Rogue - Assassin Changes

[slarden]

Thanks for responding. So you don't play Shadowdancer and have no basis for whether solo or group is easier. This is my point. You speak from a place of ignorance when you look at my completion times. Temple of Vol is the 2nd hardest quest to solo for Shadowdancer. GoP is not possible. Most players can't complete this quest on EE in Shadowdancer (I would guess less than 2%). Shadowdancer does far less damage than LD. We have no AoE. We don't get 50% dodge and 100 extra MP. Take that same squishiness with less DPS and it is much harder to succeed on EE. Yes we have stealth, but that WAY more of an advantage in a group because it is not stealth that is required to get sneak attack. You simply don't have to have agro. This is a much easier condition to achieve in group play. Completing an EE quest solo in Shadowdancer requires very good agro management, and very skilled play.

There you go speculating and criticizing again.

I normally run in shadowdancer but when I solo'd EE Vol I didn't because it didn't make any sense when LD was staring me in the face as such an obvious alternative for soloing.

I don't speak from a place of ignorance as you claim. I just did what I thought was best in the situation. Now if I gave myself 3x the amount of time to finish a quest in shadowdancer I am seriously doubting it would have been a problem to complete the quest. I was zerging and taking more risks to complete the quest quicker, but still didn't die. LD made more sense at the time.

[nokowi]

There you go speculating and criticizing again.

I normally run in shadowdancer but when I solo'd EE Vol I didn't because it didn't make any sense when LD was staring me in the face as such an obvious alternative for soloing.

I don't speak from a place of ignorance as you claim. I just did what I thought was best in the situation. Now if I gave myself 3x the amount of time to finish a quest in shadowdancer I am seriously doubting it would have been a problem to complete the quest. I was zerging and taking more risks to complete the quest quicker, but still didn't die. LD made more sense at the time.

"I generally don't solo on my rogue - I have other builds specifically for soloing, but I group much more than I solo and prefer grouping."

"I did solo EE Vol on my rogue - that is the easiest quest in the chain to solo. I didn't keep track but it was a zerg run before champions so most certainly less than half an hour. Champions introduce the possibility of one-shotting so zerging on lower-PRR characters makes no sense. It was in LD, but I don't recall if it was before or after the change to Master's Blitz. Master's Blitz was better for solo play prior to the MP changes."

Show me where you said you played in Shadowdancer? Was I making assumptions, or did you fail to provide information?

Go solo EE Temple of Vol and report back to us how easy it was.

One of us is certainly making a lot of assumptions, and doing so in a position of ignorance. Report back to us. I would like you to make a videe to show how easy it was. We can judge your preconception with the reality. Do you live stream? I would be happy to observe.

[CThruTheEgo]

The quality and productivity of this thread has taken a nosedive.

Put the ruler away.

[nokowi]

The quality and productivity of this thread has taken a nosedive.

Put the ruler away.

Hehe. Thanks CThru. I'm going to take a break from this thread for a while. I hope you enjoyed the popcorn.

[brzytki]

Then put threat reduction in your build. Problem solved.

Thanks for this tip, i've been playing my rogue for 6 years and i didn't know threat reduction existed... To be clear: NO, that doesn't solve the problem.

Run into the room 2nd.

That too doesn't solve the problem because mobs don't agro only on the first person who enters the room.

Use tactics or build around your weaknesses. Rogues have access to web traps which would deal nicely with your situation. In good groups, they are completely unnecessary. In under-powered groups, you can use web, daunting roar, etc. You have plenty of options that don't require quickened heal scrolls.

Of course, but why would i get any of them if i can get cocoon that hits me for 140+ per tick. That's your "quickened heal". Quickened scrolls would in no way be an easy button and skill reducer as you claim, especially when compared to cocoon or spells.

If you don't want to be squishy, make a pally build.

Wow, i can only counter this one with "if you want to be a solo assassin, play a bard". That's the level of your statement.

Given that rogues are squishy but have high DPS in DnD, many of us are arguing for more DPS without removing the fundamental squishy nature of a rogue. This is what you are asking for with instant heals. Not even casters can cast quickened scrolls, why should rogues?

