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The B/X Rogue $4.00
Average Rating:4.7 / 5
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The B/X Rogue
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The B/X Rogue
Publisher: Necrotic Gnome
by Aaron J. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 01/16/2020 17:21:00

I love these rules. They take something that I always felt was rather arbitrary collection of unrelated skills and turned it into a coherent system. I've banned the original Assassin classes at my table, but I've allowed them back in via this B/X Rogue class because HERE they actually make some sense.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The B/X Rogue
Publisher: Necrotic Gnome
by Mica G. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 07/05/2017 19:43:28

I intend to buy EVERYTHING put out by NGP. Everything... The B/X Rogue and the B/X Warrior have now replaced the fighter, paladin, ranger, thief, and assassin in all my games. It plays a nice balance between keeping things appropriately old-school (there are some optional rules in the beginning explaining what skills might be everyman skills) and providing a great list of talents to pick from that will have almost no two warriors alike. There are some things I was surprised to not see in there (like shield bash for the warrior) but it's not too hard (and even a little fun) for the GM to add more skills to the list.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The B/X Rogue
Publisher: Necrotic Gnome
by James S. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 12/11/2015 14:11:34

This review originally appeared on my blog at http://www.halflingsluck.com

Necrotic Gnome Productions has quietly produced quality products for almost a year now. The Complete Vivimancer is, in my opinion, their strongest product to date and showcases author +Gavin Norman's ability to take the simple rules of Labyrinth Lord and really run in an entirely new direction with them. He doesn't gussy it up with flashy art or layout - just good ol' fashioned OSR content.

I heard some of the buzz around The B/X Rogue and decided to plunk down the very reasonable cost of $1.50. After giving it a read I can say that this product really brings a lot of options to the traditional "Thief" class, while keeping things simple and easily integrated into any B/X clone out there. It seems to be written with Labyrinth Lord specifically in mind. But, there's no reason it can't work for other OSR games on the market.

The B/X Rogue does something unique with the traditional thief class. The product is correct in calling itself "The B/X Rogue" and not "The B/X Thief." Instead of providing several abilities that are locked in and increase at a specific rate, a character selects a number of special abilities called "Talents" at character creation to reflect their unique skill set. This can include the traditional picking locks and hiding in shadows or things like being able to make a skilled retreat from combat or even cast minor magic spells. As a character increases in level they can learn new Talents. It's a simple system that works very well and is easy to understand.

This creates a kind of a la carte character, but always with a roguish flavor. Want a more bardic character, or an assassin, or a swashbuckler? The B/X Rogue does it all. At a buck fifty, its well worth the cost of admission and has me chomping at the bit in hopes that Norman gives Fighters, Clerics, Magic-Users, Dwarves, Elves and Halflings similar treatments. I'd really recommend this to anyone out there who plays a lot of Basic/Expert, Rules Cyclopedia, or Labyrinth Lord.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The B/X Rogue
Publisher: Necrotic Gnome
by Timothy B. [Featured Reviewer]
Date Added: 11/24/2015 12:06:41

I love new B/X classes. If I have demonstrated nothing else here it is that. So when +Gavin Norman of the excellent City of Iron blog and Necrotic Gnome Productions came out with a new B/X class, well I had to get it. Gavin has already given us some great classes in his Theorems & Thaumaturgy and The Complete Vivimancer. Now he takes on the thief archetype in The B/X Rogue.

I say archetype because what this book tries (and succeeds, but more on that in a bit) to do is create a Rogue class that encompasses all of the various "sub-classes" we have seen on the thief over the years. How he does it is both very elegant and very, very basic, if not Basic.

Like the thief the rogue has a number of talents at his/her disposal. Instead of a percentile (or d20) roll the rogue is assumed to be fully proficient in their talent. The differences lie in the choice of talents and some of the talents themselves. The example given is the iconic Remove Traps. If a rogue has this at 1st level then they can remove or disable a trap 100% of the time. However the types of traps are now changed. The rogue can only disable small mechanical traps. Not huge pits in the floor.

The rogue class begins with 4 talents. This increases by 1 per level. Some talents have prerequisites and can only be taken at 5th level (Expert Talents, love the split of Basic and Expert Talents here). Outside of that the class it remarkably like the B/X thief.

The bulk of the book describe the 36 talents a rogue might take. This allows for near infinite (or close enough for the amount of character sheets I'll print out) rogue types. There are even magical talents for the Bards and Arcane Tricksters out there. Of course I immediately went to the magic section and quickly figured out an Occult Scholar, a rogue that raids tombs and libraries for bits of arcane knowledge and some spells to help them out. Won't help you when you need an orc killed, unless he has a scroll for it.

There is also a very useful table to help you with your archetypes. Want an assassin? Great, take back-stab, hide, garotte, move quietly at 1st level. There are 10 of these, so a d10 will also get you up and going fast. Don't want a magic-one? Easy. Roll a d8 instead.

