| 10 people marked this as a favorite. |
GENTLEMEN START YOUR ENGINES! This week's "Rogues Suck" thread will be commencing in 3... 2... 1...
Seriously though, the general consensus on the internet in general, and these forums in particular is that rogues do, in fact, suck. There are posters who will flat up tell people they're playing the game wrong if they ask for advice on a rogue character.
I'm personally of the opinion that they're weak, but can still be made useful with a bit of system mastery (Partially because they've always been my favorite class, partially because I've never been fond of the most-frequently-suggested alternates. Especially alchemists.)
That said, ranged combat is one of the things that rogues really are quite simply bad at. Rogues need to sneak attack to compete in combat. Sneak Attacking at range is bloody difficult to consistently do. The sniping mechanic will limit you to at most one sneak attack per round, and you have to be insanely good as stealth to stay hidden between shots (although anti-rogue naysayers do tend to ignore things like the range penalty to perception checks).
The Sniper archetype helps a little, letting you up the range at which you can make a sneak attack, and reducing your range penalty (although it would only be relevant for thrown weapons).
A halfling can take the swift as shadows ART to make the sniping stealth check plausible.
If you have ways of being effectively invisible to the enemy, you don't have to mess around with the sniping mechanic in the first place. If you have darkvision and they don't, you can full attack sneak attack them to your heart's content. If you have a foolish GM, or are just really lucky, a tiefling has a 1% chance to replace his SLA with the ability to see in deeper darkness. A one level dip into either waves or flame oracle will let you see through fogs or smoke clouds as if they weren't there.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
They are good skill monkeys. But the fact that the right, or maybe even a half-a$$ed, Bard archer build blows the Rogue out of the water just proves your point.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Yes. They do suck.
Paizo has given us shuriken Ninja, a ranged roguish attacker that works just fine.
Paizo has given us shuriken Ninja, a ranged roguish attacker that works just fine.
Shuriken have 10' range increments IIRC. I wouldn't call that fine.
Yes, rogues flat our suck, but they strongly contest with monks for the worst class. I personally give the edge to monks in that battle because it is possible to build a rogue who can take advantage of rogue class abilities (use dipping sauce), while monks struggle to be one-trick ponies which require the GM to cooperate by sending the right opponents against them to avoid being useless.
Monks have good archetypes though.
Short answer: Ayup.
Also @OP: Paladins aren't that MAD, at least no more than Fighters. Paladins can dump their Wis in favor of Charisma, and don't really need as much Dex or Con since they can heal themselves. Especially if they take Fey Foundling, good lord!
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
| 4 people marked this as a favorite. |
Nope. Rogues do it from behind.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Really your only option for a ranged rogue is throwing weapons on the first round of combat against flat footed opponents, then you're stuck in melee mode. You become a switch hitter ranger that can't switch, hit, or range.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
Ho, hum. It's time for another one of these? Meh.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
On paper yes, with a good player and a solid build not entirely.
|
| 6 people marked this as a favorite. |
Basically, if you have really, really good system mastery, you can get by with the Rogue.
If not, you will be disappointed, as there is always another class that does everything better.
For many, the most appealing "class feature", is writing "Rogue" or "Ninja", at the top of their character sheet. That, and getting to say "Sneak Attack" often.
Rogues can be somewhat inferior mechanically, but "flat out suck" would imply they just don´t work at all, and I can´t agree with that. They do need a bit more support, though, and it is somewhat galling how the ninja gets to have pretty much the same toolset + their ki stuff.
| 12 people marked this as a favorite. |
They only suck if your games revolve entirely around combat.
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
They are okay-ish at low level games, when their low accuracy, awful saves and low/mediocre AC aren't that much of a problem... Beyond 6th level, though, they are just a drain on party resources. The only thing Rogues give you that no other class can do better is the ability to write "Rogue" on your character sheet.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
They only suck if your games revolve entirely around combat.
Considering the 4 encounters a day baseline for making casters not run rampantly powerful, I'd say yeah, combat tends to take the most time in most games.
The only thing I can think of that takes as much time as your average combat is Kingdom Management.
The same level of system mastery required to bring rogues up to even monk levels of suck applied to any other class would in fact cause that other class to be better than anything the rogue can do.
Its a bad class and nothing currently saves it. Everything it does can be done better by an archetype in a better class,or isn't actually needed and its niche can be ignored.
Rogues suck and its best use is playing one as a self imposed nerf (like if you are a high system mastery player with a group of low mastery players).
