As a pure rogue who wants to use STR, what's the value of a SA die?

[PhoenixPhyre]

Would you be willing to give up a sneak attack die (permanently reducing your progression by 1 step) for the ability to use any non-heavy weapon for sneak attack, plus medium armor and (limited) martial weapon proficiency? If needed to sweeten the pot, would shield proficiency help?

This is aiming toward someone who wants to do a STR-based, "thuggish" rogue as part of my cross-specialization (multiclass-replacement pseudo-feats) project.

My current thoughts for this specialization (notes in Green:


Requires: Sneak Attack feature, at least 1d6 So level 3 at the earliest, since you can only choose this when your Sneak Attack dice increase

When you choose this specialization, instead of increasing your sneak attack die, you gain the following features. You now have proficiency with 3 martial weapons of your choice, medium armor, and can apply Sneak Attack when you hit with any weapon that does not have the heavy quality, as long as the other requirements for that feature are met. Yes, this is significant. Basically a couple crappy feats, plus a perk. But they're crappy feats.

On further specialization: The second time you choose this specialization (for a total loss of 2d6 sneak attack), you gain the ability to use Cunning Action one time during any of your turns even if you've already used your bonus action. You regain the use of this feature when you complete a long rest. A limited Action Surge, but only for Cunning Action. The third time you choose this specialization, you gain the Extra Attack feature This would be a minimum of level 7, if you specialized at 3, 5, and then 7. 3d6 is roughly the same as 1d8 + 5, so it's a pretty neutral tradeoff, except you gain more flexibility.


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Goals:
* Taking a specialization should always come with a cost. It should never be a pure power increase.
* Specializations should tie to a theme and all the features should serve that purpose. In this case, making a more martial, thuggish rogue who focuses on STR, not DEX.
* Specializations should provide features similar to that of another class (in this case Fighter) but
** Should never be available before the base class would get that feature
** Should generally be specialized or limited in some way. It's a minor, not a second major.

[Anymage]

If you have that many features, why not just make a subclass out of the whole deal?

I'd allow the first thug exchange. It's a bit of a drawback (slightly larger damage dice is a bit less than the sneak attack dice, and medium armor requires at least a little dex investment while a pure rogue has little need for strength), but I'd err on the side of caution when making ACFs. Make it an option at first level, maybe up the hit dice by one size, and call it a day.

After that it starts to get murkier. Extra attack, for instance, would be totally giving up one sneak attack dice for. At that point you want to start treating the whole thing as one package deal.

[Grod_The_Giant]

"Sneak attack with any non-heavy weapon" is honestly pretty negligible value. Rapiers are already 1d8; two-handing a versatile weapon gets you up to 1d10, at the cost of not being able to use your off-hand. That makes "any non-heavy weapon" a flavor choice more than anything else.

Medium armor proficiency offers a small boost at low levels, before you can boost your Dexterity to 18 (for scale mail) or 20 (for half plate), but there's still some cost attached-- you're probably eating disadvantage on Stealth checks, and had to spread your ability scores out a bit farther. I'd be more inclined to add shields and trade for for being able to Disengage as a bonus action.

[PhoenixPhyre]

"Sneak attack with any non-heavy weapon" is honestly pretty negligible value. Rapiers are already 1d8; two-handing a versatile weapon gets you up to 1d10, at the cost of not being able to use your off-hand. That makes "any non-heavy weapon" a flavor choice more than anything else.

Medium armor proficiency offers a small boost at low levels, before you can boost your Dexterity to 18 (for scale mail) or 20 (for half plate), but there's still some cost attached-- you're probably eating disadvantage on Stealth checks, and had to spread your ability scores out a bit farther. I'd be more inclined to add shields and trade for for being able to Disengage as a bonus action.

That's the goal--that these are thematic tradeoffs, not power-focused tradeoffs. Ideally the power value of any of these would be a wash. I don't want to change the power curve, and I dislike power-focused multiclassing.

What I want to do is enable thematics--a rogue with a warhammer who is more about brute force than sneakiness. The idea is that you'd pick this one if you want to go more STR, not DEX focused.


If you have that many features, why not just make a subclass out of the whole deal?

I'd allow the first thug exchange. It's a bit of a drawback (slightly larger damage dice is a bit less than the sneak attack dice, and medium armor requires at least a little dex investment while a pure rogue has little need for strength), but I'd err on the side of caution when making ACFs. Make it an option at first level, maybe up the hit dice by one size, and call it a day.

After that it starts to get murkier. Extra attack, for instance, would be totally giving up one sneak attack dice for. At that point you want to start treating the whole thing as one package deal.


Why not a subclass? Because I'm trying to emulate (weakly) multiclassing. Which lets you keep a subclass from your classes. I mean, I could just do one-and-done things (to simulate a 1-level dip), but I'd like some sort of scaling. Other planned ACFs have a natural scaling (giving a few more spells/higher level spells at a slow rate).

