Server vault stats - 2020

[ajcolt]

*Looks about suspiciously.*

There's a disturbingly large number of Assassins running about.

It explains a lot. In May I was getting stalked every time i logged in. The only reason I knew is because they were brazen enough to occasionally steal drops (This is why i totally hound drops. It is against the rules so please don't do it) and take stuff from my campfire when I was putting stuff in it. I was seriously confused the first couple times wondering if it was a bug and the game ate it. There was only one character that actually rp'd with me belonged to by Mausman (sp?). While I didn't mind at first it's seriously rude to stalk someone with no intent to rp so thats why I have my scry location turned off most of the time.

[chad878262]

*Looks about suspiciously.*

There's a disturbingly large number of Assassins running about.

It explains a lot. In May I was getting stalked every time i logged in. The only reason I knew is because they were brazen enough to occasionally steal drops (This is why i totally hound drops. It is against the rules so please don't do it) and take stuff from my campfire when I was putting stuff in it. I was seriously confused the first couple times wondering if it was a bug and the game ate it. There was only one character that actually rp'd with me belonged to by Mausman (sp?). While I didn't mind at first it's seriously rude to stalk someone with no intent to rp so thats why I have my scry location turned off most of the time.

Note that not all of the assassin and shadow dancer PCs have high enough stealth to actually be hidden for long if you have any detection at all (and honestly even without it). At least some (and based on the stats for Rogue and Phantom it appears nearly MORE THAN half) have no Rogue or Phantom levels so in many cases it is Fighter builds getting HiPS for dispel avoidance or Wizard builds gaining an escape and easy repositioning tool.

That said, you can use scry to see who is in your area and if they are hidden on scry you can pull up the player list and compare against scry if you have an issue. This allows you to narrow down who is the likely rule breaker. cheers.

EDIT: After taking another look... there are over 350 active assassin and shadow dancer prc users while there are under 135 rogue and shadow dancer builds. Now, if you include Ranger/Assassin than that will bring the number up, but point being there are plenty of assassin/shadow dancer builds that have limited actual stealth.

[zhazz]

The prevalence of assassin is not really surprising since it follows the rule of four for medium bab classes while granting hips and spells and death attack with no cost in feats. I don't necessarily think it needs a nerf, but definitely something to consider when assassin and shadow dancer are so prevalent while rogue and phantom combined are relatively small in number. Quite obviously both have always been popular on warriors and spell casters for hips cheese.

Rogue 13 is required for Epic Dodge. 16 if adding in Crippling Strike to get Epic Precision later on, which all rogues should get at least.
10 levels to get Crippling Strike, and 6 more levels of Rogue, which only really grant a few Sneak Attack dice; or since already getting Shadowdancer to 3, add those 6 levels into Shadowdancer, plus another level, to qualify for Epic Dodge while getting a lot of utility at the cost of a slight damage loss.

Assassin is just straight up better than Rogue. Still gets Sneak Attack progression, and adds a lot of utility, including two uses of invisibility (normal and greater), which can be used to get two free rounds of attacks on most targets. This due to attacking out of invisibility not invoking a cooldown on stealth, and usually winning the initiative roll. All of this without any out-of-the-way requirements.

While it would undoubtedly break a lot of builds, I think changing either/both Assassin and Shadowdancer to Rogue-kits would be an interesting change.

[chad878262]

We are not in the habit of making changes that full on breaks current builds. While it has been done (i.e. adding requirement of either WIS or CHA for Heirophant) there are plenty of examples (which I will not get in to) where certain classes or PRCs have been left alone simply because a change would cause current builds to become illegal thus putting the server in a situation to either a) have 'grandfathered' builds or b) force players that have invested a great deal of time in to their characters to RCR them, usually also requiring DM effort to assist.

Both of these are far from ideal so *if* any change were made to Assassin or any other PRC it would most likely be done in such a way as to not cause existing builds to become illegal.

[Steve]

Perhaps disallow Sneak Attack and Death Attack dice to stack?

Though the idea of attacking from out Invisibility also imitating a Hide cool down is an interesting suggestion in order to shave off some of the OP pattern play.

Or, if it is of interest to bolster Rogue instead, add more Feat options to the special Feat Levels.

[c2k]

Rogue 13 is required for Epic Dodge. 16 if adding in Crippling Strike to get Epic Precision later on, which all rogues should get at least.
10 levels to get Crippling Strike, and 6 more levels of Rogue, which only really grant a few Sneak Attack dice; or since already getting Shadowdancer to 3, add those 6 levels into Shadowdancer, plus another level, to qualify for Epic Dodge while getting a lot of utility at the cost of a slight damage loss.

Assassin is just straight up better than Rogue. Still gets Sneak Attack progression, and adds a lot of utility, including two uses of invisibility (normal and greater), which can be used to get two free rounds of attacks on most targets. This due to attacking out of invisibility not invoking a cooldown on stealth, and usually winning the initiative roll. All of this without any out-of-the-way requirements.

