Hate Towards Assassins...

Its not that assassins are a bad profession. Its mostly that the people using them that are bad. Assassin is hit and run class. Most idiot assassins jump in thinking they are a tank. This leads to their inevitable quick death. Try being a monk healing one of these assassins it really is annoying.

"Why bring an assassin when you can bring a warrior?"

Never thought it was a contest?

The point is why do so many hate the assassin and the answer is that most assassin players where warriors and can not get out of the warrior mind set! How long did it take for warriors to truly shine in the game? Provided the assassin is in the right "TEAM" and they work as part of the team rather than for themselves, then they deserve the place just as any warrior would.

It is not a debate on which is better!

I have come across so many warriors that have obviously been bought through ebay and are being run by a 12 year old for the first time. They have high ranking and would be jumped on by any group but when it comes to playing they contribute nothing as they do not know how to play!

As a warrior would you not like to have someone running around the softer targets, usualy the ones degening you, taking the heat off you so you can take the main mob down easier? Because that is how an assassin should be playing!

Respect has to be earned, if you do get in a group and they see how well you play they will add you to their friends list.

I try lots of builds out so my assassin is flexible depending on the group. I tend to stick mainly A/R as that gives me a lot of versatility. I make sure I fit with the team and I don't want to rely on a monk having to heal me too often.

"If played correctly" is the understatement of the assassin.


The problem is that the wasnt enough time and places to level up correctly----in Tyria you had ascalon, northern shiverpeaks, Kryta and the jungle before you were a high level. In cantha you have 1 area on the island that is a challenge. Its NOT enough to get to know your character, thus many unskilled people are using a new character class as if it were a tank. If the leveling process had been longer, people would have had more time to use and understand the assassin. This is also a problem with the ritualist; however, casters are easier to play by and large since they dont take the brunt of damage at the beginning (and the rit has better healing than the 'sin).

My husband has a 'sin and took hours of 'farming' the yeti to get a better handle on the skills and such; but it still wasnt enough....as he has played the character the last 3 months he has gotten better and doesnt die nearly as often (even without the monk healing him).......


so I blame the hate on the lack of slow progression .....

Why I hate assassins is for the simple reason that they remind me of something out of Mortal Combat. Basic mashing buttons to form combos to kill a single opponent, and by the way people are playing these character that seems to be the mind set they are in (I mean really Scorpion Wire that should be trade mark infringement, "Get over here!").

I believe sabretalon is correct in assuming that most assassins are simply warriors looking for another melee class to round out their porfolios.
However, I believe the assassin is more tightly linked to a caster than a melee; just insted of casting spells he casts himself at the target. The major thing missed by these wammo assassins is the fact that the spell (known as assassins) has a recharge time, for which it is best to be out of combat to wait out.

Shadow Arts are by far the best assassin skills in the game if you have a 0 in this attribute your mm fodder. This being said I think assassins often make an amazing secondary class for that attribute alone. My R/A who works in a build I like to call the jump trapper (someone else may have come up with the same build idk), pretty much uses the same principal as the assassin (get in get out), but uses traps insted of combos (good for pve).

I think most people should give the assassin a chance, i mean i can never find a group and i hardly ever die i use all the tactics you guys mentioned i play it right but no one ever gives me a chance to prove myself, so i ussually just do everyting with henchmen now, it just isnt right.

I have almost completed the Factions with my assassin and used henchmans very rarely. Mostly in small quests but every mission and primary quests have been 100% human.

The problem is, nearly every party leader assume that all assassins are some kind of wannabe warriors. Well, how you can blame them? Lots of bad experiences about bad playing assassins is more than good reason for this attitude.

You can boost your value in available human players pool by telling what skills you have and how you are going to use them. If there is at least one fair party leader in the same district, he will pick you if they need second or third melee player. Good assassin is even better than bad warrior. Let them know that you know what you are doing and doors for parties will open.

But they have been given a chance, they didn't get their reputation
by being good.
When they were introduced, people weren't standing around saying
"assassins are probably gonna suck... lets not group with them."

Anyway... It looks like they're going to have to prove that they can be
an asset to a team if they want invites. Right now it looks like if there's
a choice between wo/mo and a/x, since both are pretty bad, the
warriors +40 armor is the deciding factor.

Naw, like I said earlier, you could take all the time in the world to learn your skills, it only takes a couple bad experiences/apples to sour the batch. When Prophecies was released a ranger couldn't get into a group even for Hell's Precipice without some serious begging, and this back when ascension gave you level 20 automagically and running from beacons to droknars wasn't a common occurance.

Assassins = PvP.

