Solo warforged rougue for new player. Will work?

[stanthony]

Hi all!

I am not 100% new to DDO, I’ve played a dwarven fighter to about level 5, but I found the mechanics of that particular toon to be overly simplistic, and I sorely miss lock-picking and trap detection abilities. Besides, I really want to change the name :D
In LOTRO I have an awesome burglar character with whom I solo the game very successfully. Hence my question: will rolling a warforged rougue be a good idea for soloing?
I know that some time ago a rogue was consider among the hardest classes to solo, but I also suspect that many things has changed since that days. Recently on these forums I’ve read that one of the latest game updates made rogue much easier to solo. Is that so? Probably hirelings help, too?
What is your opinion? I really enjoy the rogue play style, but I am a somewhat casual player and I don’t want my game to be too frustrating.

Many thanks in advance!

[Jingwei]

I think the healing penalties that warforged suffer from would make this difficult.

Also, you don't technically need more than one level of rogue or artificer to be able to disarm traps. If I had to pick a race and 28 point build to try to solo pure rogue with, I think I'd try a dragonmarked halfling.

[stanthony]

Thanks, Jingwei!
Although I really don't like the aesthetics of halflings in DDO :)
I was also considering going with warforged wizard, which I know to be a solid choice for soloing, but AOE is just not my cup of tea - I prefer more personal fighting with stealth etc.
So, to sum up, in your opinion, soloing with rogue is possible and viable, but I have to select a race that of flesh and bone to be able to heal more effectively?

[Clatterfist]

I love warforged, but I can't in all honesty recommend that you play one for any light-armour based character these days, for the simple reason the Mithral Body sucks beyond all possible imagining and will cripple you at the cost of a valuable feat.

Halfling is a good choice, as suggested above: they get improved saving throws to help you solo, rogue-friendly bonuses and enhancements, and can access the powerful dragonmark of healing to help you sustain yourself when under pressure. Human is another excellent choice, as they get an extra feat and skill points and a set of enhancements which are mind-blowingly awesome for any rogue, including the ability to cast greater heroism on yourself and the option of taking a racial level of skill mastery.

I think the acrobat tree is an excellent choice for a player who enjoys some solo action. It's the least dependent upon sneak attack and offers high damage combined with high mobility. It's also a lot of fun.

[stanthony]

Many thanks!
I will have to think of it!

[stoerm]

Many thanks!
I will have to think of it!

I wouldn't give up on the idea, it's not bad as such. The rogue class has some synergies with WF, especially if you decide to go the qstaff route, which goes nicely with WF Great Weapon Aptitude and Improved Power Attack enhancements. Immunities, extra hit points and fortification also aren't bad for a low hit die class like a rogue.

Rogue mechanics used to get a Repair Construct enhancement (http://ddowiki.com/page/Mechanic_enhancements_%28history%29). Although I don't see one now, the new mechanic tree does contain Wand and Scroll Mastery as well as UMD bonuses. These open up the possibility of self healing using repair/reconstruct scrolls. While it can be expensive compared to hirelings, it's still very viable. If you go bladeforged, you get the free reconstruct ability anyhow.

Perhaps not the best combo for a starter, but could be lots of fun for an established player with the plat and gear.

[lyrecono]

Warforged indeed do bring little to the table for a solo rogue.

Humans do however, assasin or even better, quarterstaf wielding acrobat are very solo friendly, mix in 6 levels of monk for bonus feats and stances and you're on the right path :)
(take monk after 3 levels of rog, for the attack speed)

[ReaperAlexEU]

the big change was to the stealth system. previously if you got rumbled trying to run away and hide the mobs acted like they had sonar, pinging you every 6 seconds to get your exact location and never giving up. now they randomly attack in the area you were last seen and eventually giving up allowing you to do hit and run attacks.

depending on how you like to kill things all 3 rogue trees have a lot to offer. assassins are the masters of sneaking into a room and knocking of 1-2 mobs at a time without being spotted. mechanics can gun down the mobs while keeping out of arms reach. acrobats can trip the mobs up and batter several at the same time. you can also mix and match, my old mechanic now has less mechanic in him (just enough for full repeater use) and more assassin allowing me to mix up a bit of sneaky throat slitting with my machine gun.

[stanthony]

Thank you guys for very helpful answers!
In about an hour I will pour myself some wine and spend a fantastic evening in the character generator! :)

[droid327]

I actually think Ranger might be closer to a LOTRO Burglar. They also get stealth gameplay and sneak attack die and two-weapon fighting, but they're a little more friendly for soloing, with buffs and self-heals.

There's nothing really in DDO that's similar to Burglar tricks, though. There's debuffs and CCs, but they're mostly just your standard "click and cast" type.

[Ryiah]

They also get stealth gameplay and sneak attack die and two-weapon fighting, but they're a little more friendly for soloing, with buffs and self-heals.

Everyone can use stealth gameplay mechanics as everyone has access to the Hide and Move Silently skills as well as the Stealth feat. With access to UMD, which is doable with any character given appropriate gear and buffs, you can push your stealth abilities even further by using Invisibility scrolls giving limited stealth while not sneaking.

Keep in mind that LOTRO is closer to a traditional MMO. DDO has far fewer class-only gameplay restrictions and those can be reduced further with multiclassing.

[Krelar]

I actually have a warforged rogue. I made him a long time ago back before they nerfed immunities. I do remember having some problems with spot at the lower levels due to the wisdom penalty so make sure and keep your gear as up to date as possible if you don't already know where traps are. It was mostly a flavor build though not a lot of advantages especially now. the extra fort is kind of nice, and the immunity to level drain saves me from swapping in a pale lavender ioun stone when I fight beholders. I was able to score a ML 10 RR warforged +1 ghost touched rapier of disruption for like 2K plat (back when disruption triggered on every critical hit) so that made fighting undead as a rogue much easier.

[droid327]

Everyone can use stealth gameplay mechanics as everyone has access to the Hide and Move Silently skills as well as the Stealth feat. With access to UMD, which is doable with any character given appropriate gear and buffs, you can push your stealth abilities even further by using Invisibility scrolls giving limited stealth while not sneaking.

Keep in mind that LOTRO is closer to a traditional MMO. DDO has far fewer class-only gameplay restrictions and those can be reduced further with multiclassing.

True, but try building a successful stealth char when Move Silently and Hide are cross-class skills. You're basically running with a -10 penalty, compared to a Bard/Monk/Ranger/Rogue, just baseline, plus you're losing all the Enhancement bonuses to stealth that those classes get, or the few unique (non-scroll-able or pot-able) class spells like Camouflage. I don't think a pure Fighter or Cleric would be able to successfully sneak past anything in average endgame content, just on 21 base points of Hide.


the extra fort is kind of nice, and the immunity to level drain saves me from swapping in a pale lavender ioun stone when I fight beholders.

Sadly, even the Fort bonus has become deprecated, since Fort now drops as lootgen pretty often, and you can generally slot it in as the "B-side" of your Deadly or Speed (or Resistance, etc.) item, since those are only on lootgen too. The immunity to level drain is pretty much the biggest innate thing WF have left. Otherwise, they're just a hybrid between Dwarves (HP enhancments) and Horcs (THF enhancements) that can self-heal as arcanes.