.

Less caster, sure, but how are they more martial?

Favored Enemy has zero martial application, and Favored Foe was scaled back so much from its UA version that using it requires you to avoid using all but a few of your non-utility spells.

The only way Favored Terrain could have combat application is indirectly, through better perception, tracking, etc and faster stealth. That is, if you happen to be in the type(s) of terrain you previously chose. At least Deft Explorer is a bit more reliable.

... Maybe the "more martial" part comes from differences in subclasses?


...
Also hard agree on the last part: 5e's biggest flaw to me is how poor it is at exploration and discovery, which also shafts the ranger hard because most of its features about being hardy, tough experts of the wilds turn into pointless ribbons.


Wilderness survival certainly isn't enough to hang a class on, which is why rangers have struggled.

Absolutely. Favored Enemy / Natural Explorer / their replacement(s) need to have better - and more explicit - applications, particularly to combat. (The easiest way probably would've been to make Hunter's Mark into a class feature somehow. They tried to with Favored Foe, but scaled it back to the point that it's hardly worth considering.)

[Dork_Forge]

T
That is magic. Some of the Ranger's spells even have nonsensical components to worry about that doesn't even fit the fluff of it being just the cool skills a Ranger can do.

Now totally a pet peeve of mine, but if you have a concept that's not even all that difficult to make or even do in the real world, and the best you can get in the game is to slap magic onto it and call it a day. Well... man that's disappointing.

My point was that the things they are meant to do are folded into magic for simplicity of the system. If you have each as a distinct ability then not only is the Ranger a disproportionately large class crunch wise, you need to write a whole different set of rules to govern them that needs to play nice with everything else.

I don't like that it's folded into spells, it's clearly a call based on simplicity of the system, but their abilities are clearly there in their spell list...

[diplomancer]

If it's presented as a spell or medicine, mostly. The house of healing was presented as Aragorn getting the plants he needed from that **** Ioreth to start using them. Like I said, the dude has Expertise in Medicine and Nature, not just that usual proficiency nonsense.

It'a clearly more than that; but then, it's more of a racial ability than a class one. He can do it not because he's a Ranger, he can do it because he's the King. Aragorn is closer to a D&D Aasimar than a regular human in that regard.

[Dienekes]

My point was that the things they are meant to do are folded into magic for simplicity of the system. If you have each as a distinct ability then not only is the Ranger a disproportionately large class crunch wise, you need to write a whole different set of rules to govern them that needs to play nice with everything else.

I don't like that it's folded into spells, it's clearly a call based on simplicity of the system, but their abilities are clearly there in their spell list...

And I agree, but my point is that is a very poor way of modeling what they were trying to model. I did mention this is a pet peeve of mine. Not that it's not there. It's just there in a way I think was a bad decision 45 years ago that we're still stuck with.

[Dork_Forge]

And I agree, but my point is that is a very poor way of modeling what they were trying to model. I did mention this is a pet peeve of mine. Not that it's not there. It's just there in a way I think was a bad decision 45 years ago that we're still stuck with.

It's definitely a shame, though I do think it's probably decisions like this that make 5e so accessible.

They acknowledged this with the old spell less ranger UA article, though imo it was a mess.

For Ranger inspiration, for whatever it's worth a Ranger that specialises in combat and protecting against wilderness is seen in the Sword of Truth series which debuted in 1994. Not sure how much of that is directly influenced by D&D *shrug*

[Tanarii]

Less caster, sure, but how are they more martial?
d10 HD, Str or Dex primary, Metal medium armors, fighting style.

[strangebloke]

If it's presented as a spell or medicine, mostly. The house of healing was presented as Aragorn getting the plants he needed from that **** Ioreth to start using them. Like I said, the dude has Expertise in Medicine and Nature, not just that usual proficiency nonsense.

And as to getting twisted over time. It got twisted right away. The Ranger class is old and the designers were lazy. That's really it. The Ranger class predated the creation of skills (or as they were initially called Non-Weapon Proficiencies). And when looking at the stuff Aragorn does, it was decided that it would be easier to just make them spells than develop a subsystem for it.

In my opinion a bad choice. Partially because it led down the path where we are now, where doing cool but actually kinda normal stuff got smashed into the Magic system.

In DND, if you want to break a curse, you need a spell to do it. That's how the system works. Aragon, insofar as he can break curses with herblore and skill, would be better represented as a caster of some degree. And once again, he's the only one who can do it, and everyone sees it as magic, a sign of his noble heritage.

To put it another way, does it make you feel better if the ranger has a certain list of "seeds known" and he can use a limited number of "plants" per day? does it help if its not 'technically' magic?

Because if your only quibble is over this technical point (which does have mechanical effects, I know) it seems like a pretty weak thematic change. Moving from "I use magical plants in clever ways to heal things that no normal person could" to "I have magic that I can access due to my intensive study of nature".... is just not that big a jump.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Less caster, sure, but how are they more martial?


I meant that those two were more martial than their counterparts (druids and clerics). Not that rangers were more martial than paladins. The rest of it went on to describe how they're different from each other, acting as counterparts to each other rather than clones.

In the same sort of way, you have barbarians as the primal fighter and monks as the divine fighter. Both are almost entirely martial, with at most one subclass that casts anything like spells (and generally comes in at about a 1/3 caster).

I see 2 major divisions with some sub-divisions.

1. Power from learning and talent.
0-1/3 casters: Fighters, Rogues
1/2 casters: Artificers
1/1 casters: wizards, sorcerers, bards

2. Power from a connections/understanding as opposed to intellectual pursuit or natural talent.
0-1/3 casters: Barbarians (connection to primal forces), monks (learning to use ki isn't like learning wizardry, it's most about understanding the flow of existing power)
1/2 casters: rangers (understanding of nature), paladins (connection to causes and oaths)
1/1 casters: druids, clerics, warlocks

[Dork_Forge]

d10 HD, Str or Dex primary, Metal medium armors, fighting style.

Extra Attack, martial weapons, lack of default access to cantrips and half caster progression driving reliance on weapons.

Tbh I'm surprised Druids got medium and shields to begin with (a mistake imo), but Rangers seem clearly more martial...

[Tanarii]

Ranger identity though out the the editions.

1e
Rangers are a sub-class of fighter who are adept at woodcraft, tracking, scouting, and infiltration and spying.

2e
The ranger is a hunter and woodsman who lives by not only his sword, but also his wits. Robin Hood. Orion, Jack the Giant killer, and the huntresses of Diana are examples of rangers from history and legend. The abilities of the ranger make him particularly good at tracking, woodcraft and spying.

3e
The forests are home to fierce and cunning creatures, such as blood-thirsty owlbears and malicious displacer beasts. But more cunning and powerful than these monsters is the ranger, a skilled hunter and stalker. He knows the woods as if they were his home (as indeed they are), and he knows his prey in deadly detail.
Adventures: Rangers often accept the role of protector, aiding those who live in or travel through the woods. In addition, they often carry grudges against certain types of creatures and look for opportunities to find and destroy them. Additionally, rangers may adventure for all the reasons that fighters do.
Characteristics: The ranger is proficient with all simple and martial weapons and capable in combat. His skills allow him to survive in the wilderness, to find his prey, and to avoid detection. He also has special knowledge of certain types of creatures. This knowledge makes him more capable of finding and defeating those foes. Finally, an experienced ranger has such a tie to nature that he can actually draw on natural power to cast divine spells, much as a druid does. An experienced ranger often has one or more animal companions to aid him, thanks to his animal friendship spell.

4e
Rangers are watchful warriors who roam past the horizon to safeguard a region, a principle, or a way of life. Masters of bow and blade, rangers excel at hit-and-run assaults and can quickly and silently eliminate foes. Rangers lay superb ambushes and excel at avoiding danger. As a ranger, you possess almost supernaturally keen senses and a deep appreciation for untamed wilderness. With your knowledge of the natural world, you are able to track enemies through nearly any landscape, using the smallest clue to set your course, even sometimes the calls and songs of beasts and birds. Your severe demeanor promises a deadly conclusion to any enemy you hunt. When you catch sight of your quarry, will the transgressor perish by swift bow shots from a distance, or by the twofold blades that glint and glitter in each of your battle-scarred hands?

5e
Far from the bustle of cities and towns, past the hedges that shelter the most distant farms from the terrors of the wild, amid the dense-packed trees of trackless forests and across wide and empty plains, rangers keep their unending watch.
DEADLY HUNTERS Warriors of the wilderness, rangers specialize in hunting the monsters that threaten the edges of civilization-humanoid raiders, rampaging beasts and monstrosities, terrible giants, and deadly dragons. They learn to track their quarry as a predator does, moving stealthily through the wilds and hiding themselves in brush and rubble. Rangers focus their combat training on techniques that are particularly useful against their specific favored foes. Thanks to their familiarity with the wilds, rangers acquire the ability to cast spells that harness nature's power, much as a druid does. Their spells, like their combat abilities, emphasize speed, stealth, and the hunt. A ranger's talents and abilities are honed with deadly focus on the grim task of protecting the borderlands.
INDEPENDENT ADVENTURERS Though a ranger might make a living as a hunter, a guide, or a tracker, a ranger's true calling is to defend the outskirts of civilization from the ravages of monsters and humanoid hordes that press in from the wild. In some places, rangers gather in secretive orders or join forces with druidic circles. Many rangers, though, are independent almost to a fault, knowing that, when a dragon or a band of ores attacks, a ranger might be the first-and possibly the last-line of defense. This fierce independence makes rangers well suited to adventuring, since they are accustomed to life far from the comforts of a dry bed and a hot bath. Faced with city-bred adventurers who grouse and whine about the hardships of the wild, rangers respond with some mixture of amusement, frustration, and compassion. But they quickly learn that other adventurers who can carry their own weight in a fight against civilization's foes are worth any extra burden. Coddled city folk might not know how to feed themselves or find fresh water in the wild, but they make up for it in other ways.

[Tanarii]

Extra Attack, martial weapons, lack of default access to cantrips and half caster progression driving reliance on weapons.Good ones.


Tbh I'm surprised Druids got medium and shields to begin with (a mistake imo), but Rangers seem clearly more martial...
It's definitely not a mistake. Medium armor and maybe a shield is necessary for StRangers. It's bad enough they need a Dex 14 to max AC.

IMO the mistake was making their primary ability Dex and Wis instead of (Str or Dex) and Wis.

Both melee Beastmasters and melee Hunters can benefit heavily from a Str two handed build. And Beastmasters also work well as Rapier and Sheild Dex builds. All the Ranger subclasses have features where a bigger single weapon in the main hand(s) is superior to TWF and a bonus action single attack with another lighter weapon. About the only thing that supports TWF is the Hunter's Mark spell.

Edit: okay, that was all very well, but I totally misread what you wrote. Yes, Druid proficiency should have been Leather and Hide not medium armor. But they do traditionally use Wooden shields.

[stoutstien]

It's definitely not a mistake. Medium armor and maybe a shield is necessary for StRangers. It's bad enough they need a Dex 14 to max AC.

IMO the mistake was making their primary ability Dex and Wis instead of (Str or Dex) and Wis.

I blame the armor system for this really. It could have used a final polish before release to give str/dex splits more freedom rather than basically 3 load outs and 1 more if MAM is used.

[HPisBS]

I meant that those two were more martial than their counterparts (druids and clerics). Not that rangers were more martial than paladins. ...

Ah.

Now that I read it again, I'm not sure why I thought you were comparing rangers to paladins lol. Maybe just because I'm that unimpressed with rangers' martial abilities relative to all other martials.

[Dienekes]

In DND, if you want to break a curse, you need a spell to do it. That's how the system works. Aragon, insofar as he can break curses with herblore and skill, would be better represented as a caster of some degree. And once again, he's the only one who can do it, and everyone sees it as magic, a sign of his noble heritage.

To put it another way, does it make you feel better if the ranger has a certain list of "seeds known" and he can use a limited number of "plants" per day? does it help if its not 'technically' magic?

Because if your only quibble is over this technical point (which does have mechanical effects, I know) it seems like a pretty weak thematic change. Moving from "I use magical plants in clever ways to heal things that no normal person could" to "I have magic that I can access due to my intensive study of nature".... is just not that big a jump.

Or, or. Here me out. Create a system where the mundane and magical can actually interact. It’s been a problem for years especially when we get to higher level play that spell effects are best countered by casters. And this has had ripple effects throughout the system in my mind a very negative way.

Hell, you even need casters to break holes in magically created walls. Breaking things is literally all that the fighting classes are designed to do.

But regardless, I’d argue that it’s a bigger jump than you’re implying. If getting rid of the curse requires going through an elaborate series of events, like most curses from the stories that D&D draws from. Be it finding a way to fulfill the words of the curse in non-literal ways, or going to search for the plant that to save your friend. That’s where adventure comes in. That’s the fun part.

If it becomes: “I cast cure wounds. It’s a standard action.” The dramas gone. And furthermore just divides the gameplay into those who can prepare spells to fix the situation and those who get to watch. A problem that we’ve known about since the earliest days of D&D (though 3e did kick it into hyperdrive) and still haven’t actually fixed.

But this is kind of going down a long dark rabbit hole of me being disappointed in D&D design and how stuck in its ways it’s been. And me cursing the 5e playtesters. So many of my problems with the system can be traced back to them.

For the point that is relevant to this specific thread: if you are trying to model the play of such a Ranger character to a lot of people, it is predominantly a spell-less class. Maybe it can heal. And the best way to represent that is magic. Fine. Whatever. They still generally don’t cast spells to Mark their opponent that gets broken with a Concentration check, lets them be effective in a fight, or conjure arrows out of thin air, or turn to stone.

All of which comes from the concept of making the Ranger the half-Druid more than trying to represent the actual rangers in stories. Which is fine. I don’t like it. I think that stuff held back the system. But fine. It’s not my game.

But the abilities of being a good Nature Survivalist in general? That’s only worth about a feat in my estimation. That is all I’m trying to say.

[Schwann145]

The barbarian represents the "civilized" man's stereotype of the wild tribal warrior. The embodiment of everything about the wilds that scares them.

The ranger represents the civilized man that voluntarily walks out to face the wilderness and all its terrors.

I'm still catching up on the thread, but I wanted to use this as a (hopefully better?) example of my critiques here:


"The barbarian represents the "civilized" man's stereotype of the wild tribal warrior."
Is "uncivilized warrior" really a strong enough theme, on it's own, to support a whole new class though? And, unfortunately, it kinda falls flat even on just this theme alone. Consider one of the most famous "barbarian warriors" is the Mongol horse archer, a concept that the Barbarian class utterly fails to represent.


"The embodiment of everything about the wilds that scares them."
This sounds better, but more like a Druid to me, honestly.


"The ranger represents the civilized man that voluntarily walks out to face the wilderness and all its terrors."
If we replace "ranger" with "adventurer" you immediately see the issue I have with the class, IMO. This is a thing that every class does, so if it's the Ranger's *thing* then isn't that just saying that the Ranger struggles to have its own identity?
Furthermore, based on all the descriptions I've seen as of yet for what a Ranger *is,* it sounds like anyone with a strong Constitution score and good Survival and Stealth skills is a Ranger.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Ah.

Now that I read it again, I'm not sure why I thought you were comparing rangers to paladins lol. Maybe just because I'm that unimpressed with rangers' martial abilities relative to all other martials.

I was comparing the two. Both similarities (more martial than clerics/druids) and differences.

At a "base" optimization level, rangers are fine mechanically. They don't optimize as well as paladins, but then I have a strong feeling that most of the vaunted paladin strengths are due to a narrow set of challenges presented (ie mostly one big target, once or twice a day). Rangers (in general) deal with ranged fights way better than paladins do. They deal with groups of weaker enemies better. Paladins smack one thing really really really hard. Rangers (can be built to) break hordes or smash skirmishers.

[Chaosmancer]

I think that if the point of the discussion is "We should redesign the Barbarian and Ranger to be more coherent and more interesting in play" then I can get behind that discussion. I can see how things get a bit muddled and how what they do and what they are known for doesn't evolve as the game progresses.

If the point is "Barbarians and Rangers have nothing that makes them different from Fighters/Rogues" then I think we are just circling the same drain we always are. I mean, what is the difference between a Fighter and a Rogue?

And this isn't just smoke, think of the most famous game featuring a "rogue" of the past few years. Assassin's Creed. Characters like Ezio Auditore da Firenze are rogues, right? And yet one of the most iconic aspects of their combat ability is the ability to block an attack and counter-attack, and me and my sister often gathered dozens of guards to fight all at once for fun. Try and take a even a level 15 Assassin vs 30 guards in DnD 5e and you have a dead rogue. The entire point of the rogue is not to fight someone face to face, yet how many famous "rogue" characters can do exactly that? A lot of them in my experience.


But, getting a bit more on topic, I think it was both the loss of Primal and a single thematic problem that makes it seem like Barbarians and Rangers are lacking, and it is really such a blatantly obvious problem I'm a little ashamed it has taken me so long to see it.

Nature isn't scary in DnD.

Take away the dinosaurs and mammoths, and what is the scariest Beast type monster in the game? Got the Giant Ape (aka Kong) at CR 7, A Mammoth at CR 6, and a Giant Croc at CR 5.

What about plants? Treants at CR 9, but they are generally friendly, so the Undead spewing Corpse Flower at CR 8? The Shambling Mound at CR 5?


See, for the high level ranger to have a threat... they have to start breaking into other people's niches. Rangers are needed to take out Giants and Dragons... the same foes as Fighters. Meanwhile, Paladins have iconic enemies in Liches (CR 21), Vampires (CR 13), Demons (ranging CR from less than 1 to 19) and Devils (ranging from CR less than 1 to 20)

And, while maybe you could make the argument that Ranger's should be threats to Monstrosities too, those are the threats of the DnD wilds.... that isn't the case. Ranger's don't get anything that deals with them, it is Beasts and Plants, to of the weakest and a lot of people would say the least interesting types of foes.

And this does extend to Druids, because Druids and Rangers are the thematic echoes of Clerics and Paladins. And while if you said "I am going to be running a campaign focused on the Lower Planes" everyone would be clamoring to have a cleric and a Paladin in the party, "I am going to be running a campaign focused on nature" is going to get a lot of scratched heads.

Many people would think that that means a survival campaign, but Clerics and Paladins can do that too, and survival is a very low-level threat in DnD. Maybe you mean Fey? But fey are few and far between with little support. The question isn't hard because the Druid and Ranger have no identity, the question is hard because after about level 8 or 9... Nature isn't a threat. It is too weak. Just think of any ranger or druid getting the ability to turn Beasts, it is universally considered a poor ability because by mid to high levels... you aren't fighting Beasts. The ability to pass through non-magical plants? Who cares, the rose bush hasn't been a significant challenge since level 3.


So, I think any redesign of the Ranger and Druid to truly address this question of "what is the point of them" has to be accompanied with a redesign of what Nature and Primal means in the DnD context. Make "We are going to the depths of the natural world" as worrying a concept as "we are going to Hell". And the truly astonishing thing is... that isn't even that hard to do. Myth and our real natural world are full of great examples that could be adapted to make a class that focuses on "keep the borders between people and the natural world" as important and dangerous a job as watching for demonic incursions.


EDIT

I was comparing the two. Both similarities (more martial than clerics/druids) and differences.

At a "base" optimization level, rangers are fine mechanically. They don't optimize as well as paladins, but then I have a strong feeling that most of the vaunted paladin strengths are due to a narrow set of challenges presented (ie mostly one big target, once or twice a day). Rangers (in general) deal with ranged fights way better than paladins do. They deal with groups of weaker enemies better. Paladins smack one thing really really really hard. Rangers (can be built to) break hordes or smash skirmishers.


To be more fair and balanced... certain rangers like the Hunter can do this really well. Others struggle.

One thing pointed out to me is that it is completely fair to say that the Hunter should have been the base ranger. They kind of have all the things you would expect a ranger to be able to do.

[Herbert_W]

I'd like to make a point about how classes are defined, generally, and then bring back to the barbarian and ranger. I'm going to describe various classes in terms of the source of their abilities, what they are capable of, and what goals they typically work towards in the lore.

Text in bold demarks things that are especially important to defining that class. This is a bit subjective; there could be some quibbling around where the bold text should be in specific cases, but I'm interested in pulling this all together to make a general point that can survive some specific changes.

Text marked in italics is in some way lacking. This could mean poor implementation or no implementation. Once again, there's a lot of subjectivity in the specifics, but there's a broader point to be made that doesn't depend on each and every specific.



Class
Source
Ability
Motive


Fighter
Talent and training
Fighting
Various - the player has lots of options to choose between, including many that are thematically rich.


Wizard
Study
Spells
More spells for more power, more power for more spells . . . but to what ultimate end? That's up to the player.


Rogue
Skill and trickery
Sneak attack, various skills
Loot is strongly suggested, but players have the freedom to choose something else.


Cleric
Divine power
Godly help, mostly spells
God's will, theoretically. In practice whatever the player wants.


Paladin
Strong devotion to a cause or alignment
Misc. divine powers, notably including smite
Strong devotion to a cause or alignment


Warlock
Otherworldly patron
Spells, with unconventional resource management compared to other spellcasters
Patron's will, theoretically. In practice whatever the player wants.


Ranger
Training, talent, and time spent in the wilderness - basically, being the opposite of a fish out of water.
Fighting, weak spellcasting, plus a grab-bag of situational abilities. Many of these revolve around the exploration pillar, which is poorly-implemented.
Theoretically, protecting favored terrain or defeating favored enemies. Practically, going off on unrelated adventures to do whatever the player wants.


Barbarian
Sheer personal badassery, plus primal rage
Bursts of melee prowess, which are mechanically distinct in an interesting way from what a fighter could do due to being in bursts.
Various - usually in practice just whatever the player wants or the party is doing, which has nothing to do with the character being a barbarian.



There are a few points that I'd like to make here:


Generally, there's a lot of itallic text in the rightmost column. That's because that's the column where having a strong class identity is the least important - players are very good at filling in their own character motivations.
Specific to the barbarian, this class has a strong definition in both of the first columns. The source is strongly thematic, even though it doesn't directly impact play much: the most concise way to describe it is "Fremen mirage (https://acoup.blog/2020/01/17/collections-the-fremen-mirage-part-i-war-at-the-dawn-of-civilization/) except acknowledged fantasy instead of pseudohistory." The abilities are mechanically distinct in a clear yet interesting way. The rightmost column is the weak one, so it's a strong class where strength matters and it's only weak where it doesn't matter.
Specific to the ranger, this is the only class that has text that is both italic and bold - i.e. parts of this class' identity that are both core and lacking - and it has a lot of it! That, fundamentally, is where I believe that the problems associated with the ranger class come from.


The core identity of the barbarian is different from the fighter, largely just for the sake of being different. If your party needs a fighter, but you're tired of playing that class, you can play barbarian instead for some variety. The theme is cool even if not often relevant to gameplay.

The core identity of the ranger is one that just doesn't fit well into DnD. DnD has a hard time modelling people with skills so great that they seem like magic - instead, it substitutes actual spellcasting or SLAs. DnD borked the exploration pillar. DnD doesn't consistently present balanced challenges to characters with abilities situational to a region or enemy type.

