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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Steverooo" data-source="post: 804491" data-attributes="member: 9410">I kinda like SOME Rogues!I recall a scene in a 2300AD game, where a Space Pirate picked the pocket of a guy I was talking to, stole his wallet, and put it in his own back pocket.  My character, standing right behind him, then picked it from his, checked the ID, and asked the NPC if this was his wallet...  The NPC acted all shocked, and my PC handed it back, telling him he should be more careful with it, as the Space Pirate fumed.The interview continued for a while, and then my PC left to go do something else.  Thereupon, the old Space Pirate picked the NPC's pocket, yet again, and stole the wallet for the third time, glaring down the hall at my departed PC.Hey, I TOLD the guy he should be more careful with that thing!  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f600.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":D" title="Big grin    :D"  data-smilie="8"data-shortname=":D" /> So why doesn't the party trust Rogues?  Because they can Spot and Overhear, Pick Pockets and Locks, cut purses, steal, plant items... ad nauseum!How do you get around it?  Tell them you don't steal, have no Ranks in Pick Pockets, and play a good alignment.  Take other useful skills, like Disable Device and Search, instead.Or, you can do what I do, and play a Ranger/Rogue, and tell the party you're a Ranger.  I take Hide, Listen, Move Silently, Search, and Spot, with only a single Rank of most other Exclusive Skills.  Thus, I am very Rangery, but have a very small amount of extra damage from a Sneak Attack, and a few "extra" skills which can come in handy...In the current group, for instance, we got surprised by a fireball, followed by charging Lizardmen and a Troll Adept.  I spotted the Troll, warned the party that he had a rod (a Troll-sized Wand, actually), and then hit him with Alchemist's Fire before he could do anything else.  I then took cover, hid, and sneaked in for an acid attack while another couple of PCs kept him busy.After the Troll almost finished one and went down, though, both of them ran away!  So there I was, making sure the Troll stayed dead (Regeneration) all by my lonesome!  Anyway, I did, and searched the body...I found some sealed flasks (which I figured out were Alchemist's Fire), and leather bag of liquid (Tanglefoot Bag), the "rod" burned on one end (Wand of Fireballs), a silver dagger, fancy shortbow, and silver bracers.  I gathered this stuff up (putting the bow in my Quiver of Ehlonna, and the other stuff in Heward's Handy Haversack - both extra-dimensional spaces, mind you), then went to finish off the Liz, and help collect the rest of the treasue...Someone else had gathered most of it, and it was all pretty normal.  110 GP, four gems, and weapons, armor, and shields.  Only one shortsword, and the Troll's shortbow were masterwork.So my PC asks if anyone can use the wand, and the only character we'd seen cast spells in the group (a Dwarf, class(es) unknown) said "maybe".  I asked the Halfling Rogue if he can Use Magic Devices, and he says "no", so I say I might be able to (1 Rank Use Magic Device), so I'll keep it, for now.  Then I try on the Troll-sized bracers, and find that they shrink to fit, and don't increase my bow use, so I ask if they remove (they do), and then ask the GM about a possible way to determine how good they are...  I reveal ALL OF THIS to the party, except the method.(We worked out that I would take a stick, and beat on my armor lightly, then harder and harder, until it started to hurt...  Once it did, I would remove it, put on the bracers, and repeat the process.  This wouldn't have revealed the AC, but would let me figure out whether the bracers were better, worse, or the same as my armour's AC.)So then, I suggest dicing for the magic items, rather than arguing over them...  First determine who can use what, then who wants what, then roll dice for'em, with anyone without a permanent magic item getting a +1 on their roll, highest roll wins...The Fighter (covetting the bracers, which he didn't know about until I revealed their existance, and their magical nature to the group) objects.  He says someone getting the wand (not permanent) and the bracers "while someone else gets nothing" is unfair.  The Dwarf, for unstated reasons, also disagrees.  Then the Paladin, too...Meanwhile, the Half-Orc "Mercenary" (who is really an evil priest), ignoring my call for anyone with Detect Magic, tries to "secretly" cast it, and not share the info with anyone else!  Of course, the PHB clearly states that all Verbal Components must be pronounced in a "strong voice" (and the DC for overhearing normal conversation is zero), so a listen check tells me he's casting, so the GM tells me he has cast a spell, but that I don't know what...  My character also has one Cross-Class Rank in Spellcraft, though, and DC:15+0 isn't too hard to make, so I ID the spell.Well, the GM admits he messed up, twice.  The Half-Orc tries to take the bow from "the pile of treasure", even though it was in my quiver, but I point that fact out to him.  Even so, the GM lets him detect it as magic, even though it is technically on another plane(let).  So, he knows that the Bow, Bracers, and Wand are magical, while all my PC knows is that the the Wand probably is, the bracers are, and the bow is masterwork...Well, seeing how things are going, my PC has already scooped up the gold and gems, saying "We can all agree to trust the Paladin, can't we?", and giving it all to him.  He then helps the Fighter roll over a gigantic corpse, and get its armor and pack off.  There, we find a masterwork shortsword, three dead bodies, and two more gems.So, since some of the coins are there, my PC again scoops them, and the gems up, and passes the coins to the Paladin.  As he does so, however, seeing how things are going to be, he palms the two gems.  He helps the Paladin store the coins, and puts the shortsword (along with the gems) into his Haversack.On the ride back, the evil Half-Orc priest asks "Can I see that shortbow you got off the Troll?"  My PC looks at him and says "You mean the magical one, that you weren't going to tell us about?"  He then tosses it to him, the bracers to the Fighter, the Wand to the Dwarf, and asks the Halfling Rogue if he wants the shortsword (he says no, he already has one).So...  I figure my PC will get rooked on the magic items, and probably get noting but a few GP, and maybe stuck with the wand that the Dwarf tried, and can't use...From now on, though, what he finds he'll be keeping to himself, just like all the others... and those two gems are worth more than the gold the party found.Of course, if they decide that they want to work out an equitable split, I'm sure the "lost" gems can be found by a thorough Search... and Rangers have that skill, right?  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f60e.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":cool:" title="Cool    :cool:"  data-smilie="6"data-shortname=":cool:" />   Of course, with this grabby party, I don't think it'll come up!  Even the Paladin was grabbing stuff!  <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f61b.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":p" title="Stick out tongue    :p"  data-smilie="7"data-shortname=":p" /> <img src="https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/joypixels/assets/8.0/png/unicode/64/1f644.png" class="smilie smilie--emoji" loading="lazy" width="64" height="64" alt=":rolleyes:" title="Roll eyes    :rolleyes:"  data-smilie="11"data-shortname=":rolleyes:" /></blockquote>

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