[Class Build] Rangerer

[Blovski]

The most ranged of Rangers.

Principles: A ranger that hits as consistently as possible and reasonably hard, taking advantage of the class's high accuracy.

Difficulty: I'm playing on Hard with Trial of Iron and a rather odd half-custom party. I expect it'd scale well to Path of the Damned simply because your accuracy is very reliable and you don't want to be taking hits anyway.

Part one: Race

Optimal:

Wood Elf is probably your optimal choice for the better ranged accuracy and consistency. Also gives you a little defence against ranged enemies.

Interesting:

Island Aumaua (open the fight with an Arquebus or Blunderbuss for a high-damage single target shot, or have more weapon-bound spells available to you)
Death Godlike (x1.2 damage against injured opponents. Still probably not a match to Wood Elf but at least interesting)
Hearth Orlan (more crits)
Boreal Dwarf (higher might, bonuses vs. some tough enemies)

Honourable Mention:

Pale Elf (resistance to fire and cold will help you not get thumped too hard by backline return fire and also help against tough enemies such as Shades throughout the game).

Stats

Initial Stats -

I'm not much of a minmaxer. You can exaggerate these by dropping Con and Res further if you are or tweak them to your own preferences if you're not.

Might 16/Con 8/Dex 19/Per 15/Int 12/Res 8.

High might and Dex and acceptable Int and Per are your key choices. Perception will give you a lot more survivability at range and interrupt. I picked up Gift From The Machine, a Constitution bonus from Blood Sacrifice and Perception from Song of the Heavens in my run. None of these are really essential for the build working. Finished with effective stats of Might 19/Con 9/Dex 21/Per 17/Int 12/Res 10.
 

Animal Companion Choice

I think whatever you're interested in can work for you, as you're not hugely reliant on the animal companion. I went with the Antelope for better defences. Bear (Higher DR), Lion (AOE Debuff) and Wolf (Takedown) could all be valuable. Stag and Boar would probably fit less with this build, as engaging multiple enemies or being below 50% endurance are not things you really want your animal companion to do if you're reliant on dealing damage at range.

Talents/Abilities

Essential:

Vicious Aim: Better damage, more accuracy; you want this.
Penetrating Shot: Completely essential for an archer build - with the way DR works in this game, this will add a huge percentagAe to damage with bows.

Driving Flight: hit a second target with every shot. Obviously good.

 

Very Highly recommended talents -

Binding Roots: Having any melee enemy stuck for 30 seconds is a huge deal, even ranged enemies and spellcasters can be taken out of the fight with this if you then pull your party away and deal with them separately.

Stunning Shot - Allows the ranger to keep a single target they can reliably hit and that their Animal Companion can reach permanently stunlocked.

Weapon Focus: Peasant (Hunting Bow) or Weapon Focus: Adventurer (War Bow) - My preference is for Hunting Bows, given there are several excellent ones available and the very fast rate of attack emphasises the ranger's reliability. War Bows are potentially also a great option with higher damage but lower rate of fire, with the early Borresaine giving you stunning on crits. Adventurer comes with the best selection of two handers in the game but Peasant comes with Accuracy (Spear) and Deflection (Hatchet) melee options and Staffs (which often have reach enchantments).

Marksman - More Accuracy is more reliability. This is a good thing.

Envenomed Strike - Raw damage bypasses DR altogether, which is extremely valuable against enemies with high damage resistances.


Curiosities:

After you've filled the above list out, Defensive talents are helpful if uninspiring (escape disengagement, resist charm, better reflex, the ranger's dodge arrows ability). I don't know how Quick Aim and Vicious Aim interact, so don't ask me. Marked Prey is a little underwhelming, animal companion knockdown could help you out occasionally. Shot On The Run kinda contradicts the point of the build, and I'm not sure whether you can get real, meaningful speed boosting powers early enough to try a hit-and-run archer out as a build.
 

Skills/Background

These are not hugely important for a Ranger (or anyone with a full party). Stealth will let you scout a little and steal things and do a couple of quests a little differently. Someone in your party needs mechanics and traps are great. You need some Athletics just to not get tired all the time. Survival gives you better consumable use, which is nice for potions of Eldritch aim, Vital Essence or War Paint, which you should be chugging for difficult fights after reaching Twin Elms. All of these are somewhat useful.

