Rogue - Assassin Changes

[CThruTheEgo]

I thought at one point a Dev suggested the Poison Strikes DCs would be brought in line with the current game. Are Poison Strikes really being left at 10 + 1/2 rogue level DCs!?

Sev did say just today that the acrobat DCs would be getting a rework in an upcoming patch. Someone asked if that would also include the assassin poisons and, as far as I know, that has not yet been answered. So we can only hope...

EDIT: Even if a successful poison strike is not required to apply assassin's mark, it would be nice to not have to waste AP just to gain the benefit of weakening strikes and deadly strikes. So either take away the poisons as the method of applying assassin's mark, or make their DC the same as assassinate so we don't waste AP to get what's really useful about them – weakening and deadly strikes.

[redoubt]

I thought at one point a Dev suggested the Poison Strikes DCs would be brought in line with the current game. Are Poison Strikes really being left at 10 + 1/2 rogue level DCs!?

And why doesn't SD give rogue levels? Primal, divine and arcane all give class levels to boost things that rely on them...

[Full_Bleed]

First off, I enjoyed many of the changes in the rogue pass!

I do too. But it's still feels like mostly convenience and some optimization.

I wanted to address one of the changes to the Assassin enhancement. I am guessing that with Poison Strikes you simply need to make a successful attack to land your "Assassin's Mark." You don't need to achieve the DC for the Mark, correct?

If landing the Mark simply means not missing with the attack, this becomes tolerable.

I am assuming this is so. I took it to play around with but, right now, I don't think it's worth it. The DC is terrible. The Vorpal effect is the only thing really worth anything. It costs 2 AP. Weakening costs 2 AP. And Deadly costs another 2 AP.

If it was 3 AP for the chain, I *might* keep it... but as of right now. I'm dumping it.


As for Venomed Blades--I'm glad that they halved the cost, but the return is far too weak. Ok for low levels but worthless later. The base die amounts should be per 4-5 levels of Rogue or something.

[slarden]

I posted this to the wrong topic this morning - reposting here

-------------------------------------------

Without any gear/ED/Past life changes here is how my stats changed from the rogue pass. My spend in each tree is identical, but the choices were a bit better since some AP costs were reduced. 6 sun elf tree / 41 assassin tree / 8 thief acrobat tree / 25 Harper Tree

Before/After
- Doublestrike 29/29
- PRR 93/88
- MRR 45/40
- Max Dodge 25/27 ( I am not even sure why this went up - I will figure it out later)
- Melee Power 54/80 (6 from two weapon fighting line and 20 from assassin core)
- Assassinate 74/76 (change from final core)
- Sneak attack speed 75%/90% (change from addition of fast movement)
- Reflex save 76/80
- Armor class 116/117
- HP 929/929
- Spell Points 415/415
- Int 68/68
- Fortification Bypass 90/90
- Fortification 160/160
- Passive threat Generation is theoretically reduced now(I have no idea how to calc this but I am theoretically getting extra minus 15% from shiv and minus 10% from sly flourish but not sure about stacking and I can't figure out how to check it)
- I gained execute which is useful for kill stealing I guess - but I might swap it out for 2 points into light armor mastery later.

Overall I appreciate the boost received. Rogues are still the squishiest build when factoring in all forms of defenses and should gain a little damage to compensate for lost dps when dead and jumping out of combat to survive.

I think the final three cores should have a sneak attack damage boost included

Nimbleness: 20% damage boost to sneak attack damage when using a dagger or Kukri
Lethality: An additional 15% damage boost to sneak attack damage when using a dagger or kukri (35% total)
Deadly Shadow: An additional 15% damage boost to sneak attack damage when using a dagger or kukri (50% total)

[dualscissors]

As for Venomed Blades--I'm glad that they halved the cost, but the return is far too weak. Ok for low levels but worthless later. The base die amounts should be per 4-5 levels of Rogue or something.

When I weigh a static +d4/d6/d8 damage boon to every swing (unless mob is immune to poison) at a 1/1/1 AP cost, I think that's roughly fair. Compare to Sneak Attack at 2 AP for +d6 damage (situational). (edit: trim)

I think it's more that with the amount of power creep when you are hitting several hundred damage per swing because of various effects, an added +d8 - even with MP at 200% - makes someone in the epic game say, "Meh, what's the difference in not having it?"

