Ranger Tips?

[Trickster]

I'm soon to make a half-elven ranger since I'm now pretty sure I'm a one-man party.

Any tips or PrC's I should grab? I was thinking about multiclassing into rogue or factotum (If I can find the rulebook) i was thinking possibly arcane archer, because y'know, shooting stuff is fun but I want a fireball on the other end, not a point.

[Biggus]

Sniping is a good strategy for a solo character, soften up your opponents before you have to get into melee, makes you more survivable. The Woodland Archer feat (Races of the Wild p.154) is very handy for that, you can't take it until level 6 though. Deepwood Sniper (Masters of the Wild) is a decent prestige class if 3.0 material is available, I typically only take the first two levels though. If you take that you may want to also take the Power Critical feat (Complete Warrior) to take advantage of the enhanced criticals.

You'll also want a beefy animal companion to help with survival as a solo character. What level are you starting at?

Edit: Arcane Archer is rubbish except maybe for a two-level dip to get Imbue Arrow. If the Pathfinder version is available that's a lot better. What Arcane Class were you going to take to qualify for it?

[Trickster]

I read through and saw the woodland archer feat (Race's of the Wild) and plan to take it. I also saw the scout class (Complete Adventurer), which, along with the swift hunter feat (Complete Scoundrel) would allow me to take both classes up to 20 in some regards. Is that a good idea? It'll expand my skill list and hand me trapfinding.

I'll look at the Deepwood sniper. I'm not sure what familiar I'll grab, I was hoping the Dire wolf was an option cause I really wanted a badass mount for my half-elf

I think I may have missed the arcane class requirement for the Arcane Archer but if it's truly that bad I'll most likely just drop it entirely

[Inevitability]

Forrest has written a truly impressive and extensive guide on the 3.5 ranger: there's a lot here, and reading through the whole thing will probably just overwhelm you, but the appendix has some sample builds that might be helpful and it's also useful if you want to quickly see an educated opinion on a feat or class feature.

Scout/Ranger swift hunter builds are considered very solid. The traditional level distribution is scout 4 / ranger 16, which can get Swift Hunter for free at its fourth scout level, and I see no reason to stray from that. You can also go Scout 5 / Ranger 15 if you want to get Evasion twice so you can trade one of them away, but you'll end up down a point of BAB and a 2nd-level spell.

That said, note that if it's mostly trapfinding you're interested in, there's an ACF for rangers that exchanges their Track feat for Trapfinding and Disable Device as class skill (found in Dungeonscape). Another good ACF is Spiritual Connection from Complete Champion, which replaces Wild Empathy with the ability to straight-up talk to animals or plants 3/day.

[holbita]

Given that you want a fireball... have you thought about "Sword of the Arcane Order"? with that feat you can add wizard spells to your repertoire. Now... in my opinion you are not going to be able to make a good mixture of archer and spells with a ranger, specially so if you want to keep the animal companion, and if you are a one man party the animal companion I would value very highly as it means more actions per round and someone that can help you tank.

So you will need to decide, either you go sniper, in wich case I would say... check assassin, and if anything just take a bit of a ranger dip. Or check some of the more archery focused prc, but those would probably mean ignoring spellcasting.

Keep the animal companion, and take some of the druid prcs that progress spellcasting and animal companion together with Sword of the Arcane Order.

Check Mystic Ranger variant and Sword of the Arcane Order and go Ranger 10 and then multiclass, that would give you up to 5th level ranger and wizard spells with good progression, and also some archery feats, but you will lose animal companion.

Or just go full Ranger, it's the only way you are going to progress everything at once, but keep in mind that although you can really be a one man party this way, with trapfinding though an ACF, ranger and wizard spells up to 4th level, good BAB, animal companion, etc. it will probably be the weakest option as it will not specialize in any of these things, you will be a good jack-of-all-trades... but you know what they say, they are masters of none.

So think about what style you want and go for it.

Also... if you decide to go mounted charger instead of archer... a ranger does not need DEX for TWF, and if they take Oversized Two-Weapon Fighting and Dual Strike, they can actually charge and attack with 2 lances, that's a x6 to damage with spirited charge... on a class that can ignore DEX and go full STR. I thought that I would just mention some of the other ways to play ranger in case you only had them as archers in mind.

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

What level are you starting at, and what level do you reasonably expect to reach?

Swift Hunter is pretty good with Greater Manyshot, without that you can't easily get skirmish damage on multiple attacks. However, it's going to be difficult to get both that and Swift Hunter before 9th level. You need at least three Scout levels to get Swift Hunter, and you'll want six Ranger levels for the free Manyshot feat before taking Greater Manyshot. So probably get Swift Hunter at 6th level, Greater Manyshot at 9th as a Scout 3/ Ranger 6, not necessarily taken in that order.

Consider using Mystic Ranger from Dragon 336, you can just google 'Dragon 336 pdf' and find it hosted somewhere. That gets higher level spells from Ranger much sooner, and up to 5th level spells. Get the feat Sword of the Arcane Order from CoV, and you can prepare Wizard spells in your Ranger spell slots if you have a spellbook. Take the feat Magical Training in PGtF so you get a few Wizard cantrips and 0-level slots to cast them from, and a spellbook to prepare them from. You're now a spellcaster who prepares spells from a spellbook using the Wizard spell list, and per the Rules Compendium you can add more spells to that spellbook via the a method identical to what a Wizard uses. Sword of the Arcane Order requires Ranger 4, and Mystic Ranger delays your Endurance bonus feat to the 4th class level. If you make your character a Frostblood Half-Orc in Dragon Magic, you start with Endurance as a racial bonus feat with the caveat that if you would gain Endurance later, you can instead pick any feat you qualify for instead. This basically gives you Sword of the Arcane Order as a 4th level Ranger bonus feat. Use the Half-Humans and Humanlike Races variant in RoD p150 to count as a Humanoid (Human) instead of a Humanoid (Orc), which allows you to take Magical Training. If you pick up the fourth Scout level for the bonus feat, you can pick Endurance for that one and then swap it for any feat you qualify for instead.

