these things are there to enrich the experience, provide options, info, maybe items, or offer flavor or RP.
Nothing is stopping you from houseruling Tongue of the Sun and Moon back in if it's so integral to your experience. But clearly they're trying to move monk away from the singular "enlightened zen shaolin buddhist, make-me-one-with-everything-hold-the-pickles" flavor that such an ability implied, to something that is more culturally agnostic. And quite apart from the questionable flavor, it's just a poorly conceived ribbon. If any class should unlock a continuous universal language it should be the Bard, and they can actually put it to practical use.
I’m not saying Tongue of the Sun and Moon was a clutch feature but it was something they could do outside combat. I wouldn’t mind if they had something like a feature that for spending 1DP they could use their WIS for certain checks like Persuasion, Insight, or something. Not sure what skills would be appropriate.
Anyway, this discussion has gotten way off topic for a Rogue thread. I apologize for starting this tangent earlier.
yall dudes are so manipulative, you believe there is no reason to talk to or understand a person unless you can manipulate them?
How about... gaining information?
Sure, it's possible that the NPC who doesn't speak any language the PCs speak is otherwise perfectly willing to blab... but why bet on it?
Talking to someone isn't the only time you need to understand them. if you're sneaking into the villain's base and come across two guards talking to each other, being able to listen in on their conversation could be really helpful to figure out the villain's plan or maybe get the heads up on a trap or other obstacle. Casting Tongues would instantly reveal your position so isn't really an option.
Also, I'm surprised how flippant all of you are about casting a spell right in front of someone. Most ordinary NPCs aren't going to know what spell you are casting so should react as if you could be casting Dominate Person or Fireball as soon as you start casting Tongues, which sort of defeats the whole point of casting it.
Granted, that also makes the DM playing the "this NPC speaks a language no one knows" card a poor move unless it's a deliberate plot point, so I agree the concept is still largely a non-issue.
By level 13 the style of the game should be well enough established that the players either know they don't need to worry, or have already solved the problem. It might not be resource-free, but on the other hand, who would you rather have talk to the NPC: the bard with a +15 persuasion (using Tongues) or the monk with a -1?
yall dudes are so manipulative, you believe there is no reason to talk to or understand a person unless you can manipulate them?
How about... gaining information?
I guess different games, but persuade is used to gain information from people in our games. You just met rando5789! sure they can talk with you but there is no motivation for rando5789! to give you any information. If you want to know how their day is, what's a good place to eat in town sure. they will part with that. But campaign important info unless the NPC is designed to want to give out that information its up to the players to convince them to, aka persuasion.
you can gain information without talking to people at all.
you can gain insight into their motives without talking to them at all.
Most NPCs have their own goals and reasons to share info or communicate that don't require any riz at all.
merchant wants to sell you items
cop/guard wants to warn you away.
person wants your help
not to mention teamwork, aka acting as translator, or friend provides intimidation, while you are the talking person.
but the key here is not that it was optimal before, the key is that it existed, and now there is nothing social at all.
these things are there to enrich the experience, provide options, info, maybe items, or offer flavor or RP.
Nothing is stopping you from houseruling Tongue of the Sun and Moon back in if it's so integral to your experience. But clearly they're trying to move monk away from the singular "enlightened zen shaolin buddhist, make-me-one-with-everything-hold-the-pickles" flavor that such an ability implied, to something that is more culturally agnostic. And quite apart from the questionable flavor, it's just a poorly conceived ribbon. If any class should unlock a continuous universal language it should be the Bard, and they can actually put it to practical use.
the context of the discussion is not about my personal experience, its about the baseline experience of monk.
being able to understand languages isnt necessarily a Zen buddist concept. It could be flavored a number of ways. Monk is still conceptually hyper wise, who theoretically spends as much time honing its mind as its body. Where are the features representing its mental abilities/wisdom?
And trying to act like monk is not inspired by Asian culture is IMO not really a bonus. But thats a whole different issue.
but what it comes down to is they had a feature by which the monk could gain information, and insight into creatures that was socially useful. and they now don't. If there was something else maybe that would be better, but nothing is not an improvement
Granted, that also makes the DM playing the "this NPC speaks a language no one knows" card a poor move unless it's a deliberate plot point, so I agree the concept is still largely a non-issue.
By level 13 the style of the game should be well enough established that the players either know they don't need to worry, or have already solved the problem. It might not be resource-free, but on the other hand, who would you rather have talk to the NPC: the bard with a +15 persuasion (using Tongues) or the monk with a -1?
yall dudes are so manipulative, you believe there is no reason to talk to or understand a person unless you can manipulate them?
How about... gaining information?
I guess different games, but persuade is used to gain information from people in our games. You just met rando5789! sure they can talk with you but there is no motivation for rando5789! to give you any information. If you want to know how their day is, what's a good place to eat in town sure. they will part with that. But campaign important info unless the NPC is designed to want to give out that information its up to the players to convince them to, aka persuasion.
you can gain information without talking to people at all.
you can gain insight into their motives without talking to them at all.
Most NPCs have their own goals and reasons to share info or communicate that don't require any riz at all.
merchant wants to sell you items
cop/guard wants to warn you away.
person wants your help
not to mention teamwork, aka acting as translator, or friend provides intimidation, while you are the talking person.
but the key here is not that it was optimal before, the key is that it existed, and now there is nothing social at all.
Almost everything you described there is handled by common. And if what you want is can be handled without talking at all sun and the moon is not needed. that being said I put on my survey they should bring it back, i just don't think its a big deal its an ability that is almost never used and when it is its just for small role play bits that can be done in other ways.
you pointed out you think its bad, I never agreed with you. Its data that people can judge for themselves
If you feel you have nothing to say about something I post say nothing.
UA8 has not prohibited weapon swapping? what are you talking about?
You can either equip or unequip one weapon when you make an attack as part of this action. You do so either before or after the attack. If you equip a weapon before an attack, you don’t need to use it for that attack. Equipping a weapon includes drawing it from a sheath, picking it up, or retrieving it from a container. Unequipping a weapon includes sheathing, stowing, or dropping it
every time you make an attack, as part of the attack action, you can equip or unequip one weapon.
Yes, ONE weapon, not A weapon. If you draw a weapon on one attack, you can not draw or stow another weapon on another attack, only the same weapon as you drew originally.
I've pointed out that Arcane Trickster beats Assassin on damage, even now, yet it's absent from these results. I suspect the reason is because those Arcane Trickster builds rely on things from outside of the PHB, but if that is the case, then it has to drop booming blade, which is still a good ~10% of the EK's damage is based around. After all booming blade is not a PHB spell, it's from SCAG.
there is no current UA version of hex, they recanted hex in playtest 7
Eldritch Blast and Hex revert to their 2014 versions.
Fair enough, I go back and forth through UAs a lot and miss things like that, There is 9 separate UAs now and I'll admit when I made a mistake.
It uses both Charger and Hex (both of these will constantly be needing the Bonus Action, Hex to reapply, Charger for Tactical Shift to avoid taking a lot of opportunity attacks).
charger does not use a BA in one dnd
Charger
Prerequisite:
You have trained to charge headlong into battle, gaining the following benefits:
Ability Score Increase. Increase your Strength or Dexterity score by 1, to a maximum of 20.