How quickened scrolls are instant heals? Please, elaborate. Compare it to spells, you need to click 1 button for spell and 3 buttons for scroll. How is that an easy button and instant heal? Also, to make it worth it you need to spend APs in mech tree. It's 8 APs if your rogue doesn't spend any in mech or 3 more APs if you have Improved Traps already. And why rogues? Because UMD is a class skill for example (you can give it to Artis as well, bards don't really need it).

Pally has the highest burst (130k in 15 seconds) dps in the game right now, at 8000 damage per second.

As you said yourself, it's burst DPS. I don't know if you noticed but it's a figure for a double boosting pally using Zeal from Crusader (+50 MP, +50 DS which is a better DPS for a starting 10-20 seconds than Blitz). That means the longer the fight, the smaller DPS. Also, players won't use Zeal on trash mobs/all champions. Sure, if you stage a contest on high HP mob when a rogue tries to steal agro from a pally, it probably won't happen. But in a regular play it does. Might happen less now that Devs gave threat increase like candy to other classes instead of upping rogues' damage.

Show me where you said you played in Shadowdancer? Was I making assumptions, or did you fail to provide information?

I'd say both. But one could also say "Show me where i said i don't play in Shadowdancer".

Edit:

One of us is certainly making a lot of assumptions, and doing so in a position of ignorance.

Also, not to be overly snarky, but given the recent back-and-forth between you guys, i find this quote a hilarious and a shot-in-your-foot comment.

[HuneyMunster]

As still no report from devs on any tinkering to assassin enhancements yet. I can only assume that either the pass is finished, they have ideas that will be presented soon or they are still monitoring the forum for anything interesting that is being suggest by the player base.


I still would like to see poison strikes become a weapon coating and used similar to effects such as deadly and holy sword. Each poison type can be added to a weapon, so you are able to coat main hand with icy chill and offhand with heartseeker poison. Even if this requires taking a weapon off your hand so not to apply the 2nd effect to both weapon and override the previous poison.

At least this way the heartseeker fort debuff will increase chance of the paralyze effect from icy chill poison.

I would also like to see deadly strikes also increases the targets vulnerability to poisons and bleeds so that they do 100% more damage to the target. This would make envenomed blade and bleed them out combo stronger than what they are now.

The only drawback with this is that will most probably require around 45 action points spent into assassin tree unless the poisons action point costs is reduced to 1 point.

[brzytki]

I still would like to see poison strikes become a weapon coating and used similar to effects such as deadly and holy sword. Each poison type can be added to a weapon, so you are able to coat main hand with icy chill and offhand with heartseeker poison. Even if this requires taking a weapon off your hand so not to apply the 2nd effect to both weapon and override the previous poison.

At least this way the heartseeker fort debuff will increase chance of the paralyze effect from icy chill poison.

I would also like to see deadly strikes also increases the targets vulnerability to poisons and bleeds so that they do 100% more damage to the target. This would make envenomed blade and bleed them out combo stronger than what they are now.

The only drawback with this is that will most probably require around 45 action points spent into assassin tree unless the poisons action point costs is reduced to 1 point.

Those are good ideas.

I still think that 2 APs for Poisons that are mostly useless except for placing the Mark on the target is too much.

[CThruTheEgo]

As still no report from devs on any tinkering to assassin enhancements yet. I can only assume that either the pass is finished, they have ideas that will be presented soon or they are still monitoring the forum for anything interesting that is being suggest by the player base.

I think slarden's statement above about Ghallanda being down is probably the reason. It has been crashing all week. That's a pretty big deal and I can understand why that would take first priority over anything else.

I just hope we don't get forgotten about completely or, when it is time for the devs to get back to other things, they don't simply move on to something else. The common sentiment seems to be that this revamp is far from complete.

[CThruTheEgo]

I still think that 2 APs for Poisons that are mostly useless except for placing the Mark on the target is too much.

Agreed.

[nokowi]

Thanks for this tip, i've been playing my rogue for 6 years and i didn't know threat reduction existed... To be clear: NO, that doesn't solve the problem.


That too doesn't solve the problem because mobs don't agro only on the first person who enters the room.


