Dedicating themselves to the protection of the world, rangers seek out and defend against any threat that seeks to endanger their part of the earth. Whether in cold or heat, light or dark, city or wilderness, a ranger stands as the watcher of the land.
You must have a Dexterity score or a Wisdom score of 13 or higher in order to multiclass in or out of this class.
hit dice:
1d10 per ranger level
hit points at 1st level:
10 + your Constitution modifier
hit points at higher levels:
1d10 (or 6) + your Constitution modifier per ranger level after 1st
armor proficiencies:
Light armor, medium armor, shields
weapon proficiencies:
Simple weapons, martial weapons
tools:
None
saving throws:
Strength, Dexterity
skills:
Choose three from Animal Handling, Athletics, Insight, Investigation, Nature, Perception, Stealth, and Survival
starting equipment:
You start with the following equipment, in addition to the equipment granted by your background:
- (a) scale mail or (b) leather armor
- (a) two shortswords or (b) two simple melee weapons
- (a) a dungeoneer's pack or (b) an explorer's pack
- A longbow and a quiver of 20 arrows
spellcasting:
Spell Slots
The Ranger table shows how many spell slots you have to cast your ranger spells of 1st level and higher. To cast one of these spells, you must expend a slot of the spell's level or higher. You regain all expended spell slots when you finish a long rest.
For example, if you know the 1st-level spell Animal Friendship and have a 1st-level and a 2nd-level spell slot available, you can cast Animal Friendship using either slot.
Spells Known of 1st Level and Higher
You know two 1st-level spells of your choice from the ranger spell list.
The Spells Known column of the Ranger table shows when you learn more ranger spells of your choice. Each of these spells must be of a level for which you have spell slots. For instance, when you reach 5th level in this class, you can learn one new spell of 1st or 2nd level.
Additionally, when you gain a level in this class, you can choose one of the ranger spells you know and replace it with another spell from the ranger spell list, which also must be of a level for which you have spell slots.
Spellcasting Ability
Wisdom is your spellcasting ability for your ranger spells, since your magic draws on your attunement to nature. You use your Wisdom whenever a spell refers to your spellcasting ability. In addition, you use your Wisdom modifier when setting the saving throw DC for a ranger spell you cast and when making an attack roll with one.
Spell save DC = 8 + your proficiency bonus + your Wisdom modifier
Spell attack modifier = your proficiency bonus + your Wisdom modifier
Spellcasting Focus (Optional)
At 2nd level, you can use a druidic focus as a spellcasting focus for your ranger spells. A druidic focus might be a sprig of mistletoe or holly, a wand or rod made of yew or another special wood, a staff drawn whole from a living tree, or an object incorporating feathers, fur, bones, and teeth from sacred animals. You can also use objects taken from the domain you guard as a ranger.
class features:
Imprint of the Ranger
When you hit a creature with an attack roll, you can call on your mystical bond with the world to imprint a brand upon the target for 1 minute or until you lose your concentration (as if you were concentrating on a spell).
The first time on each of your turns that you hit the branded target and deal damage to it, including when you imprint it, you increase that damage by 1d4. You also have advantage on any skills checks or saving throws when you are attempting to track the branded target or the group that the target is a part of.
You can use this feature a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.
This feature's extra damage increases when you reach certain levels in this class: to 1d6 at 6th level and to 1d8 at 14th level.
Adept Wayfarer
You are a master of navigating the world around you, and you react with swift and decisive action when attacked. This grants you the following benefits:
- You ignore difficult terrain.
- You gain a +2 bonus to initiative rolls.
- You gain a climbing speed and a swimming speed equal to your walking speed.
- You can also speak, read, and write an additional language of your choice.
In addition, you are skilled at navigating the wilderness. You gain the following benefits when traveling:
- Difficult terrain doesn’t slow your group’s travel.
- Your group can’t become lost except by magical means.
- Even when you are engaged in another activity while traveling (such as foraging, navigating, or tracking), you remain alert to danger.
- If you are traveling alone, you can move stealthily at a normal pace.
- While tracking other creatures, you also learn their exact number, their sizes, and how long ago they passed through the area.
Fighting Style
At 2nd level, you adopt a particular style of fighting as your specialty. Choose one of the following options. You can't take a Fighting Style option more than once, even if you later get to choose again.
- Archery. You gain a +2 bonus to attack rolls you make with ranged weapons.
- Blind Fighting. You have blind sight with a range of 10 feet. Within that range, you can effectively see anything that isn't behind total cover, even if you're blinded or in darkness. Moreover, you can see an invisible creature within that range, unless the creature successfully hides from you.
- Defense. While you are wearing armor, you gain a +1 bonus to AC.
- Druidic Warrior. You learn two cantrips of your choice from the Druid spell list. They count as ranger spells for you, and Wisdom is your spellcasting ability for them. Whenever you gain a level in this class, you can replace one of these cantrips with another cantrip from the Druid spell list.
