We’re back at it again with another breakdown of the top 10 feats for each D&D class. Today, we’ll be covering the best feats of our nature-loving adventurer, the ranger.
Rangers are a unique class, utilizing both the combat abilities of melee classes as well as the nature-oriented spellcasting of druids. While they may appear to be loners, they are the first defense against the monstrosities which threaten civilization. Once they’re locked onto their prey, nothing can stop them from taking it down.
Here are my top ten feats that will transform your ranger from a wilderness explorer to the lethal hunter that even monsters fear.
10. Metamagic Adept (TCoE)
Wizards of the Coast: Twinferno by Justyna Gil
Become a sorcerer! Well, almost. Gain access to the sorcerer’s metamagic as a Metamagic Adept.
Ever want to dip into the sorcerer’s unique magic but don’t want to multiclass? Metamagic Adept gives you a taste of the sorcerer’s Metamagic options without sacrificing three levels to multiclass. These Metamagic options can spice up your spellcasting and give you additional bonuses to your existing spell list.
Rangers possess a wide range of spell options, covering damage-dealers to healing to practical use. Metamagic Adept boosts these spells even further, providing unique bonuses or abilities to your existing spells. Metamagic options like Distant Spell, Empowered Spell, and Quickened Spell each pair well with the ranger’s spell list.
This feat is advantageous for a ranger because it gives rangers versatility in their spellcasting, making their spells more potent or easier to use. While it can be difficult to utilize spellcasting with martial combat, Metamagic Adept can free up your actions or leave your enemies particularly vulnerable to your area of effect. Even if you choose a Metamagic option you don’t like, you can switch options when you gain an Ability Score Improvement.
Why Metamagic Adept is Great for Rangers:
- Getting meta: The sorcerer’s Metamagic options can temporarily twist spells to suit your needs, like casting a spell as a bonus action rather than an action or targeting an additional creature with a single-target spell. Metamagic Adept allows you to utilize two of these features, even if you’re not a sorcerer. This can boost your ranger’s spells and make them more viable in combat.
- Mix-and-match: Choose a Metamagic option you don’t like? No problem. Metamagic Adept allows you to swap to a different Metamagic option once you gain an Ability Score Improvement. Switching options may be more useful to your ranger if their stats are high enough.
- Sorcery points: In order to use your newfound Metamagic options, Metamagic Adept gives you two sorcery points, which renew at each long rest. Some Metamagic options only cost one sorcery point, allowing you to use two options before you need to rest.
Metamagic Adept
Prerequisite: Spellcasting or Pact Magic feature
- You've learned how to exert your will on your spells to alter how they function:
- You learn two Metamagic options of your choice from the sorcerer class. You can use only one Metamagic option on a spell when you cast it, unless the option says otherwise. Whenever you reach a level that grants the Ability Score Improvement feature, you can replace one of these Metamagic options with another one from the sorcerer class.
- You gain 2 sorcery points to spend on Metamagic (these points are added to any sorcery points you have from another source but can be used only on Metamagic). You regain all spent sorcery points when you finish a long rest.
9. Sentinel (PHB)
Wizards of the Coast: Jaspera Sentinel by Raoul Vitale
Sentinel will stop your enemies in their tracks and open them up to your attacks.
Rangers guard civilization from the dangers lurking on the horizon, preventing monsters and evil from seeping through. Sentinel demonstrates their prowess in eliminating these dangers by giving them additional abilities during opportunity attacks and when their enemy targets someone else.
With Sentinel, opportunity attacks do more than just give your character an extra attack. Your enemy does not have the advantage of the Disengage action, making them unable to run from you unless they want to risk a beating. Sentinel also works well with the ranger’s Beast Master archetype—as long as your animal companion remains in range, your ranger can take a bonus melee attack each turn.
This feat is advantageous for a ranger because it both utilizes the ranger’s Fighting Style and gives them complete control over the battlefield. Their opportunity attacks can freeze enemies in place, which can be deadly for them without an animal companion or team of adventurers on their side. Along with area of effect spells that limit an enemy’s movement, rangers with Sentinel will be able to restrain anyone trying to rush or sneak past them.
