Rogue - Assassin Changes

[BigErkyKid]

You guys are still discussing here, but have the devs said if there are going to be any further changes to rogues?

[CThruTheEgo]

You guys are still discussing here, but have the devs said if there are going to be any further changes to rogues?

From April 10th:

Yes. We will have some proposed changes on this thread soon.

Sev~

Still haven't heard anything yet though.

[BigErkyKid]

From April 10th:



Still haven't heard anything yet though.

Thanks! There is still hope :P

[CThruTheEgo]

As i promised, i ran today a few tests in Cabal to check the effect of upgraded rogue enhancements. Here's the old post about my first tests so that you don't have to sift through a couple of pages to find it and compare.


All things stayed the same except some changes in heroic enhancements. As a reminder, i did not have any Killer stacks, no MtF stacks either. Shiv might have helped these times (probably a little more SAs went in) and i remembered to use Tensers for all my tests too.
First build (compared to the one from before the revamp)

• -3 seeker (Critical Mastery)
• +5 damage (Deadly Strikes)
• +20 MP (cores)
• +6 MP TWF feats

In Shadowdancer ~2820 DPS, in LD ~3900 DPS.

Second build (compared to the one from before the revamp)

• -1 seeker (Critical Mastery)
• +2 MP (Harper)
• +20 MP (cores)
• +6 MP TWF feats

In Shadowdancer ~2800 DPS. I was too tired to try it in LD and didn't have time anyway as i had to restart some of the attempts.

As you can see, it's ~350 DPS increase on a double bursting build, obviously less for other races. From those figures one could estimate that +20 MP from full stacks of MtF could add max ~250 DPS, if present for the whole fight but then again there is a DPS loss from going into and out of sneak mode, so even lower than that.

Thanks for the testing bryztki. I'd +1 ya but I need to spread it around first.

So basically, assassin dps has not gone up that much, certainly not enough to make up for the lack of defenses and self healing, which is what we have been saying all along.

To sum up:

Pre-U25:
Shadowdancer: 2448 dps
Dreadnaught: 3375 dps
Difference between dreadnaught and shadowdancer: 927

Post-U25:
Shadowdancer: 2820 dps
Dreadnaught: 3900 dps
Difference between dreadnaught and shadowdancer: 1080

Pre/Post-U25 Difference:
Shadowdancer: 372 dps
Dreadnaught: 525 dps

This test confirms 3 things we already knew:
1) assassin dps hardly increased as a result of U25 changes
2) shadowdancer dps is awful
3) dreadnaught is the only way for assassins to have decent dps

Sev, please tell me you all are saving the best for last and still have something awesome planned for the assassin. So far this revamp has been a big disappointment.

[General_Gronker]

Most of us (still playing rogue) flocked to rogue because we don't want everything, and we like overcoming challenges.

You have absolutely no - none - zero - zilch - authority or evidence to declare why "most of us" play rouges. That's a semantic fallacy used to bolster a point that is weak at its core.

[redoubt]

1. If you can't pull agro off of a paladin, you are not playing with adequate skill. You need to up your game. Once you do that, then you will see that using diplomacy is not the unskilled play you assume. When you are fighting off-tank your DPS should be amazing.
2. If you want to test your skill run in pugs. The ones where only two guildmates every speak are the best and the other four just do random stuff, even though the leader is clearing telling everyone the plan (and asking for inputs that never come.) If you never get agro in these situations, some people might call it skill, but I call it piking.
3. Take 1/3 the hit points, half the dps and 0% of the healing for the bard/bard/paladins in your group and quadruple their kill count without dying. Now I might think you are talking about being a skilled assassin. And not by doing a section of the dungeon the group is not in. Stay with the group.

