Assassin & Application: Thoughts

[Royal Blood]

I do like the Wisp Idea. It's easy in Andunor because for some reason we sponsor the local assassin's guild but obviously Cordor /Brog/Myon etc doesn't have a guild office.

Maybe add one in the shady tavern or the Crowes nest even idk.

[Kythana]

Feels like this is getting pretty off topic. This isn't about the details of the assassination guild or any sort of pvp rules.

This is strictly about decoupling the class from the guild. Because many people would like to have mechanics not gated behind applications, and I don't think that's too much of an ask at all.

It would be even more of a boon on the mechanical side as well, as we would receive a lot more feedback about the class itself. There are some pretty wild builds you can do with application classes, but they're not as commonly known because there is such a disinterest.

[ReverentBlade]

You don't want the meta PvP build of the month having the guild perks. Having the settlement shift mechanic tied to a specific class means that the devs can keep it on a leash. While it might seem paradoxical to have "assassins" be middle of the road killers instead of the best, its a necessary protection to maintain fun and fairness. You shouldn't have to contend with the PvP Discord cliques and their meta spellblades to be a settlement leader more than is already the case. Currently, you at least stand a chance of surviving with competent allies rather than needing the best arena teams in existence.

[Kythana]

You don't want the meta PvP build of the month having the guild perks. Having the settlement shift mechanic tied to a specific class means that the devs can keep it on a leash. While it might seem paradoxical to have "assassins" be middle of the road killers instead of the best, its a necessary protection to maintain fun and fairness. You shouldn't have to contend with the PvP Discord cliques and their meta spellblades to be a settlement leader more than is already the case. Currently, you at least stand a chance of surviving with competent allies rather than needing the best arena teams in existence.

You're aware that almost every ooc organized group on the server has an assassin player, right? And that there's no rules preventing an assassin from having aid, yes?

As in. You can have a meta warlock, spellsword, WM, and AA group up with their assassin buddy, and go kill the settlement leader. The assassin just needs to get the killing blow. Which- With the subdual mechanic, this is pretty straightforward.

It's how some groups have held onto power for months/years.

All this would mean is that groups running an assassin class might just run another class instead. Or maybe they'd still run an assassin! It's not exactly like it's so weak that it can't contribute. It's still a rogue with some pretty solid features.

[Diegovog]

I disagree with allowing any class to be into the assassin's guild. This will only shift into the "what's the more OP builds of the meta". There's already a reason to force people to take at least 5 levels into assassin for the Guild, which is to avoid the assassin-dip classes which would already possibly go for tumble classes. Assassin has to feel like a full class full of identity and cool mechanics.
Also, if you want to be more of a supporting role into the faction, there has been many people who wisely managed to advertise their assistances tools for guild members. And this definitely works, you don't have to be in the Guild if you don't want to straight up be a murderer.

The Guild has improved A LOT by making targets pay 2x/3x the bounty and forbidding members to take bounties outside the Guild (hard to enforce). But I think there is a problem with not sending wisps to people, which is related to my biggest concern with the Guild as it is currently.

Nowadays, too many assassins are simply tools of other factions and these characters are often made to be assassins FOR a faction as a character concept. And that quite honestly sucks. Same goes for harpers/zhents.
These assassins are not actually doing the whole assassin rp, they will simply have the assistance of the faction and will more or less be just wielders of the curved blade.
This ruins the whole assassin rp, because when you are an assassin first and foremost, you're so careful about who you let know what you are, you have to actually build a network of information and scriers. This is both difficult and fun, but time consuming. What I've seen nowadays is just a faction which will have a friend making an assassin character to be used as a tool and they can even coordinate a bounty being placed with a short-delay assassination, not giving any real chance to the target of escaping. (don't worry, the faction will take care of finding the target, teleport-blocking and preventing escape!)

So I really think wisps warning the target prevents these coordinated bounties in some level. But I wish assassins were somehow forbidden of being tools of other factions, bland characters made to announce the assassination and mark the dead body.

