doctorbadwolf
Heretic of The Seventh Circle
Hey there folks!
Inspired in part by the Druid UA, including where it fails, I have figured out a lot of what I dislike about the Beastmaster ranger!
Now, this is the main kind of ranger I want to play in D&D. It’s what makes the ranger more interesting than a Druid with fighter levels or an arcane Trickster with primal spells.
Now, I’m kinda hoping they put an options in the new ranger to swap the other level 1 features for a base class beast companion that can be empowered with spell slots and is there to be involved in most of what you do.
But barring that, we have the subclass structure.
So what needs to work differently?
Example beasts would be air, land, and sea.
Then you would have a choice in each statblock like “Pack Hunter, Protector, Scout” or “Raptor, Messenger, Scout”, etc.
lastly you’d pick maybe two special traits? Pounce, trample, pack tactics, hamstring, grapple
Odd but popular stuff like big spiders and snakes might merit their own statblock, alongside air, land, and sea.
Inspired in part by the Druid UA, including where it fails, I have figured out a lot of what I dislike about the Beastmaster ranger!
Now, this is the main kind of ranger I want to play in D&D. It’s what makes the ranger more interesting than a Druid with fighter levels or an arcane Trickster with primal spells.
Now, I’m kinda hoping they put an options in the new ranger to swap the other level 1 features for a base class beast companion that can be empowered with spell slots and is there to be involved in most of what you do.
But barring that, we have the subclass structure.
So what needs to work differently?
- For each attack that the beast makes to not cost ranger actions, only some. That is, similar model to hunters mark, where you BA to aim the thing, and then get dice of extra damage until that target dies, and then use a BA against to re-aim it.
- Alt: let the beast just have an attack action, make that the baseline assumption, and work from there.
- Beast needs a scaling statblock with variable choices so the player can feel like their “panther” is different from my “wolf”
- Let spell slots fuel beast, from ranger spells that are made to make the ranger and 1 or more ally stronger, to the ability to share the effect of a spell that targets self with your beast
- A mount option
- A Pack Tactics fighting style to further lean into being part of a team
Example beasts would be air, land, and sea.
Then you would have a choice in each statblock like “Pack Hunter, Protector, Scout” or “Raptor, Messenger, Scout”, etc.
lastly you’d pick maybe two special traits? Pounce, trample, pack tactics, hamstring, grapple
Odd but popular stuff like big spiders and snakes might merit their own statblock, alongside air, land, and sea.