I'd consider using the Wildshape Ranger variant as well. That would allow you to turn into a Fleshraker or similar if you get stuck in melee, use flying forms, turn into a rat or small snake to scout, use aquatic forms if needed, etc. That would put you behind on archery feats though, but if you can start with flaws for two extra feats it won't matter all that much.

[Trickster]

Okay, so far here's what I'm thinking: Simple Scout 4/ Ranger X. I'm going to abandon fireball arrows, in favor for the more Stealthy Druidic Warrior feel.

I'm grabbing scout so I don't fall behind in dungeons and such. Since I'm a one-man party I also want (Hopefully) two familiars/animal companions. A dire wolf and a hawk. The dire wolf for combat and riding. The hawk for flight based scouting and to emulate some of the divination spells like Scry.

I don't really want to go wild shape for this character concept but I'm liking my idea so far. I also plan to be an expert archer while also being able to hold me own in melee... I may turn out to me a jack of all trades but that may be what I need to do. Plus Rangers are hunters, I can still track down and kill anything I need to.

Edit: I'm starting at level one and am not sure what level I'm expecting to get too, so for suggesting purposes I'm expecting getting to level 20

[Inevitability]

I'm grabbing scout so I don't fall behind in dungeons and such. Since I'm a one-man party I also want (Hopefully) two familiars/animal companions. A dire wolf and a hawk. The dire wolf for combat and riding. The hawk for flight based scouting and to emulate some of the divination spells like Scry.

In that case, I suggest getting the dire wolf companion via the Wild Cohort feat (you can have a regular wolf from level 1, and then upgrade to dire wolf around level 11; maybe flavor it as a cub up until that point?

The hawk can be gained from your ranger levels, but instead of grabbing one with the regular animal companion ability, consider swapping that feature out for an Urban Companion, which gives a smarter, more familiar-like animal. It can talk to other hawks, it boosts your own Spot check by a total of +5 (+3 for being a hawk, +2 for granting you Alertness), and at level 13 you'll get the ability to Scry on it once per day, like you want to.

[holbita]

Have you checked peregrine runner? a shame you are set on elf already, but if you could convince your DM to bypass the race restriction, it's the perfect choice here as it provides skirmish and animal companion.

[Trickster]

In that case, I suggest getting the dire wolf companion via the Wild Cohort feat (you can have a regular wolf from level 1, and then upgrade to dire wolf around level 11; maybe flavor it as a cub up until that point?

The hawk can be gained from your ranger levels, but instead of grabbing one with the regular animal companion ability, consider swapping that feature out for an Urban Companion, which gives a smarter, more familiar-like animal. It can talk to other hawks, it boosts your own Spot check by a total of +5 (+3 for being a hawk, +2 for granting you Alertness), and at level 13 you'll get the ability to Scry on it once per day, like you want to.

Perfect I'll try my best to convince him

[Trickster]

Ok so, I've discovered Cloistered Cleric... So far my plan is start scout, take a 1 level dip Cloistered Cleric for knowledge, elf, and travel domains, then grab a level in ranger. So level three looks like: Scout 1/ Cloistered Cleric 1/ Ranger 1.

Then I'll take Scout to 4 and Ranger to 15, along with grabbing the familiars mentioned above. Opinions?

[Biffoniacus_Furiou]

Elf domain, trade the Knowledge domain for Knowledge Devotion, trade the Travel domain for Travel Devotion. The most economical way of enabling skirmish on a full attack is by using Travel Devotion. Also be sure to get one rank in each monster-identifying knowledge skill (arcana, dungeoneering, local, nature, religion, planes, psionics) and the Collector of Stories skill trick. This will make Knowledge Devotion always add at least +1 to your attack and damage rolls, possibly more. Also look at other skill tricks to see what's interesting/fitting.

[Trickster]

How do you trade a domain for a devotion?

Wouldn't, theme-wise, Animal devotion over Travel work better? It gives some pretty decent benefits.

[Inevitability]

How do you trade a domain for a devotion?

Complete Champion, page 53.

[liquidformat]

Wouldn't, theme-wise, Animal devotion over Travel work better? It gives some pretty decent benefits.

If you weren't doing a Swift Hunter build then sure Animal devotion would be a solid choice. However, Travel devotion is the backbone of Swift Hunter skirmish damage is dependent on being able to move and attack, so you either need Travel devotion so you can move and make full attacks or lion spirit totem barbarian and pounce charge everything. Those are the normal two ways to take advantage of swift hunter.

Also as far as theme goes, Animal devotion would be better theme wise if you were a wildshape ranger since the feat is based around you taking on animal characteristics not having animals.

[Jay R]

I know you need a lot of feats, but for a one-person party, there is very little as good as the Leadership feat -- you become a 2-person party.

[liquidformat]

I know you need a lot of feats, but for a one-person party, there is very little as good as the Leadership feat -- you become a 2-person party.

Its a great feat as long as your DM allows it, so be sure to run it by your DM.