Post by rainbowdash on Feb 13, 2019 13:02:42 GMT
Warning: This will be contain quite a bit of ranting and might belong to a different sub-forum entirely. If it is so please move it.
HG has a varity of classes and everyone brings something to the table that is inherently unique and most oft he time fun. Of course not every class is equally good in every Meta and that is not to be expected even tho it would be appreciated.
And then there are Assassins….
This class is as if a Ranger and a Rogue had a love-child and it got born with just one eye one arm and one leg and by it’s 6th birthday the only words it could speak are: „Please finally kill or buff me.“
But but but Assassins have Mortal and Penetrating Strikes.
Yes they do. And that’s why I said love-child of a RANGER and rogue. The CS ability is very similar to the Mortal Strike one. Pretty much the same targets only that a ranger can choose from STR/DEX/WIS and melee or range while a Assassin is limited to Melee STR/DEX. Also even if the save succeeds, the target will still take (Ranger level including LLs / 10) points of Constitution damage.
To be totally fair Rangers are limited to their favoured enemies (so they cover only 80% of the endgame mobs) and Assassins can Mortal Strike everything that is critable.
Also there is Penetrating Strike.
„For characters with between 20 and 27 Assassin levels, honed weapons deliver penetrating strikes, inflicting added damage. The base strike damage added is equal to the Assassin's level, plus legendary levels if the characters control class is Assassin, plus the character's Strength modifier. Critical immune creatures hit by a penetrating strike suffer no damage if they save vs fortitude, and one quarter of the base damage if they fail. Non-critical immunes suffer one quarter of the base damage if they save vs fortitude, and one half the base damage if they fail.“
Which sounds mighty nice. Sadly ist not really added damage but rather additonal damage inflicted in a different package then the original hit resulting in it being reduced heavily or being totally negated by most mobs. Also this damage cant crit. I havent tested yet if the additional package procs additional kickback aswell but I wouldnt be suprised.
But Assassins get Death Strikes thats a good bit of damage!
Yes full level Assassins get 15d6 sneak attack damage and it stacks with Blackguards and Rogues sneak attacks.
But if that would be the reason to play an Assassin you might aswell just go Rogue. They get way more goodies like those awesome classtalents (Improved Evasion (which rangers also get for free and Assassins miss out again), Crippling Strike, defensive roll, slippery mind, oppertunist and skill mastery) and also get the ability to get the sneak bonus if they go pure.
So the sad thing is the Assassin on HG doesnt provide anything really unique while having quite a few drawbacks for a class that is bound to be played a certain way:
-You are a prestige class with the requirement of having 8 hide and 8 move silent which greatly reduces the number of ways to build them preEpic or forces you to play a certain subrace
-You are a 3 / 4 AB melee class
-You have to focus heavily into either STR or DEX to offset the natural AB progression and to maximise your Mortal Strike
-You are one off the few melee classes that does not get bonus attributes in LL alongside SDs and monks
- You get a bunch of spells but especially the L3 and L4 ones are iffy because you would need to beat creatures SR
-Your Weaponbuff is Acid and overlapping with Druids therefore nothing special like Rangers, SDs, Paladins
So what could be changed about the Ass(assins) of HG?
The biggest deal in my opinion is the Penetrating Strike seperate package damage. The same thing has been true for Fighters whetstone damage and SDs negative buff damage. In seperate packages they are really useless almost a drawback even. SO the obvious thing would be to add the extra damage to the actual hit so it can enhance the critical strike damage and only suffer from damage reduction once.
If for some reason that would not be possible, it might be worth a thought to change the damage typ into something more interesting like inflicting internal damage via festering or something. That is even somewhat on course with the whole „I penetrate your armour and poke you with my poisoned blade“ theme.
Another thing that could be changed in order to make Assassins more interesting and unique is the whole poison situation.
At the moment there are 3 poisons on the server that you can buy in the Stygia shop that have somewhat of an impact:
- Thaumaturic Poison, this weapon will apply a powerful breach effect when struck
- Rapacious Poison, this venom will cause all creatures struck to make a fortitude save or have their strengh dexterity and constitution drained on hit
- Essential Posion, this venom will cause all creatures struck to make a fortitude save or be level-drained on hit
Of those three only the first one is reliable to use due to the low save on the bottom too.
To make Assassins the uncontested masters of poison on HG and not having to share that title with Blackguards it would be really nice if they would have the ability to once a rest craft a unique poison similiarly tot he harper potion crafting. Or put some more poisons in various shops and make them only useable by Assassins. One poison could strip Crit immunity away for 1 round for example if some save is failed, there are pretty much endless ways onhits could be applied to weapons and that would be something truely unique for an unloved class.
Another thing that could be changed and that would make the player to be more active is to give the assassin a quickaction similarly to bards persuade that reduces a mobs conceal by x depending on the amount of spot the Assassin has. This would make them less of an engage and forget tank but would give them a really strong tool that helps the party and takes away rangers monopoly on concealdropping.
