Getting Rid of the Rogue in 5e

rip_rogue

Depending on your background and tastes, there are many places where Dungeons & Dragons may have taken a bad turn. For some it’s when weapon speeds and casting times were thrown out. For others it was when spellcasters got useful abilities they could use all day every day. Others feel the whole game was misconceived from start to finish and it’s just plain thoroughly bad.

Let’s take a look at the original four-person adventuring party: The Fighting Man, the Magic User, the Priest, and the Thief. What’s wrong with this list? The Thief. This wasn’t originally part of OG D&D. When you’re looking to play a bunch of tomb-raiding murderhobos delving through dungeons, slaying monsters, and taking all their stuff, isn’t everybody a lowercase-t thief? Who is responsible for finding traps? Everybody. Who is responsible for locating and bypassing perilous traps? Everybody. By introducing the Thief as a separate class, more recently called the Rogue, you take some of the core functionality of the other classes away from them to build a special little Thief-shaped niche in the genre that doesn’t belong there. Why should Conan the Cimmerian have to switch character classes midway through his career? He didn’t suddenly become a master of the arcane arts or the chosen miracle-worker of some god or other. He was an adventuring Fighting Man straight through his career, whether as a savage tribesman, pirate, mercenary, or urban thief.

So how about we just straight-up kill the Rogue as a character class and give its goodies back to those with whom they belong: everybody. In Type 5 Dungeons & Dragons, the Rogue is a middle-sized hit die character with four skill proficiencies instead of two that gains access to sneak attacks, cunning bonus actions, and some skill perks. Its subclasses are the Thief, the Assassin, and the Arcane Trickster. Thief gains benefits that, as discussed above, should be available to just about everybody. The Assassin is every bit as bad of a character class concept as Thief; a murderer for hire is an assassin. Whether this is accomplished by poison, steel, or spells the person is still a lowercase-a assassin. Really this is just a sneak attack specialist. We’ll keep that in mind. The arcane trickster is just a Wizard that’s a dick about other folks’ private property. We can probably ditch that outright. Get your Wizard Sleight of Hand proficiency and call it a day.

Let’s take a look at what to do with all these class features:

  • Saving Throws: leave them be. Everybody else already has two proficiencies here.
  • Proficiencies: Grant three skill proficiencies to every class that doesn’t include full (1st – 9th level) spell progression.
  • Expertise: Grant Expertise to a single skill to every class that doesn’t include full (1st – 9th level) spell progression. All character classes (including full casters) may select an additional skill to have Expertise in at 6th level.
  • Sneak Attack: Grant Sneak Attack to every class. Full casters get 1/3rd their character level from the existing Rogue table, everybody else gets 1/2 character level.
  • Thieve’s Cant: This is dumb and shouldn’t be included in anybody’s game. Drop it.
  • Cunning Action: Grant Cunning Action to everybody, with the following modification. The bonus action can be used only to perform a task directly related to a skill you have Expertise in. Disengage is related to Acrobatics, Dash is related to Athletics, Hide is related to Stealth.
  • Roguish Archetype: At 3rd level a character that has not already selected an Oath, Domain, Archetype, or other subclass may add Assassin to the list of subtypes available. A character selecting Assassin gains Sneak Attack at full class level on the Rogue table, in addition to the benefits of the Assassin archetype.
  • Uncanny Dodge: Starting at 5th level, whenever your character class or subclass grants you a new feature, you may select Uncanny Dodge instead.
  • Evasion: Starting at 7th level, whenever your character class or subclass grants you a new feature, you may select Evasion instead.
  • Reliable Talent: Starting at 11th level, whenever your character class or subclass grants you a new feature, you may select Reliable Talent instead.
  • Blindsense: No. Drop it.
  • Slippery Mind: Starting at 15th level, whenever your character class or subclass grants you a new feature, you may select Slippery Mind instead.
  • Elusive: No. Drop it.
  • Stroke of Luck: No. Drop it.

Now for the subclass features:

  • Fast Hands: This is mostly covered by the changes to Cunning Hands above. Mostly. Leave this out.
  • Second-Story Work: Starting at 3rd level, whenever your character class or subclass grants you a new feature, you may select Second-Story Work instead.
  • Supreme Sneak: Starting at 9th level, whenever your character class or subclass grants you a new feature, you may select Supreme Sneak instead.
  • Use Magic Device: Starting at 13th level, whenever your character class or subclass grants you a new feature, you may select Use Magic Device instead.
  • Thief’s Reflexes: Starting at 17 level, whenever your character class or subclass grants you a new feature, you may select Thief’s Reflexes instead.

