I keep struggling to find ways of offering useful suggestions, but the ideas just aren't meshing. The idea of making a rogue just to boost it's already formidable damage is just a weak source of inspiration.
A Strength rogue is interesting, but does run afoul into barbarian multiclassing territory.
And, really, there's very little stopping you from making a Strength rogue already. You can take rapier and hit with it off strength. The problem is Dex is just better than Strength, boosting AC, the most useful save in the game, initiative, and a robust skill list. Especially while limited to light armour.
A Str focused rogue is always going to be MAD as heck, and thus inoptimal.
When considering a Str rogue, it feels less like it should be about extra damage and more about being tough and intimidating. The thug or brute.
Using Str instead of Charisma for Intimidation. Being able to frighten foes. Demoralize on a hit. Being able to take a hit and resist some damage. That said, being able to sneak attack with clubs and maces (possibly adding it's Str bonus as extra damage with those weapons), might also be nice; this last bit would give a small spike of damage, but it'd almost be offset by the smaller damage dice of the d6 mace vs a couple d8 rapiers and the fact the class needs another decent Ability Score.
Still musing on the idea of a "Master Thrower" rogue build, that focuses on hurlling lots of daggers. Or stones for halflings, or axes for dwarves. Just lots of projectiles.
Again, likely as simple as allowing them to draw a weapon with the action used to throw it, and throwing an extra off-hand dagger whenever they take the Attack action. This could/should work with the existing two-weapon fighting rules where you can make a bonus off-hand attack, so the rogue can huck three daggers or two and disengage or do another stupid rogue trick. Maybe also knocking up the range of thrown weapons.
(But this likely wouldn't bring the rogue up above the maximum DPR of a greatweapon fighter with feats. But would make the rogues average damage higher by reducing the chances of misses).
However, higher level features for a "master thrower" subclass feel like they should be focused around trick shots more than damage.
This is an exaggeration, particularly in terms of the comparisons. Instead of, “gotta be careful about how far such a concept goes in execution”, you seem to jump straight to “the extremes are bad so the whole type of concept can’t work”.
Kinda. But right in the OP you talk about dropping Expertise for more damage.
I can't support that design where you get to pick-and-choose what pillar your options support.
It'd be equally terrible if you could drop all your combat powers for social and exploratory options.
if I’d suggested trading thieves cant for fighting styles, this would be an excellent point. Ribbons are abilities that have no impact on the balance analysis. Expertise has a huge impact on the balance analysis.
Expertise is a great ability in the social and/ or exploration pillars. And depending on the skill (Acrobatics) it can be somewhat useful in combat. But dropping it for more damage is the kind of design I really, really don't want to see in 5e.
the idea is to let rogues use staves, Spears, some polearms, longsword, etc. Sneak Attack is a silly name for the ability that only sticks around because of tradition, anyway. It never requires sneaking. It’s just as sensible with a greataxe as with a crossbow. The reason to not allow any given weapon is tradition, expectation hang ups, and balance.
Sneak attack was backstab before 3e, which did require sneaking.
I remember having massive minotaur rogue barbarians "sneak attacking" with greataxes in 3e, and it was always silly. I'd rather avoid that returning.
There's also not a lot of flavour behind the "rogue" with a giant two-handed glaive. What's the story there?
Plus, what's the benefit of granting rogues longswords? They can already use rapiers, which are comparable in damage.
“it needs to exclude polearms” or “this needs to not allow GWM or PAM” are great suggestions I can take away from this. Thanks. I’ll probably try to draft out soemthing that allows the weapons but not the feats, or restrict the weapons more than I’d like for balance sake if I can’t get a good draft that way.
I can't think of a way to phrase it without explicitly calling out the feats, which would be awkward.
I genuinely don’t understand this comment. I’d love it if you could elaborate. I specifically suggested a subclass that is focused on being an excellent swordsman, with nothing of flair or panache. I assumed it was obvious that I meant no mechanical support in the subclass for any greater charm, flourishy stuff, etc, than exists in the base class. This could easily be a tougher more athletic subclass, more like a melee focused scout than a relfavored swashbuckler.
I meant that, like 4e, some of the flavour of names hangs very loose on the bones of class features.
You can easily take the swashbuckler and rename its abilities and play it very differently. There's nothing that says you have to maintain the flavour of the subclass for your character.
So I don't see much need for a brand new subclass that is the swashbuckler only it's "about ruthless efficacy rather than flair and panache" when it takes 10 seconds to just tweak the swashbuckler.
Fancy Footwork becomes Quick Retreat and Rakish Audacity becomes Cruel Confidence. Elegant Maneuver becomes Maximum Effort.
The only real problem is Panache. But it's a 5-second fix to swap Persuasion for Intimidation and have charmed creatures not regard you as a "friendly acquaintance" but are instead "cowed into servility".
Maybe I was unclear in the OP, though, about an important thing. The ideas in the OP aren’t a draft of a subclass. They’re a set of lists of concepts for potential features to give to one or more subclasses focused on concepts that want for brutal, visceral, top shelf, damage output, in order for their mechanics to meet their story, and for players that want the rogue class as a whole to be more a little bit more combat focused.
Which feels more like it should just be an optimization guide. "Here's how you build a kickass rogue".
I guess I don't see the point, really.
The rogue is good at damage. Really good. It's not number #1, but there has to be a second place. There's no way to get perfect parity between all the classes, and designing something explicitly to slip it into the #1 slot is just pure unfiltered power creep.
Because if you do that for the rogue, why not also then do it for the ranger or the warlock or the barbarian. But then the rogue's not #1 anymore so you need to boost it as well.
