D&D 4E 4E Rogue for non-4E enthusiast

[hong]

This seems to be a very recently invented problem. Or at the very least, its an inversion of by far the more common complaint against 3.X.

My impression is that far more people are upset by the range of combat effectiveness which a player with system mastery can attain in build far above that of a new player than they are with the risk that a character might not be optimally combat effective. I mean, there are ways to build 3.X characters using only WotC material that do millions of points of damage in a single round. The fact that some hypothetical character A is doing a handle of points below the expected damage is a comparitively small problem. In fact, if we consider the sample characters in the DMG to be 'the expected level of combat effectiveness', I doubt much anyone was building signficantly combat weaker characters with some sort of group consensus to play in a very different way than normal.

Sigh.

1. The sample characters in the DMG are built using NPC gear.

2. Saying that compared to Pun-Pun, everything is small beans is like a Microsoft Knowledgebase article: true but useless.

The more usual complaint is that unless you had system mastery, classes like rogue would quickly reach a point where they could not hit opponents in thier expect CR range. This was especially true of 3.5 where the higher CR creatures had been refactored to take into account the unexpectedly high effectiveness of high CR characters.

3. Conflating imbalances between PCs and monsters, and imbalances between PCs alone, is another reason why Celebrim is not a statistician.

The more usual complaint against 3rd edition was I thought that there was an endless series of splatbooks and player options which had gone through insufficient playtesting, an endless series of new core classes and new PrC's designed to allow for character creation options not really possible in the core rules, and that these would synergize in unexpected ways, and that all this contributed to making the game too complex and not particularly fun at higher levels.

4. Not that splatbooks have anything to do with it.

How long do you think the math is really going to stay fixed if we have 30 base classes and 250 paragon paths? How streamlined do you think the rules will stay if the game is designed right from the beginning such that you have to expand into new territory to create archetypal characters of one sort or another?

5. Building in the potential to break the game right at the start is not a solution to the problem of breaking the game in 3 years time.

 

[kennew142]

D&D focuses on the combat. Every player should be able to contribute and have fun during combat. IMO, penalizing combat to balance a character's social skills is not the right answer.

This is the crux of the matter with the rogue class. IMO it is bad design to penalize a character class in combat in exchange for an increase in social skills. My campaigns focus on role-playing. Story and character interaction are the central elements of the campaign. Nonetheless, combat takes a considerable amount of time. At the levels we find ourselves in our campaigns, a single combat can easily take 60-90 minutes. What usually happens in 3e is that some characters are extremely ineffective during these periods. That's a pretty good stretch of time for some characters be sitting on the back burner.

The same thing could happen in social situations, except for the fact that most RP does not rely on die rolls, skills and feats. Sometimes it's necessary to resort to dice to resolve conflict that arises, but most RP is accomplished by players acting in character. I've never seen how the rogue, or other skill based characters, necessarily are better equipped to deal with these situations than are other characters. Just like problem solving, this is a matter more for the players than for the characters.

There is one issue that I honestly don't understand about this controversy regarding the 4e rogue. How did the mechanics of the 3e rogue make the character shine in problem solving and social interactions. If you're in the habit of resolving these situations with die rolls, I can see where the mechanics come into play. It's been my experience that the characters who shine in social situations are the ones whose players have good social interactive skills. Likewise, the characters who shine in problem solving situations are the ones whose players are good at problme solving. I've never seen anything in the mechanics of the class that would change this dynamic.

 

[kennew142]

Celebrim,

I've gone back and reviewed the thread and I still have to maintain that you have not explained how the 4e rogue will dictate how the character must be played. You've stated that it will do so, but you haven't explained how the new class limits the way you play it. If we're talking about weapon selection, the rogue has never had access to all of the martial weapons. If we're talking about skills, what is lacking aside from Diplomacy, Perform and Profession? I would agree with you on Diplomacy, but I thought Perform and Profession were no longer skills in 4e.

Personally, I can't see how the builds (purely optional) can dictate how anyone plays a character. If it's a matter of the rogue options, those are clearly combat options that allow a rogue to gain extra advantage from certain powers. No powers (at least of the one's we've been shown) require a particular option. They are simply enhanced by it.

