For those of you unfamiliar with The Monster Hunter series of games, you play a hunter who tracks down and kills exotic, dangerous, and often times massive monsters.
Then the hunter harvest the hides and body parts of their prey to craft stronger weapons and armor; allowing them to hunt larger and more dangerous monsters.
The monster hunters use a wide variety of weapon types and tools to get an edge in battle. Any magical effects they have access to is due to the gear crafted from the body parts of the monsters they hunt.
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TLDR
A warrior who specializes in killing strange and/or big beasts and uses crafting skills to make new gear.
A Ranger seems like a no brainer for the flavor. Probably using the Trapper Archetype. Slightly higher intelligence to handle the crafting skills.
What do you guys think would work?
Actually the best monster hunter is an inquisitor. Once they get Bane they can go nova like no other class. Judgments are also incredibly useful because they can give you what you need. If the monster is hard to hit you get a bonus to hit, if it has fire attacks you can get resistance to fire. Pretty much anything you need you have a judgment for. You also get spells including some of the very good buffs and a lot of useful spells like invisibility.
Take the feat Improved Monster Lore and a single point in each relevant knowledge will give you a good chance to identify the weakness of any monster.
Second the Inquisitor route. Bane is like strapping a +2 Greatsword to any weapon for the added damage. Add Judgement to that and BAM!
Actually the best monster hunter is an inquisitor. Once they get Bane they can go nova like no other class. Judgments are also incredibly useful because they can give you what you need. If the monster is hard to hit you get a bonus to hit, if it has fire attacks you can get resistance to fire. Pretty much anything you need you have a judgment for. You also get spells including some of the very good buffs and a lot of useful spells like invisibility.
Take the feat Improved Monster Lore and a single point in each relevant knowledge will give you a good chance to identify the weakness of any monster.
While a divine big game hunter certainly is intriguing, I think that particular concept is best left on the back burner for now. (Will definitely use for a later character.)
I think it would be prudent to think Non-magical means of hunting. Divine or otherwise.
Also to clarify, when i mention Monster Hunter, I mean Magical Beasts, Dragons, Dinosaurs, Dangerous Animals ect.
Looking up the knowledge skills. The ones that provide lore about the types of things he'd be hunting are are Arcana and Nature.
He'd need Craft {Weapons, Armor}. Possibly Craft (Leather) for the hides. Craft (Traps) possibly to help take down his quarry.
This is in addition to other skills that would be necessary in his chosen career field. (Perception, Survival)
So this guy is very skill happy. So he's either got a very high intelligence score, or a skill friendly class. that or frequently multiclasses.
Possible Ranger Ideas, (20 point buy)
Two Handed Weapon/Polearm Hunter
Level 1 Human Ranger [Trapper]
Str:17 (+2 racial)
Dex:14
Con:13
Int:14
Wis:12
Cha:8
Feats: Power Attack, Toughness
Traits: Courageous, Harvester (Trapper)
Skills:Climb +7, Craft (armor) +6, Craft (traps) +6, Craft (weapons) +6, Disable Device +7, Knowledge (arcana) +3, Knowledge (nature) +6, Perception +5 (+6 to locate traps), Survival +5 (+6 to track), Swim +7
Two-weapon/Double-Weapon Hunter
lvl 1 Human Ranger [Trapper]
Str:16 (+2 racial)
Dex:15
Con:13
Int:14
Wis:12
Cha:8
Feats: Two-Weapon Fighting, Two Weapon Defense or Exotic weapon Proficiency (Two Bladed Sword.)
Traits: Courageous, Harvester (Trapper)
Skills: Same as Above.
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Entertaining the Big Game Inquisitor.
lvl 1 Human Inquisitor of Kurgess
Str:16 (+2 racial)
Dex:15
Con:12
Int:13
Wis:14
Cha:8
Feats: Two Handed Thrower, Improved Monster lore or Point Blank Shot.
(Focuses on Spear and Javelin)
Traits: Courageous, Harvester (Trapper)
Skills:Craft (armor) +5, Craft (weapons) +5, Heal +6, Intimidate +0, Knowledge (arcana) +5 (+7 to identify the abilities and weaknesses of creatures), Knowledge (nature) +5 (+7 to identify the abilities and weaknesses of creatures), Perception +6, Profession (trapper) +3, Sense Motive +3, Spellcraft +5,
Spells: Create water, Daze, Light, Detect Magic, Cure Light Wounds, Know the Enemy.
Could be flavored as hunting challenging game as tribute to Kurgess.
You may also want to consider 3 levels of True Primitive Barbarian. Favored Terrain instead of Fast Movement ties in nicely with Ranger, but Illiteracy may be obnoxious depending on the campaign. Level 3 however, gets you Fetish Trophy, which sounds like a perfect fit flavor-wise.
Check out the Big Game Hunter Feat and the Trophy Hunter ranger archetype. Also possbly interesting Musket Master(gunslinger), or Huntmaster(cavalier), Death or Glory feat, Circling offense teamwork feat.
BTW Kobold press recently release a line of books about crafting items from special monster materials...
BTW Kobold press recently release a line of books about crafting items from special monster materials...
Exactly which books are we talking? I may have to forward them to my DM.