If I could change one thing about Rogues:
- I'd double the damage done by all traps
OR
- I'd make the negative effects of Dirty Trick harder to remove (one move action? REALLY?!)
OR
- I'd give them Weapon Finesse for free, and let them add DEX to melee damage with light weapons
OR
- I'd let Rogues add INT to their AC as long as they aren't flat-footed.
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for the rogue: better rogue talents. the barbarian rage powers should serve as a baseline--talents should be worth spending a feat on, not the other way around.
alternatively, change the slayer class name to 'rogue' and have paizo finally consign the rogue proper to oblivion and just admit it instead of dancing around the issue of releasing two more 'rogue but better' classes.
There is nothing wrong with the rogue. I wouldn't change a thing.
There is nothing wrong with the rogue. I wouldn't change a thing.
Thems fight'n words!
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If you could change one thing about the Rogue what would it be.Its existence.
Remove it from reality, replace it with the Slayer retroactively.
Despite the pooh-poohs this comment has received, I agree wholeheartedly.
Much like the PrCs in the CRB, the Rogue is a relic of 3.5 that unfortunately hasn't aged well/remained relevant.
The slayer is what a combat oriented rogue should have been all along. Currently, the rogue class is deadwood. The only point in playing one is to do a slayer/investigator multiclass without the pain of multiclassing.
Rogues aren't thus COMPLETELY pointless, but that's not much of a reason for the class to continue to receive time & energy from Paizo. It'd be far easier to just rename either investigator or slayer to "Rogue" in order to honor the legacy of continuity the class.
In my personal opinion, Rogues should be the absolute best at skills - bar none.
For me, a possible fix is giving each skill a function/ability that is 'Rogue only'.
What those are though.. who knows? You'd have to do some serious thinking/designing.
for the rogue: better rogue talents. the barbarian rage powers should serve as a baseline--talents should be worth spending a feat on, not the other way around.
alternatively, change the slayer class name to 'rogue' and have paizo finally consign the rogue proper to oblivion and just admit it instead of dancing around the issue of releasing two more 'rogue but better' classes.
You are 100% right that rogues need better talents. There is nothing mechanically wrong with the rogue that decent talents will not fix.
You are 100% right that rogues need better talents. There is nothing mechanically wrong with the rogue that decent talents will not fix.for the rogue: better rogue talents. the barbarian rage powers should serve as a baseline--talents should be worth spending a feat on, not the other way around.
alternatively, change the slayer class name to 'rogue' and have paizo finally consign the rogue proper to oblivion and just admit it instead of dancing around the issue of releasing two more 'rogue but better' classes.
I disagree.
Sneak attack has severe problems, and rogues are the skill class that is actually not that good at skills.
i would simply Gestalt Rogue and Fighter as if they were one class. just like i would Gestalt Monk with DSP Psychic Warrior.
there, the 3 weakest classes in the game have been fixed
Ninja is just a rogue Archetype
for Cavaliers, i would Gestalt them with the Samurai Archetype
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i would simply Gestalt Rogue and Fighter as if they were one class. just like i would Gestalt Monk with DSP Psychic Warrior.
I believe both the psychic warrior and the soulknife have fist archetypes.
I would not gestalt with DSP classes. They are well balanced. Thus any gestalt would be too strong or just have unneeded features.
A fighter/rogue gestalt is basically the slayer.
i would simply Gestalt Rogue and Fighter as if they were one class. just like i would Gestalt Monk with DSP Psychic Warrior.I believe both the psychic warrior and the soulknife have fist archetypes.
I would not gestalt with DSP classes. They are well balanced. Thus any gestalt would be too strong or just have unneeded features.
A fighter/rogue gestalt is basically the slayer.
in other words
in my Games
i should replace fighter and rogue with slayer, monk with Psychic Warrior and Cavalier with Samurai?
okies. sounds good.
I really love playing rogues. Unfortunately, I believe the common opinion that rogues are a weak class is probably correct. My most recent rogue was intended to wield an elven curved blade as a sneaky mobile fighter. I got talked into making her a slayer and she is a much more capable character as a result. Still, I miss that she isn't a rogue.
Part of the problem is that they gave away some of the rogue's best stuff to other classes (look ashamed whoever did this:-). Also traps have been nerfed in that they are too easy to find and disable and too many classes can do it.
What to do? I'm not sure as a lot of the damage seems irreversible.
The Assassin type rogue is now a slayer
The swashbuckling rogue is now a swashbuckler
The investigator rogue is now...
There have been some good suggestions:
Full BAB - maybe
Better rogue talents - only if you don't give them away to a bunch of other classes.
