Surprized by the continued bias against rogues

[Thrudh]

I'd rather manage aggro and play 'smart'

Yeah, that's the interesting thing about playing a rogue... It's much more dependent on the PLAYER skill... Even with the best build, if you want to maximize DPS, you have to pay attention... You have to know when to switch targets, you have to know how to shed aggro... Even if you have an uber build and can HANDLE aggro, you still don't want it, because you're not doing the best DPS when you have aggro...

So every rogue player has be thinking and playing smart all the time...

Rogues are fun...

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Yeah, that's the interesting thing about playing a rogue... It's much more dependent on the PLAYER skill... Even with the best build, if you want to maximize DPS, you have to pay attention... You have to know when to switch targets, you have to know how to shed aggro... Even if you have an uber build and can HANDLE aggro, you still don't want it, because you're not doing the best DPS when you have aggro...

So every rogue player has be thinking and playing smart all the time...

Rogues are fun...

Currently, I sneak till the mob agros on someone....tumble out of sneak and run into the middle and swing away at random mobs.
Hit diplomacy and jump to the back of the mob and swing away some more.....run around the perimeter of the pack, jumping, and switching targets constantly.....hitting diplo on occasion.

And of course jumping, tumbling out of the pack and blocking healing myself when I get in trouble.

I do still get a lot of agro and do get beat up alot......and many times to the point of death when I screw it up.
But WOW! I sure do rack up a huge kill count with that char.

it's more reckless than the way I oplay other chars, but it is fun.

I also sometimes zerge slightly ahead, jump into the middle of a mob and hit diplomacy first. If I do it right, I get lots of SAs and don't get hurt.

Then there is the assassination thing as my new toy to play with.

[Premier]

Don't tell me not to play a low HP Rogue. I'll play as I wish and do my part the best I can.

Peace!

-Premier

[Depravity]

By the way, Rogues are very good in the Shroud....

So the portals go down a little slower....

Rogues have the highest DPS in the game... yes, it's situational... and guess what... Part 4 and 5 of the Shroud IS the PERFECT situation for back-stab.. You have ONE target and you've got 5-7 guys attacking him... he can only have aggro on one at a time... Any rogue in the group is going to be doing that theoretical maximum DPS almost the whole time... Put two rogues in the group, and at least one (and most of the time both) will be getting back-stab damage every swing.

One of the reasons for what ended up the Bladebeard build - an AC tank Str rogue. With improved evasion and enough UMD to scroll/wand fireshield, you end up with a character taking at most 1/4 damage from those DBFs and a good chance to not get hit on normal and maybe hard shroud runs. Just flagged him for shroud, so we'll find out how well it works soon.

Yeah, that's the interesting thing about playing a rogue... It's much more dependent on the PLAYER skill... Even with the best build, if you want to maximize DPS, you have to pay attention... You have to know when to switch targets, you have to know how to shed aggro... Even if you have an uber build and can HANDLE aggro, you still don't want it, because you're not doing the best DPS when you have aggro...

So every rogue player has be thinking and playing smart all the time...

Rogues are fun...

Meaning a good chunk of the playerbase is going to have real problems playing rogues - they can't just run in and right click until everything is dead. Nothing makes you hate on a given class like being unable to play it.

[cdemeritt]

I find that ironic coming from someone in a guild of 'zergers'.

Don't define idiot as a zerger, they're not the same. You know that you and Malcis are always welcomed in my parties, because even though you both are some real squishies you do carry your own weight. And, as far as I'm concerned, I'm a zerger. So is a big part of the guild.

Just be careful of the words you use.

True, IFV has a lot of Zergers in it. However, you also have to point out that IFV is a Raiding Guild. 75-80% of what we do is raid. When raiding the whole Zerger thing is far less important. You simply can't run past Parts 1,2,3 of the shroud to get to Parts 4 and 5. Yes, we don't kill everything on our way to hound. But once in hound, there is no place to Zerg to. But what you might not have noticed, it that in that 20-25% of the time that we are not raiding and are working on lowbies, I tend not to be so quick to join in, because I know many people like to zerg, and I do not. I run with a limited number of guildies in non-Raid situations. yes I will join in from time to time, but often feel like I'm just holding people back from the way they want to play, and more often than not, won't go. And when I do join a zerg run, I do my best to keep up.

Also you have to remember, I don't just belong to IFV, I have several soloist toons, and even one in the Sublime PD Guild (ok, he just joined).


