Try all of those things? A Curveblade main, bow for ranged needs, then TWF or sword and board back up? How is this outside the realm of possibility with the vast number of feats a fighter gets?I could build an Elven Curveblade wielding fighter in Mithral full plate with power attack and weapon finesse that still posts good numbers for damage, would have a good to hit with a bow, could choose to TWF, or go sword and board with a scimitar.Is that actually a good idea though? To try and do all of those things at once?
I didn't ask if he could, I asked if its a good idea. Very different things.
A ranger could also get all of TWF line(3), pick up a bow and maybe drop some feats into it, and grab finesse, power attack and deadly aim(3). In fact he could use his ability to skip prerequisites to possibly open up a wider selection of stat arrays, though I wouldn't advise it if for some reason you wanted finesse since none of those builds are dexterity to damage but you'll want more dexterity than strength to benefit from finesse and your bow is still dex to attack.
There is more to Handle Animal than some of you are stating.
How often do you need to push? Is it necessary? If not then you don't really need much if any more than +9. You can take 10 on teaching or training and the DC is 15 or 20. Its also +2 to the DC if the creature is injured or taken some sort of ability or non-lethal damage. At worst you'll want +10 total to take 10 on certain tricks, but you could also grab a masterwork tool to increase it by another two for some purpose, or an ioun stone for one or just drop more points into it. Bonus tricks also come free.
Its also still of course, arguing semantics about a feature that comes free and won't turn against you, or at least not often and to be honest dominate person comes online before dominate monster for instance. The fighter doesn't get one as a class feature. Supposing the fighter is what your supposed to be comparing him too, it might help to actually talk about the ranger compared to him and what merits he has over the fighter instead of trying to downplay things the ranger gets.
The ranger is also bound to the style feats he picks. A fighter can choose any style.
Actually a ranger can pick any style available to him(crossbow, archery, Sword and board, mounted, TWF, THF, natural atm, more coming in ACG supposedly), but his bonus feats just go to one style. He can put his other feats wherever he wants though. One of the first ideas for using the skip prereqs thing that caught on was the switch hitter, a guy who put his bonus feats into archery for distance but pumped his strength and used a two handed up close after people closed in.
The point is that a fighter had enough feats to take power attack, weapon finesse, feats to be useful with a bow when needed and feats to be useful as a TWF or a sword and board back up. I didn't say anything more.
Why would someone want to use TWF, THF, Finesse, and pump all their feats into bow? Could a ranger not pick up power attack/deadly aim, weapon finesse, all 3 TWF feats, and pull out the shield when he feels like it?
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A ranger gets 10 feats like everyone else from levels and 5 bonus feats. A fighter gains 11 bonus feats. 6 more. The ranger is also bound to the style feats he picks. A fighter can choose any style.
He has 5 more. LTR. Just because the Ranger's are laid out for him doesn't make them not feats. And since he can skip prereqs, he's actually a better switch hitter than a Fighter. He can grab several critical higher level feats before the Fighter can possibly have them, and none of his class abilities lock him into a specific weapon or weapon group like the Fighter so he's actually more versatile. On top of that he's got 3x the skills, twice the saves, better "boosters" (evasion kicks the crap out of core Bravery), and limited spell casting, which means if he's prepared for the fight or taking the enemy by surprise (much more likely for him than the Fighter) he's got a substantial edge, since the Fighter's only real advantage after 4th or 5th level is that his smaller bonuses don't have time limits or action economy costs.
The subject is "is the Ranger really better than the Fighter" and that's the subject I've been talking about.
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To be fair, you can't really compare the ranger to the fighter (as they seem to be completely different from each other, in my opinion at least) the ranger specialises in attacking from either afar or up close and gaining an advantage against certain foes and in certain areas (due to their 'favoured enemy/terrain' abilities) whereas the fighter can attack at either range fluidly and treat all enemies and terrain equally.
Both classes have pros and cons (I, for example, always roleplay as a bard so I need to remember that I am at my strongest outside of combat), so it really does boil down to character comfortability always play a character that 'feels good' rather than because of high stats.
Hope this ultimately helps guys! :-)
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For the sake of easing discussion, this is what both classes gain laid out simply.