While it would undoubtedly break a lot of builds, I think changing either/both Assassin and Shadowdancer to Rogue-kits would be an interesting change.

Pure Rogue can get more sneak dice than assassin ever could. Assassin's big advantage is the long paralyze and spells.

Chad is right though. I am sure up to half of the assassins on this server are actually Elven Arcane Archer builds, because its the best class to take with Arcane Archer after the changes.

And HiPS is a can of worms. Its been the way its been since NWN1. I'm sure if there was a way to fix it, it would have been done already.

EDIT:

Perhaps disallow Sneak Attack and Death Attack dice to stack?

Though the idea of attacking from out Invisibility also imitating a Hide cool down is an interesting suggestion in order to shave off some of the OP pattern play.

Or, if it is of interest to bolster Rogue instead, add more Feat options to the special Feat Levels.

Due to the way this game has trouble stacking sneak dice, only Rogues can take Improved Sneak Attack.

[Snarfy]

Here we go again with the talk about nerfing sneaks... OKIE DOKIE THEN.





In other news... poor Divine Seeker. I used to have a 30 Bard/Divine Seeker/SD, aside from his horrific melee damage, he wasn't that bad to play. That PRC has some really cool RP flavor, but it might need a little love... like spell-casting progression, or something?

[chad878262]

simply put it would make no sense taking away the synergy of assassin to rogue/phantom since the prevalence of assassin/shadow dancer PRC's is about 3:1 compared to rogue and phantom classes combined. The issue with shadow dancer, assassin and really any rogue PRC is that it actually gives stuff that rogue already gains and thus makes them more useful as a dip to give some of the rogue good stuff to non-rogue classes. Case in point non-rogue/phantom classes that take Assassin get everything a rogue/phantom gets from it (HiPS, spells, death attack, etc), but also get improved uncanny dodge. Shadow Dancer (HiPS/Darkvision) grants non-rogue/phantoms Uncanny Dodge and Evasion (plus the obvious access to Expose Weakness).

So any consideration on addressing the issue of Assassin and Shadow Dancer being the most popular PRC's would most likely more focus on non-sneaks dipping for HiPS + all the other good stuff rather than focusing on making them have less synergy with sneak attack focused classes.

[izzul]

why is everybody still having personal vendetta against hipsers and sneak attacks after 11 years?

there are so many spot items out there and sneakers are already at a disadvantage(roll 20 meaning you can spot them if you have 19 less skill than their hide/ms). maybe because they dont want to invest their skill and want to focus on empowering their own class?

[Dragonslayer]

in many cases it is Fighter builds getting HiPS for dispel avoidance or Wizard builds gaining an escape and easy repositioning tool.

Can't stress this enough. You have a problem with HIPS being used by non stealth PCs? Raise the requirements for HIPS so that only stealth based PCs get it.

[Steve]

Well, when there are Contests, you don’t see rules of “Only 2 uses of Knockdown.”

Assassin gives sooooo much for so little. SD gives hips and Evasion for a 19 DEX and Skills, while Assassin can give hips, Death Atack and a spellbook for very little. It’s a frickin’ great PrC and I personally use it all the time in order to maximize my personal power level enjoyment.

But I also see it’s yuuuge value for so little, and would be still satisfied to use it would the Reqs be increased.

Nonetheless, and I was being sarcastic about nerfing assassins earlier, the OP data is far more interesting to consider over why many Classes and PrCs are so little used. Which I imagine has something to do with RP interests, but I’d put my Christmas money on that it is because of mechanical weaknesses, and free Players want to play a game mostly designed around combat and not be able to excel at it.

[yyj]

Hm, 10% more good than evil, nevermind the fact that some evil are Drows or in the UD, makes sense the Surface feels like it does sometimes.

You are forgetting that most folks who play neutral are really secretively evil -- just to get around certain protections like protection from evil...or certain attacks like Holy sword..

This so much this!

[Valefort]

Damn lies and statistics !

Is there another subset of characters you would like to see ? Or race specific statistics for one of those 2 subsets as I have those around as well.

[chad878262]

Damn lies and statistics !

Is there another subset of characters you would like to see ? Or race specific statistics for one of those 2 subsets as I have those around as well.

Since you asked... How about a breakdown of what other classes/PRC's are in those builds that have Assassin or Shadow Dancer. Would be interesting to see how many of these damnable HiPSters are actual sneaks and how many are not. I would assume that every rogue and phantom includes one or the other, but that still leaves about 250 or so active builds with Assassin or Shadow Dancer that are likely split mostly between Wizard (HiPS-mage), Fighter (WM w/ HiPS and EW cheese) and Ranger (HiPS Archers). It'd be interesting to know what is most prevalent.

And to be clear I personally am not certain posting this type of meta detail is something that should be done. It's a short distance from this type of overall server split type detail to metagaming other players builds, which I know happens anyway, but should not be made easier. However, if we are going to do it, certainly makes for a fun thought experiment to say the least. Just my 2 coppers.

[Valefort]

Ah that's another type of statistic rather than another subset of characters, which means I'd have to code more instead of clicking a few times, no promises