UPDATE 58 PREVIEW 1 - Dark Hunter Ranger

[GoldyGopher]

i dunno i looked it up in SRD, this thing is just supposed to give assassinate (OR PARALYZE as a toggle), sneak attack, and rogue skills.

It's basically deepwood but flavor wise in a cave instead of woods. Seems like a bad choice given available options. UNLESS They really lean into the assassinate/CC angle, and maybe offer some other interesting imbues or defensive options (since it replaces AA). overall, meh

there is one place this thing will shine in current form as that's as a place for a pure ranger (knife thrower or bow) to lean into more SA dice and such. its a no brainer there, but not sure who else would really use it

I think the tree has potential, but isn't there, without change once the newness wears off its play will drop dramatically. In part I think because of the overlap with Deepwoods Stalker and to a smaller extent Vistani Knife Fighter. To me it would have made more sense to replace Deepwoods Sniper rather than arcane archer, less overlap, but there must be reason.

[Coffey]

10% Run speed would be a great add to the class feats.

[spifflove]

No Q staff empty off handed bs or bear.

[Lotoc]

bit awkward having an imbue in both tempest and dark hunter but having no sources of bonus dice, especially when the capstone of dark hunter is an effect that gives the imbue full damage on blinded targets.
Maybe consider putting some dice in the cores?

[Coffey]

No. Just this archtype of ranger wont' be able to take it without using a racial tree since it's being replaced by a new tree. Ranger "original flavor" still has that tree.

-T

14 AP dump.

[droid327]

bit awkward having an imbue in both tempest and dark hunter but having no sources of bonus dice, especially when the capstone of dark hunter is an effect that gives the imbue full damage on blinded targets.
Maybe consider putting some dice in the cores?

Plus, since its Bleed damage and there's a lot of bleed-immune mobs...its really a double penalty, its a bad damage type and its conditional damage. It really should just be d12 bleed as the base imbue and then maybe double damage vs blind with capstone...or give capstone "If it bleeds, you can kill it": strip bleed immunity from a target

In other words, take away the conditional damage...or take away the damage type penalty...or if both penalties remain, you better pump the damage way up to compensate

[R1ncewind]

I'm going to be honest this tree is a mess, and I love Blightcaster Druid.
As it is this is going to be a tertiary tree for tempest or HW ranger trees because the best things going for it are inherent to it ( traps and SA dices), the three is trying to do too much and in doing so does too little.
First example, the imbue (but this is a problem with the hole imbue system not just this tree) the imbue doesn't have any support at all in the rest of the tree, and I know this happen in some other old trees, but it's because they are old that you get a pass on not providing a decent support for the imbue in those trees. But here? this is a new tree you don't need an imbue added to it, I repeat you don't need to add an imbue to all new trees it's an error specially when this don't add anything special to the system as a whole.
But this can be said also about the pet, why add another pet to the game before committing to a complete overhaul of the pet system in the game? it's just a waste for the class, as someone mention this is going to become another leaver puller at around lvl 12. So, unless you can commit that you are going to do this overhaul this year remove this pet completely or just give it as a feat on leveling and let's use this Enhancements slots for something more useful.
Same can be said about traps. this seems like a halfway too, it could be fun, but you either commit or drop it. and maybe add a few more specially in the T5, something like a nasty smoke trap that double you SA dmg when enemies are inside for example.
Also we don't need another assassinate doppelganger, you can be sneaky and use shadows in more ways. even something like more CC or damage traps could be useful if those scale properly.

Next I'll go into specifics in the tree mentioned in red, sorry in advance for my english.