Also giving them free attributes and talents like almost every other class in LL would definitly help to see more shady guys run around Higher Ground.
HG has a varity of classes and everyone brings something to the table that is inherently unique and most oft he time fun. Of course not every class is equally good in every Meta and that is not to be expected even tho it would be appreciated.
And then there are Assassins….
This class is as if a Ranger and a Rogue had a love-child and it got born with just one eye one arm and one leg and by it’s 6th birthday the only words it could speak are: „Please finally kill or buff me.“
But but but Assassins have Mortal and Penetrating Strikes.
Yes they do. And that’s why I said love-child of a RANGER and rogue. The CS ability is very similar to the Mortal Strike one. Pretty much the same targets only that a ranger can choose from STR/DEX/WIS and melee or range while a Assassin is limited to Melee STR/DEX. Also even if the save succeeds, the target will still take (Ranger level including LLs / 10) points of Constitution damage.
To be totally fair Rangers are limited to their favoured enemies (so they cover only 80% of the endgame mobs) and Assassins can Mortal Strike everything that is critable.
Also there is Penetrating Strike.
„For characters with between 20 and 27 Assassin levels, honed weapons deliver penetrating strikes, inflicting added damage. The base strike damage added is equal to the Assassin's level, plus legendary levels if the characters control class is Assassin, plus the character's Strength modifier. Critical immune creatures hit by a penetrating strike suffer no damage if they save vs fortitude, and one quarter of the base damage if they fail. Non-critical immunes suffer one quarter of the base damage if they save vs fortitude, and one half the base damage if they fail.“
Which sounds mighty nice. Sadly ist not really added damage but rather additonal damage inflicted in a different package then the original hit resulting in it being reduced heavily or being totally negated by most mobs. Also this damage cant crit. I havent tested yet if the additional package procs additional kickback aswell but I wouldnt be suprised.
But Assassins get Death Strikes thats a good bit of damage!
Yes full level Assassins get 15d6 sneak attack damage and it stacks with Blackguards and Rogues sneak attacks.
But if that would be the reason to play an Assassin you might aswell just go Rogue. They get way more goodies like those awesome classtalents (Improved Evasion (which rangers also get for free and Assassins miss out again), Crippling Strike, defensive roll, slippery mind, oppertunist and skill mastery) and also get the ability to get the sneak bonus if they go pure.
So the sad thing is the Assassin on HG doesnt provide anything really unique while having quite a few drawbacks for a class that is bound to be played a certain way:
-You are a prestige class with the requirement of having 8 hide and 8 move silent which greatly reduces the number of ways to build them preEpic or forces you to play a certain subrace
-You are a 3 / 4 AB melee class
-You have to focus heavily into either STR or DEX to offset the natural AB progression and to maximise your Mortal Strike
-You are one off the few melee classes that does not get bonus attributes in LL alongside SDs and monks
- You get a bunch of spells but especially the L3 and L4 ones are iffy because you would need to beat creatures SR
-Your Weaponbuff is Acid and overlapping with Druids therefore nothing special like Rangers, SDs, Paladins
So what could be changed about the Ass(assins) of HG?
The biggest deal in my opinion is the Penetrating Strike seperate package damage. The same thing has been true for Fighters whetstone damage and SDs negative buff damage. In seperate packages they are really useless almost a drawback even. SO the obvious thing would be to add the extra damage to the actual hit so it can enhance the critical strike damage and only suffer from damage reduction once.
If for some reason that would not be possible, it might be worth a thought to change the damage typ into something more interesting like inflicting internal damage via festering or something. That is even somewhat on course with the whole „I penetrate your armour and poke you with my poisoned blade“ theme.
Another thing that could be changed in order to make Assassins more interesting and unique is the whole poison situation.
At the moment there are 3 poisons on the server that you can buy in the Stygia shop that have somewhat of an impact:
- Thaumaturic Poison, this weapon will apply a powerful breach effect when struck
- Rapacious Poison, this venom will cause all creatures struck to make a fortitude save or have their strengh dexterity and constitution drained on hit
- Essential Posion, this venom will cause all creatures struck to make a fortitude save or be level-drained on hit
Of those three only the first one is reliable to use due to the low save on the bottom too.
To make Assassins the uncontested masters of poison on HG and not having to share that title with Blackguards it would be really nice if they would have the ability to once a rest craft a unique poison similiarly tot he harper potion crafting. Or put some more poisons in various shops and make them only useable by Assassins. One poison could strip Crit immunity away for 1 round for example if some save is failed, there are pretty much endless ways onhits could be applied to weapons and that would be something truely unique for an unloved class.
Another thing that could be changed and that would make the player to be more active is to give the assassin a quickaction similarly to bards persuade that reduces a mobs conceal by x depending on the amount of spot the Assassin has. This would make them less of an engage and forget tank but would give them a really strong tool that helps the party and takes away rangers monopoly on concealdropping.
Also giving them free attributes and talents like almost every other class in LL would definitly help to see more shady guys run around Higher Ground.