So the Rogue is just a background or theme now?:eek:

"The desire to multi-class is often simply the desire to play concepts that don't fit neatly into the single class paradigm"


In regards to the above,

Yes. Using myself as an example, I love the concept of a warrior mage.

Without a single class that represents that, multiclassing can handle it.

The problem is when a player expects to be the best warrior ever, and best mage ever, all in one package.

Well implemented multiclassing is a positive thing.
Poorly implemented multiclassing is an abomination.

Quote from: Bill;538301"The desire to multi-class is often simply the desire to play concepts that don't fit neatly into the single class paradigm"


In regards to the above,

Yes. Using myself as an example, I love the concept of a warrior mage.

Without a single class that represents that, multiclassing can handle it.

The problem is when a player expects to be the best warrior ever, and best mage ever, all in one package.

Well implemented multiclassing is a positive thing.
Poorly implemented multiclassing is an abomination.

I think usually Multiclassing is an abomination and just falls into the optimiser's hands.

I want sepearte classes to feel distinct but at the same time but at the same time to allow access to other areas but at a cost.
1e & 2e xp levels meants that a multiclassed elf Fighter/Mu was 8/8 when the rest of the party were 9th level giving hte elf a huge benefit. Dual classing was complex and usually crap (although you could give a MU a level or two of fighter to abuse the system if you were clever about it - see my post on dual classing ages back if you want details)

Quote from: John Morrow;538228the spirit of character classes which are designed around niche archetypes

You're right, but not just narrowly delimited niches. Colorful and distinctive niches.

Paladin. Ranger. Monk. Bard.

If you're going to have a class-based system, and D&D must be that, then you must play to the strengths of class-based design. Each class (be there few or many) should be a niche, each class should have a strong and distinctive theme, each class should be evocative.

It should be fairly obvious, when building a character of that class, what social and adventuring role it has. Fighters hit beings with things. Rogues sneak around. Clerics heal. And so forth.

This is one of the strengths, IMHO, of Arcana Evolved (and the earlier Arcana Unearthed). The classes were different, and obviously different, and each was distinctive and evocative.

I built a "genericized" rogue for my 3e campaign, and a somewhat genericized ranger. Both worked mechanically, but in broadening their possible roles, in broadening the possible abilities of the classes, I leeched away the color and the distinctiveness. They were, as a result, somewhat bland.

Rogues need to be as strongly defined as Paladins or Monks. Otherwise, you may as well be playing a skill-based system. (Which I personally prefer, but that's just not D&D.)

Quote from: John Morrow;538228And if the weird stuff that a Rogue does is not separate enough to merit its own methodology, does the Rogue deserve a distinct class or is Rogue simply a flavor of a generic skill expertise class that could just as easily be a Scholar or Weaponsmith with a different selection of skills?

I'm not.  But what about backstabbing?  What about scaling sheer surfaces?  What about moving stealthily without being seen or heard?  Sure, all of those things could be handled with skill rolls, but so could combat rolls and spell checks.

Part of what I have in mind goes back to the old GDW board game Asteroid.  One of the characters in that game was a jewel thief by the name of Alex.  The rule with Alex was that if he began and ended his turn hidden from a sentry robot, the robot wouldn't spot him even if he was visible during the move.  A simple rule that requires no skill rolls and is better for it.  How could that translate to D&D?  At first level, a Rogue can cross 5 feet without being spotted.  At second level, 10 feet.  At 3rd level, 15 feet.  Or maybe a somewhat slower progression.  The same thing could be done with sheer surfaces.  The Rogue gets a free 5 feet at first level and more as they go up.  Also give them better saves to dodge out of the way of trouble.  All not skill rolls.  

Movement already has non-skill rules and limits, which is why I focused on it.  It's also something that most of your iconic examples have in common.



If you want to reduce this to an excluded middle argument, then the flip side of your extreme is that we don't need classes and all class abilities could be handled with skill checks which is, not unsurprisingly, what most non-D&D systems do.  The slope isn't that slippery and there is no problem handling some class abilities with special rules and others with skills or feats.  

The solution to that set of preferences is to pick any number of other games out there that have unified resolution mechanics and use skills to define characters, but that's not really how D&D does things.

Why require them to take the Rogue class of skills, then?  What would be wrong with simply calling your class "Expert" and if a player chooses to be an expert in stealth, picking pockets, disarming traps, and opening locks, then they pick those skills.  If they want to be a Scholar, they pick a different set of skills?

