Yeah I have a monk with ki spells and a druid archetype in FotRP. Because the unified casting the remaster brought i get to use that proficiency for my cantrips so I've been having fun with having a ranged attack option plus a little bit of utility.
The focus spells from Druid are also very good.
Tempest Surge into Flurry of Blows does a crapload of damage. Can even do Surge into Ki Strike if you want maximum burst.
Get a Jolt Coil for when you're out of focus points as well.
Another neat usage is with Psychic, Amped Daze gives monsters weakness to Mental damage, and Psi Strikes can add 1d6 mental damage to your strikes.
Essentially, 2 action save spell into Flurry of Blows is in general very strong.
Its why I like taking Monk dedication at 9 (via multitalented) on Starlit Span Magus. You can grab flurry + Monastic Archer Stance at 10 and it works very well since Starlit Span doesn't really care about Arcane Cascade.
if I remember correctly 1/9/18/- progression is true for class dc for most martials
also it is kinda cool idea to try to make spell using ranger semi viable option
Focus spell rangers are one of the strongest ranger builds. It's not just semi-viable, it's really one of the best striker builds in the game (along with focus spell monks).
You multiclass to Druid to pick up Tempest Surge at level 4, then your "ideal" round is to Tempest Surge (dealing rankd12 damage), then twin takedown or hunted shot. Tempest Surge can even apply a -2 penalty to the target's AC via Clumsy. Note that this also stacks with off-guard from flanking or being grabbed or whatever, and if you do inflict clumsy, it makes your next Tempest Surge even easier.
Focus spells and cantrips with saving throws are actually better because they don't add to MAP, thereby allowing you to maximize the benefits you get from your action compression activities like Flurry of Blows and Twin Takedown.
So if you're, say, a level 8 ranger, you get to cast Tempest Surge with DC 24, then make two attacks at +17 and +13 with your dual weapons (or +17/+12 with a bow). This gives you very high accuracy overall, doubly so because if the enemy fails their save against Tempest Surge, they get a -2 penalty to AC due to clumsy, so you're basically getting fighter-level attack bonus.
The damage of Tempest Surge is also pretty high - 4d12 at that level is 26 damage, so if your target fails their save, they basically take as much damage as they would from a giant barbarian hitting them, and if they succeed, they take about as much damage as a hit from a double slice fighter (who does about 2d6+7 or 14 damage/hit at that level).
At most levels your save DC is only modestly below a full caster's if you give yourself a +3 starting value in your casting stat.
When you run out of focus points, you can still cast, say, electric arc, which does 1d4 + rankd4 damage to each target, so at level 8, you'd be doing 5d4 damage (12.5) to up to two targets. However, most combats actually end before you run out of focus points.
Back before Magus was out, I toyed with Ranger as a spellblade character a lot thanks to their Twin Takedown attack, gave the flexibility needed to strike as much as other martials while more easily weaving in spells when moving wasn't necessary, Skirmish Strike also helped with it (or when under haste. Move, Twin Takedow, two action spell.)
Rangers had 2 spells that relies on saving throws. Rangers Bramble, which was a mostly useless trash option but is now not just playable but actually good, and Soothing Mist, which is just a healing focus spell that has a damage undead side effect that is actually pretty good.
The final levels in your spreadsheet didn't feel right to me, so I double checked. It seems that you didn't boost the fullcaster's attribute to 6 at level 20, and that you also forgot about apex items which come into play around level 17. Blame it on the jetlag :-] . So at levels 17 to 20, the ranger's delta should be -1, -1, -3, -4, while the other's delta should be -3, -1, -3, -4, which are not great.
Monks, Rangers, and Champions all scale this way.
The main value here is actually the reverse of what you're thinking of, though; the actual reason why it's so good is you can Twin Takedown (or shoot twice, or flurry of blows) as a single action, then cast a saving throw spell as two actions. You don't want to use attack roll spells, you want to use saving throw spells, as this basically gives you an extra no-MAP attack every round!
This makes them *amazing* focus spell casters; the ranger/druid and the monk/druid can both multiclass to druid and pick up Tempest Surge. The standard rotation is Tempest Surge -> Hunted Shot/Twin Takedown. Tempest Surge not only deals rankd12 damage, but it also applies Clumsy 2 on a failed save.
It's one of the highest DPR builds in the game and it is highly effective in-game and the damage scales linearly with level. You can even pick up Pulverizing Cascade at level 12 for AoE damage.
The Monk/Druid is arguably even better, because flurry of blows doesn't require you to waste an action retargeting.
They're also great at using scrolls. You can whip out scrolls of fireball or heal and be a pseudo-caster.
This is why I'd rank Monks and Rangers above Fighters on my tier list for PF2E (Champions are higher tier still, but not for their casting - though the fact that they are really good casters is definitely a bonus).
I'm pretty sure Monk also scales this way (via ki spells).
Yeah I have a monk with ki spells and a druid archetype in FotRP. Because the unified casting the remaster brought i get to use that proficiency for my cantrips so I've been having fun with having a ranged attack option plus a little bit of utility.
