Rogue Question

I normally dont put a Rogue in my groups, its not my style, but I did since the kid in the intro of the Co8 patch highly suggested it.... my question is what weapon do they use the best?

I know they are not a great front line fighter, so I gave her a bow, but she missed everything for the first 3 levels. This is with a weapon focus in longbows.

Then I rerolled to try her in the melee, and went the dual weild/dual weild defense route, but she is not great at that either.

Any suggestions on how to make her worth the character slot? Also, she is unable to lockpick the chests in the moat house (spide tower, ghoul area, giant crayfish spot) with a lockpicking set... what is the point of having a rogue with high dex and maxed lockpicking ability?

And this is why I dont roll rogues usually... are bards any better?

 

Rogue's are fun, if a bit different to use. They generally work as supportive roles in a team/combat.

For ranged attacks the feats Point blank shot, presice shot, rapid shot (in that order) is essential. A good dexterity is good (16+ for ex). I wouldn't bother with weapon focus, it makes little difference after the first couple of levels. Also, try to shoot at enemies not in melee (as they are difficult to hit, even with all the above feats, shooting into combat without the feats requires a critical hit in most cases). Let the rogue get a few levels before judging the poor thing, a fighter they are not. Also non-elf rogues are limited to shortbow, trying ot equip a longbow will give you -4 to hit not fun. Elves get longbow proficiency so no problem.

For close combat, the dualwielding is generally never effective on low levels, but becomes better the higher level you are. Personally I wouldn't bother with dualwielding until level 8 (if pure rogue) where they get their seccond attack. Personally I prefer longspears, it allows the rogues to stand behind your fighters and other frontliners and still hit the enemy. Also remember sneak attack, it can be awesome, but it is easy to leave the rogue in a vulnerable position. Have the warriors work together with the rogue, by circling around though enemies while killing the smaller, once you got that flank, let the rogue sneak attack (works with longspear, so you can still keep some distance).

And yeah, the locks are nasty in the moathouse. Tried a Dex 18 rogue level 1 with max open lock and thief tools. Could not open it. Casted guidance on the rogue and tried again, and it worked (barelly). I belive the chest in the tower on teh moathouse have a DC (difficulty) of 29, you allways roll 20 for open lock, dex 18 gives +4, max open lock at level 1 is +4, and with thiefs tools you get no penalty. So total of 28. If you start with halfling or elf, and take max dex 20 you can open it at level 1, if not just level to level 2 and try again. Spells like Cats Grace, guidance, good hope (bard) will increase the chanses, as will getting a masterworks thief tools.

Also, the most typical rogue weapons are Shortbow, dagger (traditional), and rapier (with weapon finesse feat at level 3). As mentioned earlier, I love the longspear, becose of the reach (and simple weapon, so anyone but wizard know how to use it).

If you want a more "fighty" rogue, taking a single level of fighter (or barbarian, ranger, paladin) increases the combat a good deal, getting access to more armors, all martial weapons, some special abilities or feats depending on what class you take. One of my favorite characters is Rogue level 1, take one level fighter or barbarian, and then continue with the rest of the levels as rogue. The drawback is that I have to wait til level 3 before I can pick that damn chest in the moathouse

Edit: You can also use a rogue as the "talking character" give a decent charisma score, and take lots of social skills (diplomacy, bluff, intimidate, sense motive) All of them are class skills for rogue, and he got skillpoints to burn!

Rogue trully is the most customisable class in D&D.

Okie, longwinded ansver done!

 

Thanks so much. I lied when I said I re-rolled. I meant I switched their focus on feats. So now they have weapon focus on longbow (they are an elf) and dual weild and dual weild defense... I have them use a short sword and dagger combo...

I am not sure what I should do with them now. I noticed my ranger (also dual weilding) has better open lock skills than they do (slightly) so I feel my rogue is overly worthless unless they start getting good with the bow, but I have wasted 2 feats on the dual weilding stuff...

Crap... looks like I may need to reroll... again.

 

I find the rogue an extremely useful character. Lots of skill points, makes a perfect "face". Either ranged attack or melee work fine although you need a few levels. I prefere melee, TWF(but not for the first 2 or 3 levels) is very very good with Weapon Finess in wich case you should't bother at all about his/her Str, it'll be the Dex to matter. Obviously you'll need a light weapon(shortsword, rapier,wakizashi,dagger and such). And, having use magic device as a class feat, with a reasonable charisma you can use lots of magic stuff. And there's the sneak attack!!! Very very cool. I once had a party of 4 rouges and 1 Cle of Olidamara. I had really great fun

 

Rogues make the best characters for trap removal, sense motive and gather information, and, otherwise, are also a great jack-of-all-trades character.

