And even IF vex triggers a Sneak Attack every round... so what? That's literally the only way a rogue can even come close to matching the damage output of any other class. Rogues only get one swing per attack action, so without Sneak Attack they would be doing maybe 10 to 15 hp of damage per round, while the wizard is chucking Fireballs downrange. Rogues are super useful out of combat, but in combat - a rogue without Sneak Attack is just a dude with a knife.
In almost every case, a Rogue makes a better fighter than a fighter does. They didn't need extra help, and should not have been given weapon mastery. Your post seems to suggest that each character class should do the same amount of damage per round as every other character class. This thinking is actually quite new to D&D, and was never the case in previous editions.
Once upon a time, the fighter was the best at melee. The rogue was the best at stealth and a single backstab that occurred only once or twice each fight. Wizards could damage multiple targets at once, but the damage to each was fairly low. Clerics could hold their own on the front line, while supporting the others with spells. When a character of any class scored a hit, they rolled a single die of damage (some weapons did 2d4 instead of 1d8). Now damn near every character does multiple dice of damage on each hit and can combine damage from five different sources - on a single hit. [weapon + sneak + hex + channel divinity + smite, etc.]
They've made every class into a glass cannon. Face any character against its mirror image, and you'll see that none have the HP to absorb the damage that they themselves can dish out. Combat between equals has become nothing more than a single roll to win - whomever wins initiative, wins the fight. Once upon a time, you could lose initiative and even roll poorly for a couple of rounds before coming back to win the fight. Not anymore, now every round is an alpha strike for massive damage.
I would have thought they would have learned that lesson from the ill-fated 4e. 4e's greatest issue was that they tried to turn tabletop play into a tabletop version of a video game, where every hit does 20,000 pts of damage (slight exageration). It drove fans away from the game. Yet, here they are - making the same mistake again.
Not every class should be rolling 5 dice of damage every round.
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Playing D&D since 1982
Have played every version of the game since Basic (Red Box Set), except that abomination sometimes called 4e.
And even IF vex triggers a Sneak Attack every round... so what? That's literally the only way a rogue can even come close to matching the damage output of any other class. Rogues only get one swing per attack action, so without Sneak Attack they would be doing maybe 10 to 15 hp of damage per round, while the wizard is chucking Fireballs downrange. Rogues are super useful out of combat, but in combat - a rogue without Sneak Attack is just a dude with a knife.
In almost every case, a Rogue makes a better fighter than a fighter does. They didn't need extra help, and should not have been given weapon mastery. Your post seems to suggest that each character class should do the same amount of damage per round as every other character class. This thinking is actually quite new to D&D, and was never the case in previous editions.
Once upon a time, the fighter was the best at melee. The rogue was the best at stealth and a single backstab that occurred only once or twice each fight. Wizards could damage multiple targets at once, but the damage to each was fairly low. Clerics could hold their own on the front line, while supporting the others with spells. When a character of any class scored a hit, they rolled a single die of damage (some weapons did 2d4 instead of 1d8). Now damn near every character does multiple dice of damage on each hit and can combine damage from five different sources - on a single hit. [weapon + sneak + hex + channel divinity + smite, etc.]
They've made every class into a glass cannon. Face any character against its mirror image, and you'll see that none have the HP to absorb the damage that they themselves can dish out. Combat between equals has become nothing more than a single roll to win - whomever wins initiative, wins the fight. Once upon a time, you could lose initiative and even roll poorly for a couple of rounds before coming back to win the fight. Not anymore, now every round is an alpha strike for massive damage.
I would have thought they would have learned that lesson from the ill-fated 4e. 4e's greatest issue was that they tried to turn tabletop play into a tabletop version of a video game, where every hit does 20,000 pts of damage (slight exageration). It drove fans away from the game. Yet, here they are - making the same mistake again.
Not every class should be rolling 5 dice of damage every round.