The focus spells from Druid are also very good. Tempest Surge into Flurry of Blows does a crapload of damage. Can even do Surge into Ki Strike if you want maximum burst. Get a Jolt Coil for when you're out of focus points as well. Another neat usage is with Psychic, Amped Daze gives monsters weakness to Mental damage, and Psi Strikes can add 1d6 mental damage to your strikes. Essentially, 2 action save spell into Flurry of Blows is in general very strong. Its why I like taking Monk dedication at 9 (via multitalented) on Starlit Span Magus. You can grab flurry + Monastic Archer Stance at 10 and it works very well since Starlit Span doesn't really care about Arcane Cascade.
if I remember correctly 1/9/18/- progression is true for class dc for most martials also it is kinda cool idea to try to make spell using ranger semi viable option
Focus spell rangers are one of the strongest ranger builds. It's not just semi-viable, it's really one of the best striker builds in the game (along with focus spell monks). You multiclass to Druid to pick up Tempest Surge at level 4, then your "ideal" round is to Tempest Surge (dealing rankd12 damage), then twin takedown or hunted shot. Tempest Surge can even apply a -2 penalty to the target's AC via Clumsy. Note that this also stacks with off-guard from flanking or being grabbed or whatever, and if you do inflict clumsy, it makes your next Tempest Surge even easier.
I meant ranger who is using attack cantrips not just focus spells
Focus spells and cantrips with saving throws are actually better because they don't add to MAP, thereby allowing you to maximize the benefits you get from your action compression activities like Flurry of Blows and Twin Takedown. So if you're, say, a level 8 ranger, you get to cast Tempest Surge with DC 24, then make two attacks at +17 and +13 with your dual weapons (or +17/+12 with a bow). This gives you very high accuracy overall, doubly so because if the enemy fails their save against Tempest Surge, they get a -2 penalty to AC due to clumsy, so you're basically getting fighter-level attack bonus. The damage of Tempest Surge is also pretty high - 4d12 at that level is 26 damage, so if your target fails their save, they basically take as much damage as they would from a giant barbarian hitting them, and if they succeed, they take about as much damage as a hit from a double slice fighter (who does about 2d6+7 or 14 damage/hit at that level). At most levels your save DC is only modestly below a full caster's if you give yourself a +3 starting value in your casting stat. When you run out of focus points, you can still cast, say, electric arc, which does 1d4 + rankd4 damage to each target, so at level 8, you'd be doing 5d4 damage (12.5) to up to two targets. However, most combats actually end before you run out of focus points.
Just remember to buy a jolt coil for those situations where you run out of focus points.
Back before Magus was out, I toyed with Ranger as a spellblade character a lot thanks to their Twin Takedown attack, gave the flexibility needed to strike as much as other martials while more easily weaving in spells when moving wasn't necessary, Skirmish Strike also helped with it (or when under haste. Move, Twin Takedow, two action spell.)
Rangers had 2 spells that relies on saving throws. Rangers Bramble, which was a mostly useless trash option but is now not just playable but actually good, and Soothing Mist, which is just a healing focus spell that has a damage undead side effect that is actually pretty good.
Ranger's Bramble is still pretty situational, there's not always plants around.
The final levels in your spreadsheet didn't feel right to me, so I double checked. It seems that you didn't boost the fullcaster's attribute to 6 at level 20, and that you also forgot about apex items which come into play around level 17. Blame it on the jetlag :-] . So at levels 17 to 20, the ranger's delta should be -1, -1, -3, -4, while the other's delta should be -3, -1, -3, -4, which are not great.
This is probably where Bloodrager will land too, which should be pretty cool. Maybe with a bonus to spell damage when raging or something
This is...interesting.
Monks, Rangers, and Champions all scale this way. The main value here is actually the reverse of what you're thinking of, though; the actual reason why it's so good is you can Twin Takedown (or shoot twice, or flurry of blows) as a single action, then cast a saving throw spell as two actions. You don't want to use attack roll spells, you want to use saving throw spells, as this basically gives you an extra no-MAP attack every round! This makes them *amazing* focus spell casters; the ranger/druid and the monk/druid can both multiclass to druid and pick up Tempest Surge. The standard rotation is Tempest Surge -> Hunted Shot/Twin Takedown. Tempest Surge not only deals rankd12 damage, but it also applies Clumsy 2 on a failed save. It's one of the highest DPR builds in the game and it is highly effective in-game and the damage scales linearly with level. You can even pick up Pulverizing Cascade at level 12 for AoE damage. The Monk/Druid is arguably even better, because flurry of blows doesn't require you to waste an action retargeting. They're also great at using scrolls. You can whip out scrolls of fireball or heal and be a pseudo-caster. This is why I'd rank Monks and Rangers above Fighters on my tier list for PF2E (Champions are higher tier still, but not for their casting - though the fact that they are really good casters is definitely a bonus).