What if Sneak Attack were d8s? [Archive] - Giant in the Playground Forums

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Schwann145

2023-07-12, 07:37 PM

Quietus

2023-07-12, 07:41 PM

It'd be a lot more annoying, because d6's are the most common die to have in multiples.

PhoenixPhyre

2023-07-12, 07:47 PM

It'd be a lot more annoying, because d6's are the most common die to have in multiples.

Agreed. But also, +1 (average, and with fistfuls of dice, you're basically guaranteed near average) damage per die just isn't that much. Especially restricted to 1x/turn. For reference, it's +6.5 average damage per turn[1] at level 20. For something that starts out fairly low (for martial damage dealers).

[1] baseline, assuming making 1 attack per turn and hitting 65% of the time. More if you've got consistent advantage (maybe +8 dpt) or attacking 2x/turn (increasing the chances of getting a hit). More detailed numbers would take more effort than I'm willing to put into it right now.

Saelethil

2023-07-12, 08:20 PM

JNAProductions

2023-07-12, 08:25 PM

I'm somewhere between the 2 camps but on the damage front I'm partial to reducing Sneak Attack to 1/round instead of 1/turn and uping Sneak Attack die to (rogue level)d6.
This is probably too much but maybe not. Haven't tried it yet but some quick math shows that it's a hair under a no fighting style, subclassless, non-action surging, fighter with a greatsword at level 5 assuming 18s in attack stats, but the fighter is going to be more reliable and deal less overkill damage as well as benefit more from per hit buffs/magic weapons and their subclasses usually give them more damage. Besides, who doesn't love throwing a bucket of d6s at a monster.

Er... Under those assumptions, a Fighter does two +7 2d6+4 damage attacks. That's 22 damage on average.
A Rogue does one +7 6d6+4 (assuming a shortsword or shortbow) damage attack. That's 25 damage on average.

With on-demand advantage from Steady Aim, or TWF to give two chances to proc SA, that's more damage easily. And the Rogue will scale faster than Fighter-the Fighter looks best at levels 1, 5, and 11. Checking in at level 18 (rolled a d20, got 18) the Rogue does one attack for 19d6+5, the Fighter does three for 2d6+5. The number to beat is 71.5 (ignoring Steady Aim or TWF) so a GWM Fighter with GWF fails to meet the Rogue's damage, even without accounting for lost accuracy.

PhoenixPhyre

2023-07-12, 08:33 PM

Er... Under those assumptions, a Fighter does two +7 2d6+4 damage attacks. That's 22 damage on average.
A Rogue does one +7 6d6+4 (assuming a shortsword or shortbow) damage attack. That's 25 damage on average.

With on-demand advantage from Steady Aim, or TWF to give two chances to proc SA, that's more damage easily. And the Rogue will scale faster than Fighter-the Fighter looks best at levels 1, 5, and 11. Checking in at level 18 (rolled a d20, got 18) the Rogue does one attack for 19d6+5, the Fighter does three for 2d6+5. The number to beat is 71.5 (ignoring Steady Aim or TWF) so a GWM Fighter with GWF fails to meet the Rogue's damage, even without accounting for lost accuracy.

Yeah. <Level>d6 basically doubles the rogue's damage from baseline (one d6 attack per round, no OAs, Sneak Attack on all hits).

And a no-Action Surge champion GS fighter only sits about 1.24 (averaged over levels) the baseline rogue.

So even accounting for times without Sneak Attack, but throwing in occasional advantage or TWF means you're probably competitive or better than a (non-super-optimized) fighter using Action Surge. Without feats. Basically for free, steady state.

Saelethil

2023-07-12, 08:42 PM

Er... Under those assumptions, a Fighter does two +7 2d6+4 damage attacks. That's 22 damage on average.
A Rogue does one +7 6d6+4 (assuming a shortsword or shortbow) damage attack. That's 25 damage on average.

With on-demand advantage from Steady Aim, or TWF to give two chances to proc SA, that's more damage easily. And the Rogue will scale faster than Fighter-the Fighter looks best at levels 1, 5, and 11. Checking in at level 18 (rolled a d20, got 18) the Rogue does one attack for 19d6+5, the Fighter does three for 2d6+5. The number to beat is 71.5 (ignoring Steady Aim or TWF) so a GWM Fighter with GWF fails to meet the Rogue's damage, even without accounting for lost accuracy.

Well... I could be using Ludic's calculator wrong but yeah, higher level is a bit bonkers. Probably best not to try this one out.

Dork_Forge

2023-07-12, 08:56 PM

I'm in the camp of they do good damage, I've never encountered anyone outside of this forum and maybe a few YT channels that things a Rogue's damage is lacking. IME players tend to actually think of the Rogue as a hard-hitting class because of SA. I don't think there's any need to pump their damage, this endless damage chasing is not what the game (or average player) expects and tends to be part of why people paint certain classes as being bad (like pointing at Barbarian damage when the class clearly scales durability over damage).

However, if a table did find a Rogue slightly underwhelming I don't think d8s would matter unless the game was guaranteed to go upper Tier 2 and beyond, it just doesn't make much of a difference and if someone was made happy by +1 every two levels... then I think they're nitpicking damage anyway.

Just to Browse

2023-07-12, 09:17 PM

+0.5 per level is probably not enough damage to solve the rogues damage deficiency.

elyktsorb

2023-07-13, 01:57 AM

Every time I've played a Rogue I've never been worried about doing too little damage, between hiding and steady aim, I basically always have advantage and never miss, so even if I don't do the most damage all the time, I'm usually hitting more on average than other party members.

More interesting to me would be instead of them being 1 d8, they be 2d4's per level. Giving you the same maximum damage as a single d8, but raising your minimum.

Kane0

2023-07-13, 01:58 AM

Ive done this for assassins. It doesnt really move the needle much statistically speaking, but it sells you on the *feeling* quite well.

Gignere

2023-07-13, 05:53 AM

Problems with rogue damage is really the one attack design. Just makes their damage very volatile and against bosses it’s weakened significantly because they tend to have higher AC than the party’s level would expect because it’s a boss.

In prior editions rogue still got extra attacks. In 5e they decided to go all in on the one attack so the rogue pretty much need advantage on every attack to even compete. When other martials get extra attack, rogues should have a trivial time of getting advantage. At higher levels rogues should get ways to ignore disadvantage, if you ever played a rogue stuck in darkness at higher levels you’ll realize how crappy a rogue without sneak attack is.

It’s also why Elven Accuracy is so damn good of a feat on a rogue. Hell they should just make triple advantage a high level rogue thing.

Oramac

2023-07-13, 09:21 AM

I'm in the camp of they do good damage, I've never encountered anyone outside of this forum and maybe a few YT channels that things a Rogue's damage is lacking. IME players tend to actually think of the Rogue as a hard-hitting class because of SA. I don't think there's any need to pump their damage, this endless damage chasing is not what the game (or average player) expects and tends to be part of why people paint certain classes as being bad (like pointing at Barbarian damage when the class clearly scales durability over damage).

100% this. I've yet to meet a player who thought their damage was subpar, including myself when I play a rogue. I know the math says it's subpar, but it doesn't feel subpar, and quite often, that matters more than the math.

That said, I would not be opposed to making the SA die a d8.

Blatant Beast

2023-07-13, 09:29 AM

I've never encountered anyone outside of this forum and maybe a few YT channels that things a Rogue's damage is lacking.

A few YT channels like Treantmonk, Pack Tactics, ….small little things that don’t have a large impact on D&D opinion?

“I don’t know anybody that has issues with the Rogue, and can’t seem to find anyone online that also shares that opinion”…doesn’t really provide evidence.

I don't think there's any need to pump their damage, this endless damage chasing is not what the game (or average player) expects

To be fair, deep down none of us here know what “The Game” or “The Average Player” expects…we might know our little slice of life, but that is it.

Mythic Creatures and the expanding Hit Points of the re-released creatures from MPMOM, undercuts the notion that the game doesn’t chase damage….if the game doesn’t chase damage, then why inflate hit points?

OneD&D also provides some evidence that the design team thinks of the Rogue as a Damage dealer….the initial Rogue Revision for OneD&D had none of the control features one finds in the most recent Rogue Iteration…which is a result of player feedback.

Players want Rogues to do more than damage, WotC seemed fine with keeping the status quo. (Honestly, why do Rogues need to sacrifice SA dice to cut a tendon?..give the class Control and Damage, like a caster).

Gignere’s post really strikes a cord with me. I think the reason why many D&D Players have reservations about Rogues and Barbarians is due to each class having core abilities that are easily negated, and also easily replicated by spells.

Hal

2023-07-13, 10:06 AM

If a player at my table voiced this concern, I might suggest a feat to help resolve this. Something like:

Rogue Weapon Master

You can sneak attack with weapons without the "Light" property
If you attack with a weapon with the "Light" property, your Sneak Attack die increases to d8
If you hit with an attack but would be unable to deal sneak attack damage, you can instead choose to deal half your sneak attack damage. You can do this X times per day.

I'm just throwing upgrades out there, the point being I think you could probably offer them the upgrade in this way and make it feel good by adding in a few additional features they'd enjoy.

stoutstien

2023-07-13, 10:39 AM

Agreed. But also, +1 (average, and with fistfuls of dice, you're basically guaranteed near average) damage per die just isn't that much. Especially restricted to 1x/turn. For reference, it's +6.5 average damage per turn[1] at level 20. For something that starts out fairly low (for martial damage dealers).

[1] baseline, assuming making 1 attack per turn and hitting 65% of the time. More if you've got consistent advantage (maybe +8 dpt) or attacking 2x/turn (increasing the chances of getting a hit). More detailed numbers would take more effort than I'm willing to put into it right now.

Aye. The damage one way or the other isn't the issue.

The problem is the conditions needed to trigger is frequently aren't meet even if you preformed actions that line up with "sneaky and/or well places blows to an unaware target."

You need advantage. one of the easiest thing to generate but also the easiest thing to have canceled out with disadvantage. At later levels it's practically always a wash.

Alternatively you don't need advantage if an enemy is within 5ft of the target. I have no idea why they love to use such short range for stuff like this when reach is so common for weapons nature or otherwise. Also you can't have disadvantage.(see above)

So taking out isolated targets is difficult even if you'd assume it would be inline with the concept of sneak attack.

Maybe:

Sneak Attack
Beginning at 1st level, you know how to strike subtly and exploit a foe's distraction. Once per turn, you can deal an extra 1d6 damage to one creature you hit with an attack if you have advantage on the attack roll. The attack must use a one handed weapon, unarmed strike, or a ranged weapon.

You don't need advantage on the attack roll if another enemy of the target is within range with a melee weapon they are welding and that enemy is not incapacitated or is made with the off hand attack using two weapon fighting.

The amount of the extra damage increases as you gain levels. This damage is equal to a number of D6 equal to half your rogue level rounded up.

This way they at least have a change to get of SA even if they have disadvantage.

AdAstra

2023-07-13, 10:48 AM

As mentioned going from d6s to d8s only increases damage by +1 per dice on average, which excluding weapon damage is a little less than a 30% increase, but substantially less than that including it, especially at lower levels (at level 5 a Rogue with a light crossbow is likely doing ~19 damage per sneak attack, so going to d8s would be a <16% increase)

That kind of increase won't break the game, but is also unlikely to satisfy many complaints either since in practice they're mostly about other stuff. Also ends up magnified by extra attacks the same way that SA always is. Unless Rogue picks up the feature itself, getting more attacks per turn is going to be a big boost to Rogues independent of how powerful Sneak Attack is, since more attacks is more chances to land that damage. A Rogue/Fighter with 2 attacks and 3d6 Sneak Attack will usually be better off than either a Fighter with 3 attacks or a Rogue with 6d6 Sneak Attack. More damage and reliability over the former (assuming the same weapons) and significantly more reliability (and damage when accounting for hit chance) over the latter. Going to d8s doesn't do much to change that.

Features like the Vex and Nick from OneDnD to let Rogues get more attacks/hits more easily will have a bigger impact on their reliability and power IMO, in a manner that doesn't encourage you to multiclass in or out as much (though it also doesn't disincentivize it either, which I like).

Oramac

2023-07-13, 11:40 AM

A few YT channels like Treantmonk, Pack Tactics, ….small little things that don’t have a large impact on D&D opinion?

“I don’t know anybody that has issues with the Rogue, and can’t seem to find anyone online that also shares that opinion”…doesn’t really provide evidence.

But do they? Again, outside of this forum I know exactly zero people who actually watch or care about D&D related youtube channels. Not a single player in any game I've played over the last decade has complained about their rogue dealing too little damage. Those channels might have a large impact on the opinions of us foumites, but I very much doubt their impact on the average D&D player.

To be fair, deep down none of us here know what “The Game” or “The Average Player” expects…we might know our little slice of life, but that is it.

True. Though it must be pointed out that what The Game expects and what The Average Player expects are not necessarily the same thing. And when the slices of many lives say similar things, one can reasonably infer that those things contain at least a morsel of truth.

Damon_Tor

2023-07-13, 11:54 AM

It would be fun if sneak attack dice would "explode", IE, if you roll a 6 on one of the due you get to roll another. It's fun and feels great, but when you do the math it's only a very modest damage boost.

DarknessEternal

2023-07-13, 12:04 PM

Don't we already know with 100% certainty that Rogue's are the baseline in damage? The answer is yes, we do. PP has already posted in the thread twice, it's his math.

Psyren

2023-07-13, 12:25 PM

Kane0

2023-07-13, 12:40 PM

Maybe if sneak attack damage cut through damage resistance instead?

Saelethil

2023-07-13, 12:46 PM

Maybe if sneak attack damage cut through damage resistance instead?

I could easily see something like that being tied into Cunning Strikes. Something like, “Reduce your sneak attack by 1d6 to ignore resistance to your weapon.”

Oramac

2023-07-13, 12:50 PM

I could easily see something like that being tied into Cunning Strikes. Something like, “Reduce your sneak attack by 1d6 to ignore resistance to your weapon.”

Cool and thematic, but honestly not worth it. Assuming you can get your hands on a magic weapon (which is pretty common), the number of monsters resistant or immune to magical B/P/S (https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1X70jdBX0X0n_5V7stc1_kYERXLNGJIbdjhl3BUbKxQI/edit#gid=0) is extremely low. We don't know the plan for B/P/S in OneD&D, but it seems unlikely for this trend to drastically change.

Gignere

2023-07-13, 01:05 PM

I could easily see something like that being tied into Cunning Strikes. Something like, “Reduce your sneak attack by 1d6 to ignore resistance to your weapon.”

It be better if they can sacrifice sneak attack dice to ignore disadvantage. Which would tie in D&Done of higher floor lower ceiling design philosophy.

Skrum

2023-07-13, 01:55 PM

SA should stay the way it is, but Rogues should get extra attack. I guess the nick mastery in One would do basically this (but also lock in their mastery choice). But point is, rogue is an attack roll-based class that doesn't get extra attack. And sure, they get Steady Aim to increase their chance to hit, but still, getting one attack and whiffing and doing nothing for the round is a real feel bad moment

Increasing the chance a rogue gets to apply their SA dice w/o eating up their already crowded bonus action is the way to go IMO. The rogues' coolest feature is cunning action. Let them use it!! And even if they are a light warrior/skirmisher, they are a "fighting" class. Give them extra attack!!

Point of comparison -
a rogue with a +8 to hit against AC 16, with a 4d6 sneak attack, using a shortsword (so weapon damage is 1d6+4) does ~20 DPR when attacking at advantage. If the only change made was giving them extra attack, their DPR goes up to 32.