Now- From a Clerics point of view: High AC and High HP do not always mean better toons!
I recently ran a shroud run on my cleric that was mainly guild only. we PuG'd the last three spots. Having run with the other cleric and the guild so many times, I know what we were capable of. Most shroud runs cost my cleric no more than 10 heal scrolls or 1 mana pot if I'm being lazy and don't want use the pool method (great idea, just sometimes more than I want to do, have pleanty of pots/plat). The 3 PuGs, all boasted about their 600hp and 65 or better AC. They all went down like they were made of paper. Both myself and the other cleric had a nearly impossible time trying to keep them alive. It cost me 7 mana pots that run, while using the pools. I just could not get mana fast enough to keep them on their feet, and while the other cleric didn't say anything to me directly, based on what I saw, I bet he went though almost as many. yet the rest of the party barely had a scratch on them when it was all over. at one point I actually considered leaving them dead to save resources for the rest of the party.

[Thrudh]

Now- From a Clerics point of view: High AC and High HP do not always mean better toons!
I recently ran a shroud run on my cleric that was mainly guild only. we PuG'd the last three spots. Having run with the other cleric and the guild so many times, I know what we were capable of. Most shroud runs cost my cleric no more than 10 heal scrolls or 1 mana pot if I'm being lazy and don't want use the pool method (great idea, just sometimes more than I want to do, have pleanty of pots/plat). The 3 PuGs, all boasted about their 600hp and 65 or better AC. They all went down like they were made of paper. Both myself and the other cleric had a nearly impossible time trying to keep them alive. It cost me 7 mana pots that run, while using the pools. I just could not get mana fast enough to keep them on their feet, and while the other cleric didn't say anything to me directly, based on what I saw, I bet he went though almost as many. yet the rest of the party barely had a scratch on them when it was all over. at one point I actually considered leaving them dead to save resources for the rest of the party.

I'm a bit confused... are you saying that characters with 65 AC and 600 hps go down like they were made of paper?

High AC and High HP do not always mean better toons!

Or are you saying that were lying? Two completely different things.

[Raithe]

I'm a bit confused... are you saying that characters with 65 AC and 600 hps go down like they were made of paper?

Why would that be hard to believe, at all? If you have 600 hit points and a 65 ac, you may have only a medium dexterity and may not be wearing anything that gives you a resistance bonus to saves. A build like that would basically take 140 points of damage everytime a dbf is cast, and 230 after the fire prot disappears. Add in some meteor swarm damage, bladestorms, and even a little bit of melee damage and you are looking at a very squishy character.

Many of the people in this thread berating low con rogues think they have the game all figured out. They don't.

[Borror0]

Now- From a Clerics point of view: High AC and High HP do not always mean better toons!

True, if you gimp the rest you're an idiot. I can think of a 800 HP barbarian or a 80 monk both with no DPS. Yes, bad builds can suck. But that's going at extremes. Aiming for 300 HP? That's not asking too much.

As for them going down too quick in that Shroud, they were probably lying or had other majors flaws in their build. Sortly put, bad builds.

[unionyes]

Have to admit that I skipped pages 2 to 5 or so on this thread.

Rogues are great, and a well built well played rogue is always a good addition to any party, in any quest. When people say they 'don't need a rogue for this quest' they mean one thing.

They mean that they haven't played with a good rogue before. A bad rogue can leave a bad taste in anyone's mouth. Low DPS (or continually dying), blowing boxes, having to roll a 20 to open a lock (while the party waits impatiently), and basically being a drain on the group rather than a fully contributing member.

Unfortunately, bad rogues seem to outnumber good rogues on most servers. I found a way around this, sort of.

When I was leveling my rogue, I would go for PUG's that figured they needed a rogue for traps, like STK for example, or they figured they could five man the quest but a rogue would mean a little more loot, like Gwylans, Stormcleave, Tangleroot, that kind of thing. Once in the group, I would just get all the traps, lead the kill count, save a party wipe by being the last one standing (and rezzing the cleric or taking stones to shrines past hostile mobs, depending on the level), taking out casters who were trying to get past my Improved Evasion with AOE spells and missing, dropping web or cloud spells from scrolls or wands when the caster didn't have them loaded, that kind of thing.

I started to get invites into groups with LFM's up that had rogue excluded. People started to say I was a handy guy to have around, and grab me for quests all the time. Once in a while, somebody else would complain about how we didn't need a rogue for this quest, and I would then just out kill him, and point it out quietly at the end of the quest.

After playing a rogue (and I made my rogue because I was sick and tired of bad rogues not being able to get traps, specifically the fire trap in STK and I figured I could do better), I can honestly say that for melee types, Rogues dish out the most DPS bar none. Granted, it is situational, you need to have no aggro to get sneak bonus so an intimitank is helpful, and you can't just run in and go toe to toe, you sort of have to take the second shot, not the first shot, but if you fight properly you are the DPS champ. Add to that the ability to cast any spell in the game, the ability to stand in the middle of flamestrikes, fireballs, and lightning without taking damage, the ability to rez, and almost as a bonus the ability to disable traps and open locks, and you have an awesome character class.

