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To be honest, one of the few things I liked about 4th edition was them junking the idea of in-combat balance vs. out-of-combat balance. The game's more fun when you're not amazing at half of it, and useless during the other half.
As to the question, tradition says that the fighter is made to be great in battle and weak out of it, while the rogue is the opposite. That's not to say that you can't make fighters with decent skills or rogues who can fight well, but the basic chassis of the class is all about that balance.
The game's more fun when you're not amazing at half of it, and useless during the other half.
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Any character, any class that this statement accurately describes is purely the choice of the character. There is nothing in the rules thaty says a Fighter has to sacrifice Intelligence or Charisma to be that much more effective in combat - indeed, the fact that they get so many combat bonuses inherent to their classes suggests that they are actually being encouraged to expand their character in other ways.Specialization is the result of the kinds of games GM's run and of the choices made by their players, not of the game itself. For instance, I'm working on a Goblin Brawler right now with high ranks in Stealth, Perception, Acrobatics and Disable Device as well as some ranks in Swim, Climb and Survival. He has tons of utility out of combat - his low Charisma is a role-playing choice and a conveniant stat dump, but his 14 Intelligence more than makes up for it.
The game's more fun when you're not amazing at half of it, and useless during the other half..
Any character, any class that this statement accurately describes is purely the choice of the character. There is nothing in the rules thaty says a Fighter has to sacrifice Intelligence or Charisma to be that much more effective in combat - indeed, the fact that they get so many combat bonuses inherent to their classes suggests that they are actually being encouraged to expand their character in other ways.Specialization is the result of the kinds of games GM's run and of the choices made by their players, not of the game itself. For instance, I'm working on a Goblin Brawler right now with high ranks in Stealth, Perception, Acrobatics and Disable Device as well as some ranks in Swim, Climb and Survival. He has tons of utility out of combat - his low Charisma is a role-playing choice and a conveniant stat dump, but his 14 Intelligence more than makes up for it.
As I noted in the part of my post you didn't quote, it's certainly possible to make a fighter with decent out-of-combat utility. However, the basic fighter chassis doesn't lend itself well to out-of-combat: 2 skill points a level, no intelligence synergy, a weak class skill list, and no out-of-combat class features.
Enough feats, traits, and intelligence boosts can mitigate that weakness, but it doesn't change the fact that the basic chassis is weak in that area.
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I have to be honest about this because so many folks think that the crunchy rules in a class control EVERYTHING that a PC can do. Now there's no doubt that the rules are geared mostly toward encounters that deal with some sort of conflict, hence all of the numbers and stuff. But, I think that the big limiter on what a PC can be good at or what they can do rests more with the player than that rules. I have had players take on a monk and play them to a tee, making it fun to play, interesting to watch and most importantly, having them effective in both combat and non combat situations. I have seen players with a straight up fighter, geared toward the art of war and combat, come up and tell me that they don't know what to do with the PC when it comes to combat beyond drawing their sword and start swinging. I can go on and on about thins but ultimately, I think it's the player who must determine if the class they have chosen is "balanced". The numbers and stats can't tell you as a player what to do, they can only tell you how you can do them, the rest is up to your imagination.
The numbers and stats can't tell you as a player what to do, they can only tell you how you can do them, the rest is up to your imagination.
They tell a lot about what your character can do however, and what a wizard has the potential to do compared to a fighter is a pretty big gap. In fact mechanically what the fighter excels at is the last powerful in roleplay, but the wizard has all these options for in and out of combat. You can roleplay both, of course, and you can roleplay both amazingly and have fun! That won't change who they are mechanically though.
If this was all up to my imagination I'd never drop a dime on the rule books, because you know... no rules. Of course, no rules can be a lot of fun sometimes.
I mean, For example, are the classes that contribute the less in combat the ones that have more things to do out of combat (and vise versa)? .
The only two classes balanced that way are the rogue and the fighter. All others are good at both, more or less.
