Recently, there have been several different discussions about how
a Rogue can be played? Opinions varied between high Armor Class (AC) and low
AC; choices of weapons; to use magic as protective supports or as
offensive weapons etc... All these stems from the fact that the
Rogue is easily the most versatile character class in Diablo
Classic (IMO at least). Play her as a minimage, a warrior or an
archer. It makes little difference as she can be just as
effective and powerful no matter which style you play.
How should one play a Rogue? To answer this, you might want to
consider the following questions:
- Would you prefer the "safer" high-AC approach, or
the "more delicate" low-AC approach?
- For your weapons, would you rather use the
"traditional" weapon (ie. the bow), or maximise the use
of your high dex by using sword(or club)/shield?
- With regards to magic, would you prefer using magic as a
means of defence and transportation, or as a primary means of
attack as well?
- Are you content to play the Rogue as it is, or would you
want to try out more challenging variants?
This guide serves to provide a little bit of insight about the
various ways you can play a Rogue. It is divided into the
following sections:
- I
- - High AC vs Low AC
- II
- - Ranged Attack vs Melee
- III
- - Magic Usage
- IV
- - Stealth Play
- V
- - Equipment
- VI
- - Playing Styles
- VII
- - Rogue Variants
- VIII
- - Excellent Links
High AC vs Low AC
High AC
"Having a high AC means that enemies will miss you most of
the time, allowing you to massacre them more easily as you will
not have to go through hit recovery or blocking. Naturally, you
will not get stunlocked as well..."
- Pros:
- you will very seldom get hit by enemies and can thus survive more easily against mobs
- Cons:
- AC gives NO protection, IIRC, against any form of magical attack such as spit, Bloodstars n Fireballs,
- lose the possibility of having a beneficial prefix on your armour (good suffix are hard to come by on awesome plates too),
- IMO, it really is quite difficult to obtain a good high-AC
armour with a good suffix.
-
Typical examples:
- Awesome/Saintly Fullplates of Sorcery/Stars/Precision etc...
Low AC
"Since high AC is much safer and allows for more careless
play, why play low AC? Obviously, both have their
advantages..."
- Pros:
- have a beneficial prefix such as +resist on the armour, thus
freeing up a jewelry slot for +mana
- good low-AC armour are easier to come by since any base item
type will do,
- most good combinations (such as Obsidian/Stars) are
purchasable at Griswold.
- Cons:
- if not careful, will get torn apart vs melee creatures as they
have autohit against you.
-
Typical examples:
- Naj's Plate/Sacvenger's Carapace
- Obsidian (or other +resist) shirt of Stars/Sorcery/Precision/Giants etc...
Essentially the difference lies in the ease at which the enemies
can hit you. For high AC, you sacrifice one prefix slot for a
greater comfort zone as the enemies will have much difficulties
hitting you. For low AC, though the advantage of the added prefix
can be great, the danger and thrill of low AC cannot be
underestimated. All in all, it would depend on the way you play
(whether you are careful or reckless).
For less experienced gamers, I would certainly recommend high AC
as it allows for a greater degree of carelessness and improves
your chances of survival in the dungeons.
Ranged Attack vs Melee
Bows
"The starting weapon of a Rogue and the area where she is
really VERY proficient in, no class can match the Rogue in using
the bow as a weapon..."
- Pros:
- very fast rate of fire, the only weapon a Rogue can stun an
advocate with,
- bows usually tends to deal more damage per unit time than
melee weapons (except Civerb's Cudgel) for Rogues,
- very high to-hit considering the amount of dex the Rogue
possesses,
- kills the enemies before the enemies reaches you, thus greater
safety.
- Cons:
- no shield, thus no blocking and the loss of a prefix and
suffix,
- durability goes down quite fast (small point since gold is
abundant),
- does less damage than certain melee weapons.
- Typical examples:
- Savage Bow of Heavens: high damage bow with +all
- Emerald Bow of Heavens: resist bow with +all
- Jade/Massive Bow of Swiftness: fast bow with great potential
Melee
"With high dex, a Rogue has high to-hit, perfect blocking and
high AC. With decent magic, a Rogue has rather high virtual
hitpoints as well, making her a lean mean fighting machine..."
- Pros:
- blocking, thus allowing less hits to go through, hence less damage taken
- additional slots for a good prefix/suffix
- tends to have a higher AC than when using bows
- certain setups provides a much faster rate of kill (think CC)
- Cons:
- ranged attackers may be a problem until telekill is mastered
- much slower swing rate than bows, thus some monsters cannot be stunlocked
- damage is low in general
- Typical examples:
- Kings Sword of Haste: hasted weapons
- Kings Sword of Vamps: vampiric weapons
- Civerb's Cudgel: the fastest killing weapon (IMO) for Rogues
- Dreamflange: ideal for mini-maging
Difference here again lies in personal preference and styles.