I just want to finish by saying that being an assassin is insanely difficult but was by far the best challenge in Arelith. Researching, stalking and succeeding/failing assassinations is not for the faint of heart!

[Naghast]

Technically guild membership could still require assassin levels, but still, the "you don't want meta builds in there" argument kind of feels weird, considering assassins can just be friends with someone who rocks a meta build. As was mentioned by someone else already.

In fact, a lot of what i'd normally respond with to discuss stuff has already been mentioned by other people. I'm surprised.

[DM Monkey]

I'm not a decision maker for Arelith, but my guess is that this isn't something that will change anytime soon. What I can offer you all is some advice on how to make a decent application and what to consider when you're doing it. Please note that this is my opinion and won't necessarily reflect every DM's decision making process - we're all players just like you.

There's a few elements to a good assassin application:

Character
Write about your character to the point that we get a good idea of who they are, what they're all about, why they'd become an assassin, and potentially how they'll go about being an assassin. What motivates them? Are they already "in the business" and looking to go professional locally, or is this something new for them? What has their story been so far on Arelith? What do you think about that story will change as they become an assassin? Where is it all heading? There are a lot of resources online which will help you flesh out and consider the answers to what your character is all about. You don't always have to have every single little thing worked out, there's plenty of room for ambiguity and for things to be found out as you play along. Just give us a good idea of what we're looking at.

Sample Assassination
We're looking for an example of how you think an assassination is going to play out. The great ones consider assassinations that go well, ones that go poorly, and also include some thoughts toward how things play out for the other characters involved. You can include as much or as little as you want in this part, and it can be an entire fiction or it could be a realistic description of what you think it will play out like on Arelith.

This doesn't necessarily need to be pages and pages long! You just need to get your thoughts down so that the DM team can understand your approach to the class. That's the main thing. ChatGPT can't do that for you either!

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

I'm not a big fan of the idea of decoupling the class from the guild. I could see if it really added things like the harpers/zhents do for power level concerns, but I don't think its stronger than a pure rogue so theres no point in trying to stretch it just so people can say they are an assassin cause they wanna.

That being said, I am in the camp that a guild who takes payoffs from their targets would not be a guild anyone used after the first time it happened, and as a result the whole thing does come across a bit ridiculous. Thats not to say that I don't "get it" from a gameplay standpoint, I just feel like there has to be a better way to implement the class into Arelith's gameplay that isn't just silly.

[Amnesy]

One thing to consider potentially would be to move the application from class to factions (assassin guild). It has pros and cons on its own, but most importantly, the ability to interrupt what is often a long, long effort to affect settlement and many players who are part of its wide narrative, should be application gated, as it should be something that adds tension, and promotes RP, not ends it in what sometimes appear as OOC faction wars.

[Naghast]

I'm not a big fan of the idea of decoupling the class from the guild. I could see if it really added things like the harpers/zhents do for power level concerns, but I don't think its stronger than a pure rogue so theres no point in trying to stretch it just so people can say they are an assassin cause they wanna.

I... I mean. I did mentioned it above too, the guild could still retain it's assassin level requirement.
As for the second part of your post i just had nothing to add

One thing to consider potentially would be to move the application from class to factions (assassin guild). It has pros and cons on its own, but most importantly, the ability to interrupt what is often a long, long effort to affect settlement and many players who are part of its wide narrative, should be application gated, as it should be something that adds tension, and promotes RP, not ends it in what sometimes appear as OOC faction wars.

This is, uh.
Straight up the idea i wanted to discuss here.
Moving the app to the guild, so that the settlement destabilization ability is still gated behind an application. Because, if i remember correctly, you need to take the bounty to claim it and remove someone from a seat of power, right?

Like, spot on the idea i wanted to gather opinions on and discuss here.

[D4wN]

The new norm for assassins seems to be to place a bounty on your head while you're offline and then wait for you to log on, especially when you're a settlement leader. This has happened a few times lately and seems to be an acceptable practice. That's a lot of power to have for people and I personally think it should stay behind an application. At least to be able to join the guild. I don't care so much about the class itself.