The only two classes balanced that way are the rogue and the fighter. All others are good at both, more or less.I mean, For example, are the classes that contribute the less in combat the ones that have more things to do out of combat (and vise versa)? .
I agree.
Rogues and Bards are social animals that excel out of initiative. However, I think you also need to look at how it plays out throughout the levels. A fighter is absolutely dominant in combat for the first 5-6 levels whereas the casters are generally not very good at anything for most of that time.
I cast color spray on Brave's post. Make a DC 15 will save or sit out the fight!
They're good at a lot of things. 3rd level spells have slow, haste, and fly available, 2nd level spells include create pit, and first has grease or color spray. All but one of those spells are iconic and pretty darn good. 2 of them can effectively remove someone from play! Plenty more choices out there too, many of which are useful outside of combat such as charm person.
Another thing to think about is rogues are not social animals and that any charisma or intellect based character can easily jack up their social skills without much effort.
Another thing to think about is rogues are not social animals and that any charisma or intellect based character can easily jack up their social skills without much effort.
Rogues have Bluff, Diplomacy, Intimidate, Perform, and Sense Motive as class skills.
How are they not social animals when they get every social skill as a class skill?
Another thing to think about is rogues are not social animals and that any charisma or intellect based character can easily jack up their social skills without much effort.Rogues have Bluff, Diplomacy, Intimidate, Perform, and Sense Motive as class skills.
How are they not social animals when they get every social skill as a class skill?
Charisma is a dump for them and they don't have inherent bonuses. Its entirely possible to make a rogue who absolutely fails at being social because they aren't inherently good at it.
Cha isn't a dump for rogues unless they choose to dump it. It's quite common for a rogue to be the face simply because there's no other cha character in the party. Frex, in the others of the iconic 4 of fighter, cleric, wizard, rogue only the cleric gets Diplomacy or SM and only the fighter gets Intimidate. None get Bluff or Perform. Both F and C get only 2 points per level and both dump Int quite hard. The fighter dumps Cha too, and the cleric is only middling at it. Even a sorcerer or paladin (both Cha-based) won't be a great face because they get only 2 skill points and dump Int. And the paladin doesn't get Intimidate, Bluff or Perform, and the sorcerer doesn't get Dip or SM.
The only time a rogue will dump Cha is in a low-point build, and that's just because they're a very MAD class.
As for "inherent bonuses", who does get them? Bard? Inquisitor? That's about it.
Cha isn't a dump for rogues unless they choose to dump it.
How many class features scale off it? None? Its a dump. Its something you can viably drop and its not something you want to crank at the cost of your other skills. In any case, he's certainly not a social animal who does it innately better than others, he's actually very likely to fall behind the bard, oracle, sorcerer, etc, who have innate bonuses and a higher charisma.
It's entirely possible to make any class that absolutely fails at stuff because they aren't inherently good at it.
Yep, and the rogue isn't inherently good at social skills. I can build a fighter that's great at social skills, doesn't mean the fighter is a social animal...
You took rumour monger? That is like the worst talent ever, I'm sorry you did that.
It really is... You really should already be able to spread rumors or look for a black market, that's great roleplaying opportunity too! Usually if your in a big city with politicians and a large pop you don't have to worry about finding magic items too much anyway, the magic mart is going to be one of those classy kinds with the nice windows! I bet they put sparkly shoes up front. The game assumes you get that +2 weapon somehow anyway!
Oh also what are sleeves of disguise? Do you mean a hat of disguise?
Sleeves of Many Garments I thought when I read it. Great for a fashion statement! But really requires a bit of GM fiat to give a use since it doesn't come with any mechanical bonuses(which is why its so cheap btw!)
A fighter is absolutely dominant in combat for the first 5-6 levels whereas the casters are generally not very good at anything for most of that time.
What exactly makes the fighter so dominant over the barbarian, ranger, paladin and even the melee cleric or inquisitor for the first 5 levels?
