Essentials Assassin

[BobTheNob]

Havent played them at all, but...

Isnt one encounter power once per battle kinda limiting. I am a fan of encounter powers, and while essentials homogenized them (which I dont mind at all, being able to pick from 20 powers when only 3 were really worth their salt was just driving me crazy) still players were able to call on them more than once per encounter.

Isnt it kinda boring to only have one encounter power per encounter? Play testers out there, how much fun is this class to play?

 

[Neverfate]

Aside from getting rid of the broken infinite damage set up, they butchered the class. I highly suggest e-mailing WotC. Maybe someone still has the PDF open and can update it before they dump it an forget it.

 

[Neonchameleon]

It feels ... watered down.

I liked the choice of at wills and that assassins weren't cookie cutter. Admittedly two of the four melee assassin attacks had to go. (Jian and Javelin). And the bolas needed watering down.

But you now get nothing at level 7 except d10 damage for the encounter on a power you already have.

Hmm... I'm thinking of a Dragon article for clubs and staves. Oh, and shuriken.

 

[Neonchameleon]

Havent played them at all, but...

Isnt one encounter power once per battle kinda limiting. I am a fan of encounter powers, and while essentials homogenized them (which I dont mind at all, being able to pick from 20 powers when only 3 were really worth their salt was just driving me crazy) still players were able to call on them more than once per encounter.

Isnt it kinda boring to only have one encounter power per encounter? Play testers out there, how much fun is this class to play?

You're looking at the class backwards (or rather it was designed backwards). Although the weapon-specific At Will powers might claim to be at will, setting the situation up so they will be useful is ... difficult. So they are effectively used with the frequency of encounter powers - but you need to set them up first. What I don't know is how soon people will tire of garrottings and the option to throw people to the ground. (Also if you're counting monster HP, the low damage but high accuracy powers like the throw or the dagger get a new lease of life when a monster's approaching 10hp).

The core problem is that as things stand, you get almost all the combat versatility at first level. The MBA. The at wills. The executioner's strike. And your first poison.

 

[I'm A Banana]

I still like the Essentials version a lot.

It's not exactly the flavor I was going for with my gnome assassin (who is all about the invisibility/hiding and fear effects), but it matches an "Assassin" very nicely.

There's some role overlap between Rogue and Assassin fo sho, but the Rogue appears to do what they do purely on their own muscle, wit, and luck. They're mobility, agility, dirty fighting. The Assassin skews the odds in their favor with a bit of shadow magic and deception. They're more cautious, careful, and sudden.

It's not the resounding success of most Essentials classes, but it ain't bad.

 

[Neonchameleon]

I still like the Essentials version a lot.

It's not exactly the flavor I was going for with my gnome assassin (who is all about the invisibility/hiding and fear effects), but it matches an "Assassin" very nicely.

There's some role overlap between Rogue and Assassin fo sho, but the Rogue appears to do what they do purely on their own muscle, wit, and luck. They're mobility, agility, dirty fighting. The Assassin skews the odds in their favor with a bit of shadow magic and deception. They're more cautious, careful, and sudden.

It's not the resounding success of most Essentials classes, but it ain't bad.

Hmm... one thing that no one's mentioned on the CharOp boards is that garotte strangle has now become a really effective solo/elite screw. The target takes -2 to attack you and can't make any attacks that don't target you. There go the multi-attacks - I assume you didn't take OAs on the eight squares you had to move in. And your target should be marked/in the defender's aura. -4 to hit you - and giving the defender a free swing/free damage (assuming he doesn't escape - take Superior Fortitude!)

Still. Key flaws that were introduced.

1: No options.
2: Dead levels. We need something at L7 - it's when the Pre-essentials get their third At Will. (Ideally I'd want a bloodied suppression power or the shadow coffin back at L7).
3: Damage is too low. +3/2d8 is unsupported Warlock quality damage. And the garotte only does +3/2d4 - a controller effect. (Although see above for consequences of that control). The dagger power might look cute - but all the poisons are reliable and not that strong anyway.
4: No good ways to hide. You can do plenty once you're hidden. But the first power that helps you hide is either Darkness or Vanish at level 6.

 

[Lancelot]

I like it, and one of my players loves it. He has just spent the afternoon frantically rejigging his "traditional" Assassin to a new Essentials Assassin for the game tonight.

...so the Damage-Per-Round isn't as munchy as a ranger. A 3rd-level Assassin is still doing 1d8 (longsword) + 1d8 (damage bonus) + 5 (Dex mod) + 2 (Weapon Focus and +1 weapon) + 2d10 (assassin's strike) + auto-killing if the target goes to 10hp or less... without using a daily power and without requiring Combat Advantage.

So, that's a 27hp hit on average (or an "effective" 37hp hit, if the target happens to drop to 10hp or fewer). If it's a crit, and assuming a bog-standard +1 weapon with no high-crit property, it's approximately a 60hp shot (assuming the target drops to 10hp or fewer) with a one-handed weapon.

At 3rd level. With no daily use, and no optimization of weapons, feats or other stuff.

So yeah... I guess that's underpowered these days.

As for the flexibility.... heck, my assassin-playing friend saw all the at-wills and poisons, and his eyes just lit up. He's not the kind of player that enjoys having a raft of enounter powers on the table. He wants to get in, do some good damage, and roleplay his character. The new Assassin suits him to a "T".

 

[Aegeri]

It turns out we are playing with a broken release that shouldn't have gone up.

Whoops.

 

[Neverfate]

http://community.wizards.com/go/thread/view/75882/26276933/Dragon_393_-_Assassin:_Executioner?pg=3

"OK folks, you deserve an explanation. And that is, we messed up.

The article you're seeing and commenting on is not, in fact, the final version of the assassin executioner. Before everyone screams "shenanigans," let me explain what happened.

The magazines and the development team (and everyone else in R&D, for that matter) work on separate calendars. We have our schedule, design has its schedule, development and editing have theirs.

Normally, those things are closely coordinated. In this case, the system broke down.

Back in September, we (being Dragon magazine) promised that the updated assassin would be published in November. Under the impression that it was done, we sent the file through typesetting and posted it. The development team, however, was working toward a December deadline, and had set the assassin aside to deal with other projects. That mis-coordination went unnoticed until today, when one of the developers spotted this thread and realized that something had gone wrong.

The PDF is out there, so we're going to leave it where it is. There's no accelerating the development schedule at this time, because doing so would ripple through other projects that can't be rippled. That means the FINAL final version of the assassin will be available in December, according to Development's schedule.

That's the situation. It's embarrassing, but it's not a conspiracy. We apologize for the confusion.

Steve Winter
Editor-in-Chief, Dragon magazine

This is from the WotC forums about the feedback on the article. Looks like the REAL assassin isn't here yet which is a big sigh of relief.

 

[I'm A Banana]

So the Assassin article snuck up on them?

HA!