Assassins beware the "love" is brewing!

Someone who doesn't get it? You aren't meant to survive on the front lines. You get in, unleash a combo, fall back.

Lol, you ARE the assassin I played with the other day. I swear, the only use for some players is Putrid Explosion and Death Nova. Assassinoobs, the necromancer's best friend.

The monks are irritated because assassin play like warriors, but take hits like elementalists. Play it right and the monk wont be out of energy the whole time.

As for turning down players? i don't tend to play with PuGs, but I happily play with good assassins. We've run missions with entire parties of Rits and Assassins, without issue, because the assassins know their stuff. I'll play with anyone who can play, but the sad fact is that you don't need an assassin to complete a mission, and you do need a source of healing/protection. Sorry to those players who are good enough to make it, but don't get invites.

Here's a hint though - if you blind invite me I will not play with you. I also don't play with anyone who spams "A/W LFG no noobs".

What might get my attention? "Stance using A/W hit and run player; can build to suit, looking for group"

This player is willing to change his build around a bit, has used real words and indicated that he doesn't intend to tank. I like him already. Maybe he'll even discuss his skill bar, or take a handy warrior skill or two along.

Yes, just let they die...

Please understand that my intent was not to start a revolt. Merely to understate a revolt is in progress or in the near future. There are many GREAT suggestions in this thread and I hope most assassin players will read and listen to suggestions given. Suggestions given by those who help keep them alive THE MONKS.

I in no way wish to ban the assassin. I love the assassin… really I do…. I love to win more… really I do…. And if I have to sacrifice “you” for the good of the mission or whole I’ll do that to ensure party survival. That’s my job… I’m a monk for the group first and foremost and a monk for the individual second, and am dam proud of it. Many players in PvE Factions believe that the monk has somehow failed them when in reality it was the player who failed him or herself.

On a side note:
I have been the sole monk for a team of 8 in THK and for the Fire Island missions and beat them all so I think I can run heal or protect builds and manage my energy pretty well. So insulting my monk skills is deserving of my apathy.

I love my assasin since the FPE, and on top of that I have to wholeheartedly agree with you on the tank thing. I have a warrior that I love to beat the crap out of things, I have a necro to raise badass minions (though now only ten) to be the crap out of things, and I have my ranger to do, well, anything i so desire to. The fact is, with the exception of my ranger, the assasin has wowed me and i find it a BLAST to go duking around the map just blasting creatures and getting kills faster than any other character I know. And how do I do it? By jumping in and out of battle, healing in between, making the monks life easier to focus on others with srtonger armor that might actually be at risk because they cant avoid it all. On top of that, the assasin is useless in the fray when his strikes are recharging, the strength comes in the 1-2-3 punch.

Of course there are exceptions when you dont have to leave, or the dreaded mis-hit on the keyboard where i used critical eye instead of a shadow step (doh!), but i love the elusive play of the assasin, and to be honest, until stronger builds are discovered, it sthe way assasins were meant to be played. I really cant wait till the game balances and we can actually appreciate the new classes instead of having all the hate for them.

Btw, 6 assasins, 2 monks = a lot of fun just ot play around with. try it out for fun .

know whats worse? Assassin's with superior runes.

I'm, personally not "against" any class or anything like that...hell, when an Assassin is played right, they are awesome! However...that's the whole problem...WHEN they are played right. In almost every PUG I've been in since Factions came out...the Assassin has been the first to go down. And they go down FAST, and they go down again, and again...

The people that say "give it time, eventually people will learn to play them"...I hope that's right, but I don't know...I still see Warriors (and other classes) that can't play right. Two of the biggest problems (IMO) are 1. Assassins are often played by people who have been playing Warriors, and 2. Assassins look like the kids' favorite anime characters, prompting the new players to choose them. "HAHA I'm teh ninja look at meeeee!!" *rushes in* **smack, slash, hack* *dead Assassin*

But hey, at least the sucky Assassins make great Minion fodder.

Assassin teleports to enemy monk (PvE mind you), just barely kills it in the midst of dying. I couldn't heal them in time as I had to run to get into casting range.

I suggest not doing that again if you want to live Mr. Assassin. They respond back with something like "you noob, i killed their monk".

I found the term "stance assassin" to be an amusing concept. It was funny to me. Sorry, you found it to be something else.

LOL Quote of the Month,

Yeah I feel your pain when I play a monk. I tell the assassin to not play tank or s/he's going to die. I'll have to sacrifice a slot for VS and see if that helps them at all, otherwise they are second priority for healing over a warrior if they are going to play paper tank.

