Quote Originally Posted by CThruTheEgo View Post
There's only 2 races that offer sneak attack in the racial tree - halfling and shadar kai. I don't know much about shadar kai so I can't comment on them, but I'll be upset if halflings become the new optimal choice for assassin. I don't want to go back to halfling. They make me feel like I'm playing in giant world on mario brothers. And I still have nightmares about hezrou butt from that life...

Considering that assassin's have no viable or consistent way to induce helplessness, I wouldn't consider no mercy a big dps increase. It also requires 23 points in acrobat, so will eat up most of your extra points just like harper does now for int builds. I haven't followed all the proposed changes for acrobat, but I'd be surprised if there's 23 AP worth spending in there.
Halfling is looking really good for assassin to me with this change. There is enough points for no mercy, but I will most likely still use kta even as a dex-based assassin (the difference in damage is small) and go for more sneak attack in the halfling tree. Shadar-Kai is also a really interesting possibility since maxing out dex won't be as necessary to achieve a high assassinate dc with a dex build. Also I can now take epic reflexes or something else in place of insightful reflexes which is quite nice. It looks like I will be getting more than a small boost from this update after all.

I am sensing a Lam build is near so we may have a chance to try it out in the next 10 days.