Both Ranger and Fighter
- d10 HD & Full BAB
- Martial proficiency, medium armor proficiency, shield proficiency
- Good Fort
Fighter
- 2 skill points & 10 class skills
- Heavy armor proficiency, tower shield proficiency
- 11 bonus feats (must be Combat feats)
- Access to Fighter feats (unfortunately, most are underwhelming like Weapon Specialization and Spellbreaker)
- +5 to saves vs Fear effects
- -4 ACP & +4 Max Dex of armor, unencumbered movement in medium and heavy armor
- +4 hit/damage with 1 weapon group, +3 with a 2nd, +2 with a 3rd, etc
- DR 5/- while wearing armor or using a shield
- Automatically confirm criticals with a +1 multiplier with a specific weapon
Ranger
- 6 skill points & 15 class skills (includes Stealth, Perception, and Spellcraft)
- Strong Reflex saves
- +10 to Survival checks to track
- 5 bonus feats from a list specific to what you want (ignore prerequisites), Endurance as a bonus feat (5 less than Fighters)
- 5 favored enemies, one of which caps out at +10/+10 to hit, damage, Bluff, Knowledge to identify, Perception, Sense Motive, and Survival
- 4 favored terrains, one of which caps out at +8 to Knowledge (geography), Perception, Stealth, and Survival- as well as being untrackable
- Either the ability to share 1/2 of their favored enemy bonuses with allies as a move action or a -3 Druid level animal companion (which can be brought up to full level by expending a feat) that benefits from its master's favored enemies and favored terrains
- Ignore undergrowth movement penalties
- Swift Tracker (track at normal speed without penalty or -10 penalty at double speed)
- Evasion & Improved Evasion
- Quarry (+2 Insight to hit and automatic critical confirmation against a favored enemy target, assigned as a standrad action - 1 hour cooldown)
- Camouflage & Hide in Plain Sight (hide without cover/concealment and while being observed)
- Improved Quarry (take 20 while tracking without slowing down, +4 to hit, assigned as a free action - 10 minute cooldown)
- Master Hunter (DC 20+Wis Save or Die against each favored enemy)
- 4 levels of spellcasting (includes effects such as longstrider which match Armor Training's movement benefit, delay poison, resist energy, and instant enemy, and allows usage of CLW wands without investing in UMD or risking failure)
What Fighters have that Rangers don't
- Heavy armor proficiency and tower shield proficiency
- 5 bonus feats (must be combat feats)
- Access to Fighter feats
- +5 to saves vs Fear
- -4 ACP & +4 Max Dex of armor, unencumbered movement in medium and heavy armor
- +4 hit/damage with 1 weapon group, +3 with a 2nd, +2 with a 3rd, etc
- DR 5/- while wearing armor or using a shield
- Automatically confirm criticals with a +1 multiplier on a specific weapon
What Rangers have that Fighters don't
- 4 extra skill points & 5 extra class skills (including excellent skills like Stealth, Perception, and Spellcraft)
- Strong Reflex
- +10 to Survival checks to track
- 5 bonus feats from a list specific to what you want (ignore prerequisites), Endurance as a bonus feat (5 less than Fighters)
- 5 favored enemies, one of which caps out at +10/+10 to hit, damage, Bluff, Knowledge to identify, Perception, Sense Motive, and Survival
- 4 favored terrains, one of which caps out at +8 to Knowledge (geography), Perception, Stealth, and Survival- as well as being untrackable
- Either the ability to share 1/2 of their favored enemy bonuses with allies as a move action or a -3 Druid level animal companion (which can be brought up to full level by expending a feat) that benefits from its master's favored enemies and favored terrains
- Ignore undergrowth movement penalties
- Swift Tracker (track at normal speed without penalty or -10 penalty at double speed)
- Evasion & Improved Evasion
- Quarry (+2 Insight to hit and automatic critical confirmation against a favored enemy target, assigned as a standrad action - 1 hour cooldown)
- Camouflage & Hide in Plain Sight (hide without cover/concealment and while being observed)
- Improved Quarry (take 20 while tracking without slowing down, +4 to hit, assigned as a free action - 10 minute cooldown)
- Master Hunter (DC 20+Wis Save or Die against each favored enemy)
- 4 levels of spellcasting (includes effects such as longstrider which match Armor Training's movement benefit, delay poison, resist energy, and instant enemy, and allows usage of CLW wands without investing in UMD or risking failure)
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Ugh. Not again.
1. You don't need 5 stats as explained to you quite succinctly. You're actually less MAD as a Ranger since you can ignore some of the nasty prerequisites that gimp Fighters so badly.