Why Sentinel is Great for Rangers:
- New perks to opportunity attacks: Opportunity attacks typically only provide an extra attack, then you need to chase down your enemy. With Sentinel, opportunity attacks immobilize your opponent and prevent them from using the Disengage action to flee.While not as important if your ranger focuses on ranged weapons and spells, this is especially useful if your ranger has a melee focus.
- All eyes on me: Sentinel gives your ranger an extra attack when an enemy targets someone else, essentially forcing them to target you or risk getting targeted themselves. This can give your allies a chance to pick off the weaker baddies or position themselves to flank your opponent.
- Fetch!: Rangers with the Beast Master archetype gain an animal companion to fight by their side. Your animal companion will likely activate Sentinel’s flanking feature each turn, as long as they stay close by.
Sentinel
- You have mastered techniques to take advantage of every drop in any enemy's guard, gaining the following benefits:
- When you hit a creature with an opportunity attack, the creature's speed becomes 0 for the rest of the turn.
- Creatures provoke opportunity attacks from you even if they take the Disengage action before leaving your reach.
- When a creature within 5 feet of you makes an attack against a target other than you (and that target doesn't have this feat), you can use your reaction to make a melee weapon attack against the attacking creature.
8. Gift of the Chromatic Dragon (FToD)
Wizards of the Coast: Rivaz of the Claw by Joshua Raphael
Feel the power! Gift of the Chromatic Dragon grants you both the dragons’ breath attacks and damage resistance.
Dragons are just epic, their incredible power matched by their massive intellect and egos. The chromatic dragons don’t bestow their gifts lightly. Gift of the Chromatic Dragon allows you to harness the very powers of draconian breath attacks through your own weapons.
Gift of the Chromatic Dragon gives you the ability to infuse your weapon with additional damage types or to protect yourself with additional damage resistances. Changing your damage types and resistances can mean life or death in a fight, especially if your enemy has resistance or immunity to your typical types of damage. In addition, your character can gain resistance to more nuanced damage types in the course of battle—you can pick which type of damage you are resistant to based on your foe’s attacks.
This feat is advantageous for a ranger because it allows rangers to branch out into other damage types and resistances. Their Favored Enemy and Natural Explorer feats give them custom advantages and resistances, but there is not much room for variation, especially if your campaign does not feature said enemies or terrains. Chromatic Infusion and Reactive Resistance provide custom damage types and resistances, which you can alter based on who or what you’re fighting, making you a formidable opponent against even the most powerful elemental enemies.
Why Gift of the Chromatic Dragon is Great for Rangers:
- DRAGONS: Give your ranger’s backstory a bit of flavor! How did they gain this gift? Does their bloodline contain draconic ancestors? Did they encounter a dragon in the wild? Did they gain favor with a draconic deity or ancient power?
- Longevity: Chromatic Infusion lasts for a full minute, so you can spend just one bonus action to infuse a simple or martial weapon with draconic damage while also utilizing other bonus actions and weapon enhancements each turn.
- Gain resistance as you need it: Frustrated by the Favored Enemy/Natural Explorer features where you choose a favored enemy, terrain or language but never have the opportunity to use it? Reactive Resistance allows your character to gain resistance to a specific type of damage as you take it, making sure it is useful when you need it.
- Customize to your featured enemy: Chromatic Infusion and Reactive esistance both allow you to select the type of damage or resistance you require. This way, you can mix and match resistances based on your enemy’s attacks and weaknesses so your ranger can pepper your baddie with directed attacks.
Gift of the Chromatic Dragon
- You’ve manifested some of the power of chromatic dragons, granting you the following benefits:
- Chromatic Infusion. As a bonus action, you can touch a simple or martial weapon and infuse it with one of the following damage types: acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison. For the next minute, the weapon deals an extra 1d4 damage of the chosen type when it hits. After you use this bonus action, you can’t do so again until you finish a long rest.
- Reactive Resistance. When you take acid, cold, fire, lightning, or poison damage, you can use your reaction to give yourself resistance to that instance of damage. You can use this reaction a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.
7. Fighting Initiate (TCoE)
Wizards of the Coast: Shanna, Purifying Blade by Magali Villeneuve
Go toe to toe with the most dangerous enemies with the Fighting Initiate fighting styles.
