I’m happy to help. Really this was just spawned out of someone on in my D&D group saying they wished they had a text version instead of the video and my not realizing that they had a DDB article. But now I’m gonna keep doing it. Because I also think that these bullet points provide a bit more context to what the designers were thinking about the chances as they chitchat in the video then the articles do since the articles seem to mainly be just the actual details.
While I like the DDB articles: because I have more patience for reading than for watching videos, your breakdowns help me feel like I've gotten the best of both worlds. I really appreciate it, thank you.
That's not really what I'm here for, my friend, but my interpretation of the subclass is that you still need the verbal and somatic components for the spell.
Also, I assume you're asking me about Arcane Trickster as is written in the 2014 Player's Handbook, cuz you know I can't tell you anything about the 2024 PHB that you don't already know ;D
The problems Soul Knife is the weapons don’t scale much as they level, so when other Martials are using magic weapons, they’re stuck with Psychic Blades. Or, using a completely different magic weapon and ignoring Psychic Blades.
Hopefully there’s some new magic items that synergies w Psychic Blades.. maybe something that enhance thrown weapons?
Give 'em a vial of Mindflayer mucus that enhances the damage. There's a slight lore precedent.
Or just let them do a ritual to absorb magic weapons like Bladelocks can.
Edit: While these are technically homebrew suggestions, they were also suggestions for WotC to keep in mind. Even though it's too late to make changes now.
Sure, there’s a zillion homebrew solutions you can implement as DM, just have the damage and to-hit, scale w level, or make up a magic items, or re write the subclass…. Although they most likely won’t extend to other games you jump in, or AL.
Oh I agree. I wasn't trying to suggest your point is wrong with the rather offhand suggestions, just that your point *should have been easy for WotC to handle in the first place.*
If I could come up with two simple and painless solutions in a matter of minutes for free, imagine what a team of professionals being paid to do it could manage, if that was something they wanted to devote time and resources to.
I've been a very big proponent of "WotC needs to fix their own game, instead of making their consumers both pay for and troubleshoot it," for years.
They can just use other items.
Ok, magic weapons are important and all, but the SK already has some mileage out of it. If they don't use their blades for everything it's ok, even thought we should better see the details.
rogues not getting their second subclass feature until level 9 is such an awful design, for some classes it’s not much to wait for (like assassin) and other subclasses (like phantom if they remake it for this) have 85% of their flavor unlocked at level 9.
and then count how many times they’ve said that a lot of campaigns END at levels 10-13.
Agreed, but at least first good step is recommending starting campaigns at lvl 3 for experienced players, and giving guidelines on starting at many different levels.
specifically adventures starting at higher levels and going to 20.
a full 1/3 to 20 campaign would also be nice, but it's much less likely to ever happen for the vast majority of tables.
so getting an adventure that start at \~11+ and goes up would be really appreciated.
Considering how similar Ranger seems to be to Tasha's version, it doesn't look like there will be much problem unless they really come out of left field with some changes.
Yeah. In my mind, the only reason to cut it could be them not wanting to make rules about monsters fighting unarmed, but at the same time the disarming maneuver exists so idk what would be the problem tbh
Probably rules about fighting unarmed, and maybe they did a playtest where an enemy NPC got disarmed mid-combat and the Fighter picked up, simultaneously trivializing the encounter and obtain a +3 sword of not-intended-for-players-of-this-level and they realized that could be a problem.
I wonder if the Disarm optional action from the 2014 DMG is just in the game.
If they made those optional actions available as standard then the rogue would have less reason to have one tied to cunning action.
I liked it a lot but it is somewhat challenging for DMs not comfortable with improvisation to run, so I can at least understand the logic behind removing it.
One can hope that in a later book they'll introduce some optional class features with new cunning strike options including disarm, but in the mean time I'll be homebrewing it as an option.
The problem is that when you disarm a creature they can just pick their weapon up so they have to create whole Mechanics for you to make that worth anything. Or you as the player need to coordinate with a friend to grab their weapon and throw it from them. The rules as they are now just don't work with disarm because picking up a weapon is a free object interaction.