[SableShadow]

medium dexterity and are not wearing anything that gives you a resistance bonus to saves.

Excellent points. The analogy extends to many quests.

[cdemeritt]

Now, as far as AC/HP thing. I'm certain they had 600 HP, simply because a heal of 300 HP barely filled the bar half way. as far as the AC, well I don't know. All I know for sure is that when I'm on my cleric and I hear 600HP and +65 AC, I don't think "oh good, they'll be easy to keep alive". Some can be, but not all. Believe me, Don't believe me, at this point I don't care.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I don't waste my time arguing online, it is a completely useless endeavor. So this will be my last post on this thread. In the end, Those who like to play Slow and Easy will never convince those who like to play Hard and Fast that Slow and Easy is the way to go. And Those who like to play Hard and fast will never convince the Slow and Easy Crowd that their way is better. You might win a convert or two, but for the most part, we are happy with the ways we play. So I say we simply agree that we have two different play styles, and that they work for the people who like them, Slow and easy for the S&E crowd, and Hard and Fast for the H&F crowd, and that we accept there are many different build based on Playstyle. Let's put the bickering aside and let this thread die, like I expected that it would have 4 days ago. It was supposed to be a 5 minute B session, followed by 1 or 2 people telling similar stories followed by a "quit you whining or stop playing a rogue" comment followed by a short quick death, and by now should be on page 8.

[kamimitsu]

Let's put the bickering aside and let this thread die, like I expected that it would have 4 days ago. It was supposed to be a 5 minute B session, followed by 1 or 2 people telling similar stories followed by a "quit you whining or stop playing a rogue" comment followed by a short quick death, and by now should be on page 8.

NEVER!!!! This thread will never die!

Oh wait, there's a Forum Orthon and this thread only has 196 HP...

::squish?::

[SableShadow]

Those who like to play Slow and Easy will never convince those who like to play Hard and Fast that Slow and Easy is the way to go. And Those who like to play Hard and fast will never convince the Slow and Easy Crowd that their way is better.

Actually, that's an excellent point. I used to post quite often in the guild forums something along the lines of "If you choose those tactics, then you'll get those results." Specifically, people get used to one particular strat and don't understand that there are multiple ways to complete a given quest.

Rogues are most useful when the tactics of a quest need to change (or the quest forces the change), since we can swap from one role to another much faster than other classes.

[DasLurch]

I'm late in coming to this thread, but generally here is the bias against Rogues...

1) Too squishy for really tough fights (sadly this mostly true)
2) their AC is too low (yet another disappointing problem)
3) they have weaker DPS than other classes (also true, but far from the worst)
4) there is an incredible abundance of poorly played/built rogues out there, and by level 10 who wants another one in group that can barely kill something and have problems with all the traps (also very sad and true, especially in the level 3-8 range)
5) Rogues slow the party down (Unfair, but some truth in it since DD and search animations are soooo slow)
6) if the rogue isn't built poorly or knows whats going on, they generally want to prove how uber they are (I'm guilty of this at times, so sorry )
7) there is usually a "better option" for a party than a rogue because of #1-6 in the eyes of someone running the party.
8) And here's the kicker, not having a Rogue usually has no effect on a party whatsoever because we are only needed for looting certain chests.
9) it is the hardest class to build for a powerful end game build, and incredibly loot reliant claass. (like there's any class that doesn't rely on loot...*sigh)
10) the party leader never could figure out how to play one and is biased. (only you can change this by teaching them rogues don't ruin a party)

As far as a Rogues' benfits, I think those have been covered pretty well. How do you fix the above problems? I have no idea.

[Aesop]

I'm late in coming to this thread, but generally here is the bias against Rogues...

Most of these are perception and not truth.


1) Too squishy for really tough fights (sadly this mostly true)
Perception due to highly inflated hitpoints of other classes due to toughness Enhancments. Also not the numerous builds that reach 350-450 hp on a rogue

2) their AC is too low (yet another disappointing problem)
They have the potential to reach some of the highest AC in the game and with simple splash and the right buffs... the highest


3) they have weaker DPS than other classes (also true, but far from the worst)
Change one word in this phrase and you would be right. The work "weaker" should read "better". Rogues have better DPS than any other class for most content. Their weakness is against Undead. That said a Sorceror has better surge DPS as they can dump all their man in to damage spells really fast... but the best melee DPS is a rogue.



