Assassin Base Class (rough draft)

[doctorbadwolf]

My rough draft of an assassin full class.

I could easily expand each subclass presented here into it's own class, but that's just not the 5e paradigm, so I'll leave it at this level of expansion.
I may make the poisoner share some traits with a crafting/knowledge based scholar class, which would contain the artificer and alchemist, and the night mask has given me ideas for a type of warlock, which is my next project. Making a warlock that doesn't try to contain the hexblade and binder, and is instead fully dedicated to being a warlock.

Anyway, I'd love feedback on this, especially in terms of balance. Would you allow this class in a game alongside existing classes?




Assassin
Sidebar: This class replaces the rogue archetype. If you choose to include this class, you may want to remove that archetype from the rogue. Rogue will still contain the Thief, Arcane Trickster, and Swashbuckler.

[TABLE="width: 301"] [TR] [TD="align: right"]1[/TD] [TD="align: right"]2[/TD] [TD]Lethal, Careful Planning, Unarmored Defense
[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]2[/TD] [TD="align: right"]2[/TD] [TD]Fighting Style, Crowd Stealth[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]3[/TD] [TD="align: right"]2[/TD] [TD]Tools of the Trade, Tradition,[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]4[/TD] [TD="align: right"]2[/TD] [TD]Ability Score Increase, Contact[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]5[/TD] [TD="align: right"]3[/TD] [TD]Extreme Lethality[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]6[/TD] [TD="align: right"]3[/TD] [TD]Tools of the Trade,[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]7[/TD] [TD="align: right"]3[/TD] [TD]Ghost[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]8[/TD] [TD="align: right"]3[/TD] [TD]Ability Score Increase, Contact[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]9[/TD] [TD="align: right"]4[/TD] [TD]Tradition Feature[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]10[/TD] [TD="align: right"]4[/TD] [TD]Evasion[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]11[/TD] [TD="align: right"]4[/TD] [TD]Masterful Planning[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]12[/TD] [TD="align: right"]4[/TD] [TD]Ability Score Increase, Contact[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]13[/TD] [TD="align: right"]5[/TD] [TD]Tradition Feature[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]14[/TD] [TD="align: right"]5[/TD] [TD]Calm Detachment[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]15[/TD] [TD="align: right"]5[/TD] [TD]Fighting Style[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]16[/TD] [TD="align: right"]5[/TD] [TD]Ability Score Increase, Contact[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]17[/TD] [TD="align: right"]6[/TD] [TD]Tradition Feature[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]18[/TD] [TD="align: right"]6[/TD] [TD]Eye of The Raven[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]19[/TD] [TD="align: right"]6[/TD] [TD]Master Assassin, Master's Precision[/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD="align: right"]20[/TD] [TD="align: right"]6[/TD] [TD]Ability Score Increase, Contact, School Feature[/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE]
H i t P o i n t s
Hit Dice: 1d8 per Assassin level
Hit Points at 1st Level: 8 + your Constitution modifier
Hit Points at Higher Levels: 1d8 (or 6) + your
Constitution modifier per Assassin level after 1st
P r o f i c i e n c i e s
Armor: Light armor
Weapons: Simple weapons, Scimitars, Blowgun, Shortswords, Garrote
Tools: None
Saving Throws: Dexterity. Intelligence
Skills: Choose three from Acrobatics, Athletics,
Deception. Insight, Investigation,
Perception, Persuasion, Sleight of
Hand, and Stealth

Equipment

One Scimitar, Simple Weapon, or Shortsword

Leather Armor, Two Daggers, and either Burglar’s Kit or Poisoner’s Kit

Specialized Gear: If a feature references Assassin Weapons, it means weapons which the class gives proficiency in, or any weapons with the Light, Finesse, Offhand or Concealed properties.



Lethal: At lvl 1 you gain the ability to reduce a target to 0hp any time you would normally reduce a target to less than 5hp, and you have advantage against targets who have not acted in combat yet. At lvl 6, 9, 12, 15, 18 and 20, the hitpoint threshold for this trait increases by 5hp.

Careful Planning: lvl 1 You can spend 1 hour familiarizing yourself with an area of wilderness or an urban area ½ a mile diameter or less, or a day to familiarize yourself with an entire settlement or an area of wilderness of a size that you could cross in one day using the travel rules, moving at a normal pace (usually about 18 miles). In that area, you are never fully surprised. You can use a bonus action in any surprise round to do one of the following: Move half your speed, use the Hide action at disadvantage, or interact with your environment. You also gain proficiency checks to navigate in that area, whether you normally have proficiency or not. You can only keep one area’s features in your mind at one time. When you gain familiarity with an area, you lose familiarity with any other area for which you have used this trait, with one exception. Work with your DM to figure out a location related to your background. That location is always familiar to you.
You can also spend your move to enter a state of heightened awareness. If you are tracking a target, you remain aware of their exact location even if they break line of sight, so long as you can establish line of sight again by the end of your next turn.

