Melle rouge build tips

[mattig]

Hidy ho all,

I had this idea a while ago, but after beating this game so completely on my 360, I was kind of sick of it.

I'm coming back to it, and was wondering if anyone else tried this build and how they were most successfull.

my idea is to create a mellee rouge brawler. Has anyone else tried this? If so, how did you find yourself to be the most successfull?

[Nova225]

Basically light armor, dual daggers, focus on dual weilding. Don't pump more then 22 something strength for the best light armor, and focus the rest into dexterity and cunning, with maybe dabbling in willpower if you're desperate for some extra stamina. Specializations in Assassin and Duelist should give you the most bang for your buck in terms of raw damage.

Always position yourself for backstabs. There's a few talents in the rogue tree that increase the backstab range to 90 degrees left and right behind the target, and another that trades strength for cunning in terms of damage considerations. With dual daggers, armor will pretty much not exist for your enemies, and you'll be dropping crits.

Biggest disadvantage is mages. You don't have much health and your resists won't be very high. Dragons are also a pain in the ass since they can knock you away everytime you try to backstab. Luckily they're not immune to paralysis.

[Hjelpmooglene]

^ Focusing on either dexterity or cunning might also help. Example: You could just put just enough points into dex to wield daggers and get rogue talents, then focus the rest of your points into cunning. Bard specialization might also be good if you plan to focus on cunning.

Enemies with special abilities will be super annoying. Overwelm, knockback, and stun can spell doom for your rogue. Some enemies in the dlc will be even more annoying.

[mattig]

Thanks for the help all, is there any way to deal with those annoying enemies?

Also, is there a particular backstory that might make it more fun? I'm leaning more towards a dwarf pesant, or an elf rouge, but not really decided on anything yet.

[Hjelpmooglene]

You can paralyze, stun, or freeze them before they can hit you. A dwarf noble or a city elf will work, but you can use whatever you feel is best.

[mattig]

right-o. to me, nobles are warriors. the streets are where you find rouges.

Would I be focusing on those guys with special ability? Or is there a way I can get the tacics menu to focus on the guys with the special abilities?

[Hjelpmooglene]

Originally posted by mattig89ch:

right-o. to me, nobles are warriors. the streets are where you find rouges.

Would I be focusing on those guys with special ability? Or is there a way I can get the tacics menu to focus on the guys with the special abilities?

For the most part, you would have to control the party member to disable enemies. The game likes to send out hordes of enemies that can give you a bad day. You can set up your party tactics to handle most scenarios, but some fights need micromanagement.

[mattig]

fair enough, my quetion is, which tactics would help to target those troublesome enemies? I have't actually started up the game yet, school work calleth.

[Nova225]

You could set up a tactic on your mage to use crushing prison or paralyze on an enemy mage, which would lockdown said mage.

[Hjelpmooglene]

These are just some examples and they may not work for every enemy.
Rogues: Set stun talents for self->when attacked by melee
Warrior: Stun and knockback talents the same although you should keep the 2-handed sweep talent for when surronded by multiple enemies
Mages:Mind blast->when surronded by enemies
cone of cold->when attacked by melee*friendly fire spell*
Paralyze->enemy-target is elite or higher

Some of the better mage crowd control spells have friendly fire or the AI tends to screw it up. So I tend control the party member when using those aoe spells. Enemies can resist most stun abilities, but they can be paralyzed or frozen.

[mattig]

hokay, so I just played through the city elf starting path. I do kind of feel that, that was a good path to start as a rouge. I really enjoyed killing that one guy (don't want to spoil), and then explaining it to the king. His reaction was priceless.

I pumped my strength up to 20 to be able to wear the battledress of the provacur. Now I'm going to be leaving that alone for a bit to focus on my other skills.

It seems that my main skills are dexterity, cunning, and constitution. Dex to avoid being hit, cunning to be able to act like a rouge, and con because when I get hit I don't get one-shotted.

Do I have that about right?