Sneak attack - I'd like to see it beefed up rather than done away with such as the suggestion that rogues get sneak attack whenever a target is flanked, even if the rogue isn't doing the flanking.
One think I don't want to see is giving them a lot of magic. If they get any at all it should be little cantrip type stuff that is unique to the rogue.
Anyway, that's my rant for now.
Morag
You are 100% right that rogues need better talents. There is nothing mechanically wrong with the rogue that decent talents will not fix.for the rogue: better rogue talents. the barbarian rage powers should serve as a baseline--talents should be worth spending a feat on, not the other way around.
alternatively, change the slayer class name to 'rogue' and have paizo finally consign the rogue proper to oblivion and just admit it instead of dancing around the issue of releasing two more 'rogue but better' classes.
I disagree.
Sneak attack has severe problems, and rogues are the skill class that is actually not that good at skills.
It is true that sneak attack has problems and that many classes are better skill monkeys than the rogue. Both of these problems could be solved with better rogue talents. If rogue had combat talents that did not rely on sneak attack, or that fixed some of the problems with sneak attack it would be extremely useful. Likewise if they had rogue talents that let them use their skills in way no one else could it would fix the problem with others being better skill monkeys.
ah...that is not a change to rogues, and it would not help to make rogus feel more imprtant, like at all.If I could change one thing about Rogues:
- I'd double the damage done by all traps
Man I was running an AP with a guy who is very by the book. Except for the most random times.
We're running an AP. I as a rogue attempted to disable a magical trap. He decided instead of me destroying the trap, I just turned it off for as long as it would be relevant to us. Because a rogue mundanely destroying magic didn't make sense to him.
This guy also shuts down the wizard a lot. That kind of rules scrutiny leads to a bad time for the rogue, but the synthesist summoner just gets to roflstomp.
Full base attack bonus, that is all
something like
Hide in plain sight lv4, any terrain, 1+dex a day.
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There's no fixing the Rogue.
Well, let me clarify - it's been fixed. Any fixes now will just make it more like a Slayer. (Best combat rogue) or more like an Investigator (Best skill monkey rogue) Now, yes, I understand people are like, "But that's a Slayer now! We need to fix the Rogue!"
Why bother? It's a waste of intellectual time and, if it were implemented, a waste of print space. You have two very good classes that fill your Rogue role. Three if you count the Bard, but for flavor's sake, the Slayer and Investigator ARE closer. Besides the name and being better at everything, what REALLY differentiates a Slayer from a Rogue? A few things technically. Nothing conceptually.
And really, other fixes are just going to make it do (more) things other classes do better, anyway.
Combat feats? That's a fighter.
Debuffs? That's a Bard, and a Witch.
Take out Dex-to-Damage for other classes and make it specific to the rogue? Admission the only fix is to gimp other classes.There are a lot of sacred cows that need to be slaughtered for every new iteration of the 3.PF rules, and the Rogue is chief among them. Rip every wasted paragraph that deals with the Rogue out. Or rip out the Slayer and put that statblock over the old Rogue. Or take Arcane Trickster out of PrC, make it a 1-20 base class, and boom - new "rogue".
A purely martial debuffer is a niche that could be very thematically filled by the Rogue. Not needing to use spells is a real concern for a lot of people; if the Rogue's job was dirty tricks that would make plenty of people happy (me being one of them) as long as the Rogue is actually good at it.
Better rogue talents. Less "once a day" more "as an action".
This.
There's no fixing the Rogue.
{. . .}
Take out Dex-to-Damage for other classes and make it specific to the rogue? Admission the only fix is to gimp other classes.
{. . .}
That's what becomes necessary when you have given the Rogue's (and Ninja's) abilities to everybody else for too little cost. Not saying that nobody else should be able to do Rogue tricks at all, but that these should be harder (or at least harder to do sustainably) for those who are not specialized in such things.
I think better talents fix the rogue easy (today's advanced talents should be baseline, and new, awesome advanced talents show up).
But if you ask me for another fix? Keep the 3/4 BAB, add Int as a bonus to attack (in addition to STR/DEX, but not to damage), and CMB.
Currently working on an "archetype" for the rogue. It is not done yet, but I like how it is coming together.
There is nothing wrong with the rogue. I wouldn't change a thing.Even the Paizo design team has openly stated that they don't believe that to be true. One of the goals of the upcoming Unchained book is even explicitly to fix the Rogue.
I'm not aware of anybody saying that. Where did that happen?
Unchained is not coming out "explicitly to fix the Rogue." It's a collection of alternative rules on a variety of topics similar to Unearthed Arcana.
Maybe if you can explain why you think it is "broken" we can start there and discuss solutions.
I wanted to jump back in just to say I also strongly agree with the idea that rogue talents should remove the 1/day restriction.
