Hate Towards Assassins...

I disagree with assassins sucking in general. I've seen assassins deal alot of damage and note that assassins are capable of unloading a crapload of condtional effects on a target. Assassins can not only kill, but disable an enemy or put someone in a tight spot. It all boils down to the skill level of the player and how crafty he or she is with skills.

For example, we were doing defend droknars forge and a newbie warrior made the mistake of unleashing the wrath of 4 hearts of the titans on us. With four hearts of the titans out we were freaking screwed. They just constantly spammed Mark of Protection and no one had any way of outdamaging their heal chain. So luckily for us this rare assassin who somehow made it to granite throws shadow shroud on one of them, takes a heavy hit but deathcharges to another one and blacks him out, then kites to the 3rd heart and KD's the heart with some attack after his skill recharge.

In this time span of 3 seconds this assassin single handedly interrupted 3 mark of protections from the hearts and saves the whole party. Now I can't ever say an assassin sucks in general after seeing something like that.

Skill is a measure of using the right skills at the right time. Every skill has a purpose. I mean, you not going to Meteor Shower a fast moving enemy mob that is wailing on you at melee range, your not going to use signet of midnight on a caster... the same goes with assassin skills. If an assassin knows the time and place of his or her skills that player can be vital to the party. The scenario with the hearts is an example of that. No one in that party is going to think lightely of a skilled assassin that can shutdown 3 mass healers and save us all. Assassins can be just as impressive as any other class.

Holy shoot, that's impressive, Iwould love to know his assassins name. If I didn't lurve my guild so much i would start a new guild "The Bloodied Blade Clan" pure sin expert guild, with our services up for hire, real RP intensive

What I'm saying is, why would I bring an Assassin for damage over a Warrior.

Let's say our group looks something like this:

4/6 group

2 tank Warriors
2 Boon Prots

There's a damage dealing warrior lfg and a damage dealing assassin lfg.

Why should I take an Assassin over a warrior? Aside from the assumption that most Assassins are of little skill, what does a skilled assassin offer over a skilled warrior?

Let's say that the Assassin DOES deal more damage [that's up for debate another time] (I personaly believe they deal SLIGHTLY more damage than your average DD warrior build, though I have an exceptional DD Warrior build for PvE, though I don't think it'd be fair to compare your average Assassin to such a rare build), what else does an Assassin offer besides just damage???

A Warrior, though not built specificaly for tanking, still has the highest AL and will probably not have any problem backup-tanking, so to speak. A warrior also has a LOT more utility skills to help the party than assassins do.


And at the moment, it's also the opinions of many that a damage dealing assassin isn't worth it. Far more groups will accept a DD warrior as opposed to a DD assassin. Just because warriors are the only ones that can fill the role does not mean that that is what they will always be assigned to. Monks are the only efficient healers in the game (Sorry Restoration Ritualists, that's my opinion and the opinion of many others), does that mean you will never accept a Protection Monk because there are Communing Ritualists who fill the same role?


I'll accept that Assassins are meant for killing (duh), but where is your proof that they kill 60-75 AL targets more efficiently than a warrior? Numbers, please.


Please elaborate.


It is true that they have to regan their adrenaline after use, but the thing is they regan adrenaline quicker than your average assassin skill combo (the ones that are worth while) recharge. Also, even with no adrenaline and no skills, the auto attack from a warrior is a great threat, whereas an Assassin's auto attack is not so feared, especially since most Assassins follow the "get in, get out, don't get hit" mentality.

Honestly I don't get what the big deal is but I have 1200hrs logged so I didn't have a problem to begin with - maybe that's why I don't get it. I chose A/W - A's start with less armor so where a warrior can choose to take or not take 'WY!' I basically spam it, and can do so as normally I'm not leveraging other adrenaline skills. So my base armor is 90 anytime I'm in the thick of it (4 adr is nothing). Got tact so backing off/heal sig is fun, and hey how about 1/2 damage for a bit if need be/while using it with a shadow skill? 'Sin's got that skill. You can certainly take other tacts but that's worked for me.

I've also nabbed other key skills and elites to help. Since your leveraging tactics auspicious parry is an option (was better at 1 sec rchrg but still not bad) to do its thing and doesnt get in the way (and in fact generates) adrenaline for WY. Of course 'Sins have elites to consider, don't get me wrong, Flashing Blades in particular I've enjoyed mixed in here.