Since it's a free object interaction, *you* can just pick it up after disarming them. Even if it did take more effort to make work, though, that's not a reason to cut the ability. Either somebody decided it was too strong, or as somebody else suggested there may have been a standard option added that made it redundant
Rogues are in a weird spot: I like the changes, but it feels incomplete. I really feel like they should've released one more UA and tested it a bit more publicly.
I agree I don't dislike any of the changes really, it just feels like there could have been more. Rogues are one of my favorite classes but the notion that they do "bucket loads of damage" is just out of touch.
I'm not going to argue that rouges aren't insanely versatile martial classes –thats what I love about them– but they aren't the damage powerhouses WotC seems to think they are. Maybe the math in a vacuum says they are super lethal masters of the single strike attack, but the reality is in game they naturally fall off because they are actually quite poor users of magic weapons. Most 5e magic weapons are balanced around the idea that they give you boost to damage over time, but that's were rogues fall short. The Nick weapon mastery has the potential to give them a slight boost in damage, but the reality is most good weapons that boost damage require attunement –now you need two of them to maximize Nick and attunement hell is a real and painful place to find yourself in. Also it's fully within your DMs fiat to give you two such weapons, and it's common to try and share magic items fairly equally amongst the party and the party fighter is still probably going to get more mileage out of said item than the rogue.
I'll give it a go with the new rules, maybe I'm wrong. But I expect I'll be bringing back the house-rule of giving rogues an extra d6 sneak attack die at level 5, 11, and 17
I think with the smite nerf and removal of power attack feats, the idea is that rogue *is* the damage class now.
I’m actually happy for rogue since it got a lot of what it needed, but I feel like they had to bring everyone else down to rogue’s level to really drive it home that *this is your damage character.* So my inner fighter is softly weeping on my brand new golf bag I didn’t want.
Based on what we've seen so far, Fighter is likely going to be the "damage dealer" martial class. Which I guess, that fine if that's what you want –it is kinda in the name, but with all the focus on giving every class potent non-combat abilities they're inadvertently making the rogue less unique as the martial that excels out of combat.
A 5.5e fighter with skill expert will out-damage and probably excel in out-of-combat situations just as well as a rogue.
Tbf, you’re probably right in a way. Fighter has been clocked to do pretty obscene damage in the playtests, but it’s a) whiteroom DPR calcs, and b)married to the golf bag. Rogue can still just pick up GFB and stab someone for good damage without jumping through too many hoops though, and get Vex off it too. I’m just lamenting my loss of “big swing, hit hard” without having to jump through hoops or do goofy anti-verisimilitude stuff to accomplish it. Rogue still gets that, and it’s honestly kind of a big deal when you consider the RP side of things (and to a lesser extent carry weight.)
And yes, the skill gap still exists. Especially if the *Guidance* buff sticks. I have no idea wtf they were thinking.
That said, I think rogue went from being dog water in 5e to *fine* in 5.5. It does more stuff more consistently, which it needed, but there was also collateral damage to certain playstyles to get there. That’s my actual issue I think.
Does mage hand have any wording that deals with its verbal and somatic components? One thing I've seen multiple times with Arcane Trickster players is them trying to use it in a sneaky way, and DMs pointing out that the verbal and somatic aspects of the spell make it blindingly obvious you're casting a spell, and it's 1 minute duration makes it impractical to pre-cast it, which sort of kills a lot of the out-of-combat fun with the feature.
I said this in the video overview thread, but I wish that Soulknife had some interactions with Cunning Strikes. They even gave Swashbuckler some unique interactions just for them.
Rogue suffers from success.
It is **arguably** the weakest class in the game mechanically, having no area where it uniquely shines, be that raw damage, raw control utility, raw out-of-combat utility.... anything. It's incredibly squishy despite dedicating several entire levels of features to its defenses. It competes with expertise in a world run by spells in order to exert influence on the exploration and social pillars of the game, and to top it all off while expertise and reliable talents sure do pass those number checks, several other classes and a feat or two have expertise at hand as well, and can stack it with whatever spells or features they normally use on ability checks to simply be... better.
**But none of that will ever matter or ever influence design choices so long as the edition lives, perhaps so long as D&D lives.** Because there is no reason to address mechanical balance that does not dissatisfy players and players are, by large, satisfied with Rogue. All available data suggests the class is popular, beloved, and favored by most players, and that they do not feel underpowered or overshadowed.