Improved Dash. When you take the Dash Action, your Speed increases by 10 feet for that Action.
Charge Attack. If you move at least 10 feet in a straight line immediately before hitting with an attack as part of the Attack Action on your turn, choose one of the following effects: gain a +1d8 bonus to the attack’s damage roll, or push the target up to 10 feet, provided the target you want to push is no more than one Size larger than you. You can use this benefit only once on each of your turns.
you re just wrong about these.
Read the part that is underlined, Tactical Shift, which you'll be needing to leave Opportunity Attack range DOES require BA, else you take more attacks which is just more ways to lose Hex. This also basically limits how often you could use Charger like this, Fighter is a front-liner so I really don't see them holding Hex up well, it'll just be wasting spell slots.
Every analysis will make assumptions, analysis doesnt mean you can always do X, it lets you know what the capabilities are. Just like most analysis of rogue assumes SA every round, is it always going to happen? probably not. But assumptions are made to give people some points of comparison.
There is realistic assumptions and unrealistic assumptions, that a Fighter can keep Hex up every round of combat is not a realistic one. Fighter will have at most +3 CON, more like +2 CON for most of the early game, this means a CON save of +4 from 1-4, +5 from 2-8 & +6 from 9 -11. After getting the +5 modifier, could spec for it at level 12, if you spec earlier then you're hurting your damage output else where. This makes Hex pretty hard to use until about level 12 when you could take something to decrease losing concentration saves like take war caster feat or other wise increase CON.
shortbow is the farthest range rogue has access to and is 80 range, Fighter or Barb can move 45-60 feet turn one and throw weapons up to 30 feet. Enemies are generally not going to be 100+ feet from the players. EK also has access to spells, like the new true strike, if they go the INT route.
First off, 80 foot range is still further than Fighter or Barb can move where if you were familiar with the EK build in question, you'd know it requires melee attacks since it relies on booming blade. The rogue can still move 30 foot before firing, meaning a target 100 foot in range now comes into range, a range at which your fighter and barbarian are going to struggle to do literally anything against. 2nd, a single feat increases that 80 foot range to 320 foot, 3rd off you can just use steady aim to remove the disadvantage at above 80 foot, so you can get the vex effect ready for the next turn with advantage. This is the typical kind of mistake you make, you only look at the numbers and do not consider how these things play out in the game
Getting 320 foot for Rogue from sharpshooter can be very good, then picking up weapon training so you can use a heavy crossbow for 1d10 at a range of 400 foot, or longbow for 1d8 at 600 foot, being able to steady aim and sneak attack on them, yes most dungeon battles won't be hitting 100 foot, but outside battles very well can hit over 100 foot, and the same feet that gives that range also removes the benefits of half and three-quarters cover, which is the real benefit since now you can shoot past your own allies easier.
Next off, how is the fighter getting 45 foot? Hasn't your argument been that fighter now has tactical mind, so they've been using that which would have consumed most of their second wind charges on failed stealth and perception checks to make them successes, that or you have to admit that in fact fighter does need to be reserving these second wind charges for something more important.
fighter is perfectly capable of building for dex, or for dex and strength if they choose. once again most will choose to have dex 14 at level 1.
fighters are an adaptive class, they don't have to be slow if they don't want to be. It doesnt effect their damage.
Also I disagree with idea that rogues will get 1-2 extra rounds per day. When a fight ends is based not only on initiative, but also dpr/hp. and rogue having possibly 3 more dex is not going to lead to one extra round given 6-8 combats. +3 initiative doesnt change a low roll, to a high roll. and low rolls are what cause you to possibly lose a round. Barbarian's advantage is more of a mitigator of poor rolls.
Fighter can go DEX based but that EK build does not work with a DEX build, it relies on a push weapon, as push weapons are all two-handed, heavy or versatile, it would not work. Fundamentally a DEX based fighter has lower DPR and AC than a STR build, so they pay for the versatility to use a bow or to have that higher initiative, it is not a free trade.
As far as having 14 dexterity goes, if Fighter has 14 DEX, as a STR build, then they have basically nothing in Intelligence, Wisdom or Charisma, since you want your Strength and Constitution. If you're using standard array, you'd like be pushing 15+2, 14, 13+1, 10, 12, 8 (switch Int/cha as desired). This character has a +0 to Int, a +1 to wisdom and a -1 to charisma. Which goes back to early points, this character would need to expend a resource to do worse at charisma checks then a bard, sorcerer, paladin or warlock or worse than a Wizard or Artificer, the one exception to this maybe if you're an Eldritch Knight, as you may just drop DEX to get an okay INT score, more likely you just focus on spells that don't actually need INT tho. And this is worse at level 4, it only gets worse from there as these classes get higher ability scores and proficiency bonuses and second wind has a very limited number of charges.
Barbarian is basically in the same boat but rage charges are even more important to a Barbarian, so just wasting them at any point of the day, is pointless.
Rogue on the other hand, you need Dexterity, you're not as Constitution dependent as either Barbarian or Fighter, so you can take more points into Wisdom, Intelligence or Charisma, a build like 8, 15+2, 13+1, 10, 14, 12 is not a bad one, with this you get a +2 on Wisdom, with Expertise in perception, you have a +6 at level 1, which is already better than what fighter will get from Tactical Mind, at level 5 you'd have a +8 and at level 7 the lowest you could get is an 18, at level 19 the lowest would be a 20 in perception... Neither the fighter or the Barbarian can touch this, Barbarian while raging can potentially get close but Perception can happen at any point of the day or exploration.
Then after all of this, as Barbarian and Fighter still need to focus on constitution, you can pump up your intelligence, wisdom or charisma, using feats like Observant, potentially getting another expertise and the ability to bonus action search with a +1 to INT or WIS. You can also take Inspiring Leader and take a +1 in Wisdom or Charisma, you now get even more feel good feeling as you give 2d4+PB temporary HP to your party and your role in the party is not diminished as you still have enough HP/AC/Dex save to not be taking significant amounts of damage, as you're not the tank.
Also I disagree with idea that rogues will get 1-2 extra rounds per day. When a fight ends is based not only on initiative, but also dpr/hp. and rogue having possibly 3 more dex is not going to lead to one extra round given 6-8 combats. +3 initiative doesnt change a low roll, to a high roll. and low rolls are what cause you to possibly lose a round. Barbarian's advantage is more of a mitigator of poor rolls.
I never said Barbarians are beaten, I specifically said Fighter and yes the Rogue will get more rounds. You roll a D20 but the average initiative that a Rogue gets is 3 higher than the fighter, this is very simple maths and I don't know why you're trying to fight against something so simple. The fighter could get a higher initiative but the rogue can get an initiative so high the fighter can't beat it and the fighter can get an initiative so low that the rogue can not fail but to beat it. Further to this there are other characters in the party that are going to compete more around fighter's level of initiative than rogue's.
With Rogue having +1 initiative bonus, Rogue would go first 52.5% of the time, fighter 42.75% and remaining 4.25% is a draw.
