D&D 5E Assassins, Alignment, and Archetypes

[Beleriphon]

Take AssCreed. Altair can’t, Ezio can sometimes, if you’re very good, and Connor can fight a horde of redcoats singlehanded and limps halfway through Delaware or whatever at th e end of the game while bleeding out, because he is a force of nature.

By AC:O Alexios or Kassandra can fight an entire fort of warriors singlehandedly. Mind you, I'd never include more than a level or two of rogue for either of them. The Eagle Bearer is a fighter with a magic weapon (seriously, the Spear of Leonidas is sufficiently advanced technology that it might as well be magic).

I don't get this thread. It's been made pretty plain which fantasy trope is being worked. That might not be everyone's pick, but that's the one we're working. If you really prefer a different look, feel free to go build it.

What fictional assassin is being modeled? I'd like to see this hashed out, but I'm having trouble following what is actually being built towards. Is it an AssCreed style assassin from the later games, something like Conor or Jacob/Evie, or the assassin's guild not-ninjas?

 

[doctorbadwolf]

That's exactly my take on the assassin too. I think the ''one shot, one kill'' assassin is fun, but a slayer able to actually finish the target mostly on its own quickly if the first hit isnt enough is a must. So yeah, somewhere between a fighter and a rogue.

Yep. Some folks wanna make John Wick and James Bond a fighter, as if any concept that can fight is a Fighter. Nah.

I don't get this thread. It's been made pretty plain which fantasy trope is being worked. That might not be everyone's pick, but that's the one we're working. If you really prefer a different look, feel free to go build it.

It nearly always happens with threads about the assassin. Even in 4e, if it wasn’t a thread about optimisation, all these same arguments come out.

 

[Fenris-77]

What fictional assassin is being modeled? I'd like to see this hashed out, but I'm having trouble following what is actually being built towards. Is it an AssCreed style assassin from the later games, something like Conor or Jacob/Evie, or the assassin's guild not-ninjas?

Kalam Mekhar or Rallick Nom (Malazan Book of the Fallen), Caine (Acts of Caine), Durzo Blint (night Angel Trilogy). Waylander (David Gemmel) - are all examples of the type of fantasy assassin in question. Even Artemis Entreri is a reasonable example, evil as he might be.

 

[Fenris-77]

Back to the class at hand for a moment. I quite like both the extended crit range and bleeds as class features - they're on point and flavorful, as are shrouds. I think it's worth taking a moment to talk specifically about the mechanical implementation of those ideas though. We've spoken at least somewhat about how the rules we've got index a particular kind of mobile playstyle, which is cool and I like it, but what we haven't talked about is triggers and conditions for the abilities, at least not specifically.

The idea of extended crit range could just be cribbed from the Champion, so extend it at 3rd to 19-20 and then at some later level to 18-20. That's cool, but it isn't tasty (i.e. lacks flavor). If we want to weave the abilities together better we have a bunch of different ways we could gate and extend the crit range. First, we could gate behind advantage, which would encourage tactical play. Second, we could gate behind shrouds, which brings up some interesting choices about converting the shroud for damage or leaving in place for crits. Third, we could gate it behind the bleeds, which also plays nicely into encouraging tactical play.

If we want to gate behind advantage, we should probably consider how the class might manufacture advantage, since relying solely on other characters seems a little out of place.

If we want to gate crit range behind shrouds we need to build that decision point firmly into the base shroud rules.

If we want to gate behind bleeds we need to account for the notion that an assassin should be able kill a low power target without having to run around waiting for it to bleed to death.

There is another option - what if we gated an extension to the crit range behind all of the above? So attacking with advantage gets you to 19-20. Advantage and a shroud to 18-20, and advantage, shroud and bleed to 17-20? That seems like an interesting way to encourage the player to use all the tools in his toolbox. It also provides some interesting scaling since you wouldn't need all three to deal with mooks, but you would for bigger harder targets, and that makes a certain amount of intuitive sense, at least to me.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

Back to the class at hand for a moment. I quite like both the extended crit range and bleeds as class features - they're on point and flavorful, as are shrouds. I think it's worth taking a moment to talk specifically about the mechanical implementation of those ideas though. We've spoken at least somewhat about how the rules we've got index a particular kind of mobile playstyle, which is cool and I like it, but what we haven't talked about is triggers and conditions for the abilities, at least not specifically.

The idea of extended crit range could just be cribbed from the Champion, so extend it at 3rd to 19-20 and then at some later level to 18-20. That's cool, but it isn't tasty (i.e. lacks flavor). If we want to weave the abilities together better we have a bunch of different ways we could gate and extend the crit range. First, we could gate behind advantage, which would encourage tactical play. Second, we could gate behind shrouds, which brings up some interesting choices about converting the shroud for damage or leaving in place for crits. Third, we could gate it behind the bleeds, which also plays nicely into encouraging tactical play.

If we want to gate behind advantage, we should probably consider how the class might manufacture advantage, since relying solely on other characters seems a little out of place.

If we want to gate crit range behind shrouds we need to build that decision point firmly into the base shroud rules.

If we want to gate behind bleeds we need to account for the notion that an assassin should be able kill a low power target without having to run around waiting for it to bleed to death.

There is another option - what if we gated an extension to the crit range behind all of the above? So attacking with advantage gets you to 19-20. Advantage and a shroud to 18-20, and advantage, shroud and bleed to 17-20? That seems like an interesting way to encourage the player to use all the tools in his toolbox. It also provides some interesting scaling since you wouldn't need all three to deal with mooks, but you would for bigger harder targets, and that makes a certain amount of intuitive sense, at least to me.

That might get too fiddly, at the end. I think I’d bake it into shrouds or advantage. Probably shrouds, so you want both for crit fishing, and it’s worth it to wait sometimes to blow the shrouds until you crit.

What triggers Bleed, though? Just hitting a target? Hitting with advantage?

 

[Fenris-77]

That might get too fiddly, at the end. I think I’d bake it into shrouds or advantage. Probably shrouds, so you want both for crit fishing, and it’s worth it to wait sometimes to blow the shrouds until you crit.

What triggers Bleed, though? Just hitting a target? Hitting with advantage?

I'd say a critical, unless we really want to push the idea, then it could be a successful hit. If it's going to be a crit we may want to up the die from a d4 to something more meaningful.

 

[TheCosmicKid]

It nearly always happens with threads about the assassin. Even in 4e, if it wasn’t a thread about optimisation, all these same arguments come out.

I would take that trend as evidence that there is a real identity problem to be worked out.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I would take that trend as evidence that there is a real identity problem to be worked out.

Nah. It also happens in threads about most of the classes that aren’t the core 4.

All it indicates is that a lot of folks are resistant to new things.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I would take that trend as evidence that there is a real identity problem to be worked out.

Look, man, I don’t really have much regard or patience for this sort of “your goal is bad and you should just be happy with the status quo” argument. If what we are doing here doesn’t appeal to you, that’s fine. It does appeal to some of us, and we are gonna continue working on it.

 

[Cap'n Kobold]

I would take that trend as evidence that there is a real identity problem to be worked out.

Think of it with a different name if that helps. If its not close to your view of an actual assassin (and because that name is already officially assigned to a 'proper' assassin in D&D) then think of the class as "Slayer" or "Executioner" and try to work within the framework of what the people who are working on the class are doing.

Think of the Warcraft Assassination Rogue, or "hollywood 'assassin'" if that helps. Less good at infiltration and assassinating than a Rogue, less good at fighting than a Fighter, less good at movement than an urban ranger, but elements of all those classes in there.