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Hey dakka!
My club has decided to start a D&D campaign and the DM has said that it'll be a very long campaign going to level 20 and continuing playing but has said that he'll not be afraid to PK that we should try to optimise our characters a little bit. I made my level 4 wood-elf ranger on the spot with the DM and after the day am deciding where to go with it. I have not got much experience so was wandering what sort of classes would be a good multiclass or dip or should I play pure.

Basically the choices I've made for my character was :
27 point system to give myself 18 Dex, 15 Wis and a point dump in Str and Cha
Wood elf outlander (skills and boosting Dex to 20 and Cha to 16)
Hunter, ranged fighting, horde breaker

Hope you guys can help

You might want to ask this moved to board and role play games.

They may know more .

Multiclassing is more difficult in 5E as feats/point increases are based on class level and not base level so it takes a bit more planning if you want to do that. Odd numbers are pretty useless as a WIS of 15 is essentially the same as 14 so if you are trying to min/max you will want to change that to get the points elsewhere.

Fighter and Thief tend to be the best to multiclass with for synergy. Might want to read this to help out: Ranger Guide.


"Dipping" is more of a thing from the awful, terrible, horrible 3/3.5 days that isn't really a thing in 5e.

Wood elf racial benefit increases my wisdom to 16.
Is a 12/8 ranger thief good? What subclass of thief is useful?
I was just talking in terms of a 2 level dip into fighter for action surge or 1 into rogue for sneak, is it that bad?

So I went and had to look up the Wood Elf bonuses:

Wood Elf gets +2 DEX and +1 WIS

Now the highest a stat can be at starting is 15 (before racials) with the lowest being an 8. Now at 4, assuming you stick to one class, you get either a +2 to one stat, +1 to two stats, or a feat. So starting you probably want something like this:

STR 10
DEX 17 (15+2)
CON 13
INT 10
WIS 15 (14+1)
CHA 10

Now at level 4 Ranger you get to do an increase so you put +1 into DEX and WIS so it looks like this:

10
18
13
10
16
10

As for which subclass of either Thief or Fighter I would avoid Eldritch Knight (different caster stat and all), but outside that it is personal preference. You get the basics (Action Point, Weapon training, Sneak Attack, ect) either way so it is the specific class abilities that will make the decision. Generally if you want to be more stealthy/skilly go Thief, if you want to be more hardy go fighter.

As for the horror of "dipping" like a gakky 3/3.5 clone it doesn't reward things less then 4 levels. Remember feats/stats are at class level every four levels not base level. If you take two levels of X when everyone else is getting improvements at level 8 you will be waiting till 10 and always be two levels behind.

If you dip you miss out by two major design features.

Each character class gets keystone abilities at eighteenth and twentieth level. Dip at all and you lose the main keystone ability, raise another class to level three, where it gets its first keystone ability and you miss out on the penultimate one.

The second problem is that unlike previous editions, not all the abilities transfer over. 'Dip' into fighter and you will not get all the defensive skills of a natural fighter from first level, dip into thief and your bonus skills are fewer than usual. This is frankly fair.

Multiclassing works but you are far better off with a broader mix of class. A fighter wizard works very nicely if you take twelve levels in eldritch knight and eight in wizard, you get to be a twelfth level wizard in power with three attacks and full armour and martial prowess if you took fighter first.
It helps to have some existing synergy between the classes, with is why eldritch knight works better with wizard than champion does.
Also 5e avoids the possibility of getting a huge number of spell options, cleric/wizards are not as powerful as people would hope because the spell totals are shared not accumulated. Your character will get versatility in their magic by having their spell levels split as they wish between wizard and cleric spells, but all the spells will be lower level. You would get this anyway with a cleric/wizard and a level cap, but the game gives you a fair bonus back, you still get your ninth level spell slots, even if you can only fill them with fifth level spells maximum. For example Mordenkainens Disjunction and a 9th level Dispel Magic are one and the same, so unlike a level capped cleric/wizard you will have some of your awesome power of high level magic but not all. To get fifth level spells to power your high level slots with of course means making a more even progression, and in fact you can be more versatile than a single class wizard or cleric even with high powered magicks because you don't have access to sixth level and higher spells. Those spells might be the most powerful, but you have precious few slots to cast them with and too many lower level spells scale up and you can memorise the same total number. Single class casters have to paint themselves into a corner every time they memorise a high level spell, from a pool of known spells for the day which is always shorter than you would hope for.