Even with all his feats, armor training, weapon training and weapon specialization I would call him hardly dominant.Sure, at level 6 all non full bab classes fall back. But apart from that the classes have only different specializations. The ranger needs to fight his favoured enemy, the pally needs to fight evil and the fighter needs to have his specialized weapon handy. But could well loose out on magical bonuses by sticking with it.
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Cha isn't a dump for rogues unless they choose to dump it.How many class features scale off it? None? Its a dump. Its something you can viably drop and its not something you want to crank at the cost of your other skills. In any case, he's certainly not a social animal who does it innately better than others, he's actually very likely to fall behind the bard, oracle, sorcerer, etc, who have innate bonuses and a higher charisma.
Yeah, that's not entirely true. My favorite Rogue character uses Charisma to power the Underhanded Rogue talent as well as for Bluff effects which are key to Feint, Improved Feint, Greater Feint, Two-Weapon Feint, Improved Two-Weapon Feint and so on.
The following Rogue talents benefit from a high Charisma and/or are based on Social skills:
Charmer
Coax Information
Convincing Lie
False Friend
Hard to Fool
Honeyed Words
Obfuscate Story
Quick Disguise
Steal the Story
Underhanded
Master of Disguise
Rumormonger
Unwitting Ally
That's a pretty big investment of class features for a supposed 'dump stat'. I would caution you against the presumption that, just because you play a Rogue a certain way, that that's the only way or the proper way to play one.
It all started to get difficult when skills were introduced. Suddenly there were "out of combat" rules when before "out of combat" ment pure roleplaying (and sometimes "in combat" too).
I would have liked it more to have broader skill categories, archetypes, like artist, scholar, craftsman, atlethe, trickster and whatnot instead of craft (basketweaving) or perform (wind instruments).
And as we are at it, Perception should never have been a skill but rather something like Initiative because in 99% of all games it is much more useful than everything else, skillwise.
It's entirely possible to make any class that absolutely fails at stuff because they aren't inherently good at it.Yep, and the rogue isn't inherently good at social skills. I can build a fighter that's great at social skills, doesn't mean the fighter is a social animal...
I'm curious what makes a class "inherently good" at social skills. Is your litmus test that they need a primary class feature attached to Charisma?
I would argue that you can make a Fighter that is "great" at Intimidating (it's even done for certain builds). You'll never make one that is "great" at all of them. By the definitions laid out in the posts here, I have to think only the Bard qualifies as a social animal to a lot of people. I've seen many Rogues over the years that were very obviously social animals. Saying the class chassis itself doesn't support it is actually kind of amusing. But go ahead and keep attacking those underperforming and useless talents and rogue archetypes like that somehow proves the class doesn't support social builds. Your Rogue may not be a face, and most rogues in general many not be, but claiming the class does not support it because of that is laughable.
I'm curious what makes a class "inherently good" at social skills. Is your litmus test that they need a primary class feature attached to Charisma?It's entirely possible to make any class that absolutely fails at stuff because they aren't inherently good at it.Yep, and the rogue isn't inherently good at social skills. I can build a fighter that's great at social skills, doesn't mean the fighter is a social animal...
To me, a class being inherently good would mean the class supports raising charisma or boost your social skills. Rogue does neither. If there were synergy I'd agree, but the rogue has very little going for charisma and they need physical stats and wisdom. On the other hand; Bard supports raising your charisma as a casting stat, has them all in class, has spells to boost them, has a class feature to more easily add skill points to those checks, and some archetypes even raise them more!
I would say that the rogue is definitely equipped to be fairly good at social skills by virtue of having all the social skills as class skills, and enough skill points to take them. However, it is fair to say that other classes can make better faced than the rogue thanks to either having spells and other class features that give more benefits to face skills beyond basic proficiency, and getting more benefits from increasing charisma.
I guess it really just boils down to what level a class needs to reach to be "good" at social skills. If it takes more than just having the skills at max ranks and un-dumped charisma, then the rogue doesn't bring much to the table. Most of the social Rogue Talents are either lackluster, only useful in corner cases, or seem like they're making you pay a talent for things that characters should just be able to do normally (Rumormonger, looking at you). It doesn't help that the few really useful ones, like Honeyed Words, tend to be once a day abilities.
