[p]I'm really surprised that assassins world wide aren't complaining as much as maybe we ought to. I remember one thread a month or so ago where a dev essentially told us to shut up or he'd nerf us. We still have outstanding issues that need to be brought to dev attention that should not just be pushed away. I thought about editting my Current State of the Assassin post, but it's obvious that it does not get read. I asked for that post to be unstickied nearly a year ago and nothing was done.[/p][p]So it's time for a new post. This will have the same topic of discussion as the original Current State of the Assassin thread.[/p][p]We had that huge post about itemization. I couldn't begin to sift through all of those posts and most likely I bet most of them are ignored by the developers as well. Has anyone posted on our fabled set gear? Mainly concerning the 5 point set enhancement being absolutely ridiculous. 60 points on finishing blow.. I have many issues with this one. 1st, why is level 70 set gear affecting a level 58 ability. 2nd, why are we increasing a skill by less than 2% on 45 second recast ability? It seems absolutely pointless. If anything is going to be changed to finishing blow, why just a tiny damage increase? Suggestions? How about with the 5 set, finishing blow has a chance to outright kill the mob? or maybe increase the damage by 600 instead of 60. (I still believe that somehow '60' was just a typo)[/p][p]Ok, moving along. Our AA tree. It's been brought up before in a thread here, a thread there, and in one thread where we were told to shut up or get nerfed. Not enough can be said about our AA line. Quite simply, it stinks. Shall we go from there? Sure! I think the best class to compare AAs with are the class most similar to us. That's right, the swashbuckler. We're very similar, we are a melee based class with an aggro xfer. A year ago SoE listed Assassins as a tier 1 dps class, and the swashbuckler as a tier 2 dps class. I had written a comparison between our AA choices in detail. The problem with this is that people are going to think I'm screaming for a nerf to swashbucklers. Should they be nerfed? maybe. Their ability to do massive auto attack damage, and have AA lines in the rogue and swashbuckler lines that will help increase that auto attack damage greatly surpasses our mostly pvp oriented AA lines. We didn't get that much in the line of actual dps increasing AAs compared to other classes. It seems odd that they would ignore the primary fuction of our class when creating these AA lines. I was almost horrified when we didn't get an upgrade to murderous design, nor did we get an AA that affected it. Also the big slap in the face concerning apply poison.[/p][p]For those who have no idea what I'm talking about, this is an issue that came about with DoF was released. Apply poison is put on an ally, they can proc poison damage. If that poison ticks while we are stealthed, we have our stealth broken negating concealment, and making it extremely difficult for 7 of our attacks to be used. One of our AA lines is a big slap in the face. We can increase the chance that apply poison will break our stealth. Thanks alot! Not only that, but the final poison AA is largely pathetic. 15 seconds... FIFTEEN SECONDS!!! The only way this ability can be useful is if it was a permanent buff in some fashion (even with reduced functionality). Especially considering you're supposed to increase hemotoxin, but with this ability increasing hemotoxin seems a waste. So you avoid the hemotoxin, you avoid the apply poison, so you increase deaggro, and debuffs (but still somehow have to put the points in there somewhere, but obviously not apply poison). That's only if the ability was useful in the first place. Our poison line is a waste, swashbucklers get a permanent 5% proc chance incraese. Oh, they got what I wanted. Grats. Can't have everything though. At least our armor gives 10% (another reason to not go with the hemotoxin AA line)[/p][p]Is it class envy? yes, actually, yes. They can build themselves to do alot more dps, we can not. That's pretty much my main argument here. I'm not asking for a swashbuckler nerf. Although I do think a nerf may be warranted, I'm not asking for it. I'm asking for AAs that we can use to build ourselves for something more than pvp combat. 90% of the players are not doing pvp. A great solution would be to have 2 different AA trees depending on whether you are on a pvp server or not. I'm sure the pvp assassins don't care much for dealing an additional 20% damage with a DoT component of an ability.