[redoubt]

Vale:
Coal chamber. This wasn't really played like an assassin. Too many arrows flying and no one joined our 2 man group. Staying it sneak was nearly impossible. I mostly relied on the paladin getting agro first and using a pair of banishing rapiers and a banishing shortbow, same way I would have played a ranger.
Ritual: This was a typical assassin quest for me. We had a full 6 people in group. That makes for a very fast group. I'd run with the group and drop to sneak at the merge and do a double and keep moving forward to hit another double at the next group and then enter the melee there as my party would catch up by then. Teleporting mobs make it difficult. Most people don't every thing to set up the teleport for you to assassinate; but I dream of the day!
Rainbow: Lots of sneak immune in here. Specialty weapons were again on order.
Sleeping Dust: Tremor sense makes being a sneaky-killer tough in there. This is also the only quest where I have noticed the width of the TWF hit box. I'd be nose to nose with an orgre and manage to hit a spider at twice that distance of to my side. I'm going to have to see if there is a way to use the longer side it for assassinates on moving targets.
Running: This was the only quest out there that I would say is great on an assassin. We started with 2 and finished with 4 people. I bluff pulled everything before the first closed door and then let the paladin take agro (and then I'd assassinate and steal the kill.) Its a good thing the paladin is my friend because I stole EVERY SINGLE KILL until we went up top and the elementals and stalkers showed up. We continued the pull and assassinate then kill extras through the whole dungeon.

On the whole, the vale is not an easy place for an assassin in a group. In 4 of the 5 quest, I found playing OFF-TANK DPS to be more productive.

Wheloon Prison.
We had 2 of us for 2 quests and 3 for the next 3. I brought a level 18 hire with disco to help with the HUGE spawns out there. I'll be honest, single and double pulling through that quantity of mobs is not something I am willing to do. Our basic plan was to walk to close, but not in agro and get the hire to through a disco on the closest mob. Then we would move in and kill. I'd drop in and out of sneak, but, these quests again played heavily into the OFF-TANK DPS roll for me due to mobs spawn size/rate.

Overall comments at level 18:
DPS still seems to be adequate (but not great).
Assassinate DC is fine.
I try using poison attacks, but I can't tell if I'm actually getting any benefit from them.
Most of the time I only heal between fights or one of the hires might hit me occasionally, so healing is not a problem until it is. It becomes a problem when a mob casts deathward mid-swing and I get pulled out of stealth an pummeled 90% of hp. My only choice then is to RUN. I can run and drink pots and wand whip, or I can run and swap gear and scroll heal. Either way, if I NEED to heal, my DPS become zero and I am now a liability to the party because I need someone to take the agro or heal me. This does not happen often, but when it does it is a crisis.

On scroll healing as a whole: Back when level 20 was the cap, it was not uncommon for the group healers (yes we actually had dedicated healers back then) to use scrolls to heal. Only a few people actually had high healing amp and only a few classes routinely could UMD heal scrolls. Back then the damage incoming versus what you could heal with a scroll was much more balanced. Today's new trend of huge spawns makes that no longer the case. I remember running soloing Sin's on my ranger/rogue and using scrolls to heal. (No i didn't do elite back then either.) I'd fight, then scroll heal. At level 20 I could even do it in combat most of the time as long as I jumped and "air-healed" before I got hit again. Fast forward to Fire on Thunder peaks the on a previous rogue life of mine. I had cocoon and scrolls. In that raid if you get agro, the only way you really lose it is to kill it. Again huge spawns of mobs and rarely any CC on them meant a lot of running and scroll healing instead of DPSing. I think the people who are advocating scroll healing as valid in combat healing on EE are mistaken and likely fondly remember the game from years ago that we no longer have.

[BigErkyKid]

Thanks for the testing bryztki. I'd +1 ya but I need to spread it around first.

So basically, assassin dps has not gone up that much, certainly not enough to make up for the lack of defenses and self healing, which is what we have been saying all along.

To sum up:

Pre-U25:
Shadowdancer: 2448 dps
Dreadnaught: 3375 dps
Difference between dreadnaught and shadowdancer: 927

Post-U25:
Shadowdancer: 2820 dps
Dreadnaught: 3900 dps
Difference between dreadnaught and shadowdancer: 1080

Pre/Post-U25 Difference:
Shadowdancer: 372 dps
Dreadnaught: 525 dps

This test confirms 3 things we already knew:
1) assassin dps hardly increased as a result of U25 changes
2) shadowdancer dps is awful
3) dreadnaught is the only way for assassins to have decent dps

Sev, please tell me you all are saving the best for last and still have something awesome planned for the assassin. So far this revamp has been a big disappointment.

Just for the record, an acrobat is currently at 3,748 dps in the Bruntsmash test.

https://www.ddo.com/forums/showthrea...vine-Flourish?

