I'm not a *new* player (I created a character on day 1 of release), but my play time is probably no more than 5 months in total. 4 of which have been recently. That said, I'm a competent player, but I'm always looking to get better. So, that's why I'm here. Rather than make a new thread about Vistani Assassins I figured I'd tag on here.

I play a pure Drow (wish it were something else) Rogue Assassin in LD (no past lives of any kind), +7 Supreme Tome, enough Fate points for 4/3/1/1. Enhancements are currently 41 Assassin, 5 Acrobat, and 34 Vistani Knife-Fighter.

I play on Orien and absolutely monster truck nearly every group I am in, raids too. Granted, I realize that most players in PuGs are bad, but I digress.

That said, I love how the class performs in most group settings, but I despise being unable to solo EE/R1+ effectively (for some quests). I also hate being a glass cannon. So, my question is given the proposed changes to the EDs, Shadowdancer (which will help solve my fragility once I make that swap after U38) becomes A LOT more attractive. What kind of build would you 'experts' propose? Keep in mind that from what I have read here I value the ability to Assassinate a lot more than generally accepted by some of you.

Also, it appears from what little snooping I've done, it seems that there is no longer a reason to stay pure? I suppose the capstone justification died with item inflation?

My gear is pretty good:
3p Silent Avenger
5p Adherent (not optimized, but my CC is not high enough to fill the gaps)
Van Richtens specs
Molten Silver Gaunts
Ring of Prowess
Executioners Helm
Pain and Suffering daggers

gibbon wrote on Mar 15^th, 2018 at 3:21pm:

looking it over, seems like there is something there. 15% speed increase from what it was on live. an additional 15% in ap, 40~ MP from ap, and +15 damage from its killer instinct stacks. add that on top of a weapon profile.

Assassinate just isn't worth it. A working assassinate DC is a big investment that costs you a lot of DPS. All so that you can kill 1 mob in 1 second  every 15 seconds. Whereas if you optimize for DPS you can drop a mob reaper every ~3 seconds or whatever without sacrificing all those gear slots and AP.

Lets be generous and suppose that with a working assassinate DC you can still DPS down a reaper mob in ~4 seconds, then 1 sec assassinate + 14 secs DPS = 4.5 dead reaper mobs per 15 seconds while the max DPS version drops 5 reaper mobs per 15 seconds.

That's the best-case scenario, but let's not forget that there is always stuff you just need to DPS because it's immune to assasinate.

Yes, you can. 2 is common, 3 is a lot rarer (for me anyway).

Gearing for assassinate: So far, I haven't had to make any significant sacrifices, but moving forward I think I am going to have to cut something. However, I'm only aiming for a ~95 Assassinate DC. I've been running with ~90 and I've had a lot of success with it even in Reaper, but I spend my time in R1-6. I'm not geared for much else. Not that the server population supports much more anyway.

There is some definite tension between choosing Scion of the Ethereal and Astral. Arguments can be made for both. I lean towards Astral because it also supports Dire Charge. Also, my dodge is currently trash.

I understand what you're saying in terms of dps, but generally when I assassinate it's just before we engage a group and I instantly dumpster the 1-3 casters/mobs that resist CC or were out of range. Also, depending on the size of the group I will have time to re-hide and instantly finish whatever is left over.

Being able to instantly truck mobs that literally one shot people is underrated in my opinion.

harharharhar wrote on Mar 16^th, 2018 at 2:30pm:


Fist of the Wind?

Quote:

that is a decent time considering youre missing a bunch of dps past lives, racial ap, reaper cores, and stat boosting lives. 14k dps isn't too shabby. you could get a better time if you switched to ethereal, hit sneak of shadows, and buffed up some more.

Problem is that by dropping assassinate you turn your rogue into a non aoe version of every other melee build. Assassinate is an insanely useful tool to pop right when a fight starts and then focus on dpsing mobs.

And unlike dps it gets better and better the higher the difficulty.

I've seen a good assassin beat dc casters for kills.
I agree that reapers are problematic but if someone else gets their attention you're fine, as far as Annointed is saying.

The dps is underrated, but I get it.

So I did some number crunching, and if the new raid daggers didn't have the 2[w], they would be losing to Assassin's Kiss. Gonna LR into a vistani today.

am using celestias personally. Maybe the light maces are better but celestia gets some of the crit bonuses from assassin so they are decent.

5 Foot Step wrote on Jun 18^th, 2018 at 12:25pm:


yeah, I am running this on my monk main, for scourge and rogue lives, pretty fun so far.  I have a lot of nice wraps so taking the monk PL and using them is my plan.  I still have 2 raiders boxes on this toon, still trying to decide if they should be used for celestias...