Assassin Feedback

mkill

Adventurer
Here is my feedback (already sent).

TL;DR: Love the class, hate the guilds.

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Hello Dev team,

First of all, I like it! You managed to capture the archetype of a silent killer in the writeup.
My absolute favorite are the poisons as daily powers. Keep that.
The other great feature is that you tied the Assassin at-will powers to sneaky and unusual weapons. An Assassin with a blowgun is just so much more fitting than one who wields a full blade.

In short, I love the class and I want to play one.

However, I have one criticism:
You tied rules elements (the exotic weapon proficiencies and at-will powers) to story elements (your choice of guild).
As a DM, am I now expected to fit either the Red Scales or the League of Whispers into my campaign? No thank you. Please keep a PC rules writeup a PC rules writeup without dropping organizations into my campaign world.

The Red Scales: We don't like the powerful, the corrupt, the wealthy, so we sneak around and kill people! - So they're communist terrorists.

League of Whispers: We kill people so we're secret! - No really, who'd expect an organization of trained killers to value their privacy? I really can't imagine how they could make enemies they need to hide from. Also, if they kill everyone who knows of their existence, how do they take jobs? "10.000 gold to kill the duke? Love to do that job, but looks like you know we exist so now I have to kill you". Great business model.

If you want to tie the Guild idea to rules, use Paragon Paths. That's what Paragon Paths were invented for. Thank you. And provide a guild writeup that's not completely lame.

So please, for the love of all DMs out there, if you want to include Assassin guilds, keep them flavor text! Just give the Assassin the weapon proficiencies of both guilds, and let him choose at-wills without locking him into arbitrary weapon lists by guild. That's what I'll do at my table anyway.
 

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Ardulac

Explorer
5: Unseen Spearhead. This appears to be a newbie trap at heroic when compared to Garrotte Strangle. If you don't keep the target grabbed for the entire round then it does nothing. If we ignore Vicious Greatspears for the moment then a crit does only around twice the damage of a normal attack anywhere in heroic - so assuming both hit and no escape, the garotte strangle is about on par with damage after the first round of sustaining. But this doesn't take into account that the garrote already did damage, is more accurate, and harder to escape from. You need 2 rounds before overtaking the garrote.

I think the main selling point of Unseen Spearhead is how it works with your Assassin's Strike encounter power. So at 1st level with 20 dex we might be looking at 4d4+2d6+1d10+10 (average 32.5) damage for two rounds of garroting with the Assassin's Strike on the first hit as opposed to 29 damage from the Unseen Spearhead (assuming a d8 spear), which is only slightly behind. At that point it becomes a matter of how you build your assassin. Unseen Spearhead works better if you get Vicious Weapons and crit enhancing feats. You can also take the rogue multiclass feat that lets you add sneak attack damage once per encounter to raise the Unseen Spearhead by 12 damage.

On the subject of feedback for WotC, I would say that it would be nice if Unseen Spearhead was more explicit about what you can attack with. As it's written it is unclear whether they expect you to be attacking with the spear or drawing another weapon to attack with. If you do draw a new weapon, do you need a hand to continue "grabbing" them with the spear?
 

Xris Robin

First Post
Unless they changed the rule, Unseen Spearhead isn't just the autocrit. A coup de grace kills the target outright if it deals damage greater than or equal to the target’s bloodied value. At first level, how many creatures have a bloodied value higher than 29? If you're at least level 3, you also kill something if it drops to 10 HP or below, too. And as mentioned, if you took Sneak of Shadows to add sneak attack...

I mean, I don't think it keeps up well at higher levels. But it seems like at low levels, you can just plain kill one thing per encounter.
 

whearp

First Post
Unless they changed the rule, Unseen Spearhead isn't just the autocrit. A coup de grace kills the target outright if it deals damage greater than or equal to the target’s bloodied value. At first level, how many creatures have a bloodied value higher than 29? If you're at least level 3, you also kill something if it drops to 10 HP or below, too. And as mentioned, if you took Sneak of Shadows to add sneak attack...

I mean, I don't think it keeps up well at higher levels. But it seems like at low levels, you can just plain kill one thing per encounter.

