Hello

I am new here and want to start an Assassin Char. I have no expierence with Old RA's. What should i take? I like Infi and NS most.

Breton Slash Infi?
Sarazen Thrust Infi?

NS with Piercing?
(because no Celt available)

Since remedy will be gone with the old RAs, pierce/thrust is superior than slash in any case, since str and str/con debuff only will partially affect pierce/thrust wielder.

The nightshade will uniquely have access to viper (in old RA on a timer but cost less) and avoid pain, which is like a personal bunker of faith on a 15 min timer.

The Infiltrator will uniquely have acess to vanish without the disarming debuff and therefore can do massive front load damage by PA, CD - vanish - PA, CD ...

So, both have their points, but the NS will be perform better in fights against other stealthers, when AP and Viper is up.

I will agree

NS seems to be getting a much needed boost in the assassin rivalry (remember I am a NS here so yes I am biased and no need to point out if im wrong )

I still believe SB will be a strong opponent though due to the major focus they can add on the passive RAs due to no really good active RAs besides purge, which will lead to one very hard fight if used correctly.

Inf I believe will be where it has been all along, right in the middle of it all

Overall the assassin vs assassin will become pretty equal maybe with a slight disadvantage to SBs due to no dex/str based weapons.

I think overall I would say:

NS =(Maybe a >) Inf > SB

SBs without remedy, without viper, facing stacking str/con and str debuffs will do really, really bad damage, especially against nightshade leather.


I'd guess NS will have a slight advantage over the inf as well, not needing to spec 50 weapon for their evade stun, and with the better RA selection.


Some people say lurikeen is best (pierce of course) for the 5 more de and quick, some people prefer the resists for the elf and say that's better than the small stat boost. I think its too small of a difference to really notice.

NS will be the best in high realmranks. Why is that?

Actives that no other assassin will have:
-Avoid Pain (10/20/30% abs for 60 seconds)
-Viper

Passives that no other assassin will have access to:
Wild arcana (critchance for debuffs/dots)

I would say you have to consider what enemies you fight too.
As an inf for example, youll be hunting mid/hib casters and stealthers, most of which are not too bad 1x1

as an NS/SB you might occasionally mistaken a friar for a quick kill and regret it. minstrels are also a kind of a pain, so are reavers.

so overall, albs have it a little easier in terms of enemies i think.

i've definitely scored a lot more kills as an inf than as an NS, but that's probably also because of the higher sklls points available for higher overall damage.

now for my question:

http://darkmage.ice.org/daoc/

Im just curious, this site says NS also has Ignore Pain. is that correct or outdated?

cause then they would definitely be superior to other sins.

assasins all lost IP well before 1.69

Thx, good Info!

Thrust Infi & NS looks very close.
NS get the after Evade Stun with 25, thats really awesome. To bad there are not many scouts/hunters on Uthgard to fight as NS to make good use of detect hidden. Infi have many uthgard Ranger to fight on.
I like the look of Srarcen or Breton more as Luri/Elf Optic.

Personally Sum up Infi vs NS:

Infi:
+Better Look
+double PA with Vanish but on 30min timer
+Many Archers to fight and make use of See Hidden
-good after Evade Stun only at 50

NS:
+maybe best Assassin with 1.69
+nice RA's to choose on 15 and 30min timer + good passiv RA
+after Evade Stun with 25
-No Archers to fight and make use of See Hidden
-no "Bad Ass" Look

hmm, go with the best looking Char?

to correct you a little:

INF stun style is off block, not evade I believe.
unless it's been changed on Uth.

also to add, INF gets 2.5 skill points per level, so you can spec your weapon at 50 easily
Inf can level in pve way easier as well since you can spec envenom and weapon skill at your level with ease.
inf also gets a RA that increases the skill with second weapon, giving him higher overall damage in the long run purely with two weapons.