I made a PvE assassin, got to lvl 20, senjis corner, deleted. Crit strikes is pointless. much more profitable as a ranger/assassin.

People don't like bringing assassins in their groups because too many people don't know what they are for.

Assassins are not tanks. They are...guess what, ASSASSINS. Jump in, kill something, run away. That's all assassins are meant to do.

i kinda like assasins if you have a good build they are really good the only thing they are missing is the ability to heal themselves. theyre not tanks but if you use them correctly they can be.

It makes me sad that the 2 classes introduced in Factions are shunned.... especially the assassin.

I have yet to find a class that I don't enjoy playing and also play pretty well .
Yes it takes a while to find how you should play every class but people are automatically biased against ALL assassins (IMO).

Everyone knows about the lone stupid Wammo who thinks he's invincible but that doesn't harm the W's class rep at all. But Assassins have a stigma attached because after factions release people were getting used to playing them and of course they played them incorrectly and died a lot.... an awful lot.

My shadow step, critical with bleeding is extremely useful especially against those pesky afflicted monks but unfortunately I have to say that I had to complete factions with my assassin using mostly henchies.

Quests were all henches, Missions I found hard to get in a PUG or had to start a PUG myself to get me included!
Even in the latter parts of factions where people should believe - "well if he got this far he must know what he's doing" - it was still impossible to group.

I bet the same will happen with the release of nightfall - we'll get one class which will appear weak and get shunned...

Sadly there's no incentive to play assasins.... I don't know if buffing them would help but maybe Anet should think about it.

ok I have to post my build here.. I used to think that assassins were one hit and quit in pve and actually took my assassin through the whole factions campaign with henchmen as a crit bow ranger.. since then I've messed with builds and came up with a pve build that finally worked right.. I have'nt tried this with a real group but with henchmen you will be the main damage dealer and actually feel like a booty buster

I'm mainly posting this for guys who are stuck in pve =] you gotta try this build before bashing it

a/r
8 Dagger
12 Deadly
14 Crit (Major)'

req. 8 15% enchanted or >50 daggers

you can probably go 10 in dagger and 13 in crit if you don't have req. 8 daggers- have'nt tried it but don't see much difference

mod anything really- Zealous does'nt matter you won't have energy issues.. Vamp is'nt necessary- sundering or an elem mod would work fine too

20% enchants

armor with +15 while attacking works good

Skills:

Whirling Defenses
Sharpen Daggers
Assassin's Promise
Black Lotus Strike
Twisting Fangs
Rez Signet
Golden Lotus Strike
Fox Fangs

play it just like a warrior- sharpen daggers before going in aggro.. pick any target and promise, black lotus, twist.. level 20 mobs will die right away- follow up with golden lotus to fox fangs for bigger mobs.. whirling anytime- it's 8 seconds at 0 expertise and it's always recharged as you cycle through the mobs.. they drop like flies with this build in pve.. rangers are the only show stopper with thier evasion- just save them for last and you won't have a problem

Hope it helps anyone who's given up

I've completed the game with my assassin, had no problem finding groups either. I'm at the point where I don't even need to change my build from PvE to PvP... it works well enough in both.

I get a kick out of the monk that claims to have tanked and killed four assassins at once. Unless you are specifically built to stop me, once I begin you have eight to ten seconds to live. Period.

Assassins, played as assassins, are incredible characters, both PvP and PvE. The biggest problem that has plagued the community is the old mesmer effect... non-thinking players tried thinking people's characters and did poorly before they went back to their wammos. Unfortunately, it took a long time for that albatross to leave the mesmers neck, and it will likely be the same for the assassin.

Shortly after my copy of Factions arrived I had a go at making an Assassin. It was very hard to get accepted into groups, even on the starter island (and no, I didn't want to lead a party/form my own every time - besides the point I shouldn't have to)

Spent quite some time on that island, but it took so long getting into parties (unless it were guildies come to help out) eventually I just gave up on it. If it was that bad getting into a group at the start, how much worse would it be later on?

Fast forward some time and made a necro to replace the assassin slot - necro finishes island, Factions and most of Tyria without much in the way of problems getting into groups. Compared to the assassin which languished on Shing Jea, the necro positively broke the speed of light progressing.

Now I've made another assassin, admittedly primary use is just for storage and got Survivor so far on it.

Mostly with henchies, one time went with a PUG (told them from the start was going for Survivor.. it helped there was a level 20 in the group!), the other times with guildmates and a fellow guildy assassin survivor... but it goes to show you don't have to die over and over if you play it right and don't run in first. Though I played a bit more cautiously and took some extra healing, I didn't shirk from going in and doing the damage, and still managed to get somewhere without dying.

