Assassin help

[cbarchuk]

As I briefly mentioned previously, there are some ways to get backstabs on alert monsters. One is to blind them. This is generally reserved for bosses and other very difficult monsters, since it uses consumables (thrown blindness or cursed invisibility potions), but there is a reusable artifact phial that works for blinding humanoids. Not sure if this counts as being sneaky, but assassin can get a lot of mileage out of their extra backstabbing damage this way. Darkness also allows you to backstab monsters that can't see in the dark. Unfortunately, assassins are not particularly likely to find a spellbook of Darkness.

If you want to start off using backstabbing, one idea would be orc priest. They're full spellcasters and thus are very likely to have access to Darkness early-on. Getting their Backstabbing skill to a decent value will take some work though. Archer feels more like bringing an assault rifle to a sword fight, but dark elf archer is quite a solid choice. On the other hand, if you think assassin lacks focus, you might be even more disappointed by ranger.

I just want a class to play like how it sounds. So an assassin is skilled in daggers both as melee and thrown, poison, and backstabbing. That's sounds very cool. But most of the threads I've read about an assassin suggest you drop the dual daggers (unless you get sting & needle) and grab a sword and shield. Backstabbing is only worth it if you have invisibility or darkness. So stealth isn't enough so I wasted points on that plus one talent. You're right dual daggers has been rough since the monsters get 2 attacks against you...ouch. I simply have a hard time picturing a sneaky assassin wielding a sword and a shield. Poison is pretty cool but, with find weakness, it seems superfluous. Now I have 2 assassins: A Ratling dual wielding daggers and a high elf using a rapier/small shield and bow which he uses the most. The high elf is substantially more powerful. So that's why I mentioned using an Archer. But I guess the main value of an assassin is they're solid in both melee AND ranged as opposed to just focusing on one or the other. It's hard to remove the roleplayer in me I guess. With all that being said I'm new to this game so maybe I just haven't wrapped my head around it yet since it is a pretty deep and complex game.

[Grond]

Well, I'm not much of a roleplayer, but I'll try to give a few class suggestions ;-)

• Wizard - very focused on casting, and all class powers up to 25 are solid and help with casting. It doesn't make sense to stick with the stereotypical wizard trappings of robes and staves, but a wizard with good Learning and Mana should be able to deal with pretty much everything using magic.
• Duelist - probably the most pure melee class in the game, with class powers that make their one-handed/light-armor playstyle very powerful.
• Archer - already mentioned, but just godly with any type of missile. Archer starting out does more damage throwing their shoes than with melee.

[blunk]

I've played a LOT of melee chars and here's my experience.

For good backstabbing you really want invis and 100 stealth (I prefer cloak of invis but spell or ring are workable options).
You can do it with just mediocre stealth and no invis but you'll succed only on rare occations.

I want to think that high dex increase stealth, but thats only what it feels like, I can't say it actually is the case, and with high dex I mean 30+.

It does not matter in the graphic view what direction the monster is facing, ie don't get hung up on "back" in backstab.

You can only land a backstab on the first hit, if a monster is injured from ranged attack or something else from you there is no backstab to be had.
Ie you need to start with the backstab (a normal melee attack which hopefully is a stab), which also is suboptimal on a lot of monsters, but perfectly fine on some.

You can backstab with any weapon, I mean ANY WEAPON, it is perfectly viable to backstab with a very heavy two handed club (you can even wield an iron ration or a robe and backstab with it).
Assassins gets vastly better backstab multipliers with dagger.

Backstab is fast to train as assassin on level up.
The same goes for Stealth which is also automatically trained while going around. It trains faster if you get hold of invis (but beware of food consumption when invis).

[cbarchuk]

I've played a LOT of melee chars and here's my experience.

For good backstabbing you really want invis and 100 stealth (I prefer cloak of invis but spell or ring are workable options).
You can do it with just mediocre stealth and no invis but you'll succed only on rare occations.

I want to think that high dex increase stealth, but thats only what it feels like, I can't say it actually is the case, and with high dex I mean 30+.

It does not matter in the graphic view what direction the monster is facing, ie don't get hung up on "back" in backstab.

You can only land a backstab on the first hit, if a monster is injured from ranged attack or something else from you there is no backstab to be had.
Ie you need to start with the backstab (a normal melee attack which hopefully is a stab), which also is suboptimal on a lot of monsters, but perfectly fine on some.

You can backstab with any weapon, I mean ANY WEAPON, it is perfectly viable to backstab with a very heavy two handed club (you can even wield an iron ration or a robe and backstab with it).
Assassins gets vastly better backstab multipliers with dagger.

Backstab is fast to train as assassin on level up.
The same goes for Stealth which is also automatically trained while going around. It trains faster if you get hold of invis (but beware of food consumption when invis).

Yea I see that invisibility is must if you want to abuse stealth and backstab. But man the food consumption is crazy. Is there a way to counter this?

[blunk]

Yea I see that invisibility is must if you want to abuse stealth and backstab. But man the food consumption is crazy. Is there a way to counter this?

Its not abusing, its making the best of it, ie not a broken mechanic, just going ranged is generally safer but backstab can be a lot of fun.
Crowning reduce food consumption, it's quite noticable when using invis gear.
Invis spell does not cause extra hunger, however bookcasting invis as assassin is ... well you can do it occationally but you wont have enough mana/mana regen.

[cbarchuk]

Its not abusing, its making the best of it, ie not a broken mechanic, just going ranged is generally safer but backstab can be a lot of fun.
Crowning reduce food consumption, it's quite noticable when using invis gear.
Invis spell does not cause extra hunger, however bookcasting invis as assassin is ... well you can do it occationally but you wont have enough mana/mana regen.

Well I have 100 stealth, the stealthy talent and a cloak of invisibility. Even with all that I still find that the "you stab..." message doesn't pop up as much as I thought it would. But it does at least help where as before I would only get the backstab message if the target was in an 'uncaring' state.

[grobblewobble]

Well, I'm not much of a roleplayer, but I'll try to give a few class suggestions ;-)

• Duelist - probably the most pure melee class in the game, with class powers that make their one-handed/light-armor playstyle very powerful.

Yeah, if you're looking for a class that functions exactly 'as advertised', Duelist might be your class.

[cbarchuk]

Yeah, if you're looking for a class that functions exactly 'as advertised', Duelist might be your class.

Thanks for the feedback. Yea I guess I'm wanting the class to function as I imagine it would. For example I see the assassin in this game as a master of dual wielding daggers and throwing daggers along with stealth and poison. So that's exactly how I would want to play an assassin. I know a shield is a good idea and all but I find a tower shield wielding assassin incredibly immersion breaking. If I played a ranger then I would want to dual wield swords of some type and play him/her as...well... a ranger. So I look at these classes in a very traditional manner as you might see them in D&D or any other standard stock fantasy game. Anyways, what's a good race for a duelist? Ratling maybe?

[Blank4u47]

Personally I prefer gnome duelists, their physical stats are passable, they get an extra talent, 2 extra if you get 18 mana, plus a long lifespan.

[grobblewobble]

First off, stay away from Troll and Mist Elf. (Both of them bring additional challenges, which can be fun, but only if you want to make the game harder.)

Any race with a good toughness gives you a slight edge. Personally I like dwarves for their high age and Mithril Skin, but objectively Drakeling is best, as it is for many classes. Spitting acid lets you deal easily with a lot of nasty monsters. Karmics, paralyzing monsters and many others. It's not a solution to everything, but it tends to help against those monsters that you don't want to touch in melee range.