Between the invisible mage hand that can be used to steal and pick locks as a bonus action and access to spells like Booming Blade, Minor Illusion, Charm Person, Disguise Self, Silent Image, Mirror Image, Shadow Blade and Suggestion, Arcane Tricksters already have more than enough going for them at low levels. Also, the way that feature reads to me, you can always attempt to completely negate a spell regardless of level.
If I had to change something about it, it'd be removing the long rest until you've gotten an enemy to fail their save.
Spell Thief has a lot of secret uses that you are not thinking of. First, the fact it negates anything, even a spell that does not have a save and even one you do not see being cast.. You are now in some ways better at counter-spelling than a real wizard is. The spell just has to to target you or include you in the area of effect. The spell does not have to be a wizard spell.
Hallucinatory Terrain could be stolen and you see the reality. Storm Sphere can be stolen and you can laugh with impunity as they waste their bonus action trying to strike you with a bolt of lightning.
In addition, while you can not steal the knowledge of a 5+ level spell, Spell thief still lets you be immune to it's effects, even if no save is allowed. That means you can laugh off a Power Word Kill spell, even if you have only 1 hitpoint left.
it was just their attempt to put 2 beloved casty rogues from past editions into one subclass. Spell thief should honestly get its own subclass as either a rogue or maybe even a sorcerer/bard
I do agree that Spell thief is a great idea and could be expanded into it's own subclass. I can't see ANOTHER rogue spell caster subclass, at least not a Wizard based one. A Bard makes a lot of sense to me, more so than a Sorcerer because the Bard already can learn any spell via magical secrets.
I would, personally, like to see and Articier variant of this. Some way for them to manipulate magic, as a means to explain some of their more techy powers.
Between the invisible mage hand that can be used to steal and pick locks as a bonus action and access to spells like Booming Blade, Minor Illusion, Charm Person, Disguise Self, Silent Image, Mirror Image, Shadow Blade and Suggestion, Arcane Tricksters already have more than enough going for them at low levels. Also, the way that feature reads to me, you can always attempt to completely negate a spell regardless of level.
If I had to change something about it, it'd be removing the long rest until you've gotten an enemy to fail their save.
Spell Thief has a lot of secret uses that you are not thinking of. First, the fact it negates anything, even a spell that does not have a save and even one you do not see being cast.. You are now in some ways better at counter-spelling than a real wizard is. The spell just has to to target you or include you in the area of effect. The spell does not have to be a wizard spell.
Hallucinatory Terrain could be stolen and you see the reality. Storm Sphere can be stolen and you can laugh with impunity as they waste their bonus action trying to strike you with a bolt of lightning.
In addition, while you can not steal the knowledge of a 5+ level spell, Spell thief still lets you be immune to it's effects, even if no save is allowed. That means you can laugh off a Power Word Kill spell, even if you have only 1 hitpoint left.
it was just their attempt to put 2 beloved casty rogues from past editions into one subclass. Spell thief should honestly get its own subclass as either a rogue or maybe even a sorcerer/bard
I do agree that Spell thief is a great idea and could be expanded into it's own subclass. I can't see ANOTHER rogue spell caster subclass, at least not a Wizard based one. A Bard makes a lot of sense to me, more so than a Sorcerer because the Bard already can learn any spell via magical secrets.
I would, personally, like to see and Articier variant of this. Some way for them to manipulate magic, as a means to explain some of their more techy powers.
I say just drop the whole ability and give the AT a few extra spells and spell slots.