I'm going to apologize for the part of my post that prompted the following responses. I engaged in hyperbole, which was glaringly inappropriate in a post decrying someone else for misconstruing an argument. It also distracted from, and undercut, my argument. There is no excuse. It was wrong. I'll try not to do it again.

None, but this is not in fact relevant to anything I said. It would only be relevant if I had claimed that 4E rogues would have no out of combat ability, and I can't imagine anyone thinking that I claimed that. Yet, here we are.

Define 'nerf'. I believe you are using a hidden absolute here. No 3E core class presents the option to forgo all hit points, BAB, improved saving throws, and other combat related abilities in exchange superior out of combat abilities. It would not be objectively bad design to provide such a class, but it might be useless given the premise of most campaigns.

Yes.

Ok, I'll give you a hint: 'completely'.

As for the following:

I never asserted that. I asserted that there would be no non-combat centric build.

All we've been shown are combat related crunchy bits. Bill Slavicek was pretty open about that up front. The builds are about combat. That doesn't mean that the character is all about combat. More than anything, I think this has to do with the campaign rather than the rules.

One point that the designers have made is that social interaction would be a separate system from the combat system. Your arguments make it appear that you haven't heard that, or are ignoring it.

You've probably made that statement four times in this thread so far. I'm beginning to think you don't know what the term means.

I most certainly do know what the term straw man argument means. The following tactic is pretty cheap. You've taken an entire paragraph in which I explain how your argument was a straw man, broke it up and then interjected comments throughout. The net effect is to not address the substance of the argument, but to reply to individual sentences and/or phrases instead of the totality. It may be excusable, given the hyperbole of my previous post, but I still think it's not a fair debate tactic.

I never claimed that the previous edition was just as bad, or worse. In fact I explicitly stated that I thought the new edition was worse. Hense, by compounding an existing flaw, a step backward because 3E had done a good job of reducing the problem compared to prior editions.
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No, I don't. That phrase 'straw man argument' that you are so fond of. Perhaps you should look it up.
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Or anything I actually wrote.
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Ahem.

I still think that you're miscontruing the nature and limitations of the 4e rogue by reading limitations into the class that don't appear to be supported by the text of the preview. If not misconstruing, then certainly reading negatives into the article that I don't think are present by a plain reading.

 

[Tuft]

The same thing could happen in social situations, except for the fact that most RP does not rely on die rolls, skills and feats. Sometimes it's necessary to resort to dice to resolve conflict that arises, but most RP is accomplished by players acting in character. I've never seen how the rogue, or other skill based characters, necessarily are better equipped to deal with these situations than are other characters. Just like problem solving, this is a matter more for the players than for the characters.

Different taste for different people, so this is my opinion:

Rules, dice and stats are there to enable you to have a character that can do things that you cannot do yourself. By having a high Strength stat and applying the rules, your character can lift weights you cannot lift yourself, or jump distances you cannot. (Not to mention to do magic )

In the same manner, by having social stats a reserved and silent players can have a character do extroverted social stunts they themselves never could do. They may need a little more prodding by the DM, and more help with getting the details filled in than in the Jump example, but it is not that far off.

By not letting people have support from rules, dice and stats in social situations, you are basically doing the equivalent of not letting a character carry more than what the player can lift - something that would not be a problem if you have a gaming group consisting of weightlifters.

I'm not saying that keeping your characters to your own limitation by necessity is wrong - I assume most LARP characters have exactly the lifting capacity of their players, but there should be something that enables you to go past those limitations when you want to. And there is defintively no reason to look down on people who choose to do so...

 

[Jim Williams]

My impression is that far more people are upset by the range of combat effectiveness which a player with system mastery can attain in build far above that of a new player...

I don't think this invalidates my position that a 3.x character can be brought to the table that is more a liability than an asset in combat. However, you do bring up several good points.

The hyper-optimized character can certainly be a problem if the system master is an egomaniac, for example, or if the other players resent the rules accumen of the system master. Additionally, the continual stream of new source material creates a perpetual scope creep to the game that can be financially burdensome and add unnecessary complexity to the game. These two situations (the system master and the scope creep) can create a situation wherein one player's grasp of the gamesystem accelerates his potential for glory far beyond that of his peers.