Theodoxus

2023-07-13, 01:57 PM

What about Sneak being 1/2 level d6, as normal, but plus your level in damage on the hit. (So, at 3rd level, you'd deal 2d6+3 on a sneak instead of 2d6.)

I fear something like d6 your level is bonkers on a crit, but adding your level in damage feels good and doesn't double (making it easier to adjudicate on the fly as well).

FWIW, I granted Rogues an option at 1st level to specialize in quarterstaves, making them finesse and changing their sneak to d8s while using one, and a d4 for everything else (evocative of options from 3rd edition). No one ever ran with one, but I had a couple NPCs use the style. I thought it worked well, though obviously not everyone's cup of tea.

Schwann145

2023-07-13, 02:34 PM

And even if they are a light warrior/skirmisher, they are a "fighting" class. Give them extra attack!!

My personal opinion on what makes a class a "fighting" class was whether or not they were granted Extra Attack. The fact that Rogues lack this feature confirmed my feeling that Rogues are not primarily a "fighting" class.

How do you determine what is a "fighting class" and what is it about the Rogue chassis specifically that makes you think they're intended to be "fighters?"

Skrum

2023-07-13, 04:18 PM

How do you determine what is a "fighting class" and what is it about the Rogue chassis specifically that makes you think they're intended to be "fighters?"

Because they don't have spells and their main combat action is to make attack rolls. They are a "mundane" class, and further to the point, are obviously intended to represent the swashbuckler/finesse/knife fighter archetype.

Not getting extra attack is such a huge liability for rogues. Why DON'T you want them to get it?

Schwann145

2023-07-13, 05:13 PM

Because they don't have spells and their main combat action is to make attack rolls. They are a "mundane" class, and further to the point, are obviously intended to represent the swashbuckler/finesse/knife fighter archetype.

Not getting extra attack is such a huge liability for rogues. Why DON'T you want them to get it?
Because "doing lots of damage" is useful, but boring if that's all everyone is meant to do.
I enjoy that classes can be focused more primarily on utility than on damage dealing. While subclasses can steer Rogue into more of a "fighter" role (such as the Swashbuckler, interestingly enough), that isn't the core principle of the Rogue.
Finesse/Knife Fighters/etc are better represented by Fighters anyway, I'd say.

Subclasses such as Arcane Trickster, Inquisitive, Mastermind, (arguably) Scout, and Thief all seem to support me.

Blatant Beast

2023-07-13, 05:45 PM

Again, outside of this forum I know exactly zero people who actually watch or care about D&D related youtube channels.

The numbers of views for the videos produced at least gives some indication of perhaps how much your personal experience will differ from others.

How many gamers do you know? 200?
Even if half of the views were falsely reported, we have thousands of people, that have watched YT D&D vids from the most popular channels.

To clarify, I am not stating that people that enjoy playing Rogues are misguided, or wrong, or implying anything that can be interpreted as throwing shade.

I don't think it's fair to say channels like Treantmonk, Pack Tactics et al feel that Rogues are lacking in damage..

Seems an unnecessary distinction,…as in general, I would characterize both channels as finding the class lacking…Assassin/Gloomstalker builds have their fans, as do Arcane Trickster/Bladesinger builds.

Assassin is all about the alpha strike, but Surprise is an even smaller hoop to thread, than SA’s normal requirements.

Skrum

2023-07-13, 05:48 PM

Because "doing lots of damage" is useful, but boring if that's all everyone is meant to do.
I enjoy that classes can be focused more primarily on utility than on damage dealing. While subclasses can steer Rogue into more of a "fighter" role (such as the Swashbuckler, interestingly enough), that isn't the core principle of the Rogue.
Finesse/Knife Fighters/etc are better represented by Fighters anyway, I'd say.

Subclasses such as Arcane Trickster, Inquisitive, Mastermind, (arguably) Scout, and Thief all seem to support me.

Rogues don't really get utility though, do they? They can
Move
Hide
Do damage
Grapple, via expertise, but they're still worse at it than barbs and rune knights

They have less status effects and tactical choices than bm, rune knight, or echo knight (which I would guess make up nearly all fighter builds).

Extra Attack *adds* utility - now they can grapple and attack, for instance. "They're a utility class" is not a good reason to not let them be generally competent

Dork_Forge

2023-07-13, 05:56 PM

A few YT channels like Treantmonk, Pack Tactics, ….small little things that don’t have a large impact on D&D opinion?

... Do you actually think that they do? Neither their subscriber counts nor their views indicate a significant amount of the player base consumes their content, that's even if they actually held that opinion you're attributing to them (I don't watch either, but Psyren seems to and disputes this).

The average player isn't interested in damage to the degree we're discussing, they're most likely interested in fluff and roleplay. 5e has always been really casual and that has only increased as its popularity sky rockets, even the large dnd YTers don't really have the reach to shape general opinion outside the circles I already mentioned.

“I don’t know anybody that has issues with the Rogue, and can’t seem to find anyone online that also shares that opinion”…doesn’t really provide evidence.

I guess i missed the part where my anecdote was presented as empirical evidence. Anecdotally players I've come across (and I've only ever played 5e,but I've played with literally hundreds of people over the years and run a discord server of a few hundred) don't care about optimization except for maybe the basic of having the biggest number in the relevant stat. Most don't even know the average damage because they've never applied more maths to the game than needed to play it.

To be fair, deep down none of us here know what “The Game” or “The Average Player” expects…we might know our little slice of life, but that is it.

I can see some truth to this, except as PP has illustrated in math with the RED standard the game seems to expect the Rogue as a baseline. And as far as the average player thing, we can make some pretty safe guesses based on those anecdotes.

Mythic Creatures and the expanding Hit Points of the re-released creatures from MPMOM, undercuts the notion that the game doesn’t chase damage….if the game doesn’t chase damage, then why inflate hit points?

Improving support for late game play and simplifying monster design so that they actually stick around as long as intended and do what they're meant to without relying on the DM effectively remembering and using their abilities.

OneD&D also provides some evidence that the design team thinks of the Rogue as a Damage dealer….the initial Rogue Revision for OneD&D had none of the control features one finds in the most recent Rogue Iteration…which is a result of player feedback.

Yeah I'm not even going to take this seriously enough to even look into and address it, really. This is a 5e forum and a thread talking about the Rogue as is published in 5e. Trotting out anything to do with OneDnd isn't going to hold any water imo.

5e doesn't expect jump to be an action and I find it hard to believe that the average player wants it to be.

Players want Rogues to do more than damage, WotC seemed fine with keeping the status quo. (Honestly, why do Rogues need to sacrifice SA dice to cut a tendon?..give the class Control and Damage, like a caster).

Rogues have always done more than just damage in 5e, but I find it a bit funny you're pointing to Onednd as a back up of this stuff then literally talk about how the designers reduce damage to add effects. Could it be *gasp* the don't think the damage is too low and so lower it to attempt to balance adding effects?

Gignere’s post really strikes a cord with me. I think the reason why many D&D Players have reservations about Rogues and Barbarians is due to each class having core abilities that are easily negated, and also easily replicated by spells.
I'd love to see the spells easily replicating those effects.

But, again, many seems like pointing to a very small bucket of the overall player base.

Don't we already know with 100% certainty that Rogue's are the baseline in damage? The answer is yes, we do. PP has already posted in the thread twice, it's his math.

Yup ^

I don't think it's fair to say channels like Treantmonk, Pack Tactics et al feel that Rogues are lacking in damage. They both use a baseline figure for damage that they build their Rogues to exceed. A martial's overall power comes from how far it can exceed that baseline and what else it brings to the table. Rogues exceeding it to a lower degree than Fighters or Barbarians is okay because of the added utility they bring outside of combat, so long as they exceed it.

Not a viewer personally, but it makes complete sense that optimizers can want to establish norms of high optimization play without dictating standard game or player expectations.

SA should stay the way it is, but Rogues should get extra attack.

Sorry but no, they shouldn't, unless SA is absolutely gutted of damage.

Extra Attack is the big damage bump that defines a tier shift. Rogues don't get it (besides the fiction they're going for) because they get SA.

Giving them EA would catapult their damage in absurd ways.

Schwann145

2023-07-13, 06:17 PM

Rogues don't really get utility though, do they? They can
Move
Hide
Do damage
Grapple, via expertise, but they're still worse at it than barbs and rune knights

They have less status effects and tactical choices than bm, rune knight, or echo knight (which I would guess make up nearly all fighter builds).

Extra Attack *adds* utility - now they can grapple and attack, for instance. "They're a utility class" is not a good reason to not let them be generally competent

Movement and Skill bonuses allow you to engage with the game in a way that combat classes (for the most part) just can't. There is only so much utility to be had in combat with things like Cunning Action, Expertise, and Reliable Talent true, but these can also offer a host of benefits outside of combat in a way that Extra Attack cannot (at least I wouldn't recommend attacking twice in a social or environmental encounter!)

To further build on this, the recent UA shows Rogue even sacrificing damage in order to add Status effects to a degree that even a BM Fighter would be jealous of, further increasing their in-combat utility to much higher than it currently is.

PhoenixPhyre

2023-07-13, 06:26 PM

I wouldn't say that it's 100% certainty that rogues are the baseline. I have a really good hypothesis, backed up by a lot of data, calculations, and personal experience, that the following is close to the presumed system baseline:

1. Rogue, starting with 16 DEX and generally improving it at every opportunity
2. Wielding a shortbow or a single d6 weapon
3. Getting sneak attack on roughly 100% of hits without advantage.
4. Not getting off-turn attacks.

Note that #3 is a big assumption. But once you make things more realistic by including having advantage some of the time, having disadvantage some of the time, and just not meeting the conditions at others, it roughly balances out. With significant error bars.

I personally expect a rogue that wants to be a primary damage dealer to up the ante a bit. Either by dual-wielding (which significantly increases damage output by increasing the chances of hitting), by getting advantage (from any number of sources), or some other such means. Dual-wielding with no advantage but regular sneak attack is a ~36% increase in DPR. Way more than you'd get from going to d8s. And most of that comes from just increased sneak attack procs by increased accuracy, since that's a rogue without a fighting style.

MadMusketeer

2023-07-13, 07:10 PM

Movement and Skill bonuses allow you to engage with the game in a way that combat classes (for the most part) just can't. There is only so much utility to be had in combat with things like Cunning Action, Expertise, and Reliable Talent true, but these can also offer a host of benefits outside of combat in a way that Extra Attack cannot (at least I wouldn't recommend attacking twice in a social or environmental encounter!)

To further build on this, the recent UA shows Rogue even sacrificing damage in order to add Status effects to a degree that even a BM Fighter would be jealous of, further increasing their in-combat utility to much higher than it currently is.

I feel like you're coming at this from the wrong direction - shouldn't every class be able to do things out of combat? Different things, sure, but half the classes not having anything to do when combat ends just isn't that fun. Casters get to be good both in combat and out of it - sure, they have to trade off where they use their spell slots, but martials basically have to make that tradeoff at character creation, so they can't adjust based on the situation, and, out of combat, most rogue utility can be straightforwardly covered by casters anyway. Rogues should be as good as every other class in combat, and other classes should get more out of combat utility.

Also, what do you mean by 'combat classes?' Given that in 5e almost every other aspect of the game barely exists from a rules perspective (which is the domain in which class resides), every class is a combat class. Combat is one of the primary modes of play in 5e, and every class (including classes with utility) are designed to be good in combat.

Kane0

2023-07-13, 07:11 PM

...huh.

Hmm.

Good to know. Might need to re-evaluate like 70% of my homebrew now...

JNAProductions

2023-07-13, 07:12 PM

...huh.

Hmm.

Good to know. Might need to re-evaluate like 70% of my homebrew now...

It happens sometimes. :P

Schwann145

2023-07-13, 09:11 PM

I feel like you're coming at this from the wrong direction - shouldn't every class be able to do things out of combat? Different things, sure, but half the classes not having anything to do when combat ends just isn't that fun.
I entirely agree and underlined the key word. :smalltongue:

If I had my way, there are a host of other games I'd prefer. Unfortunately, because group-think is so very real, D&D is all anyone plays, and D&D hasn't been very good to classes in regards to filling non-combat roles.
But, since that's what we're working with, that's what I argue from.

DarknessEternal

2023-07-13, 10:42 PM

I feel like you're coming at this from the wrong direction - shouldn't every class be able to do things out of combat?

They can. Every race has at least 1, every background has 2, and every class has at least 2 skill proficiencies. Think of something to do with those.

Blatant Beast

2023-07-13, 11:59 PM

... Do you actually think that they do? Neither their subscriber counts nor their views indicate a significant amount of the player base consumes their content….

I think a sufficiently large portion of D&D enthusiasts are interested in those channels, enough that I think one would be remiss to entirely dismiss them.

That said, this is turning into a side discussion, and I will be tabling it on my end, so as to not detract from the topic.

I guess i missed the part where my anecdote was presented as empirical evidence.

Perhaps, I misunderstood. In my experience when someone takes the trouble to write: “ I've never encountered anyone outside of this forum and maybe a few YT channels that things a Rogue's damage is lacking.”….as you did in Post #8, they are trying to say that something in their experience is evidentiary and not merely their opinion.

This is a side issue, however, and probably should be tabled.

Yeah I'm not even going to take this seriously enough to even look into and address it, really. This is a 5e forum and a thread talking about the Rogue as is published in 5e. Trotting out anything to do with OneDnd isn't going to hold any water imo.

This strikes me as a bit of an overreaction. I can certainly understand being non-plussed about OneD&D, but in terms of getting ideas of how the D&D Team is approaching design, it gives the same amount of information as an U/A Article.

Dork_Forge

2023-07-14, 12:18 AM

I think a sufficiently large portion of D&D enthusiasts are interested in those channels, enough that I think one would be remiss to entirely dismiss them.

That said, this is turning into a side discussion, and I will be tabling it on my end, so as to not detract from the topic.

'a sufficiently large portion of D&D enthusiasts' You didn't even mention the largest D&D YT channels, XP to lvl 3 dwarfs your examples and primarily focuses on jokey skits. In fact you're really just highlighting that those heavy optimization channels are not even the big chunk of the 5e YT community.

I'd also, before you table this, just like to point out that a build optimizing something =/= the base thing being bad/too low damage for the game, nor do views on videos equate to agreement on content.

Perhaps, I misunderstood. In my experience when someone takes the trouble to write: “ I've never encountered anyone outside of this forum and maybe a few YT channels that things a Rogue's damage is lacking.”….as you did in Post #8, they are trying to say that something in their experience is evidentiary and not merely their opinion.

This is a side issue, however, and probably should be tabled.

Once again, it's anecdotal. I do however, stand by it. The notion that the Rogue is bad or low damage for the system (outside of extreme optimization with niche cases) doesn't hold water in many ways.

This strikes me as a bit of an overreaction. I can certainly understand being non-plussed about OneD&D, but in terms of getting ideas of how the D&D Team is approaching design, it gives the same amount of information as an U/A Article.

No, it doesn't, because they're literally changing the base game. That might tell you what the current dev team think about doing with D&DOne to stamp their mark on it. It doesn't, however, say much at all about 5e and the core design assumptions when the game was made and for most of its lifespan.

I'll highlight this with something I've brought up on here before: proficiency bonus.