This is exactly what I was thinking when I was reading the dismissers of this power. Not only does it allow for a coupe de grace with almost no chance of failure, but even in the worst case it causes the enemy and its group to focus on freeing the grabee to save him from certain death.

So really what we have here is a power that, situationally (as all the Assassin at-wills are), instant-kill a level three brute at level one. It's fun, it's flavorful, and it's pretty dang deadly.
 

RodneyThompson

First Post
Several of the poisons described here have special effects which begin with “If this attack reduces the target to 0 hit points, the target is not killed but is instead knocked unconscious and…” All of this assumes, of course, that the assassin leaves the target alive at 0 hit points rather than just finishing it off.

Whoops - the power, as written, removes the option of a kill. They should be re-written to make it clear that is an option.

Actually, the intent is that it doesn't offer the choice. If you want to kill the guy, just kill the guy. If you use the poison, you're making a deliberate attempt to do something to the person other than kill them. Besides, things like being driven permanently insane more or less equals death in all likelihood.

Note that you can use the poison for the entire encounter on a weapon, but only one piece of ammunition. However, a ranged weapon is a weapon, so one could make an encounter's worth of attacks with a ranged weapon with the poison - at least as written. The other way to read it is that an assassin is penalized for using ranged attacks.

The executioner assassin is meant to get up close and personal with people--meaning that though there is a little bit of an option to go ranged, there's also a pretty strong motivation to be good with a melee weapon. The "ranged" option is pretty limited; Assassin's Strike already keeps you within 5 of the target. The executioner is not supposed to be a full ranged striker, but to have the option for some ranged tricks.

What I'd say I'll do is make sure the poisons are reworded so that you apply them to one melee weapon or one/five pieces of ammunition, just to avoid the kind of insane confusion derived from an extremely literal reading of the way our weapon rules work. I can tell you that the intent is that you have to poison a weapon's ammunition, not the weapon itself. Really, I think it's tough to argue that applying poison to a blowgun makes the darts poisonous.

1: Assassin attack finesse is in dire need of errata. +d6 damage with either single handed weapons or assassin weapons (read: garottes). Otherwise you simply buy Weapon Proficiency: Fullblade or Executioner's Axe. And the power curve just breaks. Hell, a maul will do it. (Oh, and Kukri Lunge becomes pointless)

One thing I intentionally did was try and make it so that the size of your weapon die wasn't that important. That's why assassin's strike does d10s with damage instead of [W]s. So, you could spend a feat to go from, say, d6 to d12, which is a difference of ~2.5 points of damage at heroic tier, going up to ~5 points of damage at epic tier. Fullblade does have the nice high crit property, but the kukri is an off-hand weapon, which has some good feat and multiclassing support. I'd call one feat for 2.5 damage a fair, but not great, trade, and I think most of the time I'd rather spend my feats on other things and use a smaller weapon that I can hide on myself. As an assassin, I'd like to be a bit more subtle.


2: There really needs to be a dagger at will. Or two. I mean. Seriously? Kukri and javelin but no dagger? Which means that one of the archetypal assassin weapons is among the worst weapons they can choose. (For melee, rapier or longsword beats it hands down. And at range if you're a ranged assassin go shuriken)

The point is that the executioner assassin tends to use his "weirder" weapons for more situational things. The dagger is still a great choice for the executioner, as it can be used as a thrown weapon, can benefit from encounter-long poisons, and can be hidden easily.


3: Unarmed throw. This should be against a NAD. Ref or Fort - or a choice. AC makes little sense. Likewise the Bolas (I don't care which one- there's an argument for the bolas to hit the worse of the two).

Probably a good idea.


4: There are some odd features of the garotting rules. Like the ability to use one for an opportunity attack while having it round someone else's throat. (The trailing end of wire, I suppose?) Several possible solutions including making you only need one hand to sustain (so you can draw a normal weapon in your other hand for MBAs).

Probably something that should be clarified.