Charisma Rogues are a fact of life, Mr. Sin. They do, in fact, exist. I have run campaigns with them. They function perfectly well, both in and out of combat. In fact the charisma rogue from my Council of Thieves campaign, Baudian the Black (aka Baudian Boneyard or Baudian Shadowchaser), is the most endearing and best remembered PC from that campaign. My players still discuss his exploits fondly, and that PC's Charisma score was higher than his Dexterity.
Just because a build does not play to a classes "core strengths" in a strong mechanical sense (and I am not agreeing with you that the rogue does not support charisma builds) does not mean that the build is untenable or unplayable in that configuration.
Your "mechanics eye" is playing tricks on you if you think that a charisma rogue is a non-viable approach to the rogue. Not only are they viable, but they will actually outshine many other character choices in any series of adventures with a lot of NPC's or urban backdrops.
The Bard is a great "face", but what if a player wanted to play a notorious, card-playing, high charisma, rapier wielding rake of a character BUT did not want to play a spellcaster.
Two words. Charisma. Rogue.
Charisma Rogues are a fact of life, Mr. Sin.
I didn't say they didn't exist.
A sorcerer will raise charisma more than any other class. So by 20th level if he pulls out all the stops he's likely to be on something like 18+5+5+6=33 Cha, which gives +11 to social skills (other than sense motive). He can probably afford a few skill points (maybe 5?) for Bluff and Intimidate. So his skills are likely to be:
Bluff, Intimidate +3+5+11=+19; Dip, Perform +11; SM +2?
Conversely a rogue 20 with 12 Cha and 14 Wis who dabbles in social skills is going to have 15-20 points in his chosen skills with minimal effort. Which gives something like +19 to +25 with retries provided by talents. Advantage rogue.
A bard is probably better, but again not necessarily - it comes down to how one chooses to build the bard who might have other things to do than talk.
Yes, Dominate Monster is better than +25 Diplomacy. But that's got nothing to do with being a social animal.
Or one might think of the wonderful synthesis of a Rogue/Sorcerer/Arcane Trickster.You are comparing a rogue that wants to be good at social skils against a sorcerer that really do not care that much.A sorcerer will raise charisma more than any other class. So by 20th level if he pulls out all the stops he's likely to be on something like 18+5+5+6=33 Cha, which gives +11 to social skills (other than sense motive). He can probably afford a few skill points (maybe 5?) for Bluff and Intimidate. So his skills are likely to be:
Bluff, Intimidate +3+5+11=+19; Dip, Perform +11; SM +2?
I always liked Vivisectionist/Wizard/Arcane Trickster myself, and if you want to stay charisma based you can go Ninja/Sorcerer/Arcane Trickster. Ninja is class with charisma synergy, though they probably aren't pumping that stat.
I feel like we've gone off the tracks somewhere...
To try and get back on track, if you ignore the fighter and the rogue, there is little balancing in this regard.
Most classes have options to specialize more in one or the other field.
Do you take a school, bloodline or whatever that gives more in combat benefits or helps more out of combat? Which spells do you choose/prepare? Do you take an animal companion or a domain? Is your AC rideable?
Do you specialize or aim for a broad set of abilities?
Example:
A witch could take combat relevant hexes to get unlimited combat abilities and would be able to use all of her spells for out of combat utility. Or she could do the opposite, take utility hexes and fight using her spells. With both approaches she's good at all the times (except perhaps vs some special opponents). But she could well concentrate both resources on one and be lacking in the other. Players choice.
A sorcerer will raise charisma more than any other class.Not really. The sorcerer who wants to be good at skills will be going down the Arcane (Sage) route to make Int their casting stat giving them vastly more skill points to play with over their career.
Your Charisma based skills will be lower overall than a focused Charisma sorcerer but you will have vastly more supporting options than your Charisma based alternative.