[/p][p]So let's go over the main points I'm trying to make:[/p][ul][li]Finishing blow increase by 60 damage for 5 set item is pointless. Greatly increase the damage, or add a secondary effect or possible trigger.[/li][li]Apply poison is still broken. It still breaks our stealth. The AA line that would "Improve" the ability actually just makes the problem worse.[/li][li]AA points that can be used to greatly increase our damage output, or less pvp oriented AA lines giving something more interesting to choose from. Like our stealth + AE avoidance which is obviously a pvp ability, why not a PvE version that doesn't stealth?[/li][li]Lack of a double attack choice. Many melee classes have the option to put themselves at some sort of disadvantage to deal more damage like Guardians and Swashbucklers. Why not something that makes us ponder taking a disadvantage for more dps as well?[/li][li]Assassinate/Decpitate. 1 hour, or 15 minutes. It makes no difference. This ability needs to have its reuse lowered greatly. If wizards can potentially do 100k damage every 5 minutes ( I hate the wizard comparison but I think this one is quite valid ) why should we have to wait 15 to deal 14-30k?[/li][li]Finally, and just as an afterthought. 2 Abilities just don't look right to me. Slaughtersault does less damage than Cloaked Assault, requires different positioning, has a longer recast. Why? Reduce it's recast, or increase its damage (or both). Same thing with Spitting Asp. Less damage than Neck Shot. Same recast, requires us to be behind the target unlike Neck Shot that can be done from the flank. More disadvantages of this ability, and less damage. Generally when an ability is harder to use, it deals more damage, not less.[/li][li]Intoxication. Any DoT that we've had including hemotoxin poison had had it's duration lessened, and it's ticks quickened. This is the absolute proof of point concept. This ability has an insane lengh of time, with a painful 6 seconds between ticks. Reduce the duration of this ability to make it useful.[/li][li]Frontload. 15 seconds is nothing. It makes running hemotoxin (which is in the same AA line) pointless. Increase duration, or lower recast, or lower the amount of trigger percentage change, or all 3.[/li][/ul]
[p]" I remember one thread a month or so ago where a dev essentially told us to shut up or he'd nerf us."[/p][p] [/p][p]Really I love to see that, you think you can resurrect that comment from the Dev?[/p][p] [/p][p]I am not a big number cruncher geek or really that emotional attached to this detailed stuff, I just play to have fun and use what I have. But to give you my very general prospective on this[/p][p] [/p][p]Every class complains about things and thinks they need this or that. [/p][p] [/p][p]I just don't think things are as bad as the picture you paint[/p][p] [/p][p]Yes we have worthless EoF AA's..but whats new,,we have worthless KoS AA's too. And the EoF AA's have some benefits, such as soloing and I don't know I like the ignorant bliss poison and I think the fact that Hemo poison has been upgraded and now is better then caustic in most cases is a positive. But yea compared to allot of classes we got stiffed some. Name a class since game release that has not got the short end of the stick on one subject or another. [/p][p] [/p][p]I guess I am missing something with the applied poison thing,,,It's a buff, I put it on the tank and that's it. Off we go, as far as I know, it stays till cancelled or death. I don't ever recall my stealth being broken by a poison tick. shrug[/p][p] [/p][p]There are classes such as swashies that are a bit over powered compared to us, yes, but do you think that will last forever. The game is in consent update[/p][p] [/p][p]Some of these points are valid but, I think most good assassins here with all the faults you point out, still are on the top of the parse chart, so, I put forth all classes have abilities that are faulty. I think we need a bit of a boost and I think sooner or later we will get it. [/p]
[p]its still there in the achievement forum[/p][p]and the dev comment is still tehre as well[/p][p]since they never moved that thread over when they changed forum servers all the old posts are there but just bunched together, i tried to eliminate as much code as posible and just leave authors and text[/p][p]its about 500+ posts now. you should add these comments there[/p]
Not to be a ******* or anything but in KOS assasins were the top DPS hands down, now the other classes such as rangers have somewhat caught up due to their AA lines. Is this balance, I honestly dont know, balance by crap AA lines maybe that was SoE's intent?
