Bolts and Arrows – A Comprehensive Ranger Overview, Part 1: The Myths

Remember Fighter lacks spellcasting people, and Eldritch Knight ain’t enough

Ah, the first post outside of the expectations, and a large one at that. Now, Haen from Form of Dread has already done a pretty solid cover on the intricacies of Ranger, but I wanted to jump in and do my own.

Anyways, Ranger is, in the words of some big optimization blogs now, a very misunderstood class on terms of power. Once hailed as the worst class in the game, it is now seen as simply okay with Tasha’s features. However, all Tasha’s merely did was remove the ribbon features and add some more cool spells to the list. Ranger has, in fact, always been excellent, and at higher optimization levels of play, the only martial class that can keep up with what is presumed to be an otherwise all-caster party. This is for a number of features, which includes the subclasses, but those will come later. This post is to discuss the myths with the class.

With that, let’s discuss some of the common statements going against Ranger. This honestly will look and sound very similar to Haen’s, but that’s because the biggest complaints are generally the same.

“Just play Fighter with a bow!”

Probably one of the most common statements, also heavily popularized by a particular YouTuber (no shade on to them or anything, the videos are good and funny, and aren’t meant to be taken seriously). One of the huge things player miss with this statement is that (outside of the fact that it’s crossbow, not bow since bows are only used for default kills) Fighter is only matching up to Ranger’s martial side, and only raw martial ability at that, and is at best equal until Fighter finally gets their second Extra Attack at Level 11. And that’s all Fighter can do. Once we start factoring in other features, especially Ranger’s spellcasting (and subclasses, like I dunno, Gloom Stalker), Ranger exceeds Fighter’s capability with higher combat flexibility, control, and overall output. Oh, and Conjure Animals, the big gun spell in Ranger’s arsenal, which can outdamage even a max-level Fighter, comes in 2 levels before Fighter’s power spike if we don’t multiclass.

The tl;dr? Ranger is not just a Fighter with a Bow (Crossbow) – it’s way more than that, and the Fighter with a Bow? Left in the dust.

“But Ranger is bad because of X feature!”

A very big logical fallacy. Once again, Haen has already discussed the fallacy along many others here, but this particular one is very big for Ranger. Now, does Ranger have many bad and situational features? Yes, that is correct and not something I’ll try to say against. But what constitutes a bad class is not having good features. For example, let’s take Favored Enemy, a feature everyone knows is poor and situational. Now, put it on to a Bard. Did Bard suddenly become worse because of a bad feature? Hell no, Bard is still a very strong class and lost nothing in power. Or perhaps Haen’s example, where we place all the poor Ranger features on to Wizard. Has Wizard gotten weaker as a result of this? Ha, no.

As stated above, what makes a class bad is the lack of good features, not just having bad features. So, is Ranger lacking in good features? Far from it. Although Ranger is definitely a bit more barebones due to their bad features, they more than make up for it with the good ones (and Tasha’s smoothed out the bad ones anyways). Ranger has all the core things to be a good martial: Good hit die, good armor proficiencies, every weapon proficiency meaning it can used ranged weaponry effectively (wow, Ranger is good at range, who would’ve thought?), and Fighting Style with the most important Fighting Style, Archery. Oh, and gets an Extra Attack, as most martials do (Rogue will casually hide back around the corner. You’ll get your day, Rogue). This alone already creates a strong chassis that Fighter gets, allowing for a solid match in martial prowess (Fighter does notably have the better save proficiencies and gets a nova a little earlier though). Now throw on the other great feature: Spellcasting. Spellcasting, Spellcasting, Spellcasting. An incredible feature that separates true martials from the upper echelon of optimization. And, to top it off, Ranger has an incredible spell list, getting all the best parts of the Druid spell list (and more, with Tasha’s), and easily has the best spell list out of all the half-casters (Paladin has the worst). Outside of those though, the main Ranger progression is a bit thin, but that’s fine since good martial capabilities + Spellcasting make up for it. And that’s not accounting for the subclasses.

“Ranger is MAD and needs to stretch its ability scores!”

