Rogue - Assassin Changes

[redoubt]

I think you are underestimating (or purposely ignoring) the many advantages INT has right now. It's so lop-sided in favor of INT it isn't even funny.

The advantage of INT is that it is in the assassinate DC formula.

Saying that you need a high INT to be a trapper is false. I played a ranger rogue with only 1 rogue level for years and a starting INT of only 14. And you only need 4 skills, all of which are 1 point per rank for a rogue. A rogue gets 8 per level base, so even if you dumped INT at 8, you would still get 7 per level. Does INT help boost search and DD? Yes. You could also take the saved harper action points and put them into search & disable enhancements. You could (not that I think its a great idea) use the free feat from not taking insightful reflexes to boost you skills. Having all the social skills on your rogue is handy, but hardly game altering.

Do you really want to go down the road of completely equalizing DEX and INT across the board?

No, I don't. I'd be happy to keep things unique. That is part of why I think bringing DEX into assassinate is a bad idea.

I think they should each retain some unique strengths and weaknesses, so that there are builds that are somewhat differentiated and play a little differently but are still viable. Build variety is good.

If having everything in the assassin tree is good for DEX builds, why is it bad to have all those same things available to INT builds? Lets go back in time...

Many of us asked for INT to hit/damage in the assassin tree. What we got was the Harper tree instead. Points had to be pulled out of the racial and rogue trees to go over to Harper to get what should have been in assassin from the start. My guess is, and maybe a dev will comment, that it was considered too powerful to get the same stat for hit/damage/DC all in the same tree. DEX to assassinate would set up the same level of power as adding INT to the to/damage core enhancements, but would be cheaper and free up a feat.

IF INT to hit and damage move to the assassin cores, you would have a more realistic choice to make. Now you can choose DEX and get:
- higher DC
- free feat
- less skill points
- slightly lower trapskills (but still high enough to not crit fail.)

Or you could choose to go INT and get
- workable, but lower DC
- have to spend a feat on reflex save
- get loads more skill points to spend on things like haggle and intimidate (party crashers and crucible, right?)
- high enough trap skills to have critical successes on a 2.

If they don't want to add INT to hit/damage in assassin to continue to get people to buy Harper, so be it. But adding DEX to assassinate, and not addressing INT to hit/damage within the assassin tree, will eclipse INT builds. Even if a dex build still invests in Harper, you don't have to invest as much, so you save AP. You also free up a feat from not taking Insightful Reflexes. That is significant

The problem is a DEX-based pure assassin in today's game is a "flavor" build only, and that's just not right. It's not only well behind INT-based but also behind STR-based.

There are no DEX based assassins because the DC stat is INT. Its like saying there are no STR based sorcerers.