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D&D 5E The Warrior, a martial option for rogues

bedir than

Full Moon Storyteller
Nothing about this feels Rogue like.

The Thug builds I've seen keep the element of the ne'er-do-well and amplify their physical violence rather than just tack on fighter stuff to the rogue chassis.
 

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Yes

Explorer
I'm not sure it's really necessary to have a more "warrior-like" sub class for rogues when you can just take a few levels in the warrior class to achieve the same.
 


Sacrosanct

Legend
Well here you go, do not reinvent the wheel:

-Make any sort of Dex Fighter.
-Give him the criminal Background. *
-Give him stealth if you want to. Give him appropriate feats.

(Read this one up it is one of the best Backgrounds and certainly the most versatile, it allows a Party to go without a rogue and still do all the rogue things.)

Pretty much. One of my favorite PCs is a halfling F/T from 1e. When I converted him to 5e, that’s pretty much exactly what I did, as you say. Feels the same as a F/T.
 

Herosmith14

First Post
Okay, I've updated this thing. I saw the agreement about ditching Fighting Style and giving them something else. I also saw the suggestion to shift the Combat Master ability down to 3rd, but that seemed rather powerful to me. Even with Swashbuckler there is a restriction that early, and for my Divine Sleuth subclass, I limited it to fiends and undead.

Anyway, here's the revised Warrior



Rogue: Warrior
It is not uncommon for rogues to appear in the military. Many are scouts, spies, saboteurs, and assassins, but not many have a large place on the battlefield. You do. You have honed your craft to a point where you can take place in the front line, next to the knights and cavaliers.

Martial Finesse
At 3rd level, you have trained with certain weapons to the point of mastery. Choose one melee weapon that does not have the heavy or two handed property. You gain proficiency with that weapon, and it counts as a finesse weapon for you. You get to choose another weapon at 9th, 13th, and 17th level.
If the weapon has the versatile property, it only counts as a finesse weapon if wielded in one hand.

Bonus Proficiency
At 3rd level, you gain proficiency in Medium Armor and Shields
Armored Shadow
By 9th level, you have become accustomed to armor heavier than most other rogues are used to. Additionally, the Dexterity cap on medium armor increases by 1 for you, and medium armor does not impose disadvantage on stealth.
Additionally, you gain proficiency in the Athletics skill, if you are not already, and you double your proficiency bonus for any Athletics checks you make.

Precise Strike
At 13th level, you have learned how to find and exploit weak points in your foe. While you are wielding a finesse or ranged weapon, you roll a critical hit on a 19 or 20.

Combat Master
By 17th level, you no longer need help to distract your enemy. You do not require an ally within 5ft of your target in order to use sneak attack.
 

FrogReaver

As long as i get to be the frog
Okay, I've updated this thing. I saw the agreement about ditching Fighting Style and giving them something else. I also saw the suggestion to shift the Combat Master ability down to 3rd, but that seemed rather powerful to me. Even with Swashbuckler there is a restriction that early, and for my Divine Sleuth subclass, I limited it to fiends and undead.

Anyway, here's the revised Warrior



Rogue: Warrior
It is not uncommon for rogues to appear in the military. Many are scouts, spies, saboteurs, and assassins, but not many have a large place on the battlefield. You do. You have honed your craft to a point where you can take place in the front line, next to the knights and cavaliers.

Martial Finesse
At 3rd level, you have trained with certain weapons to the point of mastery. Choose one melee weapon that does not have the heavy or two handed property. You gain proficiency with that weapon, and it counts as a finesse weapon for you. You get to choose another weapon at 9th, 13th, and 17th level.
If the weapon has the versatile property, it only counts as a finesse weapon if wielded in one hand.

Bonus Proficiency
At 3rd level, you gain proficiency in Medium Armor and Shields
Armored Shadow
By 9th level, you have become accustomed to armor heavier than most other rogues are used to. Additionally, the Dexterity cap on medium armor increases by 1 for you, and medium armor does not impose disadvantage on stealth.
Additionally, you gain proficiency in the Athletics skill, if you are not already, and you double your proficiency bonus for any Athletics checks you make.

Precise Strike
At 13th level, you have learned how to find and exploit weak points in your foe. While you are wielding a finesse or ranged weapon, you roll a critical hit on a 19 or 20.

Combat Master
By 17th level, you no longer need help to distract your enemy. You do not require an ally within 5ft of your target in order to use sneak attack.

I love the flow for the 3rd and 9th level abilities now. The 13th level ability feels good for a rogue but not overpowered IMO. (How do you intend for the level 9 ability that doubles athletics proficiency to interact with expertise?)

Level 17 is a little lacking compared to many other rogue abilities at that level. Maybe that comes from weighting the ability to sneak attack anything at any time a bit too highly. Sneak attack in 5e is really easy to get nearly every turn in 5e, especially with the right subclass choices and occasionaly delaying your action. It's easier for ranged characters than for melee ones (other than the swashbuckler) IMO.

Anyways I'd suggest looking at the other rouge level 17 features and trying to beef yours up a little to be on par with them.
 

77IM

Explorer!!!
Supporter
I like it a lot. "Armored Shadow" is particularly interesting -- the rogue can get up to 18 AC if they pick the right armor. I think I might also give these guys shield proficiency at some point but I'm not sure when. Probably 3rd level when they are picking their fighting style. Because otherwise I don't really see anyone taking Dueling style when Two-Weapon style is available, since Dueling doesn't let you hold a weapon in your off-hand, and +2 damage is super weak for rogues with sneak attacks.

I also don't like the name. "Warrior" is much too generic to be a rogue subclass. (In 2e, "Warrior" was the superclass that encompassed fighters, paladins, rangers, and barbarians.)

But I don't have a great alternative suggestion. The best I can think of might be something like "commando" to emphasize the military special forces angle. Your flavor text describes these guys as "standing on the front lines" but that's kind of a waste of military rogues. You want your strong, tough, armored people on the front lines, and the ones with Expertise you want doing some other asymmetric thing.
 

Horwath

Legend
Well here you go, do not reinvent the wheel:

-Make any sort of Dex Fighter.
-Give him the criminal Background. *
-Give him stealth if you want to. Give him appropriate feats.

(Read this one up it is one of the best Backgrounds and certainly the most versatile, it allows a Party to go without a rogue and still do all the rogue things.)

This.

Ask if you can trade heavy armour proficiency for extra skill proficiency and thief tools.
 



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