Ranger: Guide to Races and Subjob Selection

This Article is a Community Guide
Guides exist as a community effort to help fellow players navigate the game. Opinions and strategies in their content may vary from editor to editor, but feel free to add new or correct out of date information. Guides are subject to the same editing standards of other FFXIclopedia articles.

Job Overview[]

With unparalleled tracking abilities and skill with the bow and arrow, rangers are experts in the field of hunting. Available after completing the quest The Fanged One.

Strengths[]

Extreme proficiency in ranged weapons. Bow and Gun damage combined with an Arrow's or Bullet's damage are the most damaging weapons in the game.
Accuracy Bonus traits and the ability to equip many items that increase accuracy make Ranger an extremely accurate job class.
Barrage supplies an instant burst of damage and also replenishes a Ranger's TP bar.
Often considered the job capable of doing the most damage, and as such do not have to wait very long to be invited into parties.
Ranger has access to the Widescan ability at increasingly large radius, allowing player to easily track and find enemy and NPC targets.
An entire party of Rangers, or an arrowburn party, creates one of the greatest exp/hour ratios of any setup. (Prepatch this worked, Postpatch it is only decent.)

Weaknesses[]

Low evasion and defense, although this is somewhat compensated for with Utsusemi
Ammunition costs may be prohibitive.
The extremely high damage of Ranger can provide extreme stress on a tank. This combined with the lower defense and evasion forces rangers to limit damage production in order to avoid death.
Despite good accuracy bonus traits, Rangers are still dependant on accuracy gear to consistantly land ranged attacks.
Haste does not effect Ranged Attacks.
Ranged criticals only hit for +25% instead of the normal +100%, and the main Weaponskill of choice Sidewinder cannot critical.

Race Selection[]

Starting Stats[]

Race	HP	STR	DEX	VIT	AGI	INT	MND	CHR
Hume	27	6	6	6	8	6	6	6
Elvaan	29	7	6	7	7	5	7	6
Tarutaru	23	5	6	6	9	8	6	6
Galka	32	7	6	8	8	6	6	5
Mithra	27	6	8	6	9	6	6	5

Support Job Options[]

Ninja[]

The most common, and generally most beneficial, Ranger support job. Ninja brings many useful abilities to Ranger, such as Dual Wield at level 20, Utsusemi: Ichi at level 24, Utsusemi: Ni at level 74 and also extra agility, used to increase the "soft-cap" on Ranged Accuracy. Many Rangers have Ninja subbed by 28, for dual Archer's Knives, though 24 is also a common place to start for Utsusemi. However, subbing Ninja adds even more to the cost of playing as Ranger, though not a horrible amount for leveling Ranger alone, as the only extra expense is Shihei. However, leveling the subjob itself can cost quite a lot - +Evasion gear can be expensive, and it costs insane amounts of gil for utsusemi: Ichi and Ni, and the Enfeebling: Ichi spells, though these can all be quested, or in the case of utsusemi: Ni, gained from a BCNM 40.

Warrior[]

Warrior is another common Ranger support job. Warrior greatly increases the damage dealt by a ranger, at the cost of extra accuracy from a second Archer's/Hawker's Knife. Warrior can be used from 1-24, when Ninja doesn't add at all much to Ranger. At level 30, the Berserk job ability becomes available, which provides a huge bonus in damage for 3 out of every 5 minutes. However, a Ranger subbing Warrior must be careful, as they do not have the protection of Utsusemi and the extra damage they deal causes more enmity towards the Ranger. As of the July 2005 patch, Warrior has witnessed a resurgence as a popular Ranger subjob - It is highly recommended that both these subjobs are kept leveled. Unlike ninja, Warrior is quite cheap to take to 37, making it a nice subjob for Ranger.

Samurai[]

While warrior gives berserk and ninja gives shadows Samurai can be a very good subjob. With the Samurai Store TP job trait, a gun, and a Rajas Ring at level 75 you can get 20% TP per shot, meaning 5 shots to get 100%. Combine the 5 shot setup with Meditate and you can basically spam Slug Shot which is a major source of the ranger's damage. Also, the ability Third Eye gives you 1 hit of protection; while not much, it's definitely a improvement over Warrior defense-wise. In addition, if a two handed weapon is equipped, such as the Fire Staff, the Ranger can access the Hasso (at level 50) and Seigan (at level 70) job abilities. Hasso will provide the Ranger with an additional 5 strength while Seigan will provide for multiple hit protection and reduced recast when using Third Eye.

Thief[]

Although using thief as a ranger's subjob serves little to no purpose in exp party, it is, however, an excellent choice for farming or hunting Notorious monsters. Widescan, Treasure Hunter, Flee and Shadowbind make RNG/THF arguably the best NM hunting job of the game, both in terms of claiming the monster and getting the drop. It must be kept in mind though that rangers, due to their poor defense, can't kill very high-level notorious monsters while solo, particularly without shadow images that subbing ninja would provide.

White Mage[]

White Mage is occasionally used in HNM situations for a +MND set up. With a good crossbow and holy bolts, with a lot of MND gear, and with a Light Staff a Ranger/White Mage can do some decent damage. In situations where the ranger takes area of effect damage or status effects often, wearing an item such as a Vermillion Cloak for refresh combined with the White Mage support job can increase survivability. Commonly used spells for these situations are Stoneskin, Blink, Erase and the job ability Divine Seal used in conjunction with spells Cure III and Curaga II. However, this is not a subjob for general EXPing - Players will find far more benefit in a Warrior or Ninja support job.