To be honest? I am happy with where we are. We still parse top, or very very near top of almost all raid parses, I'll admit that ManaBurn and LifeBurn get to me somewhat, but in the end we still do the kind of damage we are supposed to do. In my view we are pretty much balanced against most other dps classes, and see no point to ask for additional buffing, why campaign to be overpowered? :|
[p]This is the first I've heard about Apply Poison proc effecting our stealth... I've never noticed it myself. Are you sure this happens? It sure doesn't seem like it for me...[/p][p]Yes, our EoF lines blow. And while it hurts my pride a bit to see wizzy's manaburn in the 80+k range and necro's getting 4kdps parses and brigands in my guild out parsing me on solo mobs... when all is said and done, 9 times out of 10 my zonewide parse and total damage for the night is still the top of the list--usually by at least 200dps. In single groups doing instances, irregardless of group make up, fight by fight I'm top parse also 9 times out of 10...[/p][p]Could we use a little more DPS? Sure! Who'd turn down that?[/p][p]Personally, I'd like to just see more useful end line AAs-- something to help with Haste would be nice, further Crit% improvements, 10% increase to Decap (which in the scheme of things wouldn't do all that much to our DPS)... Something to help us reduce agro, or maybe avoid a few hits if we do grab it... There's lots of good ideas out there. But I think the poster before me was correct, and SOE used the AA lines to better balance the classes. I very seriously doubt we will ever see any changes (at least not drastic like people have suggested) to our EoF AA lines at this point.[/p][p]That said, I'm still quite content toping the parses the way I do. 95% of the time I end up 1st, 2nd, or 3rd in any parse--while others find themselves 1st, then 5th, then 4th, then 6th, then maybe 1st again... And I'm doing this in the MT group while providing solid hate for the MT, and without the DPS and other Melee buffs that the other scouts are getting in the DPS oriented groups. The fact that I can consistently parse in the top three spots like this is different than other classes that I've seen.[/p][p]I definitely have to work at it harder these days if I want to stay on top, though. But I don't really mind that.[/p][p]Honestly, the thing that bothers me the most these days about being an Assassin is the darn Leaderboard being chock-full-of-sploits and not being updated anymore. It's been a year since the exploit scores made their way to the list and it's really a bummer shooting for a high hit that is just buried below 60 bogus scores on the top 100... That really my main gripe right now.[/p]
I've got to say that I agree with the above to posters. We're not in bad shape at the moment compared to the majority of classes. Granted that one or two classes are a bit out of balance at the moment (necros and illusionists spring to mind ), but in general I'm finding myself always near the top of the parse in most zones and my gear is significantly worse than the majority of my fellow raiders. My one minor concern is about unstackable haste items. We will suffer diminishing returns from the large amount of +DPS effects and adrons far sooner than for instance a Ranger. It would be overpowered to allow current haste items to stack, but maybe SOE could add a stackable effct, similar to frenzy, which provided a minor buff to haste. Nihyn@Guk wrote: Yeah I have to agree with that, it would be great if they'd remove all those bogus melee hits.
[p]I have noticed my stealth being broken at odd times and I cant figure out why, so maybe that is the reason. Honestly this is the first I have heard of Apply Poison breaking stealth so maybe its not as well known as you think, but it would explain why my stealth gets broken at random times completely screwing up my rhythem. If it can be proven and systematically duplicated to show it being bugged they will fix it. The problem is that SOE relys heavily on players to bring these kinds of things to attention and if the problem cant be duplicated at will it takes awhile to get it fixed. If any of you guys actually play on Test and are level 58+ maybe you can get a GM to let you test it. Basically get a grp mate, put Apply Poison on them, have the GM make it trigger 100% (if thats even possible) and see if it breaks your stealth when you use Masked Attack or similar ability.[/p][p]To address some of your other points. I agree that Finishing Blow on our set armor is pretty rediculous being as it is, but the other two set effects are pretty good, especially the full set, so I figure I want that effect for set 7 and I guess it doesnt bother me too much that set 5 is practically worthless, Im not going to not get all 7 just because 5 sucks. Id love to see something else, 600dmg sounds cool or like a 25% increase in dmg, but Im not really put off by just 60. I like Getaway how it is personally, especially when my stealth does get broken for whatever reason and I miss out my full combo, Ill often hit Getaway to put me back into stealth right away to get another one off. [/p][p]Has anyone really crunched the numbers as to how having Double Attack would affect a Dual wielding class? Rangers got some double attack in their EoF AAs and Im wondering how giving it to a dual wield class would affect that class' DPS. Instead of hitting twice you are hitting four times as opposed to the rogue hitting twice, but I dont know if dmg ratings and crit ratios etc would even that out.