There are a fair amount of changes involved when you make a videogame out of a Tabletop game. It is expected that you cant do the same in a roleplaying game with your friends and in a videogame, but in my case, I would like to have the same feeling when I playing a particular class ingame.

They already made an (IMHO) good work with the "Larian variant ranger", turning the videogame-challenged ranger features into a useful skill-monkey class with some interesting character concept options so I hope they could do something with the rogues too.

I understand without the existence of the languages ingame the "Thieve´s cant" is out of the table, but a rogue worth his salt would have another useful features that are not ingame. https://www.dndbeyond.com/classes/rogue

• First
  Right now all characters have some of the key features of the rogues, namely, disengage and hide as a bonus action. Technically rogues do not lose the ability to do so because everybody can now, but I have to say that I find it fun ingame so I do not have a particular problem with any character be able to do that (I do not think that would work in a TT session but it´s fun in a videogame). But what I do not like that much is that now rogues´ 2nd lvl "cunning action" is only a free disengage. That would be a very watered-down version of one of the most useful signature actions of the rogues.
  You want to make disengage and hide a bonus for everybody? Ok. But then you have to give something to the rogues that will make up for the loss of a distinctive feature of the class.
• Second
  Another of the key features of the rogue, the expertise feature that allows them (and bards later) to become "experts" in a particular skill, doubling the proficiency in two of them. I understand other features would be difficult to make ingame, but I cannot fathom what´s the problem with adding expertise to a rogue character. I hope that would be added in the final version of the game.
• Third: Correct me if I´m wrong but I think now the "sneak attack" seems to be working differently. You only get to do it if you have advantage because you are hidden, attacking from behind, etc, but it does not seem to work if you attack a character engaged in melee with an ally (or merely near an ally like in pnp).
  I have to add that the fact that you have to choose the skill as a button instead of being applied directly is not very comfortable to play.

I hope those things would be addressed later and we could enjoy one of the classic classes of any RPG fully in the game, if not as a full representation of the great rogue of 5e, at least a class that could compete with other classes in terms of usefulness.

Add a lack of cool light and finesse weapons.

In general, allowing essentially 4 attacks per round as a thief makes them kind of OP. Play a STR based rogue and for level 4 take the 2 weapon feat giving 1 AC and removing the Light requirement. So you have four d8 attacks. Main, Off, two bonus. Also, make sure your best weapon is in your off hand. Add fire for another 4d4. Add possible sneak of 2d6. Add weapon bonuses. Add +3 for strength, etc. It's the highest damage in the game.

Now I want to preface this by saying all classes are obviously a wip but rogues feel really good right now to me honestly.

Cunning action is really nice for repositioning to an area with advantage for sneak attacks, particularly with a crossbow.

Theif's also get an extra bonus action. that plus everyone gets +attribute damage on off hands means thy do crazy damage.

A level 4 Thief with the level 4 two Weapon fighting feat will do 3(1d8+Ability score + Proficiency bonus) Per round, not including sneak attacks

I thought that the issue was only that attribute damage is applied to offhand attacks damage, even without the TWF fighting style, as opposed to the attack roll. Correct me if I'm wrong, but you don't add your proficiency to damage rolls usually.

Thieves are still dealing a lot of DPS either way though, so you aren't wrong about that at all.


My fear is that the changes in BG3 are going to make the Thief outshine the other subclasses. I know that things are WIP right now, but currently it feels like the thief was compensated for the weakening of cunning action by giving it the extra bonus action, but Arcane Trickster was left in the dust. I usually like to make build choices based on what fits my character's style, as opposed to just what's optimal, but it's harder to feel good about choosing a less optimal build when there is that much of a gap in choice balance.

They need to make Disengage an action. Currently it makes the fights a lot less strategic if everyone can disengage whenever they want.

That said I don't know how weak rogues are right now. Astarion is putting out some crazy numbers and is by far the biggest damage contributor of my current run. That plus his stealth skills lets him pick off enemies one by one. Usually gets a full kill before he fails a stealth check.

I will check later but I do not think that´s how it works. You only get one attack with the main hand (plus sneak) and a bonus attack with the off-hand. Rogues do not have múltiple attacks.
Also currently dual wielder does not add the AC bonus.

A dual-wielder warlock with hex or a ranger with hunter´s mark will get similar damage output with because they add the +1d6 every time you hit the target, not once per turn like sneak attack, so you have an extra dice with the extra attacks like the ones you get with action surge or speed potion.
Plus they have spells
Plus you do not need to sneak or fulfil the conditions to sneak attack, you attack, you hit: you deal the extra damage every time.

That would change when rogues get more levels, of course. I do not say rogues are weak, I´d say they are far weaker than in the tabletop.


Any class does that damage with the same weapon and same ability score, not only rogues.

Theifs are the only ones with a second offhand attack

Shattered Flail & Longsword + 1, potion of haste and hill giant strength and coat weapons with poison. Pop a potion of fire/acid resistance, wear natures vengeance and get another party member to set the ground under you on fire/acid. Thief op lol.

Rogues do need some attention, that's for sure. I'll just quote the relevant sections from my huge list of suggestions thread. I think this is a good way to fix the Rogue:


- Add the Expertise class feature for Rogues. It’s one of their defining features, Rogues/Thieves have always been the skill class in D&D. They need Expertise to retain that role. Also, maybe give them one more proficient skill at character creation, because right now you can make a Ranger that has more skills than a Rogue, and that steps on the class identity as the skill experts.