The PDF itself is 26 pages; a front cover, a back cover and two page OGL, all for a $1.50. Not a bad deal at all really, especially when consider how flexible this class is now. If you are a fan of the theif class, B/X or Gavin's other classes then this is a must buy.



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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The B/X Rogue
Publisher: Necrotic Gnome
by Eric F. [Verified Purchaser]
Date Added: 11/22/2015 09:00:45

I received a copy of B/X Rogue from a friend just as I was wrapping up a leg of writing on a new campaign, more on that later. B/X Rogue is a new Gavin Norman title that takes the thief and defines the PC class in new ways. The book clocks in at about twenty six pages of old school goodness. Gavin is in charge of the City of Iron blog and clocks in some damn fine titles such as the Complete Vivmancer and the crowd sourced Free OSR adventure From the Vats . He is also the man whose put out one of my all time favorite B/X pay what you want PC expansion class books Theorems & Thaumaturgy. So when B/X Rogue hit the stands today I contacted a friend to grab this title and let me take a look at it right away. So colour me intrigued, and very happy to have another variation on one of my favorite PC's classes at the table. BX Rogue does quite a bit different, this blurb from the City of Iron blog really intrigued me "More than simply a thief, the rogue class has access to talents drawn from a wide array of archetypes, all integrated into a single class. Scouts & spies, burglars & tomb robbers, charlatans & con-artists, swashbucklers & explorers, brigands & highwaymen, assassins & thugs. No need for all of those specialized sub-classes any more!" Now given that sort of a claim I could see what B/X Rogue was trying to do? But then the second part really caught me by surprise. Within these pages you will discover:

Complete advancement tables for levels 1 to 20 36 adventuring talents Themed packages of talents for a quick start into the game Guidelines for other classes attempting roguish feats Rules for song magic and dabbling in arcane secrets Right out of the gate we've got an expansion of the levels of the class and boat load of brand new adventuring talents. And that really is one of the chief things I love about this version of the Rogue. Besides being able to use ALL weapons they have a range of skills that really makes them much more customized. According to the book;The chief aptitude of rogues is the plethora of highly specialized skills of dexterity, stealth, intrigue, infiltration, and cunning that they are able to learn. These are known collectively as talents . The following section lists dozens of talents which a rogue may learn over his or her career, beginning at 1st level with four, as chosen by the player, and gaining one more talent per experience level gained. (For players who do not wish to spend time browsing the complete library random tables and quick-start selections of talents are provided later.) Talents allow the players to customize the rogue to their vision of the character and the niche of where the PC is going to fall within the bounds of the party. From a simple pick pocket to an acrobatic assassin B/X Rogue allows for this and more. Examples of talents include Awareness Your honed reactions and instinctual awareness of danger make it difficult for enemies to sneak up on you. When surprise is rolled, you are only surprised on a roll of 1 (instead of 1-2, like other characters). Gavin has a great knowledge of the Basic system and the talents system is a nice fit for just this sort of an application. Take for example Climb Rock Face, a quick and easy talent that can turn a simple thief into a movie style assassin scaling up the sides of cliff faces. Climb Rock Faces When lightly encumbered, you can climb rough rock faces unaided, with a successful DEX check. You can climb less treacherous surfaces without a check. And another thing lurking in the background is the idea of being able to have occult based talents that dovetail into the idea of the magician style thief. Something that has come down to us from the pages of sword and sorcery novels and comic books. Like the assassin its right there in the talents lurking for the dungeon master to approve the matter as they see fit for their own game campaigns. This section dovetails into the next bit quite nicely. Magical Talents get's its own section as a PC option with the Detect Magic talent, and the ever intriguing spell song abilities thrown in for good measure. Spell songs are not complicated concepts and plug into the bard being brethren to the Rogue. A concept I've seen used a couple of times over the years in various game products but this product's explanation of the spell song is straight forward, concise and well thought out ; "You have learned and mastered an enchanted song which you can sing or play on an instrument once per day to magical effect. (This talent presupposes a level of musical skill, with either vocals or one or more instruments" There are rules for the application and casting of this style of magic and spell song spell lists included within it. There are even archetype PC class style kits included, these are not clunky and ill thought out. These are concise pieces of game design that includes everything a player needs straight out of the gate. All of this comes under the "Quick-Start Talent Selection". There's even a random talents section that rounds the entire package out.

In point of fact this book could be used to create Rogues of all calibers for space based science fiction games, scavengers & assassins for post apocalyptic hell holes, sword and sorcery religious fanatic cut throats, and even inter planar highwaymen. The limit is really your imagination because of the set up of this product. The B/X Rogue is hands down one of the best products I've seen for creating a B/X Rogue that you want as a player or to create an off the cuff NPC rogue, thief, assassin, highwayman or other criminal of the underworld. I give B/X Rogues a five out of five. I should also mention that I love the black and white artwork that evocates a certain old school something within the pages. It adds a feeling of looking through a mimeographed old school fanzine.
Eric Fabiaschi Sword and Stitchery blog Want to know more? Subscribe to http://swordsandstitchery.blogspot.com/



Rating:
[5 of 5 Stars!]
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