Ranger/Druid Fey Wanderer Build

The Why:

Rangers are one of the least popular classes of Dungeons & Dragons 5E. Mostly this is because the number-crunchers out there have found that the Ranger is outperformed by virtually every other class and that most archetypes would be better built as some variation of another class (i.e. Fighter with a bow). Nevertheless, I find the Ranger to be one of my favorite classes from a stylistic perspective. I love the idea of a warrior of the forest, attacking from long range and striking swiftly with magic blades. They hide in the trees and cast cool nature-based spells. But the ultimate reason why I’m writing this build and why I picked the Fey Wanderer subclass specifically is… SHILLELAGH!
For those of you who do not know, Shillelagh is a cantrip exclusive to the Druid Spell List and it takes your generic run-of-the-mill club or quarterstaff and turns it into a magical beating stick that uses your Wisdom for attack and damage rolls. That’s right, you can finally beat people over the head with your wisdom 😊 I’ll go into the rest of the reasoning during the build discussion, so without further ado, let’s dive in!

The Build:

Level 1 Ranger 1 (1RN): This build kicks off naturally as a level 1 Ranger, giving us that sweet d10 health and proficiency in both Strength and Dexterity saves. This will help because Strength saves come up often in D&D and we are not going to have a high Strength (don’t need it, dump it). For race we’re going with Wood Elf for the stat bumps, flavor, and a future feat. It could be argued as with most builds that a Variant Human would work well to get us Polearm Master sooner, but I like having some more variety to my builds and the Wood Elf also gets us some much needed speed and a nifty hiding feature in Mask of the Wild.
For stats, let’s point buy in the following way: Strength 8 / Dexterity 12 / Constitution 14 / Intelligence 10 / Wisdom 15 / Charisma 13 (Oh hey, it’s the standard array!). I know, weird to see a Ranger with 12 Dex, right? Well that’s because we are turning Wisdom into our power stat for this build! And keep in mind that as a Wood Elf, we get +2 to Dexterity and +1 to Wisdom, giving us a starting stat block of Strength 8 / Dexterity 14 / Constitution 14 / Intelligence 10 / Wisdom 16 / Charisma 13. Put on some medium scale mail armor (Dexterity 14 gives us +2 to medium armor), grab your favorite ranged or finesse weapon and hope to survive to level 2, when the magic starts 😊
For skills and background, we can go with just about anything, but keep in mind that we are maxing Wisdom in this build, we’ll be taking the Wisdom skills that we want. Also we want to keep an eye out for the Charisma skills as we will be getting an ability at Ranger 3 that really ups our social game. Basic skill guideline is this: we get Perception as an Elf, leave an open slot (that is, DON’T pick up) ONE of [Deception, Performance, or Persuasion], Stealth is always useful, any Wisdom or Charisma skills we can pick up after that are going to be hella good. For this build, we will go with Perception (free as an Elf); Deception and Survival (from the Feylost background); Insight, Athletics, and Stealth (from Ranger skills). Mostly we’re getting Athletics to cover that terrible Strength, but really we take anything else.
Last decisions as a level 1 Ranger come from the optional class features meant to fix some problems that people had with the original Ranger. I say go for both Favored Foe for the extra damage potential and Deft Explorer for all the fun perks it gets you. At level 1, Deft Explorer gets you “expertise” in one skill, which for our purposes will be… Insight. We will be super insightful 😊

Level 2 Druid 1 (1RN/1DR): Ah, the druid dip! We do this for a few reasons: 1) the capstone ability of the Ranger is all around pretty bad (effectively once per turn +5 to attack or damage on one attack) so we don’t lose much by multiclassing; 2) we want to get that SHILLELAGH, but we also want to use the Ranger Fighting Style on something other than Druidic Warrior; and 3) we want to bump up our spell slots for a future ability that I’ll get into when we get there. And already at Level 2, the real fun begins! Cast Shillelagh as a bonus action on our first turn and keep hitting things with our now-empowered quarterstaff. It can now effectively be wielded one-handed as well, so we can keep a shield in our offhand for an additional +2 to AC. We are a Wisdom Warrior!
For our non-Shillelagh cantrip, let’s take Magic Stone, which lets us hurl a magic stone up to 60ft. Furthermore, we add our Wisdom modifier to the attack and damage rolls of the spell. Further furthermore, the spell doesn’t specify that it is an action to throw a stone, which leads me to believe that it can be thrown as an attack, i.e. we will be able to throw 2 per turn once we have Extra Attack. Confirm with your own DM to make sure they read it as I do, but that is my conclusion. Other utility cantrips are also viable options for non-combat scenarios.

