Feedback talk:User/IKenshinHimuraI/Assassin Skill Balance Ideas

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SA buff? You have to be kidding me.[edit]

I knew this would be a huge problem when they open up suggestion pages. Inexperienced, uneducated players would start posting rediculous changes, and then when it doesnt get put in they Q.Q over it and not understand why. A couple of your attempts to back up your rediculous buff to SA are

"Shattering Assault should deal +50 damage, if the non-elite Blades of Steel can deal +60 damage,
"The change I am suggesting keeps the damage even smaller than the current Blades of Steel damage- I don't see you complaining about Blades of Steel.

For some reason, you haven't read the skill description of BoS. Here's a link for you if you don't know where the page is. You need to learn something called conditions. No, i'm not talking about blind or dazed, I mean skill conditions.

The current description of Blades of Steel is

Blades of Steel: Dual Attack. Must follow an off-hand attack. If it hits, this attack strikes for +5...14...16 damage (maximum bonus 60) for each recharging dagger attack.

If the skill was changed to support your evidence that SA needs to be as good as BoS, in your head you think it says

Blades of Steel: Dual Attack. Must follow an off-hand attack. If it hits, this attack strikes for +60 damage, and removes 1 enchantment. This attack cannot be blocked.

I find your claims that you have played in top level GvG to be a total joke. If you think that assassins need those buffs, you clearly do not understand the game. Please do us a favor and take your suggestion pages down. It's a waste of your time. Here's one more thing for you before I go.

You fail to understand the basics of game balance. Please read this article.

--adrin 21:13, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

First of all, I was only comparing the damage between the two. Ones elite, ones non-elite. Don't misrepresent my statements.

Secondly, this is not a straight buff, this sacrafices recharge and making the unblockable conditional for lower energy cost and + damage.

Recharge, recharge, recharge, recharge, recharge, recharge, recharge, recharge, recharge, recharge, recharge. It should be a skill that you can only use in a combo as part of your spike. If 8 seconds is too little, make it 12. +50 damage is fitting, unblockable if not under an enchantment and removes an enchantment on each hit. 5 Energy cost so that it can actually be used in a combo with other skills. If it was a 4 second recharge, of course that would be stupidly broken. But if it is something you can not use often, it isn't nearly as overpowered. IKenshinHimuraI 21:22, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

You want to take a skill that is already overpowered and break it farther. You use incorrect statements to back up your reasons, and show no signs of knowing what you're talking about. I honestly am beginning to think this page was actually meant to hurt the game. Since almost all your suggestions break the game even more. --adrin

21:43, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

The reason this skill is overpowered is due to the unconditional "unblockable", low recharge/spamability, and synergy with Golden Fox Strike and Fox Fangs. Increasing the recharge to make it something you would only use in a longer combo, and removing the synergy would balance it completely. IKenshinHimuraI 22:22, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Ill explain Shattering Assault

Blades of Steel does more damage because that is all it can do, not to mention it can easily fall prey to it getting blocked, or having its damage reduced with enchantments
Shattering Assault ignores getting blocked so the chance for it to do massive damage is extremely high, not to mention it removes enchantments, so if the enemy was using protective spirit or shield of absorption to reduce its damage, Shattering Assault would just remove them and be capable of doing massive damage, or allow the 2nd part of your spike to do massive damage Talamare 23:07, 20 September 2009 (UTC)

Skill Bar Discuss...[edit]

Dash

Not that this bar is better without your change I'm just pointing out how warriors, elementalists, and prots would be owned by having shattering assault anywhere near what it currently is.

Additionally most of your suggested changes are rather ridiculous...

Blade of Steel - Nerfed the damage cap from 60 to 50 in order to bring this skill in line with other dual attacks' damage. So let's makes BoS like any other dual attack even though it's only effective at the end of no deep wound chains?

Death Blossom - Deals damage comparable to Blades of Steel if target is enchanted with the added bonus of AoE in that situation. This is in balance with Blades of Steel and someone could easily take either one. This provides for more diversity in Assassin builds. This one doesn't make sense to me, nerf adjacent AoE in PvP? Might help Halls... maybe... just a little in the middle, but nerfing adjacent AoE that much in PvP is ridiculous. It's punishment for bad positioning or a reward for timed use. Your attempt to diversify assassin builds just made chains without deep wound worse, makes Ninetails Strike the best Dual Attack choice, and makes DB highly undesirable in any situation.

I hold a personal, bias, grudge for such a terrible suggestion to my favorite skill ever Unsuspecting Strike. L2P, unsuspecting strike is like spreading Poison as a Ranger. Now you make it's effect highly insignificant for the sake of highly situational 100 damage strikes that are balanced by positioning? At 5 energy it just becomes a raw damage skill to start off a mindless chain. You sir, need to suggest changes that add to the game, not for the sake of making changes.~>Sins WDB 00:26, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

This bar has many other balancing issues in of itself. I changed the recharge on the suggestion page of Shattering Assault to 12 now, to put more emphasis that it is to be used in a longer recharge combo. I'd like to see Fox Fangs not be unblockable if in a stance, or end your stance.

