Assassin Guides and spells

[johnsemlak]

I'm considering buying an Assassin guidebook, probably primarily for NPC development, though possibly as a PC class. There are quite a few out now, more than rogue splattbooks I believe (another reason I'm considering one, I hope some of the material will be useful for rogues). I'm leaning towards Mongoose's, firstly because of its low price, and secondly because its Assassin character doen't cast spells.

I believe most other Assassin core classes and PrCs do cast spells-- can anybody say why this has become the trend? I certainly think a fantasy spell-using assassin can be interesting, but I'm not sure if it's a good idea having it as a standard ability.

Finally, I'd appreciate people's thoughts in general on the various Assassin splatbooks.

 

[Cheiromancer]

Mongoose's Assassin booklet is cheap, but you don't get a lot with it.

The equipment section is good, and I like the rules for concealing a weapon, but I don't like its poison rules. And its take on Assassin as a base class is awfully bland. It gets sneak attack damage as a rogue, an exotic weapon proficiency every 6 levels, and some abilities which give small bonuses to skills such as disguise, hide and move silently, craft poison, and conceal poison (in food or drink). Only 4 skill points, no evasion or uncanny dodge, and no rogue special abilities.

Whispers of Death is better for PC characters. A rogue (or rogue/fighter) can pick up levels of Mask and Shadow-Stalker and do quite well- and without spells.

If you are interested in NPC assassins, check out Crimson Contracts from Bastion. The classes there range from too weak (comparable to NPC classes like expert and warrior) to too strong (NPC villains only). The new poisons, diseases and magical devices are quite good.

Crimson Contracts has got quite a dark feel to it, though. It is also the most expensive. It would be better than Whispers for high level or high powered characters.

 

[CCamfield]

I'm somewhat ambivalent on the issue - I do like the idea of a more "historical" assassin who succeeds through their own skills. On the other hand, in a fantasy setting I think assassins would investigate the use of magic to help them succeed.

Green Ronin's core assassin class does indeed get spells, on the same order as a ranger or paladin's. (Not that many per day!) I like their book quite a bit - the societal descriptions are very well done. I guess if you didn't like them, the value of the book would be much reduced because they take up 60% of the book.

You could make a pretty good non-magical assassin class by taking the rogue, removing some of the dodge & evasion abilities, and substituting them for better weapon selection and some (fighter?) feats. There are an awful lot of rogue skills that are appropriate for an assassin. The GR assassin class doesn't really have enough skill points to cover all the bases.

 

[HellHound]

In addition to Crimson Contracts for assassins, in our first release (Librum Equitis volume 1) we included the Practical One, a non-spellcasting assassin based at least in part on the Assassins from the Assassin's Guild of Ankh-Morpork.