HOWEVER, Lore is probably your most valuable skill, as rangers have very high accuracy (higher than any of the spellcaster classes) and the Rangerer is going to be specced with high damage, fast recovery time and decent intelligence. I believe a lot of the ranged accuracy talents and racials affect accuracy for spells as well. Having your ranger able to obliterate stuff with a blob of fan of flames crits or buff with protection will prove really clutch and gives you a much better arsenal against high Pierce resistance foes.

Gear


Your choice for primary weapons is between Hunting Bows and War Bows.

With regards to hunting bows, there are four uniques, Persistence from level 4 of the Endless Paths is a very strong weapon and will easily carry you up until the Northweald. If you aren't stopping at the endless paths you can pick up the Exceptional Crooked Bee Bow from the Club of Refined and Prestigious Gentlemen in Ondra's Pearl. Once you hit the Northweald there are two options - the first is the ranger unique (Preymaker) which you get from asking for a weapon off the Glanfathan hunters. It's really very disappointing and probably not an upgrade on Persistence. Much better is Lenas Er which you get from siding with Arthwyn in the Hunter, Brother Quest and which will carry you to the end of the game. Lenas Er has an inbuilt 3 DR, which makes a lot of difference given how quickly you're firing, is Superb quality and has a couple of other good enchantments. You have just enough enchantment space left to slap Vessel Bane onto it to help you work on Adra Animats and Thaos's mooks.

I didn't run with Warbows but there's an excellent one (Borresaine) available in the Market in the Copperstone District and another off a ranger in the Woodend Plains from one of the third tier of bounties.

For your melee weapon, I'd take a slightly counterintuitive approach and suggest a weapon such as The White Spire which gives you a spellbound AOE effect, that, similar to Lore, makes your ranger a lot more flexible and dangerous in big fights and takes advantage of your might, accuracy and intellect. If you're not into launching giant damaging spell effects (how very strange of you...), there are plenty of decent hatchets, clubs, staffs and spears around. War bow rangers can take advantage of Drake's Bell or The Blade of the Endless Paths or a Pollaxe for crushing damage.

My recommendation is to detour down to the Endless Paths level 4 to pick up Rundl's Finery (enchant it to Exceptional when you hit level 8  ), Persistence (and Lawran's Stick, Resolution and a couple of other items) relatively early as that gear will carry your Ranger easily up until Twin Elms. Once you're at Twin Elms you can pick between the Starlit Garb and Rundl's Finery and pick up Lenas Er for the best possible hunting bow. If you feel like doing the last level of Bounties, the Vithrack Exarch drops Gwisk Glas, a robe which provides Second Wind, which makes it the best clothing in the game.

With regards to accessories,

honestly, these aren't terribly important. Find stuff that buffs up your might and dex and ideally anything that provides you with another per rest spell to cast (such as the Sunbeam amulet).

Notes on playing

Your ranger should not be in melee combat, ever, if at all avoidable. If enemies slip past your tanks, immobilise them with binding roots or block them with your companion. Many players will not realise that Animal Companions are not only affected by fatigue but also have no Athletics (almost certainly an oversight). You can check this by looking at your character page. This has a huge impact on the AC's survivability, so make certain to rest before challenging fights even if you otherwise wouldn't need to. Be careful with the Animal Companion as them going down reduces your accuracy and stats.

Binding Roots from Stealth on the most powerful enemy followed by running away a little is a great way to open fights. Much as I recommend spellbind weapons above they are a bit dodgy in practise, and occasionally bug out not restoring charges properly or displaying when they should. Chug War Paint in difficult fights, remember your watcher abilities, since you have the accuracy to use them and get your other characters to focus on any effect which increases your damage or decreases enemy DR. The high rate of fire really strongly rewards these effects.

Edited April 21, 2015 by Blovski

[peddroelm]

Marked prey + 40% lash damage (multiplicative) vs 25% target DR ( 30+ seconds with high int ) per encounter  and you don't mention it ?

Don't you want your ranger to do damage ?

Edited April 21, 2015 by peddroelm

[Blovski]

^

It's a perfectly fine skill but I don't actually find it that useful in practise just because of the casting time and single target application. In tough fights I'd rather spend the casting time on Binding Roots, an AOE scroll or a Spellbind or just shooting more. The exceptions, I guess, are things like Dragon fights and the final boss, which it is useful for.

[Exyll]

I tried Marked Prey on my 1st hunter but the battles dont justify its use.

