The Ranger

[Metallicus]

I keep starting games with other classes, but I always come back to the Ranger. It can be your fighter, your thief, your Druid and even a summoner all at once. I love the ability to range things down with the bow, but if you need to fight up close and personal the Ranger is still awesome. Hunter’s Mark adds damage to any attack. It is just the all-around, fun class I love.

The only other class I have done a complete EA game with is the thief.. I almost finished with a wizard once, but I really don’t care much for casters. Fighters are just too boring and really you won’t get much better than La’zel even if you make your own. I can’t get into Barbarians…I hate the ‘rage’ ability.

Doesn’t anyone else favor the Ranger?

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

I really love the Ranger too, but I kinda feel like the Druid (Wood Elf) kinda does it better. I mean, you get proficiency with a longbow as a Wood Elf, you get medium armor proficiency and shield proficiency as a Druid, and you have long and short sword proficiency. You can dual wield, particularly if you pick up Dual Wielder at level four, or you can play sword and board too. You can fire from range (longbow) and melee.

But as a Druid, you get more spell slots, and a few extra tricks up your sleeve. Like Thorn Whip, which can let you drag enemies closer (into melee range), or off of ledges, or use it to rake them across your Spike Growths. You also get Produce Flame, which is useful as a torch that you don't have to equip and remains regardless of what's in your hands, can be used as a weapon, and is also useful for igniting explosives.

You have access to thunder damage in the form of Thunderwave (and also good for knocking people off ledges, or making them take extra damage from Spike Growth). Radiant damage (and a really good moveable AoE) from Moonbeam. Fire damage from Flaming Sphere, Produce Flame and the flame sword spell.

You can heal. You have access to the same spells as the cleric does, Healing Word and Cure Wounds. I believe you also get access to Lesser Restoration.

You can buff. You get Longstrider, one of the most useful 1st level spells in the game, not only because it gives you +10 movement (and as a Wood Elf, this makes your already slightly better speed even better, but also stacks with other movement enhancers, like Crusher's Ring) and it lasts until your next long rest so you don't have to recast it every fight. It also doesn't require concentration. You get Jump, which unfortunately only lasts for 10 rounds, but it's still really good. You get Enhance Ability (I haven't actually used this yet, but I hear it's pretty good). Barkskin, but that one kinda sucks.

You can transform into animals, each of which can give you a different combat role. You can tank with bear, evade and hide with raven, spit spider webs with spider (and if you cast Flaming Sphere before you turn into a spider then you can spit those webs at the sphere and ignite them, essentially turning spider form into a napalm thrower), in addition to poisoning. The raven is immune to surface effects, so if you cast Spike Growth on top of some melee enemies and then shift into raven form, you can peck out their eyes as they try to wade their way through your thorns to get to you, and you take no damage from it.

As a Wood Elf, you're stealthy, so you can use ambush tactics, but you can also cast a concentration based spell like Moonbeam, and then Hide and just use your action to move it around on your turn.

You can Create Water, which is ridiculously useful right now with all the lightning charge based magic items they just added to the game (I actually just started a new Druid game with this build in mind).

Anyway, while I love both Rangers and Druids, in my experience the Druid can do almost everything the Ranger can with just slightly different stats. Their single target weapon attacks aren't as good, on account of not having Hunter's Mark, Ranger feature (such as Colossus Slayer), or a Fighting Style, but they more than make up for that in spell damage. The Ranger's spells are just so limited that I typically just use them for buffs (Longstrider) and maybe some concealment, like Fog Cloud, but little else. My Rangers tend to focus on archery and swords, while my Druids are insanely versatile and have all kinds of tricks up their sleeves. And they can fight too.

Of course, someday we'll be able to multiclass and play Ranger-Druids.

[Lax]

One thing I've underappreciated about the Ranger is how much HP the class can have. I wasn't aware of how tanky it can be if you choose to take it that way. First impressions, I just assumed that the Ranger was more a roughish type class. I'm still relativity new to the DND scene to know better. D10 hit die puts in on par with the Fighter and Palidan for health. Not bad.

https://roleplayersrespite.com/5e-hit-points-guide

[WeenerTuck813]

Ranger is bomb no doubt.

