Best Rogue Special Ability

[Norfleet]

Actually, the BEST "special" ability of the Rogue is the one nobody pays any attention to:

Feat: A rogue may gain a bonus feat in place of a special ability.

As for the others?

Improved Evasion is rather nice, but really quite overrated, since rogues don't really miss reflex saves: It's a supersave for a rogue, boosted effectively twice, for being a rogue, and for having high dex...which is part of being a rogue. Evasion is already all/none, half/none for improved is simply extra, since you don't really fail anyway.

Opportunist: Okay, free attack when somebody else hits him. Nabad. Not as a cool as something like Expert Tactician, though. See "Feat".

Slippery Mind: This is a will-save thing. Will saves are not a save rogues will pass. If you didn't pass the first time, you're not going to pass the next time, either. If you actually manage to pass, then it wasn't worth worrying about anyway, but pretend you failed anyway. It'll confuse the hell out of the enemy.

Crippling Strike: Okay, -2 strength is cute, but not enough to make a huge difference unless he's already pretty overloaded. Your opponent is likely to croak from the sheer damage before the strength damage stops him.

Skill Mastery: Eh. It's not a bad choice if you're in the habit of using these skills while being attacked. Otherwise, see "Feat".

Defensive Roll: Okay, nobody mentioned this one. No surprise, because it's totally useless. If you're willing to burn a feat (See "Feat"), on this, you really do deserve to die.

Therefore, in my expert opinion on matters of rogue-ishness, the best choice is "Feat".

 

[Technik4]

Norfleet-

I think you are seriously underating some of those abilities. As far as Slippery Mind - its far better than the feat equivelant.

You need 11+ to pass (50% chance failure)
-With Slippery Mind (25% chance failure)
-With Iron Will (40% chance failure)

You need 16+ to pass (75% chance failure)
-With Slippery Mind (62.5% chance failure (I think....))
-With Iron Will (65% chance failure)

You need 20 to pass (95% chance failure)
-With Slippery Mind (92.5% chance failure (I think))
-With Iron Will (85% chance failure)

So at exteremely high DCs (where you need 17-20 to pass), Iron Will is better (although I think I speak for everyone when I say I'd rather take another crack at the dice than have a +2 to my roll). In any case, Slippery Mind lets you get over rolling a '1', whereas Iron Will does nothing for you in such a case.

Crippling Strike being "cute"? Are you kidding? Have you ever had a BBEG flee mid-fight? If you have, then keep in mind every sneak attack the rogue scored would be -2 to Str, cumalitive, which if not healed by magical means requires 1 day of rest per point. Thats huge. Get your rogue a Wounding weapon and you will go to town on enemy stats - no combat feat a rogue could take (that he hasn't already) comes close, imo. Also nice in combination with some feats from Song and Silence (which allow you to trade sneak damage for effects like Hamstring).

Opportunist can be at least as good as Expert Tactician because they both only work 1/round. Again, if you are into these AoO tricks you probably already have Expert Tactician (not a hard feat to acquire, even with Combat Reflexes as a pre-req). Having both is better, but I wouldn't turn down 2 rogue abilities for Combat Reflexes and Expert Tactician.

Skill Mastery can be huge for a rogue, even out of combat. In combat it is far more helpful than a +2/+2 feat, especially when you *need* to make a skill check (and a 9 or less is a failure). I wouldn't discount this in favor of a feat, especially if I was a rogue with a decent Int. Skill-enhancing feats pale before this, hence "Mastery".

As for Improved Evasion, I still don't think its up there with the ones I just mentioned. Its very good if you are a poor roller (although so is Slippery Mind and don't forget you already have Evasion) but I think the number of times a rogue is going to roll poorly on his reflex is less than the number of times a rogue is going to need to make a Will save (that controls or compels her).

Technik

 

[Norfleet]

Norfleet-

I think you are seriously underating some of those abilities. As far as Slippery Mind - its far better than the feat equivelant.

You need 11+ to pass (50% chance failure)
-With Slippery Mind (25% chance failure)
-With Iron Will (40% chance failure)

You need 16+ to pass (75% chance failure)
-With Slippery Mind (62.5% chance failure (I think....))
-With Iron Will (65% chance failure)

You need 20 to pass (95% chance failure)
-With Slippery Mind (92.5% chance failure (I think))
-With Iron Will (85% chance failure)

So at exteremely high DCs (where you need 17-20 to pass), Iron Will is better (although I think I speak for everyone when I say I'd rather take another crack at the dice than have a +2 to my roll). In any case, Slippery Mind lets you get over rolling a '1', whereas Iron Will does nothing for you in such a case.