New Archtype for Ranger

New Tree: Dark Hunter
Replaces Arcane Archer

Themes: Assassination, sneaking, hunting, trapmaking, scavenging, throwing weapons


Changes from Base Class

Feats and Features Added:

• Trapfinding (1)
• Trap Making (3)
• Trap Sense +1 (3, 6, 9, 12, 15, 18) (same as rogue and barbarian)
• Sneak Attack 1d6 (1, 5, 10, 15, 20) (every 5 levels instead of every 2, means they get half of the sneak attack dice as Rogue does, 5d6 instead of 10d6) I like it how it is, it shouldn't be as good as a rogue, at best you could improve it as evey 4 levels so 6d6

Ranger Features Removed:

• All Favored Enemy feats that are not: Vermin, Elf, Aberration, Animal, Humanoid, Monstrous Humanoid I'm not familiar with how is this justified by lore, or maybe i'ts just a balance thing, but we could use at least 3 or 4 more options considering that if you go pure you have to select 5 out of 6 its remove the fun of selecting your FE

Spellbook:



Added:

• Curative Admixtures

Removed:

• Cure spells (they get admixtures)

Skills:

• Dark Hunters gain Open Lock and Disable Device as Class Skills

Past Life

• Dark Hunter: +1 Sneak Attack and +1 Sneak Attack Damage per stack This is just the same rogue past life, why not change it for 1 or 2 melee and ranger power per life, or something else...

Core 1:

Underdark Stalker: You gain +5 HP and +1 reflex saving throw per core ability you take in this tree.

This is just weak, we either add something else or empower the rest of the core

Core 3:

On The Hunt: When you strike someone with weapons you gain +1% dodge for 6 seconds, stacking 3 times.

this is also very weak, i would add more staking to maybe six every for 3 seconds and make it max doge too

Core 6:

Smoke Trap: Throw a smoke grenade at a target, if they fail a fortitude save (DC20 + Dex Mod + Assassinate + Trap DCs) they lose their immunity to sneak attack and 25% of their fortification for 25 seconds. (Cooldown: 12 seconds)

we need something more with this a pasive bonus, specially considering that the bonus from core 1 is so weak, something like fortification bypass would go a long way for a SA center tree

Core 12:

Escape Through the Dark: Whenever you become Invisible, your Sneak Attack Dice are briefly doubled. This lingers for 5 seconds after you become Invisible and may only trigger once every 60 seconds.

As i said before, let's make this another trap and make it better, by lasting longer but in a certain area for balance purposes

Core 18:

Death Stalker: +25% Sneak Speed. While you are sneaking, you gain a 5% enhancement damage bonus to your melee, ranged and unarmed attacks. This lingers for 10 seconds after you leave Stealth. (note: this does not stack with the Relentless Fury item affix)

with how prevalent Relentless fury is at end game ( hell even post lvl 15) this become so soooo much weaker considering that this is a core 18 ability is underwhelming, plz change it, maybe you get 5% damage boost when you have all the stacks of "On The Hunt" for example.

Core 20:

Hunter in the Dark: +2 Dex, Int, and Wis. +10% Doublestrike and Doubleshot. +10 Melee and Ranged Power. Your Cull the Weak bonus now applies against enemies that are Blind.

What is cull of the weak?

Tier 1:

Dark Wolf: You gain a Black Wolf as an Animal Companion. Each rank also gives you +5 HP. already mentioned

Wolf Hide: (req Dark Wolf) +2/4/6 PRR considering we have have other Enhancements that provides more PRR and don't require other points invested in the tree this seems weak, why not make it 1/3/5 prr and mrr
at least

Sneak Attack Training: +1 Sneak Attack die and +1 to hit when performing sneak attacks

Bleed the Weak: Imbue Toggle: 1d8 Bleed damage, scaling with Melee Power. Increases to 1d10 vs enemies below 50%, and increases again to 1d12 against enemies below 25%. where is the supp for this feature in the rest of this tree? either add more imbue dices somewhere ( maybe the cores) or just remove it entirely

Awareness: +1/2/3 Listen, Search, Spot, and to-hit.

Tier 2:

Furor of the Hunter: Your Black Wolf gains +3/6/10 to hit and damage, +2/4/6 Primal Bonus to AC, and its attacks bypass 10%/20%/50% of enemy Fortification. Same as before, we need ways for this to scale into epics and legendary levels

Assassin's Training: +1/2/3 Assassinate DCs. I really dont like this copy paste of assassinate, maybe something like while a monters is affected by you traps you get 1,2,3 imbue dices or something else for example

Sneak Attack Training: +1 Sneak Attack die and +1 to hit when performing sneak attacks

Improved Traps: +1/2/3 to the save DC's of Alchemical Trap Attacks and Magical Traps. Elemental Traps that you place now have a DC equal to 65/80/100% of your Disable Device Skill instead of 50%.