Secret to keeping your zin alive...

A/N, first slot on my skill bar is Mark of Pain. Why? Assassin AoE that will get groups to break up allowing you to worry only about your target. Which means... less damage being taken as well. For groups a little more determined to stay together, you're now doing AoE damage from MoP, and when you hit Death Blossom all those yellow numbers are rather pretty...

it is possible to make a "stance" "assassin", though. make a R/A, and take whirling defense and throw dirt. for a full 33 seconds, you are very well defended against weapon damage, and with 100 AL vs elemental, you are well defended against spells as well.

if you REALLY want to be a "stance" "assassin", take greater conflagration as well.

and now back to the point:

i think the whole concept of an assassin simply does not fit in the GW battle system. an assassin is a strategic fighter, relying on the element of surprise and quick adaptability. it focuses on hit and run tactics. he needs all of that to fight effectively. all in all, the assassin is an "urban ranger". however, for them to fully utilize their strengths, they pretty much require 12 skill slots. compressing them down to 8 slots merely turns them into one-trick ponies. by doing so, the assassin is forced to sacrifice one or two aspect of their strengths, and in the process, they become weak.

the assassin is very well designed, to be fair. however, it doesn't work all that well in the current GW battle system.

the problem with the assasin is rather simple, yet hard for many to understand

too many assasins ive seen fall into one of two traps...

#1 they think they are warriors, as has been said. guys, you have about 20 points less armor and cant take the beating they can, do not go leeroy on us

#2 they get so cought up in the various sequenced attack skills that they forget to carry a few basic commidities to help sustain themselves.

pick your attack skills and dont carry more than 4 or 5 (2 leads in case one gets blocked or missies is my preference) and dont forget the healing and defensive skills to keep your arse alive when it gets think

Hmm... ok I will cross you off of my list of possible healers.

I am a little over half-way to my survivor title with my 'sin and I have asked my Monk how much they had to heal me... other than slapping on a Mending they have had to do very little.

I use Shadow Refuge for emergency use and Troll Ungent as well that seems to take care of me quite well.

I think the key is 'sins have to either warp in and out of combat or take their own defensive and healing skills.

I will have to keep that in mind the next time I take my Mesmer out to solo the Hydra's outside Augury Rock or the Yetti outside the harbor... not that I have a clue where I should get a warrior while soloing.

It is NOT about the class... it is about how you set yourself up.

As a ranger there are places in the game that I can have more armor than the warrior and evade more often.

I don't like to use my ranger or mesmer as tanks... but if I need to in a pinch I will.

The assassin has the same base armor as the ranger and MORE ways to heal. The thing NOT to do as a 'sin is get aggro and blink back to your casters while still carrying said aggro.

This should read, "Many players in PvE Guild Wars..." The attitude isn't limited to Canthans.

I too feel your pain. I've noticed, when out with my mesmer, how often and easily most assassins die. Christ, they die easier than my mesmer does when she's being pounded on by multiple enemies. Because of this, I've been exclusively henching so far with my Canthan monk. Just don't want the hassle of healing sins and taking blame when they die, and it's impossible to get into a group without at least one sin right now. I know there are competent assassins out there, and I hope that the bad ones eventually drop out. Until then, henchies (but no assassin henchies!).

i've designed a good way for assassin groups to finish off mob groups in under 14 seconds. however, please bare with me, since i haven't gotten a good look at the assassin skills yet.

here's what you need:
a warrior tank. it doesn't really need to be a stance tank
a few assassins
a monk
some long-range classes.

the assassins will need three skills:
recall
shadow step
dash (or another stance)

here how it works:
the assassins cast recall on the warrior. then the assassins each select a target. they could select different targets, or the same target if they wish. warrior go into the mob and draws aggo. assassins then activate shadow step and end recall. they should now be within easy reach of their target. they run to their targets and spam them into oblivion. after they finish their combo, they activate dash to reappear outside. the ranged classes then finish off the weakened targets.

there you go, a complete battle sequence with assassins, in under 14 seconds. my choice of skills are definately not the best, but they're accessable to every assassin.

You think it's bad for you, having to spend a lot of energy healing assassins... well, imagine what it's like for us assassins who CAN'T GET INTO FREAKING GROUPS.

Its pretty bad. But most people are newbishly recommending 'recall' to get out of trouble when 'return' is far better. Unfortunatly recall does not always break aggro, but return will due to its cripple effect that the mobs will give up chasing you and return to attacking the tank of the group.

And its a myth that tanks can hold aggro against enemies with other players in an arms length, they are going to turn on the assassin.