As for Blades of Steel, its been one of the most powerful Assassin skills since it came out, dealing +120 damage for 5e with an 8 second recharge. I'd like to see Assassin combos be less of a spike at the end like that and have more constant damage throughout.

Death Blossom was just an idea thrown around to help with the R/A issue, but its current state is solid. I can probably remove the suggestion.

As for Unsuspecting Strike, the reason its so powerful is with its use in this following bar:

[[]]

This bar will deal ~190 damage in the first second, and its overall damage is around 500 DPS over 5 Seconds, has Deep Wound, Can loop for a 6th second for about 100 damage more. This is basically the only way to kill anything with a self heal without giving them a chance to use it unless they are in a shield set. The change for Unsuspecting would make this bar unable to do this as easily. I'll add more when I get off work. IKenshinHimuraI 02:51, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

The problem here is not any one skill on it's own. It's the combination of everything there. Also you must sacrifice health in order to use that bar, because the sins energy pool isn't large enough on its own to pull it off. So in addition to having 30 less health because of daggers being a crappy weapon you also have 25 less due to insignias. If you want to fix the assassin class it won't happen by toying with numbers alone. It needs an overhaul, much like the paragon needs, and these suggestions aren't going to make it better. The biggest problem is that the sin has midliner base states, but it's using a frontline weapon and it lacks survivability, and that's partly why the ranger is better at being a sin than a sin is.~>Sins WDB

03:25, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

This is basically the only way to kill anything with a self heal without giving them a chance to use it

Seriously, every build ever made disagrees with you. You know, before Factions was released, people killed stuff with self heals just fine. Your ideas are worse than bad - they're thoughtless. Everyone's trying to tell you you're wrong. Listen to them. ~Shard

03:26, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Seriously, you are that incapable of reading? "This is the only ASSASSIN BAR", which means bringing up "before Factions was released", and bars on other classes are absolutely irrelevant to what I'm talking about. You don't even realize that the game has changed since, 4 professions later. You're posts are worse than bad - they're thoughtless. IKenshinHimuraI 11:12, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Here's the specs of this bar. Show me a bar without Unsuspecting Strike get numbers like these that has a teleport, knockdowns, can not be kited, is on Assassin Primary, and is viable in PvP. Also notice that the 540 does not take into account Deep Wound damage (which is generally 100) IKenshinHimuraI 11:32, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

[1] You can add dark prison if you want for the "teleport & can not be kited" Talamare 23:56, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

I admit that bar is a close second in DPS, but there are a number of problems with it, especially if you do add in Dark Prison. 1, with Dark Prison you do not have the energy to pull your combo. Therefore it fails to be viable. Even if you ran it without Dark Prison, the bar I've cited recently is much harder to interrupt as Wastrel provides an initial knockdown and still have more damage. Not only that but the bar is extremely conditional; requires Mark of Instability to stick (a Hex, and a tell that you're spiking that target), it requires your enchantment to stay up, and it has the same conditions of my bar (no block, blind etc.). It's just not good. IKenshinHimuraI 05:42, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

[2] joke builds that work Talamare 07:08, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

lol [joke builds are funny] IKenshinHimuraI 07:27, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

Reasoning[edit]

That reminds me of a point I'd like to make as well in terms of how the game has changed. After Factions was released, this was [EvIL]'s Assassin bar:

Shock

This bar alone was able to kill almost any Elementalist or Ranger given that they made a mistake. The mistake was letting their self heal, which was either Healing Breeze or Troll Unguent be interrupted, not interrupting the combo or missing the chance to cast Blind. The player would die for that one little mistake. This bar, if ran now would not kill anything. Times have changed. Nightfall brought in the power creep which makes that bar completely obsolete.

As the Nightfall era began, damage increased exponentially, as did self healing and self prot. The Shadow Prison+BoA bar ripped through the unprepared. What did it take to live against this monster of a bar? The same thing it did before. The mistake was letting the self heal or self prot be interrupted or missing an interrupt/chance to blind. Both were overpowered, only one was nerfed. More and more self heals and self prots were buffed to now you have retardedly powerful skills, when compared to pre-Factions, like Aura of Sanctity, Ether Prism, Weapon of Warding, Mend Touch, Natural Stride, and many many more. That isn't even the half of it.

Snares, which were once something that took effort to upkeep are now infinitely more powerful than before. The perfect example of which is Freezing Gust. Low energy cost, low recharge, short cast, can be reapplied indefinitely, and can be used for spiking as well. All of which is one, non-elite, skill. Hell, look at snares in the factions era for contrast: Crippling Shot (which is an elite and is a condition), Deep Freeze (25 Energy, long cast), Ice Spikes (15 energy, shorter snare duration than recharge, long cast) and a few others. None of these come close to the post-nightfall skills, and have recharges long enough to be countered with hex removal. Even with Shadow Steps, one mistake on Assassin and you will die. Typically to Freezing Gust spam.

