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Hi to everyone, since the end of 3.5, i were developing my own "3.75" like many people did. When Pathfinder came out, i adapted my own version to be PF compatible.
Below i have converted mine rogue to PF (mine system has some tweaks that differ from PF, if someonec is intereseted, i would love to explain).
Mine PF Converted Rogue it`s pretty much the same as the CRB Rogue, except as follow (My own system rogue it`s different in some other ways, but this only matters to me and to those who might be interested).
Class Features
Trap Finder(Ext): A rogue adds 1/2 her level to Perception skill checks made to locate traps and to Disable Device skill checks (minimum +1). A rogue can use Disable Device to disarm magic traps. If the Rogue succeed on the Disable Device check by 10 or more, she can study the trap and bypass it without activate it. Furthermore, by increasing the Perception Check DC by 5, the rogue can search for traps that are 10ft from him, he must have line of sight and line of effect to the traps in the searched area.
At 5th level, no longer needs to increase the Perception Check DC to find traps 10ft away from him. Furthermore, by increasing the Perception Check DC by 10, the rogue can search for traps that are 20ft away from him, he must have line of sight and line of effect to the traps in the searched area.
At 10th no longer needs to increase the Perception Check DC to find traps 20ft away from him. Furthermore, by increasing the Perception Check DC by 10, the rogue can search for traps that are 30ft away from him, he must have line of sight and line of effect to the traps in the searched area.
At 15th level, the rogue no longer needs to increase the Perception Check DC to find traps 20ft away from him. Furthermore, by increasing the Perception Check DC by 10, the rogue can search for traps that are 40ft away from him, he must have line of sight and line of effect to the traps in the searched area.
At 20th level, the rogue no longer needs to increase the Perception Check DC to find traps 40ft away from him. Furthermore, by increasing the Perception Check DC by 10, the rogue can search for traps that are 50ft away from him, he must have line of sight and line of effect to the traps in the searched area.
Add at 5th, 10th and 15th the below mentioned abilities
Backstab (Ext): The Rogue is skilled at hitting enemies that give their backs, at 5th level, whenever the rogue succeeds in a sneak attack against an flat footed opponent, if the attack was an critical threat, the threat is automaticaly converted in a critical hit.
Improved Backstab (Ext): At 10th, the rogue refined her art to strike their enemies when they can't perceive the threat, whenever she succeeds at a sneak attack against an opponent flanked by her and that didn't attacked or caused harm against the rogue on this turn, if the attack is a critical threat, the threat is automaticaly converted in a critical hit. This ability stacks with backstab.
Greater Backstab (Ext): A rogue at 15th level became an expert at striking were hurts, once per encounter, if the rogue succeeds at an sneak attack, she can convert the hit into a critical hit.
Thoughts?
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I don't really see much point to the increasing distance of spotting traps. Probably because we don't use many traps - does it come up often for your group? I know it never would with mine - the rogue usually goes in front or in the second row in dungeons, and spots traps before people run into them with the Trap Spotter talent. I can see granting that talent for free at a certain point.
Critical hits for rogues as written are fairly pointless, making me question the usefulness of the Backstab line of abilities you've presented. Typically you'll get another 1d6+1 or so damage out of a crit, since almost all of a typical rogue's damage is based on sneak attack, and most rogues (as a broad generalization, admittedly) rely on melee weapons, and they're usually the d6 weapons, your rapiers and short swords. You might have a bunch of Power Attacking, greataxe-wielding rogues that deal a lot more damage on a crit, but I haven't seen many of those. Also, I wouldn't build mechanics that encourage builds like that, because it doesn't suggest rogue to me.
You might consider instead some variation on the critical feats, expanding the rogue's ability to inflict negative conditions on enemies when they crit. That'd fit well with a rogue thematically and be quite useful. There are already a few rogue talents that do this (Bleeding Attack, Crippling Strike, etc).
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i like the range of your Trapfinding ability.
if you are using injury-strain rules you could make traps automatically inflict 'injury' damage to make this ability more important in your world.
i might even fold in Trap Spotter rogue talent at half range. honestly i don't know why it is separate from Trapfinding in the first place...
agreed with SteelDraco about the critical hit stuff. but as a thought, if you want to restore how backstab kinda used to work how about:
Backstab
This ability replaces Sneak Attack but in all ways acts as sneak attack except that it is limited to a single use per round.
Further, a rogue who successfully confirms a critical hit as part of a Backstab may add half again as many Backstab dice to the damage roll. This is +1d6 at 3rd level, +2d6 at 7th, +3d6 at 11th, +4d6 at 15th, and +5d6 at 19th.
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I Considered simple putting trap-spotter for free, but i thought that something different, that could enhance trap spotter would be a better idea.
In my games there is at least one trap per game, be that natural (an hidden chasm by foliage, or quicksand) or built.
