Rogue Con Jobs

[KyleG]

So i am after some inspiration for some Con Jobs that a charisma but not dexterity based rogue could pull with people as he travels around. It might be fun to do something i personally are so completely ignorant of so i want a couple of ideas for things i could do to earn?(trick) coin out of people.

Cheers

[Trustypeaches]

In my current game of Dragon Heist, I am playing a halfling conman warlock who uses his wits and wiliness to hustle on the streets of Waterdeep, wriggling his way into and out of all sorts of trouble. Here are some of the shenanigans he got up to:


Setting up a fortune reading tent, using detect thoughts and insight to feign clairvoyance, charging 1 gold per reading
Selling bottles of "Floomph Juice" for 5 gold a pop, a miracle concoction said to cure diseases, revertless baldness, and improve male performance (depending on who i was selling it to)
Setting up a betting ring in a renovated tavern around rigged "goat fights". Yes these involved actual goats.
Cheating at Poker and other card games by using his invisible imp familiar (Wisp) to glance at his opponents cards
Convincing someone to invest 5 gold into a business startup, promising a 10% return. Presenting the same offer to a dozen other investors. Set up a D&D ponzi scheme.
Using his powers to feign a "haunting" of a local business, subsequently posing as a cleric who could exercise the site, requesting a mere 20 gold for material components necessary in the ritual

There is a LOT more :x

My recommendation is to find another party member to perform cons with, as cons are usually more fun and more successful if you have another person to support you (my character uses his imp a lot of the time).

[Unoriginal]

Basically everything can be a con. You just need to find or create a demand, present a possible way of getting it, then pocket the money and only pretend to deliver what's the demanded product.

Back in the day, there was a con where people pretended to rig boxing matches, and once they convinced someone to bet big after a few "successful bets on rigged matches", they would play a false recording of the boxer taking the dive being killed (pretending it was a live report) and then convincing the mark they could get into jail for murder. The mark would then leave, abandonning their money.

Convoluted, sure. But it takes advantage of a demand (money through cheating), a plausible method of getting it, and gives an explanation as to why it doesn't deliver.

[elyktsorb]

Once as a Ranger/Rogue, I stood in front of a boat at some docks (I knew this particular vessel's crew), and when someone came up to try and see the captain of the boat, I told them they would have to pay to get on the boat. This ranged anywhere from 20 Gold to 400 Gold. (As I charged per head, and just fluctuated the price for really no reason)

[Ventruenox]

A little bit of homework (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_confidence_tricks) can provide a plethora of existing con job tricks and traps that just need reskinned to a fantasy setting. Utility cantrips such as Prestidigtation, Thaumaturgy, and Minor Illusion are pure gold for a con man with a little roleplaying.

My character for a new campaign starting this week is a Divine Soul Sorcerer, with a splash of Rogue for Expertise, who focuses on a particular long con. He is selling a fake religion. I'm mixing the approaches of faith healer Benny Hinn with the movement started by author L Ron Hubbard, and incorporating the mythology of Battlestar Galactica, while speaking like Foghorn Leghorn.

[Moredhel24]

Not a rogue but one of my characters is a tiefling (devil tongue variant) fiendlock with the charlatan background. The con he likes to run is pretend to be a fiend terrorizing rural villages that the rest of the part is hired to "banish" back to the lower planes.

[strangebloke]

Basically everything can be a con. You just need to find or create a demand, present a possible way of getting it, then pocket the money and only pretend to deliver what's the demanded product.

Back in the day, there was a con where people pretended to rig boxing matches, and once they convinced someone to bet big after a few "successful bets on rigged matches", they would play a false recording of the boxer taking the dive being killed (pretending it was a live report) and then convincing the mark they could get into jail for murder. The mark would then leave, abandonning their money.

Convoluted, sure. But it takes advantage of a demand (money through cheating), a plausible method of getting it, and gives an explanation as to why it doesn't deliver.

Yup. That's why its a 'con.' Con means 'confidence.' and that's the core of the con game.

Typically a good con game requires a few people cooperating. Consider your standard shell game. You've got the guy controlling the cups (the 'sharp'), you've got someone standing lookout, you've got a pretty face(honey trap), and you've got a 'random member of the audience' (shill).

Typical setup in a bar (for a shell game) is simple. Target comes in, often a sailor fresh off a voyage, flush with cash and looking for some fun (in modern times, this would be a tourist). The target wins the first run, loses the second, then the shill approaches him, possibly after he sits down. "I've got a method for always winning at that game." he says, and demonstrates this. They let the mark win a few times, and the sharp mentions that if things continue this way he's going to get cleaned out (despite having a huge wad of cash.) At this stage, there's a new element subtly added to the game. Whoever bets first that they can find the ball gets to take the prize. This heavily incentivizes the mark to bet high and bet quickly. If he doesn't bet quickly, he'll lose his chance to clear out the sharp. He throws a big wad of money down and then...

"Look out, the police!" The lookout yells, and the whole group clears out. Except for the honey trap. She approaches him immediately later, and smooths things over. She approaches the mark sympathetically, and says that those guys are notorious. She also tells the mark that going to the police will get you thrown in prison.

There's tons of games written on this model, but the goal is always the same: Get the other person to believe that you having their money is safer for them than any other alternative.

Good ones for high charisma include pretending to get hit and injured by a cart, followed by a fake police officer who demands a bribe to make this all go away, demanding recompense for a 'very valuable' damaged piece of property, and of course, selling snake oil.

[Unoriginal]

There's also the one with the "lost valuable item" that could be played well in a D&D world.

The mark walk in the street, where there is a flyer asking for "X lost item, Y amount of reward for whoever bring it back to Z place". Then someone "just happen" to find the item, but, see, they're late for an important appointment, so they'd give the item to the mark for a small percentage of the reward. It's better than both of them not getting any money, right?

And then it turns out the item is worthless trash and the place's inhabitants never offered a reward.