Improving rogue talents.

[1Mac]

I looked at Stream of the Sky's evaluations of rogue talents and came up with some intuitive and utterly untested suggestions for improving them. I relied on the PfSRD, and since they don't have the Ultimate Combat talents up yet, I couldn't consider them. Otherwise, if I didn't mention a talent, it's because I agreed with SotS's assessment, and if they were * or **, I thought they were helpless.

In a few cases, I make the case for keeping a talent as is, with a revised ranking. There weren't too many of those.

[sblock]Assault Leader: Unlimited use, grants Attack of Opportunity as an immediate action, instead of an attack.

Befuddling Strike: Penalty increases to -4 at 10th level.

Camouflage: Unlimited use. Instead of a bonus, Rogue may roll a Disguise check along with a Stealth check and use whichever is higher. Effect can't be destroyed. One ally for every three Rogue levels may benefit from this talent, using the better of the allies Stealth check or the Rogue's Disguise check.

Canny Observer: Instead of a bonus, roll twice and take the better result.

Charmer: Unlimited use.

Distracting Attack: Sacrifice 2 Sneak Attack dice per ally for whom the target is flat-footed.

Expert Leaper: Combine with the effects of Ledge Walker.

Fast Fingers: Unlimited use.

Hard to Fool: Unlimited use.

Honeyed Words: Unlimited use.

Ledge Walker: Combine with the effects of Expert Leaper.

Nimble Climber: May reroll with a +5 bonus. Also, may move up to half your speed while Climbing.

Offensive Defense: No change. This has apparently been errata'd so that the Rogue gains an AC bonus from Sneak Attack dice without "sacrificing" them, as discussed above.****

Peerless Maneuver: Unlimited use.

Positioning Attack: After hitting, may move 10 feet as an immediate action without provoking an Attack of Opportunity. Unlimited use.

Powerful Sneak: Bump to treating 1's and 2's as 3's. Does not require a full attack.

Quick Disable: Reduce the difficulty of disabling a device by one quality for the purposes of time.

Snap Shot: If there is no surprise round, the rogue gains the initiative bonus for the first attack of the combat.

Sniper's Eye: Instead of stated benefit, gain Sneak Attack on ranged attacks with 60 feet.

Advanced

Another Day: Either make it unlimited use, or get rid of the staggered condition.

Crippling Strike: Unchanged. It's as much about keeping your opponent from hurting you as it is about hurting him.***

Deadly Sneak: Made redundant by improved Powerful Sneak, described above.

Defensive Roll: May be used to mitigate damage from any attack or (HP) damage-dealing spell or ability. Mitigates all damage on a successful save, half damage on a failure. Still once/day.

Fast Tumble: Unchanged. I think Pathfinder tumble is easier than you let on. It seems harder to tumble past one or two foes, but easier to tumble past many more foes.***

Knock Out Blow: Unlimited use.

Master of Disguise: Roll twice on Disguise checks, instead of gaining bonus. Unlimited use. Probably shouldn't be an Advanced talent.

Redirect Attack: Unlimited use. Make a Feint attempt as an immediate action to trigger effect (target does not become flat-footed).

Stealthy Sniper: I always thought the Sniping rules were too harsh to be fun or useful. I'd make -10 the default, with this talent reducing the penalty to -5.[/sblock]

 

[StreamOfTheSky]

If you can believe it, I was actually being overly nice in my ratings, as I knew to not expect much. That even "grading on a curve" my ratings were as low as that is just sad. If I ever bother (with the final version nerfs from the playtest, I'm convinced it's unplayable, so why bother?) to rate Ninja Tricks, I'll be much more brutally honest in their worth. And...I guarantee you they'll still score better. Because the stuff Ninjas get is actually helpful. If only they were left with the ki to make much use of it...

My responses to your houserules (If something's missing, I agree and have no comment) including a few of my own suggestions for things you considered hopeless that i think have potential:

[sblock]Assault Leader: Does this also cost the Rogue his immediate action, or just the ally's? I'd limit it to once/round in either case.

Befuddling Strike: Why did I rate this 2 stars?! Dang I was soft. Your revision still might not be enough.