Setting aside personality conflicts, I know I would rather deal with a character that lays down the law with extreme prejudice over a character that brings little to no combat ability to the table. At best, the system master can serve as a valuable mentor and create an atmosphere of friendly competition amongst the players. At worst, the ineffectual character will be dead weight in combat and could be indirectly responsible for character death or a party wipe.

Given that we have not yet seen the finished product, I would still be surprised if all of the major heroic fantasy character archetypes that support the theme of D&D are not covered in some fashion in the initial release. Regardless, 4E is eventually going to grow to a level of complexity beyond its inital boundaries. I have no doubt the number crunchers will take full advantage of the new systems, but it will be an improvement if the new edition can guarantee combat options to every character.

 

[Ahglock]

For the love of all that in unholy please stop using math. I took statistics because it was the quickest way out of math while still getting a degree. I hate math with a passion.

 

[Carnivorous_Bean]

The idea that INT is once again a dump stat for most characters makes me sick.

I may be misinterpreting here, but I think that INT as a dump stat for ROGUES is what we were shown in the preview. Not 'most characters.' Please bear in mind that this is a preview of one class, not every class in the book. Saying that all character classes will have INT as a dump stat because one character class does is kind of like saying that because one Irishman has a wart on the end of his nose, every other Irishman must, too.

 

[DonTadow]

Wow, well If i was on the fence about 4e, I"m certainlly leading more to monte's 3.75 now. Auto HP, Auto skills, and it seems that the role playing part of the game has been sucked out. I must apologize, I really defended 4e in the beginning and swore they weren't going the mmo route, but I can't shake that feeling.

It sounds like 4e has taken this game pre 1st edition making it a pure combat board game that you have the option of role playing at.

This fits the mmo environment fine as there is no role playing in those games.

 

[Mustrum_Ridcully]

In the same manner, by having social stats a reserved and silent players can have a character do extroverted social stunts they themselves never could do. They may need a little more prodding by the DM, and more help with getting the details filled in than in the Jump example, but it is not that far off.

By not letting people have support from rules, dice and stats in social situations, you are basically doing the equivalent of not letting a character carry more than what the player can lift - something that would not be a problem if you have a gaming group consisting of weightlifters.

I think having rules for social interaction of PC and NPCs is important. But to play a "social" character effectively, there are still certain things that the player must bring to the table
For example:
- Taking initiative. It's not enough to wait till you accidently stumble into a social situation. You must really aim for it. This can be a problem for a "shy" player.
- You need to able to formulate your own goals and see how they might contrast with that of the NPCs, and how they can be adjusted to fit together. It's true that a good Diplomacy roll might enable you to sugest a deal to an NPC that's not as good as it could be, but if you don't offer anything reasonable, the check will become so much harder, and at some point, your skills can only fail you.

A similar thing is true in combat. All the combat power in the world can't help you if you don't know how to apply it. If the Fighter is avoiding combat, or is using a weapon not optimal for the situation or his skill, or is no actively keeping enemies busy to avoid them killing the wizard, the combat will become a lot harder. Maybe he survives due to uber-stats, but if the rest of the party is dead, he was hardly effective...

 

[AllisterH]

The hyper-optimized character can certainly be a problem if the system master is an egomaniac, for example, or if the other players resent the rules accumen of the system master. Additionally, the continual stream of new source material creates a perpetual scope creep to the game that can be financially burdensome and add unnecessary complexity to the game. These two situations (the system master and the scope creep) can create a situation wherein one player's grasp of the gamesystem accelerates his potential for glory far beyond that of his peers.

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Actually, I disagree with blaming splatbooks for powercreep. In WOTC's later monster manuals, the creatures got progressively tougher by lowering of their CRs than what their CRs would've been in earlier manuals.

However, this had nothing to do with splatbooks but with the fact that WOTC designers realized that the PHB itself was the biggest source of power creep. Compare say a sample character from the PHB to what an Optimized version of that character using the same core only material.

The difference in effectiveness is staggering. Much more so that say an average character using PHB + PHB II when compared to an average character using only the PHB.