[In Sorrow We Trust]

The new norm for assassins seems to be to place a bounty on your head while you're offline and then wait for you to log on, especially when you're a settlement leader. This has happened a few times lately and seems to be an acceptable practice. That's a lot of power to have for people and I personally think it should stay behind an application. At least to be able to join the guild. I don't care so much about the class itself.

people making assassins to snitch on bounties probably encouraged this a little bit

[D4wN]

I mean.. Logically one could consider that snitching on Guild information and preventing a bounty being collected may also be considered an act of betrayal? Logically?

[In Sorrow We Trust]

I mean.. Logically one could consider that snitching on Guild information and preventing a bounty being collected may also be considered an act of betrayal? Logically?

should be, but I guess the guild still gets their money lol

[Diegovog]

Revealing any information from the Guild should be treason. But how do you even report it? You "feel" that someone is not being really an assassin for the guild and is snitching for someone?

My major issue with the Guild is how assassins are too tied to factions and even settlements nowadays.

[Yvesza]

The guild only really cares about being paid, most of their racket is extortion. The assassins are almost secondary (especially with how tilted the mechanics are in favour of non-interaction).

[Kythana]

I... I mean. I did mentioned it above too, the guild could still retain it's assassin level requirement.

This seems like a fine solution to me.

Let anyone take the assassin class, remove the application.

Keep the class requirement for guild membership, but one can only join after an approved application.

So you would have guild assassins(who can remove settlement leaders), and non-guild assassins.

[Cthuletta]

The wisp was actually just me on Seraphine - This was back when we had the 24 hour rule, and it was required

I do enjoy the idea of the assassins themselves sending the wisp as an alternative, and was unaware that was a thing that was required at some point!
I think at some juncture it was automated, as the ones I had seen all said the exact same thing with the same formatting. I could very well be wrong, of course, as this was three-ish years ago and I was brand spanking new to the server.

Either way, I think the wisp (either automated or by a player) acts as a good initiative to bend the rules a little bit on the engagement prior to RP for those in the guild itself, which would be a great boon to those who take the time to apply for it and are trusted by the DMs to do so in good faith. I'm still pro de-coupling the application from the class, to the Assassin's Guild itself, provided they get something 'extra' that would prevent people just rolling assassins for the mechanical aspects and the Guild potentially becoming stagnant. Absolutely nothing wrong at all with people who want to dip into the class for fun, of course. Just don't want the Guild itself to suffer for it.
Why join the guild with an application if you get nothing extra, y'know?

I also like the idea of a timer on paying off the bounty, so +1 to For My Next Trick's idea, though that's not really based on anything to do with an Application, just a good idea in my eyes.

[Arigard]

Some personal feedback/ideas on the assassin system as it stands (after playing one).

-It does provide some real day to day RP sustenance. It opens up a lot of RP very quickly as everyone is interested in knowing, or having an assassin onside.

-As a character you get the potential to influence actual politics and the world in interesting ways, you have tangible power in a mechanical way that most classes simply don't get access to.

-It is somewhat fun to try and come up with long winded plans, or RP to track targets & make things interesting.

-The system as it stands completely works against itself in a few ways. Divulging information as an assassin should be made a crime against the guild and punishable, in the same way that Harpers are monitored. It's crazy that you can simply undermine the entire purpose of the guild at the drop of a hat. The majority of assassins are simply more useful as information bots about who is a target, than actually being an assassin. Assassins are more likely to screw each other over currently, than they are to actually work together - which seems to defeat the entire purpose of a tight knit "guild".

-Contracts should have a much longer expiry (unless a character is rolled). Many players currently know if they simply dissappear for a while (or sit inside a safe place) they can undermine the system entirely. It's currently very frustrating to try and be an OOC morally benefitial assassin to the server. 95% of times someone finds out about a bounty, it becomes almost impossible to interact with said characters in any way. They either hide in untouchable areas, or simply reduce their playtime and wait out the timer. All this does is encourage larger and larger groups to try and hit them as quickly as possible - that is why you are getting bounties placed a split second before an attempt, or just before someone logs into the game.