Both melee and bows have their advantages but luck with
equipment/drops do affect how you play sometimes too. Eg, you'll
never be able to play sword/shield well if you can't find a
decent sword and a decent shield, likewise you can hardly be a
good archer if all the bows you find are pathetic.
For less experienced gamers, I would recommend bows. Arrows are
unlimited and bows should be enough for you to survive well
enough to learn the game and develop your own style.
Magic Usage
Magic is a very powerful "thing" and can be an extremely
useful allies if used well. Below are some of the most widely
used (???) spells for Rogues:
Defence
- Heal:
mainly for non-Manashield Rogues)
- Manashield:
the Rogue has pretty decent magic and mana, so why not make use of it?
- StoneCurse:
very helpful for keeping enemies at bay and reducing the number
of enemies you have to face.
Offence (F-Fire, L-Lightning, M-Magic)
- Fireball (F):
the highest damage fire spell (and perhaps overall as well)
- Guardian (F):
useful for attracting the enemies bit by bit
- Chain Lightning (L):
can be potentially VERY damaging (ie. kill a pack of Balrogs in
hell/hell with one cast?) For how to cast it well, check out this site:
Moriah's Chain Lightning Demonstration
- Charged Bolts (L):
for how to cast it well, check out this site:
Charged Bolt: How-to and pictorial
- Bone Spirit (M):
can be used to attract enemies from around corners, otherwise
useless.
- Flash (M):
'Teleflash' kills non-magic immune creatures very quickly
Miscellaneous
- Golem:
this supernatural being can be used both in offence and
defence. Beware of bloodstars though.
- Teleport
- Town Portal
Depending on the individual, there may be other good scouting
spells such as Flame Wave and Elemental. Lightning is also a good
substitute for Chain Lightning in certain situation and before
you really mastered the intricate ways of Chain Lightning.
Magic is useful but it is up to the individual whether he/she
wants to use magic as a primary weapon. Magic can usually do more
damage per unit time than melee/bows but is often restricted in
higher difficulty levels as the enemies get immune/resistant to
magic.
Stealth Play
A very often neglected aspect of gameplay is stealth. The
darkness is a very powerful weapon which can easily by used to
your fullest advantage. Why would you want to go stealth in the
first place?
One scenario where stealth comes in very useful is during item
recovery. If you have just lost your equipment to monsters, it
may be rather difficult at times to go in there and get your
equipment back. After all, if the enemies are strong enough to
kill you while you are wearing your best equipment, they must
surely be capable of killing you without your best equipment. By
going stealth, you can either activate one enemy at a time, thus
making them easier prey; or you can use Infravision or some
lighted projectile (e.g. Firebolt, Bloodstar, Lightning arrow
etc) to locate the enemies and avoid them altogether. That way,
item recovery becomes much easier, especially if telekinesis is
used. A good item recovery guide can be found at Cat's page.
Stealth can also be a playing style as well. Town portal or
guardian spells can be used to light up the environment (just the
dungeon, NOT the monsters) for an extended period of time so that
you will know where to go. Elemental arrows (ie from bows of
lightning/thunder/burning etc), and other magical projectiles
such as bloodstar can be used to locate monsters. Firing arrows
or projectiles into the darkness beyond your light radius (and
even off the screen) enables the Rogue to kill many enemies
without even seeing them.
Some typical gear would include Nightscape, Gotterdamerung.
Equipment
Headgear:
In my opinion, there are really only three good headgears for
Rogues:
- Royal Circlet
(AC40, +10% light, +10 to all, +40 mana)
- No matter how you play your Rogue, the Royal Circlet has only
benefits and is a good helm in all cases.
- Thinking Cap
(AC 2-4, +20% resist all, +1 slvl, +30 mana)
- more for mini-mages, the Thinking Cap provides spell levels and
some resistance.
- Obsidian [heagear] of Sorcery
(+31-40% resist all,
+16-20 magic) - again more for mini-mages, this headgear provides up to 20 magic and frees up a jewelry slot for +mana.
Another possible helm is the
Gotterdamerung (AC60, -40% light, +20 to all, NO resist) - The major drawback here is the lack of resistance, which can
really hurt. One way out is to leave it unidentified and use it
for the 60 AC it provides (which IMO is not all that great for a
Rogue which already has lots of AC due to high dex.
Yet another possible but "not-so-all-round" helm is the Helm of Sprits
(AC6-8, 5% lifesteal)
- Drawback here is the lack of AC and the lack of other benefits.
The lifesteal effect can be rather useful when using the CC setup
but not as good otherwise (as Rogue's melee damage is rather
pathetic).
Armour:
- High AC
- Essentially, this means high-end Awesome or Saintly Full Plates
(AC70-75) provided up to 187 AC. Good suffix can vary from Giants
(for wearing the plate), Sorcery (providing magic for
spell-casting) and Stars (for good +all).