I did have a funny experience in one mission. The players for some stupid reason started blaming me for their falures and that they were all dying. Then someone commented "Dont heal the assassin he is a nub" the next battle with me dancing in and out of the fight everyone else died except me. I did not receive any heals. I then told them off and mapped back. Grabbed henchmen and got a expert completion level.

I find this elitism extremely annoying, even when I am playing my class proper people are blaming me for things other members failed at. (For instance that NECRO tanking mobs). Warriors dying with 3 monks supporting them etc. With all this class hatred it is easy to overlook the failures of other group members. A tanking assassin is much better than a tanking caster. I hope all the leeroyys leave so the class wont be so hated.

The second thing the assassin is really good at is disabling enemy casters while being able to do heavy damage. With bosses doing double damage it is almost required that you disable that elemetalist boss so he cant cast his high powered spells. (Unless you want your monks to feel the wrath of a 250 damage Double Dragon, see how much energy THAT drains from you).

Ah well, I have the entire Assassin Profession unlocked except for "Assassin's Promise" back to working on my restoration ritualist.

I dont have too much trouble keeping assassins alive as any other caster class.. maybe you guys suck at monking

I think this is probably the umpteenth thread about a monk or a necro who hates assassins. The bottom line is pretty simple and many people have stated it over and over again - assassins are fast and you dash in for an attack and you get out, you should be self sufficient. However, being self sufficient applies for all classes. You shouldn't have to rely on someone on your team to help you get through, even if you're a caster, you still want to stay alive and do damage and make sure the rest of your team gets it through.

It's called playing as a team. Monks that don't want to participate? That's just being a bad monk, plain and simple. Seriously, do you want a non team player on your team regardless of class? Hell no. I'd rather have NO monk with a bunch of team players than having a group with two monks that only think of healing tank classes and themselves.

With that being said, I think it's pretty obvious that a lot of us out there forget that this is a game made for teams. Yes, there are lots of solo builds out there, but they're mostly for farming.

In my honest opinion, there are a lot of bad assassins out there, but at the same time, there are bad monks too. It's not just a flavor stuck to one class. Bad can happen to anything.

I personally love my 20 A/N, and when I can find a group, well, that's what henchies are for. The assassin craze will probably stop soon when most assassins reach level 20 and want to start another character. For now, be patient.

Quoted for truth.

actually, i'm recommending recall for getting INTO battle. you can use whatever you want to get back, but the shadow step+dash combo do not require you to actively select a target. i also fully realize that the warrior won't hold onto aggro when the assassin warp in. the assassins are in their for only a few seconds to finish their combos, and then they're out. the warrior's supposed to be outside of your aggro circle when he's pulling anyways.

Gee I wonder why?.. Thus the point of this thread. The "Love" is brewing.

I sure hope not…. I actually am a good healer as my guildies and friends would tell you, and I am sure you are a good Assassin. Not all assassins are bad just 90% of them. As I said earlier I do like the assassin for what it does.

I also play an Assassin /Ranger. This combo seems to work well and I can get in and out of places quick. I also have trouble getting into groups with my Assassin so I feel your pain there as well. I have also found Critical Strikes works great with Marksmanship. So sometimes I will advertise as a back up Barrager or Critical Eye Marksman. Just to get through team missions.

This thread is about educating people on how the Assassin class should be played and how the assassin can be more beneficial for the group as a whole. However as many of you have noticed the “Love” for the assassins is causing the class pain. Hard to get in PUG groups, Monks refusing to heal (either good players or bad players) etc etc. Every class has its part including the assassin. Know your role, know your limitations, and do what is best for you and the group.

When you monk, you sometimes have to make the decision not to heal someone because that's best for the team. Let's say you're out with a tanking elementalist. Someone who stands there spamming flare while six enemies pound on them. At first, you try to keep them healed, at the expense of not doing a good job healing anyone else. Then you see them do it again with the next mob, and again with the next mob. You make the decision to pay less attention to them, because while you're busy wasting all your time and energy babysitting them, you aren't healing anyone else. So healing them is actually not good for the team. When I monk, I'd prefer one person to die than five.

What's happening right now is that lots of assassins are like that elementalist. They haven't learned how to play an assassin properly, so they're tanking, and with every mob, they're taking major damage. If the monk tried to keep them healed, the monk would not be able to keep everyone else's health up. That's why a GOOD monk who is a team player may decide to stop healing an incompetent assassin (or any other incompetent). Bad players are not entitled to healing when it jeopardizes the rest of the team.