Of course, but why would i get any of them if i can get cocoon that hits me for 140+ per tick. That's your "quickened heal". Quickened scrolls would in no way be an easy button and skill reducer as you claim, especially when compared to cocoon or spells.


Wow, i can only counter this one with "if you want to be a solo assassin, play a bard". That's the level of your statement.


How quickened scrolls are instant heals? Please, elaborate. Compare it to spells, you need to click 1 button for spell and 3 buttons for scroll. How is that an easy button and instant heal? Also, to make it worth it you need to spend APs in mech tree. It's 8 APs if your rogue doesn't spend any in mech or 3 more APs if you have Improved Traps already. And why rogues? Because UMD is a class skill for example (you can give it to Artis as well, bards don't really need it).


As you said yourself, it's burst DPS. I don't know if you noticed but it's a figure for a double boosting pally using Zeal from Crusader (+50 MP, +50 DS which is a better DPS for a starting 10-20 seconds than Blitz). That means the longer the fight, the smaller DPS. Also, players won't use Zeal on trash mobs/all champions. Sure, if you stage a contest on high HP mob when a rogue tries to steal agro from a pally, it probably won't happen. But in a regular play it does. Might happen less now that Devs gave threat increase like candy to other classes instead of upping rogues' damage.


I'd say both. But one could also say "Show me where i said i don't play in Shadowdancer".

Edit:
Also, not to be overly snarky, but given the recent back-and-forth between you guys, i find this quote a hilarious and a shot-in-your-foot comment.

My argument would be that you already have too much easy healing with cocoon (as you point out), bottle of rum, sovereign pots, etc, and that we have adequate countermeasures (agro control, threat reduction, daunting roar, meld into darkness, improved uncanny dodge, diplomacy, etc)

Adding more healing at the expense of others play style (those who want to feel squishy and like the play style of having to jump away) is a net change away from the idea that rogues are squishy in DnD, and at the expense of other players.

I realize we have players playing rogue in DC or LD right now that want them to play just like pally barb. Where you can stand there and provide dps and healing sufficient to never have to jump away. Given the lower DPS of rogue, DPS improvements are where I feel the change should happen, not in taking this game further from its DnD flavor.

MOAR DIPS!

[slarden]

My argument would be that you already have too much easy healing with cocoon (as you point out), bottle of rum, sovereign pots, etc, and that we have adequate countermeasures (agro control, threat reduction, daunting roar, meld into darkness, improved uncanny dodge, etc).

Adding more healing at the expense of others play style (those who want to feel squishy and like the play style of having to jump away) is a net change away from DnD, and at the expense of other players.

I realize we have players playing rogue in DC or LD right now that want them to play just like pally barb. Where you can stand there and provide dps and healing sufficient to never have to jump away. Given the lower DPS of rogue, DPS improvements are where I feel the change should happen, not in taking this game further from its DnD flavor.

MOAR DIPS!

If I had to choose between DPS and quickened scrolls I would definitely choose DPS. I suspect the problem devs are facing is that splash rogue builds with solid (but not the best) sneak attack in LD and to a lesser extent DC will do some very nice damage. This is why the right dps improvement path is something the devs already ruled out - buffing shadowdancer. I hope part of the delayed response is that changes to shadowdancer are now on the table by process of elimination. This is the best way to help people that want to play a rogue like a rogue without creating new FOTM rogue splash blitzing mortal fear builds.

If the devs are sticking to their guns on shadowdancer and afraid to boost dps because of splash builds in other destines- I hope they at least give rogues some other unique and creative buffs.

[nokowi]

If I had to choose between DPS and quickened scrolls I would definitely choose DPS. I suspect the problem devs are facing is that splash rogue builds with solid (but not the best) sneak attack in LD and to a lesser extent DC will do some very nice damage. This is why the right dps improvement path is something the devs already ruled out - buffing shadowdancer. I hope part of the delayed response is that changes to shadowdancer are now on the table by process of elimination. This is the best way to help people that want to play a rogue like a rogue without creating new FOTM rogue splash blitzing mortal fear builds.

If the devs are sticking to their guns on shadowdancer and afraid to boost dps because of splash builds in other destines- I hope they at least give rogues some other unique and creative buffs.

