What drives a poor reputation for the Rogue class?

[Schwann145]

Something no one has thought to mention yet... but as much as the evil villain organization doesn't trust you, the PC, they also don't trust each other. They're all a bunch of self-serving back-stabbers when you get right down to it.

You know what a bunch of people who work together but don't trust each other aren't going to be surrounding themselves with? A bunch of mind readers and true seers.

[strangebloke]

Something no one has thought to mention yet... but as much as the evil villain organization doesn't trust you, the PC, they also don't trust each other. They're all a bunch of self-serving back-stabbers when you get right down to it.

You know what a bunch of people who work together but don't trust each other aren't going to be surrounding themselves with? A bunch of mind readers and true seers.

You mean like, githyanki, drow, illithids, fiends, liches? ...all of which have mind reading or truesight or other divination present in the statblocks for creatures up and down their evil hierarchies? Evil orgs that don't trust each other are more likely to rely on magic to test their minions and allies.

But the point more generally is that pretending to be a random person who they've never met before might get you in the door, but that's about all its going to do as far as infiltration. Pretending to be a random evil swordsman might get you a job with the lich, but they're not going to tell some hireling everything about where their phylactery is stored. There's going to be like. Locks. Encrypted journals. Relationships you need to build. If you just want to get in the door, that's really just... not that hard.

The main advantage of this ability is maintaining a cover for a really long period to become a mole and build up to getting really deep access to stuff that's really protected. But this is not a style of play that's going to fly with the real humans who are also at the table with you and aren't built for this.

[Dr.Samurai]

Spoiler: Strangebloke

Show

I take you at your word, but you pretty consistently seem to misread my intentions and my friends' intentions. (which I know because I play with Ludic and others outside of this forum quite a bit) Some of this may be a failure to communicate on our part, but I really don't think so,

Okay... Strangebloke, this thread is 17 pages long, and I think the first time I replied to you was a couple of pages back and it was to agree with you. I have no idea why you think I'm misconstruing anything YOU said when you and I have not been engaging for the vast majority of this thread. When I did AGREE with you, you made a comment about how people get their hackles up over innocent comments that are in no way suggesting people don't play the class/subclass. You've said repeatedly now that no one is saying the features are useless, and there are no dog whistles.

I have the sense, given your comments about not posting here, not liking these discussions, and your lumping yourself in with the greater conversation despite only joining recently, that someone complained, and you've come running to white knight for your buddies.

The problem is... everything on the internet is eternal. So you can try and pretend that people are being misunderstood and you're confused, but let me clear things up for you. See comments from this thread saying that the features we've been discussing are no better than a background, or a skill proficiency/tool proficiency. In other words... useless:

Assassin's level 9 and 13 features are the sort of things that you could arguably have done with regular skill checks even if the feature never existed. What's more, these identities that take you, a high level adventurer, a very long time to craft can fall apart to low level divinations.

While we're on the topic of what a DM might allow, Xanathar's has this to say: "Advantage. If the use of a tool and the use of a skill both apply to a check, and a character is proficient with the tool and the skill, consider allowing the character to make the check with advantage. This simple benefit can go a long way toward encouraging players to pick up tool proficiencies."

So if disguise kit and Deception both apply, a DM might be giving you advantage anyways.

And you've gotta spend 3 hours stalking the person before you can use Impostor. With that in mind, I have to ask: Just how much better is this disguise than one I could whip up with high check rolls? Because I don't need to be an Assassin for those. In fact, I can boost my skill rolls more if I'm not one.

For example, look at an Assassin ability:
Surely this should just be a standard use of the Disguise and Forgery Kits?

I despise this sort of design because 1) Assassins end up stuck with the astonishing ability to use a disguise kit to... disguise themselves! 2) The ability to create disguises/personas of this nature is removed from other rogues, "because otherwise what would be the point of this ability?".

The point is that in the campaigns that don't have those counters, you don't need a dedicated Infiltration subclass feature anyway, because without those things you can get by with a bog standard disguise kit and Deception Proficiency/Expertise anyway. You thus have no reason to pick Assassin over a subclass with features that will make it more likely you can both survive and contribute outside of that niche. Neither version of Assassin has anything that makes it special; as stated above, 2014's false identity is foolproof until it isn't (and even when it is, what benefit that specifically gets you is vague at best) and 2024's is rendered moot by the tool+skill=continual advantage rule.

Even when those aren't a concern, a numerically high check (20+) functionally does the same thing by letting you defeat passive defenses, because they are fixed.

Exactly - wow, I succeeded without rolling, at a thing that I wasn't going to fail the roll at anyway (hello Reliable Talent + Expertise + perma-Advantage, all of which I'll get before 9 now.) Sure wish I had a subclass feature instead...

The issue is not "derp, what do with false identity?" but rather "what makes the Assassin's false identity so much better than one I can craft with my base class that it's worth an entire subclass feature?" As above, "you don't need to roll" isn't good enough, especially with the 7-day price tag tacked on.

Exactly - anyone can do something like this, so in order to try and preserve Assassin's dubious niche, you're now houseruling in unwritten handicaps like "require more checks, as much time or more, and more money." Either that, or rogues who don't have this feature merely get the lesser ability to "wear costumes." It's exactly the kind of artificial ceiling I'm glad is getting tossed out of the game.

Yes, if you houserule in a handicap that every other subclass needs at least 7 days like they do, likely more, and maybe throw in a monetary cost too, the Assassin looks better by comparison. And if I break Nancy Kerrigan's kneecaps before the Olympics I'll be the figure-skating champion too. It's not a great argument for Infiltration Expertise being the entirety of a subclass feature.

I know there's a difference, that isn't the question. The question is whether non-Assassins can make one, not whether they're different.

If they can't, that one feature is arbitrarily limiting every other rogue (not to mention every other skill-based character - you want to tell me a Bard can't make a false identity??) and should be thrown out.