Need a break/low on E (before zeal daggers a real possibility) consider bonnettis and other options.

All I know is I get 'huh so you don't die really, wild' and also things die fast and smooth like. Even a friend told me 'oh so Sins don't have to be DoA.' There are other postings in the 'Sin forum too that should be read. I dunno I've had no trouble. Also I've tried other things like A/R crit-barrager (again more supporting skills and elite, and quite fun/effective), the obvious A/Mo options (you have more energy for maintains than warrior), some fun with A/Me (invunerable elite arcane echo'd with illusion of weakness on for a runner of sorts) and there's a nice write-up on A/N pvp 20degen which I might see about tailoring for some pve, for sure leveraging the 'Sin. Not a lot with /E or /Rit yet but all in good time - have some things planned for a/e too tho.

No w/o -dmg red you're not warrior uber but your hardly paper mache. Soloing takes different planning but if you have one Rit working with Union >>> Warr with sup abs, the right armor, and the best in-game shield.

Meanwhile damage-wise your chains can be devestating and repeatable and it's really not that hard to work out, but yeah it takes a little more work then casual effort not to be run-over I suppose, certainly you don't have the warrior defensive luxuries built-in. But you have skill flexibility, the energy regen, and potential synergies that are quite powerful.

BigTru, to your post, my A/W will have more free adrenaline and energy to help the party with Warrior skills than your warrior will, and quite frankly you wouldn't have the energy/points in a secondary to add much else so that wouldn't be a counter. And a lot of those extra bits adding to the party are tactics and no attribute. I don't have a wealth of free slots left but certainly a couple fun ones can be added to the mix.

But even then rarely is the warrior a utility beast.
And calling the warrior auto-attack a great threat is a bit much IMO, it's usually more about the spike. And lets talk spike. You mention the 'Sins recharge. If 2 warriors and the Sin can't spike a target through one 'burn-out' spike there's something wrong. And Sin can spike immediately and can still be pumping the first round or even going for the second by the time the warriors have their adrenaline needed to pump theirs out.

I guess for #s we could all head to the training ground and talk specifics.

To Lordhelmos's post, yeah that's the thing, even in the primary the 'Sin has utility/abilities that cross traditional mesmer/necro/ranger lines and unique to themselves. I do great things with my warrior don't get me wrong, but there are 'Sin applications that aid in handling targets in ways few classes can.

So if I had a choice and had 2 warriors already I'd MUCH rather get a skilled 'Sin, just like a skilled mesmer (and I suppose even still do a degree) and skilled ranger get overlooked at times - then yet another skilled warrior.

Well enough jibber-jabber for now, cheers
CKaz

Ok I was not going to respond but the above statement is an example of ignorance.

1. Any restoration focused Ritualist can tell you after he owns you that the Ritualist can solo about any other class in the game with the sole exception of the Mesmer.

2. Palm Strike + Twisted Fangs = dead guy
I have killed more people in PvP and more monsters in PvE using this simple 1+ 2 combo then any other combo with any other character. It is the sole reason I deleted my Ele and replaced him with an assassin. YES it took a while to understand the assassin basics but NOTHING compares to the Assassin Spike. Many Groups are now requiring an assassin to join as a Warrior Backer in PvE as of late. NOT TO BE A TANK mind you but to spike what the TANK is attacking. (Tanks takes the aggro Assassin Spikes it ... etc...) NO OTHER CLASS comes close. ELITE ASSASSIN players are beginning to understand this and are beginning to do it well.

Assassin Hate is more from a lack of understanding of tactics then anything else. Using your abilities to the best of your abilities is what keeps you and your comrades alive.

on your pve statement this is true... prob is that bad playing assassins cant be totally passed to the player when for example that tanks dont know how to call targets...

its really hard to play an assassin well with a sucky party as well and i will defend assassins on this that they can do some great dmg if the tanks take agro and call targets... however in the big picture i still think assassins ARE weaker than intended...

all this about playing the assassin right and wrong.. but really take a look at the example... and the rioght way to play and assassin is a very tight line that so many variables break... again such as prot healers not protecting wars not agroing or calling targets (which btw is a overall group killer all groups go down much faster when tanks call targets and call the right ones mind you like taking out the 3 healers first instead of trying to kill the war with 3 healers healing it)

I can and will blame some of the assassin hate on OTHER players that cant play their characters right...

