Rogues: The Class Left Behind

[TimeAdept]

Hunter is referring to epic spell focus bonuses.

And no, there is absolutely no sarcasm.

Rogues are literally still better than druids.

Roll the EDR Monolith Druid with Conj, Trans focuses and EDK (which you can drop in Monolith form) and get back to me.

[Seven Sons of Sin]

A lot of the corrections to some classes have seen spectacular results from adjustments that are either soft/hard bonuses (barbarian, paladin wisdom) and class-specific gear (paladin, ranger). I was wondering if the rogue could further find benefit.

If rogues are meant to be true skill junkies, what if? they received:

+1 hard INT bonus every 8-10 levels, to cap at +3/4 at level 30

Having recently played a paladin, knowing I could start with lower wisdom at level 3 was such a liberating experience. I know rogues almost always want 14 INT, some might even argue 16. In addition, they want Dex, and Con, and more STR doesn't hurt (maybe less with encumbrance changes).

rogue specific gear: one for STR-based, one for DEX-based

You could make the argument that rogues with enough UMD can just use whatever they want, but a 45 UMD requirement seems steep.
Besides, I personally see rogue gear focusing on: Appraise/Bluff, Hide/Move Silently, Disable Device/Open Lock, Search.
I don't really know what the armor would look like beyond that.

The alternative is that X amount of rogue levels can count towards the UMD requirement for Special Weapons/Armor/Equipment. I personally like that more, because it's so rouge (spelling intentional) to just copy and use the niche of other builds. But I don't know how feasible that is.

[Sockss]

Hunter is referring to epic spell focus bonuses.

And no, there is absolutely no sarcasm.

Rogues are literally still better than druids.

Pure druids are top tier PvP and god tier PvE

Rogues are trash tier in both.

There's really no comparison.

[TheRagingGoblin]

Hunter is referring to epic spell focus bonuses.

And no, there is absolutely no sarcasm.

Rogues are literally still better than druids.

Pure druids are top tier PvP and god tier PvE

Rogues are trash tier in both.

There's really no comparison.

What needs to be looked at is how the class is being used.

As a dip class rogue is one of the best with access to Evasion, UMD, Tumble and many other utility skills. Druid is a near useless dip.

With a moderate amount of rogue levels you see it in some of the "top tier" builds, usually for epic-dodge. Druid is never taken in moderate amounts.

When taking "epic" amounts of the class, rogue is becoming far less useful as the benefits are largely front loaded. AB, direct damage (when unable to sneak attack) and ability to survive all become prominent issues. Druid is obviously excellent with 25+ levels.

Rogue as a class is not poor and it is in fact incredibly useful. The issue is when it becomes the focus and it's taken in "epic" (pun not intended) amounts.

[If Valor Were Inches]

Some dipping reliance can be countered by preventing level ups unless all skill points except a max of one are spent.

I like Seven's INT idea though.

[One Two Three Five]

Oh for the love of god let's not do this to a sorely needed thread.

Simple Fix: Any rogue additions are on-creation-subclasses or gained with a 10+ investment in rogue.

[susitsu]

its time to stop posting

Cute, I'll remember that.

I actually think pure druids are pretty strong right now.

I legitimately still have trouble justifying even playing one.

Roll the EDR Monolith Druid with Conj, Trans focuses and EDK (which you can drop in Monolith form) and get back to me.

It's like, how better to trap yourself in a one-trick pony form while the enemy has all the time in the world to decide how to deal with you?

Pure druids are top tier PvP and god tier PvE

Rogues are trash tier in both.

There's really no comparison.

There is no comparison, but you're wrong. Druids have PvE, which is definitely "expensive" for a rogue to solo, making appraise a legitimately vital skill to the rogue's leveling process.

In all my time playing a rogue for the PvP, Ive found that I feel like I'm in a constant state of "I can take anyone." Not upfront, no, but all the rogue has to do is learn about their target and they can then do anything. I mean there's really a big pallet of options open to rogues that no "one" character will ever compare to. Rogues get to cover a wide variety of bases and master multiple approaches to any one situation, unlike some less skill filled classes.

