rogue soloing

[revanist25]

my rogue is lvl 21 a first life and going shadow dancer. are there any epic quest solo options for a rogue? i mean ive never really tried to solo any quest before. was wondering if its viable and if so what it is needed

[Gizeh]

Soloing on a rogue is very well possible (with some preparation) and can be a lot of fun. My main character is a rogue and I solo quite a bit, as most of my guild members and friends live in different time zones, and I do not always feel like pugging. Actually I usually solo new content on my rogue to get first impressions at my own pace, as he is my most survivable character due to several things all rogues can achieve, namely stealth, trapping, self healing and buffs (also note that my character is an assassin, for rogues focussing on the other prestige enhancements these tactics may have to be adjusted):

- Stealth: the ability to explore areas and assess mobs while being undetected is awesome, especially with a high enough spot to detect hidden mobs. This will allow you to plan a strategy on how to take on groups - assassinate one, then initiate combat, use Bluff to lure single mobs away from the group, or simply sneak by and avoid the fight altogether (note that sometimes mobs must be killed in order to advance a quest).

- Trapping: find and disable all traps - or just run through them unharmed thanks to improved evasion if you feel like it - in some cases you can even lure mobs into traps and kill them that way. Traps that you can craft yourself: I haven't tried playing a mechanic with the new enhancements, but from the old (and still functioning, I hope) trapmaking system only noisemaker traps are useful imo; I always have a few on me to lure mobs into certain positions.

- Self Healing: one thing I would definitely recommend is to get a +39 UMD bonus. It doesn't have to be permanent, if you need a Heroism potion or Greater Heroism scroll to reach +39 that's fine (unless you fight mobs who dispel magic). The reason is that Heal scrolls have a UMD difficulty of 40, thus with +39 UMD you will always succeed, as you will at least roll a 1. Of course you may still fail a concentration check if you try to cast during combat, but putting some distance between you and the enemy usually does the trick. Should your UMD not be high enough you can use one of the cure {adjective} wounds wands, but they will be less effective. A Heal scroll, with full wand and scroll mastery (from the mechanic tree), will heal 192 hp even without any healing amplification.

- Buffs/Utility: also dependent on UMD; my favorite is Greater Heroism (scrolls available in the Portable Hole, which you can access with a Teleport scroll); I usually start using it on my rogues when I have a 60% success chance --- 11 minutes of +4 to attack, all saves and all skills plus fear immunity is good enough that I willingly risk losing a scroll or 2 to failed casting attempts :D. Other useful wands/scrolls include Shield, Fire Shield, (Greater) Restoration and Displacement. (Greater) Teleport is nice if you are too lazy to walk (like me :)), and while not useful for soloing, it can never hurt to have a few Raise Dead or Resurrection scrolls for party members.

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Gear (and abilities for UMD)

I'm not sure if it's a good idea to lay out a detailed item per slot plan. Priorities can change, acquiring some gear can be too grindy or too hard (at least without a group), and I do not know all new gear yet so I do not want to recommend hopelessly outdated gear. However, there are two things that are awesome to have for a solo rogue, namely Improved Deception and, as mentioned above, a UMD bonus of +39 or higher.

(Improved) Deception: I highly recommend getting both an accessory and a weapon with it, as in this combination the chance for it to proc increases (at least it did until the newest update). When it procs, the mob you are fighting will turn around and be vulnerable to sneak attack damage for a short time. With imp. deception on both slots and Bluff in case deception does not proc you'll be dealing SA damage most of the time, even if you have the mob's aggro. Imp. de. seems to appear regularly on random weapons now, and a relatively easy to get accessory is the Golden Guile from Lords of Dust.

UMD (including charisma) abilities and gear: You may need some gear to get your UMD up to 39, even with full ranks. Here is a list of abilities and item effects that will increase UMD to pick and mix from:

Abilities:
- mechanic UMD enhancement +1 to +3
- Skill Focus: UMD (+3 UMD) - I usually take this at mid levels and swap it out for a different feat once my UMD is high enough without it
- Skill Mastery (+1 to all skills): rogue special ability at 10/13/16/19 and shadowdancer tier 2 - I wouldn't recommend taking this more than twice at heroic levels as improved evasion and opportunist are too good to pass on, beyond that it's a matter of personal preferences
- Epic Skill Mastery (+1 to all skills): every epic level

Items:
- cha enhancement: up to 10 cha (+5 UMD) is available now afaik, +6 (+3) or +8 (+4) may be easier to obtain
- exceptional cha: +1 to +3, depending on your base cha +1 to +2 to UMD
- cha tomes: not necessarily easy to get in quests, but at least until a while ago +2 tomes could be found on the AH for reasonable prices (may vary depending on server)
- good luck: +1 or +2 to all skills and saves
- competence: usually +3, for example on an item of Persuasion (+3 to all cha skills, can be crafted) or various versions of the Treasure Hunter's Spyglass
- enhancement: the two items I know that give you a +3 enh. bonus to UMD are the tier 3 epic Treasurehunter's Spyglass (which is a great rogue item in general, at least for situational use, but can't be acquired all year) and the epic Big Top (Phiarlan Carnival)
- exceptional cha skill: I don't know a fast and easy way to acquire items that give you this bonus type, I just didn't want to omit this; examples include the upgraded Ring of Lies, Dragontouched armor with an Eldritch Rune of Skill: Charisma and certain Greensteel items (mainly caster GS items that will give a bonus to cha skills in addition to their other functions)

-other:
ship buff: +1 or +2 cha

Actually, there may be a third item effect you may be interested in: Radiance. Radiance only used to available on Greensteel weapons for a long time, but the effect can also appear on random weapons now as a suffix ("of radiance"). Basically if you score a critical hit on an opponent with a radiance weapon he will be blinded for a while and thus be subject to Sneak Attack damage.

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Quests

Relatively easy epic quests for testing your soloing abilities include Partycrashers, The Snitch and Under The Big Top from the Phiarlan Carnival adventure pack and Bargain of Blood and The Tide Turns from the Sentinels of Stormreach adventure pack.

Most importantly, take your time and don't worry if you do not succeed at first.

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As you did not say how much experience you have playing rogues (or DDO in general) I tried to give as much information as I could without getting too far into the details (except for how to improve UMD, but that's a very important soloing skill for rogues imo). Depending on the knowledge you already have I hope I didn't bore you to death or overwhelm you. :)

[revanist25]

thx, thats alot of good info. i try to keep my umd max, i think its 33 or 34 unbuffed.and yeah i try to keep greater hero on me at all times.i do have 1 improved dec item on at all times, dont have a wep with it or radiance though. im dual wielding sacrificial daggers atm. been thinking of stocking up on heal scrolls, i do stock up raise dead scrolls. and i will def try though quests to solo. =-)

[Gizeh]

The sacrificial dagger is an awesome rogue weapon imo, the level drain effect procs often and at least on epic normal the ability damage should easily make mobs helpless (and thus subject to SA damage) - on epic hard many mobs seem to be very resistant to ability damage, but the level drains will still work.

Don't worry if you don't have a deception or radiance weapon, they are by no means necessary, just alternative options to let you deal SA damage when soloing.