Action Boost: Skills or Sprint

Tier 3:

Primal Energy: Your Black Wolf gains a +2/+4/+6 Primal Bonus to all Ability Scores. Same as before

Snap Trap: Toss a snapping trap at the targeted enemy. If they don't make a Fortitude Save (DC 20 + Dex Mod + Assassinate + Bonus Trap DCs) they are rooted in place by the trap's jaws.

Sneak Attack Training: +1 Sneak Attack die and +1 to hit when performing sneak attacks

Use Magical Device: +1/2/3 Use Magic Device considering the lore, why not add better effects of potions and scrolls you use a other enhancements in other trees provides, this is also a T3 enhancements so it should be better

+1 Dex / Int / Wis

Tier 4:

Lupine Instincts: Your Black Wolf inherits your Search and Spot scores, and will automatically find traps and secret doors for you assuming you meet the statistical threshold. this could be usefull only if the pet add its own stats to this, mostly for new players

Slayer in the Dark: Killing an enemy grants you a +5 Morale bonus to Melee and Ranged Power, stacking 2/3/4 times. Duration: 20s
Sneak Attack Training: +1 Sneak Attack die and +1 to hit when performing sneak attacks

Smoke Bomb: Smoke Bomb SLA

+1 Dex / Int / Wis

Tier 5:

Ferocity: You gain +10% Doublestrike and Doubleshot. Your Black Wolf gains 25% Attack Speed and 100% Fortification Bypass.

Stone's Hue: Your Camouflage spell also grants the target +1 PRR per 2 caster levels, max caster level 20. This is soo sooo weak for a T5, also you need to add the 25% Competence bonus to maximum hit points, since this is supouse to be a thrower tree too ( i haven't seen almost no supp for this in the tree anyway) this should be a good place to put a selector between the hp option and some more melee power and a really good thrower option, something in the same realm of Ten Thousand Stars for example, or you gain double your SA dmg for the duration

Death Attack: Ranged Assassinate. Balance TBD. From the pen and paper source, this is essentially a copy of the ability Assassinate from Assassin, so we're looking into a way to differentiate it from the Rogue ability. Open to suggestions on this front! I really don't like the idea of repeating this rogue feature, I rather have something related to darkness, I really think that you should add more "darknes" to the trapps or add a darkness trap that also make you gain a good amount of offensive stats while in it. and maybe some defensives too

Blade Specialization: You gain a +1 Competence bonus to Critical Damage Multiplier with your weapons. If you have Improved Critical: Piercing, this bonus to Threat Range is doubled.

Dark Sight: You have True Seeing. You may also toggle this on to gain Underdark Sight while within the Underdark.

This need to get out of here, I get why you want to add the Underdark sight but this could be placed anywhere and this tree need so much help in the T5 to make it compite with Tempest. Something really good vs single target considering that tempest excels vs more mobs, or something that improve the imbue, (if you also add more support for it in the rest of the tree, could be good, maybe something like your bleed damage also affect mobs inmune to bleeding for example plus 3 imbue dices?



Known Issues:

• Several icons have not been finalized.
• All visual effects have not been finalized.
• The Tier 5 Death Attack is not complete, see tree for details.
• Open Lock and Disable Device skill trains have some issues

[Dreppo]

Dark Sight: You have True Seeing. You may also toggle this on to gain Underdark Sight while within the Underdark.

Now that we have this, all underdark races that have Darkvision in PnP (Drow etc.) should also get Underdark Sight automatically as a racial feat.

[Kvetha]

Death Attack: Ranged Assassinate. Balance TBD. From the pen and paper source, this is essentially a copy of the ability Assassinate from Assassin, so we're looking into a way to differentiate it from the Rogue ability. Open to suggestions on this front!