If they can, then the rogue has every feature they need to make failing at making one a statistical anomaly already, meaning the feature isn't worth the paper it's printed on, and should be thrown out.

Ergo, conclusion - throw it out.

There is a PHB background that has you start with a false identity including acquaintances, documentation, official letters, etc at level one.

And if they possessed the skills to do it once, it's reasonable to assume they're capable of doing it again somehow, especially since one of the character traits you can put on that background is "I put on new identities like clothes." Another is "I insinuate myself into people's lives to prey on their weakness and secure their fortunes."

The XGtE description of tool proficiencies says it "allows its owner to adopt a false identity." Heck, it even mentions you can use a disguise kit proficiency check to spot whether someone else is in disguise. The proficiency can represent more than just putting on clothes.

Base Rogue already has many effective roleplaying tools, why do they also need a valuable subclass feature taken up with jank?

I'm saying that if it tells you that your favorite scheme is "I put on new identities like other people put on clothes" or "I insinuate myself into people's lives to prey on their weakness and secure their fortunes," then it seems reasonable to expect that the game thinks you should be able to do that somehow. Such as, you know, with ability checks.

Indeed. I just don't get this rush to defend a horrible subclass feature that doesn't need to be there when ability checks and features that make characters really good at them already exist.

If your 2014 Assassin is trying to do that same-day then they're SOL too, because you needed 6 more of prep.
And if you did have 7 days of navelgazing prep time to learn about their acquaintances and pick a suitable target to impersonate, tell me why I wouldn't with a different rogue again?

If my base class gives me a minimum roll of 20, very likely approaching 30, then I don't actually need a crappy ribbon that guarantees believability - I'll take my chances. (And a subclass with actual features.)

The Assassin's Infiltration Expertise ability at 9th level, and Imposter ability at 13th level, are only marginally better than the Charlatan Background's fake I.D., and the Imposter ability is worse than the Actor Feat.

Why would I be against contested checks? I have Expertise, Reliable Talent, and permanent Advantage, while the NPCs I'm infiltrating don't. Contest away, they're going to lose.

so I'm left here trying to figure out why we keep having these 10-page disagreements over what is functionally nothing.

TBH, these endless circular debates over nothing are why I'm not active here anymore. It's just one side saying "generally I think [x] performs better at most tables" and another side going "but at SOME tables maybe it doesn't, why aren't you acknowledging these scenarios I've come up with" Neither of which really contradicts the other.

Yeah but clearly this isn't true, as noted in the quotes above right? I mean... it seems like you're just here to defend Ludic and others by downplaying the claims that have been made and trying to make me and others seem unreasonable or like we're misunderstanding. But the quotes clearly show that people in this thread, your friends, think the feature does little more than normal ability/tool checks, and I and others disagree with that. So please try to represent this accurately if you're truly mystified and really trying to understand where the confusion lies.

In fact, I don't think I'll reply further to this because I've already wasted too many hours of my life on this.

This aged like milk.

...and it doesn't have to, because that's not how a short-term infiltration would work.

Yes, you could play a long game and actually join the organisation as a mole and in that case, your credibility comes from your actual interaction with the organisation. That's not how you'd use a false identity, except as a means to start just such a long con.

To perform a short-term infiltration, you'd use one of your many alternate identities, utilising whichever one gets you in by association to the organisation. Creating an alt-ID of something you cannot possibly live up to (such as the given example Succubus) is not a fault of the ability, but of the player for making such a thin ID where you literally don't have the physical, magical or mental capabilities required of it. Making an alt-ID of a grizzled mercenary who used to run with a band of thugs that have a good reputation with the org you're infiltrating is better, but might fall down if you don't know much about that other organisation or are demonstrated to not actually be that tough or grizzled.

The 'trick', if there is one, is simply to use an alt-ID that garners enough trust to get you in on merits you actually possess; Bruce Wayne as Batmans "rich socialite" Alternate Identity works because he's actually rich and actually a socialite; no-one he meets suspects his true identity as the Dark Knight because everything they know about him, even if they've never met, tells them he's Bruce Wayne. Silk (of The Belgariad) can pose as the Drasnian Merchant of that name, despite being of royal blood, because he's actually Drasnian and has a good eye for trade, but only has a little more difficulty posing as an easterner because he's linguistically and culturally educated. If he didn't know multiple languages, he'd be a bad spy if he was trying to pass as a foreigner in anything but an emergency.

So for our Assassin to infiltrate an organisation, he doesn't need to pose as a member of it, necessarily, they just need to be someone that has legitimate interest in interacting with it. A wealthy merchant investing in a bank doesn't need any intimate knowledge of the bank and it's org chart, only to demonstrate that they're a)wealthy and b)of good standing. Infiltrating a cult as a prospective member doesn't mean you need to know who the big boss is; in fact that might be downright suspicious. Rather, posing as some rich, more-money-and-influence-than-sense noble dandy who drank the kool-aid might get you further in than trying to pass as an established member.

The point is, that a fully blown cover ID isn't something thrown together out of pieces that don't fit and the strength of the Assassin feature is that when a PC with it makes a functional alternate identity and not just a hammed-up disguise, it is all but infallible.

Very well said.

Having a cover identification of Bob the Baker does not help with the random group of bandits inhabiting the ruined moat house the party just came across.

The problem is simply that you see no value in Infiltration Expertise in the ways that we're describing. Because my answer to this would be "maybe, maybe not, but if not, the assassin still can have regular disguises and Deception Expertise". But the assassin also has this unique deep cover feature as well for when that ability can be used. But since you don't see it that way, it's perceived as a wasted feature.

Did the internet kill nuance? (the answer of course is: yes) People have not been saying Infiltration Expertise does nothing, people have been saying the ability fills a very small niche.