Another common statement, one that also extends to Paladin and a handful of the true martial subclasses. However, at least for Ranger, this is untrue for one reason: Ranger’s best spells are from the Druid spell list. Now, why does this mean Ranger isn’t MAD (Multiple Attribute Dependent)? Druid’s best spells rely very little on spellcasting ability, and the good ones that have save effects don’t rely on the save effects to be good. These spells include Conjure Animals, Pass Without Trace, Goodberry, Aid, Entangle, Spike Growth, and so on. These sound familiar? They’re on the Ranger spell list too. So, as with the Druid not needing to worry too heavily about Wisdom, usually getting it to 16 and either bumping it up very later on or not at all (and can even be lower if multiclassing), Ranger can simply leave their Wisdom at a 15 or 16 at character creation and be done with, never touching the score again outside of probably Resilient (Wisdom) down the line for Wisdom save proficiency in the later portions of the game. This leaves quite a bit open for the other scores Ranger uses, which are Dexterity and Constitution. Ranger’s lack of reliance on spellcasting score means that it doesn’t need to invest heavily into Wisdom, and as a result has way more to spare for the other two stats that Ranger uses.

As a side note, I find it funny how the primary stats Ranger uses (DEX, CON, WIS)) also so happen to be some of the more important stats in the game: DEX is the primary weapon attack score for many martial characters, and getting it to 14 is important for a fullcaster to maximize half-plate. CON is for general saves you’d hate to fail, like poison, and most importantly to a caster, Concentration. WIS is for mental saves, which while already devastating, can outright kill in higher levels if not properly protected.

“But why should I waste 2 feats just on Crossbow Expert and Sharpshooter?”

Actually, this is just more of a general one that also applies to Fighter and Rogue. Martials are generally at a big disadvantage compared to casters, it’s a very well-known and disputed topic. So, what is the best way to at least try and keep up? By doing your job as a martial and do more damage. However, that’s pretty difficult without certain feats, since lack of a bonus action attack and power attack means that your DPR is going to leave a lot to be desired.

Let’s take a subclassless Fighter using a Hand Crossbow at Level 5. The Fighter started with a 16 DEX and rushed to 18 at Level 4, and took the Archery Fighting Style at Level 2. Average enemy AC at this level is 14, and the Fighter has a +9 to hit (2 from Archery, 4 from DEX, 3 from Proficiency Bonus). This Fighter on average does 12.35 DPR (2 attacks, 1d6 damage die from Hand Crossbow, +4 from DEX). Not terrible, but not the greatest either (and this isn’t even actually possible as you can only make at most one attack per turn with any crossbow without Crossbow Expert or the Repeated Shot infusion due to the Loading property.)

What about our oft quoted Fighter with a Bow? A small increase, becoming 14.05 DPR (2 attacks, 1d8 damage die from Longbow, +4 from DEX). So, clearly not much better.

Now, how about a Fighter with a Hand Crossbow, and Crossbow Expert alone. 18.525 average DPR (3 attacks, 1d6 damage die from Hand Crossbow, +4 from DEX). Already you can see a clear improvement, just from having a bonus action attack – and before Level 5, this would’ve been an even bigger DPR increase since you’d have 2 attacks instead of 1.

Lastly, let’s do Crossbow Expert + Sharpshooter with a Hand Crossbow. and the Fighter didn’t get to 18 DEX at level 4, instead taking Sharpshooter: 25.275 DPR. That’s a massive increase, even though you only have a +3 to hit due to the -5 penalty from the power attack. More than just a +2 DEX.

As you can tell, these 2 feats have greatly increased the Fighter’s damage output, and would do the same to Ranger and Rogue (Monk unfortunately does not get martial weapon proficiency, and Paladin and Barbarian are so STR-based that they’re kinda shoehorned into melee). The same logic here applies to Polearm Master + Great Weapon Master in the case of a melee-oriented character, mainly Barbarian. So yes, investment into a bonus action attack feat and a power attack feat is very worth it.

As for how you get these feats before level 8, it’s through the only races that matter for martials,: The free feat races, AKA Variant Human and Custom Lineage. Any other race that does not grant a free feat at Level 1, or isn’t Volo’s Kobold, is pushed way out. There are the racial flight ones, but if those are allowed, you’d be better off playing a caster, not a martial. Now, of course if the DM uses the very popular homebrew rule of free feat at Level 1 and doesn’t restrict feats, specifically the bonus action attack and power attack ones, then sure, your race choices open up greatly, though Volo’s Kobold and racial flight races still dominate.