Most battles are over in under 2 min, I eventually pick it up much later and give it a shot on some of the higher end bosses and bounties...meh

If it was a mark until the prey died, yes thats good, but 30 seconds?

Maybe I dont use it right (mark / stay on him while others kill rest) but it seems like having everyone focus fire is much more effective than pulling him off to *maybe* kill one target before 30 seconds is up

 

I am torn between the war bow and hunters bow myself...if you spec right, maybe the speed of the hunter can make up for its lack of power, but that Superb warbow on the last tier of bounties...its a beast.

I dont know how people like Arbalest and pistols, its like having a 5 man party cause they're out of the battle so long reloading

Edited April 21, 2015 by Exyll

[Exoduss]

In PoE its simple , anything will work on hard and on potd aswell , it is also very simple : want a marksman with bow you go for ranged rogue , you want ranger to do real damage you go for multiple firearms and arbalests , also when you use the gimped war bow ranger Marked Pray is a must

[Exyll]

why/how is the war bow gimped?

[mazeltov]

Good advice for the novice. Upboated.

[Exoduss]

This discussion happened alrdy on other threads : rangers with war bows dont do half the damage of the real build , i played both and it is massive difference , also rogue with same warbow will outdamage ranger atleast twice

 

Reloading can be improved in many many ways ( gunner , swift aim , chanters chant , weapon with speed like forgiveness or holdwall , and last but not least le quick switch)

Edited April 21, 2015 by Exoduss

[Exyll]

well Im not switching multiple guns and rifles and pistols and whatnot in combat like Im Mad Max so what was decided to be the best overall weapon for ranger

[Exoduss]

Play rogue or be a gimp then:)

[dukefx]

Agreed. 2nd playthrough was a ranger. I gave everything to make it viable. There's a thread with screenshots showing statistics. If you compare my ranger with all those rogues there you'll realize that the ranger is clearly nowhere near a "heavy hitter" like the rogue.

[Exyll]

ok I'll go rogue then for my ranged party slot - warbow

Thats a shame about ranger, seems they always mess up the archer in these games - either they never hit hard enough or fast enough

[MadDemiurg]

Play roguecipher or be a gimp then:)

There, fixed it.

[Xosmi]

Some thoughts on this build : 

 

#1 - i would pick crossbows over war bows. not that bows are bad, but they do have issues with overcoming DR.

#2 - Why no swift aim ? x1.2 Attack Speed x1.5 Reload Speed at the cost of -7 accuracy is too great to pass up, especially since you are taking Vicious aim as well.

#3 - binding roots isn't exactly bad, but if you are playing with a party, your spellslingers are going to have plenty of debilitating abilities allready, there's more useful talents to focus on first. i'd take swift aim at creation, then wounding shot and accurate wounding shot over binding roots any day.

#4 - missing bloody slaughter especially - causes more crits on low endurance targets, but more importantly makes all your crits do more damage.

[dukefx]

Some thoughts on this build : 

 

#1 - i would pick crossbows over war bows. not that bows are bad, but they do have issues with overcoming DR.

#2 - Why no swift aim ? x1.2 Attack Speed x1.5 Reload Speed at the cost of -7 accuracy is too great to pass up, especially since you are taking Vicious aim as well.

#3 - binding roots isn't exactly bad, but if you are playing with a party, your spellslingers are going to have plenty of debilitating abilities allready, there's more useful talents to focus on first. i'd take swift aim at creation, then wounding shot and accurate wounding shot over binding roots any day.

#4 - missing bloody slaughter especially - causes more crits on low endurance targets, but more importantly makes all your crits do more damage.

#2 Afaik they can't be active at the same time. Haven't tried recently tho.

#5 False. That +0.5 crit dmg multiplier only affects the crits against targets with low endurance.

[Blovski]

Some thoughts on this build : 

 

#1 - i would pick crossbows over war bows. not that bows are bad, but they do have issues with overcoming DR.

#2 - Why no swift aim ? x1.2 Attack Speed x1.5 Reload Speed at the cost of -7 accuracy is too great to pass up, especially since you are taking Vicious aim as well.

#3 - binding roots isn't exactly bad, but if you are playing with a party, your spellslingers are going to have plenty of debilitating abilities allready, there's more useful talents to focus on first. i'd take swift aim at creation, then wounding shot and accurate wounding shot over binding roots any day.