Unarmored Defense: 10+dex+int

Lvl2 Fighting Style: Choose one.
Archery, Dueling, Mariner, Two-Weapon Fighting, Lurker, Small Arms, Improviser, Redirection

Crowd Stealth: Starting at level 2, you can gain and maintain stealth in a crowd, using Stealth or Deception. While hidden in this manner, you treat non hostile creature’s spaces as normal terrain, rather than difficult terrain. You stop being hidden if you take an overt action, such as making an attack, breaking into a run (Dash action), or otherwise making yourself stand out from the crowd. You can become hidden again in this manner, if noncombatants and/or allies are available to blend in with and you can break line of sight with any enemies. Allies can only be used in this way if enemies are not aware that said allies pose a threat.

Tools of The Trade: Starting at 3rd level, any time you reduce a target to 0hp you can immediately move 10ft without using your movement per turn, and then use a bonus action to either attack a second target, Hide (if possible), or Intimidate another target or targets. If you succeed on the Intimidation, you have advantage on attacks against them. You can only make this extra movement and action once per turn.
Additionally, at those levels, choose one of the following benefits.

• You have advantage on the resulting roll to Hide, Attack or Intimidate.
• Difficult Terrain does not cost extra movement.
• If getting to the secondary target requires you to move in a way that would normally call for an ability check, such as climbing, jumping, using acrobatics to safely fall, etc, no ability check is required.
• In addition to the normal options, you can instead take the Dash action as a bonus action.
• Increase the distance you can move by 5ft. This can be taken multiple times, each time increasing the distance by 5ft.
• If you are wielding only ranged/thrown weapons, or have multiple thrown weapons on your person and a free hand (including a hand that is holding a thrown weapon), you can make an extra ranged attack, against a different target, as part of the second attack given by the Lethal feature. You only deal Ability mod damage, but the target is either Hamstrung, knocked prone or, if you have a poison on your person, the attack can apply that poison. (requires level 6 or higher)

School: You are either a Guild Assassin Poisoner, or a Night Hunter. Choose at level 3.

Contacts: At level 4 and 7 you gain a contact. This is a person who can shelter you when you are on the run, help you find specialized supplies, get you in contact with an information broker, or find you work, anywhere in their home region or within an organization to which they belong. They also treat you as friendly, which may be relevant when trying to garner other favors from them. They will not follow you into danger, nor will they resist torture to protect you, are reluctant to directly risk their livelihood or position for your benefit.
In addition to the above, you contacts allow you to leave no trace of your passing through a settlement, one way or another. As long as you do not get caught doing anything extremely noteworthy, such as saving the town, or assassinating it’s mayor, you can choose to leave no memory or evidence of your presence there. If you choose to stay in the settlement after doing so, you must either use a new identity, or this effect is canceled out. If you do something too noteworthy for this benefit, you can spend one day making two DC 15 Ability checks, using two of Deception, Investigation or Performance, and spending 50 gp. If either check fails, you fail, and cannot try again to erase the memory of whatever actions you committed. You are also noteworthy in that settlement for at least one month, or as much as a few years if your deeds were noteworthy enough. If you succeed, you are forgotten as if you had done nothing noteworthy. Note: In most cases, this represents misdirecting associations and identification, meaning that people still remember that their town was saved and/or destroyed, but not that you were the one who did it, or who you are.

Extreme Lethality: lvl 5. You have advantage Poisoned targets, Frightened targets, and Charmed targets. Additionally, any attack you make against a surprised target has double the normal HP threshold for your Lethal feature. (So, if Lethal requires you to knock a target to 5hp or less, you instead get the benefit if you reduce a target’s hp to 10hp or less if they are surprised.)

Lvl 7: Evasion

10: Masterful Planning: In an area with which you are familiar using the Careful Planning feature, you have Advantage on all Ability checks made as part of a Chase, to find food or shelter, to navigate, or to gather information, and you can gain familiarity in half the normal time.
Additionally, you can purchase illicit goods at half the normal price, and ignore difficult terrain while traveling in familiar locations.

11: Calm Detachment: You are immune to Poison effects and have advantage vs Fear and Charm effects.

14: Crows’ Feast: When you roll a critical hit, you roll two extra dice, instead of one, and whenever you reduce a target to a number of HP equal to the higher of twice the number listed under Lethal for your level or ¼ their max HP, rounded down, the target must make a constitution saving throw or be reduced to 0hp by the attack.

18: Eye of The Raven. Starting at 18^th level, Gain advantage on all Perception, Investigate and Insight checks while using Careful Planning. You also gain Darkvision, or improve your Darkvision by 30ft. Lastly, your crit range increases by 1 on attacks against any 1 creature you have tracked, followed or observed for at least 1 minute while in this state within the last week. This state ends either when you choose to end it, when you enter combat, or take a short or long rest, and you cannot use it again until you take a short or long rest.

