Well, there was a bit of a talk before for putting in viable alternative spells for ranger, and I had a look through the source books and a few caught my eye. Some were overpowered as hell so I won't mention them, but I'll put a couple down at least, as possible 3rd level spells.
I should preface this by saying that I think Blade Thirst should stay as it is. Ranger has huge advantages in very high stealth, good skill choices, full BAB, HiPS, Bane Bow, and Hawks flight. It should be mentioned in a previous mention that Paladin was pointed out to be overpowered, and it is very strong - but it has no detection, and on a server that has no auto defeats of stealth this is quite potent a difference. A ranger does not suffer from this deficit, and has an absolutely excellent skill selection that the paladin simply does not.
Regardless, putting down the spells.
Detect Favored Enemy
Lvl 3, Ranger 3, Divination
Components - V, S, DF
Casting time - 1 action (over 3 rounds)
Range - long (400ft, maybe too much)
Saving throw - None
Spell resistance - None
Target - self
Allows the ranger to concentrate and sense the presence of their favored enemies. Fluff text aside it works exactly like the paladins 'detect evil (cough chaos)' ability, doing a three round concentration check to detect favoured enemies nearby, instead of an alignment, which is quite a potent detection tool, limited by numbers of casts.
Embrace the Wild
Level - Ranger 3, Druid 3 (though this may be just made Ranger, potentially?)
Components - V, F
Cating time - 1 action
Range - Personal
Target - self
Duration - 10 mins a level (recommended 1 hour+1 turn per level)
This spell allows the caster to take on some of the aspects and nature of a wild animal. You retain your form, but gain the natural and extraordinary senses of a chosen creature.
This spell would function much like a 'protection vs alignment' or 'polymorph' spell, granting a bonus of a type in terms of feat and skill bonus depending on the creature chosen. Some possible ideas included would be -
Eagle - Spot +5, Search +5
Cat - Darkvision, Move Silent +5
Bear - Antagonise +5, Discipline +5
Wolf - Listen +5, Discipline +5
There are other animals and the values may vary, as the spell description itself doesn't give specifics (rather weirdly) and leaves things rather nebulous in terms of values, simply saying the player gains all the ranks of the creature.
The next spells are from the Book of Exalted Deeds, and are somewhat overly goodly aligned. They can however be retweaked to be a little less overbearingly goody goody. The four particulars were a level 1 spell, Eyes of the Avoral, a level 2 spell, Silvered Weapon, a level 3 spell, Inspired Aim, and lastly, Spear of Valarian, a lvl 4 spell.
Eyes of the Avoral (suggested renaming, Eyes of the Farseeing)
Transmutation
Level - Ranger 1, Druid 1, Sorcerer/Wizard 1 (suggest locking to ranger/druid)
Component - S
Casting time - 1 Standard action
Range - touch
Target - One creature
Duration - 10 minutes per level (suggest tweaking to shorter)
Saving through - will negates (harmless)
Spell resistance - yes (harmless)
A simple +8 bonus to spot, nothing more.
Silvered Weapon.
Transmutation
Level - Paladin 1, ranger 2 (suggest removing as paladin option, buffing as ranger option)
Components - V, S
Casting time - 1 standard action
Range - touch
Target - one weapon or projectile
Duration - 1 round/level (perhaps worth changing to be in line with bless weapon)
Saving throw - fort negates, object - harmless
Spell resistance - yes, object - harmless
This spell turns a weapon silvered weapon for the purpose of overcoming damage reduction. My personal suggestion would be to bring this spell in line with bless weapon of a paladin, but make it for a ranger. My suggestion would be to make it 1D6 divine or magical damage vs either shapechangers, or favored enemies, or magical beasts - or a combination of a pair of these. Favored enemies would only work if it was a self cast spell, instead of another player. If it was to be tweaked to be self cast, it'd make sense to make it favored enemies, but at that point it would be more viable as a lvl 2 or even a lvl 3 spell, due to the other bonuses that rangers get stacking on top. This varies from the pen and paper, but then again a fair few of other spells do to.
Inspired Aim
Enchantment (Compulsion)
Level - Bard 4 (recommended against?) ranger 3
Components - V
Casting time - 1 standard action
Range - 40 ft (similar range to Sacred Haven, presumably)
Targets - Allies within 40ft of caster
Duration - Concentration (recommend 1 hour +1 turn per level)
Saving through - Will negates (harmless)
Spell resistance - yes (harmless)
The spell inspires a +2 bonus on all ranged attacks made by everyone in the radius. This would require having a ranged weapon equipped before casting, but it would probably also be useless with GMW. My suggestion for a tweak is a flat +2 magic damage bonus to all of the rangers Favored enemies applied to all allies within range. +2 isn't a great deal, but its flat damage, could be made a low chance of resist property, and it would be a large party buff as well. Otherwise, a tweak of 1d4 would also work, perhaps moving the spell to lvl 4 range.
Spear of Valarian.
Transmutation
Level - Druid 5 (recommended locked out?), ranger 4
Components - V, S
Casting time - 1 Standard action
Range - Touch (Caster only?)
Target - One non magical weapon (suggest moving to any weapon)
Duration - 1 Round/level
Saving throw - for negates - object, harmless
Spell resistance - yes - object, harmless
Spear of Valarian, in the description, transforms a non magical weapon into a shimmering silver spear that acts as a +1 silvered bane weapon (magical beasts). A suggested retweak of this would involve either a powerful bane effect on a melee weapon (excluding ranged deliberately) to create a stun effect or extra damage, or an effect similar to Mordenkainen's sword, creating a spear instead that defends and fights beside the caster. To be fair, this one I was leery on, but I thought best to include anyway.
There were others I found. One ridiculous spell gave a ranger +20 to hide and move silently as a lvl 3 spell. I didn't include that one. They don't need it.