It's great for what it was designed for, a scaling piece of your modifiers. It is horrific at what they are trying to shoehorn it into, which is a substitute for short rest recharging. It drastically ramps the power of abilities and makes no sense as a flat number replacement for short rest assumptions by the game. Current devs doing stupid stuff with 5e, largely motivated by abandoning it as anything but a massive paid playtest for 2024.

Corran

2023-07-15, 06:35 AM

There seems to be two pretty common camps when it comes to Rogues:
"They don't do enough damage."
vs
"They aren't primarily a damage class, so it's fine that they don't do as much damage."

On the one hand, you aren't redesigning the utility class into something it's not (appeasing group B) while still increasing it's damage output (appeasing group A).
Would upping the SA die value to d8 rather than d6 work to make "everybody" happy?
Everybody? No. It still wont match a specialized fighter in damage output after the first tier, and this is the complaint people I know had with rogues. That their damage output does not scale enough. I think rogues are more than fine as they are btw, their damage is more than ok if you take everything (not just skills) else they can do into account.

Ive done this for assassins. It doesnt really move the needle much statistically speaking, but it sells you on the *feeling* quite well.
No offense meant, but it does not do the trick for me. Dpr increase does not scream assassin to me. Maybe if it was accomplished through the use of poisons it would be better suited, but it still isn't nova, dusguises/invisibility or mundane/magical utility for being better at tricking, tracking, killing, etc.

My personal opinion on what makes a class a "fighting" class was whether or not they were granted Extra Attack. The fact that Rogues lack this feature confirmed my feeling that Rogues are not primarily a "fighting" class.

How do you determine what is a "fighting class" and what is it about the Rogue chassis specifically that makes you think they're intended to be "fighters?"
This is arbitrary. Rogues dont get extra attack but they get sneak attack. Sneak attack sort of has extra attacks baked in it. The fact that the damage output is more prone to variance (assuming you do nothing to mitigate this) does not lead me to your conclusion. Rogues dont get high AC values either, but they get increased mobility and a defensive reaction. They tank differenltly than fighters do. In some cases better, in some cases worse. The whole package completes itself nicely, as there are a lot of features used for how a rogue best defends that synergize with features used for how a rogue best attacks. It is a nice versatile fighting package. Different than what you'd expect from your average fighter (which is good design), but a fighting package nonetheless.

Rogues don't really get utility though, do they? They can
Move
Hide
Do damage
Grapple, via expertise, but they're still worse at it than barbs and rune knights

They have less status effects and tactical choices than bm, rune knight, or echo knight (which I would guess make up nearly all fighter builds).
This does not seem right. I'll avoid the comparison (cause I am not too familiar with echo and rune knights), so, without getting into any shenanigans, just think of the following:
Round 1: You rush the enemies in melee (cunning action potentially paired with an ability check; an area rogues can be good at) and dodge. Hope is that enemies will stay distracted by you until you caster pal fireballs them. In this round you are (hopefully) acting as a tank (and a bait).
Round 2: You attack any one of the remaining strugglers (stay in place and absorb damage via uncanny dodge or disengage/dash away if it's too dangerous to remain close). In round 2 you are acting as a melee dpr.
Round 3: Disengage/dash into a safer or more advantageous position, take out a ranged weapon and shoot. Thanks to how SA works just as well in melee as in range, this round you are acting as a ranged dpr (with targeting restrictions -which can be very bad- if you cannot leverage advantage or allies; steady aim was a BIG boon for the rogue).

Isn't that enough combat utility? They can do other stuff too (like for example they are very good at threatening space thanks to their good OAs), but I wanted to highlight the utility in just the basic stuff you'd expect from a martial (ie defend, kill in melee, kill from range) and stick to their basic features (SA, cunning action, uncanny dodge, evasion).

Tl;dr: Almost every round presents a tactical choice to the rogue. This is because offensively they are just as good in melee as they are from range. This at the very least presents the dilemma of whether you want to get attacked this turn (eg to take some heat off of an ally) or not. Their mobility and slipperiness is insurance to the aforementioned choice (ie in the case of "yes"), and in turn presents you with even more choices. Like if you want to use it and press at a weak spot (such as by going after a soft target whom you'll attack or otherwise neutralize; or by luring an unsuspected enemy into a goose chase). They can tank decently a single opponent for a long time. Or it can be worth tanking numerous opponents for a brief time. They can scout ahead (lack of DD hurts) and they wont hurt you if stealth is the best solution. And they can kite and fight a retreating battle like it's nobody's business. And if you want to kick down the door and leroy jenkins it, they can do that as well. You can push the end of the adventuring day further if you make a good use of your HP, and you can play an important tactical role (for someone who cannot cast high level spells) at dire straits thanks to the versatility of the class.

Skrum

2023-07-15, 09:51 AM

This does not seem right. I'll avoid the comparison (cause I am not too familiar with echo and rune knights), so, without getting into any shenanigans, just think of the following:
Round 1: You rush the enemies in melee (cunning action potentially paired with an ability check; an area rogues can be good at) and dodge. Hope is that enemies will stay distracted by you until you caster pal fireballs them. In this round you are (hopefully) acting as a tank (and a bait).
Round 2: You attack any one of the remaining strugglers (stay in place and absorb damage via uncanny dodge or disengage/dash away if it's too dangerous to remain close). In round 2 you are acting as a melee dpr.
Round 3: Disengage/dash into a safer or more advantageous position, take out a ranged weapon and shoot. Thanks to how SA works just as well in melee as in range, this round you are acting as a ranged dpr (with targeting restrictions -which can be very bad- if you cannot leverage advantage or allies; steady aim was a BIG boon for the rogue).

Isn't that enough combat utility? They can do other stuff too (like for example they are very good at threatening space thanks to their good OAs), but I wanted to highlight the utility in just the basic stuff you'd expect from a martial (ie defend, kill in melee, kill from range) and stick to their basic features (SA, cunning action, uncanny dodge, evasion).

Tl;dr: Almost every round presents a tactical choice to the rogue. This is because offensively they are just as good in melee as they are from range. This at the very least presents the dilemma of whether you want to get attacked this turn (eg to take some heat off of an ally) or not. Their mobility and slipperiness is insurance to the aforementioned choice (ie in the case of "yes"), and in turn presents you with even more choices. Like if you want to use it and press at a weak spot (such as by going after a soft target whom you'll attack or otherwise neutralize; or by luring an unsuspected enemy into a goose chase). They can tank decently a single opponent for a long time. Or it can be worth tanking numerous opponents for a brief time. They can scout ahead (lack of DD hurts) and they wont hurt you if stealth is the best solution. And they can kite and fight a retreating battle like it's nobody's business. And if you want to kick down the door and leroy jenkins it, they can do that as well. You can push the end of the adventuring day further if you make a good use of your HP, and you can play an important tactical role (for someone who cannot cast high level spells) at dire straits thanks to the versatility of the class.

YMMV, I guess. Obviously the only experience of rogue I can draw from is how I've seen rogues play at the table I play at, and that in turn is shaped by the game style (which can favor some classes more than others). FWIW, we do tend towards an episodic, long-rest heavy game that features a few very deadly combats. Not ideal for a rogue, and I'm aware of that.

That said - the characters who are pure rogue or primarily rogue all end up playing very similarly. That is, keeping at range as best they can and sniping for consistent damage. They spend the vast majority of their action econ keeping themselves alive. I.e., cunning action to maintain or gain distance, and uncanny dodge to (hopefully) not get wasted. They are very...one-note. All of their actions are inwardly-focused in the sense that they offer very little support to the rest of the table. Flanking is about it. This is contrast to a paladin that has 1 or 2 auras, bless, and aid, or a fighter that might have something like bait and switch, maneuvering attack, and menacing attack, or if they're a rune knight, cloud rune, fire rune, runic shield, and an effectively unbeatable grapple check.

The point I'm trying to make is the other classes have *resources* to spend and better ways to tactically work with other members of the party. Interact, if you will. The rogue famously has no resources to spend, and their actions provide no particular benefit for anyone else. If the encounter has some feature, like "this lever needs to be pulled to turn off the Autogoblin Printing Machine," then sure, the rogue could zip over and do it. But so could the monk (and both would still get there later than the spellcaster that used vortex warp or thunderstep). And even if there's a feature like that, that's like....well it comes up occasionally. The majority of the time, the rogue is a fragile, at-best adequate damage dealer that brings almost nothing else to the combat.

Edit: in rogues' favor, cunning action is a super fun ability that can see good use on any character that doesn't have a crowded bonus action (paradoxically, pure rogues DO have a crowded bonus action). The rogue subclasses too have moves to offer the right build. Throw in the extra skills and expertise, and rogue is a great dip that has interesting things at 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level. I really think they are limited to that though. If someone wants to play the rogue archetype, they are better served by taking at most 3 levels of rogue and then going somewhere else.

Corran

2023-07-16, 09:31 AM

YMMV, I guess. Obviously the only experience of rogue I can draw from is how I've seen rogues play at the table I play at, and that in turn is shaped by the game style (which can favor some classes more than others). FWIW, we do tend towards an episodic, long-rest heavy game that features a few very deadly combats. Not ideal for a rogue, and I'm aware of that.
I dont think this makes too much of a difference. I mean, sure, a rogue might get some additional value as a pick, say, in a dangerous extensive dungeon crawling scenario where rests could be an issue. That's because they would rely less than most on rests for gaining back power, also because they wouldn't require as much of the party's healing to go heir way as for example the paladin or the PAM/GWM fighter would (because they need to stay in melee -and thus their HP topped- to be individually effective more than the rogue does). Maybe the problem is that I have not played many such scenarios so I dont fear them as much as I should, but either way I dont rate this very highly. I think few deadly fights per day are fine for the rogue to show value.

Some of the rogue's value shows when the party has some room to pick how they'll try to approach an encounter. Do you want to stealth your way in? The rogue wont be better than a druid but it doesn't matter, they can support the idea. Maybe you want to defend a choke point or otherwise throw one pc against as many enemy attacks as possible. The rogue wont be better than a kensei monk archer or a fighter archer (depending on if you value avoidance or damage more for this particular encounter), but it doesn't matter, cause they can support the idea (maybe by even taking the role of the turtle, provided the party has enough dex targeting AoE damage to make up for the lack of toughness on the rogue's part; also provided the enemies are gullible or desperate enough to take whatever bait you offered them). Do you want to lure the enemies into fighting you in a battlefield of your choice (eg because they have very large numbers and you want to counter that with trapped terrain, cover, chokes and stuff)? The rogue wont be as efficient at this as a shadow monk operating in the dark, but they can support the idea. Is your party heading to an ambush? The rogue wont be better than a caster who can use divinations for scouting and information gathering, nor will they have something like teleportation contingencies, but they have damage mitigation tools to withstand some pressure, and they have some avoidance tools, so while they are far from ambush-proof, they have enough about them to make them less of a weak spot that you have to worry about when the ambush springs (and if they help with scouting they get you another pair of eyes and ears to help foil the ambush).

All in all, a rogue does not hurt/limit your options the way other (more specialized) builds would. That's the main reason I think of rogues as versatile. And this kind of versatility is powerful if it is true for enough members of a party. But more than that, it is enjoyable. In the sense, that when playing as a rogue, all the options are open for you. Let me contrast this with one or two more specialized builds. Let's pick a paladin and an archer fighter. While both classes offer enough to be far from a gimmicky build in either case, the paladin's main offensive output lies in being in melee so that you can smite a target in need of smiting, and the fighter's (/archer's) main offensive contribution lies in having a clear line of sight (and ideally advantage too against/) to the most threatening enemy. What happens though to the paladin's efficiency if it's not a good idea to be in melee? What happens to the archer if they are denied line of sight, or if they engage in melee either by force or by choice (eg because you need to throw additional bodies to fill in a gap or to draw some attention or for whatever other reason)? It gets reduced. Granted, there are ways to play around these hurtful conditions. For the paladin, it's too damn easy to pick up a ranged attack that's significantly better than the throwing of javelins or than reverting to a longbow (even if we are talking about dex based paladins). In fact, it is so easy, that when you also realize how easy it is to win most encounters from range, when the bubble breaks, you will start feeling extremely limited when playing a single class paladin build (even with the new fighting style options, which help, but they are nowhere near enough). With the archer fighter it is a little more tricky. While avoidance options are easy enough to get through race or through a feat, getting in, but also out of melee, is a little more tricky to accomplish without a big drop in efficiency (because remember, some resources also go to boosting ranged attacks in the first place since it's you main thing). One thing I can think of is if you are an EK. They are versatile enough to play a quite effective archer, while also being capable to do well in melee (blur/ mirror image/ shadow blade/ warmagic & GFB) and with a decent option to back out of it (warmagic & BB or just straight extra attacks if necesssary, backed up by mobile). So the EK can do all that with just one extra feat and potentially (saying potentially cause there are other good options) one or two unrestricted spell picks, with their base features (or cheaply obtainable options) doing most of the work. But I am not sure about the other fighter subclasses which lack access to magic (not because magic is that powerful in this case where we are talking about low level spells, but because it is so full of options that you will most likely find the ones you need to complete what you wanted to do). The point is that the rogue starts with this kind of versatility that some other classes might be able to acquire with feats and most likely with multiclassing.

That said - the characters who are pure rogue or primarily rogue all end up playing very similarly. That is, keeping at range as best they can and sniping for consistent damage. They spend the vast majority of their action econ keeping themselves alive. I.e., cunning action to maintain or gain distance, and uncanny dodge to (hopefully) not get wasted. They are very...one-note. All of their actions are inwardly-focused in the sense that they offer very little support to the rest of the table. Flanking is about it. This is contrast to a paladin that has 1 or 2 auras, bless, and aid, or a fighter that might have something like bait and switch, maneuvering attack, and menacing attack, or if they're a rune knight, cloud rune, fire rune, runic shield, and an effectively unbeatable grapple check.
I can relate to that, from both ends of the spectrum. On one hand, it's very frustrating to have your melee character close to dying while a ranged ally (especially one where if changing from range to melee in that moment strictly helps the party in every individual account) keeps maintaining distance. I think this happens a lot because of a certain mentality I've seen in many dnd players, where they "have to" choose what kind of character they are playing and then they commit to it 100%. And I am no stranger to it, I've done it as well. It's often that you have a certain picture in mind when making a character. But nowadays I leave some room open for my character to be more than that one thing he will be most of the time (or in important moments, or whatever). Cause what I really want my character to be, is the most effective I can get them to be based on the situation and unavoidably on my character's abilities. That's why I dont want to place too many restrictions on my build. On the other hand, there is some guilty pleasure to be had when the DM asks you where your character is, only for you to reply "about 60 feet away from where the grid ends, under the cover of dark, also wearing camouflage and shooting from inside a bush" and gladly offering to roll for stealth, while also knowing that you have a great passive perception, enough mobility and a great back up strategy for when the DM eventually decides they had enough of your bull**** (because deep down what you really want to do with a rogue is play the "come and get me" game, it gets no better than that).