2. TWF, Rangers ignore the Dex requirement.
3. Healings and other spells Rangers get are simply something more than Fighters get. Free CLW wand usage is a benefit to not be ignored. A Fighter till high levels will only be able to use those wands sporadically whereas a Ranger simply always succeed on their use. Fighter fails a UMD check? Time is ticking on buffs in the dungeon. Rolled a 1? You just locked the party out of the CLWs wand. A Ranger doesn't deal with any of those issues.
4. FE is always good because you should be communicating with your GM when making your character. A GM who forces you to make your Favored Enemy blind is kind of a jerk. It's as arbitrary as making sure the Weapon Training you selected as a Fighter never come up. Plus with an Animal Companion you essentially get twice the benefit when it comes up since it benefits fully from it.
5. Skills vs letting someone else do it. Sure lets let someone else do combat too. What a silly idea. Skills are often a try once, if you don't succeed someone else could try. Having as many rolls as possible is a good thing. Being able to make a roll is infinitely better than not being able to. I don't see how hard that is to understand.
6. Spells; It's better to use your time than spend it twiddling your thumbs. Coincidentally, the Ranger is an amazing scout and so will usually ensure buffing time by virtue of succeeding his scouting runs which benefits the whole party. Which culminates in Rangers effectively earning their party extra actions before a fight. Best case scenario is the Fighter can match the Ranger's scouting abilities in stealth, not perception(Since Rangers actually have a use for Wisdom) and only if he's not in his Favored Terrain.
What does a Fighter get? A few more points of DPR but doesn't have anything else really going for it. He gets 5 more bonus feats, but the Ranger's ignore prerequisites which quite frankly is far better.
A Fighter gets Shield Master at 11th level. A Ranger gets it at 6th. A Fighter gets Improved Precise Shot at 11th. A Ranger can get it at 6th.
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Oh, and in addition Rangers are easily capable of crafting items for themselves and their allies, while Fighters need both Master Craftsman and a crafting feat, and even then are extremely limited in what they can make.
Fighters just need a SLA to craft magic items.
Fighters just need a SLA to craft magic items.
Which they have to expend resources to obtain.
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Design Manager
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The fighter could take a Bane weapon and gain a +2 to hit and +2d6 damage which is very close to mimicking the Favoured Enemy class feature.
Are you seriously suggesting that +2 to attack and 7 average damage is equivalent to +10 to attack and damage and a number of key skills, plus an additional +10 to atk, dmg, and skills for his pet or +5 to the same for everyone else?
That's not even math.Not to mention the Ranger can grab Bane as well if really wants to.
The fighter could take a Bane weapon and gain a +2 to hit and +2d6 damage which is very close to mimicking the Favoured Enemy class feature.
Which would be interesting if the Ranger didn't have the ability to do the same thing, the exact same way, for the same price.
You missed that the animal companion also gains the full benefits of his master's Favored Enemy and Favored Terrain bonuses.
Fixed, thanks.
You seem to have missed the point from the first post you decided to respond to and deviate to whatever is going on now. Someone stated a fighter is MAD needing Str, dex, con, int, wis.
Erm... What does his amount of MAD have to do with the feat count and how many styles he can pick up at once? The original quote doesn't mention MAD at all!
I could build an Elven Curveblade wielding fighter in Mithral full plate with power attack and weapon finesse that still posts good numbers for damage, would have a good to hit with a bow, could choose to TWF, or go sword and board with a scimitar.
Edit: Removed some posts. Let's be clear here: You can disagree with someone, that's fine. But insulting them is not okay. Mistakes in interpretation is just that—a mistake. Going into how awful a person might be for making that mistake is also not okay. Let's be civil here, and everybody can express their opinion without dog-piling onto them.
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Edit: Removed some posts. Let's be clear here: You can disagree with someone, that's fine. But insulting them is not okay. Mistakes in interpretation is just that—a mistake. Going into how awful a person might be for making that mistake is also not okay. Let's be civil here, and everybody can express their opinion without dog-piling onto them.
Liz, could you please explain where that was happening? Because I don't think all of the posts you removed matched that description, and I also have concerns that some of the posts you did leave set the precedent that complaining and throwing unfounded accusations is a good way to "win" an argument.
If 5 completely separate posters disagree with another posters statement, and we each completely separately respond, where is the line between "dog-piling" and 5 individuals just happening to all individually disagree with a statement?