+2 rogue goes first 57.5% of the time, fighter 38.25%
+3 rogue goes first 61.75% of the time, fighter, 34%
If I have done my maths right, Rogue is going first almost twice as often at a +3, (difference of 27.75%). That is quite a significant difference and means Rogue will in fact go first many more times over a campaign, during a day, they are likely going before the fighter twice more (5 vs 3), if there is eight encounters. So yea, Rogue is clearly going to get more rounds of combat than fighter.
just because you disagree with one facet of data, or choice by someone running numbers, does not negate every facet of the data. Have you done an analysis of EK damage? Have you done an analysis of 2014BM expected DPR?
you think your lack of Analysis is better than a detailed analysis complete with what they did and why they did it, just because you don't like the builds they chose to do?
the point of the post was 2014 BM damage is not the benchmark any more. multiple classes can surpass it, and BM isnt the top fighter build any more. Even if you ignore EK completely, the one dnd martials can surpass 2014 BM. The point still stands.
Why is the 2014 Battlemaster DPR relevant when it got nerfed via feats? This discussion relates to where Rogue is in the UA, we know Battlemaster was overpowered in 5E, this was not a rogue issue it was a Battlemaster/fighter issue of that particular subclass being too powerful. Personally think the charger feat should disallow walking away from the enemy first, but we will see if they fix that in final release.
I also do not fully know if what they do with Quarterstaff really is permitted, Dual Wielder says you can treat the "other weapon" as if it had the light property, they are using that to give it either the vex or nick property (I believe the vex) but is that actually allowed with Master of Armaments to do this. Dual Wielder does not say the other weapon HAS the light property and so I do not believe it is the case*. So you're asking to make an anaylsis on something based on so many grey areas, it's kinda crazy and it's an area that WotC need to be reviewing all these synergies to really rule on if they work or not but this is again going back to issues with the design of fighter and not issues with rogue, other classes are also negatively affected when there is that one OP build and it's quite possible that it'll be something commonly banned like the Eloquance Bard is, for example but hopefully WotC don't leave it to get to that point.
*additionally to the case, Master of Armaments does not work off of weapons, it works off the weapon type as it uses the phrasing, "kind of weapon." Meaning it definitely does not work, but this is fundamentally to show how grey areas work. Ultimately you don't get to add "light" to the quarterstaff type, thus the build does not work at all.
I have not said the attempt at making an analysis is a bad thing, I've just said they have made mistakes, which on such a large amount of work, is going to happen and I think what they did is good but you can't take it as factual, it is based on quiet a few assumptions of which a lot do not occur in gameplay and it's only basing these figures off of ideal situations, which with the assassin build is a lot easier to maintain than the eldritch knight one, and I mean A LOT easier. Overall, me not wasting literal days to put together an alternative sheet with assumptions altered or the maths for Arcane Trickster doesn't change the fact the spreadsheet EK build is still based on big assumptions and weird tactics that just don't work in the actual game or assume one vs one only nor that the gap would be smaller in EK vs arcane trickster than EK vs assassin.
A lot of classes are doing more damage in OneD&D, Battlemaster might have come down now, but in general most have gone up, with the inclusion of weapon masteries and other buffs. Mostly the nerfs that have come in are for Sharpshooter and Great Weapon Master. But again, it returns to what is the issue, is the issue the Rogue class or is the issue the few broken builds that people have been finding? The issue is not the rogue class and rogue is not in an awkward place.
Your reading of the equip rules is off.
there is no part of that sentence that ties it to a specific weapon for your whole round. You have an assumed intent of what you think the rule should do, and are trying to make it mean something it doesnt.
every time you make an attack, if its part of the attack action, you can equip or unequip one weapon.
there is no connection the first time you do it with the second time you do it. nothing in the language suggests you are tied to manipulating the same weapon for the whole round.
one attack, one equip/unequip action, one weapon.
For example Start fight with sword in hand
after attack1 stow sword
before attack2 equip Maul
another example
attack 1 draw and throw dagger
attack 2 draw and throw handaxe
attack 3 draw polearm
one weapon is there to highlight the number of weapons, not a special significance of the weapon. you see this in the dual wielder feat which allows two weapons whenever something says one.
Quick Draw.You can draw or stow two Weapons that lack the Two-Handed propertywhen you would normally be able to draw or stow only one.
the intent of the rule is to allow people to equip and unequip weapons, limited by the number of attacks in their attack action.
people with 1 attack can't swap weapons not counting throwing
for people with two attacks, they can swap weapons 1 time, not counting throwing.
people with 4 attacks can swap weapons 2 times, not counting throwing.
The fact they didnt choose arcane trickster, is because they were more interested in assassin numbers, guessed assassin would have more damage, or wanted to highlight assassin. they also didn't choose shadow or elements monk. The dude never said they tested every build that exists. And they aren't required to, they are simply sharing their info with the community. I might like to see how arcane trickster compares with their assumptions, but its not really a flaw in the data.
You don't need to use tactical shift to use charger. charger only requires you run 10 feet in a straight line before making an attack. you can do this moving corner to corner, or by moving the enemy. If you are surrounded, maybe you use tactical shift, but its more because you are surrounded than because you really need 4.5*Accuracy more damage that round. I have tested numerous characters with charger, its not hard to use charger without any special features.
As an aside, when I talk about the skill capabilities of the fighter class, and tactical mind, I'm not making assumptions about what build they are using, or the priorities of the player. Fighter is by design, a highly adaptable class, designed to have build diversity. Every player can decide what they want to use their second wind on. They have that choice.
So something here, you keep saying 'that EK' build, but they have two different EK builds there. there is a STR TWF EK build, and an INT Dueling EK build, which are you referring to?
the build that uses a staff doesnt depend on VEX or Nick, its a shield based build that uses dueling and Int. And staff is versatile, and can have pushing. They have different damage calculations.
As far as maintaining concentration, a spell is only wasted if it doesn't give you value. the value of a level 1 slot in damage is 2d6-3d6.
for the TWF EK, they get its value back in round one, they increase its value for ever round it goes longer. their con could be anywhere from 14-20 depending on the player choices. from 1-5 your chance of getting hit by an attack 60% chance they wiff. assuming low (14) con, 75% chance I pass the save. 1/10 attempts to hit will break concentration.1/20 if you go 16 con. thats a worthwhile lvl 1 slot. not to mention EK probably has shield spell. That hex will definitely have strong return on value. Higher level, when missing becomes rarer, and damage greater, concentration might be harder, but you also have more slots.
the Board EK gets value back in two rounds, but they also got better AC, same stuff as before but higher AC.
The BM stuff you quoted me saying was a side comment about overall power level of optimized 5e versus optimized onednd. I was keeping that context. So its more a question of why did you bring up that comment if you weren't debating the premise of that post?
for initiative, +3 isnt significant enough that luck won't dominate the actual results, we use averages to try simplify/guesstimate, but there is a big range with the normal part of the bell curve. The question is what is the probability given two random d20 rolls, that the rogues +3 will change the result between the two? the answer is, pretty low.
also I really am not sure why you and others are hyperfocused on fighter versus rogue. the premise of the thread is rogue is undertuned compared to other classes, we can maybe limit it down to just martials to simplify discussion, but this is not only about fighter, or one specific build/subclass. But we can discuss it.
see how often that +3 is the primary determiner of who is first with 4 people. (lets say monk20dex, barb14dex advantage, fighter14dex, rogue20dex) its going to be almost never.
even going by averages, going first does not guarantee you and extra turn. you only have an extra turn over other players if the last turn ends without them taking action. I don't think with a sample size of 6-8 rolls( a days encounters), that +3 is going to actually get to affect that. especially across 4 players.
first chance of +3 changing outcome, * the chance that encounter ends with rogue getting a turn a fighter not. the +3 really is not going to effect things much.