the leader should be using the radar and pining rally points and directing movement and the tanks should be taking agro and calling targets but guess what there are just as many players that dont do those things as so called "Assassin thinking they are a tank" noob assassins

i guess what im trying to say is that assassins do have to play a certain way to be effective and a group that doesn't work well with the assassin class make the assassin look sucky which gets them all the blame... my experiences with most groups where horid i blame a lot of my inefectiveness of my assassin on that, really i do i mean its a little difficult which targets to pick that are already agroed when the tank isnt calling those targets or when the rest of the group focuses all attention to the melee mobs leaving the casters soley to the assassin which draws agro to the assassins when they are trying to do their job ultimately makeing them ineffective...

and overall i do blame the assassin class do to its inability to be played effectively in other variety of ways... they can trully only be played one way and i call that a class flaw more than i blame the player...

its the player. not the build.

a player with some common sense wont play a bad build.

I like to monk and am damn good at it. I am not perfect, but know what it is about. BUT, nearly every time that an ass joins the group I am in, I can't help but think "are they gonna think they are a tank?".

If someone can actually play an ass well, then good for them, but from what I have seen, too many peeps try to treat them as tanks, and just get their arse beat down; beat down fast. Kinda hard to heal one charac that dies within 3 hits. Spike damage or no when you have 6 others to look after. Like I said, I guess there is a smart way to play them, but not many do.

I had an ass, and a perfect set of gold daggers for her with a nice +30 HP mod. Heh, she just got deleted two days ago. But not before she was my mule. The class is a joke, and meant to be played for fun IMO.

IMO drakyn you are not correct, Big tru I would love to answer all of your things that you brought up, but I am rather sick after a day at a water park XD About a DD Sin over a DD war is that sins do more +damage with their skills, also the spiking is how they can chain so effectively if unhindered<--I know someone is going to say somethjing about the unhindered part, I have spiked warriors in PvP and they have gotten aggravated and said "sins FTL" I chuckled, Wars are better than sins at DoT but sins hands down spike better IMO and ya know this whole war over sin thing is getting on the old nerves, they work best in synergy not against eachother, I think gloryfoz put it best. I also think the sin should spike other stuff if there are two tanks, if the two tanks focus on one target it= dead.

I found a way to make assasins not suck that bad. I gave mine an axe a shield 12 axe mastery 9 tactics and 14 critical strikes (superior+mask)

I just kinda made up sh*t from there.

I don't know if I just got really, really lucky, but I don't think I have ever seen a bad assassin. When factions first came out, my freind and I bought it and made our characters around the same time. He made an assassin, and I made a monk. We literally did the whole game together and almost every time we decided to play with other players, instead of npc's (basically only on missions), we would have at least one other assassin in the group besides my freind. I have never had any problem healing my friend or the other assassins in the group, and I have seen how much better assassins can be at dealing damage. Pus, about 1/4 of the time, the assassins would be tanks, (sometimes they were the only tanks because there we no warriors wanting to join a group for some reason....) and I still never had trouble healing them. The ONLY assassins I had trouble healing were the ones taht had the starting armor and were alredy past the starting island. I really dont see how most of you can think that assassins aren't very good... I accually try to get assassins in the group when i am the leader. Again, maybe I got really lucky and got pro assassins in my groups and my freind just happened to learn how to be a good assassin really quick, but I highly doubt it...

Also, y are people randomly posting things about rits? isnt this post only about assassins???

yeah, assassins are the worst class in the game /endsarcasm...fun watching them in gvg when solo most of the npc's in the enemy base. As for pve, I couldn't imagine them being any less effective. If your team is smart, you shouldn't be involved in many high pressure situation, so even with a dumb assassin, how is healing any harder than with... a dumb ele? or anybody for that matter. Ofcourse, with my assassin, I still have shing jea armor, so when I got off of the Island, I started dying fast...maybe the bad assassins you are seeing are people who are starting their first character, in which case it would be hard for them to get into the game really because of lack of money/skills/equipment. My assassin has been stuck at lvl 17 since factions came out mainly because I rarely pve anymore, and I'd rather get my other characters through factions first.

My issue with Sins is that they usually shadowstep into the middle of an enemy group.... and prompty die.

I can't even run over to heal them as fast as they can charge to their death (don't they have a skill named that? :P).

