Rogue Design goals . L&L May 7th

[Stormonu]

I don't think this was really touched on, but one of the Rogue's best talents is AVOIDING danger.

The fighter has to rush the bugbear guarding the door. The rogue distracts it with a thrown pebble and sneaks past it.

The fighter has to time a jump through a pendulum trap he triggered. The rogue finds it before it goes off and nimbly jams or breaks the mechanism to get past it.

The fighter wants the treasure the guards are protecting, he's got to fight them. The rogue fast-talks the guards into loading the treasure into his wagon and if he's really good, the guards give the rogue their personal treasure as well to invest in his "sure thing" that'll "have a huge return on their investment."

The fighter leads an army into the fray, using his knowledge of warfare to bring his forces to bear as he seeks out the enemy commander to face in single combat. The rogue? He slipped into the camp last night under cover of darkness, killed the general in his sleep and took the concubines home with him.

The fighter's great when facing opponents who want your blood. The rogue has a few tricks up his sleeve to deal with foes, but his talents really rely on getting by without inciting trouble.

The wizard and the cleric? They can do things with magic, but it takes time, money and they can only do it so many times a day. The rogue? He can do it when he wants as many times as he cares to and it generally makes him money.

 

[Iosue]

If you need to disengage or run away, that is a VERY thin line to walk in terms of being bad at fighting.

No, I think Mearls is being straight up in this concept of the rogue as being bad at fighting. The rogue in this conception is not going to be able to go toe-to-toe with a fighter (or monster) of equivalent level. That is, [kenobi]from a certain point of view[/kenobi], "bad at fighting".

However, that is entirely separate from being "bad at the combat pillar of D&D". Here we have the rogue being able to deal overwhelming damage when surprising the enemy. In addition to that, notice that there are hints of rogues being able to do "controller" type effects (caltrops under the bugbear's feet will not likely do much damage, but would probably create a slowed-type condition, or a difficult terrain condition, or perhaps give the bugbear a penalty to-hit and/or to AC).

 

[Chris_Nightwing]

I much prefer the idea of the Rogue being for the most part defensive, or annoying in combat, occasionally dealing exceptional damage because they've waited for the right moment. This is one of the problems of tying combat advantage to sneak attack - hundreds of effects might provide combat advantage, so parties optimise to produce such an effect every round, or arrange flanking every round. It would be nice if the Rogue could do other, non-combat, things with their off turns that proved useful.

I think that for skills, they might also be rerolling dice, or be able to use a Take 10 mechanic better than other characters so that they are good with skills. It would certainly be much easier for tasks such as finding traps if there was no dice roll, and therefore no metagaming - you find traps hidden with a DC of X or less, if you find none then you have to guess whether there's a very hidden trap (as in reality). Perhaps they can approach such situations cautiously to provide a bonus (Take 12? Take 15?) at the expense of time.

 

[Steely_Dan]

I like the idea of a rogue slinking off for a round or two, then, bam, ganks you from behind.

It sounds like rounds will go quicker in 5th Ed (action and a move), so maybe not attacking every round is not such a big deal.

 

[Minigiant]

It seem each class is a trimmed down method of approach.

Fighter: Fair Weapons Combat and Physical toughness/survival
Rogue: Indirect Combat and Skill use
Cleric: Support and Healing spells
Wizard: Direct Magical influence

So a pirate is not automatically a fighter/rogue.

If your pirate swings to the other ship, takes the enemy shots, and cuts down the other crew; you are a fighter.
If you call you god to blow wind hard on the enemy deck and buff your whole crew before jumping across; you are a cleric.
If you sneak onto the other ship, wait for the rest of your crew to start the fight, and either cut the sails or backstab the enemy captain; you are a rogue.
If you charm the enemies into fighting each other while blowing holes in the deck with magic; you are a wizard.


Fighter is to Rogue as Wizard is to Cleric. Sway the fiight your way indirectly.
The rogue can't straight up fight an equal level fighter or combat monster, but they can cheat
Backstab/Sneak attack unsuspecting foes
Toss caltrops at approaching chargers
Lace a blade with poison and let it do the work
Trigger a trap and be the one who survives it
Explosives to the face
Sand in the eyes

Fight smart when you can't fight hard.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

Please stay away from auto-success.

 

[Plane Sailing]

Please stay away from auto-success.

Pretty sure you're going to be disappointed on this one.

 

[ForeverSlayer]

Pretty sure you're going to be disappointed on this one.

Strike 1!

 

[Gold Roger]

As always the caveat of insufficient data and vagueness, but it does sound like they move away from the slice and dice killer acrobat. I very much approve, the guy lacking awesome combat ability and making up for it with trickery is one of my favorites.

For those of you who don't want to lose the slice and dice variant, remember, they might give us the assassin pretty early in the circle, who might very well fit that mold. And there's a good chance a properly themed fighter or ranger might be able to do that, if there's no assassin.

There's no such alternate class fit for us sneaky gits.

 

[ExploderWizard]

We houseruled it so you could set up a Backstab by not attacking on your turn back in 2E, and the end result wasn't so much an effective combatant so much as one who sucked less.

I'll believe it when I see it, and Rogues being second rate combatants is not an acceptable outcome.

Well if the rogue is a first rate combatant in head to head fighting, where does that leave the fighter?