D&D 5E Assassins, Alignment, and Archetypes

[Sword of Spirit]

I too was disappointed with the 5e rogue assassin. I would be fine with it being a rogue subclass, except there isn't enough room to include the essentials of a D&D assassin.

In 3.5e I expanded the assassin prestige class into a full class, and it looked pretty good (never actually played it).

For me, in a D&D assassin, I like arcane spellcasting. I know it was a 3e innovation, but since we're bandying about 4e innovations, I assume it's legit.

What I currently do is stick with the official subclass but have a ubiquitous order of assassins that take Magic Initiate wizard.

If I were making a base class I'd be tempted to make it a half caster. D8, start with rogue proficiencies but grant martial weapons. Maybe leave disguise and poison to kit proficiencies or Expertise. Look to various ranger subclasses for DPR inspiration, with some sort of particularly lethal attack option. But making it a half Int-based arcane caster gives it a niche that means it doesn't need as much innovation just to have a place.

Probably not quite what anyone else would want, but thought I'd share.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

I skipped some posts, but I think Creed of__________ (creatures) sounds so badass I might get it tattooed after work latter today .

If 3.5 and 4e had some spellcasting, would it be possible....now hear me out and dont freak out just yet....to do a full class with 1/3 casting (like the first artificer) ? With infiltration and stealth spells?

Maybe each House (yeah, House sound even cool than Creed, extra point if one is Rising Sun, specialized in killing vampire and undead) could have bonus spells?.

I dont mind if you would prefer the class to stay non-magical, I get it also.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Tell Cersei Lannister: I want her to know it wasn't my PC but I had poisoned Joffrey if I could and I wouldn't regret at all.

Using poisons in the battle field isn't honorable, not fair play, but some chaotic good characters could dare to do it.

Good assassins are possible, but they would rather to use another name, for example "Slayer of Domiel" (prestige class from "Book of Exalted Deeds").

"Honorable" is decided by the people who make the rules. This isn't really important, but it is just something that I've encountered a few times and feels like it is worth discussing.

Let us say a knight is going to execute a bandit. They toss them a sword so they can have an "honorable" fight. But, is it really "honorable and fair"?

They knight is fully armored in fine steel, wielding their own sword, has years of swordplay experience and a daily regime of training to keep their skills sharp.

The bandit has some patched together leather and cloth armor (if they are lucky) and as a commoner has never really learned the sword and is using a random weapon instead of one suitably balanced for them.

Is this fair? Not really.

The only "fair" fight a warrior can have is against another warrior, with the same level of equipment, and the same level of training. So, in the context of medieval times. The only fair fight they can have is against people of their own social class. DnD makes this slightly more complicated, due to the rogue and barbarian mechanics allowing them to fight as well lightly armored as the heavily armored fighter and paladin, but it seems like "poison isn't fair" is an arbitrary line to draw. It is equally unfair for someone twice your size to fight you in melee. Cobra Kai loves "fair fights" where both sides stand and punch each other, because they were trained to fight that way.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

Bran Stark executed an innocent man with his own hands because he tought that was a deserter when really only was the suvivors of an attacks against his exploration squad.

But I understand your doubts about the code of honor. The real History talks us about the tsujigiri or a special case of Kiri-Sute Gomen:

(From Wikipedia)

A popular incident tells how a commoner bumped into Saiheiji Tomo, treasurer of the Owari-Tokugawa family, and ignored him further when Tomo demanded him to apologize. Feeling merciful, the samurai offered the peasant his wakizashi so he had a chance to defend himself, but instead, the commoner decided to run away with his wakizashi, causing further dishonor. The incident resulted in Tomo being disowned from the Owari-Tokugawa clan. He later regained his honor by seeking out the commoner, collecting the wakizashi and killing the whole family

Here in the Western Society we are used to think we have to respect some universal moral principles, for example the human dignity. This has a name, the Natural Law.

If a knight fights against a group of criminals who are a menace for innocent people, then he hasn't to worry about "fair-play". Other matter is if the suspect surrenders and doesn't show signs of trying some trick. The priority should be to defend the law & order, not the glory. We aren't talking about a sport game but fighting for your life.

The Spanish king Carlos I said to his son Felipe II we need a balance between justice and mercy or one will become vice, and not virtue.

 

[Fenris-77]

Real world ethics fall apart when you apply them to D&D. Mostly ethics is concerned with trying to determine 'what is good' etc, but in D&D we know, absolutely, who is good, who is evil and who's in between. Killing an 'evil' man is no longer a matter of perspective, but a simple fact. Not that it matters, fantasy 'assassins' of the type this thread talks about plainly exist in fiction in a state of 'not evil', and that's about as deep as we need to go to build a character class. I'll let the players decide what the ethics looks like when they build an actual character.

 

[doctorbadwolf]

I too was disappointed with the 5e rogue assassin. I would be fine with it being a rogue subclass, except there isn't enough room to include the essentials of a D&D assassin.

In 3.5e I expanded the assassin prestige class into a full class, and it looked pretty good (never actually played it).

