D&D 5E Split the Assassin from the Rogue back into its own class

[DND_Reborn]

1. Cultural Weaponry
2. Noble Weaponry
3. Precise Attack
4. Skirmish Attack
5. Battle Command
6. Heedless Strike
7. Acrobatic Defense
8. Weapon Tosser

Brief explanations would be helpful.

Mechanically, how would these work?

 

[Paul Farquhar]

1. Cultural Weaponry
2. Noble Weaponry
3. Precise Attack
4. Skirmish Attack
5. Battle Command
6. Heedless Strike
7. Acrobatic Defense
8. Weapon Tosser

I'm at 8 ideas now
And that's before you steal ideas in TCOE or go magic

Those look like a bunch of different names for sneak attack.

Apart from Weapon Tosser, which looks like... something else.

 

[Minigiant]

Brief explanations would be helpful.

Mechanically, how would these work?

1. Cultural Weaponry
   1. You choose 2 weapons as cultural weapons
   2. You can attack as a bonus action with a cultural weapon
2. Noble Weaponry
   1. You can chose 2 weapons as noble weapons
   2. You add you Charisma mod to hit and damage roll with noble weapons
3. Precise Attack
   1. You can cause a hit with a light or finesse weapon to be a crit
   2. You can do this a number of time equal to your Prof modifier
4. Skirmish Attack
   1. You can add 1d4 damage and +1 AC per 10 ft you move before attacking
5. Battle Command
   1. Warlord stuff
6. Heedless Strike
   1. You attack and add prof bonus to hit and damage but subtract it from AC and saving throws
7. Acrobatic Defense
   1. Your AC is 10 + Double your Dex mod if wearing no armor and wielding no shields or heavy weapons
8. Weapon Tosser
   1. Your range with thrown weapons is doubled and you crit on a 19-20
9. Intelligent Defense
   1. You can replace your Dex with Int when determining AC
10. Lucky Strike
    1. When you roll a 4 with a weapon damage roll, gain a Luck Point
11. Expert Flanker
    1. When you use the Help action on your turn, one hostile enemy within 10ft is considered "flanked"
12. Poison Mastery
    1. Using poisoner kit, you can change a posion's damage to acid, necrotic, or radiant.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

1. Cultural Weaponry
   1. You choose 2 weapons as cultural weapons
   2. You can attack as a bonus action with a cultural weapon

So, how is that better than the shortsword I can bonus attack with anyway?

• Noble Weaponry
  1. You can chose 2 weapons as noble weapons
  2. You add you Charisma mod to hit and damage roll with noble weapons

So how does +5 points of damage compete with +11d6 sneak attack?

• Precise Attack
  1. You can cause a hit with a light or finesse weapon to be a crit
  2. You can do this a number of time equal to your Prof modifier

Is that with or without sneak attack? With it's overpowered, without it's garbage.

• Skirmish Attack
  1. You can add 1d4 damage and +1 AC per 10 ft you move before attacking

So I give up +11d6 damage in order to run around the target in circles?

I could go on, but I can't be bothered. I still want to know what the Weapon Tosser does though...

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Interesting thought.

It makes me wonder if SA dice could be used in other fashions. I mean, I don't mind a Rogue class, but it bothers me that most people play them as so focused on combat and the SA damage. I like to play Rogues who are primarily skill experts, who can fight, but are usually more part of a party due to their skills. I like them more like the "Expert" sidekick class.

The first Artificer UA had an Alchemist subclass that used different potion/items that progressed exactly at the same rate as sneak attack.

If a player liked the idea of an expert without the stabby-stab part of the Rogue, I'd let them use that alchemist's item instead.

 

[Minigiant]

So, how is that better than the shortsword I can bonus attack with anyway?

So how does +5 points of damage compete with +11d6 sneak attack?

Is that with or without sneak attack? With it's overpowered, without it's garbage.

So I give up +11d6 damage in order to run around the target in circles?

I could go on, but I can't be bothered. I still want to know what the Weapon Tosser does though...

I've said it multiple times now.
My proposal would not be removing Sneak Attack.
The Rogue would get a slower progression than the Assassin and get additional features.