[K00lex]

You don't really need to add CON, STR, or WIL, if you go to Circle Tower after Lothering. You also don't need CON, if you have enough DEX, Armor, and/or Stealth.
Concentrate on DEX at start. Aim for 24 DEX first, then, put the rest into CUN. Then, split between DEX & CUN, up to 30 to get Whirlwind. Then, 36 if you want Dual Weapon Mastery.
Get Combat Training Level 3, while working to get Momentum and Lethality.
You can wait on getting Combat Movement and Coup De Grace, if you micromanage your rogue and position him/her behind opponents.
Skip Dual-Striking Tree until late in the game, and you have extra talents to play around.
Get Dual Weapon Finesse and Expert in-between skill-talent lag to get Combat Training-3 and Momentum. If you are frontal assault dual-wielding rogue, you can wait on Stealth Tree until after Lethality, otherwise, get up to Combat Stealth in-between skill-talent-level lag with Lethality & Assassin/Bard talents.
If you have Stone Prisoner DLC, go to Honnleath early and get Helm of Honnleath (my rogue used it all the way thru Awakening).
Always sustain Song of Courage to increase Attack, Damage, & Critical Chance. Synergy with CUN-focus build.
You don't really need Feign Death, Captivating Song, or Evasion (I didn't like the extra seconds used to run parrying animation, which interrupts my rogue's fast attacks, thus reducing DPS.)
After Combat Training-4, get Coercion , Stealing, and/or Poison-Making. Then, Survival.
If you have problem opening locked chests (even with all the CUN you are pumping), put a point or two into Deft Hands Tree.
In combat, use Dirty Fighting as an opening move, then reposition around for backstab attacks. Or, use Flurry. If you have Coup De Grace, then attack with"backstab" without repositioning. Save time and increased DPS. I hardly use Deadly Strike or Cripple. Occasionally, Below The Belt. Sometimes, Dual-Weapon Sweep when 2 or more in front of my rogue. Whirlwind when surrounded. Later in game, Riposte or Publisher as opening move with disabling effect. Never Dual-Striking, since you want to hit critically almost all the time.
Before leaving Lothering, be sure to buy Thorn of the Dead God dagger. Wear Dalish Armor for DEX bonus, until Shadow of the Empire. Then, finally Felon's Coat.
Save money to purchase Rose Thorn dagger.
If you played thru DLCs, pair RT with Dead Thaig Shank or Duncan's Dagger. Or, 3rd-tier Thorn of the Dead God.
With this build, your rogue can solo in Nightmare level. Enjoy...

[mattig]

wow, thats alot of info. awesome info, but alot.

ok, I was hoping to be an in your face kind of rouge. Not a real big fan of micromanaging in general, thats when the game becomes alot less fun for me. I like to interfere when needed, not need to interfere after every sword swing.

I've never really looked at the bard skill tree, but I will start looking at it now. Heres a thought, I played through this game on my 360. Can I transfer that save data (unlocks ect.) to my pc?

I didn't really like the look of dual striking, slowing down my attack for a slightly increased damage didn't seem like a good deal.

It has been while, so I really don't remember where you can unlock all of the sub classes. Some I do, others i'm fuzzy on.

I was going to try and even out my unlocks, to help build a more well-rouded character. But, if unlocking pure attack early will help more throughout the game, then I guess thats what I'll do.

Is there a rough limit for the game to stop putting points into dex? For ex, if I shoot for 36 dex from the start, is that all I'll need for the rest of the game?

Thanks for the feedback!

[Nova225]

Unfortunately Rogues are better for the backstabbing portion, so if you're going to be a melee rogue, you either need to get a lot of paralyze runes and rely on Coup De Grace, or you're going to have to reposition for backstabs constantly. Warriors are better "in your face" dual wielders, where as rogues are better for sneaking around and getting constant criticals.