Fighting Styles provide additional bonuses to specific modes of combat, allowing you to specialize with different styles and weapons. For martial classes that already grant a Fighting Style like the ranger, Fighting Initiate allows you to gain an additional Style from the extended fighter list. This gives them additional abilities and bonuses they wouldn’t have access to normally, transforming them into a ranger-style fighting machine.
Rangers gain a Fighting Style with their class features at second level. Fighting Initiate allows your ranger to gain an additional Style from the fighter list, branching out beyond the ranger’s Fighting Styles to become a more versatile combatant. It also allows you to change your mind, replacing your current Fighting Style with a different one when you gain an Ability Score Improvement.
This feat is advantageous for a ranger because it builds off and extends features the ranger already possesses. The fighter’s Fighting Style list is longer than the ranger’s list, so Fighter Initiate lets rangers take advantage of even more combat bonuses and techniques. It also gives you the opportunity to modify your build based on character growth or playstyle development.
Why Fighting Initiate is Great for Rangers:
- More punch for your punch: Rangers already gain a Fighting Style at second level, but Fighting Initiate lets them focus on an additional Style from the fighter list, giving them an extra bonus in combat from an extended roster.
- Mix-and-match: Pick a Fighting Style that doesn’t fit your playstyle? No worries. Fighting Initiate allows you to swap to a different Fighting Style once you gain an Ability Score Improvement. Switching Styles may be more useful to your ranger if their stats are high enough.
- Martial prowess: For rangers who want to focus on physical combat instead of spellcasting, Fighting Initiate grants additional abilities which focus on martial combat. With the extended fighter list of Fighting Styles, your ranger could even take on Great Weapon Fighting or Protection to provide even more variety.
Fighting Initiate
Prerequisite: Proficiency with a martial weapon
- Your martial training has helped you develop a particular style of fighting. As a result, you learn one Fighting Style option of your choice from the fighter class. If you already have a style, the one you choose must be different.
- Whenever you reach a level that grants the Ability Score Improvement feature, you can replace this feat's fighting style with another one from the fighter class that you don't have.
6. Crossbow Expert (PHB)
Wizards of the Coast: Apprentice Sharpshooter by Steve Prescott
Become an experienced marksman and ranged combatant with the Crossbow Expert.
Rangers are typically thought of as solitary archers, keeping to the shadows while their arrows rain from above. For a ranger who focuses on ranged combat, Crossbow Expert opens up an additional weapon and bonus features for making ranged attacks. It also synergizes well with existing ranger spells and features, giving your ranger more bang for their gold piece.
While rangers do not gain a crossbow with their starting equipment (the main reason why this feat isn’t ranked higher), the heightened damage of a crossbow and the bonus attack they gain with Crossbow Expert may just entice you to give it a shot. The ranger spell hunter's mark also increases the damage dealt to specific enemies, allowing them to be picked off quickly and efficiently with a bonus attack. Even if they do not use a crossbow, Crossbow Expert optimizes ranged attacks in general by removing the disadvantage of close-range attacks.
This feat is especially advantageous for a ranger because it plays so well with existing ranger features and archetypes. Rangers already have opportunities to gain bonuses with ranged weapons as part of their baseline character progression, but Crossbow Expert enhances these bonuses. It allows greater customization both in and out of combat through crossbow proficiency and spellcasting synergy.
Why Crossbow Expert is Great for Rangers:
- Crossbows: You love your crossbows! While rangers do not start out with a crossbow, Crossbow Expert provides both crossbow-specific and overall ranged weapon abilities that are well worth the investment.
- Close range: Crossbow Expert removes the disadvantage for ranged attacks within 5 feet, so you can utilize all ranged weapons within close range.
- Arrow to the knee: Two attacks for the price of one! After making an attack with a single-handed weapon, you have the lightning-fast reflexes of a Crossbow Expert and can make a bonus attack with your crossbow. This gives your ranger an extra chance to deal damage, potentially with boosts from supportive spells like hunter’s mark.
- Pair with ranger abilities: Ranger spells like hunter’s mark and abilities like Favored Enemy provide additional damage and disadvantages to a specified enemy. Paired with the Crossbow Expert’s bonus attack, your ranger can take advantage of these features multiple times per turn.
