Larian Studios Forums Baldur's Gate III Baldur's Gate III - General I've completed three playthroughs, and I've come to a conclusion:

Rogues are useless in this game. When you can pick locks as a Warlock or Ranger, why would anyone play a rogue?

For the playstyle ? I like nimble melee dps. Sure I have to work far more for my dps than a warlock or ranger but I like it Plus at level 4 , rogues deals quite some heavy damage.
But sure you can play without a rogue ,just as you don't need a druid or ranger or a mage necessarily. On the fair side , having a specialized stealthy lockpicker , skilled at pickpocketing can be appreciated just by the fact the rogue will be in charge of having skills to make it easier while your warlock ,who is limited in skills to begin with , will focus on 'conversation' skills (at least that's what mine does).

Yeah, playstyle, mainly. My first run through was a rogue, I'll explain that in the next mini-paragraph. I love the skills. Like a lot. But they're pretty useless in combat, unless they're ranged, at least in my limited experience.

It gives me no joy to say that, honestly. Through EVERY DnD game I've ever played, I've pretty much played a halfling rogue, human bard, or a wizard. I don't think I've ever played a warlock.

Perhaps changes will be made.

I haven't played since November of last year but I certainly felt the Rogue class didn't feel quite 'right' or specialised enough, at least compared to previous D&D CRPGs. It's always been one of my go-to classes to play so I was a little disappointed at their implementation. Maybe it's just 5e, maybe its Larian, I don't know...

I found sneak attack to be a valuable source of extra damange. Melee sneak attack is harder to trigger now, as they removed advantage when attacking from behind. Perhaps, they should consider allowing to perform sneak attack on enemies already engaged by another unit - as it is in PnP.

But I will agree that Rogue doesn't feel exceptionally unique to play.

It's going to be mostly utility and out-of-combat to be honest, and from what I can tell having out of combat skills is going to do a lot for generating opportunities... in combat stuff for rogue feeling unique is mostly mid to high level.

Yes, it could well be 5E, I'm not sure. My rules familiarity stops at 3.5

I don't like the idea that every class/sub-class needs to be able to do something that no one else can or else they're useless. With that logic, bards will be "useless" because they're a jack of all trades type. Or with the same logic, they're the only class you need because you don't technically need anyone else. I've got healing potions, why do i need a cleric? I've got a melee cleric, why do i need a fighter?

I do not want only Rogue to be able to pick locks.... no I do not hate Rogues it is not that. I do not mind peole playing Rogues.

I am not sure but when all classes in PHB released... well my brother will create a chraracter but he often likes to play Wizard or Sorceror or Druid I guess.

Here are the party I would like to play with:
Cleric what domain remains to be seen my favorite Domain has not yet been released. However if pessimistic and not more domains then Light Domain.
Druid because shapeshifting is so fun. Tempus would be a domain I would like indeed and the Tempus deity!!!
Ranger be my ranger + fix the rogues stuff!
Wizard or we can change this to a TANK like PALADIN!

If playing with 2 companions well then I let my brother create what he wants and do my Cleric likely unless I want to try something else even Paladin perhaps.

Rogues STILL don't have expertise???

Hey hey, don't knock Rogues. I normally play a Rogue type class in most games, but seeing as this one comes with the sexiest vampire rogue on the planet, I just take Astarion with me everywhere in every playthrough.
I love the playstyle and the damage he does. I do feel like the Sneak Attacks have been nerfed a bit in Patch 5 by requiring Advantage which is sometimes cancelled out by some other Disadvantage, but it just means I have to think things through more in combat.

Rogues are great. Maybe you're not using Sneak Attack right. Astarion has saved the game more times than not. Spider fight, he would attack and dart back into hiding so Spider wouldn't know where he was. Hit, hide, and they dead.

And yrs, everyone can lockpick, but having proficiency still makes it so Astarion has the best chance of success. Later levels will also make Rogue better long term.

Picking locks isn't that special to a rogue though is it? I've had to pick locks just to get into my own home, and I don't thnk of myself as a rogue.

I'll play a rogue for the versatility (and brass balls), it's still the most fun to play as. Rules change, but the rogue will still try to sell you a used sword at half the price, and ask you to consider voting for her!

I love playing rogues for the combat versatility. Flanking in melee range + poison + sneak attack is very solid damage.

You could argue that rangers can do more damage, but rogues have a lot more tricks up their sleeve and can cover more ground. Is rogue more challenging to play and to utilize tactically? Sure, but I love that added layer of challenge.

Also the hidden subtext in your statement is that we really don't *need* any particular class anymore. This is true, and a huge strength of the 5E system. We don't need dedicated healers, we don't need a dedicated Tank, we don't need a rogue to handle sleight of hand/scouting/stealth stuff. And frankly good-riddance to that tired old pigeon-holed system.

Now groups really can be more or less whatever and we can make it work.

5e rogues are heavy into Utility, which Larian's effort into the environment should make pretty interesting, but in general for combat a lot of Rogue is positioning and attacking.