^^^ I understand what you're saying, but I guess I came off the wrong way.

Playing as a good monk does require decision making, but I guess my generalization was way too broad. I was talking about monks that are picking their nose like Sister Tai or monks that kamikaze and go straight into aggro.

I realize that in order for a team to work out well, they should have to know who to heal and when to heal, etc. I guess I was thinking it and didn't type it out, but there are monks who only think to heal a certain class or character when they very well could have healed someone else - or they went to go pick up loot instead of helping the team.

I agree with you that monks who decide up front who they will heal or what professions they will heal are monks you don't want on your team.

Patience people. I think the guy who said that Prophecies helped train people better because it takes longer to reach level 20 is thinking the right direction. In Factions you hit 20 in like no time at all so you don't have that much time to "learn" your class.

I started and Assasin to see what they were like. To me its all new so it takes time to learn it. I used henchs to do quests around the island and with them you almost HAVE to be the tank. Plus, when you start out it takes a while to get all the skills needed to be an "effective" assasin and now you have to buy most of your skills.

Everyone need to take a deeeeeeeeeep breath. For gods sake, Factions just came out!!! Give people time to learn how to play FFS!!

/not signed

The fact that I got my assassin to level 20 in under 15 hours did disturb me a bit. Especially when you consider the common n00b mentality that "I am level 20, that means I am a pro at this game!111"

Tried to tank in random arenas......wasnt too hard for me to figure out that assassin is a "hit and run" class.

Yeah, I agree that there are a lot of noob assassins out there who think they can tank, and I would hate it if I were a monk.

But my build is different than almost all other assassins. So I work a little differently.

I play an A/W and I use an axe and shield, giving me more armor than a regular Assassin. I do a ton of criticals, so I bring along critical defenses, which lets me avoid a lot of damage. I constantly keep watch yourself on, and I put up shadow refuge whenever it recharges.

Since I have a lot more armor than a regular assassin, I can stay in the battle, but I'm not the tank, I don't rush ahead and aggro everything. I wait for the warriors on my team to run in and grab the aggro, then I go in and start attacking.

I've actually had a monk tell me yesterday that I was a pleasure to have on the team since they didn't need to waste a ton of energy healing me, unlike most other assassins she has played with.

But for all other assassins, do you combo and get out!

Yeah, Anet even made a post about how to play an Assasin. I heard them called an "aggro magnet" somewhere. Seems about right. Yes they are melee and will get hit a few times but if they start getting hit they gotta use their little step skills and get the fk outta there get some heals and head back in. The revolt has already started and ive seen many assasins rejected from groups. I take 1 or 2 in but if they die I leave them dead till the fights done and if they aggro I let them die before I go in a pull a nice chunk. At this point "a dead Assasin is a good Assasin."

Funny how people think it can't be done just because they can't do it. I play an Assassin Ranger in factions. I've always soloed or played with my wife and since she has a mesmer and a ritualist as her characters that leaves me as the tank. No an assassin can't tank as a 100% assassin and being a monk seconday doesn't work like it does with a warrior. I picked ranger because of skills like troll unguent (sure it takes a bit of time to cast but it can't be stripped, shattered or stopped by anti spell skills and only cost 5 energy), lightning reflexes, healing spring, I have a tiger (that takes some of the attention off me, adds damage to the enemy, provide another corpse for mm if it dies) and the other stances that allow you to evade attacks. The apply poison works well with my daggers too.

This isn't as effective as a warrior because of the energy you need to spend to do it but it can be done at the cost of not using the good (more energy costing) attack skills. However you can do more critical hits and can do double strikes just by attacking normally which leaves you almost (but not quite) at evens with a warrior (I mean a 100% warrior not using their secondary at all). A warrior using their secondary to buff themself out tanks an assassin twice over.

You say they're to warp in, strike, then warp out only well guess what? With that tactic you spend energy getting in (unless you run which leaves you open to getting hit along the way), spend more energy on attack skills, then warp away spending more energy (again, unless you run leaving you open to hits). That not only limits you on the attack skills you can use while up close (since you have to save energy to warp out) but you spend half the time standing out of harms way waiting for your energy to get back up. When you compare the attributes and skills to all the other classes they are no better or worse just different. So that leaves the assassin at a 50% or 75% efficiency at best for their role. Their role being melee. The daggers were designed to be the assassins weapon making the assassin a melee fighter yet they are not only concidered a magic user (of sorts) by the players but by the mobs as well. There have been plenty of time when my wife moved on ahead to take on the next mob while I finished the remaining one but when I show up to help the whole mob (no exaggeration) begins to attack me and leaves her alone. We bring warriors for some quests and missions and when she runs ahead the henchies (warrior included) usually follows. When I clean up and catch up I find that the enemies have focused their attention more often on the spell casters and not the warrior but when I move into aggro, BOOM, every one of them are focused on me. They even stop attacking the monks which (according to an AI update some time back) is suppose to be at the hight of the enemies priority to attack list.