Yeah again, this is not true. I think you and Skrum have had the most nuanced approach to it, but Ludic and Psyren have been pretty clear about how useless the feature is. After arguing for some time, they eventually softened their position, and Ludic did outright say "it's not useless", but you have to square that with everything else that was said before we unpacked all the claims they were making about countermeasures and disguise/forgery kits, etc.

So seriously... I'd appreciate it if people stopped trying to misrepresent the comments in the thread and the responses to them.

It gives the assassin a false identity that is close to bullet proof, not just a false identity. The assassin creates enough documentation to back things up, which has all sorts of benefits. If they claim to be an agent of the king, they will have letters from the king confirming this that are good enough to pass scrutiny from anyone, other than the king's absolute inner circle (this is all how I would run it - I take the statement about the ability as covering all of that.) In addition, while they don't create identities for the party members, it isn't that hard to expand to include them. A wealthy merchant will have bodyguards, and perhaps advisors or accountants with them. So you get the assassin as the wealthy merchant, and you get the fighter as their bodyguard, and you get a wizard as their accountant, and you get the barbarian as their masseuse, or whatever other role as an employee of the assassin they want. If the group wants to play such a campaign, the DM should go with the employees of someone with a bulletproof identity are not likely to be investigated. If you don't suspect the foreign noble of being anything other than what they say, why would you question whether their lady-in-waiting is anything other than that?

If you are using stealth along with this, you are likely not using it to its full ability. It is not a sneaking ability, it is a social one.

In addition, a key factor is being missed - the identity does not need to be set up immediately before using it. Let's say a party tends to take the winters off of adventuring - avoid dealing with the worst weather, and give them time to do downtime activities. Well, once they hit level 9, they should have enough money to set up a dozen false identities every winter. The first winter after hitting 9, I would create a wealthy merchant, a famous chef, a religious leader, a foreign noble, a retired gladiator, a famous playwright, a successful general, an insightful jester, a skilled medium, a criminal lieutenant, an inquisitor in the largest faith that would have one, and the owner of a carnival/menagerie. Then, if I needed to use any of those in the future, they would already be ready to be stepped into.

Spoiler: Situation A - assassinating a king

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The party takes a job to assassinate a king of a neighboring kingdom. They are an assassin, a sorcerer, a cleric, and a fighter, all level 13 (those were randomly selected). After doing some investigation into the king, the assassin is confident that he can kill the king with his purple worm poison, they just have to be able to deliver it. So they create a plan. The assassin creates/uses a false identity of a famous chef from a faraway kingdom. They enter the city, go to the fanciest place to dine, and order something. The assassin as chef will taste just a bite, then throw down his napkin in disgust and go to leave. The other party members will try to calm him down, point out the good things about it, and call him by that false name, while otherwise pretending to try to be incognito. The goal being to lure the king into demanding the services of such a chef for his table. They pretend to avoid the king, to make the king want them even more, eventually giving in and allowing the king to hire him and his staff to prepare a meal. So he poisons the meal for the king. Now, the king has a food taster, but they have a cleric and a sorcerer. Somehow, between the two of them (I don't know, maybe the sorcerer is divine soul, maybe the cleric took metamagic adept and has subtle spell, maybe the fighter picks a fight with the taster before the lunch and punches them, then the cleric "heals" them) they get protection from poison cast on the taster. Taster tastes the food, everything is OK. King eats, king dies, sorcerer teleports them out of dodge.

Spoiler: Situation B - assassinating a king

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This time, we have an assassin, a barbarian, a wizard, and a bard, level 10. Same job, this time in the course of research, they find that the queen has recently died, and the king is distraught. So the assassin breaks out the famous medium disguise. They spend quite a bit to set up shop in a wealthy area, then the bard goes out to plant stories about the medium and their incredible skills (sure, this has to assume that there aren't a bunch of people who can speak with the dead.) The news eventually gets back to the king that this medium is in town - a famous medium that people in town have already heard about. They just need to string the king along enough to get him to agree to a private meeting, but since the medium is known to be a medium not any kind of fighter and the king is distraught over the death, this can be done. Once they have him alone, king is dead, wizard teleports (teleportation circle) them out of dodge while the barbarian makes sure no one can get in the room for the one minute casting time.

Spoiler: Situation C - assassinating a king

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Another king, another assassin party. Now we have an assassin, a ranger, a druid, and a warlock. They find that the king desires new experiences, paying large sums of money for them. So the assassin goes with the menagerie owner, either coming to town ahead of the menagerie to work out a deal, or maybe they have actually created a menagerie at some point. (We'll go with the former.) So they come to town and they start trying to make deals with landowners to put on their show. To do so, they have the ranger start bringing out some animals for the animal show - every one is actually a wild shaped druid, and they perform the tricks flawlessly to the amazement of the viewers. They do this for several landowners, to ensure that the amazing abilities with animals they have displayed get talked about, and to get the landowners to fight over who gets to host them and get their cut of the show. Since they know the king wants new experiences, it is only a matter of time before they ask the party to perform for the king. When the party is in the kings presence, the perfectly trained "bear" that has been flawless up until now goes crazy and mauls the king to death. The menagerie members flee ahead of the law, and a new story about them circulates, meaning this might be harder next time, although if you never use a bear again you might get away with it.

I could create scenarios for any of those identities to kill a king, and I think I could make them pretty entertaining to play. And, yes, the DM would absolutely need to be playing along to get these to work, but ultimately that's true for anything the party does. I started those by randomly selecting the party, then figuring out a scenario that would be fun for that party (IMO, of course). I have not run such a game in 5e - I've run heist-centric games in older versions, when a feature like this didn't exist, though, and I can see how it would have been a helpful one. (It would be much better at lower levels). One problem is that there aren't a ton of published modules about heists, and those that do tend to be low levels. If it doesn't come on line until level 9, the Keys from the Golden Vault only really makes it worthwhile in the fey palace one. If it was there at level 3, it would be useful for the entire campaign. I get why it's 9, but I agree with anyone who has said that it is underwhelming at that level. I think the designers made a mistake with it, and should have put more focus onto when abilities would actually be useful in game, rather than attempting to spread out everyones' "stronger" abilities to later on. Sometimes - like in this case, IMO - that robs them of the value they should have.