-Gold generated by the guild should be split in some way between its members (with perhaps a small percentage bonus for the actual claimant). I don't know if that can be done by some kind of honour/weighted system - but encouraging absolute "first come first served" only encourages players to rush to the end, out of fear they might miss their chance. If assassins all pushed in the same direction and knew that the guild benefits as a whole, there would be much less incentive to rush. I don't 100% know how this could work fairly, but TBH, i'd say that the benefits of a handful of people receiving somewhat passive income on an application class would far outweigh the negatives of players prioritising rushed mass group hostile ganks.

-Keeping information 100% in house would mean that the first time someone had an attempt made on them, would be the point they can pay off any outstanding bounty (considering they survive) - this primarily gives assassins time. As paying off stands at a higher rate than the initial bounty, there's actually a potentially mechanically weighted benefit to failing as an assassin. That means you can give people far more oppurtunity to "Get away/live" and not get completely "punished" for it. To be honest, it may even become common practice for assassins to "toy" with their targets more, if they know that encouraging the bounty to be paid off is actually an attractive option. Longer bounty timers + less incentive to see the actual assasination as a win/lose event would hopefully help to make the RP focus of the journey more important.

-To the above and the points about it not making good customer sense. If someone pays off their bounty at 2-3x the rate, the original gold should be returned to the initial client. That is the ONLY way that such a system makes sense and remains integrity - and the proceeds of the payoff, should likewise be split between assassins guild members. It is the threat of being assassinated that makes the payoff system work - that is down to the assassins being the threat. If someone pays for a service and someone else pays more to nullify their payment, it is understandible that the guild would go with the higher payment. It is not logical, that they would however just run away with the initial money, or else who is going to give them gold in the future?

-Assassins need more tools available to them to work solo, or in small groups. Honestly I think the rules should change back to where RP could happen and then an attack could be carried out within 24 hours. However, I think only assassins should ever be able to try and claim a bounty - similar to how the rules changed in Dis. That means no finding groups of 5+ friends who are seperate from the guild to try and claim one. The system should encourage the guild to be secretive/selective and actually work together to make the RP fun for all. It should also encourage the RP build up mechanically - more than the payoff. If you have time to be patient mechanically, you are far more likely to do so IC. I'm less convinced on this one only because I think there are fun assassination possibilities to be undertaken with the wider player base, but they would need to be set up to the point that none involved know of the intended target, or the intent to begin with. (I.E no - lets get the gang together to hunt down said person. If you somehow as the assassin convinced two groups to fight to the death and your target is involved etc).

-There should be an option to place a revenge bounty on "Whomever" placed it on you - annonymously - that is to say the guild would never betray the source of their customers, but they do know who placed the bounty & are always interested in more coin to fuel the conflict. Give those with targets on their heads the option to fight back, at least against the individual who placed the bounty.

---

TDLR

Working for the guild should ultimately be a character defining focus, not a throwaway to help people establish their own position in the server. As it currently stands assassins are simply a political tool being wielded as a personal play toy of already established groups for entirely their own goals. This shouldn't be how it operates. The guild should be an apolitical entity, that is not tied to any government, or political interest. It is about making coin and coin alone & upholding an internal code, it should hold no sway in favouritism, or loyalty to anyone except itself and its own code.

Ultimately, if you mechanically encourage people to rush through RP to get a gold reward, or tell their friends they are a target of an assassination - that is exactly what they will do. If you mechanically encourage people to work together, uphold secrecy and build up narative and reward them for doing that instead, you are likely to get that as a desired result.

[Ceyella]

The wisp was actually just me on Seraphine - This was back when we had the 24 hour rule, and it was required

I do enjoy the idea of the assassins themselves sending the wisp as an alternative, and was unaware that was a thing that was required at some point!
I think at some juncture it was automated, as the ones I had seen all said the exact same thing with the same formatting. I could very well be wrong, of course, as this was three-ish years ago and I was brand spanking new to the server.