Bleed Them Out falls into this too.

[slarden]

I really don't understand why people are complaining that these changes aren't enough. Rogues are not meant to be primary damage dealers or tanks, they are support/specialists! My first life level 28 rogue has over 700hp, max dodge, enough UMD to use any magic item, high enough saves to almost never fail one, can sneak past anything with care, and can open/disable any lock/trap. The only gripes I have are the slow sneaking and the fact that assassinate doesn't seem to work as well as it should with DC of over 60 (with current gear/abilities I think it's about 65 max). IMO, assassinate should work on anything except bosses or red names that can make a save against it. Additionally, I think that being struck by a random ranged attack shouldn't break sneak when it's well over 100 in both Hide and Move Silently. BTW, Sev, my rogue has 29d6 sneak attack damage, nearly double what you're saying. A good rogue can annihilate any single target without the use of assassinate with an improved deception item and weapon and practically not get hit at all. Rogues were not meant for taking on mobs! If you solo a rogue you should be sneaking/bluffing and never taking on multiple enemies!

Rogues aren't meant to be tanks, but they ARE meant to be high dps when they don't have aggro. Sneak damage just doesn't scale as well to the new epic system even with the 26 melee power boost rogues just received.

Max assassinate DC with the release of U25 is 84, although once you get to about 78 assassinate I don't think the trade-offs are worth it.

[slarden]

In theory it should only help.

I am thinking it will help newer and casual folks playing rogues the most which is good.

There is definitely only an upside to it for rogues.

[CThruTheEgo]

In theory it should only help.

I am thinking it will help newer and casual folks playing rogues the most which is good.

There is definitely only an upside to it for rogues.

I was wondering about this as well. AP are even tighter now so I'm looking for ways to save them. With shiv we also get sneak attack on demand, regardless of agro. When I reset my enhancements for the first time earlier today, the only threat reduction I took was the first rank of shiv (I actually only took it for the bluff clicky). I didn't get a chance to test in a group, but I'm curious to see how it works and if I'll have to pick up more threat reduction.

[Full_Bleed]

When I weigh a static +d4/d6/d8 damage boon to every swing (unless mob is immune to poison) at a 1/1/1 AP cost, I think that's roughly fair. Compare to Sneak Attack at 2 AP for +d6 damage (situational). And Venomed Blades damage is crittable unlike Sneak damage.

Maybe you're right... When you put it that way, SAT doesn't seem worth 2 APs either. I'd been auto-taking it out of habit.

So, now I'm asking myself, "If you had another tier of Sneak Attack Training that you could take, would you spend it on a d6 poison stance or the SAT?" Given that choice, diversity should probably win out.

I think I'm sold. Drop a SAT for the d6 Venomed Blades. And, further, look good and hard at dumping even more of the SAT's as well.


Now, all of that said, maybe I'm seeing such "weakness" because it is all pretty weak for the post 20 game.

[draven1]

How about changing poison DC to use assassinate DC formula?

10 + "rogue level" + Int Mod + "assassinate DC from gear"

You know you need that level of DC for epics.
For current DC, you will never get successful poisoning attempt for even epic casual.

I like to see this formula for shadow dagger, too.

Or just remove DC part for poison attacks & shadow dagger.
Both are quite weak even it could always bypass DC check.

And remove Toxin Affinity enhancement, NO ONE WILL TAKE IT.
I would like to see some roguish CC ability to replace Toxin affinity. Like Sap, hamstring.
Or you can give some that CC ability for poison strikes.

Bleed them out & Lethality need some serious love, too.

-------------------------------------

Why can a missed or dodged arrow still break sneak? It didn't deal even an 1 damage. HOW?