In AD&D, the description of Thief states:

"The primary functions of a thief are: 1) picking pockets, 2) opening locks, 3) finding/removing traps, 4) moving silently, and 5) hiding in shadows."

D&D originally had a very narrow niche.  In arguing against a fairly narrow niche, I think you are arguing counter to the spirit of character classes which are designed around niche archetypes, not vague broad types of characters.  I think what you are talking about has more in common with the broad Champions categories of "brick", "energy projector", "speedster", etc.

Not "a musketeer".  I was talking about the titular iconic characters, who should be some sort of Fighter on the basis of their fighting prowess.  They illustrate my point that there are plenty of Fighter character concepts that include rogue-like skills and abilities as well as other skills.  Any character class can make an argument for skills, and if all that defines a Rogue is that they spend even more time on skills, does that really make Rogue a distinct class that warrants forcing players to take Rogues skills to justify its existence?

Frankly, I'd rate Bilbo a Commoner.  What Rogue-like skills does he actualy display?

Sure, and being used to skill-based and point-buy systems, I can think of dozens of character types that have nothing to do with the traditional D&D thief that I could build with a robust skill system and lots of skill choices.  What I don't understand is why you think Rogues should be distinctly blesses in that regard.

The desire to multi-class is often simply the desire to play concepts that don't fit neatly into the single class paradigm.

Okay we are looking at the design ask for D&D rogues. We are not looking at Rogues in another game we are therefore bound by the strictures of Class and level. Lets state that at the begining.
I actually think that in any game classes (or professions or archetypes) that grant access to some areas of the game at a cheaper cost or more easily than others prevent the colours of the game from running together too much to produce a sludge. But I can see that is a preference thing.

Lets look at the other mundane class, the fighter. The base figther gets no unique skills, aside from the frankly rather daft attacks versus sun 1HD opponents and the ability to attract followers and build a castle (anyone can build a castle you just need money and most classes get followers). They don't get to change into bears, or teleport, or move super fast. There is nothing a fighter can do that no one else can do. He is just better at it. And in AD&D he isn;t much better at it.
A 10th level fighter will have (9 x 5.5 +3) = 53 HP and require 12 to hit AC 0. He will have AC c. -2 to -4 from Magical armour and shield
A 10th level Cleric will have (9 x 4.5 +2) = 43 HP and require 14 to hit AC 0
He will have AC c. -2 to -4 from magical armour and shild and a fuck load of spells.

So really the fighter ain't a lot better. Does that mean that we should ignore fighters as a class? no of course not because they are iconic for the genre just like rogues

I propose giving fighters access to combat options. I would cascade these from fighting styles running fighting styles much like I would run skills. So if you are a Master of one handed weapon you can use a one handed weapon in each hand, you can perform a repoiste attack , etc ... I would allow other classes to learn the same skills just at a higher cost. the same thing as I would do for rogues and rogue skills.
In actually play the fighter class will be much better at fighting and the rogue class will be much better at roguing.

Backstab is a feat. I expalined that you can have feats which are added to the base class. Simple. Don't like feats then assign them to the class as a obligatory feat like Cleric turning undead.

I am not sure where you get this idea that thieves are meant to be the best climbers ever.... the PHB  (1e pg 27) says -
'Acsending and descending vertical surfaces is hte ability of the theif to climb up and down walls. It assumes that the surface is coarse and offers ledges and cracks for toe and handholds'
It doesn't turn thieves into spiderman.

Monks already get the vast majority of thieves' skills (including climbing) already so even the suggestion that the skills are just the domain of theives is already undermined (I will assume the AD&D assasin is just a theif subclass and won't use that as an additional example) .
By UA Barbarians can climb as well as well as thieves (of course they can also detect magic, track like a ranger and shoot fireballs out of their arse )

I agree that early D&D has the thief in a very narrow niche, but then early D&D was a very narrrow niche. As soon as you release D&D into the wild the thief expands massively by the time 2e comes along you have already allowed the rogue to spread their skills points in a customised fashion so that players can create the various different sorts of thieves they wanted to play. And the kits available to thieves show what a wide selection that was.

You have to work within the D&D design paradigms of class and level. At the same time you want to avoid class and rules bloat and the tyrany of the unique whilst allowing flexible customised charaterisations.
Using rogues to be the flagship of your skills system the place where PCs will get most familiarity with it then can choose whether they want to extend that as a play choice across the whole game or whether then keep that particular dial turned down to get an older school feel seems to be to be eminently sensible and elegant.

