Here is my second ever 1st. lvl character I have made for 4e. Please post comments and critique. I want him to be a very effective Stormwarden damage dealer.
Weapon Proficiencies: Simple Melee, Military Melee, Simple Ranged, Military Ranged, Longbow, Shortbow
Implements:
*Racial Abilities: +2 Nature, +2 Perception. Group Awareness: You grant allies within 5 squares of you a + 1 racial bonus to Perception checks. Wild Step: Ignore Difficult terrain when you shift (even if you have a power that allows you to shift multiple squares). Elven Accuracy (see Encounter powers).
Fey Origin: Considered Fey for the purpose of effects that relate to this origin
Ability Scores: Str 16 (+3), Con 13 (+1), Dex 14* (+2), Int 10 (-0) , Wis* 14 (+2), Cha 8 (-1) (+2 to Dex and Wis from Racial bonuses)
Defenses
AC: 14 (10 + 2 from Leather Armor + 2 from Dex Mod + ½ Char lvl)
Fortitude Defense: 14 (10+Str mod+1 from Ranger + ½ char lvl )
Reflex Defense: 13 (10+Dex mod+ 1 from Ranger, + ½ char lvl)
Will Defense: 12 (10+Wis mod+ ½ char lvl)
Hit Points: 30 (5 extra included from Toughness feat)
Bloodied: 15
Healing Surge HP Healed: 8 (1/4 max HPs + Con mod)
Longsword (x2): +3 to attack, 1d8 dmg, Weight: 4lb, Heavy Blade, Versatile
Standard Adventurer’s Kit: Backpack, Bedroll, Flint and Steel, a Belt Pouch, 2 Sunrods, 10 days worth of Trail Rations, 50 ft. of Hempen Rope, a Waterskin
Lantern: Weight 2 lb.
Money: 18 gold
Class Features Two-Blade Fighting Stlye, Hunter’s Quarry, Prime Shot
Nature (Wis) + 9
Acrobatics (Dex) + 7 (AC Penalty)
Heal (Wis) + 7
Perception(Wis) + 9
Stealth (Dex) + 7 (Armor check penalty)
Powers
At Will Powers
Twin Strike, Hit and Run
Encounter Powers
Two-Fanged Strike
Daily Powers
Hunter’s Bear Trap
Utility Powers
Feats Toughness: Gain 5 additional HPs per tier. (Bonus Feat)
Elven Precision: When you use the Elven Accuracy power, you gain a +2 bonus to the new attack roll
You seem to have added your CON modifier to the healing surge value... This is only something Dragonborn can do as far as I know, unless you either have a houserule or a feature I am unaware off.
Also, how do you have two feats as an Elf Ranger? Only humans get an extra feat at level 1.
Feats Elven precision is the wrong feat. It's not bad, but it's not great either. Given that you make many, many attacks in an encounter--perhaps twice as many as any other character class--getting to a +2 to re-roll one of those is far less beneficial than doing more damage with every hit.
In order from most to least increase in damage per round, here're the feats you should be thinking about: -Bastard Sword Proficiency -Weapon Focus (Heavy Blades) -Leathal Hunter -Two Weapon Fighting
Two weapon fighting is special since it's a prerequisite for a key defensive feat for your characer, two weapon defense. There's something to be said for TWF at level one and then TWD at level two; if you have a healer in your party, I would say postpone TWD and take one of the first two at level one. Bastard Swords are much better than longswords, but a long sword with heavy blade focus comes close to a bastard sword; if you dislike the dual bastard sword aesthetic, I'd say you're cool with longswords plus weapon focus. Leathal Hunter improves with age quite nicely, but I would say get TWD before leathal hunter.
(Leathal hunter is best for rangers that plan both ranged and melee attacks, since it's the only feat that works with all the kinds of attack the ranger can make. But most characters tend to specialize in either archery or TWF.)
Ability Scores If you're using the standard array, it looks like you've miscalculated to me. Should you have a 16, not 14, Dex? These ability scores have the right idea--Str, Dex, Wis, Con, Int, Cha is the order of importance (you could switch int and cha if you liked.) I would try to have a +3 bonus in Str and Dex and a +2 bonus in Wisdom; +1 is fine in Con. However...
Race If you're set on playing an elf, play an elf. However, elves are sub-optimal TWF rangers. Humans are better because you can get a 16 str. with point buy or standard array and bump that to 18 with your racial mod. Because a ranger makes many, many attacks, every marginal increase in your attack bonus has a bigger pay off than with other classes that make (usually) just one attack per round. You can use mobility for defense, so the emphasis on dexterity is less important. If you're doing point buy, 16, 15, 13, 12, 10, 8 is good combination. (Double check that it's leagal, I'm only mostly condident I did the math right.)
Equipment Hide armor. The -1 penalty to a few checks isn't apt to get you killed; skill check rarely kill you. On the other hand, less than optimal AC is the third leading killer among adventurers.
