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Ok.... I looked around on the forums, the internet, wiki, etc. Is there list of Amian approved deities that support Rangers somewhere? Or can nearly all Gods support a Ranger? Also, what are the rules for Rangers and their alignment in respect to their God?

Thanks!

Ranger is not restricted by deity, but to receive your powers you must still be within one step of the god's alignment, and adhere to the dogma.

Ok... so any God can in theory support a Ranger, so long as they follow the dogma and are within one step of alignment?

Thanks so much!

Yes, that is the line we have taken. There is conflicting information in the sources, because TSR and WotC can't seem to have made up their minds about rangers. Some books say they need to follow nature deities, but those same books list rangers among non-nature deities' clergy or give such NPC examples. Not to mention there's no consensus on the definitive nature deity list, to begin with. On Amia, in any case, there's no restriction.

What then are the major distinctions between the Ranger and Druid spellbooks? Can anyone differentiate how they get their spells, why they get their spells, and how their purpose might differ because of it? Is a Ranger of a non-nature deity then closer to a Cleric than a Druid?

Mercedes wrote:

What then are the major distinctions between the Ranger and Druid spellbooks? Can anyone differentiate how they get their spells, why they get their spells, and how their purpose might differ because of it? Is a Ranger of a non-nature deity then closer to a Cleric than a Druid?

Well, Druids, Clerics, and Rangers all receive their spells from the Divine. Each one needs to follow certain procedures, which are dependent upon their deity, before they can receive their spells. For some it's as simple as praying to their deity, for others they need to make some sort of offering. The time of day that this happens at depends upon the deity. Ranger/Druid/Clerics are only as close as they are portrayed by a person playing these characters, otherwise they are distinct and separate classes.

In my own mind, I draw the ranger / druid distinction like: A ranger is friends with nature; she and the land have a symbiotic, mutually beneficial relationship. A druid is a servant of the land, placing nature above herself, rather than alongside herself as a ranger. The tools and mechanics are very similar, but the attitude is different. When I think of a ranger, I think of Aragorn. He knows how to live off the land, he can read it like a book and make it work for him and do tricks for him. But his main focus is elsewhere. The wilderness itself is not his job. The wilderness is just where he happens to do his job.

So a ranger of a non-nature deity would still be expected to uphold certain natural duties as well?

I wouldn't think so. A ranger of... just to pick a god out of the air... Tempus, wouldn't necessarily feel any obligation to the land. She'd feel an obligation to be a warrior, albeit one who's specialized towards a certain style of fighting and a certain terrain. A ranger of Sune might feel an obligation to protect and defend only those areas of wilderness that she finds beautiful, because her divine mandate is to preserve beauty, not to preserve wilderness.

A ranger of Meilikki or Solonor definitely might have just as deep a commitment to the wilds as a druid, but that would be a function of being "of Meilikki" or "of Solonor," not a function of being a ranger.

I think it is helpfull to think of a Ranger as you would think of a Ranger RL: Either a park ranger or a specialised soldier (ie: military Jaegers), or a combination of the two in the case of Meilikki and Solonor.

A ranger does not have to love, or even like nature. He just knows how to survive in it way better than anyone else (excluding druids), and can use that either for good or ill or something in between.

Rangers and Their Deities....

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