Aragorn is the archetypal Ranger, and probably where Gygax got the idea for the Ranger class in the first place from

>classes

He's a Hunter.

>Herbs and poultices and tricks learned from Elves.
so it's a low-magic campaign.
>Nothing prevents a Ranger from using two-handed swords. And he was also described as being good with a bow.
Paladins are proficient in all martial weapons. He sure isn't much for two-weapon fighting, at least.
>Who doesn't in the Fellowship?
He had one before it was given to them by Quest NPC Elrond, the whole fated to be King thing.
>Simply because he is from a line of kings who they owed fealty. Not something that was inherently unique to his "class"
So the DM came up with a lore-spin on why he can do the things he can do.
>Animal companions are for pussies anyway.
They are in 5e. Why is Beastmaster so gimped?

Rivendel was his time skip.

> He sure isn't much for two-weapon fighting, at least.

He does so fending off the nazgul at weathertop.

>>no animal companion
The hobbits are his animal companions, duh.

>Gygax

Don't you mean Joe Fischer?

Classes are fine as mechanical archetypes. The trouble is really the extent to which 3.5 pushed "everything has to be its own class," as opposed to encouraging imagination and refluffing.

There is no real reason for a samurai not to be mechanically the same as a paladin.

Two weapon fighting is not a Gygax thing.

he chases the Nazgul off with burning branches because... something something light good dark evil. In any case I doubt he has proficiency in 'burning brands'.

your mom is my animal companion.

>The ranger was introduced in The Strategic Review Volume 1, Number 2.

Okay, so I didn't know that. Fair enough.

>no smite
>no detect evil
>uses a bow
>good at survival and nature
>no prominently displayed holy symbol
if he is a paladin, he is not a very good one

He can successfully fight ghosts and wraiths user. that sounds like smiting to me.

Tw guys with swords should very well be the same. If one wants to dabble in arcane or holy arts, he should just be able to do that. A paladin is just a guy with a focus in martial combat, clerical matters and whateverthefuck his chosen god's domain is, wheras a samurai is just a dude versed in combat, archery, and stately and courtly matters. If the paladin wants to become a samurai, he should just be able to learn that shit instead of faffing around with multi or dualclass nonsense that has never once in the history of RPG's worked out well.

>>no smite
Smite does not necessarily need to have a magical visual effect. It's just a mechanic, and can be represented by killing the shit out of something. Also >>no detect evil
Anduril is forged by elves, user. That means it glows when orcs are near.
>>uses a bow
once again, Paladins are proficient in all martial weapons.
>>good at survival and nature
all we see of this is his healing ability. Unless you're counting that he is familiar with the lands around Rivendell and Gondor. Guess that makes ME a Ranger since I know my way around my hometown.
>>no prominently displayed holy symbol
The White Tree is his holy symbol. It's right there in the OP.

>So the DM came up with a lore-spin on why he can do the things he can do.
The fact that Aragorn is Isildur's heir is a fucking backbone to the entire story.

>Every character in fantasy needs to fit into class/race archetypes
>It's entirely impossible for Aragorn to be a sui generis "class" with skills depending on what the plot requires

Go play freeform, Marx.

Actually, it was just re-forged by elves. Original blade of Narsil was made by dwarves of Nogrod. Also, of elven swords, onlt blades of Gondolin possesed this ability, and no one in third age could even get near such craft, since the withering of the world's magic.

Also, Isildur's Beryl ring - it literally marks him as the King of Gondor, and is a symbol of such importance that wizards took note of it.

>something something light good dark evil.
Just because they're incorporeal doesn't mean they are invincible. They wear cloaks and armor for protection and intimidation, and fabric tends to be very flammable.

Nazgul instill fear above everything else. They're very inept combatants.

That wasn't the first time he's fought them.

Both elves and the men of Numenor can fight ghosts and wraiths and wights, unlike ordinary mortals.

He quite clearly has a brand in either hand. You have read the books, haven't you?

and the Oathbreakers are not even mentioned in the story until The Return of the King. What's your point?

So then he can fight them with the penalty from two weapon fighting without the proficiency.

>Smite does not necessarily need to have a magical visual effect. It's just a mechanic, and can be represented by killing the shit out of something. Also #
That's because he's a king of Gondor.

