Dusty wrote:Don't... Everyone's advice is valuable. Rogues have been heavily nerfed. You have to get right behind an enemy to sneak attack and as far as I know, you can't get multiple sneak attacks with > 3 attacks per round.
So far as I know (and I've played the OC and Dasaria 2 so far as a a rogue), you can only pull off one sneak attack per round as a rogue wielding a single weapon, or two as a dual wielding rogue. This is provided you sneak up behind him and don't have someone else distracting him from the front.
However, even when a tank's engaging them from the front, the sneak attacked character (if AI controlled) tends to turn around briefly after the sneak attack, which makes your "next" attack that round a normal attack, but the potential for more than 1 or 2 sneak attacks per round exists. Hopefully this situation is a bug they fix.
Contrast to NWN I when my rogue could stealth right up to another character and pull off 6 sneak attacks in that first unstealthed round... and then Hide in Plain Sight and do it again. Damn.
Anyway, the most debilitating bug MP rogues currently face is that stealth only works against NPCs, and does not work against PCs. Yup, teh l4mage. Also, another pain in the *** rogue afflicting bug is that stealthing or searching reduces your movement speed to half your
normal speed, regardless of if you're hasted or have other speed bonuses.
So you might want to hold off on being a rogue until Obsidian irons out some of the bugs. I personally find it really crappy that my rogue can't piss of another PC, run around a corner and stealth to get away from being beaten into a pulp... <sigh> but I keep holding out hope that this will change. Soon.
As to the guide - your "best" rogue race is probably going to be either a human or some sort of elf. But any race can do, as has been pointed out. The strength of the rogue is all those skills you get (8 base + int + other modifiers), so you're the go to guy in the party. Scout, set and disarm traps, unlock doors, lure dumb enemies into charging around a corner into three tanks a couple at a time, etc. Everyone else in the party beats on things until they die - and you make that process easier and make sure you all get rewarded for your goblin thumping, by recovering trapped loot. Outside of the dungeon, all those skills can translate rather nicely into some conversational strength and/or a high appraise score, making you an ideal candidate to buy gear and sell loot for the party as well. You pay for this unrivaled versatility by sucking massive, hairy ballsack in combat. (Yup, sad but true. The only class worse in combat than the rogue is the hilariously pathetic bard class.) And never having enough feats to do what you want.
Oh, right, and quick tip - since you're probably limited to small weapons with your weapon finesse, make sure you always have a mace or two handy. All those small piercing weapons do you no good against the undead, or piercing/slashing resistant enemies, and I'm pretty sure maces are the only "small" weapon to do bludgeoning damage.
Your primary abilities are Int and Dex. Int for those skill points (and many rogue class skills are Int based, not Dex based) and Dex for the other class skills... and Armor Class in those wimpy light armors you're restricted to. With weapons finesse, this also translates into a nice to hit bonus... though, this is gimped up too, as your base attack bonus is "medium," rather than "high" for the other fighter types. Grr. Con is also a very good stat to have a bonus point or two in... as a d6 HP character, failure to do so will result in quick death. Well, even quicker, given that fighter types will have both better AC and better attack bonuses than you, and mage types can exploit your horribly low will saves. Grumble. Con also helps a little with your fort saves, which are also innately low.
Obviously, human's a nice rogue choice - extra feat and an extra skill point per level, so you can mitigate your feat shortage somewhat, and focus on your strength in skills. They have no real shortcomings as a rogue, but I find that they make unimpressive rogues, stat-wise. Though, of course, they do make pretty good rogues after 12 levels, when you can correct or mitigate that stat problem.
Elves (and sub races) are good Rogue races for several reasons. Primarily, "Keen Senses" makes sure you're always in search mode for traps, and Elvish ability scores tend to compliment the rogue class rather nicely. All elvish races have either a +2 to Dex or a +2 to Int, and the Drow make perfect rogues (ability score wise), with +2 to Dex, Int and Cha, which covers all your class skills beautifully. The elvish racial immunity to sleep and hardiness against enchantments are also quite useful (an immobilized rogue is a dead one, and the +2 saving throw against enchantment like spells help mitigate your lousy will save), and I find the elvish weapon proficiencies useful in the early levels too. I like to take the Luck of Heroes feat at lvl 1, so using a longsword instead of a shortsword for the first few levels is... nice. And, of course, longbows > shortbows, so that's nice too. Rogues need every edge they can get in combat. The big drawback of Elvish rogues is the lack of that extra feat on character creation that humans get and maybe a lower number of skill points. But my elvish rogue builds have 18 int, instead of a human 16, so the skill points work out the same for me with either race.
Drow in particular make excellent rogues (if you can survive the first few levels as a +2 ECL race), because in addition to all the helpful elvish racial abilities, you get darkness, (good for casting on an enemy and either running like hell or moving in for sneak attacks against a blinded opponent), strong will (+2 will saves, perfect counter to that rogue weakness), see invisibility (useful for a scout, no?) and of course, SR of 11+ level (yeah, SR always rocks. 'Nuff said.). And from a roleplaying perspective, what better race for sneaking around in the shadows, living on the wrong side of the law, and being a generally untrustworthy and unsavory character?
The other thing about playing a rogue, is that they multiclass into almost any other class well, so they're a nice class to take for a few levels of high skills and sneak attacks (make sure you start with a rogue as your level one char, to get all those skill points on character creation!), or a nice class as a primary class, with a few levels of some other class thrown in to help you not suck horribly in combat. About 4 levels of fighter lets you have some useful feats, or a few levels of wizard/sorcerer (depending on whether you focused on INT or CHA) are really helpful in helping you not suck so much in combat. And as previously posted, if you plan on doing a prestige class, you'll need to plan with that class in mind from character inception, because of your lack of feats. 1 lvl of ShadowDancer is rather nice for the Hide in Plain Sight ability, and Assassins are just an all-round good choice for the evil rogue. Though, to be honest, I'm highly unimpressed with the prestige classes as far as rogues go. You generally have to waste a feat to get the prestige class you want, and most of the abilities you'll get from a prestige class you already have as a rogue. Grumble. They generally help other classes become more roguey instead of help rogues strengthen their skills or not get squished in battle
To get the Shadowdancer class, I have to waste a feat on Mobility, even when I have a score of >20 on Tumble? Yeah, f*** you guys too. And Shadow Thief of Amn? Aside from being general crap, I have to waste a feat on the useless "Stealthy" to get that? Whores. I gotta be evil to be an assassin? Come on, evil people need assasssinating too.
But assassin is definitely the most useful prestige class for the rogue... though I find it irritating that rangers can take it too. Assassin gives you extra sneak attack damage and the possible ability to paralyze on hit, as well as poison resistance and useful spell like abilities for rogues as you advance in the class. I only wish good rogues could get it to. What, assassinating the evil tyrant isn't "good?" Bah.
But basically, the rogue class can be played so many ways, there's almost no "wrong" way to play it - and so long as you're comfortable being merely a supporting player on the edges of the battlefield, it's a pretty fun class to play. At least, I always found it fun - but then again, I'm a fan of the thief and Tom Clancy style games, so sneaking around and delivering silent death is very appealing to me.
Wow.
/end dissertation-length rant.
