Backgrounds with Class: Ranger
Some classes and backgrounds mesh naturally, from a conceptual standpoint. Soldier and Fighter, Entertainer and Bard, Sage and Wizard. But backgrounds aren’t class-restricted, and so I wonder what it would look like if you paired every class with every background, even the ones that seem at odds, like Sage and Barbarian, or Outlander and Wizard. So I thought about it, and this is what I came up with. Some character concepts for each class, and each Player’s Handbook background for each class.
I struggled with this introduction. There’s a lot to talk about with rangers, and so much of it is mechanics- not what I’m here for with this series. Rangers are hunters and trappers, but that can take a lot of forms. More than any other class, I think rangers feel like animals in how they’re meant to be played- animals specialize in killing before they’re killed. Hunting. Traveling safely and minimizing risk. Hiding or fleeing. All things rangers are good at, with the use of the right subclass and Tasha’s. So think about how your ranger does what they do, and how they fit into the ‘ecosystem’ they grew up in. It’s all about finding a niche.
The Acolyte Ranger serves his church, seeing the faithful and their messages from their origins on the Material Plane to their pilgrimage and touchstone sites on the Outer Planes. He can read the portals like the flow of a river, their keys like the signs of prey. The Lady of Storms’ faith teaches that change is the way of things, and he must agree- portals wander or change like the moon, pilgrims shy like uncertain sheep, and his arrows never fly the same way twice. All the same, axes in hand, he tracks them all.
The Charlatan Ranger blends into the stone like she’s part of it. Invisible to the eyes of those that go without light, she keenly imitates the call of the roper, the knock of the hook horror, and the rumble of the great worm to pass unremarked. Hunting is scarce in the dark, but an overwhelming offense has always been a winning tool for her, and if ever she were to leave her deep home she would find this the case elsewhere too.
The Criminal Ranger knows well the ways of society- well enough, even, to bait predators to the pasture. A blackmailer and saboteur, he has been responsible for lost sheep, failed crops, fouled wells, and all manner of misfortune as a hand for hire. The farming conglomerates of the great plains have nothing but gold for a man who can bring the roc or wolf to the pastures of their foes, and his keen ability and kinship with the beasts and spirits of the earth leaves him in a position to profit.
The Entertainer Ranger draws songbirds like a brick of suet- she’s long since stopped trying to fight them off, and instead puts them to work earning their keep as her backup singers. She’s not averse to taking them to battle, either- their beaks seem sharp as daggers, and they evade capture like leaves darting on the wind. While her choir has been known to nest in her hair, the closest and best of them don’t eat, and she’s started to suspect small nature spirits are her true companions.
The Folk Hero Ranger has earned a reputation for bringing wonders to those around them ever since they trekked into the Feywild a firbolg and came back…horned, with a fine new boar spear. That they put paid to old Razorback to stop the beast from terrorizing the charcoal-makers was almost afterthought, and their tendency for sowing strange fruit behind them as they travel has started folk muttering it’s not the same one who came back, but a changeling intent on sowing mischief as much as seed.
The Guild Artisan Ranger always thought she had dreadful luck, and her last ship’s journey proved her right when she was caught in a storm and wrecked. Still, a quick wit, a dagger on her thigh, and a willingness to make do proved her greatest virtues, and re-adjusting to civilization was a bit of a trial. Daughter to a tobacco trader, she refuses to set foot on a trans-oceanic journey again, but she’s amassing quite the reputation as a hunter- tracking and killing prey with only a pair of knives for protection will do that.
The Hermit Ranger has lived in a land of icy nights, thin air, and barren mausoleums for as long as he can remember. Taken on occasion by the corruption in the land, he’s tracked and slain his share of demons and skeletons through the necropolis streets, overcome by a hunger that no amount of abyssal chicken or scraped lichen can satisfy. The demons have started to murmur that a fiend-slayer’s ghost haunts the city’s unlit streets- after all, who else could stay hidden from their pursuits for so long?
The Noble Ranger prefers his hunts from horseback, and the wilder the steed, the better- trained to ride in one frantic trip across the night sky, he longs again to hunt in such strange and fine company. Now, the pounding of hoof on earth is a pale shadow of what he remembers of that hunt through the starry sky, and his scent- blood, and earth, and woad- is a constant reminder. He favors the lance or the bow, for beast or for man, as he’s started to find bounty hunting a passable substitute for the fey chase.
The Outlander Ranger knows the land well- the initiation into adulthood in his clan is burial alive, followed by a week of survival alone in the wild. This time imprinted itself deep on his soul, as he spoke with the earth well enough to call a wolf straight from the soil to help him hunt and track. Since, he’s spoken with spirit of sky and sea too, and knows the simple language of spirits well enough to pull them to the world to join him. His kin and clan name him beastmaster, but he knows better- he’s a spirit-speaker.
The Sage Ranger is a lifetime student of Zbigniew Wojcik, the famous occult scholar and monster hunter. She’s spent his entire career learning from him, and the elder hunter has gladly embraced his student’s enthusiasm- but her lack of experience is starting to prove a liability. At her mentor’s urging, she’s readying to leave the lecture hall and take her skills to the wilderness.
The Sailor Ranger is used to sailing in the dark- tabaxi eyes work well in little light, and the small vessel their crew runs rum in doesn’t want to attract any attention from Croix Sang, Cottonmouth Cove, or any other port they lay into. The isles of the Cane Sea are spotted with ways to other places, though, to those who know the way, and not all of the rum they run is only from this world- so learning the lay of the land and rhythm of strange waves is well within their preparations.
The Soldier Ranger was a battlefield hunter, and officers and mages were her quarry. She’s skilled in the recognition of rank and order needed to pick her targets in the field, and when the battle was over or not yet begun, she kept herself busy doing much the same in the enemy camp. Equally at home in the grand melee or raining arrows from a distant hilltop, she prides herself on being death at all ranges, and now that her army days are behind her, she handles her adventuring days much the same.
The Urchin Ranger grew up in a city built on cities. Venitar’s history is long and storied, but the old cities have sunken beneath the modern, towering streets, and in some places have been closed to the sky by new streets built over old. She delves these deeps, running stolen goods and guiding smugglers through the chaos underground left by the Fracture, and relying on her best partners- a swarm of ghostly rats- to guide her when her own sense of direction fails.
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