Curse

pah01 · Jun 24, 2007, 12:54 PM // 12:54

Dear All.

I really really hate the way this class plays right now. It sucks. Everyone knows this.

There are only two viable strategies that can be utilised by the assasin right now.

Return Abuse.
Prism 1-8 button mashing.

The major problem that I see with the two builds/strats above is that it is a very passive type of play.

What do we want the assassins role to be?

I would give a lot to have just one active viable assasin skillbar that makes me really consider running it in a balanced build.

Quote:

Originally Posted by please nerf this crap pls

List of nerfs needed before one can get into discussing how to make the assasin require skill to play.

1. Shadow Prism - 60 second recharge 15 energy 1 second cast. Why? Because F the skill thats why.
2. Return - 60 second recharge, Max teleport distance 2 radar bubbles away, Why? Because F the skill thats why.
3. Expose Defences - 2 second cast 60 Second Recharge, Why? Because F it thats why.
4. Black Spider/Lotus Strikes - No longer return energy or poison the targets. F these skills.

The sins need a three skill attack chain that offers a spike comparable to a Sever, Gash and Final Thrust spike on a sword warrior. This wont kill someone solo but will finish of low targets and shares a good portion of the spike with the rest of the team.

Their Hexes need a good reason to bring them outside of enabling overpowered chains. Curses are brought to shutdown melee, water to snare[melee shutdown], dom to shutdown casters , what kind of hexes do we want the assasin to Have?

They need a good dagger interrupt that actually has an effect like dshot and disrupting chop but is robust eneogh on its own that its worth bringing.

If the sin was able to inflict blind with a dagger attack outside of temple strike as well we might have a sort of melee control/interrupt/melee spiker with the above kind of bar that would be worth bringing alongside a warrior or two.

Any more ideas?

Joe

around · Jun 24, 2007, 01:15 PM // 13:15

Please, stop with this passive=bad thing. Hexes are bad because their reward is far in excess of their cost. Shouts are bad because they provide unstrippable party-wide defense buffs.

What most people actually mean when they say passive=bad is ridiculous amounts of party-wide defense=bad.

Assassins are pretty badly designed, but they aren't beyond hope. Buff their leads and offhands a bit, and that should do.

Either that, or just use Moebius strike, which is possibly the best pressure skill in the game.

TheOneMephisto · Jun 24, 2007, 01:55 PM // 13:55

Quote:

Originally Posted by spawnofebil

Please, stop with this passive=bad thing. Hexes are bad because their reward is far in excess of their cost. Shouts are bad because they provide unstrippable party-wide defense buffs.

What most people actually mean when they say passive=bad is ridiculous amounts of party-wide defense=bad.

How I think of it is that passive is okay as long as active is better. For instance, Aegis should be okay but guardian should be much better when used by a good player. Tainted should be okay but a ranger with apply should be better when played by a good player.

around · Jun 24, 2007, 02:41 PM // 14:41

Quote:

How I think of it is that passive is okay as long as active is better.

Truth.

If passive play were so bad then tainted ought to be the most overpowered skill in the game.

Lodurr · Jun 24, 2007, 07:36 PM // 19:36

Quote:

Originally Posted by pah01

There are only two viable strategies that can be utilised by the assasin right now.

Return Abuse.
Prism 1-8 button mashing.

I found this on Izzy's talk page on the Official wiki, responding to someone saying Seeping Wound is a weak elite:

Quote:

Yeah it's one I haven't put much effort into lately beacuse it's just on oddball from the Assassins real job, which is get in kill and get out. ~Izzy @-'----

So 1-8 button mashing was the goal.

I'd like to see the four-string combos go away by nerfing BLS or BSS to lead attacks. I like the idea of mini-shutdown skills like short duration blinds, conditional KDs, etc. And some way to help mass degen at the stand--a Poisoned Dart skill or something in the Deadly Arts line. Assassins have 100 darts on all their armor skins, might as well give them useful dart skills.