[brzytki]

Hey Sev, can we have an update on the incoming changes? It's been a week since you said there would be news "soon" and almost 2 weeks since the U25 went live. A simple peek at what you are considering (not necessarily at what will go live) would be much appreciated.

And i have a question about Poison Strikes again. Do i get the benefit of Deadly Strikes on my rogue if i'm beating on a monster that has Assassin's Mark from some other rogue but not from mine? I noticed yesterday that the Marks are separate ones, when i examined the monster my Assassin's Mark was under the debuffs i inflicted and there was another Mark under the others' debuffs list. Unless there is another debuff that shares the image of Assassin's Mark.

[CThruTheEgo]

Almost the end of the day on a Friday. A week after your last post.

Sev, you are truly a master of suspense.

[slarden]

Well folks, WB is in the middle of the 1st quarter close and working on Gland stability issues. Assassin may not be the # 1 priority right now.

Of course, Murphy's law says right after I post this he will respond almost immediately so I can look foolish.

[CThruTheEgo]

Well folks, WB is in the middle of the 1st quarter close and working on Gland stability issues. Assassin may not be the # 1 priority right now.

Of course, Murphy's law says right after I post this he will respond almost immediately so I can look foolish.

Fingers crossed that you end up looking like a fool... no offense.

[nokowi]

A quest will go alot quicker with a good group for sure because party damage is roughly 6x greater and total of enemy hp doesn't go up nearly as much. Rogues are definitely better suited for group play.

What I was talking about specifically was avoiding and managing agro. It's easier to do solo because you have total control over the environment and the timing. In some quests the # of mobs is significantly less. Especially when you are willing to do things like run a 15 min quest in over 1 hour by playing it safe.

My point was that you have less control over preventing agro in a group where random people do random thing - your agro management tools remain the same but can be more stretched because the supply is limited.

I don't consider soloing EE Vol in 1+ hour an accomplishment - I don't think it requires skill to do it at all because this is a PVE environment and all that requires is playing it safe and sacrificing time for efficiency. That isn't "superior skills" - it's simply playing it safe. Calling that proper agro management is a huge stretch.

All you have to do in group play is run into a room 2nd. This is much easier than running solo, jumping over a mob, and getting to that pesky caster. If you go in first and screw up, the first AoE takes agro off you. Diplomacy removes agro. None of these things can happen in solo play. You mess up, you pay for it. Even in a complete fail of a group, the agro taken off of you, the reduced damage taken, and the increased SA damage makes things easier.

Please post a video of your EE solo Temple of Vol with a DC assassin and show us how its done. Good luck not "playing it safe" with a level 20 rogue in Shadowdancer in this quest. You will find about 15 EE mobs attacking you at once if you mess up. You can see me ddoor a few times when this happens, specifically because I am dead if I don't. In group play you could just hit the diplomacy button and go into stealth, or wait for someone else to attack. I am skeptical you can do better based on your incorrect insight into solo play. You even have additional MP and damage now that we are in U25, so this should be trivial for you and take far less than 1 hour. You can prove me wrong and I (and others) will be able to add weight all your statements. My videos prove scroll healing can work in combat, despite my supposed lack of skill.

If anybody wants to request quickened scroll heals, I have no problem. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. I have a problem when people make 100% incorrect statements as justification for why they "need" this and can't get along without it. Skilled players are doing just fine without quickened scroll heals. Many group players build without scroll heals at all. Not because they are not useful, but because they can better spend the AP somewhere else, and because group play is easier than solo play, where both cc and better healing are needed to tackle EE content.

1. EE solo play is easier than group play (100% false)
2. scroll healing can't work during combat (100% false)

I don't even use scroll heals in groups because my damage taken is so low. Cocoon is enough by itself.

Why do you need quickened scroll heals in group play? This is a skill reducer, because it allows reduces the penalty for screwing up. It also changes the feeling of being squishy by having to jump away. This is why I am personally against it.

