How do you think rangers compare wit the other fighter classes, personally id rather hav a paladin.

The Ranger is quite a strong, fun, and balanced class. (The Paladin is, too, of course.) His Stealth skill is comes in very handy, even if he can't Backstab like the Thief can, and while his selection of spells is pretty meager, he makes a decent support caster (Casts Doom right before your <u>real</u> Priest casts Greater Command, thus achieving in 1 round what would have taken you 2, etc).

Their 2 free points in Dual-weilding are also a strong bonus: Your Armor class does not matter in BG2 as much as it did in BG1 (since there are quite a few creatures whose THAC0 is so ridiculously low that they're going to hit you no matter what), which means using a Shield loses some allure....which means Dual-wielding looks like the way to go. In order to Dual-wield 2 different types of weapons at his maximum proficiency, a Ranger only needs to spend 5 proficiency points, meaning he can be at 100% potential right at the beginning of the game. A Fighter, however, would have to spend 13 proficiency points, meaning he has to wait until Level 27, well into the ToB range. (Okay, so the Fighter can eventually Dual-wield much better than the Ranger can, but look at the time difference.)

And then there's the Ranger/Cleric, quite a powerful combination. With both the Druid and Cleric halves of the Priest scroll open to you....hoo boy. A Tank under Ironskins, Righteous Magic and Armor of Faith is not someone to be taken lightly, especially when he can counter your PfMW with an Insect Plague or three.

I like rangers, especially the archer kit. It helps having a character who can deal as much damage from long range as some people can from in the melee, thus not taking as much damage...They can hide in shadows too, and that helps out...Also charming animals isn't really key in this game, but its a cool thing to have.

IMO, rangers and paladins are about equal in their power, if you know how to use them...but neither one is as powerful as the versatile Kensai ;)

I had a lot of fun taking my Archer through the game. In addition to the obviously exceptional ranged abilities, they make good scouts and can hold their own in melee.

And don't forget that the Stalker can backstab while having a significant better THAC0 than a regular thief. And that the racial enemy bonus can make some quests (e.g. the Keep) very easy early on.

SixOfSpades, notice that although you say 'maximum proficiency', reality is that Grand Mastery versus Specialization is nothing that big. I mean, who really care about 1 to damage and 1 to hit.

Really, Rangers are just as good as Fighters. However, IMO, Fighter kits are better than Ranger kits (except for the Archer).

If you download the Grand Mastery fix (the one that resets it to the true 2nd edition values), then it does make more difference. But even then, the ranger ends up being more versatile than the fighter does. The fighter can be good with a couple of weapons, while the ranger can easily do more than that. Thus, if you want your fighter to be good with bastard swords later in the game (after level 1), you can put 5 stars in it, but that is 15 levels of advancement to get that good, as compared to 6 levels for the ranger to "max out" on the skill; the ranger can max out 2.5 weapons for every one the fighter (though this does not take into account the slower advancement or the lower max level; considering those it should be more in the range of 1.5:1 or even 2:1). The fighter will be better overall with their one weapon, but the ranger can be better at multiple weapons. I guess my point is that I have always considered the fighter to be right there with the sorcerer as classes better to play after going through the game at least one time. If you put 5 stars in a weapon where you will not find many good weapons until near ToB, then you are shooting yourself in the foot. Meanwhile, you can make this mistake with the ranger and then "recover" (get max slots in another weapon more "useful") much more quickly than the fighter. They also can wield a greater variety of the good weapons you come across, and are easier to switch weapons with when better ones come along. Combining that with the two slots in dual-wield, and they can hold their own right along with the fighters.

