What to do with the Ranger - ideas thread

[Odd Hermit]

At least in the current build, they seem to be the weakest class by a fair margin.

 

I would also say they're a bit boring.

 

I'm curious how other backers would like to see the class changed.

 

My own preferences would lean toward giving them some magic and more stealth focus, along with making their animal companions more durable - possibly benefiting from/scaling with the ranger's gear, and having their own talent trees could help.

 

They could also use some bonus to traps.

 

One spell/ability I'd like to see come back is something like camouflage, a stealth bonus for the whole party for having a ranger in the group. Maybe outdoors only. Probably implemented as an aura around the ranger.

 

Another is healing. There aren't many health restoration abilities and the few talents that offer it are weak and almost a non-consideration. Rangers seem like a fitting class for healing wounds outside of combat, being rugged wilderness survival-savvy sorts. Nothing dramatic, perhaps 3 per rest 25% health restoration on friendly target, keeps you going a bit longer.

 

As for traps, that's a tough one to implement with mechanics also covering lockpicking and rangers don't have a bonus to it. I'd say perhaps for the express purpose of trap setting, give the ranger a bonus equal to say, having +4 mechanics. Your ranger won't be your lockpicker but having a second character able to set strong traps could be nice on harder difficulties.

 

As for magic I'd keep it very simple, some support/debuff removal(poison/sickness/disease), crowd control(they have binding roots but get it very late and it's kind of weak), and a bit of stam regen. 

 

I'd also give a bonus for characters near their animal companion. "_Animal_'s Presence" for example. DT bonus for bear, defense bonuses for antelope, +might and stam regen for boar, flanking bonuses for wolf(pack-style). Something like that anyway.

 

Some stronger animal abilities would be nice too. Wolf should have a howl that summons wolf spirits to aid it in combat, for example(synergy with its flanking bonus!). Stag could have a super-high damage charging ability. Bear could get some kind of rage giving bonus damage and making it immune to will-targeting attacks.

 

 

 

I'm just throwing ideas out here. Rangers represent, at least to me, a more difficult style of character to make work in a CRPG without just going very cliche and making them the archer class. They're very "out-of-combat" oriented with their skill sets and it's hard to make that style of stealth/survival feel interesting and matter in a CRPG focused more around direct combat. I hope they manage to pull it off by release.

Edited March 8, 2015 by Odd Hermit

[mrmonocle]

Rangers suck, I say eliminate the class alltogether.

[Gromnir]

 

 

My own preferences would lean toward giving them some magic and more stealth focus, along with making their animal companions more durable 

 

so, you wanna make'em more like d&d rangers.

 

*shrug*

 

that is okie dokie. personally, we tend to agree with mr.monocle at this point.  dump 'em.  complete opposite o' hermit, we see fixing ranger either by making 'em a ranged weapon damage dealing class without the unnecessary ranger trappings, or cutting 'em out o' the game complete. in our estimation, animal companions and stealth and outdoor affinity is not gonna make rangers better.   get rid o' the ranger crap from the crappy ranger, or get rid o' the ranger.  

 

'course it is too late for our suggestion, so at best we is gonna get half-measures that make rangers less horrible.

 

HA! Good Fun!

Edited March 8, 2015 by Gromnir

[roguelike]

Right now they're the best class for ironman soloing so I'd prefer they stuck around.

 

Honestly I'm not sure why everyone hates rangers.  Their 'archer' role is clearly defined, wounding shot is a great fight opener, driving flight is fun, their modal ranged abilities are about as good as any class gets.  Having a dog follow you around is fun even if having it die and crippling your stats is not.  

 

They seem like the best choice if you want ranged, single target, sustained dps.  I mean sure, that's not actually a great thing to want right now, but their archer role is far clearer than whatever role barbarians or wizards have, both of whom are overshadowed by other classes doing everything they do but better.

 

Sure, their pet stuff is a complete trainwreck, but that's only because obsidian isn't willing to bite the bullet and make them good.  If pets shared defensive and accuracy stats with the ranger, then you could make them good at off-tanking or good at interrupting and they'd be fine.

 

Also Marked Prey should be party wide and Bonded Grief should end when combat ends.

[wanderon]

Based on the improvements we have seen already and the current state they are in I am fairly optimistic that the ranger will be viable at release - I have played with at least a couple of them in every build and the last one I played was pretty effective - they are never going to be the best choice ever but I can see myself choosing one perhaps as my first run. I certainly don't think they should be abandoned what possible use is that.