Patccmoi · Jun 24, 2007, 07:45 PM // 19:45

Assassins already have combos similar to Sever-Gash-Final in damage. The main problem is that their recharge is too big and if a part is interrupted all the rest fails and in the current meta it's pretty damn hard at the stand to have a full combo go through without Expose or something like that.

Lead-Offhand-Dual combos need much better recharge overall (max 4-6s recharge on lead/offhands) to be viable. As long as the recharge is higher than that, they won't be because they will be too unreliable and Assassin pressure IS their combo, unlike warriors and Dervish that also have great auto-attack pressure.

Strong single-target shutdown skills should be buffed as they should be imo what allows Assassins to kill solo target. Not a straight kill combo, but a mix of strong combo pressure + shutdown. Stuff like Temple Strike/Golden Skull Crack, Shroud of Silence, Siphon Strength (not too bad now actually) need to be made more and more viable as well as some non-elite options (Blinding Powder could be improved for example, and a short non-elite daze option would be quite nice. For example Disrupting Stab could change to be that if it interrupts a spell it dazes target for 1..4s).

Straight offhands out of elite ones should imo do no or low +damage. They should be utility skills that allow to reach quick dual attacks. This would remove most of the offhand-dual-offhand-dual incredibly single-minded Assassin bars.

The way i'd like to see Assassins personally is as some sort of melee Mesmer. Strong combos, but not straight-kill, with strong single target shutdown to prevent a lone target from handling you too easily (since single target fight should still be Assassin's strength). If you add strong single-target shutdowns, they also become much more interesting as stand character. Atm those skills are too narrow or too limited to see real play.

EDIT : and ya, i saw that too on Izzy's page and i was like 'oh, that's really how they like Assassins to be? Great...'

Symbol · Jun 24, 2007, 07:59 PM // 19:59

I want to see more disruption on assassin bars, in the form of interrupts and daze, KDs can remain a warrior specialty for the most part.

I'd like disrupting stab to be worthwhile as a dagger interrupt. That means a .5 sec activation and a 6-8 sec recharge.

I'd like exhausting assault to be able to follow both leads and offhands.

I'd like disrupting dagger to not have the weird delay that makes it so hard to interrupt 1s casts with it.

I'd like more skills that punish players who cast/use skills while a sin is stabbing them in the face.

Of course all of this is pointless if their bread and butter lead - offhand - dual combos aren't viable, so those skills need to be fixed first.

Shuuda · Jun 24, 2007, 08:02 PM // 20:02

I'm actually I huge fan of assassins, and believe they are actually well made, better than the nightfall proffessions at least. As Patccmoi said, it would be nice to see more of a Melee mesmer starting to get shown more, so improvements to shut down skills like Temple Strike, Shadow's Shroud, and Dark Apostasy etc would be a dream for me. Other than that I love the assassin offences, Good spiking and as it was said here, Moebius strike is one of the best melee pressure skills in the game, on Level with Dragon Slash at the least. Shadow stepping is something I love as well, it's great as a secondary proffession as well, all melee can take advantage of it, and casters can get good defence out of it.

Also, I vote for a short ranged Deadly arts weapon, and have the throwing dagger skills as attack stills for them.

Riotgear · Jun 24, 2007, 08:54 PM // 20:54

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patccmoi

The main problem is that their recharge is too big and if a part is interrupted all the rest fails and in the current meta it's pretty damn hard at the stand to have a full combo go through without Expose or something like that.

Blind will botch the combo, but block isn't even that reliable against it unless it deflects BSS. BLS is gonna hit unless the target's already got a block prot on, Twisting's main damage is in the DW so it gets two shots to do what it needs to do anyway, BSS does not need Twisting to succeed at all to work, and Blades' conditionality isn't that hard to meet. Add that to the fact that a missed component recharges instantly anyway, and I wouldn't really say it's any easier to make a combo fail than it is to stop SGF. It's just easier to get Spirit Bond up.