What needs to be looked at is how the class is being used.

As a dip class rogue is one of the best with access to Evasion, UMD, Tumble and many other utility skills. Druid is a near useless dip.

With a moderate amount of rogue levels you see it in some of the "top tier" builds, usually for epic-dodge. Druid is never taken in moderate amounts.

When taking "epic" amounts of the class, rogue is becoming far less useful as the benefits are largely front loaded. AB, direct damage (when unable to sneak attack) and ability to survive all become prominent issues. Druid is obviously excellent with 25+ levels.

Rogue as a class is not poor and it is in fact incredibly useful. The issue is when it becomes the focus and it's taken in "epic" (pun not intended) amounts.

Here we go. This is a bit better of an approach to the argument. Though I would like to direct you all back to Grumpycat's post.

I just want to make an interesting observation.

Other classes, to balence them/make them more useful, tend to get tweaked in and of themselves.
It seems to me (and I may be wrong here) that most of the time, when devs want to make the rogue class more 'useful' they change the environment. (traps, locks, spot checks, ect.)

Again - this isn't really appropos anything, it's just an interesting observation to mull over.

Rogues have a lot of upfront, set damage that depends on nothing like crits. Just understanding your set-up. They have assured DPS appliance as long as they meet their requirements (for sneak attacks.) While other classes are not restricted like this, it then comes to a question of skill, does it? But I'm not the sort to champion such an argument genuinely.

Their kit is big and in-case anyone thought that AB wasn't 1/2 for every single class in epic levels, allow me to correct that. Fighters get 1/2 AB in epics. Clerics and rogues too. This means the maximum base AB one may have is 25 with twenty full BAB levels pre-epic.

What does this actually mean to a rogue? Against well-warded, well-geared targets, one-on-one? It hurts when they can just go improved expertise and it affects you as heavily as it does, sure. But now you've got a bunch of choices.

Anyway, my primary bother was it felt like the concept implied was that rogues were only "untouched" class/the only one without "needed" love when they actually have an incredibly better time than druids. I mean really, with all the "party buffs" (I mean the death update) and our preferred requirement for clerics in our parties, you may as well literally never take a druid who has lesser spells with lacking relevance.

Druids "look" nice right now, and I still kinda wanna make one, but I'd like to have a character that can win waaaaaaay more fights than that predictable, outdoorsman AOE stuff.

Honestly, I'm concerned by anything people ask "for" rogue simply due to the higher skill players that run rogues and will further demolish other players more easily with that kind of stuff.

Rogues can already garbage can anyone. Soloing is still kinda disgusting.

[Sockss]

Changing the environment does not make the rogue class more useful, it makes rogue skills more useful (and in some cases a necessity which causes needless content gating.)

In fact, having high skill requirements for certain things doesn't even help rogues as they are, it helps bards and trickery clerics, who are much better at 'rogue skills' than rogues are.

When I say god tier PvE, I'm not talking about being able to do PvE. Any class can do PvE because on Arelith, it's very easy to do. The difference is ease, efficiency and speed.

Rogues do not gain options, or approaches over any other build. They offer very few, lackluster advantages for heading above the required 3 dump levels.

Rogues do not have a lot of upfront damage , at least not enough to warrant them being so terrible in every other area (Please factor in AB to your build and first flurry SA's into your calculations, which I doubt you have done) and it comes down to lack of skill of an opponent whether they even get that off. (See: Initiation rules, True seeing, walking away).

Rogues have unfavorable high saves and hit die.

If you're getting dumpstered by a rogue, you are objectively terrible, or very unlucky.

I'm still not convinced this isn't some crazy good bait.

((I also wouldn't consider a rogue to be someone rogue dump levels, just as I wouldn't consider a bard to be someone with bard dump levels))

[Thanatosis]

[susitsu]

That picture is my everything.

A True Seeing change would be good.

Saves, yes bad. This is a legitimate problem. There are ways around this and rogues benefit from per level mudane checks on dispelling. I would still rather run a rogue over a blackguard.