Quote from: jibbajibba;538302I think usually Multiclassing is an abomination and just falls into the optimiser's hands.
 
I want sepearte classes to feel distinct but at the same time but at the same time to allow access to other areas but at a cost.
1e & 2e xp levels meants that a multiclassed elf Fighter/Mu was 8/8 when the rest of the party were 9th level giving hte elf a huge benefit. Dual classing was complex and usually crap (although you could give a MU a level or two of fighter to abuse the system if you were clever about it - see my post on dual classing ages back if you want details)

OK side rant...I've never found multiclassing in older editions particularly unbalanced. I remember a couple of articles about this in Dragon back in the day which probably led to the whole 3E "fix" which made alot of the multiclass combinations suck badly.
 
The fighter/mage gets various limitations in 2E
*multiple ability dependency i.e. you need a high Int and Str, so you're not as good at either.
*armour limitations for the fighter/thief, unless you can find elven chain. The non-elves didn't even get that. Other combinations likewise had special limitations e.g. nothing pointy for cleric/?.
*less hit points than the fighter: 1.33 per wizard level + 2.6 per fighter level
*no weapon specialization
*no specialization in a school of magic
*probably no kit (OK, the racial kits were unbalanced; but they're optional).
L8 vs. L9 for wizard is also a significant difference; no 5th level spells or ability to make some magical items, IIRC. At higher levels the character gets further behind (the single-class character also gets a +2 bonus to their level limit, I think, as well as probably having a higher prime requisite).
 
Also as far as it being unbalanced goes, multiclassing is actually supposed to be of some benefit; its a racial ability (among other things compensating you for not having a soul, being a midget, or the movement rate of a rock).

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;538319OK side rant...I've never found multiclassing in older editions particularly unbalanced. I remember a couple of articles about this in Dragon back in the day which probably led to the whole 3E "fix" which made alot of the multiclass combinations suck badly.
 
The fighter/mage gets various limitations in 2E
*multiple ability dependency i.e. you need a high Int and Str, so you're not as good at either.
*armour limitations for the fighter/thief, unless you can find elven chain. The non-elves didn't even get that. Other combinations likewise had special limitations e.g. nothing pointy for cleric/?.
*less hit points than the fighter: 1.33 per wizard level + 2.6 per fighter level
*no weapon specialization
*no specialization in a school of magic
*probably no kit (OK, the racial kits were unbalanced; but they're optional).
L8 vs. L9 for wizard is also a significant difference; no 5th level spells or ability to make some magical items, IIRC. At higher levels the character gets further behind (the single-class character also gets a +2 bonus to their level limit, I think, as well as probably having a higher prime requisite).
 
Also as far as it being unbalanced goes, multiclassing is actually supposed to be of some benefit; its a racial ability (among other things compensating you for not having a soul, being a midget, or the movement rate of a rock).

so on 2e Multi classing I am assuming you are usng your own rules as from the book -  

• The can specialise - the multiclass character can do everything a fighter can do
• A multi classed priest can use any weapons limited to his faith, plenty of faiths let you use swords
• less hit points than a fighter for sure but a lot more HP than a MU
• multi class wizards can totally use school specialisation, no limits on that although only elves can cast in armour and that is limited to elven chain
• armour restictions as a whole are not huge restictions if you have magic to help out thieves can wear armour but are then limited to detect noise and open locks

Quote from: jibbajibba;538324so on 2e Multi classing I am assuming you are usng your own rules as from the book -

• The can specialise - the multiclass character can do everything a fighter can do
• A multi classed priest can use any weapons limited to his faith, plenty of faiths let you use swords
• less hit points than a fighter for sure but a lot more HP than a MU
• multi class wizards can totally use school specialisation, no limits on that although only elves can cast in armour and that is limited to elven chain
• armour restictions as a whole are not huge restictions if you have magic to help out thieves can wear armour but are then limited to detect noise and open locks

On Weapon Specialization: "Multi-classed characters cannot use weapon specialization; it is available only to single-classed fighters". (2nd Ed. Player's Handbook, page 52):
 
On specializing: "Most specialist wizards must be single-classed; multi-classed characters cannot become specialists, except for gnomes, who seem to have more of a natural bent for the school of illusion" (2nd ed. PHB pg 31)
 
(also note illusionists get shafted with 3 oppositional schools - including Evocation and Abjuration - instead of the usual 2).
 