>>>no detect evil
>Anduril is forged by elves, user. That means it glows when orcs are near.
That's the door, not the character.
>>>uses a bow
>once again, Paladins are proficient in all martial weapons.
Rangers also use bows.
>>>good at survival and nature
>all we see of this is his healing ability. Unless you're counting that he is familiar with the lands around Rivendell and Gondor. Guess that makes ME a Ranger since I know my way around my hometown.
He talked Gollum across Middle Earth.
>>>no prominently displayed holy symbol
>The White Tree is his holy symbol. It's right there in the OP.
That's the symbol of Gondor which Aragorn wears because he's their king.

>talked
Tracked

>That's because he's a king of Gondor.
I don't think you're getting what I'm saying here. Have you never played a game in a homebrew setting before?

Because I don't know if you've noticed, but there's no Middle-earth splat for D&D.

>That wasn't the first time he's fought them.

[citation needed]

>Both elves and the men of Numenor can fight ghosts and wraiths and wights, unlike ordinary mortals.

First off, Numenoreans != Dunedain. Secondly, what makes you think ordinary mortals can't fight the ringwraiths? If they were that invincible, you'd think the 5-9 of them at Bree would have just butchered the entire town, but no, that's not what they can do.

Incorrect. Strider is the archetypcal Ranger, whereas Aragorn is a pretty standard Fighter. The player must not have enjoyed Ranger as much as he thought we would, finding it limiting during the Helm's Deep. He rebuilt his character afterwards, and took the Citadel of Minis Tirith as his Stronghold.

Those Quads means you must be right. I'll take it.

>Legolas a Ranger
>Probably thinks Gimli is a Barbarian or Fighter

The Elf and the Dwarf are an Elf and a Dwarf, nipplenuts.

He's called a Ranger in the book, retard.

According to MERS, Legolas is a fighter. Being elfy, having a bow and no armor doesn't automatically make him a ranger. Been a while since I read it, does Legolas ever do some excessively woodsy shit? Aragorn, on the other hand, spend years in the wilderness before he meets Frodo.

Also nice Quads.

Both incorrect. Once races are no longer separate classes, both Gimli and Legolas are fighters. Simply two very different styles due to different race predilictions. One's a Dex-focused bowman, the other's a Con-prioritized greataxe-wielder. Has it right.

>Been a while since I read it, does Legolas ever do some excessively woodsy shit?
He can kind of understand trees and I think talk to them in a limited way but that's a racial thing I think. The answer si that for an elf growing up in Mirkwood Legolas displays conspicuously little woodsy shit.

Being a Paladin isn't a requirement to be a king. Two-weapon fighting for Rangers isn't all that hot to begin with, so I don't see your point.

If anyone is a Paladin, it's Gandalf. Aragorn is a Ranger, Legolas is a Fighter, Gimli is a Rogue/Fighter.

Since when does Gimli have any ranks in rogue?

Making the Paladin a Core Class was a mistake.

The inspiration for the Paladin came from the medieval knights who have a oath to their King and to God which they can never break or stray from. That´s why they can use divine magic and why the need to always be lawful good. Aragorn ist just a Ranger from a noble family which becomes King, end of story. He never serves any oath or uses any kind of divine magic. Infact, the first ever law he sets himself under is the oath to rule just at his crownation.

Dirty fighting, I guess? Not sure where he's going with that either.

Since he sneaked into ur mums bed

From what I remember about the books' lore (which is not much, it's been a while since I've read any of the books), it's more of a passive attunement to the forest as opposed to actively speaking to it. Basically, he can feel the mood of the forest, but he can't really influence it to any great degree. If I recall correctly, one of the big things about Radagast is that he could speak to the plants and animals for information. That implies the ability is at least somewhat rare.

Maybe that's because that's simply not his job. Might know his way around a forest, but spent most of his time training to kill shit. Even elves living in a forest only need so many professional I-live-in-the-woods-for-a-living guys

Oh OK, I thought Legolas could actually hear individual trees talking but that's probably closer tot he mark.

>Gandalf
>Not Favored Soul or simply a Celestial assuming the guise of a mortal
I mean, you're right about the divine magic part.

Eh, I disagree. I just sort of wish that they'd gone in a more Cloistered Cleric route for the cleric rather than having two heavily-armored divine warriors. Make the paladin the beefy, heavily-armed and heavily-armored fist of divine justice, and let the cleric be more like a 3.5 Cloistered variant or a 4E Invoker.

Paladins come from Three Hearts And Three Lions by Poul Anderson.
Revise and resubmit.

The thing is, the divine warrior bit isn't exclusive to the paladin which I hate because it's been enshrined as the defacto holy warrior the same way that a cleric is the only one who can be a priest of a religion.

