Not liking my 20 rogue

[maddong]

Since I've never played a pure rogue before I used a +20 LR to turn someone into a 20 rogue int based assassin with agony/drow dagger. It plays well in a group when I'm trailing someone but when I try to solo it feels less than ideal. The assassinate feels a lot less reliable than what I'm used to (handwrap stuns) and it is hard for me to get used to trying to sneak mode right before attacking in battle (I tend to not even hit or they tend to be dead).

I'm wondering if I would be better off LRing 6 levels into ranger to make 14 rogue/6 ranger? Then I would have manyshot and exposing shot in my bag of tricks.

Or should I stick with the pure rogue?

Can you bluff, sneak, then assassinate? Can you exposing strike, sneak, then assassinate?

Or with my playstyle would I be better off doing 19 rogue/1 monk and stunning?

[Munkenmo]

I'm wondering if I would be better off LRing 6 levels into ranger to make 14 rogue/6 ranger? Then I would have manyshot and exposing shot in my bag of tricks.

If you're considering splashing, I'd advocate dropping one more rogue level, 14rogue nets no worthy bonuses.

if you were to go 13/6/1 you could pick up one:

fighter = bonus feat, cheaper haste boost enhancements than the TA tree.
monk = bonus feat, and the ability to spend 2 more feats on +1 crit multiplier on 19/20
fvs = qualifying for empower heal, and an sp based divine might.
cleric = qualifying for empower heal and cheap scroll mastery
druid = qualifying for empower heal + rams might

[Saekee]

Since I've never played a pure rogue before I used a +20 LR to turn someone into a 20 rogue int based assassin with agony/drow dagger. It plays well in a group when I'm trailing someone but when I try to solo it feels less than ideal. The assassinate feels a lot less reliable than what I'm used to (handwrap stuns) and it is hard for me to get used to trying to sneak mode right before attacking in battle (I tend to not even hit or they tend to be dead).

I'm wondering if I would be better off LRing 6 levels into ranger to make 14 rogue/6 ranger? Then I would have manyshot and exposing shot in my bag of tricks.

Or should I stick with the pure rogue?

Can you bluff, sneak, then assassinate? Can you exposing strike, sneak, then assassinate?

Or with my playstyle would I be better off doing 19 rogue/1 monk and stunning?

Rogues require a very particular playstyle. I assume you have read the INT based rogue and Hassan's Assassin thread?

For a stun rogue, there was an excellent Epic Elite build posted recently using (I believe) 17 rogue, 2 monk, 1 fighter. I just tried to find it but could not (maybe your search fu is better than mine). A stunned mob is vulnerable to sneak attacks; add the attack speed of an unarmed monk and the results are very good. The planner had everything in wisdom (naturally) as well as DC improvements etc.

A pure rogue assassin is all about stealth tactics, timing, bluff, heavy UMD with things like Sleet storm, displacement, tenser's, etc. as well as the right gear for blinding or improved deception on both an item and the off-hand blade (usually the EMG). The rogue threads will help you with those tactics.

Both these approaches are very effective. Since you have done a stun monk, you probably have all the right gear and know how to do it--might be the route for you and try an INT rogue down the road.

[Chaios]

Can you bluff, sneak, then assassinate? Can you exposing strike, sneak, then assassinate?

Yes, you can do that, but faster if use improved feint for the bluff, and use bluff to stealthily pull individual mobs away from a group. The lvl 6 deepwood stalker core enhancement "exposing strike" also gives a bluff attack and its on a different timer than IF. The bluff/sneak/assassinate timing takes getting used to, but it works.

[CThruTheEgo]

An assassin does have a very different playstyle than other melees. Rogues in general tend to be a bit slower when soloing due to their reliance on sneak attacks for dps. You can sometimes just sneak past trash and not worry about fighting. But a lot of quests require you to kill all or specific mobs to move forward. Assassinating a group of mobs one at a time while solo does take some time. But you get a ridiculous amount of sneak attack damage and you don't have to let that go to waste.

As Saekee mentioned, improved deception or radiance will allow you to get sneak attacks even when you have agro. These are indispensible tools for a rogue that wants to solo quickly. Improved deception on a single item and both weapons all stack, so if you have it on all three of those you will see you are getting sneak attacks almost constantly. I find I don't even need to use bluff with this setup.

If you're having trouble getting into sneak mode before combat, I keep sneak at number 1 and assassinate at number 3 on my hotbar so I can access both quickly. Drop into sneak as you are approaching mobs, assassinate one, then drop out of sneak and start meleeing another. If you're with a group, then when assassinate goes off timer again, drop back into sneak and assassinate a different mob than the one the group is working on, then drop out of sneak and go back to meleeing. By doing this you maximize your contribution through both melee dps and instakills.