With these new skills, defense reigns supreme. The balance between the importance of micro and macro game play has shifted dramatically, in favor of macro. Why split when you can counter-split? Why play offensive and take risks when you can play defensive and win? There's no reason to, when the current meta encourages defensive play. Why does this all matter? That is a matter of opinion, but for me: Defense is boring, Offense is fun. Micro emphasis allows players to carry teams, Macro emphasis provides for teams carrying the player. I admit bias though, as I prefer Micro emphasis as I'm good at it. I am here suggesting changes that would make the game more fun for me to play; that shouldn't need to be stated and its the definition of bias.

But more to the point, one of two things must happen in order to change the nature of this game to promote offensive game play over defense.

Buff Split. The obvious way to do this is by buffing Assassins. Bring them to the level that they can threaten Elementalists with unremovable prots such as Weapon of Warding and Ether Prism and be a risk for Rangers with Mend Touch and Natural Stride. This is the route that is easiest to implement, have less of an effect on the overall game, bring another profession into the metagame which is currently underpowered, create more diverse builds, and the option of offensive splits. This effects only one class.
Nerf nearly every defensive skill in the game to the level that you would find during the Factions Era. This has an effect far-reaching and beyond "split" game play. This would not just require the nerf of all defensive skills but offensive skills as well. This would better be described as reversing the power creep. If this took place, the old [EvIL] Assassin bar would be viable and playing would remind you of GvG in the Prophecies/Faction's era.

I'd prefer reversing the power creep but I don't see that happening as it would take significant work and extensive testing time. This would only be viable as a long term goal for next year, if they even want to bother putting more effort into GW1. Buffing Assassins takes significantly less effort. These suggestions are a "rough draft" of things that should be actually tested, as you can discuss skills on paper all day long and never fully see the outcome of a change. However you should use this discussion page to discuss how a specific skill would be game breaking, giving examples of how it will be used with other skills to be overpowered. I'll change the suggestion to make it fitting.

What I do see happening though, is Sharp posting over-generalizations, exaggerations, and misrepresentations of everything I have said. Then proceed to argue against the points he has made for himself and win an argument against himself (thats a first). Hopefully predicting it will deter it.

tl;dr : The power creep left the Assassin behind. IKenshinHimuraI 11:12, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

The assassin didn't get left behind it's spikes became more powerful through the implementation of new skills. It was left behind when they nerfed its unblockable 400 damage spikes in order to prevent instagibbing npcs.

As the Nightfall era began, damage increased exponentially, as did self healing and self prot. The Shadow Prison+BoA bar ripped through the unprepared."

"The power creep left the Assassin behind."

These type of statements are why people have a problem with your postings. You reference the nightfall power creep, then give an example where sin bars are effected. You end with saying they were left behind due to the power creep. Additionally, if people are not understanding your points, word your points properly leaving as little room as possible for misunderstanding.~>Sins WDB

13:49, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

If you couldn't tell there were paragraphs between the two statements, let me clarify it for you. Assassins were nerfed. The power creep continued to buff skills after the SP/BoA nerf that did not include Assassin Buffs. Everything else got stronger. So if it isn't clear, yes they were a lot stronger with the release of Nightfall, but they eventually began nerfing sins and never buffed them again.. i.e. leaving them behind. IKenshinHimuraI 19:19, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

well, as you can see, i have no bias either. here's proof that I am good --adrin

18:22, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

First of all, I posted that saying that I do have bias. Second of all, you are not Java. I know Java. And Java supports buffing sins. IKenshinHimuraI 19:19, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

This is turning into an English lesson right here. When one says "Left Behind" it means others progressed while the designated did not. Assassin's were buffed then got the shaft, it's not the same thing, which is why I would make sure your words can't be confused. Take what you will out of the discussions on this page, I just hope you think more about what you put four tildes next to.~>Sins WDB

21:23, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

They got buffed, then they got nerfed. And then they were left behind. Other progressed while the Assassin did not. This happened for just under a year. Wasn't that hard was it? IKenshinHimuraI 21:51, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

Ego dude...ego...it's in the way. ~>Sins WDB

22:02, 21 September 2009 (UTC)

But...the bar Kenshin posted doesn't have Unsuspecting Strike. How does it kill things? ~Shard

01:48, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

"This bar, if ran now would not kill anything." Read before posting. IKenshinHimuraI 06:06, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

Tbh, a lot of what he said is pretty spot-on.

Warriors are always invaluable because they have amazing damage, shutdown, and disruption. The thing about shutdown and disruption is that is gets more valuable as opponents are running stronger skills, so warriors have managed to keep up relatively well.

Rangers are in the same boat, largely. Snares are good in every meta, and rangers have always had some of the best. Even after the nerfs, they still manage to do pretty decent damage because they're still physicals. They have always dominated splits and will continue to. They've managed to keep up pretty well, and, as if they weren't doing good enough, have been buffed several times in departments in which they already excelled.