NS can only go 35+15 at RR5, otherwise you'll gimp yourself because you dont have as many points.
you do get magic though, which can be used to cast while rooted or to pull enemies. as inf you can use crossbow for that, but damage is neglibile.
you're also smaller and harder to detect or target.
viper tbh is a neglibile skill since the timer is 30 mins and it costs 14 points to get that skill, so imo it's useless.
WA is useful though and should be maxed


so in conclusion:

INF pro:
lots of rangers to kill, great weapon damage, lots of points to spend, easier to level since they kill faster than NS
INF con:
not as much poison damage
needs to use crossbow, so have to buy heavy bolts for that and possibly rely on crossbow for maxing your spec
no reliable stun style (biggest disadvantage in my opinion)

NS pro:
smaller size makes you more stealthy and a lot harder to find/target (as luri that is)
evade style will guarantee you get lots of stuns, letting you escape or kill the target a little easier
best poison damage with WA and viper
take less damage with absorption RA

NS con:
less weapon damage
very few archer type enemies
lots of infs/minstrels and possibly friars that you will end up fighting a lot, making it quite challenging in the long run


I would go NS if you want to fight mostly other assassins and if you want challenge.
go INF if you want to level a little faster (not by much tho hehe), spec your assassin as high as you can or exert revenge on pesky rangers.
it's also easier to play as inf i believe, but that's just me. i found it very challenged to do pve solo as an NS

terragon wrote:to correct you a little:

INF stun style is off block, not evade I believe.
unless it's been changed on Uth.

Dragonfang (50 Thrust style) is after-evade and stuns for 5secs. In the earlier days of daoc it were 9secs.

So it has not been changed on uth. Mabye there were some changes on live tho, but I dunno. Only played live till toa release.

that;s good to know about dragonfang. its not useless after all:)

just one more thing I thought about.

inf absolutely has to get See Hidden, a 14 point RA to see rangers even when they're hidden
NS does not need that ability because scouts and hunters are very few in numbers and you could use normal stealth detection means for that. so you save 14 points and could use them for WA/viper

In my RA Planner See Hidden is a 8 Point RA. But you are right, infi need See Hidden much more as NS.

Garad wrote:The Infiltrator will uniquely have acess to vanish without the disarming debuff and therefore can do massive front load damage by PA, CD - vanish - PA, CD ...

Better check up on this, i remember that did not last long before Mythic removed the double PA glitch. It was not intended for offence, only defence.

terragon wrote:also to add, INF gets 2.5 skill points per level, so you can spec your weapon at 50 easily

inf also gets a RA that increases the skill with second weapon, giving him higher overall damage in the long run purely with two weapons.

NS can only go 35+15 at RR5, otherwise you'll gimp yourself because you dont have as many points.

an RR5 NS that autotrained can spec;

35 stealth
35 venom
36 pierce (51 composite)
44 CS
28 CD



An Inf that wanted to have an off evade stun and spec CS can go;

35 stealth
35 venom
50 thrust (for evade stun)
44 CS
22 DW





So as you can see the NS is going to have the higher offhand fire rate because they have 6 more CD than the inf has DW. I am unaware of any disparity between the RA selection of NS/INF/SB regarding duelist reflexes.

The NS magic was intended to balance the Inf spec points and SB higher HP per con. But if the inf has to trade away the extra spec points to get off evade stun, they don't really do the inf any good.

Now the inf can spec 36 thrust and raise DW/CS to do better damage than the NS, but then he won't have an evade stun. The inf can spec 50 thrust 50 DW, have the evade stun and better melee dmg overall, but they trade away PA chain, anytime snare, anytime combat speed debuff chain, huge damage evade chain...


though the inf does has a 10% advantage from armor tables...


regarding viper, I remember testing this on live with a friend and the old school viper was making his SC debuff hit twice as hard. if it gets implemented this way here, viper will be a complete iwin, coupled with Ap2/3, that's 3 (AP can be hit twice) decent actives every 30 minutes. Maybe at low RR you won't be able to get it, but high RR NS will be able to hit a decent iwin active RA about every 10 minutes. Not including purge.

@ ronian
wild arcana should not affect dot/debuffs only
for the dd and nuke