Granted, that also makes the DM playing the "this NPC speaks a language no one knows" card a poor move unless it's a deliberate plot point, so I agree the concept is still largely a non-issue.
By level 13 the style of the game should be well enough established that the players either know they don't need to worry, or have already solved the problem. It might not be resource-free, but on the other hand, who would you rather have talk to the NPC: the bard with a +15 persuasion (using Tongues) or the monk with a -1?
yall dudes are so manipulative, you believe there is no reason to talk to or understand a person unless you can manipulate them?
How about... gaining information?
I guess different games, but persuade is used to gain information from people in our games. You just met rando5789! sure they can talk with you but there is no motivation for rando5789! to give you any information. If you want to know how their day is, what's a good place to eat in town sure. they will part with that. But campaign important info unless the NPC is designed to want to give out that information its up to the players to convince them to, aka persuasion.
you can gain information without talking to people at all.
you can gain insight into their motives without talking to them at all.
Most NPCs have their own goals and reasons to share info or communicate that don't require any riz at all.
merchant wants to sell you items
cop/guard wants to warn you away.
person wants your help
not to mention teamwork, aka acting as translator, or friend provides intimidation, while you are the talking person.
but the key here is not that it was optimal before, the key is that it existed, and now there is nothing social at all.
Almost everything you described there is handled by common. And if what you want is can be handled without talking at all sun and the moon is not needed. that being said I put on my survey they should bring it back, i just don't think its a big deal its an ability that is almost never used and when it is its just for small role play bits that can be done in other ways.
to be clear my contention is not that its the greatest skill or my best mental concept of how monks could get a social feature, its more that it was infinitely more useful than having nothing like that. And its not useless, as some people claim.
to be clear my contention is not that its the greatest skill or my best mental concept of how monks could get a social feature, its more that it was infinitely more useful than having nothing like that. And its not useless, as some people claim.
Yeah I liked the idea of the feature, the problem really was that it was basically just comprehend languages or tongues, which full-casters have had access to an entire eight levels earlier. It's not a terrible feature but it's terrible as the only feature for that level.
It was a feature absolutely crying out to be made available sooner, and put alongside something else. It would have been fine if it came in at 11th-level for example, alongside the third Monastic Tradition step, plus this would make it a lot closer to a half-caster getting 3rd-level spells at 9th-level, and as a "secondary" feature I doubt anyone would mind overly much.
This is definitely a problem with 5e Monks though; there are a bunch of higher level features that aren't necessarily bad features in isolation, but as the main (and only) feature for an entire level are just incredibly underwhelming, and made sticking with Monk into higher levels much more difficult.
OneD&D Monk definitely needs to get some utility back, preferably from something available early with some kind of scaling, even if it's just that it costs Discipline points so you can do it more as you level up.
To get back on topic though, 5e Rogue and playtest Rogue don't have this as a problem; expertise is great for out of combat utility, and Reliable Talent makes a lot of what a Rogue does no longer a question of "if" or "when" – it just happens.
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these things are there to enrich the experience, provide options, info, maybe items, or offer flavor or RP.
Nothing is stopping you from houseruling Tongue of the Sun and Moon back in if it's so integral to your experience. But clearly they're trying to move monk away from the singular "enlightened zen shaolin buddhist, make-me-one-with-everything-hold-the-pickles" flavor that such an ability implied, to something that is more culturally agnostic. And quite apart from the questionable flavor, it's just a poorly conceived ribbon. If any class should unlock a continuous universal language it should be the Bard, and they can actually put it to practical use.
Honestly I get this, and now I wish Bard had something like Tongue of the Sun and Moon lol. If I may ask, if you had to come up with a flavor/ribbon ability that was to replace TotSaM for UA8 monk, what would it be? I've been trying to think of what out-of-combat abilities I would have added to the monk to add to the class fantasy that is more culturally-vague.
Since this thread has been getting off topic recently, I thought I would start a new thread HERE if you wish to continue the discussion about Monks and Tongue of the Sun and Moon etc.
Let's get this one back on track about Rogues.
Sorry if this blue color is annoying, I wanted it to stand out :op
there is no part of that sentence that ties it to a specific weapon for your whole round. You have an assumed intent of what you think the rule should do, and are trying to make it mean something it doesnt.
And I'd say the same thing about your reading, it does not say 'one weapon per attack', it says 'one weapon'. So the RAW is definitely on my side here, you can argue against that all you want and infer the RAI is something else, but the RAI is clearly to fix the issue of drawing thrown weapons which exists in 5E where Barbarian/Fighter/Paladin could only throw 1 (maybe 2 on first round) thrown weapons like a Javelin in a round, it was never intended to be this thing of switching three weapons around constantly over a 6 second period. You can continue to argue that it means something else, but I honestly do not believe your usage of it was ever intended and so we will remain only at an impasse on this point if you're going to do that.
But since I know you want to argue the point. It also partially fixes the issue where people were dropping weapons to pull a second weapon, since the free item interaction only applies to a single weapon which made switching weapons in combat cumbersome.
You can also interact with one object or feature of the environment for free, during either your move or your action. For example, you could open a door during your move as you stride toward a foe, or you could draw your weapon as part of the same action you use to attack.
If you want to interact with a second object, you need to use your action. Some magic items and other special objects always require an action to use, as stated in their descriptions.
under 5E rules you could only stow or draw one weapon, at a time, not both (unless you use your action) making switching weapons at all a case of drop the weapon and draw another one. Now you can stow the weapon as the free item interaction and draw a weapon as part of the attack action allowing for effectively switching weapons once per turn, dual wielder allows you to do it with two weapons, so you could switch two hand crossbows with a shortsword and scimitar, but again, only once per round.
The fact they didnt choose arcane trickster, is because they were more interested in assassin numbers, guessed assassin would have more damage, or wanted to highlight assassin. they also didn't choose shadow or elements monk. The dude never said they tested every build that exists. And they aren't required to, they are simply sharing their info with the community. I might like to see how arcane trickster compares with their assumptions, but its not really a flaw in the data.
Yes, but you're treating the numbers for assassin as if they represent the whole of Rogue and not just the subclass of assassin, which again is doing well. There is a slight dip in tier 3 but overall assassin is around where it should be. However you're ignoring that I have pointed out the flaws already, but most of them are on the EK side, making the EK numbers bigger than they should be.
Since I had nothing to do yesterday, I have started compiling the numbers*, overall, their numbers are very hard to read since they hard coded a lot of values, so can only assume what they meant in areas. But from what I see, it looks like they assume they have far more advantage than they actually have and are making use of things they didn't state, for example pulling shillelagh from nowhere, now build 2 pulls shillelagh from the additional 1st level feat a human gets, which I assume build 1 is doing but it's not noted anywhere. Not really stated what they expect quarterstaff is using for weapon mastery, is it topple? a quarterstaff can only have push, sap or topple, I assume it's push since it is replacing warhammer? but now I have to assume on the part.
*still working on them so flaws could exist, will work at my own pace, not going to rush anything out for this discussion, it is mostly for my own curiosity and I have other things going on in my life.