[nokowi]

I'm sorry to break it to you but on a drow in SD without haste boost it's no wonder that you don't pull agro in group play. Any melee/specialist that runs in LD/Crusader/PA and maybe Fury will do more damage than you and couple it with your -threat gear/enhancements, others' +threat and it's understandable. When i'm double boosting on my assassin i pull agro sometimes, especially on bosses/champions and that's when quickened scrolls would be great. Or when the group pulls too many mobs at once and people start dying. And what happens when someone dies? Monsters attack the person next to them or next on their agro list. That's when your rogue can grab agro of a couple of mobs without even knowing. In high lvl EE content, an assassin has 2 ways of playing: skirting the edges of a fight assassinating mobs from stealth and waiting for the cooldown not engaging in the fight otherwise OR assassinating once off cooldown and keeping up with other melees. The former is a "safe" mode while in the latter you risk grabbing agro and facing cleaving mobs and stray arrows.

In solo play you have easier time predicting what's gonna happen next, what threats you'll face and have all the time you want. In group play you don't have much time to flower-sniff, won't have time to check the buffs on every champion that's approaching your group, a person who has agro of archers can run behind you and you'll get shot instead of them pulling you out of sneak, for example. Group play has more randomness than solo play, i think that's what other people want to say. Also, quest scaling. When soloing you won't see many hits for 150+ damage unless from a champion but go in the same quest with 4-5 more people and suddenly trash hits you that hard.

Then put threat reduction in your build. Problem solved. Run into the room 2nd. 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.

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

I can solo most EE's. So I have no issue when other players die. I finish off any mobs, if needed, and then rez them. I have cc and I invest in scroll heals to deal with many mobs at once. Quest scaling has never been an issue for me in the 6 years I have been playing as a rogue.

[nokowi]

1. If you can't pull agro off of a paladin, you are not playing with adequate skill.

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.

[slarden]

All you have to do in group play is run into a room 2nd. This is much easier than running solo, jumping over a mob, and getting to that pesky caster. If you go in first and screw up, the first AoE takes agro off you. Diplomacy removes agro. None of these things can happen in solo play. You mess up, you pay for it. Even in a complete fail of a group, the agro taken off of you, the reduced damage taken, and the increased SA damage makes things easier.

Please post a video of your EE solo Temple of Vol with a DC assassin and show us how its done. Good luck not "playing it safe" with a level 20 rogue in Shadowdancer in this quest. You will find about 15 EE mobs attacking you at once if you mess up. You can see me ddoor a few times when this happens, specifically because I am dead if I don't. In group play you could just hit the diplomacy button and go into stealth, or wait for someone else to attack. I am skeptical you can do better based on your incorrect insight into solo play. You even have additional MP and damage now that we are in U25, so this should be trivial for you and take far less than 1 hour. You can prove me wrong and I (and others) will be able to add weight all your statements. My videos prove scroll healing can work in combat, despite my supposed lack of skill.

If anybody wants to request quickened scroll heals, I have no problem. Everyone is entitled to an opinion. I have a problem when people make 100% incorrect statements as justification for why they "need" this and can't get along without it. Skilled players are doing just fine without quickened scroll heals. Many group players build without scroll heals at all. Not because they are not useful, but because they can better spend the AP somewhere else, and because group play is easier than solo play, where both cc and better healing are needed to tackle EE content.

1. EE solo play is easier than group play (100% false)
2. scroll healing can't work during combat (100% false)

I don't even use scroll heals in groups because my damage taken is so low. Cocoon is enough by itself.

Why do you need quickened scroll heals in group play? This is a skill reducer, because it allows reduces the penalty for screwing up. It also changes the feeling of being squishy by having to jump away. This is why I am personally against it.

You act like anyone that disagrees with you is lacking skill and knows less than you. That is the problem I have with your comments - they are close-minded and consider only your own playstyle.

Avoiding agro is easier when soloing, but the quest will take longer for rogues. I have nothing against that, but that is the way it is. Scroll healing can work in combat, but it;'s sub-optimal due to the disruption chance. I never get disrupted on my cocoon even without quicken.

I requested quickened scrolls more for res scrolls in raiding more than anything else, but I would use them for heals from time to time as a backup. You made too many assumptions about WHY I asked for what I asked for.

I use unquickened cocoon and that is always going to be better than quickened heal scrolls and I have enough sp and a bauble on my rogue, but not all rogues have the sp so quickened scroll healing would make a nice backup for them. And scroll healing does require some skill to use effectively - even if quickened.

