U58 Preview 2: Dark Hunter Ranger Archetype

[Rull]

I like the design changes, the tree gets more identity compared to preview 1.

As for balance, whether it is good to use or not may very well depend on if the imbue scales with 100% melee power or with 200% melee power.

[Yamani]

5. Escape through the dark (Core 4): As there is no way of becoming invisible for the base class, or this archtype, I just don't get this as a Core ability at all. Would feel bad taking it. If it is intended for use with a specific item of equipment or multiclass combination can that be explained please? Even then it that would feel odd for a core ability, unless I am just missing something. Should this Core have an additional short duration invisibility ability (Shadow Cloak: 10 second invisibility on a 60 second cool down) or would that be too powerful?

The smoke BOMB sla in t4 is a 12 second invis + displacement.

[Strimtom]

I played a bunch with this tree, and while it is fun, it is buggy! I have feedback about thinks that could be improved, as well as some bugs I found.

• BUG: Dark hunter rogue skills still applying as crossclass on character creation
• There should be reduced armor check penalty for medium armor somewhere in the tree since it is stealth medium. Maybe each core gives -1 armor check penalty
• Something in dark hunter should probably blind. Maybe smoke bomb?
• Should get access to both nimble fingers (feat) and accelerate metamagic (feat) for pot throwing.
• Blade specialization should be a multi selector for range or multi so you can choose whether you want to invest more in Deepwood or tempest
• An Effect where you treat blind targets as Favored Enemies would be cool
• T5 too expensive, players should not feel punished for taking T5 in a tree
• Elaborate parry should work in medium or light armor, as well as the tempest capstone, so there is better synergy with the other ranger trees
• Disable device a little low, might be worth it to have a skill in the tree for + to disable device (maybe it's +1 UMD/disable/open lock)
• Snap trap is very out of place here given that the tree is basically melee now, and should probably have another effect, would be a good place for the blind. Think pocket sand a la Dale Gribble

[Andu_Indorin]

My first impression is that this archetype has two principal attractions: trapping for Rangers; and a wolf companion for Rangers. On the first point, I'm not sure that this archetype really stands out from a Ranger 18/Rogue 2. On the latter point, Talan really hits the nail on the head.

I really like the concept of the Class, and when first announced was looking to play it, although as a variant of Tempest. However, now I'm not sure I would play it. Key issues/ potential fixes from my perspective are:

2. Wolf Companion: I love the fact that Ranger will have a pet option. However, this will die all the time, which could quickly become a frustrating liability. Deaths will be more frequent than for the Druid wolf, due to (correctly) lower healing abilities on the Ranger and less defensive buffs. Suggestions which I don;t think would imbalance anything:
- Wolf Hide (T1): Add additional Fortification per rank to the Wolf
- Lupine Instincts (T4): Add Healing Amp per rank to the Wolf, so that Ranger heals can better help keep it up... if vials ever land on target in combat.
- Rez Ability: Druids get to Rez their Wolf 3/ rest. The same ability could be added into the archtype. In the current D&D TTRPG (post Tashas) Rangers can essentially re-summon their companions every short rest.

Because the Wolf necessarily is squeezed into an enhancement tree, rather than as a stand alone companion with its own enhancment "tree", it is indeed a liability. I tried out this Wolf Companion in the Epic Barovian wilderness with a full set of boosts: Augment and Improvement Augment Summoning; the Primal Avatar destiny boosts; the Scion of Elysium Legendary feat; and finally the Ravenloft hound gear. I got into a scrum with two or three groups and the wolf was quickly dispatched, partly because unlike the Druid, the Ranger has a very, very limited ability to heal in combat. (Why the use alchemical flasks rather than actual cure spells??? Does the original Dark Hunter prestige class have the Perform: Dance as part of their class skills?) With its cool down, Rejuv. Cocoon only delayed the inevitable. And then, once resurrected, without the Druid's heal/regen spells, it took about a dozen admixtures to bring the pup back up to full strength.

This was only in an Epic wilderness setting. In actual end game dungeon content, these problems will get worse. And with group runs, again unlike the Druid's wolf, the Dark Wolf companion would be a soul stone in short order and the Ranger then faces the decision to fall behind to heal wolf or keep up with the group. So, why even spend points in an Enhancement tree for a terminal soul stone? Even with Talan's suggestions for fortification and healing amp, and even if the admixtures are changed to more manageable spells, the health and hp of the wolf simply doesn't look as if it is up to the task of questing beyond level 16 or so.

And this brings us back to original point. If the wolf is actually a liability, why not Ranger 18/Rogue 2?

