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DracoKnight
2015-02-27, 08:03 PM
I decided to make a new subclass for Rogues, to flesh out my world a little bit more, and I was wondering if there's anyone who could give me thoughts on whether or not its balanced. Thanks!


Roguish Archetype: Mercenary

Sellsword
At 3rd level you gain proficiency with all martial weapons. Al1 Martial weapons that do not have the Heavy or Two-Handed property gain the Finesse property.

Fighting Styles:
Upon reaching 3rd level, you choose a fighting style to fit how you would play your character.
⁃ Archery: You gain a +2 bonus to attack rolls you make with ranged weapons.
⁃ Defense: While you are wearing armor you gain a +1 bonus to your AC
⁃ Dueling: When you are wielding a melee weapon in one hand and no other weapons, you gain a +2 bonus to damage rolls with that weapon.
⁃ Two-Weapon Fighting: When you engage in two-weapon fighting you can add your ability modifier to the damage of the second attack.

Pay the Reaper
At 9th level you gain proficiency in the Persuasion skill, and you have advantage to improve payment, and whenever your character is bartering.

Shadowy Soldier
At 13th level you gain proficiency in the Stealth skill if you do not already have it. You gain advantage on all Stealth ability checks.

Merchant of Death
At 17th level you add 3d6 to your damage rolls, if the targeted enemy is under half their total health.

Strill
2015-03-06, 04:10 PM
Two-weapon fighting and Duelist are very weak with the Rogue since the bulk of their damage comes from Sneak Attacks. I'd expect most players to just take Archery or Defensive.

Pay the Reaper and Shadowy Soldier are very bland. Rogues already get two more skills than other classes to begin with.

Cobrakun
2015-03-06, 04:57 PM
I would have to agree, that two-weapon fighting and duelist are somewhat weak, however, I find it to be very useful in certain situations. For example, a rapier with the duelist fighting style would do a minimum of 5 damage at level 1 providing that you have a +2 to dex. It isn't the best but in comparison to being stuck with no sneak attack and a dagger, you're kinda stuck. Two weapon fighting can add some extra damage to finish off those you nuke with sneak attack as well. Little bits of damage can go a long way.

That being said, Sellsword seems a bit weak to me. The most highest dice you could roll would be a d8 anyways, so why even bother. Granted, i find it fun seeing a rogue with a warhammer. My suggestion is for this: Keep the proficiency in all martial weapons. Then allow the rogue to choose 1 or more (your preference) of those martial weapons work for purposes of sneak attack. A great sword perhaps? Although RPing that may be hard. Then again sneaking up behind someone then slashing them with any weapon could hit a critical point.

Pay the reaper seems like a fun option, but as was said already needs a bit more. Persuasion is good. But i think it would be fun to also add in something like this: you can buy things for 25% less and sell things for 25% more. Something of that nature.

Shadowy soldier is alright, but needs a bit more as well. Advantage on stealth checks is nice. But in addition to that adding something like: you are able to hide in dim light or in minimal cover, would be fun.

These are just my .02, thought i would share. I like it, but in my opinion, it needs a bit more. I hope this helps

Cobrakun

DracoKnight
2015-03-09, 05:03 AM
Thank you both, I am modding my build for this, to take your thoughts into consideration :)

Myzz
2015-03-10, 09:23 AM
Roguish Archetype: Mercenary

I'll be addressing with my opinions, point by point... I hope you don't mind that.


Sellsword
At 3rd level you gain proficiency with all martial weapons. All Martial weapons that do not have the Heavy or Two-Handed property gain the Finesse property.

From a game balance perspective I don't mind this. I would probably add Versatile to the exclusion list as well, or as a minimum any weapon used with 2 hands. That would effectively limits all finesse weapons to the same dmg die as a Rapier, 1d8.


Fighting Styles:
Upon reaching 3rd level, you choose a fighting style to fit how you would play your character.
⁃ Archery: You gain a +2 bonus to attack rolls you make with ranged weapons.
⁃ Defense: While you are wearing armor you gain a +1 bonus to your AC
⁃ Dueling: When you are wielding a melee weapon in one hand and no other weapons, you gain a +2 bonus to damage rolls with that weapon.
⁃ Two-Weapon Fighting: When you engage in two-weapon fighting you can add your ability modifier to the damage of the second attack.

This seems very weak for losing Assassinate... essentially you swap 1 level of MC into Fighter for the Assassinate (without gaining the other fighter L1 benefits)... so I have no issues with it.


Pay the Reaper
At 9th level you gain proficiency in the Persuasion skill, and you have advantage to improve payment, and whenever your character is bartering.

Advantage on bartering rolls seems powerful enough, especially for a character that could possibly have Expertised it...


Shadowy Soldier
At 13th level you gain proficiency in the Stealth skill if you do not already have it. You gain advantage on all Stealth ability checks.

Advantage on Stealth is HUGE, at level 13 if you put your Expertise into Stealth and got your Dex to 18 your looking at +14 Stealth with advantage... THAT IS AWESOMEly powerful... compare to other rogue archetypes: Thief gets advantage on stealth checks at level 9, making him the best stealth character, BUT can ONLY move half his speed that turn... I would suggest adding some sort of speed reduction as well... Or just use Supreme Sneak from Thief here <word for word>


Merchant of Death
At 17th level you add 3d6 to your damage rolls, if the targeted enemy is under half their total health.
I would change this to an AUTO Crit when hit a target with < Half Health. Maybe even change the name to Execute (lol). Compare this to an Assassins L17 Death Strike: double damage if a surprised creature fails a Con save, includes assassinate dmg crit... for a whopping x4 dice dmg vs surprised foes...

Death Strike is more powerful BUT also only usable during the surprise round... Whereas Merchant of Death (execute) will be used to finish off grievously wounded foes... making the Mercenary the top kill stealer =)

for MoD-Execute, I might not even have a problem with having it auto crit on hit AND maximize dmg from dice... IF the ability also requires that you have advantage on the attack... (which of course means your doubling and maximizing sneak attack dice). Its late enough in the game that your not going to be adding a whole lot of extra, non-sneak attack dice like smites or superiority dice, especially if the DM does NOT allow poisons to crit...

All in all looks nice and pretty fun to play... Not sure I would play it over an assassin, BUT it is very close. Basically you gain some benefits of MC'ing 1 level into fighter (but not all), without actually having to MC. This means that your Sneak Attack progression is not delayed, at the cost of pushing your assassinate ability to end game, but also acquiring Supreme Sneak from the Thief (which is also delayed, comparatively).