So lately I've been playing the living daylights out of my assassin, trying to gear up in both pve and pvp. For the most part I've got pve figured out, what stats to look for and all that stuff. PVP however, I have not entirely figured out. I know a lot of people would be critical and call me a noob for not knowing how to play "the easiest class in the game", but until I one shot people, I'm going to need to know what to gear for and how to allocate my AA. This is a guide I've thought up based on my current knowledge. If anything is wrong, correct me, but I'm more likely to accept your help if you explain why a certain stat/aa is better than some others rather than tell me "do ___". Anyway, this is what I've come up with so far. AA and why I chose what I did (Color coded : Red = Abilities, Yellow = Additional Effects) AA Setup : Here Sorry for the ridiculously long edit, but anyway : In the Predator tree, I went for the obvious endlines, getting str and agi for the reuse on big abilities, cast speed, crit chance, crit bonus, and movement speed. Next I had a bit of trouble deciding whether I wanted to try Intoxication or go for Obfuscation. I went with Obfuscation because Intoxication is a rather long DoT, even when reduced to half duration, and most fights shouldn't last that long. I avoided Stealthy Avoidance (lol) so I could get a few more points in the shadows tree. I grabbed the improved reuse time and auto attack multiplier (flurries and MAs do insane damage). And the last point went into Poison Combination so I could get a bit more mit reduc going out. Next was the Assassin tree, and I basically got anything that said 'increases damage', improved reduction, or decreased the duration of something. I didn't put points in to improve the self buffs because, well, on a 2-4 minute reuse timer, they won't be much help in pvp, except Enhance: Exacting because it reduces reuse AND improves the ability.. I grabbed the increased proc chance on Death Mark for the group heal effect, and most targets will die rather fast, or will kill me rather fast, so more often I'm healing, the better. I obviously put points in Repeated Stabbing for that sweet chain casting, and grabbed Frontload as well as Getaway. I went against my word, just recently saying cooldowns weren't useful, but another stealth (target drop) that gives speed, and a double proc chance cooldown is awesome (when you have Followthrough on several items, that will be a great dps increase). Spent points in improving Death Blow to finish off a critical player when they are low, OBVIOUSLY got the group heal effect on Death Mark, and went for Killing Fury for some sweet Death Blow crits. I will explain why I got Enhance: Cunning Defense in a bit. And of course, Shadow Step for leet damage and catching runners. Third is the shadows: Grabbed max HP and max power increase. Reuse timer on Cheap Shot, mitigation increase (since I'll be using Cunning Defense), increased damage on Quick Strike, stealth movement increase (to catch people running by), 5% more max hp, increased damage on my Masked Strike (because I use it a lot), increased agi from buffs (2 buffs will be giving me AGI, and at master, that's maybe 4-5% damage increase), the increased crit damage (duh?), Noxious Enfeeblement (in case a target is hitting me or a group member hard), Killing Blow for an easier time killing off low hp targets, increased Crippling Strike damage, and the final two endlines for bonus damage and a heal. Lastly, Heroic Tree : Ability Modifier (most of the abilities scaled to pvp will gain more from ability modifier than from a % damage increase via agility), 10% potency and 8% reuse (only 8% reuse because 2% reuse on most abilities is a small fraction of a second.), Dexterous Attacks so my abilities hit twice, and Killing Spree so Shadowstep hits harder, and finally Fatal Combination. Most fights won't last long enough for me to have a 5% chance to gain a bit more damage. This one is easier to use, and more likely to happen. Stats and Adornments Basically your priority should be getting anything that reduces your damage out of the way. The only exception to this is 100% MA and 125% CC. 100% Multi Attack - This is my highest priority. It's not very difficult to obtain, especially with your myth. In just the 7 pieces of crafted gear (with no myth), I have 69.2% PVP MA. A few adorns, some additional pieces, and your myth will make 100% very easy. 125% Crit Chance - Two PVE weapons will get you nearly 60-80%, maybe more if you have raid weapons. Then the rest will come from the pvp gear. Anything over 125% is unnecessary (need the extra 25% to negate the effects that reduce chance to be crit). Either you crit or you don't, and you'd rather crit. Flurry - Any amount of flurry is going to bring out some insane dps increases. Crit Bonus - Crit Mit is going to be around 60-70% with JUST the crafted pvp gear. If anyone adorns for this it will be even higher. You want your crits to worth something, right? Determining how much Crit Bonus you want depends on who you're fighting really. You want your CB > their CM. Potency - Base damage increases are AWESOME. Haste - Haste is an amazing stat... halving your attack speed is going to make your dps much higher, and anything beyond 100 haste becomes flurry. 100% DPS - A base percent damage increase on your auto attacks is going to help a lot because, if you have been following, auto attacks are a lot of damage. Additional Multi Attack - Getting 200% MA in pvp gear is slightly more difficult than getting 100%. I put 100% at the top because it easy to obtain, and guarantees a second hit on every auto attack. Getting a guaranteed third hit on every auto attack is not so easy. Ability Modifier - This will increase your skill by the value of your Ability Mod, up to half the original value. Agility - Agility is another base damage increase (to everything) but it increases damage at a much slower rate.f damage. Beyond 100% however, the rate of return slows down significantly, making this stat less valuable. Weapon Skill - This increases minimum damage, meaning you are going to hit closer to the max number you see in your stats panel. This also increases your chance to hit with those weapon types if you are not capped. Reuse Speed - Mainly only the stealth attacks that hit very hard are going to benefit much more than a second with this, and it will only reduce the reuse timer to half the original. Ability Cast Speed - Most assassin combat art casts are very fast, and this won't increase the speed by much more than a few hundreths of a second. Healing Reduction - Lots of items available will reduce the healing received by the target of the proc. This makes killing those ridiculously overpowered (sarcasm) healers easier. 75-100% Critical Mitigation - Crit mit is going to reduce the damage you are taking by a lot, and anyone who is geared will be critting every hit, or mostly every hit. You can get 75% fairly easily without having to use more than 1 or 2 adornments for it. It comes with gear. Remember: Crit Mit reduces the damage of a crit. If someone has 100% crit bonus, their damage will be doing 150% more, so 100% crit mit will still cause you to take 50% more damage from a crit. I put this last, however, because assassins are not tanks, we are damage dealers. Beyond that, anything else is just a choice. Now I'd like to talk about where I chose to put my adornments. This part is a bit more confusing than knowing what to gear for. I applied my adornments as follows: Head : [Agi] [Mortal Blade VI and Flurry] [Touch of the Nightshade and Flurry] Shoulders : [Haste] [Flurry] [Flurry] Chest : [DPS] [Potency] [Potency] Forearms : [Multi Attack] [Crit Bonus] [Crit Bonus] Gloves : [Weapon Skill] [Masked Strike VII and Flurry] [Fatal Followup II and Flurry] Legs : [Multi Attack] [Crit Bonus] [Crit Bonus] Boots : [Haste] [Multi Attack] [Multi Attack] Weapons : [Adornment of Blasting] and if you have a yellow/red slot, get instant damage procs. Waist : [Haste] Wrists : [Weapon Skill] Fingers : [Ability Modifier] Neck : [DPS] Ears : [Ability Modifier] Charms : [Multi Attack] and if you have a yellow/red slot, get instant damage procs. Cloak : [Haste] If you don't have the faction to buy the Focuses, just replace them with the stat with the highest value on the list above (normally going to be MA). Of course to help with your MA value you're going to need your Mythic Enervated Buff. This will give 15% MA and 10% damage on stealthed combat arts.
