Revising the Thief Acrobat

[Josh_Kablack]

because the original is straight-up weaker than a core rogue, multiclasses poorly, even with sneak attack, deals less damage in melee than a fire mage; because carrying around a 10' pole is a stupid legacy of gygax because we actually have Tome skill feats now; because requiring a class feature to use a grappling hook is dumb, and because tumbling into umbral banyons is just bad flavor. But most especially because I was putting off work on the game I'm actually running.

(revised)Thief Acrobat

(based on the original from Frank and K's dungeonomicon)

"They put their safe on the ceiling, it's like they wanted me to take these scrolls."

While the common rogue is a thief, con-man, and scout extraordinaire, the thief acrobat is a highly trained specialist in the art of housebreaking and feats of dexterity and acrobatics. As an adventurer, they are masters of negotiating difficult terrain and situations with flair and panache. Masters of athletics and gymnastics, they hone their art to a level that seems to be magical to the initiated. Most use these skills to gain the easy score or poorly defended hoard, but some take up the life of an adventurer as a chance to test their purely mortals skills against the world full of magic and supernatural creatures. 

Playing a Thief acrobat: The thief acrobat gets many skill-based feats, and has other abilities that involve skill use, so it is highly important that they have enough skill ranks to take advantage of these, therefore you probably want Int as your highest attribute. Dex and Str can also be important as combat stats and as the basis for many of your skills.

Alignment: Thief Acrobats tend to have a cavilier attitude about the laws of whatever society they are in, and so many are chaotic. However it requires a lot of dedication to master such acrobatic feats and honor among thieves is not just a saying, so equally many are lawful.

Races: Any, but especially the 400 meter high hurdle

Starting Gold: 4d4x10 gp (100 gold)

Starting Age: As Rogue

Hit Die: d6
Class Skills: The Thief Acrobat's skills (and the key ability for each skill) are Appraise (Int), Balance (Dex), Bluff (Cha), Climb (Str), Craft (Int), Diplomacy (Cha), Disable Device (Int), Escape Artist (Dex), Hide (Dex), Jump (Str), Listen (Wis), Move Silently (Dex), Perform (Cha), Profession (Wis), Search (Int), Sense Motive (Wis), Sleight of Hand (Dex), Spot (Wis), Swim (Str), Tumble (Dex), Use Magic Device (Cha), and Use Rope (Dex).

Skill Points/Level: 6 + Intelligence Bonus
BAB: Medium (+3/4level), Saves: Fort: Poor; Reflex: Good; Will: Poor

I am still back and forth on the BAB. Giving it +1/level risks overshadowing the core rogue and the Tome Samurai, but giving it +3/4 means that even with sneak attack included, it's still behind the melee damage of the fire mage until 6th level, and without sneak attack it's a noncombatant. Hopefully death from above and noncombat utility compensates

Level, Benefit
1 Acrobatic Flair, Athleticism, Trapfinding,
2 +1d6 Sneak Attack, Evasion, Acrobatic Jump
3 Bonus Feat, Kip Up, detect magic
4 +2d6 Sneak Attack, Death From Above
5  Rapid Stealth, Power Slide
6 +3d6 Sneak Attack, Mercurial Charge 
7  Bonus Feat, Unsettling Choreography
8  +4d6 Sneak Attack, Improved Evasion 
9  Athletic Cascade, Skill Mastery.
10 +5d6 Sneak Attack
11 Bonus Feat, Aggressive Stealth
12 +6d6 Sneak Attack, Dedicated Evasion (standard action) 
13  Planar Tumble
14  +7d6 Sneak Attack, Dedicated Evasion (move action)
15  Bonus Feat
16 +8d6 Sneak Attack, Dedicated Evasion (protect ally)
17 Supreme Evasion
18 +9d6 Sneak Attack, Supreme Skill Mastery
19 Bonus Feat. Supreme Pizza
20 +10d6 Sneak Attack, The Perfect Caper

All of the following are Class Features of the Thief Acrobat class:
Weapon and Armor Proficiency: Thief Acrobats are proficient with all simple weapons, as well as the sap, the shortsword, the whip, bolas, the long staff, and the shuriken. Thief Acrobats are proficient with light armor but not with shields of any kind.