19: Master’s Precision: Whenever the Lethal feature would reduce a target to ohp, you can instead choose to impose one of the following conditions, with disadvantage on any saving throws associated with it.
Paralyzed, Petrified, Unconscious, Stunned.
Doing so is treated the same as reducing the target to ohp, for the purposes of any and all other traits the character has, including Lethal and Tools of the Trade.


[sblock=Guild Assassin]

Lvl 3: Ghost of the Rooftops: Your speed increases by 5ft, and you gain a climb speed equal to your speed -5ft. Additionally, you have expertise with the Acrobatics and Athletics skills, and when you use Acrobatics to perform Acrobatic stunts, those stunts can include the following:

• Clearing objects at full speed (no extra movement cost per foot of movement), such as walls, carts, stalls/counters that as tall as your chest or lower, or by diving or sliding under or through a space through which you could crawl comfortably, such as the space beneath a wagon, or a hole in a wall.
• Running up or along a wall, for a number of feet equal to the result of the check.
• Reduce Falling damage by a number equal to the check result
• Jumping from a climbing position, onto another higher climbing position, either directly above you or to the side or behind you, or through a window, etc.

In the case of reducing falling damage, you reduce it by a number equal to your check result +2, and if you reduce it to 0, you do not fall prone, and can use any remaining movement as normal. When you make a long jump, increase the distance you can jump by your Dex mod.

Patience: lvl3 As a reaction to being attacked, you can make an attack with the Lethal class feature, as if you had reduced a target to 0hp. If an attack that triggers this ability misses, you can either add your int mod to damage, or throw the target up to 5ft. The target is knocked prone. The DM may decide that the target get's a Dex saving throw, especially if the movement would put the creature directly into harm's way, such as with a cliff's edge.
You gain a unique list of additional tertiary benefit options, as follows,

• (Automatically gained with the above trait) If you succeed in the counter attack, make an acrobatics or athletics check. If successful, the triggering attack against you deals no damage. If the triggering attack was a critical success, it succeeds, but is treated as a normal attack, doing normal damage, instead.
• You have advantage on all attacks made on another character’s turn.
• Your Speed increases by 10ft. This can be taken multiple times. You gain 10ft of speed each time.
• You can add your int mod damage to any attack made with the Patience trait, and can throw enemies up to 15 ft, instead of 5.

9: Precision: While wielding only a Shortbow, Blowgun, Light Crossbow, Hand Crossbow or weapons with the Light, Finesse, Thrown or Offhand properties, increase your crit range 1, to a max range of 17-20. A weapon must only have one of the above properties to qualify.

13: Alacrity: Increase speed by 10ft, treat slippery surfaces, narrow surfaces, and hazardous terrain as if it were normal terrain or surfaces.

17: Determination: You are immune to effects that reduce your speed, and have advantage on saving throws against Exhaustion, or any condition or effect which takes away your ability to move.

20: Guild Secrets: You become proficient in all saving throws and death saving throws. You also automatically crit against the secondary target of your Tools of The Trade feature.
[/sblock]
[sblock=Shadow Stalker]

Spellcasting. As Arcane Trickster, except where noted. Spells use Int,

Spell save DC=8+your proficiency bonus+your Intelligence modifier

Spell attack modifier=your proficiency bonus+your Intelligence modifier

Lvl 3: Night Mask Form. You can become one with the shadows, making your form ethereal, and nearly invisible. Use a spell slot as a bonus action to enter Night Mask Form, gaining the following benefits.
While in this form, you have advantage on Stealth checks.
While in dim light or darkness, you gain +10 Speed, advantage on Acrobatics and Athletics checks, and double your jump distance.
You can expend a spell slot to gain advantage on a saving throw against an effect that would cause you to take damage as a bonus action, or to heal yourself for 1d6+int mod HP as an action. You can also use two spell slots to cast a spell listed with an asterisk in your spell list, even if you don’t have that spell prepared.
You can also expend a lvl 2 or higher spell slot to, as part of a successful secondary attack using your Tools of The Trade class feature, summon a shadow pet made from the shadow of the creature you reduced to 0hp. The shadow pet has a the stats of a creature you choose with a CR equal to half that of the creature whose shadow it is made from, minimum ¼ CR. If you expend a 3^rd level spell slot, it has the same CR as it’s origin creature, and expending a 4^th level slot gives it resistance to all physical damage.
You can use Night Mask Form once between long rests. It lasts 1 minute.