Some serious thought was placed into the balancing of multiclassing, I am genuinely impressed with the quality of games design in 5e. It you try to dip or otherwise minimax you will lose out, but you can multiclass into two or three classes more or less evenly and come out with a very good build.



Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ranger specific advice.

I have just looked at the player Handbook for you.
Rangers are odd in that the keystone abi9lities are not too great. losing the keystone abilities for some classes, fighter for instance is a serious loss. For rangers you can make do without.

The change from 19th to 20th only gives you Foe Slayer. Now don't get me wrong Foe Slayer is powerful as Wisdom is an important stat and the bonus can be applied retroactively, and therefore should be reserved until you miss within the desired range, or added to the damage of the final if successful attack. not bad at all. sadly if only effects your favoured enemies, and really a 19th level ranger is already death on legs to its favoured enemy so you can let this one pass. Furthermore it only augments your power, it gives you no further capability unlike many keystone powers.
Feral senses does give you an extra ability, but any ranger worth his bow and sword will have that covered by a magic item at a far lower level. Any ranger that needs to get to 18th to get situational awareness is very lucky to get to 18th level at all. If we drop down to sixteenth we will lose all your fifth level spellcasting slots and be down to nine spells, but really you arent missing much the majority of your casting power, what little you have of it is still there.

I suggest therefore that you aim for a 16th level ranger by 20th character level. If you take one other class you can raise that to class level four and claw back your ability score bonus. Which class to go for?

Thief is your suggestion. It isnt bad, not bad at all but a multiclass rogue doesnt get half the skill repertoire of a natural rogue. you only get one extra skill that you dont already have, plus thieves tools. That is enough however so long as you took stealth as a ranger, or make it your crossover skill. I would choose assassin at third level rogue as you will likely have high initiative as a wood elf ranger and will be able to land +2d6 sneak shots with advantage on any target just by preempting them on the turn order. This is way more powerful than Foe Seeker. You also get Expertise, which you should apply to stealth and one other skill.

Ranger 16/Rogue 4 is a good choice. However branch into rogue early and spend all four levels preferably just after getting your ranger ability score improvement, so you dont lag behind in stats as Ahtman warns.

Before you do there are two other viable options. Both of which also claw back your ability bonus, and offer more than a solo ranger.

Barbarian greatly adds to your attack power via Rage. Danger Sense is better than Feral Senses IMHO, and having d12 hit dice for four level cant hurt. This is a solid choice if you have a less subtle melee ranger, as you are a wood elf I am not seeing this as much. You will be a tight line fighter earlier than if you single classed. Rogue is likely a better option though.

The third and final choice, and one I prefer is druid. Druid has very good synergy with ranger and offers a lot. For a start you will end up with twelfth caster level for spell clots, which measn you have 4th level spells as frok the 16th level ranger, but two 5th and one 6th level spell slot. Wild shape is awesome for escape and evasion, and you will be skilled enough to be able to take an aquatic form, which will greatly improve your tactical mobility and survival in certain circumstances. Not bad, furthermore you would get cantrips, which rangers lack, and be a druid long enough to get three cantrips, four if you choose Circle of the Land. I wouldn't though, instead choose Circle of the Moon. Druid cantrips arent powerful at all, unlike wizard ones, but they do help a lot with day to day life and add a creative toolbox to exploit. Your Wild Shape is buffed slightly, but most importantly you can use your spell slots to heal yourself, as a bonus action, not a spell. Therefore you can wild shape to relocate or evade up to twice a day, and heal yourself (while running or swimming flat out) without casting spells while doing so. This more than makes up for any supposed loss of fighting power by not being a full ranger. Ranger druids can be very tough to kill if they maintain their tactical mobility.

Ranger 16/Druid 4 is a good choice. Branch into druid when you would branch ijto rogue.

Which is better?
The rogue is clearly more killy, especially with a bow, but the druid is far more versatile. Either go for a ranger/assassin or take the ranger/druid and choose your cantrips wisely for maximum creative use. I would argue that both are more powerful or at least more versatilte than a 20th level ranger. I wouldnt choose the barbarian personally, and outright reject all the other options for lack of synergy, though a ranger/bard survived the first glance.

are you using feats? and are you using the sword coast adventures guide?

Multi-clasd into Ranger. Dual wield your bows and then dual wield the dual wield.

But on a serious note, pure Ranger is a good option in fifth iirc so consider that too.

Also note that they recently updated the ranger as well.

Multiclasses are weaker

Usually, as intended, but not always.