Well, there a couple ways you could make it harder. I'm all in favor of that. :)

Maybe buff up the monsters in the Guild significantly? I don't like how right now you can just plow through the assassins like it's cool... it should be much, much harder IMO. I would like it to be something like the Bug Temple - a challenging area with good rewards, but often avoided by players (at least until the late game) because of the immense risk.

I think that the entry requirement (backstabbing 50 monsters) could be changed to maybe backstab 20 peaceful monsters? You could be required to be chaotic to join and learn anything, too, which would mean putting off crowning if you want to be able to train. (knowing that as soon as you switch alignments, all training stops)

I really actually liked my idea of having multiple NPCs hanging around the Assassin Prince, each one who assigns a quest. How about, for Alertness, after you join the guild there is an NPC who asks you to assassinate the Dwarven Mystic and then charges you 50,000 gp to learn Alertness? Keep in mind you won't have a large supply of gold until after the Tower anyway. So basically you're trading 4 potential SoCR (and probably pissing off all of Dwarftown) in exchange for the skill. I think that's a pretty fair trade off. Assassinating Khelevaster isn't really a tough choice - either you're going for a normal ending, and so you can do so with no repercussions, or you're going for an Ultra Ending, in which case you simply won't do it. (or at least, don't do it before he summons the ToTRR) You're not actually losing anything by doing so. And also, I think you guys are really, REALLY overestimating the power of Alertness. I haven't noticed that big of a difference, except maybe with the ACW (The only race without enough HP around level 20 to take a energy beam from him and survive already starts with Alertness) and item destruction from the BDC. (So late in the game it's not a serious threat to your survival, just an annoyance)

However, if the power is overestimated, why should something as grave as pissing off the whole town with possible cursedooming be needed as a counterbalance?

That's hardly a penalty at all, mike3. The real loss is you have to give up a guaranteed ring of ice if you assassinate the mystic, and a chance at four SOCR and some POEH. Both of those separately are wish-worthy, so giving up both of them is quite something. (though, to be fair, Alertness is not currently wishable) Pissing off DT is hardly a repercussion and should be done frequently.

Anyway, I see no problem with having to assassinate Mystic or whoever for FW or Alertness or something. It's a pretty rad concept and I like it a lot.

Yeah, I frequently murder everyone in DT anyway, just for fun. :)

My idea (presuming that Alertness not being wishable is a bug that will be fixed, not an intended feature) is that you're giving up roughly one wish worth of gear in exchange for a skill you would probably spend a wish on. (though I'd probably wish for Concentration instead)'I'd be interested in seeing a similar quest for an AoLS... Though I'm not really sure if an AoLS is something that should ever be guarenteed. I mean, Nethack has a guarenteed WoW in the Castle, and it makes the game a lot more boring knowing if you can survive to that point, you can have any item you want. (I once had 5 AoLS' in a Nethack game)

Also, the new way !oEx works makes generating a ring of ice a lot easier.

Hmmm, probably the assassin's guild could offer it's members random assassination tasks? Would be something like Thrundar's kill-monster-quests and the reward would always be a nice amount of gold or probably some kind of item. They could also sell potions of poison to the members... could be quite useful to classes other than assassins.
Just like JellySlayer I don't like the idea that some of my fave skills would be availible for every char.

I think I know where Jelly is going and he is right. Making more skills available to more classes is a fine way to make this game play exactly the same with every character.

Right now this is how I see things: A thief has a unique playstyle because of the chance to steal nice items. If I feel like playing this kind of character however, I would expect better affinity for stealth.
Instead, we have plenty of races and classes that start with stealth and thus its advantage is diluted. I'd love to see stealth buffed significantly but taken away as a starting skill from a lot of r/c combinations, to the point where only thieves, assassins and perhaps archers have it, plus mist elves as they are supposedly reclusive and hard to find. Every other r/c combo would be forced to either wish for it or have a lucky potion/scroll of education roll.

Two weapon combat should be much less common as well and learning it from Bart made impossible. At the same time, once the skill is maxed, it's effect on combat should be much more dramatic, i.e. lowering base action cost to only ~1.2x normal one handed attacks.

Something like this could be done to every skill and each class and race would have a more limited access to them.
The above two are just examples.
This would encourage players to choose a particular style.
Maybe open their eyes and make them think: hey, I actually like how this works.
Unique features have the ability to make something more interesting.
I realized recently that ADOM plays virtually the same in late game - hit things until they die, collect stuff, move on.
It doesn't matter if I'm a monk, a thief, merchant or a mindcrafter.
Hell, even my wizards usually run around with aotme and only use acid ball when hitting each monster separately would take too much real time.
This also makes me question my previous assessment of aotme, to the point I'm no longer certain if the buff was the right thing, but that's another story.