The problem of course is, that rogues dont do relatively enough damage to justify sticking to the playstyle you are witnessing. What they do is great when no allies are under threat. And it's good (with the potential to be great if there is a suitable target) if they can double down on their damage (such as if using the ready action haste cheese). It's not good though when neither of these holds true, cause the simple reality is that they wont match the damage output of any other optimized archer beyond tier 1. Which is a downside, cause if you are not putting yourself to absorb attacks, if you are not casting buffs, debuffs, AoEs or whatever, if the only thing you are doing is dealing damage from range, then that damage has to better be really good for your play to even begin contributing. What you are seeing is rogues playing as fighters. Ask your friend whom you see playing the rogue like a fighter why they chose to play a rogue in the first place, since a fighter could do the same thing in combat, only better. You might get an answer about how rogues get other stuff in return that fighters dont. And it's true. Rogues get plenty of cool stuff even before you bring the subclasses under examination. It's a fair comeback, but to a different question. Because it does not address the previous question, and the reason it does not address it is because rogues can be played more effectively than what you are witnessing. On a sidenote, that's why though you end up with people talking about rogues being a skill class and not a martial class. Because these people do notice how the rogue underperforms in combat when played as a fighter, but they think that's the only way for a rogue to be played and the trade is that rogues are a little better (and later on significantly better) at ability checks.

So, let's talk strictly about combat. Specifically let's talk about combat after it has started. And let's assume a fair fight. The archer rogue wont match say, the battlemaster archer's damage. How can you compensate for that? What can the archer rogue do better than a battlemaster archer in a fair fight? Since weaponizing their reaction is out (hence the problem in the first place), their reaction is free for some tanking. With it, they can tank better than the battlemaster archer. If in particular there are enemies around with strong single attacks and a high attack bonus, they can tank significantly better. What's more, they dont get a debuff if they engage in melee (as most archers who lack CBE will). In fact they get a straight boost if being in melee opens up their bonus action (at no feat cost) for damage. Most importantly, they are significantly better at getting out of melee if things get tough, which in turn at the very least might allow the rogue more rounds in the fighting after (correctly or mistakenly) having committed in melee. Dont get me wrong. I love long range sniping and my arcane trickster got sharpshooter at level 10 (and if I played the character again from the beginning I'd even take it sooner; not for the -5/+10 clause of course). But when the fight is on and allies are hurting in melee, I have to close the distance (up to very close if needed) and help spread out or mitigate enemy damage, cause this way I can do better than my unhasted dpr (in some cases even better than that) which I would be able to deal from 600' away. Of course that has its uses, but not at the described situation. The ideal scenario (in a fair fight) is starting from up close from the very start, in the hope of slowly luring persistent (primarily or solely) melee enemies away from the rest of the fight. Depending on how the encounter is progressing and on what kind and how many enemies you managed to slowly lure away, there will be a moment where you have to hit the gas (that moment may be rushed if your personal defenses are not holding of course). At that moment, you trade a number of OA's for a number of rounds where the enemies will be underperforming (all the way up to doing nothing if they cannot threaten from range). This last bit is not crucial, just the little extra something I have sometimes been able to squeeze out of my rogue where resourceless output is concerned. The crucial thing is not to neglect your rogue's defensive capabilities, which can be applied aggressively and without costing you in offensive efficiency under the logically assumed scenario based on your presentation of the problem. So, bottom line. When there is urgency, most archers can justify far better than the rogue keeping their distance, while the rogue will have to mix it a bit in most cases to offer the max they can. Thankfully out of combat healing is cheap, so HP are just a resource for you to use in very combat (since being a rogue means you can reposition and create distance easily enough against most threats).

The point I'm trying to make is the other classes have *resources* to spend and better ways to tactically work with other members of the party. Interact, if you will. The rogue famously has no resources to spend, and their actions provide no particular benefit for anyone else. If the encounter has some feature, like "this lever needs to be pulled to turn off the Autogoblin Printing Machine," then sure, the rogue could zip over and do it. But so could the monk (and both would still get there later than the spellcaster that used vortex warp or thunderstep). And even if there's a feature like that, that's like....well it comes up occasionally. The majority of the time, the rogue is a fragile, at-best adequate damage dealer that brings almost nothing else to the combat.
Laughed with the autogoblin printing machine. But I wouldn't agree. Even if we put aside the possibility to approach combat in more than one ways and the possibility of affecting it before it has even started, it still leaves the rogue with enough cooperation value. True, they will be on the receiving end for the most of it, but this does not make any difference to the produced value. They are (and for good reason) the prime recipients of buffs like haste and greater invisibility, as well as of anything that hands out out-of-turn "extra attacks", and they can shine whenever you need to rely on heavy obscurement. In the context we are now discussing, these things (that I would otherwise describe as the fine print) are far from nothing (though I feel strongly that the tactical value of the rogue being in how it allows multiple approaches to combat far exceeds whatever you can do during it, be that change of roles or whatever else synergy you can squeeze out of your build and that of teammates; but synergies do exist, and that's what I am talking in this part of my post).

Now I'll say something that will sound like a hyperbole. But it's not. Every encounter has an autogoblin printing machine. EVERY SINGLE ONE (I am not shouting :). The fact that this might go unnoticed is usually because of habbit. I guess sometimes it goes unnoticed because the encounter might be easy enough to not warrant enough time to think about it. And of course there will be times where most of the obvious avenues will be cut off because of group inefficiencies. That's where the rogue shows their outmost value. As martials go, it's, if not the best, then among the very best ones, as far as not limiting your options go. Whatever you want to do, the rogue will play a part in it. Sometimes small, other times big, but they'll be part of the best available solution.

Heck, even if all of your encounters involve aware monsters that are only one barred but easily smashed down door (or whatever else equivalent of that) away, you can still try to mix and match approaches (that is, even if the DM does nothing to incentivize it, you can still attempt it and see what happens). Have the rogue (or a better candidate if one exists) open the door and run away towards where the rest of the party has prepared to fight. Or unlock the door and use it as cover behind which you'll shoot the enemies. Or if the enemy is determined to make a stand there (say, because of some sort of advantage; eg enemy caster can AoE you when you open the door, or archers are ready to shoot at you once inside from behind total cover, essentially murder holes, or they have ballistas and porcupines aimed at the point of your entrance, etc), throw a fog cloud in and send in the rogue (along with whomever else can help) to cancel whatever advantage the enemy had (possibly even to smoke the enemies out assuming that's worth risking).

Edit: in rogues' favor, cunning action is a super fun ability that can see good use on any character that doesn't have a crowded bonus action (paradoxically, pure rogues DO have a crowded bonus action). The rogue subclasses too have moves to offer the right build. Throw in the extra skills and expertise, and rogue is a great dip that has interesting things at 1st, 2nd, and 3rd level. I really think they are limited to that though. If someone wants to play the rogue archetype, they are better served by taking at most 3 levels of rogue and then going somewhere else.
Well, they get some nice features at the first few levels, but who can really make good use of them? I rate expertise because I like trying to get good use out of ability checks, so I would rate it highly if I grabbed in on my way to pick something else. But not on its own. I've done it a two times (it was essentially the same character concept - the second time sort of inverted- that I used in two different campaigns), when I used one level of rogue on a cleric. I had this background where the character in both cases began as a criminal before eventually finding faith in a deity (Lathander -and not Pelor!!!- the first time, Bane the second), and I also wanted the character to act as sort of a street preacher in between adventuring, so I wanted expertise since my cha alone would not cut it enough for my taste. But this was optimizing more for a concept and not really optimizing the character as a combat build (in which case I'd just pick urchin or criminal background and go for an extra cleric level instead). So IMO cunning action is the main prize. But who needs it? Off the top of my had, I'd say archers, fullcasters and melee nova builds most likely.

So which archers? Fighters get a new attack option at every tier and all the way up to 20. It's not a good choice to delay and eventually skip any of that for a mobility option that you could otherwise replicate with a race or one of a few feats. Maybe it was in the earlier days of the edition. Who else? Rangers get 2/3 of cunning action as they level if I am not mistaken, so they are out as well. Monks are mobile enough on their own, so skip. Who does that leave? Ancestral barbarians? Maybe, I dont know.

Melee nova builds. Paladins are out. Conflicting multiclassing requirements and access to mounts are one thing, but the main thing is that there are far better multiclassing combinations out there that cover more and more immediate needs. Maybe for a PAM/GWM fighter. Maybe. Although I would much rather go for the extra attacks (or even a barb mc for rage) and count on allies for mobility if that's on the table.

And lastly, casters. Medium/heavy armor proficiency takes priority IMO, so I think this limits us to bladesingers, hexblades, hobgoblin wizards and certain bards for the most part. I've been tempted to add rogue 2 to one bladesinger I played in the past but delaying spell progression dissuaded me while that character lasted (about up to lvl 6 I believe). And I finally attempted it with a hexblade archer, whom I used for a loooong time (1-15). And while I was sure about the choice (went with a 3 level dip) in the beginning, there were many occasions (during CLs 8-11) where I wished I had just the extra pact slot and conjure fey. The trade was certainly something I felt badly about at times. It had its merits, but man, delaying that 11th level hurts a lot for a warlock (particularly if your resources are further pressed by smites).

So I dont really know about that. Do you have any good combinations I missed? Did I miss something about any of the ones I mentioned that makes it better than I think?

I like a bit of multiclassing on a main rogue build though. I considered a little bit of cleric (twilight), warlock (any) and wizard (probably bladesinger) for my main AT build, but eventually I decided towards battlemaster (currently fighter 2/ AT 12, but will rush more levels in fighter -battlemaster- once I hit rogue 13). Single class was an option too, but I liked how multiclassing was leaving me with more freedom in picking feats and how it speeded up a few things I wanted online sooner.

stoutstien

2023-07-16, 01:24 PM

So for my WIP I was working with the following feedback:

- absolute damage was fine they lacked relative damage. Meaning that on paper at the end of the day they were ok but it didn't feel that way and felt left out when it mattered the most.
*solution. add a few forms of controlled damage spikes that don't effect the ceiling.*

- the T2 blues. Lvs ~5 to ~10 feel bad. even if they get strong features in that range it feels like other classes have it better. If the subclasses has a weak lv 9 feature, it's even worse.
*Solution. Reorganize features to add better scaling and be more exciting to look forward to.*

- Capstone is bad.
*Solution. See above*

- boring and set action flow. The class embodies being unpredictable and opportunistic but in play is very linear. *Solution. Add some decision points both in/out of combat.*

- discounting sneak attack damage as a feature they lack any iconic fulfillment.
*Solution. Pick a theme and support it.*

Side note
Expertise. Removed as printed.
Generally classes are generic and subclasses are setting specific.

Current version

Hit Dice: 1d8 per rogue level
Hit Points at 1st Level: 8 + your Constitution modifier
Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d8 (or 5) + your Constitution modifier per rogue level after 1st

Proficiencies
Armor: Light armor
Weapons: one handed melee weapons and ranged weapons without the heavy property.
Tools: Thieves' tools
Saving Throws: Dexterity, Intelligence
Skills: Choose four from Acrobatics, Athletics, Deception, Insight, Intimidation, Investigation, Perception, Performance, Persuasion, Sleight of Hand, and Stealth

Reliable Talent
Beginning at 1st level, you have refined your chosen skills until they approach perfection. Whenever you make an ability check that lets you add your proficiency bonus, you can treat a d20 roll of 5 or lower as a 6.

As you further master your skills this number increases. The value is equal to 5 + half your rogue level rounded up.

Sneak Attack
Beginning at 1st level, you know how to strike subtly and exploit a foe's distraction. Once per turn, you can deal an extra 1d6 damage to one creature you hit with an attack if you have advantage on the attack roll. The attack must use a one handed weapon, unarmed strike, or a ranged weapon. *Add verbage for use with natural weapon*

You don't need advantage on the attack roll if your attack is a critical hit, is made with the off hand attack using two weapon fighting, or there is another enemy of the target is within range with a natural or melee weapon they are welding and that enemy is not incapacitated,

The amount of the extra damage increases as you gain levels. This damage is equal to a number of D6 equal to half your rogue level rounded up.

Thieves' Cant
During your rogue training you learned thieves' cant, a secret mix of dialect, jargon, and code that allows you to hide messages in seemingly normal conversation. During combat you can communicate information to allies in such a way that only other creatures that know thieves' cant could possibly understand such messages if it was not intended for them. It takes four times longer to convey such a message than it does to speak the same idea plainly.

In addition, you understand a set of secret signs and symbols used to convey short, simple messages, such as whether an area is dangerous or the territory of a thieves' guild, whether loot is nearby, or whether the people in an area are easy marks or will provide a safe house for thieves on the run.

Cunning Action
Starting at 2nd level, your quick thinking and agility allow you to move and act quickly. You can take a bonus action on each of your turns in combat. This action can be used only to take the Dash, Disengage, or Hide action.

Roguish Archetype
At 3rd level, you choose an archetype that you emulate in the exercise of your rogue abilities. Your archetype choice grants you features at 3rd level and then again at 9th, 13th, and 17th level.

Ability Score Improvement
When you reach 4th level, and again at 8th, 10th, 12th, 16th, and 19th level, you can increase one ability score of your choice by 2, or you can increase two ability scores of your choice by 1. As normal, you can't increase an ability score above 20 using this feature.

Masterful recovery
At 5th level, you have a knack for succeeding when you need to. If you attack a target within range, you can forgo rolling and hit regardless of any other stipulations.

Alternatively, if you make an ability check, you can treat the d20 roll as a 20.

Once you use this feature, you can't use it again until you finish a long rest.

Uncanny Dodge
Starting at 6th level, when an attacker that you can see hits you with an attack, you can use your reaction to halve the attack's damage against you.

Evasion
Beginning at 7th level, you can nimbly dodge out of the way of certain area effects, such as a red dragon's fiery breath or an Ice Storm spell. When you are subjected to an effect that allows you to make a Dexterity saving throw to take only half damage, you instead take no damage if you succeed on the saving throw, and only half damage if you fail.

Off the back foot
Beginning at 11th level, you have an intuitive ability to deliver attacks even when you are pushed onto the defensive. As part of that same reaction when you use your uncanny dodge ability, you can make a single weapon attack against the creature that is attacking you.

Elusive
Beginning at 14th level, you are so evasive that attackers rarely gain the upper hand against you. No attack roll has advantage against you while you aren't incapacitated.

Slippery Mind
By 15th level, you have acquired greater mental strength. You gain proficiency in Wisdom saving throws.

Peerless
By 18th level you have honded your skills beyond perfection. Your proficiency bonus is increased by 2 to a maximum of 8.

Orchestrated Schemes
When you reach 20th level, you have become adept at quickly assessing dangers and formulating plans. You can take two turns during the first round of any combat. You take your first turn at your normal initiative and your second turn at your initiative plus 10. You can't use this feature when you are surprised.

Additionally, when you roll initiative and have no uses of masterful recovery, you regain it but it must be used on your first turn.

Arm of Dur Hel (Assassin)

Assassination
Starting at 3nd level, you are at your deadliest when you get the drop on your enemies. Once during your first turn, when you hit a creature with a weapon attack you deal extra damage to that target. That damage equals 5+ twice your rogue level.

Bonus Proficiencies
When you choose this archetype at 3rd level, you gain proficiency with the disguise kit and the poisoner's kit.*add verbage to pick different skills if prof is redundant*

Insignia Of Tyrants
Starting at 9th level, you have learned to strike so fast and viciously that it sows confusion leaving targets vulnerable. When you use your assassination feature, Target one hostile creature within 5 feet of you or the target that you can see or hear. That target must make a Dexterity saving throw (DC 8 + your Dexterity modifier + your proficiency bonus). On a failed save that creature is instantly dropped to 0 HP if it's challenge rating is at or below CR 2.

Regardless if the target passes it save or it's CR, it cannot take any reactions until the end of its next turn.

As you advance, the threshold is increased to CR 3 at level 13, and CR 4 at level 17.

Wet Work
Starting at 13th level, your time spent lurking and planning tasks have sharpened your awareness of dangers. You have blind sight out to a range of 10 ft as long as you are not deafened.