5: Unseen Spearhead. This appears to be a newbie trap at heroic when compared to Garrotte Strangle. If you don't keep the target grabbed for the entire round then it does nothing. If we ignore Vicious Greatspears for the moment then a crit does only around twice the damage of a normal attack anywhere in heroic - so assuming both hit and no escape, the garotte strangle is about on par with damage after the first round of sustaining. But this doesn't take into account that the garrote already did damage, is more accurate, and harder to escape from. You need 2 rounds before overtaking the garrote.

Having a helpless opponent is really good--an automatic critical hit. I think your math is a bit off on a crit, as you also get all the crit riders--magic weapon dice, feat bonuses, etc. Not to mention that you can maximize your assassin's strike damage on a crit, effectively the same as maximizing the damage of three encounter powers of other creatures. Sure, it's tougher to make this one work, but I think if you can pull it off (especially in conjunction with an ally dazing/stunning the target) then there's a big payoff.


6: Without superior cover, total concealment, or some form of invisibility, the assassin can't hide. Which means he's hosed by certain styles of DMing (and if I see another rose bowl I'll be annoyed). Possible synergy with the missing dagger power? The dagger doesn't do extra damage, but the small weapon does allow the assassin a distraction to hide in regular cover that turn?

It's true that it relies on certain assumptions about encounter design, but there is also some utility power support, like darkness.


7: Silent Stalker. Does this automatically unhide you at the end of your turn? Or can you use it to "sling shot" - silent stalk to the guard and then take your second action to run past them to the next spot of cover. (I'd allow the sling shot, myself, but can see arguments both ways).

Well, if you hide again on that same turn, you don't become un-hidden automatically. The duration of that "being hidden" has superseded your earlier duration. The silent stalker power just lets you get around the whole "becoming unhidden as soon as you leave cover" thing.

8: Was the intent for any or all of precision darts, bolas takedown, and unarmed throw to gain the bonus damage from Attack Finesse. And if they do do they also gain the enhancement bonus?

Yes, and yes.

If you want to tie the Guild idea to rules, use Paragon Paths. That's what Paragon Paths were invented for. Thank you. And provide a guild writeup that's not completely lame.

I'm sorry that you find them lame--I thought they were appropriate, and I think you're being a bit dismissive of their flavor. These aren't super fleshed out organizations, but instead are designed to inspire players and DMs to expand them out how they see fit while giving them a few tenets to lean on. However, I disagree that they shouldn't be included at heroic tier. I think it's important to provide those flavor options for players at the outset, especially for a class that is part of the Essentials--designed to be the on-ramp for players.

So please, for the love of all DMs out there, if you want to include Assassin guilds, keep them flavor text! Just give the Assassin the weapon proficiencies of both guilds, and let him choose at-wills without locking him into arbitrary weapon lists by guild. That's what I'll do at my table anyway.

Actually, the weapon lists aren't arbitrary. They were chosen to provide a binary choice--melee tricks, or ranged tricks. As for what you'd do at your table--great! You seem like an experienced DM, and I expect that those guilds will get tweaked by lots of DMs to fit their campaign settings. I just though it would be a good chance for the article to give some inspiration to DMs that are just getting started.
 

Obryn

Hero
Wow, great insights, Rodney! It helps; one of my players is going to try one of these guys out next week.

I hate to re-ask a question, but what's the relationship between these At-Wills and the normal Assassin At-Wills? Would a Guild Assassin be able to take the At-Wills from the non-Guild Assassin class, or vice-versa? Would a Human Assassin be able to take a third Guild Assassin At-Will?

I'm just kind of confused about the relationship between this subclass and the other one!

Thanks!

-O
 

The Little Raven

First Post
Poisoner's Kit

No price is listed for the poisoner's kit and, since other kits vary in price significantly, you can't really extrapolate how much it would cost.

Also, there is a single mention of an assassin's kit, which I assume is just a typo and means poisoner's kit (since it's saying you have to have it to make poisons).

Unarmed Throw
I think this should be a slide effect, not a push, since when throwing them to the ground you should be able to do it in any direction, not just straight away from you.