Camouflage: Being destroyed isn't much of an issue, it only takes 1 min. per person to redo. And it's odd for it to not be destroyable. I think the terms could be better defined, like how a cold burst somehow destroys it yet scorching ray does not.

Charmer: It might be ok unlimited use, but it probably should have some limits. In particular with diplomacy, I think this would be too good for a dip to snatch up as you've changed it.

Combat Swipe: You gave up on this, but I think all it needs is an extra line to say that you can now obtain Greater Steal without meeting the prerequisites and it's golden.

Distracting Attack: I think this one was fine as is, and you've made it useless for a simple Rogue 2 dip to help the actual party Rogue, which IMO is the main reason to take it. Benefiting multiple allies is nice and all, but overall I prefer the original to your revision.

Fast Fingers: I don't mind this as unlimited use, others might.

Guileful Polyglot: You gave up on it, I'd have it give a free language each Rogue level from then on, culminating in Tongue of the Sun and Moon at level 15 or something.

Hard to Fool: See Fast Fingers.

Honeyed Words: See Fast Fingers.

Major and Minor Magic: I rated these too well. I suggest allowing the Rogue to choose a new cantrip/spell each day as she likees, at a minimum.

Nimble Climber: Your version is an imporvement, but I would have this either a) let you reroll any failed climb check, not just ones you failed by 5 or more, at the same bonus and DC or b) Let you retain your Dex mod and dodge bonuses to AC while climbing.

Peerless Maneuver: See Fast Fingers.

Positioning Attack: I'd prefer if it was unchanged from what's written except made once/encounter instead of once/day. Or if you don't like encounter-based metrics, you can use it once on a given oppponent each day. And remain 30 ft and not an action cost.

Snap Shot: For the first attack? That's...awkward. I don't know how I would like this changed, but...not like that.

Sniper's Eye: Excellent, especially if using my rogue houserules to eliminate concealment as a SA-denying condition.

Stand Up: After a certain Rogue level (5-7 seems like a fine, arbitrary point to pick), you should be able to stand without provoking. At a higher level (11? I don't know), it can give the option to kip back up to your feet Shawn Michaels style as an immediate action, before you can even provoke an AoO from someone with Greater Trip for falling and the like.

Surprise Attack: If this extended through any possible surprise round AND the first round (even if there is no surprise round), this could be decent.

Advanced

Another Day: Unlimited would be too good. I'd say once/encounter or get rid of staggered if it's once/day.

Fast Tumble: Tumbling past a dozen foes means putting a dozen foes between yourself and your party... I don't really care if doing this is slightly easier in PF. Tumbling is still suicidal. And 1-4 foes is 95% more likely to be what you encounter in a D&D/PF game.

Hunter's Surprise: If this explicitly let you sneak attack something normally immune (including the % protection of fortification armor) and was once/encounter, it'd actually be awesome.

Knock Out Blow: An at will save or lose that can potentially be spammed 6 times a round or so is too strong, you need to rein this one in.

Master of Disguise: As your changes and not an advanced talent, or just simply make it a supernatural Disguise Self usable at will (CL = Rogue level) and keep it here. It's a level 1 spell effect and an 1800 gp item, it'd be far from overpowered. In fact, make it a swift action to use.

Redirect Attack: Your version is fine. Alternatively, as written in APG but once/encounter.

Stealthy Sniper: I don't mind this, just note that your advanced talent is now giving only a +5 bonus to a specific use of a skill, not even a full time +5. By level 10+, Skill Focus is giving +6 to every use of the skill...[/sblock]

Also, since we're at the stage of houserules, these are my current ideas for rogue to help establish them as the skill kings, make ranged SA viable again (mostly just reversing all the changes PF made), and reduce their MAD:

[sblock]Rogue (all changes also apply to Ninja):
- Gain a good will save progression.
- A Rogue gains a bonus to Initiative equal to half his Rogue level. Starting at level 8, a Rogue may choose (before rolling) to take a -10 penalty on his Initiative roll if there is a surprise round and he can act in it. By doing so, the Rogue gains a full round of actions in the surprise round. At level 16, a Rogue always gains a full round in the surprise round, without needing to take the penalty. At 20th level, a Rogue can always act in a surprise round.
- Every 3rd Rogue level, choose two skills. You gain the Skill Focus feat with these skills.
- Sneak attack works under concealment but not total concealment.

