Assassinate

[Jadeare]

So, fellow rogues, how is Assassinate working for you? What have you assassinated that is memorable?, what hints and tips can you give for those who are having trouble using it practically?. IE with a fast moving party in quests with groups of mobs flailing and moving everywhere.

I have a little run set up in the vale where i do the dingo, troll, devil and bats (no assassinate on the bats but easy enough to do by yourself). Havn't had an assassinate miss on one of these guys yet.

Can also get to the gnoll without aggroing the mephits, they get a bit angry tho and try to find you (aggressively) once you pop him.

You can get two enemies in one hit if you are face the right way and hold your tongue just so.

Add to this my fellow rogues.

Hints Tips Experiences.

[Maegin]

the faster sneaking line and spring attack did me wonders, and using ghoste's invisibility methods, its more like playing splinter cell, than ddo.

[CSFurious]

it is a great enhancement

[kamimitsu]

Faster sneaking (as mentioned previously) is a huge help. I respecc'd up to IV and got some 30% striders... your luck may vary. I also usually use dual puncturers (wish I had WoPs), as the CON damage on a crit seems to come off before the FORT save. Lower CON=Lower Save.

If/when you fail to assassinate, I find the best recourse is to tumble away, switch weapon sets (based on target) and get killing. The tumbling does two things: it breaks your sneak posture, and it gets you far enough away to have time to switch your weapons. I generally switch to paralyzing/weakening of enfeebling. Other than tumbling, you can always use diplo (which I don't do very often) if you are in a party.

For non-soloing situations, I'm still finding my groove for WoAII. Here are a few of my strategies:
Some quests have intermediary Yellow-named bosses at certain stages. I let the tanks go in and get the bosses attention, then I sneak up and do the deed. In a non-pug party, you can sometimes get someone to open the door for you (out of sight), you can sneak in and assassinate the boss and roll back to the door frame to bring the rest of the baddies to your waiting party. It's also a good way to pull monsters to your party in general. Sneak in, zap one, tumble away, drag dead guys buddies to your ambush.
I also use assassinate in The Shroud a bit. While everyone is beating on the portals, I stay in sneak and prepare for the trog spawns. I can usually take out 1 or 2 (if they are close enough) before the sorcs finger them. Same for part 4 and the gnolls.
Don't bother trying to assassinate in a wild battle, someone will bump you and break your stealth mode, and you'll get the "incorrect stance" error. Pick a target that is close, not moving much, and busy trying to kill your party-mate. Sneak directly to it, and get the kill(s). You can be a high AC/low DPS intimitank's best friend this way.

As for The Vale:
If you want to get the Gnoll/Mephits, body pull the mephits one by one and bring them down, then go in and assassinate the named (if there are two or so mephits left, don't worry about it).
Getting the other named gnolls (in the tree-villages) are much, much harder (but doable). Keep a few things in mind: 1. Sneak by anything that you can... even if you have to wait a while for it to move. 2. Archers will ALWAYS shoot at you if they can see you. If you must kill a monster in view of an archer, be prepared to move quickly to kill the archer. 3. You can stay hidden when swimming or going up ladders, so long as you were hidden when you last were on solid ground (actually, you can hide while jumping out of water with a bit of timing).

So far in The Vale, I've assassinated the Hyena, Troll, Devil, Bezekira, Gnoll (w/mephits), Ogre-mage and two of the tree-top gnolls. The ogre mage is really easy (and usually first on my list). Just be sure to pull the spiders (you can't sneak by them, so let their tremorsense kick in and drag them away), one by one to the wall west of the Ogre mage. Once the field of spiders is clear, he's all yours.

I'm sure there's a lot more to add, but hopefully the above will help you (or someone) out.

Shiz

[kyebosh]

Beholders go down well!
If you have crippling strike, Assassinate them with 2xWeakening (of Enfeebling if you can)... even if they save, 2-3 hits & they're at 0-STR, stop casting & Auto-Crit

If they change the Sneak mechanism to be cancelled by Hits only (not Misses), Orthons & Devils will go down quick, especially with a high-AC Rogue.