Basically what I'm getting at is that the two classes have their archetype meld too much into roles that any other class technially could assume.

There's no reason I couldn't have a very religious fighter or a rogue who's gone into the priesthood but still has the moves to be sneaky beaky.

This also doubly goes for the barbarian where the default assumption is being some loincloth wearing conan viking knockoff who's all about nature (i.e. the animal totems)

I've played six rangers and only one of them had an animal companion. The mastery over the undead was clearly a racial trait. Also D&D class features are not based off of lord of the rings and never have been. Read some more about Gygax's influences. Also note that Aragorn was able to survive in the woods best of all the characters, which is a RANGER trait, and the 3.5 and onward skill system did the most to damage class-based roles by making the one ranger-specific thing fucking useless.

Nice quads, though. Seriously, Aragorn is likely a multiclass ranger/paladin who later takes on paladin levels as he embraces his heritage.

What is Aragorn's CHA?

I've always been told that Aragorn had all 17s in his stats.

Personally, I could see Aragorn having a 14 in every stat without an issue.

Yes Marx, classes.

As in the class of people who have a job as opposed to the class of people who sofa surf most of their life, never manage to hold down a job, sponge cash off of their friends and somehow believe that they are qualified to write a book about shit they don't understand.

The AD&D ranger had allies, not animal companions. The only version of the ranger that doesn't have any source of healing is the 4e ranger.

Two-weapon fighting was only added to the ranger's list of abilities in 2e as a nod to one specific thing in Fellowship (and possibly Drizzt but the devs generally deny it)

What part of a paladin is "clerical matters"?

>If the Paladin wants to dedicate himself to learning arts that take a lifetime to learn he should just do so on the fly and pretend he didn't spend a lifetime mastering his own arts
No

AD&D had a Cloistered variant of the cleric mostly as an NPC class.

My favorite non-templar cleric in 2e used Bard as a chassis and traded its wizard spells for access to a number of priest domains, it ended up being the one cleric class I always used.

Your conclusion doesn't follow from your question.

Isn't an elf who doesn't cast spells basically a fighter?

With some irony, Faramir is actually the archetypal Ranger.

He wears leathers, his skill with the bow is noteworthy, and he is widely viewed as incorruptible.

Meanwhile Aragorn only uses a bow once; in Balin's tomb.

>Gygax

In D&D-terms, Aragorn's purifying/healing hands came with the baseline racial "king" package of the character.

He's a king disguising as a Ranger.

His profession is ranger. His class is fighter. He put points in heal.

Umm. Yes. Yes there is.

drivethrurpg.com/m/product/192261

What's a paladin?

>great weapon fighting
I would hardly call his sword a great weapon and nothing stops a ranger from using a greatsword
>has a righteous quest against evil
Not because of a magic oath or god though. Anyone can decide to fight evil because evil is bad, ranger, wizard, rogue, fighter.
>mastery over the undead
One group of undead, because they are bound to him specifically, not because he has magic undead powers.

>I don't think you're getting what I'm saying here. Have you never played a game in a homebrew setting before?
No idea how that is related. I can make any class a king who controls an army of undead.

Guess capitalism is all right if you're lucky

>Meanwhile Aragorn only uses a bow once; in Balin's tomb.

And that's in the movie, in the books he's using his sword, no mention of a bow, although he does claim on the trek from Weathertop to Rivendell that he's a good shot.

Anduril is clearly not a greatsword.

ae-lib.org.ua/texts-c/tolkien__the_lord_of_the_rings_1__en.htm

Chapter 3 of Book two

>The Company took little gear of war, for their hope was in secrecy not in battle. Aragorn had Andúril but no other weapon, and he went forth clad only in rusty green and brown, as a Ranger of the wilderness. Boromir had a long sword, in fashion like Andúril but of less lineage and he bore also a shield and his war-horn.

And we see Boromir fight with sword and shield together. If his unnamed blade is of a similar type as Andúril, the flame of the west is also a one handed blade.

>And that's in the movie, in the books he's using his sword, no mention of a bow, although he does claim on the trek from Weathertop to Rivendell that he's a good shot.
Cheers, recalled that after I posted. Fucking Peter Jackson.

Re-Rivendel and Post-Rivendel Aragorn are two almost entirely different characters in mechanical D&D terms. This is why shoving things into a D&D framework that weren't intended to exist there is usually a bad idea.