Patccmoi · Jun 24, 2007, 09:25 PM // 21:25

Quote:

Originally Posted by Riotgear

Blind will botch the combo, but block isn't even that reliable against it unless it deflects BSS. BLS is gonna hit unless the target's already got a block prot on, Twisting's main damage is in the DW so it gets two shots to do what it needs to do anyway, BSS does not need Twisting to succeed at all to work, and Blades' conditionality isn't that hard to meet. Add that to the fact that a missed component recharges instantly anyway, and I wouldn't really say it's any easier to make a combo fail than it is to stop SGF. It's just easier to get Spirit Bond up.

A missed component only recharges instantly if it didn't meet it's requirement (i.e. you can if you use a Dual straight out of nowhere). If i use BSS and it 'misses' cause of Blurred Vision, it won't get recharged.

And i'm talking more about pressure assassins than 1-2-3-4 assassins. I tried running Moebius as stand Assassin for example and the instant you face some kind of hex team you're a liability. You miss too much, and so you can't pressure at all, and standing there trying to hit with low AL when not achieving anything just fails.

The difference though with an Assassin and a warrior is that your combo CAN'T fail or you're not doing jack. A warrior is still pressuring, maybe hitting with Bull's Strike, maybe doing SOMETHING. Maybe most of his SGF won't kill and might be blocked/miss, but even if they do he's pressuring the rest of the time. As a stand Assassin, if your combos fail, you're not doing jack. Unless you're like spamming siphon speed, but that's still not worth a character slot.

If they give them more useful shutdown/utility and combos are just a part of your build, this becomes somewhat less of a problem cause you're useful out of combos. But atm combos are assassins, and with combos being too unreliable at stand assassins are simply not good stand chars.

urania · Jun 24, 2007, 10:16 PM // 22:16

i believe assas are just fine the way they are now....actually, a few more nerfs would be quite nice :]

when u meet a rit with warmongers, assa with moeb strike, exhaulting attack and dis stab+flurry and ofc with expose, and dont have a good, and i mean good, blinder or hexer in team, one'd think anet loves such lameway builds to be even more effective as they alreday are :P

and btw, shroud of silence is mean. without preveil or purge sig, that is.

Blame the Monks · Jun 24, 2007, 10:27 PM // 22:27

Sins were flawed from the concept board. Shadowstepping is inherently flawed and kills much of the tactics of the game. The sin combo system ensures sins can't match the utility of other physicals and ensures their damage is fragile and gimmicky. The whole concept of a solo spiker is trash for strategic team play. And finally, their armor and base damage are too poor.

The whole class should be hammered to nonexistence in real pvp (specifically kill recall and all other shadow steps to radar range), although its fine as is for RA, AB, and BotvBot. Those people button mashing and its a fine into to pvp.

Anet knows they screwed up big on the sin. I've heard it from a dev's own mouth. But anet can't nerf them out of game thanks to marketing, so too bad for those of us who enjoyed winning based on skill and not build.

Um Yeah · Jun 24, 2007, 10:32 PM // 22:32

Quote:

Originally Posted by Patccmoi

and ya, i saw that too on Izzy's page and i was like 'oh, that's really how they like Assassins to be? Great...'

Quote:

Originally Posted by dictionary.com

as·sas·sin n. One who murders by surprise attack

Meh, get in quick, kill, get out kinda fits that description. Pressuring someone isn't very surprising...

Anyway, I would probably like sins filling in pressure and shutdown roles tho, but right now I don't see that happening because of the things Pat said regarding combos, and because low AL forces them to run away whenever a warr looks at them. Meh, what do I know. I only use sin in HB b/c moebius/horns lock is hax

.

Shuuda · Jun 24, 2007, 10:39 PM // 22:39

Quote:

Originally Posted by urania

and btw, shroud of silence is gay. without preveil or purge sig, that is.