 

I always use a full Rogue as an NPC. The game is incredibly difficult without one:- rogues are, after all, vital for charisma-related dialogue(high-CHA sorcerers don't gain as many skill-points, which is odd). Plus, rogues(if next to a fighter or monk with the improved trip feat), can do so much damage to tripped hostile NPCs, provided that they have the dual-wielding feat - I find the latter feat becomes highly effective after c. level 2. And chests become a horror to open without a rogue - unlike NWN, there's no way, seemingly, for a fighter to break open a chest with his bare strength(or with a two-handed sword for that matter - this seems unrealistic).

Now that up to 8 PCs are allowable, I always use a full Monk, full Fighter, full druid, full cleric, full wizard, full sorcerer and full rogue. I just use the last slot for Fruella and Meleny, and that's it - I prefer to do a little cheating re stats for the half-orc(and die-rolling in general), and by exchange, forego allying with Oohlgrist, Scorrp, Thrommel/Otis etc. etc., as these are generally way overpowered, to the point where the game becomes too easy.

 

hi guys, im from ukraine and i ask to excuse me for my bad english and this necroposting =]

i have a really stupid noob question, how i may enabled hide mode, i search it in radial menu but his no there, search in the toee manual but this no there too. tnx.

 

In the radial menu, go to the skills section (where search, heal, picklock etc are) and look for sneak.
Click it, and your character will now go in "sneaking" mode, you'll see that it moves slower and it's slightly crouched.
I doesn't get invisible or nothing like that, but you can pass right in front of creatures (provided you have enough skill points).
To get out of "sneak mode", just open the radial menu again, and you'll see a "stop sneaking" option now. That's it.

:wavey:

 

heeeeh, big tnx man, im with my silly english, didn't guess that sneak mode and hide mode are synonyms.

 

Indeed.

If you use a rogue and you want to dual wield, I suggest picking up weapon finesse, two weapon fighting, improved two weapon fighting, weapon focus shortsword, and critical hit shortsword at level 12. I'm not sure what order they become available, except critical is at level 12.

Either that or pick up a weapon feat in glaive, halberd or spiked chains, it's basically cheating it's so powerful, then just pick up critical hit (weapon) at level 12.

Dodge and mobility are excellent feats for a rogue, and tumble is an great skill.

I don't use my rogue as a party face, instead I max out disable device, open lock, hide, sneak, tumble and use magical device, this allows at times for my rogue to sit back and use wands of fireball etc, in times of need.

Appraisal is a good rogue skill, I'm not sure how much of a discount it gives, but it's going to save you money at the shop. Apparently it works for the whole party.

 

My suggestion for making that a useful slot (note: I do have a bard in my group that handles the conversation skills):

Go with a human rogue/ranger. I start off with level 1 as a rogue for maximum skill points, take power attack and cleave right away, and I can cover pretty much every non-conversational class skill with her, plus bluff and appraise for the heck of it. Then take two levels of ranger, for dual wield. After that, another rogue level and then pretty much just alternate between the classes as seems best. Combat reflexes at level 3 helps too. Has worked out great for me.

Oh, and for a SPOILER (highlight to read):

Taking exotic weapon proficiency with this character, and making this character chaotic good, this character makes a great choice for dual wileding Scather and Fragarach later in the game. This can actually become the most effective character in the party built this way

Qwinn

 

I disagree with your spoiler for one simple reason: since Scather and Fragaratch never miss, why would you bother burning any feats to give them a better attack bonus? IMO, you are better off giving them to different characters and using them two-handed (no EWP) with power attack and combat expertise maxed out. Improved Critical (bastard sword) is great for these weapons also. In the end you will do more damage that way.

 

in order to have both weapons you basically have to cheat, right?, might as well open a console and make a set for the whole party.

 

Well, depends on what you define as cheating. In the vanilla game, if the person with the second of those weapons dies while in your party, you can take it from them and then ressurect them and finish the quest they're involved with.

Humble NPC's makes this easier (you don't have to kill the person), but if you want to consider that a cheat I can't really argue.

And erkper, in reply:

My build didn't really burn any feats to do what I suggested, as those feats come free as a ranger. I mean, I suppose you could have the person take archery instead of dual wielding as a ranger based on your reason, but I don't really see the point if you're never going to use archery either, heh. I still go with it because most of the game takes place before you get those and you can dual wield prior to that point, it's just cleaner from an RP perspective, and finally if you decide -not- to take Thrommel's weapon you can still dual wield Scather along with something else without heavy penalties. As for your other suggestion, I'm afraid I don't have a second chaotic good character to take the other weapon, sigh, heh, but I see your point.
Qwinn