Need help: Sniper rogue

[clash]

I am working on a sniper rogue archetype and would love some feedback as well as help fleshing out the abilities a little more.

Sniper rogue:
3 Take Aim: As a bonus action you can take aim against an enemy that is at least 30ft away from you. If you take aim you suffer no disadvantage for attacking a target in 1/2 or 3/4 cover and may apply sneak attack against any target you aim at.
3 Weapon Training: You gain proficiency with all ranged martial weapons.
9 Trick Shot: Your extensive training has made even the most difficult archery contests trivial. You gain advantage on all attack rolls made to shoot a stationary object. This includes such things a shooting an archery target, shooting the rope of a noose or firing into a trap pinhole.
13 Keep your distance: As a reaction to getting hit by an attack you may immediately move up to half your speed. This movement does not provoke opportunity attacks from the creature that triggered the movement.
17 Overwatch: You can see up to 1 mile away with no difficulty, able to discern even fine details as though looking at something no more than 100 feet away from you. In addition, when you are wielding a ranged weapon, you may make an opportunity attack against any creature that moves within your range provided they do not have any cover.

[Tough Butter]

Dude. That is absolutely INSANE. Like, you need to scale it down a bit. Let me break it down.

Take aim: Legit 100% auto sneak attack? That is literally too good for a level 14 or 15 rouge, not a 3!

Keen sight: Great fluff. Keep it.

Keep your distance: Seems good but needs finer tuning, such as their ability to avoid multiattack, and what about AoO?

Far shot: Laaaaaame. When will this PC ever see an enemy 600 feet away and go: Ha! Now I can use this ability! For thirteenth level, sucks.

Both 17th level abilities: WHAT? So not only can you auto sneak attack, you can auto hit or auto kill? Do you realize how powerful that is. You are potentially killing, one-shoting every enemy you can fight, Big bad Tarresque the GM has been waiting to suprise you're under levelled PCs with? Nope, auto kill. From 800 feet away. 300+ damage in one turn.


This is waaaaay too powerful. Like, the most powerful home brew I've ever seen. Next try, try things like lower rolls needed to crit, bonuses to rolls when shooting from a distance, and the like.

Please say you are not currently playing this.

[PotatoGolem]

Aside from headshot, this seems balanced, maybe even weak. Headshot is way, way too good. 5e has largely gotten rid of save or die effects

[Lalliman]

Regardless of balance, this just isn't very interesting. Take Aim takes away the rogue's primary mechanic of looking for ways to Sneak Attack, reducing you to doing the same action every round: aim, shoot, aim, shoot, and then occasionally retreat when an enemy gets too close. Even the Champion makes more round-to-round decisions than that due to their multiple attacks. Deadeye is even worse. Why take the joy of rolling dice away from yourself?

Thing is, Sneak Attack already works with ranged weapons. Any rogue with a shortbow and the Sharpshooter feat can snipe people from 300 feet away. You can still get Sneak Attack from flanking allies or other circumstances, and even when you can't, you can use your bonus action to Hide and get it anyways, if your Stealth check succeeds. I don't think this archetype needs to exist.

[Gr7mm Bobb]

Why not follow the 17th level given by the Assassin class? That's effectively what you are going for anyway with the "save or suck". The ability to "ethereal strike" someone from distance is cool, not sure how to change it. Maybe use a resource (like superiority die) so that you have a way to be awesome with your shots, but now it runs out of steam at a reasonable rate. That would also give them access to debilitating control effects as well, like disarming, pinning, hamstring, etc. Who knows, maybe making this as a Battlemaster styled rogue archetype using d6's would be a good approach.

I recommend allowing the movement as a reaction to not provoke oppurtunity attacks period, or just from the creature that triggered it.

The extended perception range would be better placed alongside the 7th level feature so you don't show up the eagle totem in fluff. (yes I'm aware that they are ribbon abilities)

The double range increment is meh to me in a way that it is a dead feature when feats are available (granted it is in line with the swashbuckler gaining part of the Mobile feat). I would honestly recommend a flat addition to the base ranges for range weapons and double that bonus for 2H range weapons. Like maybe 25 to 50? Or maybe even 5 feet per rogue level, that way you can reach out an touch people from stupid distance, just maybe not immediately.