Level 3 Ranger 2 (2RN/1DR): After the initial druid dip, we want to get to the Ranger’s level 5 extra attack as soon as possible, so we’re starting in that direction now. Level 2 Ranger also comes with a Fighting Style choice and we are going to select Dueling, giving us an additional +2 to damage rolls with our SHILLELAGH (+5 total)! We also get to choose two 1st level Ranger spells and we’re going to start with Hunter’s Mark, a Ranger classic. Hunter’s Mark will be our concentration spell of choice when we’re not concentrating on something like Favored Foe. The second spell can be anything, but I like going with something like Absorb Elements since it can utilize our reaction, give us some defense, and even power up our attacks. Very useful for keeping our frontline character alive and kicking!

Level 4 Ranger 3 (3RN/1DR): Now we choose our Ranger subclass, which will be the Fey Wanderer. We get Dreadful Strikes, which adds a bit to our damage output. At this level it’s just a d4, but it’s a d4 added once to each creature we hit. This helps under niche circumstances, like being surrounded by goblins, but free damage is free damage. The more exciting boon (in my opinion) is Otherworldly Glamour, which allows us to add our Wisdom modifier to any Charisma check we make. Furthermore, we get an additional skill proficiency in one of Deception, Performance, or Persuasion (we’re taking Persuasion for our build). Now we are all in on Wisdom, even in social encounters. Icing on the cake: we also get a “preternatural blessing” which we’re going to take in the form of fey antlers. We look super dope 😊

Level 5 Ranger 4 (4RN/1DR): At level 5 we take an additional Ranger level, which gets us to our first Ability Score Improvement (ASI). In lieu of bumping up our Wisdom, we’re going to take the Polearm Master feat, which allows us to make an additional attack as a bonus action on our turn. Now we need to take a moment to discuss how this feat might interact with our Shillelagh cantrip. Direct from the cantrip: “you can use your spellcasting ability instead of Strength for the attack and damage rolls… and the weapon’s damage die becomes a d8.” From Polearm Master: the bonus action attack “uses the same ability modifier as the primary attack [and the] damage die for this attack is a d4.” Since Polearm Master is more specific in referencing the damage die of a specific attack, I believe that the bonus action attack with the quarterstaff would use a d4, but I think that an argument could be made to support a d8 be used for the bonus action attack as well. Check with your DM to see how nice they are. Either way, we now get two Shillelagh strikes in a turn, which is great. Also, we get to hit creatures as they enter our attack range, which is a fairly common occurrence.

Level 6 Ranger 5 (5RN/1DR): Extra Attack! More Shillelagh!!! Also Misty Step is auto-loaded to our spell list for easy teleportation around the battlefield.

Let’s pause to take a look at our fighting form… We are now a level 6 character that can make up to 3 attacks in a round. Each attack uses our Wisdom for attack and damage rolls (+3 right now) and our fighting style increases the damage of each hit by 2. We also get one free d4 added from Dreadful Strikes and, assuming we have Hunter’s Mark up, we get an additional d6 per hit. On average, if we hit with everything, we’ll be doing 39-40 damage per round. For reference, our character has 51 health at this point. Also, because we are in scale mail armor, have +2 AC from our Dexterity, and are wielding a shield, our AC is 18. That’s one of the highest base values (i.e. no magical additions) for armor in the game, so we’re looking pretty good!