I personally have never been very successful with the bluff-sneak-assassinate combo. Some players swear by it but it has never worked well for me.

It might be the case that this is just not a playstyle you enjoy. If so, splashing might be a better choice for you and others have already provided some good options for this.

[Satyriasys]

I never use bluff on my Assassin, the animation is too slow and awkward. With 2 Agony's and a Deception item mobs seem to be constantly bluffed anyway. I just stealth into a group and do a double assisinate then hit haste boost and burst the others down. If I run into trouble go into stealth and assassinate some more. Also dont underestimate the power of Improved Uncanny Dodge.

I play a Shadar-Kai and could never play another race as an Assassin. The Gloom Stalker passive allows you to assassinate mobs while they're aggrod on you, no bluff needed, and the Shadow Jaunt lets me get out of trouble instantly. Like someone else said Assassins are very play style dependent and I would wager certain people would never enjoy playing one.

[Saekee]

Improved deception on a single item and both weapons all stack, so if you have it on all three of those you will see you are getting sneak attacks almost constantly. I find I don't even need to use bluff with this setup.

I did not know that all three stack; I assumed that it was just one weapon and the deception gear slot, usually with the deception weapon in the offhand. nice tidbit thx.

I personally have never been very successful with the bluff-sneak-assassinate combo. Some players swear by it but it has never worked well for me.

Another shortcut is to use the Sap feat if one can fit it in. Sap, and then take one's time to bluff, stealth and assassinate (or stealth, bluff, assassinate). If it fails, Sap them and try again. All needing to timed right of course.

[Raoull]

I did not know that all three stack; I assumed that it was just one weapon and the deception gear slot, usually with the deception weapon in the offhand. nice tidbit thx.

From my testing, the way it works....

Non weapons: Deception triggers 5% of all attacks. Improved Deception triggers 10% of all attacks. These two stack if you have both.

Weapons: Again 5/10. They stack with non-weapons. However, a weapon with deception does not grant deception to the other weapon, they are weapon specific. (The sneak damage does work on both weapons for the random-loot deceptions.)


Ranger 6 for exposing strike is pretty awesome, but probably overkill. I use it on my rogue, but as much for the extra damage as the deception proc. It is sweet on the big slow bosses that spin around though.... that seems to differ from mob to mob. You can sneak anything for 4 seconds, but for some it will also really mess with them attacking you back (this hold true for all deception procs). I did build my toon specifically for it, but I don't think I would again. If I were to build another Rogue with a ranger 6 splash, I'd either be a dex based elf or a str based anything else to maximize the Manyshot burst. I went a dex based halfling. The manyshot burst is still pretty nice, as long as you're in sneak range (which DWS helps....).

[maddong]

I assumed agony would grant improved deception to the offhand as well.... So the optimum isn't imp dec weapon, dec weapon, it is double agony + imp dec and dec items....

So 23.05% per hit (.9 x .9 x .95)?

Is agony the only imp dec dagger?

I seem to be doing a bit better soloing easy content after adding a deception item to my agony and removing assassin's venomed blades. Sap, stealth, bluff, assassinate seems to work pretty well.

[Todkaninchen]

I never use bluff on my Assassin, the animation is too slow and awkward. With 2 Agony's and a Deception item mobs seem to be constantly bluffed anyway. I just stealth into a group and do a double assisinate then hit haste boost and burst the others down. If I run into trouble go into stealth and assassinate some more. Also dont underestimate the power of Improved Uncanny Dodge.

I play a Shadar-Kai and could never play another race as an Assassin. The Gloom Stalker passive allows you to assassinate mobs while they're aggrod on you, no bluff needed, and the Shadow Jaunt lets me get out of trouble instantly. Like someone else said Assassins are very play style dependent and I would wager certain people would never enjoy playing one.

I usually use bluff mainly to pull mobs out of the pack and kill them one-at-a-time.

Using it in the middle of a melee... yeah, that's kinda' awkward.

[Shadow_Jumper]

I play a Shadar-Kai and could never play another race as an Assassin. The Gloom Stalker passive allows you to assassinate mobs while they're aggrod on you, no bluff needed, and the Shadow Jaunt lets me get out of trouble instantly. Like someone else said Assassins are very play style dependent and I would wager certain people would never enjoy playing one.

This. I play a halfling assassin and could never play another race for assassin. Rogues are VERY play style dependent, and are one of the only classes where you can say that the player who plays the build, is just as important as the build itself. Rogues in general are not very good at soloing as other classes, but they can sneak past a lot of the mobs without having to fight them. IMO rogues are more of a group build, I do the best on my rogue in a party, and rarely solo on him, but I do see some posts of rogues soloing quests, its all up to the player.

Check out the build in my signature for a halfling assassin build if you're interested.