[Grod_The_Giant]

I am working on a sniper rogue archetype and would love some feedback as well as help fleshing out the abilities a little more.

Sniper rogue:
3 Take Aim: As a bonus action you can take aim against an enemy. If you take aim you suffer no disadvantage for attacking a target in 1/2 or 3/4 cover and may apply sneak attack against any target you aim at.
The Rogue is balanced around always getting his Sneak Attack, and the bonus action cost is considerable for them, so I'm not super worried-- it means they're not hiding or using Crossbow Expert, for a start. If you're concerned about balance you might put in, oh, a Perception check, or perhaps add in a Swashbuckler-style qualifier ("target is more than X feet away," perhaps; that way you can snipe from long range and rely on allies as usual in the scrum), but I wouldn't worry too much on that front. Lalliman's point about turns becoming repetitive is worth thinking about, though.


3 Keen sight: You can see up to 1 mile away with no difficulty, able to discern even fine details as though looking at something no more than 100 feet away from you.
I might kick this up to 9th level; it's a bit much conceptually for a mundane class at 3rd level.


9 Keep your distance: As a reaction to getting hit by an attack you may immediately move up to half your speed.
Could use a bit of fine tuning, yeah... I think "opportunity attacks have Disadvantage" would be good-- it lets you interrupt multiattack, which is neat, but there's still some cost.


13 Far shot: You can double the short and long ranges of any ranged weapons.
Like Gr7mm Bobb, my main concern here is that, unlike Take Aim, it overlaps too heavily with Sharpshooter.


17 Deadeye: Your aim becomes unparalleled. When you use Take Aim you can choose to forgo rolling the dice. Instead your attacks automatically hits and the target must make a dexterity saving throw or take the normal damage of the attack. On a successful save they only take half damage.
Replacing an attack roll with a Dex save is fine and cool; probably even a little weak for 17th level, even with the save-for-half.


17 Headshot: When you use Take Aim you can attempt to kill your target with a single shot to the head. On a hit the target must make a constitution saving throw or be reduced to 0hp. on a failed save they still take the normal damage of the attack. After you use this ability you cant use it again until you take a long rest. If the attack misses your use of the ability is not expended.
Hmm... 5e really steers clear of the save-or-die business, but this is, basically, a 9th level spell. Comparing it to Power Word: Kill, the closest analogue, this works with any hit point total, but has two points of failure: an attack roll and a save. Comparing it to Death Strike, it's more powerful but has the 1/long rest limit. It's also a capstone feature, though... I can see leaving it; I can also see weakening it somewhat. Taking Death Strike and changing the restriction to once/short rest seems appropriate to me.

[clash]

This is all really good feedback. I have incorporated some of it and made changes. Let me know if the changes have made it better/more flavorful.

I changed take aim to only work on targets at least 30ft away.

Incorporated keen sight into the level 17 ability.

Replaced far shot with trick shot adding more flavor and out of combat utility.

Added avoiding opportunity attacks from the trigger creature as part of Keep Your distance

And I wasn't completely satisfied with either level 17 ability so instead I changed it to another idea that I had been considering. However I feel the new level 17 ability might be too strong. If you agree I would welcome tweaks that would put it on par. If it needs a more interesting ability there or anywhere else, as always I am open to suggestions.

Thanks everyone!

[Llama513]

I really like the concept, and the take aim, makes alot of sense for what sneak attack, can be looked at, if you view it as an extremely precise attack, taking time to aim and hit the exact point you want to makes a lot of sense

[clash]

Thanks, do you feel anything needs further balancing?