Call of Death
Starting at 17th level, your time spent eliminating enemies has made you the master of instant death. When you hit a target with your assassination attack, that attack is automatically considered a critical hit.

Arkhios

2023-07-16, 02:46 PM

Corran

2023-07-16, 03:10 PM

stoutstien

2023-07-16, 04:35 PM

Some quick thoughts after a first glance:

No opinion on opening up the weapon selection. I guess anything that lets me sneak attack with a sap is good. Objection on the unarmed attacks though. That's the monk's bread you are eating there.

I like this reliable talent better than the old plus expertise, as it matches better the rogue I got to know first (3e). In fact, I would go even further, by not restricting it to what you are proficient with, but having it apply to everything (initiative excluded). This way at least I can have my rogue attempt things others would not, and with a gutted skill selection this is as close to unique class skills as it gets.

On thieves' cant. Remove it from the class and add it to the thief subclass.

On cunning action. Place a restriction on dash. You cannot use it if you already dashed this round. Also, no dashing allowed if you use cunning action to dash. Essentially, no double dashing. Never understood why rogues were supposed to be amazing sprinters.

On masterful recovery. I dig it. Fortune favors the bold and all that (plus, anything that lets me every now and then ignore the stupid dice is nice in my book). The long rest recharge limits this nicely. Nice, very nice.

On off the back foot. Oof. This is way too strong. Maybe as a capstone. Or in the 19th level to leave space for a barbarian level in there so at level 20 you get that sweet synergy. But at tier 3? This is quite stronger than extra attack 1 and 2 put together. Besides, it pushes the rogue into a melee dpr/tank hybrid. I am not sure that's needed. Expect lots of barbarians deep and for cunning action to be used to dash forward (with its remaining usefulness to get reduced mostly into out of combat tricks). I am surprised you didn't even give it a restriction, like prof times per day or something. Bad on all counts.

On slippery mind. This needs to go down to tier 2 or be replaced with something else entirely. Waiting till level 15 for wisdom save prof was a cruel joke played on us by the devs.

On orchestrated schemes. I like it. Like its name too.

ps: Oh? You removed blind sense and gave it to the assassin? Why?

Monk got major overhaul as well and rogue getting SA with UA attacks doesn't effect their niche and there is an monkish rogue in working on.

I've debated moving cant off but I left it for now.

Dash has been reworked so double dashing doesn't work as is. *Besides for monks who get it build in*

Off the back foot- this was a risky options but in play it's more feel than impact. It has 3 gates to work for major effect. You need to be attacked, it need to hit, and you still need to meet SA requirements if it's going to hit for anything noteworthy. I might limit to melee/thrown weapons but as of now it has been ok.
It's a thorn/momentum swing feature by design as in it makes you risk your position for SA.

*I realized I forgot the line that makes SA once a round that would make a difference. The assassin subclass makes up the damage difference from this change.*

Also I don't have lv by lv multiclassing so that's a none issue.

Slippery mind- id love to move it down but unless I want to remove the extra ASI no space.

I gave an enhanced blind sight to the assassin as it is themed for the faction in the setting. All the subclasses that are related to this deity have it in some capacity and I like rogues getting a bonus to prof bonus.

Quietus

2023-07-16, 06:06 PM

What, are the two of you saying that you don't have a dice pool the size of a fishbowl at minimum!?

...Dice vendors rejoice, the more dice the merrier!

I do, but none of my friends do. I try to argue for the common man, not the outliers like myself.

Witty Username

2023-07-16, 09:58 PM

100% this. I've yet to meet a player who thought their damage was subpar, including myself when I play a rogue. I know the math says it's subpar, but it doesn't feel subpar, and quite often, that matters more than the math.

The math is all that bad either, most of the YT optimization chanels I track have good things to say about rogue even those that have concerns.

Heck, as I recall, Treantmonk's highest damage build he has covered was a single class rogue.

I personally think there is some improvements that could be made, but that is more high level utility and across the board things, not just rogue.

And the weapon restrictions on sneak attack are dumb and unnecessary.
--
My opinions on d8 dice for sneak attack,
It is technically a damage increase but a small one.
Availability of d8s is a minor issue, and one that paladins deal with it all the time (just buy your rogue sneak dice).
I am not against the proposal, but I have little emotion on the subject.
I think the route I would go is a simple multiplier, like the backstab of the AD&D thief. So something like ×2 for first level, x3 for 3rd, x4 for 5th etc.
I think that would cause pretty big jump in damage at high levels though.

Dork_Forge

2023-07-16, 11:51 PM

And the weapon restrictions on sneak attack are dumb and unnecessary.

Eh I don't know about that, it feeds the fiction (Sneak Attack with a massive polearm feels weird) and it keeps a pretty substantial damage feature separate from damage concerns like PAM/GWM. Just removing the restrictions feels like a can of worms, but I could understand allowing longswords as part of it and that damage bump is minor without player-facing stacking concerns.

elyktsorb

2023-07-17, 12:07 AM

Something I think would be an interesting idea for making Sneak Attack deal more damage in a neat way would just be to add layers to the actual sneak attack.

"Beginning at 1st level, you know how to strike subtly and exploit a foe's distraction. Once per turn, you can deal an extra 1d6 damage to one creature you hit with an attack if you have advantage on the attack roll. The attack must use a finesse or a ranged weapon.

You don't need advantage on the attack roll if another enemy of the target is within 5 feet of it, that enemy isn't incapacitated, and you don't have disadvantage on the attack roll."
(Putting this here for context)

For instance, if an enemy was both 5ft from an ally and you also have advantage on the target, your sneak can deal an additional flat amount of damage, like +3 or something. Nothing game breaking or super substantial, but enough that it would be neat.

And then as they gain levels it could either be that the flat amount goes up, or for each additional 'thing' like if the target has a debuff of some kind, the flat damage could increase for each of those.

Corran

2023-07-17, 06:26 AM

Monk got major overhaul as well and rogue getting SA with UA attacks doesn't effect their niche and there is an monkish rogue in working on.
Fair. I've been thinking a bit about your assassin changes, and then it struck me. SA with unarmed strikes would IMO be better as an assassin perk. I mean, think about it. The mundane assassin in a magic world has a very big disadvantage to overcome and little to show for. They need something to set them apart and make them have some kind of edge in killing. So if we were to keep the assassin completely or mostly mundane and we are not to go with anything like arrows that bend space and time or magical perfect disguises and the like, then being able to kill with just their bare hands and no weapons (combined with their assassinate ability) is a big plus that would give them an edge (even if its only narratively) against not-assassins assassins.

Dash has been reworked so double dashing doesn't work as is. *Besides for monks who get it build in*
Glad to know I am not the only one bothered by it.

*I realized I forgot the line that makes SA once a round that would make a difference. The assassin subclass makes up the damage difference from this change.*
No potential to SA with OA's?! *gasps

I gave an enhanced blind sight to the assassin as it is themed for the faction in the setting. All the subclasses that are related to this deity have it in some capacity and I like rogues getting a bonus to prof bonus.
I've been thinking about your change to assassinate. I like the idea but I am not sure how it will translate into play. Let me tell you though why I like it and contrast it to assassinate as it is now.

Assassinate, as it is now, is a big nova boost (if you can get it to work). Naturally, you ideally want to do that against a scary enemy. But you dont want to face scary monsters (and their entourage) alone, you want your group with you. Which creates the well known problem of how difficult it can be to get surprise when the whole party is with you and not everyone is geared for stealth to at least some extent. Which means that the assassin has to have the whole party kind of work for them (not really, they work for the whole party, but you get my point). And furthermore, if the whole party gets surprised the extra damage from the assassin, while still very useful, is kind of overshadowed because having the whole party get an extra turn will still be the major highlight.

But with your change, assuming it can translate well to play, I see great potential. That of making the assassin useful, a team player, and expediting play at the same time. I think of the following situation. The party has entered a dungeon. This dungeon is a live environment. At some room there is the boss with minions where you'll have the tough fight, there may be other rooms where you are going to have tough fights as well. But, there are going to be some patrols and some sentries that are going to be easy pickings. You sent the assassin in fist (along with any other stealthy members that might be willing to join) to take those out (potentially while doing some scouting if you are short on information). This clears the way for the rest of the party to reach the tough fights without any obstacles, and more importantly, with a far better chance of surprising them (not necessarily in game terms, but you can still profit by catching enemies unaware even if it is only until a few seconds before the battle starts). This way, it's not the whole party trying to work for the assassin, but it's the assassin working for the party. As for table time, it's just a few seconds more than you would spend on "on the fly" scouting, but if you want you can shrink this even further by just rolling a few dice (or one) and annuncing the result (I mean, this whole assassinating could very well happen in a matter of seconds of table time by just narrating it very briefly). Maybe this could work better by allowing to split the CR value into more than one target (perhaps up to prof bonus without your total maxing the CR restriction; or something like that). But generally, if it can work in play like that, I'd easily play this assassin, cause as team play goes, you are now playing someone with a good side role in scouting, for whom scouting got some additional value in clearing out threats that could inconvenience the whole party (such as by raising the alarm). And this can be made to work nicely regarding table time and moreover it suits the theme of the class.

stoutstien

2023-07-17, 07:25 AM

Fair. I've been thinking a bit about your assassin changes, and then it struck me. SA with unarmed strikes would IMO be better as an assassin perk. I mean, think about it. The mundane assassin in a magic world has a very big disadvantage to overcome and little to show for. They need something to set them apart and make them have some kind of edge in killing. So if we were to keep the assassin completely or mostly mundane and we are not to go with anything like arrows that bend space and time or magical perfect disguises and the like, then being able to kill with just their bare hands and no weapons (combined with their assassinate ability) is a big plus that would give them an edge (even if its only narratively) against not-assassins assassins.

Glad to know I am not the only one bothered by it.

No potential to SA with OA's?! *gasps

I've been thinking about your change to assassinate. I like the idea but I am not sure how it will translate into play. Let me tell you though why I like it and contrast it to assassinate as it is now.

Assassinate, as it is now, is a big nova boost (if you can get it to work). Naturally, you ideally want to do that against a scary enemy. But you dont want to face scary monsters (and their entourage) alone, you want your group with you. Which creates the well known problem of how difficult it can be to get surprise when the whole party is with you and not everyone is geared for stealth to at least some extent. Which means that the assassin has to have the whole party kind of work for them (not really, they work for the whole party, but you get my point). And furthermore, if the whole party gets surprised the extra damage from the assassin, while still very useful, is kind of overshadowed because having the whole party get an extra turn will still be the major highlight.

But with your change, assuming it can translate well to play, I see great potential. That of making the assassin useful, a team player, and expediting play at the same time. I think of the following situation. The party has entered a dungeon. This dungeon is a live environment. At some room there is the boss with minions where you'll have the tough fight, there may be other rooms where you are going to have tough fights as well. But, there are going to be some patrols and some sentries that are going to be easy pickings. You sent the assassin in fist (along with any other stealthy members that might be willing to join) to take those out (potentially while doing some scouting if you are short on information). This clears the way for the rest of the party to reach the tough fights without any obstacles, and more importantly, with a far better chance of surprising them (not necessarily in game terms, but you can still profit by catching enemies unaware even if it is only until a few seconds before the battle starts). This way, it's not the whole party trying to work for the assassin, but it's the assassin working for the party. As for table time, it's just a few seconds more than you would spend on "on the fly" scouting, but if you want you can shrink this even further by just rolling a few dice (or one) and annuncing the result (I mean, this whole assassinating could very well happen in a matter of seconds of table time by just narrating it very briefly). Maybe this could work better by allowing to split the CR value into more than one target (perhaps up to prof bonus without your total maxing the CR restriction; or something like that). But generally, if it can work in play like that, I'd easily play this assassin, cause as team play goes, you are now playing someone with a good side role in scouting, for whom scouting got some additional value in clearing out threats that could inconvenience the whole party (such as by raising the alarm). And this can be made to work nicely regarding table time and moreover it suits the theme of the class.

All rogues being decent at landing a sucker punch or cheap shots isn't something I'm really committed to. No one have used it yet besides the odd moment or to land less than lethal blows.

SA being once a round was a deliberate move. Across the board damage was brought down so the base class floats around in the middle and the assassin is just behind the more dedicated warrior types. *Outside of the round one potential of save or die a bodyguard.

there are a few new actions that are very useful. I'm moving away from <I attack> as the standard. Somebody's actions are the reason why the assassin is actually as powerful it is. The ability to prevent reactions at the same time they are targeting the primary threat prevents damage redirection. (Think the game: Get Down Mister President!)

I have played with a few different forms of the Insignia Of Tyrants feature. I'm not 100% satisfied with it now but it's hands down the favorite feature for the class in my playtest group. With morale and instinct checks they have preemptively ended a ton of potentially deadly challenges.

Note: assassination isn't reliant on SA. So with this feature they could eliminate 3 targets in a single action during their first turn. Risky but doable as both are declared on hit.

*Surprise rounds aren't a thing. It's broken up into two parts. Coup de grace are basically any time they have time to set up a proper ambush with 10+ minutes of prep time undetected in one "location". Works like the PHB assassin where all attacks have advantage and auto crit. You also automatically max initiative. Powerful but the stationary set up makes it difficult to pull off.
Surprise is when you get the jump on someone but it's more spur of the moment. If you have surprise you automatically treat your initiative as a 20.

None of that "it's an extra round but maybe not nonsense".*

Skrum

2023-07-17, 12:34 PM

Well, they get some nice features at the first few levels, but who can really make good use of them?

Barbs are the classic one. Once rage activates, barbs don't really need their bonus action. Granted, they have to change their weapon type to a finesse weapon to make use of the reckless attack/sneak attack synergy, but it's a solid pick for a character that either wants to use a shield or leave a hand free for grapples. I'm playing the latter build right now, and did I say rune knights have an unbeatable grapple check? Barb/rogues with expertise in athletics have a REALLY unbeatable grapple check.

As far as the other classes go, sure, if you're comparing cunning action to a level 20 capstone, rogue is a lot less attractive. But most games don't go that far, and barbs, rangers, and fighters are get diddly-squat from level 6-10. If the game you're playing is capping at 8 or 9 or 10, I'd MUCH rather play ranger 5/rogue 3 or fighter 6 rogue 2 over ranger 8 or fighter 8 (in most cases). Frankly, even if the game was going to 20, I'd be sorely tempted to pick up cunning action at level 7 or 8 and get to use it for the next 13 levels of play vs waiting for a capstone ability that I only get to use in the final few sessions of the campaign.

5eNeedsDarksun

2023-07-17, 07:33 PM

Dork_Forge

2023-07-17, 07:35 PM

I'm not sure Rogue has aged that well with newer content. Arcane Trickster is still the strongest option, where other classes have newer subclasses that have provided superior options. Treantmonk ranks the rogue subclasses between C (AT) and E. That said, I think if the goal is to try to get more parity among classes, changing SA to a d8 is probably a decent (and nicely scaling) improvement for Rogues.

I don't understand this take, when Steady Aim makes Sneak more reliable for the class as a whole and the newer subclasses pack outright damage bumps.

What is disappointing about the Soulknife, for instance?

Gignere

2023-07-17, 08:27 PM

I'm not sure Rogue has aged that well with newer content. Arcane Trickster is still the strongest option, where other classes have newer subclasses that have provided superior options. Treantmonk ranks the rogue subclasses between C (AT) and E. That said, I think if the goal is to try to get more parity among classes, changing SA to a d8 is probably a decent (and nicely scaling) improvement for Rogues.