Oh, and I think your consideration of the fighter kits are clouded by how good they are when dualed with another class. Admittedly, I think the beast master sucks, but both the archer and stalker are great kits. The kensai pure class is very hard; great offense, but major downside on the defense. Same with the wizard slayer; great abilities, but not using much in the way of magical items hurts. The berserker is probably the best rounded kit, with the least downside. Thus, I actually think that the ranger kits are about even with the fighter kits, if just evaluated as a pure class character. However, there is no comparison with a dual class , as the ranger can only dual with cleric, while the fighter kits have great dualing (i.e. kensai/mage, kensai/thief, berserker/cleric, wizard slayer/thief, etc. etc.).

Final point: I think Paladins wipe the floor with both if they belong to one of the kits. All 3 kits are solid, and since the game really doesn't implement the "law v.s. chaos" aspect in the game, it is easy enough to do the "good path" through the game and face no real moral dilemmas. Of course, if you are roleplaying correctly, you will still follow up on those things (no pickpocketing good items or stealing from shopkeepers ;) ). But even then, I think paladins kits have very few downsides as opposed to the other two classes.

[ 09-25-2003, 11:00 PM: Message edited by: Nerull ]

Nothing whatsoever wrong with a good Paladin... or a good Fighter for that matter. As compared to Fighters and Paladins, Rangers are generally more versatile, giving you more options than being a straight-up tank character, while still being able to fill the straight-up tank role. The free two points in dual-wield is definitely a huge benefit. The ranger kits allow you to delve a little further into their various alternate roles... Archer for ranged combat, Stalker for stealth, and Beast Master for more animal/nature affinity. I have nothing to add to Six of Spades's discussion of the Ranger/Cleric multiclass; keep that in mind as another solid Ranger option.

Keep in mind that there are two NPC Rangers available in the game, one a straight Ranger and one a Stalker. So if you want to try the class out a bit without making your PC a Ranger, feel free to invite one or both of them into your party and see how you like them. There's one NPC Paladin (Inquisitor), and there's four NPC Fighters (Fighter, Berserker, Fighter/Cleric dualclass, Fighter/Druid multiclass).

One more note: several posters have painted the Fighter's ability to put 5 proficiencies in a single weapon rather oddly. In the straight unmodded BG2 game, yes a Fighter can put 5 proficiencies in a single weapon, but it really adds very little over the same basic 2 proficiencies that Paladins and Rangers can do. It's certainly not like a Fighter is forced to pick a weapon and put 5 slots in it. In fact, I never allocate more than 2 proficiencies to any weapon my Fighters are using until they have 2 in every single weapon and weapon style that I ever want them to use. Even if you do want to go with the Fighter that is the grandmaster of one weapon and dual-wield, you can have that Fighter dual-wield two weapons of the same type (say 2 Long Swords)... and you can reach perfect mastery of that fighting style with only 8 proficiency slots (5 in one weapon, 3 in dual-wield) at a much more reasonable 12th level. If you have no mods installed, the bottom line is that although technically the ability to put 5 proficiency slots in a weapon is a Fighter-only advantage, in practice it's not a very big one and, at least in my opinion, not worth choosing a Fighter for over a Ranger or Paladin.

[ 09-26-2003, 02:59 PM: Message edited by: Klutz ]

Just a bit of trivia; Archers do not have the Charm Animal ability.

As Nerull pointed out, installing the Grandmastery fix does mean that putting 5 stars into a weapon makes a heck of a lot of difference. As well as the -1 THAC0 and +1 Damage, it lowers the Speed Factor and (this is the important bit) adds more attacks per round. A Level 13+ Fighter, Dual-wielding 2 weapons in which he has Grandmastery, has 4.5 attacks per round. Cast Improved Haste on that guy, and you've got a whopping *9* attacks per round. Characters that can only put 2 stars in a weapon (Rangers, Paladins, Barbarians, Multiclassed Warriors) are capped at 3 attacks per round (I think), or 6 when Improved Hasted.

Oh yeah, and Beast Masters well and truly suck. If you play a Beast Master, I will come over to your house and hit you.

You sure? Jim played one solo and completed SoA-ToB. You might also find that his Beastmaster will hit harder... with a certain stick. [img]tongue.gif[/img]