Are there any that break/become too strong just by taking the limit out?
Give'em an ability that grants them a bonus to hit and damage whenever an ally is engaged with the same opponent, call it Opportunist...this would stack with flanking. Starts at +1 at 2nd level, then increases by +1 every 4 levels to a max of +5.
Flip the 'g' and 'u' around. Definitely that.
I wanted to jump back in just to say I also strongly agree with the idea that rogue talents should remove the 1/day restriction.
Are there any that break/become too strong just by taking the limit out?
This oneI wanted to jump back in just to say I also strongly agree with the idea that rogue talents should remove the 1/day restriction.
Are there any that break/become too strong just by taking the limit out?
Good catch.
So.. obviously you'd have to re-work this one (turn it into an immediate action?) and there are probably some others out there too.
This oneI wanted to jump back in just to say I also strongly agree with the idea that rogue talents should remove the 1/day restriction.
Are there any that break/become too strong just by taking the limit out?
Good catch.
So.. obviously you'd have to re-work this one (turn it into an immediate action?) and there are probably some others out there too.
Well as Paizo has already determined. Negating one melee attack per round is just too gamebreakingly strong. And that option was the 4th feat in a chain.
Well as Paizo has already determined. Negating one melee attack per round is just too gamebreakingly strong. And that option was the 4th feat in a chain.This oneI wanted to jump back in just to say I also strongly agree with the idea that rogue talents should remove the 1/day restriction.
Are there any that break/become too strong just by taking the limit out?
Good catch.
So.. obviously you'd have to re-work this one (turn it into an immediate action?) and there are probably some others out there too.
Fair enough, but they also gave the Swashbuckler class a parry ability at 1st level. So it is not outside the realm of possibility.
However, how you fix this particular talent (and others like it) is the subject for another thread.
In an older thread about this subject, someone brought up the idea that Rogues could have a higher skill cap than their level. Instead of max ranks being equal to their level, it would be equal to 1.5 their level (rounded down). So a 2nd level rogue could have a max of 3 ranks, at 4th it would be max 6, etc.
It was brought up that you'd have to watch out for Prestige classes as this system would allow for early entry but as a spit-ball brainstorm idea.. I kind of liked it.
And, lastly, I'm of the camp that Rogues should stay away from increased sneak attack or full BAB. Leave that to the major fighter types.
There is nothing wrong with the rogue. I wouldn't change a thing.Even the Paizo design team has openly stated that they don't believe that to be true. One of the goals of the upcoming Unchained book is even explicitly to fix the Rogue.
Cite? I mean yes, there will be stuff for the rogue, but I dont remember them saying the Rogue is badly done.
This oneI wanted to jump back in just to say I also strongly agree with the idea that rogue talents should remove the 1/day restriction.
Are there any that break/become too strong just by taking the limit out?
Good catch.
So.. obviously you'd have to re-work this one (turn it into an immediate action?) and there are probably some others out there too.
I suggest ed that the One a day talents be fixed in one of two ways:
make them all 3X+ Stat bonus/ayOr add a Rogue Only Talent that makes them usable like that.
Redirect-attack is very cool, but being able to do it only say 6 times a day would stop it from being broken. And make the Rogue much more survivable.
What if Rogues had a talent that let them roll Reflex saves against Critical hits?
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What would I change?
I suppose I would revise the entire skill system so that it wasn't synthesized/gamed by spells +X (+5 to climb, jump, etc) and I wouldn't allow dipping or access into most of their skills unless you actually had levels in Rogue.
Basically a skill system overhaul that would make the Rogue the only class one with 100% access to a majority of what are current Rogue-like skills.
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There is nothing wrong with the rogue. I wouldn't change a thing.Even the Paizo design team has openly stated that they don't believe that to be true. One of the goals of the upcoming Unchained book is even explicitly to fix the Rogue.I'm not aware of anybody saying that. Where did that happen?
Unchained is not coming out "explicitly to fix the Rogue." It's a collection of alternative rules on a variety of topics similar to Unearthed Arcana.
Maybe if you can explain why you think it is "broken" we can start there and discuss solutions.
How about, in the Unchained thread itself and at the PaizoCon 2014 banquet, the same place Jason Buhlman said on camera in front of a room full of people that the Summoner is the (and I quote) "most horribly twisted broken thing you could have at your table".
And yeah, one of the goals of Unchained is explicitly to fix the Rogue. All of the classes explicitly mentioned in the Unchained release information are classes that don't live up to Paizo's design philosophy. The Rogue in that book will be straight-up better than the current Rogue, who has many issues including:The worst to-hit of any martial class in the game. He's the only 3/4 class with no way to boost his to-hit.