All very well said.

[strangebloke]

[SPOILER=Strangebloke]
Okay... Strangebloke, this thread is 17 pages long, and I think the first time I replied to you was a couple of pages back and it was to agree with you. I have no idea why you think I'm misconstruing anything YOU said when you and I have not been engaging for the vast majority of this thread. When I did AGREE with you, you made a comment about how people get their hackles up over innocent comments that are in no way suggesting people don't play the class/subclass. You've said repeatedly now that no one is saying the features are useless, and there are no dog whistles.

I have the sense, given your comments about not posting here, not liking these discussions, and your lumping yourself in with the greater conversation despite only joining recently, that someone complained, and you've come running to white knight for your buddies.

The problem is... everything on the internet is eternal. So you can try and pretend that people are being misunderstood and you're confused, but let me clear things up for you. See comments from this thread saying that the features we've been discussing are no better than a background, or a skill proficiency/tool proficiency. In other words... useless:

I genuinely just don't know what to say man.

You keep saying that people are saying its useless. They don't say this, haven't said this, have in fact said the opposite many many times.

The point is that there's a good deal of air between "literally useless" and "almost always less useful than other comparable features at level 9." Infiltration expertise is useful in some scenarios. But overall, the subjective assessment they're presenting is that rogues can by default already be very good at this disguise/forgery/bluff kind of infiltration, so its kind of overkill to have an entire level of your class there to just go from "consistently hits DC 17" to "consistently hits DC infinity."

take this quote (don't know from whom)

The point is that in the campaigns that don't have those counters, you don't need a dedicated Infiltration subclass feature anyway, because without those things you can get by with a bog standard disguise kit and Deception Proficiency/Expertise anyway. You thus have no reason to pick Assassin over a subclass with features that will make it more likely you can both survive and contribute outside of that niche. Neither version of Assassin has anything that makes it special; as stated above, 2014's false identity is foolproof until it isn't (and even when it is, what benefit that specifically gets you is vague at best) and 2024's is rendered moot by the tool+skill=continual advantage rule.

The word here is "get by with" and "no reason to pick assassin over other benefits." This is an assessment of mechanical utility relative to alternatives. You are better off with infiltration expertise, but you can get by without it. In short, its useful, but you don't need it to have a good disguise. This is something you've said yourself, when you point out that an assassin can still impersonate someone, they just can't use the level 9 ability. The phrase "no reason to pick assassin over a subclass with [other] features." similarly does not imply that it doesn't do anything, just that other subclasses generally do more. Its an assessment of opportunity costs. The feature is pretty strong when it works, but would be more useful at level 3 than at level 9 when you're only 2 levels away from reliable talent and a big increase to your proficiency. (People also generally expect really strong features at level 9)

Its certainly not a statement of judgement against someone who just wants to play the class anyway. Something can be strictly suboptimal and still fun to play. These are just separate discussions entirely. Ludicsavant helped make a video on youtube where they take a monk into a challenge encounter and beat everything where more 'optimal' builds failed, so I think you see that we all understand that something that offers less utility overall isn't necessarily a harsh condemnation.

Again, to put this into perspective, in super smash bros melee, there's a character named Roy, who is strictly just a worse version of another character, Marth. And not like a little bit worse than Marth, like a LOT worse. marth is close to the best in the game, roy is close to the worst. The devs made Marth deal more damage at range and roy deal more damage when right next to someone, but its definitely better to do big things when you're far away than when your close, and the balance team messed up and made Marth WAAAAY better. But the best Marth player in the world (Zain) actually also plays Roy a lot and at one point based on his performance with roy alone was top 20 in the world. Roy is really bad but still has some edge cases where he can do some unique stuff. Zain really likes playing Roy and thinks he's funny and interesting. Would he ever ever ever argue with someone to say that Roy was actually more useful than Marth???? Obviously not, but he isn't playing roy because he's good. He's playing Roy because Roy's his boy and he likes roy.

I think its productive to separate questions of what is strictly the highest possible utility, from questions of what is interesting or potentially enjoyable. If you vibe with Assassin that's chill, but I think you could buff the subclass A LOT without making it close to overpowered.

This aged like milk.

consistency is the bugbear of little minds. I'd certainly be happier if I didn't subject myself to these conversations, but here we are.

[Psyren]

Samurai, not a single one of those quotes says useless. I want the ability replaced because I think it would be easy for something better to take it's place, but of course it can see some use in some... sort of campaign... somewhere. That doesn't change my opinion about it being bad and worthy of redesign or chopping. And I think that's where we'll have to leave this discussion because that's as close as I can get to your side, which is to say not at all.

[Dr.Samurai]

I genuinely just don't know what to say man.

Then please don't. This is very frustrating. I think you took it as a flippant comment when I said I appreciate you, but I meant it in earnest. I hardly agree with most people here but I still appreciate their insight precisely because the game can be run so many different ways. You're one of those people. But when I replied to your comment in agreement, you came at me about my hackles being raised for no reason. When I clarified that indeed there are people arguing that the feature is no good, you psycho-analyzed me and guessed at my intentions.

It's disappointing. I honestly have to ask... are your friends children? If so, I'll stop engaging. But if not, I'd recommend you allow them to handle their own problems. Because you're either confused, or are conflating and cherry-picking posts in this thread to arrive at your conclusions and accusations. I'm happy to argue about rogue subclass features with you, but I'm not interested in arguing against your sanitized version of what Ludic has been saying. Let him argue his own points; he's a very capable person.

You keep saying that people are saying its useless. They don't say this, haven't said this, have in fact said the opposite many many times.