The core identity of the barbarian is partially thematics that don't affect play, and partially variety for the sake of variety. The core identity of the ranger is not a DnD character.

[Chaosmancer]

*snip*

The core identity of the barbarian is different from the fighter, largely just for the sake of being different. If your party needs a fighter, but you're tired of playing that class, you can play barbarian instead for some variety. The theme is cool even if not often relevant to gameplay.

*snipped for focus*

The core identity of the barbarian is partially thematics that don't affect play, and partially variety for the sake of variety. The core identity of the ranger is not a DnD character.


I also think that the Barbarian does similar things in new ways, generally, compared to the fighter.

Barbarians have two roles. Tank and Melee Damage dealer. Fighters generally have three(?) broadly speaking Tank, Melee Damaged Dealer or Ranged Attacker.

Fighter's tank by being hard to hit. They are one of the only classes that can get a 21 AC without magic or level 20. Barbarians generally tank by being hard to put down. And, in fact, Barbarians can have just as much or more AC if built right and using a smaller weapon (which causes an issue)

Fighter's do melee and ranged damage via the same mechanic. More attacks. Barbarians do it via attacks that hit harder, but this is also a place where Barbarians run into some issues.

See, given a longsword and shield, High level Fighter Damage is actually impacted less than Barbarian damage. Going dual-wielding should be awesome for Barbarians (and very iconic) but they lack the fighting style to make it work. Leaving them with seemingly a single route towards their damage, 1 big weapon.

But, on the flip side of this, they are superior damage sponges until you can prevent them from being in the fight. And that is the biggest issue. A fighter can be build to be a ranged fighter, but a Barbarian can't. They have a single "build" style. Where as the fighter is more versatile. That is a small issue, but they are accomplishing those two main goals, usually, with little issue.

[stoutstien]

I also think that the Barbarian does similar things in new ways, generally, compared to the fighter.

Barbarians have two roles. Tank and Melee Damage dealer. Fighters generally have three(?) broadly speaking Tank, Melee Damaged Dealer or Ranged Attacker.

Fighter's tank by being hard to hit. They are one of the only classes that can get a 21 AC without magic or level 20. Barbarians generally tank by being hard to put down. And, in fact, Barbarians can have just as much or more AC if built right and using a smaller weapon (which causes an issue)

Fighter's do melee and ranged damage via the same mechanic. More attacks. Barbarians do it via attacks that hit harder, but this is also a place where Barbarians run into some issues.

See, given a longsword and shield, High level Fighter Damage is actually impacted less than Barbarian damage. Going dual-wielding should be awesome for Barbarians (and very iconic) but they lack the fighting style to make it work. Leaving them with seemingly a single route towards their damage, 1 big weapon.

But, on the flip side of this, they are superior damage sponges until you can prevent them from being in the fight. And that is the biggest issue. A fighter can be build to be a ranged fighter, but a Barbarian can't. They have a single "build" style. Where as the fighter is more versatile. That is a small issue, but they are accomplishing those two main goals, usually, with little issue.

Ironically I've found barbarians using shields to be up with the most effective strategies. Between danger sense and shield master they can be extremely tough even without raging and shoving as a bonus action fits into their fairly open action economy. They don't really get much return from big weapons honestly. sure they have reckless to use with GWM but they don't have the attack count built in to really crank damage that way so they need to sink two feats into it to see any real return on top of being pretty MaD.

Thinking on it the ranger is also MaD but don't have the same return that pallys get with Cha investment.

[Tanarii]

They don't really get much return from big weapons honestly. sure they have reckless to use with GWM but they don't have the attack count built in to really crank damage that way so they need to sink two feats into it to see any real return on top of being pretty MaD.
Barbarians get the most use out of GWM of any class. Because of Reckless Attack.

[stoutstien]

Barbarians get the most use out of GWM of any class. Because of Reckless Attack.

Eehh. The cost/benefit and total value is better for fighters and they don't have to sabotage defenses to do it.

[strangebloke]

Ironically I've found barbarians using shields to be up with the most effective strategies. Between danger sense and shield master they can be extremely tough even without raging and shoving as a bonus action fits into their fairly open action economy. They don't really get much return from big weapons honestly. sure they have reckless to use with GWM but they don't have the attack count built in to really crank damage that way so they need to sink two feats into it to see any real return on top of being pretty MaD.

Thinking on it the ranger is also MaD but don't have the same return that pallys get with Cha investment.

Rangers don't need wisdom. Very few of their spells require attack rolls or saving throws. Most of their spells heal or buff and don't really care about what your wisdom score is. In fact, because so much of their spell list focuses on out-of-combat utility they don't really need to worry about con saving throws either, and if you make them a backliner, they also don't take as much damage (and need less CON) than a paladin.

A Ranger can safely dump wisdom and/or constitution without too much difficulty. They only need dexterity and in a strength focused build they only really need a 14.

But forget about that, Barbarians are one of the most SAD classes in the game. If you want to build them for defense, well, they end up with two of the three best saves by default, have the fattest hit die in the game, can get 19 AC with no stat higher than 14, and have built-in resistance that basically make them unkillable at low levels.

As for offense, the boosts they get to damage and accuracy are so good that they can skate by with relatively low strength. Sure there's a tradeoff with reckless attack but they're so solid defensively on a baseline that you honestly won't even mind most of the time. At absolute most you might want to avoid using it in some situations (the memetic hobgoblin archer swarm) and when you're not raging.

And like... Barbarians love GWM? You get a massive accuracy boost from reckless and you crit twice as often meaning you frequently get that BA attack. Polearm Master is just icing (and is imo unneeded.) At level 5 a barbarian with GWM and 16 strength will feel like a straight up monster. That's not to say that Shield Master is invalid, just to say that GWM definitely isn't bad on a Barbarian. Barbarians are so incredibly strong at early levels that in my experience they don't really start falling off until tier 4.

[Chaosmancer]

Ironically I've found barbarians using shields to be up with the most effective strategies. Between danger sense and shield master they can be extremely tough even without raging and shoving as a bonus action fits into their fairly open action economy. They don't really get much return from big weapons honestly. sure they have reckless to use with GWM but they don't have the attack count built in to really crank damage that way so they need to sink two feats into it to see any real return on top of being pretty MaD.

Thinking on it the ranger is also MaD but don't have the same return that pallys get with Cha investment.

I agree in terms of Tanking. I played a sword and board Barbarian. But, in terms of damage, you are losing out a lot. Now, maybe there are some new good builds using Slasher and being a tank, but it feels like you aren't doing good martial damage.

I also have found that it is nearly always superior to go for medium armor as a Barbarian. Half-Plate is equivalent to a 20 CON 14 DEX barbarian with no armor. So, until you can get 20/16, you are better off with the armor than without, which again... doesn't quite feel like barbarian style, but is the most effective choice.


-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Rangers don't need wisdom. Very few of their spells require attack rolls or saving throws. Most of their spells heal or buff and don't really care about what your wisdom score is. In fact, because so much of their spell list focuses on out-of-combat utility they don't really need to worry about con saving throws either, and if you make them a backliner, they also don't take as much damage (and need less CON) than a paladin.

A Ranger can safely dump wisdom and/or constitution without too much difficulty. They only need dexterity and in a strength focused build they only really need a 14.

But forget about that, Barbarians are one of the most SAD classes in the game. If you want to build them for defense, well, they end up with two of the three best saves by default, have the fattest hit die in the game, can get 19 AC with no stat higher than 14, and have built-in resistance that basically make them unkillable at low levels.

As for offense, the boosts they get to damage and accuracy are so good that they can skate by with relatively low strength. Sure there's a tradeoff with reckless attack but they're so solid defensively on a baseline that you honestly won't even mind most of the time. At absolute most you might want to avoid using it in some situations (the memetic hobgoblin archer swarm) and when you're not raging.

And like... Barbarians love GWM? You get a massive accuracy boost from reckless and you crit twice as often meaning you frequently get that BA attack. Polearm Master is just icing (and is imo unneeded.) At level 5 a barbarian with GWM and 16 strength will feel like a straight up monster. That's not to say that Shield Master is invalid, just to say that GWM definitely isn't bad on a Barbarian. Barbarians are so incredibly strong at early levels that in my experience they don't really start falling off until tier 4.


I'm mostly in agreement with the barbarian. They don't start feeling like they are falling off until 9 or 11, then they start feeling like they are behind. Early game? Monstrous.

I do disagree with the Ranger Analysis though, only because while you can get away with a low wisdom, it affects a lot more than spells.

[Schwann145]

And this isn't just smoke, think of the most famous game featuring a "rogue" of the past few years. Assassin's Creed. Characters like Ezio Auditore da Firenze are rogues, right? And yet one of the most iconic aspects of their combat ability is the ability to block an attack and counter-attack, and me and my sister often gathered dozens of guards to fight all at once for fun. Try and take a even a level 15 Assassin vs 30 guards in DnD 5e and you have a dead rogue. The entire point of the rogue is not to fight someone face to face, yet how many famous "rogue" characters can do exactly that? A lot of them in my experience.

To be fair, Assassin's Creed wasn't supposed to have that kind of combat. We have testers asking for more combat to thank for that.
Personally, I don't think of Ezio from AC (or Corvo from Dishonored, for that matter) when I think of a Rogue - I think of Garrett from Thief. In Thief, assuming you don't cheese obvious flaws in the game, if you found yourself in combat with a guard, one on one, and you played it smart and patiently, you could probably win. If you found yourself against more than one guard, or just assumed you could take them and didn't play it smart and slow, you were going to die, because you aren't meant to stand up in a fight like that; it's not your bag. :smallwink:

[strangebloke]

I'm mostly in agreement with the barbarian. They don't start feeling like they are falling off until 9 or 11, then they start feeling like they are behind. Early game? Monstrous.

I do disagree with the Ranger Analysis though, only because while you can get away with a low wisdom, it affects a lot more than spells.

it effects wisdom saves and wisdom skills but I don't see that it effects many class features. Some subclasses care more, but don't think that merits a significant investment. You probably don't want to dump wisdom (do you ever?) but I really can't see pushing it higher than 14 as being all that worthwhile.

[Schwann145]

I'd like to make a point about how classes are defined, generally, and then bring back to the barbarian and ranger. I'm going to describe various classes in terms of the source of their abilities, what they are capable of, and what goals they typically work towards in the lore.

Text in bold demarks things that are especially important to defining that class. This is a bit subjective; there could be some quibbling around where the bold text should be in specific cases, but I'm interested in pulling this all together to make a general point that can survive some specific changes.

Text marked in italics is in some way lacking. This could mean poor implementation or no implementation. Once again, there's a lot of subjectivity in the specifics, but there's a broader point to be made that doesn't depend on each and every specific.



Class
Source


Barbarian
Sheer personal badassery, plus primal rage





Maybe I'm nitpicking here, but what else are forum discussions for, eh?
I feel like your Barbarian Source of "sheer personal badassery" comes off as comical in a way that the rest of your graph just doesn't, so it's a bit hard to take it seriously.
For the Source of "primal rage" I simply see an issue of, "what even is that?" It's just so poorly defined by the game, ya know? (I imagine Paladins moved more into being servants of a God, as Clerics, and away from the "sworn oath gives me my power" angle for much the same reason: it's just too hard to explain why a Bard who swears an oath doesn't get immunity to magical diseases but the Paladin does, ya know?)


Barbarians get the most use out of GWM of any class. Because of Reckless Attack.

Hmm... disagree. Two attacks w/o advantage is always better than one attack with advantage. Three attacks w/o is probably about equal to two with. Four w/o is back to being better than two with. Action Surging for 4+ attacks is going to be way better.
If both classes had the same number of attacks, then yes the Barbarian would be better with GWM. As is? Fighter wins.

[strangebloke]

Hmm... disagree. Two attacks w/o advantage is always better than one attack with advantage. Three attacks w/o is probably about equal to two with. Four w/o is back to being better than two with. Action Surging for 4+ attacks is going to be way better.
If both classes had the same number of attacks, then yes the Barbarian would be better with GWM. As is? Fighter wins.

If what you claim is true and three attacks without advantage equal two with, then the barbarian gets more out of GWM for 15/20 levels.

TBH though GWM is also crazy for Barbarians because it gives them a bonus action attack and they otherwise have trouble finding a bonus action to use besides rage.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Maybe I'm nitpicking here, but what else are forum discussions for, eh?
I feel like your Barbarian Source of "sheer personal badassery" comes off as comical in a way that the rest of your graph just doesn't, so it's a bit hard to take it seriously.
For the Source of "primal rage" I simply see an issue of, "what even is that?" It's just so poorly defined by the game, ya know? (I imagine Paladins moved more into being servants of a God, as Clerics, and away from the "sworn oath gives me my power" angle for much the same reason: it's just too hard to explain why a Bard who swears an oath doesn't get immunity to magical diseases but the Paladin does, ya know?)


Paladin's didn't do that at all. In fact, 5e moved them much more away from gods. In fact, they're not (by default) connected to divine worship in any way. FR says otherwise, but that's one major way FR deviates from the default.

And swearing an oath (lowercase) doesn't do anything. Lots of people swear oaths. It's not the words that matter. It's the singular dedication to that cause that grants power. And that's not something most people can muster. Just like most devout people (including most priests!) aren't clerics and most minstrels aren't bards. And most warriors aren't fighters, nor are most cut-purses rogues.

Barbarians draw their power from the nature of emotion itself. The exact mechanisms vary, but since anger is one of the strongest and most easily roused emotions, it's the one that often forms a breakthrough for nascent barbarians. Not all angry people can Rage--Rage draws on the power inherent in the world itself. As a barbarian grows, they attune to more than just anger (or focus entirely on anger, in the case of the berserkers). A totem barbarian channels through the images of beasts, taking on bits of their power (a non-transformational equivalent of wildshape). An ancestor barbarian channels via imagery and connection to his ancestors, forming primal power into echoes of them to guard and ward. Zealots channel through devotion to a god. Unlike a cleric, whose power literally comes from their god or a paladin, whose power comes from his dedication to the underlying cause and the sacrifices inherent in the Oath he swore, a zealot barbarian can be utterly wrong about the nature of the being he worships. His power comes from the fervency of his belief itself, even if there really isn't anything on the other side. You could be a Zealot of a non-existent god whose religion is an utter transparent sham; a cleric of that same deity would lack power and a paladin could never swear Oath to those principles, as there's nothing really there.

[Dork_Forge]

Hmm... disagree. Two attacks w/o advantage is always better than one attack with advantage. Three attacks w/o is probably about equal to two with. Four w/o is back to being better than two with. Action Surging for 4+ attacks is going to be way better.
If both classes had the same number of attacks, then yes the Barbarian would be better with GWM. As is? Fighter wins.

I'm not entirely sure what your point of comparison is here, I think you're mixinf Extra Attack and Action Surge?

AS is a short rest ability, so realistically they'll be making the same number of attacks the majority of the time until level 11+. I'm not a fan of GWM, but the Fighter core chassis doesn't really compete with the Barbarian until additional attacks come online, the Barbarian isn't just attacking with advantage when they want (at obvious cost), they're also adding Rage damage onto each of those hits.

Things get muddier when you add in subclasses, but both classes have subclasses that can either get more out of GWM specifically or just add more damage on top.

[Tanarii]

Hmm... disagree. Two attacks w/o advantage is always better than one attack with advantage. Three attacks w/o is probably about equal to two with. Four w/o is back to being better than two with. Action Surging for 4+ attacks is going to be way better.
If both classes had the same number of attacks, then yes the Barbarian would be better with GWM. As is? Fighter wins.
Two attacks with advantage but -5/+10 is better than 3 attacks with no advantage and -5/+10. And that doesn't happen until level 11.

Action surge is a once every other fight scenario. But yes, on that round, Fighters come out ahead.

The point I was making is Barbarians are the only class where taking GWM is almost always better than a Str ASI, because they will be attacking with advantage almost all the time. Even if you're otherwise cranking Con up first, which isn't a bad idea for a Barbarian, because again they hit so much.

[stoutstien]

Two attacks with advantage but -5/+10 is better than 3 attacks with no advantage and -5/+10. And that doesn't happen until level 11.

Action surge is a once every other fight scenario. But yes, on that round, Fighters come out ahead.

The point I was making is Barbarians are the only class where taking GWM is almost always better than a Str ASI, because they will be attacking with advantage almost all the time. Even if you're otherwise cranking Con up first, which isn't a bad idea for a Barbarian, because again they hit so much.
GWM doesn't beat a straight STR increase unless fighting targets below 16 AC with constant RA. The opportunity cost for the barbarian for feats is also much higher with less ASIs.

Overuse of RA can be a bigger cost than player realize. Usually only takes three incoming attacks to start causing issues. Party needs to be built to provide cheap hp recovery or cancel the disadvantage.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

You can always play the reductionist game. But you lose a lot.

Rage, by itself, is not something you can stuff into a subclass without seriously distorting things.

----------
Barbarians, rangers, druids. The three "primal source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Monks, Paladins, Clerics. The three "divine source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Fighters, Artificers, Wizards/Sorcerers. Four "arcane source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Rogues, Warlock[**], Bards. Three "skilled-source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Is it a perfect description? Nope. Is it a formal distinction? Nope. But as one way of looking at things, it works pretty well. So Barbarians are to Fighters are to Rogues as Paladins are to Rangers are to Artificers.

[**] Yeah, this one's a bit of a stretch. It's not really a full-caster in the same way the others are, despite getting 9ths. But it's also clearly not a half-caster like the other middle-slot ones. The scales aren't exactly the same, to be honest.



Primal isn't a thing anymore, sadly, so I think a bit of change on this works better.

Rogues and Fighters: No magic needed. These are the two classes that can have spellcasting or magic through subclasses, but it's rare. Most Rogues and Fighters offer 0 magic.

Monks and Barbarians: Magic, but not spellcasting, needed. To have a monk is to have a magic class, you will always have a magic class due to ki being magic. Now, it isn't spellcasting, but it's magic. Barbarians have, like one or two (last I saw) subclasses that allows you to not be magical, all the other subclasses push magic onto your character. Outside of Battlerager and Berserker, you can't make a non-magical Barbarian and Battlerager is dwarf only and Berserker kills yourself. 2 out of 8 Barbarian subclasses are non-magical... So Barbarians seem to be in the magic, but not spellcasting, grouping.

All others: Spellcasting needed (at least how WotC sees the classes (ranger) in this current edition.

So, the three groupings would be...


No Magic, Magic, Spellcasting

In 5e, the less magic you have, the simpler your character will be.

So...

Simple: Fighter

Moderate: Barbarian

Complex: Ranger

The Ranger is a mix of the Rogue and Fighter + Barbarian. Not in thematics, but in ideology. It has the skills and weapon combat of Rogues and Fighters and then also the magic. Now, the Ranger kinda fails at a few things but it's clear to see what they were trying to do.

Even with tactics, the Fighter is the most simple of the core classes. Move and hit. Barbarians got to juggle rage and reckless attack, and Rangers got to juggle spell slots.

[ZRN]

It's specifically the Barbarian and Ranger that stump me, and it's largely due to how their expansion into products outside of the PHB makes less and less thematic sense and feels like developers just grasping at straws. Examples like Path of the Zealot or Path of Wild Magic for Barbarian are so far left field that they could belong to any number of classes and still technically "fit." Same for subclasses like Horizon Walker and Gloom Stalker.
They seem a lil shoehorned and it feels likely because they needed content and couldn't reproduce the core of the class any longer, because the core of the class is so either poorly defined or so weak that it didn't really have enough to support itself.


I think part of the problem here is that when making this "ranger and barbarian (and monk and paladin?) are just fighter subclasses" argument, the tendency is to treat the fighter as just a baseline generic nothing class. It's not! The fighter has a fairly specific identity in 5e: it's the Expert Combatant. The guy who, in a modern-set film, would make 45 gun-loading sounds every time he got ready for a fight, just to show the audience how tacticool he is. He may have various approaches to combat (e.g. an eldritch knight augments his fighting with magic and a psi warrior uses telekinesis to pack an extra punch), but at core he's all about mastery of weapons and tactics. A barbarian's not really that kind of fighter any more than he's a rogue.

Another thing to consider is, what do the specific mechanics of each class allow and promote? Barbarian rage is a mechanically and thematically strong aspect of the class that can be flavored as a quasi-spiritual ancestral communion (ancestor barbarian), an animalistic tranformation (beast), or just a good old-fashioned frenzy (berserker), among others. The class is designed so that each subclass tweaks that central rage mechanic in different ways. I guess you COULD come up with multiple different fighter subclasses that each had some kind of "trance" or "rage" effect x times per day, but how would that stack with 3-4 attacks per round and Action Surge?

Rangers, to me, feel less unique than barbarians, but some of the same considerations apply. Yes, you can play a fighter with something like the old Scout UA subclass to be a decent hunter/tracker, but your primary focus is still "best at fighting," while at least ideally a ranger is more broadly focused.

[Tanarii]

GWM doesn't beat a straight STR increase unless fighting targets below 16 AC with constant RA. The opportunity cost for the barbarian for feats is also much higher with less ASIs.Thats not correct for Barbarians, because of Reckless Attack giving advantage.
And there is no opportunity cost, because it's an straight upgrade to taking a Str ASI, if you primarily use Heavy weapons.


Overuse of RA can be a bigger cost than player realize. Usually only takes three incoming attacks to start causing issues. Party needs to be built to provide cheap hp recovery or cancel the disadvantage.If a Barb isn't using it almost every round, they're doing something wrong.

[Dork_Forge]

If a Barb isn't using it almost every round, they're doing something wrong.

Got to disagree with this, a Barbarian that Recklesses without forethought is a dead Barbarian. The extra hp and resistance only goes so far, especially if it's non resisted damage (the bear totem barb in my game recently discovered this with the psychic damage that's been flying around).

There's also the added risk of advantage triggering additional effects, it isn't super common but I can think of at least two different monsters that do additional damage if the attack had advantage.

[Tanarii]

Got to disagree with this, a Barbarian that Recklesses without forethought is a dead Barbarian. The extra hp and resistance only goes so far, especially if it's non resisted damage (the bear totem barb in my game recently discovered this with the psychic damage that's been flying around).
There's some situations where it's a bad idea, but even when you're party is outnumbered 2 to 1 it's still generally a better idea than not. The increase in offense is generally that valuable to finishing the fight faster.

If you're the only tank, it might be a bad idea depending on the situation. I'd say "being the only tank" is doing it wrong, but that's too much of a stretch. :smallamused: OTOH tank Barbs usually aren't 2H guys.

[stoutstien]

Thats not correct for Barbarians, because of Reckless Attack giving advantage.
And there is no opportunity cost, because it's an straight upgrade to taking a Str ASI, if you primarily use Heavy weapons.

Ok.
A 16 str barb with rage up and RA with GWM is dealing 22.5 DPR at lv 5 vs 17 AC. 16 AC is ~26 DPR. Assuming no first round conflicts with ba attack.