I don't hate assassins, I just don't like playing with them the way that they normally die -- I mean play. I have played with a few sins that didn't suck in random groups, and they were actually not bad; they just can't charge in and do their thing, and are more tricky to play.

Critical Eye, Way of Perfection, and Flashing Daggers are a good combo imo... I've found it very effeciant for soloing/farming with an asn.. I don't ever get groups with the asn so I don't even try another build..

From Master Togo's First Book for Healing Monks: Thou shalt not waste time nor energy healing assassins.

Short and simple, for ANY class, Its not the Build/Character/Class, its the player. you can have a VERY good player with a noob skill bar, or a noob with a pro skill bar, and I think the good player would win in a 1v1...

why are people still arguing about this?

we have a melee class with paper armor.
we have a lot of damage
we have a lot of people who can't play the class

What do you guys expect? favorable attitudes on assassins?

Nevermind also that assassins are worthless in high level pve. Completely utterly worthless.

My TF axe war can kill any soft target just as fast as any assassin. And I dont have to use some ridiculous elite to make my skills recharge instantly and depend on it as well. Not only that with shouts/disrupting chop/blow I can act as an important supplement to the group (stopping 3 different dragon's stomps, anyone?)

Oh yeah - Watch Yourself! is a good idea, but with one flaw - the assassin can't tank initial spikes because it has no adrenaline in the beginning.

Assassins have high condition and damage output, I've been at the hands of it in PvP (though they were jokse when hit with Blackout), but once they catch aggro, it's game over man.

A small correction: sinican, a warrior can have 100AL, it's called Sentinel armor and is reliant on a strength of 13 or higher. I know, my warrioress has it and it is a universal 100AL (rather than 80 +20 vs physical). But a reminder: the best armor in the world cannot save your ass if you don't know how to play your character (build/skills/etc.)!

Pro-Monk, I disagree with you because it is a blanket statement that does a grave injustice to 1) good assassins and 2) good healers! If you have a team with both of those assets, you're set for victory (assuming the remainder of the party aren't complete morons).

Ghozer, QFT. That's what I've been saying for months (everytime one of these "<insert profession here> sucks" threads crops up).

What confuses me the most are these posts talking about how effective assassins are.

After they state this, they go on to describe the myriad ways of wasting skill slots just to make for the assassin's crappy armor.
Watch yourself? Auspicious parry? Disciplined stance? Wow - there goes anywhere from 1 2 or 3 skill slots - slots that could have been used for real utility and damage.

As for the assassin's DPS, that's entirely mitigated by the fact that they can't tank worth crap. Not only is their DPS mitigated by all the skills they replace in order to keep themselves alive, they have to run in and out of battle if things get hairy.

Warriors are in the thick of it 24/7, always fighting (unless dead). Meanwhile the assassin has to run in and out of battle, wasting time and decreasing their overall DPS. G F G.

And nevermind any kind of critical hit is out of the question once you hit a boss. Talk about being useless.

I know there's a lot of people defending assassins out there. But I think anet has made a mistake with this class, and it needs some real buffing (I can't really propose any..but there are problems) in order to be made really useful for pve.

And please - sure assassins are great in pvp, but pvp is NOTHING like pve, so dont even bring that up.

Assasins are good... I remember going into PvP with my warrior.. one assasin.. I walked out to fight... and an assasin jumped down on my and instantly killed me lol.

Superior runes on you maybe?

YunSooJin: I do not PvP, don't really plan to ever, so I speak only of what I've noticed or experienced in PvE.

Assassins were never meant to be the front line tanks. If they are all you've got for a tank, then it behooves them to either do their damnedest and deal damage/stay alive OR you to develop a better party!

while we are on the assasin topic, i just like to say, can you please stay away from shiroken elementalist. thanx

That's exactly the problem.
What I was outlining was the problem that while theoretically assassins have high DPS, in game applications their DPS is limited by their frantic attack and retreating as well as their limited skill selection due to attempting to pick skills to prevent damage to themselves.

If you want to compare them to warriors in damage, they probably do less in the end.

Why would anyone bring an assassin then? Either bring another warrior or another class.

EDIT:
People make the mistake of thinking tanks are always tanks. Warriors are tanks simply by virtue of their armor. The monster's warriors and assassins are usually of little consequence. Stare down the business end of a evis/exec/pene blow/pene chop and then ask who has high DPS.