Again where did I say I NEED quickened scrolls? Just because I like the concept doesn't mean I NEED those. I thought it would be beneficial to bring roques back to where they used to be - a class that had an advantage with scroll healing. To be perfectly blunt if rogues had quickened scrolls now it wouldn't even be as significant as the older days when it was hard to get UMD to scroll heal and rogues could get enough concentration to cast without failing. You act like this would be a broken ability, but it wouldn't be a rogues main source of self-healing so how could it be an easy-button. If rogues want an easy button they make sure they have enough sp, a bauble, a regular and epic twisted talisman, concordant opp and any other sp regen they can get and they use divine crusader + cocoon. Divine crusader is the easy button for self-healing and if a rogue has trouble staying alive they should focus on getting enough sp + sp regen to use divine crusader effectively. Quickened scroll healing would be far inferior to the existing easy button they can use today.

I don't mind that you disagree, but I just wish you wouldn't attack other people's skill level as your counter-argument approach. First of all you are speculating and second of all you are flat out wrong on many of things you claim are absolute.

[slarden]

Fingers crossed that you end up looking like a fool... no offense.

No offense taken, it's my specialty.

[nokowi]

I don't mind that you disagree, but I just wish you wouldn't attack other people's skill level as your counter-argument approach. First of all you are speculating and second of all you are flat out wrong on many of things you claim are absolute.

***-for-Tat. Others are guilty of plenty in this thread. I am not a lone offender.

I have ran into the situation MANY times where players playing easier builds think you are a bad player because it takes longer to complete a quest as a Shadowdancer. Quite frankly, we are tired of this.

My experience as one of the top rogue players in this game is that group play is vastly easier.

Lets's start with facts, so that I don't have to make assumptions.

1. Do you solo EE quests with a level 20 Rogue in Shadowdancer with a DC Assassin (DC 72+)?

2. Have you solo'd EE Temple of Vol in this build?

3. Do you speak from a place of knowledge when you laugh at my completion time, or are you unaware of the difficulties of actually soloing this quest on EE in Shadowdancer on a DC build?

We know for a fact that I have done both Solo and group EE play in Shadowdancer. We don't know this about you. One of us speaks from a place of knowledge, the other is uncertain. Please post your EE Temple of Vol Shadowdancer video so that I can stop making bad assumptions about your level of knowledge and skill. If you don't feel like doing this, at least answer 1-3 so your level of knowledge on solo play can be determined.

[slarden]

***-for-Tat. Others are guilty of plenty in this thread. I am not a lone offender.

I have ran into the situation MANY times where players playing easier builds think you are a bad player because it takes longer to complete a quest as a Shadowdancer. Quite frankly, we are tired of this.

My experience as one of the top rogue players in this game is that group play is vastly easier.

Lets's start with facts, so that I don't have to make assumptions.

1. Do you solo EE quests with a levle 20 Rogue in Shadowdancer with a DC Assassin (DC 72+)?

2. Have you solo'd EE Temple of Vol in this build?

3. Do you speak from a place of knowledge when you laugh at my completion time, or are you unaware of the difficulties of actually soloing this quest on EE in Shadowdancer on a DC build?

First of all I've seen no evidence you are one of the best rogue players in the game as you claim. Your recent commentary and continual need to insult/demean others proves to me that is not the case.

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.

I don't laugh at your completion time nor do I care how long it takes you to complete. Stop acting like a victim because you are the person that started attacking others about their skills you knew nothing about. I am not as impressed with your videos as you are, although I didn't watch everything. I only watched enough to confirm what I suspected once I saw how long the video length was.

[nokowi]

First of all I've seen no evidence you are one of the best rogue players in the game as you claim. Your recent commentary and continual need to insult/demean others proves to me that is not the case.

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.

I don't laugh at your completion time nor do I care how long it takes you to complete. Stop acting like a victim because you are the person that started attacking others about their skills you knew nothing about. I am not as impressed with your videos as you are, although I didn't watch everything. I only watched enough to confirm what I suspected once I saw how long the video length was.

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 thats 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 like Temple of Vol requires very good agro management, and very skilled play. Much more than it would take in a group, where completion times can be as low as 5 minutes.

I will just ask on this thread. Who else on this thread has solo'd EE Temple of Vol in Shadowdancer with a DC (72+) rogue? If you have, is soloing or grouping easier?