Sneak Attack

[Aloro]

That's not tottaly accurate. Flanking does not deny someone their dex bonus, it only alows a rogue who is one of the flanking people to make a sneak attack

Ah, you're right. One of the perils of posting at work is I write very quickly and then read what I wrote later. Flanking does give a rogue the ability to Sneak Attack, but it does not cause the target to lose his or her Dex bonus. Instead, all melee attackers who flank (are on directly opposite sides of the target) should get a +2 to their attack rolls.

It seems logical to me, that someone who is in melee combat with one more people is going to have serrious trouble paying attention to exactly what part of his body the rogue is aming at.

I have mixed feelings on this subject. I agree that being attacked will be a distraction, but I also think that the ability to flank with ranged weapons makes rogue archers a bit unbalanced. Having played rogues in NWN with and without missile weapons, I've noticed that the difference is HUGE. A well-played rogue with a missile weapon can be one of the deadliest things in NWN.

- Aloro

[Ashlynn]

A well-played rogue with a missile weapon can be one of the deadliest things in NWN.

Yarrrrrr...

*ahem*

We now return you to your regular discussion.

[Bear]

[I have mixed feelings on this subject. I agree that being attacked will be a distraction, but I also think that the ability to flank with ranged weapons makes rogue archers a bit unbalanced. Having played rogues in NWN with and without missile weapons, I've noticed that the difference is HUGE. A well-played rogue with a missile weapon can be one of the deadliest things in NWN.

This is true, assuming: a) you have a friend that can tank for you and keep the bad-guys off of you; and b) the creature is not undead, an ooze, construct or some other monster immune to sneak attack damage...

If you are alone as a Rogue it is an entirely different story. You can get one (maybe two) sneak attacks off before it's all over. Remember, rogues get the second lowest hitpoints in the game, cannot summon pets (unless through rare, expensive scrolls), get the lowest will and fortitude saves, cannot use shields, cannot use medium or heavy armor and are typically limited to a small selection of low-damage weapons. In a one-on-one battle (with players of equal skill) I would give the rogue even or slightly worse odds agaisnt almost almost any other class.

Ultimately, I suspect they tweeked the flanking/flat-footed rules not b/c the rogue was under or over powered, but b/c the system found it difficult to tell when two players were directly opposite. As it stands, I think the class works fine.

Bear
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Val Cy'svarillo

[Aloro]

This is true, assuming: a) you have a friend that can tank for you and keep the bad-guys off of you

Like Cha'reth does for Val, you mean?

- Aloro

[Sifu B]

I have a rogue that took level of ranger to use the bow and two weapon fighting. What I need to do is fugure out what weapons to use. Before I always used a rapier +2 and have recently been using either a shortsword "hotblade" or handaxe +1. Perhaps I should get a good dagger? I havn't figured out if I like using two weapons yet.

Storm

Rogues are deadly with that sneak attack.

Onto the two weapon thing, I and a friend did a bit of testing in the toolset. We created identical characters, gave them each 1000 HP, matched them up with various weapons, feats, etc. The question: is two weapon fighting really any better than anything else? (We were looking at things purely from a do-the-most-damage perspective, so we didn;t run tests with sword/shield combos.

Our results (using barbarian Gnomes *cough*):

Against enemies at the challenging level or above, a two-handed weapon is more effective than using dual wield.

Against moderate and below enemies, the dual wield situation can be slightly advantageous - since you are hitting more often. Even though your to-hit numbers are lower, it doesn't matter so much since weaker opponents are easier to hit. If you have cleave and dual wield against large numbers of weaker opponents, watch them fall.


I always wanted to play a little character with a big weapon. Sadly, he can't use the really big weapons, so he settles for a bastard sword, and is envious of those who use greatswords and greataxes. But my overall startegy has always been to focus completely on offense. Early on, I thought wielding two weapons would be much stronger in this regard - but because of the way strength bonuses, to-hit numbers, etc. work out, this isn't always so.

Like Jordicus points out, good dual wield strategies involve taking improved criticals and then using two of the same weapon, or in mixing up the damage type your weapons are doing. I still use dual wield frequently, and it's always nice to have options!

When I run into something that resists slashing damage, out come the dual short swords!

[valis]

True, but then again a Rogue's BAB isn't that high, and they're getting negitves for two handed fighting. Rogues don't hit nearly as offten as a fighter does, and when facing a fighter in heavy armor, with a high AC, they're not real likely to hit all that offten.

Hmm on a different server my 20th lvl cleric with an ac of 38 and 172 hp got taken down by 2 hits from a lvl 20 rouge...they dont really have to hit with every attack...

[tlotig]

1d8 + 2 (Base STR MOD) + 1 (1.5 x STR MOD for 2H Weapon) + 5d6 (Sneak at level 9) piercing/slashing damage + 2 Points of Strength Damage (Crippling Strike)

Umm you don't get the 1.5x mod for a double weapon I don't think. You get 1x on the main hand, and .5 on the off hand.

At level 10.. a rogue has 2 attacks / round.. raising the total melee attempts to 4x / combat round.

True, but then again a Rogue's BAB isn't that high, and they're getting negitves for two handed fighting. Rogues don't hit nearly as offten as a fighter does, and when facing a fighter in heavy armor, with a high AC, they're not real likely to hit all that offten.

Unless of course you are an evil halfing rouge using 2 daggers weapon finesse and lots of dex,
your high dex takes care of low BAB and poor AC o and tends to result in winnign initiative for those couple of extra sneak attacks *grin* i am from mythos, just joined the forums here, my main character is darkling lvl 15, 5 attacks crippling strike, sneak attack .
of course against undead i am suddenly reduced to d4 damage per hit so it has its down sides