Spell list: (Spell slots per level are the same as the arcane trickster, except that you get 1 less cantrip than the arcane trickster, never gain level 4 spells, and get 1 lvl2 spell at assassin level 6, and a lvl3 spell at assassin level 12.) choose from the following list, instead of any other list.
Cantrips (2, +1 at level 10)
Chill Touch, Mage Hand, Minor Illusion, True Strike, Resistance, Sacred Flame, Vicious Mockery, Frostbite,
Lvl1
Shadow Cloak*, Hex, Unseen Servant, Illusory Script, Jump, Longstrider, Fog Cloud, Minor Illusion, Disguise Self*, Alarm, Detect Magic, Absorb Elements, Ice Knife, Hunter’s Mark
Lvl2
Darkvision*, Enhance Ability, Pass without Trace, Magic Weapon, Darkness*, Invisibility*, Suggestion, Blindness/Deafness, Knock, Shadow Walk*, Beast Bond, Create Shadow Item*
Lvl3
Counterspell, Fear*, Tongues, Slow, Vampiric Touch, Conjure Animals, Dispel Magic, Glyph of Warding, Speak with Dead*, Leomun’s Tiny Hut, Magic Circle,

Night Moves: Whenever you can choose a new trait from your Tools of The Trade class feature, you can choose one of the following traits instead. You also choose one benefit, from this list only, at level 3.

• When you use Night Mask Form, you have advantage on attacks made after you teleport, and you base speed increases by 10ft while in dim light or darkness.
• You can forgo the secondary attack, but still take the movement, with an extra 10ft of teleport distance that doesn’t count against your movement. Expend a spell slot to double the extra distance.
• When you cast the Conjure Animals spell, you can cast it as if with a 5^th level slot, if you do so instead of taking the secondary attack from Lethal.
• You can see normally in darkness, even magical darkness.
• If you choose to Forgo the extra attack when you drop an enemy to 0hp, you can instead regain a use of Night Mask Form. Can only do this once, until you take a long rest.
• You gain +1 to AC and all saves when in Night Mask Form. (Requires lvl6)

9: A Shadow In The Night: Night Mask Form now lasts 10 minutes, and you gain an extra level 1 spell slot. Additionally, special vision such as Darkvision does not work on you in Night Mask Form except for truesight, which allows a creature to detect you normally. So, a creature with Darkvision makes checks to perceive you, or attack you, as if they did not have Darkvision, as long as you are in Night Mask Form, but a creature with truesight ignores this trait.

13: Night Everlasting: Night Mask Form now Lasts 1 hour, you gain an extra level 2 spell slot, and when you use a spell slot to gain advantage on some saving throws, you also gain advantage on saving throws against any condition which includes the incapacitated condition, or Death.

17: Night Errant: Shadow Walk, Shadow Cloak and Speak with Dead are each moved one level down the spell list, and you gain one extra Cantrip.

20: Night of Living Shadows: Night Mask Form now lasts until you take a long rest or end it, you gain resistance to all damage when you use a spell slot to gain advantage on saving throws, your movement increases by 5ft while in Night Mask Form, and you can use a lvl3 spell slot to make creatures have disadvantage on saves against any fear or charm effect (including skill use) you use against them for 1 minute as a bonus action, or to extend Night Mask Form to 1 ally. Such an ally only gains the benefits granted at level 3. If the ally has no spell slots, it can spend Hit Dice instead.
[/sblock]

[sblock=poisoner]
Poisoner this is the most in progress part of the class right now, besides the formatting of the writeup.

Lvl3: Poison expertise: You gain Expertise with Poisoner’s Kit and one skill from your class list or Persuasion. You also can forage/scavenge the ingredients for a number of vials of your Expert Poisons equal to your Intelligence modifier, per day, paying nothing to create said vials of poison. Collecting and creating Expert Poisons takes you 1 hour, and can be done as part of a rest. You gain one Expert Poison at this level. With the exception of the Creeping Death Toxin, any creature that fails a save vs one of your poisons gains a level of exhaustion.
Expert Poisons:
Creeping Death: Target gains 1 level of exhaustion. At the beginning of each of it’s turns, it makes a Constitution saving throw. Success removes a level of exhaustion, while failure adds one. A nat 20 removes the effect entirely, as does a successful saving throw made when the target only has one level of exhaustion.
Blue Licorice Tonic: Counter to it's innocuous name, this poison is one of the worst. The target makes a Wisdom saving throw. If it succeeds, it is Frightened, and has advantage on a saving throw made at the end of it's next turn to rid itself of that condition. If it fails, it instead suffers a violent madness, begins growling incoherently, and must use it's action each turn to attack the nearest creature it can reach, even an ally. It will always try to make Opportunity Attacks, even against allies and noncombatants. If it cannot reach a creature, and has either already used it's movement or successful held itself in place, it will throw anything it can reach at the nearest creature it can see, or begin attacking inanimate objects.
The Final Meal: The assassin must spend a day studying the intended target before making this poison. As part of studying the target, the assassin arranges for the target's meals to meet certain harmless specifications. More or less of a given spice, a certain type of wine, etc. When the poison is applied, either into food or drink, or more directly, the target becomes sluggish and mildly incoherent, as if drunk. Observers are at disadvantage to notice that anything is wrong, until the poison's exhaustion has progressed to within two steps of Death. The poison is so expertly designed that the victim's symptoms seem like normal effects of a full belly and good drink. If the victim realizes the danger, they can induce vomiting in order to gain advantage on all subsequent saves against the poison.

