Can Ranger w/10 INT be a Rogue?

[~Quozl]

Greetings All,

Lemme rephrase that. Can a Ranger w/10 INT ever be a DECENT Rogue? I'm a newbie(on Sarlona) and have noticed a dearth of Rogues and have started appreciating the Disarm and Open abilities.

I would really like Disarm and Open however with such low INT I'm afraid if I ever became a Rogue I would never get a sucessful role with these odds.

Opinions please. Although I'm guessing the answers are gonna be 'No' and 'Reroll.'

Thanks!

[CSFurious]

personally, i have never wanted to play a rogue-skill dabbler & by that i am talking about a ranger, wizard or bard who have 1 or 2 levels of rogue & try to trapsmith like a pure rogue

i think you should just roll a rogue & actually take 1 or 2 levels of ranger for the use of healing wands, if you want to work on traps

most good rogues have 13 or or higher base int

my latest try on a rogue (there have been many rolls) is a 32-point dwarf who will be 10rogue/4fighter at the current level cap

he is a dwarf for the search bonus & hitpoint bonuses that you can get with a dwarf, and he is somewhat tankish as he already has 81 hitpoints at level 4, but he is still a rogue who will ultimately be an off-tank dps'er who will also be able to handle most traps at least on normal and hard, and, hopefully elite

a drow can be a smart rogue because of their natural int bonus

i have seen what you are asking done before, but i think you should just be mainly a rogue as they are a fun & challenging class to play

peace

[Dexxaan]

Suggest Rerolling or better yet make a Multi-Use-Rogue.

Mine is 8 Rogue 4 Fighter and 2 Ranger; Will go 10 Rogue as Level Cap increases.

Has 32 DEX; 20 INT (when Rogueing); 22 STR; 26 UMD; AC 48+ Unbuffed and the following feats worth Mentioning: Multi-Shot (and it's pre-req's); Precision; Precise Shot; Rapid Shot, All the Rapier/SSword Drow Enhancements. With the right gear you can outmelee a tru-DEX-Based Ranger, be More useful than a pure Rogue, and get all the traps, locks u want. (Of course Cabal is a problem for him still, have to roll VERY high).

Anyway just a suggestion.

[Zenako]

Can it work with a 10 starting INT. It can, but you will always be a few points short on skills like Disable (about the most important since you only get once chance to fail and blow the trap). I would recommend at least a 14 starting INT. Not only does this give you two more skill points each and every level, it makes it pretty predictiable that you can get to 20 INT with Tome and or Items. INT Tomes are the cheapest ones on the market and Clever Goggles almost sell for below list price. From what I have seen, starting around a 14 is a good spot/trade off.

My 28 pt Elf Ranger/Rogue Jareko started with 14 INT. His almost endgame stats are now (with gear etc) STR20 DEX30 CON16 INT20, WIS18 CHA10. If I had it to do over I probably would have gimped his CHA more, but I hated the thought of putting a negative modifier on some skills when I started.

With 14 Base INT I was getting 8 skill points a level (Ranger 6 plus 2 for INT). That is enough to keep the cross class skills of Open and Disable topped off and have four points to spend on things like Spot and Search for one each and then drop points into other skills like Jump, and Swim, etc. as your build and thoughts dictate. With only a 10 Base INT the lack of those 2 skill points each level will curtail your ability to keep "other skills" enhanced. You will still be able to keep a few core roguish skills topped off. I decided to ignore UMD when starting with this character, since it was also gonna be a cross class skill for most levels. I took the second rogue level fairly early to get the Evasion Feat, it really helps surviving early on.

[Borror0]

Opinions please. Although I'm guessing the answers are gonna be 'No' and 'Reroll.'

Yes, but only if your first level was a rogue level.

You'd max Disable Device, Spot, Search and Open Lock. Then, you can go all Ranger from now on, you'll be able to keep those four maxed.