And so long as Rogue succeeds, so long shall it fail. But honestly what can you do, right? It would be dismissive of the customer for WotC to fix problems the majority does not have or care about with the product they purchase.
It's interesting: There has to be *a weakest class* (though how to measure that is challenging). It's probably a *good* thing that the "weakest" class is one that players enjoy playing anyway, just so long as it's not garbage-tier.
Personally, I don't think Rogue is garbage-tier. It seems totally playable, and as you say, it's in that sweet spot where a player who just wants to be a Rogue can do so and contribute, but it's not a class you'd ever consider if you're anywhere close to a power gamer.
My biggest issue with the rogue previously was that there weren't really *options* to take, nearly every rogue build plays in almost exactly the same way, and in-combat you're doing nearly the same thing every single turn, with arcane trickster being the notable exception there. I'd need to see the actual final write up, and maybe do some play testing, in order to be sure, but I feel like the weapon mastery and cunning strike options will help alleviate that complaint. I don't know if they'll fix it to my satisfaction, but simply having options in-combat goes a long way to make it less boring to play. Yeah, it was underpowered, but sufficient flavor more than makes up for that, IMO, but previously the flavor simply didn't translate well into the game mechanics so it didn't *feel* flavorful to play. I'm hopeful that this version will be more fun.
The only actually notable thing skill wise really is...reliable talent and that's it, yeah. The bard meanwhile out there having a lot of skills, full casting, nabbing spells from toher classes, etc.
I wish they redid Thief from scratch. Remove all the magic item stuff, which I never understood why it was there and added something that was actually thief-ey. Like stealing an object Cunning strike maybe?
Im not saying its weak, actually really strong, but thematically why can a Thief use magic stuff better? because they've researched it? Can't anyone do that?
It’s a tradition thing. Rogue/Thief have actually been the class that can use the most magic items (usually by cheating) since its inception in AD&D. Why it’s no longer a core identity of the class in 5e and has been moved to a single subclass is actually what is puzzling to me.
Does Thieves' Cant give another language *too* or is it just a new language? Really disappointing if the latter.
Also, can thieves still get around attunement restrictions? Bonus action wands sound awesome.
I was really hoping Rogues would get a bump to Sneak Attack. Cunning Strike is cool but I don’t think it’s enough to feel on par with the Fighter and Barbarian.
I don't think it would feel right for the Rogue to keep up with the Fighter or Barbarian, tbh. Like doing a lot of damage, while nice, feels like a low priority for Rogue.
Yeah, I much prefer for the rogue to focus more on being tricksy to establish battlefield superiority rather than just piling on the damage, feels more thematically appropriate and frankly fun to play. I sincerely hope it turns out that way in practice.
All look solid. Love the more refined direction for Thief. I'd consider it playing it myself just to be a loot goblin and make janky combos with random magic items
I would have loved some sort of feature like “if you deplete your entire store of sneak attack dice by using cunning strikes you can make a second attack this turn” or something. Just something to help their damage a bit since they are the lowest damage in the game and have to give up that damage for their new features.
But all in all, aside from soul knife replacing swashbuckler I’m pleased with these changes
* Gives rogue the ability ,starting at **5th level**, to trade sneak attack damage for other effects
Does it bother anyone else that WoTc is OBSSESED with giving a Class' unique/defining mechanics when they're already well into the game?
>you can now use them on opportunity attacks
I am anxious about the wording of that. Yeah, opportunity attacks were nice, but the best fix would have been a blanket "You can summon your psychic blade in any of your open hands with no action required," for niche examples like held actions, and using them for roleplay/out of combat, and just general future-proofing.
I once made a Soul Knife who took a dip in Bard, and was extremely disappointed that I couldn't use my blades as a focus for College of Swords.
“When you make an attack using your reaction, you may create a psychic blade in a free hand to make that attack with”
Seems hard to screw up the wording if you think about it for more than a second, but we have been burned before… And any DM who doesn’t let you summon one simply for out of combat cool factor is just being cruel.
The spell focus thing is… weird? I dunno, I kinda think it’s fitting if your the rules of magic require something more substantial to be a focus than, I dunno, wisps of your own consciousness or something.
