Ranger: Frontier Warden

Rangers who become Frontier Wardens have learned to expect the impossible. On Thaedros, where the familiar dangers of Encara's documented wilderness gave way to an alien world where anything might emerge from shadow or storm, these rangers developed a hypervigilant paranoia that borders on the supernatural. They scan every direction at once, expect threats from angles that shouldn't exist, and have learned to keep entire expeditions alive through sheer, exhausting watchfulness.

Where other rangers specialize in hunting specific prey or mastering particular environments, Frontier Wardens master the art of simultaneous threat management. They are the guides you cannot afford to leave behind when venturing into uncharted territory, because they alone understand that on Thaedros, the greatest danger is always the one you didn't think to watch for.

Subclass Features

3rd Level: Constant Vigilance

Your hypervigilant awareness cannot be caught off guard. You gain the following benefits:

• Never Surprised: You cannot be surprised while conscious, and you have advantage on initiative rolls.
• All-Direction Watch: As a bonus action, you can mark up to 2 creatures within 60 feet that you can see. Until the start of your next turn, you know the exact location of marked creatures even if they become hidden or invisible, and attacks against you from marked creatures have disadvantage.
• Threat Assessment: When you use your Hunter's Mark spell, you can split its effect between up to 2 creatures instead of 1. Each creature takes half the bonus damage (rounded down), but you maintain concentration on both simultaneously. Additionally, when you hit a creature marked by your Hunter's Mark, you can deal an extra 1d4 damage. This damage increases to 1d6 at 11th level.

3rd Level: Expedition Leader

Your experience managing multiple threats makes you invaluable to any group venturing into danger. Choose one of the following benefits, which you can change when you finish a long rest:

• Coordinated Movement: Allies within 30 feet of you can use your passive Perception score instead of their own for detecting hidden creatures and traps.
• Danger Sense: When you or an ally you can see is targeted by an attack, you can use your reaction to shout a warning. The target gains a +2 bonus to AC against that attack.
• Resource Conservation: During a short rest, you can help your allies recover more efficiently. Up to 3 allies regain one additional hit die when they roll hit dice to recover hit points.

7th Level: Paranoid Precision

Your constant state of alertness allows you to engage multiple threats with deadly efficiency. You gain the following benefits:

• Scattered Attention: When you make a weapon attack against a creature marked by your Hunter's Mark, you can make an additional weapon attack against a different creature within range as part of the same action. You can use this feature a number of times equal to your Wisdom modifier per long rest.
• Reactive Strike: When a creature you can see moves within 30 feet of an ally, you can use your reaction to make a ranged weapon attack against that creature if it's within your weapon's range.
• Stress Focus: You have advantage on Constitution saving throws to maintain concentration on spells, and difficult terrain doesn't slow your party's travel when you're leading them in your favored terrain.

11th Level: Expect the Worst

Your paranoia has become a supernatural defense against the unexpected. You gain the following benefits:

• Multiple Threat Tracking: You can now mark up to 4 creatures with your All-Direction Watch feature, and the effect lasts until the start of your second turn after activation.
• Disaster Preparation: Once per long rest when you or an ally fails a saving throw, you can declare "I expected this" and allow them to reroll the save, taking the higher result. You must declare this before learning the consequences of the failed save.
• Exhausting Watch: As an action, you can enter a state of total vigilance for 1 minute. During this time, you and allies within 30 feet gain the following benefits:
  • Cannot be surprised
  • Advantage on Wisdom (Perception) checks
  • +10 feet movement speed
  • Resistance to the first damage taken each turn
  
  After this feature ends, you gain one level of exhaustion. You can use this feature once per long rest.

15th Level: Master of the Unexpected

Your hypervigilance has reached legendary proportions. You have become the ultimate expedition leader for ventures into the truly unknown.

• Omnidirectional Awareness: Your All-Direction Watch can now mark up to 6 creatures, and you can see invisible creatures within 60 feet of you as if they were visible.
• Crisis Management: When initiative is rolled, you can choose to act first regardless of your initiative roll. Additionally, during the first round of combat, you and allies within 30 feet can move up to their speed and take one additional action (not an Attack action).
• The Thing I Feared Most: Once per long rest, when you or an ally would be reduced to 0 hit points by an attack, you can declare that you anticipated exactly this scenario. The triggering attack automatically misses, and you can immediately use your reaction to move up to your speed and make a weapon attack against the attacker. You must narrate what specific precaution you took that saved your ally (positioned yourself for intervention, noticed the attacker's tell, etc.).