Idea Assassin Adjustment

So my proposal is very simple and it stems from the idea that mobility is more beneficial to an assassin rather than extra health:

Remove

• Absorption Hearts on a Kill

Add Any One Of:

• Longer Duration Speed Boosts (Total 2)
  
• One Extra Speed II Boost (Total 3)
• Instant Speed Boost Granted Upon a Kill (Total 2)

Why I Think the Absorption Hearts Should Be Removed​

At first, I really liked the added absorption hearts on an assassin kills because it rewards you for getting a kill and provides some extra protection when either attacking or being attacked. However, because the absorption hearts are taken away 22s after gaining them you have a limited window to use them "effectively" and often assassins aren't able to use them to any significant advantage. Let me briefly discuss the two situations I've outlined in bold above.

1) Attacking Someone With The Absorption Hearts
In the event of attacking someone with the absorption hearts (without an assassinate) the only targets an assassin should be able to kill in a 1v1 situation are ninjas and assassins assuming both players have similar levels of pvp skills (possibly pyros, mages, and archers too but I'd say this is unlikely). In addition, After assassinating someone and gaining the absorption hearts you likely have 0 or 1 speed boost in store. Personally, I find that I use 1 speed boost to reposition myself after assassinating someone so at that point I'm waiting for my speed boost to come back in order to strike which takes up a good chuck of that 22s time. Therefore, having limited targets to attack to begin with, only 22s to find someone to attack, and restricted mobility after assassinating someone means more often than not you aren't using the absorption hearts offensively.

2) Being Attacked With The Absorption Hearts
In the event you are attacked as assassin with absorption hearts and someone has the jump on you there is almost no way you can effectively fight back and win unless it's an assassin. You are better off trying to run away. In terms of the whole "the absorption hearts give you extra survivability" argument I'd argue it really doesn't in the case for assassins. This is because health becomes more effective with more protections and assassin has essentially no protections. Thus, a heavy with two absorption hearts has more effective health than an assassin with the two absorption hearts. I'm not sure how the calculations might work out but I suspect the effective health of an assassin with the absorption hearts is really near a half of a heart advantage over one without them.

All in all the absorption hearts are not able to be used effectively while attacking because of limited target selection, a small time frame to attack with the hearts, and reduced mobility after assassinating someone. In the situation you are being attacked as an assassin your effective health does not contribute to your survivability in any significant manner.

Why I Think Assassins Should be Given Extra Mobility​

The basis for this request stems from my personal experience that a mobile assassin is a more effective assassin. A majority of my deaths either come from running out of speed boost and I can't run away or dying during the assassinate phase. The dying in assassinate phase I'm fine with and it makes sense. However, I believe adding an additional speed boost to an assassin, longer duration speed boosts, or an instant speed boost upon a kill will boost survivability by being able to avoid threats more effectively vs the absorption hearts.

The Thought Process - Boosting Survivability Through Repositioning
Once I fine a target, ideally I would like to use 1 speed boost to get in and 1 speed boost to get out. However, in practise i find myself more often than not using 2 speed boosts while going in and having none in reserve to get out (in the event i survive that is ). This likely stems from the fact that i like to be moving at all times so when i find a target I already have 1 speed boost used up leaving only 1 to go in for a kill. Now, some people might say I shouldn't be aimlessly wandering around but I assure you I'm not. It's imperative for an assassin to keep adjusting their position as to not become predictable especially against higher level pvpers. If you can consistently switch up where you attack from you will always keep attackers guessing (this is apart of the mind games people talk about when playing this class). Therefore, to be able to more effectively roam and change tactical positions i believe it would be more beneficial for assassins to have additonal mobility.

1) Longer Duration Speed Boosts (Total 2)
Longer duration speed boosts would help with the whole "use 1 speed boost to get in and one to get out" by allowing more time for the assassin to approach their target. However, I must say this is my least favourite proposal because the existing problem of using 1 to roam and 1 to go in for a kill will still exist. Although I do believe this additional mobility will still be more beneficial over the absorption hearts.

2) One Extra Speed Boost (Total 3)
Adding an extra speed boost would essentially add a "roamer" speed boost which would allow assassins the ability to reposition themselves frequently without having to worry if they will have a boost to get out from a kill.
This is my second ideal fix however I think its the most susceptible to the argument that this would give to much mobility to assassins and non speed classes would have almost no potential to catch them and thus kill them.