Let's be honest here. You're a rogue. Not a cleric. You're never going to pass a will save worth diddly squat, because of how blatantly and obviously rigged it is, and it's a waste of good feats to even pretend you can. Your own probability figures do not look terribly favorably on this. Unless you somehow luck out and get a rogue with a solid Wis score, you're not going to pass when it actually matters, and if you do pass, it didn't matter. This area is a totally lost cause. I mean, come on, 75% failure rate? I've seen better odds in Vegas.

Crippling Strike being "cute"? Are you kidding? Have you ever had a BBEG flee mid-fight? If you have, then keep in mind every sneak attack the rogue scored would be -2 to Str, cumalitive, which if not healed by magical means requires 1 day of rest per point. Thats huge. Get your rogue a Wounding weapon and you will go to town on enemy stats - no combat feat a rogue could take (that he hasn't already) comes close, imo. Also nice in combination with some feats from Song and Silence (which allow you to trade sneak damage for effects like Hamstring).

Yes, yes, that's all very nice, but do you seriously think an L10+ BBEG won't have access to Lesser Restoration? A few shots of that will cure that up no problem. CS is, at best, cute. Certainly worth taking if you can't think of anything else, but not at the top of the priority list.

Opportunist can be at least as good as Expert Tactician because they both only work 1/round. Again, if you are into these AoO tricks you probably already have Expert Tactician (not a hard feat to acquire, even with Combat Reflexes as a pre-req). Having both is better, but I wouldn't turn down 2 rogue abilities for Combat Reflexes and Expert Tactician.
[/B]

Hey, I said it wasn't bad. Didn't say it wasn't worth taking, but can it compare to "Any Feat Of Your Choice"? Not everyone can guarantee that Opportunist is useful to them, but everyone could use another feat.

Skill Mastery can be huge for a rogue, even out of combat. In combat it is far more helpful than a +2/+2 feat, especially when you *need* to make a skill check (and a 9 or less is a failure). I wouldn't discount this in favor of a feat, especially if I was a rogue with a decent Int. Skill-enhancing feats pale before this, hence "Mastery".
[/B]

See previous. Hey, you do get to pick 4 of these things, you know. And my opinion of +2/+2 skill feats is one of open disdain, so that's not saying much. In my book, +2 on an iffy maybe makes it still an iffy maybe, and in the real world, iffy maybes are nos.

As for Improved Evasion, I still don't think its up there with the ones I just mentioned. Its very good if you are a poor roller (although so is Slippery Mind and don't forget you already have Evasion) but I think the number of times a rogue is going to roll poorly on his reflex is less than the number of times a rogue is going to need to make a Will save (that controls or compels her).
[/B]

Like I said, IE is overrated. Certainly a rather low choice on things for a rogue to burn a feat on, although certainly worth considering if the reason you happen to have 10 levels of rogue has absolutely nothing to do with high dexterity.

 

[Numion]

We are talking about 50% less damage only in very rare circumstances: 1) You were targeted by a ref save based damaging spell, and 2) you failed the ref save.

Excactly. It's like some small energy resistance that comes into play once every leap year!

NORMAL EVASION MEANS NO DAMAGE ON A SUCCESFUL SAVE!!!

Sorry, just seemed like a common misconception on this thread. Improved Evasion is worse than normal Evasion. Rogues tend to make their ref saves at higher levels (at least with the nerfed Spell Focus), Improved Evasion will see play less often than normal Evasion.

BTW, thanks for the rules info, Hypersmurf! You're da new Caliban!

 

[Hypersmurf]

BTW, thanks for the rules info, Hypersmurf! You're da new Caliban!

But... haven't we still got the old Caliban?

-Hyp.

 

[hong]

But... haven't we still got the old Caliban?

It's an Oedipal thing.

 

[Hypersmurf]

It's an Oedipal thing.

... do I want to know about this?

-Hyp.

 

[Sanackranib]

since sneak attack didn't make the list . . . I would have to go with improved evasion or skill mastery