Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Build Discussion The ranger kind of sucks...

The original PHB ranger wasn't great. When early access first came around, EVERYONE was excited with what Larian did with the ranger. I was eagerly awaiting to see what it was going to look like at higher levels, and, now that we have the full game, I'm very, very disappointed.

Larian should have just adopted the ranger presented in Tasha's Cauldron of Everything, or they should have did more with their homebrew.

At level 6 and level 10, you get to pick extra level 1 abilities. I would have rather had Expertise in a skill, Roving to increase my movement speed, and Tireless to get temporary HP.

Hide in Plain Sight...is garbage if I'm just going by its description. You get to be invisible if you don't move? When is this ever useful? At least Land's Stride will be useful, I guess.

The subclasses aren't bad, but it's not a good feeling knowing you have to acquire some disappointing and lackluster abilities before you get those high level subclass features, and I'm not sure the ranger's spell list is even that great to make staying a single class desirable.

Larian did so much needless homebrew, but they couldn't even give the ranger some REAL love?

Come on!

At least they're not pact of the tome warlocks or college of lore bards.

5E: Here's some interesting subclasses that respectively gives the warlocks more spell choice and turns bards into even bigger skill monkeys.

Larian: El Mao, let's spice this up! Wouldn't it be so dope if the entirety of the subclass feature was just three more cantrips of no use at all, one of which actively breaks Hex? It sure would! And why should them stinking lore bards have a choice in what skills they get, eff that noise, let's just give them some fixed stuff and if some of it overlaps with existing skills then too effing bad!

I could be overlooking something, granted, but from where I'm sitting, those two subclasses really take the cake in terms of being horribly underwhelming.

For every good change Larian made to the 5e rules, they made at least two bad or completely unnecessary ones.

Why can prepared casters change prepared spells at will, yet rangers, bards, and sorcerers can't learn additional soells?

Why is shove still a bonus action?

Why can every class cast spells from scrolls?

WHY DID THEY GIVE HUMANS AND HALF-ELVES ARMOR PROFICIENCIES, EFFECTIVELY MAKING THEM THE BEST ARCANE CASTERS IN THE GAME?

So many unnecessary and questionable changes to the ruleset.

I´m still in Act 1 at level 5, but holy crap my Gloomie is *NICE*. A little different from PHB, certainly but *NICE*

Could you elaborate please for those of us not familiar?

I was planning a full Pact of Chain Warlock, a Pact of Blade Warlock/College of Swords Bard multiclass, and a full College of Lore Bard...

Your information may help me decide.

Thank you.

Pact of the Tome warlocks per 5E rules get three cantrips of their choice from any spell list and they get the ability to learn ritual spells. Thus they get a fair bit more utility out of combat, which is where the ability to cast something other than eldritch blast really shines.

Larian has instead given them three cantrips of Larian's choice, specifically Guidance, Viscious Mockery, and Thorn Whip. And that's it, since ritual casting isn't implemented. Guidance is a great cantrip, except it is absolutely horrible for warlocks, because it requires concentration, which means it breaks Hex. And you don't have the spellslots to keep recasting Hex. Viscious Mockery and Thorn Whip are combat spells that don't come close to an invocation-boosted Eldritch Blast. So not only does this pact boon not give you anything, it also gives you a helpful option to accidentally break your Hex in every single skill check afterwards.

College of Lore Bards aren't anywhere near as badly implemented, but per 5E they should get proficiency of three skills of your choice, and of course you wouldn't choose proficiency in skills you were already had proficiency in. Larian instead implemented it as "you get proficiency in Arcana, Intimidation, and Sleight of Hand", meaning you don't get a choice and if any of those skills overlap with your history or class proficiencies then that's too bad. It isn't debilitating as such, just somewhat annoying and imposing. I suppose the bigger draw for the class is getting more access to Magical Secrets, though of course that's also not quite "spells from any classes" in Larian's implementation.

If you want a skill monkey bard who is also good at lockpicking, bullying, and arcane stuff, then lore bard is fine, but you have to plan accordingly. You can respec to change your class proficiency choices but you cannot respec your origin.

Thank you, that's very helpful, and I'll keep the proficiency issue in mind when I role him up.

The problem isn't the subclasses. The problem is the ranger class. The subclasses are fine. The ranger class is poorly designed.

Ritual casting is implemented, but the in-game class descriptions fail to mention this outside of the Ritual Caster feat. Also, the spell selection neglects to tell you which spells are rituals. There's no ritual tag when choosing spells, but you'll see which spells are rituals after you learn them

Ranger has always been bad, when you add to the fact that other classes got a huge boost in power from the homebrew while scuffed fighter/ druid hybrid it makes sense why I, and many other put it into meme tier on our videos. Here is how to fix ranger

1)give them favorite enemy from pathfinder: +2 to hit

2) give them a wolf companion at level 1, and upgrade it to direwolf at lvl 6

3) Give them lead arrows spell.

Ranger Longstrider spell is a Ritual Casting outside of combat. I finally figured this out yesterday. I then was able to cast it on all 4 party members after we left camp. Everyone in the party now has Longstrider until Long Rest. Seems like that is overpowered, but that’s how it currently works.

Doesn't change the fact that there's no real incentive to continue taking ranger levels after level 5. Other spellcasters also get Longstrider AND more spells learned, so this actually isn't as big of a benefit to the ranger as it is for another caster.

A lvl 10 Wood Elf Ranger is proficient in 11 skills.

If you start with 8 17 13 12 14 12 and choose Wood Elf as the race and Guild Artisan as the background you start with Perception, Stealth, Insight, Persuasion. Then you can choose Animal Handling, Nature and Survival from the Ranger skills and Sleight of Hand and Investigation from Favored Enemy and Natural Explorer. Later you can get Religion and Arcana too.


A lvl 10 Dragonborn Ranger can get resistance to 4 different damage types. A Dwarf or Tiefling Ranger can get 3 and only need to go to lvl 8 Ranger to get them.


Gloomstalker lvl 7 gets 4 saving throw proficiencies.



Larians Ranger homebrews are SUUUUUPER busted.

I am only level 5 but my WE Gloomstalker is pretty easy to play and very powerful. Feels a lot stronger than the Hunter I played in EA.

Could have let this ranger have his post, guy.

Y'all are missing the point entirely.

My ranger so far 5gloomstalker/3assasin hit like a train and one-shoot most targets down from stealth.

It just need a good optimization with extra weapon DMG, usage of toxins and initiator to produce the surprise status to enemies