Same barbarian with +2 str is dealing 22.1 against 17 AC and 23.2 vs 16.

So anything over 16 AC starts to work against GWM for barb even with throwing ever attack recklessly.

taking PaM leaves both options behind before level 9 where that next ASI and prof bump starts catching up to the upper AC values you see on NPCs.


Using reckless every round is not a good idea with tables that play deadly + encounters regularly. Zealots can get away with it more or if you use a shield to soften the defensive penalty but for the most part RA when you aren't in rage is a good way to sprial an encounter into a loss. With rage up its more valid but 3-4 rages don't cover every encounter most days let alone losing one due to blowing a save or just being CC.

*One of my big complaints with barb is tossing 80% of the class kit onto a single feature that is both limited and pretty easy to waste. The loss of a single rage during a standard adventuring day is like sucking 3-4 spell slots away from a caster.

[ew_of_chiswick]

Barbarians, rangers, druids. The three "primal source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Monks, Paladins, Clerics. The three "divine source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Fighters, Artificers, Wizards/Sorcerers. Four "arcane source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Rogues, Warlock[**], Bards. Three "skilled-source" classes, in order of increasing spell-casting.

Is it a perfect description? Nope. Is it a formal distinction? Nope. But as one way of looking at things, it works pretty well. So Barbarians are to Fighters are to Rogues as Paladins are to Rangers are to Artificers.

[**] Yeah, this one's a bit of a stretch. It's not really a full-caster in the same way the others are, despite getting 9ths. But it's also clearly not a half-caster like the other middle-slot ones. The scales aren't exactly the same, to be honest.
Calling this back from page one, I really like this framing. I would probably switch Artificer and Warlock, though (and that helps with your footnote, too). I think Artificers fit the "skilled-source" category well, especially if you consider tool proficiencies to be skills. And Warlocks are arcane / learned casters, so they fit in the Fighter-Wizard spectrum.

[Dienekes]

Ok.
A 16 str barb with rage up and RA with GWM is dealing 22.5 DPR at lv 5 vs 17 AC. 16 AC is ~26 DPR. Assuming no first round conflicts with ba attack.

Same barbarian with +2 str is dealing 22.1 against 17 AC and 23.2 vs 16.


Am I reading this wrong or is the GWM 22.5 > than the +2 Strengths 22.1?

So AC 18 or higher don’t take the -5 penalty. And this is ignoring the potential Bonus Action attack with GWM.

Out of curiosity how many monsters have AC 18 or higher at level 5? Legitimately don’t know here.

[Izodonia]

Rangers are basically "commandos", and not just in the sense that they probably don't wear underwear. They're the guys who can kick your ass one-on-one, but can also hump 50 miles through the jungle, eating snakes along the way, before slipping into the enemies' camp and slitting their throats as they sleep. In a way, they're closer to the modern-day concept of the "warrior" than the armored knight is.

[stoutstien]

Am I reading this wrong or is the GWM 22.5 > than the +2 Strengths 22.1?

So AC 18 or higher don’t take the -5 penalty. And this is ignoring the potential Bonus Action attack with GWM.

Out of curiosity how many monsters have AC 18 or higher at level 5? Legitimately don’t know here.

I was adding the bonus action part of GWM.

It's higher but at a margin so low that it's not worth much and once you factor in the inability for GWM bonus action to proc during any round the barbarian has to activate rage, which is impossible to calculated exactly, that reduction combined with what ever gap forms from AOO values makes it a wash in the best case scenario.

ACs are all over the place based on CR but 15-17 are pretty common so that what I tend to use.

[Willie the Duck]

What are these classes really supposed to be? What about them makes them deserving of their own base class chassis, rather than being extensions of the Fighter (or maybe Rogue)?

I think, on a fundamental thematic level, the distinction is this* -- In most D&D settings, there are ~3 basic 'types' of environments -- dungeons (or the equivalent, sometimes extending into the entirety of a dark lord's domain), civilization (cities, or cities plus rollicking pastoral peaceful countryside), and 'the wildes.' I feel like any characters, particularly those with the survival skill, are perfectly competent and capable to go out into said wilderness and accomplish something (usually travelling through it to reach the dungeon-equivalents and back again). For Rangers and Barbarians, that's home -- It's where they live, come from, or similar. Isn't it dangerous? Of course! Life is dangerous, and there's opportunity to be had out here. Everyone can't live in the safe**, secure city, but the barbarian/rangers will be more than happy to be hired or join up with a group of city slickers wanting to go out and accomplish something out there in the wilds (or the dungeons beyond). The major distinction between ranger and barbarian is mostly that the barbarian represents part of a peoples who live out in this wilds, while the ranger is vaguely the same civilization is the people of the cities and farms, just a member of it that lives out in the wilds.
*All of this is IMO, and using lots of generalities for the sake of brevity.
**How safe the city really is depends on how the DM runs their game


Ranger has the same issue really - what is it, if not just a Fighter (or Rogue) with the right Background and a strong Survival skill?
My above point is why I don't think these are the same as rangers. However, it is a real question as to how a ranger is distinguished (thematically) from an <any class> with the outlander background. This, however, is not unique. Backgrounds (while lovely) are a spanner in the thematic works. A regular human champion fighter with acolyte background is hard to distinguishable from a cleric, a criminal background from a rogue, and so forth.


So this is sort of a tangential point. But does anyone else think that “Wilderness Survivalist” makes more sense as a feat? Pretty much any class can say they lived out in the wild and picked up some tricks to aid the exploration and travel parts of the game. It doesn’t really effect the round per round combat playstyle that the base classes focus on (though as a tangent, if WotC went the other way and fleshed out every classes non-combat options that’d be fine too).

Honestly, you could probably give the rough equivalent of Natural Explorer in every non-urban terrain, and I doubt it would even be considered an overpowered feat to pick.
I think wilderness explorer could have become a package for expanded (and more impactful) backgrounds, as a feat, as a subclass selection, or even as an optional tack-on system you could select (and presumably some other benefit if you do not select it) if and only if the DM decided to use an optional 'rigorous survival subsystem' optional ruleset. As a feat, it could certainly work (particularly if everyone got one feat at level one), but the designers wanted to keep feats optional.



And Rangers already required focusing on TWF (daggers/hatchets) and Archery (bow/crossbow) weapon proficiencies as of 1e Unearthed Arcana publishing (as well as Drow PCs being just awesome at TWF naturally).
They had to take a weapon proficiency in one of each. Whether that means focusing on them or not is an open question. Because of the imbalance on the weapons table, every ranger I ever saw in play used longsword, composite longbow, lance (when mounted), and dagger (in case there was tunnel fighting or the DM otherwise ruled out larger weapons)... just like everyone else who could. Some players definitely used that dagger or handaxe proficiency to wield one in their off hand (since why not, unless you found a +3 shield or the like?), but I'd call that opportunism more than focus.


Ranger identity though out the the editions.
1e...
2e...
3e...
4e...
5e...
[/I]
Don't forget :
Oe :smalltongue:I get some cleric and wizard spells, an extra HD, can use crystal balls, and earn an extra 33% experience points, just because! :smallbiggrin:

[Izodonia]

Backgrounds (while lovely) are a spanner in the thematic works. A regular human champion fighter with acolyte background is hard to distinguishable from a cleric, a criminal background from a rogue, and so forth.


I disagree. Class is what the character is; background is what the character was.

[Morty]

In a way, rangers are right square in the middle of D&D's considerable confusion as to what its different parts - classes, subclasses, backgrounds, feats - are meant to represent. As will happen when class can encompass something as generic as the fighter or as specific as the barbarian. As I've said before, I don't think wilderness survival is a very good class feature, seeing how it's already a skill proficiency and the focus of some background. Moreover, it's pretty niche and might very well not come up much in any given game - which is fine for a background or skill, not so much for a central class feature.

[Willie the Duck]

I disagree. Class is what the character is; background is what the character was.

Oh sure, it can work that way. An acolyte fighter might very well be coded as a guy headed towards becoming a cleric, but then decided they could accomplish their goal by focusing on the fightery stuff instead. It gets pretty murkey though, when your character gains skills and other advantages that they still use while adventuring. It also runs into issues with barbarians --someone was a sage or acolyte (or sailor, etc.), but then went out and became a member of one of the civilizations that live out in 'the wilds?' I mean, sure if that's what you want to play. None of these lines are drawn in ink and the boundaries shift and warp. Regardless, I still think outlander eats into ranger and barbarian turf more than a fighter or rogue with survival, which was to what I was addressing.

[Kane0]

Rangers are basically "commandos", and not just in the sense that they probably don't wear underwear. They're the guys who can kick your ass one-on-one, but can also hump 50 miles through the jungle, eating snakes along the way, before slipping into the enemies' camp and slitting their throats as they sleep. In a way, they're closer to the modern-day concept of the "warrior" than the armored knight is.

Now that sounds pretty cool.

[Justin Sane]

Honestly, I feel Geralt of Rivia is a pretty good representation of a 5e Ranger - deep knowledge of his usual enemies, a smidgeon of magic learned for utilitarian purposes, knowledgeable in tracking and outdoor skills? Close enough in my book.

Also, DnD as a whole would benefit immensely if they didn't use the "has magic, therefore uses spells" logic so often.

[GooeyChewie]

To answer the original question, I don't think the problem is that Rangers and Barbarians (and Rogues, because the question gets asked about them from time to time) lack an identity. I think the problem, in as much as there is one, is that Fighters are a blank canvas. They are proficient with all weapons and armor, so no other class can distinguish itself that way. Then they also get the most ASIs, so they can use feats to bring in flavor from any other class' identity.

If I were designing 6e*, I would not lump Barbarian, Ranger and Rogue into Fighter. Instead, I would restrict Fighter so as to give it a stronger identity. Take away ranged weapons** and the ability to use finesse, and Fighters get a much clearer identity as the strength-based armored martial. Barbarians would still be the strength-based unarmored martial (with Monk as the dexterity-based unarmored martial). Rogue would also lose ranged weapons (except the sling), focusing instead on finesse weapons as the dexterity-based lightly-armored martial. Then Rangers would be the foremost ranged combatants. Ranger spellcasting would come from a subclass.

Regarding background, my main complaint about them is that the ones which seem like a good fit for a class are often the worst mechanical choices for those classes. Soldier makes a ton of sense for a Fighter, but the skill proficiencies you get for it are also available through the Fighter class. Likewise the Charlatan, Criminal and Urchin backgrounds provide skills which are already available to Rogues.


*I'm not suggesting we should be designing 6e. I just think a new edition is the only time when lumping together or splitting up a whole class really makes sense.
**Note that "ranged weapons" does not include thrown weapons. Fighters could still throw hand axes; rogues could still throw darts.

[Izodonia]

Oh sure, it can work that way. An acolyte fighter might very well be coded as a guy headed towards becoming a cleric, but then decided they could accomplish their goal by focusing on the fightery stuff instead. It gets pretty murkey though, when your character gains skills and other advantages that they still use while adventuring. It also runs into issues with barbarians --someone was a sage or acolyte (or sailor, etc.), but then went out and became a member of one of the civilizations that live out in 'the wilds?' I mean, sure if that's what you want to play. None of these lines are drawn in ink and the boundaries shift and warp.

Don't think of them as problems - think of them as storytelling opportunities. Your barbarian acolyte, for instance: you were kidnapped from your tribe a a child and sold to an evil snake cult who raised you as a temple slave, until you escaped and travelled back north to regain your heritage (if you really insist on undergoing barbarian training, say that there was a kindly old slave from your tribe who taught you to fight on the sly). Sage? Your tribe was friendly with a solitary wizard living up in the mountains, and as a curious type, you liked to hang around his tower and help him with his research. Sailor? Your a Viking or a Polynesian, dealer's choice. There's no class/background combo too outlandish for a cool backstory - in fact, the more unlikely they seem, the more interesting your character.

[Morty]

Also, DnD as a whole would benefit immensely if they didn't use the "has magic, therefore uses spells" logic so often.

It would also benefit immensely if it didn't use "does anything impressive, therefore uses spells" logic, but I guess that ship has sailed a while ago.

[PhoenixPhyre]

It would also benefit immensely if it didn't use "does anything impressive, therefore uses spells" logic, but I guess that ship has sailed a while ago.

I mean, there's two things going on here.

First, there is absolutely the ingrained idea that fantastic (ie not part of earth-reality) things === spells. And that should die hard (no, not the Christmas movie). Non-spell abilities should absolutely be doing fantastic things. Spells at the fictional level should only be one of many forms of fantastic ability.

At the mechanical level, using spells as the default dumping ground for "re-usable fantastic effect that a spellcaster might want to do as well as some other creature" makes some sense from a rules-duplication-avoidance standpoint. You have a single (mechanical) system to deal with, which can get properly debugged and balanced against the other things without having a bunch of variations on the same wording copied and pasted around the "code". This is how I see things like the Totem Barbarian's Spirit Walker ability--they're "casting a spell" mechanically, but in reality they're just that in-tune with nature that they can do it. Same with most racial and monster innate spellcasting. I'd prefer if they removed all components from such (they do, generally, but not always)--in-fiction they're just producing the same effect without the rigamarole of casting the spell.

Having a bunch of subsystems that somewhat, but not entirely replicate spells (or which are somewhat, but not entirely replicated by spells) ends up causing edge cases and loopholes for munchkinry, as well as just general jank and bloat. Is it the most elegant solution? Maybe not. But it's workable. If and only if the first part (breaking the fantastic == spell link) happens. But that's a cultural shift, mainly among the forum base, not as much at the game level.

[Chaosmancer]

To be fair, Assassin's Creed wasn't supposed to have that kind of combat. We have testers asking for more combat to thank for that.
Personally, I don't think of Ezio from AC (or Corvo from Dishonored, for that matter) when I think of a Rogue - I think of Garrett from Thief. In Thief, assuming you don't cheese obvious flaws in the game, if you found yourself in combat with a guard, one on one, and you played it smart and patiently, you could probably win. If you found yourself against more than one guard, or just assumed you could take them and didn't play it smart and slow, you were going to die, because you aren't meant to stand up in a fight like that; it's not your bag. :smallwink:

True, but I remember Thief being an exception to the general rule of heroic rogues. It is a call back to how they are supposed to be, but many of them aren't.

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it effects wisdom saves and wisdom skills but I don't see that it effects many class features. Some subclasses care more, but don't think that merits a significant investment. You probably don't want to dump wisdom (do you ever?) but I really can't see pushing it higher than 14 as being all that worthwhile.


Wisdom Saves
Skills (Perception being one of the most important skills in the game)
29 spells out of 79, so a 3rd.

Their Capstone
Tireless
Druidic Warrior


Dread Ambusher

Hunter's Sense
Magic User's Nemesis

Otherworldly Glamour
Beguiling Twist
Misty Wanderer

Gathered Swarm (and a lot of later abilities just modify this one)

All New Beast Master Primal Companions

This is all the officially published stuff that deals directly with your wisdom mod. Now, I guess you are somewhat correct, in that earlier rangers like the Hunter and the Horizon Walker can simply ignore their wisdom score, if they are willing to take the hit to their skills, but with Tasha's we have at least 3 subclasses that are going to rely on it heavily.

So, I don't think you can make a blanket statement like "Ranger's don't need wisdom" when iconic skills like tracking and perception rely on it, and half of their subclasses rely on it, and a few of their innate options rely on it.


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Paladin's didn't do that at all. In fact, 5e moved them much more away from gods. In fact, they're not (by default) connected to divine worship in any way. FR says otherwise, but that's one major way FR deviates from the default.

And swearing an oath (lowercase) doesn't do anything. Lots of people swear oaths. It's not the words that matter. It's the singular dedication to that cause that grants power. And that's not something most people can muster. Just like most devout people (including most priests!) aren't clerics and most minstrels aren't bards. And most warriors aren't fighters, nor are most cut-purses rogues.

Barbarians draw their power from the nature of emotion itself. The exact mechanisms vary, but since anger is one of the strongest and most easily roused emotions, it's the one that often forms a breakthrough for nascent barbarians. Not all angry people can Rage--Rage draws on the power inherent in the world itself. As a barbarian grows, they attune to more than just anger (or focus entirely on anger, in the case of the berserkers). A totem barbarian channels through the images of beasts, taking on bits of their power (a non-transformational equivalent of wildshape). An ancestor barbarian channels via imagery and connection to his ancestors, forming primal power into echoes of them to guard and ward. Zealots channel through devotion to a god. Unlike a cleric, whose power literally comes from their god or a paladin, whose power comes from his dedication to the underlying cause and the sacrifices inherent in the Oath he swore, a zealot barbarian can be utterly wrong about the nature of the being he worships. His power comes from the fervency of his belief itself, even if there really isn't anything on the other side. You could be a Zealot of a non-existent god whose religion is an utter transparent sham; a cleric of that same deity would lack power and a paladin could never swear Oath to those principles, as there's nothing really there.


I like this, I'd nitpick some details, but I agree with the thrust of the argument.


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If a Barb isn't using it almost every round, they're doing something wrong.


Gonna have to disagree with this as well. I've seen too many barbarians get wrecked because they Recklessed at the wrong time. It is a powerful option, but there are times when it is not the best move to make yourself so easy to hit.

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*One of my big complaints with barb is tossing 80% of the class kit onto a single feature that is both limited and pretty easy to waste. The loss of a single rage during a standard adventuring day is like sucking 3-4 spell slots away from a caster.

Agreed, Rage is incredibly vital to the Barbarian's abilities, and everything ties into it. I see why they made that decision, but it definitely makes Barbarians either run out of gas way sooner than most other classes, or they play very cautiously with when they choose to rage. Which feels thematically odd.


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Rangers are basically "commandos", and not just in the sense that they probably don't wear underwear. They're the guys who can kick your ass one-on-one, but can also hump 50 miles through the jungle, eating snakes along the way, before slipping into the enemies' camp and slitting their throats as they sleep. In a way, they're closer to the modern-day concept of the "warrior" than the armored knight is.


So is any rogue or a dex-based fighter or a Monk or a Warlock.

See, this is the problem. You can describe what you think the ranger should be, but "eating snakes" and "killing sleeping enemies" is something that any adventurer can do. You aren't really differentiating the ranger by saying they can survive by eating snakes, or travel 50 miles.

Every single adventurer in the game can Quick March 15 miles (difficult terrain halves) through a dense jungle with 90 lb backpacks and end that march perfectly fine. Every single one, yes, even your strength 8 bookish Wizard.

They all also aren't going to be pushing much beyond that, except for maybe the fighter or the barbarian, because every 2 miles past that is a Con Save, and Ranger's don't get Con Saves natively. And nobody is pushing it more than a little bit, because exhaustion will cripple the party.

I really think this is such a core problem, what people want to describe as "the ranger" is something that a wizard can do. Every Adventurer is capable of that feat from level 1. Ranger's have to be more than that.

[Willowhelm]

Ranger's have to be more than that.

You mean like maybe being able to move at normal speed, without getting lost, and making the whole group stealthier on top?

[Willie the Duck]

Don't think of them as problems - think of them as storytelling opportunities. Your barbarian acolyte, for instance: you were kidnapped from your tribe a a child and sold to an evil snake cult who raised you as a temple slave, until you escaped and travelled back north to regain your heritage (if you really insist on undergoing barbarian training, say that there was a kindly old slave from your tribe who taught you to fight on the sly). Sage? Your tribe was friendly with a solitary wizard living up in the mountains, and as a curious type, you liked to hang around his tower and help him with his research. Sailor? Your a Viking or a Polynesian, dealer's choice. There's no class/background combo too outlandish for a cool backstory - in fact, the more unlikely they seem, the more interesting your character.

I didn't say anything about them being a problem. Are we having the same conversation here?


I mean, there's two things going on here.

First, there is absolutely the ingrained idea that fantastic (ie not part of earth-reality) things === spells. And that should die hard (no, not the Christmas movie). Non-spell abilities should absolutely be doing fantastic things. Spells at the fictional level should only be one of many forms of fantastic ability.

At the mechanical level, using spells as the default dumping ground for "re-usable fantastic effect that a spellcaster might want to do as well as some other creature" makes some sense from a rules-duplication-avoidance standpoint. You have a single (mechanical) system to deal with, which can get properly debugged and balanced against the other things without having a bunch of variations on the same wording copied and pasted around the "code". This is how I see things like the Totem Barbarian's Spirit Walker ability--they're "casting a spell" mechanically, but in reality they're just that in-tune with nature that they can do it. Same with most racial and monster innate spellcasting. I'd prefer if they removed all components from such (they do, generally, but not always)--in-fiction they're just producing the same effect without the rigamarole of casting the spell.

Having a bunch of subsystems that somewhat, but not entirely replicate spells (or which are somewhat, but not entirely replicated by spells) ends up causing edge cases and loopholes for munchkinry, as well as just general jank and bloat. Is it the most elegant solution? Maybe not. But it's workable. If and only if the first part (breaking the fantastic == spell link) happens. But that's a cultural shift, mainly among the forum base, not as much at the game level.

At some level, I think the designers just decided that any kind of modular rules effect that a character might have in limited amounts over a certain complexity level might just as well be spells. Given the reaction to both 3E's Book of 9 Swords and 4E, I can understand why they thought that was how people saw things.

I certainly think it made sense at the time in The Strategic Review vol.1 #2 or AD&D's PHB for the herb lore and similar to be represented by some low-level spells rather than create a robust skill system out of whole cloth for this one class only. At this point, I think it is a combination of inertia and, as you say, it is easy to use and reduces the amount of reduplicated/redundant rules.
*they possibly could have made it work with a %-chance-of system like TSR-era thieves, but I doubt the results would have been better.

[Schwann145]

...and Ranger's don't get Con Saves natively.

I think this, more than anything else, kinda debunks the argument that Rangers are the rugged nature survivalist. A Con save prof seems like step 1 in building such a character, and Rangers don't even get that!

[PhoenixPhyre]

At some level, I think the designers just decided that any kind of modular rules effect that a character might have in limited amounts over a certain complexity level might just as well be spells. Given the reaction to both 3E's Book of 9 Swords and 4E, I can understand why they thought that was how people saw things.

I certainly think it made sense at the time in The Strategic Review vol.1 #2 or AD&D's PHB for the herb lore and similar to be represented by some low-level spells rather than create a robust skill system out of whole cloth for this one class only. At this point, I think it is a combination of inertia and, as you say, it is easy to use and reduces the amount of reduplicated/redundant rules.
*they possibly could have made it work with a %-chance-of system like TSR-era thieves, but I doubt the results would have been better.

Yeah, that's point #2. Having a single "do specific modular thing" subsystem (spells) is, in my mind, a pretty darn good idea. One of the big failings of the alternate subsystems/resources is lack of support. If you have a class (cough battlemasters cough) who have some alternate pool of things they can choose from, it's much less frequent that you're going to see additions to that. Especially if that class isn't one of your core classes. Spells? Those are in just about every player-facing book, plus campaign books. So dumping things into the "spell" pool means that you can reliably get new "features" by ones and twos instead of only getting them when they do a full class book. How many new spells have been published, compared to battlemaster maneuvers?