- Low AC
- Non-unique armour will typically have a good +resist
(Obsidian, Ruby, Diamond, Sapphire depending on needs and
availability) as prefix, and Precision, Sorcery or Stars as
suffix.
- Uniques would include Naj's Light Plate and the Scavenger's
Carapace.
- The Naj's is an good mini-mage equipment, providing magic,
resistance, spell level.
- The SC gives -15 dfe as well as lightning resist, thus reducing
chance of being stunned.
Jewels:
- Prefixes:
Basically, there are only two good types prefixes: +mana and +resist. My suggestion would be to try to reduce the number of +resist jewels to 2 or less, so that more +mana jewels can be used.
- Suffixes:
IMO, there are two types of good suffix types: +all and +mag.
Magic allows greater efficiency and effectiveness of a Rogue's
spell capabilities while + all gives good damage, magic (and thus
overall advantages).
- Notes:
Essentially, the jewelry setups usually depends not on
what you want but more on what you have. Good jewels are VERY
hard to come by, so you likely have to make do with what you have
at hand.
Bows:
- Damage bows
Most highly prized is perhaps the Savage LWB of Heavens as
merciless/ruthless cannot be generated together with heavens. The
+all effect has good all-round effects and adds significant
damage for a Rogue. Bows along this lines are useful for low-mid
level Rogues but start to lose their shine as the Rogue
progresses in levels (thus gaining significantly large character
damage).
- Elemental bows
Though its category is a bit dubious as elemental bows are also
high damage bows, they are really in a league of their own.
Versus creatures not immune to the element, these bows can deal
spectacular damage (due to a bug perhaps), MANY times over with
one arrow compared to non-elemental bows. Examples are Merciless
Long War Bow of Thunder (for Lightning) or Burning (for Fire).
- Resistance bows
At higher levels, the damage bonus from a damage prefix has makes
much less difference. On the other hand, a resist bow helps to
provide resistance, freeing up a possible jewel slot for +mana.
Good for mid-high level Rogues whose character damage starts to
weigh a lot more than weapon damage.
- Swiftness bows
Though damage may be less at first, at higher levels, Swiftness
bows can do more damage than the typical "damage bows".
It has the added advantage of being able to keep several monsters
in stunlock at the same time (in particular knights and witches).
This keeps you from being mobbed. Again, good for mid-high level
Rogues whose character damage starts to get significant.
- The Gnat Sting (HELLFIRE only)
A highly under-rated bow, the Gnat Sting gives the Rogue the
ability to fire three arrows with one click (thus doing 300+
damage possibly). This gives the advantage of keeping up to three
enemies (usually witches and knights); or enables the rapid
massacre of one single enemy. Good position and firing angles
have to be practised before the benefits of this bow can be
optimised. In general, if you want three arrows from this bow,
you will have to fire slower, at around once per 0.50 seconds
(compared to 0.35 seconds for normal bows). This means that
certain enemies (ie Advocates) will escape if you fire three
arrows, so you would have to go for rapid fire (only one arrow)
in certain cases. But still, the offer of triple damage is too
great for me to resist.
Note: Unique bows and knockback bows are deliberately left out as
they pale in comparison to the bows listed above and have very
limited benefits.
Melee Weapons:
- Hasted Weapons
Mainly to speed up attack rate and thus damage per unit time.
Preferably with a prefix that adds damage (such as King's or
Merciless series).
- Vampiric Weapons
Economical, especially a Rogue that uses Manashield. Preferably
with a prefix that adds damage (such as King's or Merciless
series).
- Civerb's Cudgel
The fastest weapon for killing enemies in hell. x3 TOTAL damage
vs Demons is no joke and cannot be underestimated.
- Dreamflange
+30 magic, +50mana, +1 slvl, +50% resist magic. Need I say
more? A typical mini-mage weapon.
Shields:
- Fast-block Shields
In particular, Stormshield and Holy Defender. Fast block really
helps a lot in the ability of a Rogue to melee multiple enemies
at one time.
- High AC Shields
Awesome, Holy shields are usually used and good suffixes may be
+hitpoints or of Ages. Actually there are few good suffixes to
speak of but +hitpoints and of Ages are probably the best there
are IMO.
- Resistance Shields
Obsidian/Emerald shields provide some resistance, freeing up some
slots for jewels.
Playing Styles
Playing styles greatly depend on the individual and there is no
fixed style or best style to play a Rogue due to her versatility.