Considering the phantom is the highest damage build for rogues that is strange to say that they haven’t had good subclasses.

5eNeedsDarksun

2023-07-18, 01:24 AM

Considering the phantom is the highest damage build for rogues that is strange to say that they haven’t had good subclasses.

I didn't say they hadn't had good (by comparison) subclasses. I said AT was still the strongest option, and I'll let that stand for itself. Soulknife and Phantom are decent, but they don't re-set the bar for a class that is clearly in the bottom half, and probably bottom third.

Newer Sorcerer options are a significant improvement; 2 of the newer Cleric options are near broken; I'd say the same for Shepherd Druid after DMing one; Rune Knight and Echo Knight clearly re-set the bar for fighters; even the lowly monk got the Mercy option; Ranger got feature options as well as several stronger subclasses including the Gloomstalker.

Given all this, I'd say a little bump to SA wouldn't be out of order.

JNAProductions

2023-07-18, 01:26 AM

I didn't say they hadn't had good (by comparison) subclasses. I said AT was still the strongest option, and I'll let that stand for itself. Soulknife and Phantom are decent, but they don't re-set the bar for a class that is clearly in the bottom half, and probably bottom third.

Newer Sorcerer options are a significant improvement; 2 of the newer Cleric options are near broken; I'd say the same for Shepherd Druid after DMing one; Rune Knight and Echo Knight clearly re-set the bar for fighters; even the lowly monk got the Mercy option; Ranger got feature options as well as several stronger subclasses including the Gloomstalker.

Given all this, I'd say a little bump to SA wouldn't be out of order.

How much experience do you have playing Rogues?

I've never really felt them as being weak. The one change I think would be good is give them some form of spike damage-they don't need more damage usable all the time, they could use the ability to say "This turn, I do more damage" without relying on lucky crits. But it's not NEEDED.

5eNeedsDarksun

2023-07-18, 01:33 AM

How much experience do you have playing Rogues?

I've never really felt them as being weak. The one change I think would be good is give them some form of spike damage-they don't need more damage usable all the time, they could use the ability to say "This turn, I do more damage" without relying on lucky crits. But it's not NEEDED.

I didn't say it was needed; not sure if someone in this thread did. We've had a few at our table, and again I'd stand by what I said; they've solidly moved into the bottom 1/3 of classes. That'd be the bottom 4. Monks are clearly worse, but If you disagree with my assessment, then what are the other 3 classes that are weaker? There are a few classes, including Barbarian that I'd place near them (probably below due to Rogues having more out of combat utility), but I'd struggle to clearly place Rogues solidly ahead of 2 others. In my mind that makes them weak.

JNAProductions

2023-07-18, 01:36 AM

5eNeedsDarksun

2023-07-18, 01:57 AM

The way I'm reading your posts is "Rogues are bottom third-AKA bad."

Which, on reread, isn't necessarily accurate. I'm not sure where exactly I'd rate Rogues, but in my experience, the best and worst 5E classes in actual play aren't far apart. So even if Rogue is the worst class, it's scoring 8/10, with the best being 9.5/10 or so.

So, to clarify your position, if you could: Do you think Rogues are bad?

I didn't say they 'NEEDED' a bump, which you felt the need to write in caps.
I didn't say they were 'bad'.
And I didn't say they didn't have 'good subclasses', which another poster attributed to me.

I did say they hadn't aged well, hadn't had a subclass that reset the bar (which many/ most other classes have), and that the d8 proposed by the OP was decent bump that would help level them. No, I don't think they're bad; they're below average, and enough below at this point that I could see some players being turned off. I think the OP's proposal is simple, applies to all subclasses, and could easily be adopted. I'm not a proponent of power creep, but in this case I see it as catch up.

Witty Username

2023-07-18, 02:24 AM

I didn't say it was needed; not sure if someone in this thread did. We've had a few at our table, and again I'd stand by what I said; they've solidly moved into the bottom 1/3 of classes. That'd be the bottom 4. Monks are clearly worse, but If you disagree with my assessment, then what are the other 3 classes that are weaker? There are a few classes, including Barbarian that I'd place near them (probably below due to Rogues having more out of combat utility), but I'd struggle to clearly place Rogues solidly ahead of 2 others. In my mind that makes them weak.
Isn't this more a caster vs martial claim?
If we cover non-casters (qualifying half-casters as casters for this purpose)
Fighter
Rogue
Barbarian
Monk
We see among martials rogue isn't actually poor off and is one of the stronger options.

Now I agree that there are issues here, but it is a bit beyond small dice increases. I am of the mind it is more how martials classes scale (er, mostly they don't).

Dork_Forge

2023-07-18, 02:39 AM

I didn't say they 'NEEDED' a bump, which you felt the need to write in caps.
I didn't say they were 'bad'.
And I didn't say they didn't have 'good subclasses', which another poster attributed to me.

I did say they hadn't aged well, hadn't had a subclass that reset the bar (which many/ most other classes have), and that the d8 proposed by the OP was decent bump that would help level them. No, I don't think they're bad; they're below average, and enough below at this point that I could see some players being turned off. I think the OP's proposal is simple, applies to all subclasses, and could easily be adopted. I'm not a proponent of power creep, but in this case I see it as catch up.

I don't agree that AT is a clear winner of best or most powerful subclass, I also think that using it as a yard stick for future subclasses is a little off, since the nature of being a casting subclass means it benefits from splat much more than other subclasses could.

It seems like your issue is that you're weighing the Rogue in the current state of the game, which is power creep and some just utterly stupid decisions (Twilight Cleric) and in that light it is found lacking, because it hasn't received the same amount of creep as other subclasses.

I would contend, however, that for a class uniquely able to take advantage of...advantage, Steady Aim is a significant wave to raise the class ship. In terms of subclass I'd also argue that the new subclasses moved the needle in how you're describing. I mean Soulknife raises the damage bar, makes a skill heavy classed even more reliable, added in team-wide support via telepathy, an accuracy bump and teleportation... That all seems a darn sight more impactful than the Sorcerer getting some more spells.

Then there's the whole feat situation, with more feats benefitting the Rogue more than most because of their additional ASI.

I wouldn't really mind the d8 bump, but the Rogue certainly doesn't need it and I can't say I really see the below average thing either.

elyktsorb

2023-07-18, 04:12 AM

I said AT was still the strongest option, and I'll let that stand for itself.

To be fair, by 13th lvl a Thief Rogue that's getting reliable access to scrolls and other magical stuff would be above an Arcane Trickster imo

Derges

2023-07-18, 05:18 AM

Eh I don't know about that, it feeds the fiction (Sneak Attack with a massive polearm feels weird)

Personally, I love the idea of big dumb rogues. I'm all for sneak attacks with mauls and don't feel it goes against any fiction. There are plenty of ruffian types with sorts of weapons in all sorts of fiction. To be honest I don't see why there hasn't been a subclass with an expanded weapons list yet, monk got one.

4th had a rogue build based on a "rattling" keyword which was essentially a menacing rogue inflicting extra effects though being intimidating and scary.

stoutstien

2023-07-18, 06:06 AM

I cannot fathom the logic that new content making old content obsolete is anything but a decrease in the quality of a game.

Rogues are fine just don't really 'feel' right which is the more important bit.

Witty Username

2023-07-18, 09:53 AM

It seems like your issue is that you're weighing the Rogue in the current state of the game, which is power creep and some just utterly stupid decisions (Twilight Cleric) and in that light it is found lacking, because it hasn't received the same amount of creep as other subclasses.

On this point, I would also point out, even with Tasha's the needle hasn't moved that much in terms of relative class balance.
Monk got on the leaderboard but is still the bottom slot, and their has been some shifting in the casters, sorcerer is debatably the most powerful now but that is alot to due with it being more in line with other casters now as opposed to below the line.

Like, has rogue meaningfully changed positions in how relatively potent it is since the PHB?
Has Barbarian out pased rogue?
Was rogue better than fighter in 2014?
Not really as far as I can tell. The biggest shifts were ranger, which everyone has differing opinions on. And Artificer, which is new, and debatably on the weak side of rogue.

5eNeedsDarksun

2023-07-18, 11:37 AM

Isn't this more a caster vs martial claim?
If we cover non-casters (qualifying half-casters as casters for this purpose)
Fighter
Rogue
Barbarian
Monk
We see among martials rogue isn't actually poor off and is one of the stronger options.

Now I agree that there are issues here, but it is a bit beyond small dice increases. I am of the mind it is more how martials classes scale (er, mostly they don't).

One of the things I realized after thinking about this a bit more is that martials can be buffed significantly by magic; specific to magic weapons Rogues benefit less due to having fewer attacks, and I think this has shown up at our table. As we get into late tier 2, early tier 3, a magic weapon in the hands of a fighter can do bonus damage multiple times per round regularly. I think this is notable and doesn't really show up in many rankings.

Theodoxus

2023-07-18, 11:50 AM

Makes me wonder how far the martials game could be stretched before it was declared 'broken'.

Like, Barbarian. Would it break things if their rages recharged on a short rest? Or, like PF2, after a minute?

Fighters, what if Action Surge was available every time they rolled for initiative? Or Second Wind was available only when they went Bloodied (below half hit points) and refreshed every time they were healed to max (by any means).

Monks, what if Flurry of Blows granted a number of attacks equal to your Proficiency Bonus?

Rogues, what if Sneak Attack could apply to any and all attacks that qualified, no per round/turn limit?

Compared to any class that has baseline spell casting, I don't think any of these would actually break 5E. It would in fact, make martials fun to play. Sadly, what none of them address is out of combat capabilities, which is actually where the classes lack definition and usefulness... but I guess we need some reason for people to still pick casters, right?

Skrum

2023-07-18, 12:21 PM

I'll say it. Rogues are weak. Weak =/= unplayable. Weak = weak. If a rogue and any other class is played at a similar optimization level, most - arguably all - other classes are going to get more bang for their buck.

More than any other class, the rogue excels at parts of the game that doesn't always appear in play. The classic trope of a rogue is a character that can sneak around, slip in out of places without being seen, slip in and out of combat like a ninja, and even engineer favorable engagements. That not only takes a lot of extra forethought on the part of the DM (for the sake a single character getting to feel competent!), it is not conducive to party dynamics. The Solo Rogue Show makes a great cutscene in a movie; it makes for a pretty boring interlude for the rest of the table.

And that's before we even get to spellcasters casually being able to out-rogue the rogue using 1st and 2nd level spells - but more likely, just straight up outplay them in every conceivable way by using even better spells.

IMO, the rogue needs one of two things (but probably a bit of both) -
1) the skill system needs to be fleshed out and developed to the point where a class that is good at skills is getting something far more valuable than it currently is. Please, people have said to me "yoU JuST neED to USe sKIlLs mOAR;" the table I play at uses skills all the time. I promise! But that doesn't change the fundamental ancillary place skills have in 5e. The rules for combat are pages and pages and pages. The majority of class rules are about what they can do in combat. Skills are a tiny fraction of that. Ergo, a class that specializes in skills are not getting a tool that is equal to being good in combat

2) the rogue needs more combat options. Cunning Strike is a great start, and I'm really liking that particular ability. But it needs to go further. Rogues need resources so they, like every other class in the game, have an option to "do the thing right now," whether that be damage, status effects, defensive options, ally support; any and all of the above. But rogues need it, badly. Having cooldown-style abilities means a character has more tactical options; they can rise to the occasion. Lacking them means the class just chugs along at a single speed. It alienates them from the rest of the table and means they won't shine at the same time or in the same way. I get the allure of classes having different strengths, and I'm not arguing against that - but I'm saying that each class needs to shine at the same time, but it's all in different ways. This is good game design. Bad game design is the rogue helps the party infiltrate the castle and get to the boss fight, but then just kinda twiddles their thumbs when the fight starts. I'm exaggerating for effect, but that's where I think rogues are right now.

Theodoxus

2023-07-18, 03:19 PM

There are at least half a dozen rulesets that I've pulled parts from that have far more exhaustive skill systems, skill tricks, skill feats, etc. than WotC has produced. I don't think WotC is particularly concerned with expanding, much less optimizing, the skill system. I highly recommend looking outside the WotC box if that is the desire.

If you're hard coded to only using official source material... well, you can certainly request it via feedback, but since they dropped nearly all skill support after 4E, I don't think they're gonna head back in that direction...

Witty Username

2023-07-18, 08:08 PM

I disagree that rogue abilities need to have costs associated with them. I personally prefer the conditional nature of rogue abilities, having prof bonus per long rest to sneak attack is substantially less satisfying in comparison to sneak attack with advantage, for example.

If I were updating rogue with new abilities, I would much prefer abilities that either set-up or pay off favorable conditions.

Much like the hide/cunning action + sneak attack we already have.

Like say, you have advantage against enemies with a lower movement speed than your own. Along with, as a bonus action you may make a dexterity (Athletics, Acrobatics, or Sleight of Hand) check opposed by a targets strength save, if you succeed until the end of your next turn their movement
speed is reduced to 0.
Or when an enemy makes an attack against you, as a reaction you may make a charisma (deception) check, until the end of your next turn any attack rolls against you miss unless they are higher than your result on this check.
And as a separate ability, when an enemy misses an attack against you they take damage equal to your sneak attack, the DM determines the most appropriate damage type for the situation

Dork_Forge

2023-07-18, 08:29 PM

Personally, I love the idea of big dumb rogues. I'm all for sneak attacks with mauls and don't feel it goes against any fiction. There are plenty of ruffian types with sorts of weapons in all sorts of fiction. To be honest I don't see why there hasn't been a subclass with an expanded weapons list yet, monk got one.

4th had a rogue build based on a "rattling" keyword which was essentially a menacing rogue inflicting extra effects though being intimidating and scary.

I don't oppose a more thuggish subclass being published, but I do think it should be the exception, not the default. Doing a bunch of damage with a maul screams more 'GWM' than it does 'Sneak Attack.'

That said I'll point out that Strogues are already a thing, one of my games has a Barbarian/Rogue MC that uses Str for attacks and functions very well.

One of the things I realized after thinking about this a bit more is that martials can be buffed significantly by magic; specific to magic weapons Rogues benefit less due to having fewer attacks, and I think this has shown up at our table. As we get into late tier 2, early tier 3, a magic weapon in the hands of a fighter can do bonus damage multiple times per round regularly. I think this is notable and doesn't really show up in many rankings.

A Fighter can apply a bonus more, but the Rogue gets more out of the accuracy bump by default. That said, I hardly think Rogues wanting magic items that aren't just weapons and armor is a bad thing.

I'll say it. Rogues are weak. Weak =/= unplayable. Weak = weak. If a rogue and any other class is played at a similar optimization level, most - arguably all - other classes are going to get more bang for their buck.

Based on... What? Weak in comparison to what yard stick?

If a player picks up a Rogue and another picks up a Barbarian and they both do no optimizing but bumping their main stat, how is the Rogue weak at damage?

If a Rogue that doesn't think and just attacks and moves around is compared to an equally mindless caster... How is that weak, when spell choice and budgeting is far more thought and optimizing to be effective?

More than any other class, the rogue excels at parts of the game that doesn't always appear in play. The classic trope of a rogue is a character that can sneak around, slip in out of places without being seen, slip in and out of combat like a ninja, and even engineer favorable engagements. That not only takes a lot of extra forethought on the part of the DM (for the sake a single character getting to feel competent!), it is not conducive to party dynamics. The Solo Rogue Show makes a great cutscene in a movie; it makes for a pretty boring interlude for the rest of the table.