Obryn said:
I hate to re-ask a question, but what's the relationship between these At-Wills and the normal Assassin At-Wills? Would a Guild Assassin be able to take the At-Wills from the non-Guild Assassin class, or vice-versa? Would a Human Assassin be able to take a third Guild Assassin At-Will?

I'm just kind of confused about the relationship between this subclass and the other one!

It's just like the relationship between knight and the normal fighter. Since these at-wills are specifically not Assassin 1 At-Will Attack Powers (just like knight stances are not fighter ones), they cannot be chosen by a non-executioner assassin.

Since humans specifically get an at-will attack power, or heroic effort, they would have to go with heroic effort since the executioner subclass doesn't offer at-will attack powers (just like the knight doesn't get a third stance).
 

Skyscraper

Explorer
I haven't read this whole thread, but aside from very minor things, I find the Essentials assassin to appear like a really fun approach to this class. The idea of poison use, the flavor of the different abilities, the "death attack" when an enemy is close to 0 HP, it's cool throughout. Congrats!

Sky
 

The executioner assassin is meant to get up close and personal with people--meaning that though there is a little bit of an option to go ranged, there's also a pretty strong motivation to be good with a melee weapon. The "ranged" option is pretty limited; Assassin's Strike already keeps you within 5 of the target. The executioner is not supposed to be a full ranged striker, but to have the option for some ranged tricks.

Of course :)

What I'd say I'll do is make sure the poisons are reworded so that you apply them to one melee weapon or one/five pieces of ammunition, just to avoid the kind of insane confusion derived from an extremely literal reading of the way our weapon rules work. I can tell you that the intent is that you have to poison a weapon's ammunition, not the weapon itself. Really, I think it's tough to argue that applying poison to a blowgun makes the darts poisonous.
Pedant: Poison resevoir in the blowgun.

One thing I intentionally did was try and make it so that the size of your weapon die wasn't that important. That's why assassin's strike does d10s with damage instead of [W]s. So, you could spend a feat to go from, say, d6 to d12, which is a difference of ~2.5 points of damage at heroic tier, going up to ~5 points of damage at epic tier.
d6 -> 3.5 on average. d12 -> 6.5. ~3 rather than 2.5. (Rapier and longsword are both d8, meaning 2 for each of them - still nice for a feat). To me the part that matters is that they make the Kukri attack irrelevant. Either you can charge for a [2*d6] attack with a kukri having gone to the trouble to use one of your scarce At Wills, or you can charge for a [d12, Brutal 2] with an executioner's axe with the same to hit score, more average damage, and a much better melee basic attack the rest of the time.

Fullblade does have the nice high crit property, but the kukri is an off-hand weapon, which has some good feat and multiclassing support. I'd call one feat for 2.5 damage a fair, but not great, trade, and I think most of the time I'd rather spend my feats on other things and use a smaller weapon that I can hide on myself.
Depends. Because the first strike without warning matters...

As an assassin, I'd like to be a bit more subtle.
My Bravura Warlord carries his dynamic longsword round his wrist as a garrote most of the time (and his summoned scale armour ... elsewhere). And once steel is drawn and the fight is on, subtlety loses to speed of assassination. People are already alerted by the clash of sword on sword, and the best way you can alert as few people as possible is to make it as fast as possible.

Also as an adventurer I expect to walk around with people armed to the teeth. There's a running joke in one of my groups where my Monk takes the focus fire because he looks suspicious because he's not heavily armed or armoured. (Which suits me - he's got the best defences in the party and is planning to learn to snatch arrows out of the air). To blend in you want beaten looking armour and some sort of decent weapon - not having obvious ones in that sort of group is, of itself, suspicious. Missions where the sort of stealth that requires no obvious weapons are the exception rather than the rule.

The point is that the executioner assassin tends to use his "weirder" weapons for more situational things. The dagger is still a great choice for the executioner, as it can be used as a thrown weapon, can benefit from encounter-long poisons, and can be hidden easily.
Encounter long first level poisons can be applied to e.g. rapiers which are already doing an average of 2 more damage (meaning that even if you lose the thrown attacks but mostly use melee you're ahead). Or applied to a magic shuriken that returns and can be used with a highly mobile [2w] attack if you're a ranged assassin. And slow in melee won't matter half as much as slow at range. A dagger is a weird weapon for a primary weapon. With good real world reason (it's too short to be effective normally) and in game mathematical support (d4). And therefore should be treated as such.

