More than Epic Traps?

[DeepFriedMoose]

I feel your pain, Steve. Sounds like I made the exact same "type" of rogue. He's pretty new yet, and I'm a pretty pro-active player, so we'll see where it goes. (I'm not implying in anyway that you were not pro-active with yours, by the way, just to be clear.)

Power Creep is almost always unintentional, by it's nature. But it is rather something that needs to be carefully tended to, like a garden full against weeds, you know? I believe it was Blizzard that first coined the term "Power Creep" due to the expansions they were releasing with WoW, but it was also evident on games like Runescape. They just didn't have a word for it yet.

It's something to be vigilant against, and I would ask, truly humbly, for the player-base to be aware of it, and to avoid falling into it as well. It is a slippery slope, and all too easy to fall in line with.

[LetterOfTheLaw]

The playerbase obviously plays a part, but when you can run into +18 to-hit goblins in a CR 7 area it sort of promotes a certain mindset.

Never seen a trap that nasty (never been further than mid-levels), maybe the chest was full of paladins? It's possible to stack traps on the ground, but I wonder if it's possible on an object.

[DeepFriedMoose]

The playerbase obviously plays a part, but when you can run into +18 to-hit goblins in a CR 7 area it sort of promotes a certain mindset.

Never seen a trap that nasty (never been further than mid-levels), maybe the chest was full of paladins? It's possible to stack traps on the ground, but I wonder if it's possible on an object.

This might be a bit of a chicken-and-egg scenario, but the way it usually goes is a few people make a power build, and start rolling though content like it's nothing, then complain that it's not even remotely challenging, so the difficulty gets ratcheted up. Over the course of a couple of generations, this leads to +18 to-hit goblins.

It can be fixed, though. It just takes time, determination, and the will to see it through.

[Tsidkenu]

The MMO solo-grind powerbuild mindset is unfortunately one of the staples of BGTSCC and the reason for so many quirky 'powerbuilt' mobs to attempt to curb the roflstomp. This is why most, if not all, high tier bosses have saving throws in the 30-40's, with various other extraneous immunities (eg. death magic immunity, avasculate immunity, mind spell immunity, knockdown immunity, negative energy immunity, sonic immunity, +5000 hitpoints) so a DC 42 Wail necromancer can't just wander on by, POP, collect loot, move on.

While I don't necessarily agree with having 446 damage divine traps, they do bring back that hint of caution for solo grinders that maybe, just maybe, they should bring a dedicated trapspringer with them next time

[DeepFriedMoose]

If that's the case, Tsikendu, then it is what it is.

Again, power creep is killing classes, and catering to power builds because they whine about the game being too easy leads to power creep. Because of this, rogues are caught in the middle, with nowhere to go. Can't stab a b**** because monster AC is too high. Only role left is dungeons.

But, power creep cuts twice here, because in response to random wizards strolling around cleaning house, traps get ratcheted up, too. Only now they kill everything, including the rogue, because there is no save on any of the traps either.

Net result: playing a rogue sucks balls, so nobody plays them, and now there's nobody around to open deadly chests.

"It wasn't the Powerbuilds. It was us that killed the Beast."

[Blackman D]

except a trap isnt gonna kill a rogue who invests in disarm and search, DCs are actually not that high but only trapfinders can disarm 20+ DC

my trapper can recover all of the epics which is a higher DC than just disarming them

[Nemni]

Again, power creep is killing classes, and catering to power builds because they whine about the game being too easy leads to power creep.

I can't remember seeing much of this. There are still several areas on the server that are so difficult that few people ever go there. (Which is also a risk/reward issue).

I also don't think there has been all that much power creep in classes. Look at the druid. It's still very much top of the pile in most categories, yet it received its buffs many years ago. Classes introduced lately are typically balanced to a lower power standard.

Power creep is more true for items, but the Avernus shop was partly introduced to cancel the big advantage some players had for grandfathered gear, which is gear that has been along for a long time.

[Egg Shen]

My rogues can handle all traps and pretty much solo the whole server with the help of some consumables. *shrugs* Are they 'powerbuilds?' Yes, I suppose they are. Do I feel my roleplay is somehow hampered by my character being a powerbuild? No.

If I had the same character and re-rolled him as a mechanically weaker version of himself, lets say rogue 30 with no HIPS, his personality wouldn't change. He'd still have the same friends and enemies, still have the same idiosynchrasies and fears and interests and goals. All the stuff that really matters when you think of what makes up an actual person.

