Making A Rogue-Friendly RPG Part 2: The Rogue's Role
One of my favorite strips in "Knights of the Dinner Table" (A comic about... believe it or not... RPG players) is entitled "It Takes a Thief." Bob, the player of the group's thief (rogue), is late for the game, and so the party is attempting to get some playing done without him.

The Game Master, B.A., sets the stage for a contest in town with a very valuable prize that their characters could participate in. He explains, "An ornate rug approximately fifty feet by fifty feet square covers the center of the flagstone pavement. Dead center in the middle of the rug is a fine golden goblet. It is encrusted with gems around its rim. And sitting in it is a marvelous ovate opal."

He goes on to explain the rules. "The nice lady explains to the group that the first person to take possession of the gem without bearing down on the rug may keep the opal and the goblet. But here are the rules! You can not walk on the carpet. You cannot suspend someone over the carpet. You cannot attempt to hit the goblet or stone with any kind of missile or thrown item. And you cannot use magic items or spells to accomplish the task." There are twelve other (non-player-character) travellers attempting the puzzle, and each participant is only allowed one attempt per day.

The players struggle for three hours (and several in-game days) trying to solve the puzzle, with no luck. Their attempts get disqualified because of the use of magic. One player attempts to disbelieve the rug as an illusion and just walk over it, to see if its all a trick. They attempt to pole vault across the rug (missing woefully). They try to send a trained monkey across to pick up the gem. They try stilts. They build a small catapult to fling a player across the room - resulting in no goblet and a lot of damage as he strikes the wall on the other side. They plan to build a suspension bridge across the courtyard, but are told that it is not allowed.

Finally, Bob shows up. The other players express their woes, and one player expresses the opinion, "Don't bother, Bob. It's a no-solver that B.A. threw at us to keep us occupied until you showed up."

After Bob hears the rules, he says, "Well, let me start with the most obvious solution. I kneel down on my knees at the edge of the rug and begin to roll it up. When I get to the middle, I'll reach over and pick up the goblet and the opal."

B.A. exclaims, "That's it! The opal and the goblet are yours!"

The other players stare at Bob in disbelief, and then in frustration. He says to them, "Sorry, dudes. Sometimes it just 'takes a thief!'" (Then he decides not to share his treasures, and dances a mocking jig on the table. The other players rip up his character sheet and pour soda down his pants. He got off easy.)

Rogue Is a State of Mind
Now, playing a rogue in an RPG isn't necessarily going to translate to clever outside-the-box thinking on the part of the player (at least for most players). But I think it illustrates a point that I promised to talk regarding some concrete ways to make a more rogue-friendly RPG.

Rogue is as much a state of mind as it is a set of rogue-like skills. The rogue, to me, is the outside-the-box thinker. They follow the fighter-pilot admonition "If you ain't cheatin', you ain't tryin'." And they in some way embody the trickster achetype - Loki, Coyote, Raven, Brer Rabbit, Puck, and others.

When given the choice of the lady and the tiger, the rogue is the guy who tries to open both doors at the same time, and then make his escape while the tiger is busy eating the lady, and then trying to figure out how to run off with the princess later. The rogue is Captain Kirk reprogramming the simulation so that he could beat the Kobiyashi Maru scenario. The rogue gets around the rules, possibly even breaking the rules, often choosing higher risk for higher reward.

Which undoubtably annoys other players in a multiplayer game when the risks don't pan out.

Motivation many vary, but in general what a rogue player in an RPG wants to feel like he's contributing to the group's success (in a multiplayer game) in a meaningful way, has the chance to really shine with his unique abilities once in a while, and that he gets to do it all by being clever, tricky, and and cunning rather than just being mightier-than-all-opposition.

A Rogue By Any Other Name
Of course, this isn't limited to a rogue "class" (particularly if you are playing a non-class-based system). Any player or character can have a rogue mindset. An RPG might have several rogue-like classes that specialize in cleverness and non-traditional tactics under different names: Swashbuckler, smuggler, netrunner, thief, scoundrel, fixer, secret agent, scout, whatever. Or it might be a classless system.

In Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, the illusionist class (pre-3rd edition, when it became just a specialization) had plenty of roguelike potential. It was also very hard to play well, as the sheer flexibility and power of the spells tended to confuse players. I thought the Enchanter class in EverQuest had more of a roguish style of play than the rogue class itself. When they weren't being tapped as little more than a mana battery.

Mixing Rogues And Non-Rogues
Sun Tzu talks about the orthodox and the unorthodox giving rise to each other, and how the combination of unorthodox surprise attack and the orthodox direct attack, used in combination, lead to victory. In a party-based game, the rogue is (at least in theory) the unorthodox specialist. Even if orthodox combat, in the real world, scouting, espionage, and surveillance is a critical activity... all rogue-like specialties. Laying siege to a castle isn't necessary if you've got an "inside man" who can leave the back door open for you.

The roguely route might be offer the chance of the highest reward for the least resources, but it also often yields to the highest risk. Clever plans go south. That's where the rest of the group comes in to pull the rogue's butt out of the fire --- er, I mean, provide a backup contingency plan. When you finally get caught sneaking through the Imperial battle station trying to rescue the princess, it's time for a few straight-up fights while you make your escape.