- Fix Sneak Attack. It shouldn’t be a separate ability on the hotbar. It would be much better as a toggle, just like you use for Repelling Blast. This would allow us to potentially Sneak Attack with an offhand attack, with a special arrow shot, with an Opportunity Attack, and so forth. As it should be. Still only once per turn, of course. Also, please roll each of the Sneak Attack dice separately, instead of rolling once and multiplying. It should be consistent damage, not swingy.

- Add another type of Cunning Action, to make up for the fact that you gave bonus action Disengage and Hide to everyone. That takes a lot of the Rogue’s specialness away, and only having one Cunning Action (Dash) seems kind of anemic compared to many other class features. My suggestions would be either Cunning Action: Throw (bonus action, once per round), Cunning Action: Dodge (bonus action), or Cunning Action: Hide (once per round can Hide without using any action at all).

- Limit offhand attacks to once per round. Right now, the Thief subclass emerges as this obvious damage beast, which is not really what it’s supposed to be. I love the extra bonus action, that’s fantastic, but it should be used for utility purposes, not to make extra attacks that the class shouldn’t have.



Also, related:

- Make these traps disarmable. I found tons of traps in the game that could not be disarmed, and it was very disappointing, as a Rogue player. There were 23 trap disarm kits (I don’t know why we need these, instead of just using Thieves’ Tools, but whatever) in my inventory at the end of my playthrough, and virtually no traps to disarm. I found at least two trapped chests that couldn’t be disarmed, all those traps in the swamp couldn’t be disarmed, the mines along the side approach to the goblin camp couldn’t be disarmed, the proximity bombs in the Zhentarim hideout couldn’t be disarmed, and so on. Disarming traps is an important part of the D&D style of game for many people, so please make most of the things disarmable.

- Improve the AI of enemies when you are Hiding. Right now they mostly just stand around and wait to die if you are hidden. This is pretty bad. They should come searching for the hidden character(s), or go take cover somewhere, or do something sensible. Right now, you can’t even play a stealthy hit-and-run playstyle without automatically exploiting an obvious failure in the AI, which is not fun.

- Change the fact that activating Dash instantly breaks Hide and Invisibility. This especially makes no sense given the fact that you can activate Dash first, and then Hide, and still move at double speed while Hiding.

- Show the roll (either in the combat log, or as a pop-up such as when disarming the 5% of traps that you can actually disarm) when lockpicking. We need to know whether we failed due to a low roll, or failed because the difficulty is high.

I was wrong, Thief gets 3 attacks, not 4. But still...

Assuming Rogue (not Thief) can sneak attack every turn and STR Ranger keeps up Hunters Mark and STR Warlock keeps up Hex, then yes - they are equal. Keep in mind, you don't need to sneak, just be behind which is easy with jump. IME its easier to jump than juggle buffs especially if you decide to switch targets and rogue doesn't worry about losing the buffs on failing a CON save.

BUT Thief has the highest damage. Thief gets extra offhand attack too. So thats extra Weapon+STR+Element+Procs.

I run Shattered Flail main hand and Dragons Grasp offhand. So on top of your ranger or melee warlock, I do 1-6 slashing + 1-4 fire + 3 STR + 1-6 healing + and apply burning.
(Alice seems to prefer 2-9 vs 1-6 + burning. So avg 2 damage vs burning... I can see that.)

I can't tell you how many times I have killed 3 mobs in 1 turn.

Now I am not arguing that Rogues dont need to get fixed and Fire's list is perfect. I am not saying rogues dont need love. I am simply clarifying that due to Thief giving another bonus action that can be used to attack - it is OP and the highest (single target) damage in-game.

^THIS! Firesnake to the rescue once again.

I really don't get the lack of expertise. To code that must be extremely simple with an "if" function:
if expertise = 1
proficiency = proficiency x 2
else

If I can do that, why can't a Larian employee?

Expertise allows Rogues to take advantage of the Surprise mechanic far more often, it is one of their main features in the Pnp.

Rogues are my favorite class, so i really hope they fix some of the glaring problems noted in this thread. Expertise is absolutely vital to making rogues stand out in 5e, in my opinion. And in BG3 with pretty much every class being able to hide and disengage all over the place, rogues need all of their unique features to feel special. Otherwise you might as well just play a fighter with the criminal background.
I also think sneak attack is bugged or something, because half of the time I expect it to work it doesn't.

You get Sneak Attack damage if your Rogue can be hidden during combat. I usually have Astarion jump behind the enemy, Hide, and then Sneak Attack XD.

With how amazing Astarion is in combat, I don't agree with the OP at all XD! Astarion is the best party member in combat, so I can't believe Rogues are weak or bad :P.

It is not that they are weak or bad, they are lacking core features. Their more defining feature, Cunning action, was butchered and everyone has bonus actions.

Thief has double Bonus Action, I've never gone Arcane Trickster though. Thief is way more fun with two bonus actions <3.

From my experience Larion comes of as a spiteful Chaotic Evil DM.. You know those types you play with then afterwards never ever want to go back.. yeah those.


My Smol Tav is an arcane trickster and he's pretty good as well. backstab and spells and crossbows op as..

The UA Cunning Action variant might not be bad:

You gain an additional way to use your Cunning Action: carefully aiming your next attack. As a bonus action, you give yourself advantage on your next attack roll on the current turn. You can use this bonus action only if you haven’t moved during this turn, and after you use the bonus action, your speed is 0 until the end of the current turn.

That would be okay with me.