For Arcane Trickster, each of the archetype features are made available to Bard, Sorcerer, and Wizard characters in lieu of an equal or higher-level subclass feature. Clerics that are associated with a trickster God may also gain access to these features, and add Mage Hand to their list of available spells.

This has the overall effect of dropping the class count by one, the subclass count by two, and expanding the complexity and options for the remaining classes tremendously.

Revisiting the Muscle Rogue:

The Muscle Rogue is clearly a Fighter at heart. We start out with the same race, background, and attributes as before. Essentially this is the same character. For Fighting Style it seems Dueling has some appeal. We can buy him an extra attack with his Strength bonus with Two Weapon Fighting, but he generally isn’t using his off-hand to attack; he’s using it to trip. Duelism it is. We select Athletics for his single Expertise.

At second level he gains an Action Surge, which is a great Fighter ability. An additional action that can be used for basically any purpose? Quite nice. But now we have a choice between Cunning Action and Action Surge. We can set aside Cunning Action for later, but who wants to wait to actualize their character concept? Cunning action at 2nd level, at the cost of never getting an Action Surge.

At 3rd level we normally get to pick a Fighter Archetype. His reliance on wits and tricky maneuvers suggests he will be adopting the Battle Master archetype, but I want to keep him focused on his Sneak Attack damage, so we borrow the Assassin archetype from the now-defunct Rogue class. He is now proficient with the disguise kit and poisoner’s kit, and gains the Assassinate feature and full Rogue progression for sneak attacks.

At 4th level we get the standard ability score improvement, which we use to level off Strength and Constitution at 18 and 16, as before.

At 5th level our Muscle not-Rogue gets an extra attack. Alternately we may select Uncanny Dodge. Being more stabby is much more appropriate for where we’re going here, so we select Extra Attack.

At 6th level we gain access to our second Expertise selection. Depending on how the campaign has been going, it may be a good idea to pick Perception. We also use our Ability Score Improvement to top off Strength at 20.

At 7th would have gained Evasion as a Rogue, but there is no feature gained by Fighter nor Assassin here. This will still be an option at 9th level, when Assassin grants Infiltration Expertise and Fighter grants Indomitable. We’ll drop the Assassin feature and pick up Uncanny Dodge from back at 5th level.

At 8th level we can bump Constitution up to 18 and effectively gain eight hit points. Instead we take the Alertness feat.

At 10th level we can bump Constitution up to 18 and effectively gain ten hit points. Very tempting. With proficiency in Constitution saves, we may as well take Tough for twenty extra hit points and +2 per level going forward. Alternately select Dungeon Delver, depending on how the campaign is going.

At 11th level we must choose between Reliable Talent or a third attack. At this point we should have a strong feel for how the actual campaign is running. Considering that we already have two or three chances to gain sneak attack damage per round, but can only benefit from it once, I select Reliable Talent. Getting an opponent prone is important to everybody in the party, while an additional attack is only worth so much.

Muscle not-Rogue
Mountain Dwarf Fighter 11 (Assassin Archetype), Soldier Background
Lawful Stabby
Worships Pelor the Burning Hate

Attribute Value Bonus Save
Str 20 +5 +5
Dex 14 +2 +6
Con 16 +3 +3
Int 10 +0 +4
Wis 12 +1 +1
Cha 8 -1 -1

Skills: *Athletics(13), Intimidation(3), Investigation (4), *Perception(9), Stealth(6)
Tools: Brewer’s Supplies, Disguise Kit, Knucklebones, Land Vehicle (Cart), Poisoner’s Kit
Languages: Common, Dwarven
Hit Points: 125
Armor Class: 16 (breastplate plus Dexterity)
Initiative: +7
Weapons: Rapier (+9 to attack, 1d8+7 damage), Javelins (+9 to attack, 1d6+5 damage, range 30’/60′)
Sneak Attack: 6d6 damage
Other notable features: Darkvision 60′, Dwarven Resilience, Stonecutting, Cunning Action, Extra Attack (two total), Uncanny Dodge, Reliable Talent, Assassination, Indomitable, Magnificent Beard.

The resulting character feels significantly less thief-like. His skill list is short and notably absent of Thieves’ Tools. His Expertise is in two fifths of his skills, not two thirds. He has an additional chance to land a sneak attack every round, and does slightly more damage. His Cunning Action is more broadly useful, letting him attempt to trip or grapple or shove an opponent without leaning on Two-weapon Fighting to glean a bonus action. The additional attribute bump gets him an additional feat, which we could have used to pick up more skills if the party is really missing the presence of a dedicated thief. To make a dedicated Thief with this house rule, you would want to pick a more suitable background (one with Thieves’ Tools proficiency, perhaps) and lean more heavily on the Rogue and Thief class features, selecting the Champion or Battle Master as the Fighter Archetype.