Mechanics that don't support his intended playstyle. He's got crap saves, weak armor, and yet he's expected to get right into the mix of things and move into attack range, handle poison traps, etc.
Incredibly weak class features: see arbitrarily limited talents (all that 1/day nonsense), class features that don't do anything or which do something the rules would have let you do without them previously (if you convince someone of something with bluff, now they don't have to UAE their bluff check on other people! Umm, why is someone who believes what they're saying is true making a bluff check to begin with?).
Etc.
At the end of the day though, I don't need to worry about discussing solutions, because one of the best teams of game designers in the world already knows what is broken and is working on a fix.
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This oneI wanted to jump back in just to say I also strongly agree with the idea that rogue talents should remove the 1/day restriction.
Are there any that break/become too strong just by taking the limit out?
Good catch.
So.. obviously you'd have to re-work this one (turn it into an immediate action?) and there are probably some others out there too.
That's what more or less limits swashbucklers from parry/riposting EVERY incoming melee attack. Make it an immediate action and it's not only limited to once per round, but if they use that talent they won't be able to use any others or even any other immediate actions that round. Make 'em think about when they're going to use it.
And yeah, one of the goals of Unchained is explicitly to fix the Rogue. All of the classes explicitly mentioned in the Unchained release information are classes that don't live up to Paizo's design philosophy. The Rogue in that book will be straight-up better than the current Rogue, who has many issues including:There is nothing wrong with the rogue. I wouldn't change a thing.Even the Paizo design team has openly stated that they don't believe that to be true. One of the goals of the upcoming Unchained book is even explicitly to fix the Rogue.I'm not aware of anybody saying that. Where did that happen?
Unchained is not coming out "explicitly to fix the Rogue." It's a collection of alternative rules on a variety of topics similar to Unearthed Arcana.
Maybe if you can explain why you think it is "broken" we can start there and discuss solutions.
What was actually posted is: "1. The classes mentioned fall into a special category in my mind. That being: Classes I would do differently today than the way they were done years ago during their initial design phase. Its not that we dislike them, it is just that they do not quite live up to our current design philosophies here in the office. This is a chance for us to revisit them in a safe environment, while allowing all of you to play with the results."
Not the same as "explicitly to fix the Rogue".
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How about, in the Unchained thread itself and at the PaizoCon 2014 banquet, the same place Jason Buhlman said on camera in front of a room full of people that the Summoner is the (and I quote) "most horribly twisted broken thing you could have at your table".
I call bull s!+! on his statement. Utterly untrue. It is no more powerful than any other full spellcaster in the game (and arguably less so).
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I have to wonder what point you saw in repeating something I'd already linked in. The class doesn't fit their design philosophy (which is "make good, balanced classes and fun, accessible mechanics").
Unless you think maybe the Rogue is one of the overpowered classes they're fixing.
It's fine though, I'm certain Pathfinder Unchained will make it very clear what they think of the Rogue in it's current incarnation.
I make certain every ROGUE is equipped with lots of ROUGE since so many people end up calling it that anyway.
Ugh. Drives me crazy.
Better rogue talents. Less "once a day" more "as an action".This.
Seriously, take a look at some of the investigator talents. Things like effortless aid, empathy or sickening offensive for example. Those should be the baseline for talents, as opposed to things like deft palm or hard to fool.
(Just look at the difference between empathy and hard to fool. How can anyone say they are even closely balanced?)
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Change the Rogue's role in combat from DPR to debuffing.The rogue is really not a designed to be the DPR guy. He is more like a secondary combatant with non-magical utility. Thematically the rogue is the "fixer", but without magic and no EX that looks magical, and no boost to his combat abilities he just falls behind the other classes.He has utility abilities out of combat, sure, but in-combat? All he does is damage. The only combat related boosts he gets involve sneak attack die; whether this was intended or not, when initiative is rolled the rogue's role is to hit stuff right now. He's terrible at it, of course, and it's frankly not very thematic for a Rogue to be competing with a Barbarian.
Which is why I reworked the Rogue to revolve around the dirty trick maneuver...
Debuffing as an option is not a bad idea. In 3.X Oriental adventures you could trade in some of your sneak attack dice to do other things. The skill tricks from one of the later books would also be nice for a rogue to have.
Better rogue talents. Less "once a day" more "as an action".This.Seriously, take a look at some of the investigator talents. Things like effortless aid, empathy or sickening offensive for example. Those should be the baseline for talents, as opposed to things like deft palm or hard to fool.
(Just look at the difference between empathy and hard to fool. How can anyone say they are even closely balanced?)
Okay.
Wow. That's...pretty awful. Poor rogue.