Relevant to Rogues but not directly part of the class:
- Blinking allows you to sneak attack.
- Enemies balancing without 3 Acrobatics ranks can be sneak attacked.
- You can sneak attack with splash weapons against a target you hit with the primary (not splash) damage.
- Acrobatics: Only contains Balance and Tumble (new skill called Athletics contains Jump and Climb). No longer a Barbarian class skill. Can be used to roll on a landing (DC 15) to reduce falling damage by 10 ft (you can still also jump down with the Athletics skill, also). Without 3 Acrobatics ranks, if you stand in an area that requires balance checks, you lose your dexterity and dodge bonuses to AC. Tumble DCs follow 3.5's rules (ie, base DC 15 and so forth, the enemy's CMD is irrelevant, etc...).
- Weapon Finesse: Any weapon that can be finessed can use the wielder's dexterity modifier instead of strength on attack rolls without need of this feat. This feat allows a creature to add his dexterity to damage with any light weapon or weapon with the finesse property instead of strength. You do not gain extra damage from wielding a weapon two-handed as you would with strength, and your damage is still modified by any strength penalty you may have (in addition to adding your dexterity modifier).
[/sblock]

 

[1Mac]

Hey SotS, thanks for the reply! I'll have time to respond in detail tomorrow. For now a few random thoughts.

-Like you, I'm cool with roll-twice, at-will. It sounds more powerful than it is, basically because unlike bonuses, it doesn't mean you can accomplish more difficult task, just that you can complete average-difficulty tasks with greater regularity.
-I forgot about iterative attacks (which I'm not a fan of and would probably Trailblazer-ize if I ever run PF) and Combat Reflexes for a few of these. Assume once per round in places where that may be an issue.
-For Assault Leader, I was thinking an immediate action from the ally alone, in response to a failed attack from the Rogue. In general, I wanted many talents to be used as often as possible, but still triggered by a check, or a limited resource, or a special circumstance.
-I'm not opposed to per encounter myself, but I was under the impression that Pathfinder and its fans were.

Anyway, thanks again! I like a lot of your suggestions. More tomorrow.

 

[SlyDoubt]

Also, since we're at the stage of houserules, these are my current ideas for rogue to help establish them as the skill kings, make ranged SA viable again (mostly just reversing all the changes PF made), and reduce their MAD:

Kind of unrelated to the topic but I'm curious why you think the PF team ended up making such changes?

From what I've seen you know a tremendous amount about PF (and I assume 3E) . In your experience was ranged SA an overly powerful ability in 3E? Probably at a certain point I imagine there were absurd builds due to the 'complete' series of books.

 

[1Mac]

Detailed responses

[sblock]Assault Leader: "Does this also cost the Rogue his immediate action, or just the ally's? I'd limit it to once/round in either case." Just the ally, and it costs him his AoO. Since there is a resource being expended to use this (AoOs, just not the rogue's), I don't mind this one being unlimited. Maybe soften it by saying that each ally can only benefit once per round, to prevent crazy synergy with a Combat Reflexes monk or something.

Befuddling Strike: It's a free penalty to an enemy's attack, with unlimited use, for doing what the rogue would do anyway. I thought the penalty was a little shallow at high levels, hence the boost, but I'm not sure I see the problem.

Camouflage: "Being destroyed isn't much of an issue...." It does make it weird, though, esp. if it becomes based off of Disguise as I suggest. Fireball doesn't mitigate other Disguise checks, why this one?

Charmer: "It might be ok unlimited use, but it probably should have some limits. In particular with diplomacy, I think this would be too good for a dip to snatch up as you've changed it." You might be right about double-rolling and Diplomacy. Maybe limit it to changing attitudes, once per day per target.

Combat Swipe: Steal is just a weird Combat Maneuver. I can't see anything that it does that Disarm or the Sleight of Hand skill doesn't. I could stand to be corrected, though!

