First time D&D player: Races and class questions. (5e)

[VinitBelam]

As far as I see in DnD the only official PC races are humans, elves, gnomes, dwarves, half-lings, half orcs, and dragon born, or, at least these are the most common.

I want to start playing DnD, but I have trouble doing human-like characters in a lot of settings, I am less invested this way. I am looking on roll20 for 5e campaigns, what homebrew races do you think would be most commonly allowed for those 'noob campaigns'?

Originally I wanted to be a gnoll ranger, but I found out the ranger is awful, or at least for the reason I want to be a ranger, is there any class that is ranged with a bow that isn't awful? (or was it because of my source? From the looks ranger is just, your animal is all you are good for, and you are only good wherever your favored terrain and enemies are)

Also is there any reliable information to get about DnD? I cannot get rulebooks, and even though it is pirating, PDF's for the rule book are so massive that I can't read it without the pages going blank, and the only wikis I found are for homebrew, or are poorly formatted.

[Admin Dirk]

If you are talking about 5th edition DnD, Wizards has published this openly, as a beginning guide to the game. You can play DnD with the information inside, quite well. It's not the entire set of books, but it's a starter set, and it's legal.

https://media.wizards.com/2016/downl...D-OGL_V1.1.pdf


This also has tieflings and half elfs as player races.

[hafrogman]

Originally Posted by VinitBelam

... but I found out the ranger is awful, or at least for the reason I want to be a ranger, is there any class that is ranged with a bow that isn't awful? (or was it because of my source? From the looks ranger is just, your animal is all you are good for, and you are only good wherever your favored terrain and enemies are)

Just a word of caution to not believe everything you read about D&D. There are a lot of people out there very invested in making only the most mechanically perfect character possible, but that is only one way to play the game.

The ranger is a perfectly viable class. The beast master subtype is only one of a number of options, so not all rangers need to have a pet at all. I know you're just getting started, but later books also added more options to the class. So don't give up on it just yet.

But, within the bounds of the basic rules Admin Dirk posted, if you want to play an archer, fighter is a great option. You may think of a fighter in heavy armor with sword and shield, but a fighter can be a master of any weapon, even a bow. Rangers have more wilderness skills to augment that, but the fighter is the hands down combat machine.

Welcome to our hobby.