I am trying to make an even more skill oriented rogue. So far all I have is:
Lose: Sneak attack
Gain: Skill Focus (Gained when gained sneak attack)
Lose: Uncanny dodge
Gained: All skills are in class
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I am trying to make an even more skill oriented rogue. So far all I have is:
Lose: Sneak attack
Gain: Skill Focus (Gained when gained sneak attack)
Lose: Uncanny dodge
Gained: All skills are in class
Why not just take levels of the Factotum class (from Dungeonscape, I think). They have all skills as class skills, the ability to add their level to a skill check 1/day/skill, Int to Str- and Dex-based skills, and a whole host of other things that a Rogue-like character would love.
Because that isn't the purpose here, now is it?Quote:
Originally Posted by Garryl
actually, that is pretty much the focus. Factotum is even moreso the Skillmonkey then rogueQuote:
Originally Posted by Cranthis
the purpose is an acf for rogue, not choosing a different class. it doesn't matter if it would be better to be factotum, it is not the goal. so you could say that he should make it different to make it a better choice then a factotum, rather than saying be a factotum
That is not ACF territory though, that pretty much calls for a total rebuild that makes rogue more stable.Quote:
Originally Posted by zetsu1919
Factotum has fewer skill points than a rogue, is almost unplayable without an Intelligence focus, and gets into spells and healing which might be off-flavor for a rogue type.
That said, I really don't care for the idea of all rogues everywhere having Heal, Survival, Spellcraft and Knowledge: Psionics all in-class (to say nothing of Lucid Dreaming and Iaijutsu Focus). Already I think it's questionable how the same rogue can have "nerd" skills like Appraise and Decipher script, "social butterfly" skills like Diplomacy and Bluff, the "jock" skills Climb, Jump and Swim, and Dex-based "jester" stuff like Tumble, all on the same build; it seems like these ought to be sub-classes or something, but that's probably just me. Still, no need to make the Rogue any more of the "I can do any bloody thing I want (other than cast spells, since I wouldn't need to do anything else if I could do that)" character than he already is.
Sneak Attack for Skill Focus is both overly vague and, methings, a poor trade. You're basically taking away the class' entire ability to function in a fight, after all, as well as its most distinctive feature. You wind up with something little better than an Expert, and I think that at that point most players would rather choose the factotum.
I'd leave Sneak Attack in place, and drop things like Evasion, Trapfinding, and some of the special abilities. In return, maybe grant bonuses to max skill ranks, a version of the bardic knack ACF from the PHB2, the ability to always take 10 on skill checks, and things of that nature. Feel free to add more than you take; Rogue is a bit weak.
I agree with Grod here, leave the rogue abilities in place and give them the abilityt o take 10 on a skill at every X level, like the first time at 2nd and every 4th level afterwards?
THen give them Int to some things like a dodge bonus to AC, maybe initiative and etc so that INT look actually attractive to a Rogue and bonus! you get more skill points.
I'd advise against that one; of those skills that aren't in the rogue's list, many are lacking because they really don't fit the idea of what a rogue is.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cranthis
However, here's an idea: Let rogues take skill tricks for free whenever they meet the prerequisites and a class level prerequisite (the class level prerequisite should be 3 less than the number of ranks needed for the trick, so it only limits multiclass rogues).
Another idea, though this one might be a bit too powerful: A rogue who gets the ability in question gets virtual ranks in every skill equal to his INT modifier; these virtual ranks act as ranks for every purpose (including synergies the ability to use skills that are unusable untrained), but do not stack with ranks bought with skill points. That way, your rogue can do pretty much anything to a small degree.
What about dropping something, such as evasion and uncanny dodge, to gain a bard's bardic knowledge ability?
Somewhere there is also a bard variant where you lose bardic knowledge and gain the ability to once per day per skill add your class level to a skill check.
ALso, take a look at pathfinder rogue. They get a "rogue trick" every other level and those rogue tricks include a number of skill focused tricks.
How about this:
1. Drop 1st level SA to have all skills as class skills + Bardic Knowledge.
2. Replace each trap sense bonus for skill focus.
How about Dropping trap sense for all class in skill, and every other sneak attack is traded in for skill focus?
It would make more sense to drop all the sneak attacks and keep trap sense; at least trap sense is sort of related to the Search and Disable skills.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cranthis
Honestly, you could probably drop a single sneak attack die for skill focus at every class level and still have it be a bad trade as often as not, skill focus is not a strong feat.
The best trade would be a floating skill focus feat they can retrain in 5 minutes. trading uncanny dodge for it, along with all skills as class skills. Then we are getting into reasonable ACF territory for making yourself weak to rogues or loosing sneak attack
How about drop everything BUT sneak attack, give them 10 skill points, and give them the standard rogue skill list +3 of their choice? And then, to make them viable in encounters with things immune to sneak attack, let them spend three skill points for a skill trick that makes a given creature type vulnerable to their sneak attack (but not fully; they spend 3 skill points to make undead take half sneak attack damage, then can spend another 3 to make it full). And let them spend 3 skill points to regain some of the other class features, like uncanny dodge if for some reason they want it.
That's pretty close to +3 on all skills...unless it's a predominantly combat game, that's far more powerful than being weak rather than useless in combat.Quote:
Originally Posted by toapat
Hmm. I think:
Drop trap sense, gain skill focus at every trap sense level.
Bump uncanny dodge to when I would get Improved uncanny dodge, and get all skills in class
This will leave 4th level a dead level.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cranthis
It would make more sense to lose 1st level d6 to SA. If you consider the loss to great for having all skills as class skills, add another Skill Focus at 1st level.
You could also allow selection of skill feats instead of Skill Focus.
True. I think I will go with that, for the getting all skills in class.Quote:
Originally Posted by nonsi
Why don't you just hand them effective ranks in any class skill they don't have ranks in equal to the bonus they would get from Trapsense?
After all of your (well most of you guys) help, I've come to:
Lose: 1st sneak attack die
Gain: All Skills in class, and Skill focus as a bonus feat.
Lose: Trap sense
Gain: Skill Focus as a bonus feat at 3rd level, and every 3 levels after (3, 6, 9 etc)
I would also allow someone to take a skill feat (a.g. Agile/Alertness/...) instead of Skill Focus.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cranthis
I agree, but this is for my own thing anyways. Anyone is free to use it of course, but I would use it to take skill focus anyways.Quote:
Originally Posted by nonsi
Also, maybe trade Evasion for the Bardic Knack ACF? (when making skill checks, you can use 1/2 your level in place of skill ranks; you can't take 10 or use trained-only skills if you're untrained)
If, for example, you wish to be really awesome at stealth, you'd also take Stealthy, not just Skill Focus: Hide & Move Silently.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cranthis
That involves categorizing those feats somehow. How would you do that?Quote:
Originally Posted by nonsi
Feats that enhance skill checks.Quote:
Originally Posted by Just to Browse
I know. I said thats what I'm putting in, I just also said that I would generally use skill focus.Quote:
Originally Posted by nonsi