Eles are just ridiculous at this point. Mind Blast is a gamewinner, Freezing Gust is a gamewinner, Blinding Surge is a gamewinner, and, apparently, Sliver Armor is a gamewinner.

As long as Diversion exists, mesmers will have a spot. As said before, shutdown and disruption become more valuable as opponents' skills get stronger.

Necroes are kind of iffy at this point. They're not bad, but there's generally an option that does more or better than whatever a necro would do. Faint is good anti-melee; water eles have Blurred AND Shatterstone. The one thing that necroes really excel at at this point in time is enchantment removal, and that's usually not enough to warrant them a slot.

Monks are monks. Even though they've gotten weaker and most everything else has gotten bigger, faster damage, they're still monks. There's just no replacement.

Rits just got a lovefest. On top of the best party support in the game, rits also have their irremovable buffs and free att points (since it only takes one rit line to do things that it takes two other lines to do), so they'll remain one of the most versatile classes, hands down.

In spite of a series of nerfs, paragons have still got a spot for the time being.

Dervishes and assassins (excluding this one bullshit skill) are pretty piss weak at the moment. Seriously, when was the last time you flicked on obs and found a derv or sin? They're just not competitive. :\

is for Raine, etc. 12:20, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Pika Fan 12:38, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

i♥u.

is for Raine, etc. 12:59, 3 March 2010 (UTC)

Curiosity[edit]

This page became a TL:DR nightmare because essentially everyone was against the SA buff... and yet you still think SA should be +50? Have you ever gave thought to maybe making it less then +50... like +20 Talamare 10:39, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

noone's going to be able to tell him how wrong he is enough for him to believe it. he's just gunna have to keep hearing it until he fails less --adrin

10:43, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

I've cleaned it up a bit, and changed/removed some of the suggested changes on the front page. I changed the "unblockable" a little but its essentially the same. The problem with something like +20 damage that when given the decision of which skills to put on your bar, why take that when you could just as easily take Blades of Steel or take another Elite? +35? Sure, I'd make it an 8 second recharge though. +45? , I'd make it a 12 second recharge. This is something that you would need to test to ensure you can't make "instagib" bars with. It just needs to be something you would want to take over a non-elite dual attack.

However, as a long term goal, I think that it would be best at +20 damage, if we were to see all dual attacks get a damage nerf and all lead and offhand attacks seeing a damage buff. That would encourage going through a traditional combo if it is damage that you are after, or Offhand->Dual if you are after utility and a quick knockdown.IKenshinHimuraI 11:11, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

What exactly is your goal with assassins? You mention that they are underpowered yet you provide nerfs for dagger attacks and wish to restore shadow steps to their OP state and beyond. In addition you have Shadow Form as a mostly useless skill that can only be useful to a flag runner as every other role has infinitely better elites to choose from. Basically what I'm seeing is you want sins to have low offense, no utility, and shadow step. So... low damage chains combined with a teleport that will 95% of the time force them into bad positioning... they'd still be terrible as their only function with your trend would be spike support.~>Sins WDB

15:08, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

The goal is to make the a viable option to split with. The chains huge +damage were a little on the broken side, as I don't think anyone wants Assassins to be able to do what they could in the Shadow Prison days. Adding in new options will allow for better bar compression and you'll see new possibilities to have a good bar.

Shadow Form would be something that helps you not be stuck in a base; although I'm not even sure if a skill programmable. It isn't a necessary change but more of a novelty.

I don't understand how you think removing the Aftercast will return Shadow Steps to their "OP state and beyond" if they require critical strikes. Would you care to explain? (Besides explaining to me what AoD does, which I'll discuss separately if you feel you need to). IKenshinHimuraI 16:57, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

No aftercast + set 20 second recharges. It's mind boggling to me to set all of them to 20 seconds. The no aftercast makes shadow steps completely uncounterable. By the way your shadow form suggestion is possible to implement, but it's still an overall weak elite except on flaggers where it is somewhat useful. Anyways, like I said before the changes to attack skills and shadow steps don't support splits they are spike support changes. If you want the sin to have better splitting capabilities it needs survivability in addition to its mobility. Aura of displacement and shadow walk are the only skills that give it that option but there is a problem in those, which is that there is no limit to the return step range except the radar limit. ANet's changes to Heart of Shadow and Viper's Defense were interesting changes that have a similar effect that is limited, but given 70 armor and melee range offense it's not that great.~>Sins WDB

18:21, 22 September 2009 (UTC)

The only skills listed with a different recharge than what it has previously had is Death's Charge and Dark Prison.

For Death's Charge, if it was to become a 20 sec recharge, it's energy cost could be changed to 10 to balance it out, or don't touch the recharge and implement the enchantment feature. I'll change it back to 30 to make things simple.
As for Dark Prison, the 10 energy limits it from much abuse, and the snare is short/weak. Besides, it's a one way trip to the target, unlike the more abusive shadow steps (AoD, Shadow Walk, Recall).