#4 - missing bloody slaughter especially - causes more crits on low endurance targets, but more importantly makes all your crits do more damage.

 

1. High, high attack speed, and I wanted to use bows because I like them. I've never had a problem with the DR output, generally frequent crits make up against high DR enemies and with Persistence's Damaging 3 and Lenas Er's 3 DR bypass it's worked fine for me.

2. Didn't know if you could stack the two. Certainly worthwhile if you can.

3. Eh, 30s stuck is really strong and I liked the ranger having something else to do. I do think having someone indefinitely stuck is way better than them being hobbled.

4. Interesting idea, might be worth taking, certainly, though I don't think it works like that.

 

Yeah, I know Rogues are the optimal, bestest ranged class. I just find them so dry as to be flavourless in PoE, so I'd rather not have them. Multi-gun-switching is kind of a chore for me and I'm not convinced that the high damage is better than frequent granular damage against the squishies your backline needs to mop up quickly. Also, if you want to take advantage of Stunning Shot, you want very frequent attacks rather than guns.

Edited April 21, 2015 by Blovski

[Francis Ironwood]

 

Some thoughts on this build : 

 

#1 - i would pick crossbows over war bows. not that bows are bad, but they do have issues with overcoming DR.

#2 - Why no swift aim ? x1.2 Attack Speed x1.5 Reload Speed at the cost of -7 accuracy is too great to pass up, especially since you are taking Vicious aim as well.

#3 - binding roots isn't exactly bad, but if you are playing with a party, your spellslingers are going to have plenty of debilitating abilities allready, there's more useful talents to focus on first. i'd take swift aim at creation, then wounding shot and accurate wounding shot over binding roots any day.

#4 - missing bloody slaughter especially - causes more crits on low endurance targets, but more importantly makes all your crits do more damage.

#2 Afaik they can't be active at the same time. Haven't tried recently tho.

#5 False. That +0.5 crit dmg multiplier only affects the crits against targets with low endurance.

 

#2 You're right. Can't have Vicious Aim and Swift Aim on at the same time, but you can have Swift Aim or Vicious Aim and Penetrating Shots on. Not exactly intuitive interaction there. It does kinda make sense since Vicious and Swift are class powers, but still kinda iffy for me.

[Crucis]

Blovski,

 

IMO Marksman should be considered an essential talent for a Ranger.  And beyond that, I'd say that picking whatever weapon focus contains your ranged weapon of choice should also be considered essential.  Whatever boosts your Ranger's accuracy will in the long run also increase the likelihood of getting fewer misses, fewer grazes and more hits and more crits, which translates into more damage.  (Also, having a WF means that you'll have a +6 acc bonus in some melee weapons for those times when you're forced into melee.)

 

 

As for Rogue vs Ranger for better ranged combatant, I think that it's sad that Rogues are better than Rangers.  IMO, rangers should be the best ranged weapons combatants by wide margin.  And their talents should reflect that.  Of course, I suppose one problem here is that it's fairly easy for a player to generate sneak attack situations with various spells, etc so that a ranged rogue gets plenty of shots at sneak attack eligible targets.  I'm not sure what could be done to counter this for the Ranger, other than allowing Rangers to get sneak attack bonus damage (with ranged weapons only) as well.

 

 

 

Also, I agree with your racial choices.    Wood elves are an obvious choice for a ranger with the ranged combat bonuses.  (This is probably just as true for ranged rogues as well.)  Of course, the obvious choice can also be a cliched choice for some.  And your "interesting" alternatives all appear to be solid choices for ranger builds, since each comes with a benefit that can definitely come in handy.  The weakest option is probably the Island Aumaua, if only because it seems to me that you only benefit from it if you choose to use guns.  If you want to be a bow ranger, then having an extra weapons slot is probably less valuable.  The Death Godlike's ability lets you be a better finisher.  The Boreal Dwarf's ability (+15 Acc vs primordials and wilders) is sort of like a racial enemy, and not to be sneezed at.  And the Hearth Orlan's ability to get more crits against enemies being targeted by an ally isn't bad either.