So what are rogues? They have relatively low AC and HP, so they're obviously not tanks. They don't have many ways to buff or debuff others, so they're not support. They don't really have healing, so they're not healers. According to you, they should be doing less damage than fighters, so they're not damage dealers. What is left?
"Power Creep". That's your concern. And you're right, that is a valid concern. You could certainly make a compelling argument that D&D is using Power Creep to try to draw in new players by giving D&D characters the kind of damage output that we're used to seeing from WoW characters.
But the rules have already been written, published, and put into practice. Tables are already running games under these rules. So if we're going to play this game, under this ruleset, let's at least try to keep the game fun and fair for everyone involved. When we hit Tier 4 and the wizard is chucking a Meteor Swarm downrange, and the fighter is using her Action Surge to make EIGHT attacks in one round while wrapped in plate armor and using a bonus action to recover up to 30 hit points... and then it's the rogues turn. And he's standing there with a shortsword and ONE attack roll to make. Come on. Give the poor fella Sneak Attack.
So what are rogues? They have relatively low AC and HP, so they're obviously not tanks. They don't have many ways to buff or debuff others, so they're not support. They don't really have healing, so they're not healers. According to you, they should be doing less damage than fighters, so they're not damage dealers. What is left?
The big secret of old-school thieves: they were awful. Their big thing was their special skills, that nobody else could do, but they were absolutely terrible at those, too, until they got quite a number of levels.
The modern rogue is a competent skill character, even at low levels.
However, the game's designers also understand that combat is a big part of the game, and that being dead weight in a fight is no fun for anyone. Thus, sneak attacks.
Depends on the edition. Back Stab depending on edition may just require you be behind them and the multiplier of damage was either with or without modifiers. Outside of BECMI you were pretty much always better off multiclassing with your thief levels. Thanks to the multiplier in the editions where it was with modifiers we always gave the strength gear to the thief, when they are hitting for (1d6+X)2-5damage its pretty good in 1e especially with the hit points enemies had in 1e.. Though again multi classes with fighter was better as they dropped very little in thief levels and that backstab might be happening multiple times a round. Though if you used the two weapon rules even the thief could do that.
In almost every case, a Rogue makes a better fighter than a fighter does
They really, really don't
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
In almost every case, a Rogue makes a better fighter than a fighter does
They really, really don't
In our extended group it is rare to find someone willing to play a fighter anymore, they all opt for rogues, and on the rare case someone does play a fighter - they are the first to die. Rogues outperform fighters. This trend started back in 3rd edition, and the nail in the coffin for fighters was 5e. Rogues consistently do more damage than fighters who only start to catch up around 11th level, Rogues have fewer hp but can reduce incoming damage, Rogues have lower ACs but can get out of an enemy's reach preventing them from being attacked, Rogues have better saves vs damage causing effects and spells most commonly encountered.
Dex builds clearly outperform Str builds in 5e, and when comparing dex builds the rogue is king. I've been playing for over 40 yrs, and I saw the trend start back in 2nd edition of elevating the rogue to the role that fighters once held, and that trend has only gotten stronger with each edition since. A battlemaster will lose in a solo fight to a swashbuckler of equal stats (and this is just one of many many examples that have been demonstrated in other threads). A battlemaster will be out of superiority dice in just a couple of rounds, while the rogue will continue to score sneak attack damage round after round for the entire fight. Especially now that the difference in HP between a rogue and a fighter is only an average of 1 hp/level. Not only is the rogue better in a fight than the fighter, their skills outside of combat (including the most common skills used in the game) again favor the rogue's survivability.
I'll take a rogue over a fighter any day (though this is a bit off topic). They should have restricted Weapon Mastery to fighers only.
In almost every case, a Rogue makes a better fighter than a fighter does
They really, really don't
Rogues outperform fighters
...
