Rogues: essential class or sacred cow?

[Brennin Magalus]

It's the "off we go to the depths of the dangerous unknown tunnels; let's bring along a member of the clergy" that loses me.

You forget Brother Maynard.

 

[gizmo33]

However, if we use your definition of Monopoly and apply it to D&D as "a game that evokes ideas and themes fantasy works", it's certainly possible that discarding some wargame-ish concepts from it in favor of rules that would better represent archetypes from those fantasy works, instead of being designed to model 4 battlefield specialist with a thin fantasy disguise. Keep that last "possible" at whatever value it has, but please don't ask me this time to write a whole ruleset to prove my point.

Well we'd have to use my "definition" wouldn't we? Why not use yours? Even so, mine seems inadequate (which would explain why I never intended it to be a definition) because it doesn't clearly distinguish between DnD and a Hildebrant painting of a dragon, for instance.

You're "thin fantasy disguise" statement also seems to be hinting at some idea I can't quite identify. Disguise is somewhat charged language that implies some motive - but I can't figure out what that is. I don't see any clear reason to suppose that any DnD game designer has been trying to "disguise" anything. Besides, how "thin" is the diguise of a fighter who kills a dragon with a sword? What isn't fantasy about DnD?

The core activity of DnD is the dungeon crawl, which has it's foundation firmly in wargaming and NOT in fantasy literature. If DnD is supposed to model literature, then what literature? All possible fantasy? And why are there so many more "dungeons" in DnD than there are in books?

Finally - I think one of the huge factors missing in your reasoning of "DnD as model of literature" idea is that DnD is a game, and as such there are certain "game issues" to take into account. For example, although "side kick" is an archetype in literature, most people who play DnD don't want to play one. "Playable" is something that DnD has to take into account that's not present in literature - another reason why my definition would be insufficient. You wouldn't be able to simulate any story that has only a single main protagonist - and there are plenty of those in the fantasy genre.

Also, DnD is a resource management game (natural outgrowth of wargame, NOT story-based game) and so certain things that work nice in literature (ex. Conan not wearing armor during a particular adventure) doesn't work out quite as well when you don't have writer's license to fall back on.

 

[Owldragon]

For the question of whether the rogue's place can be filled by other classes, I point to Arcana Evolved. Monte Cook has said in interviews that the classes there are designed to divide up party roles using a different set of archetypes. Instead of fighters, we have unfettered for lightly-armored swashbucklers and warmains for heavily armed tanks. Indeed, one of my favorite things about AE is that it allows any spellcaster to fill the role of healer - so no more cries of "Somebody has to play a cleric!"

If you don't like the rogue, I say just do what Arcana Evolved does - let anyone search for traps, and introduce other classes to fill the role. AE introduces a new skill-monkey class (the akashic) and a mobile fighter-type (unfettered). Both can be a rogue-like characters by choosing the appropriate skills, and gain access to sneak attack as one of their special abilities (although akashics have a choice whether to take sneak attack).

The only drawback is for those who really love the sneak attack ability, as both AE classes only give +1d6 sneak attack every four levels. I've considered allowing rogues in the next AE game I run, but in a role as secret agents / assassins. Or I may just let people play ninjas and say that's close enough.

 

[Pickaxe]

The purpose of Monopoly is to provide a ruleset for modelling the things that you can do in Monopoly. Isn't this the basic nature of a game? Most games are not simulators of anything - except maybe Hungry Hungry Hippo.

Actually...

The history of Monopoly can be traced back to the early 1900s. In 1904, an inventor named Elizabeth Magie patented a game through which she hoped to be able to explain some of the economic ideas of Henry George.

Or you could go with the Hasbro-endorsed version where Charles Darrow invents it in the thirties to stick it to The (Rich) Man.

Let's follow this Monopoly analogy. Monopoly is a game based on economics, giving players a chance to emulate landlords. Like D&D, it is also its own genre, using a board with spaces, advancing pieces using die rolls, etc. We could identify many games that use these mechanics (though I can't say that they originated with Monopoly); furthermore, there are a multitude of variations on Monopoly, though all preserve elements that are perhaps essential (e.g., the mechanics) and others that might be better considered to be sacred cows (e.g., "Free Parking", identifying the board spaces as places, etc.). I don't think people who play Monopoly: Philadelphia Eagles Version are thinking about the economic inspirations for the game, but they would probably have relatively strong feelings about the role of "Jail" or whether they can still be the racecar or the thimble.

D&D is a game ultimately based on "Sword and Sorcery" fantasy, giving players a chance to emulate heroes of history, myth, and fiction. D&D is its own genre, inasmuch as many aspects of the game are identified with D&D, including polyhedral dice, six ability scores, hit points, and (among other classes) the rogue. Some elements are essential, in that if you remove them, D&D is no longer a "Sword and Sorcery" fantasy RPG. Others are only essential as identifiers of D&D, such as polyhedral dice and hit points; these, I would argue, are sacred cows. Is the rogue an essential part of the fantasy genre that underlies D&D, or is it just so identified with D&D itself that we can't think of playing D&D without it (and so it endures with each new edition)?

World of Warcraft illustrates why I wonder about the rogue. WoW is clearly a game inspired by the same fantasy genre that inspired D&D, and it (like most computer games of this genre) just as clearly has drawn many of its features, including its core mechanics as well many of the races and character classes, from D&D itself. The WoW rogue is a light-armored sneak who typically wields two-weapons and is mainly characterized by being able to dish out lots of damage. Is this the D&D rogue that we've discussed here? Not really; MMORPGs still haven't found a way to code a "dashing scoundrel," so classes or archetypes that rely heavily on roleplaying are beyind them. Yet, they still feel compelled to include the rogue. Why? Because it's in D&D, and if you want to look like D&D, you need all of its icons, including the rogue. Can't accommodate the roleplaying nature of the rogue? Well, just let them sneak attack all day long, and make opening locked boxes a minor trick that they can do.