[unbongwah]

Dunno how many of these might be "functional internally," but a few comments:

• This bug from Preview 1 persists: "Open Lock and Disable Device skill trains have some issues." Train 4 ranks in both at level 1; at level 2 it shows only 2 ranks trained.
• Dark Hunter gets Curative Admixture: Cure Light Wounds as a level 1 spell, but cannot take Empower Healing Spell at level 6, because the feat is hard-coded to require ranger level 8 (when they normally get CLW spell). Seems like an oversight since I thought the point of the restriction is to not let you take Empower Heal if you don't have access to any Cures yet.
• Half-elf Dark Hunter - the 1d6 sneak attack from the rogue Dilettante feat apparently doesn't stack with Dark Hunter's sneak attack; but the half-elf enhancements to sneak attacks appear to stack with Dark Hunter's. This implies Dark Hunter's sneak attacks are being treated the same as rogue's wrt Dilettante. Is that a bug or WAI? [Sneak attacks from rogue and Dark Hunter levels and Enhancements both appear to stack.]
• Tier-4 Enhancements only require 15 APs spent in the Dark Hunter tree to access, not the usual 20. Guessing that's a bug, but if not: cheers, mate.
• Smoke Trap and Snap Trap DCs don't scale with your ranger levels, unlike Death Attack or Mechanic traps: is that WAI? If so and if you can get the DCs high enough, I feel like the biggest winners will be rogue 12 / Dark Hunter 6 Horizon Walkers, who would benefit from having extra root and sneak-attack-proccing effects as well as +5d6 sneak attacks for 15 APs.
• Not a fan of tying the bonus Imbue dice to the wolf enhancement line. Why don't you put it where the Use Magic Device bonus is? You know, the skill which isn't actually a Dark Hunter class skill.

[Natashaelle]

I tend to agree with the others about the medium armour/evasion thing, albeit that not every Ranger-inclusive build needs evasion.

But needing to splash into say Rogue to get a basic Ranger Class Feat seems pretty counterintuitive, particularly given the trapping abilities of the Archetype itself.

The UMD in Tier 3 seems off-colour though -- replace it with Evasion ?

[Deivonte]

Personally, I like the medium armor change, there is an actual gameplay change and not just a vehicle to make a 100% better tempest ranger, but there are a couple of anti-synergies in the ranger trees that don't work with medium armor. In order to remedy this, I think that a feat that counts medium armor as wearing light armor for the purpose of enhancements, similar to Divine Dream from Sacred Fist counts them as wearing heavy armor for the purpose of enhancements.

The Death Attack seems very limited, being that it only works on certain favored enemies and the favored enemies list is limited in this archetype, which makes it feel very weak. I have 2 ideas to fix this. The first is to make Death Attack a gap closer, like "Go for the Kill" in the druid wolf tree. You would keep the limited nature of the Death Attack, but it would feed into that ambusher fantasy of pouncing on your target. The second idea is to allow the ability to assassinate anybody, but give 5E disadvantage to favored enemies.

For a roguish tree, there are no bonuses spot, search, disable device, or open lock anywhere in the tree, specifically search and disable device as those are int bases skills and it's already hard enough for first-life characters to trap properly.

I really don't like the wolf. The pet auto-searching should really be a feature of artificer, not dark hunter. Pets, in general, are bad in DDO and it feels terrible to add another one without a rework of pets. It just sounds like do work now to make more work yourself later.

I like the concept of the tree but I think that it needs a little more time to cook and I hope that you consider delaying this archetype.

[Coffey]

I tend to agree with the others about the medium armour/evasion thing, albeit that not every Ranger-inclusive build needs evasion.

But needing to splash into say Rogue to get a basic Ranger Class Feat seems pretty counterintuitive, particularly given the trapping abilities of the Archetype itself.

The UMD in Tier 3 seems off-colour though -- replace it with Evasion ?

The Dark Armor Core 3 works well with trapping as its half damage from all trap types plus a chance at a reflex saving throw for those trap types.

But i would feel better with Light Armor Evasion > Improved Evasion defensibly when getting hit by casters. Or am i wrong about that?

[Smokewolf]

I can't see this enh-tree being real popular for those that take it primarily to disable traps.

[Diracorvus]

I know people are asking for buffs for the wolf, but please don't make it stronger than the pets from druid and artificer. The shared imbue is already something that would fit better with the iron defender. Don't overbuff this archetype just because pets don't work in high reaper legendary content. Give pet buffs to the actual pet classes. They often make little difference even in elite content.
Maybe make the Dark Hunter wolf a non-combat pet that just detects traps and gives buffs, similar to the familiars and give the real pet buffs to druid and artificer. They need heal amplification, fortification and imbue sharing a lot more.

[McLoopie]

Bear in mind, to the people saying "just take evasion from Shadowdancer", you are actually giving up the Improved Evasion you would have got if you already had evasion. Which is actually pretty useful, especially if you are struggling to get a good reflex save.

[salmag]

As I typed in the first pass:

- Move the dog to the cores; or better yet, make the dog a stand-alone companion.
- Replace UMD with Imbues.