To show you the madness of those stats here is a part of one formula that they use at level 20: H142*(3.5+R142+3.5+4.5*2+R142*2+3.5*2+4.5*7+3*Q142)
Can you figure out what it means? H142 is attack roll with advantage, R142 is the ability modifier and Q142 is the weapon enchantment (i.e. +1/+2/+3).
This appears to be a 1d6 weapon, making an attack with hex, 3.5+R142+3.5. They noted down shortsword as using nick which leads into the next part:
this part appears to be a 1d8 weapon making two attacks with hex, 4.5*2+R142*2+3.5*2. They state they use a warhammer, which they use push with, so why do these two attacks have advantage? It's pulled from no-where, there is no source for this advantage, it certainly isn't studied attacks, they are assuming a base 85% chance to hit, so you're going to get less than 1 studied attack a round and worse yet, it could hit on the first attack, the one they assume advantage from find familiar for. So why is this in the section of attacks with advantage? It's not clear.
This part appears to be booming blade, 4.5*7. This assumes the target monster moves, but it's hard to tell what assumptions specifically are being made to justify that, obvious assumption would be the push.
Finally we have, 3*Q142. which begs the question, if you're listing three attacks like this, why not to use do 3*(Q142+R142) or vice versa. This is the amount of damage from an enchanted weapon, why it doesn't appear next to the ability modifier, who knows?
So I can only try to decode these things by assumptions and then there is still unexplained things in there, so you'll have to forgive me if I overlook things... and this is just one part of one equation that they're using to get these numbers.
You don't need to use tactical shift to use charger. charger only requires you run 10 feet in a straight line before making an attack. you can do this moving corner to corner, or by moving the enemy. If you are surrounded, maybe you use tactical shift, but its more because you are surrounded than because you really need 4.5*Accuracy more damage that round. I have tested numerous characters with charger, its not hard to use charger without any special features.
This information is wrong, because you're assuming there is no other enemies stood next to the target or player, which is a weird assumption to make, you're a fighter on the front line, you probably have 2/3 creatures on you for 80% of most fights. But I now realise going back over those crazy numbers again that they in fact push twice, which still isn't a 100% way to do it (depends on position of other creatures), but it does remove most uses of tactical shift, what it doesn't cover is what happens if you miss the (push) attack, since hitting is a requirement. And you're probably in most combats recasting hex every turn which does conflict with tactical shift when you need it.
So something here, you keep saying 'that EK' build, but they have two different EK builds there. there is a STR TWF EK build, and an INT Dueling EK build, which are you referring to?
the build that uses a staff doesnt depend on VEX or Nick, its a shield based build that uses dueling and Int. And staff is versatile, and can have pushing. They have different damage calculations.
Obviously the first build, since that is the one that they used for their graphs after all. But there is actually 4 builds, not 2.
the Duelling build does around around 7 less DPR every level until around tier 4 gameplay... now as I stated, a reason a lot of their numbers are so high is they assume an Action surge every 4 turns of combat, at level 17+ if you have 6 encounters all 4 rounds long, that might be possible but for tiers 1-3? This assumption is overly ambitious and definitely not reflective of a normal dungeon, it's way too high. If you adjust down the action surge damage, that INT build gets for tier 1-3 to more realistic ones then the assassin is actually doing around 110% to 70% of the damage (levels 1-3 assassin does more), there is a low point at level 11 (the 70%) where fighter gets a 3rd attack and booming blade gets a cantrip upgrade where all rogue gets is a sneak attack increase (+1d6) but then that EK build gets literally nothing more until level 17.
I'm not going to worry about Tier 4 play, there is usually too much going on by Tier 4 to worry about just the base classes anymore and I honestly haven't seen anything that leads me to believe that WotC have fixed Tier 3 & Tier 4 gameplay properly yet. I also don't care if the Int build has a higher AC, it doesn't really matter to the discussion, Rogue is not a tank, so how fighter vs fighter builds compare against each other does not really impact on how fighter vs. rogue works out.
The BM stuff you quoted me saying was a side comment about overall power level of optimized 5e versus optimized onednd. I was keeping that context. So its more a question of why did you bring up that comment if you weren't debating the premise of that post?
for initiative, +3 isnt significant enough that luck won't dominate the actual results, we use averages to try simplify/guesstimate, but there is a big range with the normal part of the bell curve. The question is what is the probability given two random d20 rolls, that the rogues +3 will change the result between the two? the answer is, pretty low.
In regards to BM, I was brining up, why are you even bringing it up, and the reason is because, you wanted too, it didn't make a point. This is why is why I brought it up, in these long discussions why have a non-point? The context is where is Rogue in OneD&D which old BM is not relevant too.
As for initiative, I literally put down the maths that shows this statement is bogus, luck is a factor but it's going to normalise too rogue going first about 61% of the time, fighter about 35%, and the remaining 4.25% will be split in half. If we want to remove luck factors then let's remove attack rolls to begin with, and oh no the EK now does like double the damage of Rogue.... the mistake you made earlier in the thread (Page 4) and multiple people correctly called you out on, because even in these luck factors, you can't dismiss them since they do contribute to the final figures. Roughly speaking you'd expect the rogue to get over 1 more turn than the fighter in a dungeon. Now it could be the case that in one dungeon run the fighter gets 1 extra turn but when you build that up to 10 dungeons, you could get 2 dungeons where the rogue gets 3 turns of combat more, 1 where they get 2 turns of combat more and none where they only get 1. The point is that when you normalize the numbers over a campaign, that +3 initiative does lead to more turns of combat and to a statistically significant number.
also I really am not sure why you and others are hyperfocused on fighter versus rogue. the premise of the thread is rogue is undertuned compared to other classes, we can maybe limit it down to just martials to simplify discussion, but this is not only about fighter, or one specific build/subclass. But we can discuss it.
You mean after you lost the point of Barbarian versus Rogue and you shifted it to Fighter versus Rogue yourself. We have already gone over why Rogue does not need to be the top of DPR, they are not a damage focused class, so running in circles around classes isn't going to help you here, Monk has literally nothing else but damage and stunning strike, which is part of the reason that class is so significantly weak in 5E and needed massive buffs in OneD&D, and it's still going to be less popular than Rogue even after all of this. Barbarian will still be less popular than Rogue. Heck the only class in OneD&D that will probably be more popular, is fighter and that'll probably still be the Champion Fighter. Champion fighter is not an optimized choice but was basically the most played subclass of the most played class in 5E, because fundementally it's easy to play which if battle is not necessarily your focus, can be a good thing and it can be a good way into the game too as it's not overly complicated.
Inherently these EK builds are very complicated, very specific and very optimized, I don't frankly care nor believe it impacts Rogue gameplay. There is always going to be the occasional power-gamer that will use (or fight (figuratively) with the DM to use) and abuse these kinds of builds. What I do care about is people arguing that classes need to be buffed because there is one over-sight in another class that it can be power-gamed, because A) that is not an issue in the class that can not, it's an issue in the class that can. And B) it's just not the way most parties play the game; Lone wolves that do everything by themselves tend not to do as well as roles that fulfil being part of the party and contributing to the party. Rogue does this latter part, extremely well already, it doesn't need to be doing any more because then it's going from part of the party to lone wolf, the only thing this rogue can't do is tank and heal, you can take feats to help with healing at levels 10, 12 & 16, you can boost your HP with Tough and be pressing basically 1 AC less than a STR fighter without a shield by level 10.