--Axe

 

[gizmo33]

I don't think people who play Monopoly: Philadelphia Eagles Version are thinking about the economic inspirations for the game, but they would probably have relatively strong feelings about the role of "Jail" or whether they can still be the racecar or the thimble.

I was just about to post "what about the Lord of the Rings edition of monopoly?" but you beat me to it. I can't think of anything farther away from capitalism than Lord of the Rings other than maybe "Monopoly: Communist edition" or something like that. Something tells me that if the history you cite were fundemental to the definition of the game, there wouldn't be such variants. So when you remove the history, which IMO is of questionable usefulness, how to you arrive at a "definition" of monopoly? IMO it is what it is - by nature a circular definition, but so is the definition for the word "apple."

Ultimately (and the point of my Monopoly example), I suspect that a definition of DnD in anything other than circular terms stands a good chance of not really resembling the game. Then again I don't have much to work with as a definition for DnD that isn't just innuendo at this point.

D&D is a game ultimately based on "Sword and Sorcery" fantasy, giving players a chance to emulate heroes of history, myth, and fiction.

Although you go on to clarify, and this sentence in itself isn't really the crux of your argument, there's a question about how much of DnD is really supposed to be emulating anything. Just look at the "Giants in the Earth" articles in early Dragon magazine - hardly any of the characters statted up are single classed. Had DnD been anything close to a "literature simulator", how could it have done such a poor job in deciding on classes? In fact, even when multiclassing was added later, the classes of the characters in the articles often break those rules as well. So IMO it only gives players a chance to emulate heroes in the broadest sense, and in terms of design IMO the priority has always been given to the game vs. any kind of emulation. When DnD has tried to emulate any given work of fiction in the past, it has often had to break it's own rules to do so.

 

[Stalker0]

For the question of whether the rogue's place can be filled by other classes, I point to Arcana Evolved. Monte Cook has said in interviews that the classes there are designed to divide up party roles using a different set of archetypes. Instead of fighters, we have unfettered for lightly-armored swashbucklers and warmains for heavily armed tanks. Indeed, one of my favorite things about AE is that it allows any spellcaster to fill the role of healer - so no more cries of "Somebody has to play a cleric!"

Its maybe ironic that Monte also said the rogue was the most solid class he had worked on, the one class he felt needed no work whatsoever.

If your going to drop rogue, you better give all of those class skills and skill points to someone else. If your going to drop fighter, better give all of those feats to someone else, because both things players want.

Some players want to be the skill master. What other class would they play? Rangers got the stealth stuff down, but they lack the traditional "thieving skills." The bard has the social aspects, but not the full monty elsewhere. This is the archetype the rogue fulfills.

Further, not everyone wants to be a full blown barbarian. What about the guy who started in a barbarian tribe but then came to civilization and joined the army? Classic barbarian/fighter. Fighters and rogues are great ways to take the full blown archetype of barbarian, ranger, paladin, bard and push them in a slightly different direction. To me, that's pretty essential.

 

[Doug McCrae]

D&D is a game ultimately based on "Sword and Sorcery" fantasy

Lord of the Rings, surely the primary source, is high fantasy rather than sword & sorcery.

D&D is its own genre, inasmuch as many aspects of the game are identified with D&D, including polyhedral dice, six ability scores, hit points, and (among other classes) the rogue.

It's more than just the rules artefacts, it's the game universe. The adventuring party along with a particular combination of party roles especially the cleric healer, PC races that look like the Fellowship Of The Rings, a plethora of monsters and magic items, flash-bang Vancian magic, long dungeon delves and fight after fight after fight. If you read a novel that had all those elements would you say "That's sword & sorcery" or would you say "That's D&D"? The D&D genre doesn't have to be confined to a game only.

 

[Tonguez]

Lord of the Rings, surely the primary source, is high fantasy rather than sword & sorcery.

Nope primary source would be Sword & Scorcery (see how many times Conan does a dungeon tower crawl) with heavy addition of High Fantasy (per races and spellcasters). Admittedly LoTR is perhaps the first time a fanstasy novel focussed on a 'Party' rather than a single protagonist and supporters, but I raised that point with Gary once and he claimed that the party was a product of the game (ie PCs working together) and not inspired by any source material

 

[Doug McCrae]

Nope primary source would be Sword & Scorcery (see how many times Conan does a dungeon tower crawl) with heavy addition of High Fantasy (per races and spellcasters)

I mean primary source in the sense that D&D has taken more from Lord Of The Rings than from any other single work. And more from Tolkien than any other author.

 

[Pickaxe]

Lord of the Rings, surely the primary source, is high fantasy rather than sword & sorcery.

Maybe I'm just ignorant of the difference. What I'm calling "Sword and Sorcery" is the collection of fantasy work by the usual authors cited (Tolkien, Lewis, Vance, etc.) as well as the influential mythologies, mainly of Western Europe (Greek, Norse, Arthur, biblical, etc.). It doesn't change the fact that D&D has other genres as sources, which is really my point.

It's more than just the rules artefacts, it's the game universe. The adventuring party along with a particular combination of party roles especially the cleric healer, PC races that look like the Fellowship Of The Rings, a plethora of monsters and magic items, flash-bang Vancian magic, long dungeon delves and fight after fight after fight. If you read a novel that had all those elements would you say "That's sword & sorcery" or would you say "That's D&D"? The D&D genre doesn't have to be confined to a game only.

I agree with all of this and would happily add everything you mentioned to the brief list of "sacred cows" that I gave as defining D&D as a genre. That doesn't detach D&D from its sources.

--Axe