[redoubt]

If the issue is a lack of scaling, then just scale the dice. Not positive on the exact amout, but as an example:

Sneak attack dice:
Level 1: d6
Level 6: d8
Level 12: d10
Level 18: 2d6
Level 24: 2d8
Level 30: 2d10 per sneak attack die

Venomed Blades:
At level 10, double the dice 2d4/2d6/2d8
At level 20, triple the dice 3d4/3d6/3d8
At level 30, quadruple the dice 4d4/4d6/4d8

Bleed them Out: Scale same as SA dice.

Critical mastery: 1/2/3 per 6 levels.

[HuneyMunster]

How about changing poison DC to use assassinate DC formula?

10 + "rogue level" + Int Mod + "assassinate DC from gear"

You know you need that level of DC for epics.
For current DC, you will never get successful poisoning attempt for even epic casual.

I like to see this formula for shadow dagger, too.

Or just remove DC part for poison attacks & shadow dagger.
Both are quite weak even it could always bypass DC check.

And remove Toxin Affinity enhancement, NO ONE WILL TAKE IT.
I would like to see some roguish CC ability to replace Toxin affinity. Like Sap, hamstring.
Or you can give some that CC ability for poison strikes.

Bleed them out & Lethality need some serious love, too.

-------------------------------------

Why can a missed or dodged arrow still break sneak? It didn't deal even an 1 damage. HOW?

It doesnt matter what the DC of the Poison strikes are as long as its -1 saves on hit, a fairly useless ability damage in epics on crit, and the main effects that require a save (Heartseeker, Paralysis and Shattermantle) still requires a vorpal to occur.

So I would also like to see the ability damage either removed or merged into main effects being on crit. This is because having a decent chance to Paralysis would give a rogue some CC.

[Saekee]

When I weigh a static +d4/d6/d8 damage boon to every swing (unless mob is immune to poison) at a 1/1/1 AP cost, I think that's roughly fair. Compare to Sneak Attack at 2 AP for +d6 damage (situational). And Venomed Blades damage is crittable unlike Sneak damage.

I think it's more that with the amount of power creep when you are hitting several hundred damage per swing because of various effects, an added +d8 - even with MP at 200% - makes someone in the epic game say, "Meh, what's the difference in not having it?"

Bleed Them Out falls into this too.

Hi dualscissors, I didn't know venomed blades can crit. They work very nicely with Sting of Ninja.

[dualscissors]

Hi dualscissors, I didn't know venomed blades can crit. They work very nicely with Sting of Ninja.

My bad, I was apparently sidetracked when posting and mischaracterized it simply as "can crit." :-/

[Full_Bleed]

My bad, I was apparently sidetracked when posting and mischaracterized it simply as "can crit." :-/

So, is it modified by crit or not? I took from your first post that it is, but then you went back and edited that out.

I didn't really notice much since I only took the 1st tier to test with the MP adjustment and my reaction was, "This would be awesome... in Water Works!"

[dualscissors]

So, is it modified by crit or not? I took from your first post that it is, but then you went back and edited that out.

I didn't really notice much since I only took the 1st tier to test with the MP adjustment and my reaction was, "This would be awesome... in Water Works!"

I don't see any evidence that it crits. I was having a spacey moment. Either way, the merit of the point remains in that Venomed Blades is fairly close to the Sneak Attack boosts in the tree with respect to damage and AP cost. Venomed Blades stacks at 200% with MP as a virtue.

My pitch is that any one of these damage boosts is relatively weak in the epic game, but a lot of them stacked up make a sizeable difference.

[nokowi]

The major damage boost in U25 comes through the ability to have a Human DC Assassin play in Legendary Dreadnaught, with DC's in the 70-73 range. Those of you willing to play in LD should be happy with DPS. Those of you wanting to use stealth in Shadowdancer (or who simply hate the cleave - LD gameplay) are sadly left out.

The 20 MP and vorpal are appreciated, but end game DPS and boss DPS in particular will be low (in comparison to all other melee passes) in Shadowdancer unless Shadowdancer Destiny gets a revamp. On the plus side, rogues do well at lower levels.

I suggest you all look into LD in the short term, and see if you are willing to use it until (if?) we can get a Shadowdancer pass.