Combat stuff is mostly:

- Cunning Action - Hide, Dash, Disengage as bonus actions - Currently in BG3 hide is a bonus action for everyone, I tend to think that should be a Rogue thing only. (Rangers I think might get it at higher levels, actually)
- Sneak Attack - Usable once per turn (so should be able to trigger on Opportunity attacks too)
- Uncanny Dodge - Defensive, use your reaction to reduce an attack by half
- Evasion - Defensive, works as it did in 3.X
- Blindsense - Detect invisible things within 10ft
- Slippery Mind - Proficiency in Wisdom saving throws
- Elusive - No attacks have advantage against you unless you're incapacitated.
- Stroke of Luck - Turn a miss into a hit (level 20 ability)

So a lot of Rogue combat is very basic and stuff that is passive or defensive. Though with bonus action dashes and disengages, you are going to be all over the map.

Where they shine is the massive number of skills, Expertise and things like Reliable Talent (if you have proficiency in a skill any roll on that skill less than 10 is treated as a 10, yes, this includes natural 1s.. so from level 11 on, Rogues no longer get natural 1s on skills they are proficient in.)

A lot of the subclasses are geared toward exploration and interaction as well.

Assassin has some combat stuff but is mostly geared toward long-term infiltration. Assassin's combat stuff is mostly first round only
Thief lets you disarm, lockpick, sleight of hand, or use object as bonus actions, so you'd be able to open stuff in combat and still fight, or disarm traps... or set traps if Larian lets us do that....
Arcane Trickster adds the most diversity since you get spells though even here it's mostly Illusion and Enchantment so less of the combat stuff.

going into other subclasses

Scout gives you increased mobility and some other benefits
Mastermind, Inquisitive, and Swashbuckler make it easier to use your sneak attack, but still it's you using sneak attack

Phantom and Psiblade probably add the most variety to combat.

Even their utility stuff is basically "lots of skills which I almost never fail at" but given the variety of skills that covers a lot of ground. You could build a Rogue as anything from an adventuring scholar to a police investigator.

But yeah... Rogue on tabletop is sort of a utility god with reliable but not exciting combat options.

Larian's approach to heavy environmental interactivity makes this a feasible playstyle. Though I would like them to make Hide a bonus action ONLY for rogues (and possibly high level Rangers... I think they get that ability).

Even then the benefit of rogue is basically "I can do this stuff other characters do, but I can do more things, and I only rarely ever fail". So it's still not going to look too stand out on first glance.

Their power is that sort of easily overlooked bit you get from "lots of bonuses/passives"

As Thrythlind mentioned, Rogues receive a lot of their savoury at later levels, something that we are denied as of now. That alone can create a pretty lopsided impression.

Another thing that has been mentioned, but not detailed, and the one you can see thanks to EA being hobbled by level 4 cap. Rogue's Sneak Attack receives an additional 1d6 at every odd level, while Warlock's Eldritch Blast receives an extra 1d10 every 4th level after first. As such, level 3 Rogues will have their SA at 2d6 (+ whatever damage their weapon + DEX does), while Warlocks currently don't improve their EB at all, save for Agonising Blast, which of course is a blast because it's a guaranteed +damage on hit, but still not quite the same as an extra die.

Personally I love Rogues, but they require careful positioning and overall tactical orchestration to really shine. I remember, when I played NWN2, what kind of a hassle it was to move Neeshka behind the enemies to trigger her Sneak Attack, constantly minding AoOs from other foes in the vicinity. In 5e, this is no longer necessary, thankfully.

Maybe you are just not using Sneak Attack? Larian's controls for it are quite unorthodox: you can't just click an enemy, you need to use separate melee / ranged SA buttons on the hotbar. Weird and counterintuitive if you ask me, but that's all we have for now.

Yeah, and the Reaction system of just automatically activating on first trigger is going to be hard on some Rogue abilities as well. (Uncanny Dodge)

I can see they decided to go with "set up trigger" rather than Solasta's "show option on trigger" but I much prefer Solasta's take on this.

There's some consideration to be taken when using Reactions and the way Larian is doing it makes it pretty hard on things.

I would definitely not mind a "Take Opportunity attack? Yes/No" dialogues or "Cast Shield? Yes/No" dialogues.

It could also work with Sneak Attack especially for Rogues that dual wield since you can decide to sneak attack AFTER a hit has been determined.

As a note this is also going to suck for Paladins since by what I can tell here Paladins will have to decide whether or not to Smite before they roll instead of choosing to add it to a successful attack as you can in the TTRPG.

Rogue can attack 4 times. It's sound very strong for me. Some that to poisons and sneak attack.

5E's design was deliberately designed to move away from traditional/MMO-esque class archetypes (likely as a response to 4E), and a part of that was basically ensuring that basically any party composition should work. As a result of that, Rogues definitely do feel a bit different compared to previous editions. Useless? No. But definitely different.

For example, at higher levels Rogues in 5E actually have better survivability than Fighters - due to the later really haven't no scaling defensive abilities. Yes, Fighters have on average 1 more hp per level, and usually 1 more AC due to plate, but the Rogue gets Uncanny Dodge and Evasion (on top of better disengage/mobility), which more than makes up for it.

Nah, they will do the same to Paladins what they did to Weapon Masters: a Hotbar button for a separate kind of attack, which will use up a spell slot if they hit and won't if they miss. Same as it is with superiority dice, currently.