The skill system leaves something to be desired, but the notion that the Rogue excels in something that doesn't always sees play just screams false. That could be a valid criticism regarding the Ranger and travel/exploration, but not the Rogue and skills.

I've never seen a game that doesn't use Stealth and Perception, Athletics can be opted into whenever the Rogue wants with grappling, never mind the commonhood of Sleight of Hand, Thieves Tools, and Investigation. Skills are baked into the game and for a Rogue to not get to use their skill-based abilities means that they chose very badly for their Expertise/profs and the DM is doing a pretty poor job that they're never relevant.

And that's before we even get to spellcasters casually being able to out-rogue the rogue using 1st and 2nd level spells - but more likely, just straight up outplay them in every conceivable way by using even better spells.

... Please show your work here. I have a feeling this will just retread the zomg Find Familiar line of thinking, but there is no way a caster is really doing what you're talking about, they certainly not doing it and then doing anything else.

IMO, the rogue needs one of two things (but probably a bit of both) -
1) Skills are a tiny fraction of that. Ergo, a class that specializes in skills are not getting a tool that is equal to being good in combat

Are we looking at different Rogues? Sneak Attack, Cunning Action, Uncanny Dodge, Evasion... All hallmark Rogue features that are applicable in combat that don't (necessarily for CA) involve skill use. The Rogue is very good at skills, but to say that is all they're good at is ignoring the bulk of the class chassis.

2) the rogue needs more combat options. Cunning Strike is a great start, and I'm really liking that particular ability. But it needs to go further. Rogues need resources so they, like every other class in the game, have an option to "do the thing right now," whether that be damage, status effects, defensive options, ally support; any and all of the above. But rogues need it, badly. Having cooldown-style abilities means a character has more tactical options; they can rise to the occasion. Lacking them means the class just chugs along at a single speed. It alienates them from the rest of the table and means they won't shine at the same time or in the same way. I get the allure of classes having different strengths, and I'm not arguing against that - but I'm saying that each class needs to shine at the same time, but it's all in different ways. This is good game design. Bad game design is the rogue helps the party infiltrate the castle and get to the boss fight, but then just kinda twiddles their thumbs when the fight starts. I'm exaggerating for effect, but that's where I think rogues are right now.

Rogues don't need resources as a base class. Making them the same as every other class in that regard just makes the game less interesting, not more.

And the whole more options in combat thing is arguably where subclasses come in, and do a pretty decent job overall as is. Thief using stuff as a bonus action, Swashbuckler Skirmishing, AT just getting spells, Soul knife and Phantom as a whole etc.

The only point I'd really change with Rogues is that their subclass levels are a mistake, 3-9 is too big a gap, it feels bad and leaves function on the shelf for too many games.

Witty Username

2023-07-18, 09:37 PM

I don't oppose a more thuggish subclass being published, but I do think it should be the exception, not the default. Doing a bunch of damage with a maul screams more 'GWM' than it does 'Sneak Attack.'

My complaint is personally less archetypes (although there are archetypes that benefits from it) and more it feels like it emphasizes the wrong thing.
In my mind, what makes a sneak attack is the tactics employed, the target being guard down or impaired and prioritizing patience or accuracy. Its not about whether or not a dagger, club, or brass knuckles were employed.
Now should some weapons be harder to sneak attack with than others, sure. But since this is a matter of accuracy primarily, I feel like this is more about proficiency. If the rogue isn't skilled with a weapon, it shouldn't get sneak attack. Like, say why can any rogue sneak attack with a longbow, but not a longsword? Despite them being proficient with one but not the other.
The other end of this is why not mauls, greatswords, or pikes? Well the are hard to catch someone unawares with but that is more talking skills (stealth, sleight of hand, etc) not attacks. And it is not like in the fiction or reality that a person cannot be practiced at precision with such weapons (champion fighter doesn’t have a restriction on improved critical hit chance on what weapons they use). It comes off to me more like all creatures have force fields that protect the head and neck but only work on non-finesse weapons. Especially when finesse weapons include whips.
And the last is what does it get us, not alot. It doesn't strengthen classic rogue archetypes, it strictly enforces one or two at the expense of all others.
Now, this is because I believe with absolute confidence, that things like GWM are not even all that interesting for a rogue. If I was more convinced of a mechanics issue, I might have a different opinion. Like say if monk had acess to guns with one feature and all monks decided to drop martial arts use in favor of gun, that implies issues with monk. I don't see similar being true for rogue.

In short, I don't see a good reasoning why not, and I see rogue abilities as much about mindset as choice of tools. An so it feels unnecessary, I would require proficiency as the check (since landing a headshot is a pain on your first day at the range, no matter who you are).

Amechra

2023-07-18, 11:22 PM

There are at least half a dozen rulesets that I've pulled parts from that have far more exhaustive skill systems, skill tricks, skill feats, etc. than WotC has produced.

Part of the problem with skill systems and D&D is that 3e gutted the Fighter and the Thief in order to make its feat and skill systems, and that entire part of the game never fully recovered.

Honestly, 5e would've been better off if it either acknowledged that it doesn't really care about mundane stuff and made all of the classes some flavor of spellcaster, or if it gutted the feat and skill systems and gave the Fighter and Rogue (and friends) their toys back.

Then again, I'm one of those heretics who thinks that 5e would be a better game in general if it was a bit more focused on producing D&D characters instead of Skyrim characters, so make of that what you will.

Dork_Forge

2023-07-19, 12:27 AM

My complaint is personally less archetypes (although there are archetypes that benefits from it) and more it feels like it emphasizes the wrong thing.
In my mind, what makes a sneak attack is the tactics employed, the target being guard down or impaired and prioritizing patience or accuracy. Its not about whether or not a dagger, club, or brass knuckles were employed.
Now should some weapons be harder to sneak attack with than others, sure. But since this is a matter of accuracy primarily, I feel like this is more about proficiency. If the rogue isn't skilled with a weapon, it shouldn't get sneak attack. Like, say why can any rogue sneak attack with a longbow, but not a longsword? Despite them being proficient with one but not the other.
The other end of this is why not mauls, greatswords, or pikes? Well the are hard to catch someone unawares with but that is more talking skills (stealth, sleight of hand, etc) not attacks. And it is not like in the fiction or reality that a person cannot be practiced at precision with such weapons (champion fighter doesn’t have a restriction on improved critical hit chance on what weapons they use). It comes off to me more like all creatures have force fields that protect the head and neck but only work on non-finesse weapons. Especially when finesse weapons include whips.
And the last is what does it get us, not alot. It doesn't strengthen classic rogue archetypes, it strictly enforces one or two at the expense of all others.
Now, this is because I believe with absolute confidence, that things like GWM are not even all that interesting for a rogue. If I was more convinced of a mechanics issue, I might have a different opinion. Like say if monk had acess to guns with one feature and all monks decided to drop martial arts use in favor of gun, that implies issues with monk. I don't see similar being true for rogue.

In short, I don't see a good reasoning why not, and I see rogue abilities as much about mindset as choice of tools. An so it feels unnecessary, I would require proficiency as the check (since landing a headshot is a pain on your first day at the range, no matter who you are).

What you're referring to is meant to be reflected in the conditions of SA, the need for an ally or advantage to represent taking advantage of those opportunities. The finesse property and ranged requirement are both (IMO) about class fiction (generally mauls and pikes are not what come to mind for rogueish characters) and keeping a lid on a scaling damage feature (mostly the former). The game just doesn't have the depth to it to achieve what you're talking about and gating something behind proficiency is pretty meaningless when proficiency is so laughably easy to obtain.

On what is gained mechanically by unchaining the weapon requirements: for a start a straight damage increase, you just get access to higher damage dice options, reach without trading down a damage die, PAM for a decent bonus action offering which is straight damage and another chance to get SA. GWM is just an example of what is possible when removing those restrictions, is that great on a Rogue in general? No, but Uncanny Dodge can allow them to stand in front a monsters and chain Steady Aim and a GWM strike, for example. Then there are the MC can of worms, like the Barbarian/Rogue MC I mentioned previously, that can now function as a normal Barbarian but with Sneak Attack damage.

And to your last point about guns and Monks:

We can only speak for the guns we have, they're just flat better than other options with easy-to-mitigate downsides. That is 100% about guns, not about Monks.

The only weapon req change I'd want to see to base Rogues is allowing SA with your unarmed strike, but I think that is probably best behind a subclass anyway.

Gignere

2023-07-19, 07:23 AM

What you're referring to is meant to be reflected in the conditions of SA, the need for an ally or advantage to represent taking advantage of those opportunities. The finesse property and ranged requirement are both (IMO) about class fiction (generally mauls and pikes are not what come to mind for rogueish characters) and keeping a lid on a scaling damage feature (mostly the former). The game just doesn't have the depth to it to achieve what you're talking about and gating something behind proficiency is pretty meaningless when proficiency is so laughably easy to obtain.

On what is gained mechanically by unchaining the weapon requirements: for a start a straight damage increase, you just get access to higher damage dice options, reach without trading down a damage die, PAM for a decent bonus action offering which is straight damage and another chance to get SA. GWM is just an example of what is possible when removing those restrictions, is that great on a Rogue in general? No, but Uncanny Dodge can allow them to stand in front a monsters and chain Steady Aim and a GWM strike, for example. Then there are the MC can of worms, like the Barbarian/Rogue MC I mentioned previously, that can now function as a normal Barbarian but with Sneak Attack damage.

And to your last point about guns and Monks:

We can only speak for the guns we have, they're just flat better than other options with easy-to-mitigate downsides. That is 100% about guns, not about Monks.

The only weapon req change I'd want to see to base Rogues is allowing SA with your unarmed strike, but I think that is probably best behind a subclass anyway.

One change I would make is to bake Elven Accuracy into the base class rogue probably as the level 11 damage bump equivalent of what all other martials get. Maybe even allow it to apply to skill checks as well.

Kane0

2023-07-19, 07:36 AM

Man it would suck to have to wait that long when you can ordinarily get it at like 4 or 8

Gignere

2023-07-19, 08:15 AM

Man it would suck to have to wait that long when you can ordinarily get it at like 4 or 8

Well but then you’re stuck playing some sort of elf.

stoutstien

2023-07-19, 01:08 PM

One change I would make is to bake Elven Accuracy into the base class rogue probably as the level 11 damage bump equivalent of what all other martials get. Maybe even allow it to apply to skill checks as well.

I played with that but it felt like a "win more" feature as with basic advantage and decent build you were already getting SA often enough to not feel bad.

Gignere

2023-07-19, 01:18 PM

I played with that but it felt like a "win more" feature as with basic advantage and decent build you were already getting SA often enough to not feel bad.

The worst thing when I was playing a rogue was fighting bosses that typically had higher ACs than level expectations. Any misses there just really sucked so having triple advantage would allow the rogue to punch up easier kinda like action surge and reckless attacks for fighters and barbarians would do during boss fights.

For easy fights I agree with you that the improvement would be marginal.

stoutstien

2023-07-19, 01:36 PM

The worst thing when I was playing a rogue was fighting bosses that typically had higher ACs than level expectations. Any misses there just really sucked so having triple advantage would allow the rogue to punch up easier kinda like action surge and reckless attacks for fighters and barbarians would do during boss fights.

For easy fights I agree with you that the improvement would be marginal.

Its why I ended up adding the 1/day "you hit no matter what" option. Every once in a while you will be in a situation where you have to deal with either high AC, or otherwise avoidance focused, foe so they have a trump card that completely bypasses it all.

Really nice when the enemy has a AC boosting reaction and the rouge just "nopes" them and nukes their spell casting feature for a round.

Theodoxus

2023-07-19, 04:33 PM

Then again, I'm one of those heretics who thinks that 5e would be a better game in general if it was a bit more focused on producing D&D characters instead of Skyrim characters, so make of that what you will.

That's the first I'd heard that, but then, I haven't played Skyrim. Back when 4E was being compared to WoW, that got my hackles up, because I was huge into WoW at the time, and didn't feel that way at all. But I guess it's inevitable that some bleed through will happen between CRPGs and TTRPGs. It'd just be super f'n nice if the cross communities didn't make the relative devs gun shy. I place the vast majority of the blame for why 5E ended up more retro-clone than innovative of 4E at the feet of the 'eww, it feels like a video game' crowd. 4E is way better at what D&D wants to be, than what the players think it is. And 5E is much the worse because of what was essentially a bait and switch.

What you're referring to is meant to be reflected in the conditions of SA, the need for an ally or advantage to represent taking advantage of those opportunities. The finesse property and ranged requirement are both (IMO) about class fiction (generally mauls and pikes are not what come to mind for rogueish characters) and keeping a lid on a scaling damage feature (mostly the former). The game just doesn't have the depth to it to achieve what you're talking about and gating something behind proficiency is pretty meaningless when proficiency is so laughably easy to obtain.

On what is gained mechanically by unchaining the weapon requirements: for a start a straight damage increase, you just get access to higher damage dice options, reach without trading down a damage die, PAM for a decent bonus action offering which is straight damage and another chance to get SA. GWM is just an example of what is possible when removing those restrictions, is that great on a Rogue in general? No, but Uncanny Dodge can allow them to stand in front a monsters and chain Steady Aim and a GWM strike, for example. Then there are the MC can of worms, like the Barbarian/Rogue MC I mentioned previously, that can now function as a normal Barbarian but with Sneak Attack damage.

And to your last point about guns and Monks:

We can only speak for the guns we have, they're just flat better than other options with easy-to-mitigate downsides. That is 100% about guns, not about Monks.

The only weapon req change I'd want to see to base Rogues is allowing SA with your unarmed strike, but I think that is probably best behind a subclass anyway.

While it would be more complicated to track, I think the best solution would be to allow any martial weapon the Rogue class grants proficiency in (currently only longsword would apply), any simple or martial weapon with the Finesse tag, and any weapon proficiencies granted by race. This would reflect both their greater knowledge of their stereotypical racial weapons along with Rogue training, while keeping any other method of proficiency from carrying over. Just because a Rogue gains adequate knowledge of how to swing a greataxe or poke with a pike doesn't mean they're good at finding the 'sneak spot' with them.

I could see a feat tax down the line, where a Rogue could sneak attack with any weapon their proficient with, if it was warranted, but not natively.

Kane0

2023-07-19, 04:47 PM

You could just have versatile weapons count as finesse when used in both hands.

Dork_Forge

2023-07-19, 05:29 PM

T
While it would be more complicated to track, I think the best solution would be to allow any martial weapon the Rogue class grants proficiency in (currently only longsword would apply), any simple or martial weapon with the Finesse tag, and any weapon proficiencies granted by race. This would reflect both their greater knowledge of their stereotypical racial weapons along with Rogue training, while keeping any other method of proficiency from carrying over. Just because a Rogue gains adequate knowledge of how to swing a greataxe or poke with a pike doesn't mean they're good at finding the 'sneak spot' with them.

I could see a feat tax down the line, where a Rogue could sneak attack with any weapon their proficient with, if it was warranted, but not natively.

Whilst I like this better than just giving them the ability to SA with any old thing.

You could just have versatile weapons count as finesse when used in both hands.

I do prefer this as a fix, if one must be applied.

Though I've never had a Rogue complain they want to use different weapons, personally.

Witty Username

2023-07-20, 12:05 AM

Though I've never had a Rogue complain they want to use different weapons, personally.