Level 7 Druid 2 (5RN/2DR): We dip back into our Druid skills and pick up our Druid Circle. By now, we have what we need for our basic fighting form going forward: high-Wisdom Shillelagh-wielder. The next step is to add to our abilities with some super cool summoning skills as we start working towards Fey Reinforcements, which we unlock at Ranger 11. Hence, we’re going with the Circle of the Wildfire Druid. With our Wild Shape, we can summon a Wildfire Spirit as an action. Furthermore, we can use one of our Wild Shapes to cast Find Familiar via the optional Druid feature Wild Companion. When we do this as a Druid, the familiar is type fey, so for fun we’re going to say we summon an owl (which we do for its Flyby Help feature) that has antlers that match ours 😊 Octothorpe: on brand.

Fast forward time… For the next several levels, not a lot of BIG changes occur as we race to Ranger 11, I’ll just highlight some of the cool incremental improvements we get at each level. Normally our fight will consist of some combination of “Bonus Action (BA): Shillelagh + Action (A): Attack” or “A: Summon a thing + BA: Command that thing” or “BA: Hunter’s Mark + A: Attack”. Some of the fun comes from the options 😊

Level 8 Ranger 6 (6RN/2DR): Favored Foe Die increases to 1d6; our speed goes up to 40′ and we get 40′ for both climbing and swimming.

Level 9 Ranger 7 (7RN/2DR): Beguiling Twist: we already have advantage on saving throws against being charmed from being an Elf, so this just adds advantage against being frightened. Also cool reactionary counter-charm/fear, but probably only useful in niche circumstances. It helps that our spell save DC is high from how wisdomous we are.

Level 10 Ranger 8 (8RN/2DR): Can I get a “double advantage”? We’re grabbing the feature Elven Accuracy so that our Wisdom-based attacks get three dice rolls whenever we have advantage instead of just two. Also we’re upping our Charisma to 14 so that our social skills get an even greater boost (+2 from Charisma, +3 from Wisdom).

Level 11 Ranger 9 (9RN/2DR): Not much to talk about here, but we do get access to 3rd level Ranger Spells and we should pick up Elemental Weapon. At this level, it is more expensive than Hunter’s Mark and doesn’t hit for as much, but it will improve at higher levels.

Level 12 Ranger 10 (10RN/2DR): We unlock the Ranger’s Nature’s Veil ability, which allows us to turn invisible briefly a few times a day. Great for generating advantage for attacks as the invisibility is broken by the start of our next turn, not by performing actions (i.e. ATTACKS!!!). We also get Tireless from the Ranger’s Deft Explorer ability, which gives us a way to generate temporary hit points and helps us to remove exhaustion levels with a short rest.

Level 13 Ranger 11 (11RN/2DR): YEEEEEEESSSSSSS! We are Ranger 11 and unlock one of the Fey Wanderer’s coolest abilities: Fey Reinforcements. This ability is so cool that while I was developing this build specifically for Shillelagh use, this ability made me go back and redesign the whole build. Here’s what we get from Fey Reinforcements: we learn Summon Fey (cool), we can cast it without a material component (Oooooo), we can also cast it once per long rest without using a spell slot (nice), and whenever we start casting Summon Fey we can modify it so that it doesn’t require concentration but the spell’s duration is reduced to 1 minute (SAY WHAT!?!). As written, you get one free casting a day, but you can continue to spam the no concentration version of the spell as long as you have the spell slots. The duration reduction is a drag, but most Dungeons and Dragons battles last for less than 10 rounds (1 minute = 10 rounds), so it’s unlikely that you’ll lose your fey warriors in the middle of the fight. We can also upcast Summon Fey to get more and more powerful fey friends to fight for us!
And now I reveal a little more of the strategy of multiclassing. Our summoned fey get extra attacks based on the spell slot used: 2 attacks for 4th level, 3 attacks for 6th level, 4 attacks for 8th level. As a Ranger, we are technically a half caster, which means we have spell slots, but we don’t get higher spell slots as quickly as a full caster (i.e. a Druid). We determine our spell slots by adding half our Ranger level (rounded down) to our full Druid level and looking at the spell slots for the resulting level. For us that’s Ranger 11, halved to 5.5, rounded to 5 plus Druid 2 for a result of 7. A level 7 caster has 1 beautiful 4th level spell slot, which we will be using in battle to summon our fey buddy. It may be worth using our concentration so our biggest fey lasts for longer, but I would recommend keeping that for something like Hunter’s Mark. Eventually, with enough Druid levels we can unlock 6th level spell slots and our summoned fey will be able to attack thrice per round with no action from us 😊