Poisoner’s Tricks: Choose from this list, in addition to the standard list for the Tools of The Trade class feature.

• You have 5 specialized throwing darts, or pieces of ammunition for a bow, crossbow, or sling. Arrows and crossbow bolts of this type do a die step less damage. These specialized projectiles act as being coated with a poison of your choice that you know how to make, including your Expert Poisons. If used with a successful attack granted by the Lethal trait, the target of the attack has disadvantage on their first saving throw related to the poison.
• Learn the recipe for a new Expert Poison, and can now use Intelligence to make Deception checks.
• Learn two recipes for Expert Poisons.
• You can now add Intelligence to damage with thrown Assassin weapons, in addition to Dexterity.

9: Deadly Chameleon: As the rogue’s Imposter feature

13: Weaponized Hallucinogen: You know how it is, you’re at a party, having a good time, and then someone breaks out the weaponized hallucinogens.
You can create a number of non lethal “poisons” using the Expert Poison feature. These poisons mimic certain spells. You gain recipes and uses for these poisons as if their corresponding spell were being granted on the Night Mask casting table. These poisons are applied just like any other poison. If the spell has a concentration value, the creature instead gets a saving throw at the end of each of it’s turns, even if it has already made a saving throw against the effect that turn. If a victim would normally take damage from the spell, the poison version instead gives that creature a level of exhaustion. Creatures gain exhaustion levels just like with other Expert Poisons. These poisons differ in that instead of death, the final level of exhaustion is a deep slumber that lasts a number of hours equal to your int mod + proficiency bonus. It wouldn’t do, after all, to kill the entire court just to get to the king.
Charm Person, Friends, Minor Illusion, Silent Image, Sleep, Tasha’s Hideous Laughter, Blindness/Deafness, Darkness, Hold Person, Fear, Hypnotic Pattern, Major Image, Suggestion, Dissonant Whispers, Calm Emotions, Enthrall, Zone of Truth,
Weaponized hallucinogens that would target multiple targets as a spell, only do so if made as a grenade, or gas release capsule. Gas release capsule is just a grenade that’s easy to hide (concealed property), with a aerosolized release nozel you activate when you place it. Can be set to begin release as much as 1 hour after being set. If you set it while it is hidden, you must make a new check to conceal it. Grenade works the same as Alchemist’s Fire, but replaces the effect with the spell effect. Grenades and gas release capsules take twice as long to make as normal Expert Poison recipes, and cost 1gp each, even if you forage or scavenge the ingredients. For 5gp, you can instead make 2 units of ammunition that do half damage upon impact, and then work the same as a grenade.
Creatures within 15ft of the grenade or capsule are effected by the poison as per the spell description. Creatures within the spell’s normal range are affected by the poison gas as normal. Creatures more than 10 ft outside that area have advantage on saves vs the effects. Beyond that point, creatures are unaffected.

17: Ghostly Planner: You have advantage on any checks made as part of using the Ghost class feature, and can forgo the gp cost. You also gain advantage on checks to bribe an official, redirect blame when accused of a crime, gather information, or insinuate one of your identities into a social circle you must work for entry into, such as a town’s high society, a guild, or other exclusive organization when in one of your familiar locations, as per the Careful Planning and Masterful Planning class features.

20: Deadly Recall: You never lose familiarity with a location, lose your way in a settlement, ruin, dungeon or other constructed environment, and gain proficiency on all Int or Wis checks to recall information, solve a puzzle, and have advantage on crafting checks. Each vial of your Expert Poisons now contains 2 uses. Lastly, it takes 1 month to lose the benefit of Eye of The Raven. [/sblock]

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Also included: my general houserules, and some new weapons, properties, fighting styles and spells.

 

[Inchoroi]

Honestly, you're not going to get a lot of exposure unless they're posted directly in the thread...

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Fair enough. I can do that. I made some minor changes anyway.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

and here are my houserules. [sblock=forgive the rough draftish formatting]Houserules:
Classes:
Ranger:
Beastmasters gain the Beast Bond spell as an ongoing permanent effect with their beast companion.