Now, I would never talk about the death of rogues. The biggest problems about rogues is the rareness of good rogues. Most of them don't know that they are DPS!!! even if they are squishy. most of them don't know how to manage their aggro, how to be a total killer. Most rogues are a dead weight to carry in a dungeon. However, the good ones make hell of a difference in a party.

There are about as much bad rogues as there are bad arcanes, but a bad arcane is more useful..

[Zenako]

To answer a few other things.

OPen locks you get to keep trying. Add up all your bonuses and then roll a d20 and add it. Opening locks is pretty easy. Bonus Lock picks will be available from vendors and from treasure pretty often. The best of them add another +7 to the roll.

Spot and Search are skills that you need to have a certain total skill level to even find the trapbox or enemy. If your skill is even short by one point, that is as good as being 20 points short.

Disable Traps you get a d20 roll, but if you fail to disable the trap it might blow up and then be unable to disable it. You can succeed on a 1, I know I have if your skill is high enough anyway.

You need to be able to FIND the trap box to even have a chance to DISABLE it. That makes the SEARCH skill very important.

MOVE SILENT and HIDE skills are also fixed with no d20 rolls involved. IF your skill at those is better than the monsters SPOT and LISTEN skills, you are effectively invisible to them. Again, that is why every point can matter, since there is no chance to succeed if you are even one point short, unlike the Open Locks and Disable skills.

If you find a Prayer Clickie, hold onto it. The extra plus one boost might be useful if you do not have anything else boosting your chances at low to mid levels.

[Zenako]

Yes, but only if your first level was a rogue level.

You'd max Disable Device, Spot, Search and Open Lock. Then, you can go all Ranger from now on, you'll be able to keep those four maxed.

Now, I would never talk about the death of rogues. The biggest problems about rogues is the rareness of good rogues. Most of them don't know that they are DPS!!! even if they are squishy. most of them don't know how to manage their aggro, how to be a total killer. Most rogues are a dead weight to carry in a dungeon. However, the good ones make hell of a difference in a party.

There are about as much bad rogues as there are bad arcanes, but a bad arcane is more useful..

Agreed, my 7th level pure Rogue can dish out melee damage faster than many of my capped toons, but she is "ahem" very squishy by comparison (and was very happy to find a racial restricted item of Mod FORT to wear). A couple of elemental weapons, and an extra 4d6 from sneak attack damage on each can put some SERIOUS hurt out on the mobs. It is hard to make sure the Tanks keep aggro.

[Lawst]

I would really like Disarm and Open however with such low INT I'm afraid if I ever became a Rogue I would never get a sucessful role with these odds.

Open Lock is Dex based so you shouldn't have a problem here unless your a strength based Ranger with low Dex... As for Disable, not likely for the higher level quests, especially on elite(is there any other difficulty?) though with a +2 Int Tome, +6 Int item, +15 DD item and a +2 luck (Stormreaver's bracers would help too) you might have a decent shot with quite a few Traps.

[Eudimio]

Greetings All,

Lemme rephrase that. Can a Ranger w/10 INT ever be a DECENT Rogue? I'm a newbie(on Sarlona) and have noticed a dearth of Rogues and have started appreciating the Disarm and Open abilities.

I would really like Disarm and Open however with such low INT I'm afraid if I ever became a Rogue I would never get a sucessful role with these odds.

Opinions please. Although I'm guessing the answers are gonna be 'No' and 'Reroll.'

Thanks!

The simple answer is "yes". But you're setting the bar pretty low. A DECENT rogue will be able to pick a lock in Twilight Forge or take care of the traps in VoN 5. Do you want to be a GOOD rogue or an EXCEPTIONAL rogue? That answer would be "no".

Happy Hunting.

[strummer]

My ranger has done fine w/low intelligence (8 +1 tome=9). I did not take a level of rogue until lev 9 or 10. I mainly took 1 level of rogue for UMD, open locks, and for the extra backstabbing damage. I can open any elite lock, can umd any item and buff myself with stoneskin scrolls, lev 10 shield and blur wands, etc. My search and disable traps stats have been adequate the few times the party wants a trap disabled (usually everyone runs through anyway).
My rogue stats are as follows (fully self buffed w/tools): spot 46, search 41, dd 36, ol 46, umd 31.
My only regret is not starting with rogue as level 1.

