How would I play a thug or combat oriented strength-Based rogue in D&D?

[PunkManiak]

I've had a character idea stuck in my head for a while now. In essence, the only word I can think of for this sort of character is a thug. The character wields a maul, which is an odd sort of weapon, it's similar to a one handed-mace but even heavier and slower and hits like a Mack truck, it's still one handed though. I'll be fighting without a shield so my character will have to be able to dodge, and I'll be wearing nothing but light leather armor. For other skills, I was thinking of having the character be skilled in mostly rogue talents, sneak maybe for the ability to sneak attack, pickpocketing, lockpicking, and speech for intimidation. In essence the character would be a city thug, skilled in rogue skills but specializing in straight up combat, and crushing enemies skulls with his maul. For classes I'm looking at Duelist, Rogue, Bard, and Warrior as potential fits.

[Arc_knight25]

If Pathfinder is open to you then the Rogue Archetypes of Thug and Skulking Slayer maybe of use to you. They will give you that brutality your looking for.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

Sneak Attack variant fighter, perhaps with a Rogue level thrown in + Able Learner? Urban Ranger with the two-handed weapon combat focus? Barbarian with some Cityscape substitutions? Any or all of the above?

If you give me some more details I can try to whack out a build stub for you. What playable levels and so forth are you looking for? Do you have any skill thresholds you want?

[Willie the Duck]

I don't know if any of these fit your build, but I would consider the Unearthed Arcana alternate class abilities:

There is the Thug fighter: exchange your first level feat and reducing armor proficiencies to light for adding Bluff, Gather Information, Knowledge (local), and Sleight of Hand to the fighter skill list, and give them 4+Int instead of 2+Int skill points/level. Also add Urban Tracking to fighter bonus feats. With the exception of lockpicking, this seems to fit your bill. Maybe talk with the DM and come up with a custom lockpicker Apprentice (DMG II, p. 176) feat that gives you, say, Open Lock and Disable Device or Search.

There's also the Dirty Fighter: Exchange fighter feats for a sneak attack progression equivalent to a rogues. Despite the thug having given away one of its feats already, it is specifically stated that you can take dirty fighter and thug together.

Adventurer rogue: Going the other direction, this rogue gives up their sneak attack in exchange for a fighter's feat progression.

[Flickerdart]

There's an alternative fighter (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#fighterVariantThug) that gives up a bonus feat and armor for some rogue skills, and a second variant (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/variantCharacterClasses.htm#fighter) that gives up the rest of the feats for sneak attack. It's a pretty solid chassis for a guy who wants to be a brutal strength-based rogue!

Also, never underestimate the value of multiclassing. A few levels in barbarian will do you good - more strength, more skull-cracking, perfect for a brutish thug! Since sneak attack gets better when you have more attacks, grab whirling frenzy (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/variant/classes/classFeatureVariants.htm#rageVariantWhirlingFrenzy ) instead of vanilla Rage for an extra attack and an AC bonus (which you'll need).

As a thug, your character will favor short odds and abhor fair fights. What better way to embody that than the wolf pack? Dedicate yourself to the Spirit Wolf Totem (Complete Champion) and Wolf Totem (wolfTotemClassFeatures) to swap out some barbarian abilities for Improved Trip and a damage bonus when flanking.

Since more attacks is better for you, we can go to the ranger for dual-wielding. But not any regular ranger - an urban ranger (rangerVariantUrbanRanger)! For a character that's street-savvy, being able to track down people in the city is a valuable skill. Your second weapon will be your fists (using the Superior Unarmed Strike feat) because what kind of street thug can't slug it out bareknuckle? You can use your hand as a trip attack, then beat the opponent senseless when he is on the ground. Very thuggish!

So a build might look something like this - urban ranger 2/(spirit) wolf totem barbarian 2/thug sneak attack fighter from then on.

[Zaq]

In 3.5, there's very little in the Rogue class itself that truly demands that DEX be your primary attribute. Many iconic Rogue skills (Balance, Tumble, Hide/MS, etc.) are DEX-based, high initiative is good for Sneak Attack on turn 1, Evasion wants you to have a good Reflex, and you do have to feed your AC somehow. But while DEX is obviously encouraged, it's not demanded. (Not that a thug can't be DEX-heavy, but you mentioned being STR-primary, so that's why I'm going down this road.) Melee Rogues still use STR for damage (and, by default, to hit), so there's no downside there, and while you'll have to get the proficiency somehow, there's no limitation (in 3.5, at least) saying that you can't use the type of weapon you're describing for Sneak Attacks.

Your biggest concern is just going to be defense. Rogues don't have great armor options (sure, at high levels, your AC comes almost entirely from stats and/or from magic items, if you haven't decided to ditch AC entirely in favor of miss chance, but that isn't the case at low levels), they have low HD, and they tend to draw a lot of fire because they hit really hard, so you need to find a way to deal with some attacks coming your way.

Overall, though, nothing says that a Rogue can't be a thuggish bruiser. Using the actual Rogue class isn't your only option by a long shot (plenty of other good options have been mentioned), but I see it as being perfectly serviceable (it really is your best low-maintenance option for skills + Sneak Attack).

[Telonius]

If you're talking about the maul from Complete Warrior, it's like a Bastard Sword - you can use it two-handed as a martial weapon, but you need Exotic Weapon Proficiency to wield it one-handed.

[Seppo87]

If Pathfinder is an option, play a Slayer.

If it's not, you'll probably want to multiclass to something with a good armor proficiency.