Being amazing at not taking damage from reflex saves isn't a big deal. Reflex 9/10 means not taking full damage from a fireball ect. all of the rogues saves are based around this. Fort and will saves tend to be more life and death than reflex saves. Fail a fort, you could lose 1d6 con each round ect. Fail a will, and you will attack the party, be controlled long term (for future betrayals), or be locked out of combat by the multitude of mental based shutdown spells/effects.
The ninja, while not being a powerhouse by any means, is probably a better choice most of the time if you restricted the choices to just those two classes. Not a good place to be in terms of power levels.
They only suck if your games revolve entirely around combat.Considering the 4 encounters a day baseline for making casters not run rampantly powerful, I'd say yeah, combat tends to take the most time in most games.
The only thing I can think of that takes as much time as your average combat is Kingdom Management.
Four encounters per day... or four combats per day? Which are you talking about?
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
I really dislike making threads like this, but I've been looking at making a ranged Rogue build and frankly it seems like they... well, basically suck completely. Paizo seems to have sort of dropped the ball on this...
If you only look at combat you might be correct. But out of combat rogues are ok. And all in all I see rogues as stronger than fighters because the can do a relevant bit in combat and are very good out of combat.
The fighter is very good in combat but nearly useless out of combat.Rogues have some interesting archetypes, they can use talents to get combat feats (1 free to choose, one for weapon focus, one for weapon finesse and I think there is one for weapon prof, too.)
With the swashbuckler archetype they get a martial weapon prof and can take combat trick two times.
Build your rogue with a little cha, to be able to be the party face and you can take flagbearer to buff the party without having to play a bard. There are options and, in my view they are less of a strawman than the options given for why fighters do not suck out of combat.
Four encounters per day... or four combats per day? Which are you talking about?They only suck if your games revolve entirely around combat.Considering the 4 encounters a day baseline for making casters not run rampantly powerful, I'd say yeah, combat tends to take the most time in most games.
The only thing I can think of that takes as much time as your average combat is Kingdom Management.
If you don't have at least 4 encounters where casters have to expend resources you tend to have a campaign structure where the casters blow all their power in one go then the group rests till they can do it again.
Combat is time consuming, since PF is heavily combat focused, you will spend at least a plurality of your time in combat rounds. This is at least my experience in 3.x/PF play (my 2nd ed gaming had more RP, but that was because I played in RP heavier groups in instant death settings for murder hobos: Ravenloft and Planescape).
As for rogues being more powerful if you don't' have combat: A NPC expert is just as good as a skill monkey, if you are breaking out that argument you are essentially saying that the rogue's power level is best compared to an NPC class, not a great place to be. Hell an aristocrat is arguably as good in combat as rogues (better weapons and armor) and has a respectable amount of skills and better inherent social position.
| 5 people marked this as a favorite. |
They only suck if your games revolve entirely around combat.
COnsidering that the inquisitor and bards are flat out better out of combat, I would say that "yes". Rogues sucks.
I even would say more. Paizo do not care about rogues, purporsely or not they have been putting nails in the rogue coffing book after book.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
I really dislike making threads like this, but I've been looking at making a ranged Rogue build and frankly it seems like they... well, basically suck completely. Paizo seems to have sort of dropped the ball on this...If you only look at combat you might be correct. But out of combat rogues are ok. And all in all I see rogues as stronger than fighters because the can do a relevant bit in combat and are very good out of combat.
The fighter is very good in combat but nearly useless out of combat.Rogues have some interesting archetypes, they can use talents to get combat feats (1 free to choose, one for weapon focus, one for weapon finesse and I think there is one for weapon prof, too.)
With the swashbuckler archetype they get a martial weapon prof and can take combat trick two times.Build your rogue with a little cha, to be able to be the party face and you can take flagbearer to buff the party without having to play a bard. There are options and, in my view they are less of a strawman than the options given for why fighters do not suck out of combat.
Enter the ranger, see the situation, the ranger start laughing.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
1. I think rogues are probably the worst overall class in Pathfinder. As they have no real niche in our out of combat that can't be better performed by another class, and even their breadth of expertise can be better handled by another class. I wouldn't recommend someone play one, and I wouldn't play one myself.
2. Rogues don't just suck. Rogues are a class that is totally replaceable, and that is bad game design, but they aren't horrible to play. Would I play one? No, but that doesn't mean they will never have a place in a game. Low magic, low level, low combat? Rogues can be pretty good there.