Thief rogue has to be the DPS king at the moment. Astarion has so much awesome synergy between that neck that gives him poison dmg when healed, bite, and 3 attacks each round + sneak attack.

At the moment, I still think Gith Wizard is king.

17 AC. Prof with Great swords, and Sword of Justice gives him 19 AC. Abjuration and Armor of Agathis gives him 22 temp Health that can be refreshed in-battle multiple times with AoA spell or SoJ Shield. Every time he’s hit he returns 10 cold damage, so he’s a walking melee killer swinging a 2H +1 Greatsword.

We’ll, then you factor in full Wizard casting, all the cleric/Druid spells.

If only I could find scrolls of Hex and Eldritch Blast lol

[stimpatch]

I was thinking a lot about this the other day and to be fair, all of the classes in Baldur's Gate 3 seem to be really well balanced so far. That is to say - I currently can't think of any class I would avoid playing because it feels under powered. That thought aside, I am definitely in agreement that Ranger is in a really good place right now. Between Hunter's Mark and Giant Slayer it's hard to find anyone dishing more ranged weapon damage short of maybe a Rogue, but even then there are times when you can lose the ability to sneak attack.

[Sir_Baldur]

Originally posted by WeenerTuck813:

Ranger is bomb no doubt.

Thief rogue has to be the DPS king at the moment. Astarion has so much awesome synergy between that neck that gives him poison dmg when healed, bite, and 3 attacks each round + sneak attack.

At the moment, I still think Gith Wizard is king.

17 AC. Prof with Great swords, and Sword of Justice gives him 19 AC. Abjuration and Armor of Agathis gives him 22 temp Health that can be refreshed in-battle multiple times with AoA spell or SoJ Shield. Every time he’s hit he returns 10 cold damage, so he’s a walking melee killer swinging a 2H +1 Greatsword.

We’ll, then you factor in full Wizard casting, all the cleric/Druid spells.

If only I could find scrolls of Hex and Eldritch Blast lol

At level 4, take Warlock Initiate as your feat and you've got Eldritch Blast.

For me, my only complaint about Rangers is the summoning. The graphics for it are horrible. I don't want to feel like a magical sailor-moon caster when playing a ranger. People who play a beast-master ranger tend to want a Pokemon like experience where you and your animal buddy kick ass and have a friendship. I can see this happening with the Owlbear cub, or the dog in BG3, but there is no magic or connection in the relationship if my summoning is arbitrary and graphically rendered like a "summon monster" spell, rather than using "speak with animals", rolling a animal handling check, and then bringing the animal into my life.

[Metallicus]

Originally posted by Sir_Baldur:

Originally posted by WeenerTuck813:

Ranger is bomb no doubt.

Thief rogue has to be the DPS king at the moment. Astarion has so much awesome synergy between that neck that gives him poison dmg when healed, bite, and 3 attacks each round + sneak attack.

At the moment, I still think Gith Wizard is king.

17 AC. Prof with Great swords, and Sword of Justice gives him 19 AC. Abjuration and Armor of Agathis gives him 22 temp Health that can be refreshed in-battle multiple times with AoA spell or SoJ Shield. Every time he’s hit he returns 10 cold damage, so he’s a walking melee killer swinging a 2H +1 Greatsword.

We’ll, then you factor in full Wizard casting, all the cleric/Druid spells.

If only I could find scrolls of Hex and Eldritch Blast lol

At level 4, take Warlock Initiate as your feat and you've got Eldritch Blast.

For me, my only complaint about Rangers is the summoning. The graphics for it are horrible. I don't want to feel like a magical sailor-moon caster when playing a ranger. People who play a beast-master ranger tend to want a Pokemon like experience where you and your animal buddy kick ass and have a friendship. I can see this happening with the Owlbear cub, or the dog in BG3, but there is no magic or connection in the relationship if my summoning is arbitrary and graphically rendered like a "summon monster" spell, rather than using "speak with animals", rolling a animal handling check, and then bringing the animal into my life.

That is an interesting point regarding the summons. I hadn’t considered that.