Crossbow Expert
- Thanks to extensive practice with the crossbow, you gain the following benefits:
- You ignore the loading quality of crossbows with which you are proficient.
- Being within 5 feet of a hostile creature doesn’t impose disadvantage on your ranged attack rolls.
- When you use the Attack action and attack with a one handed weapon, you can use a bonus action to attack with a hand crossbow you are holding.
5. Dungeon Delver (PHB)
Wizards of the Coast: Lantern Scout by Steven Belledin
Sneak through dungeons with ease as a Dungeon Delver.
As part of their name, Dungeons & Dragons campaigns are likely to feature dungeons filled with monsters, traps, and (hopefully) a stash of loot at the end. Dungeon Delver provides you with the expertise to spot danger and spoils alike, as well as the reflexes to stay alive long enough to find them.
As natural explorers, rangers often take the lead when investigating a new and potentially dangerous area. In addition to a ranger’s baseline features, Dungeon Delver ensures your ranger will know exactly what to look out for, whether it be a secret entrance or a trap waiting for its next victim. Even if your ranger activates a stray crossbow trap, Dungeon Delver gives them an advantage on saving throws to avoid or resist the trap’s effects.
This feat is especially advantageous for a ranger because rangers will likely utilize all of the following features throughout their campaign. Being able to spot traps is vital to your party’s overall endurance in a dungeon crawl. Dungeon Delver also pairs with existing ranger abilities like Natural Explorer, Primeval Awareness, and Feral Senses to become aware of any dangers or threats around you.
Why Dungeon Delver is Great for Rangers:
- Scout ahead: Since rangers are nimble and observant, they are already prime candidates to scout out danger. Even when not in a dungeon, Dungeon Delver ensures that your ranger will both spot these dangers and avoid getting caught themselves.
- Eye spy: With advantage on Perception and Investigation checks, no detail will slip by your ranger unnoticed. Wisdom (Perception) is already a strong stat for rangers, but Intelligence (Investigation) will certainly benefit from the additional bonus.
- I play my Trap Card: Dungeon Delver gives your ranger advantage on saving throws to avoid traps, which is typically Dexterity (a very high ranger stat). Even if they are caught, they gain resistance to the damage they do take.
- Get a move on!: There's no need to waste time looking for mimics or pitfalls. Dungeon Delver allows your party to travel normally, even when keeping an eye peeled for traps. This brings your party mates up to your ranger’s skill level.
Dungeon Delver
- Alert to the hidden traps and secret doors found in many dungeons, you gain the following benefits:
- You have advantage on Wisdom (Perception) and Intelligence (Investigation) checks made to detect the presence of secret doors.
- You have advantage on saving throws made to avoid or resist traps.
- You have resistance to the damage dealt by traps.
- You can search for traps while traveling at a normal pace, instead of only at a slow pace.
4. Gift of the Metallic Dragon (FToD)
Wizards of the Coast: Ancient Brass Dragon by Johan Grenier
Another dragon gift? Awesome! Gain new healing and protective abilities with Gift of the Metallic Dragon.
It’s another feat from Fizban’s Treasury of Dragons! This time, the metallic dragons are stepping up to offer their own inspired abilities and features. Gift of the Metallic Dragon provides bonus healing and protective abilities, making sure you and your party members stay in the fight and look awesome while doing so.
Draconic Healing may seem like a redundant ability since rangers can already take the cure wounds spell, but it can actually free up an extra prepared spell and slot. Protective Wings give you literal spectral wings, providing a boost to your AC as well as that of nearby allies and your beloved animal companion. In addition, both of these benefits can be utilized multiple times per long rest.
This feat is advantageous for a ranger because it gives rangers more healing and defensive utility. Draconic Healing grants one free use of the cure wounds spell as well as removing the need to prepare it with your limited spells. Protective Wings protect you and your closest allies, increasing your safety while scouting ahead.
Why Gift of the Metallic Dragon is Great for Rangers:
- Free healing: While rangers do have cure wounds as part of their spell list, Draconic Healing grants you this spell apart from your initial prepared spells and allows you to cast it once without a spell slot. This frees up an extra prepared spell and slot for your ranger’s arsenal.