So this is the reason why it's got so much attention because A) we already did barbarian, B). Monk is only at the same level of DPR as barbarian but yet can't even tank. C) Rogue is already a very utility based class which covers a lot of utility for the party which other classes struggle to compete with, only Ranger and Bard really can potentially replace a Rogue, which is far less than any other class could be replaced out with. And D) these optimizations are always based around being lone wolves, never about contributing to the party.
see how often that +3 is the primary determiner of who is first with 4 people. (lets say monk20dex, barb14dex advantage, fighter14dex, rogue20dex) its going to be almost never.
even going by averages, going first does not guarantee you and extra turn. you only have an extra turn over other players if the last turn ends without them taking action. I don't think with a sample size of 6-8 rolls( a days encounters), that +3 is going to actually get to affect that. especially across 4 players.
first chance of +3 changing outcome, * the chance that encounter ends with rogue getting a turn a fighter not. the +3 really is not going to effect things much.
First off, the link appears to be broken,
second off, I already did the maths in a better way. I took every result the Rogue could get (1d20), every result the fighter could get (1d20) and calculated how often they'd be beaten by the other class on that dice roll, I then averaged the results out and got the results:
+1 initiative bonus, Rogue would go first 52.5% of the time, fighter 42.75% and remaining 4.25% is a draw.
+2 rogue goes first 57.5% of the time, fighter 38.25%
+3 rogue goes first 61.75% of the time, fighter, 34%
These aren't just random numbers, these are specifically how well they'd do. And the +3 difference means the Rogue wins nearing twice as often as the fighter, that is very statistically significant.
Now what is insignificant is how you feel because of Anecdotal evidence, how you feel the results of just rolling some dice, most players feel like they roll low most of the time they play when in reality it's usually fairly equally balanced of high and low. Anecdotal evidence is just meaningless when you're dealing with specific numbers. If we are talking about opinions on the class itself then Anecdotal means something because people's opinions are Anecdotal, but this is a more specific question of how many times does the rogue go before the fighter in combat, which isn't a matter of opinion.
I think rogue looks ok, but I will aleays multiclass them to get a second attack and thus increase chance to land sneak attack. If anythimg I think rogue should get a second attack around lv 13-18 somewhere.
That said I have massive issues with the changes to Assassin and Gloomstalker that effectively kill the whole flash-damage supertype which is kind of fantasy staple.
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Nothing is stopping you from houseruling Tongue of the Sun and Moon back in if it's so integral to your experience. But clearly they're trying to move monk away from the singular "enlightened zen shaolin buddhist, make-me-one-with-everything-hold-the-pickles" flavor that such an ability implied, to something that is more culturally agnostic. And quite apart from the questionable flavor, it's just a poorly conceived ribbon. If any class should unlock a continuous universal language it should be the Bard, and they can actually put it to practical use.
Sure, it's possible that the NPC who doesn't speak any language the PCs speak is otherwise perfectly willing to blab... but why bet on it?
I’m not saying Tongue of the Sun and Moon was a clutch feature but it was something they could do outside combat. I wouldn’t mind if they had something like a feature that for spending 1DP they could use their WIS for certain checks like Persuasion, Insight, or something. Not sure what skills would be appropriate.
Anyway, this discussion has gotten way off topic for a Rogue thread. I apologize for starting this tangent earlier.
EZD6 by DM Scotty
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Talking to someone isn't the only time you need to understand them. if you're sneaking into the villain's base and come across two guards talking to each other, being able to listen in on their conversation could be really helpful to figure out the villain's plan or maybe get the heads up on a trap or other obstacle. Casting Tongues would instantly reveal your position so isn't really an option.
Also, I'm surprised how flippant all of you are about casting a spell right in front of someone. Most ordinary NPCs aren't going to know what spell you are casting so should react as if you could be casting Dominate Person or Fireball as soon as you start casting Tongues, which sort of defeats the whole point of casting it.
you can gain information without talking to people at all.
you can gain insight into their motives without talking to them at all.
Most NPCs have their own goals and reasons to share info or communicate that don't require any riz at all.
merchant wants to sell you items
cop/guard wants to warn you away.
person wants your help
not to mention teamwork, aka acting as translator, or friend provides intimidation, while you are the talking person.
but the key here is not that it was optimal before, the key is that it existed, and now there is nothing social at all.
the context of the discussion is not about my personal experience, its about the baseline experience of monk.
being able to understand languages isnt necessarily a Zen buddist concept. It could be flavored a number of ways. Monk is still conceptually hyper wise, who theoretically spends as much time honing its mind as its body. Where are the features representing its mental abilities/wisdom?
And trying to act like monk is not inspired by Asian culture is IMO not really a bonus. But thats a whole different issue.
but what it comes down to is they had a feature by which the monk could gain information, and insight into creatures that was socially useful. and they now don't. If there was something else maybe that would be better, but nothing is not an improvement
Almost everything you described there is handled by common. And if what you want is can be handled without talking at all sun and the moon is not needed. that being said I put on my survey they should bring it back, i just don't think its a big deal its an ability that is almost never used and when it is its just for small role play bits that can be done in other ways.
Your reading of the equip rules is off.
there is no part of that sentence that ties it to a specific weapon for your whole round. You have an assumed intent of what you think the rule should do, and are trying to make it mean something it doesnt.
every time you make an attack, if its part of the attack action, you can equip or unequip one weapon.
there is no connection the first time you do it with the second time you do it. nothing in the language suggests you are tied to manipulating the same weapon for the whole round.
one attack, one equip/unequip action, one weapon.
For example Start fight with sword in hand
after attack1 stow sword
before attack2 equip Maul
another example
attack 1 draw and throw dagger
attack 2 draw and throw handaxe
attack 3 draw polearm
one weapon is there to highlight the number of weapons, not a special significance of the weapon. you see this in the dual wielder feat which allows two weapons whenever something says one.
the intent of the rule is to allow people to equip and unequip weapons, limited by the number of attacks in their attack action.
people with 1 attack can't swap weapons not counting throwing
for people with two attacks, they can swap weapons 1 time, not counting throwing.
people with 4 attacks can swap weapons 2 times, not counting throwing.
The fact they didnt choose arcane trickster, is because they were more interested in assassin numbers, guessed assassin would have more damage, or wanted to highlight assassin. they also didn't choose shadow or elements monk. The dude never said they tested every build that exists. And they aren't required to, they are simply sharing their info with the community. I might like to see how arcane trickster compares with their assumptions, but its not really a flaw in the data.
You don't need to use tactical shift to use charger. charger only requires you run 10 feet in a straight line before making an attack. you can do this moving corner to corner, or by moving the enemy. If you are surrounded, maybe you use tactical shift, but its more because you are surrounded than because you really need 4.5*Accuracy more damage that round. I have tested numerous characters with charger, its not hard to use charger without any special features.
As an aside, when I talk about the skill capabilities of the fighter class, and tactical mind, I'm not making assumptions about what build they are using, or the priorities of the player. Fighter is by design, a highly adaptable class, designed to have build diversity. Every player can decide what they want to use their second wind on. They have that choice.