- Dueling. When you are wielding a melee weapon in one hand and no other weapons, you gain a +2 bonus to damage rolls with that weapon.
- Thrown Weapon Fighting. You can draw a weapon that has the thrown property as part of the attack you make with the weapon. In addition, when you hit with a ranged attack using a thrown weapon, you gain a +2 bonus to the damage roll.
- Two-Weapon Fighting. When you engage in two-weapon fighting, you can add your ability modifier to the damage of the second attack.
- Close Quarters Shooter (UA). When making a ranged attack while you are within 5 feet of a hostile creature, you do not have disadvantage on the attack roll. Your ranged attacks ignore half cover and three-quarters cover against targets within 30 feet of you. You have a +1 bonus to attack rolls on ranged attacks.
- Interception (UA). When a creature you can see hits a target that is within 5 feet of you with an attack, you can use your reaction to reduce the damage the target takes by 1d10 + your proficiency bonus (to a minimum of 0 damage). You must be wielding a shield or a simple or martial weapon to use this reaction.
- Mariner (UA). As long as you are not wearing heavy armor or using a shield, you have a swimming speed and a climbing speed equal to your normal speed, and you gain a +1 bonus to armor class.
- Tunnel Fighter (UA). As a bonus action, you can enter a defensive stance that lasts until the start of your next turn. While in your defensive stance, you can make opportunity attacks without using your reaction, and you can use your reaction to make a melee attack against a creature that moves more than 5 feet while within your reach.
- Unarmed Fighting (UA). Your unarmed strikes can deal bludgeoning damage equal to 1d6 + your Strength modifier. If you strike with two free hands, the d6 becomes a d8. When you successfully start a grapple, you can deal 1d4 bludgeoning damage to the grappled creature. Until the grapple ends, you can also deal this damage to the creature whenever you hit it with a melee attack.
Spell Casting
By the time you reach 2nd level, you have learned to use the magical essence of the world to cast spells, much as a druid does.
Primal Awareness
Beginning at 3rd level, your mastery of ranger lore allows you to establish a powerful link to the nature of feral creatures around you.
You have an innate ability to communicate with creatures that do not know a language. Through sounds and gestures, you can communicate simple ideas to a creature that does not know a language as an action, and can read its basic mood and intent. You learn its emotional state, whether it is affected by magic of any sort, its short-term needs (such as food or safety), and actions you can take (if any) to persuade it to not attack.
You cannot use this ability against a creature that you have attacked within the past 10 minutes.
Additionally, you can spend 10 uninterrupted minutes in concentration attuning your senses to the world around you and connecting to its energies. This allows you to sense the largest disturbance within 5 miles of you and the approximate direction it is from you. This feature also allows to you to know limited sounds, tastes, smells, and feelings from the disturbance you detect.
Ranger Conclave
At 3rd level, you choose to emulate the ideals and training of a ranger conclave. Your choice grants you features at 3rd level and again at 7th, 11th, and 15th level.
Ability Score Improvement
When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can't increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.
Martial Versatility (Optional)
Whenever you reach a level in this class that grants the Ability Score Improvement feature, you can replace a fighting style you know with another fighting style available to rangers. This replacement represents a shift of focus in your martial practice.
Extra Attack
Beginning at 5th level, you can attack twice, instead of once, whenever you take the Attack action on your turn.
Land's Stride
Beginning at 8th level, you can use the Dash action as a bonus action on your turn. In addition, whenever you finish a short rest, your exhaustion level, if any, is decreased by 1.
Obscuring Touch
At 10th level, you can draw on the powers of the world to reduce the presence of living things. You can use your action to touch a willing creature to give it advantage on Dexterity (Stealth) checks. This blessing lasts for 10 minutes or until you use this feature again.
You can use this feature a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.
Vanish
Starting at 14th level, you can use the Hide action as a bonus action on your turn. Also, you can't be tracked by nonmagical means, unless you choose to leave a trail.
Feral Senses
At 18th level, you gain preternatural senses that help you fight creatures you can't see. When you attack a creature you can't see, your inability to see it doesn't impose disadvantage on your attack rolls against it.
You are also aware of the location of any invisible creature within 30 feet of you, provided that the creature isn't hidden from you and you aren't blinded or deafened.
Domain of the Ranger
At 20th level, your connection to the world and its energies has deepened to where you gain the ability to bend it to your will temporarily. As an action, you may manifest an illusory realm around you in a radius of 100 feet. For 1 minute, this realm takes the form of the land you protect and, while inside the realm, you gain the following benefits:
- Your spell save DC increases by 1.
- Your walking speed increases by 5 feet.
- Whenever a creature attacks you, roll a d20. On a 6 or lower, the attack misses.
- When you take the Attack action on your turn, you can make one additional attack as part of that action.
Once you use this feature, you must finish a short or Long Rest before you can use it again.
subclass options:
Hunter
Some rangers seek to learn specialized fighting techniques for use against the most dire threats. Members of the Hunter Conclave spend time tracking, studying, and learning about their chosen threat to most effectively destroy them.