I see that this is being compared more to rogue than falconry, and if this makes falconry even more close to obsolete for a ranged instakill, that'll be sad. This should be a multi selector similar to Coup de Grace for swashbuckler or Holy Retribution in KotC for pali as those are boith istakills with both a melee and ranged option. Coup de Grace scales its DC easily as it's based on the perform skill with a 20 second timer, but it has the added difficulty of having the enemy CC'ed (a weird bug is normal light and heavy xbows break soft cc like daze before trying to trigger the instakill). Holy Retribution can scale pretty well with sunder DC's and has a longer 30 second timer, but only works on evil creatures and with only a 33% chance on enemies with over 5k health. Death from Above in falconry has the same DC calculation as rogue assassinate, but with character level instead of class as it is a universal tree wit ha 60 second timer with a chance to reset on using falcon attacks (it is used once or twice per fight even with the chance to reset it's cooldown as that doesn't seem to activate enough and it tends to just do the full 60 seconds), and while it has the most reliable chance to activate for starting a fight, it is also only ever single target while the other two work with IPS.

Death Attack should probably scale with the higher of either dex or wis and almost just like the rogue for DC's as (10 + Ranger level + the greater of Wisdom or Dexterity bonus + bonuses to Assassinate) and not having extra hoops to jump through as assassinate tends to be harder to boost than the other options. A cooldown of probably 30 seconds at maximum wouldn't be terrible, as any longer feels like forever in combat after using the rogue's at 12 seconds .

I have made a ranged Death from Above, Coup de Grace, and Holy Retribution character over the years to try out the various forms of ranged assassinate. Out of those, Coup de Grace feels the worst as it either requires very specific setup or team coordination. After that is probably Death from Above which feels great outside of the eternally lasting cooldowns. Holy Retribution tends to feel the best out of the tree even with the limitations as it tends to work on at least someone often enough (especially with IPS) and doesn't require extra setup for what is usually an attack that is meant to start a fight.

[dkyle]

New Archtype for Ranger
...
Tier 5:

Ferocity: You gain +10% Doublestrike and Doubleshot. Your Black Wolf gains 25% Attack Speed and 100% Fortification Bypass.

I think this ought to have an option to be a melee primary enhancement, granting the Tier 5 HP bonus. Maybe split this into 2 optionals, one with doubleshot, and one with doublestrike, with the latter granting the HP bonus?

[SpardaX]

What +1? There's no +1 to Range

The way I read it is this...

+1 Comp to Mult
Double feat benefit from IC:Pierce to Range

That lets you stack another +1 Comp to Range from DWS....so with Rapier should be 18-20 +3 from IC:P +3 from double +1 from DWS for 11-20 x3

That's a mod of .90, which is among the best but isnt an outlier

This is how I read it too. Could be they made a typo in the original post, but at least right now it says:

+1 Comp bonus to MULTIPLIER. If you have IC:Piercing, IC:Piercing's Threat range is doubled.

[kpak01]

Anyways, as is this is so good, should we say RIP Rogues?

Yeah. Come on, SSG. Rogues and Artis have something unique and you're taking that away. You could simply remove the trap stuff entirely from Hunter and it would still be interesting and good. Stealing other class defining features is way too much.

[SpardaX]

Ignore this post. What it said is already here somewhere else.

[Lotoc]

This is how I read it too. Could be they made a typo in the original post, but at least right now it says:

+1 Comp bonus to MULTIPLIER. If you have IC:Piercing, IC:Piercing's Threat range is doubled.

interestingly the way it is actually working on lam right now is

+1 comp bonus to multiplier, if you have IC:Piercing active +2 comp bonus to multiplier instead.

It isn't at all adjusting crit range.

[SpardaX]

I think the tree has potential, but isn't there, without change once the newness wears off its play will drop dramatically. In part I think because of the overlap with Deepwoods Stalker and to a smaller extent Vistani Knife Fighter. To me it would have made more sense to replace Deepwoods Sniper rather than arcane archer, less overlap, but there must be reason.

Personally if I was playing this tree, a sneak attack focused ranger, I would be combining it with the preexisting sneak attack focused ranger tree. I think the reason it didn't replace deepwood stalker, and also the reason that this tree seems to have a lot of combo with deepwood stalker, is that this tree is meant to be played with deepwood stalker.

In fact, This + Stalker + Vistani sounds like itd be a pretty good stabby build. Maybe with a few levels of rogue just to push a couple extra SA dice.

Though to give my initial reaction, these 2 cores seem a bit weak.