 

The one downside for me to a Death Godlike ranger is that it seems counter intuitive.  If there was going to be a Godlike ranger, one'd think that the obvious choice (abilities aside) would be a Nature Godlike.  But frankly, these racial abilities that only trigger when you get below a certain about of personal END don't do much for me, other than the Moon Godlike's one which makes some sense.  That is, if your END starts getting low, you start healing.  That appeals to me.  OTOH, if your END gets low, you get more stats (i.e. a Nature Godlike)?  Meh.  If I'm a ranger, I should be behind the lines trying to avoid damage, thus reducing the chance that I'd be able to trigger this ability.  I can see this being valuable for something like a monk, but for a ranger, not so much.   Oh well. 

 

One downside for a boreal dwarf ranger, at least for me, is that one of the Companions is already a boreal dwarven ranger, Sagani.  Kinda seems to make her superfluous, but take that as you will.

 

 

 

That's all.  BTW, I'm glad to see this sort of thread, talking about a single class, discussing good racial choices for the class, appropriate talent choices, etc.  I hope to see more threads like this for all of the classes.  IMO, this sort of thread, if done well, ought to be pinned at the top so that new players visiting here can get this info more easily.

[MadDemiurg]

For rangers to be #1 (at least #1 auto attack) ranged dps their talent that gives their AC +50% damage against targets under DoT should work on ranger himself. That would be ranger's SA equivalent. This way rogue has SA + melee modal (reckless assault) and ranger has his own SA equivalent + ranged modals.

 

However, I'd prefer to see ranger's AC buffed first. If AC is decent throughout the whole game ranger doesn't necessarily need to be better than rogue at shooting.

[Crucis]

For rangers to be #1 (at least #1 auto attack) ranged dps their talent that gives their AC +50% damage against targets under DoT should work on ranger himself. That would be ranger's SA equivalent. This way rogue has SA + melee modal (reckless assault) and ranger has his own SA equivalent + ranged modals.

 

However, I'd prefer to see ranger's AC buffed first. If AC is decent throughout the whole game ranger doesn't necessarily need to be better than rogue at shooting.

 

DoT?

 

Enhance the AC?  Meh.  Personally, I wish that having an AC was a choice for rangers rather than a requirement.  Once I learned that having an AC go down in battle gave the Ranger a penalty, I got a LOT more cautious with my AC, which honestly was a pain.  My first choice would be to make AC's optional.  Second choice might be to do away with the ACC penalty if the AC goes down in battle.  Third choice, buff it.

 

Regardless, I still think that the Ranger should be better than a Rogue as a ranged combatant.  Seems to me that that's the entire point of the Ranger class, to be the masters of ranged combat.  And let's face it, Rogues aren't masters of ranged combat so much as they're opportunists who take advantage of the Sneak Attack ability to do more damage than Rangers.    It's OK with me that Rogues do a lot of damage if handled well.  It's not so OK with me that they're better at ranged combat than Rangers.    Seems to me that Rangers get the short end of the stick in these games.  The real short end.  But if they're supposed to be masters of ranged combat, then it should be reflected in the game and in the damage they do, AC's be damned.  But that's just my opinion. 

[b0rsuk]

1. I don't agree Driving Flight is "obviously good" with hunting bows. Driving Flight deals less damage on second hit, and hunting bows already struggle against DR.

2. I'd consider Swift Aim. -7 Accuracy for 1.5x attack speed. This lets you take "Swift and Steady" talent, +5 accuracy. You end up with 1.5x attack speed and just -2 Accuracy.

3. Animal companions other than wolf have 5 Intelligence since patch 1.03. This means their Takedown duration went down from 5s to 3.8s. 10,10,10... stats on wolf may be an oversight that will be patched, or intentional because wolf serves as "baseline", much like humans are the average race in all fantasy.

4. Binding Roots are not just good for keeping targets away ! It's great for ganging up on enemies, because Stuck gives -20 to Deflection.

 

Marked Prey... even against bosses, it's doubtful it's actually much benefit. If you take Wounding Shot instead, the hobbling effect gives -20  Reflex, which other party members can use.

 

If you're using Hunting Bows, I recommend Combusting Wounds ! A level2 Wizard spell, which makes an enemy take 5 fire damage each time it's hit ! So faster, weaker attacks are actually better.

[MadDemiurg]

 

For rangers to be #1 (at least #1 auto attack) ranged dps their talent that gives their AC +50% damage against targets under DoT should work on ranger himself. That would be ranger's SA equivalent. This way rogue has SA + melee modal (reckless assault) and ranger has his own SA equivalent + ranged modals.