[/p][p]As for decapitate, with Perfectionist making it 10min and some gear making it even less its not too bad as it is imo. Sure wizards and necros can do 100K every 5min potentially, but I honestly havent seen it affect overall dmg much. In zonewides we all parse pretty close to the same and I outparse the wizards almost always in a zonewide. Now obviously there is a split in views on which is more important, the encounter at hand, or the zone as a whole so oppinions are going to vary. I am positive that reducing the reuse on decapitate will push our zonewide parses up above everyone else making us a very good target for a real nerf. I use intoxication more for the debuff than the damage in all honesty, its a pretty could offensive debuff when added to the other debuffs in the INT line and since it has such a long cast its pretty unreasonable to cast it while fighting unless you are in a joust type situation like matron for example.[/p][p]I dont disagree with you on any of the points you made except maybe decapitate needing to have its timer reduced further. Each of your points are valid and address potential weaknesses in our class many of which we are all aware of. As I go into more detail farther down, I personally do not feel that we are so bad off and I bet that that is one reason why there hasnt been much complaining.[/p][p]I am completely convinced that EoF AAs were an attempt to balance out the classes and for the most part they were very successful in doing that. Rangers got the boost they needed to actually compete with an assassin and other classes got definate boosts in various ways. Its not perfect, but it is a lot better than it has been in the past. Assassins were undeniably #1 DPS class in KoS, the good ones were so far ahead of the pack that it was pretty rediculous in all honesty. With this expansion not raising the level cap, SOE could not build vertically, they had to build horizantilly. Assassins were the top of the pyramid already and so there wasn't much vertical improvement that could be reasonably given to us. Other classes were farther down the pyramid and could be given more vertical improvement to bring them up to snuff, especially if they were in need of it. [/p][p]I have believed this for as long as I can think back, that the assassin class is the most stable and least in need of assistance than any of the other classes. We haven't been given that much in the past because we haven't needed it. Its like two young children in a classroom, one is very bright and doesn't need much assistance, the other struggles more and requires more assistance. The first child gets jealous of the attention the other is getting and demands to be treated the same, but in reality he doesn't need it. You've all seen this kind of thing with children. I hear it all the time that SOE has neglected the assassin class, that we never get any assistance etc etc. Really, we are just jealous cause all the other classes are getting attention and what not and we aren't, but the reality of it is that we really dont need it.[/p][p]Yes, there are things that probably could be improved with assassins and some the definately should be, but I think that is the case with most classes. I can empathize with how demoralizing it was to see our new AAs. I, like probably everyone else, was expecting to see cool and exciting new abilities and it was very dissappointing, but they really aren't too terrible in all honesty and I haven't lost any of my prowess as a high class DPSer because of them so I really dont mind them that much.[/p]
Whatever the "state" of the assassin class, the fact remains the EOF AAs are utter crap. If they don't want to improve our DPS, give us *something*. I don't understand why if rogues and summoners can have our DPS, why we can't have some utility. If nobody else will complain, I will. Necros are topping parses purely because of Lifeburn, every 5 minutes. How is that fair at all? Decapitate is a total joke now. Swashies and brigands can parse very very well now and have a huge amount of utility to boot. how is that fair? If we're going to be rogues, then let's get some utility. There's not a lot of difference in DPS anymore. It's especially bad in EOF where every other fight is a joust it seems. There's pure dps classes which offer nothing else, and it seems like there's not much advantage to those anymore. Not just assassins but the other ones too. The spectacle of our AAs being trash just makes it all worse. EOF gives us nothing. That's not a good thing.
[p]Yea we are not that bad off, as everyone keeps saying but the op does make good points.[/p][p]I ask the guy in the top raiding guild on my server, who parse #1? He said both the swashies and the one assassin go back and forth.[/p][p]That’s a pretty big error, no? [/p][p]We are content with doing equal damage to necro, swashies, conjour. Everyone posting seems to be Those classes have twice the utility, and don’t have the restrictions we have to pump out the DPS. [/p][p]What class solos better then nerco and conjour and at the same time does #1 raid dps[/p][p]Things are off, we should not lose site of that, lets call things as they are, no we don’t sux, but yes, balance is a bit off in the wrong direction for us. I think we should at least acknowledge that. [/p][p]Give us a boost in some utility if not a boost in dps. [/p]
[p]Things are off, but not on our side. Assassins are doing DPS at the level we should be, which is also at the level that the other Tier 1 classes are doing. Taking Assassin DPS up will only take things more out of balance. So unless you want to start campaigning to nerf swashys and summoners then its probably better to just let it be the way it is now. If tier 2 classes are overpowered, which is probable, than the problem lies there and here, and increasing our DPS would not change the fact that they are still overpowered, it would just make us overpowered along with them. So I agree that something needs to be done, but I do not think the problem lies at our end. [/p]