Acrobatic Flair (Ex): A Thief Acrobat may move her full movement while using the Tumble or Balance skill without suffering a penalty or increasing the DC of her check.

Athleticism (Ex): A Thief acrobat adds her class level to any Climb, Swim or Jump check she makes. Her jump distances are not limited by her height.

Trapfinding: At 1st level, Thief Acrobats can use the Search skill to locate traps when the task has a Difficulty Class higher than 20. 
Finding a nonmagical trap has a DC of at least 20, or higher if it is well hidden. Finding a magic trap has a DC of 25 + the level of the spell used to create it.
Thief Acrobats can use the Disable Device skill to disarm magic traps. A magic trap generally has a DC of 25 + the level of the spell used to create it.
An Thief Acrobat who beats a trap’s DC by 10 or more with a Disable Device check can study a trap, figure out how it works, and bypass it (with her party) without disarming it.

Acrobatic Jump (Ex): A thief acrobat of 2nd level or higher can jump 10' in any direction as an immediate action. This does not count against her normal movement limit nor prevent her from taking a 5' step that she would otherwise be entitled to. Movement during such a jump provokes AoOs as usual (although the thief acrobat may use Tumble or similar abilities to avoid doing so).

Sneak Attack (Ex): At 2nd level, a Thief Acrobat gains the sneak attack ability as a Rogue. Her sneak attacks inflict an extra d6 of damage at 2nd level. This damage increases by 1d6 at every even level

Evasion (Ex): If a 2nd level Thief Acrobat succeeds in a Reflex Save to halve damage, she suffers no damage instead.

Bonus Feats: At 3rd, 7th, 11th, 15th and 19th, a thief acrobat gains a bonus [Skill] feat. These bonus feats must be feats for Thief Acrobat Class skills.

Here's the list:

Appraise: Acquirer's Eye
Balance: Steady Stance
Bluff: Con Artist,
Climb: Super Scaler
Craft (Int) - no skill feat in PDF tome compilation, and I'm sure we don't care
Diplomacy: Leadership, Persuasive
Disable Device: Professional Luddite
Escape Artist: Slippery Contortionist
Hide: Stealth
Jump: Leap of the Heavens
Listen: Alertness
Move Silently: Ghost Step
Perform (Cha) - no skill feat in PDF tome compilation, do we even care?
Profession - no skill feat in PDF tome compilation and I'm sure we don't care.
Search: Investigator
Sense Motive: Natural Empath
Sleight of Hand: Deft Fingers
Spot: Sharp-Eyed
Swim: Swim like a fish
Tumble: Acrobatic
Use Magic Device: Item Master
Use Rope: Legendary Wrangler

This lets a given thief acrobat gain a climb speed or be immune to falling damage or gain a swim speed or ignore squeezing penalties etc.

Kip Up (Ex): At 3rd level, a Thief Acrobat may stand up from prone as a free action that does not provoke an attack of opportunity.

Detect Magic (Sp): At 3rd level, a Thief Acrobat may use detect magic at-will. A Thief Acrobat may use her Appraise Skill in place of her Spellcraft in order to glean additional information from her detect magic.

Death From Above (Ex): At 4th level, the Thief Acrobat has learned to use the energy of a fall to devastating effect. If she falls at least 30’ (by falling from a height or by using a Jump check) and ends within or adjacent to an enemy's square, any attacks she makes at the end of that fall deal extra damage equal to her sneak attack dice. Note that this is not actually a sneak attack and so can effect creatures immune to sneak attack, and if the requirements for sneak attack are also met, this damage stacks with sneak attack dice. Note also that this ability does not reduce falling damage, so you may want to look into feats, skills or items for that sort of thing.

Power Slide (Ex): If a 5th level Thief Acrobat takes damage from an attack, she may allow herself to be flung backwards , thereby lessening the impact. She may make a Balance check with a DC equal to the damage inflicted and if she succeeds, she suffers only half damage. This is a skill check, not a Saving Throw, so abilities such as Evasion do not apply. She is moved away from the source of damage by 5' for every 5 points of damage (or part there of) negated in this way. If there is not enough space for her to move, she suffers a d6 of damage for each square not moved. Movement due to Power Slide provokes attacks of opportunity as usual (although the thief acrobat may use Tumble or similar abilities to avoid doing so).