Time will tell.

Either way, I would not choose to ruin the play style for those who enjoy the challenge of jumping away for those that feel the need to be able to stand in one spot. Players who want to feel almighty already have other build choices that play very similarly (dps + healing >> mob damage) in these same destinies.

[brzytki]

Adding more healing at the expense of others play style (those who want to feel squishy and like the play style of having to jump away) is a net change away from the idea that rogues are squishy in DnD, and at the expense of other players.

I realize we have players playing rogue in DC or LD right now that want them to play just like pally barb. Where you can stand there and provide dps and healing sufficient to never have to jump away. Given the lower DPS of rogue, DPS improvements are where I feel the change should happen, not in taking this game further from its DnD flavor.

MOAR DIPS!

How is it at the expense of others play style, exactly? If something like this goes live, would it force you to not use scrolls, if so why?

You still claim quickened scrolls would be an easy button and an instant heal (again, how exactly?) however you are glossing over the fact that now cocoon (which is vastly superior to scrolls because it's not interruptible, grants temp HP, heals for more total HP, can be used in combat w/o a need to switch weapons and it's lvl 1 twist while W&SM requires 8 APs) is pretty much a required way to heal yourself in EE content. And you know why it is like that? It's precisely because the scroll healing is not reliable.

[slarden]

Time will tell.

Either way, I would not choose to ruin the play style for those who enjoy the challenge of jumping away for those that feel the need to be able to stand in one spot. Players who want to feel almighty already have other build choices that play very similarly (dps + healing >> mob damage) in these same destinies.

I don't agree with that but I understand your point. People have different opinions on it, but I think that is a reason why we will never see quickened scrolls as there is a fairly even split between support, animosity and apathy. It wouldn't make sense for the devs to spend $ on quickened scrolls since it isn't widely supported by the community.

[nokowi]

How is it at the expense of others play style, exactly? If something like this goes live, would it force you to not use scrolls, if so why?

You still claim quickened scrolls would be an easy button and an instant heal (again, how exactly?) however you are glossing over the fact that now cocoon (which is vastly superior to scrolls because it's not interruptible, grants temp HP, heals for more total HP, can be used in combat w/o a need to switch weapons and it's lvl 1 twist while W&SM requires 8 APs) is pretty much a required way to heal yourself in EE content. And you know why it is like that? It's precisely because the scroll healing is not reliable.

I use scroll healing. It is very reliable for me. You already have cocoon. I accept that it is easy healing. I also use cocoon. What am I glossing over?

Is your position that if you have 1 easy button heal, you need more easy button heals?

Saying that scroll healing is unreliable for all players would be wrong. I demonstrate scroll use in combat in my videos, and I use them effectively in combat in EE content, both in solo or group play.

I accept that your experience with scroll use is unreliable.

[nokowi]

I don't agree with that but I understand your point. People have different opinions on it, but I think that is a reason why we will never see quickened scrolls as there is a fairly even split between support, animosity and apathy. It wouldn't make sense for the devs to spend $ on quickened scrolls since it isn't widely supported by the community.

Thanks Slarden.

Who knows what the devs will decide. We can only express our opinions, and hope.

[brzytki]

I use scroll healing. It is very reliable for me. You already have cocoon. I accept that it is easy healing. What am I glossing over?

Is your position that if you have 1 easy button heal, you need more easy button heals?

Saying that scroll healing is unreliable for all players would be wrong. I demonstrate scroll use in combat in my videos, and I use them effectively in combat in EE content, both in solo or group play.

I accept that your experience with scroll use is unreliable.

No, my position is you fail to realise that such an upgrade would be in no way an easy button nor an instant heal as you claimed. I asked you a few questions and you failed to address them, saying all the same words from before like a broken record. Are you going to tell me that if it went live people would not jump away from mobs to scroll heal themselves but stand right next to mobs for 2 seconds fumbling with their equpiment (switching to scrolls, using, switching back to weapons) risking even more hits from mobs while not DPSing? That's what i don't understand, you claim it would ruin a certain playstyle but i don't get what that playstyle is. So i'm asking for a third time for you to elaborate on that.