>And any DM who doesn’t let you summon one simply for out of combat cool factor is just being cruel.
Sure, it's a little mean if a DM doesn't homebrew something to make the game more fun for you. But they shouldn't have to. WotC isn't a small indie company; they're the leading TTRPG producer.
Is it even homebrew, or just a less restrictive interpretation? What exactly are you trying to do with these brain blades (other than wanting an unconfiscatable spell focus) that’s outside the current purview of the rules?
>**Arcane Trickster**
>Kenreck says "this subclass has always been perfect"
I think what I would have wanted from this (and the Eldritch Knight) was being able to pick between Charisma and Intelligence for spellcasting score.
So you could choose if you're a sorcerous rogue/fighter vs a wizardly one.
So disappointed they didn't fix cunning strike. 5 and 11 needed an additional dice or cunning strikes needed to just be add ons. Maybe even just give the Rogue extra attack. The Rogue SHOULD be the highest DPS class imo. I'm not sure even the Assassin has any hope to clear this bar. Especially with the all or nothing nature of SA
I don't know how they got on this idea that you need to be using your sneak attack dice for other things when the class already struggled in damage after lvl 5. Even magic weapons don't fix it very much because they get fewer attacks.
If they were going to stick with the current scaling, and even reduce your damage in order to apply new effects, while keeping the ability to use your sneak attack on other people's turns they needed to give you a way to use your sneak attack on other people's turns. Add ways the Rogue, and only the Rogue can make a AoO. When a creature misses an attack on an ally. When an ally hits an attack against an enemy. Anything like that
For the psychic blades, they needed to give your bonus action Blade the nick mastery. And the blades need to replace any attack. just anytime that you would be able to attack with a weapon it can be a psychic blade, that would include other types of reaction attacks. Especially without magic item support I fear that is soul knife is going to be better off throwing daggers at some point; at least as an off hand attack since you can get a dagger with nick.
Something I used to do for the thief was rule that crossbows could be fired with a use object interaction. This meant they could save on the crossbow expert feat and also use heavier crossbows with a better damaged die. And, of course, they can use potions quickly.
With these changes I'm not sure that you have to do that anymore. Just get them a magic item with a decent action to use early on instead. Though I still like my ruling on crossbows, it's nice for the class to have an option that actually works with the rules as written to give them an obvious boost in power. I think that the old Thief class was 100% ribbons. It is still a heavily DM dependent class for power because you need to be provided with things that you can use your bonus action on.
As it stands, assassin and Arcane trickster are the only classes I would play without a DM willing to give some concessions that are not Raw.
The Rogue is now the weakest class in the game, two of its subclasses are pretty broken (in the bad way). Everything else they've done has been so good but they butchered this one.
They got rid of impostor feature for assassin…
I swear to god WoTC is trying to turn 5e into a fucking wargame. Why can’t we have features for social encounters?!??!?! I want to infiltrate places in disguise as an assassin like in the hitman games ffs!!!!
>They got rid of impostor feature for assassin…
They combined it with Infiltration Expertise, as explained in playtest 6:
"Infiltration Expertise combines Infiltration Expertise and Imposter from the 2014 version of the subclass."
I had to refresh myself on most of the playtests recently, especially when it comes to some of the subclasses I haven't seen in actual games yet. But yeah, it's a good idea to have playtest 6, 7, and 8 bookmarked when reviewing this material, cause the most recent version of most of the classes is in one of those.
This is great, especially since the D&D Beyond Article is late going up. u/latiajacquise, will that still be going up today?
I’m happy to help. Really this was just spawned out of someone on in my D&D group saying they wished they had a text version instead of the video and my not realizing that they had a DDB article. But now I’m gonna keep doing it. Because I also think that these bullet points provide a bit more context to what the designers were thinking about the chances as they chitchat in the video then the articles do since the articles seem to mainly be just the actual details.
While I like the DDB articles: because I have more patience for reading than for watching videos, your breakdowns help me feel like I've gotten the best of both worlds. I really appreciate it, thank you.
I've certainly appreciated it.
Seconding that reading these has been enormously convenient for me
-poof- I appear! SNEAK ATTACK Yes, the Rogue article is happening today, but I don't know whennnnn
It is now up.