Some sample styles and setups are (but not restricted to):
- Archer possible setup (in this case low AC)
- Royal Circlet (RC)
- Obsidian Shirt of Stars
- Savage Bow of Heavens
- Obs/Zod
- Dragon/Zod x2
- Archer Mini-mage possible setup (in this case high AC)
- Thinking Cap (TC)
- Awesome Plate of Sorcery
- Emerald Bow of Heavens
- Dragon/Zod x3
- Sword/Shield possible setup (in this case high AC)
- RC
- Awesome Plate of Stars
- KSOH
- Stormshield (SS)
- Obs/Zod x2
- Dragon/Zod
- Sword/Shield Mini-Mage possible setup (in this case low AC)
- TC
- Obsidian Shirt of Sorcery
- KSOV (or KSOH)
- Obsidian Shield of Tiger
- Dragon/Zod x3
- CC/Shield possible setup (in this case high AC)
- RC
- Awesome Plate of Precision
- Civerb's Cudgel
- Stormshield
- Obs/Zod x2
- Dragon/Zod
- Mini-Mage possible setup (in this case low AC)
- Thinking Cap
- Naj's Plate (or Scavenger's Carapace)
- DF
- Emerald Shield of Ages
- Dragon/Zod x3
- Mini-Mage possible setup 2 (in this case high AC)
- TC
- Awesome Plate
- Dreamflange
- Stormshield
- Obs/Zod x2
- Dragon/Zod
As can be seen, there are so many different styles to play a
Rogue with vastly different equipment setups.
Which is the best setup? Which is the most effective for you? The
only way to find out is to try them out yourself and see which
suits you best... For all you know, none of these styles may suit
you; or more than one style maybe comfortable for you and you
might want to play a combined style (eg melee Rogue with various
weapons); or vary your style depending on monster mix (eg
CAT-Rogue)
How I Play My Rogue
Having played all sorts of styles and variants of Rogues, I have
now ended up with very few setups that have maintained my
interest. One of them is my first Rogue, the other being my first
amazon (a triple class one):
- Icewynd (AMZ) lvl 40+ (one setup)
- Ruby Crown of Sorcery (60%)
- Ruby Armour of the Tiger (60%)
- Ruby Sword of Speed (60%)
- Ruby Shield of Ages (56%)
- Ruby Amulet of Zod (54%)
- Ruby Ring (60%)
- Ruby Ring of Wizardry (58%)
A purely obsessive setup with a total of 408% resist fire
(out of a max of 420). Is it efficient? Nope. Is it an overkill
on resist fire? Yes. Do I have difficulty playing this character?
Yes. But was it fun? Yes (for me at least).
- Myriam lvl 44
- Thinking Cap
- Ruby Shirt of Stars (??/11)
- Emerald Bow of Heavens (50/15)
- Dragon/Zod (56/16)
- Drake/Zod (47/20)
- Drake/Wiz (45/28)
Emerald Shield of Ages (50)
CC, KSOH and KSOV. Lack of a fastblock shield really hurts at times causing a total
lack of efficiency sometimes but again, the most important thing
of all is to have FUN!?! Isn't it?
Rogue Variants
Tired of playing the Rogue as it is? or finding the killing of
Diablo too easy even at hell difficulty? Bored of not being able
to improve your setups anymore? If your answer is yes, you might
want to try out some variants of play.
Woody's Asylum
Home of the nude nation, this site offers many original
variants such as Beyond Naked Rogues (BNR), Archers (ARC) and
archetype characters. If you have any problems, you can also
visit the forum there -- the Nude Beach, where many variant
players gather.
Charis' Diablo Variants
Home of the Amazons. This site offers 1001 "second
generation" variants. Anything you can possibly think of
might be in there. The largest and most developed variant there
is perhaps the Amazons (AMZ) together with various amazon dual-
or even triple-class.
- Other variants by Charis includes the Nightshadow (NtS),
Seraph, Bodybuilder (BB), Elemental Sorceress and many countless
other excellent variants (most of which have been dotted before
to show their feasibility. Variants by other players are also
offerred, such as Sorceresses and Savages.
Living off the Land (LoL)
If you want a challenge and don't want to be bogged down by
heavy rules, try living off the land, a style which you literally
"lives off the land", using only equipment and stuff
found in the dungeons etc.
Excellent Links
Some excellent sites providing an insight on playing Rogues:
(1) Lochnar's Freshman Diablo (for newbies):
(2) Shuri's Multiplayer Guide to Rogues
For tips/guides on spellcasting:
(3) Moriah's Diablo Strategy - Chain Lightning
(4) DSG Strategy Tips Page - Charged Bolts
(5) Charis' Diablo Variants and Strategy - Teleflash
For interesting variants for Rogues or other classes:
(6) Woody's Diablo Asylum: (home of the Beyond Naked Way and many other playing variants)
(7) Charis' Diablo Variants and Strategy (home of the Amazons and tons of other variants)
(8) Bostic's Living off the Land (LoL) Rules
Hope I have helped in any way. Comments/nits welcome.
Ice(BNR)
"Versatility is strength."
HP: Caverns of Ice
Entertainment.