Favored Enemy
Beginning at 1st level, you have significant experience studying, tracking, hunting, and even talking to a certain type of enemy commonly encountered in the wilds.
Choose a type of favored enemy: beasts, fey, humanoids, monstrosities, or undead. You gain a +2 bonus to damage rolls with weapon attacks against creatures of the chosen type. Additionally, you have advantage on Wisdom (Survival) checks to track your favored enemies, as well as on Intelligence checks to recall information about them.
When you gain this feature, you also learn one language of your choice, typically one spoken by your favored enemy or creatures associated with it. However, you are free to pick any language you wish to learn.
Primal Awareness
You can focus your awareness through the interconnections of nature: you learn additional spells when you reach certain levels in this class if you don't already know them, as shown in the Primal Awareness Spells table. These spells don't count against the number of ranger spells you know.
Ranger Level |
Spell |
3rd |
Disguise Self |
7th |
Locate Object |
11th |
Slow |
15th |
Locate Creature |
You can cast each of these spells once without expending a spell slot. Once you cast a spell in this way, you can't do so again until you finish a long rest.
Greater Favored Enemy
At 7th level, you are ready to hunt even deadlier game. Choose a type of greater favored enemy: aberrations, celestials, constructs, dragons, elementals, fiends, or giants. You gain all the benefits against this chosen enemy that you normally gain against your favored enemy, including an additional language. Your bonus to damage rolls against all your favored enemies increases to +5.
Additionally, you have advantage on saving throws against the spells and abilities used by a greater favored enemy.
Presence of Prey
Starting at 11th level, you can remain perfectly still for long periods of time to set up ambushes.
When you attempt to hide on your turn, you can opt to not move on that turn. If you avoid moving, creatures that attempt to detect you take a −10 penalty to their Wisdom (Perception) checks until the start of your next turn. You lose this benefit if you move, either voluntarily or because of some external effect. You are still automatically detected if any effect or action causes you to no longer be hidden.
If you are still hidden on your next turn, you can continue to remain motionless and gain this benefit until you are detected.
Additionally, you can attune your senses to determine if any of your favored enemies lurk nearby. By spending 1 uninterrupted minute in concentration (as if you were concentrating on a spell), you can sense whether any of your favored enemies are present within 5 miles of you. This feature reveals which of your favored enemies are present, their numbers, and the creatures’ general direction and distance (in miles) from you.
If there are multiple groups of your favored enemies within range, you learn this information for each group.
Gaze of the Apex Predator
At 15th level, you become an unparalleled hunter of your enemies. As a bonus action, you infuse your gaze with the might of your presence and focus it on a single creature. The creature that you look at must make a Wisdom saving throw. If the creature fails its saving throw, it is either frightened or grappled for 1 minute. At the end of each of its turns, it can make another Wisdom saving throw. On a success, the effect ends on the creature and it is immune to the Gaze of the Apex Predator for the next 24 hours.
Additionally, if the target of this ability is your favored enemy, it has disadvantage on the saving throw. You may use this feature 3 times between short or Long Rests.
Level | Proficiency Bonus | Features | Spells Known | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th |
---|
1st | +2 | Imprint of the Ranger, Adept Wayfarer | - | - | - | - | - | - |
2nd | +2 | Fighting Style, Spellcasting, Spellcasting Focus (Optional) | 2 | 2 | - | - | - | - | |
3rd | +2 | Primal Awareness, Ranger Conclave | 3 | 3 | - | - | - | - |
4th | +2 | Ability Score Improvement, Martial Versatility (Optional) | 3 | 3 | - | - | - | - |
5th | +3 | Extra Attack | 4 | 4 | 2 | - | - | - |
6th | +3 | Imprint of the Ranger Improvement | 4 | 4 | 2 | - | - | - |
7th | +3 | Ranger Conclave feature | 5 | 4 | 3 | - | - | - |
8th | +3 | Ability Score Improvement, Land's Stride, Martial Versatility (Optional) | 5 | 4 | 3 | - | - | - |
9th | +4 | | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | - | - |
10th | +4 | Obscuring Touch | 6 | 4 | 3 | 2 | - | - |
11th | +4 | Ranger Conclave feature | 7 | 4 | 3 | 3 | - | - |
12th | +4 | Ability Score Improvement, Martial Versatility (Optional) | 7 | 4 | 3 | 3 | - | - |
13th | +5 | | 8 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 1 | - |
14th | +5 | Imprint of the Ranger Improvement, Vanish | 8 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 1 | - |
15th | +5 | Ranger Conclave feature | 9 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 2 | - |
16th | +5 | Ability Score Improvement, Martial Versatility (Optional) | 9 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 2 | - |
17th | +6 | | 10 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 |
18th | +6 | Feral Senses | 10 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 1 |
19th | +6 | Ability Score Improvement, Martial Versatility (Optional) | 11 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 |
20th | +6 | Domain of the Ranger | 11 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 3 | 2 |