 

[DND_Reborn]

EDIT: I see from another post these don't remove SA, but maybe use a lesser version like half SA damage. So, ignore my comments about comparing to SA damage.

Thanks. A quick critique follows:

1. Cultural Weaponry
   1. You choose 2 weapons as cultural weapons
   2. You can attack as a bonus action with a cultural weapon

1.1. Isn't really that beneficial since they have most weapons they would already use. They could gain some heavy weapons, which might be interesting, but since the damage potential is no where near on par with SA, I don't know if it was meant to make up for losing SA.

1.2. This conflicts with Cunning Action, and Rogues often already use their bonus action for TWF.

• Noble Weaponry
  1. You can chose 2 weapons as noble weapons
  2. You add you Charisma mod to hit and damage roll with noble weapons

1. Same as above.
2. Not bad, but increases MAD dependency a bit.

• Precise Attack
  1. You can cause a hit with a light or finesse weapon to be a crit
  2. You can do this a number of time equal to your Prof modifier

This is better. Again, I don't know if your idea was to "compete" with SA, in which case it is woefully low, but if not I could get behind this.

• Skirmish Attack
  1. You can add 1d4 damage and +1 AC per 10 ft you move before attacking

Hmm... A different mechanics with the per 10 feet moved. How long would the AC bump last? I think this has some promise.

• Battle Command
  1. Warlord stuff

Which means little to me, but ok.

• Heedless Strike
  1. You attack and add prof bonus to hit and damage but subtract it from AC and saving throws

This one is good IMO. How often? Would you limit the number of uses? Also, how long would the penalties last, until the start of your next turn?

• Acrobatic Defense
  1. Your AC is 10 + Double your Dex mod if wearing no armor and wielding no shields or heavy weapons

No issues with this one, but instead of double DEX mod, how about DEX mod and proficiency bonus?

• Weapon Tosser
  1. You range with thrown weapons is doubled and you crit on a 19-20

We have a feat Long Thrower that is similar to this.

• Intelligent Defense
  1. You can replace your Dex with Int when determining AC

Like this one.

• Lucky Strike
  1. When you roll a 4 with a weapon damage roll, gain a Luck Point

Luck point would be used for...?

• Expert Flanker
  1. When you use the Help action on your turn, one hostile enemy within 10ft is considered "flanked"

Good. You might also allow the PC to take the Help action as a bonus action?

• Poison Mastery
  1. Using poisoner kit, you can change a posion's damage to acid, necrotic, or radiant.

I like this one as well. It would be an interesting replacement for SA, where you can craft poisons that deal "SA" amount of damage as well. It allows SA to be used but not about the location of the hit, etc. but more the type of damage.

Thanks for the breakdowns.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I've said it multiple times now.
My proposal would not be removing Sneak Attack.
The Rogue would get a slower progression than the Assassin and get additional features.

Removing or nerfing - it has the same effect.

I think removing - making it assassin only feature - actually makes sense.

The only problem is giving all those other rogue subclasses a combat feature that is of equal value and thematically appropriate.

 

[Minigiant]

Removing or nerfing - it has the same effect.

I think removing - making it assassin only feature - actually makes sense.

The only problem is giving all those other rogue subclasses a combat feature that is of equal value and thematically appropriate.

If you were to go strip SA from rogue and only give it to the Assassin class, then I'd make rogue get bigger crits. Reroll damage 2, 3, 4 5, or 6 times.

Make them combat equal to a cleric but when they get lucky...

 

[Paul Farquhar]

Make them combat equal to a cleric but when they get lucky...

The rogue needs to be considerably better at weapon damage than a spell-throwing cleric!

And you need to come up with a different thing for each rogue subclass.

(a lot of what you are saying is coming across as hate for rogues. Is that really what you mean?)

 

[Minigiant]

The rogue needs to be considerably better at weapon damage than a spell-throwing cleric!

And you need to come up with a different thing for each rogue subclass.

(a lot of what you are saying is coming across as hate for rogues. Is that really what you mean?)