Would this mechanically weaker character have access to more "roleplay" skills, such as diplomacy? Sure, but that's incidental in this case because rogue has lots of skill points. It won't always work out that way. And while I know we're supposed to "play our character sheet," I don't think you'll get hit with the ban hammer for saying something diplomatic without having ranks in the skill. The core of what makes up your character doesn't have all that much to do with your character sheet (I suppose with the possible exception of clerics, which are lame characters that nobody should be playing... )

So on a server like ours, my advice is just to play a strong build so you don't have to come here and complain about something that is entirely within your power to fix.

As for the OP, yeah that's a pretty brutal trap. I'm on the fence about whether to feel bad for you, though. On the one hand, we've had a decade of learning that rogues aren't really needed here, so when something like this happens it's easy to get peeved. But at the same time, it's nice to have some fear when playing as well (and I can't say my rogues are sad to see a drawback for bashing chests and making their singular and signature ability not be completely irrelevant).

[Steve]

Lack of development of Skills shouldn't prevent a character from attempting and kind of action, it's simply the result based on the challenge (DC) that will manifest...or not.

Even if your Toon has 33 points in Diplomacy, that's not a recipe for Epic I Win in Diplomacy Everytime RP. Even a 33 Diplo character can fail her Action if they role a 1 and the DC is 35.

Point is that Fun should be seen in attempting Actions both in and above the "known" skill set, and appreciate the result! I often bang my keyboard then have a good laugh when the Engine pwns my Toon because of something action I choose for it. It's a game people!!!

[Hoihe]

[snark] You all know there's a single-player version of this game if you want to solo everything, right? [/snark]

I'm all for requiring a dedicated rogue* to successfully loot a dungeon. "Loot runs" are an MMO thing, and do not belong on an RP D&D server, even a "Medium" RP server. Fight me.

This is Dungeons and Dragons. Dungeons are not safe places with guaranteed success, even if you've been through that same dungeon before. Some type of spell-casting (buffs) is needed for any non-fighter class (Monk, Rogue, Bard(?) etc.) to successfully survive areas within a character's CR. Fighter-classes can tank it out with the right build (see below), but even they use wands, wards, or dip into a spell-class to make it through with efficiency. And spell-casters are always wise to bring some kind of Melee-class to run interference against monsters, although, it seems many of them can buff themselves up to a level that it doesn't make a huge difference. It makes perfect sense that, if you want to maximize the amount of gold/loot you get from a dungeon, bring a rogue.

Side note: I would also highly encourage the staff to add the "broken item" % chance when bashing open a chest.

The power-creep that I've noticed happening over the last few years is starting to get on my nerves. Powerbuilds are almost required to play on this server at this point. They are required if you expect any measure of success in PvP. It's utterly ridiculous.

Over the last year, the majority of builds that I see regularly fall into only two types: Casters or High AB Melee classes. Usually some mix of both. Many of them dip into rogue classes to get around certain obstacles built into their "base" class, and that usually seems to be in order to get UMD to skirt around alignment/class requirements on items. (e.g. gaming the system to further power-build). It seems to me that every-other "Build Request" is Gish. Gish gish gish gish gish gish. Is everyone so interested in soloing the content on this server?

Yes, between timezones, rp conflict, etc. it can be rough. I'd like to turn that around and say it's just as rough for a pure rogue* class, because there's nobody around to buff or protect them when bad stuff goes down. Such is the limits of the class system. Squishy mages don't get their loot, my rogue gets killed by goblins. Constantly. We all have our cross to bear.


All that being said, Rogues* get it hard. Didn't dip into a HiPS PrC? Dead. Fail a trap disarm? Dead. The only trap I've found in the entire server that allows a reflex save is Spike Traps, and the rare Electric trap. It pretty much sweeps Evasion and Improved Evasion off into a corner, to be dusted off when PvP happens. "Solo" rogues should be just as hard to pull off as solo-anything, but I see a couple of fairly common rogue-based power-builds, usually for PvP. This is a party-based game. Party up, or just accept the consequences.

* (Yes, that means a ROGUE, not yet another powerbuild.)

Having tons of skills sucks. Some DMs will just take your HD, add 15 and call it a day as the DC.

Even if that skill, for that task, is supposed to just take a roll of 15, so you only trained it to 10 ranks with 8 ability mod. Boom, you can't do the routine action.