Downtime:
Training: Training a new proficiency, including skill proficiency, takes 150 days. Many proficiencies require goods, services or both in order to train. These can include tutoring services, renting the use of a crafting facility, dojo, or other specialized space, or the purchase of trade goods such as metal, cloth, etc. Baseline cost to rent a space or hire a tutor is 2gp/day. You may be able to find a Master of a craft, or above facilities, at a higher cost. If so, you can spend double the base cost, and gain 2 extra days of training per week in which you have access to said tutor or facility, without spending extra time.
Training while adventuring: In order to spend a day training, you must be able to spend at least 3 hours, interrupted no more often than once per hour, doing nothing but training. Some proficiencies cannot reasonably be trained in while on the road, as they require specialized facilities that cannot be mimicked in a hastily built campsite.
Training while travelling: You cannot spend a day training while travelling at a fast pace. Additionally, if you travel for a week or longer, you can only train 3 days per week training while travelling at a moderate pace, and 4 days per week at a slow pace. If you are travelling under stealth, you can only train 2 days per week.
Training via direct experience: During the course of an adventure, you may have an opportunity to attempt to use the proficiency you are trying to train in. If there are meaningful consequences for a good or bad outcome using the proficiency, you can “use” one or more days of training as a result. See the table below for specifics. If you have trained in this way, you cannot do so again until you have completed a long rest.
Minor Failure: 1day
Major Failure: 2days
Minor Success: 2days
Major Success: 3days

Crafting. You can craft stuff equal to 5gp+proficiency bonus per day.

Research: No automatic cost. Int or Wis checks made at DM’s discretion, usually per week, or month, but can be per day under the right circumstances. Some research facilities might require payment, or a service or good of some kind, such as a copy of a rare book or help building a new wing of a building, in order to gain entry. Occasionally, a Charisma check might either be required for entry, or in place of an Int or Wis check, representing gaining the help of a knowledgeable person at the facility.

Practicing a Profession: Training NPCs in one or more proficiencies you have can provide a Comfortable lifestyle. If you have Expertise in the proficiency for which you are tutoring or you are lvl 10 or above, upgrade the lifestyle provided.
Working part time allows you to engage in a second downtime activity, even if you normally couldn’t do so. If you work part time, you downgrade the lifestyle provided by your work.
You can also live a less comfortable lifestyle than you earn, in order to save money.

Equipment:
Garrote: Martial, Two Handed, Light, Finesse, special* *can only be used as part of a grapple attack, can make attacks as normal against a creature you have grappled. 1d6 dmg, 5gp.
Light Shield: Simple, 1d4, Off-Hand, Finesse. (choose one: round or arm shield. Round can be donned or doffed the same as a weapon. Arm takes the same time as a regular shield, and cannot be disarmed)
Targe: Martial, 1d6, Off-hand, Finesse (round or arm, as with light shield)
Glaive loses Heavy, dmg changes to 1d6, gains Off-hand and Finesse.
Parrying Dagger:
New Weapon Properties.
High Crit. Extra damage dice from a crit with this weapon are a die step higher.
Off-Hand. If paired with a one-handed, non-versatile weapon, gives +1 AC. Two offhand weapons still only give +1AC. Some versatile and two handed weapons have this trait, usually double ended weapons and polearms. Such weapons with this property gain +1AC only when used two handed.
Add Offhand to Parrying Dagger, Shortsword, and Sickle, and to Quarterstaff, Spear and Glaive.
Add High Crit to Dagger, Sickle, Rapier, Flail, Maul, Morningstar, War Pick, Dart, and Blowgun.
Add Finesse to Handaxe, Quarterstaff
Unarmed Strike is a Martial weapon, and does 1d4 dmg. If a character is not proficient with Unarmed Strike, and does not possess a natural weapon, they roll 2d4, and their damage is equal to the lower result. Proficiency also gives Unarmed Strike the Finesse and Light properties.


New Spells:
Conjure the Wild Hunt (ASchmidt from enworld)

5th-level conjuration
Casting Time: 1 action
Range: 60 feet
Components: V, S
Duration: Concentration, up to 1 hour

You summon fey spirits that take the form of beasts and appear in unoccupied spaces that you can see within range. Choose one of the following options for what appears.

• Two Hell Hounds or Winter Wolves
• Four Displacer Beasts, Perytons, Phase Spiders, or Werewolves
• Six Death Dogs, Dire Wolves, or Giant Hyenas
• Eight Worgs

Each beast is also considered fey, and it disappears when it drops to 0 hit points or when the spell ends.
The summoned creatures are friendly to you and your companions. Roll initiative for the summoned creatures as a group, which has its own turns. They obey any verbal commands that you issue to them (no action required by you). If you don’t issue any commands to them, they defend themselves from hostile creatures, but otherwise take no actions.

At Higher Levels. When you cast this spell using certain higher-level spell slots, you choose one of the summoning options above, and more creatures appear: twice as many with a 7th-level slot and three times as many with a 9th-level slot.