The reasoning behind a 20 second recharge on the rest of the skills is because it is a pretty fair timer for allowing Assassins to spike using a teleport. Combos in the form of spikes, instead of repetitive spam like the R/A template that was recently nerfed, takes more precision to run. Timing, range and target choice becomes much more important with a 20 second recharge. Blow it on a target with pre-prots and you have to wait, if you survive your mistake. Under a 20 second recharge, it becomes impossible to follow an Assassin with damage. Any more than a 20 second recharge and it becomes unfavorable to incorporate your teleport into your combo.

A few other points...

The aftercast was not an original part of shadow steps. It was added due to nerf "Eurospike" warriors from having an instant deep wound and to give LoD monks a chance to catch spikes. WoH/Patient Spirit is now meta, and this isn't really a problem, especially if you're excluding warriors from using teleports with the critical strikes clause. Even without the Aftercast, Assassin spikes were not too difficult to catch.
Heart of Shadow and Viper's Defense are cool skills, no doubt, but absolutely worthless for any real chance of survival. It isn't possible to Heart of Shadow out of a perma-snare. What you need to increase your survivability is either the ability to kill your target with confidence or something to survive being snared.
Shadow of Haste and Recall were both overpowered skills. They did not need to be in the enemy's range to be setup and could not be easily countered (if at all). AoD required an enemy target, bringing you into melee range with them and easy for target for enchantment removals, given that the enemy team can communicate. I could care less if Shadow of Haste and Recall were removed from the game as they promoted degenerate play, however AoD was a more dynamic skill, and I see no harm in bringing it back to its original state, and even lowering the energy cost of it. It would definitely be strong, but it depends on what bars you could take to do something with it. IKenshinHimuraI 04:37, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

"of my suggestions", "what exactly is wrong with it to make you disagree with it." - +50 SA - Talamare 04:14, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

No aftercast teleports[edit]

guess why shadow walk now has 1 second disable on attack skills Talamare 03:22, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

It has no cast time, and it was implemented to kill warrior adrenaline. IKenshinHimuraI 04:38, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Then why doesn't it say "Lose all adrenaline?" ~Shard

04:40, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

"It has no cast time". Two birds, one stone. IKenshinHimuraI 04:47, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

it wasnt about the cast time, it was about the aftercast Talamare 04:48, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Shattering Assault and Unsuspecting Strike[edit]

First, why do you think +100 damage is OP on Unsuspecting Strike, but not on Shattering Assault?
Second, Shattering is already borderline godly, why do you want to make it do ~25 more damage per hit than it currently does? ~Shard 04:48, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

not borderline godly... its technically/statistically OP Talamare 04:50, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

There is a scale of goodness among game components. Useless < Underpowered < Decent < Good < Overpowered < Godly < Broken. ~Shard

04:53, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

where do you get this information?--98.238.169.189 04:54, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Lingo. That's not "The Official Game Component Power Scale" of course. ~Shard

04:56, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

hmm thats a good scale, but removing 2 enchants with 100 elemental damage with 4 seconds recharge, I would rank it between godly and broken Talamare 04:56, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Out of curiosity, is there a scale below "useless" called "smiters boon" or is "smiters boon" the term for the process of turning something that was previously ranked 'good' or higher into 'useless'? Talamare 04:59, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Unsuspecting has a 2 second recharge, spamable, and it allows for significantly more damage in ones combo than any other lead attack. It's conditional statement (above 90%) is too weak.

Shattering Assault... increasing its damage would only be evident on targets with above 60 armor. Currently there is no difference between +100 and Deals 100 on 60 armored targets. It will have a 12 second recharge, consume your Elite slot, and requires an offhand to be successful in order to be used. It will not be entirely unblockable anymore (I've changed the suggestion in less than 24 hours, be sure to reread it). It's much more conditional than Unsuspecting.

And to be clear Talamare, we are talking about my suggested change to Shattering Assault, not how it is now. IKenshinHimuraI 05:00, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

100 damage deals 100 damage on 60al... +100 damage deals 160 damage on 60 al Talamare 05:03, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Go to Isle of the Nameless right now with Shattering Assault and attack the 60 armor target. With proper specs, you should hit twice for ~80. (50 damage, + Dagger damage which crits for I think 37 at 15). IKenshinHimuraI 05:06, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

done, did 55 damage per hit using 15 dagger mastery Talamare 05:12, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

[proof] IKenshinHimuraI 05:14, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

No. After you unsuspecting a target once, it drops below 90% health. If a character has 600 health, and this does +100 damage, they're at 500 or less health (base weapon damage). Every other time you use US, it does only the +20.