[Sensuki]

The modal abilities aren't very good because they incur a high penalty. TBH they should have looked at the Lone Druid for DotA2 or something for inspiration ... but from what I gather, they only have League of Legends players among their team 

[Sarex]

The modal abilities aren't very good because they incur a high penalty. TBH they should have looked at the Lone Druid for DotA2 or something for inspiration ... but from what I gather, they only have League of Legends players among their team 

 

Because it's the superior game obviously. /runs

[Odd Hermit]

 

 

 

My own preferences would lean toward giving them some magic and more stealth focus, along with making their animal companions more durable 

 

so, you wanna make'em more like d&d rangers.

 

*shrug*

 

that is okie dokie. personally, we tend to agree with mr.monocle at this point.  dump 'em.  complete opposite o' hermit, we see fixing ranger either by making 'em a ranged weapon damage dealing class without the unnecessary ranger trappings, or cutting 'em out o' the game complete. in our estimation, animal companions and stealth and outdoor affinity is not gonna make rangers better.   get rid o' the ranger crap from the crappy ranger, or get rid o' the ranger.  

 

'course it is too late for our suggestion, so at best we is gonna get half-measures that make rangers less horrible.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

 

I know Rangers sucked in most implementations of DnD, but think Cleric/Ranger in 2e(IWD/BG2) minus the cleric weapon restrictions.

 

Cleric/Rangers were awesome.

 

I also like the old 1h/no shield style, but I wouldn't try to enforce that since it seems they want classes to have freedom in weapon set-up.

 

IWD funnily enough had a half-arsed method of simulating dual wield by giving them an extra attack with a one handed weapon and I kind of liked this better than actual dual wielding.

[Sensuki]

We'll see how they are in the next patch, but there's been plenty of topics on this already

 

IMO the main things that are needed is that the animal companions need more health, better defenses and more damage. 

[ISC]

They seem like the best choice if you want ranged, single target, sustained dps.

 

Uhm, what about rogues?  

[Gromnir]

 

 

 

 

My own preferences would lean toward giving them some magic and more stealth focus, along with making their animal companions more durable 

 

so, you wanna make'em more like d&d rangers.

 

*shrug*

 

that is okie dokie. personally, we tend to agree with mr.monocle at this point.  dump 'em.  complete opposite o' hermit, we see fixing ranger either by making 'em a ranged weapon damage dealing class without the unnecessary ranger trappings, or cutting 'em out o' the game complete. in our estimation, animal companions and stealth and outdoor affinity is not gonna make rangers better.   get rid o' the ranger crap from the crappy ranger, or get rid o' the ranger.  

 

'course it is too late for our suggestion, so at best we is gonna get half-measures that make rangers less horrible.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

 

I know Rangers sucked in most implementations of DnD, but think Cleric/Ranger in 2e(IWD/BG2) minus the cleric weapon restrictions.

 

Cleric/Rangers were awesome.

 

I also like the old 1h/no shield style, but I wouldn't try to enforce that since it seems they want classes to have freedom in weapon set-up.

 

IWD funnily enough had a half-arsed method of simulating dual wield by giving them an extra attack with a one handed weapon and I kind of liked this better than actual dual wielding.

 

ranger/clerics (multi-class half-elf or dual-class human) were ridiculous overpowered.  they were dual-wielding melee monsters that could access both druid and cleric spells, including the cleric spells that could functional boost the ranger/cleric's combat prowess past any fighter build. vanilla druid progression were a terrible handicap, but heck, your ranger/cleric didn't need worry 'bout such trivial things. because o' the bizarre xp progression o' 2ed d&d, the ranger/cleric were functional sacrificing a single level o' cleric spell casting to not only get druid spells, but full dual-wield, exceptional strength, fighter/ranger con bonuses and weapon specialization.

 

do Not use ranger/cleric as an example o' what the poe ranger should aspire to be. please.

 

HA! Good Fun!

[Odd Hermit]

 

 

ranger/clerics (multi-class half-elf or dual-class human) were ridiculous overpowered.  they were dual-wielding melee monsters that could access both druid and cleric spells, including the cleric spells that could functional boost the ranger/cleric's combat prowess past any fighter build. vanilla druid progression were a terrible handicap, but heck, your ranger/cleric didn't need worry 'bout such trivial things. because o' the bizarre xp progression o' 2ed d&d, the ranger/cleric were functional sacrificing a single level o' cleric spell casting to not only get druid spells, but full dual-wield, exceptional strength, fighter/ranger con bonuses and weapon specialization.

 

do Not use ranger/cleric as an example o' what the poe ranger should aspire to be. please.