[Something completely different]

The ranger is generally considered the weakest class in 5E especially if you only use the PHB sub classes.
They can do a lot but they aren't the best at anything.

Their healing spells are sub par without healing word, more so if you use a bow which means you likely will be too far off to rush in and cast a heal.

They're good at archery but so is a rogue who can hide as a bonus action and then shoot with advantage for much more damage.

They can fight well in hand to hand but nowhere near as well as a fighter or barbarian.

Personally I do enjoy their style but I don't consider them op or even strong at all.

[Metallicus]

I enjoy being a jack of all trades when playing DnD. Being able to handle multiple situations is what I enjoy. I don’t game the meta. I play for fun.

[Something completely different]

As do I which makes the ranger a good pick for me as well but I'd not play a PHB ranger in a difficult pnp campaign such as CoS or the dungeon of the mad mage.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Originally posted by Something completely different:

The ranger is generally considered the weakest class in 5E especially if you only use the PHB sub classes.
They can do a lot but they aren't the best at anything.

Their healing spells are sub par without healing word, more so if you use a bow which means you likely will be too far off to rush in and cast a heal.

They're good at archery but so is a rogue who can hide as a bonus action and then shoot with advantage for much more damage.

They can fight well in hand to hand but nowhere near as well as a fighter or barbarian.

Personally I do enjoy their style but I don't consider them op or even strong at all.

When you're solo'ing, you don't have to be the "best" at anything, you just have to be "good enough" to pass. That's where hybrid utility classes like the Ranger and Druid come in. They are useful enough to get you by in so many situations that they are practically self-sufficient.

[jinath715]

Originally posted by Metallicus:

I keep starting games with other classes, but I always come back to the Ranger. It can be your fighter, your thief, your Druid and even a summoner all at once. I love the ability to range things down with the bow, but if you need to fight up close and personal the Ranger is still awesome. Hunter’s Mark adds damage to any attack. It is just the all-around, fun class I love.

The only other class I have done a complete EA game with is the thief.. I almost finished with a wizard once, but I really don’t care much for casters. Fighters are just too boring and really you won’t get much better than La’zel even if you make your own. I can’t get into Barbarians…I hate the ‘rage’ ability.

Doesn’t anyone else favor the Ranger?

Rangers have always been a very fun class to play in all of the previous D&D games (BG, BG2, IWD, and IWD2, Neverwinter Nights, etc...).

Rangers are probably the most balanced of all the game's classes and also represent the most desirable attributes of any good aligned character which most players can genuinely relate to IRL.

[Aldain]

Ranger got lucky in both BG3 and Solasta, vanilla 5e Ranger is...not so good.

Both games gave a few tweaks to the class and BOOM they're awesome.

[Metallicus]

Originally posted by Aldain:

Ranger got lucky in both BG3 and Solasta, vanilla 5e Ranger is...not so good.

Both games gave a few tweaks to the class and BOOM they're awesome.

I haven't played DnD for about 20 years. I have been exclusively a DM for a long time. When I played we still had 3.5 rules which were fun.

[Pan Darius Cassandra]

Originally posted by Metallicus:

Originally posted by Aldain:

Ranger got lucky in both BG3 and Solasta, vanilla 5e Ranger is...not so good.

Both games gave a few tweaks to the class and BOOM they're awesome.

I haven't played DnD for about 20 years. I have been exclusively a DM for a long time. When I played we still had 3.5 rules which were fun.

3.5 was the worst edition due to the lack of bounded accuracy.

[God King 069]

Originally posted by pandariuskairos:

Originally posted by Metallicus:

I haven't played DnD for about 20 years. I have been exclusively a DM for a long time. When I played we still had 3.5 rules which were fun.

3.5 was the worst edition due to the lack of bounded accuracy.

Let me sum up pandarius for everyone so you can just skip it from now on: 3.5 is the worst edition because of bounded accuracy, Alignment was the worst system ever created by D&D, Pathfinder=Mathfinder, Anything equating to people using realistic real life examples of things he sees not being 'diverse enough' = misogyny or racist.

You're welcome. Feel free to skip this from now on.