[Zenako]

My ranger has done fine w/low intelligence (8 +1 tome=9). I did not take a level of rogue until lev 9 or 10. I mainly took 1 level of rogue for UMD, open locks, and for the extra backstabbing damage. I can open any elite lock, can umd any item and buff myself with stoneskin scrolls, lev 10 shield and blur wands, etc. My search and disable traps stats have been adequate the few times the party wants a trap disabled (usually everyone runs through anyway).
My rogue stats are as follows (fully self buffed w/tools): spot 46, search 41, dd 36, ol 46, umd 31.
My only regret is not starting with rogue as level 1.

Just curious how you got all three dd, ol and UMD all to those levels with cross class skills costing two each? while also keeping class skills of spot and search trained up? Lets see how it works out.

Spot (Wis) = 17 ranks + 13 item + 10 ranger Spell + 4 GH + 2 Head = 46 OK
Search (Int) = 17 ranks + 13 item + 4 GH + 2 head = 36 so some enhancements could do it (elf boosts, or human versatilty, etc)
DD (Dex) = 17 ranks (many of the cross class cost) + 13 item + 4 GH +2 Head = 36 ok
Open Locks (Dex) = 17 ranks(many cross classed) + 13 item + 4 GH + 2 head + 7 picks = 43 plus some enhancements and stats ok
UMD (Cha) = 17 ranks (many cross classed) + 3 Cartouche + 4 GH + 2 Head = 26 with feats or enhancements and stat boost (CHA) ok.

You got 24 skill points at 1st level, and another 13*6 = 78 for ranger levels and 8 for the one rogue level. Assuming you put all rogue points into one of the rogue skills (UMD for example).


Spot 17
Search 17 Total of 34
UMD 8 (rogue) total of 42
UMD 9 for a cost of 18 for a total of 60
DD for 17 for a cost of 34 for a total of 94
OL for 17 for a cost of 34 for a total of 128 out of a total available of 110 points. So we need to dump 18 net skill point costs.

If we dump a total of 9 combined ranks from DD and OL that would cover the 18 points. With good dex say 28, that would be adding 9 to the OL and DD rolls, more than covering the shortfall.

So yup you can reach the levels shown.

The question then becomes are those skill levels good enough for the content. On normal runs, I would venture to say so. On some high end hard and elite runs, will fall short, especially on the Disable, but as pointed out, many groups just blast through traps and heal up afterwards as it happens.

[strummer]

Here is the breakdown of my rogue skills: Ranger 13/rogue1 with int=9

spot : rank 8,gh 4,item 13,gl stone 1, insight spell 10, ranger boost 5, elf 2, wiz 3=46
search: rank 14, gh 4, item 13, gl stone 1, ranger bst 5, int 2, elf 2=41
dd: rank 1, gh 4, item 13, gl stone 1, vent bracer 3, ranger bst 5, int 2, pick 7=36
ol: rank 4, gh 4, item 13, gl stone 1, ranger bst 5, dex 12, pick 7= 46
umd: rank 17, gh 4, item 2, gl stone 1, ranger bst 5, chr 2=31

Stats will be better when I find head good fortune, +2/3 tomes, +15 items, or if I have a bard song or prayer clickie.
If you take a level of rogue at a earlier level you will be able to put more ranks in dd and ol.

[CSFurious]

its what separates the dabblers from the real rogues

although i agree most players just run through the traps

but, when you play with a great rogue, you know it because there are so few of them

i was in maze of madness elite the other night & the level 14 rogue made me want to cry, could not find traps, did not want to pull switches & set off traps (i actually had to tell him to pull the switches & that his reflex save would protect him), and best of all, ran around using a throwing weapon, and he knew he was bad because when he left group, he said "i am going to leave so you guys can get a better rogue"