AA Death Arrow

[Bargeld]

Since all the other changes are being discussed, I thought I would be the first to bring this one up.

Last night, lots of PvP. A number of our fellows got hit by the new death arrow and the reports in party chat were that the DC was between 50 and 53.

As an almost 2 year member of SL, I have crunched the numbers in almost every combination in order to make effective assassins. Knowing what other faction-mates ended up with also adds to my belief that there are really only a couple decent assassin builds. Being a proud owner of a lvl 40 with 28 assassin and a 47 DC one-shot, I have to protest. Please review the following:

Assassin one shot considerations:

+4 int books are required to be competitive (i used one in order to reach 47 DC)
50 DC underground, in SL cradle only
AC at best will be 60-65, no shield, no epic dodge
Weapon must be prepared before striking
target cannot be aware of you for strike, meaning you have to burn at least 2 epic feats on ESF hide/ms
good luck breaking 55 ab
melee strike only and must have a bladed weapon

AA (I do not have one, so my considerations may be skewed)
Only dex required, no secondary stat
Ranged attack
50 dc regardless of any stats, skills, etc. You get it just for being an AA
Can walk up to a target without sneaking, without buffing and shoot them in the face and still get your 50 DC

This is a plain and simple insult to assassins. AA should stand for Assassin Archer, cuz they are just plain better at it now.

[mgrjebbo]

I see your point, however I think that assassin needs a boost instead of nerfing AA. I like the AA changes.

[Alkapwn]

I agree Assassins are fun but almost worthless when it comes to heavy pvp. One shot and one quick get away is all you get. Not to mention the terrible saves.......

[Korr]

Well to start, assassin death attack is a ranged touch attack. Meaning 55 AB will hit 95% of the time. I had an assassin build that could push over 50 DC without any books. Wiz 13 / Assassin 27. Dispell bait, but the point is to never see it coming. With such a high int that gives a PLETHERA of spells level 7 and below, invis, ii, darkness, on and on and on. I wont disagree though, assassin could use a bit of love with how their one shotting works. AA now just gets to run around and anytime try to pop you. The DC for death and paralyze sometimes goes glitchy too if anyone remembers (dont recall last time I saw an assassin wandering around), but never forget the almighty paralyze too. The length of that is too good to forget. Find one unsuspecting mage and take him out of the equation!

[Bargeld]

Find one unsuspecting mage and take him out of the equation!

I can't they all have a dual logged cleric that's FoM'd them.

[LinuxPup]

Is spellcraft considered?

[Bargeld]

Very difficult to tell, is it supposed to be? Intuitively, I never thought spellcraft had anything to do with the touch attack or the DC for assassins... I will try to check.

[Amoenotep]

the dc is 50 with 30 AA lvls. AA's have no real epic feat selection, no good saves, no skill sets that are useful.

dc is AA+15 with a +5 bonus at lvl 30...just for being that kamikaze AA that won't be effective at living.

you get great AB and low end damage because everything is pierce resist.

spellcraft is considered towards the DC...

[Bargeld]

5 + 28 + 11 int with helm + 3 fox = 47

I have 21 nat spellcraft. I hope you mean the AA.

And you realize, with the prevalence of Multi-logging and Pleveling, that negative aspect penalizes some and helps others...

[Bargeld]

The best conceivable DC for assassin would be like 5 + 30 + 15 + 3 = 53

of course you could make your life real pitiful and invest in more int feats for another 5.

[Amoenotep]

so your telling me that a good boost to a pure dedicated class makes your assassin look so crappy its sad? with a 1/day ability and if thats all they build around then they are dog meat....bring 2 guys and have the second kill him

[Daltian]

so your telling me that a good boost to a pure dedicated class makes your assassin look so crappy its sad? with a 1/day ability and if thats all they build around then they are dog meat....bring 2 guys and have the second kill him

So to counter AA you need 2 chars? Anyway, AA might be ok as it is, didn't really think about the new changes, but what Bargeld says has a lot of sense. After all, his assasin is as dedicated as the AA. And has much more restrictions. I will never play an assassin for sure, since I only build in NC and TC, and might build AA some time in the future, but I certeanely see the Bargelds point.

[Bargeld]

On the contrary, Assassin gets a pure class bonus as well. Ashame its not assassinating... it actually removes your (poison from the weapon) ability to do so.

I'm quite pleased with Gem, when she has a good day, she can clean house, but like Alka sed... in a frey you are dog meat (last night was a testament to that).

I always thought the monicker of having the best AB along with a WM was an AA's claim. They just needed real ammo to do real damage.

Assassins should get the one hits.

[Amoenotep]

assassin gets a decent skill set, they get not horrible feats, they even get some nifty spells...not too mention they get a sneak attack, which really helps if your flanking.


AA's get run and shoot, 1 death arrow...more run and shoot....shoot some more, shoot again...don't stop running because all you can do is craft traps...shoot again....crap forgot to run..look at that i laid down and am now getting killed

[Bargeld]

Its an archer, what do you expect to do? Just make it more damage... I agree with that side of it. Gem has 3x extra sneak feats and can easily kill a barb with max heal skills, doing 75-90 death attack without crits, 8x a round with melee. But with her bow (which IS her focus) the death attack crits can clear 200. Make an AA do that instead of giving then some outrageous death DC. Consider their other abilities (which was done) and see how that goes.

But for a class that had a 17 DC death arrow last week, this is nuts.