Dex builds clearly outperform Str builds in 5e, and when comparing dex builds the rogue is king
You keep throwing around the word "outperform" without bothering to explain what it is you think the rogue outperforms the fighter at, exactly, so there's no real way to debate you on the point
They certainly don't outperform fighters at tanking, PAM builds, and that sort of thing though. My last battle master -- a tabaxi heavy crossbow specialist-- would also laugh at the idea that he'd be taken down by a swashbuckler, depending on the terrain
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Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock) Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric) Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue) Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
How exactly do DEX builds outperform STR builds? STR is going to beat DEX at baseline AC, the high end of DEX martial melee weapon damage is the low end of STR martial melee weapon damage, STR weapons get better feats to improve damage, STR weapons have more masteries including one for a free extra attack and one that guarantees some amount of damage on every hit. DEX is probably better for avoiding AoE saves, but STR is used for saves to avoid effects that restrain or otherwise hold a target in place, which can keep them from acting regardless of remaining HP.
In almost every case, a Rogue makes a better fighter than a fighter does
They really, really don't
In our extended group it is rare to find someone willing to play a fighter anymore, they all opt for rogues, and on the rare case someone does play a fighter - they are the first to die.
That second point may be why your group doesn't like fighters.
However, who's doing the front-line work, then? Not the rogues.
Dex builds clearly outperform Str builds in 5e, and when comparing dex builds the rogue is king. I've been playing for over 40 yrs, and I saw the trend start back in 2nd edition of elevating the rogue to the role that fighters once held, and that trend has only gotten stronger with each edition since. A battlemaster will lose in a solo fight to a swashbuckler of equal stats (and this is just one of many many examples that have been demonstrated in other threads). A battlemaster will be out of superiority dice in just a couple of rounds, while the rogue will continue to score sneak attack damage round after round for the entire fight. Especially now that the difference in HP between a rogue and a fighter is only an average of 1 hp/level. Not only is the rogue better in a fight than the fighter, their skills outside of combat (including the most common skills used in the game) again favor the rogue's survivability.
Pretty much every class-to-class comparison is artificial, and who comes out ahead depends on the conditions you set.
But PC vs PC in a head-to-head fight is completely artificial. The classes aren't designed to fight other classes. They're designed to fight monsters, and they almost never do so in a one-on-one fight. There's expected to be multiple participants on both sides, and that matters. (I'm pretty sure that, without doing anything unusual, one can set up any class-v-class fight so that either participant wins.)
For instance, the fighter is way better at holding the front line than the rogue -- they're harder to hit and tougher. That swashbuckler isn't looking so hot as soon as they have a couple of guys on them.
And that's the point -- the two classes fill different roles in combat. Rogues can dish it out, but they can't take it, and unless somebody is there to take it, the rogue's probably the target. (And if they stay out of sustained melee, nobody's stopping the casters from getting smeared.)
Fighters can dish it out, and they can also take it. Even if rogues do more average damage (don't know, don't care), they need the fighter (barb/paladin/monk) out there to do their thing.
(I must also note that you're using the meleeist of rogues, who just happens to be designed for one-on-one fights. Meanwhile, the vast majority of the battlemaster's abilities are really only useful in multi-participant fights.)
In almost every case, a Rogue makes a better fighter than a fighter does
They really, really don't
when people say rogues do more damage I am wondering if they are comparing a sword and board fighter build vs a DPR rogue build. Because fighters do more damage if built to do damage in every game I have seen. I can see rogues are better survivors arguments due to their bonus action mobility/hiding etc. But not being targeted is not as useful to the party as being targeted and soaking it which is what fighter types do.
In almost every case, a Rogue makes a better fighter than a fighter does. They didn't need extra help, and should not have been given weapon mastery. Your post seems to suggest that each character class should do the same amount of damage per round as every other character class. This thinking is actually quite new to D&D, and was never the case in previous editions.