Either way, I think the wisp (either automated or by a player) acts as a good initiative to bend the rules a little bit on the engagement prior to RP for those in the guild itself, which would be a great boon to those who take the time to apply for it and are trusted by the DMs to do so in good faith. I'm still pro de-coupling the application from the class, to the Assassin's Guild itself, provided they get something 'extra' that would prevent people just rolling assassins for the mechanical aspects and the Guild potentially becoming stagnant. Absolutely nothing wrong at all with people who want to dip into the class for fun, of course. Just don't want the Guild itself to suffer for it.
Why join the guild with an application if you get nothing extra, y'know?

I also like the idea of a timer on paying off the bounty, so +1 to For My Next Trick's idea, though that's not really based on anything to do with an Application, just a good idea in my eyes.

An RP warning was required not outright a wisp, the wisp was just very convenient and easy, as it amounted to copying names down, then going to a wisp sender and feeding them all in until I got a hit. then copy-paste, send.) I would also note the times I got hits on someone to track when they typically play...

I played arelith for 60 hours a week while working full time that far back. the board would be checked four times a day -atleast- and I had a template I used. It probably just felt automated due to my addiction... it did get out of hand the amount of effort and work I put in and I got extremely burnt out, and other assassins would get me trouble as they 10000% wanted to scry gank people to make 500,000 appear in the bank. lol. Thats why we have an app really, and even then it failed with several.

I think the application is to make sure people who take do not play to win. Like Sera with her coats, I always made sure to understand I am the bad guy, and in arelith - the bad guys always lose. You have to go in with that mindset, you are not there to win, and get paid. The application helps DMs determine that.

[MRFTW]

It'd be cool to try that dirgesinger / assassin synergy. Miserichorde looks fun. I disagree with app-locking in principle so won't be able to try it out without some compromise in that regard.

My characters are the type that would hire assassins, but as so many people have said, neither of them would contract the guild because the guild has an atrocious habit of letting people pay off their bounties.

It should be made clear to assassin players as well as their targets that attempting to pay off assassins is foolish at best. For most assassins, having your target offer you everything they have before you take their life is 99% of the job. The rest is hydrogen peroxide

In this kind of setting, any kind of assassin that would let themselves be bribed out of a bounty should very quickly find themselves out of a job and, shortly after, on the run themselves because their former employer has just put a king's random on their head. The reason it's not like that is because a faceless guild takes both the bounty and the bribe, leaving the actual assassin PCs to... become messengers, I guess. At least, that's what it feels like.

Source: I read Brent Weeks' fantastic Night Angel trilogy once, so now I think I know what I'm talking about.

[Eyeliner]

Maybe some assassins need to start killing the targets even if the bounty was paid off to protest that policy… pretend they didn’t get the memo that the contract was cancelled, or that goes against their personal code

[Diegovog]

-Gold generated by the guild should be split in some way between its members (with perhaps a small percentage bonus for the actual claimant). I don't know if that can be done by some kind of honour/weighted system - but encouraging absolute "first come first served" only encourages players to rush to the end, out of fear they might miss their chance. If assassins all pushed in the same direction and knew that the guild benefits as a whole, there would be much less incentive to rush. I don't 100% know how this could work fairly, but TBH, i'd say that the benefits of a handful of people receiving somewhat passive income on an application class would far outweigh the negatives of players prioritising rushed mass group hostile ganks.

I really disagree here. There's no way I had to go through all the insane trouble (and it is a LOT of work) to get a high-priority target murdered only to be turned into passive income for the other assassins who did absolutely nothing. You want to stimulate people to actually go after the marks. And by giving 100% of the bounty to the assassins this was a great step in the right direction.

-Keeping information 100% in house would mean that the first time someone had an attempt made on them, would be the point they can pay off any outstanding bounty (considering they survive) - this primarily gives assassins time. As paying off stands at a higher rate than the initial bounty, there's actually a potentially mechanically weighted benefit to failing as an assassin. That means you can give people far more oppurtunity to "Get away/live" and not get completely "punished" for it. To be honest, it may even become common practice for assassins to "toy" with their targets more, if they know that encouraging the bounty to be paid off is actually an attractive option. Longer bounty timers + less incentive to see the actual assasination as a win/lose event would hopefully help to make the RP focus of the journey more important.