"With proper specs, you should hit twice for ~80. (50 damage, + Dagger damage which crits for I think 37 at 15)"

Stop. Before anybody says anything else, I want you to read this page and tell me why what you just said is wrong. (hint: read the "Notes" section) ~Shard

05:17, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

I had thought it was merely the same as +damage but was effected by armor. My mistake. It is interesting that you can crit for 82 as the math on the page for Critical Hits says the maximum is near 70. IKenshinHimuraI 05:20, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

In any case, I'll change the suggestion to a lower number, say +40? IKenshinHimuraI 05:25, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

counter proof In its current state it allows it to crit, no one said it couldnt... but every time you do not crit it will always do the same amount of damage... because it replaces your dagger damage so for 2 hits your "weapon range" becomes 50-50 Talamare 05:27, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

The math on the other page is for percent to critical, not damage. Also, it's a dual attack, and since it's unblockable (being enchanted is a joke of a "condition"), it's actually doing double its listed damage. You've lowered the energy cost to 5. 5 energy unblockable attack skills shouldn't do +80 damage. ~Shard

05:29, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Nine Tail Strike ? Talamare 05:31, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

geez with sunder and 15 dagger the current SA can hit for 111 damage per hit... its even more imba than I thought Talamare 05:34, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

"The exact damage of a critical hit is based on a simple formula: The weapon's maximum damage multiplied by the square root of 2 (1.414...)". 50 x the square root of 2 = 70.71. According to the reverse math, you are actually dealing 58 damage at 14 dagger mastery. It probably calculates the 15^50 into it then, yes? I did not think of that at first.

In response to "You've lowered the energy cost to 5. 5 energy unblockable attack skills shouldn't do +80 damage." I cite the lack of any problems with Nine Tail Strike. Its fairly balanced, has a shorter recharge, but is a non-elite. Damage-wise, I don't think this will be too much of an issue. IKenshinHimuraI 05:37, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

With sunder and 15 dagger the current blades of steel can hit for 105 per hit... so 50 is potentially stronger then +60 apparently Talamare 05:39, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Then consider it a nerf all along ;) IKenshinHimuraI 05:41, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

no! no one uses 60 al in pvp, the minimal you will find is probably 80, and by then SA's damage drops dramatically Talamare 05:45, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Yeah I know, I was joking anyways. Shattering Assault is such a poorly designed skill in the first place, changing it from something dumb into something useful but not broken isn't exactly the easiest thing to do.IKenshinHimuraI 05:53, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

While we're still in this section, let's talk about US. I've only used it in one build, and that build was NOT built to kill players. It costs 1/3 of your energy (or if you crit, slightly less) and only gets the big damage once per target per combo, unless they get infused or something. Outside of that particular build I ran, I've never seen any major use of US since it was released. If it was 5 energy it would be a different story, but it's hard to pull off successive combos with that 10 energy gone. ~Shard

06:00, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

US is a skill I had never really touched until recently and laughed at people who used it in because it was a Lead Attack that cost 10 energy. When Fox Fangs got buffed to a 1/2 activation, I noticed the synergy between these two skills. Together, it takes the time of what an Offhand took, in a Offhand->Dual starting combo. In the skill bar that I have been playing around with,

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it serves as the largest source of damage in the spike. It isn't that I enjoy using it (trust me I do), but it's ability to deal +100 damage and recharge in 2 seconds that is a little overpowering. I didn't feel that it was right to increase the recharge, so I decided to reduce the damage to make it less overpowering. In the particular build I posted, it takes the place of Falling Spider Strike. The benefits include +100 more damage (Fox Fangs compensates for the damage Falling Spider does), makes it unnecessary for you to use Wastrel's as a KD in order to spike and allows you to spam on targets while you wait for recharges. It's just an extremely good skill as long as Fox Fangs exists. It will still be a great skill to use, it will just not allow you to deal +190 damage, with Fox Fangs, in 1 second.

As for the energy, it is tough, but managable if you can sit on your Zealous Daggers. If you do not have enough energy to go through the spike in normal order, it is also viable to Wastrels->Falling Lotus->Horns->US->Fox->Twisting. This bar is very flexible. IKenshinHimuraI 06:14, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

If you're going to post a bar showing off how good a skill is, you need to isolate that skill amongst balanced skills. This means don't put a broken shadow step on a bar and say "Look! This bar is OP!"

There's a completely different issue about allowing assassins to have 5 or 6 attack skills unrelated to Unsuspecting Strike. The bar being flexible and overpowered has little to nothing to do with US. ~Shard

07:03, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

The teleport isn't necessary to look at the combo, you could run around with Dash or YAA for all I care and the damage is the same. Granted, the 5 or 6 attack skills isn't what we're looking at, we're looking at US, but I think that looking at it in a combo is important to understand how it can be [ab]used. It serves as a skill that can both be used as a spike skill and a spam skill, and in both situations it dealing +100 damage without being very conditional is really strong. I mentioned the flexibility of the bar, as it accommodates for the energy issue you brought up. Other than that, the statement wasn't significant.