If by "mean", you mean "Total awesome, it's the best shut down skill I've ever used as an assassin" Then you hit the nail on the head. But really, use that skill right, then you can save yourself from hex stacks and hinder any other caster, and it helps with the rest of your killing. e.g: Put hex on targe, but SoS on monk, Kill target, or something similar.

pah01 · Jun 25, 2007, 09:09 AM // 09:09

When people say passive play they dont just mean party wide unstrippable defence. They mean all kinds of strong effects that can be got for little or no effort.

Return and all shadowstepping is an example of that. The whole prism sin bar is an example of that.

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

I like the idea of a melee mesmery type character Patcc.

Give us a single bar with necessary buffs that would in your opinion make some top guilds run this bar in place of a warrior/ranger/mesmer.

Joe

frojack · Jun 25, 2007, 12:05 PM // 12:05

'Spike! Spike!' is shit gameplay. Witness Rit Spike for example, Ranger spike, Euro spike etc. (Though Euro wasn't too bad). It all drag's the game down to one of reflex and spike/spike prevention instead of one of skill and strategy.
If all a class can do is do it faster and easier (shadow nonsense > 1 2 3...) you end up with bad games. 'Who can spike the fastestes' is not fun...

The idea of a 'melee-mesmer' is a really good one. A character who just messes with you, so that your foe is disabled in a similar way to what a mesmer does, is a very interesting idea.

linh · Jun 25, 2007, 12:08 PM // 12:08

Don't mess up between Return and Recall. Recall is gay, while Return ( which mostly only monks use it) is actually a good skill.

Thom Bangalter · Jun 25, 2007, 12:27 PM // 12:27

no, not really. Who needs to properly prekite when they can just use return and get out of trouble?

moko · Jun 25, 2007, 12:51 PM // 12:51

your midline has to.

but really face it, if you don't use return, you have gole, and usually end up with aegis.

in all honestly, what would you like to face more?

aegis or return? sacrificing one of the few good emanagement skills left for a shadowstep is actually pretty fair imo. if you add in the lack of block, it's just needed to survive.

and i don't know, i'd generally like recharge nerfs to the current meta and want buffs to the other, so the assassin spikes remain for those that want to still use them, just at a higher recharge (30,40), and buffs to the weaker skills (esp leads, in recharge and energy) that make them more spammable and allows possible targetswitching for pressure. also a buff to crit strikes might be nice, something along the lines.

for each bla bla whatever rank in crit strikes you gain bla bla whatever energy and the chance that your attacks can't be missed increased by bla bla whatever %.

along with an epxose nerf (preferable removal from the game ^^, or just your next 1...3 attacks depending on your attribute cannot be blocked), blocking can still work, but assassins won't be as fragile to hexes, and are able to somewhat compare to a warrior in terms of pressure. (of course the spikes would be buffed again, but i suppose if the recharge is doubled from what it currently is, if you go by shadow prison without any other hex, it should be fine)

offensive shadowstepping needs to DIE. higher recharge, less snare durations, higher costs, empty adrenaline pool on shadowstep, IT NEEDS TO DIE COMPLETELY. it's like RaO - warrior for idiots.

imo another big problem with assassins currently is that their energy management is directly linked to daggers, basically making deadly arts so so so bad on energy. and the only real energy management skill that exists is assassin's promise and that promotes spikes even more so go figure.. this also kills many other ways of utility.

about making them melee mesmers...that's going to be horrible. terribly overpowered IMO. don't give them too much, dazed, blind, shutdown, spike damage..no. it's like backfire, empathy and diversion on the same target except the first 2 deal damage except the target isn't doing anything. lol.

lacasner · Jun 25, 2007, 01:44 PM // 13:44

Quote:

offensive shadowstepping needs to DIE. higher recharge, less snare durations, higher costs, empty adrenaline pool on shadowstep, IT NEEDS TO DIE COMPLETELY. it's like RaO - warrior for idiots.

Higher recharge kills them completely. WHy would you want to teleport one aggro circle once per minute, for 10 energy??