Once upon a time, the fighter was the best at melee. The rogue was the best at stealth and a single backstab that occurred only once or twice each fight. Wizards could damage multiple targets at once, but the damage to each was fairly low. Clerics could hold their own on the front line, while supporting the others with spells. When a character of any class scored a hit, they rolled a single die of damage (some weapons did 2d4 instead of 1d8). Now damn near every character does multiple dice of damage on each hit and can combine damage from five different sources - on a single hit. [weapon + sneak + hex + channel divinity + smite, etc.]
They've made every class into a glass cannon. Face any character against its mirror image, and you'll see that none have the HP to absorb the damage that they themselves can dish out. Combat between equals has become nothing more than a single roll to win - whomever wins initiative, wins the fight. Once upon a time, you could lose initiative and even roll poorly for a couple of rounds before coming back to win the fight. Not anymore, now every round is an alpha strike for massive damage.
I would have thought they would have learned that lesson from the ill-fated 4e. 4e's greatest issue was that they tried to turn tabletop play into a tabletop version of a video game, where every hit does 20,000 pts of damage (slight exageration). It drove fans away from the game. Yet, here they are - making the same mistake again.
Not every class should be rolling 5 dice of damage every round.
Playing D&D since 1982
Have played every version of the game since Basic (Red Box Set), except that abomination sometimes called 4e.
So what are rogues? They have relatively low AC and HP, so they're obviously not tanks. They don't have many ways to buff or debuff others, so they're not support. They don't really have healing, so they're not healers. According to you, they should be doing less damage than fighters, so they're not damage dealers. What is left?
"Power Creep". That's your concern. And you're right, that is a valid concern. You could certainly make a compelling argument that D&D is using Power Creep to try to draw in new players by giving D&D characters the kind of damage output that we're used to seeing from WoW characters.
But the rules have already been written, published, and put into practice. Tables are already running games under these rules. So if we're going to play this game, under this ruleset, let's at least try to keep the game fun and fair for everyone involved. When we hit Tier 4 and the wizard is chucking a Meteor Swarm downrange, and the fighter is using her Action Surge to make EIGHT attacks in one round while wrapped in plate armor and using a bonus action to recover up to 30 hit points... and then it's the rogues turn. And he's standing there with a shortsword and ONE attack roll to make. Come on. Give the poor fella Sneak Attack.
Heck, even Hawkeye had exploding arrows.
Anzio Faro. Protector Aasimar light cleric. Lvl 18.
Viktor Gavriil. White dragonborn grave cleric. Lvl 20.
Ikram Sahir ibn-Malik al-Sayyid Ra'ad. Brass dragonborn draconic sorcerer Lvl 9. Fire elemental devil.
Wrangler of cats.
The big secret of old-school thieves: they were awful. Their big thing was their special skills, that nobody else could do, but they were absolutely terrible at those, too, until they got quite a number of levels.
The modern rogue is a competent skill character, even at low levels.
However, the game's designers also understand that combat is a big part of the game, and that being dead weight in a fight is no fun for anyone. Thus, sneak attacks.
Depends on the edition. Back Stab depending on edition may just require you be behind them and the multiplier of damage was either with or without modifiers. Outside of BECMI you were pretty much always better off multiclassing with your thief levels. Thanks to the multiplier in the editions where it was with modifiers we always gave the strength gear to the thief, when they are hitting for (1d6+X)2-5damage its pretty good in 1e especially with the hit points enemies had in 1e.. Though again multi classes with fighter was better as they dropped very little in thief levels and that backstab might be happening multiple times a round. Though if you used the two weapon rules even the thief could do that.
They really, really don't
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
In our extended group it is rare to find someone willing to play a fighter anymore, they all opt for rogues, and on the rare case someone does play a fighter - they are the first to die. Rogues outperform fighters. This trend started back in 3rd edition, and the nail in the coffin for fighters was 5e. Rogues consistently do more damage than fighters who only start to catch up around 11th level, Rogues have fewer hp but can reduce incoming damage, Rogues have lower ACs but can get out of an enemy's reach preventing them from being attacked, Rogues have better saves vs damage causing effects and spells most commonly encountered.