That's why I like rangers best. They are not considered magic users so their not at the top of the AIs target list but they also do their damage from afar so they dont body block turning the aggro on them (role of a tank). The assassin is flawed that way though. They are melee which means they must get up close to do their damage but are considered magic users (and a high priority one at that) which seems to attract all the wrong attention from the enemies. So you need the skills that evade and block as well as good healing skills if your are going to contribute 100% in the fight like every other class can. Even spell casters can use wands and staffs to attack from a safe distance when waiting for energy while the assassins have to stop. That's the design flaw I was suggesting a fix to. If the assassin skills had the same cost of the ranger skills (most being 5 or 10 with more 5 than 10) then it could contribute 100% to the fight. No running away to stand there while your energy recharges. The attribute that gives energy back could even stay the way it is although the change I would like to see is change it so it reduces the energy cost of certain skill types and leave the energy cost of assassin skills the same. Like the ranger.

Now I found a way to tank next to a warrior but it requires me relying heavily on my ranger class and I need my tiger too. Without the tiger to take some of the aggro off me I still get overwhelmed without a healer. I guess since I'm such high priority so is my pet. I only got the pet recently since I wanted the skill slots for other skills to heal, do damage and evade. Had I known the pet took aggro off me as much as it does I would have gotten one alot sooner. It's like having an evade skill that doesn't cost anything to activate and lasts a long time. I'm not saying that the pet takes all the aggro but will take the aggro of one or two enemies out of a group of five or six which is enough.

So in short the change is this. Reduce the energy cost of skills to match that of the rangers. The armor can stay the same so assassins will take more damage than a warrior but the energy regen and amount of energy can stay so the assassin can keep the skills up. Also the aggro priority should be changed as well.

Yes I will say it again to all those monks. Stop being so high and mighty. Your a player that contributes just as much as anyone else. No more, no less. So all this going on strike, getting into the FoW or UW for free and getting paid to do missions and quest that you have yet to get done yourself is absolute Bull Shit just because your a monk. Besides, it's tougher doing the high level quests as a monk using only henchies than it is as a warrior using only henchies. Plus I have done more than my fair share of high level quests and missions succesfully in a full party of people after the monks rage quit for whatever reason. I've also found that the healer and protector henchies do just as well and better than most players using a monk. So no your not all important just for being monks so no you should get any unique benefits or treatment.

"You are not a beautifull nor unique snowflake, you are the all singind, all dancing crap of the world." -Fight Club

agree with OP 200%.

Err... right, have you ever actually look at the math for this? A warrior who knows what he is doing can survive quite nicely without taking +armor/stance skills. After all the monsters tend to go after the squishies...

So in PvE, I am actually of the opinion that it's better for the warriors to take things like condition removal and interrupts than +armor stances...

i hench everything in the game except missions. and for those i WILL NOT join a group with more than 1 assassin or warrior. like stated before, assassins are a HUGE waste of good energy

My suggestion for Sin primaries:

1) Don't shadow step into battle -- you'll pull all the aggro. Let the Warrior go in first.
2) Try to use a secondary that gives you some defensive skills. Warrior (for stances) is good. Ele's and Mesmers have armor enchants that might be worthwhile. Blood Necro's have Demonic Flesh as well as some life/energy regenerating skills.
3) Assassin skills quickly deplete your energy. Consider ranger primary for expertise (it has good stances as well) or necro or mes secondary for energy management. Or use some of the assassin energy management skills.

This thread can be made about any character. The message can be summed up in to one word from my native language of leetspeak. L3rN70p14yN00bCr41M0r3kkthxbai

Assys that actually use there 2nd professions well and use buffs can tank... With 0 point in earth magic and with armor of earth on an assassin has similar defense to a warrior. Don't hate the character hate the noob that made it.

Physical resistance with 0 in inspiration gives an assy 10 more def than a warrior against phys. Just throwing out random skills so people can see my point that its not the Char its the toon.

Yes! I hate assasains who attempt to tank. I had a group with 2 assasains, and before the halfway point of the mission they had 60 DP. Do the monks a favor and leave the tanking to a tank. There are skills like "dash" with a 3 second run speed for a reason.