Stop conflating posts. I have specifically called out Psyren and Ludic since you've insisted on misrepresenting the discussion. And they don't have to literally say useless. I provided the quotes. You are free to ignore them.

The point is that there's a good deal of air between "literally useless" and "almost always less useful than other comparable features at level 9." Infiltration expertise is useful in some scenarios. But overall, the subjective assessment they're presenting is that rogues can by default already be very good at this disguise/forgery/bluff kind of infiltration, so its kind of overkill to have an entire level of your class there to just go from "consistently hits DC 17" to "consistently hits DC infinity."

But you know that I'm not taking issue with the notion that it is "literally useless" right? I've put forth that it's actually a powerful feature. I don't care if you think it's "literally useless" "almost useless" "kinda useless" or whatever other label. I think it's powerful. Someone else said to think about it as a social feature, and that was what I was failing to convey all the time I was talking about the feature. So it's not just that "it's not useless but still sucks and isn't worth the subclass", which I actually don't think is all that different from just calling it useless, but I recognize that you have an agenda to help your buddy out. It's that I think the feature can bring something valuable to the table. Yes, the soulknife gets some powerful features at level 9, but in my opinion so does the Assassin, and its a unique one, as opposed to adding to your attack roll and getting teleports, which can be done other ways as well.

take this quote (don't know from whom)

Go ahead and read all of their other quotes I provided for you. There's a context to this discussion.

But also... it doesn't matter. Even if the claim isn't "literally useless" (to humor you), I still disagree with the assessment. I agree that it requires a certain game but... so what? You think the game doesn't exist... I'm in a hexcrawl that I've been playing in for months and literally just had our first encounter in the last couple of weeks. The rest was spent in the port city as downtime. There's another game I didn't have a chance to apply to just recently that has a year of downtime between each level. Right here on the forums. So you can dismiss it all you want that you've never seen a game where this feature would work, but not all games are like your games. What I and others have done is explain how we can see this feature working for the assassin and the party in a game, and some of us think that it is powerful and valuable when it works that way. What others have done is said "you can already do this with ability checks, this feature doesn't do anything", which is not true and not helpful. And you're defending it as nuanced.

The word here is "get by with" and "no reason to pick assassin over other benefits." This is an assessment of mechanical utility relative to alternatives. You are better off with infiltration expertise, but you can get by without it. In short, its useful, but you don't need it to have a good disguise.

Nowhere in that quote does it say "you are better off with Infiltration Expertise". Nowhere does it say it is useful. You're mischaracterizing again. Please stop.

He is literally saying the subclass is not useful enough to take, and your big defense is "no one has literally said it's useless". Amazing clarification, that changes everything!

Psyren literally just posted that it is bad and worthy of chopping. I disagree with this assessment and think the feature is powerful. Is that okay? Are you going to police the conversation because no one has said "it's literally useless"?

Do you see it as reasonable to say "Guys, no one has said it's literally useless, they are just saying it's bad, should be removed, there's no reason to choose this subclass, and you can already do what its features provide with regular ability checks that anyone can do. Why are there ten pages of arguments???". Are you suggesting we just agree with the assessment we don't agree with? Because you don't like these threads but can't keep yourself away?

If you vibe with Assassin that's chill, but I think you could buff the subclass A LOT without making it close to overpowered.

Nothing I've said contradicts this notion and I agree with it. I've said as much in this thread. I agreed with you on a similar point, much to my chagrin given what it's triggered. Shame on me for letting you draw me into a strawman argument, as up until this part of the discussion I don't think I've ever accused anyone of saying it's literally useless. I don't need to, because I've just been arguing that the feature is strong, not that it isn't literally useless.

[Schwann145]

Samurai, not a single one of those quotes says useless.

That doesn't change my opinion about it being bad and worthy of redesign or chopping.

Distinction without a difference.

[Psyren]

Distinction without a difference.

I'm acknowledging that it has a use - for you. That doesn't mean I have to think it should stay in the game.

[tokek]

Breaking my own rule to reiterate:

I have literally never heard of anyone playing this kind of game, so its impossible for me to comment on what would or would not be reasonable in such a campaign.

Again, this is like asking how to do a poirot-style murder mystery in DND. It doesn't really have any support from the system and seems like a poor fit.

Weirdly I have played out a campaign like this but I was playing a warlock who went hard on Dream/Scrying etc. I don’t think the bad guys ever knew who was in the dreams of all their minions.

The physical infiltration attempts were patchy and being counter-infiltrated certainly created a sense of paranoia. We didn’t have an assassin rogue and while one would have worked just fine there is always another way. The rogue we did have did a very reliable job once they had Reliable Talent and mundane methods don’t trigger magical alarms.

[Witty Username]

To pivot a little,
I feel like assassin could be better at making poisosns, envenom weapons is a thing but that is pretty limited and doesn't really capture making deadly concoctions.

This may be me still being frustrated that according to Xanathar's making poisons with a poisoner's kit isn't a thing.
<Grumbling in general frustration with all forms of crafting in 5e> give me more stuff like herbalism kit being able to make healing potions.

Back to infiltration expertise, I do think the less interesting ability was kept in the playtest, I think it could be expanded to all charisma checks instead of just deception.

[Psyren]

To pivot a little,
I feel like assassin could be better at making poisosns, envenom weapons is a thing but that is pretty limited and doesn't really capture making deadly concoctions.

This may be me still being frustrated that according to Xanathar's making poisons with a poisoner's kit isn't a thing.
<Grumbling in general frustration with all forms of crafting in 5e> give me more stuff like herbalism kit being able to make healing potions.

Back to infiltration expertise, I do think the less interesting ability was kept in the playtest, I think it could be expanded to all charisma checks instead of just deception.

Yeah - to be totally clear, the playtest features suck too. But at least they're trying.