6 thoughts on “Getting Rid of the Rogue in 5e

  1. Burrowowl Post author

    Correct. The Muscle Rogue uses two-weapon fighting. The Muscle not-Rogue just uses a Rapier in one hand and Cunning Action for his miscellaneous athleticism. Normally that wouldn’t be possible, but the Cunning Action is house-ruled to let a character use whatever skill(s) he’s got expertise in.

  2. Aldarc

    I disagree with the rationale for getting rid of the rogue. It’s a rationale that could be expanded to other classes. For example, why does the priest and the magic-user need to be separate classes? It creates an artificial distinction between magic. Why can’t the magic-user heal? Also, doesn’t everyone fight? Some fight with spells and others with swords. The thief does have a long place in the world of myth and story. They are the lightly-armored, cunning infiltrators, skillful tricksters, artful dodgers, bumbling burglars, and nimble thieves. You wouldn’t turn the titular “Thief of Bagdad” into a fighter. You wouldn’t turn Bilbo or Frodo into fighters. You wouldn’t turn either the “Thief and the Cobber” into fighters. Locke Lamora was neither a fighter nor a mage. The rogue exists to cover a range of narrative archetypes that lie outside of both the fighter and mage archetype. Sure OG D&D may have started with Fighter, Magic-User, and Cleric, but many other games often reduce the trifecta to variations of these archetypes: Warrior, Mage, and Rogue/Thief.

  3. Burrowowl Post author

    You make some good points with strong examples there, Aldarc. You could just as well boil things down to Magic User and Other, but then you’d just be lumping two already-quite-strong feature sets in the Cleric and Wizard together, with no particular benefit to the remaining class. Be devolving the features of the Rogue back to all other classes, the love gets spread around a bit more. In the thematic space between Sir Lancelot and Bilbo Baggins there exists a broad spectrum of not-magic-using character archetypes that may be better represented by a single class instead of drawing a bright line in the sand straddled by Grey Mouser, Captain Blood, D’Artagnan, and a hundred other excellent not-spellcaster characters.

    This is just a thought-experiment, of course. If I were actually to pare down the 5th edition character classes to three, I’d probably go with Fighter, Paladin, and Warlock, with the Rogue features up for grabs more-or-less as described here.

  4. Disagreeable

    I wholeheartedly disagree with your sentiments concerning the elimination of the rogue class. First off, you complain that the rogue should be taken away because everyone deserves the abilities that the rogue specializes in. The same can be said about many, if not all, the other classes. The barbarian, for example, could just be a higher strength, higher constitution fighter that does not wear armor. The monk could be a fighter that uses no weapons. The wizard, cleric, druid, and warlock could all be combined into plain magic man. And for those classes that have a little bit of both, why not just make them that plain magic man that uses a weapon. (I’m looking at you paladin and ranger). And if the classes are just going to be dropped into either magic man or warrior man then there are probably people who can find a way to make it so that there are enough similarities between the two to make just one man character. Might as well play some freeform game after that.

  5. Burrowowl Post author

    Disagreeable – your suggestions regarding the mud classes are things I take for granted. Of course the Barbarian class shouldn’t exist. Neither should the Monk. Fighting Man, Magic User, Priest, and (arguably) Thief are the four main Dungeons & Dragons character classes. You may recall that in earlier editions things like the Paladin and Ranger were explicitly sub-classes of Fighter, Illusionist was a sub-class of Magic User, Druid was a sub-class of Cleric, etc. If you were to reduce D&D from its four main classes to three, it would be Fighting Man (Fighter), Magic User (Wizard), and Priest (Cleric). If you were to reduce it to two, it would be Fighting Man and Magic User. The compulsive need to have dozens of character classes’ presence assumed is fabricated, unnecessary, and generally counter-productive.

    Anyhow, the core reasoning behind getting rid of the Rogue is that not only should everybody have the kinds of abilities placed in that class but that the other classes suffer from not having them in a stereotypical (archetypal?) D&D game. And adventuring party doesn’t need Smite Evil or Quivering Palm or Wild Shape. They need to be able to detect and circumvent traps, bypass locks, locate secret doors, and be sneaky.

    Also, Barbarian is a background, not a class. I had high hopes regarding this when the first playtest packet came out. Alas, it wasn’t to be.

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