The line is crossed when the disagreement is personal, not of the person's opinion, or making accusations of somebody else's intent.
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Design Manager
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The line is crossed when the disagreement is personal, not of the person's opinion, or making accusations of somebody else's intent.
Then I'd respectfully ask that you remove the post 10 above this as well.
@everyone who's taken it upon themselves to argue with anything and everything I post out of pure belligerence, you may want to take a step back. Bigotry isn't tolerated on these boards and neither is gang harassment.
This is an accusation of intent. He is saying that people who disagreed with him are guilty of bigotry, and I don't think a single person in this thread displayed "intolerance of any ideas other than his or her own, esp on religion, politics, or race".
I didn't see anyone actually insult him at all (maybe one or two inferrals of intent towards Shadowsoul....), and responding to disagreement by accusing people of a hate crime because they disagreed with you is not the kind of action that should be encouraged or rewarded in discourse between adults. It's tantamount to playing the race card because you're too lazy to show your ID to a bank teller.
a feature that comes free and won't turn against you, or at least not often and to be honest dominate person comes online before dominate monster for instance.
Just had to point out Dominate Animal is earlier than both, is rather rare. I have seen it come into play though - AC dropped the master in one round (favored enemy human....)
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a feature that comes free and won't turn against you, or at least not often and to be honest dominate person comes online before dominate monster for instance.Just had to point out Dominate Animal is earlier than both, is rather rare. I have seen it come into play though - AC dropped the master in one round (favored enemy human....)
It's not often a good idea to specialize in hunting your own kind... I had a similar instance occur when a Fighter/Ranger in our group with Favored Enemy (Humanoid:Elves) ended up dominated and destroyed the party cleric, who was not one of the heavily armored front liner type of clerics.
I'm not convinced the healing part is that much of a benefit. Anyone can get UMD and use a wand, but trying this in melee is not a good idea because you draw AoO's and drawing a wand and using it takes up two actions that draw AoO's.
Casting a spell from a wand doesn't provoke an AoO.
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Activation: Wands use the spell trigger activation method, so casting a spell from a wand is usually a standard action that doesn't provoke attacks of opportunity.
What does a Fighter get? A few more points of DPR but doesn't....Fighters will have higher AC meaning less hits which make his hp last longer. Ranger will need more healing than a fighter.
Both have equivalent will saves only rangers get wis caster stat that. Never reaches decent numbers much like the fighters. So both are dominate bait.
A fighter's bonuses to hit and damage will be active all the time vs. only when facing a favored enemy. Sure there's a spell for that, but now it's back to the having to waste resources deal which you seemed opposed to in your previous post.
A fighter will have a higher CMB/CMD.
I'm sure there's other facets the fighter will excel at, but no one cares what fighters are good at it seems.
To me:
Fighters - balance of offense and defense (not the highest in either compared to others)
Rangers - on par offense, lower AC defense, slightly higher saves, magic
Higher AC? Barkskin is a longlasting scaling AC benefit.
FE is twice the benefit Weapon Training is, at faster scaling, you get it earlier AND it applies to more than just attacks and damage(I.E Makes you better at skills too). Your Animal Companion also benefits fully from it. So when you DO encounter your Favored Enemy, it's 4 times as good as Weapon Training.
Why? CMB and CMD as a system is borked. Early levels, everyone can be good at Combat Maneuvers with light investments, late game everyone is terrible at them without incredible investments and even then some enemies are just going to be flat out immune to them.
I would love to hear what I get by choosing to play a Fighter over a Ranger.
Because a debatedly slightly higher AC is a poor metric. And don't get me started on your old argument of unhitable builds because you can make an unhitable character AC-wise with any class in the game.
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What does a Fighter get? A few more points of DPR but doesn't....Fighters will have higher AC meaning less hits which make his hp last longer. Ranger will need more healing than a fighter.
Both have equivalent will saves only rangers get wis caster stat that. Never reaches decent numbers much like the fighters. So both are dominate bait.
A fighter's bonuses to hit and damage will be active all the time vs. only when facing a favored enemy. Sure there's a spell for that, but now it's back to the having to waste resources deal which you seemed opposed to in your previous post.
A fighter will have a higher CMB/CMD.
I'm sure there's other facets the fighter will excel at, but no one cares what fighters are good at it seems.
To me:
Fighters - balance of offense and defense (not the highest in either compared to others)
Rangers - on par offense, lower AC defense, slightly higher saves, magicHigher AC? Barkskin is a longlasting scaling AC benefit.