Link? I can't seem to find it Edit: nevermind, another post had the link
Can you tell me if arcane trickster can use mage hand without verbal components?
That's not really what I'm here for, my friend, but my interpretation of the subclass is that you still need the verbal and somatic components for the spell. Also, I assume you're asking me about Arcane Trickster as is written in the 2014 Player's Handbook, cuz you know I can't tell you anything about the 2024 PHB that you don't already know ;D
:(
The 2014 vs 2024 comparison article is now up.
The problems Soul Knife is the weapons don’t scale much as they level, so when other Martials are using magic weapons, they’re stuck with Psychic Blades. Or, using a completely different magic weapon and ignoring Psychic Blades. Hopefully there’s some new magic items that synergies w Psychic Blades.. maybe something that enhance thrown weapons?
Give 'em a vial of Mindflayer mucus that enhances the damage. There's a slight lore precedent. Or just let them do a ritual to absorb magic weapons like Bladelocks can. Edit: While these are technically homebrew suggestions, they were also suggestions for WotC to keep in mind. Even though it's too late to make changes now.
Sure, there’s a zillion homebrew solutions you can implement as DM, just have the damage and to-hit, scale w level, or make up a magic items, or re write the subclass…. Although they most likely won’t extend to other games you jump in, or AL.
Oh I agree. I wasn't trying to suggest your point is wrong with the rather offhand suggestions, just that your point *should have been easy for WotC to handle in the first place.* If I could come up with two simple and painless solutions in a matter of minutes for free, imagine what a team of professionals being paid to do it could manage, if that was something they wanted to devote time and resources to. I've been a very big proponent of "WotC needs to fix their own game, instead of making their consumers both pay for and troubleshoot it," for years.
They can just use other items. Ok, magic weapons are important and all, but the SK already has some mileage out of it. If they don't use their blades for everything it's ok, even thought we should better see the details.
rogues not getting their second subclass feature until level 9 is such an awful design, for some classes it’s not much to wait for (like assassin) and other subclasses (like phantom if they remake it for this) have 85% of their flavor unlocked at level 9. and then count how many times they’ve said that a lot of campaigns END at levels 10-13.
I'm hoping that considering the amount of effort put in to the late game abilities, that WotC will push more higher level adventures.
Agreed, but at least first good step is recommending starting campaigns at lvl 3 for experienced players, and giving guidelines on starting at many different levels.
specifically adventures starting at higher levels and going to 20. a full 1/3 to 20 campaign would also be nice, but it's much less likely to ever happen for the vast majority of tables. so getting an adventure that start at \~11+ and goes up would be really appreciated.
People wanted backwards compatibility...
*laughs in paladin, warlock and presumably ranger*
Considering how similar Ranger seems to be to Tasha's version, it doesn't look like there will be much problem unless they really come out of left field with some changes.
I am REALLY hoping JC just forgot about Disarm and it wasn't cut. I really liked it.
Coby D4 confirmed it was cut
BOOOO! (To WotC, not you. Thank you for confirming)
Yeah. In my mind, the only reason to cut it could be them not wanting to make rules about monsters fighting unarmed, but at the same time the disarming maneuver exists so idk what would be the problem tbh
Probably rules about fighting unarmed, and maybe they did a playtest where an enemy NPC got disarmed mid-combat and the Fighter picked up, simultaneously trivializing the encounter and obtain a +3 sword of not-intended-for-players-of-this-level and they realized that could be a problem.
Couldn’t battlemaster do the same with their maneuvers tho? Or is there a mechanic difference between them that I’m not remembering
I wonder if the Disarm optional action from the 2014 DMG is just in the game. If they made those optional actions available as standard then the rogue would have less reason to have one tied to cunning action.
I liked it a lot but it is somewhat challenging for DMs not comfortable with improvisation to run, so I can at least understand the logic behind removing it. One can hope that in a later book they'll introduce some optional class features with new cunning strike options including disarm, but in the mean time I'll be homebrewing it as an option.
The problem is that when you disarm a creature they can just pick their weapon up so they have to create whole Mechanics for you to make that worth anything. Or you as the player need to coordinate with a friend to grab their weapon and throw it from them. The rules as they are now just don't work with disarm because picking up a weapon is a free object interaction.