I also have to disagree with some things here. When you are encouraging people to pay the bounty, the whole point of the Guild fails in itself. The paying off part if an alternative, much much more expensive, which works well, because even if the target isn't murdered, they are hurt economically.

-To the above and the points about it not making good customer sense. If someone pays off their bounty at 2-3x the rate, the original gold should be returned to the initial client. That is the ONLY way that such a system makes sense and remains integrity - and the proceeds of the payoff, should likewise be split between assassins guild members. It is the threat of being assassinated that makes the payoff system work - that is down to the assassins being the threat. If someone pays for a service and someone else pays more to nullify their payment, it is understandible that the guild would go with the higher payment. It is not logical, that they would however just run away with the initial money, or else who is going to give them gold in the future?

Oh no, please no. This is bad for the whole economy and election system of the server. If placing a bounty means you will get your gold back guarantee or the target dead, there are no reasons to actually not place a bounty on every single opponent in an election. There's no drawbacks! You want to run for chancellor? Why not put a million+ bounty on your opposing candidate? You'd get your whole gold back + punish economically whoever is paying or remove the candidate you wanted. Either way there's only a positive outcome to placing bounties.

-Assassins need more tools available to them to work solo, or in small groups. Honestly I think the rules should change back to where RP could happen and then an attack could be carried out within 24 hours. However, I think only assassins should ever be able to try and claim a bounty - similar to how the rules changed in Dis. That means no finding groups of 5+ friends who are seperate from the guild to try and claim one. The system should encourage the guild to be secretive/selective and actually work together to make the RP fun for all. It should also encourage the RP build up mechanically - more than the payoff. If you have time to be patient mechanically, you are far more likely to do so IC. I'm less convinced on this one only because I think there are fun assassination possibilities to be undertaken with the wider player base, but they would need to be set up to the point that none involved know of the intended target, or the intent to begin with. (I.E no - lets get the gang together to hunt down said person. If you somehow as the assassin convinced two groups to fight to the death and your target is involved etc).

100% agree. Killing squads with assassins just to use the curved blade is poor professionalism.

-There should be an option to place a revenge bounty on "Whomever" placed it on you - annonymously - that is to say the guild would never betray the source of their customers, but they do know who placed the bounty & are always interested in more coin to fuel the conflict. Give those with targets on their heads the option to fight back, at least against the individual who placed the bounty.

This is actually a pretty cool idea. Problem is, people tend to abuse mechanics they know. If they know there is a revenge system in play- then they will use a secondary character to actually place the bounty, undermining the whole revenge system

[Diegovog]

Also, there's some observational information regarding the "paying it off" part of the current system that I don't think I can go in depth, but my honest opinion as someone who has been playing an assassin since before the belt, is that the current paying system is pretty fair for all sides and works well.

[Royal Blood]

Also, there's some observational information regarding the "paying it off" part of the current system that I don't think I can go in depth, but my honest opinion as someone who has been playing an assassin since before the belt, is that the current paying system is pretty fair for all sides and works well.

I disagree strongly that the payment system works. To just be concise the way it works right now, you're basically out of it for 30 days if you can't pay your bounty off. You need to hide. And yes, you will be logged in less because you can't 'idle' your play time has to be intentional.

It can be fun to orchestrate this hiding IC but my biggest issue with the system right now is that your bounty has no definitive end point. It can go on -forever- with /extremely/ low investment. So while the bountied character goes to extreme IC lengths to be protected or hidden, those placing the bounty only need to visit the guild and toss in a handful of coins to ensure the bounty continues.

I suggest that all the bounties be capped at 30days. If someone wants that bounty to continue, they have to pay like 10% or more of the total bounty. You shouldn't be able to play a multi million gold bounty then just throw 10k coins to the guild to have it continue for 30days.

Keep the refunds if the target isn't killed. But give these bounties an eventual end or /increase/ the investment a faction needs to invest to keep a bounty going.