So something here, you keep saying 'that EK' build, but they have two different EK builds there. there is a STR TWF EK build, and an INT Dueling EK build, which are you referring to?
the build that uses a staff doesnt depend on VEX or Nick, its a shield based build that uses dueling and Int. And staff is versatile, and can have pushing. They have different damage calculations.
As far as maintaining concentration, a spell is only wasted if it doesn't give you value. the value of a level 1 slot in damage is 2d6-3d6.
for the TWF EK, they get its value back in round one, they increase its value for ever round it goes longer. their con could be anywhere from 14-20 depending on the player choices. from 1-5 your chance of getting hit by an attack 60% chance they wiff. assuming low (14) con, 75% chance I pass the save. 1/10 attempts to hit will break concentration.1/20 if you go 16 con. thats a worthwhile lvl 1 slot. not to mention EK probably has shield spell. That hex will definitely have strong return on value. Higher level, when missing becomes rarer, and damage greater, concentration might be harder, but you also have more slots.
the Board EK gets value back in two rounds, but they also got better AC, same stuff as before but higher AC.
The BM stuff you quoted me saying was a side comment about overall power level of optimized 5e versus optimized onednd. I was keeping that context. So its more a question of why did you bring up that comment if you weren't debating the premise of that post?
for initiative, +3 isnt significant enough that luck won't dominate the actual results, we use averages to try simplify/guesstimate, but there is a big range with the normal part of the bell curve. The question is what is the probability given two random d20 rolls, that the rogues +3 will change the result between the two? the answer is, pretty low.
also I really am not sure why you and others are hyperfocused on fighter versus rogue. the premise of the thread is rogue is undertuned compared to other classes, we can maybe limit it down to just martials to simplify discussion, but this is not only about fighter, or one specific build/subclass. But we can discuss it.
go grab some dice, or pop
https://www.google.com/searchq=roll a die&oq=roll a die&gs_lcrp=EgZjaHJvbWUqBggAEEUYOzIGCAAQRRg7MgYIARBFGDzSAQkxMTE2NmowajmoAgCwAgA&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8
see how often that +3 is the primary determiner of who is first with 4 people. (lets say monk20dex, barb14dex advantage, fighter14dex, rogue20dex) its going to be almost never.
even going by averages, going first does not guarantee you and extra turn. you only have an extra turn over other players if the last turn ends without them taking action. I don't think with a sample size of 6-8 rolls( a days encounters), that +3 is going to actually get to affect that. especially across 4 players.
first chance of +3 changing outcome, * the chance that encounter ends with rogue getting a turn a fighter not. the +3 really is not going to effect things much.
to be clear my contention is not that its the greatest skill or my best mental concept of how monks could get a social feature, its more that it was infinitely more useful than having nothing like that. And its not useless, as some people claim.
Yeah I liked the idea of the feature, the problem really was that it was basically just comprehend languages or tongues, which full-casters have had access to an entire eight levels earlier. It's not a terrible feature but it's terrible as the only feature for that level.
It was a feature absolutely crying out to be made available sooner, and put alongside something else. It would have been fine if it came in at 11th-level for example, alongside the third Monastic Tradition step, plus this would make it a lot closer to a half-caster getting 3rd-level spells at 9th-level, and as a "secondary" feature I doubt anyone would mind overly much.
This is definitely a problem with 5e Monks though; there are a bunch of higher level features that aren't necessarily bad features in isolation, but as the main (and only) feature for an entire level are just incredibly underwhelming, and made sticking with Monk into higher levels much more difficult.
OneD&D Monk definitely needs to get some utility back, preferably from something available early with some kind of scaling, even if it's just that it costs Discipline points so you can do it more as you level up.
To get back on topic though, 5e Rogue and playtest Rogue don't have this as a problem; expertise is great for out of combat utility, and Reliable Talent makes a lot of what a Rogue does no longer a question of "if" or "when" – it just happens.
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Honestly I get this, and now I wish Bard had something like Tongue of the Sun and Moon lol. If I may ask, if you had to come up with a flavor/ribbon ability that was to replace TotSaM for UA8 monk, what would it be? I've been trying to think of what out-of-combat abilities I would have added to the monk to add to the class fantasy that is more culturally-vague.
Since this thread has been getting off topic recently, I thought I would start a new thread HERE if you wish to continue the discussion about Monks and Tongue of the Sun and Moon etc.
Let's get this one back on track about Rogues.
Sorry if this blue color is annoying, I wanted it to stand out :op
EZD6 by DM Scotty
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And I'd say the same thing about your reading, it does not say 'one weapon per attack', it says 'one weapon'. So the RAW is definitely on my side here, you can argue against that all you want and infer the RAI is something else, but the RAI is clearly to fix the issue of drawing thrown weapons which exists in 5E where Barbarian/Fighter/Paladin could only throw 1 (maybe 2 on first round) thrown weapons like a Javelin in a round, it was never intended to be this thing of switching three weapons around constantly over a 6 second period. You can continue to argue that it means something else, but I honestly do not believe your usage of it was ever intended and so we will remain only at an impasse on this point if you're going to do that.
But since I know you want to argue the point. It also partially fixes the issue where people were dropping weapons to pull a second weapon, since the free item interaction only applies to a single weapon which made switching weapons in combat cumbersome.
under 5E rules you could only stow or draw one weapon, at a time, not both (unless you use your action) making switching weapons at all a case of drop the weapon and draw another one. Now you can stow the weapon as the free item interaction and draw a weapon as part of the attack action allowing for effectively switching weapons once per turn, dual wielder allows you to do it with two weapons, so you could switch two hand crossbows with a shortsword and scimitar, but again, only once per round.
Yes, but you're treating the numbers for assassin as if they represent the whole of Rogue and not just the subclass of assassin, which again is doing well. There is a slight dip in tier 3 but overall assassin is around where it should be. However you're ignoring that I have pointed out the flaws already, but most of them are on the EK side, making the EK numbers bigger than they should be.
Since I had nothing to do yesterday, I have started compiling the numbers*, overall, their numbers are very hard to read since they hard coded a lot of values, so can only assume what they meant in areas. But from what I see, it looks like they assume they have far more advantage than they actually have and are making use of things they didn't state, for example pulling shillelagh from nowhere, now build 2 pulls shillelagh from the additional 1st level feat a human gets, which I assume build 1 is doing but it's not noted anywhere. Not really stated what they expect quarterstaff is using for weapon mastery, is it topple? a quarterstaff can only have push, sap or topple, I assume it's push since it is replacing warhammer? but now I have to assume on the part.
*still working on them so flaws could exist, will work at my own pace, not going to rush anything out for this discussion, it is mostly for my own curiosity and I have other things going on in my life.
To show you the madness of those stats here is a part of one formula that they use at level 20: H142*(3.5+R142+3.5+4.5*2+R142*2+3.5*2+4.5*7+3*Q142)
Can you figure out what it means? H142 is attack roll with advantage, R142 is the ability modifier and Q142 is the weapon enchantment (i.e. +1/+2/+3).