Why spend skill points on craft X if you could spend it on UMD, tumble, spot/listen, H/MS?


As for gishes. Let's make a clarification. You're talking about muscle gishes who ward every 3-6 mins and use their spellbook as nothing but Haste, haste haste and haste.

Try to play a character who practices mystran restraint and only uses spells when overwhelmed when it comes to their melee weapon. Practically impossible past a certain CR - you need tons of AB and tons of caster stat and feats to have a decent impact.

As for rogues - why play a rogue if literally your party runs at the chests, bashes the lock and eats the traps before you even react? "Oh, let's make traps lethal to anyone." Great, time for 900+ damage traps because of Earth Genasi WM/FBs. Also, they should for no reason pierce all forms of DR. And also, no evasion safe. Also, must require 35+ disable device roll to avoid dips.

Speaking of dips. I absolutely hate how many skills have inflated DCs. We've got a ton of skills - yet if something ROUTINE with nothing threatening you from performing it properly takes a DC above 30... why bother?

[Rask]

The MMO solo-grind powerbuild mindset is unfortunately one of the staples of BGTSCC and the reason for so many quirky 'powerbuilt' mobs to attempt to curb the roflstomp. This is why most, if not all, high tier bosses have saving throws in the 30-40's, with various other extraneous immunities (eg. death magic immunity, avasculate immunity, mind spell immunity, knockdown immunity, negative energy immunity, sonic immunity, +5000 hitpoints) so a DC 42 Wail necromancer can't just wander on by, POP, collect loot, move on.

While I don't necessarily agree with having 446 damage divine traps, they do bring back that hint of caution for solo grinders that maybe, just maybe, they should bring a dedicated trapspringer with them next time

Unfortunately the true reason for insane traps and sudden shot up in enemy difficulty in late levels. It's funny because DM's try to encourage builds that favour RP over power, but the actual server areas promote power-building since if you build for RP, some areas become impossible to traverse.

[electric mayhem]

A take 20 on disarm checks for rogues would go a long way to helping.
My utility rogue (whilst mid level still) occasionally fails on some traps rolling 1-5. Morally demeaning.

Why do we take 20 on open lock and Heal skills... yet no disarm traps?

[Hoihe]

A take 20 on disarm checks for rogues would go a long way to helping.
My utility rogue (whilst mid level still) occasionally fails on some traps rolling 1-5. Morally demeaning.

Why do we take 20 on open lock and Heal skills... yet no disarm traps?

Take 20 implies that rolling below the DC doesn't mean failure; that you can try again. For Heal, this means that given the time to properly dress a wound, you'll always treat it at the best of your ability. Do notice "provided you have enough time" - you can't take 20 mid-combat, and I'd argue you shouldn't when stabilizing someone - failing on the first try might mean they bleed out. Furthermore, taking 20 is based on the idea that skills can NOT have critical success or critical failure. Merely, you do your best or your worst, but neither will guarantee failure or success. Someone who has 33 lore(x) will never end up unable to answer simple questions, even if roused from sleep (rolls 1). Furthermore, Peasant Joe will never answer a DC 30 question by rolling 20 on lore(X)

Take 10 is the other option. Take 10 implies that you are NOT under duress and can call upon your routine knowledge. Do note : routine. When taking 10, you are NOT taking risks, but in exchange you won't get exceptional results, just average. Usually, you take 10 when you know that the task is routine for someone your skills, but don't want to take the risk of rolling say 2, when you'd need 3 to pass.

You can take 10 on pretty much any skill, but only when Out of Combat or are otherwise not under duress. Yes, this means you can take 10 on tumble to climb a vertical wall without failure, provided you are not being chased. The only "tax" you have to pay for take 10 is that you forfeit the ability to, for that attempt, to pass DCs that require you to roll 11 or more.

As such, Disable Device could be given Take 10 as an option when out of combat.

[Tsidkenu]

Rogues already get a bonus feat (Skill Mastery) that lets them not roll lower than 5 in or out of combat on disable device (includes set trap, pick pocket & open locks as well). If you're sick of failing on rolls of 1-5, take that feat

[electric mayhem]

Rogues already get a bonus feat (Skill Mastery) that lets them not roll lower than 5 in or out of combat on disable device (includes set trap, pick pocket & open locks as well). If you're sick of failing on rolls of 1-5, take that feat

Oh! Didn't know about that one! Cheers for the tip Tsid.