I don't hate rogues.
I think the D&D community stuffs too much into the rogue class and is ruining it and the fighter.

The Rogue isn't even a real class right now. It and the fighter are foster homes for subclasses.

Rogue doesn't even mean anything except "Not a Warrior or Spellcaster". Rogue flavor is dead and I blame WOTC and a whole chunk of the community.

 

[Parmandur]

I don't hate rogues.
I think the D&D community stuffs too much into the rogue class and is ruining it and the fighter.

The Rogue isn't even a real class right now. It and the fighter are foster homes for subclasses.

Rogue doesn't even mean anything except "Not a Warrior or Spellcaster". Rogue flavor is dead and I blame WOTC and a whole chunk of the community.

The Rogue and the Fighter do have the highest power budget assigned to their Subclasses of the core 12, as opposed to the more core feature oriented Bard for example.

That's a feature, not a bug. It allows for a variety of archetypes to be covered elegantly.

 

[Paul Farquhar]

I don't hate rogues.
I think the D&D community stuffs too much into the rogue class and is ruining it and the fighter.

The Rogue isn't even a real class right now. It and the fighter are foster homes for subclasses.

Rogue doesn't even mean anything except "Not a Warrior or Spellcaster". Rogue flavor is dead and I blame WOTC and a whole chunk of the community.

Okay, so the thing you hate is subclasses.

But "Rogue" is a very good catch-all term. "a person or thing that behaves in an aberrant or unpredictable way" - dictionary definition 2. See Rogue Squadron (Star Wars), Rogue (X-Men) etc.

 

[DND_Reborn]

I don't hate rogues.
I think the D&D community stuffs too much into the rogue class and is ruining it and the fighter.

The Rogue isn't even a real class right now. It and the fighter are foster homes for subclasses.

Rogue doesn't even mean anything except "Not a Warrior or Spellcaster". Rogue flavor is dead and I blame WOTC and a whole chunk of the community.

I agree with much of this. I think the problem is there isn't an "Expert" class and unfortunately the Rogue and Bard, due to expertise, are forced to serve that role.

 

[Minigiant]

The Rogue and the Fighter do have the highest power budget assigned to their Subclasses of the core 12, as opposed to the more core feature oriented Bard for example.

That's a feature, not a bug. It allows for a variety of archetypes to be covered elegantly.

It's a feature to not create new classes and because WOTC was afraid of the fanbbase to stamp down on core flavor or mechanics.

It's 1000% a feature. A bad one IMO.

 

[Parmandur]

It's a feature to not create new classes and because WOTC was afraid of the fanbbase to stamp down on core flavor or mechanics.

It's 1000% a feature. A bad one IMO.

Mechanics aren't flavor and do not have flavor in themselves, they serve flavor within a design framework. Elegance is one of the best indicators of good design.

 

[Minigiant]

Mechanics aren't flavor and do not have flavor in themselves, they serve flavor within a design framework. Elegance is one of the best indicators of good design.

That's my point.

The flavor of the Rogue was killed so any mechanic could be attached as a subclass.

 

[Maxperson]

One extra class that overlaps significantly with three others. Where do you stop? A slightly more fighty cleric? A slightly less fighty cleric? A slightly more holy monk? Pathfinder had at least 50-something classes at last count.

5e has 13, and that is already too much overlap.

Overlap doesn't matter. If for some reason you or your players care about overlap, just choose classes that don't. So if player A picks the slightly more fighty cleric, nobody else picks a cleric. That way your players don't overlap and those of us who don't care about overlap and want more classes all have what they want.

 

[Parmandur]

That's my point.

The flavor of the Rogue was killed so any mechanic could be attached as a subclass.

That's because the flavor resides in the Subclass.

 

[Parmandur]

Overlap doesn't matter. If for some reason you or your players care about overlap, just choose classes that don't. So if player A picks the slightly more fighty cleric, nobody else picks a cleric. That way your players don't overlap and those of us who don't care about overlap and want more classes all have what they want.

I mean, I'd say the reasonabl3 compromise Ground is what we have now already with 13 Classes in 5E, instead of 4 with robust Subclasses as D&D Next started with.