Unsuspecting would never be a problem if Fox Fangs did not have 1/2 attack speed and a 3 second recharge. With these two skills you can Tab,1,2,Tab,1,2 etc. and put out too much damage. If the change was to occur to this skill that I suggested, this entire bar would not be overpowering. IKenshinHimuraI 07:19, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Just noting - my stance is I think SA is OP... what you suggest to change for US I dont care one way or the other... tho it did annoy me before when you claimed that US was the only way to kill things, which I moved to prove that wrong, whether or not you want to nerf US is up to you Talamare 07:52, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Unsuspecting would never be a problem if Fox Fangs did not have 1/2 attack speed and a 3 second recharge. With these two skills you can Tab,1,2,Tab,1,2 etc. and put out too much damage. If the change was to occur to this skill that I suggested, this entire bar would not be overpowering. IKenshinHimuraI 07:19, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Have we mentioned the health hit you take for the necessary increase in energy pool to pull that bar off. This bar is clearly specialized and is OP because of the sum of it's parts. Change Lotus for Spider and it doesn't work, take out wastrel's and put in shadow prison and it doesn't work. Why? Because of the energy intensiveness. Fact is Unsuspecting strike has it's own balance through being energy intensive. If Wastrel's collapse was 10 energy like it should be this bar could never exist.

If you need to change useful skills I say seniority stays, seems fair but at times you can't do that. In this case we can that means Wastrel's and Fox Fangs are on the chopping block. However, Fox Fangs didn't really have much of a change... just recharge. Therefore, the nerf should go to Wastrel's as it has the newest functionality and will be missed the least. The skill seniority thing is completely 100% based on opinion, but human nature says if something ain't broke don't fix it. Since, the combination was broke my nature tells me to change the part of the broken combination that has been around for the shortest amount of time. Of course Wastrel's Collapse is OP on it's own due to obvious reasons, namely a 1/4 ranged knockdown that teleports you to a target that is mostly defenseless now for 5 energy. So, there is a non-opinion fact-based reason to change it.

Kenshin you are correct that you could simply press tab+1+2, fortunately melee is balanced by the need of positioning. Shadow Steps bypass that need, therefore wastrel's (or Shadow Prison) is necessary in the bar. I decided to do a little comparison with similar damage and I found I deal about 80 less damage with my cripslash warrior over a 5 second chain than that combo. proof and proof. -60 for the 10 seconds of bleeding i let go on the 458, vekk was using gale bcs HotO obviously has issues there. But 384-307 and 398-317 are close. Warrior was under conjure using shock->cripslash->gash->savage slash->auto->auto. I don't get why you feel 80 damage makes the sin build OP based on the damage alone when it's not enough to kill someone and the bar has no utility.~>Sins WDB

08:21, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

There's a few things you are overstating a bit. I can pull the full combo of this bar with 0 in Critical Strikes, using Zealous Daggers, all Survivor Insignia, two Runes of Attunement. That is, 29 energy cap, with 0 energy gain on crits. It would be silly to go into a GvG with such a set up as you become useless with DP's reduction of your energy pool and bad luck getting crits, I'll give you that. The point is, you don't need to sacrifice health to successfully pull off a combo. If I can pull off this combo with Shadow Prison on a 35 energy pool, I'm sure I can pull it off with a 10 energy Wastrel's.

You're whole second paragraph confused me. For instance, this sentence, "In this case we can that means Wastrel's and Fox Fangs are on the chopping block." has some serious problems lol. I think I can guess what you mean but I feel it is important to note that Fox Fang's had a massive change. Attack speed and recharge are extremely important, and not to mention that it triggered the R/A meta. But I can agree that Wastrel's is overpowered, but it shouldn't be lessened until there is an alternative, at the least. If Wastrel's is removed, it is much more difficult to pull a combo after a teleport as all your other alternatives either do not snare, or cost 10 energy with a longer recharge. Basically, a lot of things across multiple classes would need to be touched in order to really fix some of the issue skills for Assassin without completely killing it from use in the process.

As for your tests at isle of the nameless, you're doing something wrong, but I'm not quite sure what it is. For starters, you do not need Vekk to cast gale, you can kill the dummies next to Master of Damage and still have time to unload a combo. Secondly, this is how long it should take for you kill with this bar, with proper DPS numbers etc. Re:proof. Those are a lot better than your numbers for the same bar. 540-320 = 220 damage difference. And this bar has plenty of utility: two knockdowns (one of which is teleporting and quarter cast), one of which can be set up to quarter knock, the ability to spam Unsuspecting/Fox, and an ungodly amount of spike damage in 5 seconds. I'd call that utility, but we haven't really given a specific definition to utility. IKenshinHimuraI 09:01, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Two runes of attunement is sacrificing health, that's 20 less. In order to have a large enough energy pool for a 10 energy shadow step you'd need 34-35 energy available. In under 1 second with the combo you burn through 20 energy from Wastrel's, US, and Tiger. It would be 25 energy in the 1st second with a 10 energy step and about a 45-50 health drop total. Fox Fangs only had its recharge dropped it's always been a fast activation offhand. The bar only has utility for a spike, it has no general use utility beyond being able to spread US once and a while if you know something about positioning.