No class in Pathfinder just sucks. They just suck when they're standing next to someone who is completely (intentionally or not) aping their gimmick or making it less useful. For Rogues, there just happens to be a whole lot of other class that do that. Either naturally, or with spells, equipment, archetypes, traits, or some combination of them.
| 13 people marked this as a favorite. |
They're weak in combat, and don't actually have any good class features that provide significant bonuses to act within their own roles. Rogues are thematically sneaky, but don't have any bonuses to stealth. They're con men, without any significant bonuses to bluff. The role is not significantly matched by the roll play.
They're hurt more than most by the move or damage dichotomy of martials
There's also the trend that people that are trying to make a powerful character avoid the rogue, so fewer of the people who COULD make a powerful rogue do.
*rocks in chair* In my day we walked uphill both ways to the dungeon, and traps were TPKs. Miss a trap ? Die. Look at a trap. Die. Hear the sound of the trap closing, the trap is so awsome that the vibrations kill you! Muahahahahah! The entire room spins around, you're chucked through a 200 foot tall corridor filled from top to bottom with permanent blade barrier spells and dropped into a vat of acid and then attacked by acid breathing sharks!
The DM had to keep a bonfire going just to dispose of all the character sheets, and he filled his Olympic sized swimming pool with the players tears!
Now traps are CR balanced. Some of them are bad, some of them are an inconvinience, but you're far more likely to die from a really hard encounter.
-What this means for your character is that if you're only 85% as a rogue as a real thing its no big deal.
2) Skill parity
In 3.whatever The ability to have skills as a class skill really mattered as you got up in levels. At 20th level a class skill would be at 23 ranks and a cross class skill at 11 ranks. The pathfinder equivilant is a +3 bonus, which fades quickly in importance as you level.
Grabbing a single level or rogue let you max out the skills, but you still had to pay double the sp's to do it. Even wizards couldn't usually afford to do that with more than 1 or two skills.
Under pathfinder, you get 90% of the benefit of having rogue class skills in a single level. Take 1 level, grab +3 to most of the good skills.
-This means you can be a rogue 1/ whatever X and loose very little trap finding ability.
3) trait customization.
With the ever widening availability and diversity of traits its become very easy to get that +3 bonus on the skills that you really care about.
-Even without a level of rogue you can probably use your traits to get disable device and perception.
4) Skill consolidation
In 3.0 you needed 8 skill points for perception (spot, listen, search), acrobatics (jump, tumble, balance) , and dealing with mechanical stuff (open lock, disable device). With the consolidation its pretty easy to get by on 4 skill points to do the same job.
5) Handy hobbies.
For things you might only need a little of you can put one rank into it and get a decent +3 bonus on it. This will let you hit a tn 15 check with a little luck.
6) Everyone can find traps.
The rogues trap finding ability can be made up with a good wisdom score and a feat. You don't NEED a rogue to do it anymore. Concentrate on getting a good perception score. Not every trap needs to be disarmed but they all need to be seen.
|
|
| 7 people marked this as a favorite. |
If you think rogues suck, it's because you're trying to play them like another class.
Try this build on for size: Play an elf rogue. Get your Dex to at least 18, but try to keep everything else around 12. Don't dump anything. Trade out the elven magic trait for the silent hunter trait. For your other traits, pick up warrior of old and threatening defender.
Your first level feat should be combat expertise. At 2nd level, you're using a rogue trick to gain weapon finesse, because you're going to be using a rapier whenever you have to put your composite longbow away. At 3rd level, you want improved feint. Now you've got all the melee help you need, so all of your subsequent feats should be chasing down ranged effectiveness: point-blank shot, precise shot, rapid shot, manyshot, focused shot, etc. Read up on all the different flavors of arrows there are to buy!
For your 2nd and 3rd rogue talents, ignore the crappy sneak attack ones. Instead, go for minor magic (touch of fatigue) and then major magic (vanish). Every level, put your favored class bonus into the elf racial bonus that increases the uses per day of these spells.
For your skills, concentrate on the classic rogue stuff: acrobatics, bluff, disable device, disguise, escape artist, perception, sleight of hand, stealth, and use magic device. Now actually go and read up on everything you can do with those skills. Seriously, go read them again. I'll bet even an experienced player is going to discover something he didn't know at least one of those skills does.
And now you're all set. You can dish out incredible damage at short range or in melee, plus you have long range capabilities. After the battle, when the fighter, cleric, wizard, and most other classes are sitting there twiddling their thumbs, waiting for the next fight, you can get to work using bluff, disable device, and disguise to turn a town upside down!