 

HA! Good Fun!

 

 

Just because they were overpowered doesn't mean the concept of such a character is bad if given sensible limitations. The default Ranger class on its own was too weak, a Ranger with full Druid/Cleric spells was overpowered. Some happy medium could be found.

 

Keep in mind PoE doesn't have pre-buffing which was a big part of what made "Cleric/Druid-Zilla" builds overpowered.

 

[roguelike]

 

They seem like the best choice if you want ranged, single target, sustained dps.

 

Uhm, what about rogues?  

 

I don't think rogues get any relevant ranged class abilities other than deep wounds, which is pretty bad.  Early on they're going to be better just due to sneak attack, but by level 5 a ranger should have two useful ranged talents over a ranged rogue: swift aim + stalkers link for +13 acc, and whatever 20% attack speed and 50% reload speed averages out to be when reload speed bonuses aren't bugged (maybe 30%  more attacks?).

 

The naive breakpoint for whether +.5 damage is better than +30% attack speed (or whatever it really is in addition to the accuracy bonus) is going be around +.9 damage which seems a little high but not completely unreasonable for a 5th level character to have in between weapon enchantments, might, and buffs.

 

I mean, rangers could probably use a numbers buff, but it's not like they're in a completely different ballpark.  If anything, rogues who want to be ranged probably need more options instead of just wasting their 3rd and 5th level class abilities on not terribly relevant stuff.

[dukefx]

I'll add something that hasn't been mentioned yet.

 

Rangers have a lot of abilities that are very conditional. Some of these require you to reposition yourself (for example driving flight's 20° angle). Here comes the fun part... while you reposition yourself you suffer a huge reload penalty. So... Josh wants to reward and punish you at the same time for tactical gameplay.

 

Marked Prey needs to be an instant action or at least make it so that it won't alarm anyone (i.e. it won't initiate combat). I imagine it's something like sneaking in and pointing with two fingers at your eyes then pointing at the target. Currently you are wasting a full attack for a miserably low bonus.

[Elerond]

Rogue's Sneak Attack (passive damage bonus against enemies with status effect or if they hit target withing 2 seconds before combat starts), Crippling Strike (extra damage and causes hobble effect, twice per encounter), Blinding Strike(Blinds target and causes extra damage, once per encounter), Dirty Fighting(passive, 10% of hits become critical ), Finishing Blow (gives accuracy bonus against wounded enemies, 3 times per rest), Deep Wounds(passive, Slash, Pierce and Crush damage caused by the rogue to also do Raw Damage over time, this combined with Blunderbuss (Lead Splitter) is quite devastating), Deathblows(passive, sneak attacks become more powerful when enemy has two or more status effects), Withering Strike (extra damage and weakens enemy, 1 time per encounter) and Fearsome Strike (extra damage, enemy become hobbled and weakened, 1 time per rest) abilities work with ranged weapons, which make them quite superior ranged class.

[Gromnir]

the concept o' the ranger/cleric was to combine the spell-casting abilities o' TWO classes while gaining premier thac0 progression.

 

a balanced version o' the concept? a decent melee combatant who can cast spells and wear armour sounds like a chanter.  problem solved. am not seeing a need for a nature-based version o' the chanter.

 

different stokes?

 

HA! Good Fun!

[roguelike]

Rogue's Sneak Attack (passive damage bonus against enemies with status effect or if they hit target withing 2 seconds before combat starts), Crippling Strike (extra damage and causes hobble effect, twice per encounter), Blinding Strike(Blinds target and causes extra damage, once per encounter), Dirty Fighting(passive, 10% of hits become critical ), Finishing Blow (gives accuracy bonus against wounded enemies, 3 times per rest), Deep Wounds(passive, Slash, Pierce and Crush damage caused by the rogue to also do Raw Damage over time, this combined with Blunderbuss (Lead Splitter) is quite devastating), Deathblows(passive, sneak attacks become more powerful when enemy has two or more status effects), Withering Strike (extra damage and weakens enemy, 1 time per encounter) and Fearsome Strike (extra damage, enemy become hobbled and weakened, 1 time per rest) abilities work with ranged weapons, which make them quite superior ranged class.

None of that has to do with the ranger's fundamental kit though.  The only thing preventing the ranger from doing more damage is some numbers tweaks.  Also Deep Wounds is terrible and doesn't stack (if it's giving 5 stacks on blunderbuss shots that seems like a bug?), Dirty Fighting is worse than terrible, finishing blow is... I don't know what this ability does or is supposed to do, and I haven't seen the other abilities, I guess they're level 9+?  Also, a lot of that is not sustain.  I think in an 'ideal' world rogues would do more burst with their higher damage abilities but less sustained damage and rangers would do more damage with their better ranged modals.  Right now that balance isn't quite there, but it seems like it's visible.