The first one is designed to be a wash for STR rogues. A lateral, horizontal move, not an upward one. Technically, all of them should be at most a minor power boost, at least situationally. The important thing to me is the thematics that they enable, while not changing the overall power curve substantially.

And does it matter if to get Extra Attack you'd have to have given up a total of 3 sneak attack dice?

[Grod_The_Giant]

That's the goal--that these are thematic tradeoffs, not power-focused tradeoffs. Ideally the power value of any of these would be a wash. I don't want to change the power curve, and I dislike power-focused multiclassing.

What I want to do is enable thematics--a rogue with a warhammer who is more about brute force than sneakiness. The idea is that you'd pick this one if you want to go more STR, not DEX focused.
Right, but right now I think you're actually losing power-- getting to use a warhammer instead of a rapier and wearing scale mail instead of studded leather is not worth losing a d6 of sneak attack, nor is 1/day actionless Dash/Disengage/Hide.

I could maybe see something more like:

Level 1: Lose Sneak Attack, but gain a "Backstab" that functions twice/short rest with all weapons. In exchange, gain all martial weapons, medium armor, and shields, and a fighting style
Level 3: +1d6 Backstab, which continues to progress by 1d6 at every odd level.
Level 5: Gain Extra Attack
Level 7: Gain 1d6 Sneak Attack, which continues to progress by 1d6 at every odd level.
Level 9+: As usual

Although at a certain point, "Rogue with more direct combat capabilities" just turns into a spell-less Ranger, just like "Fighter who trades some brute power for skills" does.

[PhoenixPhyre]

Right, but right now I think you're actually losing power-- getting to use a warhammer instead of a rapier and wearing scale mail instead of studded leather is not worth losing a d6 of sneak attack, nor is 1/day actionless Dash/Disengage/Hide.

I could maybe see something more like:

Level 1: Lose Sneak Attack, but gain a "Backstab" that functions twice/short rest with all weapons. In exchange, gain all martial weapons, medium armor, and shields, and a fighting style
Level 3: +1d6 Backstab, which continues to progress by 1d6 at every odd level.
Level 5: Gain Extra Attack
Level 7: Gain 1d6 Sneak Attack, which continues to progress by 1d6 at every odd level.
Level 9+: As usual

Although at a certain point, "Rogue with more direct combat capabilities" just turns into a spell-less Ranger, just like "Fighter who trades some brute power for skills" does.

I don't want to have a complex progression. More complicated features are better for archetypes, which this is designed to sit alongside, not replace. This should be in the form of individual packages that can be taken or not.

Would changing it to something like (not worrying about precise wording here)

When you choose this specialization at first level you don't get the Sneak Attack feature. Instead you get martial weapons, medium armor, and a fighting style and/or +1 HP, to match a fighter's d10). You get Sneak Attack starting at 3rd level like normal, but from 1d6 and with all non-heavy weapons. Effectively, you've delayed Sneak Attack.

No other progression. Basically, this is a 1st level dip in Fighter, without a few of the pieces and with the other rogue features instead.

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I think I'll parcel them out separately, instead of trying for progression. Just with level prereqs to gate them.

So you might have a different one that lets you trade out <something yet to be determined> for a limited version of some other fighter feature. Or one that grants access to a Channel Divinity option from a domain. Or one that lets a spell-caster delay their own progression for a metamagic and a couple of points to spend on it (but no burning slots for metamagic or the reverse). Etc. But each as separate things unless they're identically repeatable.

[Dienekes]

Yeah, gonna back up Grod on this one.

The best Str weapon to gain in terms of damage that are not Heavy give 1d8 one-handed. Which the Rogue already gets. Or 1d10 versatile, which is already a trade off in not really using your second hand for anything. And Rogues already get Longsword which does it.

Medium Armor is not great in 5e. If you’re focusing Dex as a Rogue usually will, they’ll match the AC of a medium armor pretty much always. So that’s not so much a buff as a nothing. There’s kind of a reason why the Str fighters in the game either get Heavy Armor or in the case of the Barbarian a way to add their Con to AC and a whole lot of damage mitigation.

At this point if you want Rogues to allowed to be Thugs, just giving them Medium Armor and Sneak Attack on Strength, non-heavy weapons is a simple way to give the flavor without any actual change in power. There are just some things that when added to a class don’t really change anything. At least not in a way you want to lose something for it.

The cost is, well, you’re not focusing Dex a far more useful ability and you’ll be worse at pretty much everything a rogue is expected to do out of combat, which are all largely Dex skills.

So to go with your initial design goals, giving this to the Rogue isn’t really a power increase. It’s at most a versatility increase. And even that’s kinda debatable. At most give up Thieve’s Cant. It’s mostly a fluff ability. One fluff ability for another seems fair.