Plus, by using a common framework you end up with way fewer edge cases. You're extending an existing set of things via adding content, rather than building entirely new frameworks for one particular case. In programming, that's called DRY--Don't Repeat Yourself. Or it's basically reinventing the wheel, which in my experience ends up with lots of square wheels.

5e works (IMO) so well because it tries to keep the base system very streamlined and modular with well-defined hooks for extension. Adding something where you've got choice that drains a resource (above a certain complexity)? Can it be framed in the form of a spell? Then do it as a spell. Note that they've not implemented the whole psionic dice or psionic point rules they tried--they were too complex and had too many edge cases. KISS.

[greenstone]

For me, the ranger is a shaman class. They are animism-based casters, and thus completely different to fighters and barbarians.

I group fighters, barbarians and rogues together, in that they are all martial characters that rely mostly on their own skill and power. Rogues rely on agility and quickness, barbarians rely on innate toughness, fighters rely on practice and learning and skill.

Wizards are in this group as well, because their source of power is their own self. A fighter spends weeks and months in study and practice of martial skill, a wizard does the same with arcane skill.

Other classes rely on power from an external source. Animism casters (rangers, druids, maybe paladins depending on how you define them) are getting this power from nature spirits and totems and other "primitive" gods. Invocation casters (clerics) and theurgy casters (warlocks) get it from a "higher" power (a god, a demon, an unfathomable creature from the outer dark).

Sorcerers just do weird stuff with their blood and/or body. The less said the better. :-)

[Chaosmancer]

You mean like maybe being able to move at normal speed, without getting lost, and making the whole group stealthier on top?

I may be a negative nelly here, and I love rangers don't get me wrong, but how often does that matter?

Getting lost in the DnD wilderness isn't dangerous. Moving at normal speed is only useful if the DM didn't plan for you to arrive based on your travel speed (and must DMs don't calculate that anyways) and Group Stealth isn't something the ranger can actually help with outside of a spell.

Unless you are referring to moving stealthily at a normal pace, but that doesn't actually make the group stealthier, it just lets them make a stealth check... which many DMs have them do anyways.


It has to be more than "I can survive in the wilds". I mean, we don't stop fighters at "can hit a man in armor" and there is basically nothing in the DnD natural wilderness that a 3rd level wizard can't escape from or drive off. All adventurers can survive in the Wilderness.

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I think this, more than anything else, kinda debunks the argument that Rangers are the rugged nature survivalist. A Con save prof seems like step 1 in building such a character, and Rangers don't even get that!


I think it was a MADness issue. They need Dex for iconic weapons and bows, they need wisdom for casting, Constitution for toughness, Intelligence for herb lore, strength for climbing and swimming and other athletic feats... they just couldn't have everything.

And while Dex and Con or Dex and Wis makes sense.... no one is allowed two powerful saves.

[Willowhelm]

I may be a negative nelly here, and I love rangers don't get me wrong, but how often does that matter?

It matters specifically in the scenario you were referencing.



Every single adventurer in the game can Quick March 15 miles (difficult terrain halves) through a dense jungle with 90 lb backpacks and end that march perfectly fine. Every single one, yes, even your strength 8 bookish Wizard.

They all also aren't going to be pushing much beyond that, except for maybe the fighter or the barbarian, because every 2 miles past that is a Con Save, and Ranger's don't get Con Saves natively. And nobody is pushing it more than a little bit, because exhaustion will cripple the party.

I really think this is such a core problem, what people want to describe as "the ranger" is something that a wizard can do. Every Adventurer is capable of that feat from level 1. Ranger's have to be more than that.

You want rangers to be "more than that" but... rangers are. They specifically have things that make your scenario's outcomes totally different. Everyone can travel twice as far (with a ranger) and they wont get lost (with a ranger) meaning that travel distance actually is towards the goal. They can still be alert to danger (no ambushes). And the ranger can cast pass without a trace too. These are things that make a ranger more than other classes in this scenario.



Getting lost in the DnD wilderness isn't dangerous. Moving at normal speed is only useful if the DM didn't plan for you to arrive based on your travel speed (and must DMs don't calculate that anyways) and Group Stealth isn't something the ranger can actually help with outside of a spell.


I dispute that getting lost in the DnD wilderness isn't dangerous. That's a strange choice by the DM in my mind. Just being in the wilderness is dangerous, being lost there doubly so.

When you say it doesn't matter and immediately caveat it you highlight exactly what it is that makes the ranger the ranger.

It's only useful if the DM doesn't handwave the aspect of the game where rangers are useful - true! But that isn't about the ranger that's about the DM.

Rangers can only help the party stealth with a spell - true! But rangers get a spell that helps the whole party with stealth! That's a spell most classes don't get.

They have their niche.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

It matters specifically in the scenario you were referencing.



You want rangers to be "more than that" but... rangers are. They specifically have things that make your scenario's outcomes totally different. Everyone can travel twice as far (with a ranger) and they wont get lost (with a ranger) meaning that travel distance actually is towards the goal. They can still be alert to danger (no ambushes). And the ranger can cast pass without a trace too. These are things that make a ranger more than other classes in this scenario.



I dispute that getting lost in the DnD wilderness isn't dangerous. That's a strange choice by the DM in my mind. Just being in the wilderness is dangerous, being lost there doubly so.

When you say it doesn't matter and immediately caveat it you highlight exactly what it is that makes the ranger the ranger.

It's only useful if the DM doesn't handwave the aspect of the game where rangers are useful - true! But that isn't about the ranger that's about the DM.

Rangers can only help the party stealth with a spell - true! But rangers get a spell that helps the whole party with stealth! That's a spell most classes don't get.

They have their niche.

I think a Trickery Cleric is a much better option than a Ranger when it comes to helping the party with Stealth.

Trickery has their level 2 feature that gives someone a level 9 Rogue feature (advantage on stealth) w/o the speed restriction. They also get pass w/o Trace as a spell much faster and with more slots.

Now, Trickery is about misdirection and not really stealth themselves, but you can do a stealthy trickery Cleric.

The ranger has some good stuff, but it feels like they don't synergize with themselves all that well (unlike the Paladin).

[Droppeddead]

I think a Trickery Cleric is a much better option than a Ranger when it comes to helping the party with Stealth.

Trickery has their level 2 feature that gives someone a level 9 Rogue feature (advantage on stealth) w/o the speed restriction. They also get pass w/o Trace as a spell much faster and with more slots.

Now, Trickery is about misdirection and not really stealth themselves, but you can do a stealthy trickery Cleric.

The ranger has some good stuff, but it feels like they don't synergize with themselves all that well (unlike the Paladin).

Trickery Clerics are only good for shorter stealths, if you're sneaking into a lcoked house. If you want to travel stealthily for hours and hours (or days) at an end (and not at half speed) you need a ranger. Rangers can also easily get food for groups up to ten each day (even bigger groups if they spend enough spell slots).

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Trickery Clerics are only good for shorter stealths, if you're sneaking into a lcoked house. If you want to travel stealthily for hours and hours (or days) at an end (and not at half speed) you need a ranger. Rangers can also easily get food for groups up to ten each day (even bigger groups if they spend enough spell slots).

Shorter stealths? They have more spell slots to dedicate to Pass w/o Trace and get it a whole two levels earlier without needing to prepare it to boot. They can drop the spell when needed. Which is exactly what a party will need.

Long march stealth is so niche that it's not even an actual niche, it's a ribbon.

Also, if they get into a sticky situation, Trickery Clerics eventually get Modify Memory which is fantastic for stealth. Can't raise an alarm if you don't remember seeing the party there.

As for getting food... That's also part of a ribbon, which can be simulated rather well with the Outlander background feature.

The ranger doesn't even do its own "niche" the best. Druids also blow Rangers out of the water with the stealth aspects as, not only do they get pass without trace w/ more spell slots, they also have goodberry which just laughs at the Ranger's ability to find food (which the Druid eventually gets a lot of slots to dedicate to it).

The Ranger's only "niche" is in its ribbon abiities which aren't exactly a niche as others fills that roll better. The ranger only really looks good when you compare it to something like the fighter that doesn't get skills/utility.

[Kane0]

The Ranger's only "niche" is in its ribbon abiities which aren't exactly a niche as others fills that role better. The ranger only really looks good when you compare it to something like the fighter that doesn't get skills/utility.

So is that due to the features or the identity?

[Droppeddead]

Shorter stealths? They have more spell slots to dedicate to Pass w/o Trace and get it a whole two levels earlier without needing to prepare it to boot. They can drop the spell when needed. Which is exactly what a party will need.

Yes, shorter. Sure, you can burn your resources every hour if you want to but rangers can do the same for free. And without the speed reduction. You do realize the difference, don't you?


Long march stealth is so niche that it's not even an actual niche, it's a ribbon.

Irrelevant. Even if it's just a ribbon (the world's most famous fantasy book is basically a long march stealth campaign) it is still part of the ranger's "thing".


Also, if they get into a sticky situation, Trickery Clerics eventually get Modify Memory which is fantastic for stealth. Can't raise an alarm if you don't remember seeing the party there.

Also irrelevant. This thread isn't about which class is best at stealth.


As for getting food... That's also part of a ribbon, which can be simulated rather well with the Outlander background feature.

How is not starving to death a ribbon? :P


The ranger doesn't even do its own "niche" the best. Druids also blow Rangers out of the water with the stealth aspects as, not only do they get pass without trace w/ more spell slots, they also have goodberry which just laughs at the Ranger's ability to find food (which the Druid eventually gets a lot of slots to dedicate to it).

Why are druid goodberries better than ranger goodberries? Also, druids don't get the same group stealth ability that rangers do. Either way, see the previous answer regarding the topic of the thread.


The Ranger's only "niche" is in its ribbon abiities which aren't exactly a niche as others fills that roll better. The ranger only really looks good when you compare it to something like the fighter that doesn't get skills/utility.

I woud agree with you but then we'd both be wrong. ;) As has been pointed out in numerous threads already, the ranger is enough of its own thing mechanically and narratively that they warrant their own class. And the same goes for barbarians.

[sophontteks]

Shorter stealths? They have more spell slots to dedicate to Pass w/o Trace and get it a whole two levels earlier without needing to prepare it to boot. They can drop the spell when needed. Which is exactly what a party will need.

Long march stealth is so niche that it's not even an actual niche, it's a ribbon.

Also, if they get into a sticky situation, Trickery Clerics eventually get Modify Memory which is fantastic for stealth. Can't raise an alarm if you don't remember seeing the party there.

As for getting food... That's also part of a ribbon, which can be simulated rather well with the Outlander background feature.

The ranger doesn't even do its own "niche" the best. Druids also blow Rangers out of the water with the stealth aspects as, not only do they get pass without trace w/ more spell slots, they also have goodberry which just laughs at the Ranger's ability to find food (which the Druid eventually gets a lot of slots to dedicate to it).

The Ranger's only "niche" is in its ribbon abiities which aren't exactly a niche as others fills that roll better. The ranger only really looks good when you compare it to something like the fighter that doesn't get skills/utility.
Rangers are a martial class that gets expertise, nature spells, and mobility. Druids are primarily spellcasters. Is this not enough? Why take away our martial nature class? Should we get rid of paladins too?

Since Tasha rangers had no trouble filling their niche: Skilled warriors with a splash of nature. Prior to Tashas people were desperate for them to finally make a fix official. We already know we need rangers. The people demand it.

[KorvinStarmast]

These threads pop up from time to time, if you really wanted you could get reductionist on the whole system up until you're left with a thief, fighting man and magic user, where the game started.
It started with Fighting Man, Cleric, and Magic User.
Thief was added to that.


It's become something else. Something that stands or falls on its own. Indeed, and Conan was a Fighter / Thief, which I think is, in AD&D speak, a human character with two classes. If you make a 5e Barbarian with the Criminal Background, you can probably manage OK ...
Wizards...I personally think they're the worst designed class. {snip} the 8 schools of magic are vestigial at best. This is where the five colors of magic in MtG as an import into D&D is mildly intriguing, though it can be messed up in implementation

[kore]

My favorite 4e class was the Avenger. Barbarian, in my opinion, is a great way to mechanically build an Avenger in 5e. And with Zealot it shows that the mechanic is just that, the mechanic. You can skin the class however you wish. I would probably still reskin a totem barbarian as my avenger, you're only limited by your imagination. I reskinned Ancestral Guardian features to be technological on my warforged barbarian in an Eberron-esque campaign; raging was a fight-mode built into its design.

[Morty]

My favorite 4e class was the Avenger. Barbarian, in my opinion, is a great way to mechanically build an Avenger in 5e. And with Zealot it shows that the mechanic is just that, the mechanic. You can skin the class however you wish. I would probably still reskin a totem barbarian as my avenger, you're only limited by your imagination. I reskinned Ancestral Guardian features to be technological on my warforged barbarian in an Eberron-esque campaign; raging was a fight-mode built into its design.

It would have been possible, or perhaps even easy, to build "barbarians" as a more open-ended class for aggressive fighters when the edition was designed, with a raging berserker as one of the options. But it couldn't happen, because people would have been upset if there was no class named "barbarian" on the list.

[Chaosmancer]

It matters specifically in the scenario you were referencing.

Nope.

See, Izodonia laid out the scenario that the Ranger is the guy who can walk 50 miles, eating snakes and slipping into the enemies camp.

Moving at normal speed? Doesn't matter unless I'm following them. He didn't say that, and if I'm following someone 50 miles, then there is something else going on.

Getting Lost? If I am following a mobile camp in the jungle, it basically can't happen. They would certainly leave a trail, and the jungle is at least as easy to track on as Grass, which means that you are looking at a DC 10. No guarantee, but anyone with a +2 Wisdom can likely follow those signs. And I'm going from the DMG rules on tracking here.

Stable Location and not following a group? Then normal speed doesn't matter. Following a Group? Then getting lost is less of a concern.

And the last thing you mentioned was making the whole group stealthier, which again, depends on your exact set up. Sure, maybe if you can't stealth, and you blunder into a group you are following, then making stealth checks could matter... but the Paladin has a -1 Dex and Heavy Armor, so giving the opportunity for stealth doesn't really help your case. Going to a static location? Then generally you start the stealth portion afterwards, and again, Ranger's aren't the only characters who do "sneak into place"

That is something that can be done.... by any class. "Sneak into the compound" is a DnD adventure that the entire group is meant to participate in, so the Ranger doesn't really add anything here.

And, if the point is that the ranger is the best for stealthily following a group of enemies overland... that is very specific isn't it? That isn't an enemy type like "Fiends and Undead" or an approach like "Magic" or "Skills" that is a very specific type of encounter. And not something unique to the ranger.

They need to be more.





You want rangers to be "more than that" but... rangers are. They specifically have things that make your scenario's outcomes totally different. Everyone can travel twice as far (with a ranger) and they wont get lost (with a ranger) meaning that travel distance actually is towards the goal. They can still be alert to danger (no ambushes). And the ranger can cast pass without a trace too. These are things that make a ranger more than other classes in this scenario.

Right, you are missing the point entirely.

IF I need to travel twice as far
IF I need to not get lost
IF I care about ambushes (and the ranger isn't the best at stopping ambushes, because anyone can use their passive Perception, and Clerics tend to be better, or Rogues)

THEN in this specific set up of following a group of enemies overland.... the ranger is better.

What if the Castle is in the middle of the forest, but has a clear road? What if the forgotten tomb is in the forest, but it doesn't matter if you take a week or a month to get there? What if there isn't an enemy to ambush you?

Then the argument falls apart. You are taking something highly specific and saying "this is the point of the ranger" but it can't be. They have to be more than that single scenario. Because if they are solely "I can get you to the adventure" then... a party without a ranger is going to essentially have the same experience as one with a ranger, unless the DM specifically goes out of their way to try and force them to regret that.

And try challenging a 9th level party with "wilderness survival" It frankly isn't a concern unless you homebrew stuff HEAVILY.





I dispute that getting lost in the DnD wilderness isn't dangerous. That's a strange choice by the DM in my mind. Just being in the wilderness is dangerous, being lost there doubly so.

When you say it doesn't matter and immediately caveat it you highlight exactly what it is that makes the ranger the ranger.

It's only useful if the DM doesn't handwave the aspect of the game where rangers are useful - true! But that isn't about the ranger that's about the DM.

Rangers can only help the party stealth with a spell - true! But rangers get a spell that helps the whole party with stealth! That's a spell most classes don't get.

They have their niche.


It is a spell Druid's get. And druid's are useful in more than this single scenario.

The DnD wilderness isn't dangerous. It just isn't.

A Jungle is a location with "abundant food and water sources". Characters can carry weeks worth of food, and it is a DC 10 check to find 1d6+mod days of food and 1d6+mod days of water. Have two teams of the party do that, one helping the other. How hard is a DC 10 check with advantage?

Quicksand? DC 10 + 1d4+1, so an average of DC 13 to start. With a partner who can grant advantage. Increasing DC every turn, sure, but even with a Con of 10? You have 13 turns to make that skill check. And we are talking about level 9 characters, not level 1. Even a scrawny wizard might have Misty Step prepared to just bamf out.

Extreme Heat? Does nothing if you have water, which in the jungle you do. Or, you can travel at night. Even odds that a decent part of the party has darkvision, or access to lights, and it is far cooler at night.


If you took an average person, threw them in a jungle and told them to wander around until they got out... they very well could die.

You throw a 9th level adventurer into a jungle, and tell them the same thing.... They are very likely to be fine. A 15th level character is assuredly going to be fine. So, Rangers have to be more than the "I survive in the wilderness" character, because by mid-levels, that isn't a challenge for ANYBODY.



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So is that due to the features or the identity?


I think it is a combination, but a bigger factor is that the World doesn't support them. There is nothing that you can point to and really say "this challenge is specific to a high level ranger". Most things we think about them doing are things that a low-level ranger is doing, and that is because the "wilderness" in DnD is a low -level challenge.


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Irrelevant. Even if it's just a ribbon (the world's most famous fantasy book is basically a long march stealth campaign) it is still part of the ranger's "thing".

If it is a ribbon, it is considered unimportant.

If it is unimportant, why is it the Ranger's Thing? Shouldn't they be... MORE than some unimportant aspect of the game?



Why are druid goodberries better than ranger goodberries? Also, druids don't get the same group stealth ability that rangers do. Either way, see the previous answer regarding the topic of the thread.

Because 1st level spell slots are meaningless for a 9th level Druid, while they are still a significant resource for a 9th level Ranger.

[Droppeddead]

@Chaosmancer, are you sure that you have understood what the thread is about? Because you keep arguing things that are completely irrelevant to the actual topic. Just to make clear, the topic isn't "are Rangers the best at things" or "Can rangers do things no other class can" but rather "are the barbarians and rangers cool enough to warrant their own classes instead of being fighter subclasses".


Nope.

See, Izodonia laid out the scenario that the Ranger is the guy who can walk 50 miles, eating snakes and slipping into the enemies camp.

Moving at normal speed? Doesn't matter unless I'm following them. He didn't say that, and if I'm following someone 50 miles, then there is something else going on.

Getting Lost? If I am following a mobile camp in the jungle, it basically can't happen. They would certainly leave a trail, and the jungle is at least as easy to track on as Grass, which means that you are looking at a DC 10. No guarantee, but anyone with a +2 Wisdom can likely follow those signs. And I'm going from the DMG rules on tracking here.

Stable Location and not following a group? Then normal speed doesn't matter. Following a Group? Then getting lost is less of a concern.

I guessed you've missedall the stories and real world accounts of entire armies being lost in jungles, mountains or deserts? Or people trying to track down other people over vast expanses of wilderness? explorers and travellers looking for ancient citiies disappearig without a trace? Sure, you might not play those sorts of adventures and that's fine, I'm just pointing out that you are completely wrong when you say that these things are of little or no importance.


And the last thing you mentioned was making the whole group stealthier, which again, depends on your exact set up. Sure, maybe if you can't stealth, and you blunder into a group you are following, then making stealth checks could matter... but the Paladin has a -1 Dex and Heavy Armor, so giving the opportunity for stealth doesn't really help your case. Going to a static location? Then generally you start the stealth portion afterwards, and again, Ranger's aren't the only characters who do "sneak into place"

Again, not sure what this has to do with anything. I guess you can make up all sorts of scenarios where stealth isn't needed, but that isn't the topic at hand.


That is something that can be done.... by any class. "Sneak into the compound" is a DnD adventure that the entire group is meant to participate in, so the Ranger doesn't really add anything here.

Or, if we hold you to your made up scenario of a clumsy paladin in heavy armour, the smart thing to do is send in the people that can sneak while the paladin does something else?


And, if the point is that the ranger is the best for stealthily following a group of enemies overland... that is very specific isn't it? That isn't an enemy type like "Fiends and Undead" or an approach like "Magic" or "Skills" that is a very specific type of encounter. And not something unique to the ranger.

They need to be more.


They are. This is just one aspect of the ranger.



Right, you are missing the point entirely.

Not really, but you are moving the goalposts.


IF I need to travel twice as far
IF I need to not get lost
IF I care about ambushes (and the ranger isn't the best at stopping ambushes, because anyone can use their passive Perception, and Clerics tend to be better, or Rogues)

THEN in this specific set up of following a group of enemies overland.... the ranger is better.

Again, this isn't about whether or not the ranger is "better" but as you can clearly see, the Ranger has its uses.


What if the Castle is in the middle of the forest, but has a clear road? What if the forgotten tomb is in the forest, but it doesn't matter if you take a week or a month to get there? What if there isn't an enemy to ambush you?

Then the argument falls apart. You are taking something highly specific and saying "this is the point of the ranger" but it can't be. They have to be more than that single scenario. Because if they are solely "I can get you to the adventure" then... a party without a ranger is going to essentially have the same experience as one with a ranger, unless the DM specifically goes out of their way to try and force them to regret that.

Again, there are multiple real-world and fictional scenarios where time is in short supply and the need to get somewhere quickly and safely is a pivotal point of the entire ordeal. It might not be the kind of adventure that tickles your particular fancy, but it is a staple of adventuring. Ignoring an entire genre just becuase it doesn't suit your particular argument is at est intellectually dishonest.


And try challenging a 9th level party with "wilderness survival" It frankly isn't a concern unless you homebrew stuff HEAVILY.

So? It can still be done.



It is a spell Druid's get. And druid's are useful in more than this single scenario.

The DnD wilderness isn't dangerous. It just isn't.

A Jungle is a location with "abundant food and water sources". Characters can carry weeks worth of food, and it is a DC 10 check to find 1d6+mod days of food and 1d6+mod days of water. Have two teams of the party do that, one helping the other. How hard is a DC 10 check with advantage?

Quicksand? DC 10 + 1d4+1, so an average of DC 13 to start. With a partner who can grant advantage. Increasing DC every turn, sure, but even with a Con of 10? You have 13 turns to make that skill check. And we are talking about level 9 characters, not level 1. Even a scrawny wizard might have Misty Step prepared to just bamf out.

Extreme Heat? Does nothing if you have water, which in the jungle you do. Or, you can travel at night. Even odds that a decent part of the party has darkvision, or access to lights, and it is far cooler at night.