 

I guess that's why I don't understand why everyone thinks the ranger is in so much trouble.  They're like 1 patch away from not being bad at all.  Meanwhile druids have no worthwhile class abilities, no worthwhile class talents, and extremely limited neutral talents to improve their spellcasting abilities.  Wizards best role role is 'guy who is good at attacking with wands'.  And Barbarians lose out in melee dps to rogues in exactly the same way that rangers lose out in ranged dps except much worse.

[Elerond]

 

Rogue's Sneak Attack (passive damage bonus against enemies with status effect or if they hit target withing 2 seconds before combat starts), Crippling Strike (extra damage and causes hobble effect, twice per encounter), Blinding Strike(Blinds target and causes extra damage, once per encounter), Dirty Fighting(passive, 10% of hits become critical ), Finishing Blow (gives accuracy bonus against wounded enemies, 3 times per rest), Deep Wounds(passive, Slash, Pierce and Crush damage caused by the rogue to also do Raw Damage over time, this combined with Blunderbuss (Lead Splitter) is quite devastating), Deathblows(passive, sneak attacks become more powerful when enemy has two or more status effects), Withering Strike (extra damage and weakens enemy, 1 time per encounter) and Fearsome Strike (extra damage, enemy become hobbled and weakened, 1 time per rest) abilities work with ranged weapons, which make them quite superior ranged class.

None of that has to do with the ranger's fundamental kit though.  The only thing preventing the ranger from doing more damage is some numbers tweaks.  Also Deep Wounds is terrible and doesn't stack (if it's giving 5 stacks on blunderbuss shots that seems like a bug?), Dirty Fighting is worse than terrible, finishing blow is... I don't know what this ability does or is supposed to do, and I haven't seen the other abilities, I guess they're level 9+?  Also, a lot of that is not sustain.  I think in an 'ideal' world rogues would do more burst with their higher damage abilities but less sustained damage and rangers would do more damage with their better ranged modals.  Right now that balance isn't quite there, but it seems like it's visible.

 

I guess that's why I don't understand why everyone thinks the ranger is in so much trouble.  They're like 1 patch away from not being bad at all.  Meanwhile druids have no worthwhile class abilities, no worthwhile class talents, and extremely limited neutral talents to improve their spellcasting abilities.  Wizards best role role is 'guy who is good at attacking with wands'.  And Barbarians lose out in melee dps to rogues in exactly the same way that rangers lose out in ranged dps except much worse.

 

 

Barbarians aren't meant to be dps class, but front line class, they can't take damage and weaken enemy so that others can finish them of, but they are in my opinion weakest of three (fighter, monk and barbarian) front line classes.

 

Druids have good spell which make them good in crowd control and dealing damage also, they are in this role much better than their counter part wizard, but wizards is much more flexible class. Druid's spiritshift is currently about useless, but in PAX video they seemed to have gotten boost.

 

I would argue that dirty fighting is not useless especially on wild orlan rogue, but as hit to critical change don't work now as it should it is hard to say for sure how useful it is.

 

Deep wounds is not terrible even if it don't stack (which it in my opinion should do) as raw damage don't get modified by armor or any other protection. 

 

Ranger isn't bad class but currently they lose in their main role to other classes as both rogue and cipher can do more dps in both ranged and close combat. And ranger don't have flexibility play any other role than ranged dps.

 

Archetype roles for classes, if I have understood correctly, are following  

 

DPS classes

Rogue: Melee dps

Cipher: Spell casting dps that is mix of ranged and melee dps

Ranger: Ranged dps, with animal companion that should work as melee extra

 

Support classes

Priest: Active supporter with wide spell selection

Paladin: Passive supporter with modal auras, best support in direct combat

Chanter: Mix of passive and active supporter, with their chants and invocations, weakest support in direct combat

 

Crowd control

Wizard: Widest range of spells of all classes, which are meant to give them flexibility to do other roles. Without buffing weakest class in direct combat

Druid: Combat oriented crowd controller

 

Front line

Barbarian: Melee AoE that can reach most vulnerable enemies  

Fighter: Passive melee tank class that can block most dangerous enemies 

Monk: Most active melee class that is something from between barbarian and fighter

 

From all classes ranger fares worst in their archetypal role when compared how well other classes can do that role, in my opinion.