3) Instant Speed Boost Granted Upon a Kill (Total 2)
This is my favourite proposal because it immediately fixes the problem of not having speed boost to exit a kill. Now if you use your last boost to go in for a kill you are TRULY all in because if you are unsuccessful you will likely die, but if you succeed you will get an immediate speed boost to help you get out. Those two extra hearts aren't going to help you in the middle of a dense battle if you can't get out.

Summary​

Overall, I would like to see a slight change to assassin where the class gains additional mobility instead of having absorption hearts gained upon a kill in order to increase its survivability. Assassin in its current state isn't able to effectively use its gained absorption hearts on an assassin kill because of limited target selection, a 22s time constraint, and reduced mobility. Furthermore, the effective health gained from the absorption hearts is not significant in increasing the class' survivability post kill. On the other hand, giving assassins additional mobility through one of the three options outlined will help increase survivability by providing additional time to get in and out of kills and repositioning around the map.

P.S.​

Just a little side note but I used to play assassin quite a bit in the MCPVP days so this is where a lot of my judgment is coming from. I know assassin isn't the most "popular" class so I hope people take it easy on me lol.
Thx for reading

 

Well I guess my whole point is assassin didn't really get a buff with the absorption hearts so i was suggesting slightly improving mobility in some way shape or form; something that could actually improve QOL for assassins. Adding slowness after a kill I think will kind of ruin the feel for the kit as you speed into a kill and then become super slow at the most vulnerable part of your attack sequence. This slowness effect sounds more like a kamikaze strike were you go in knowing you are full well going to die. Keep in mind, assassins are meant to get in and out of kills quickly.

 

Yeah I think assassin as fine as is. I just wanted to see a transfer of weight from the absorption hearts to some mobility because they don't really seem useful. In terms of getting a kill without an assassinate i think its still more beneficial to give an assassin the instant assassinate rather than the speed boost. However, I'd be for this change (if we agree it's a nerf) as long as one of the other mobility additions I recommended is added along with the removal of the absorption hearts.

 

You have a fair point. It just seems strange to me that a class can have a mechanic that serves almost no use so I was just proposing ways to try to rework it so that i makes sense for an assassin. I think the best option I proposed (if you don't want to change things up a whole lot) is just to increase the duration of the current speed boost by like 2s or something along those lines and get rid of the absorption hearts. I doubt that even this change would push assassin out of a balanced state.

 

I think I need to clarify that I'm not advocating for a buff but rather a slight rework to the class so that the mobility additions are roughly equal to the loss in the absorption hearts. So overall a net neutral trade that makes it so assassins actually get some more usefulness out of the trade off. I realize now that granting an extra speed boost or an instant speed boost after a kill might not be an equal trade off so the best solution would be like a 2-4s increase in duration on the current speed boost.

Current sprinting speed in MC is 5.612m/s and with speed II it is 7.857m/s. So overall the net difference is 2.245m/s. I propose giving an additional 2s increase so an assassin can travel roughly 4.5 blocks further each speed boost. This may seem like a buff but I'd argue not many people would even notice a difference in the speed duration including assassins. And with the offset of the removal of the absorption hearts I think this could be a way to achieve the net neutral rework. Again, I'm not looking for a way to buff assassin but shift its current absorption heart advantage into something more usefully for assassins regardless of how small it is.

 

I'm not sure how I can be more clear but I'm trying to offset the small buff that the absorption hearts gave to assassins into an equally as small buff into mobility for assassins. It may seem like a buff but I'm trying my best to propose a solution to make the originally small buff of the absorption hearts actually useful for assassins. I recognize that its tough and I don't intend to buff assassins but rather take a unuseful mechanical buff into a useful mechanical buff.

As for assassins being broken I have to disagree. I think a lot of the precised brokenness comes from their ability to instantly kill someone which is understandable. However, assassins are equally punished during the assassinate phase by dying if they get hit by anything whatsoever. I'd argue archers are more broken as an instakill class because they have no threat of death when headshotting people and if someone is up close they can hold a fight with most classes unlike assassins.

 

If mobility is thrown out of the question, even a tiny one such as a duration increase, I'm not sure there's any change that could be implemented where it becomes useful to an assassin. It seems the change will have to be as equally useless as the absorption hearts one for it to be considered which is not what I'm going for. Furthermore, if a majority of people believe assassin is busted I'm starting to think any change that could be deemed useful will just be labelled a massive buff which kills any potential for an adjustment.