FE is twice the benefit Weapon Training is, at faster scaling, you get it earlier AND it applies to more than just attacks and damage(I.E Makes you better at skills too). Your Animal Companion also benefits fully from it. So when you DO encounter your Favored Enemy, it's 4 times as good as Weapon Training.
Why? CMB and CMD as a system is borked. Early levels, everyone can be good at Combat Maneuvers with light investments, late game everyone is terrible at them without incredible investments and even then some enemies are just going to be flat out immune to them.
I would love to hear what I get by choosing to play a Fighter over a Ranger.
Because a debatedly slightly higher AC is a poor metric. And don't get me started on your old argument of unhitable builds because you can make an unhitable character AC-wise with any class in the game.
You only get so many spells to cast in a day so you will need to decide what all you will be taking. Being a two weapon ranger and casting spells in battle is not a good idea. Bark Skin is nice but sometimes hours can go by between encounters.
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I'm not convinced the healing part is that much of a benefit. Anyone can get UMD and use a wand, but trying this in melee is not a good idea because you draw AoO's and drawing a wand and using it takes up two actions that draw AoO's.Casting a spell from a wand doesn't provoke an AoO.
Forgot that was changed from 3.5. I still wouldn't be drawing one in combat.
Spells are a bonus, not the primary feature of a ranger so they are still nice to have. Barring spells such as entangle most ranger spells seem best cast out of combat. How far out of combat depends on how much info you have.
As for wands, I try to avoid them in combat also, but things happen.
With that said why did this turn into a "ranger vs fighter" debate?
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Spells are a bonus, not the primary feature of a ranger so they are still nice to have. Barring spells such as entangle most ranger spells seem best cast out of combat. How far out of combat depends on how much info you have.
As for wands, I try to avoid them in combat also, but things happen.
With that said why did this turn into a "ranger vs fighter" debate?
Probably because the thread started off with "Nah, Rangers aren't that great" when the class's general comparison is to our good (weak) friend, the Fighter. I think the game would be better served dropping the Fighter class since it's so generic and its job is filled by Barbarian/Ranger/(Slayer)/Etc. But then we'd lose one of the few heavy armor classes and only tower shield class, and that'd just be a shame.
ok.. that is what it was.
Forgot that was changed from 3.5. I still wouldn't be drawing one in combat.I'm not convinced the healing part is that much of a benefit. Anyone can get UMD and use a wand, but trying this in melee is not a good idea because you draw AoO's and drawing a wand and using it takes up two actions that draw AoO's.Casting a spell from a wand doesn't provoke an AoO.
No change.
Spell Trigger, Command Word, or Use-Activated Items
Activating any of these kinds of items does not require concentration and does not provoke attacks of opportunity.
You only get so many spells to cast in a day so you will need to decide what all you will be taking. Being a two weapon ranger and casting spells in battle is not a good idea. Bark Skin is nice but sometimes hours can go by between encounters.
A lot of people put Barkskin on an amulet anyway. Still, nice to have it as a spell to get it without cost and not use a slot if you have something else to put there, and at 10 min/level it will go for hours by the time you nab it. Especially nice if you have a natural attack build, not that the fighter knows what that looks like with his class features alone.
No one's going to argue you have infinite spells, but... spells are nice. No one's going to argue you should use spells with TWF by dropping your weapon because that's silly(and unfortunately another reason why TWF tends to be subpar to THF, though you can do things like use a quickdraw shield which is rather insane imo). The ranger spell list is also best used for utility imo. Again, I don't see how this is comparing anything to the fighter.
Not every class can attain unhittable ACs and most that compare require more resources or circumstance to do so. The fighter gets to exceed most AC just by having dex, and Mithral full plate. Throw in the sash of the war champion and he can push 22 AC from the full plate and dex. That's more than any other class.
Actually most classes can get pretty high AC bonuses because anyone but an arcane caster can wear heavy armor and you get a lot of bonuses from enhancements to natural armor, armor bonus, and deflection. At best the fighter has a +4 potential from his armor training, and he requires the dex to get it. Some classes have a higher potential, like a barbarian's beast totem(ranger isn't one of them, to my knowledge). At higher levels, classes can also wear mithral, or Celestial plate, or if your GM allows it, mithral celestial full plate. The Fighter's armor training is on sale. Sash of the War Champion also caps out and stops at armor training 4 because of its wording.