Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - Build Discussion Why are Ranger's rated so poorly?

I have played a Ranger (Gloomstalker)Assassin 5/5 up until the beginning of Act 3 and the character has been pretty useful. Armed with 2 hand crossbows and the Sharpshooter feat she has dealt out some pretty hefty damage in combat. And yet, I keep reading that the Ranger class is pretty poor overall. Is there a reason for this? Is it a case of other classes dealing out a lot more damage? I'm just surprised a little as the damage seems pretty nasty and she is a more than competent thief as well.

Same experience here except I play as a Ranger Hunter, so I personally do not understand where such statements come from either.

My Drow Ranger with a shield (20AC currently) at level 6 on Tactician difficulty very rarely gets hit, while dealing around 50 damage per turn easily with her dual-crossbows. All "major" battles have been a breeze to go through since she hits like a truck and dodges attacks like they're nothing, so I just park her between an entire group of enemies and watch the misses fly as I unload crossbows all around, despite the increase in enemy's hit chance and HP pools.

Mostly the problem is, as far as combat goes, whatever Ranger can do, others do better.

IMO, where Ranger shines is a great skill proficiency access. Starting out with as much as 9 skill proficiencies is really good for a game like BG3, where there are so many skill checks all around outside combat.

Gloomstalker Ranger is as far as is goes when it comes to combat, simply because its extra attack on turn 1 and Misty Step are really useful and heck you can play human without second thought too because you get a freebie darkvision too. But that's it - level 5 you're done and better off multiclassing into something else. Others? BM at least has some utility with pets that do conditions and don't die in 1 hit and Hunter is plain worthless - 1d8 once per turn, bruh.

So that plus a ton of skills is really great, but for combat same 5 levels of Fighter are easily better with Action surge, Heavy Armor and Maneuvers (or Crit range if you want that). Misty step you can get from other sources plenty. Heck slap level 6 and get extra feat as Fighter too!

I admit I didn't progress far into the game yet (first serious playthrough, Party members are currently Level 5), but I am enjoying my BM .

Maybe there are builds that dish out more damage than BM, but I am not the person to go for Min Max. I also don't plan to respec my companions.


I chose Ranger as main character because I wanted a character which scales with dexterity so he can pick locks / disarm traps, since during my first steps in the game I learned that I don't like Astarion that much so I didn't want him as a party member.


So in the end, for me there were the options to go for Ranger, Bard or Rogue. And I chose Ranger.

I love Rangers so I am biased. I think the BG3 Ranger is quite powerful going ranged. I am not a huge fan of melee Rangers, just on the basis of your damage is going to be worse than every other martial class while at the same time being the least tanky, but there are still the non combat advantages the class has over a lot of others. They get a lot skill check options with Ranger and Wisdom and they can easily handle lockpicking/disarming detail.

Wny? Because like all assasin builds, If you do not know what that is, you have not hit the harder part of act 3. All of act 1, and 2 are easy, it's a bad bench mark for build testing. You need to be able to survive the near infinite free stealth abilities, spell nukes, etc. While your enemy

Probably one reason is because there are so many ways to play this game. Wether you focus mostly on the fighting, are into min/maxing, or not, skill checks etc. If you just play the game, enjoying most of the aspects of the game, without specializing in any aspect, all the class are fine. And you have 4 in the party anyway, so it's ok if not one character shines at every part of the game.

I don't think for example you'll face a problem in Act 3 because of unstoppable. If you have anyone with in your party for example, you'll be totally fine, and those fights might even be one of the less challenging fights for you in act 3. Your Ranger doesn't have to be the one. Now if you play on modded extra hard, or want to go through it very fast, or want your PC to be the best damage dealer etc. the Ranger might not be the best character (I don't know personally).

Its because of 2 things really.

1: combat wise a fighter is better at everything they do. Even paladins are better. And some other classes can be as well depending on their subclass. What little unique spells they have are almost all tied to ranged combat. So if you want to play a melee ranger several other classes do it better then you do.

2: their unique features are very niche. And in tabletop often dont get used or are under utilized. Theyre essentially, all roleplay features.

Basicly, a player has to know upfront what the dm is going to do for an enviroment and enemy wise; or most of his features go to waste.

The features also only work in their favoured terrain. So say you are a forest ranger and end in a desert..... all your special features just stopped working.

Preferred enemy is a nice feature. But its very limited and ONLY works against that particular enemy. So you can play a campaign and never run into yohr preferred enemy

Tldr a Ranger is....fine if build as a ranged character. If you get to play in your preferred enviroment you are a superstar when it comes to roleplay. Survivaling with a Ranger is super easy. Without one its a pain in the ass if your dice rolls dont go well. If you are not in your preffered enciroment its just a subpar fighter. What little spellcasting a ranger has generally only benefits them. And only benefits ranged builds.