Envenom Weapons - The idea here is sound, the execution is just incredibly poor. An Assassin is exactly the rogue I would want to be encouraged to use/be the master of using a poisoner's kit. But I think it was Pack Tactics who calculated that this ability adds 3-4 DPR at 13th level. The juice just isn't worth the squeeze here.

Infiltration Expertise (2024): This one is just redundant - whether you make it just Deception or all charisma checks, the rules glossary codified the whole "skill + tool = advantage" rule. So the feature actually does nothing! The speech/handwriting mimicry meanwhile is at least interesting, if a bit squishy.

[Blatant Beast]

Breaking my own rule to reiterate:

I have literally never heard of anyone playing this kind of game, so its impossible for me to comment on what would or would not be reasonable in such a campaign.

Again, this is like asking how to do a poirot-style murder mystery in DND. It doesn't really have any support from the system and seems like a poor fit.

I am going to point out that Dragon Magazine #111 (I think that was the one), had a Murder Mystery Adventure called Death of an Arch Mage, that took place (in part), over dinner, and with all the suspects staying at the manor, and it involved a three stage poison....which as a kid I loved.

Keep in mind this was in 1e, and at the time I do not think a skill system had been published yet.
(Non Weapon Proficiencies came out latter that year, but they would not have helped with the adventure).

5e is more than capable of handling a murder mystery, or a campaign that deals heavily in intrigue.

Running a Murder Mystery, is less about the rules, and more about creating the atmosphere, and getting the players invested, and then reacting to them. It also likely requires plotting out a timeline of events. The Death of an Arch Mage adventure was a very good example of using organization to help you run a complex adventure, that could go off in many different directions. (The adventure taught me quite a bit)

Perhaps there is more under heaven and earth that you are imagining?

Now, that stated, this would still be a case of the Assassin being a niche class.
My view is hyper specialized abilities, that do one thing really well, are fine, as long as there is also a more generalized component included.

Turn Undead, as a feature is a good example of this, especially when you include the Tasha optional rules.

Turn Undead is awesome against undead, and does nothing against other creatures. Then your cleric subclass will add an additional use option, that often times is more generally applicable. Finally, Harness Divinity can be used to recover a spell slot.

This type of modularity ensures, that Channel Divinity is useful in any number of situations.

The Assassin, is not built this way. The class has a number of very niche abilities, from requiring Surprise to Infiltration Expertise. The subclass simply is not the best example of how to design for 5e....

[Sorinth]

To pivot a little,
I feel like assassin could be better at making poisosns, envenom weapons is a thing but that is pretty limited and doesn't really capture making deadly concoctions.

This may be me still being frustrated that according to Xanathar's making poisons with a poisoner's kit isn't a thing.
<Grumbling in general frustration with all forms of crafting in 5e> give me more stuff like herbalism kit being able to make healing potions.

Back to infiltration expertise, I do think the less interesting ability was kept in the playtest, I think it could be expanded to all charisma checks instead of just deception.

I'm not sure poison is really the way to go given how many creatures are resistant/immune, not too mention there's now a poisoner feat which covers the theme. Though I suppose one way to get a poison theme would be to allow the assassin the option to swap the damage type of their SA into poison and give a bonus when doing so. Extra damage dice or allowing a reroll of any 1s and 2s could make sense.

[Blatant Beast]

The Poisoned Condition is pretty useful. If the Assassin was able to craft poisons as part of their Long Rest, (the Artificer class and infusions, is a potential model that can be used), and the poison used a higher Saving Throw DC based off the Assassin's Dexterity score, that might be interesting.

Drow Poison, with a higher DC can be potent.
Perhaps the Assassin, eventually learns to craft a poison that does what many toxins do in the real world....kills the target, and if the target makes the save, then they take damage.

[Amnestic]

I'm not sure poison is really the way to go given how many creatures are resistant/immune, not too mention there's now a poisoner feat which covers the theme.

A feat replicating a class feature, in nature or in mechanics, is fine. There's a bunch of feats that do that (like the BM maneuver feat).

Ideally if the campaign is going to feature a lot of poison resist/immune creatures that'd be something the DM brings up early on/session 0 so players can plan accordingly.

[Psyren]

5e is more than capable of handling a murder mystery, or a campaign that deals heavily in intrigue.

...
Perhaps there is more under heaven and earth that you are imagining?

Running a Murder Mystery, is less about the rules, and more about creating the atmosphere, and getting the players invested, and then reacting to them.

You do realize you're literally supporting strangebloke's point here? They weren't saying you can't run such a game in 5e, but the rules aren't exactly helping in any way. (That's totally fine by the way, I'd rather insert this kind of aside into my 5e campaign rather than learn a whole new system for one session.)

I'm not sure poison is really the way to go given how many creatures are resistant/immune, not too mention there's now a poisoner feat which covers the theme. Though I suppose one way to get a poison theme would be to allow the assassin the option to swap the damage type of their SA into poison and give a bonus when doing so. Extra damage dice or allowing a reroll of any 1s and 2s could make sense.

That's exactly why the damage should be higher, to compensate for poison's drawbacks. (Though it's worth pointing out that even with poison being the most-resisted element, there are still fewer monsters overall that resist it than don't, and it's not like the Assassin will do less damage or be less effective than other rogues even if they were to avoid using it.)

[Blatant Beast]

You do realize you're literally supporting strangebloke's point here? They weren't saying you can't run such a game in 5e, but the rules aren't exactly helping in any way. (That's totally fine by the way, I'd rather insert this kind of aside into my 5e campaign rather than learn a whole new system for one session.)

I can not speak for Strangebloke, (and they might have abandoned the thread), but when they state over the course of several posts that in their thousand of hours of play across many tables, that they have never played in an Intrigue heavy game, that they consider such games "theoretical", and have never known anyone to play in an Intrigue heavy game, and that the rules have no support for such a game.....my takeaway is that they are basically saying 5e does not do Intrigue.(perhaps I misinterpreted their point)

A game's theme is a matter of tone. Tone can be set by the DM, without needing new rules.
Now, some new rules or rules interpretations can also help set the desired tone, but it is not essential.