Enjoy!
| 14 people marked this as a favorite. |
Basically, if you have really, really good system mastery, you can get by with the Rogue.
If not, you will be disappointed, as there is always another class that does everything better.
For many, the most appealing "class feature", is writing "Rogue" or "Ninja", at the top of their character sheet. That, and getting to say "Sneak Attack" often.
First off let me apologize beforehand if I use the wrong jargon. I have played d&d since Ford was in office but never played anything past 1 ed ad&d so I may not get the terminology right.
This is a real problem. The game shouldn't require 'system mastery' for a basic feature to work. If the 'thief' or rogue isn't a basic feature of a fantasy adventuring rpg _Nothing_ is. Being able to properly roleplay a paladin or a monk ought to be harder than the mechanics of being 'The Grey Mouser'. An archery rogue should be a natural, keen eyesight and a steady hand are necessary for both.
No mechanics for an rpg should be harder to learn and use than the actual roleplaying. Having good enough ability scores to play certain classes (if you want those classes to be rare) is one thing. Requiring someone to be conversant with nearly 600 pages of basic rules and hundreds more of supplements to merely _play_ a basic fantasy archetype is too much.
No one (except innocent wide-eyed players) expected the monk to shine, David Carradine had just made 'kung-fu' a household word and the show was number one in its time slot from start to finish. Players wanted to be Caine. I doubt two middleaged wargamers from Wisconsin were as thrilled to bring in oriental monks. So while I am not thrilled they have not made the monk effective in 35 plus years I am not surprised.
But nerfing the thief? That's just poor form and requiring you to understand something longer and more dense than many college text books to simply play effectively is just flat ridiculous. Holmes managed to make an effective game in a pamphlet smaller than the Jehovah Witness tracts that were handed out door to door or the Avon catalog. Don't get me started on how small the 'white books' were.
Okay rant off. Maybe I am just old but I remember finding a single magic item in an adventure being thrilling. Now all the guides I am reading assume there'll be standardized magic items available when and where you need them. It's a different world.
That's my two coppers.
Karl
| 13 people marked this as a favorite. |
If you think rogues suck, it's because you're trying to play them like another class.
If you're going to tell me I'm doing something wrong, you're going to need to give me something a LOT better than that build
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
A knight having any kind of concern for peasants, let alone sticking his head out for them, now that ruins immersion.
Remember that D&D is based more off of stories than reality, and an idealized form of chivalry rather than the armored sociopaths we seem to have actually had.
I've seen this sentiment expressed several times. I don't understand it though.What is the big deal with kung fu style monks running around Frogsquat-on-Avon? Our fantasy archetypes and characters have only a very loose correlation to history as it is, so what's the big deal here?
I also think the old days were cool with Expedition to the Barrier Peaks, Temple of the Frog, and portals to Boot Hill. Murlynd's six-shooters were A-Ok with me.
Just don't get how a David Carradine type running around beating up stuff with his fists and spouting Zen-like sayings ruins any kind of immersion.
A knight having any kind of concern for peasants, let alone sticking his head out for them, now that ruins immersion.
Oh, I love the idea of the monk I was a teenager at the time who loved the tv show, Bruce Lee movies and practiced martial arts four hours a day.
I had no problem with the concept just the execution. On the other hand I doubt Gygax and Arneson were champing at the bit to add David Carradine to every party. Just my view looking back.
Rogues, when built correctly, are the 2nd highest damaging class in the game. It is just that most people do not know how to build rogues.
I built a L11 rogue not too long ago that could do 300+ DPR.
Rogues, when built correctly, are the 2nd highest damaging class in the game. It is just that most people do not know how to build rogues.
I built a L11 rogue not too long ago that could do 300+ DPR.
When sneak attacking and getting a full attack, sure. The problem is you can't always count on one or the other, much less both
| 2 people marked this as a favorite. |
If you have more than just the core books cleric archers are actually viable. Erastil grants longbow prof and the feather sub domain. Wis doesn't need to be high to drop buffs on yourself and fly around lobbing arrows.
I'm at work right now, I'll post it when i get home.
| 1 person marked this as a favorite. |
It all depends on what you want , if you want to build an archer that can rain down damage and hold his own in melee then i say go ranger all the way
But if you want a stealthy skill monkey that can back up the party with well placed shot in support of the party then a rouge will do just fine
You just need to decide what sort of character you want to play if you want max damage then go ranger or fighter if you want stealth shed loads of skills and being able to do the odd mega damage with sneak attack then rouge its up to you