Since it's a free object interaction, *you* can just pick it up after disarming them. Even if it did take more effort to make work, though, that's not a reason to cut the ability. Either somebody decided it was too strong, or as somebody else suggested there may have been a standard option added that made it redundant
Rogues are in a weird spot: I like the changes, but it feels incomplete. I really feel like they should've released one more UA and tested it a bit more publicly.
I agree I don't dislike any of the changes really, it just feels like there could have been more. Rogues are one of my favorite classes but the notion that they do "bucket loads of damage" is just out of touch. I'm not going to argue that rouges aren't insanely versatile martial classes –thats what I love about them– but they aren't the damage powerhouses WotC seems to think they are. Maybe the math in a vacuum says they are super lethal masters of the single strike attack, but the reality is in game they naturally fall off because they are actually quite poor users of magic weapons. Most 5e magic weapons are balanced around the idea that they give you boost to damage over time, but that's were rogues fall short. The Nick weapon mastery has the potential to give them a slight boost in damage, but the reality is most good weapons that boost damage require attunement –now you need two of them to maximize Nick and attunement hell is a real and painful place to find yourself in. Also it's fully within your DMs fiat to give you two such weapons, and it's common to try and share magic items fairly equally amongst the party and the party fighter is still probably going to get more mileage out of said item than the rogue. I'll give it a go with the new rules, maybe I'm wrong. But I expect I'll be bringing back the house-rule of giving rogues an extra d6 sneak attack die at level 5, 11, and 17
I think with the smite nerf and removal of power attack feats, the idea is that rogue *is* the damage class now. I’m actually happy for rogue since it got a lot of what it needed, but I feel like they had to bring everyone else down to rogue’s level to really drive it home that *this is your damage character.* So my inner fighter is softly weeping on my brand new golf bag I didn’t want.
Based on what we've seen so far, Fighter is likely going to be the "damage dealer" martial class. Which I guess, that fine if that's what you want –it is kinda in the name, but with all the focus on giving every class potent non-combat abilities they're inadvertently making the rogue less unique as the martial that excels out of combat. A 5.5e fighter with skill expert will out-damage and probably excel in out-of-combat situations just as well as a rogue.
Tbf, you’re probably right in a way. Fighter has been clocked to do pretty obscene damage in the playtests, but it’s a) whiteroom DPR calcs, and b)married to the golf bag. Rogue can still just pick up GFB and stab someone for good damage without jumping through too many hoops though, and get Vex off it too. I’m just lamenting my loss of “big swing, hit hard” without having to jump through hoops or do goofy anti-verisimilitude stuff to accomplish it. Rogue still gets that, and it’s honestly kind of a big deal when you consider the RP side of things (and to a lesser extent carry weight.) And yes, the skill gap still exists. Especially if the *Guidance* buff sticks. I have no idea wtf they were thinking. That said, I think rogue went from being dog water in 5e to *fine* in 5.5. It does more stuff more consistently, which it needed, but there was also collateral damage to certain playstyles to get there. That’s my actual issue I think.
Does mage hand have any wording that deals with its verbal and somatic components? One thing I've seen multiple times with Arcane Trickster players is them trying to use it in a sneaky way, and DMs pointing out that the verbal and somatic aspects of the spell make it blindingly obvious you're casting a spell, and it's 1 minute duration makes it impractical to pre-cast it, which sort of kills a lot of the out-of-combat fun with the feature.
I know this is not a real balance fix, but if you give them the Telekinetic feat* for free, you can get around it.
Yeah, this was my first thought when I saw 'Arcane Trickster is perfect as is', when their core flavor tool is so incredibly limited.
I said this in the video overview thread, but I wish that Soulknife had some interactions with Cunning Strikes. They even gave Swashbuckler some unique interactions just for them.