Specialty priests: Yes, a number of specialty priests can use swords; they typically get limitations in other areas to compensate e.g. less spheres of magic. Someone in a game I was in had a ranger/cleric of Sif for instance who could use a sword; looking at them now they get access to 7 spheres vs. the normal cleric's 12 spheres, and can't turn undead.
 
More hit points than the MU, I'll grant. For the 8/8 F/M vs. the M9  its 31.44, vs. 22.5.
 
On armour - I'm kind of entertained that by RAW a fighter/thief can't Read Languages while wearing platemail...I wouldn't enforce that, but I think losing access to Move Silently, Hide in shadows and backstab is a big deal.
 
On "armour restrictions are not a big deal if you have magic to help" - if by magic you mean e.g. Bracers of Armour or the Armor spell, then in the first instance if this is available the PCs probably also have access to magical armour which has an even better AC and improves their saving throws, while in the second case the spell still doesn't have a great AC (AC 6) and it also will helpfully melt halfway through combat after taking too much damage.
 
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I think the identity crisis of the Rogue pretty clearly stems from the fact that it was a very logical class back when every class had very specific niche protection.  The rogue was the only guy who could do the things the rogue does.

As soon as 3e came along and added a general skill system that meant anyone could move silently, hide, pick locks, spot traps, etc., the Rogue started making less sense. The solution to that was to turn him into the guy with far more skill points, and/or into the guy who do special combat manoeuvres.  The problem with that is that the former doesn't really solve anything in terms of making the rogue unique and therefore class-worthy, and the latter breaks into the territory of the fighter; meaning that the rogue will always either be a worse combat option than fighters (and therefore a suboptimal class) or a better combat option than fighters (making fighters stupid).

This might be tricky to actually resolve, particularly without resorting to superpowers, which would also be stupid.

RPGPundit

Quote from: Bloody Stupid Johnson;538487On Weapon Specialization: "Multi-classed characters cannot use weapon specialization; it is available only to single-classed fighters". (2nd Ed. Player's Handbook, page 52):
 
On specializing: "Most specialist wizards must be single-classed; multi-classed characters cannot become specialists, except for gnomes, who seem to have more of a natural bent for the school of illusion" (2nd ed. PHB pg 31)
 
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Fair enough I was reading page from page 45 on multiclassing with contradicts this . But then of course this is D&D

Warrior - A multi-class warrior can use all of his abilities without restriction. The Warrior abilities for the base for other character classes.

Quote from: RPGPundit;538536I think the identity crisis of the Rogue pretty clearly stems from the fact that it was a very logical class back when every class had very specific niche protection.  The rogue was the only guy who could do the things the rogue does.

As soon as 3e came along and added a general skill system that meant anyone could move silently, hide, pick locks, spot traps, etc., the Rogue started making less sense. The solution to that was to turn him into the guy with far more skill points, and/or into the guy who do special combat manoeuvres.  The problem with that is that the former doesn't really solve anything in terms of making the rogue unique and therefore class-worthy, and the latter breaks into the territory of the fighter; meaning that the rogue will always either be a worse combat option than fighters (and therefore a suboptimal class) or a better combat option than fighters (making fighters stupid).

This might be tricky to actually resolve, particularly without resorting to superpowers, which would also be stupid.

RPGPundit

But from the start of AD&D Monks could do everything apart from pick pockets and read languages.

I really think giving Thieves more skill points which they have to spend on thief skills whilst allowing some other subclasses access to some of those skills through a general skilsl system workd perfectly well.

A final point on theif super powers. I was thimking about this when looking through the other D&D classes. If effect what high level feats coudl you give thieves that have some sort of genre justification.
Its not easy...

There are a couple of mundane things you could add in like Ambidextrous or superb balance, but as I noted I woudl prefer feats to be scalable with level (although in a sense Ambidextrous is as the things it enables scale with level , like 2 weapon fighting or whatever).
Then I was thinking about fiction thief characters and what we could extract that had a supernatural feel without making them 'magic'

Alter Self - In GoT the assassins that Arya encounters and is now training to be can change their faces to disguise themeselves
Outrageous Luck - the rogue/thief character is often simply outrageously lucky allowing some sort of re-roll option mightbe a way of simulating that
Hide in Plain sight - beefing up the Hide in Shadows skill to allow thieves to literally melt from view.

I guess the idea would be to gift things that felt exceptional without requiring actual magic.

it is hard though as I wouldn't want my thieves gettign those sort of powers I much prefer them to be mundane

So, to return to the start of this thread, it seems that the Rogue's prime Class Ability is that only they can take a 10 on skill checks.