If you took an average person, threw them in a jungle and told them to wander around until they got out... they very well could die.

You throw a 9th level adventurer into a jungle, and tell them the same thing.... They are very likely to be fine. A 15th level character is assuredly going to be fine. So, Rangers have to be more than the "I survive in the wilderness" character, because by mid-levels, that isn't a challenge for ANYBODY.


Just as a reminder. Where are not talking about the difficulty of 9th level characters surviving a particular scenario. We aren't even talking about 9th level characters at all. We are talking about whether or not Rangers and Barbarians are enough of their own thing that they warrant their own classes, remember?



If it is a ribbon, it is considered unimportant.

If it is unimportant, why is it the Ranger's Thing? Shouldn't they be... MORE than some unimportant aspect of the game?

The argument that it is a ribbon is irrelevant because it has nothing to do with whether or not the class itself is viable. If you want to discuss the merits of the class abilities of the ranger, that's a completely seperate topic.



Because 1st level spell slots are meaningless for a 9th level Druid, while they are still a significant resource for a 9th level Ranger.

First of all you are objectively wrong. Goodberries are just the same no matter if a druid or a ranger casts the spell. Secondly, we aren't talking about "9th level" anythings. The question was specifically about the goodberries themselves.

[Kuu Lightwing]

Honestly when it comes to this question, specifically applied to 5e, I do feel it's a bit strange, especially given how there's not many classes released for it to begin with. In 3.5e where there were classes for whatever archetype or specific niche you wanted - it's doesn't look so strange to have a separate class for "Angry fighter", but for 5e where every sensible and not so sensible archetype is crammed in subclasses, it does feel strange that apparently the concept of "A fighting man who gets angry and hits harder" deserves its own class separate from "generic fighting man" class, while for example "An archer who shoots magic arrows" becomes a subclass of the "generic fighting man" (and gets the whooping 2 magic arrows per rest). Or why "Holy man who smites enemies with divine conviction" is a separate class from "holy man" and "fighting man" while "A warrior blending magic and melee in combat" is delegated to subclasses of "magic man" or "fighting man".

Thus I do not agree that you cannot make rage a subclass without seriously distorting things, or rather not any more than they are distorted for many other concepts that were forced into subclasses. Even psionics, which is supposedly entirely separate power source, is often suggested to condense into subclasses (which has been done in Tasha already). But personally I'd advocate for more classes rather than for removal of Barbarian and Rangers. I do somewhat understand the concern for "class bloat", but I don't find it worse than subclass bloat, and classes offer more design space to the concepts they are meant to represent, rather than attaching everything to other concepts and identities.

And in general I think subclasses as they are, are supposed to do way too many things. They are both supposed to differentiate between "A wizard who specializes on Divinations" and "A wizard who prefers Illusions" and at the same time "A wizard who sits back and casts powerful spells" and "A sword fighter that uses magic in his swordplay", and while I think it does the former relatively well, for latter the four levels of features spread across 20 levels, isn't just sufficient enough.

[Droppeddead]

TEXT.

Not neccesarily disagreeing with you just pointing out that "A sword fighter that uses magic in his swordplay" is done over at least four different classes and even more subclasses. Some of them are better executed than others, I agree.

[anthon]

my understanding is that the ranger is literally that human guy from lord of the rings, and all other character references like Robin Hood etc. were poorly imported.

there's a movie called first knight, with sean connery, and the lancelot character is literally a D&D ranger living in the forest wielding two swords.

army rangers are trained in surviving in the forests and sniping techniques, traps, camouflage, etc., somewhat similar to Green Berets with different focus.

Boy Scouts of pre-world wide web/video games were very similar to D&D rangers with natural skills, survival, leather, hunting, fishing, tracking, etc.



The Barbarian has never been done correctly in any edition of D&D, if Conan is your role model. While you are all told that your barbarian is that guy, there's 100 fighters that do it better. Many editions of Barbarians were Berserkers or Skin Rider variants. Some are based on vikings. Some are based on savages. Some are based on tribes. But mostly, they are a disappointment in the Conan box.

Conan the Schwarzenegger was a 7 time Mr. Universe Steroid Monster wielding a giant Bastard Sword with the heft and cleaving power of a zweihander. He was a trained Ninja Assassin with high Stealth, Climb Walls, Camouflage techniques, and Thieving Appraisal techniques. He had insane stamina from pushing an oil well for decades non stop. In a comic variant, he lifts a 2-3 meter diameter boulder over his head, weighing over a thousand pounds.

What is the lifting capacity of your 5e characters?

What are the ninja skills of your barbarians?

I just don't see it. in 1e the barbarian didn't even have weapon specialization. That's insane. Conan definitely had weapon specialization, and multiple weapon specialization as a trained gladiator. Conan also wore armor some of the time. He wasn't always a half naked loin cloth guy.

Barbarian? Do they even get Weapon Smithing - the opening Forge scene of Conan we all know and love?

[Tanarii]

Thus I do not agree that you cannot make rage a subclass without seriously distorting things, or rather not any more than they are distorted for many other concepts that were forced into subclasses.
But that's not all that separates Barbarians and Fighters. Barbs can't use Heavy armor (including features actively impeding it), they have bigger HD, they get different class skills, they have features that make up for a lack of Dex despite not having armor. It's too much to cram into a level 3 feature.

[Dienekes]

But that's not all that separates Barbarians and Fighters. Barbs can't use Heavy armor (including features actively impeding it), they have bigger HD, they get different class skills, they have features that make up for a lack of Dex despite not having armor. It's too much to cram into a level 3 feature.

Eh. I think we can safely assume this can be altered a bit. Changing a class into a subclass will inevitably create changes. It's whether the changes really matter for getting the feel of the character that's important.

For the Barbarian, the class skills are mitigated with background choice. The large Hit Dice is pretty irrelevant to the playstyle of the class. Sure it will be missed but it's not role changing.

That leaves at level 3 a Rage and an ability to push them to armorless route. That's not all that bad.

The bigger issue, as I see it, is less that the Barbarian would need to be slightly altered to fit the Fighter. It is that there are now other concepts that don't fit the Fighter that will be lost. The Fighter with some Rage bonus would do a fine enough job modeling the base Barbarian, and even the Frenzied Berserker. But when you get to the weirder versions like Beast, Storm Herald, etc. that you see how much leg work the Rage feature is doing to fit a bunch of concepts to it.

[Droppeddead]

Barbarian? Do they even get Weapon Smithing - the opening Forge scene of Conan we all know and love?

You mean the scene where Conan's dad forges a sword? Probably the dude has some sort of Artisan background that gives him profiency in blacksmiths' tools.

[stoutstien]

But that's not all that separates Barbarians and Fighters. Barbs can't use Heavy armor (including features actively impeding it), they have bigger HD, they get different class skills, they have features that make up for a lack of Dex despite not having armor. It's too much to cram into a level 3 feature.

Saying that I could see ranger and barbarian sharing a base class and working more like warlock where you can pick and choose how they use their primal powers.

[strangebloke]

The most annoying thing about this discussion is that people keep bringing up Conan as though the 'barbarian' class had no other inspirations when first conceived and continues with no further inspiration to this day. Icelandic sagas? Never heard of them. The Hulk? Clearly nobody would want to play a thematically similar character in a different genre. Aragorn is the only formative character as far as the development of the ranger archetype is concerned, despite being one of four characters within LotR itself who fit the mold. Legolas, Haldir, and Faramir all fit the mold of "woodwise warrior on the edges of civilization" at least as well as Aragorn does, and that's in the context of one series.

Fiction, particularly fantasy, is full of Fremen Mirage expies. Hard men forged by harsh environments who often tend to be stronger and more ferocious (or in the case of the ranger, more patient and cunning) than their civilized counterparts. The creator of Naruto reimagined his four main characters as western fantasy characters, and the archetypes he chose were fighter (naruto), wizard (kakashi), barbarian (sakura) and ranger (sasuke). This is the level of cultural penetration that these archetypes have, and if you somehow still doubt that, I'll point out that barbarian is currently tied for fourth most popular class in the game despite its clunky implementation.


Saying that I could see ranger and barbarian sharing a base class and working more like warlock where you can pick and choose how they use their primal powers.

This I'd be willing to contemplate more than making either of them a fighter subclass, but tbh if every class was as well-designed as warlock I would actually be willing to cut down to 6-7 classes.

[Kuu Lightwing]

But that's not all that separates Barbarians and Fighters. Barbs can't use Heavy armor (including features actively impeding it), they have bigger HD, they get different class skills, they have features that make up for a lack of Dex despite not having armor. It's too much to cram into a level 3 feature.

It's the same for other concepts that were shoehorned into subclasses. Bladesinger didn't need to be a 9th level caster, needs bigger HD, ideally different class skills and features too. It's easy to justify that you can't do that as a subclass when it already is implemented using a much bigger design space of a complete class.




<snip>

The bigger issue, as I see it, is less that the Barbarian would need to be slightly altered to fit the Fighter. It is that there are now other concepts that don't fit the Fighter that will be lost. The Fighter with some Rage bonus would do a fine enough job modeling the base Barbarian, and even the Frenzied Berserker. But when you get to the weirder versions like Beast, Storm Herald, etc. that you see how much leg work the Rage feature is doing to fit a bunch of concepts to it.

That just shows that a full class allows for more options and variety than a subclass. Yes, of course a subclass Barbarian would be much more limited than a full class Barbarian, in terms of how you can alter or expand it, but that's exactly my point. I'm not convinced that if Bladesinger or Arcane Archer were full classes, they wouldn't offer the same or even greater variety of concepts around them.

[ZRN]

But that's not all that separates Barbarians and Fighters. Barbs can't use Heavy armor (including features actively impeding it), they have bigger HD, they get different class skills, they have features that make up for a lack of Dex despite not having armor. It's too much to cram into a level 3 feature.

Good point. A lot of these "ranger/barbarian as fighter subclass" arguments could be solved by trying your best to actually make such a subclass and see how it compares to the published full classes. CAN you make a fighter subclass that plays like a 5e barbarian without being insanely overpowered, due to the additional fighter features he gets? I feel like probably not.

[Morty]

Saying that I could see ranger and barbarian sharing a base class and working more like warlock where you can pick and choose how they use their primal powers.

I agree. While neither barbarians nor rangers are good classes, making them fighter subclasses is a dead end, because fighter is already stretched so thin it's practically translucent. And is a pretty poor chassis in general. If we had better martial classes instead of fighters, maybe.

[Chaosmancer]

@Chaosmancer, are you sure that you have understood what the thread is about? Because you keep arguing things that are completely irrelevant to the actual topic. Just to make clear, the topic isn't "are Rangers the best at things" or "Can rangers do things no other class can" but rather "are the barbarians and rangers cool enough to warrant their own classes instead of being fighter subclasses".

Yes, I do understand the question. At their thematic elements are just as strong as pretty much every other class. My point is that in asking the question and presenting it as "status Quo" vs "fighter or rogue subclass" you can end up missing a major part of the problem.

Are fighters super thematic? Not really. They are a blank egg shell white for "guy in armor with weapon" That literally describes half a dozen classes. But we are okay with them being this blank facade because we can place them in the world at all levels. The town Guard, the soldier, the Royal Guard, the Champion of the Arena. They make sense as Fighters.

Place a high level rogue into the world, what are they doing? They are going after the Vault of Ages, or sneaking through a compound of ninjas, we can imagine what place they have in the world.

High Level Paladin? Fighting a Demon Lord, running an Order of Knights, Leading the charge into a Hellmouth.

But... what is it we want High Level Rangers to face? Surviving in the Desert? Anybody can do that. Hunting dangerous beasts? Every beast is low level, you need to start talking about Dragons... who are classically foes of Fighters or Paladins. Heavily armored warriors with shields. It is hard to find something in the world and say "that is the domain of a high level ranger." You are looking at the class exclusively, but that blinds you seeing that the problem is beyond the class.




I guessed you've missedall the stories and real world accounts of entire armies being lost in jungles, mountains or deserts? Or people trying to track down other people over vast expanses of wilderness? explorers and travellers looking for ancient citiies disappearig without a trace? Sure, you might not play those sorts of adventures and that's fine, I'm just pointing out that you are completely wrong when you say that these things are of little or no importance.

I don't care about armies. An army isn't an adventuring party. You want to talk about a real world person who vanished looking for El Dorado? Cool. They weren't a 9th level wizard. Or a Rogue. Or a Monk.

See, you are missing the point. You are immediately trying to sell me that the real world is dangerous. Sure it is... just not to a mid-level adventurer. Mundane threats like getting lost in the Jungle are designed for low-level play, not mid, not high. Poisonous snakes and spiders can kill people in the jungle, attacks by jaguars could kill a person in the jungle. None of that breaks CR 3. A single Jaguar attacking a 9th level wizard, even from stealth? Dead Kitty.




Again, not sure what this has to do with anything. I guess you can make up all sorts of scenarios where stealth isn't needed, but that isn't the topic at hand.

Sure, we can trade stories and scenarios back and forth, but you are saying that this is some great ability of the ranger, to give the group stealth...

Does that work in a Tomb? While sneaking up on a warehouse? Heck, you are talking about stealth while traveling, it doesn't even help if the group hears something and leaves their camp to investigate while in the woods. You are looking at the smallest sliver of a set of situations, and that invites issues. It blinds us to what is actually going on.




Or, if we hold you to your made up scenario of a clumsy paladin in heavy armour, the smart thing to do is send in the people that can sneak while the paladin does something else?

Yeah, you always have to plan around the guy in heavy armor. Whether it is a Paladin, a cleric, An artificer or a Fighter.

All the ranger is doing is making it a group stealth check while moving over large tracts of land... something you can do anyways if you take longer. And time pressure is a rare situation, isn't it? Or do we always have time pressure in every adventure to go over the wilderness?




They are. This is just one aspect of the ranger.

You are only half listening. They need to be more than "I can survive the wilderness" or "I can walk through the jungle" because at a certain point in the game... that is everyone.

The issue with "I'm the guy who can stealthily walk through the jungle and survive, while tracking down my foes" is that is literally describing any mid-level dex character. That could be a rogue, or a bard, or a dex fighter or a warlock. Especially with a party of adventurers, who can use a variety of tools all at once. The only possible difference is... the ranger is slightly faster. Which again, that is only time pressures.

Their theme is good, but they need to be more than wilderness survival, because the DnD wilderness isn't scary to the average adventurer.




Again, this isn't about whether or not the ranger is "better" but as you can clearly see, the Ranger has its uses.

Sure, enough to hire an NPC. You see this as an issue of being "Better" or not. That isn't my point.

The design seems like it is incomplete, because there is not a threat to design against. Ranger's get an 8th level ability to walk through non-magical plants without taking damage. How often is that even a thing? It won't help you survive in the more harsh environments like glaciers or deserts, so why is it a thing? Because the ranger is the "forest guy" and there is nothing else they could think of. At least in my opinion, because by 8th level, you aren't pushing through non-magical rosebushes and taking damage, you aren't dealing with curtains of razorvines. It isn't a threat.




Again, there are multiple real-world and fictional scenarios where time is in short supply and the need to get somewhere quickly and safely is a pivotal point of the entire ordeal. It might not be the kind of adventure that tickles your particular fancy, but it is a staple of adventuring. Ignoring an entire genre just becuase it doesn't suit your particular argument is at est intellectually dishonest.

And putting the ranger in the niche of only being designed to deal with a time pressure overland through a hazardous wild land is pointless. Yes, that can be AN adventure. But it is highly specific. And I don't think the ranger should be reduced down to that. I think discussing that aspect, and treating it like it is a serious point of contention is missing the point. I'm not being intellectually dishonest by saying that people can't enjoy that style of game, or that it doesn't make for a compelling story, but this discussions happen all the time, and "time pressure adventure through the jungle while avoiding ambushes" is consistently brought up as something that the majority of people... don't do. It isn't that isn't compelling, or isn't an option, it is that there is little point. There is nothing in the wilderness that is more than a speed bump for a mid-level party. Much of the time they are traveling down roads or rivers that are well-established, or looking for things that aren't under a time pressure. The game wasn't designed with those threats in mind, and acknowledging that and adding that as a point we need to address to properly address the Ranger's issues is more productive than trying to pretend like quicksand bogs and mosquitoes are serious threats to adventurers that a ranger somehow counters.




So? It can still be done.

Yes, but "homebrewing heavily" is sort of a sign that something is missing. That is my point. If your response is "well, I can homebrew to provide these sort of challenges and rewrite the ranger" then you are just skipping the part where the rest of us are still pointing out the problem.





Just as a reminder. Where are not talking about the difficulty of 9th level characters surviving a particular scenario. We aren't even talking about 9th level characters at all. We are talking about whether or not Rangers and Barbarians are enough of their own thing that they warrant their own classes, remember?

Which shows you aren't listening to my point.

A class needs to be viable from level 1 to level 20. That is why it includes things like levels 9, 10 and 11. People who are saying a ranger doesn't deserve to exist because a rogue with skills can replace them is seeing the problem I'm pointing out, but thinking that it isn't a problem. Because everything people use to defend rangers is LOW LEVEL.

You keep bringing up the real world like it matters to this conversation. If a tree is swung at me, I'm going to die. If a Hill Giant swings a tree at a 9th level wizard, they are a bit scared, but they are also likely to win that encounter. If it is swung at a fighter, that is just the cost of doing business, and they are going to be fine. A trained soldier in an enclosure with a hungry Jaguar is likely dead, or if not they are going to come out seriously and heavily injured unless they have a gun. A 9th level fighter with a shortsword? That Jaguar isn't even going to touch them.

Yes, entire armies have died in jungles. But DnD jungles are not threats to mid-level adventurers, so selling the ranger class as "able to handle the DnD Jungle" is nearly meaningless, because you are going to quickly find that there is nothing in there that needs handled.





The argument that it is a ribbon is irrelevant because it has nothing to do with whether or not the class itself is viable. If you want to discuss the merits of the class abilities of the ranger, that's a completely seperate topic.


If you want to focus solely and completely on whether or not the ranger is thematically viable.... it is. Conversation done.

But that solves nothing, and the people who are going to argue the opposite need to be convinced of why it is viable, and what needs to be done. Why is a rogue or a Bard with the right skills not a ranger? That is the challenge, and part of the reason it feels like such a real challenge, is because the ranger is designed to work in an anemic and weak section of DnD. That doesn't detract from their theme at all, it means that if we want to honor their theme, we need to work on the real issues.





First of all you are objectively wrong. Goodberries are just the same no matter if a druid or a ranger casts the spell. Secondly, we aren't talking about "9th level" anythings. The question was specifically about the goodberries themselves.

Then you don't even understand the point of the example given.

Goodberries become a meaninglessly easy resource for Druids. They can choose to have them whenever they want, and they have plenty of casting power outside of it.

A ranger has to choose them early on, with a highly limited spell selection, and they have to choose to give up a significant casting to utilize them.

That, to answer your literal question, are why Druid Goodberries are better than Ranger Goodberries. Because for druids it is basically a free emergency food supply whenever they want. And it isn't that for Rangers.

[Droppeddead]

I agree. While neither barbarians nor rangers are good classes, making them fighter subclasses is a dead end, because fighter is already stretched so thin it's practically translucent. And is a pretty poor chassis in general. If we had better martial classes instead of fighters, maybe.

Barbarians are objectively one of the best classes of the game. Rangers post Xanathar's (and especially after Tasha's) are also good.


Yes, I do understand the question. At their thematic elements are just as strong as pretty much every other class. My point is that in asking the question and presenting it as "status Quo" vs "fighter or rogue subclass" you can end up missing a major part of the problem.

Well, what you are doing is moving the goal post.


Are fighters super thematic? Not really. They are a blank egg shell white for "guy in armor with weapon" That literally describes half a dozen classes. But we are okay with them being this blank facade because we can place them in the world at all levels. The town Guard, the soldier, the Royal Guard, the Champion of the Arena. They make sense as Fighters.

Place a high level rogue into the world, what are they doing? They are going after the Vault of Ages, or sneaking through a compound of ninjas, we can imagine what place they have in the world.

High Level Paladin? Fighting a Demon Lord, running an Order of Knights, Leading the charge into a Hellmouth.

But... what is it we want High Level Rangers to face? Surviving in the Desert? Anybody can do that. Hunting dangerous beasts? Every beast is low level, you need to start talking about Dragons... who are classically foes of Fighters or Paladins. Heavily armored warriors with shields. It is hard to find something in the world and say "that is the domain of a high level ranger." You are looking at the class exclusively, but that blinds you seeing that the problem is beyond the class.

You're being intellectually dishonest again. Numerous classes can do what the things you listed. That's rather the point of the game, that you don't have to play a specific class to do certain things. The Ranger as a concept has been around for at least as long as modern fantasy has been around. The fact that you can't figure out where they fit in (or rather, ignore all of the examples of where they do) is not the ranger's fault.


I don't care about armies. An army isn't an adventuring party. You want to talk about a real world person who vanished looking for El Dorado? Cool. They weren't a 9th level wizard. Or a Rogue. Or a Monk.

Did you purposefully not read the entire thing? That was a response to your erronous claim that travelling safely is no big deal. I pointed out that your claim is incorrect. Also not sure why you are so fixated with level 9 characters, that is completely irrelevant to the topic at hand.


See, you are missing the point. You are immediately trying to sell me that the real world is dangerous. Sure it is... just not to a mid-level adventurer. Mundane threats like getting lost in the Jungle are designed for low-level play, not mid, not high. Poisonous snakes and spiders can kill people in the jungle, attacks by jaguars could kill a person in the jungle. None of that breaks CR 3. A single Jaguar attacking a 9th level wizard, even from stealth? Dead Kitty.

Sure, if by "missing the point" you mean "show that you are wrong". Saying that "rangers have no thematical place in a game about adventurers" because "jaguars aren't dangerous to a high level character" is like saying "paladins have no place in the game because a single zombie is no threat against a high level paladin". Yeah? So? And again with the fixation with 9th level characters...


Sure, we can trade stories and scenarios back and forth, but you are saying that this is some great ability of the ranger, to give the group stealth...

Well, I'd rather we stick to the topic at hand. Which, again, is the fact that Rangers have their place in D&D even though they might not be the best at absolutely everything.


Does that work in a Tomb? While sneaking up on a warehouse? Heck, you are talking about stealth while traveling, it doesn't even help if the group hears something and leaves their camp to investigate while in the woods. You are looking at the smallest sliver of a set of situations, and that invites issues. It blinds us to what is actually going on.

Not at all, I'm trying to get you back ontrack.


Yeah, you always have to plan around the guy in heavy armor. Whether it is a Paladin, a cleric, An artificer or a Fighter.

Again, this is in no way relevant to the discussion at hand.


All the ranger is doing is making it a group stealth check while moving over large tracts of land... something you can do anyways if you take longer. And time pressure is a rare situation, isn't it? Or do we always have time pressure in every adventure to go over the wilderness?