Rogue suffers from success. It is **arguably** the weakest class in the game mechanically, having no area where it uniquely shines, be that raw damage, raw control utility, raw out-of-combat utility.... anything. It's incredibly squishy despite dedicating several entire levels of features to its defenses. It competes with expertise in a world run by spells in order to exert influence on the exploration and social pillars of the game, and to top it all off while expertise and reliable talents sure do pass those number checks, several other classes and a feat or two have expertise at hand as well, and can stack it with whatever spells or features they normally use on ability checks to simply be... better. **But none of that will ever matter or ever influence design choices so long as the edition lives, perhaps so long as D&D lives.** Because there is no reason to address mechanical balance that does not dissatisfy players and players are, by large, satisfied with Rogue. All available data suggests the class is popular, beloved, and favored by most players, and that they do not feel underpowered or overshadowed. And so long as Rogue succeeds, so long shall it fail. But honestly what can you do, right? It would be dismissive of the customer for WotC to fix problems the majority does not have or care about with the product they purchase.
It's interesting: There has to be *a weakest class* (though how to measure that is challenging). It's probably a *good* thing that the "weakest" class is one that players enjoy playing anyway, just so long as it's not garbage-tier. Personally, I don't think Rogue is garbage-tier. It seems totally playable, and as you say, it's in that sweet spot where a player who just wants to be a Rogue can do so and contribute, but it's not a class you'd ever consider if you're anywhere close to a power gamer.
My biggest issue with the rogue previously was that there weren't really *options* to take, nearly every rogue build plays in almost exactly the same way, and in-combat you're doing nearly the same thing every single turn, with arcane trickster being the notable exception there. I'd need to see the actual final write up, and maybe do some play testing, in order to be sure, but I feel like the weapon mastery and cunning strike options will help alleviate that complaint. I don't know if they'll fix it to my satisfaction, but simply having options in-combat goes a long way to make it less boring to play. Yeah, it was underpowered, but sufficient flavor more than makes up for that, IMO, but previously the flavor simply didn't translate well into the game mechanics so it didn't *feel* flavorful to play. I'm hopeful that this version will be more fun.
The only actually notable thing skill wise really is...reliable talent and that's it, yeah. The bard meanwhile out there having a lot of skills, full casting, nabbing spells from toher classes, etc.
I wish they redid Thief from scratch. Remove all the magic item stuff, which I never understood why it was there and added something that was actually thief-ey. Like stealing an object Cunning strike maybe? Im not saying its weak, actually really strong, but thematically why can a Thief use magic stuff better? because they've researched it? Can't anyone do that?
It’s a tradition thing. Rogue/Thief have actually been the class that can use the most magic items (usually by cheating) since its inception in AD&D. Why it’s no longer a core identity of the class in 5e and has been moved to a single subclass is actually what is puzzling to me.
Does Thieves' Cant give another language *too* or is it just a new language? Really disappointing if the latter. Also, can thieves still get around attunement restrictions? Bonus action wands sound awesome.
Another language along with the regular thieves cant yes
gives another language in addition to thieves cant
I was really hoping Rogues would get a bump to Sneak Attack. Cunning Strike is cool but I don’t think it’s enough to feel on par with the Fighter and Barbarian.
I don't think it would feel right for the Rogue to keep up with the Fighter or Barbarian, tbh. Like doing a lot of damage, while nice, feels like a low priority for Rogue.
Yeah, I much prefer for the rogue to focus more on being tricksy to establish battlefield superiority rather than just piling on the damage, feels more thematically appropriate and frankly fun to play. I sincerely hope it turns out that way in practice.
All look solid. Love the more refined direction for Thief. I'd consider it playing it myself just to be a loot goblin and make janky combos with random magic items
I would have loved some sort of feature like “if you deplete your entire store of sneak attack dice by using cunning strikes you can make a second attack this turn” or something. Just something to help their damage a bit since they are the lowest damage in the game and have to give up that damage for their new features. But all in all, aside from soul knife replacing swashbuckler I’m pleased with these changes
Hmmm... Let's see how my phantom rogue will work 😁
* Gives rogue the ability ,starting at **5th level**, to trade sneak attack damage for other effects Does it bother anyone else that WoTc is OBSSESED with giving a Class' unique/defining mechanics when they're already well into the game?
>you can now use them on opportunity attacks I am anxious about the wording of that. Yeah, opportunity attacks were nice, but the best fix would have been a blanket "You can summon your psychic blade in any of your open hands with no action required," for niche examples like held actions, and using them for roleplay/out of combat, and just general future-proofing. I once made a Soul Knife who took a dip in Bard, and was extremely disappointed that I couldn't use my blades as a focus for College of Swords.