As for stats, I like to put 2 into cunning and one into dexterity. Cunning is your main source of damage once you get lethality. Dexterity helps a little bit, but cunning also improves armor penetration, as well as effecting what talent you can get, so you want to pump more into cunning then dexterity overall. It doesn't hurt to put points into DEX though, since it helps with your defense as well.

[K00lex]

Originally posted by mattig89ch:

ok, I was hoping to be an in your face kind of rouge. Not a real big fan of micromanaging in general, thats when the game becomes alot less fun for me. I like to interfere when needed, not need to interfere after every sword swing.

Well, when I played a Dwarf Noble Rogue, I role-played to be a frontal attack 'honorable' fencer, i.e. no use of stealth, no poison blades, and no backstabbing (except auto-backstab via Coup De Grace). So, I don't bother with repositioning for a sneak attack or hide in shadows. ;-)

I played on PC, so with auto-attack, there isn't much micro-managing. If Tactics doesn't initiate an attack at start of combat, I'd just select a target, activate a talent, and check on companions. After the initial talent (most likely Dirty Fighting or Riposte) is used, my rogue will continue to attack via auto-attack, so I'd just monitor or cast spells from the mage companion or check targets for the archer.

Originally posted by mattig89ch:

I've never really looked at the bard skill tree, but I will start looking at it now. Heres a thought, I played through this game on my 360. Can I transfer that save data (unlocks ect.) to my pc?

No, you can't transfer savegames on DA:O or DA2 across platforms. However, you can set up a World State via Dragon Age Keep, then use these decision points in new DA: Inquisition game.

I used Song of Courage for my tank, my melee rogue, and my archers. Since almost all my rogue playthroughs are built with high CUN, the benefits of this talent is very high, especially, for increasing critial chance percentages. :-)
Duelist talents aren't that useful, since they are only for one character.

Originally posted by mattig89ch:

I didn't really like the look of dual striking, slowing down my attack for a slightly increased damage didn't seem like a good deal.

The increase damage is useless, when your rogue can't do critical attacks (with Dual Striking). So, better use Momentum and Lethality (with high CUN) for high DPS.
Oh, high CUN also increases Armor Penetration, so rogue's daggers are very effective DPS weapons against Elite/Boss enemies.

Originally posted by mattig89ch:

It has been while, so I really don't remember where you can unlock all of the sub classes. Some I do, others i'm fuzzy on.

Quick summary: Assassin from Zevran, Bard from Leliana, Duelist from Isabela, Ranger via book from Bodahn; Templar from Alistair, Berserker from Oghren, Reaver from Kohlgrim, Champion from Arl Eamon; Shapeshifter from Morrigan, Spirit Healer via a book from Wonders of Thedas, Blood Mage from Desire Demon, and Arcane Warrior from elven spirit in phylactery. See http://dragonage.wikia.com/wiki/Classes_and_specializations_(Origins)

Originally posted by mattig89ch:

I was going to try and even out my unlocks, to help build a more well-rouded character. But, if unlocking pure attack early will help more throughout the game, then I guess thats what I'll do.

Is there a rough limit for the game to stop putting points into dex? For ex, if I shoot for 36 dex from the start, is that all I'll need for the rest of the game?

Thanks for the feedback!

Remember to acount for extra bonus attribute points from the Fade during Circle Tower quest. I let DEX get up to 36 naturally & with Circle Tower, then, it goes up higher from wearing armor, helm, gloves, boots, amulet, belt, and rings. My DEF is 130+ by Battle of Denerim, and I don't even other to get Evasion or use Dodge percentages, as most enemies can't hit me. :-p

In the beginning, Alistair can be your tank, until you recruit Sten or Oghren, or convert a mage into Arcane Warrior (with sword & shield). Leliana can pick locks & detect/disarm traps (with her 2 levels of Deft Hands) until your own CUN gets high enough to surpass hers. Zevran can make poisons & grenades. Morrigan can mix potions & salves. So, yeah, reply on companions to help you, until you become a one-man killing machine. ;-)