Again, ignoring the arguments that doesn't fit your persnal narrative is intellectually dishonest. Yes, time pressure is a staple of the adventruing genre.


You are only half listening. They need to be more than "I can survive the wilderness" or "I can walk through the jungle" because at a certain point in the game... that is everyone.

Please stop being so rude. You are the one being hung up on just the one aspect of the ranger. Rangers are more than survive in the wilderness. And even if we take your flawed example ("at a certain point in the game everyone can survive in the widerness") that relies on the assumption that a) the game goes on for far enough that other character classes can compensate for their surviavlist shortcomings and b) ignoring the fact that the same premise goes for every class "at a certain point in the game everyone can stab people - so fighters are pointless" or "at a certain point of the game everyone can survive falling from the fifth floor - so monks or pointless". Do you get the point yet?


The issue with "I'm the guy who can stealthily walk through the jungle and survive, while tracking down my foes" is that is literally describing any mid-level dex character.

Except that it doesn't and again you are ignorig the parts that you don't like.


That could be a rogue, or a bard, or a dex fighter or a warlock. Especially with a party of adventurers, who can use a variety of tools all at once. The only possible difference is... the ranger is slightly faster. Which again, that is only time pressures.

But it isn't a fighter, warlock, rogue or a bard. We've already covered time pressure.


Their theme is good, but they need to be more than wilderness survival, because the DnD wilderness isn't scary to the average adventurer.

Well, luckily for you no-one has claimed that rangers or just wilderness survival, so you can stop fighting that windmill. ;) But I'm glad that you can admit that Rangers as aconcept are viable enouhg to warrant their own class in D&D.


Sure, enough to hire an NPC. You see this as an issue of being "Better" or not. That isn't my point.

Please stop lying. I literally said that it was not about being better. And "Hiring an NPC" is an argument that works for every class.


The design seems like it is incomplete, because there is not a threat to design against. Ranger's get an 8th level ability to walk through non-magical plants without taking damage. How often is that even a thing? It won't help you survive in the more harsh environments like glaciers or deserts, so why is it a thing? Because the ranger is the "forest guy" and there is nothing else they could think of. At least in my opinion, because by 8th level, you aren't pushing through non-magical rosebushes and taking damage, you aren't dealing with curtains of razorvines. It isn't a threat.

Percieved mechanical shortcomings of the class doesn't not negate the suitability of the the class' theme.


And putting the ranger in the niche of only being designed to deal with a time pressure overland through a hazardous wild land is pointless. Yes, that can be AN adventure. But it is highly specific. And I don't think the ranger should be reduced down to that. I think discussing that aspect, and treating it like it is a serious point of contention is missing the point. I'm not being intellectually dishonest by saying that people can't enjoy that style of game, or that it doesn't make for a compelling story, but this discussions happen all the time, and "time pressure adventure through the jungle while avoiding ambushes" is consistently brought up as something that the majority of people... don't do. It isn't that isn't compelling, or isn't an option, it is that there is little point. There is nothing in the wilderness that is more than a speed bump for a mid-level party. Much of the time they are traveling down roads or rivers that are well-established, or looking for things that aren't under a time pressure. The game wasn't designed with those threats in mind, and acknowledging that and adding that as a point we need to address to properly address the Ranger's issues is more productive than trying to pretend like quicksand bogs and mosquitoes are serious threats to adventurers that a ranger somehow counters.


Again, nothing of this is relevant for the topic at hand, no-one is claiming that rangers should only have a single niche (last time I checked they had what, seven? subclasses/niches) and moree importantly, saying that low-level threats aren't dangerous for higher-level parties goes for every kind of threat and every class. This might not be how you play the game, but many DMs up the threats according to the players level.


Yes, but "homebrewing heavily" is sort of a sign that something is missing. That is my point. If your response is "well, I can homebrew to provide these sort of challenges and rewrite the ranger" then you are just skipping the part where the rest of us are still pointing out the problem.

Well, you can also up the challenge by not homebrewing, just by, you know, throwing mor edangerous challenges at the players?



Which shows you aren't listening to my point.

Please stop being intellectually dishonest. I am simply replying to what you are writing. If you fail to convey your point that's on you.


A class needs to be viable from level 1 to level 20. That is why it includes things like levels 9, 10 and 11. People who are saying a ranger doesn't deserve to exist because a rogue with skills can replace them is seeing the problem I'm pointing out, but thinking that it isn't a problem. Because everything people use to defend rangers is LOW LEVEL.

First of all, all classes are viable from level 1 to 20. Do some classes have more spectucular features at certain levels than others? Yes. Does that invalidate the entire class? Of course it doesn't. Just compare bards' capstone with Barbarians'. Either way, for some reason you are the one fixating on level 9. Saying that "everything people use to defend rangers is LOW LEVEL" is simply false. You are the one stuck comparing low level ranger stuff with high level other classes stuff. The theme of the ranger goes through the whole run of class levels. Monster Slayers become progressively better at hunting monsters, Gloom Stalkers get gloomy-er, beast masters get cooler pets, etc. And guess what, that fits the theme of those kinds of rangers perfectly.


You keep bringing up the real world like it matters to this conversation.

You do know that real world events and perils are often an inspiration for fiction, right? And that fiction is a way to deal with those events in ways we can't in the real world?


If a tree is swung at me, I'm going to die. If a Hill Giant swings a tree at a 9th level wizard, they are a bit scared, but they are also likely to win that encounter. If it is swung at a fighter, that is just the cost of doing business, and they are going to be fine. A trained soldier in an enclosure with a hungry Jaguar is likely dead, or if not they are going to come out seriously and heavily injured unless they have a gun. A 9th level fighter with a shortsword? That Jaguar isn't even going to touch them.

And Batman can defeat Superman? Or some other irrelevant example?


Yes, entire armies have died in jungles. But DnD jungles are not threats to mid-level adventurers, so selling the ranger class as "able to handle the DnD Jungle" is nearly meaningless, because you are going to quickly find that there is nothing in there that needs handled.

Must be a pretty boring game if nothing dangerous ever happens to anyone...


If you want to focus solely and completely on whether or not the ranger is thematically viable.... it is. Conversation done.

Well, that was the topic of the conversation so... But thanks for finally admitting that you are wrong. Good on you.


But that solves nothing,

Well, it does though, doesn't it.


and the people who are going to argue the opposite need to be convinced of why it is viable, and what needs to be done. Why is a rogue or a Bard with the right skills not a ranger? That is the challenge, and part of the reason it feels like such a real challenge, is because the ranger is designed to work in an anemic and weak section of DnD.

Not true, especially not after XgtE and TCE. But sure, it doesn't help when people claim that the Ranger isn't viable when they appearntly think they are. A bit weird, really.


That doesn't detract from their theme at all, it means that if we want to honor their theme, we need to work on the real issues.

Serious question, if that is your stance, why have you spent the last few days arguing that Rangers aren't viable, then?


Then you don't even understand the point of the example given.

You have failed to provide a point, if that's what you mean.


Goodberries become a meaninglessly easy resource for Druids. They can choose to have them whenever they want, and they have plenty of casting power outside of it.

A ranger has to choose them early on, with a highly limited spell selection, and they have to choose to give up a significant casting to utilize them.

Irrelevant for the actual effect of the actual goodberries.


That, to answer your literal question, are why Druid Goodberries are better than Ranger Goodberries. Because for druids it is basically a free emergency food supply whenever they want. And it isn't that for Rangers.

Well, that's just not true though, is it? There is literally nothing mechanically better about goodberries coming from a druid than goodberries coming from a ranger.

[Kane0]

Barbarians are objectively one of the best classes of the game.

This piqued my curiosity, could you elaborate?

[SpawnOfMorbo]

So is that due to the features or the identity?

Yes?

It's cyclical.

First, the Ranger, compared to the Fighter or Rogue, is comparing a specific class to two generalist classes so it's a bit unfair, but even compared to the Paladin, the Ranger comes up short and we see what the Ranger could be when their niche isn't a ribbon that can easily be replicated by many classes

(off topic: and I refused to be pulled into an argument with someone that doesn't understand context or what constitutes relevancy. Not you, but this is why I'm not responding to another in this thread)

The base Ranger needs to be more general to fit in with 5e. Even the Paladin, of all classes, is a generalist class. So far the Ranger is a specific class that is defined by a ribbon that doesn't have a lot of base rules to fall back on.

Base Ranger should probably be spell-less and then have 3 subclasses.

Hunter: Stays spell-less and focuses on martial combat, being a hybrid of Fighter and Rogue. Give it some reasons to go either stre gtg or dexterity (which the base Ranger tries to, at least).

Arcane casting: Elemental damage spells. Gain burningg hands, ice knife, and others to exploit the weakness of an enemy (that you know thanks to other class features).

Divine casting: Hunting/trapping spells. These can still do a bit of damage, like Dust Devil or Spike Growth but will be more about tactics.

Natural Explorer should have the terrain changeable during a long rest. At 6th level you get all terrains, cause like, you're awesome.

Favored Enemy should give information on weaknesses automatically but also be an action to learn things about a creature you see that aren't specifically chosen as your current favored enemies. Have it where you can change favored enemies during a long rest. You know the Battle Master and Master Mind features that let you figure out ability scores and stuff? Think those, but it doesn't take a minute, it takes an action (and later a bonus action @ level 6). The Ranger can look at a creature, size it up, and tell their allies what to focus on. You can tack this on to Primeval Awareness in some way, if you want, but I like keeping it non-magical. The ranger doesn't have ONE or TWO favored enemies, everyone is the Ranger's favored enemy. And if you're not, you will be if you make them mad.

Ok, you know what, I'm gonna have to just make this now. A ranger that fits within the current 5e landscape. The base class will be generalist, but will have a niche that relates to the biggest aspect of D&D, combat.

[Kane0]

Make sure to drop a link!

[stoutstien]

This piqued my curiosity, could you elaborate?

I'm also curious. Objectively I can't even say that barbarians are not even the best at being barbarians with the narrative and mechanical niche of being the super tough melee combatant that can overcome challenges with force.
Not to say that barbarians are bad or unplayable with the general high floor that 5e has but they pitter out early.

[Dienekes]

I'm also curious. Objectively I can't even say that barbarians are not even the best at being barbarians with the narrative and mechanical niche of being the super tough melee combatant that can overcome challenges with force.
Not to say that barbarians are bad or unplayable with the general high floor that 5e has but they pitter out early.

I do personally find it amusing that the Barbarian’s fluff is that they’re bigger, tougher, more naturally skilled than anyone else. ... But fighters get more ASIs so they’re actually more physically gifted from level 6 until 20th level.

Of course Fighters fluff is that they’re highly trained exceptionally skilled masters of war and only one of their subclasses seem to know how to do anything interesting with a weapon.

But then I have a lot of little finicky issues with 5es fluff and mechanics not quite aligning how I think they should align.

[Morty]

One thing with rangers that isn't brought up as much is their identity as a "skill class" and relationship to fighters. Namely, the fact that rangers can fight and have a bunch of survival, knowledge and nature abilities (pretending for a second they work), it reinforces the fighters' identity as big, dumb door-openers who need help to do anything that isn't breaking things. Though that's less of a problem with rangers and more the generally confused identity of what a class is supposed to mean, plus fighters being... like they are.

At any rate, if I were to do something with rangers and barbarians, I'd try one or more of the following:


Merge barbarians and rangers into one "wilder" class, with subclasses making them hunters, berserkers, etc. The less supernatural aspects of them can be subclasses of other classes.

Make barbarians into a more generic "vanguard" class that contains berserkers, martial artists and other mobile and aggressive warriors. This helps fighters be less generic too, as the "defender" class, like in 4E.

Make rangers focus on beastmastery.

Corollary to the above, merge rangers and druids into a "beastmaster" class.

Make rangers into a "monster hunter" class.

Make rangers into a more generic "smart warrior" class, that can include hunters.

[Chaosmancer]

Well, what you are doing is moving the goal post.

No, I'm not. From my very first post on this thread, I've been having the same conversation.

Sure, the OP asked the same question that has been asked a dozen times, and I'm not engaging in the classical responses to that question. I'm finding a new angle, one that hasn't been beaten to death a dozen times before. The goal post is still fixing the ranger's identity problem, I'm just approaching from a direction other than "yah huh, the ranger is a defined class" or "nuh uh, the rogue/Fighter can do everything a ranger can do"




You're being intellectually dishonest again. Numerous classes can do what the things you listed. That's rather the point of the game, that you don't have to play a specific class to do certain things. The Ranger as a concept has been around for at least as long as modern fantasy has been around. The fact that you can't figure out where they fit in (or rather, ignore all of the examples of where they do) is not the ranger's fault.

That is going to be your go to ad hominem isn't it? Accusing me of "intellectual dishonesty"? I guess at least it is better than accusing me of being unable to read.

I'm talking about classical archetypes. You don't have the famous spread of "A Fighter in Hell" right? Sure, they can fight fiends, and they can be good at it, but a Paladin is a classical archetypical enemy of fiends. And it shows through their design. That is why they have oaths, why they used to be limited to lawful good, they were the moral shield of the world against the forces of darkness. Same with rogues. Everyone can use skills (and the bard and the rogue share a lot of design space) but the rogue's design also pushes into the territory for how they are conceptualized. Being able to hide or disengage as a bonus action is a big deal for getting that slippery feel.

The problem with the ranger isn't that we can't conceptualize anything that their archetype should be able to do. It is that the game when applied as written puts their archetype up against a poorly made paper mache version of it. Sure, it is scary enough for commoners to go out into the wilderness, but every single adventurer is meant to do the same, so making Ranger's and Druids the masters of that realm leave them feeling weakened, because they are pitted against minor threats and much safer environments than their counterparts in the Cleric and the Paladin.

And this isn't an insurmountable problem, because 4e started to actually deal with this, with their inclusion of the the Great Spirits, the Feywild, and other such things.




Did you purposefully not read the entire thing? That was a response to your erronous claim that travelling safely is no big deal. I pointed out that your claim is incorrect. Also not sure why you are so fixated with level 9 characters, that is completely irrelevant to the topic at hand.

Ah wait, there it is. Yes, I can read. Yes, I did read it. Why do people always think that I would spend the hour or so on these long responses and not read the thread?

And I've explain why I am "fixated" on level 9 characters. Because people always present the issue as "Ranger's are needed to travel through the jungle safely" but a level 9 party, with any class, can wander the Jungle in relative safety. There is nothing there that can threaten them. This is why people can accuse the ranger of having nothing that a rogue with the right skills can't do, because the application of the Ranger's archetype is all low-level material like "don't get lost in the woods"




Sure, if by "missing the point" you mean "show that you are wrong". Saying that "rangers have no thematical place in a game about adventurers" because "jaguars aren't dangerous to a high level character" is like saying "paladins have no place in the game because a single zombie is no threat against a high level paladin". Yeah? So? And again with the fixation with 9th level characters...

No, you didn't prove me wrong by saying "but armies in the real world were killed by jungles". Again, don't care about armies, don't care about the real world. If you want to actually prove me wrong, give me a beast or plant that is a threat to a mid to high level party.

Because, you are right, a Mid level to high Level Paladin isn't threatened by a single zombie. How about a single lich though? A single vampire? A single Death Knight? Give me the equivalent, RAW, to those from the Beast or Plant categories. Give me the natural world's version of those enemies. Because I'm saying they don't exist, so pointing out how many people died of dysentery in South America doesn't really prove me wrong.




Well, I'd rather we stick to the topic at hand. Which, again, is the fact that Rangers have their place in D&D even though they might not be the best at absolutely everything.

Well, friend strawman, I never claimed they should be the best at absolutely everything. And I agree that Ranger's have their place in DnD.

My point is that their place is ill-defined, not because the ranger is ill-defined, but because literally the place they are supposed to stand in DnD is ill-defined. The assumption they are built on is flawed, so we need to fix those flaws for Ranger's to truly shine.




Not at all, I'm trying to get you back ontrack.

No, you are trying to make this a yes/no question, which is going to mire us in being unable to respond to the typical criticisms, because we will be ignoring one of the big problems with the ranger.




Again, this is in no way relevant to the discussion at hand.

Yes it was, as I explained.




Again, ignoring the arguments that doesn't fit your persnal narrative is intellectually dishonest. Yes, time pressure is a staple of the adventruing genre.

Not, it is actually intellectually honest to admit that time pressure, while one way, isn't a common factor. How many debates on the adventuring day long rest vs short rest have you had? I've seen dozens, and the time pressure argument comes up, and is discussed in the same manner.

The DM is the one who is going to tell the party how long it takes to get where they are going. You are placing the ranger's role directly into their hands to not only make a time pressure consistently, but to make it actually matter. Because if it is a week's travel, but the ranger can cut it down to three days... well, the DM planned on you taking a week or taking three days, either way, the ranger's ability isn't actually changing anything. Because if the DM gave you a time limit of 24 hours... then you fail either way.




Please stop being so rude. You are the one being hung up on just the one aspect of the ranger. Rangers are more than survive in the wilderness. And even if we take your flawed example ("at a certain point in the game everyone can survive in the widerness") that relies on the assumption that a) the game goes on for far enough that other character classes can compensate for their surviavlist shortcomings and b) ignoring the fact that the same premise goes for every class "at a certain point in the game everyone can stab people - so fighters are pointless" or "at a certain point of the game everyone can survive falling from the fifth floor - so monks or pointless". Do you get the point yet?

The guy constantly accusing me of being dishonest or not paying attention wants me to stop being rude the single time I said he seems to be half listening?


Anyways, you are taking my example and making it hyperbolic to make it seem stupid. From level 1 everyone can stab someone, that never made fighter's pointless. Even being able to use all armors, all shields and all weapons is shared between fighter's and paladins. Still never made fighters pointless, because Fighter's were designed to be more than those things.

But, here is the kicker, what else is a ranger designed to do, other than fight or do wilderness survival?

Look at the monk. They aren't the "fall from a great height" class. They are the unarmed combatant class. And, yes, everyone can punch an enemy, but the Monk is incredibly superior in clearly defined ways that really can't be replicated by other abilities.

But the ranger... can. Finding food and water without a check? A mid-level survival check does the same thing. Finding your way through the wilderness? Same thing. Their niche is being the Natural World's Martial, what the paladin is the cleric, the ranger is to the druid, but "be in nature" is something that can be trivially recreated by other classes. In part, because the challenges presented by that section of the game, are all anemic. An Outlander never gets lost and can find food and water for people without a check.

A ranger's niche isn't ill-defined because the ranger needs a new niche or because it can be swallowed by more generic concepts like fighter or rogue, it is ill-defined because the game hasn't focused on that aspect of the game world.




Except that it doesn't and again you are ignorig the parts that you don't like.

You mean like how DMs have people do stealth checks?




But it isn't a fighter, warlock, rogue or a bard. We've already covered time pressure.

Yes, time pressure has been covered. So stop bringing it up.




Well, luckily for you no-one has claimed that rangers or just wilderness survival, so you can stop fighting that windmill. ;) But I'm glad that you can admit that Rangers as aconcept are viable enouhg to warrant their own class in D&D.

See, this just shows you never understood my point. Because I was never arguing that they weren't a concept viable enough. Not from post 1. You just thought I was and seemingly weren't listening to what I had to say. So, maybe go back and read what I'm saying with this new perspective.




Please stop lying. I literally said that it was not about being better. And "Hiring an NPC" is an argument that works for every class.

I'm not lying. You literally saying it isn't about being better was why I said you are trying to make this about being better.

I'm arguing texture, and you are saying "but this isn't red" and I'm telling you it has nothing to do with color, you are trying to make it about being red or not. Saying, "I literally said it isn't red" just proves my point that you are trying to talk about a completely separate category and not engaging with what I'm trying to discuss.




Percieved mechanical shortcomings of the class doesn't not negate the suitability of the the class' theme.

Again, that is true. However, that is WHY people are attacking the theme. So, we need to address the mechanical shortcomings. If a paladin could be 90% recreated by doing a fighter with the acolyte background, then the same conversations would happen about them. But they can't, so their theme is accepted. My entire point is trying to address the root cause, so that the theme can stand firm.




Again, nothing of this is relevant for the topic at hand, no-one is claiming that rangers should only have a single niche (last time I checked they had what, seven? subclasses/niches) and moree importantly, saying that low-level threats aren't dangerous for higher-level parties goes for every kind of threat and every class. This might not be how you play the game, but many DMs up the threats according to the players level.

You are right, they do.

What sort of threats do you send against a high level party of rangers for their unique skills? A time pressure quest to forge through the wilderness? That is literally the same thing you sent them against at low levels.

This is literally my point. High Level threats designed specifically with rangers in mind don't exist, and that is a problem.




Well, you can also up the challenge by not homebrewing, just by, you know, throwing mor edangerous challenges at the players?

Like what? They don't exist in this space. That's what I'm talking about.





Please stop being intellectually dishonest. I am simply replying to what you are writing. If you fail to convey your point that's on you.

And since I keep responding to tell you how you are missing the point, maybe listen a bit and think about if you are missing the point.




First of all, all classes are viable from level 1 to 20. Do some classes have more spectucular features at certain levels than others? Yes. Does that invalidate the entire class? Of course it doesn't. Just compare bards' capstone with Barbarians'. Either way, for some reason you are the one fixating on level 9. Saying that "everything people use to defend rangers is LOW LEVEL" is simply false. You are the one stuck comparing low level ranger stuff with high level other classes stuff. The theme of the ranger goes through the whole run of class levels. Monster Slayers become progressively better at hunting monsters, Gloom Stalkers get gloomy-er, beast masters get cooler pets, etc. And guess what, that fits the theme of those kinds of rangers perfectly.

First off, you are objectively wrong about Beast Master Pets. Per Raw they may get some new abilities, but you can never get a dire wolf or a griffon as a Beast Master companion.

And, I didn't bring up most of the ranger features, you did to try and prove me wrong. But, what you actually need to prove me wrong is to show the challenges. So, what are the challenges that you send specifically against a high level ranger?

You mention monsters, but not a single thing the ranger has applies to monstrosities. It could be incredibly interesting to give them something that says "Treat all monstrosities as though they were Beasts for the purposes of spells and effects". That would make them far better at fighting monsters. PHB RAW instead gives rangers... the ability to use mud and leaves to make camouflage, or a poor man's version of a rogue's cunning action. It isn't until 18th level that high level ranger's get something befitting them... in an ability they have now partially given to the fighter and the rogue at levels 1 and respectively.

Again, I welcome you proving me wrong. Give me a challenge for a high level ranger, but I think you are going to have to move into enemies and scenarios that... any other martial class can handle much the same.




You do know that real world events and perils are often an inspiration for fiction, right? And that fiction is a way to deal with those events in ways we can't in the real world?

Being bit once by a massive poisonous snake like a King Cobra is very very likely to end in death for most people on Earth, without rapid medical attention and anti-venom.

That translates into a Giant Poisonous Snake in DnD. A CR 1/4 threat that cannot kill a 3rd level character in a single bite.

Yes, I am aware that fiction is inspired by real world events. But ignoring that the fictional world operates in such a way that real world problems stop becoming threats is just ridiculous. You can keep pretending like they are, but that isn't going to help you in anyway deal with the issues facing the ranger. It is pure "guy at the gym" fallacy.