- Spectral wings: Protective Wings gives you temporary spectral wings to shield you or a close ally or animal companion from an attack. Not only is this useful, but it looks epic!
- Multi-use abilities: Both abilities gained through Gift of the Metallic Dragon can be utilized multiple times per combat. The bonus spell cure wounds can be cast with ordinary spell slots after its initial use, and Protective Wings can be summoned multiple times, up to your proficiency bonus total.
Gift of the Metallic Dragon
- You’ve manifested some of the power of metallic dragons, granting you the following benefits:
- Draconic Healing. You learn the cure wounds spell. You can cast this spell without expending a spell slot. Once you cast this spell in this way, you can’t do so again until you finish a long rest. You can also cast this spell using spell slots you have. The spell’s spellcasting ability is Intelligence, Wisdom, or Charisma when you cast it with this feat (choose when you gain the feat).
- Protective Wings. You can manifest protective wings that can shield you or others. When you or another creature you can see within 5 feet of you is hit by an attack roll, you can use your reaction to manifest spectral wings from your back for a moment. You grant a bonus to the target’s AC equal to your proficiency bonus against that attack roll, potentially causing it to miss. You can use this reaction a number of times equal to your proficiency bonus, and you regain all expended uses when you finish a long rest.
3. Poisoner (TCoE)
Wizards of the Coast: Alchemist’s Gift by Cristi Balanescu
Concoct deadly poisons and put them to use with Poisoner.
At their core, rangers are in tune with the wilderness and can utilize the natural world around them to suit their needs, for both good and ill. Drawing from these roots, Poisoner taps into the more deadly side of alchemy, enabling your ranger to concoct potent toxins. These poisons can be applied to weapons and even overpower an enemy’s poison resistance.
For an experienced crafter, poisons can be applied in a variety of ways, from coating a dagger to dipping your arrows in the stuff. Poisoner gives your ranger the knowledge and tools to make and apply their toxins, which also provides a bonus in combat. For a ranger, this is especially useful when paired with Extra Attacks, Fighting Styles, and the Hunter archetype, each of which boosts your accuracy and damage output.
This feat is advantageous for a ranger because rangers can create a number of doses and apply them to weapons as well as ammunition. An archer ranger can concoct a supply of poisoned arrows, while a martial ranger can utilize them on a variety of melee weapons. In addition, the poisons can be applied while in combat and can make even the most hardened enemy succumb.
Why Poisoner is Great for Rangers:
- Toxic agents: Your ranger has likely encountered poisons before, either while exploring the wilderness, in previous skirmishes, or through past experience. You know how to create extremely potent toxins and can overcome any poison resistances your opponents may have.
- Poisoned weapons: Poisoner allows you to coat your weapons or ammunition in poison. With an archer ranger, you can coat your arrows and have a stockpile of deadly weapons for an entire minute. With a melee ranger, you can coat your weapons and utilize them up close and personal.
- Quickly, quickly!: Poisoner has made your mind and hands fast, allowing you to coat a weapon in poison as a bonus action and leaving your action free to put those poisons to use through an attack roll or spellcasting.
- Junior alchemist: Your ranger knows how to use a poisoner’s kit and can make their own poisons! These poisons pack quite a punch, too: 2d8 per attack with a poison-coated weapon.
Poisoner
- You can prepare and deliver deadly poisons, gaining the following benefits:
- When you make a damage roll, you ignore resistance to poison damage.
- You can coat a weapon in poison as a bonus action, instead of an action.
- You gain proficiency with the poisoner's kit if you don't already have it. With one hour of work using a poisoner's kit and expending 50 gp worth of materials, you can create a number of doses of potent poison equal to your proficiency bonus. Once applied to a weapon or piece of ammunition, the poison retains its potency for 1 minute or until you hit with the weapon or ammunition. When a creature takes damage from the coated weapon or ammunition, that creature must succeed on a DC 14 Constitution saving throw or take 2d8 poison damage and become poisoned until the end of your next turn.
2. Piercer (TCoE)
Wizards of the Coast: Haktos the Unscarred by Ryan Pancoast
Keep your enemies on their toes and deal even more piercing damage with Piercer.
