I must be playing to much pathfinder because I'm building yet another character.
I'm planning on building a skill monkey rogue, with use magic device as a fairly big part of gameplay later. I know I won't be super effective in combat, but I'd like to not be totally useless.
I was thinking of going human, because the extra feat would be a huge help and the extra skill point would help with the skill monkying. I was thinking of building the 20 point buy something like 14, 14, 12, 13, 10, 14 with the +2 bonus still up in the air.
Because of the lower constitution and dexterity I was thinking of building a long spear rogue with improved feint to get one solid sneak attack in a round, and putting my +2 into strength to help with that. All the posts I've seen however however seem to say this is a poor choice for the rogue. Considering I'm not trying to build for maximum DPR would this still be a poor choice? would something else suit me better?
I'm open to moving around abilities, but I definitely want to stick with skill monkey and use magic device.
There's a new archetype, Eldritch Scrapper I think? It gives you some spellcasting for sneak attack and rogue tricks. Might be more of what you're looking for.
Eldritch Scoundrel.
Also, Skill Monkey Rogues don't exist. Rogues are, baseline, skill monkeys due to high ranks per level.
If you want to make a Rogue that avoids combat, you are choosing the wrong class. Rogues dedicate a large part of their budget to combat and you can't trade that.
Perhaps Eldritch Scoundrel will be better but otherwise, I think you are in the wrong track here.
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At the very least, be an unchained rogue. It's a complete upgrade to the rogue chassis, and will allow you to be somewhat effective. If you are going to go long spear, I would suggest going half-elf, pick up the elven branch spear, and and go finesse based instead. It will give you better combat capability, more AoOs, the same damage, better AC, not effect your skills, and allow unchained skill unlocks.
Personally if you want a skill monkey you should pick one of the skill monkey classes, Bard or Investigator as they do skills better and can help in combat easier than a rogue.
Or if wanting to focus on the magic UMD part, go wizard, you'll get like 7 skills a level, so a tiny bit smaller, but you can have a familiar and spells to help with stuff.
At the very least, be an unchained rogue. It's a complete upgrade to the rogue chassis, and will allow you to be somewhat effective. If you are going to go long spear, I would suggest going half-elf, pick up the elven branch spear, and and go finesse based instead. It will give you better combat capability, more AoOs, the same damage, better AC, not effect your skills, and allow unchained skill unlocks.
well this way you could lower str some more to free up more points for other stats.
I must be playing to much pathfinder because I'm building yet another character.
I'm planning on building a low-level abilities only rogue, with being a commoner as a fairly big part of gameplay later. I know I won't be super effective in combat, but I'd like to not be totally useless.
Why would you do that to yourself?
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Are you sure you want to be a Rogue? Investigators are much better at the 'skill monkey' aspect of things and make excellent Str-based melee with a longspear.
You'd adjust stats to be something more like this:
Str 15+2 Dex 14 Con 12 Int 16 Wis 10 Cha 7
And then go Empiricist and grab the Student of Philosophy Trait. As of 2nd level, that lets you use Int instead of Wis, Dex, and Cha for Diplomacy, Perception, Sense Motive, Disable Device, Use Magic Device, and all Bluff checks except feinting in combat.
You'll also still have the same number of skill points per level (due to higher Int), plus the ability to add +1d6 to many skill rolls much of the time. And you get Extracts, which are close enough to spellcasting as makes no difference.
You lag slightly behind in combat for the first few levels, but once Studied Combat kicks in at 4th (5th for Quick Study) you're better at that as well.
Now, if you do want to stick with Rogue (which I wouldn't, given what you say you want) hopefully you're going Unchained, which makes Str higher than 10 basically meaningless, so...go with Str 10 and better Dex and use a finesse weapon.
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Why would you do that to yourself?I must be playing to much pathfinder because I'm building yet another character.
I'm planning on building a low-level abilities only rogue, with being a commoner as a fairly big part of gameplay later. I know I won't be super effective in combat, but I'd like to not be totally useless.
There are some people who enjoy pain. At some point most encounters will be either him Dying or Picking himself off the floor and fixing everything wrong with him. That is a majority of what rogues do already...he is just willingly making himself worst off than he already would be.
Never the less good luck...your gonna need it.
One way to stay competitive in combat is to go Unchained Scout Rogue two-handed Power Attacking with a Finesseable Weapon. Elven Branched Spear, Aldori Duelling Sword or Elven Curve Blade all work. Mixing in Major Magic (Shield) even gives you an acceptable AC if you can keep Dex high.
This build actually keeps necessary combat investment relatively low. You need Power Attack, Weapon Proficiency in your weapon of choice and then mainly just Rogue Finesse to perform decently. You do need 13 Strength and decent Dexterity to get the benefit though.
No one says use the whole book. But Unchained Rogues are legal in PFS and should be legal in all games.
Just because they f!!@ed up when designing a class in the CRB means you should be stuck with that. Give good design the props it deserves.
Unchained rules are "vague suggested alternate set of rules your DM might let you use if he feels like it"
Unchained Classes are complete classes from a rules book like cavalier, bloodrager or Kineticist. That is why people think Unchained classes are part of the rules. URogue is a straight buff to Rogue because the designers admitted the rogue was in a rough spot and could use some attention.
How is anyone thinking unchained is part of the rules? It offers a vague suggested alternate set of rules your DM might let you use if he feels like it (In which case you definitely aren't playing Pathfinder).
Sure, if I'm using the better balanced classes from PATHFINDER Unchained I'm "definitely [not] playing Pathfinder".
Whatever.
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OK I didn't put that very tactfully, in fact I was rude. Apologies.
To me, Unchained isn't part of "normal" Pathfinder like all the other books, it sits in the same area as other possible alternate rules like Armor as DR.