And Batman can defeat Superman? Or some other irrelevant example?

And I'm the one being intellectually dishonest? You know my example wasn't irrelevant. The entire point I'm trying to make is mundane threats don't challenge mid to high level adventures. Pretending they do is foolish.




Must be a pretty boring game if nothing dangerous ever happens to anyone...

Of course dangerous things happen, they just don't come from the Jungle. I mean, sure, I could play the game where the party is on day 19 of walking through the jungle with limited food and water, but they are mid level characters, they aren't in danger and I'm just wasting everyone's time trying to win points for realism. You fast forward to the ancient temple where the ACTUAL threats are, and move on with the game. Because playing it out is just wasting people's time.




Well, that was the topic of the conversation so... But thanks for finally admitting that you are wrong. Good on you.


ROFLOL

Seriously, you have no idea what I'm trying to argue. I'm not admitting I'm wrong, because my argument has never been that the ranger lacks in thematic space. Stop thinking I'm attacking the ranger and read what I'm writing.




Well, it does though, doesn't it.

Now, it doesn't, because the ranger still has problems. It isn't being realized in a way that people are accepting. People are trying to replace it with fighters and rogues, and just saying "the ranger has a strong theme" doesn't rebutt their concerns.

Concerns we can ACTUALLY address, by seeing where one of the big problem points is.




Not true, especially not after XgtE and TCE. But sure, it doesn't help when people claim that the Ranger isn't viable when they appearntly think they are. A bit weird, really.

And what sort of DM options did XgtE and TCE give us for making the wilds more dangerous? What sort of high level beasts or nature spirits did they provide to give us a proper foil for rangers.

Oh, you were talking about the mechanical power of the class? That does nothing to address my concern, because I'm talking about the space in the world that the ranger is supposed to fit in.




Serious question, if that is your stance, why have you spent the last few days arguing that Rangers aren't viable, then?

I HAVEN'T

I've been arguing that the space set up for the ranger to operate in, Their villains, their environment, the things meant to challenge rangers were made lacking. The best people can come up with is going through the jungle and trying to find food.

Ranger's are an echo of Paladins. What is the ranger's equivalent of being transported to Hell? What is the Ranger's equivalent of a Lich?

If that was more filled out. If Ranger's were the enemies of Abominations and battled Fey and there were a lot of fey and ranger's had abilities to fight Abominations, then people wouldn't be going around trying to say that the Ranger could be replaced by a Fighter. And Ranger's are thematically perfect for that enemy. Defending the natural order and straddling the worlds of the wild and civilization is what they do. But what we need to do is make that space big enough to fit them.




You have failed to provide a point, if that's what you mean.

No, you have simply failed to understand. Too busy calling me dishonest and making personal attacks to get the point I'm trying to make.




Irrelevant for the actual effect of the actual goodberries.

Well, that's just not true though, is it? There is literally nothing mechanically better about goodberries coming from a druid than goodberries coming from a ranger.


You understand the concept of resource management. You understand the cost of a ranger giving up one of 3 spells (unless you want to give up spells of 2nd level or higher) for solving the problem of food. Something that a party in mid levels pretty much never has to worry about.

Druids give up a single spell for a single day, if they need it.

Ranger's give up 33% of their 1st level spells, 50% if you want decide that Hunter's Mark is a must have. And they do that permanently.

Sure, the mechanical effect of the spell is identical. That is why the cost of the Ranger's version makes the Druid's version better. Because they get the same effect, at a lower price.

[Kane0]

-Snip-

Okay so how about some of these:

- Search as a Bonus Action. Rangers are supposed to be skilled but in a different way to say, Rogues. Rogues are all about stealth, for Rangers it's something they can do but what they are really good at is tracking and finding. So we mirror Cunning Action. This also syncs up with their Find/Locate X spells and Primal/Primeval Awareness ability.

- Treat Oozes/Monstrocities as Beasts for the purposes of skills/spells. Ties in directly to what you were saying with threats from Beasts/Plants dying off during tiers 1-2. Maybe also treat fey, elementals and other creature types in a similar way in later tiers, especially if this ties into favored enemy (assuming it doesn't get rewritten or scrapped along the way).

- Genericized extra movement type and/or damage resistance based on Terrain you're currently in (which is to say, it's adaptable). Adds to Favored terrain in some respects that doesn't completely throw away the idea that Rangers ought to be good at exploration, and doesn't stop being relevant as levels progress.

- A Ranger version of the Battlemaster's Know Your Enemy and Mastermind's Insightful Manipulator, taking a minute to size up the AC, HP, two proficient saves/skills or one damage resistance/immunty/vulnerability of a creature. Make it take an action instead of a minute if the creature is a favored enemy even.

Of course certain existing things would have to be adjusted to fit this kind of thing in but hey, why not.

[Chaosmancer]

Okay so how about some of these:

- Search as a Bonus Action. Rangers are supposed to be skilled but in a different way to say, Rogues. Rogues are all about stealth, for Rangers it's something they can do but what they are really good at is tracking and finding. So we mirror Cunning Action. This also syncs up with their Find/Locate X spells and Primal/Primeval Awareness ability.


I like it in theory, problem is that Search is rarely ever used in combat. The Inquisitive Rogue gets the exact same ability, but it is often considered incredibly weak because of this exact reason.

Sure, RAW, it is decent, but when RAW comes up against SOP, it is important to understand how the game is actually played.


- Treat Oozes/Monstrocities as Beasts for the purposes of skills/spells. Ties in directly to what you were saying with threats from Beasts/Plants dying off during tiers 1-2. Maybe also treat fey, elementals and other creature types in a similar way in later tiers, especially if this ties into favored enemy (assuming it doesn't get rewritten or scrapped along the way).

I think this goes a big way to tying the ranger more closely with its proper theme. Right now, they can't really affect monstrosities, but making Monstrosities and such count as beasts could allow a Ranger to use Animal Friendship on a Purple Worm, for example.

Sure, any character can take Animal Handling and handle simple beasts. But as true master (like the ranger) can tame the untameable. They can speak with Wyverns, calm Rhemoraz's, communicate with Oozes.

Now, I'm not sure about Elementals or Fey. Some fey would make sense, like Blink Dogs, but Fey Lords like eladrin would be trickier. Elementals... honestly tend to feel more like a wizard thing sometimes. They are on that border. Sure, the "pure" elementals get tied to druids, but the Genies, Azer, Gargoyles, far more of a wizard and arcane role for them. So, I'm not sure how that should break.




- Genericized extra movement type and/or damage resistance based on Terrain you're currently in (which is to say, it's adaptable). Adds to Favored terrain in some respects that doesn't completely throw away the idea that Rangers ought to be good at exploration, and doesn't stop being relevant as levels progress.

Honestly? Tasha's Roving ability is one of the most Rangerly things I think I have ever had on a character. You gain +5 ft, and a swimming and climbing speed. Being the guy who just surges up a wall or a tree feels very much like a ranger, and it is 100% not tied to terrain.

And, terrain effects are tricky. They are situational, so they either have to be ribbons, or quite powerful. And neither way has seemed to work very well.




- A Ranger version of the Battlemaster's Know Your Enemy and Mastermind's Insightful Manipulator, taking a minute to size up the AC, HP, two proficient saves/skills or one damage resistance/immunty/vulnerability of a creature. Make it take an action instead of a minute if the creature is a favored enemy even.

Another thing that is good in theory, but never seems to come up or work in actual play. I've actually had to alter Know Your Enemy to make it useful. Most players don't need to know things like AC and HP, they become obvious in play and you don't make up a full action by knowing ahead of time. Most resistance/immunity/vulnerability are obvious.

Again, the idea is good, but that set of mechanics just doesn't work out the way the designers seemed to have wanted.



Of course certain existing things would have to be adjusted to fit this kind of thing in but hey, why not.


Exactly, but I think that the thing being missed is that we can't just change the ranger. No amount of changing the ranger is going to fix this problem on its own. We also need to expand the game in ways that highlight why the ranger can be useful. We need to think about how the ranger helps when not out in the wilderness, because everyone else's abilities work no matter where they are standing, which makes the ranger feel weaker, because if you put them in the wrong place, they ARE weaker. But, the things they are countering in the right place... aren't big enough threats or challenges to make up for being dependent on the terrain.

[Dienekes]

I like it in theory, problem is that Search is rarely ever used in combat. The Inquisitive Rogue gets the exact same ability, but it is often considered incredibly weak because of this exact reason.

Sure, RAW, it is decent, but when RAW comes up against SOP, it is important to understand how the game is actually played.

Mid-level ability to recognize enemies’ resistances and weaknesses?

Personally I’d also just change the Ranger’s terrain choice to: urban, wilderness, or dungeon and be done with it.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Alpha: the re-Niche Ranger

https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/RBQo63eVoWN2


Rearranged and threw some things together, built this with ideologies from Rogue, Monk, and Warlock... Weirdly enough.

Land's Stride got a small buff

HiPS got a small buff, it takes damage to mess up your camouflage.

Steel Will got a big buff and placed in the Core Class.

Vanish got a buff and made into the capstone. For Slayer was pretty bad... I turned it into a subclass feature that replicates the Warlock's Cha to damage (but more restrictive).


The biggest change is the Ranger's Niche. Finding food isn't the Ranger's niche, knowing enemies is the niche. Information is the name of the ranger, they know how to kill things and how not to try and kill things. Favored Enemy is more flexible and large but isn't a direct combat option, but if you have a creature as a favored enemy you can learn what they're best at and can change your tactics based on that. Now you don't have to wonder what a ranger can find out, you straight up know what a ranger can do.

Fighters still do more damage, rogues still do expertise and skills much better, but enemies? The Ranger can tell you HOW to kill something.

Favored Terrain becomes more flexible but not much of a change.

Tools? Cartographer's Tools, because, why doesn't the Ranger get these? It's basically the Rogue's thrives tools.

Might change the name of Etymology, but, I divorced the languages from favored enemy for a bit of flavor and so Favored Enemies can be switched around easier.

Needs more work, but, it's on the right track (tho, tbf, I haven't slept in a loooong time).

Gave a "Favored Enemy slot" column so that people can remember more easily how many they have since they may be switching from humanoids (2) to non-humanoids.

[Luccan]

I think if Natural Explorer and Favored Enemy gave more general bonuses based on which you chose, it could potentially solve a lot of issues. I wouldn't change how they work (other than collapsing Humanoid down to one category like with everything else), but instead add to them. Natural Explorer gets you one minor bonus applicable in some situations outside the specific environment you picked (but not all) and bonus spells like the non-PHB subclasses. You wouldn't get any more than those subclasses provide, just a choice of bonus spells known across a few levels as a result of having multiple favorite terrains. So the subclass lists would basically add to that, you can either pick your terrain spell or your subclass spell for a level. So Arctic, for instance, might make you acclimated to cold environments to not take penalties and would also have Arctic themed spells or maybe spells themed around surviving in arctic terrain.

Then Favored Enemy would add an ability for the specific enemy, then one than could be applied for generally. For instance Dragon could give you a bonus to all saves based on a dragon's natural abilities, so you'd get it for a Red Dragon's Frightful Presence but also for a Psuedodragon's poison. And then maybe a bonus against area damage effects generally, because the most common dragons have damaging breath attacks, but your Ranger knows how to apply that knowledge in other situations too. Humanoids would get the worst bonus for this one, since they would provide the best social/noncombat bonuses already.

I'd also change HiPS to not reset every time you move and throw some other limit on it.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

I think if Natural Explorer and Favored Enemy gave more general bonuses based on which you chose, it could potentially solve a lot of issues. I wouldn't change how they work (other than collapsing Humanoid down to one category like with everything else), but instead add to them. Natural Explorer gets you one minor bonus applicable in some situations outside the specific environment you picked (but not all) and bonus spells like the non-PHB subclasses. You wouldn't get any more than those subclasses provide, just a choice of bonus spells known across a few levels as a result of having multiple favorite terrains. So the subclass lists would basically add to that, you can either pick your terrain spell or your subclass spell for a level. So Arctic, for instance, might make you acclimated to cold environments to not take penalties and would also have Arctic themed spells or maybe spells themed around surviving in arctic terrain.

Then Favored Enemy would add an ability for the specific enemy, then one than could be applied for generally. For instance Dragon could give you a bonus to all saves based on a dragon's natural abilities, so you'd get it for a Red Dragon's Frightful Presence but also for a Psuedodragon's poison. And then maybe a bonus against area damage effects generally, because the most common dragons have damaging breath attacks, but your Ranger knows how to apply that knowledge in other situations too. Humanoids would get the worst bonus for this one, since they would provide the best social/noncombat bonuses already.

I'd also change HiPS to not reset every time you move and throw some other limit on it.

My alpha build of a Re-Niche Ranger makes Favored Enemy useful, but not directly combat related.

Also, HiPS needs to be reapplied if you get damaged. Plenty of ppl can wear camo and do stuff without needing to reapply the camo. There's already the qualifier for it only working when you aren't moving.


https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/RBQo63eVoWN2

[Luccan]

My alpha build of a Re-Niche Ranger makes Favored Enemy useful, but not directly combat related.

Also, HiPS needs to be reapplied if you get damaged. Plenty of ppl can wear camo and do stuff without needing to reapply the camo. There's already the qualifier for it only working when you aren't moving.

Ah, the link seems to be broken so I just shared some thoughts I had. I'm not surprised others have thought along similar lines.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Ah, the link seems to be broken so I just shared some thoughts I had. I'm not surprised others have thought along similar lines.



Homebrewery gets weird sometimes.


https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/RBQo63eVoWN2

[Chaosmancer]

Mid-level ability to recognize enemies’ resistances and weaknesses?

Personally I’d also just change the Ranger’s terrain choice to: urban, wilderness, or dungeon and be done with it.


Dang internet eating posts.

Anyways, that sort of ability might work, but it has never been done particularly well. Even the Monster Hunter's "Hunter's Sense" which does this as an action just isn't considered a very good ability, because most of the time the information is obvious.

Fire giants are immune to fire
White Dragons (ice dragons) are immune to ice.

There are some rare instances of it, like Frogemoths that could be useful, but it is a very niche and rarely used ability whenever it has been designed.



As to the terrains, not sure how "dungeon" is different than Urban, and then you are left with just two. I don't see the point in the terrain abilities.


---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------




https://homebrewery.naturalcrit.com/share/RBQo63eVoWN2


The biggest change is the Ranger's Niche. Finding food isn't the Ranger's niche, knowing enemies is the niche. Information is the name of the ranger, they know how to kill things and how not to try and kill things. Favored Enemy is more flexible and large but isn't a direct combat option, but if you have a creature as a favored enemy you can learn what they're best at and can change your tactics based on that. Now you don't have to wonder what a ranger can find out, you straight up know what a ranger can do.


Link is busted, but I am curious how you decided to do this. I can see this being a great direction for the ranger thematically, but mechanically, most monsters aren't complicated enough that you need actual information. So, I'm curious how you worked that abstraction in.

Edit: Oh, it is literally just information.

That just... isn't useful.

Like, say I take Giants as a favored enemy. Then I see a giant, I can learn that... it has a high strength and con? There isn't a lot I can do with that information, and ... I already knew it. It is a giant after all.

Sure, if there is some obscure Monstrosity or something this sort of stuff can be helpful, or if you need to hit things with spells like sleep or power word kill then the exact hp count is helpful, but... in general it just doesn't change anything the party is doing.

[Dienekes]

Dang internet eating posts.

Anyways, that sort of ability might work, but it has never been done particularly well. Even the Monster Hunter's "Hunter's Sense" which does this as an action just isn't considered a very good ability, because most of the time the information is obvious.

Fire giants are immune to fire
White Dragons (ice dragons) are immune to ice.

There are some rare instances of it, like Frogemoths that could be useful, but it is a very niche and rarely used ability whenever it has been designed.



As to the terrains, not sure how "dungeon" is different than Urban, and then you are left with just two. I don't see the point in the terrain abilities.

Well making it a Bonus Action instead of an Action is already a start. Advantage on all saving throws made by the target would be my theoretical second half. Either right away or as an upgrade after a few levels. You know this creature, you know and are prepared for all it's tricks.

That or combine with Hunter's Mark as the central ability to be upgraded, much like Warlock's Eldritch Blast. Giving a bunch of potential bonuses against whatever your quarry is.

[Sorinth]

I think the biggest reason this topic comes up so much for Ranger and not Paladin is because Paladins get a cool combat feature that nobody else does. Give the Ranger a unique combat feature on par with Smite and we'd stop seeing these threads.

In a sort of opposite but equal vein if Paladins are the kings of single target damage then Rangers should probably be the kings of AoE. Dealing with a horde of rampaging horde of monsters also fits quite well with the whole Frontier vibe as well.

I think to a degree they were on the right track with a number of spells and abilities such as Horde Breaker, Volley, Whirlwind Attack and spells like Hail of Thorns, Conjure Barrage, Conjure Volley. The features being unique to a sub-class (And the thematically less popular one), and the spells just not dealing enough damage just made everything kind of fall flat.

[SpawnOfMorbo]

Dang internet eating posts.

Anyways, that sort of ability might work, but it has never been done particularly well. Even the Monster Hunter's "Hunter's Sense" which does this as an action just isn't considered a very good ability, because most of the time the information is obvious.

Fire giants are immune to fire
White Dragons (ice dragons) are immune to ice.

There are some rare instances of it, like Frogemoths that could be useful, but it is a very niche and rarely used ability whenever it has been designed.



As to the terrains, not sure how "dungeon" is different than Urban, and then you are left with just two. I don't see the point in the terrain abilities.


---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------






Link is busted, but I am curious how you decided to do this. I can see this being a great direction for the ranger thematically, but mechanically, most monsters aren't complicated enough that you need actual information. So, I'm curious how you worked that abstraction in.

Edit: Oh, it is literally just information.

That just... isn't useful.

Like, say I take Giants as a favored enemy. Then I see a giant, I can learn that... it has a high strength and con? There isn't a lot I can do with that information, and ... I already knew it. It is a giant after all.

Sure, if there is some obscure Monstrosity or something this sort of stuff can be helpful, or if you need to hit things with spells like sleep or power word kill then the exact hp count is helpful, but... in general it just doesn't change anything the party is doing.

It's very useful.

Knowing what to target and with what can help casters not waste spells.

Now, if your DMs don't do a whole lot with enemies, then sure but with all the games I've played in, knowledge is power. Sure, giants are strong, but just looking at a lot of creatures isn't enough.

Casters don't need to be wasting spells, Fighters don't need to be grappling the wrong enemies, and knowing that a creature has a huge bonus to insight will keep things moving and you know not to try and lie to a creature.

Ever have a DM throw albino red dragons at ya? Having a Ranger be able to say, with 100% certainty, that it's a red dragon will save the Gnome Evoker's life (2e was fun).

If you need everything to be directly combat related you might as well throw away the Ranger and make it a Fighter/Rogue subclass and call it a day.

Taking your giant example... Yeah, giant strong, but do you know if that specific one has all their hit points? Special skill modifiers? What is it's resistances? Special attacks? How do you know if that Giant isn't a Psionic Giant?

Are you going to metagame?

How about something less extreme? 4 elves jump out of the woods, which one do you want to grapple? Which one do you cast a Wis save spell against? Which one has spellcasting and which one may be taking being a spellcaster?

Idk, my games are way more dynamic than "big = strong".

[PhoenixPhyre]

If I were to rebuild the ranger (which is not on my project list right now), it would be by doubling down on the primal identity. You're not just a dude who knows the woods/mountains/etc well. You've made friends with the spirits of nature. Not like a druid, who serves those forces. But as a friend, who keeps spirits as pets. Who bonds those spirits to his weapons and armor and the animals he encounters. And who invokes their aid to produce supernatural effects.

Things like
* Supernatural tracking. Place your hand on the ground and state a type of creature; you know where all of them are within X radius (where X is big). Increased to Y when you're in your favored terrain.
* Infused weaponry. Basically infuse spells into your weapons and armor. Instead of spending slots to do big bursts of damage (ie paladin smites), you're spending spell slots to produce long-lasting effects. Want to fly? Infuse an avian spirit into your armor. The bigger the slot, the longer the effect. Want to land like a cat? Infuse a cat spirit into your boots. Infusing elemental spirits into your weapon would add damage. Etc. Give a list of these things.
* Instead of having a specific enemy type, you'd pick a favored type. A type of spirit that you particularly bond with. Infusing the appropriate type of spirit would produce bigger bonuses.
* And other things I can't think of right now, but in the same vein.

--------------
This is in line with my own setting's canon on the nature of rangers and druids. Both make deals with kami (the animistic spirits of nature in everything, the most basic form of the fey). Druids make transactional ones, offering bits of self-energy (spell slots) in exchange for services. The spirits inhabit and channel the spell through the druid. And wildshape is trading a bit of energy to make a temporary body for a beast spirit and exchange his own for that one. The beast gets to experience physicality, while the druid's soul is safe in that temporary body and the spirit does the interface work.

Rangers, on the other hand, make spirits into pets. They bond with minor ones and attach them to their persons. That's why so much of ranger casting is equipment-based--they're infusing the spirits into those items temporarily. And the beastmaster's pet scales because they've attached its spirit to their own, sharing a link at the soul level.

[rel]

I find the cleric far more out of tone with the rest of the game.
Their grab bag of weird powers has no solid theme and the clerical archetype, Van Hellsing vampire hunter, has far less of a place in high fantasy than Aragorn or Conan.

[diplomancer]

I find the cleric far more out of tone with the rest of the game.
Their grab bag of weird powers has no solid theme and the clerical archetype, Van Hellsing vampire hunter, has far less of a place in high fantasy than Aragorn or Conan.

That's not the Clerical archetype; Van Helsing is closer to a Rogue or, in some respects, to a Monster Hunter. The Knights Templar, and, more generally, priests associated with the Crusades, are the clerical archetype.

[Asisreo1]

I think if Natural Explorer and Favored Enemy gave more general bonuses based on which you chose, it could potentially solve a lot of issues. I wouldn't change how they work (other than collapsing Humanoid down to one category like with everything else), but instead add to them. Natural Explorer gets you one minor bonus applicable in some situations outside the specific environment you picked (but not all) and bonus spells like the non-PHB subclasses.
In case you don't know what Natural Explorer's main trait is (not being sarcastic or hostile. Its a difficult rule), Natural Explorer gives you expertise on all int/wis skills related to your favored terrain.

For example, tracking down a horse in a desert with your FT being grasslands means you still get expertise because horses are related to the grasslands even in a desert. A ranger will easily recognize the species native to their environment even in snow, mud, sand, or soil.

So there are more general usage of Favored Enemy, they just are rarely understood as a part of the class features.

[rel]

That's not the Clerical archetype; Van Helsing is closer to a Rogue or, in some respects, to a Monster Hunter. The Knights Templar, and, more generally, priests associated with the Crusades, are the clerical archetype.