Personally, I built and 'retired' my 'sin twice (once at lvl 17 and the other a little lower lvl). My problem wasn't limited skills, it was a combination of too few skill slots and lack of versatility of usage because of the 1-2-3 order of 'sin attacks! If you have a 1-2-3, then you can have only two of those sequences. Imo, that really cuts the usefulness of a 'sin since there are several nice 2nd attacks or even dual attacks but if you don't have preceeding ones, you can't use them at all. Seems too limiting to me.

UPDATE: There is now an assassin Survivor!

Yunsoon pick a sin over a second warrior because, sins can kill casters before they can kill him, a tank can't say the same, Sins and Tanks can really work together, while the tank tanks away, the sin can annihilate any caster that has his spells set on the warrior.

match 3, evil vs mh is a great example of what sins can do.

oh and yun soo I forgot to answer one of your other statements, I know people say Sins rokk but then go into the armor issues, but those aren't the best sins, the best sins are the ones who give you a combo then tell you how they get the hell outta there and then right back in.

Tell that to Sister Tai...

On the bright side i've found taking Distracting Blow a great way to ensure i live by interrupting Silver Armour.

In GvG and PvP Assassin are lethal with AoD. Simply teleporting over to an enemy and rapidly assisting in a spike from out of the blue kills monks. So does using it to travel to the other monk and quickly knocking him down. I've found my AoD Blackout Assassin to be quite amusing in those situations. Specially as you can remove AoD even with a blacked out skillbar.

In PvE... the higher level enemies, the worse an assassin gets. I honestly can't see a use for 1 in FoW/UW. What are you gonna do an Abyssal before it turns round and knocks your head clean off? You just can't stand next to the Warrior, either the agro shifts to you or you get caught in all the attacks aimed at him. Sure you could bring along AoD and Vipers Defence... but your losing out on anything to cause damage now the more skill you bring for defence. Things like Barrage are just gonna tear you apart.

Kijik - any competent warrior will take down any caster as fast as an assassin will.

I dont see how anyone can say different. Have you ever been spiked as a caster by a warrior in PvP? The normal evis-exec-penetrating-penetrating combo does an incredible amount of damage. Add that with frenzy/tiger's fury and you've got one csater dead within a couple seconds.

I would know - I do it all the time.

I wasn't a huge fan of the assassins either. That is, until I unlocked all the skills I needed for my assassin build and played a few rounds in AB.

They are a blast. xD

Assassins are....assassins. They're supposed to do their job quickly, effectively. If not, they're supposed to get the hell out of there < which is what most sins don't do, which is why people hate them.

They are glass cannons, they can be incredibly powerful (hell, 1 chain attack of 4-5 skills can kill a caster), but extremely weak. Basically a pvp class. The only use I see for them in PvE is possibly critical bow, but that has its limits as well.

Guess that's what I'm trying to say but unable to say in so few words.

Yun Soo.. I may not have spiked anyone with my warr but have you spiked anyone with a sin? ALso after your tank spikes one of my casters, my sin comes and spikes lez see you.. Like I have said before, we need to stop comparing them and see how we can have them exist in harmony, for a better happier world

Before Factions came along, there were hate threads against Wammo and how some of us think Mending makes them invincible to Leeroy their way into any group of hostiles while the other half of the community calling them noob.

And now we have hate threads against Assassins.

Cant wait for Chapter 3 to see whats the next class to pick up the baton. ^^

yah now people actually "appreciate" wammos and think "hey its better than a sin" I an't wait for the next class either so that the heat gets taken off sins.

i am a pro sin player.
no really, i am. i understand this profession very well, so here is my opinion.

as for the noob sins, everyone's got to understand this: assassins have a huge learning curve. their job in battle requires more focus than any other profession, save the monk.

your job is to stay behind the battle lines, and wait for that perfect opportunity. watch your enemies movements, watch your team's movements, and master COMMON SENSE.

to be successful, sins have to utilize "hit and run". KNOW that you are weaker than your foe. they know you are weak, so don't lie to yourself. get in quick, unleash a caster kill, then assess the situation. do you have enough hp? are people targeting you? these are questions you must ask yourself.

this is but a little insight into the sin profession. if you are really dedicated to this, there are tons of deep techniques for the assassin.

Very true jazzy oh and fight club FTW, we should make a sin fight club


oh and uh "Tyler Durden says: Use Soap"