Level 14 Ranger 12 (12RN/2DR): We get to bump up our Wisdom and everything we do gets a little better. Our Wisdom becomes 18 and that +4 bonus is applied to Shillelagh hits, spell save DC, Wisdom skill checks, and Charisma skill checks.
Point of order, our Charisma skill checks now get a total of +6 from our ability scores which is higher than most classes can get. Couple that with the 1 “expertise” skill we got as a level 1 Ranger and we would be outperforming any other class in that skill, with some competition from a high-Charisma Rogue who would have higher consistency from the Rogue’s Reliable Talent ability. We don’t have this because we picked Insight for our special skill, but you could do another build this way (I probably will in a future build). If you don’t like waiting this late to get more Wisdom, you could skip the Elven Accuracy. It’s a great feat, but it may not be as helpful as a straight increase in Wisdom would be, considering how much we rely on Wisdom. Trust your instincts on that pick.

New fighting form stats… Our gameplay in battle now shifts a bit. Going into a fight, our first round will be some setup with a bonus action Shillelagh followed up by a 4th level Summon Fey (no concentration for us!). The summoned fey can hit right away, so the first round isn’t even a total loss. Next turn we use our bonus action to cast Hunter’s Mark and we begin smacking our marked foe with our Shillelagh. On follow-up turns we continue to smack our marked foe as much as possible, using our bonus action to turn invisible or transfer the mark or smack some more as fits our situation. We can get another concentration-free 4th level Summon Fey going if we want or we can pop out our Wildfire Spirit or Find Familiar fey owl as we want.
Alternatively, we can stand back in relative safety as we continue to spam Summon Fey for no concentration. We have one free summoning (which as a DM I would rule needs to be the lowest possible spell slot for the spell) plus two 4th level summons plus three 3rd levels summons, so that’s 6 fey we could have active at one time without even concentrating. That’s pretty cool. Our regular damage hasn’t gone up by much over the last 8 levels unfortunately, we’re only doing 43.5 damage per round with our regular attacks, but keep in mind that we now have double advantage whenever we would normally have regular advantage and we have our 4th level fey buddy that can help add to our damage per round. Our fey buddy, who I have decided to name Feybio, has an AC of 16, has 40 health, and deals 1d6 + 7 piercing damage + 1d6 force damage per hit for an average of 28 damage per round. Oh, and his hit chance is equal to our spell attack modifier, so it’s also based on our Wisdom 😊

We now have a choice… At this point, we have a big choice to make that I think garners some attention. We can stick with a Ranger focus and unlock some cool Ranger abilities like Vanish, Feral Senses, and our Fey Wanderer’s Misty Wanderer feature. I think the big payoff for this path is access to Misty Wanderer, which allows us to cast Misty Step for free up Wisdom-Modifier times per day. We can also bring along one willing creature with Misty Step so it’s useful for rescues. The other path we can take is to dive further into Druid levels and maximize our spell slot availability and levels. Both are valid, but after much consideration, I think I’m going to dive headfirst into Druid for the remainder of the levels because that path leads to the greatest improvement on what we’re all here for: SHILLELAGH!!!

Level 15 Druid 3 (12RN/3DR): 5th level spells, and now that Elemental Weapon that we picked up O so long ago surpasses the damage of Hunter’s Mark, though it takes a 5th level spell slot to do so. 2d4 averages to 5 damage per hit versus 1d6 which averages to 3.5 per hit. Special note: Elemental Weapon can only be cast on non-magical weapons and Shillelagh turns your weapon into a magical weapon. However, you can start with a plain stick, cast Elemental Weapon on it first, and then cast Shillelagh. Just remember the order is important 😊

Level 16 Druid 4 (12RN/4DR): MAXIMIZE WISDOM! Heck yes! +5 to attacks, +5 to damage, +5 to spell save DC and spell attack modifier, +5 to social skills.