About Backstab, i was thinking in the old d&D backstab (that multiplies damage) but i think you are right, i don't whant to see greaataxe wielding rogue too often...
Well, thanks for the insight, i think i'll go backk to my worktable on that one, maybe replacing the backstabbing line with senak attack enhacements instead of damage would be nice, but rainzax idea is also good, i'll think in something else...
My purpose is to make the rogue as good as the Ninja (or better) without making it magical.
Thanks!
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After some considerations, i altered the features as follows:
Class Features
Trap Finder(Ext)[b]: A rogue adds 1/2 her level to Perception skill checks made to locate traps and to Disable Device skill checks (minimum +1). A rogue can use Disable Device to disarm magic traps. If the Rogue succeed on the Disable Device check by 10 or more, she can study the trap and bypass it without activate it. Finally, by raising the perception check DC by 5, the rogue can find traps up to 10ft away from him, she must have line of sight and line of effect to the trap. The trap finding area increases by 10 ft at every 5 rogue levels attained. (20 ft at 5th, 30ft at 10th, 40ft at 15th and 50ft at 20th).
[b]Backstab(Ext): At 5th level, whenever the rogue scores a critical threat in a succesfull attack against a flat footed oponente, her total sneak attack damage increases by half (+50%).
Improved Backstab (Ext): At 10th level, the rogue can use his backstab class feature whenever he obtains a critical threat in a succesfull attack agains an opponent she is flanking that did not attacked or caused harm to the rogue this round.
Greater Backstab (Ext): At 15º level, once per encounter as a free action, whenever the rogue obtains a critical threat in a succesfull attack against a opponent, this attack is also considered a sneack attack.
What do you think?
I have a couple things:
1. Why? (You haven't really stated why you are making these changes to the PF Rogue. What deficiency in the PF Rogue are you trying to fix here?)
2. Your second posting of the revised rules flows better I think. However, I would not give them the Sneak Attack bonuses just for achieving a critical threat. I would only give the bonus damage to them on a confirmed critical hit.
3. Why do your Rogues need to be able to spot traps at 50 feet away? You might consider dropping this and giving them some other upgrade instead.
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I think I might approach things a bit differently. Lots of classes can step on the rogues toes now with trapfinding and skills.
I think they need a flatout bonus on certain rogue skills, like trapfinding.
You know Perception, Stealth, Disable Device, Use Magic Device, Acrobatics, maybe a social skill or two.
Right now most people seem to pump Perception, if you are a class that keys off wisdom you probably have a higher Perception score than the rogue even if you haven't used a trait to make it a class skill. Other classes are the same with skills like UMD.
If said rogue takes a couple of feats to make his Stealth score astronomical compared to other people in his party, I say working as intended.
I see were you are going, and i agree with you. Commenting your reply and answering shadowlord's question number 1 is; a lot of other classe have access to pretty much everything the rogue know to do - bards and barbarians have trapfinding (and clerics), bards have sneak attack, etc. Make thing a bit complicated the ninja shows up as the rogue should be.
My intentions is to give leverage to the rogue, that the class should stand toe-to-toe with the ninja (without beign equal) and, at the same time be the best trap dealer in the game again.
The other skill bonuses apart perception, you kind of answered you inquire alredy. There is plenty of rogue talents and feats that can suffice it, no need to build it in the class mainframe.
About shadowlord's question #2: I choose to beo in a critical threat because the ability is alredy too restrictive so i made the choice to easy it a little and because i find not confirming a critical threat a bit frustrating, having an extra damage with a threat, even if you do not confirm it, compesates a little. Apart tha makes rogues deadlier with criticals, confirmed or not, and that is what i think a rogue is - an opportunist that knowd were to hit, when to hit - and, when the opponent lowers his guard against a rogue, even one ill connected blow it's a nasty one.
#3: Well, locating every trap in 50ft radius make the rogue an trap locator machine, althought usefull, maybe just 30ft can be enough. You think if i maintain this AND put some other trap/lock dealing trick would be to much? The raisings could be 5 by 5 feet...
1. I agree that the Rogue has really been stepped on, however I am not sure boosting Sneak Attack damage and trap finding radius are the best way to address it.
Yes, several other classes can now gain access to Sneak Attack and/or Trapfinding. However, the other class archetypes rarely gain both abilities and I don't think any of them have a full Sneak Attack progression except the Alchemist and Ninja.
With that said, I don't think I would raise the Rogue's SA damage by 50% every time they have a crit threat and have them spotting traps at 50' away to solve the problem. IMO it’s way too easy to get crit threats and 50’ is way too far to be spotting a poisoned needle in a lock.
2. Ok, I understand your reasoning, but I disagree. A 50% increase in Sneak Attack damage is no small thing, I would not make it TOO easy for your Rogues to achieve this.
3. I would definitely reign this in or modify it. Possibly even just roll the trap spotter talent into the trapfinding ability and leave it at that. Dropping it down to 20 or 30 feet might not be bad.