Dread Commando is a prc that lowers armor penalties and gives you a good precision damage progression, it might fit with your concept.

[Gildedragon]

The already mentioned options of SA fighter and Urban Rogue are, what I think, the best pseudo rogue types.
Now if you want the skills and the Trapfinding
1: Rogue, feat: able learner
2+ other full BAB sneakstab classes

Of going str based: go for heavy(ish) armor. As heavy as not to hamper your Dex bonus, but with str you can actually carry bulky things.

[PunkManiak]

Would it be possible to do a primary str based Rogue with secondary stats being constitution and dexterity? If I could keep light armor and get decent AC that would be awesome. The multi-classing Flickerdart mentioned of Barbarian and Urban Ranger, really sound like they might fit this character, with the primary weapon being the Maul and the Secondary weapon being his fists for trips and throws in combat, it might work.

[Zaq]

That's totally doable. If you're not casting spells (or some equivalent), your "primary" stat doesn't matter all that much in 3.5, and since you're going to be getting a benefit from each of STR and DEX, it's not going to hurt you to have STR be higher than DEX, though I wouldn't dump DEX entirely (which you said you weren't going to do, so we're cool). (When I say that it doesn't matter, I don't mean that you can ignore it; what I mean is that there isn't a huge built-in downside for choosing a different primary stat than what the game apparently expects, assuming that you're aware of the consequences and maybe have a workaround or two.)

Like I said, there's no reason you can't accomplish this with the actual Rogue class, since that'll give you more skill points than basically anything else (allowing you to still be reasonably skillful even if you aren't prioritizing INT). Rogues get light armor out of the box, though you'll have to do something unusual to get proficiency with a maul (a dip, a feat, a race, etc.). Whether light armor is enough to give you whatever you consider to be "good AC" without your DEX being super high is, of course, dependent on what you consider "good AC" to be, though if you're starting at a high enough level to have access to a handful of magic items, there's plenty of low-hanging fruit for nickel-and-dime AC bonuses (Ring of Protection, Amulet of Natural Armor, actual bonuses on your armor itself, etc.); having really great AC always takes investment, but you might be able to be good enough.

I'm not sure how easy it's going to be to be able to rely on your fists for "trips and throws" (or for punching, for that matter); all of those things take feats, and feats are precious to a Rogue. If you have access to Tome of Battle, you can take a dip in Swordsage; the unarmed variant gives you IUS for free (and a small amount of increased damage), and Setting Sun maneuvers have lots of "trips and throws" even if you don't have all the usual feats. Barbarian does have some options, though if you just want to be a Barbarian, maybe you should just be a Barbarian, since Barbarian isn't going to help much with skills or with Sneak Attack. I guess it all depends on how many levels you're willing to spend and what you really want the character to do.

[ExLibrisMortis]

There's a barbarian variant that grants you Improved Unarmed Strike and Two-Weapon Fighting (but only with unarmed strikes), so you can use your maul main-hand and follow up with a kick or something (fighting dirty - also another hit that gets Sneak Attack). As I recall, the variant stacks with Whirling Frenzy, Spirit Lion Totem, and Wolf Totem.

[Melcar]

I've had a character idea stuck in my head for a while now. In essence, the only word I can think of for this sort of character is a thug. The character wields a maul, which is an odd sort of weapon, it's similar to a one handed-mace but even heavier and slower and hits like a Mack truck, it's still one handed though. I'll be fighting without a shield so my character will have to be able to dodge, and I'll be wearing nothing but light leather armor. For other skills, I was thinking of having the character be skilled in mostly rogue talents, sneak maybe for the ability to sneak attack, pickpocketing, lockpicking, and speech for intimidation. In essence the character would be a city thug, skilled in rogue skills but specializing in straight up combat, and crushing enemies skulls with his maul. For classes I'm looking at Duelist, Rogue, Bard, and Warrior as potential fits.

Have you tried the variant fighter class the Thug? Its from UA!

[PunkManiak]

There's a barbarian variant that grants you Improved Unarmed Strike and Two-Weapon Fighting (but only with unarmed strikes), so you can use your maul main-hand and follow up with a kick or something (fighting dirty - also another hit that gets Sneak Attack). As I recall, the variant stacks with Whirling Frenzy, Spirit Lion Totem, and Wolf Totem.

What was mentioned to me above were Whirling Frenzy, and Wolf Totem. I was basically thinking of dumping a few levels into barbarian to get these and IUS eventually.

[LordOfCain]

I would like to +1 playing the fighter variant, the thug???, or the rogue variant with fighter bonus feats. Both are on the SRD.

[ExLibrisMortis]

What was mentioned to me above were Whirling Frenzy, and Wolf Totem. I was basically thinking of dumping a few levels into barbarian to get these and IUS eventually.
Yeah, Flickerdart recommended the Spirit Wolf Totem. It's an unorthodox choice (Spirit Lion Totem is the default pick), but +2 on attacks when flanking is very useful to a rogue, of course, and a bit less brute-force übercharging than pounce.

You only need two levels in barbarian to get everything you need. A second-level barbarian gets:
- Weapon and armour proficiencies ... trade for ... IUS, TWF with unarmed strikes (Dragon #349)
- Fast movement ... trade for ... +2 on attack rolls while flanking (Complete Champion)
- Rage ... trade for ... Whirling Frenzy (Unearthed Arcana)
- Uncanny Dodge ... trade for ... Improved Trip (Unearthed Arcana)

Barbarian dips are pretty versatile, with all the ACFs out there. Druid has nice ones, too, if you want to bump your will save.