When I hear the title "Piercer," I think of someone wielding a bow and arrow or a spear. With this feat, your ranger will become an expert with piercing weapons, gaining increased stats and additional bonuses with critical hits. Before long, your enemies will be little more than pincushions.
Rangers utilize or are proficient in just about all of the piercing weapons available in the handbook, from bows and arrows to spears and shortswords. They even start with exclusively piercing weapons as their starting equipment, unless they want to choose their own melee weapons. Piercer provides damage re-rolls and bonus damage to critical hits with a piercing weapon, so why not take the free advantage?
This feat is especially advantageous for a ranger because it boosts the ranger’s existing capabilities with piercing weapons. With a re-roll each turn and an entire bonus die of damage with critical hits, there is practically no reason why a ranger wouldn’t want to put their piercing weapons to use! Piercer also increases your Strength or Dexterity, which are stats that a ranger already focuses on and can develop even further.
Why Piercer is Great for Rangers:
- Watch the numbers go up: Rangers begin with high Dexterity and proficiency in both Dexterity and Strength saving throws. Piercer boosts one of these stats even further, potentially increasing that stat’s modifier.
- Piercing damage proficiency: A decent amount of ranger weapons will deal piercing damage, particularly their ranged weapons and shortswords. Piercer allows you to re-roll the damage for a piercing attack each turn.
- ‘Tis but a flesh wound: Piercer deals an extra die of damage on critical piercing hits. Pair this ability with feats or features granting extra attacks, like Crossbow Expert, Sentinel, or the Extra Attack feature, and it will turn your enemies into pincushions.
Piercer
- You have achieved a penetrating precision in combat, granting you the following benefits:
- Increase your Strength or Dexterity by 1, to a maximum of 20.
- Once per turn, when you hit a creature with an attack that deals piercing damage, you can re-roll one of the attack’s damage dice, and you must use the new roll.
- When you score a critical hit that deals piercing damage to a creature, you can roll one additional damage die when determining the extra piercing damage the target takes.
1. Sharpshooter (PHB)
Wizards of the Coast: Lurking Deadeye by Livia Prima
You are the master of all ranged combat as the resident Sharpshooter.
Rangers are the resident sharpshooters of the D&D class lineup. With the Sharpshooter feat, they become true masters of all ranged weapons, from the simplest dart to the heaviest crossbow. They gain the ability to hit just about anything, however far away or hidden it may be.
Certain features keep ranged weapon users in check, like restrictions on range or allowing opponents to hide behind cover. Sharpshooter bypasses these restrictions, transforming nearly impossible targets into child’s play. Sharpshooter also enables a bit of a gamble on each attack roll, wagering a mild penalty for a massive sting of damage.
This feat is especially advantageous for a ranger because it makes archer rangers absolutely unstoppable! Rangers can hit almost anything they see because they have no disadvantage for extended range, half cover, or three-quarters cover. In addition to those massive advantages, they can also gamble to win a huge damage boost on every attack.
Why Sharpshooter is Great for Rangers:
- It’s in the name: While not all rangers utilize ranged weapons, sharpshooter is a clear choice for archer rangers due to its extensive bonuses to ranged combat.
- Long range: Targets that are farther away are naturally harder to hit. Sharpshooter gives your ranger an eagle’s vision, making long-distance targets as easy to hit as close-range ones.
- You can run, but you can’t hide: Sharpshooter ignores half and three-quarters cover. If you can see your quarry at all, they are fair targets.
- My aim is true: Sharpshooter gives you the opportunity to gamble a penalty on attack rolls to gain a whopping +10 damage. Rangers also take Dexterity as their highest stat to minimize the risk of the attack penalty. Pair this ability with various extra attacks, and your enemies won’t know what hit them.
Sharpshooter
- You have mastered ranged weapons and can make shots that others find impossible. You gain the following benefits:
- Attacking at long range doesn't impose disadvantage on your ranged weapon attack rolls.
- Your ranged weapon attacks ignore half cover and three-quarters cover.
- Before you make an attack with a ranged weapon that you are proficient with, you can choose to take a -5 penalty to the attack roll. If that attack hits, you add +10 to the attack's damage.
