 Just play a fighter with a bow. It's way better All right fine I'll talk about the class rangers the other of the bisexual style of classes where it likes fighter But it also likes drew it and flips between the two depending on which one looks cuter at the moment Hell it even steals a few things from rogue because it's so indecisive and despite the name ranger You're not actually restricted to use any sort of ranged weapon in order to be effective as far as combat goes You get the usual fighter but not really fighter set of features fighting style all weapons extra attack spell casting d10 hit die Hey Macarena from rogues it steals the ability to channel your inner chameleon and blend into the environment except instead Of hiding in the shadows and watching where you step it's more like putting on makeup So you need to take some time have a good look in the mirror Maybe look up some tutorials while you're at it then start over when you realize you're using the wrong shade of foundation from druid It steals some of that being one with nature flavor It's got going on and a whole lot of spells but not without a few exclusive spells of its own like having a target Explode a bunch of thorns when hit with a ranged attack plant arrows in the ground and turn them into proximity based fireworks Except the gunpowder is magic and the lights are bits of enemy brains and single-handedly the objectively best ranger spell swift quiver Not for the unlimited ammo. That's dumb Nobody keeps track of their arrows anyway, but because it turns your range weapon into a rapid-fire machine gun But Joseph you said you don't need to use a ranged weapon to be effective as a ranger Those are some like range weapon exclusive spells. That may be true. However Anyway, when it comes to actual unique ranger features You can use the power of racism to decide what kind of creatures you're going to perform Exerpotent hate crimes on and preferred terrain where you can pick your favorite environment and after trotting around picking flowers Or littered depending on what it is you can become a fantasy bear grills Which is basically real life bear grills except with a cobald crew filming you instead And if you worry that that sounds too situational and that if you picked a forest terrain and the entire campaign took place in the Snowy mountains would mean the feature would be more useless than a football player who got tapped on the shoulder and started clutching their knees crying in The fetal position don't worry you're right and it is what isn't situational is just about everything else involving the environment You can sense what kids are trespassing on your lawn and then not have to worry about the weeds that might otherwise slow you down from Catching them and giving them a good weapon when it comes to flavors of the know really trusts us You can totally use melee and still be useful class You have Pokemon trainer with a gun like rogues But even dodger literally a monster hunter thinking with portals and pew pew pew pew pew All right Let's address the beholder in the room the vanilla incarnation in the ranger has a reputation being less useful when compared to the other classes due to Questionable abilities and how they function that's not to say the class can't be useful or powerful in the right circumstances But some consider the ranger situational and sometimes underpowered features to leave something to be desired However, there's nothing wrong about talking to your DM about changing how certain skills work if that happens to be the case So that you can have more fun at your role-playing table, but you know what at the end of the day It's not about how many numbers you can do to the bad guys But whether or not you can shoot spikes out of the ground while firing bolts from your heavy crossbow atop a feather ball Surapter and now you know how to play ranger. You're welcome