I don't know why it matters whether I have vekk galing or if the dummies are dead, I don't think it does. I also notice you only have 1 result total posted which is likely a best possible scenario of all crits. It also goes for 6 seconds, I figure you must have landed an auto attack or a dual auto attack after the combo, because my numbers were consistant and didn't involve an extra auto. It doesn't even make sense for that 5 chain combo to deal 500 raw damage... the plus damage is 223 (14crit, 13dag) and the average dagger hit (with cust and 15^50) is going to be ~20 slashing * 7 hits is 140. Assuming you get a crit or two that's ~34 damage. So let's say 223(AL ignoring) + 168(slashing with 2 crits), that equals 391. If we use a vamp weapon that's 21 extra damage so 412 and further putting this into a best case scenario we get 14 damage extra from every dagger strike that criticals and if the other 5 critical that's 70 extra. So we get 482. This still doesn't add up to 540 but an auto attack with 2 more criticals is 34damage *2, which is 68 + 6 (vamp). Our total now is 556 that's close to what you had minus 1 crit and it's 542 damage, which is nearly exactly what you have. So, like I said best case scenario (or close to it) with a little extra is what your number looks like, if this screen shot is taken almost immediately and that is your energy it would further tell me that you had a near perfect chain of criticals. In any case, the numbers definitely back my proof up.

So, if I'm right about the numbers (I'm as close to sure as possible that I am right), what is your view about unsuspecting strike and this bar now? Do you think it's OP because of the damage still or OP because of Shadow Stepping and the uncounterable nature of Wastrel's? What's your new view about the sin if any, besides the fact that they obviously need revamped almost everyone can agree on that.~>Sins WDB

15:22, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

If you're going to be picky about sacrificing health, you could argue every rune that isn't a Rune of Vitae/Superior Vigor is sacrificing health. Be reasonable, this is not sacrificing health that you wouldn't be more than willing to give up on another class given any reason to.
Vekk using Gale doesn't matter much, but you're being inefficient, which may or may not mean you aren't paying full attention to your skill bar and activating skills slowly. This is important though.
You math is far from precise. I'd like to see you explain these [results]. Not all attacks were critical hits. No auto attacks were used. 14 Dagger Mastery, 13 Critical Strikes.
You can get much lower results with no crits and having your daggers hit low end damage. Without any constant damage between classes, you shouldn't make the comparison. That is, look at damage if they were all crits or some other form of similar comparison. Trying to say these are the damage numbers you get when an Assassin doesn't crit is pointless because you have a fairly good chance of getting crits. Not getting crits would be the unlikely scenario.

I'll answer the question you asked, if you are right about the numbers, my view about Unsuspecting Strike is the same. It would more balanced at a 5e, +50 attack than a 10e, +100 attack. I'd be more inclined to buff things like Horns of the Ox's damage as an Assassin spike should be able to deal more constant DPS throughout a spike, not having such high peaks and such low troughs. IKenshinHimuraI 21:29, 23 September 2009 (UTC)

Sorry I haven't been keeping up with all of this, but there's been a lot of failure going on that I had to make visible. Anyways, I'm glad to see you're open minded and changed a few of your other skills to be more acceptable. I'd still like to try to convince you that Unsuspecting Strike is not that powerful right now, or if not that, your version makes it really, really bad (nobody would use it). The current version costs 10, which is hard to spam, even with a combo of 5 energy skills. I've run it in GvG, it's very hard to maintain pressure with it. You can't use it on one person the whole time (they'll almost never be at full health after the first time it lands), so the only way to capitalize on the damage is to find a new target every few seconds. You say it's overpowering when used in a 5-attack combo, but how do you know it's because of US and not because of either the other 4 skills or because assassins with 5 attack skills are inherently imbalanced anyway? ~Shard

02:13, 3 October 2009 (UTC)

When compared to the bar that uses Falling Spider instead of US/Fox, the damage put out between the two bars are radically different. This is why I conclude it is US/Fox Fangs being the cause, and I am targeting US because Fox Fangs isn't that powerful by itself. If it was put at 5 energy, with the changes I have made, I would still use it in the same bar. Perhaps you could increase the cutoff at 80% if it mattered, but I still think this attack hits way to high for something you can just walk up and use. It would increase its viability on targets under its cutoff and be a more balanced skill, when compared to the rest of the Lead Attacks. IKenshinHimuraI 20:20, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

Feedback talk:User/IKenshinHimuraI/Assassin Skill Balance Ideas

Contents

SA buff? You have to be kidding me.[edit]

Skill Bar Discuss...[edit]

Reasoning[edit]

Curiosity[edit]

No aftercast teleports[edit]

Shattering Assault and Unsuspecting Strike[edit]

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