[Baseili]

I wouldn't mind seeing Dirty Fighting reworked into a Rogue/Assassin feat so that when the attack lands it rolls a DC for dazing the victim for 2 rounds, maybe 20 DC + rogue/assassin levels vs concentration with a minute cooldown and bypassing mind effecting resistance/immunity due to the physical nature of the attack.

I'll have a think and post something more indepth later.

[Sockss]

I would still rather run a rogue over a blackguard.

Could you provide a list of things that rogues are better than so we can fill up that trash can?

Lmao

[Torrtorr]

I think giving rogues more uses out of skills or feats (like dirty fighting) would be a decent idea.

Giving them the ability to trigger a parry riposte that deals 1/2 their sneak attack damage once per round even if they're not in the parry mode, for example.

Dirty fighting giving them a chance to knock down the enemy at x% per round depending on their amount of, let's say, tumble + spot.

Give rogues some goodies if they're willing to invest a lot in the class, they don't need to be 'The dude who sneak attack' forever.

[Cortex]

rogue is better than wm

[Seven Sons of Sin]

Why does everything have to degrade into memes?

Honestly.

[Thanatosis]

Why does everything have to degrade into memes?

Honestly.

Get a grip, dude. Two or three humorous posts isn't this oh-so-woeful "degradation" (lol) into memes.

[Sockss]

It's pretty impossible to have a serious mechanical discussion with someone that puts rogues top dog in PvP, therefore memes.

I'm pretty sure the devs and balance team know rogues are awful, but EE and other projects are taking priority.

[susitsu]

I think I'll just let Socks keep aggressing. What Ive said is by no means a joke. Rogue is far from "bad," and while there issues and difficulties, I think the class makes a lot of sense.

You should not fight up front.

You should not be able to.

But no matter how many weapon masters dip rogue to pick locks instead of bard for saves, rogues are still the best dungeoneering class.

Pixies still don't even change that.

The player door DCs are a little too high.

Saves can be a pain and so can their hp, but mages largely suffer from the exact same random unexpected corpsing issues, except traps are no problem for rogues.

[BegoneThoth]

You can do most if not all of those things with a Rogue splash.

[Dr. B]

My own thinking is that any buffs given to rogues should require *more than* 13 levels, and *absolutely* more than 10, and *ABSOLUTELY* more than 3. Otherwise things will probably get broken. Alternatively, they should require that at least 50% of your character levels be in rogue.

[BegoneThoth]

My own thinking is that any buffs given to rogues should require *more than* 13 levels, and *absolutely* more than 10, and *ABSOLUTELY* more than 3. Otherwise things will probably get broken. Alternatively, they should require that at least 50% of your character levels be in rogue.

I agree. It's why my epic feat suggestion started at Rogue 20.

[Sab1]

Rogues will always be primarly a dip class for people wanting tumble, UMD, some sneak etc.

[Nitro]

I think I'll just let Socks keep aggressing. What Ive said is by no means a joke. Rogue is far from "bad," and while there issues and difficulties, I think the class makes a lot of sense.

You should not fight up front.

You should not be able to.

But no matter how many weapon masters dip rogue to pick locks instead of bard for saves, rogues are still the best dungeoneering class.

Pixies still don't even change that.

The player door DCs are a little too high.

Saves can be a pain and so can their hp, but mages largely suffer from the exact same random unexpected corpsing issues, except traps are no problem for rogues.

Ok, I'll bite. What can a pure rogue do better than a given class that just dips into rogue? (Just being a skillmonkey doesn't count).

[susitsu]

Being a skillmonkey is literally everything.

Quick answer while I'm at work? Put out massive amounts of ranged dps within 30 ft of your target as a melee character using weapons that do 1d3 damage with no focus or specs in them and crippling strike them while you're at it.

[flower]

Enviroment changes will help.

Traps and locks being set to require least 10+ rouge levels on high DC.

No dip will save you.

And i remember Yasdia. What hell he was able to pull on you, when he was ready to engage. Several epic electro traps piled up and it does not matter how much damage your WM does..