[p]God forbid I try to search for something on these crap forums but another bug I found on the predator int line[/p][p]When I finally can cast Poison Combonation when a mob is poisoned as soon as the "poison" state wears off the debuff goes away[/p][p]Sorry posted somewhere else but you know =P[/p][p] [/p][p]Only gripe I have to agree with is most other people get some sort of double attack aa line. Rangers get a 10% chance to double attack ranged[/p][p]why dont we get the same for melee?[/p][p] [/p]
Cruoris@Vox wrote: [p]well maybe cause Rangers even with the 10 pecent chance to double attack dont out damage assassins, there are abilities we get they dont, right? I am sure no one wants all the classes the same, the bottom line is Rangers are not over powered. So there is not a problem. [/p][p] [/p]
[p]top parse or near top, plus excessive bleeding which so many think sucks debuffs a minimum of 10% off mob hp[/p][p] let's see on a MiS mob that's only 400k+[/p][p]shoot for some bug fixes, like apply poison stealh break or whatever...anything else well the dev is right, shut up or nerf[/p]
[p] [/p][p]Well I for one have no problem calling for a nerf of supposedly Tier 2 classes if they do not plan on bumping up Predator/Sorc DPS. Never in the past have I been an advocate for such things but enough is enough. Necros are casting Lifeburn every other fight and doing 60-80k. Swashies with Agi/Wis build can win the parse 90% of the time single or group mobs. [/p][p]If assassins are indeed where we are supposed to be, then summoners and rogues need to get beat down with the nerf bat because quite frankly its unbalanced as it stands. Rogue = better debuffs, better solo, better utility, better dps? Summoner = better solo, better utility, better dps? Pred/Sorcs do one thing and one thing only, DPS. We shouldnt have to be looking over our backs or worse yet, looking up at the parse winner podium and see the Gold, Silver and Bronze medals around the necks of swashbucklers and necromancers. Its utter BS.[/p][p] [/p][p]I'd like to see them add a feature to Finishing Blow that relates to epic mobs simular to Inquisitor's "Verdict". When the mob is at 1-2% the mob is instantly killed. I'd like to see the damage range increased on Assassinate aswell, tired of waiting forever to cast that only to hit for 15k. Even 27k is a disappointment now, when ya have wizards/necros nailing mobs for 100k.[/p][p] [/p][p] [/p][p] [/p][p] [/p]
As a 70 raiding assassin, I'd like the following things: - AE taunt. What if I want to tank? - 1000 more mitigation and str self buffed. - 1000dps fireball out of my butt. Ok, but seriously, I think we only need 1 change in an AA to make everyone happy. How about one of these options: - Make Hemotoxin have more ticks before overwrite with full AA, even if its proc'd over with a new tick count. - Change AFKaway to constant 10% haste buff or constant 5% AE auto attack (or double attack?). - Make repeated stabbing useful somehow. I think for most situations assassins are fine and still top dps. However, we can't scale up as much as necros, swashy, and heck even ranger now. (BTW rangers are finally just right when equipped & grouped right, good job SOE). Maybe we just need to stick with it and grin & bear it. I mean, warlocks have been broken for how long? Wizards have been sub-scout dps for how long? Rangers in T7 have had it a lot worse than us.
[p]With the changes the made to hemotoxin and coupled with the hemo AA, it outperforms caustic now in most situations, especially in EoF. So I dont really think that it needs anything done to it. [/p][p]Getaway is pretty nice really. On any fights where youd actually use it the timers on the AEs should be already known so there is very little down time. Hit it, couple seconds later AE drops and continue on. [/p][p]I would like Excessive Bleeding to actually work in a way that can get the full 5% and be actually noticeable. Id actually spec to excessive bleeding if I knew it worked right and I could get all 5% for a decent duration.[/p]
Want to make repeated stabbing useful? Make it actually do what the name implies - double attack - either..say, a straight double attack percentage (10%?) or maybe a chance (say..5%) for a CA to hit twice - not enough to be significantly overpowering, but a chance of occaisionally boosting spike damage... a 1 in 20 chance of decapitate doubling would be far from overpowering, heck, brigands get a CA that effectively does the same thing to an attack/debuff of their choice. =)
[p]If you want double attack then ask for an illusionist to cast Illusory Arm on you. If every single class is going to get double attack then why do we have classes to begin with? Seriously, we are fine; just takes a lot more of skill now to parse on the top.[/p][p]The only thing I'm not happy about is that wizards / necromancers don't have to work for their dps. Manaburn / Lifeburn is imo an easy mode T1 dps button. No merit on that whatsoever.[/p]
Asking for double attack now will only lead to assassins being overpowered.. If your looking in zones like labs/lyceum/DT - swashy's are going to look overpowered, if you look at the zones like fth/mmis/hos assassins should be at/near the top every time.. Lets take last night for example, our swash held a 1.9k zonewide - our warlock held a 2.6k zonewide for labs+lyceum. The other night in FTH (not all the way through mind you - guild still has problems there) - our assassin held a 2.1k zonewide - I held a 2.2k zonewide, the swash held a 1.5k zonewide. Seriously - if your complaining that much about AE encounters - change your pred tree up and let me know how you do going wis/int. Try thinking outside the box for yourself before calling out nerfs to other classes.