[Llama513]

After discussing with some others, it may step too much into the area of a ranger, and quite possibly make the ranger obsolete, as you would be able to out damage a ranger quite easily, and take much of the rangers archery strength away from them, as such, it might work better to have this be a ranger, archetype in 5e, just do to balance between ranger and rogue, you would have to figure out how to make take aim work without having sneak attack, or giving the archetype a weaker version of sneak attack

[Gr7mm Bobb]

After discussing with some others, it may step too much into the area of a ranger, and quite possibly make the ranger obsolete, as you would be able to out damage a ranger quite easily, and take much of the rangers archery strength away from them, as such, it might work better to have this be a ranger, archetype in 5e, just do to balance between ranger and rogue, you would have to figure out how to make take aim work without having sneak attack, or giving the archetype a weaker version of sneak attack

A mechanic that I've been playing with in my head is one that uses an idea branched off of yours. Maybe a mechanic that allows you to take aim as a bonus action for advantage. At 5th level (when most Unearthed Arcana ranger archetypes gain Extra Attack) you may make a Single ranged attack against a target. If both dice from would result in a hit, you deal your weapons damage as though you struck twice. Critting with one die results in an additional set of weapon die, critting with both results in 2 additional sets of weapon die.

You can expand on this a couple of different ways, but overall it effectively allows you to have more reliable, but explosive damage. Maybe have the 11th level feature allow them to deal there damage x2 initially with the advantage die capable of making it x3 (or even x4, but the ranger has spells that help it step on the rangers toes).

If you haven't seen the experimental fighting style from the Underdark Unearthed Arcana, its worth noting for a range focused archetype.

"Close Quarters Shooter: You are trained in making ranged attacks at close quarters. When making a ranged attack while you are within 5 feet of a hostile creature, you do not have disadvantage on the attack roll. Your ranged attacks ignore half cover and three-quarters cover against targets within 30 feet of you. Finally, you have a +1 bonus to attack rolls on ranged attacks."

A little intense, but the feat bullets it does steal are relatively minor. You know, save for the "shooting while threatened" bit that seems to have many a DM up in arms.

[Llama513]

I think that would help to bring it closer in line

[clash]

After discussing with some others, it may step too much into the area of a ranger, and quite possibly make the ranger obsolete, as you would be able to out damage a ranger quite easily, and take much of the rangers archery strength away from them, as such, it might work better to have this be a ranger, archetype in 5e, just do to balance between ranger and rogue, you would have to figure out how to make take aim work without having sneak attack, or giving the archetype a weaker version of sneak attack

I understand what you are saying but by that same notion a fighter makes the ranger obsolete, except this applies doubly so. This rogue still has only one shot, and can't take the archery fighting style. A fighter can take more shots than the ranger and can take the archery fighting style, so why play a Ranger?

You dont play a ranger for single target ranged damage which is what this class focuses on. In that aspect they will always lose. You play a Ranger for the ranged damage + the extra utility offered by their spells + the thematic bonuses offered by favored enemy (revised ranger otherwise just fluff mostly) and at high levels the rangers main stick is at will aoe dmg. That is what they bring to the table that no other class has. This doesn't give the rogue any of those things which are really the only reason to play a ranger over a fighter.

However with the revised ranger, who doesn't get extra attack I could see the merit of making this a ranger subclass. It is something I will look at more but I just felt that sniper archetype went better with the precision damage theme offered by the rogue framework rather than tacking the rogues main stick onto the ranger.

[Gr7mm Bobb]

However with the revised ranger, who doesn't get extra attack I could see the merit of making this a ranger subclass. It is something I will look at more but I just felt that sniper archetype went better with the precision damage theme offered by the rogue framework rather than tacking the rogues main stick onto the ranger.

That does make sense, I honestly feel that doing for a sniper rogue what swashbuckler did for the melee rogue is a good idea. The Assassin Captone really does scream sniper to me. With maybe the level 3 features giving the archery fighting style and the ability to shoot while in melee without penalty, or just bonuses to a weapons standard a extened range that scales with level, that nifty "take aim" feature you listed. The 7th level feature giving the farsight feature of the Barbarian eagle totem. Maybe tack on a neat vision ability like being able to cast See Invisibilty, Arcane Eye, or Faerie Fire. The 10th level could be the ability to gain bonus damage if both dice of advantage register in a hit (or this could just be a 17th level ability if the mechanics involved make it too strong). And 17th level allows you get that "Boom Headshot" feel with the assassin capstone.