At 1st level, it costs the Ranger’s action for the companion to attack at 5th level, the companion’s attack also grants the Ranger an attack at 11th level, the companion makes an additional attack with the Ranger’s action. The Beast Master, however, relies upon the animal companion, and suffers from an action economy nightmare. The Hunter Ranger is one of the weaker martials because of its lackluster non-combat abilities, but holds its own in combat with damage boosts from Hunter’s Mark and Colossus Slayer. The PHB version of the Ranger sits in an odd place as the middle ground of the Druid, Rogue, and Fighter flavors. The PHB Ranger’s combat output is either through tacked-on damage to each attack (Hunter’s Mark/Hunter’s Colossus Slayer) or in getting a third attack via companion (Beast Master). The Rogue’s Sneak Attack requires finesse weapons, but adds extra dice as she gains levels. The Paladin spends spell slots to amp up her damage. The Monk can get up to four attacks in a round, with weapon damage that scales as she levels. The Fighter gets a third (and fourth) Extra Attack with any weapon she chooses. These classes are defined by their use of a weapon as their main source of damage, and they are all balanced around their damage output per round, either through more attacks in a round or additional sources of damage. ![]() In order to understand the design changes of the Revised Ranger, it’s important to understand how 5th Edition balances martial classes (Barbarian, Fighter, Monk, Paladin, Ranger, and Rogue) in combat. It’s only available to one subclass, and it happens to be the single worst class in the game by a longshot. The last hope for the Ranger, his last One Cool Thing, is the animal companion. The Fighter has both trickiness and brute force in combat, the Paladin has better burst damage and party buffs, the Barbarian tanks, the Rogue dominates the Exploration pillar with its Expertise, and the Druid has identical-or-better wilderness and animal handling capabilities. As printed in the Player’s Handbook, the Ranger is a total mess it’s the weakest of the martial classes in combat, it lacks a niche, and its class-defining abilities are either useless, overshadowed by other classes, or simply less fun in practice than they should be. As we discussed on Total Party Thrill #18, I love the concept of the Ranger class in Dungeons & Dragons, but I’ve been disappointed with its implementation in 5th Edition. In previous Unearthed Arcana editions, they proposed new archetypes to mixed reception, but this one is actually a rebuild from level 1 to 20, with three subclasses: the Hunter Conclave, the Beast Conclave, and the Deep Stalker Conclave.įull disclosure: I’m a Ranger critic. This week, Wizards of the Coast released the much-awaited The Ranger, Revised Unearthed Arcana, in which they took the first pass at a truly redesigned Ranger class.
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