One does not need an Agatha Christy Rules insert to run a mystery. One does not need a Le Carré rules insert to run a spy campaign.

Indeed, I would even go so far as to state, that sometimes specialized rules decrease immersion.

[Dr.Samurai]

Weirdly I have played out a campaign like this but I was playing a warlock who went hard on Dream/Scrying etc. I don’t think the bad guys ever knew who was in the dreams of all their minions.

The physical infiltration attempts were patchy and being counter-infiltrated certainly created a sense of paranoia. We didn’t have an assassin rogue and while one would have worked just fine there is always another way. The rogue we did have did a very reliable job once they had Reliable Talent and mundane methods don’t trigger magical alarms.

I've always wondered about the potential of Dream.

To pivot a little,
I feel like assassin could be better at making poisosns, envenom weapons is a thing but that is pretty limited and doesn't really capture making deadly concoctions.

This may be me still being frustrated that according to Xanathar's making poisons with a poisoner's kit isn't a thing.
<Grumbling in general frustration with all forms of crafting in 5e> give me more stuff like herbalism kit being able to make healing potions.

Back to infiltration expertise, I do think the less interesting ability was kept in the playtest, I think it could be expanded to all charisma checks instead of just deception.

I am going to point out that Dragon Magazine #111 (I think that was the one), had a Murder Mystery Adventure called Death of an Arch Mage, that took place (in part), over dinner, and with all the suspects staying at the manor, and it involved a three stage poison....which as a kid I loved.

Keep in mind this was in 1e, and at the time I do not think a skill system had been published yet.
(Non Weapon Proficiencies came out latter that year, but they would not have helped with the adventure).

5e is more than capable of handling a murder mystery, or a campaign that deals heavily in intrigue.

Running a Murder Mystery, is less about the rules, and more about creating the atmosphere, and getting the players invested, and then reacting to them. It also likely requires plotting out a timeline of events. The Death of an Arch Mage adventure was a very good example of using organization to help you run a complex adventure, that could go off in many different directions. (The adventure taught me quite a bit)

Perhaps there is more under heaven and earth that you are imagining?

Now, that stated, this would still be a case of the Assassin being a niche class.
My view is hyper specialized abilities, that do one thing really well, are fine, as long as there is also a more generalized component included.

Turn Undead, as a feature is a good example of this, especially when you include the Tasha optional rules.

Turn Undead is awesome against undead, and does nothing against other creatures. Then your cleric subclass will add an additional use option, that often times is more generally applicable. Finally, Harness Divinity can be used to recover a spell slot.

This type of modularity ensures, that Channel Divinity is useful in any number of situations.

The Assassin, is not built this way. The class has a number of very niche abilities, from requiring Surprise to Infiltration Expertise. The subclass simply is not the best example of how to design for 5e....

Lumping these two thoughts together...

My ideal scenario would be to keep Infiltration Expertise/Impostor, and tighten up the language to avoid confusion on what the benefits are. When it comes to niche abilities or clunky/inconvenient abilities (like beast master) my preferred solution is to grant more abilities. Instead of changing the feel of beast master by providing a spirit that you summon, give the subclass other features that aren't tied to the beast, so you can have the benefit of playing a beast master and roleplaying that archetype, without completely losing your subclass features if the beast dies.

For Assassin, I think the features we're discussing shouldn't be the only features they get at those levels. Even Assassinate, while potentially powerful when you get it, only works IF you get Surprise AND go before your target (and hit, of course). So a lot of times you're not benefiting from it. Now you do also gain tool proficiencies, which is not nothing, but I would think something else should be received at level 3. (Or features moved around as others have suggested, as well as adding other features.

The Poisoned Condition is pretty useful. If the Assassin was able to craft poisons as part of their Long Rest, (the Artificer class and infusions, is a potential model that can be used), and the poison used a higher Saving Throw DC based off the Assassin's Dexterity score, that might be interesting.

Drow Poison, with a higher DC can be potent.
Perhaps the Assassin, eventually learns to craft a poison that does what many toxins do in the real world....kills the target, and if the target makes the save, then they take damage.

I think poison crafting definitely makes sense and the assassin should have those features if anyone should.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

If we're going to want to lean into poison, I think three things are necessary.

First, the assassin needs access. That means being able to get poisons by purchasing them, crafting them, conjuring them magically (a favorite from 3E) or generating them through natural means (harvesting poisons from an animal companion or summoned creature was another 3E favorite). It also means that poisons need to be printed. Poisoners need a variety of poisons with differing effects.

Second, the assassin needs opportunity. Poisons take time to apply and don't last forever. Not all poisons are inflicted through injury, either. We're already questioning class features that involve situational non-combat bonuses to situations like disguises and infiltrations, which in my experience are way more common than opportunities to use noncombat poisons. How often are injested poisons going to come up?

Third, the poisons need to be effective. 1d6 damage doesn't cut it. Many things are resistant or immune (specialized poisons can help with this but that gets back to needing them to be printed). The assassin already leans heavily into first-round nova damage; adding extra poison on the first round might not make the strength meaningfully stronger and doesn't do anything to add extra oomph in later rounds.

[Skrum]

Third, the poisons need to be effective. 1d6 damage doesn't cut it.

Total aside, but does poison damage make no sense to anyone else? If a liquid, substance, something, does immediate damage, it has to be doing so on a mechanical or chemical level, which would make it something like acid....which is its own damage type. Poison should be "con save or suffer effect." Not "X poison damage."

[Kane0]

A few extra conditions would be helpful too. Say for example Weakened, Dazed and Confused which would essentially be the same as the effects of the ray of enfeeblement, tashas mind whip and confusion respectively. For those stronger poisons that would do more than just disadvantage without simply adding more damage.