It's unreliable in group play in EE content in that aspect that if you get hit while trying to scroll heal, you'll likely fail concentration check because mobs don't hit at end game for 40 damage, they hit for 3-4 times that even with 100 PRR. And if you fail the check, you now have even more HP to scroll heal and a delay before you can use it again. Now, i get that many people like to kite mobs around while trying to scroll heal themselves and deem it fun, but i'm not one of them. If i invest in something, i expect it to be good.

Edit:

My argument would be that you already have too much easy healing with cocoon (as you point out), bottle of rum, sovereign pots, etc,

I'm sorry are you gonna list all items in game that can be used for healing no matter their cooldown, TP cost, drawbacks and/or availability? I don't know if you know that Bottle of Rum has a 5 minutes cooldown at its top tier AND can't be used with other eternal flasks, like FoM for example. Sovereign pots, right because i have an endless supply of TP to buy them from the Store. Greater Healing pot is the best thing you can get from traders in game - 50 HP plus 10-20 HP every 2 seconds for 10 seconds, with 30 seconds cooldown. I don't really see that abundance of healing we are supposed to have now, certainly not all of them are easy heals and most of them are not gonna cut it in EE.

[nokowi]

No, my position is you fail to realise that such an upgrade would be in no way an easy button nor an instant heal as you claimed. I asked you a few questions and you failed to address them, saying all the same words from before like a broken record. Are you going to tell me that if it went live people would not jump away from mobs to scroll heal themselves but stand right next to mobs for 2 seconds fumbling with their equpiment (switching to scrolls, using, switching back to weapons) risking even more hits from mobs while not DPSing? That's what i don't understand, you claim it would ruin a certain playstyle but i don't get what that playstyle is. So i'm asking for a third time for you to elaborate on that.

It's unreliable in group play in EE content in that aspect that if you get hit while trying to scroll heal, you'll likely fail concentration check because mobs don't hit at end game for 40 damage, they hit for 3-4 times that even with 100 PRR. And if you fail the check, you now have even more HP to scroll heal and a delay before you can use it again. Now, i get that many people like to kite mobs around while trying to scroll heal themselves and deem it fun, but i'm not one of them. If i invest in something, i expect it to be good.

Edit:
I'm sorry are you gonna list all items in game that can be used for healing no matter their cooldown, TP cost, drawbacks and/or availability? I don't know if you know that Bottle of Rum has a 5 minutes cooldown at its top tier AND can't be used with other eternal flasks, like FoM for example. Sovereign pots, right because i have an endless supply of TP to buy them from the Store. Greater Healing pot is the best thing you can get from traders in game - 50 HP plus 10-20 HP every 2 seconds for 10 seconds, with 30 seconds cooldown. I don't really see that abundance of healing we are supposed to have now, certainly not all of them are easy heals and most of them are not gonna cut it in EE.

You can watch my video and see me use the bottle of rum for emergencies. Yes I am aware of the timer. You can search all day for things I don't know about healing, but you are wasting your efforts here. I do have a hard time believing a 6 year veteran has any trouble with resources, but if your opinion is that resource constraints limit your healing options, your are welcome to it. I don't use pot healing, diplomacy, or most of the methods I suggest as options. For me, it's as simple as agro control, cocoon, an occasional rum, and scroll heals (solo mostly). Scrolls are easily replaced, so resources play no role in my healing needs. Yes, I could stand in one spot if scroll heals were quickened. I absolutely hate the play style of LD, so your experiences may differ. They do not invalidate mine.

As a player that currently scroll heals in EE content, I am in a good position to say that quickened scroll heals would reduce the quality of play in this game for me. I would be upset if this were implemented when I know players have options that they are not currently using. (Are you using poison to reduce MP of mobs?) If I can get by without diplomacy, daunting roar, healing pots, threat reduction, escape notice, or meld into darkness (you can choose to twist these), I would imagine an experienced vet such as yourself could do better than me using these additional tools. Agro control trumps all of these.

