Tierd of hearing your assassin will never be a viable ally? Sick of dying? Lost on even where to start with your sin? This is general stratagies, ideas and concepts that will help you with your sin. From your attributes, to your skills, to how you execute, I will try and cover as many different aspects of the assassin as I possibly can, and hopfully, help people who are having trouble playing their assassin.
First off, lets look at the 2 attributes that are hardest to understand. Critcal Strikes and Dagger Mastery.
When allocating your points, think about your build and your purpose, do you use alot of spells? If thats the case Critical Strikes will lend you more Energy at higher levels. Out to spike as hard as you can as fast as you can? Dagger mastery increases your critical hits % more then critical strikes AND increases your double strike chances(critical strikes does not). Keep this in mind, because how you allocate your points here really determines your capabilities as far as spell casting, and or damage output.
Now lets look at your other 2 attributes.
Shadow Arts - This skill set is for mostly defensive purposes. This includes shadow steps, evasive spells, and healing spells. If you are having problems staying alive, put points into here, and use your evasive/healing spells to slow down the amount of damage your taking. Ideally, if your quick, you shouldn't need points in this, because your able to tele in, and tele out(which don't need points here to be effective, THIS IS AN ADVANCED TACTIC THOUGH).
Deadly Arts - These usually are missunderstood, and missused in my opinion. These aren't for KILLING your target, they are for crippling your target, making them softer, slower, or lose health quicker, or to make you stronger. This are important if you arn't using your secondary class to do that job(my preferred route). Use these wisly, combined with the correct attacks, these can do WONDERS for your chances of eliminating your target.
Overview of the Assassin
A major issue with the assassin is the damage they take. They have honestly, no energy problems if you go for the critical strikes focus, and if you go dagger mastery, you shouldn't need as much energy to kill your target off in the first place. So why does the assassin seem to drop so often? This isn't a flaw of the class, its user error. You will never be able to take hits like a warrior guys, unless your A/Mo - In which case you drop alot of the quick killing ability of the assassin(which is in my opionion why you would pick an assassin in the first place) to just be able to be in the frey like a warrior, severly dropping the amount of damage you do over time. Dispite what anybody will tell you, an assassin is equally as leathal as a warrior, but in a different manner. Unlike the warrior who CHARGES into battle, the assassin must wait, watch how the battle is going, and then begin his assault.
CHOOSE YOUR TARGETS WISLY!
At times this means waiting till you find that enemy who wandered too far from the monk, or a monk who isn't heavily guarded. At other times it means ambushing a warrior who is wrecking havoc on your front lines. Other times it means just waiting till a target is low in health, and swooping in for the kill. Other times it might mean SACRAFICE... yes i said it... DON'T BE AFRAID TO DIE IF AND ONLY IF YOU KNOW YOU CAN TAKE YOUR TARGET OUT OF THE FIGHT... If your fighting a group whose extremly solid, but reliant on another caster to be effective, and they are defending that caster, wait for that split second you know you can get in, and know you can ELIMINATE THAT TARGET... Its ok for an assassin to die, as long as he dosn't do it too too often, and as long as he is able to take his target with him. A team with out a monk is in more trouble then a team who just lost their sin.
Now for another key point... a comparison... Everybody keeps comparing the assassin to a warrior which is a rediculous argument to make. The warrior can take more hits, and over time deals a much large amount of damage because he dosn't have to leave battle, stop to heal, or maintain a large number of enchanments to stay alive. The assassin dosn't tank, dosn't deal large quantities of damage over time, and if he is going to try, he is going to use most of his skill bar trying to maintain his enchanments.
The assassin does his damage by ambush, surprise, and by disabling their target. If you were to compare the assassin to any other class in guildwars, the mesmer is probably the closest thing to it, not the warrior. The assassin is a melee version of a mesmer. An effective mesmer catches sombody off guard. Casts a empathy on a warroir whilst he is in the midst of a chaotic battle, and laughs as the warrior digs his own grave. Or blacks out a monk when the warriors just make it to him. The assassin is the same kind of general concept, you don't want your presence to be obvious. You want to pop in whilst sombody's attention is drawn, drop your combo(not hex, there is the difference) and disappear again. You have to know your enemies weakness, and exploit it to the fullest. Going head to head with a warrior is not advised, because there are too many damaging attacks a warrior has against an assassin. Now if you shadow step in while the warrior is going head to head with another warrior(sounds like casting empathy don't it) and drop your combo on him... that warrior is now in a panic, while your teammate is probably enjoying a good laugh.
Another key thing to keep in mind before you rush right into everyones radar... If you try to tank, your going to make your monk very very angry. The warrior can do that because so much of the damage is just ignored. Never happened. If a sin trys to tank and is suffering large amounts of damage, that probably means your monk is overextending their magic reserves on keeping you alive, whilst your warrior is wondering where that 1 heal he needs is, or that ele that is running from a warrior is getting decimated. You have to stay off peoples radar to be effective. Be patient...
I know this isn't exactly an indepth view of combos and what not, BUT its an overview, its a general reason to play an assassin... If people begin to understand where the assasssins true lethality lies, i think that people will begin to benifit greatly from their presence on the battle field.
Cryptic Quote Out ---
C