[Theodoxus]

Re: Poison, love the traction that it's getting 4 pages after I suggested it...

One thing that hasn't been pointed out, I've yet to have a Rogue go Assassin in any game I've played or run, for any feature outside of Assassinate at 3rd level. That's been 100% of the reason they go Assassin, and then, if the game gets to 9th level, they've multiclassed into something else (typically Barbarian for the advantage post round 1). Hell, I've seen many players, generally in AL, who try to convince DMs that Assassinate works if their target didn't know the ASSASSIN Was in combat - so they'd attack, run, hide, wait a round, and then try to Assassinate again.

[KorvinStarmast]

Okay, I keep seeing this and it's bugging me.

And it bugged me that you chose not to comment on my nondetection suggestion as compared to the Barbarian feature.

Exactly right, AT is stronger.

It's held its own since the PHB came out.

I want the ability replaced

Right. Then tell me what you think about my suggested folding in of nondetection, which I compared to the 10th level Barbarian feature.

[JellyPooga]

Total aside, but does poison damage make no sense to anyone else? If a liquid, substance, something, does immediate damage, it has to be doing so on a mechanical or chemical level, which would make it something like acid....which is its own damage type. Poison should be "con save or suffer effect." Not "X poison damage."

Hard agree. While some extremely virulent poisons might do immediate damage, their effects should be debilitating rather than damaging IMO. Paralysis (whole and/or localised) and unconsciousness should be the most common, in my opinion, but in a fantasy setting we also have the luxury of magical effects being applied by poisons; petrification, sleep, blindness (also applicable by mundane means), fear and more should also be on the table for sure.

[KorvinStarmast]

Hard agree. While some extremely virulent poisons might do immediate damage, their effects should be debilitating rather than damaging IMO. Paralysis (whole and/or localised) and unconsciousness should be the most common, in my opinion, but in a fantasy setting we also have the luxury of magical effects being applied by poisons; petrification, sleep, blindness (also applicable by mundane means), fear and more should also be on the table for sure.

Or a poison the imitates something like the Feeblemind spell (though not quite as strong) ... as an old fart, I am not going to recommend something like Dementia in a Bottle, but certainly something like a confusion spell but also reflecting memory and other processes ... until the poison is neutralized.

[QuickLyRaiNbow]

Total aside, but does poison damage make no sense to anyone else? If a liquid, substance, something, does immediate damage, it has to be doing so on a mechanical or chemical level, which would make it something like acid....which is its own damage type. Poison should be "con save or suffer effect." Not "X poison damage."

That's how it worked in 3E, and it wasn't that useful, partly because it was faster to just kill things with damage, especially since being good with poisons is also often coupled with Sneak Attack. There are cases where ability damage or other effects are useful, but they're either weird (use a blowgun to do minimum damage to inflict sleep poison to kidnap someone, meaning you're deactivating your Sneak Attack feature) or super super super niche (put an injested Wisdom damage poison in the soup served at the meal the guy is eating at so he'll be more susceptible to the Charm you're going to use later).

[Darth Credence]

I would agree with the idea that poison should do things other than damage, I think part of the problem with that will go back to the HP is meat discussion. If HP is more than just meat, then poison doing damage makes sense - it lowers the capacity of the combatant to remain in combat, which is represented as HP. Let's take sarin gas - you get a whiff of that, and you can get pain, difficulty breathing, loss of muscle control, cramps, coughing, convulsions, loss of consciousness, paralysis, and more, up to death. Some of those would be best represented as conditions, some would be best represented as HP loss (I'm thinking pain most specifically).

So, I'm on the side of poison should absolutely have more effects, but HP damage is still appropriate to reflect some effects of poison.

[Sorinth]

That's exactly why the damage should be higher, to compensate for poison's drawbacks. (Though it's worth pointing out that even with poison being the most-resisted element, there are still fewer monsters overall that resist it than don't, and it's not like the Assassin will do less damage or be less effective than other rogues even if they were to avoid using it.)

Yeah they won't be less effective since they can choose whether to convert or not but generally speaking I do think Assassin should be the more DPR focused subclass. Personally I don't think it matters whether that added DPR comes from poison, getting extra attack, or something else entirely, poison is thematic so it does makes a lot of sense to use that as the means of increasing that DPR.

[Sorinth]

Total aside, but does poison damage make no sense to anyone else? If a liquid, substance, something, does immediate damage, it has to be doing so on a mechanical or chemical level, which would make it something like acid....which is its own damage type. Poison should be "con save or suffer effect." Not "X poison damage."

Well even if it takes a poison 20 minutes to kill someone it's not like at 19:54 you are acting at 100% which is what happens under certain interpretations of damage/hp. The more you lean into the idea that HP is plot armour the more poison as damage makes sense.

[Telonius]

So a bit higher damage, but with how items are in 5e not a whole lot missing comparatively.

The 3.5 comparison is a bit more complicated than just that. 3.5 didn't limit the number of times you could sneak attack per round. If you were flanking with a foe, you'd get sneak damage every time you hit. With the right feats (Two-Weapon Fighting feat tree and the Craven feat), those numbers would add up quickly - if you hit. Rogues had a lower Base Attack Bonus than most melee classes, so they connected less often.

In 3.5, it was trickier to get Sneak Attack to apply to ranged combat. You needed to get your target in a position where they were denied their dex bonus to AC. Again, you could do it, but you had to jump through a whole lot of hoops to do so. (Sniping rules were ... complicated).

The other big difference is that in 3.5, there were whole classes of enemy that were flat-out immune to Sneak Attack, Undead and Constructs being the most notable. There were ways to overcome that (like Weapon Crystals), but they were added on in splatbooks and not used in every campaign. So if you were fighting a necromancer's horde, the Rogue would often be plinking away with 1d6's and feeling useless, when the rest of the melee classes were using Power Attack to deal a whole lot more.