Distracting Attack: I'd rather this talent be more useful to pure rogues than an esoteric rogue dip. What killed me about this was needing to sacrifice all your SA dice to give your allies what is effectively a small attack boost, which would be a silly decision at high levels. Still, if you like the dip, you could make it a sacrifice of either all your SA dice, or two dice, whichever is lower (i.e. 1 die at 1st and 2nd levels, 2 dice at third and beyond).

Fast Fingers, Hard to Fool, etc.: This could be rolled up into one talent, which the rogue can take multiple times, once each for one of a small list of skills.

Guileful Polyglot: "You gave up on it, I'd have it give a free language each Rogue level from then on, culminating in Tongue of the Sun and Moon at level 15 or something." But putting ranks in Linguistics does the same thing. A rogue dedicated to Linguistics could run out of languages fast. (tangent: Have you checked out the Linguistics rules in Trailblazer? If you can get over the idea that you can't learn languages after first level, they are kind of excellent)

Major and Minor Magic: "I suggest allowing the Rogue to choose a new cantrip/spell each day as she likees, at a minimum." That sounds like a fine suggestion.

Nimble Climber: "b) Let you retain your Dex mod and dodge bonuses to AC while climbing." This I like a lot, and I feel dumb for not having thought of it. If it's in addition to my expanded suggestions, it would put it on par with something like the combined Great Leaper/Ledge Walker talent I proposed.

Positioning Attack: If possible, I prefer unlimited use, limited effect, but your proposal is cool.

Snap Shot: "For the first attack? That's...awkward." I meant attack round, if that's what's confusing (iterative attacks, grr). Otherwise I think it fits the intended flavor of the talent.

Sniper's Eye: "Excellent, especially if using my rogue houserules to eliminate concealment as a SA-denying condition." Thanks!

Stand Up: This talent annoys me because in 3e its effect was simply an expanded use of the Tumble skill. I like your suggestions, though Jackie Chan-ing before being hit from prone seems like it should at least require an Acrobatics check.

Surprise Attack: "If this extended through any possible surprise round AND the first round (even if there is no surprise round), this could be decent." I like it!

Advanced

Another Day: "Unlimited would be too good. I'd say once/encounter or get rid of staggered if it's once/day." You may be right, though I suspect playtesting could be surprising. Being staggered for a round after using it sounds like quite a drawback.

Fast Tumble: Agree to disagree.

Hunter's Surprise: "If this explicitly let you sneak attack something normally immune (including the % protection of fortification armor) and was once/encounter, it'd actually be awesome." True, though that's a pretty bold reading of the intent behind the talent. I wouldn't mind it, though.

Knock Out Blow: "An at will save or lose that can potentially be spammed 6 times a round or so is too strong, you need to rein this one in." Yep, once per round, iterative attacks, mumblegrumble.

Master of Disguise: "...make it a supernatural Disguise Self usable at will (CL = Rogue level) and keep it here." Again, this somewhat changes the design intent, but it's kind of cool if you like quasi-magical rogues.

Redirect Attack: Again, it comes down to whether you like greater use, less effect or less use, greater effect.

Stealthy Sniper: "I don't mind this, just note that your advanced talent is now giving only a +5 bonus to a specific use of a skill, not even a full time +5. By level 10+, Skill Focus is giving +6 to every use of the skill..." Fair enough, but the two stack, so I'm not concerned.[/sblock]

Again, thanks for checking these out. To return the favor, I like a lot of your suggestions on the Rogue and rogue-iness. The one thing that gives me pause is the free Skill Focus feats, for being at once too much and too limited. Too much, because giving +6 bonuses away like candy is pretty powerful, and too limited because it will mean the same bonuses to similar skills for every rogue that gets built (Stealth, Bluff, Acrobatics, and Disable Device will be everyone's first choice, for example).

You could get at something similar by giving the rogue more skill points and gradually increasing the skill rank cap as the rogue gains levels (this is more or less what Iron Heroes did with its Thief class). Arrives at much the same effect, with more flexibility and less uberpower.