All DPR calculations here done by LudicSavant’s and AureusFulgen’s DPR Calculator. It’s very comprehensive.

“Ranger needs to spend their concentration on Hunter’s Mark so they can do good damage!”

Well, seeing as how the whole thing about damage has already been picked apart, this statement basically doesn’t work out anymore. In addition, Hunter’s Mark is a poor spell and is not a significant DPR increase, and eats up your bonus action, a bonus action that could’ve been spent on another Hand Crossbow attack with Crossbow Expert + Sharpshooter. And of course, it takes up your concentration and expends valuable spell slots, preventing you from using and concentrating on more valuable spells at its level, like Fog Cloud or Entangle, or for defensive spells like Absorb Elements. Expending spell slots just for Hunter’s Mark also means less leftover spell slots to rest cast Goodberry or Aid. Granted, you could say expending any spell does the same, but it’s even more impactful with Hunter’s Mark since you’re burning a spell slot for a spell that doesn’t have any meaningful effects and eats up your concentration. A rather intelligent Kobold has covered this topic here.

*Something about Summons*

This is split into a couple parts. The first is regarding the fragility of summons in general. While summons can certainly be fragile, it’s all about overwhelming the action economy, which Conjure Animals excels at. 8 creatures is quite a bit to get through, and may require the target to drop an AoE effect if they even have one, and very often must get dangerously close or even within their own area of effect since Conjure Animals summons are usually right up in the target’s face. In addition, if the target needs to attack the summons, they are not targeting anyone in the party – and there’s 8 summons for them to get through (or a little less, if you summoned something like Giant Snails or Dragonflies in order to just have a wall of flesh, but those make up with larger HP pools and/or a ton of Dodge spam). Multiple summons means a large effective HP pool and more time the target needs to spend clearing them out. And what if they ignore the summons and try to go after the players? Let’s just say being on the receiving end of 8 Velociraptors for 2 rounds isn’t healthy for any enemy.

The second is action economy. This one actually is a fair argument, since RAW summons from Conjure Animals have their own initiative, and can bog down the pace of combat. There are solutions both the DM and player can do to counter this. The DM can houserule that the summons take their turn directly after the players, speeding up combat. This is a houserule though, which not every DM will do. The player on the other hand, can do plenty: Plan the creatures’ actions before their turns, create macros for the major creatures they plan to use, and preemptively prepare tokens or miniatures to place down. (For macros if you use a virtual tabletop like Roll20, TreantMonk has a document with macros here).

The third regards damage output from summons. Haen from Form of Dread has covered this in a smarter way than I ever could to be frank, so read article, which was linked at the start. Outside of that, all I can really say is: Go for hordes over singular summons. Action economy overwhelms enemies.

Lastly is that the DM picks the summons. While this can certainly screw you over, remember to always talk with the DM about summoning spells, and remember to read summoning spells clearly (or just read spells clearly in general). Put together a list of summons that you’d like to use that the DM won’t ban and discuss it with them – be reasonable, and don’t press for one particular summon, the DM already has enough on their hands as is. Preferably, the DM isn’t trying to ruin the fun for the players and will be accepting so long as you discuss your summons. If the DM is adversial however, then yeah, you do lose your big gun spell as a Ranger and likely shouldn’t play one, or a Druid for that matter since it’s also the big gun spell for Druids! That said, Rangers and Druids still have plenty of excellent spells to work with, and can continue to contribute well, though the loss of Conjure Animals is certainly a hard hit (more so for Druid since they get Conjure Animals way earlier).

Now, one concern is when Conjure Animals is met with creatures resistant or immune to nonmagical damage. This is certainly an issue, but if that’s an enemy you come across, you’ll probably know very quickly and can expend your spell slots on a control spell instead – or do a 6-level dip into Druid for Shepherd. Druid dips in general are common for Ranger since more ammunition for spells is good, and a 6-level dip into Druid for Shepherd’s 6th-level feature is worth it to maintain the incredible output of Conjure Animals.

Conclusion

In short, Ranger is a good class that is above the stigma it has received, and can contribute very effectively. The next article will go over the base class, discussing each of the features. I’m in for a long ride with this one.

With that, I hope this article has been a good start. I’m very excited to continue this.

– Mistral Umaimon

God this looks like I just straight up copied Haen. I guess it kind of is.