Rapid Stealth (Ex): At level 5, the Thief Acrobat does not suffer the -10 penalty to Move Silently or Hide for moving at her full normal speed. She still suffers the normal -20 penalties to hide and move silently for running or fighting if she performs those actions.

Mercurial Charge (Ex): At level 6, a Thief Acrobat need not move in a straight line to charge, nor must she charge the closest available space. She still may not move back on herself during a charge, and her charge move still ends as soon as she threatens her target.

Unsettling Choreography (Ex): A Thief Acrobat of 7th level is adept at making other creatures fall down, and may use her Dexterity Modifier in place of her Strength modifier when making a trip or bullrush attempt.

Improved Evasion (Ex): When a Thief Acrobat of 8th level fails a Reflex Save to halve damage, she takes half damage anyway.

Athletic Cascade (Ex): At 9th level, if a Thief Acrobat moves before making an attack, for the purposes of flanking she may count any square she has moved through as threatening an opponent, in addition to the space she is actually attacking from. In this manner, she may even flank with herself

Skill Mastery (Ex): At 9th level, a Thief Acrobat is able to take 10 on any Appraise, Balance, Disable Device, Jump, Hide, Move Silently, and Tumble checks even in stressful or dangerous situations.

Aggressive Stealth (Ex): A Thief Acrobat of 11th level does not suffer the -20 penalty to Hide or Move Silently checks for running or fighting.

Dedicated Evasion (Ex): At 12th level, a Thief Acrobat gains the ability to evade with almost supernatural skill. As a standard action, she can add her Thief Acrobat level as a Dodge bonus to her Reflex Saves and AC for one round. At 14th level she may activate this ability as a move action and at 16th level she elect to apply this dodge bonus to one adjacent ally instead of herself.

Planar Tumble (Su): At 13th level, a Thief Acrobat can take shortcuts through local terrain by contorting herself through whichever tranistory plane(s) happen to be most coexistent. As a move action, she may place herself a number of feet away from her starting point equal to the result of a Tumble Check. She ignores any and all intervening terrain (even walls of force) and creatures (even if they are grappling, pinning or have swallowed her whole). This ability does not work in planar or demi-planar regions where there are no coexistent transitive planes (which is pretty much just The Far Realm and personal demiplanes whose owners have used morphic traits to block, unless your MC is being a jerk.)

Supreme Evasion (Ex): At 17th level, a Thief acrobat takes no damage from any effect requiring a Reflex save.

Supreme Skill Mastery (Ex)  At 18th level, a Thief Acrobat is able to take 20 on any Appraise, Balance, Disable Device, Jump, Hide, Move Silently, and Tumble checks even in stressful or dangerous situations, and does not take twenty times as long as usual for taking 20.

Supreme Pizza (Ex): At 19th level, the thief acrobat's acquisitive ways transcend the game, and the thief acrobat's player is no longer expected to kick in when the gaming group orders food. Despite such chitziness, other players must abide by the thief acrobat player's choice of toppings (although this is limited to the toppings listed on the menu) or quietly pick them off. You wanna play a 19th level game, you gotta deal with anchovies.

The Perfect Caper (Ex): At 20th level, a Thief acrobat steals the gods' greatest treasure and wins D&D.

[RadiantPhoenix]

Supreme Pizza (Ex): At 19th level, the thief acrobat's acquisitive ways transcend the game, and the thief acrobat's player is no longer expected to kick in when the gaming group orders food. Despite such chitziness, other players must abide by the thief acrobat player's choice of toppings or quietly pick them off. You wanna play a 19th level game, you gotta deal with anchovies.

I think this ability might be overpowered...

I want the pizza with diamonds! a thousand of them! Each the size of my fist!

[Josh_Kablack]

Right-o, Nerfed that.

[CatharzGodfoot]

Finally, a capstone that's really worth it!

[OgreBattle]

Has anyone used this in a game yet?

[Aryxbez]

Didn't even know this thread existed until it was brought up, I actually thought it was a "new" thread, revising on this class. The 3rd level Free Action Prone is a nice touch, and kinda reminds me how warrior types shouldn't be as helpless while prone. Though, I actually liked the notion of the Quarterstaff for it, kinda gave it some unique flavor among other Rogue-type classes (even if a Gygax reference, like to the 80's cartoon).