Core 3:

On The Hunt: When you strike someone with weapons you gain +1% dodge for 6 seconds, stacking 3 times.

I don't know about other people, but if I'm playing a character that uses dodge, I generally try and aim to max it, because it's such a powerful defense. I have a few ideas for this. I would make it either:
+1% dodge AND +1 Max dodge, stacking 2 times (This makes it useful even for someone who's maxed their dodge) Or
+1% dodge AND +1 Max Armor Dex Bonus, stacking 3 times. (Honestly I'd prefer 4 or 5 times but that's probably not happening.) This makes it useful for someone who's wearing armor, and has maxed their dodge based on the armor they're wearing. Considering Ranger's focus on light armor, personally this is the option I think best fits, and I know you guys don't like to give out Max Dodge, so I assume this is also the option that is a safer bet. Or actually, something that gives the 4 or 5 but doesn't make it immediately strong!
+1% dodge AND +1 Max Armor Dex Bonus. This stacks 2 times, but gains +1 possible total stack per additional core you take in this tree up to Core 18.

Core 12:

Escape Through the Dark: Whenever you become Invisible, your Sneak Attack Dice are briefly doubled. This lingers for 5 seconds after you become Invisible and may only trigger once every 60 seconds.

I don't really know what to make of this. I like it, but 5 seconds per 60 seems very small. I agree with a previous commenter about the 10/60 or 5/30. I am assuming you guys want it to be 5 seconds or in other words, a very small duration, because you want it like a quick ambush surprise thing. Fits the sneak attack theme. So I would go with the 5s on / 30s cooldown personally. Also if this is meant to combo with the Smoke bomb SLA, maybe in this core, you could include that the Smoke Bomb SLA gains innate quicken? I can see melee players getting annoyed at having to stop fighting to use smoke bomb during combat to get this benefit. Just a thought.

[Kielbasa]

Now would be a great time to clean up the wierdness of split critical modifiers in Tempest and Deepwood Stalker. 21 ap spent in both doesn't seem bad at first glance but it is a ton of ap when you consider you need to spend 42 ap to get +1/+1 its clunky and creates a lack of flexibility that other classes don't have to deal with.

Trapmaking!! I would love some quality of life adjustments here. Some of the crowd control ones work fairly well even into epic content but it sure would be nice if you could either smash the trap at your feet ala some of the alchemist spells or if you could throw them at your target like snap trap. Either option would make them easier to use in today's fast paced combat.

Epic/Destiny Ranger Feat- Mark Target. Requires 12 ranger levels. Just give us a fully upgraded mark target from horizon walker would be about as useful and strong as rogues epic feat of 3d6 sa dice.


More ideas to come later.

[Scrag]

But can someone confirm that _invisible_ is what is really meant here in the core enh, and not hidden? Because an archetype with a power that requires you to be _invisible_ with no in-class ability to do so sucks.

If it means hidden, clean the language please. Hidden makes sense. Invisible makes zero sense.

[yfernbottom]

Just to have another option for a single class trapper, I am really psyched to try this out. This looks like a lot of fun, and I can imagine several builds I would want to take for a spin.

Some way to get more imbue dice other than points into Inq. and playing an elf/ dark elf, besides multiclassing, would help the imbue toggle a lot. It's a neat idea, but maxing out at 1d12 it's not very useful.

I bought the version of Sharn that lets all my characters use that tree, so it's not an issue for me. However, it's quite a grind to earn that tree on a new server if you don't buy it. Further, with 42 points pretty much already being spent for crit bonuses, having a third tree be so close to mandatory seems off to me.

[Smurgels]

Yeah. Come on, SSG. Rogues and Artis have something unique and you're taking that away. You could simply remove the trap stuff entirely from Hunter and it would still be interesting and good. Stealing other class defining features is way too much.

yep. what's the point of ever being rogue in this game anymore? y'all need to go back to the drawing board on this one.

[Captain_Wizbang]

Death Attack: Ranged Assassinate. Balance TBD. From the pen and paper source, this is essentially a copy of the ability Assassinate from Assassin, so we're looking into a way to differentiate it from the Rogue ability. Open to suggestions on this front!

chosen target maybe? Eyes for blinding & stun?... Legs for knockdown.