4) there is an incredible abundance of poorly played/built rogues out there, and by level 10 who wants another one in group that can barely kill something and have problems with all the traps (also very sad and true, especially in the level 3-8 range)

But by level 16 most of those rogues have been retired and usually the decent ones are left


5) Rogues slow the party down (Unfair, but some truth in it since DD and search animations are soooo slow)
This is due to poor trap design which only do damage. Make it an FtS trap or a maze trap and suddenly a rogue will speed things up


6) if the rogue isn't built poorly or knows whats going on, they generally want to prove how uber they are (I'm guilty of this at times, so sorry )
THat's a player problem and not a class problem. I just wanna finish the dang quest


7) there is usually a "better option" for a party than a rogue because of #1-6 in the eyes of someone running the party.
Yep complete perception based on incorrect assumptions

8) And here's the kicker, not having a Rogue usually has no effect on a party whatsoever because we are only needed for looting certain chests.
And the reason here is because their should be a class that is mandatory to complete a quest... sadly sometimes it seems they only believe this is true for rogues though


9) it is the hardest class to build for a powerful end game build, and incredibly loot reliant claass. (like there's any class that doesn't rely on loot...*sigh)
It ain't an easy class that is true... but it is is one of the best for utility and ability


10) the party leader never could figure out how to play one and is biased. (only you can change this by teaching them rogues don't ruin a party)
Yeah I've had to prove some of them wrong in the past... but man do egos get bruised


As far as a Rogues' benfits, I think those have been covered pretty well. How do you fix the above problems? I have no idea.

Just saying

Aesop

[Godsblight]

Before I even start sorry for the horrible spelling and grammar that will incur during this message (small children and people with weak hearts my not want to read this)

anyhoo...

I have played this game since it first came out of beta and back then rouges were completely normal; people would just go "hey there is a trap in this quest... whats your hp.. not so good... and the claric or the wiz/sorc couldn't survive this.. better get a rouge."
but after the constant playing of the game everything becomes tedious and you start to pinpoint all the flaws in the traps and other aspects of this game. Sure they update and make things harder but making things hit more on a trap that you can walk around doesn't make the trap more effective. I do believe that traps should be not based on any type of one factor... have traps that cause stuff that normally you wouldn't get from other things. like some aspect of bleeding or tendon slice for a extreme amount of time.... because i mean these monsters put this trap here to stop people from coming into their space and busting up the place and killing/maming them in the process. wouldn't you think they would have the sence to try to make the traps kill people. I know people are going to say "well they are ment to kill people." but really if you went though a trap that sliced u in the belly you would be bleeding for quite some time without a healing kit or a powerful clairc spell to stop it and if it hit u in the leg u would be limping around for a while... I say the class isn't the problem the root is the repetitiveness of the traps and the lack of realism behind being hit by the traps, because no matter how much dmg you put on a trap there is still the work around.

[Seacog]

I have a barbarian with 705 hp on Sarlona. He tanks well enough for hound, reaver never did vision though so no idea there. I ALWAYS let clerics know my AC blows though, I mean heck, I am a barbarian. If a barbarian has an AC worth mentioning, he ain't much of a barbarian imho. What does this mean for shroud? It means i Deal some good damage, but as the other person prior to me stated, it means i am getting wailed for 150'ish fire damage even on a save sometimes, and 220-250 on a failed save. So if i draw specified aggro, which ihave done many times, and he starts targeting me, i'll drop quick if the cleric or caster isn't on the ball. However, i usually fall back once he targets me, to give the healers a chance. The only time i don't is when my healers tell me to stay in, usually if we have him to a sliver, or we lost too many people already. What it boils down to, is having the hp is handy, but if yer comparing it to shroud, thats all that matters besides evasion. Since few of his attacks are actually melee, its the fire that rips these guys apart, and their ac is meaningless.

[kamimitsu]

A couple of folks mentioned inventive traps (flesh to stone, bleeding for long periods for time, hamstring etc.) rather than inflated DMG and saves. What a fantastic idea! I hope the devs are listening. Why couldn't you have a trap the threw up a disco ball, or blindness, or sprung an anti-magic field? It wouldn't necessarily mean rogues were essential for the quest , but it would make them much more in demand. It might also create demand for some less commonly known spells (stone to flesh, for example).

Shiz

[Borror0]

Borror, I believe that when you quoted me in your last post, you accidentally included your comment in the quote of my comments.

Sorry about that, my mistake. Fixed now.

Some can be, but not all. Believe me, Don't believe me, at this point I don't care.

How would you explain the 200 HP guy is easier to heal than the 600 HP guy if they both got equivalent AC and Evasion?

There is no logic to it, at least for Shroud part 4.

[Borror0]

5) Rogues slow the party down (Unfair, but some truth in it since DD and search animations are soooo slow)

If you intend rogues are a burden, that's simply not true. If you mean they have to stop and do the traps, that's rather a ridiculous argument. The rogues does not have to stop at the trap. There is no 'disable the trap or the rogue dies'. If you don't want the rogue to do the trap, just let him know.

The rest has been covered by Aesop.