 

However, I'd prefer to see ranger's AC buffed first. If AC is decent throughout the whole game ranger doesn't necessarily need to be better than rogue at shooting.

 

DoT?

 

Enhance the AC?  Meh.  Personally, I wish that having an AC was a choice for rangers rather than a requirement.  Once I learned that having an AC go down in battle gave the Ranger a penalty, I got a LOT more cautious with my AC, which honestly was a pain.  My first choice would be to make AC's optional.  Second choice might be to do away with the ACC penalty if the AC goes down in battle.  Third choice, buff it.

 

Regardless, I still think that the Ranger should be better than a Rogue as a ranged combatant.  Seems to me that that's the entire point of the Ranger class, to be the masters of ranged combat.  And let's face it, Rogues aren't masters of ranged combat so much as they're opportunists who take advantage of the Sneak Attack ability to do more damage than Rangers.    It's OK with me that Rogues do a lot of damage if handled well.  It's not so OK with me that they're better at ranged combat than Rangers.    Seems to me that Rangers get the short end of the stick in these games.  The real short end.  But if they're supposed to be masters of ranged combat, then it should be reflected in the game and in the damage they do, AC's be damned.  But that's just my opinion. 

 

DoT = damage over time.

 

AC offers a sizable advantage to the ranger at low levels atm, it just doesn't scale well. Ditching it seems like redefining the class completely. Leaving it in its current state is undesirable for me - I don't like gimmick features. But if ranger was better than rogue at ranged combat AND provided a decent free offtank rogue would become UP compared to the ranger...

[Crucis]

 

 

For rangers to be #1 (at least #1 auto attack) ranged dps their talent that gives their AC +50% damage against targets under DoT should work on ranger himself. That would be ranger's SA equivalent. This way rogue has SA + melee modal (reckless assault) and ranger has his own SA equivalent + ranged modals.

 

However, I'd prefer to see ranger's AC buffed first. If AC is decent throughout the whole game ranger doesn't necessarily need to be better than rogue at shooting.

 

DoT?

 

Enhance the AC?  Meh.  Personally, I wish that having an AC was a choice for rangers rather than a requirement.  Once I learned that having an AC go down in battle gave the Ranger a penalty, I got a LOT more cautious with my AC, which honestly was a pain.  My first choice would be to make AC's optional.  Second choice might be to do away with the ACC penalty if the AC goes down in battle.  Third choice, buff it.

 

Regardless, I still think that the Ranger should be better than a Rogue as a ranged combatant.  Seems to me that that's the entire point of the Ranger class, to be the masters of ranged combat.  And let's face it, Rogues aren't masters of ranged combat so much as they're opportunists who take advantage of the Sneak Attack ability to do more damage than Rangers.    It's OK with me that Rogues do a lot of damage if handled well.  It's not so OK with me that they're better at ranged combat than Rangers.    Seems to me that Rangers get the short end of the stick in these games.  The real short end.  But if they're supposed to be masters of ranged combat, then it should be reflected in the game and in the damage they do, AC's be damned.  But that's just my opinion. 

 

DoT = damage over time.

 

AC offers a sizable advantage to the ranger at low levels atm, it just doesn't scale well. Ditching it seems like redefining the class completely. Leaving it in its current state is undesirable for me - I don't like gimmick features. But if ranger was better than rogue at ranged combat AND provided a decent free offtank rogue would become UP compared to the ranger...

 

 

DoT:  Ahhh.  Thnx.

 

Perhaps, but as I said above, I don't really like the AC in the first place and removing it wouldn't bother me.  Another reason that I don't like the AC is that the Ranger in PoE isn't really the same as a DnD Ranger conceptually.  PoE Rangers don't strike me as forest guardians in the same way as they do in DnD, which in turn seems to me to make having the animal companion feel out of place.  The animal companion would make more sense (at least to me) for a DnD style forest guardian Ranger.  But I get the sense that the PoE ranger is more of a ranged weapons expert than a forest guardian because so darned few things about the class have anything to do with nature.  About the only 2 things that link to nature are the AC and the binding roots ability, and I could deal with not having either of those if rangers were truly masters at ranged combat.

 

But others may see rangers different than I do.

 

[b0rsuk]

But ranger already is better than rogue at ranged combat. Stunning Shots.

[Looms]

Short Ranger guide:

 

Wood Elf

20 base Dex

Driving Flight

Stunning Shots

Swift Aim

Hunting Bow