New things:

- Make Smoke Trap have a BLINDING effect.
- Add +1/+2/+3 Disable Device, Open Lock, Reflex Save vs Traps to Tier 1
- Make Bleed the Weak Scale off of Melee OR Range Power.
- Make Snap Trap an AOE, not single target.
- Make Death Attack a CHOICE between Melee OR Range.
- In core 6, Give DH a choice between Evasion or Medium Armor w/ Exceptional bonus to Armor Class +10% and 50% trap damage. If Medium Armor is chosen, allow synergy with the Tempest tree.

The way the tree is NOW, it will not be used. It sucks. This was a waste of developer time and energy.

As for Rangers themselves, Change them to act like they did in 3.5e. Make them CHOOSE between Range or Melee at level 2. Then give them their stand-alone companion.

[spifflove]

As I typed in the first pass:

- Move the dog to the cores; or better yet, make the dog a stand-alone companion.

As for Rangers themselves, Change them to act like they did in 3.5e. Make them CHOOSE between Range or Melee at level 2.

That’s called a fighter.

[salmag]

That’s called a fighter.

What is a Ranger anyway? A fighter in and about the woods, friend of nature, Woodsman.

What is a Monk? A meditative fighter.

What is a Barbarian? A wild out of control fighter.

They are all fighters. Rangers just just have a longer area to roam. They like to do it with a pet companion, which was a characteristic that set them apart from fighters.

[Kielbasa]

The biggest problem this archetype faces right now is the lack of action point flexibility. You feel punished if you grab the crit range enhancement from deepwood stalker since you will also need "no step missed" from horizon walker or the intelligence equivalent to have useful dcs for anything at endgame and haste boost from either tempest or vistani. You cannot afford all of this and you will need it all to be viable. The t2 action boost should have an option for haste boost as well.

The best way to build a dark hunter is going to be ignore the dark hunter tree entirely if you plan to melee and use tempest+dws or vistani. If you want to use a bow you will go horizon walker, deepwood stalker for sniper shot, vistani for haste boost, and then finally splash dark hunter for the level 12 core but only if you happen to have enough ranger levels to take it otherwise you probably have more interesting enhancements to grab elsewhere.

Given this logic the tier 4 and 5 enhancements and the level 18/20 cores are going to need to be interesting enough for people to want to use them. Dark Hunter in its current state does not do enough to make me want to use them.

Its not a terrible tree I just do not see enough in here "yet" to divert me away from the other options a dark hunter ranger will have available to them. I am confident others will come to the same conclusion if they have not already.

[Saekee]

The Dark Armor Core 3 works well with trapping as its half damage from all trap types plus a chance at a reflex saving throw for those trap types.

But i would feel better with Light Armor Evasion > Improved Evasion defensibly when getting hit by casters. Or am i wrong about that?

You are correct

[Assassination]

The biggest problem this archetype faces right now is the lack of action point flexibility. You feel punished if you grab the crit range enhancement from deepwood stalker since you will also need "no step missed" from horizon walker or the intelligence equivalent to have useful dcs for anything at endgame and haste boost from either tempest or vistani. You cannot afford all of this and you will need it all to be viable. The t2 action boost should have an option for haste boost as well.

The best way to build a dark hunter is going to be ignore the dark hunter tree entirely if you plan to melee and use tempest+dws or vistani. If you want to use a bow you will go horizon walker, deepwood stalker for sniper shot, vistani for haste boost, and then finally splash dark hunter for the level 12 core but only if you happen to have enough ranger levels to take it otherwise you probably have more interesting enhancements to grab elsewhere.

Given this logic the tier 4 and 5 enhancements and the level 18/20 cores are going to need to be interesting enough for people to want to use them. Dark Hunter in its current state does not do enough to make me want to use them.

Its not a terrible tree I just do not see enough in here "yet" to divert me away from the other options a dark hunter ranger will have available to them. I am confident others will come to the same conclusion if they have not already.

What would be nice is if they put the "trance" in the dark hunter or deepwood stalker tree. The +1 to crit range should be moved to tempest tier 4. That would help a lot, and would allow us to splash lightly into this new tree. Unfortunately this tree does not have much going for it, besides sneak dice and a little bit of imbue that is sort of useful. To have a whole line of enhancement for a pet that is useless, is well sort of useless. The trap stuff is novel, but again not useful. If they made pets useful, and traps then that would be something.

[Voxreal]

This went for cool I will finally build a pure ranger to ya not worth my time. This tree now makes ranger a second class melee Arti and the Arti has way more utility. The loss of core evasion makes this even more reason to play an Arti so hope you back track this one a little.

Only add I rely have is why is the FE list so small what? What is the lore you are trying to shoot for here because if it is under dark lore then you are missing undead and a few others but some are better then all I hope.

[spifflove]

Only add I rely have is why is the FE list so small what? What is the lore you are trying to shoot for here because if it is under dark lore then you are missing undead and a few others but some are better then all I hope.

The wolf is really a zombie wolf but don’t tell anyone especially not me. I was also wondering why undead was not a favored enemy.

[Coffey]

Medium Armor must be a Red Herring to noodle on because it makes no sense for a Ranger.