[Whipstitch]

do Not use ranger/cleric as an example o' what the poe ranger should aspire to be. please.

This. Ranger/Cleric popularity stems largely from the fact that they were basically Clerics who happened to be better than other Clerics. In terms of ethos most people would be hard-pressed to explain what the big difference between a Ranger/Cleric and Fighter/Cleric of a nature deity is supposed to be in the first place. Ranger/Clerics couldn't even scratch the "cunning woodsman skilled with both blade and bow" itch because of their equipment restrictions.

Edited March 9, 2015 by Whipstitch

[Two-Bull]

1. I've give the player the ability to turn off the pet. I would rather have my own pool of health that I don't have to micromanage.

 

2. I would create two seperate paths of ranged focus: beast-master and something similar to the Archer kit without the pet.

 

3. The beast master ranger would get an ability to draw in animals from the environment to add to the fight. As their level gains, they can pull in progressively more animals from the environment. Their pets would get a passive ability bonus to sneak/spot/scout.

 

4. The solo ranger would get combat archer abilities: a pinning shot, and a ranged heat-shot stun. (Neither of those require much animation). I would give the solo ranger a camoflauge skill that grants ranged deflection bonuses in combat and the ability to blend in with the environment and sneak off. The solo ranger would gain a passive ability bonus to sneak/spot/scout.

 

5. I would give all rangers a higher level ability to camoflauge your whole party to set up ambushes.

 

That would be my changes: create a beast-master path and a combat archer path.

Edited March 9, 2015 by Two-Bull

[Shevek]

I say make them a beast master with multiple selectable pets (birds for reducing enemy accuracy, bears to absorb dmg, boars to knock **** around, etc) and attacks linked to coordinating pet attacks and positioning, etc. This way they can be built as melee or range.

[wanderon]

I've been fooling with a more rogue like ranger using both ranged and melee (two weapon plus blunderbuss) situationally and when you add the companion in (especially if they get a little better) I'm liking it pretty well.

 

I do like the beastmaster idea where you could summon different animals but would probably want it limited to one per rest (and not allow you to swap them in battle).

 

As for the whole ranger/cleric thing to me it was really just about the access to all priest spells instead of one or the other for F/D or F/C. The only downside was the weapon restrictions and that didn't matter in BG2 as some of the best weapons in the game were cleric weapons.

[Odd Hermit]

I've been fooling with a more rogue like ranger using both ranged and melee (two weapon plus blunderbuss) situationally and when you add the companion in (especially if they get a little better) I'm liking it pretty well.

 

I do like the beastmaster idea where you could summon different animals but would probably want it limited to one per rest (and not allow you to swap them in battle).

 

As for the whole ranger/cleric thing to me it was really just about the access to all priest spells instead of one or the other for F/D or F/C. The only downside was the weapon restrictions and that didn't matter in BG2 as some of the best weapons in the game were cleric weapons.

 

It was good in post-HoW IWD w/out the entire druid spell package. I was actually thinking of that and not BGII since that was kind of a bug or poor implementation.

[Sensuki]

I'll add something that hasn't been mentioned yet.

 

Rangers have a lot of abilities that are very conditional. Some of these require you to reposition yourself (for example driving flight's 20° angle). Here comes the fun part... while you reposition yourself you suffer a huge reload penalty. So... Josh wants to reward and punish you at the same time for tactical gameplay.

 

This is a good point, but it's actually kind of my fault that there is a recovery penalty for moving, because I really wanted recovery time to be unpaused while moving and that was the only way I could get him to change it. I do not believe that recovery time should even be slowed while moving even for ranged characters, and I will probably mod it out of the game at some point, if they don't.

[roguelike]

 

Ranger isn't bad class but currently they lose in their main role to other classes as both rogue and cipher can do more dps in both ranged and close combat. And ranger don't have flexibility play any other role than ranged dps.

 

 

From all classes ranger fares worst in their archetypal role when compared how well other classes can do that role, in my opinion.

 

That seems like a fair way to look at it.  I think to me the fact that the ranger *could* be the best ranged dps class with just a few tweaks means that I'm not really concerned even if he is currently the worst at fulfilling his role.  In comparison, Druids fulfill their role fine (which is apparantly aoe damage dealer?  I haven't played a game with druids in it in a long time, but 'really good at blowing things up' was never how I thought of them, did I just miss the point where they became this?), but seem to have even more acute build diversity problems than rangers and that's a problem that will need new abilities or talents or mechanics to resolve, not just higher numbers on a modal ability.  Likewise, it's hard to see an easy way to turn Barbarians into... whatever they're supposed to be.