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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Messageboard Golem" data-source="post: 2010049" data-attributes="member: 18387">Four assassin product hit shelves at nearly the same time. So what is one to do? Buy them all and sort the chaff.The Assassin's Handbook, while nice and juicy, had some essential flaws, but is the best of the printed assassin books$3 = 8 page equivalent for Mongoose's Power Class book$5 = 40 pages for Whispers of Death (PDF)$7.50 = 128 pages for Crimson Contracts (PDF)$19.95 = 64 pages for The Assassin's HandbookThe Assassin's handbook is the most expensive of the Assassin products, but is also by far the best of the two printed products.Layout on this one is nice, easy to read and has nice dark illustrations.Like the Mongoose Power Class, this book introduces the Assassin as a 20 level base class. While the book claims to be recapturing the old 1e assassin, this class has spellcasting progression like the DMG Assassin. The primary difference between the DMG assassin and the GR assassin is changing the Death Attack into the Killing Blow ability. Effectively, a Killing Blow is a coup-de-grace attack that can be used against a target when a sneak attack could have been, in addition, the target must make a save or die, with the DC of the save being the amount of damage the attack dealt. Of course, this means that all assassins now carry picks and other x4 critical weapons, throw in a few points of power attack, and make the save impossible. Right off the bat, the class fells broken, and the one game we played with the class proved it beyond a shadow of a doubt.Thankfully, the three prestige classes in the book do not use this base class as a requirement, as I can't imagine using this base assassin in a game.The prestige classes are well done, and balanced compared to most. What sets them apart is they each have a theme and heavy flavor - if Whispers of Death had this kind of flavor material, it would have been a much better book. Some of the classes seem to be a little heavy on the spell-like abilities (granting multiple uses per day), but not completely out of whack.The new spells in the book are a nice collection, and are fully useable with any of the assassin classes detailed in the various assassin books, which makes for a nice plug-in. If nothing else, the spells chapter should be referenced for any assassin-centric game. Some of the new feats deal with poisons in the same basic way that metamagic feats modify spells. Empower poison increased the numeric effects of a poison by one-half. But then Maximize poison has the exact same effect? These feats work by spending extra time preparing the poison. Plus there are feats giving Poison Use (as per the DMG Assassin ability), and a cool "weapon panache" which is like weapon finesse, but with your Charisma.The poisons chapter is an excellent addition, with several real-world poisons in the mix. If you have the Poisoner's Handbook from Bastion, then this is less useful, but is otherwise the best material on poisons currently available, as far as I know.The final (and largest) section of the book details two Assassin groups - the Sirat and the Vultur. Plenty of flavor in this section, including details of the organizations, maps, new clerical domains, and some complete character.In all, the book is a nice addition to the DMG Assassin Prestige Class (or could probably work as is if you replace the Killing Blow with the Death Attack ability from the DMG Assassin), or to your Assassin collection. Unless Crimson Contracts goes to print, it is the best assassin book in print. If I only had this book out of the four, it would rate a 4/5, but since none of the assassin books rates a 5, this only rates a 3.</blockquote>

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