Hope thats helpfull

Truth must be told. Is hard to be rouge, is easier to be fighter / paladin
And since people dont like to be challenge they just dont like rogues

That's hardly "truth".

People enjoy playing different classes in different ways.

Maybe the general idea is that rangers are woodland people. Not so suited for dungeno crawling, so it's not a preferred choice.
I 've done different classes in EA, and chose a ranger to embark in the final version. It turned out to be the class I liked most in the game, but it was not the first one I tried.
On tabletop DND, I prefer clerics, and that was my first choice in EA, but in BG3 it's not a very good class to play.

I imagine that at least some of it is a consequence of the poor reputation Rangers have in the tabletop rpg. And indeed their first implementation in the Player's Handbook was fairly poor. But I've always felt that many of the criticisms are either misguided or simply empty parroting. Rangers are perfectly fine.

Tha is exactly why it it the whole truth.

People dont like to think, they want to feel they are good with minimal efford

man clerics are waaaay to powerfull in BG3 just stop thinking them as if this were D&D table top and use what BG3 has and learn what it does not

Parroting is really the extent of it.

Rangers are easily as good in combat as fighters are. Folks talk as though Fighters have some huge advantage because a pure fighter at level 11 gets an extra attack, but in reality the most effective combat builds are not taking 11 levels of fighter. Monk/Warlock/Barbarian Tavern Brawler shenanigans can get you 50+ damage per attack and 6+ attacks per turn if all you care about is dishing out damage, while moving quite fast. But because folks are convinced Champion Fighter is the king of damage, if it doesn't get that 3rd attack at level 11 it's dismissed as a 'subpar fighter'.

Rangers get an extra attack at level 3, whether that's via Horde Breaker or Dread Ambusher or best of all a companion, and they retain an attack advantage vs a Fighter from level 3 all the way through to level 11. At level 11, it's debatable, because while the Fighter catches up and indeed pulls ahead while using Haste, Beast Master Rangers actually get an extra attack on their companion, pushing them ahead again. If you ignore the companion's unique abilities and attacks and assume the Champion Fighter is always under the effects of haste and theory craft scenarios in your head where the Champion Fighter has an advantage, then sure, Champion Fighter will still pull ahead damage wise. But in practice Rangers will do just as good if not better, through every stage of the game, vs an equivalent fighter.

Their unique features are also not at all environment dependent in BG3, granting things like Proficiency in Heavy Armor (meaning that while a dip in Fighter after level 1 won't grant heavy armor proficiency, Ranger will). Hide in Plain Sight in BG3 only takes an action instead of a minute. They have spells, they have better skill proficiencies, they are a perfectly functional and capable class. But folks hear they're bad so they avoid them and parrot them being bad to others, without ever trying them out themselves.

I've never been in a PnP campaign with a Ranger where they didn't shine, in my current campaign we have both a Ranger and a Fighter and the Ranger does easily 3x the damage the fighter does. Part of that is due to the Ranger being, well, Ranged while the Fighter is melee, so the Fighter wastes more actions and turns trying to get to enemies while the Ranger just keeps pumping out damage, part of that is due to the Ranger having Sharpshooter while the Fighter is Dual Wielding rather than going Great Weapon Master, and Sharpshooter and Great Weapon Master are outright busted from a balance perspective, and part of that is (I suspect) due to the Ranger cheating a bit, assuming they have advantage and are not seen by the enemies when the DM hasn't confirmed it, or deciding to apply Sharpshooter after rolling, or reporting to hit numbers consistently that would imply the penalty for Sharpshooter was not taken while reporting damage figures which would imply it should have been, all the normal stuff which tends to happen in PnP campaigns when Sharpshooter or Great Weapon Master are around. Even setting that stuff aside though the Ranger would easily exceed the fighter's damage totals, largely because Fighters don't actually have that much of their kit which improves their damage output vs other Martial characters, beyond the one round per rest action surge.

In BG3, Rangers are even better than they are in PnP. I'm glad you're having a great time with them, they're a great class. I wouldn't worry about those who knock the class based on blanket unfounded assertions or 'white room analysis' (theoretical scenarios cherry picked to prove a point). I certainly haven't heard anyone in BG3 or PnP who has ever actually *played* a Ranger and said 'Man I just can't keep up in terms of damage output' or 'I never feel like I'm useful and contributing to the party' or anything of the sort. Nor do I expect I ever will.

If you want to be an archer, you're better off being a fighter, maybe even a rogue.
If you want to be a dual wielder, you're better off being a rogue or fighter.
If you want to make use of spells with Wisdom, you're better off being a cleric or druid.
If you want good combat use from summons, you're better off being a wizard or druid.
If you want to engage in stealth shenanigans, you're better off as a rogue.