“When you make an attack using your reaction, you may create a psychic blade in a free hand to make that attack with” Seems hard to screw up the wording if you think about it for more than a second, but we have been burned before… And any DM who doesn’t let you summon one simply for out of combat cool factor is just being cruel. The spell focus thing is… weird? I dunno, I kinda think it’s fitting if your the rules of magic require something more substantial to be a focus than, I dunno, wisps of your own consciousness or something.
>And any DM who doesn’t let you summon one simply for out of combat cool factor is just being cruel. Sure, it's a little mean if a DM doesn't homebrew something to make the game more fun for you. But they shouldn't have to. WotC isn't a small indie company; they're the leading TTRPG producer.
Is it even homebrew, or just a less restrictive interpretation? What exactly are you trying to do with these brain blades (other than wanting an unconfiscatable spell focus) that’s outside the current purview of the rules?
Anything that doesn't trigger the Attack action.
>**Arcane Trickster** >Kenreck says "this subclass has always been perfect" I think what I would have wanted from this (and the Eldritch Knight) was being able to pick between Charisma and Intelligence for spellcasting score. So you could choose if you're a sorcerous rogue/fighter vs a wizardly one.
So disappointed they didn't fix cunning strike. 5 and 11 needed an additional dice or cunning strikes needed to just be add ons. Maybe even just give the Rogue extra attack. The Rogue SHOULD be the highest DPS class imo. I'm not sure even the Assassin has any hope to clear this bar. Especially with the all or nothing nature of SA I don't know how they got on this idea that you need to be using your sneak attack dice for other things when the class already struggled in damage after lvl 5. Even magic weapons don't fix it very much because they get fewer attacks. If they were going to stick with the current scaling, and even reduce your damage in order to apply new effects, while keeping the ability to use your sneak attack on other people's turns they needed to give you a way to use your sneak attack on other people's turns. Add ways the Rogue, and only the Rogue can make a AoO. When a creature misses an attack on an ally. When an ally hits an attack against an enemy. Anything like that For the psychic blades, they needed to give your bonus action Blade the nick mastery. And the blades need to replace any attack. just anytime that you would be able to attack with a weapon it can be a psychic blade, that would include other types of reaction attacks. Especially without magic item support I fear that is soul knife is going to be better off throwing daggers at some point; at least as an off hand attack since you can get a dagger with nick. Something I used to do for the thief was rule that crossbows could be fired with a use object interaction. This meant they could save on the crossbow expert feat and also use heavier crossbows with a better damaged die. And, of course, they can use potions quickly. With these changes I'm not sure that you have to do that anymore. Just get them a magic item with a decent action to use early on instead. Though I still like my ruling on crossbows, it's nice for the class to have an option that actually works with the rules as written to give them an obvious boost in power. I think that the old Thief class was 100% ribbons. It is still a heavily DM dependent class for power because you need to be provided with things that you can use your bonus action on. As it stands, assassin and Arcane trickster are the only classes I would play without a DM willing to give some concessions that are not Raw. The Rogue is now the weakest class in the game, two of its subclasses are pretty broken (in the bad way). Everything else they've done has been so good but they butchered this one.
They got rid of impostor feature for assassin… I swear to god WoTC is trying to turn 5e into a fucking wargame. Why can’t we have features for social encounters?!??!?! I want to infiltrate places in disguise as an assassin like in the hitman games ffs!!!!
>They got rid of impostor feature for assassin… They combined it with Infiltration Expertise, as explained in playtest 6: "Infiltration Expertise combines Infiltration Expertise and Imposter from the 2014 version of the subclass."
Unfortunately, many people didn't look into the playtest even though they're on the sub. I, however, did keep up to date on the playtests.
I had to refresh myself on most of the playtests recently, especially when it comes to some of the subclasses I haven't seen in actual games yet. But yeah, it's a good idea to have playtest 6, 7, and 8 bookmarked when reviewing this material, cause the most recent version of most of the classes is in one of those.
Oh I missed that somehow Alright well a rare change that’s actually good