Shadow Walk
Level 2 Conjuration, Ritual
Casting Time: Bonus Action
Components: S
Range: Self
Duration: special, Concentration (up to ten minutes)

You gain the following movement option, which lasts until you use an amount of distance equal to your speed in this way. (so, for most level one characters, you have 30 feet of movement to use this way, for the entire duration of the spell, even if that means multiple turns. This also means that you can shadow walk half your speed, and then use the rest of your movement per turn normally, to walk, climb, jump, etc.)
Shadow Walk: You step from one shadow to another. This can include the shadow cast by a creature. If it does, you can end the step adjacent, rather than in the space of, the creature. This movement works just like your normal movement in terms of being broken up, and/or used between multiple attacks. You only use half your movement per turn.
If you cast this spell in low light, you gain an extra 5 ft of movement to use in this manner, while casting in darkness grants an extra 10ft.
At higher levels: If you use a higher level spell slot to cast this spell, you add 5ft of movement per additional spell slot level to your speed while this spell lasts.
Ritual Use: You can spend 10 minutes concentrating on a spot you can see. That spot must be within a distance equal to your speed x5. You can then “walk” to that spot in an amount of time it would normally take to walk your speed.

Shadow Cloak
Level 2 Conjuration
Casting Time: Bonus Action
Components: V, S
Range: Self
Duration: 10 minute

You wrap unnatural shadows around yourself, becoming difficult to see and partly ethereal. Other creatures have disadvantage on Perception checks to see/find you, and you gain +1 to AC. You can forgo the AC bonus by spending an Action to cast this spell, and extend the Cloak to all allies who remain within 10 feet of you for the duration. Ritual: Cast 10 minutes, lasts 1 hour. If used during travel, allows the group to use stealth while travelling at a normal pace, you end the travel with one lvl 2 slot expended, even if you rest at the end of the journey.


Create Shadow Item
Lvl 2 Conjuration
Casting Time: 1 hour (at the end of a long or short rest)
Range: 5ft
Components: V, S, one gem or crystal worth at least 1gp, one item, as described in the spell text
Duration: Special
You create an item made of shadow. It appears to be made of obsidian, cobalt glass or another semi-opaque material of your choice. You must destroy an item of equal or greater value to use this ability. In the destroyed item’s place forms any one mundane item, including a set of armor or a weapon. If the weapon created normally uses ammunition, this creates 5 units of that ammunition, which can also be summoned or dispelled as a bonus action. This item lasts until you destroy it, and is treated as magical for the purposes of dealing with resistance, if a weapon. The item normally has no magical effects or bonuses. However, if the item destroyed was magical, it gains the same magical traits.
No matter what, the item can be summoned or dispelled as a bonus action, and does not exist while dispelled. You can maintain a number of such items equal to your casting stat mod or max spell level, whichever is lower.
At higher levels: Using a higher slot increases the number of items you can create and store in this way by one per higher level slot used. Or you can use a lvl 3 or higher slot to give the item a mundane property such as Thrown, or Light. A lvl 5 or higher slot can be used to spend a month of downtime enchanting the item as a common or uncommon magic item, with your DM’s approval. Lvl 7 slot or higher can be a rare enchantment. Lvl 9 slot can be used, once in a characters career, to create a legendary item. These enchantment rules do not apply if the campaign does not allow PCs to create magic items.

New Fighting Styles:
New Options.
Lurker: If you fight with no weapons drawn, or with only a light offhand weapon and a free hand, and wear light or no armor or shield, you gain +2 damage when you draw a hidden weapon as part of an attack. You have advantage on checks to hide weapons and other small objects on your person, plant them on another character, or create a hidden cache no larger than 1 square foot.
Small Arms: While wielding only one handed Off-Hand weapons, you gain +2 to melee damage, and your ranged attacks gain +10ft range.
Redirection: While wield only one weapon with the Light, Finesse or Off-hand properties (and no other weapons), you gain +1AC against melee attacks, and +1 damage on attacks made with a Reaction, and any time you force a creature to move against their will, you can increase that movement by 5ft.

Improviser: You gain proficiency in all improvised weapons, including normal weapons that you are using in an improvised manner (like making melee attacks with a ranged weapon or throwing a weapon that doesn’t have the thrown property). Normal weapons under improvised use do one less die step damage. Truly improvised weapons are treated the same as improvised weapons that closely resemble an existing weapon. Ie, they use that weapon’s stats. (Note: some improvised weapons may be innocuous enough that if you start a fight with them, your target(s) may not perceive you as a threat until it’s too late. I recommend allowing sleight of hand or stealth, even if the enemy is aware of the character, when determining if the enemy is surprised by the attack. Essentially, consider having potential enemies treat the character as if they were unarmed until such time as the character makes an attack, or otherwise initiates combat)
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[Ezel]

Careful planning is brilliant, honestly stuff like the ranger's favored terrain would work better this way, so that you are not gimped when outside of your terrain, you just have to prepare beforehand, I might actually switch the ranger favored terrain for this mechanic.