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If you want to make the Rogue more lethal, I would suggest a few alternate paths, I have not play tested any of these but they are things I have heard of or thought of that might be worth fleshing out.
A. Give Rogues full BAB for attacks that qualify for Sneak Attack. In the same manner that Monks get full BAB for Flurry of Blows.
Or give them a bonus to strike on Sneak Attacks. Something like +1 to attack rolls for every 4 or 5 levels in Rogue.
B. Allow the Rogue to roll d8s instead of d6s for Sneak Attacks in a Surprise Round, against flat-footed opponents in the first round of combat, or against an opponent who didn't recognize the Rogue as a threat or didn't know the Rogue was present. The trade off is that Sneak Attack dice are d4s in any other situation.
Alternately you could allow the Rogue to role 2x his Sneak Attack dice for a surprise attack (surprise round, flat-footed first round of combat, unaware opponent), but only roll 1/2 Sneak Attack dice on other Sneak Attacks like Flanking.
This makes the Rogue focus more on those truly Stealthy strikes, not just a flank master.
C. If you want Rogues to be more focused on Stealthy kills I would recommend giving them one of three things that equate to an assassination technique: Either give them access to the Assassinate advanced Ninja trick after 10th lvl. Or give them a modified Coup De Grace mechanic that allows them to CDG characters even if they aren't helpless, but this would have to be strict. The modified CDG could only be used on characters that are not aware of the Rogue or don't recognize him as a threat. Allowing this against any flat-footed opponents would be taking it too far. Alternately, you could make the Assassin's Death Attack ability an advanced rogue talent and make the Fort check DC: 10 + 1/2 Rogue leve + Int Mod.
D. Another thing you could do for the Rogue if you want them to be more diverse and not quite so stepped on by Bards would be to give them 10 + Int mod for skill points rather than 8 + Int mod.
E. Also you could give them a few extra Rogue Talents. Instead of 1 every 2 levels you could give them 1 every 2 levels plus a bonus 1 every 4 levels. So at level 20 they would have 15 vs 10.
F. Lastly you could input a fighting Style mechanic much like the Ranger's Style feats. I wouldn't give them as many feats as the Rangers do for this but 3 or 4 chosen from a TWF or Ranged style could give the Rogues in your game the boost you're looking for.
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Some of these suggestions work better than others. Some require more work and testing than others on the part of the DM. They are certainly not meant to be used all at once, but one or two of them might give a slight boost in one niche or another without pushing the Rogues out of game balance.
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Shadowmaster, first of all, thanks to throw so many input on my idea, thanks a lot!
You pointed out that 50% more sneak attack damage for critical threats is a lot, and i agree. Althought i nerfed invisibility in my system, i did'n nerfed it enough to invalidate the ring of invisibility rogue sploit, so i'll heed your advice and downgrade the ability to confirmed critical hits.
About the 50' trapsense. 50' is at 20th level, at this level it's supposed the character could do extraordinarie things. at 15th to 19th level the rogue can spot traps at 40'. That is 10' more than trap spotter, but he must accept the -5 penalty and spend an action making the perception check. With trap spotter he gets no penalty and wastes no time - far more incredible, IMO. Where you considering this on your analisys?
About just including trap spotter. I considered it, but i don't whant to do this because i want to let the players have the choice to get the talent or not, to make theirs character even better at trapfinding. 50' maybe too much to spot a poison needle on a lock, but even considering that we are talking about a 20th rogue, that could do far more amazing things than that at this level, taking pains and time to search (translated by the perception penalty and standard action) and subject to light conditions and obstacles, at the same time that a 2nd level rogue with trap spotter could do the same thing,in a smaller range (30'), but painlessly and without any real waste of time (it's a free roll without penalty)?
About the other advices, i did several cool rogue talents that covers the "stealthy assassin" rogue type, but i'll not mortar those abilities in the rogue mainframe. I want my rogue as "generic" and flexible as possible.
I'm starting to think that would be better to put the new rogue talents here too, just to give a better idea of what i'm doing...
Anyway, i`m thinking on something quite different, i`ll post it when it`s ready...
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in the spirit of boosting the sneak attack, borrowing the essential idea from Cheapy's sneak attack alternative, have you considered granting your Rogue half of their sneak attack dice against foes who suffer from certain conditions (such as pinned, shaken, dazzled, nauseated, flat-footed, flanked... i can't find the whole list)
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Hey, that's a good idea i haven't explored yet, thanks for the link (And thanks Cheapy too!) but, like ranged combat relies on feat choices to work, i think that's the same for ranged sneak attack. In my system, ranged sneak attack works, given the right choices of rogue talents, but not quite as often as Cheapy's. But thanks, a new set of rogue talents just flourished on my mind! I'll fine tune my rogue option then write about.