Level 17 Druid 5 (12RN/5DR): Feybio gets an upgrade! At this level we get a level 6 spell slot and Feybio gets a 3rd attack. We don’t ever get to level 8 spells, so this is about as good as Feybio gets: AC is 18, health is 60, average damage per round is 48.

Level 18 Druid 6 (12RN/6DR): We unlock the next Wildfire Druid ability at this level: Enhanced bond. Rules as written, whenever we cast a spell that deals fire damage or restores hit points while our wildfire spirit is summoned add a d8 to one damage or healing roll of the spell. The only spell that we’re casting on the regular that might apply is Elemental Weapon set to fire damage, but at its casting we don’t do any damage. If you have an excessively nice DM, they might let you add 1d8 to one damage roll per turn of your Fire Shillelagh, but I wouldn’t count on it and probably wouldn’t allow it at my table. Consider this a small boost to healing for those times when your Wildfire Spirit is out and you have to toss a Healing Word at someone.
A different fun aspect of this ability is that spells you cast can originate from your Wildfire Spirit, so Feybio can spawn from your Wildfire Spirit now 😊

Level 19 Druid 7 (12RN/7DR): We reach 7th level spell slots and realize our max damage with a 7th level Elemental weapon plus Shillelagh shenanigans.

Level 20 Druid 8 (12RN/8DR): We cap off our build with an additional feat since there’s not a lot gained from improving our ability scores at this point. Some options are Tough, Shield Master, War Caster, and Resilient: Constitution. I’m definitely leaning towards taking War Caster or Resilient: Constitution because it will help us maintain that Elemental weapon which is a pain to lose at 7th level. Ultimately, I’m going with Resilient: Constitution because the extra +6 to Constitution saves is better than advantage at this stage. Arguably, one of these could have been taken much earlier, potentially in place of Elven Accuracy, but I’m happy with the path we took.

Endgame fighting form… This is it, the number we’ve all been waiting for: how much Shillelagh damage can we do? On its own, we will have cast Elemental Weapon at 7th level on it prior to Shillelagh and we’ll be swinging with 2 regular attacks and one slightly weaker attack. We get one use of Dreadful Strikes per turn and we have the Dueling fighting style which gives us +2 to one-handed weapon attacks. All in all, that gives us an average of 58.5 damage per turn assuming all strikes hit and no criticals. Now to add to that, don’t forget that we’ll want to summon Feybio who is doing 48 damage per turn and that we can continue to summon mini-Feybios to do even more damage.

Army of Feybios approach… now I need to see how much damage an army of Feybios can do. As an 12RN/8DR character, we have the equivalent spell slots of a level 14 caster. Counting only level 3 spell slots and up, that’s 1 level 7, 1 level 6, 2 level 5, 3 level 4, and 4 level 3 slots (including the free one), giving us a total of 11 Feybios. By concentrating on the level 7 Feybio, I can summon all 11 Feybios for one glorious round before the Feybios start timing out (non-concentration Feybios last for 1 minute).
Next we calculate the different damage outputs from each casting of the Summon Fey spell. The number of attacks each Feybio gets is SPELL_LEVEL/2, rounded down. The damage for each attack is (2d6+3+SPELL_LEVEL) . All in all, the final formula looks like this (bold font indicates the spell level):

1*[3*(2d6+3+7)] + 1*[3*(2d6+3+6)] + 2*[2*(2d6+3+5)] + 3*[2*(2d6+3+4)] + 4*[1*(2d6+3+3)]
OR
40d6 + 155

The average damage of that round is 295! Sure it takes a lot of buildup and all of your spell slots, but we also weren’t counting the damage each Feybio was doing before this ultimate turn. Practically, this situation probably won’t come up too often, but it’s fun to imagine a single character that continually spawns fey warriors to defend himself. And if anyone survives that onslaught, there’s still always Shillelagh 😊