Lethal is interesting, it could be cool to see it growing with levels, up to enemies with maybe 25hp and maybe having a version at higher levels that takes down enemies with 80hp remaining if they fail a constitution save. There are magic weapons that already do this always.

Tools of the trade makes this assassin more of a dervish fighter than a stealthy character, even more so if you consider they get the fighting style. Even though the character wouldn't be able to resist a melee, because of the 1d6 damage die.

Contacts sounds really weird as a class feature, it's more of a backgrund feature.

Extreme Lethality I see that this improves the lethal threshold, but only once at level 5 and only with surprises, since there are already magic weapon features the lethality is where you can go wild.

Ghost is a very very strong ribbon feature, but it's still a ribbon feature and very situational as well.

Masterful Planning brings the ranger "better in a place or another" back in place, but being only a change of speed it's not too bad, anyway it's unneeded.

Eye of the raven has really weird wording, in general the rule wording is not too precise for all the features, keep an eye on that.

Master's Precision puzzles me, why would I want to add a status when I can simply bring the creature down? At level 19 as well, on a creature with 5-10hp that's not even gonna happen often at all.

Master Assassin is another strange background feature, these things are usually gained by the player by playing the character, they don't automatically come at a certain level.

There's a lot of stuff in the archetypes and I don't have time to comment everything.

There are some very good ideas, but I think it would be better to just use the best ideas as another archetype for the rogue, instead of making this into an entirely new class. You managed to avoid making an overpowered class, which is generally good for homebrew since underwhelming homebrews get accepted by DMs while homebrews that only look overpowered are avoided even if they are actually balanced. The class might be underpowered though, having a large amount of situational and utility features, without any stable source of damage similar to extra attack or sneak attack. Also considering how the classes try to be simple in 5e, this class has too many features, you need to choose few features and let them grow with levels. Your assassin has 36 paragraphs divided between base and 2 archetypes, the Rogue in the handbook has 28 paragraphs divided between base and 3 archetypes. In particular your archetypes have way too much depth when compared to usual archetypes.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Thanks for the feedback. Lethal and Careful planning are enough the core of the class that I'm really happy to see them well recieved.

I definitely need to fix a lot of the wording. A lot of it is due to missing things in revision. for instance, Lethal does improve, by 5hp at levels 6, 9, 12, 15, 18, and 20. I just forgot to move the text saying that when I separated Lethal and Tools of The Trade into two features.

The class does have a lot of situational features. I think I can easily pair that down, although other than the tools of the trade options, it's pretty much got the same number of distinct features as the rogue.

Anyway, my feeling was that the class is a bit cluttered and underpowered (although, not as much as it would be if LEthal didn't scale), with some really fun features, so I'm glad to hear someone else have the same impression. LIke it says in the title, this is a rough draft. I think I can iterate this into something I would accept at my table.

Anyway, Master's Precision is that way because sometimes in a campaign it's better to not kill a target, including when infiltrating a place in order to kill a very specific target. This is one of the traits that can probably be combined with something else, though, since it is very situational and generally just lets you do something that is less powerful, but more versatile.

I combined ghost and contacts into one trait, cleaned up some language, and did a lot of tweaking. And now, for bed. Thanks again for the feedback!

 

[Ezel]

Bringing a creature to 0hp can already avoid to kill them.

From the phb:
Knocking a Creature Out
Sometimes an attacker wants to incapacitate a foe,
rather than deal a killing blow. When an attacker
reduces a creature to 0 hit points with a melee attack,
the attacker can knock the creature out. The attacker
can make this choice the instant the damage is dealt.
The creature falls unconscious and is stable.

The master's precision option is useless. I would make that into a maneuver style thing that can add the condition by default with the attack, or similar stuff.

Try to have less and more powerful effects as well, contacts doesn't need to grow either, and ghost seems nearly scrappable. Simpler is better in general.

You're welcome, good luck with the development!

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I'll probably combine master's precision with another benefit, then. The idea is to incapacitate in a long lasting way, without killing unnecessary targets, and I like the idea of a master assassin being able to walk through a place, taking out unavoidable targets, but leaving everyone but the actual target alive. idk. it's too late to figure it out right now. I'll take a fresh look tomorrow.

 

[Ezel]

The idea is to incapacitate in a long lasting way, without killing unnecessary targets, and I like the idea of a master assassin being able to walk through a place, taking out unavoidable targets, but leaving everyone but the actual target alive.

Well, even a lower level assassin can already do all that with the basic rules. Bringing a creature to 0hp but stable is already the most long-lasting and useful condition that you can inflict. If anything you might want an ability to hide corpses or unconscious people very fast to avoid alarming the enemies. And maybe the whole idea of "avoiding unnecessary targets" might come as a feature tailored on this concept, for example choosing a "target creature" once per day and have a large damage bonus on that unless you kill something else, and that becomes lower every time you knock something else down to unconsciousness. Just a very half assed example though.
Good night!