For me, in a D&D assassin, I like arcane spellcasting. I know it was a 3e innovation, but since we're bandying about 4e innovations, I assume it's legit.

What I currently do is stick with the official subclass but have a ubiquitous order of assassins that take Magic Initiate wizard.

If I were making a base class I'd be tempted to make it a half caster. D8, start with rogue proficiencies but grant martial weapons. Maybe leave disguise and poison to kit proficiencies or Expertise. Look to various ranger subclasses for DPR inspiration, with some sort of particularly lethal attack option. But making it a half Int-based arcane caster gives it a niche that means it doesn't need as much innovation just to have a place.

Probably not quite what anyone else would want, but thought I'd share.

I skipped some posts, but I think Creed of__________ (creatures) sounds so badass I might get it tattooed after work latter today .

If 3.5 and 4e had some spellcasting, would it be possible....now hear me out and dont freak out just yet....to do a full class with 1/3 casting (like the first artificer) ? With infiltration and stealth spells?

Maybe each House (yeah, House sound even cool than Creed, extra point if one is Rising Sun, specialized in killing vampire and undead) could have bonus spells?.

I dont mind if you would prefer the class to stay non-magical, I get it also.

Now, I don’t have any especial hatred of Spellcasting assassins, but I do wonder if maybe...there are enough Spellcasting classes in dnd 5e?

I think we can do more that is unique and interesting if we leave the Spellcasting out, on the one hand.

On the other hand, Mage Hand, Minor Illusion, Shadow Blade, Invisibility, Disguise Self...

I think maybe the way to go is a “ki” like resource, that some subclasses use to cast spells? The House of the Doppelgänger could gain some of the spells listed above, for instance. And some of the new psionic spells.

Wild idea; what if Shrouds are a limited resource? You have 1/level Shrouds per short rest, you can place them on a creature, only 1 creature can have shrouds on it, etc. when you spend shrouds to do anything other than add damage to an attack, you can spend from unused shrouds or from shrouds placed on a target.

idk saves us coming up with a separate limited resource mechanic.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Now, I don’t have any especial hatred of Spellcasting assassins, but I do wonder if maybe...there are enough Spellcasting classes in dnd 5e?

I think we can do more that is unique and interesting if we leave the Spellcasting out, on the one hand.

On the other hand, Mage Hand, Minor Illusion, Shadow Blade, Invisibility, Disguise Self...

I think maybe the way to go is a “ki” like resource, that some subclasses use to cast spells? The House of the Doppelgänger could gain some of the spells listed above, for instance. And some of the new psionic spells.

Wild idea; what if Shrouds are a limited resource? You have 1/level Shrouds per short rest, you can place them on a creature, only 1 creature can have shrouds on it, etc. when you spend shrouds to do anything other than add damage to an attack, you can spend from unused shrouds or from shrouds placed on a target.

idk saves us coming up with a separate limited resource mechanic.

I get what you mean.

On the other hand, if we are building an executioner that works in the default world where magic isnt rare, it kind of make sense to have a class using even a little bit of it to get an edge over its victims.

Rereading the first artificer article, with built-in 1/3 caster (same progression as EK and AT up to 4th level spell at 17th level), magic is very only supplemental to all the other abilities of the class. Its mostly only for utility: invisiblity, passwall, spider climb, protection from poison, darkness, darkvision, enhance ability, sleep.

I often find myself in the opposite situation as you: I try to design newer, more special things for my new classes, but many time its feels like most of them are just spells with another name and a different fluff, but with the same effects.

 

[Fenris-77]

Spells per/day abilities aren't uncommon and it might be the easiest way to implement spells in the class. A 1/3 caster is also very possible. The class could use a Ki point variant, but there's an upper limit to how may different mechanics you really want on class to have. You could incorporate it straight into the shrouds mechanic too - gate the spells by level and cost them in shroud points.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

Spells per/day abilities aren't uncommon and it might be the easiest way to implement spells in the class. A 1/3 caster is also very possible. The class could use a Ki point variant, but there's an upper limit to how may different mechanics you really want on class to have. You could incorporate it straight into the shrouds mechanic too - gate the spells by level and cost them in shroud points.

I'd see the Shrouds be fueled by spell slots ala Divine Smite.

Like, you can spend a 1st level slot to add a Shroud to 2d12 (+1d12 per extra level) psychic damage as a Bonus Action. You dont need to ''reclaim'' the shroud on the same turn. So you can spend many turn to build up your Shrouds to do a big a** nova.

 

[Fenris-77]

I'd see the Shrouds be fueled by spell slots ala Divine Smite.

Like, you can spend a 1st level slot to add a Shroud to 2d12 (+1d12 per extra level) psychic damage as a Bonus Action. You dont need to ''reclaim'' the shroud on the same turn. So you can spend many turn to build up your Shrouds to do a big a** nova.

That's fine if all the subclasses have spell slots, but that wasn't the plan. There's nothing wrong with casting as a subclass bit I, much like DBF, am more interested in seeing what can be done without it. You could always take on a 1/3 caster subclass as you own little bit of this bigger idea.