However, looking again now, wrt specifically the classes, I can't find any specific language calling them out as alternate and there is the sentence "These classes can be used alongside their original counterparts"... so guess I'm wrong there.
Unchained actually Did fix the classes it presented.
The rogue needed a HUGE facelift as Core rogue is strictly worst than many NPC classes. Let that sink in a Bit. Core rogue really is TRASH that is good for starting fires after you rip it out the CRB.
The Summoner got Toned DOWN thanks to Unchained. It revamped their spell list to not be so powerful and brought Edolions into check. Now you can't make a level 1 pounce monstrosity that 1 shots bosses on a pounce.
The Barbarian got more math friendly and fixed needing the Raging Vitality feat so you do not suffer sudden death syndrome. Its actually EASIER to play than the Core Barbarian. It also fixed a few rage powers.
The Monk got a much needed buff and mechanics are now easier to understand. They are more survivable on the front lines now even if they did nerf the saves.
All in all The fixes in Unchained were very much needed and should be embraced by the community at large. They were much needed fixes. Did they completely fix rogue...no but it got MUCH much better and makes a viable option now. There is absolutely really no reason to play a CRB rogue. Unless you like punishment and Pain.
If I manage to pull something off in combat, that is awesome and memorable.
Yeah, sorry, but "wow, the rogue did half the damage the fighter did this fight insteat of only providing flanking (while nearly dying) for the first time in 5 levels!" is just not my kind of memorable I want for my character.
If you GM doesn't like the normal summoner, he will ask you to use the unchained version. There, toned down. Unchained Summoner is a way for GMs/groups to have the summoner class usable in a martial heavy party (or alongside players with low system mastery) without large amounts of houserules.
Why is easier to play better? To me *personally* the main long term fun of PF is the fact that it's a complex system and it takes a long time to develop enough system mastery to play a certain characters properly.
Easy to play has nothing to do with system mastery. Easy to play means you don't have to recalculate a bunch of stuff in combat all the time (and for players with little experience, not randomly dying because you didn't know the importance of Raging Vitality).
Picking a weak class and trying to make the most of it is *interesting*. This is part of why I view "balance" as bad: if everyone is equal, then why bother to learn?
Wow, I see a big problem right here. Balancing has nothing to do with everyone being equal. Balancing is about everyone being viable/useful. The normal Rogue is, simply put, complete crap. He isn't the best a scouting, he isn't the best sneaky combatant, he isn't the best skillmonkey, he isn't the best party face, he isn't the best trap handler and he isn't the best good-at-multiple-things-guy. He isn't even second best at any of these things. Unless the ground plus GM handles the rogue with kiddie gloves, he will be useless (i.e. not making any actual impact) most of the time.
It doesn't matter if you make the most of a rogue because you can't min/max social encounters, dealing with traps is really straight forward, and in combat it doesn't matter if you go from 15% to 20% of the other people's damage.The monk is a similar thing: It's frustrating to play. Many of the main class abilities either don't work together or actually work against each other! Flurry of Blows can't be combined with Fast Movement. The nature of Flurry of Blows and the complete dependancy on it hinders stunning fist. The high wisdom dependancy means you have to be either bad at fighting or bad at surviving melee (which also means being bad at fighting).
Neither Unchained Rogue nor Unchained Monk are overly strong. They are nowhere near Barbarian or any of the 6/9 casters. What Unchained does is provide something to work with. It provides a fertile ground to, as you said, "[Pick] a weak class and [try] to make the most of it". Only now the other players can actually notice your work.
No, Pathfinder Unchained is not the be-all and end-all. Many of the optional rules are either unnesassary (like the whole alignment stuff) of poorly executed (like the revised action economy - how the hell didn't the editor notice that it doesn't even explain how the unchained Flurry of Blows interacts with it? Does Paizo even have an editor? Doesn't look like it!), and I actually dislike the Unchained Summoner (at least the Eidolon part - I want more freedom for my Eidolon, not less!). I would have gone much much further for Monk (completly replace Constitution with Wisdom) and Rogue (make it HD10 and full BAB because that's what every martial should have). But still, UnMonk, UnRoge and UnBarbarian (finally a Barbarian I can optimize without feeling like a cheater for ragecycling) are better classes than the CRB versions, and Variant Multiclassing is something I I really like, even if many of the classes suck.
Edit: If this post feels hostile to you, please beleive me that it's not meant that way. I like to diskuss this!
A rogue is a sneaky chancer, if he gets into a straight fight, he *should* get his arse kicked. This is an RP game, not an E-sport. If a "Rogue" type guys picks a straight fight with a Fighter, Wizard, whatever, he *should* get his arse kicked. If I'm playing a Rogue, I am fine with the fact I suck in combat. If I manage to pull something off in combat, that is awesome and memorable. If you are mainly playing PFS/AP's where combat is > 70% of the game, I can see your point.
This is still the case with the Unchained Rogue.
To me, Rogue vs. Unchained Rogue is the difference between a stealth game you win by save scumming, and a stealth game that you win with tactics.
If "oh, I've been caught!" means game over, that seriously limits your fun and you need to create artificial (i.e. GM granted) concessions to compensate. That's how the regular Rogue operates.
The Unchained Rogue doesn't need anyone to piggyback them to function. If stealth or skills fail, you got good combat ability. You aren't a fighter. You still don't have: a million combat feats, great accuracy, several viable fighting styles and god knows you don't have the stats or AC of a frontliner.You rely on tactics and positioning to get sneak attacks still.
But you do have Debilitating Injury to reward a hit so that it allows you to become more competent for the rest of the battle and Finesse Training to get 2 extra feats, because you'd have otherwise picked Weapon Finesse anyway.