A simple change in your approach to combat can cut your agro dramatically, regardless of your current play style. I believe trash mobs switch agro every few (6?) seconds. If they start with agro on someone else, you have the DPS to kill them before they attack you. I believe your play choices are causing some of your issues. Other rogues in LD that I have played with are not experiencing your problems. They know how to control how much agro they take for difficult situations, and they have sufficent dps to not worry about most trash mobs.

[redoubt]

Pally has the highest burst (130k in 15 seconds) dps in the game right now, at 8000 damage per second. Rogue is nowhere near this value. Go run EE Cabal and kill the first optional in 12 seconds on EE. Post a video for us. If you are beating pallys in DPS, I would guess its because you are judging your skill by the great pugs you are in, and have a distorted view of reality. Once again, feel free to prove me wrong. I stand by my statements and have a good history of backing them up.

Sure you can get good kill counts, but you will not be pulling agro off a boss against a good player. You might be confused because some bosses have random agro, and require a player with intimidate. This is unlikely to happen in a random pug.

If you play in LD or DC as a rogue, it does take more skill than some other builds. Please don't tell every Shadowdancer player that they lack skill simply because they prefer a play style different than yours.

I'm not playing in LD or DC, though I would like to try it.

I actually interrupted my TR plan to go back to being a rogue to test it during this initial phase of U25 where Severlin said they were going to evaluate rogues and do a finishing pass. It was important enough to me that I changed my plans to participate in the test. This is the same reason I am in Shadow Dancer now.

I hope you saw that the title of the post you quoted was, "Playing with skill and sarcasm." Of course you won't pull agro off a fully buffed, TWF pally at peak dps. But at the same time, you can pull agro off of a shield paladin in normal game play.

You say that playing with pugs lessens the applicability of my skills or experience, but I would argue the opposite. If I run with the High Lords of Malkier, everything is easier. Odds are I could run into the room spamming intimidate and never get agro and do lots of dps and maybe not embarrass myself on the kill chart. Its easy to play when everyone in your group is awesome. Its much harder to manage in a pug with a very wide split in abilities.

I mostly list the LFM for my static duo and accept the next 4 of appropriate level and we go with whatever we get. We do join other groups if they happen to be in the quests we are looking to do soon. We don't shy away from the power guilds and in fact enjoy the times we run with them. We learn things and it helps us elevate our own game; and I don't think we actually embarrass ourselves either.

Time will tell.

Either way, I would not choose to ruin the play style for those who enjoy the challenge of jumping away for those that feel the need to be able to stand in one spot. Players who want to feel almighty already have other build choices that play very similarly (dps + healing >> mob damage) in these same destinies.

I don't think quickened scrolls would lessen the need to jump away. The time spent waiting for the heal would still result in death even with quicken.

To me, quickened scrolls would allow me to jump away and scroll heal, then jump back in. This is different than, jump out, run, scroll, heal, get hit in the back, run, scroll, heal, get hit in the back.... All the while thinking, man if this was an amazing guild/channel group I would not have to deal with this because someone else would have agro.

[redoubt]

Sentinals chain on EH went fine. I'm still seeing lots of DW on epic wards. At least this is the best I can puzzle it out.

Going from 14-21 so far since update 25 I would recommend:

1. 4% DW/DB bypass per rogue level.
2. 4% DW/DB bypass per level of SD. Giving rogues the ability to assassinate mobs with DW/DB would be a feather in the hat and something actually unique. Mobs with DW/DB are the number one thing that get me into trouble on my rogue. DC casters get to use their DC advantage via many other spells, CC, AOE Insta-kill etc. Assassins have ONE thing. Let make it special please. Following the % schedule I proposed a 20 rogue has an 80% to bypass DW/DB. This rogue can run in LD or DC and still have that, or they can choose to be specialize more as an assassin and run in SD and get 100% bypass and be the ultimate stealth killer.
3. Add a better means to break lock with monsters that have noticed you. I don't mind if they follow me around a corner and keep looking for me, but if I go around a corner and stealth, they should lose lock and have to actually find me again. I don't mind a small bonus to spot/listen because they are aware of my recent presence, but the current state is more like they can see me through walls.
4. DPS has been acceptable with the huge amount of past lives I have. I think a small bump may be needed for those not sitting on 20+ past lives.