As a side note, I don't play beastfighters, as in - ever.
There's just no room in a world of fantasy roleplaying where I would deliberately run around unarmed, with all those nice swords laying around.
This is my personal selection process - I like monks (never unarmed), mindcrafters, wizards and assassins, while most other classes are less attractive to me because of the skill/class power combinations they offer.
I think this is the right way, to make people try every char and then decide to play something that suits their expectations.
Perhaps in a few years somebody decides to give another class a shot and that's fine but it will only work if that class offers something unique but effective in its own way.

Additionally to the points about making characters play differently (which I absolutely agree with), why should joining the Assassin's Guild have benefits for every class except assassins?

One could say the same about the thieves' guild...

This has been my opinion as well for a while. Most games are identical post casino, because all of the cool differences in skill and playing style become mostly irrelevant at that point. I.e, my early game thieves will sneak around dungeons, locking doors and pickpocketing monsters and running away. But by late game, it doesn't really make sense, so a thief plays the same way as a wizard or a fighter. There is a big exception here, which is Mindcrafters. Mindcrafters have a unique enough special ability to make them at least somewhat unique in the late game. Which is why I enjoy playing them.

I've been brainstorming a lot of ideas on how to change this, it mostly comes down to stronger and more unique class abilities starting around level 25 or so. I also suggested more racial abilities in a reply to this RFE, it could use some love.

Really, what needs to happen is
A) As you suggest, skills become more restrictive or,
B) more class specific skills/skill bonuses and special abilities get added.

As an example of B, we already see this with spellcasters: they learn and cast more easily, get 10x as many books, more PP, and are overall much better at Mana. Anyone can get concentration and learning and try and cast spells (except maybe barbarians and mindcrafters), but at a significant handicap.

Likewise, anyone can learn stealth, but it makes absolutely no sense that a wizard or even a paladin would ever be as good at sneaking around as an assassin or a thief. The fact this happens means the mechanics weren't really well thought out when they were implemented. In general, actually, physical/combat related mechanics seem far less defined, and give less bonuses to physical/combat classes, compared to magic and spellcasters, which is why spellcasters are so OP in comparison in ADOM. Not that I think we need everything to be fair and balanced, it just feels like one received a lot less thought than the other. So either wizards should really be a lot worse at combat, or fighters better. Same for other specializations, like farmers, merchants, assassins, thieves, etc. They should actually be much better at whatever profession they are than anyone else.

I'll probably compile all this into an RFE in the next few days, feel free to add anything else you can think of! (Or submit it yourself if you already have it ready/have the time :))

Also, just FYI, this thread is 2 years old...

FYI, I'm not paying for the cake!

Eh?

I couldn't care less if it's 2 or 20 years old as long a the subject is still relevant.

Maybe if you got *one* of those skills, chosen randomly, I might be ok with it.

Like it was explained here, though, it takes all of the racial power out of orcs and dark elves, and damages the game's racial diversity. Which is a shame, because the idea of joining the assassin's guide is great!

I think that fixed bonuses or thematic item rewards for quests are better. Like getting a poisoned/weeping eternium dagger of mayhem/devastation for one of the quests and/or a cloak of invisibility. Not too powerful but useful.
Perhaps a sort of "blessing" like a permanent, one time bonus of 5d2 DV or a one-off chance to summon 3d3 friendly assassins or master assassins for assistance, who disappear after ~100 turns.

'of penetration' weapons would be more fitting in regards of an assassin themed weapon ;)

a weeping/poisonous eternium dagger of penetration would be a nice upgrade for Thieves/Assassins who took their Heir gifts. Maybe that's a possible idea for the mechanic of joining? A thief/assassin being an heir to the Assassin Prince...

I would like to go back to the original post and throw my hat in favor of being able to join an assassin's guild. Thematically and from a role-playing perspective, it sounds very fun.

On skills: I think I'm siding with Dogbreath on this one. Alertness and FW, by the time you actually complete whatever pre-req quest to get them, should be late enough that they don't make a huge difference. HOWEVER, I do like the fact that learning new skills is very difficult to do in ADOM, and am not sure I want a char. running around with almost every skill after being in the two guilds, completing the barbarian and druids quest, and trading in the gladius. I would suggest that performing quests for the Assassin Prince gives/trains a defined skill each time. If he has 3 quests, have a level req. on them (like 20, 25, 30), and have the skill you get/train scale in value with it. So first quest, you either gain Stealth or +10d4 to the skill, second you get Dodge, or +10d4, and for the last one you pick either Alertness or Find Weakness. With the level requirements (30 for FW and Alertness), this should really limit the OP-ness people are worried about, and it would still make the game more fun (in my opinion).

One other option would be that the Thieves Guild and Assassin's Guild are rivals, and you can only be in one. A quest to kill the other guild leader should be given by them.