Playing the Rogue
Playing a rogue well in a dice & paper RPG (and precious few CRPGs) means taking a pro-active rather than reactive stance in regards to using one's... unique talents. The rogue shouldn't be waiting around for the game (or game master) to throw her an opportunity to use her skills. This is why things like disarming traps, spotting secret doors, and unlocking doors - things which people automatically think of when you talk about rogues in a traditional medieval fantasy RPG - are really weak applications for rogues. Sure, it's nice to help them feel needed. And those kinds of activities can be a amusing... for the rogue, at least. Everyone else just sits around waiting for the rogue to make her rolls, though, idly wondering if she'll keel over dead from a botched trap-disarm check.

A Rogue-Friendly Game System
Consequently, a good rogue-friendly game system should include skills usable by the rogue at any time - or at least in common situations. Disarming traps is a special case situation (which requires additional work by the level designers). But what about setting traps? I can attest by experience that this was the single most powerful rogue skill in Neverwinter Nights and Baldur's Gate II (In BG2, I think I killed Demogorgon this way... )

Another great addition to Dungeons & Dragons third edition was the "Use Magic Device" skill. This was actually based on an old first-edition, little-used high-level rogue trick of using magical scrolls. People get confused by the name of this skill... maybe it should be called "subvert magic device" or "hack magic device." This skill makes the rogue capable of cheating to make a magical item work that would otherwise require some kind of special criteria (or "security clearance") to operate. To its credit, Dungeons & Dragons Online does provide this skill, and I take full advantage of it... though I think the activation checks are set a little too high.

There are lots of really fun rogue-like verbs that can be implemented by a game system, though not all rogues will bother with all of them: lie, subvert, reveal, steal, cheat, conceal, spy, swindle, fast-talk, infiltrate, forge, entrap, seduce, escape, misdirect, outwit, sneak, disable, intimidate, disarm, mislead, lock, unlock, deceive, bypass, confuse, obfuscate, ensnare, scout, camouflage, trick, incapacitate, assassinate, discover, divert, outmaneuver...

Sorry, I fell asleep on the enumeration, there. Where was I?

Designing Adventures For Rogues
If putting the above into a computer RPG was easy, everyone would be doing it. We'd have RPGs out there now that would sound like the retelling of a classic adventure novel, rather than a play-by-play of a thousand rounds of whack-a-mole. There are some nasty problems:

#1 - The challenge and flow (and FUN) of the game is based upon the idea that the players will engage the obstacles in a traditional manner. Bypassing those challenges and skipping to the reward (a very roguely thing to do) would "ruin" the game. (As a side note, I sidestepped most of one of the more challenging end-game encounters in Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines via a maxed-out stealth skill. I should note that while that segment of the game was much easier than it was probably supposed to be, it was also a lot of fun for me than most).

#2 - Too often rogue-oriented tasks are special-cased into the game. This ensures that they are expensive to create (and therefore rare), and will frustrate players whose characters don't have the necessary skills to succeed in the specially coded scenarios, as most players feel entitled to all of the game's content.

#3 - In a multiplayer game, you want to keep the party together doing the same activity in which everyone can participate and have fun. This means downplaying anything that the rogue would best do solo.

#4 - Many rogue-like activities are social. Computers don't do anything resembling human sociality very well. Most CRPGs have just given up on the concept and divided the world into two types of interactive creatures: Those that you fight, and those that stand around waiting to dispense canned prose like a human-shaped vending machine. And for the purpose of generating lots of combat, the players are usually led to spend most of their time in unfriendly territory where engaging in chit-chat with those you come across is just not expected.

#5 - With saved games and easy resurrections / respawning, the high risk / high reward options lack the element of "high risk." There becomes no reason for players NOT to pursue the riskier option.

#6 - Depending upon the game system you are using, many non-combat activities are resolved with a single random check (and maybe not even that --- with saved games, they might effectively be resolved automatically --- the player will just keep restoring until they get a favorable result for anything important). That's not interesting gameplay. Interesting gameplay involves decisions and interaction. Which means complicating things up and adding some kind of mini-game (like the combat mini-game) for specialized roguely (or non-roguely) actions. Note: I'm gonna praise Oblivion here again for doing just that - not that the mini-games were great, but they were a step in the right direction IMO.

#7 - Artificial Intelligence is stupid, and doesn't usually learn from its mistakes. So allowing a player to "outwit" her AI opponents is sorta like giving her a barrel of fish to shoot for the ENTIRE GAME. The same tricks will work over and over again (like the aforementioned traps in Bioware's games) until they become boring. And boring isn't a winning game design element.

In a future article, I will outline some examples I've encountered in previous RPGs (computer, massively multiplayer, and dice-and-paper) that have overcome these challenges (or, in roguely fashion, neatly bypassed them altogether), as well as some ideas that have been bouncing around in my brain for dealing with 'em. And my experience is limited - feel free to help me fill in the gaping, wide holes I've left here. I'm anxious to hear your thoughts and ideas on this!


(Vaguely) related meaningless ponderings:
* RPG Design: The Brute Force Problem
* RPG Design: Why Can't I Get Past the Stupid Door?
* Game Design: Fixing Interactive Storytelling
* The Evolution of Computer RPGs
* RPG Design Seed Challenge
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Labels: Game Design, Roleplaying Games

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