I have personally gotten a few of flavors of complains:
-character fiction, character is trying to emulate something from media that fits the rogue class fantasy but doesn't allow sneak attack (has mostly been anime when it comes up)
-confusion, mostly longsword, of weapons that rogues get proficiency in but for no apparent reason
- porting concepts from 3.5, which didn't have this restriction
- and spell attacks, which are beyond the scope of this conversation I think, but was also possible in 3.5

--
MCing for sneak attack with better weapons is a lot less of a concern to me than other people make it out to be -
Like for example
the Barbarian 2/ rogue 1
vs the Rogue 3
even if we grant the maul, the barbarian going from behind on damage, to matching
3d6 plus mod vs 2d6 + weapon + plus mod
and this trades of a bunch of things like subclass features, steady aim, cunning action etc. pick a different level and it mostly holds out, levels in another class cost sneak attack dice.

And notably other weapons don't have the restriction already, such as longbow or heavy crossbow, and what we tend to see, is MCs having some shift in weapon selection but that not being the primary motivation for the mix or even a motivator at all.
XBE +SS has been on the table for rogues since day one, and most rogues don't even use it, I doubt that PAM + GWM would be a game changer, let alone one strong enough to see a notable shift in player behavior

Dork_Forge

2023-07-20, 01:48 AM

I have personally gotten a few of flavors of complains:
-character fiction, character is trying to emulate something from media that fits the rogue class fantasy but doesn't allow sneak attack (has mostly been anime when it comes up)

Huh, what anime character are they going for? Fiction I get, but I also don't really care if players just reskin stuff to suit them.

-confusion, mostly longsword, of weapons that rogues get proficiency in but for no apparent reason

I get this, the longsword prof just seems like empty lip service to past editions.

- porting concepts from 3.5, which didn't have this restriction

I have some players from older editions, but they're not the type to 'port' specific builds over, I can see how this would be really problematic for some wanting to do that.

- and spell attacks, which are beyond the scope of this conversation I think, but was also possible in 3.5

I don't think that's really an issue, it only comes into things with AT and MCing, I don't see a real reason for SA to work with spells, maybe if the AT dropped some design space for it in a feature.

--
MCing for sneak attack with better weapons is a lot less of a concern to me than other people make it out to be -
Like for example
the Barbarian 2/ rogue 1
vs the Rogue 3
even if we grant the maul, the barbarian going from behind on damage, to matching
3d6 plus mod vs 2d6 + weapon + plus mod
and this trades of a bunch of things like subclass features, steady aim, cunning action etc. pick a different level and it mostly holds out, levels in another class cost sneak attack dice.

I'm not sure why you chose such a low level comparison, but sure:

Rogue 3 (Rapier): 1d8+2d6+3 = 14.5
Barbarian 2/Rogue 1 (maul and Rage): 3d6+3+2 = 15.5

So, actually ahead in fights that matter. Extra Attack obviously compounds this.

And the whole trading features thing... eh? I don't personally get or advocate dipping 1 level and Rogues are extremely front loaded, just going to 3 does what you actually named.

The example from my game is Barbarian 9 Rogue 6. He chooses levels primarily based on what his character has been doing since the last level up. He get's to pair Uncanny Dodge and Bear Totem resistances for ridiculous durability, gets the Expertises and get's Sneak Attack reliably thanks to Swashbuckler and Reckless. He already pumps out very nice damage without unlocking GWM or PAM. (the actual weapon die doesn't really matter since he TWFs anyway)

And notably other weapons don't have the restriction already, such as longbow or heavy crossbow, and what we tend to see, is MCs having some shift in weapon selection but that not being the primary motivation for the mix or even a motivator at all.
XBE +SS has been on the table for rogues since day one, and most rogues don't even use it, I doubt that PAM + GWM would be a game changer, let alone one strong enough to see a notable shift in player behavior

Because SS doesn't make much sense on a class with one attack and no Archery style. But there's no melee equivalent of archery anyway and PAM is a different beast to XBE. PAM would be higher damage and allows for Reach and GWM is mostly a thing about stacking in MC (although the Steady Aim/Uncanny Dodge slugfest is funny).

It's a damage boost no matter what and has the potential of interacting with stuff Sneak Attack was never meant to stack with. And then it doesn't even match the fiction of the Rogue as a whole. It just seems like more is against doing it than for it imo

Witty Username

2023-07-20, 09:57 AM

Huh, what anime character are they going for? Fiction I get, but I also don't really care if players just reskin stuff to suit them.

The most common (and most extreme example) Zabuza from Naruto, which is essentially an Arcane Trickster rogue with a greatsword.

--
Low level comparisons are admittedly a bit of a bias on my part, since I dislike delaying my character archetype.
But it also screens out some noise because the example is barbarian, as essentially any MC with barbarian gets into the past 6th level no real features thing (exaggeration, they get some decent stuff at 14 and 20)
But for the sake of
Barbarian 9/ rogue 6 is getting a 3d6 sneak attack
Rogue 15 is getting 8d6 sneak attack.
So to calculate
Barb 2d6+mod for a great weapon, twice, gets you to 7d6 + (mod twice).
Rogue gets 8d6 + mod and a weapon dice
As long as the weapon dice is about a d8, this puts rogue a d6 ahead of barbarian, unless the barbarian is raging, (+3 at this point). So because of rage and extra attack, the damage is slightly better but almost matching. This is hardly a dramatic shift in damage.

Amechra

2023-07-20, 12:53 PM

confusion, mostly longsword, of weapons that rogues get proficiency in but for no apparent reason

A Thief Rogue would actually be a surprisingly close to letting you play Link... except you're a longsword user, so you don't get Sneak Attack.

...

Thinking about it... the intent for Backstab/Sneak Attack is two-fold:

It encourages people playing Rogues to care about positioning/the environment, which is cool (5e kinda fails at this because it's a little too easy to get reliable advantage).
It encourages people to play with the small, crappy sneaky weapons that most people ignore — daggers being a d4 weapon matters WAY less when you're slapping 6d6 bonus damage on top of that (it fits with the image!).

The thing is, I'm not sure that the current model (where most of your damage comes from the massive bonus Sneak Attack gives you) is the best approach for this? I honestly think that a tweaked version of the playtest Paladin (yeah, really) is closer to what I want out of the Rogue — higher base damage and extra attack, with the option to spend a bonus action on juicing up an attack if they need to (or get a crit). It wouldn't be a perfect 1-to-1, of course, but I feel like that'd be nicer than gambling everything on one big attack every turn.

stoutstien

2023-07-20, 01:37 PM

A Thief Rogue would actually be a surprisingly close to letting you play Link... except you're a longsword user, so you don't get Sneak Attack.

...

Thinking about it... the intent for Backstab/Sneak Attack is two-fold:

It encourages people playing Rogues to care about positioning/the environment, which is cool (5e kinda fails at this because it's a little too easy to get reliable advantage).
It encourages people to play with the small, crappy sneaky weapons that most people ignore — daggers being a d4 weapon matters WAY less when you're slapping 6d6 bonus damage on top of that (it fits with the image!).

The thing is, I'm not sure that the current model (where most of your damage comes from the massive bonus Sneak Attack gives you) is the best approach for this? I honestly think that a tweaked version of the playtest Paladin (yeah, really) is closer to what I want out of the Rogue — higher base damage and extra attack, with the option to spend a bonus action on juicing up an attack if they need to (or get a crit). It wouldn't be a perfect 1-to-1, of course, but I feel like that'd be nicer than gambling everything on one big attack every turn.

SA is fine as long as you don't fall for the trap logic that everyone should be dealing X amount of damage per turn or the world implodes.
The entire point of the shift to everyone has damage built in was the occasional PC to miss or do something else and nothing seriously alters but for some reason the player base took that to mean everyone needs to del damage all the time or they lose.

Then the game design began to warp to this logic and here we are.

Theodoxus

2023-07-20, 02:41 PM

Whilst I like this better than just giving them the ability to SA with any old thing.

I do prefer this as a fix, if one must be applied.

Though I've never had a Rogue complain they want to use different weapons, personally.

Yeah, that's far more elegant and was something I already allowed Rogues to do with longswords. One of my favorite archetypes (looking at Witty's post) was the old Kobold Rogue from Dark Age of Camelot, that used two-handed longswords as their primary weapon style. Was sad when 5E came out, granting Rogue's the ability to use longswords, but couldn't sneak with them...

Amechra

2023-07-20, 04:55 PM

I haven't played Skyrim.

This isn't a "5e is too much of a vidja gaem!" thing — it's a joke about how Skyrim characters almost universally end up being either armored mages or stealthy archers if you optimize. :p

Which, to be clear, is an alright thing in Skyrim, since it's a single-player game — of course you want your character to be as broadly capable as possible! But it's less ideal for a team game that's more-or-less designed around playing a group of specialists.

Then the game design began to warp to this logic and here we are.

Eh, your complaint about people being too overly-focused on damage would have more ground to stand on if we weren't talking about a game where the amount of damage you deal is the default metric for how much progress you've made through combat, which happens to be the default activity that results in character progression. Which is one of the major decisions that WotC made when they acquired D&D and set about making theirs — 3e, 4e, and 5e are all openly combat-focused games in their own ways, because WotC operates under the (pretty reasonable) assumption that people like fantasy violence.

Contrast that with, say, early D&D, where the primary way of getting that tasty Character Progression Juice (it makes you grow big and strong!) was bringing treasure out of the dungeon, and every monster told you how good their morale was (AKA how easy it was to make them stop fighting without killing them). In that context... yeah, sure, obsessing about everyone dealing roughly the same amount of damage is pretty pointless.

stoutstien

2023-07-20, 05:27 PM

Eh, your complaint about people being too overly-focused on damage would have more ground to stand on if we weren't talking about a game where the amount of damage you deal is the default metric for how much progress you've made through combat, which happens to be the default activity that results in character progression. Which is one of the major decisions that WotC made when they acquired D&D and set about making theirs — 3e, 4e, and 5e are all openly combat-focused games in their own ways, because WotC operates under the (pretty reasonable) assumption that people like fantasy violence.

Contrast that with, say, early D&D, where the primary way of getting that tasty Character Progression Juice (it makes you grow big and strong!) was bringing treasure out of the dungeon, and every monster told you how good their morale was (AKA how easy it was to make them stop fighting without killing them). In that context... yeah, sure, obsessing about everyone dealing roughly the same amount of damage is pretty pointless.

The thing is <party> damage is somewhat important but a single action/turn isn't. After T2 damage isn't even a solution as much as a fall back and that excluding lateral solutions.

The party is going to win unless the do repetitively dumb things over the course of multiple encounters. so by hyper focusing on maximizing every turn for damage will waste a ton of effort and eliminates a large portion of potential content. Players and GMs need to resist this temptation or be prepared for the obscure experience that comes from it. It becomes a game of actively trying to play less.

A rogue, or anyone really, spending a turn not attacking shouldn't feel like a punishment but an opportunity.

Skrum

2023-07-20, 06:46 PM

The thing is <party> damage is somewhat important but a single action/turn isn't. After T2 damage isn't even a solution as much as a fall back and that excluding lateral solutions.

The party is going to win unless the do repetitively dumb things over the course of multiple encounters. so by hyper focusing on maximizing every turn for damage will waste a ton of effort and eliminates a large portion of potential content. Players and GMs need to resist this temptation or be prepared for the obscure experience that comes from it. It becomes a game of actively trying to play less.

A rogue, or anyone really, spending a turn not attacking shouldn't feel like a punishment but an opportunity.

I strongly feel you're not even talking about 5e DnD anymore. These qualities and "goals to strive for" are totally fine and that sounds like it could be a good game, but it's not 5e. Or 4e, or 3e. Amechra is right. Characters progress and gain power by winning combats. Fully half the class' main contribution to combat is dealing damage (as in, it's an expected part of their role and abilities that do damage take up some significant portion of their design space). Since DnD is also a team-based game, all the players getting to have fun and contribute to the majority of scenes and encounters is an important part of making a fun game that people want to play.

stoutstien

2023-07-20, 07:55 PM

I strongly feel you're not even talking about 5e DnD anymore. These qualities and "goals to strive for" are totally fine and that sounds like it could be a good game, but it's not 5e. Or 4e, or 3e. Amechra is right. Characters progress and gain power by winning combats. Fully half the class' main contribution to combat is dealing damage (as in, it's an expected part of their role and abilities that do damage take up some significant portion of their design space). Since DnD is also a team-based game, all the players getting to have fun and contribute to the majority of scenes and encounters is an important part of making a fun game that people want to play.

I never said that anyone should be left out of dealing damage. If anything I said that everyone has it built right. Even the non combat option deal enough to be worth the action when the occasion calls for it.

The point was that in a given encounter 1-2 turns spread out among the party that is spent on <not damage> shouldn't be seen as a fault of design when it fact it was expected.

But if you start treating ever action as damage and GM's start building encounters as more HP to be damaged you end up with a race of numbers that goes no where. All you do is take out huge swathes of content and label it not good enough because it's damage.

Theodoxus

2023-07-21, 05:45 PM

Y'all don't play with milestones?

Frogreaver

2023-07-24, 01:02 PM

elyktsorb

2023-07-25, 01:21 AM

I always loved SS on my rogue. Not for the -5/+10 but for removing cover and increasing range. Scout ahead. Shoot something far away. Fall back to party if it didn’t die. Worked great with assissinate feature as well.

Yeah, in the pre-steady aim rogue world, being able to ignore half and 3/4's cover, as well as shooting at long range not imposing disadvantage, is pretty nice. Even in the post steady aim world, getting to have advantage on long range shots, and ignoring those covers is still pretty good for making sure you hit every turn.

Gignere

2023-07-25, 08:12 AM

Yeah, in the pre-steady aim rogue world, being able to ignore half and 3/4's cover, as well as shooting at long range not imposing disadvantage, is pretty nice. Even in the post steady aim world, getting to have advantage on long range shots, and ignoring those covers is still pretty good for making sure you hit every turn.

I think it’s pretty campaign specific, on most campaigns being able to shoot at long distances is not really possible in most encounters due to being in dungeons that twists and turns. While ignoring cover is nice but roughly half the DM I played with pretty much ignores everything but 3/4 or even full covers. Even when the DM enforces cover rules Elven Accuracy combined with steady aim / bonus action hide, pretty much does the same thing as SS but you also get +1 dex out of it.

Witty Username

2023-07-30, 12:23 PM

Because SS doesn't make much sense on a class with one attack and no Archery style. But there's no melee equivalent of archery anyway and PAM is a different beast to XBE. PAM would be higher damage and allows for Reach and GWM is mostly a thing about stacking in MC (although the Steady Aim/Uncanny Dodge slugfest is funny).

Stacking in MC, is already a thing for SS. Fighter/rogue has most of what would be in play for barbarian and a few things that are above and beyond that.

PAM does have opportunity attack stuff, but beyond that holds no advantage on XBE (1d8 + 1d4 is equivalent to 2d6, and reach is good but but not better than having 30ft range), for a single class rogue anyway, for barbarian rogue it functions as a access point for a SS equivalent that barbarian can use with rage and reckless attack.

But this is the overall, removing weapon restrictions doesn't actually boost the rogue mechanically all that much, Barbarian/rogue does get a small bumb. This is primarily an opening of astectics options:
-Clubs for the street brawler (and fists but that runs into other weird rules)
-Javelin and spears flavored as harpoons for pirate types
-Axes for wilderness rogue types and the occasional horror movie antagonists

And this sits along with the rapier and dagger duelists, knife throwers and longbow snipers. Which still work as advertised. And are generally superior options still.