Powers You've got the right at-will and encounter powers. Jaws of the wolf is more powerful than Hunter's Bear trap. The average damage you will do if you miss both attacks with Jaws of the Wolf is 13; with a hit and a miss, it's 22.5 and with two hits, 27. Hunter's bear trap does either 6.5 or 16.5 + five points on going. That on going damage is worth about 9 points of damage on average, or 23.5 points of damage on average with a hit. Bear Trap is more of an archer power because when you can attack from range, slowing your enemy helps if it's a melee sort because it never gets to you; slow isn't so useful to a melee fighter.
Or do you all think this build is better than my elven one. I tore this from another thread over at EN World.
I like melee characters, and after looking over my books I came up with a pretty solid build that kicks butt as a striker but is as solid in defense as a defender, all while having more than a few tricks up its sleeve.
The core synergy is the ranger’s use of the Wisdom ability. It powers the ranger’s flashier moves, contributing to shifts, pushes, and various bonuses. Couple that with Pit Fighter, which has a 16th level feature that lets you add Wis to weapon damage, and you wind up with a heavy-hitting fellow that’s also light on his feet. And then add in the fact that many ranger powers let you make two attacks (effectively doubling the bonus from Pit Fighter), and you’ve got a ginsu-that-walks.
This build is up to 16th level. For future levels, keep bumping Wisdom and Strength. The 21st level bump will increment Con to 17, unlocking Axe Mastery (crit with axes on 19-20), which is good because at that level this guy’s crits would do an additional + 4d10 damage (on top of magic bonuses). With so many of his attack powers allowing two or more attack rolls, he’ll crit often.
Race: Human
Class: Ranger (Two-Blade) Trained Skills: Athletics(Str), Dungeoneering (Wis), Endurance (Con), Heal (Wis), Nature (Wis), Perception (Wis) Note: As a human you can train pretty much each class skill you'll be good at as a low Dex Ranger. Fighter multiclassing no longer gives a useful skill, but it's really all about the paragon path anyway.
Action Surge is very cool; especially on Rangers because their powers often include multiple attacks. I delayed taking most of the heavy armor feats until later, but there was still plenty of room for them because there just aren't that many axe related feats. +1 AC just doesn't thrill me, so I took other feats first.
Powers At Will Human Bonus: Careful Attack 1st Hit and Run 1st Twin Strike
Note: I do not like Careful Attack. It sucks in comparison with Twin Strike, even on hard to hit enemies. It was just the only melee at-will left and there is very little hope of hitting with Nimble Strike because it is a Dex based power The synergies are great. The ideal scenario is to get attacked with an AoE that does half damage on a miss. Interrupt with Disruptive Strike, dealing damage and causing the attack to miss (but still do damage). That triggers Deadly Payback as a reaction. On your turn, begin by spending an action point to attack with Armor Splinter (with the +2 bonus from Deadly Payback, one attack is likely to hit) causing at least a 4 point penalty to armor class--remember to add 1/2 your level to the damage of each attack thanks to Extra Damage Action. Then for your normal standard action, finish the poor guy off with Blade Cascade. The bonus from Deadly Payback is still there, but now the target also has a penalty to AC. You can keep rolling attacks until you finally roll a miss, and since it’s all still the same turn you keep the damage bonuses from both Deadly Payback and from Extra Damage Action: a total of +10 damage. Since Blade Cascade is a 2[w] attack, each attack does 2d10+ 13 + 10 damage (a spread of 25-43 per hit, not counting magic weapons or criticals, or the +2d8 to the first attack from hunter's quarry).
Ouch.
* A pretty awesome combo, and only gets nastier if you have friends.
Here's a little combo of my own: Epic feat Two-Weapon Flurry let's you make a second opportunity attack with your off-hand at -5 if you hit with the first one. Heavy Blade Opportunist let's you use At-Wills for opportunity attacks. Rangers have an At-Will that attacks with both weapons, and can use one-handed weapons in the off-hand as off-hand weapons. Opponent provokes opportunity attack, you use Twin Strike, hit, and then use it again. That's up to 4 hits of 2[W] + Str damage in Epic.
Is this build better than my elven Stormwarden one?
Others might disagree, but I'd stick with Elf for most Ranger builds, including the TWF melee style. There's a couple reasons for this:
* You're out a bit on your attack attribute, but you're also attacking a lot more which should help to make up for it some. You're also not being penalized on the damage of Twin Strike here, which helps to make it a bit more OK. * Wild Step is important for all of the shifting that a Ranger does. * A racial bonus to Perception is really nice for the group's classic tracker/spotter. Side note the +2 Wisdom here as well for a very good early Perception check. * Dexterity and Wisdom are both secondary attributes for you. * Move 7 - very nice for Strikers
All of those together add up to a lot in my book.
Without spending a lot of time thinking about it, I'd start with post-racial stats like:
