We ran into an issue in our game today, and I’m just wondering if anyone else has seen this or might know a solution.
One of our players is (well, was…) a ranger. Every time he would use animal companion (after level 5, this wasn’t always the case), it would instantly aggro him and start a combat. No one else had him marked as an enemy, only the ranger. We once tried attacking it when we were in camp, and Astorian ran over to heal it. If no one made any moves and just ended their turn, the combat rotation just went in circles and nothing would happen. Does this sound familiar to anyone?
Outside of sneak damage (which in longer combats/higher difficulties is micromanaging hell in combat) every other class except cleric* consistently out-damages rogues. You can kinda make up the difference with the dual hand crossbow/Thief subclass cheese, but only until level 6 where every other class (except cleric*) awakens and can consistently do more damage per round after the first round. If you never get into combat, like your example, rogues can be powerful, but realistically a barbarian with half the levels will have better action economy and damage per turn the second combat starts.
*This isn’t to say clerics can’t be powerhouses, but the best/consistent damage output for clerics isn’t online until level 8+(war domain multi with either paladin or fighter, or monk if you want to be extra spicy), at which point your cleric really should be focused on healing/buffing and not doing practically any damage themselves.
Rogues aren’t meant to be your primary damage dealers…? They’re best employed for their skills (talking, opening shit, stealing, being your lover, etc) over their combat abilities. They generally have more skill points to spend and more proficiencies. But I still agree that in the video game, stealth kinda sucks. Cones of vision are too wide for the smallish areas pretty much every encounter happens in. Plus there is no day/night cycle, and most of the game is spent in the sun.
Unlike something like WoW, d&d rogues aren’t “dps.” Clerics too. They focus more on healing, history, religion, and control through buffs/debuffs.
If you just want maximum damage output: Be a monk.
Fair,I do find that Rogue does make up for it though. Their versatility ( arrows can be a game changer as well as their spells if applicable.) And their usefulness outside of combat with lockpicking/trap disarming expertise, as well as their 3nhanced perception does help a lot.
When it comes to archery, I feel like Astarion either does a lot of damage or none. If you like dual hand crossbows you can have issues because there are only like 4 or 5 different ones in the game. Making you stuck with a normal one, or a +1 one for the majority of the game while the rest of your party probably has a kitted out weapon.
I feel like Larian did overnerf archers. It was the same thing in d2os. I didn’t like how archers felt at all and the damage felt very weak compared to the other classes. Sebille, the dual daggers rogue would practically one-shot act 3 mobs while Ifan feels like he is doing 10 damage. I always reclassed him to be more summons or magic based as a result, which has the added bonus of not making his wolf summon completely useless. (Though still outclassed by the incarnate, especially since wolf needs source points to summon.) I find archers a bit more useful in bg3, Astarion can get some pretty high hit %s compared with the rest. Hes steadily at an 80-90% chance to hit while everyone else feels like they are 60-80%. I do feel like they could use multi attack though. Arcane trickster feels awkward without bring able to cast laughter or grease and shoot with the arrows.
I haven’t really messed with melee Astarion but I feel like the game does not encourage the Sebille gameplay. There aren’t enough mobility options for that. It’s a shame too because I found the Sebille gameplay pretty fun.
Longbow battlemaster fighter is almost as good at committing war crimes as it is in stock dnd, biggest downside is I don’t think you can choose to activate the “add battle die to your attack roll” post attack like you can in stock.
I’m sure it falls of a little, but it’s a pretty good nova at level 5.
I fail to see how an archer can be bad when there are black powder arrows. You litteraly spew fireballs that push enemies!
Havent seen a single one of those
For this, the low level cap really is what hurts. If you don’t mind being slightly underpowered for act I, going Shadow Monk/Assassin will get you Sebille-like gameplay. Shadow Monks get teleportation relatively early on, and their skills complement any class features/feats that increase sneak damage multipliers.
They’re still over all outclassed since Larian’s changes to the 5e ruleset and features really don’t favor stealth for the most part, but you can make something close to a melee sneak build viable especially if you’re not playing on tactician.
I mostly play on tactician because I find balanced too easy now haha. My ranger playthrough is balanced and that honestly feels more hardmode than tactician becsuse ranger just feels so bad. It feels like it does nothing good and is outclassed. Atleast rogue has out of combat use, but rangers don’t even get lockpicking/etc bonuses outside of your general dex bonuses. Plus summons based rangers are practically unplayable because of them counting towards the crime system, making you feel like mods are nigh on mandatory for that kind of playthrough. I did want to play a vanilla playthrough, though, but I keep gravitating towards my modded ones…