Turning undead is an explicit reference to Van Hellsing brandishing a cross to ward off Dracula. The original purpose of the cleric was to oppose vampires specifically, literally why the class was first added to D&D.

The archetype has certainly mutated over the decades and there are other influences but even now, the cleric is much more a Van Hellsing than the ranger is Aragorn

[Luccan]

In case you don't know what Natural Explorer's main trait is (not being sarcastic or hostile. Its a difficult rule), Natural Explorer gives you expertise on all int/wis skills related to your favored terrain.

For example, tracking down a horse in a desert with your FT being grasslands means you still get expertise because horses are related to the grasslands even in a desert. A ranger will easily recognize the species native to their environment even in snow, mud, sand, or soil.

So there are more general usage of Favored Enemy, they just are rarely understood as a part of the class features.

That is... not how I've seen anyone argue that should be ruled. It also seems rife for edge cases with weird exceptions and I'm gonna be honest "I can track horses through sand because I lived in grasslands" does not really make sense.

Edit: Seriously, exactly how loose can you get with "related to your favored terrain"? It seems like it would super exploitable if people played it that way, but again this is the first I'm seeing of this argument. Do you have any designer reference? Because it would be a pretty major misreading for a lot of people to make and no one on the D&D team ever commenting on it seems odd

[Morty]

Serious question: do rangers need favored enemy and favored terrain? Since I've seen people, both official designers and homebrewers, try to make them work for a while. But maybe an ability that can just stop working through no influence on the player's part just doesn't really work as a class feature.

[Asisreo1]

That is... not how I've seen anyone argue that should be ruled. It also seems rife for edge cases with weird exceptions and I'm gonna be honest "I can track horses through sand because I lived in grasslands" does not really make sense.

Edit: Seriously, exactly how loose can you get with "related to your favored terrain"? It seems like it would super exploitable if people played it that way, but again this is the first I'm seeing of this argument. Do you have any designer reference? Because it would be a pretty major misreading for a lot of people to make and no one on the D&D team ever commenting on it seems odd
I'm sure its still "dependent on the DM." But that interpretation is the ones me and my groups have ran with since the beginning of 5e and it widens the scope of the Ranger's abilities by alot so I don't see why it would be incorrect.

It would seem weird if someone lived in the grassland and could find a horse in a desert. But you didn't just "live" in the grassland, you are THE expert in grasslands. You'd have studied mostly every species, you'd have seen almost every plant, you'd have known of the common hazards and common survival techniques in this environment.

Think about it, if you were a grassland expert, you'd probably be able to apply some of your skills as long as they're related even if you aren't physically in the grassland. If I'm in a city and I see someone selling wheat and I want to know if its expired, it doesn't matter that I'm not physically in the grassland because I have enough wheat experience to instantly identify it.

[Luccan]

Serious question: do rangers need favored enemy and favored terrain? Since I've seen people, both official designers and homebrewers, try to make them work for a while. But maybe an ability that can just stop working through no influence on the player's part just doesn't really work as a class feature.

That's a fair point. Tasha's alternate features let you drop them entirely too and on my current Kobold Ranger I opted for those. This is why I proposed having them give you more general abilities based on the terrain or enemy. It gives the class some customisation that seems more in line with all Rangers being experts in different biomes and creatures.

One of the biggest problems with 5e's baseline ranger is that your primary base class abilities can simply be irrelevant to the adventure or even the campaign. There's no other class where this is the case. So you probably don't need natural explorer or favored enemy specifically, but I don't think there's anything wrong with fixing them up instead of replacing them.


I'm sure its still "dependent on the DM." But that interpretation is the ones me and my groups have ran with since the beginning of 5e and it widens the scope of the Ranger's abilities by alot so I don't see why it would be incorrect.

It would seem weird if someone lived in the grassland and could find a horse in a desert. But you didn't just "live" in the grassland, you are THE expert in grasslands. You'd have studied mostly every species, you'd have seen almost every plant, you'd have known of the common hazards and common survival techniques in this environment.

Think about it, if you were a grassland expert, you'd probably be able to apply some of your skills as long as they're related even if you aren't physically in the grassland. If I'm in a city and I see someone selling wheat and I want to know if its expired, it doesn't matter that I'm not physically in the grassland because I have enough wheat experience to instantly identify it.

It's a fine ruling if your table likes it, but I don't think it's going to find a lot of support. And while I said earlier it could be exploited, after some thought I'm not actually sure how much more useful this would actually be. Like, being able to track horses super well regardless of where you are actually seems like the most generally useful case, because your foes might use those. The freshness of grain just isn't generally relevant to the D&D experience. What exactly is arctic knowledge likely to do for me in this swamp? Or jungle to mountain? I'm actually turned around on it now where I think it might not still be enough. You have actual experience with this ruling: any more examples of how your table used it?

[Kane0]

-Linky-

Was broken earlier but managed to get in, not bad! Reckon you could start a homebrew thread so I can post thoughts without derailing here?


Serious question: do rangers need favored enemy and favored terrain? Since I've seen people, both official designers and homebrewers, try to make them work for a while. But maybe an ability that can just stop working through no influence on the player's part just doesn't really work as a class feature.

Nah not really, I've got some stuff in my sig and they basically dropped them.

[Morty]

That's a fair point. Tasha's alternate features let you drop them entirely too and on my current Kobold Ranger I opted for those. This is why I proposed having them give you more general abilities based on the terrain or enemy. It gives the class some customisation that seems more in line with all Rangers being experts in different biomes and creatures.

One of the biggest problems with 5e's baseline ranger is that your primary base class abilities can simply be irrelevant to the adventure or even the campaign. There's no other class where this is the case. So you probably don't need natural explorer or favored enemy specifically, but I don't think there's anything wrong with fixing them up instead of replacing them.

There's nothing wrong with fixing them, I just don't think it's likely to work and rangers are pretty crowded with features as it is, especially with Tasha's. At some point it becomes a better idea to prune things out and replace them with something more likely to work.



Nah not really, I've got some stuff in my sig and they basically dropped them.

4E and Pathfinder 2E likewise drop them from rangers... well, I think PF2E keeps favored terrain as a feat. I don't have a lot of good to say about PF2E, but this one move is pretty good.

[Droppeddead]

This piqued my curiosity, could you elaborate?

Sure. It's a very solid class with, if simple very effective mechanics. It has a wide selection of subclasses that cover a wide range of playstyles all (well, almost) all of which have very strong and interesting mechanics. The basic features (rage, reckless attack, danger sense) are useful from when you get them all the way to level 20. They have one of the best (and coolest) capstones and the subclasses also have very useful abilities (again, with some exceptions). What flaws and weaknesses the class have are pretty much entirely built in on purpose like lacking in ranged attacks and defence against magic. Even that can usually be mitigated with the right race (yuan-ti and half-elf zealots, looking at you!). Not the best class by far, but a very good one.


No, I'm not. From my very first post on this thread, I've been having the same conversation.

So you've been moving the goalpost from the beginning? Gotcha.


Sure, the OP asked the same question that has been asked a dozen times, and I'm not engaging in the classical responses to that question. I'm finding a new angle, one that hasn't been beaten to death a dozen times before. The goal post is still fixing the ranger's identity problem, I'm just approaching from a direction other than "yah huh, the ranger is a defined class" or "nuh uh, the rogue/Fighter can do everything a ranger can do"

Or as the French say "moving le goalpost". ;)


That is going to be your go to ad hominem isn't it? Accusing me of "intellectual dishonesty"? I guess at least it is better than accusing me of being unable to read.

Well, it's not really an ad hom since it is what you are doing.


I'm talking about classical archetypes. You don't have the famous spread of "A Fighter in Hell" right? Sure, they can fight fiends, and they can be good at it, but a Paladin is a classical archetypical enemy of fiends. And it shows through their design. That is why they have oaths, why they used to be limited to lawful good, they were the moral shield of the world against the forces of darkness. Same with rogues. Everyone can use skills (and the bard and the rogue share a lot of design space) but the rogue's design also pushes into the territory for how they are conceptualized. Being able to hide or disengage as a bonus action is a big deal for getting that slippery feel.

The problem with the ranger isn't that we can't conceptualize anything that their archetype should be able to do. It is that the game when applied as written puts their archetype up against a poorly made paper mache version of it. Sure, it is scary enough for commoners to go out into the wilderness, but every single adventurer is meant to do the same, so making Ranger's and Druids the masters of that realm leave them feeling weakened, because they are pitted against minor threats and much safer environments than their counterparts in the Cleric and the Paladin.

And this isn't an insurmountable problem, because 4e started to actually deal with this, with their inclusion of the the Great Spirits, the Feywild, and other such things.

No-one said it was an insurmountable problem. Rangers have worked (in this game and others) for as long as they have been around.


Ah wait, there it is. Yes, I can read. Yes, I did read it. Why do people always think that I would spend the hour or so on these long responses and not read the thread?

Well, your answer really doesn't make sense if you did.


And I've explain why I am "fixated" on level 9 characters. Because people always present the issue as "Ranger's are needed to travel through the jungle safely" but a level 9 party, with any class, can wander the Jungle in relative safety. There is nothing there that can threaten them. This is why people can accuse the ranger of having nothing that a rogue with the right skills can't do, because the application of the Ranger's archetype is all low-level material like "don't get lost in the woods"

Again, why do you assume everyone are playing 9th level characters and have rogues with the same skills as potential rangers? We can all come up with hypothetical scenarios where certain classes aren't needed. I usually play in games where the party doesn't include a cleric for example. Yet we still manage to survive! Well, except that one-shot where my rogue fell into a pit of lava...


No, you didn't prove me wrong by saying "but armies in the real world were killed by jungles". Again, don't care about armies, don't care about the real world. If you want to actually prove me wrong, give me a beast or plant that is a threat to a mid to high level party.

You not caring about arguments that doesn't fit your narrative is why I point out that you are being intellectually dishonest. And again, your highly specific hypothetical scenarios are completely irrelevant.


Because, you are right, a Mid level to high Level Paladin isn't threatened by a single zombie. How about a single lich though? A single vampire? A single Death Knight? Give me the equivalent, RAW, to those from the Beast or Plant categories. Give me the natural world's version of those enemies. Because I'm saying they don't exist, so pointing out how many people died of dysentery in South America doesn't really prove me wrong.

What makes you think that rangers are forced to only fight beasts and plants? This is a complete non sequitur and completely irrelevant to the dicsussion of whether or not rangers are valid as concept for their own class.


Well, friend strawman, I never claimed they should be the best at absolutely everything. And I agree that Ranger's have their place in DnD.

Good for you.


My point is that their place is ill-defined, not because the ranger is ill-defined, but because literally the place they are supposed to stand in DnD is ill-defined. The assumption they are built on is flawed, so we need to fix those flaws for Ranger's to truly shine.


And like has been pointed out, that is completely wrong on all accounts. But more importantly, that is completely off-topic.


No, you are trying to make this a yes/no question, which is going to mire us in being unable to respond to the typical criticisms, because we will be ignoring one of the big problems with the ranger.

Not ignoring anything.


Yes it was, as I explained.

Just because you keep on saying that, doesn't make it so.


Not, it is actually intellectually honest to admit that time pressure, while one way, isn't a common factor. How many debates on the adventuring day long rest vs short rest have you had? I've seen dozens, and the time pressure argument comes up, and is discussed in the same manner.

Well, it's not intellectually honest. Long versus short rests is also a different topic. Can we focus on this one, please.


The DM is the one who is going to tell the party how long it takes to get where they are going. You are placing the ranger's role directly into their hands to not only make a time pressure consistently, but to make it actually matter. Because if it is a week's travel, but the ranger can cut it down to three days... well, the DM planned on you taking a week or taking three days, either way, the ranger's ability isn't actually changing anything. Because if the DM gave you a time limit of 24 hours... then you fail either way.

And if you have a paladin in the party that can beat one lich and the DM throws twentyfive liches at you, you will also fail. Can you come up with something else than overblown hypothetical examples where the DM is deliberately trying to screw over the players?


The guy constantly accusing me of being dishonest or not paying attention wants me to stop being rude the single time I said he seems to be half listening?

Well, yes. Because you are and it would be nice of you to stop.


Anyways, you are taking my example and making it hyperbolic to make it seem stupid. From level 1 everyone can stab someone, that never made fighter's pointless. Even being able to use all armors, all shields and all weapons is shared between fighter's and paladins. Still never made fighters pointless, because Fighter's were designed to be more than those things.

If you think that your example was stupid it was so from the beginning, I just pointed the logical conclusions of said example.


But, here is the kicker, what else is a ranger designed to do, other than fight or do wilderness survival?

Doing ranger stuff. And there is enough ranger stuff to fill about 8 subclasses.


Look at the monk. They aren't the "fall from a great height" class. They are the unarmed combatant class. And, yes, everyone can punch an enemy, but the Monk is incredibly superior in clearly defined ways that really can't be replicated by other abilities.

Again, you don't have to be "superior" at anything to warrant your own class. And, funnily enough, one of the arguments for the monk being a weak class is that pretty much everything that the monks can do can easily be replicated by other abilities.


But the ranger... can. Finding food and water without a check? A mid-level survival check does the same thing. Finding your way through the wilderness? Same thing. Their niche is being the Natural World's Martial, what the paladin is the cleric, the ranger is to the druid, but "be in nature" is something that can be trivially recreated by other classes. In part, because the challenges presented by that section of the game, are all anemic. An Outlander never gets lost and can find food and water for people without a check.

Well, if you think that's all the ranger is, can I suggest you look at the other aspects of the class? Perhaps a ranger that isn't 9th level?


A ranger's niche isn't ill-defined because the ranger needs a new niche or because it can be swallowed by more generic concepts like fighter or rogue, it is ill-defined because the game hasn't focused on that aspect of the game world.

And this still doesn't mean that the ranger doesn't warrant its own class, funnily enough.


You mean like how DMs have people do stealth checks?

No, I mean like how your example was wrong since it didn't correspond with reality.


Yes, time pressure has been covered. So stop bringing it up.

Lol. I was replying to something you said. If you want to move on, please do. But don't complain that you get the same answers if you keep on bringing up the same things over and over.


See, this just shows you never understood my point. Because I was never arguing that they weren't a concept viable enough. Not from post 1. You just thought I was and seemingly weren't listening to what I had to say. So, maybe go back and read what I'm saying with this new perspective.

Again you are being rude. that's not nice. Me pointing out that you don't have a point is not the same as me not understanding it.


I'm not lying. You literally saying it isn't about being better was why I said you are trying to make this about being better.

Well, you were, and are.


I'm arguing texture, and you are saying "but this isn't red" and I'm telling you it has nothing to do with color, you are trying to make it about being red or not. Saying, "I literally said it isn't red" just proves my point that you are trying to talk about a completely separate category and not engaging with what I'm trying to discuss.

Well, you are correct in that you are arguing something that doesn't have to do with the original question. I'm just wondering why. "This car needs to be blue!" you say while the rest of us go "Yeah, sure, but we are talking about cake now?"


Again, that is true. However, that is WHY people are attacking the theme. So, we need to address the mechanical shortcomings. If a paladin could be 90% recreated by doing a fighter with the acolyte background, then the same conversations would happen about them. But they can't, so their theme is accepted. My entire point is trying to address the root cause, so that the theme can stand firm.

Not really. "How do we make the ranger better" is a completely different topic from "do rangers warrant their own class".


You are right, they do.

I know, thank you.


What sort of threats do you send against a high level party of rangers for their unique skills? A time pressure quest to forge through the wilderness? That is literally the same thing you sent them against at low levels.

Whatever kinds of threats that the DM feels like, just like with every other class. Are you seriously arguing "there are no high CR monsters that are specifically designed to counter rangers, therefor the rangers aren't viable"? Because that is a rather strange argument.


This is literally my point. High Level threats designed specifically with rangers in mind don't exist, and that is a problem.

Wow, you are. Right. Well, that's an easy one to answer. Any high level threat can be a danger to any class. see how easy that was?


Like what? They don't exist in this space. That's what I'm talking about.

The monster manual is full of things. Start there.


And since I keep responding to tell you how you are missing the point, maybe listen a bit and think about if you are missing the point.

Like I said, you not having a valid point is not the same as someone else missing it.


First off, you are objectively wrong about Beast Master Pets. Per Raw they may get some new abilities, but you can never get a dire wolf or a griffon as a Beast Master companion.

So I am, in fact, not objectively wrong? Or are you arguing that the only cool pets are dire wolves and griffons?


And, I didn't bring up most of the ranger features, you did to try and prove me wrong. But, what you actually need to prove me wrong is to show the challenges. So, what are the challenges that you send specifically against a high level ranger?

Actually I don't, since that is irrelevant. There doesn't need to be a specific obstacle that only rangers can defeat for the class to be viable. Why would there? There aren't for any other classes.


You mention monsters, but not a single thing the ranger has applies to monstrosities.

Uhm, do you really believe that the rangers abilities only work against beast? That you can't put Hunter's mark on, say a dragon or a drow? That's weird because in the PHB it gives dragons as a specific example for the feature "Favored enemy"...


It could be incredibly interesting to give them something that says "Treat all monstrosities as though they were Beasts for the purposes of spells and effects". That would make them far better at fighting monsters. PHB RAW instead gives rangers... the ability to use mud and leaves to make camouflage, or a poor man's version of a rogue's cunning action. It isn't until 18th level that high level ranger's get something befitting them... in an ability they have now partially given to the fighter and the rogue at levels 1 and respectively.

Again, do you think that Rangers are only allowed to use their abilities against beasts? Does that mean that, say a paladin or a cleric can't use their abilities against beasts?


Again, I welcome you proving me wrong. Give me a challenge for a high level ranger, but I think you are going to have to move into enemies and scenarios that... any other martial class can handle much the same.

Again, why does there have to be a specific anti-ranger challenge for the class to be viable? There aren't for any other class and most if not all of the other classes have overlapping abilities. It's a feature, not a bug.


Being bit once by a massive poisonous snake like a King Cobra is very very likely to end in death for most people on Earth, without rapid medical attention and anti-venom.

That translates into a Giant Poisonous Snake in DnD. A CR 1/4 threat that cannot kill a 3rd level character in a single bite.


Well, most people on Earth also can't throw fireballs, conjure a swarm of insects, find portals to other planes or anything else that D&D characters can do. Snakes can easily kill Commoners.


Yes, I am aware that fiction is inspired by real world events. But ignoring that the fictional world operates in such a way that real world problems stop becoming threats is just ridiculous. You can keep pretending like they are, but that isn't going to help you in anyway deal with the issues facing the ranger. It is pure "guy at the gym" fallacy.

Uhm, you are the one wanting to make the ranger the guy at the gym... That said, I'm not ignoring anything, I'm pointing out the thematics of the ranger class.


And I'm the one being intellectually dishonest?

Yes.


You know my example wasn't irrelevant.

No, it was.


The entire point I'm trying to make is mundane threats don't challenge mid to high level adventures. Pretending they do is foolish.

So you are arguing that easy challenges aren't challenging? Sure, and a single skeleton isn't a threat to a high level paladin. I guess that invalidates the paladin?


Of course dangerous things happen, they just don't come from the Jungle. I mean, sure, I could play the game where the party is on day 19 of walking through the jungle with limited food and water, but they are mid level characters, they aren't in danger and I'm just wasting everyone's time trying to win points for realism. You fast forward to the ancient temple where the ACTUAL threats are, and move on with the game. Because playing it out is just wasting people's time.

Again, just because you play the game in a certain way doesn't mean that everyone does. But then youre ignoring the fact that it can be a good thing to arrive at day 19 instead of day 26 and everything else that has been mentioned. But hey, you do you. But just realize that your personal playing style is irrelevant when it comes to the actual topic.


ROFLOL

Seriously, you have no idea what I'm trying to argue. I'm not admitting I'm wrong, because my argument has never been that the ranger lacks in thematic space. Stop thinking I'm attacking the ranger and read what I'm writing.

Too bad, then we could have moved forwards.


Now, it doesn't, because the ranger still has problems. It isn't being realized in a way that people are accepting. People are trying to replace it with fighters and rogues, and just saying "the ranger has a strong theme" doesn't rebutt their concerns.

Concerns we can ACTUALLY address, by seeing where one of the big problem points is.

Again, different topic, different thread. Remeber the cake?


And what sort of DM options did XgtE and TCE give us for making the wilds more dangerous? What sort of high level beasts or nature spirits did they provide to give us a proper foil for rangers.

Where does this notion that there has to be class-specific unique threats come from? It's not like there are for any other classes. Why just the ranger?


Oh, you were talking about the mechanical power of the class? That does nothing to address my concern, because I'm talking about the space in the world that the ranger is supposed to fit in.

But why do you ignore so much of that world, then?


I HAVEN'T

No need for allcaps. This is just a game, remember?


I've been arguing that the space set up for the ranger to operate in, Their villains, their environment, the things meant to challenge rangers were made lacking. The best people can come up with is going through the jungle and trying to find food.

No, that's perhaps the best that *you* can come up with. People who have been writing and playing ranger-esque characters have been able to come up with things for literally decades.


Ranger's are an echo of Paladins. What is the ranger's equivalent of being transported to Hell? What is the Ranger's equivalent of a Lich?

You do know that rangers can fight liches? And that not all paladins fight them?


If that was more filled out. If Ranger's were the enemies of Abominations and battled Fey and there were a lot of fey and ranger's had abilities to fight Abominations, then people wouldn't be going around trying to say that the Ranger could be replaced by a Fighter. And Ranger's are thematically perfect for that enemy. Defending the natural order and straddling the worlds of the wild and civilization is what they do. But what we need to do is make that space big enough to fit them.

Abilities? You mean like hunter's mark, favored enemy and primeval awareness? Or do you mean subclass specific features like the ones that, say Horizon Walkers, Fey Wanderers and Monster Slayers get?


No, you have simply failed to understand. Too busy calling me dishonest and making personal attacks to get the point I'm trying to make.

Again, you not having a point is not the same as people not getting it. Everything you have said has been answered.


You understand the concept of resource management. You understand the cost of a ranger giving up one of 3 spells (unless you want to give up spells of 2nd level or higher) for solving the problem of food. Something that a party in mid levels pretty much never has to worry about.

Druids give up a single spell for a single day, if they need it.

Ranger's give up 33% of their 1st level spells, 50% if you want decide that Hunter's Mark is a must have. And they do that permanently.

Sure, the mechanical effect of the spell is identical. That is why the cost of the Ranger's version makes the Druid's version better. Because they get the same effect, at a lower price.

Again, glad to see you can at least admit that you are wrong. Or are you playing some version of the game were druids always have goodberries prepared and never run out of spell slots? Is that an Unearthed Arcana perhaps? Because if you'd actually cared to take in what was being said, this wasn't a point about resource management.

[sophontteks]

While the need for a specific enemy to make a class viable seems irrelevent to me, there is an entire ranger subclass devoted specifically to fighting mindflayers and other horrors of the underdark. Another subclass is equipped to combat fey. Another for giants. Another for hordes. Another for threats from another plane.

There is definately a theme here that is being ignored.

[truemane]

Metamagic Mod: Closed for review