Now the acid test: ran out of quests to do with henchies, and Viznuh looms large as I'm forced to do that to get any further - not very hopeful of getting into a group, the Survivor title probably count against it too (people think, understandably, you're gonna quit). Survivor? Well, at least the char hasn't died.. but also people will think going to quit. I don't blame them, as I tend to think that too when I see a survivor hehe Can't win either way I suspect.

I think some kind of (slight) armour boost would help, some improved self healing or better teleport/shadow step skills provided early in the game would go a long way towards changing the current dying-machine image of assassins.

As a further thought, Nightfall will be out in a few months or so probably - with two more characters, assassins will probably be even more in trouble if things don't get fixed before then. People will have even less reason to take an assassin when they have a Ritualist or a Paragon to choose from (holding off thoughts on the Dervish, it may just end up another Assassin...)

I like all these people who delete there assassin before even completing the game... They never gave them a chance in Cantha. They never even let them see Tyria. Assassins own Tyria so easily. Mursaat aren't like Shiro'kens. They don't come in groups of 10 giving rise to purely cookie-cutter builds to get through them. Mursaat Eles come in 1s, 2s or 3s. If they come alone assassins can anihilate them faster than any other profession.

Hate towars assassins is peoples tend to over tank or aggro too much. Not saying assassins isn't built for melee combat but comparing their armor to what warrior has, it's pretty low on protection. They can do mass amount of damage but the thing is for sins, you have to know when to back off. It's like hit and run.. (what i used mainly for my sin). You hit the target few times and switch off to the next. Don't just stand in the middle of the pack getting hammer on. No to mention, monks refuse to heal sins who got the tank mentality in them. Also, most of the groups won't take sins unless they promise not to be a tank or even none at all.

I think peoples still rely on wammo more than sins. People think that assassins aren't great nor damaging but once they use one. They might see how cool assassins are.

Evilsod, I suspect it's not a matter of the people who make assassins not giving them a chance.. it's everyone else not giving them a chance. That or their experience of assasins in the group weren't very good. End result, people don't pick assassins anymore. Those who made one give up on it.

Thats why i reserve my assassin for the hilarity of Alliance/Guild trips. Most fun i've had in a while jumping around the Fort owning Mursaat Eles (and occasionally getting stuck outside and blown up by my own monk on the catty ).

They don't complain then i take my ranger to FoW as an Enraged Beastmaster either ^^ (Word of warning, never use Symbiotic Bond if you intend to clear the forest alone later on... its bugged)

My Assasin has no problems killing. He consistently kills faster than any of my other chars. He is more dependant on a monk and more at risk than any of my other characters because of his proximity to the battle. A simple boon prot build never has problems keeping him up and out of danger. Of course if the

1. the tank didn't move
2. the ele didn't cast firestorm
3. the mesmer didn't cast chaos storm
4. the necro didn't cast mark of pain
5. the monk didn't cast balthazars

then we wouldn't be discussing any of this. The sad thing is that most failures in the PVE environment are the failures of the group as a whole, not one individual (unless he goes by the name of Leroy). If an experienced group fails, it's because several players were not on the same page.

Be fair and practical in your analysis and have fun with other people regardless of the class and you'll all do fine. If they need help, teach them in a non-confrontational manner and you'd be amazed at the results. Your playing experience is what you make it.

The problem with Assassins is that their biggest weakness is also the bread and butter of Factions PVE (and also one of its greatest failings imo): throwing lots of enemies at you at once.

I will agree taht assasins self heal does sck and that u can never get a group with them, the reason for this is becuz most assasins do sck. i myself can take any warrioir with sentinels armor[100al] and full hp easily with my asasin before im near death. tehn again i made my own build and dont copy like others. i use a 4/5 skills combo to kill anything. even works spikig monks. depends if they catch u used deaths cahrge at them lol. its not that the character class scks. its just how peoiple use them. assasins are meant to be fragile as they are sealth with mass dmg while not being able to endure alot of dmg... My assasin in 3 sec can easiliy deal Tripple if not 4x the dmg as a warrioir. besdies a warrioir ahs to wait to recharge his attacks. and the onlybane for my build is a hamemr warrioir with precahrged skills. if your skills are not charged u are mine. i give u 4 seconds of time.

eoither way i deleted my pve assasin cuz cant ever get a group thus i only usee them in pvp and get called a newb sin tho i dont even sin. and they get owned. you just ahve to find the right player to bean assasin. i watch gvg's etc and every assasin i c got some lame build.