Depends on your alternative and somewhat on the build. A sage sorcerer is a lot different than a normal sorcerer, but a sorcerer could go sylvan and use his pet for some physical labor, boost his own social skills, and augment his everything with spells. (spells are big in the non combat gig!)
An inquisitor will always have a bonus to some social skills(stern gaze), and can make his charisma skills wisdom based(conversion domain). With a dip you can get a pretty high boost for anyone wisdom based, and depending on your GM maybe even double dip wisdom(though I wouldn't bank on it).
Bard definitely has a lot of things to boost his everything between performance, skills, archetypes, etc. Jack of all trades. Many of the versatile performances also happen to be social skills and are still charisma based.
Oracle can be legalistic, has lots of things in class and variables to that, and can always give boost to just about anything with spells. They can also be pretty sad, with charisma to darn near everything depending on feats/mystery. If you go dual cursed you can choose to give just about anyone a reroll to anything once per turn.
The rogue itself has some options, but most of them are considered subparfor a reason. Some let you do something you should already be able to do, others let have a once/day design.
To me, a class being inherently good would mean the class supports raising charisma or boost your social skills. Rogue does neither. If there were synergy I'd agree, but the rogue has very little going for charisma and they need physical stats and wisdom. On the other hand; Bard supports raising your charisma as a casting stat, has them all in class, has spells to boost them, has a class feature to more easily add skill points to those checks, and some archetypes even raise them more!I'm curious what makes a class "inherently good" at social skills. Is your litmus test that they need a primary class feature attached to Charisma?It's entirely possible to make any class that absolutely fails at stuff because they aren't inherently good at it.Yep, and the rogue isn't inherently good at social skills. I can build a fighter that's great at social skills, doesn't mean the fighter is a social animal...
I do hope you understand this is an optimization perspective, correct? Dump stats and focusing on 2 or 3 features with synergy is exactly what optimization is all about. It is not, however, what the baseline game is built around. In the baseline game, which is where the original question should be dealt with, rogues are indeed overly capable of being "social animals". Bards can definitely be better at it. But I don't think the baseline game supports your view that only Charmisma-focused classes and features qualify as great social builds.
Fighters and Rogues are the outliers on the original post's question. Most classes, and spell casters in particular, can build for non-combat performance without crippling the other side. Fighters have a VERY hard time building for non-combat performance without falling into an underperforming combat setup. There have been a few attempts at adding some Int and Cha focused feats or archetype features to make such builds possible, but even in the baseline game these seem to fall short, especially when it is so much easier to build for combat performance outright. And lets face it, even in the baseline game, combat performance usually has a bigger effect on party survival.
The Rogue has the opposite problem. It's core combat mechanic is problematic to begin with. No matter how many resources a Rogue dedicates to combat performance, their noncombat performance remains fairly stable though, unless you start dumping Cha or Int. There are more options for the Rogue to boost their combat performance, but it almost always comes at the price of their other defining class feature... trapfinding. (I've always wondered why nearly every Rogue archetype has to give this up) Talents help, but they still end up falling short of shifting the balance in a desirable fashion. A Half-Orc Dungeon Rover/Trapper/Shapeshifter Ranger is far better at being a Rogue... at least, a Rogue that does not care about social skills.
I consider the Rogue the most out of balance class on the low end. It gives up a little too much on the combat side of the scale, but this is in part due to the mechanics of sneak attack. But really, the Rogue and Fighter are basically the opposite ends of one thread. The Fighter will always be lackluster in intrigue and espionage style games. The Rogue will always be lackluster in a combat heavy game. Sadly, most games feature a lot more combat than non-combat challenges, and this is why the Rogue suffers in the eyes of most.
I do hope you understand this is an optimization perspective, correct? Dump stats and focusing on 2 or 3 features with synergy is exactly what optimization is all about.
Yes... Which is why I used the word inherently. I can make a fighter who's focused on skills and may possibly be able to make one that does social skills quiet well, doesn't make the fighter class inherently good at skills.
I didn't say anywhere you couldn't make a rogue good at social skills, but I chose not too because I can do that with anyone.