Even you, maker of this thread, said yourself that in the run where you played as ranger, you didn't actually play as ranger.
You played as a multiclass creation that had ranger in it. It's not the same thing.
You did Gloomstalker + Assassin for stealth shenanigans, presumably.
I'll bet the Assassin levels end up mattering more, but either way BG3 is certainly bigger on creating multiclass amalgamations than 5e ever was. 5e, simply put, allowed multiclassing but one was never really *meant* to. BG3 it feels like you're meant to.
In any case if you want to compare classes to each other, compare one-class builds, not multi-class amalgamations.
Would you do a run as just gloomstalker, with no rogue levels?

With all of rangers mechanics being done better by someone else, the reason's left for taking it are narrative. Maybe I prefer the idea of one loyal pet (granted the game diminishes that by making the beastmaster companion a changable fey spirit summon instead of an actual permanent companion like it should be) to the idea of just spawning a little horde of summons as a wizard or druid.
That said if you want to be a sort of hybrid character without multiclassing to create it, that's kind of what the ranger is for. Similar to Paladin, in that respect.
Honestly I feel like Ranger and Paladin may have been originally created for the purpose of giving players an excuse to have higher Wis / Cha on a martial class, for perception and dialogue. Now we just need a class that is the martial's excuse for taking Int.
As far as multiclass builds go, I might add some Hunter to an archery Fighter for horde breaker, gloomstalker to assassin perhaps (so I'd be rogue-ranger, not ranger-rogue, at least in mentality)

Doing just straight single class comparison, as you indicated was correct, for level 10 and below (the vast majority of the game), can you please explain how and why Fighter is a better Archer, and by what margin they are better at being an archer? We'll ignore everything else a Ranger can do and just focus on the Archery, same for the Fighter (lol). What exactly, prior to level 11, makes the Fighter superior as an Archer, and how much of a benefit does it provide? I'm curious to see what your response looks like. I see claims like this all the time, but pretty much always just as blanket statements without any rationale or support, just stated as though they're unquestionably true.

If the entire reason they're better in your mind is because Fighter at 11 gets an extra attack, that's fine, and we can certainly do some comparative analysis, as I still disagree, but if that's all it is can we first agree that 11+ represents proprtionally a small part of the game experience, and that prior to level 11 Fighter does not offer substantial advantages for the Archer archetype?

We can also say that they weren't given a unique starting outfit, so same look as the rogue with a different colored dye which is poor start.

Second problem I have is that beastmaster beasts have to wear a mask when they get their big power spike. I just don't dig the look on it, since it removes their facial expressions which is a big part of the charm there for me.

Ranger itemization doesn't feel like they got much compared to other classes. I don't know what would be fun, maybe ranger gloves of strength? since they take such a hit there in the new renditions. Something that raises it to a 15 or 16 could be cool. Being able to set traps would have been cool as well, or tracking where only rangers might know what to look out for. Their benefit to passing around in the wild aren't worth much cause anyone can go anywhere. To make the class shine I think they need a specific bonded animal with a name we choose, who can compensate for class weaknesses with that sort of flavor. Vibe on druids is more wildshape and summons and spells, so to compete Ranger's having a special animal companion at all times who can use help or cast healing word maybe. Then they'd instantly be back in the running. Another fun option would be a fairy companion who just always manages to save the animals at the last second no matter what, like even if it's game over. Maybe they whelp but still manage to escape. That'd be a nice touch.

For ranger outfits, having something with a starting hood/cloak would be cool. I think they should be able to fish and retrieve supplies from the wilderness and recruit animals to the camp. Scratch and Owlbear related questlines should get us a bit more content too. In general the game doesn't really provide enough areas with animals around that could join into the battles to make some of these charm animal type spells feel useful.

Rangers don't have anywhere near the amount of magic gear options martials get, 90% of gear in the game is martial gear, and like 5% left is sorc/wiz/warlock gear with the other 3% ranger and 2% druid gear. Ranger has a single legendary longbow, martial classes have over 5 legendary weapons, casters have a single legendary staff. Druids have zero legendaries for them, at least as regards wildshapes or symbiotic entity mechanics.

Not a single piece of gear buffs up or radically alters your animal companions. In order to make effective use of your spells, you gotta dump wisdom into them while either being restricted to DEX based finesse weapons, or if you want to be a 2H ranger you'll have to give up dex for str or wis for str.

Jump and the gross availability of misty step/fly granting items and gith racials also remove a lot of what balances martials downwards, so their weaknesses are removed while having more potential damage. Paralysis autocrit mechanic, one of the biggest damage power creeps in the game, is only available by being within 3m of the target.

Martials just got such an absurd amount of favoritism in the itemization pool and shoring up of weaknesses via teleports/elemental resistance granting gear while the other classes got left in the dirt. Then there's the fact that Fighter can make very good use of ranged weapons while sacrificing no melee perks, and they can take advantage of both elemental arrows and spell scrolls since Larian didn't put class restrictions on them.

You can also craft venoms and oils very trivially, but elemental arrows cannot be crafted.