Now allowing access to heavy weapons? Honestly still not a good trade, but not as bad.

If we’re going with multiple attacks, there is the idea of halving the amount of SA dice you get, but applying them to all attacks.

I’m wary of giving Fighting Style of a Fighter. On the one hand it might be worth the sneak attack damage. But it wouldn’t be too good for your brute build. +2 damage with a one-handed strength weapon is not the end of the world. But Archery? That’s probably very good. And doesn’t really need the boost.

[Grod_The_Giant]

When you choose this specialization at first level you don't get the Sneak Attack feature. Instead you get martial weapons, medium armor, and a fighting style and/or +1 HP, to match a fighter's d10). You get Sneak Attack starting at 3rd level like normal, but from 1d6 and with all non-heavy weapons. Effectively, you've delayed Sneak Attack.
That's not bad, yeah.

[Old Harry MTX]

When you choose this specialization at first level you don't get the Sneak Attack feature. Instead you get martial weapons, medium armor, and a fighting style and/or +1 HP, to match a fighter's d10). You get Sneak Attack starting at 3rd level like normal, but from 1d6 and with all non-heavy weapons. Effectively, you've delayed Sneak Attack.

You get +1 HP only at first level or at each level?

[Edea]

That's another issue with trying to make stuff like this a subclass: it'd be ideal if such things came online from 1st level as they're character-defining approaches to one of the main 'pillars' of the game, yet a lot of classes don't get any subclass features until 3rd.

A big example's a 'brawler rogue' that prefers using their fists; you can give them the required features as a sub-class, but then for 1st and 2nd level they're...not a brawler rogue. You'd have to lean on multiclassing (which is optional/variant) and start as a monk, and even then not only is the flavor wacky (monk flavor of 'spiritual enlightment' doesn't match up well with a rogue's generally materialistic/down-to-earth worldview), but it's not RAW that Martial Arts allows fists to be used with Sneak Attack, so you're still not really a 'brawler rogue'; certainly not right from the start, and debatedly not ever.

[sengmeng]

I played a totally rules legal strength rogue. It went fine. You have to sneak attack with a finesse weapon by RAW; you don't have to USE the finesse option.

[Old Harry MTX]

That's another issue with trying to make stuff like this a subclass: it'd be ideal if such things came online from 1st level as they're character-defining approaches to one of the main 'pillars' of the game, yet a lot of classes don't get any subclass features until 3rd.

A big example's a 'brawler rogue' that prefers using their fists; you can give them the required features as a sub-class, but then for 1st and 2nd level they're...not a brawler rogue. You'd have to lean on multiclassing (which is optional/variant) and start as a monk, and even then not only is the flavor wacky (monk flavor of 'spiritual enlightment' doesn't match up well with a rogue's generally materialistic/down-to-earth worldview), but it's not RAW that Martial Arts allows fists to be used with Sneak Attack, so you're still not really a 'brawler rogue'; certainly not right from the start, and debatedly not ever.


In fact in these cases it is better to make a variant of the class rather than a subclass, IMHO.

[JNAProductions]

I made a class that might interest you. The Enforcer (https://forums.giantitp.com/showthread.php?566793-Enforcer-A-Strongman-s-Rogue).

Now, probably not exactly what you're looking for, but feel free to nab ideas from it!

[PhoenixPhyre]

You get +1 HP only at first level or at each level?

Every level might be a bit much--this is simulating taking 1 level of Fighter, which ends up being a +1 HP difference.

[PhoenixPhyre]

That's another issue with trying to make stuff like this a subclass: it'd be ideal if such things came online from 1st level as they're character-defining approaches to one of the main 'pillars' of the game, yet a lot of classes don't get any subclass features until 3rd.

A big example's a 'brawler rogue' that prefers using their fists; you can give them the required features as a sub-class, but then for 1st and 2nd level they're...not a brawler rogue. You'd have to lean on multiclassing (which is optional/variant) and start as a monk, and even then not only is the flavor wacky (monk flavor of 'spiritual enlightment' doesn't match up well with a rogue's generally materialistic/down-to-earth worldview), but it's not RAW that Martial Arts allows fists to be used with Sneak Attack, so you're still not really a 'brawler rogue'; certainly not right from the start, and debatedly not ever.

I've got a brawler rogue cross-specialization planned for this, basically giving the rogue a limited Martial Arts feature and letting them SA with it. Maybe something to do with ki-like stuff. Haven't figured that one out yet.

That's kinda the point--without multiclassing (and even with multiclassing), it's difficult to do certain things with classes. A DEX-barbarian (especially of the whirling dervish TWF style). A good theurge. Etc. It'd be nice to be able to get that flavor without the issues involved with multiclassing.