Deadly arts skill line -_-

Is it just me? or does this skill line in general need a total overhaul, you almost don't see any of these put to good use. Assassins can't use em in most competitive instances cause they need dagger masters/crit strikes/shadowarts for refuge, escape and aod/deathcharge. The deadly arts line is completely ignored by primary sins. Even then, 2ndary sins can't really make much use of them either, since alot of them are tied to be used by primary sins, which overall limits their usefulness.

My question is, w/ the blatant imbalance, why hasn't this been touched yet? I know everyone already knows that sins are by far the least versatile of all classes, but atlest give this skill line some overhauls or buffs to make them more useable and promote variety.

Deadly Arts has no self-heal. Shadow arts does. Give Deadly Arts a self-heal and reduce recharge on some skills and it will be used more. As it stands, it's underpowered like Ritualist Channeling.

It'd be neat if Deadly Arts had a new weapon, like throwable daggers or ninja stars.

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/signed for flying daggers

Scorpion Wire is an Ace skill, best deadly arts skill ever.

Dont they already have dagger throw skills? Dancing dagger+crippling dagger, right? They're deadly arts skills aren't they?

Yes, but I think the suggestion is for a different weapon type to replace the hand to hand daggers. It would be a ranged weapon like a bow, for normal attacks. That way, you don't have to invest in dagger mastery.

Wow, IMHO, these are some horrible ideas these guys are inputting... shurikens..yesh.. Anyway, My main point is that alot of the deadly line requires ties too strong to primary sins. Skills like entangling asp can only be used after a lead attack. Obviously those who don't use daggers can't use it(and other skills similar to it). The deadly arts line simply ain't as flexible as say the tactics, illusion, wilderness lines.. etc. The way assassin skills are built up, its almost strictly pvp(not just gvg, but any form of person vs person). To have deadly arts more viable for other classes to use would be key. Even though alot of the deadly arts skills can be used, the way they work, its almost strictly designed just for primary assassins w/o regard for build synergy w/ other classes and actually be competitive.

Its kinda sad really, as we might actually see more people using /a and not just for teleport skills. Some people might say the same about channeling, but atleast channeling is very useful in pve, can't really say the same for deadly arts.

dancing daggars counts for a lead, that's how you can sue entangling asp without daggars. Although not great it... kind of works... still the skuriken would help but don't count on getting it. Probably be better off trying to use a spear if your doing this, or critical barrager.

Problem is, critical barrager only works for primary sins w/ critical strikes, which the point of this thread(atleast my intention) is to allow deadly to be branched out to other classes and synergize w/ them.

good call on dancing daggers, forgot about it, but like you said, they're not great, and serve no other purpose other than to use offhand attacks or follow up attacks that in the deadly line, really aren't that great to begin w/. I was thinking of deadly arts can be used as the way curses line is used but instead of spamming hexes left and right ,they spam conditions, thus "deadly" great builds can be developed if anet made deadly arts that way.

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Ok, not everyone who plays a primary Assassin has to use Shadow Arts.

Shadow Arts is only used for self-defense (i.e. Shadow Refuge, Dark Escape, Return, Blinding Powder). If a primary Assassin branches out and uses their secondary class for defense instead, you won't need any skill points in Shadow Arts. AoD is a no attribute skill, so it's unaffected. Return and Death's Charge are only used for the shadow stepping effect, so they're unaffected by the level of Shadow Arts. Shadow Refuge, Dark Escape, and Blinding Powder are unnecessary if you have defense from your secondary, so Shadow Arts really isn't required for a primary Sin.

With that said, Deadly Arts can easily be used by a primary sin, without sacrificing Dagger Mastery or Critical Strikes.

Here's a build I use every once in a while:

Assassin/Mesmer

11 + 1 + 3 = 15 Dagger Mastery
9 + 1 = 10 Deadly Arts
8 + 1 = 9 Critical Strikes
8 Illusion

Assassin's Promise

Impale

Golden Phoenix Strike

Twisting Fangs

Critical Eye (I mainly use this for the extra energy management it provides. Anything can be used in this slot though. Assassin's Promise is good enough on it's own.)

Distortion

Illusion of Weakness

Ressurrection Signet

The build trounces almost anything in PvE, and It's gotten me quite a few RA and TA wins. If I know I'm going to be going up against enchantment removal, such as in PvP or in certain areas of PvE, just switch out the Critical Eye for another enchantment to cover the Illusion of Weakness. This build really shines when your group can spike efficiently, because it'll net you loads of energy from the Promise. This build doesn't really need a self heal due to Distortion and the emergency heal from the Illusion.

The main weakness of the build is conditon stacking. Blindness and mass degen will shut the build down. But then again, that's true for 80% of all assassin builds.

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