this post was submitted on 20 Oct 2025
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Hot take, rogues shouldn't exist. It's more entertaining for any other class to do their job. Every hero from fantasy is a thief at some point, but a specialist just takes most of the jobs adventurers do, and throws them into one pile. You parties will be more useful without a rogue.
For example, fantasy's most famous burglar wasn't a rogue. Bilbo was a commoner who was hired as a burglar. Do you think the Hobbit would have been better if Bilbo was amazing at his job?
Big disagree, though still upvoted you cause that is a hell of a hot take.
Sneaky stabbers are cool, and I like skill monkies. Not just 'the theivery havers', but also the bag of tricks, the preppers. Batman is basically a rogue.
And, sure, it can be interesting to have the party be bad at Stealth on purpose. To have to bumble their way through everything. I don't think Rogues are strictly necessary. But I like that they're an option.
I mean, I can kind of understand the perspective. Having one party member being responsible for non-combat skills is suggestive of an extremely combat-focused game design. I come from systems where having skill monkies isn't practical due to the breadth of the skill system; someone doing the job of a rogue in D&D would have to wildly outlevel the rest of the party.
Then again, those systems are typically more grounded than having PCs become powerful enough to butt heads with demigods after a year of adventuring, so D&D having a bit of a cartoonish vibe to it is very much in character. It's not a flaw, it just feels different. I still think it's kinda funny, though.
"Here's Joe, he hits things with a sword and is athletic. There's Bob, he gets angry and hits things with an axe and is athletic. Over there's Jim; he turns into animals and hits things and knows stuff about nature, plus he's athletic. Lucy here hits things with a blessed mace and can heal people and is athletic. And that's Wayne, our salesman locksmith armorer medic seaman carpenter commando."
Rogues aren't really designed to be good at everything, they are designed to be very good at a few skills (in 5e). Bards are the 'generalists' (which, imo. is blatantly OP considering they are also good spell-casters).
PF2e is where they just kinda get all the skills (along with investigators).
Bards wouldn't exist without rogues. They're just a symptom of the problem.