And as I said, one of the best things an assassin can do is not look like an assassin. Someone walking round with a group of people in scale armour with large shields and carrying only daggers? Rogue or assassin. Or Warlock. Either way, watch him. He's an unknown quantity. Someone wearing battered leather armour and carrying a great big weapon? He's what you expect. Yes, he needs watching. But not special attention. (And if he's hiding, who cares anyway? - if necessary he can also ask the fighter to hold his fullblade for him before going into a situation where he needs to not look like an adventurer.)

To use an analogy, your approach to assassin weapons for adventurers appears to resemble trying to use desert camoflague in the jungle.

Probably a good idea.
Thanks.

Having a helpless opponent is really good--an automatic critical hit. I think your math is a bit off on a crit, as you also get all the crit riders--magic weapon dice, feat bonuses, etc.
My math is off because I'd missed that you got the d6+weapon bonus to a spear grab.

But with the garrote
First attack: 2d4 + d6 + stat + item
Sustain: 2d4 + d6 + stat + item

With the spear:
First attack: d6+item
Sustain: 6 [W] + 6 [bonus] + stat + item + item *d6

Assuming level 3, +1 item, stat 18:
Garrote: 5 + 3.5 + 4 + 1 = 14.5 dpr
Javelin: 4.5 damage round 1, 20.5 damage round 2. = 25 vs 29

Throw in 2d10 vs 20 for the encounter powers and yes, it becomes 45 vs 40 and the spear does take the lead. Slightly. (I gave it 4.5 less damage in my previous simulation because I didn't realise you got the weapon talent bonus).

On the other hand, the way to get maximum mileage out of the attack is to assume the Executioner's Axe is well named.
Sustain: 12 [W] + 7.5 (high crit d12 Brutal 2) + 6 (bonus) + 4 (stat) + 1 (item) + 3.5 (high crit if you aren't going e.g. Vicious) = 34 (54 with the encounter power.) I'd still rather have the garrote I think.

Not to mention that you can maximize your assassin's strike damage on a crit, effectively the same as maximizing the damage of three encounter powers of other creatures. Sure, it's tougher to make this one work, but I think if you can pull it off (especially in conjunction with an ally dazing/stunning the target) then there's a big payoff.
If. There's a pretty high payoff to it, granted. But honestly until you hit level 7 even on a successful attempt it's doing no better than the garrote unless you unleash something like a fullblade to help. And the edge at level 7 is only changed by 4.5 (Assassins Strike change) + 3.5 (crit weapon) - 1 (stat bump) = 7

It's true that it relies on certain assumptions about encounter design, but there is also some utility power support, like darkness.
Some, granted.

Well, if you hide again on that same turn, you don't become un-hidden automatically. The duration of that "being hidden" has superseded your earlier duration. The silent stalker power just lets you get around the whole "becoming unhidden as soon as you leave cover" thing.
That's what I thought, thanks. It just could be read that it delays you being unhidden rather than prevents you being unhidden as long as you go back into cover by the end of the turn. Slingshotting round guard posts is useful for an assassin. As is move - silent stalker to noble. Minor - apply poison to food, drink, or jewelry in front of them. Move - back into cover having never become unhidden.

I'm sorry that you find them lame--I thought they were appropriate, and I think you're being a bit dismissive of their flavor. These aren't super fleshed out organizations, but instead are designed to inspire players and DMs to expand them out how they see fit while giving them a few tenets to lean on.
I liked them for that reason. I would, however, include a note in the final version saying that this isn't essential and that many assassins are self-taught but even in these cases they normally follow one of the regular paths. Just make a little more explicit what you are doing.

Edit: If that seemed overly critical, sorry. I just have a very mathematical mind at times - and a sneaky one at others. I love the core of the class (my favourite assassin in pretty much any RPG and really want to play one). I'm just trying to help polish it a little.
 

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