[HuneyMunster]

The major damage boost in U25 comes through the ability to have a Human DC Assassin play in Legendary Dreadnaught, with DC's in the 70-73 range. Those of you willing to play in LD should be happy with DPS. Those of you wanting to use stealth in Shadowdancer (or who simply hate the cleave - LD gameplay) are sadly left out.

The 20 MP and vorpal are appreciated, but end game DPS and boss DPS in particular will be low (in comparison to all other melee passes) in Shadowdancer unless Shadowdancer Destiny gets a revamp. On the plus side, rogues do well at lower levels.

I suggest you all look into LD in the short term, and see if you are willing to use it until (if?) we can get a Shadowdancer pass.

Shadowdancer does really need a pass, but I doubt it will for a while yet. I would really much prefer to remain in SD as I do not want to sue LD. I heard that there are plans to add Arti destiny at some point so would think it wouldn't happen, if at all, until then.


Stuff I would like to see for Shadowdancer

* Fix that Cloak of Shadows and Shadow Manipulation don't seem to add max charges (unless thy now give the extra max charges)

* Dark Imbuement needs improving.

* Executioners Strike/Shot to use highest of Dex and Int.

* Shadow Training II only adds 2 SA dmg instead of 2 SA dice(from what Ive read not checked myself) and could do with shorter cd

* Shadow Training IV Shadow Walk is not particularly useful. Could do with being replaced with Shadow Jaunt with 45sec-1min cd and 15sec cd reduction for Shadai Kai.

* Improved Invis need to either apply the displacement effect on activation or my preferred option to adds extra incorp while in Shadow form before the displacement take effect (Reason not effected by champion true seeing).

* Shadow Mastery could allow Sneak Attacks to crit. This could be with reduced crit multiplier (1.5) or on a roll 19-20 based on weapon crit multiplier etc, depending on balance.

These changes could make Shadwdancer something to conisder not only for all rogue build, but also Ninja spys and wolf druids.

[dualscissors]

The major damage boost in U25 comes through the ability to have a Human DC Assassin play in Legendary Dreadnaught, with DC's in the 70-73 range. Those of you willing to play in LD should be happy with DPS. Those of you wanting to use stealth in Shadowdancer (or who simply hate the cleave - LD gameplay) are sadly left out.

The 20 MP and vorpal are appreciated, but end game DPS and boss DPS in particular will be low (in comparison to all other melee passes) in Shadowdancer unless Shadowdancer Destiny gets a revamp. On the plus side, rogues do well at lower levels.

I suggest you all look into LD in the short term, and see if you are willing to use it until (if?) we can get a Shadowdancer pass.

I'll go out on a limb and say Shadowdancer is only a couple of tweaks from being drastically improved. Something like: 1, it needs a sub-5 tier boost to significant spike damage to bridge some of the gap between SD and LD dps, and 2, Dark Imbuement needs to be an epic-worthy cannon; it's currently Pathetic.

[CThruTheEgo]

The major damage boost in U25 comes through the ability to have a Human DC Assassin play in Legendary Dreadnaught, with DC's in the 70-73 range. Those of you willing to play in LD should be happy with DPS. Those of you wanting to use stealth in Shadowdancer (or who simply hate the cleave - LD gameplay) are sadly left out.

The 20 MP and vorpal are appreciated, but end game DPS and boss DPS in particular will be low (in comparison to all other melee passes) in Shadowdancer unless Shadowdancer Destiny gets a revamp. On the plus side, rogues do well at lower levels.

I suggest you all look into LD in the short term, and see if you are willing to use it until (if?) we can get a Shadowdancer pass.

Sadly, this has been my experience as well. In shadowdancer, there's very little difference from before the revamp. DPS is great in dreadnaught, but that's got absolutely nothing to do with assassin or their revamp. Being tied to dreadnaught for dps is just as lame as being tied to shadowdancer for DC. So nothing has really changed.

It is pretty sad that there are effectively only two melee destinies – divine crusader and legendary dreadnaught. Any melee looking for endgame dps is going to be in one of these two. So although Sev said early on that this wasn't happening right now, I have to echo the sentiment of many others and say that shadowdancer really needs a revamp and, with the revamp to assassin, this is the perfect time to do it.