Dex builds clearly outperform Str builds in 5e, and when comparing dex builds the rogue is king. I've been playing for over 40 yrs, and I saw the trend start back in 2nd edition of elevating the rogue to the role that fighters once held, and that trend has only gotten stronger with each edition since. A battlemaster will lose in a solo fight to a swashbuckler of equal stats (and this is just one of many many examples that have been demonstrated in other threads). A battlemaster will be out of superiority dice in just a couple of rounds, while the rogue will continue to score sneak attack damage round after round for the entire fight. Especially now that the difference in HP between a rogue and a fighter is only an average of 1 hp/level. Not only is the rogue better in a fight than the fighter, their skills outside of combat (including the most common skills used in the game) again favor the rogue's survivability.
I'll take a rogue over a fighter any day (though this is a bit off topic). They should have restricted Weapon Mastery to fighers only.
Playing D&D since 1982
Have played every version of the game since Basic (Red Box Set), except that abomination sometimes called 4e.
You keep throwing around the word "outperform" without bothering to explain what it is you think the rogue outperforms the fighter at, exactly, so there's no real way to debate you on the point
They certainly don't outperform fighters at tanking, PAM builds, and that sort of thing though. My last battle master -- a tabaxi heavy crossbow specialist-- would also laugh at the idea that he'd be taken down by a swashbuckler, depending on the terrain
Active characters:
Carric Aquissar, elven wannabe artist in his deconstructionist period (Archfey warlock)
Lan Kidogo, mapach archaeologist and treasure hunter (Knowledge cleric)
Mardan Ferres, elven private investigator obsessed with that one unsolved murder (Assassin rogue)
Xhekhetiel, halfling survivor of a Betrayer Gods cult (Runechild sorcerer/fighter)
How exactly do DEX builds outperform STR builds? STR is going to beat DEX at baseline AC, the high end of DEX martial melee weapon damage is the low end of STR martial melee weapon damage, STR weapons get better feats to improve damage, STR weapons have more masteries including one for a free extra attack and one that guarantees some amount of damage on every hit. DEX is probably better for avoiding AoE saves, but STR is used for saves to avoid effects that restrain or otherwise hold a target in place, which can keep them from acting regardless of remaining HP.
That second point may be why your group doesn't like fighters.
However, who's doing the front-line work, then? Not the rogues.
Pretty much every class-to-class comparison is artificial, and who comes out ahead depends on the conditions you set.
But PC vs PC in a head-to-head fight is completely artificial. The classes aren't designed to fight other classes. They're designed to fight monsters, and they almost never do so in a one-on-one fight. There's expected to be multiple participants on both sides, and that matters. (I'm pretty sure that, without doing anything unusual, one can set up any class-v-class fight so that either participant wins.)
For instance, the fighter is way better at holding the front line than the rogue -- they're harder to hit and tougher. That swashbuckler isn't looking so hot as soon as they have a couple of guys on them.
And that's the point -- the two classes fill different roles in combat. Rogues can dish it out, but they can't take it, and unless somebody is there to take it, the rogue's probably the target. (And if they stay out of sustained melee, nobody's stopping the casters from getting smeared.)
Fighters can dish it out, and they can also take it. Even if rogues do more average damage (don't know, don't care), they need the fighter (barb/paladin/monk) out there to do their thing.
(I must also note that you're using the meleeist of rogues, who just happens to be designed for one-on-one fights. Meanwhile, the vast majority of the battlemaster's abilities are really only useful in multi-participant fights.)
when people say rogues do more damage I am wondering if they are comparing a sword and board fighter build vs a DPR rogue build. Because fighters do more damage if built to do damage in every game I have seen. I can see rogues are better survivors arguments due to their bonus action mobility/hiding etc. But not being targeted is not as useful to the party as being targeted and soaking it which is what fighter types do.
I neither hate nor like them. I think the new version are far more balanced and prevents attempts to optimize, min-max or whatever.