This appears to be a 1d6 weapon, making an attack with hex, 3.5+R142+3.5. They noted down shortsword as using nick which leads into the next part:
this part appears to be a 1d8 weapon making two attacks with hex, 4.5*2+R142*2+3.5*2. They state they use a warhammer, which they use push with, so why do these two attacks have advantage? It's pulled from no-where, there is no source for this advantage, it certainly isn't studied attacks, they are assuming a base 85% chance to hit, so you're going to get less than 1 studied attack a round and worse yet, it could hit on the first attack, the one they assume advantage from find familiar for. So why is this in the section of attacks with advantage? It's not clear.
This part appears to be booming blade, 4.5*7. This assumes the target monster moves, but it's hard to tell what assumptions specifically are being made to justify that, obvious assumption would be the push.
Finally we have, 3*Q142. which begs the question, if you're listing three attacks like this, why not to use do 3*(Q142+R142) or vice versa. This is the amount of damage from an enchanted weapon, why it doesn't appear next to the ability modifier, who knows?
So I can only try to decode these things by assumptions and then there is still unexplained things in there, so you'll have to forgive me if I overlook things... and this is just one part of one equation that they're using to get these numbers.
This information is wrong, because you're assuming there is no other enemies stood next to the target or player, which is a weird assumption to make, you're a fighter on the front line, you probably have 2/3 creatures on you for 80% of most fights. But I now realise going back over those crazy numbers again that they in fact push twice, which still isn't a 100% way to do it (depends on position of other creatures), but it does remove most uses of tactical shift, what it doesn't cover is what happens if you miss the (push) attack, since hitting is a requirement. And you're probably in most combats recasting hex every turn which does conflict with tactical shift when you need it.
Obviously the first build, since that is the one that they used for their graphs after all. But there is actually 4 builds, not 2.
the Duelling build does around around 7 less DPR every level until around tier 4 gameplay... now as I stated, a reason a lot of their numbers are so high is they assume an Action surge every 4 turns of combat, at level 17+ if you have 6 encounters all 4 rounds long, that might be possible but for tiers 1-3? This assumption is overly ambitious and definitely not reflective of a normal dungeon, it's way too high. If you adjust down the action surge damage, that INT build gets for tier 1-3 to more realistic ones then the assassin is actually doing around 110% to 70% of the damage (levels 1-3 assassin does more), there is a low point at level 11 (the 70%) where fighter gets a 3rd attack and booming blade gets a cantrip upgrade where all rogue gets is a sneak attack increase (+1d6) but then that EK build gets literally nothing more until level 17.
I'm not going to worry about Tier 4 play, there is usually too much going on by Tier 4 to worry about just the base classes anymore and I honestly haven't seen anything that leads me to believe that WotC have fixed Tier 3 & Tier 4 gameplay properly yet. I also don't care if the Int build has a higher AC, it doesn't really matter to the discussion, Rogue is not a tank, so how fighter vs fighter builds compare against each other does not really impact on how fighter vs. rogue works out.
In regards to BM, I was brining up, why are you even bringing it up, and the reason is because, you wanted too, it didn't make a point. This is why is why I brought it up, in these long discussions why have a non-point? The context is where is Rogue in OneD&D which old BM is not relevant too.
As for initiative, I literally put down the maths that shows this statement is bogus, luck is a factor but it's going to normalise too rogue going first about 61% of the time, fighter about 35%, and the remaining 4.25% will be split in half. If we want to remove luck factors then let's remove attack rolls to begin with, and oh no the EK now does like double the damage of Rogue.... the mistake you made earlier in the thread (Page 4) and multiple people correctly called you out on, because even in these luck factors, you can't dismiss them since they do contribute to the final figures. Roughly speaking you'd expect the rogue to get over 1 more turn than the fighter in a dungeon. Now it could be the case that in one dungeon run the fighter gets 1 extra turn but when you build that up to 10 dungeons, you could get 2 dungeons where the rogue gets 3 turns of combat more, 1 where they get 2 turns of combat more and none where they only get 1. The point is that when you normalize the numbers over a campaign, that +3 initiative does lead to more turns of combat and to a statistically significant number.
You mean after you lost the point of Barbarian versus Rogue and you shifted it to Fighter versus Rogue yourself. We have already gone over why Rogue does not need to be the top of DPR, they are not a damage focused class, so running in circles around classes isn't going to help you here, Monk has literally nothing else but damage and stunning strike, which is part of the reason that class is so significantly weak in 5E and needed massive buffs in OneD&D, and it's still going to be less popular than Rogue even after all of this. Barbarian will still be less popular than Rogue. Heck the only class in OneD&D that will probably be more popular, is fighter and that'll probably still be the Champion Fighter. Champion fighter is not an optimized choice but was basically the most played subclass of the most played class in 5E, because fundementally it's easy to play which if battle is not necessarily your focus, can be a good thing and it can be a good way into the game too as it's not overly complicated.
Inherently these EK builds are very complicated, very specific and very optimized, I don't frankly care nor believe it impacts Rogue gameplay. There is always going to be the occasional power-gamer that will use (or fight (figuratively) with the DM to use) and abuse these kinds of builds. What I do care about is people arguing that classes need to be buffed because there is one over-sight in another class that it can be power-gamed, because A) that is not an issue in the class that can not, it's an issue in the class that can. And B) it's just not the way most parties play the game; Lone wolves that do everything by themselves tend not to do as well as roles that fulfil being part of the party and contributing to the party. Rogue does this latter part, extremely well already, it doesn't need to be doing any more because then it's going from part of the party to lone wolf, the only thing this rogue can't do is tank and heal, you can take feats to help with healing at levels 10, 12 & 16, you can boost your HP with Tough and be pressing basically 1 AC less than a STR fighter without a shield by level 10.
So this is the reason why it's got so much attention because A) we already did barbarian, B). Monk is only at the same level of DPR as barbarian but yet can't even tank. C) Rogue is already a very utility based class which covers a lot of utility for the party which other classes struggle to compete with, only Ranger and Bard really can potentially replace a Rogue, which is far less than any other class could be replaced out with. And D) these optimizations are always based around being lone wolves, never about contributing to the party.
First off, the link appears to be broken,
second off, I already did the maths in a better way. I took every result the Rogue could get (1d20), every result the fighter could get (1d20) and calculated how often they'd be beaten by the other class on that dice roll, I then averaged the results out and got the results:
+1 initiative bonus, Rogue would go first 52.5% of the time, fighter 42.75% and remaining 4.25% is a draw.
+2 rogue goes first 57.5% of the time, fighter 38.25%
+3 rogue goes first 61.75% of the time, fighter, 34%
These aren't just random numbers, these are specifically how well they'd do. And the +3 difference means the Rogue wins nearing twice as often as the fighter, that is very statistically significant.
Now what is insignificant is how you feel because of Anecdotal evidence, how you feel the results of just rolling some dice, most players feel like they roll low most of the time they play when in reality it's usually fairly equally balanced of high and low. Anecdotal evidence is just meaningless when you're dealing with specific numbers. If we are talking about opinions on the class itself then Anecdotal means something because people's opinions are Anecdotal, but this is a more specific question of how many times does the rogue go before the fighter in combat, which isn't a matter of opinion.
I think rogue looks ok, but I will aleays multiclass them to get a second attack and thus increase chance to land sneak attack. If anythimg I think rogue should get a second attack around lv 13-18 somewhere.
That said I have massive issues with the changes to Assassin and Gloomstalker that effectively kill the whole flash-damage supertype which is kind of fantasy staple.