Armageddon General Discussion Board

Backstab.  I can remember reading about the skill for the first time in a Dungeons and Dragons Player's Guide waaaaaaay back in the 80's.  

Nothing I had hitherto encountered in fiction -- GI Joe, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, HeMan vs. Skeletor -- had prepared me for reading about this.

Backstab seemed sneaky.  Backstab seemed devious.  I liked the idea.  I probably played a couple of thief characters just to try it out.  As I grew older and turned to more sohpisticated fiction, I discovered historical and literature precedents for the skill, and it seemed a neat application to bring to the gaming table.

The backstab skill, although popular, tends to generate a lot of controversy.  For one, it's hard to find a large group of gamers who will agree to what exactly the backstab skill is.

Having spoken with a number of people on the subject, I've encountered three general schools of thought on the backstab skill.

Anatomy Although perhaps the least plausible, there are a few people who feel that a fictional/fantasy assasin might study a lot of anatomy.  As a result, they know exactly where to stab a person (between the ribs, into a lug, a soft underbelly) who is not prepared to defend themselves against this.  

Flank Attack This is perhaps the most popular, for people who take the literal explanation.  An assassin waits for an opportunity to step behind a person, and then attacks from an advantageous position.  No one except for a skilled contortionist will be able to parry shots coming behind them with full effectiveness, leaving the victim unprepared to defend themselves.

Surprise Attack This personally is my favorite, because it encompases a lot of possibilities, including finding a way to attack someone who is surrounded by guards, or finding a way to stab someone who you are talking to.  What I believe is that a backstab is not taken literally, but rather it is the attempt by any sneaky, sharp-minded and aggressive person to launch an attack on a foe who is not expecting it.  You might be lulling them into a relaxed state, they might be busy reading a book, or unlocking their apartment.  In any event, they aren't prepared for your surprise attack and thus have trouble defending against it.


The possibilities are fascinating.  Nonetheless, regardless of how you mechanically explain the skill, each explanation seems to require that the victim is not prepared for the attack.  After all, if two warriors square of against each other, they're using general combat skills and they aren't really using backstab at all.

A funny thing happened to me a few weeks ago.  Some person used the backstab skill against me about four times in three real life minutes.  In the weeks leading up to this, they'd said and done a number of things that gave me the impression that they didn't really identify with who assassins are and what it is that they do.  Without making any sort of critique of their role-play skills, what I am more interested in finding out is the general sentiments of the player-base.  

Personally, I was trying to imagine myself in that situation, and what my response would be.  It's very feasible that someone might try to stick a knife in my ribs someday.  What if they tried and they were not succesful?  Could they then immediately take two steps behind me and try again?  After that didn't work, could they then hide behind a tree for a minute, and then rush up for a third shot?  And when that shot is unsuccesful, could they put on a fake nose go in for the fourth try, me not expecting any of it?

I suppose that my take on this is that it would be very possible for a skilled person to get a shot in on me.  If this didn't work, I'd probably be really nervous, jumpy and alert.  After that, it would be really really hard to catch me with my guard down for the next twenty-four hours, or the rest of the day.  In essence, I feel that your next shot at me would be when I finally settle down somewhere to get some sleep.

How does everyone else feel?  Is there any sort of limit to how often you can backstab the same person?

Properly roleplayed, I could see backstabbing more often than you suggest...

I find the options you've listed have a bias against backstabbing very often at all.

However, if you can set the situation right?  I could see several times in rapid succession.

Personally, I believe by backstabbing once, with the code, encompasses all the hits you just tried to make. As you can run up behind someone and stab them 6-7 times rather quickly. Using "Backstab," the skill, more than twice a fight is kind of cheasy. Especially when it is one on one, they aren't going to keep walking and not give a damn, they are going to turn with all their might to see what the fuck just stabbed them, or they'll die.

If an assassin Backstabs, and fails completely, at trying to kill something. Then they should see the disadvantage (they tried to kill someone, but failed completely with all the advantages they had) to it and run away for another day, not try to fight because the code says they can. It is similiar in my mind to attacking the same NPC over and over, then resting, then fighting again until you win.

Some may do, i hope the majority don't.

I'm thinking of playing an assassin as one of the next characters. I want to see the hard of work the immortals on 'rinth.. So, the advices of the folks who are used to sneaky 'rinth dwellers will help a lot to me. I have little to none experience with assassins.
So please, experienced ones, one's looking forward to see examples of good RP of backstab training and actual usage of the skill, even a few logs stripped of IC information. Remember I'm a non-native English speaker and it's often hard for me to emote about something I'm alien to.
Thanks in advance to all who spare their time.

I think that a good measurement is per battle as opposed to an IC day.    If someone got backstabbed in the 'rinth and fled immediately (while limping) and the attacker got ahead of him, the attacker can wait in ambush again and again and again.

However, saying that you can miss a backstab and then ninja-teleport behind someone and try another backstab is, to me, very cheesy unless your character is an experienced 35-day elf assassin with AI agility fighting against a super-slow mul or human...and even then.

Backstab, as I see it, requires both knowledge of anatomy and the element of surprise.  This is why you get that prompt after you send in a backstab command.  If you try a backstab, then flee, then hide in the next room and tail the target again in an attempt to land another backstab, that's okay in my book as long as you're not twinky about it.  But backstab isn't just the knowledge that taking a dagger to the heart, throat or through the eye is dangerous.

Look.. I play a Assassin at the moment. Or a guy with the guild Assassin anyway.... and I think this post stupid. One: It is realistic to stab someone in the back more than one day! in fact it is realistic if you're quick enough to backstab someone twice in a fight.  Because backstabs are suprise attacks, aiming for weak spots in the opponents anatomy, and sneaking up behind someone. In fact I've used backstab against a animal before, twice in a row. And that's because my character knew weak spots in the animals anatomy, and sneaked up on him the first time. This is realistic, and plausible. There is nothing to say it's not.

Quote from: "Anoyyed Kank"Look.. I play a Assassin at the moment. Or a guy with the guild Assassin anyway.... and I think this post stupid. One: It is realistic to stab someone in the back more than one day! in fact it is realistic if you're quick enough to backstab someone twice in a fight.  Because backstabs are suprise attacks, aiming for weak spots in the opponents anatomy, and sneaking up behind someone. In fact I've used backstab against a animal before, twice in a row. And that's because my character knew weak spots in the animals anatomy, and sneaked up on him the first time. This is realistic, and plausible. There is nothing to say it's not.

P.S: Just to note I don't think this thread is stupid, but the people who say it's not alright maybe a bit vague on there views. I think this thread is good.

Using backstab on an animal twice? Err.. forgive me but...

1. Outdoor rooms are not rooms assassins can sneak and hide. So, your character does not know to blend in aside a rock or level with the scrubs. You fled, then came back -and the creature saw it, because assassins do not get outdoors sneak and hide- then surprised the creature that actually sees you, possibly even trampling at you? You told the animal "Look behind you! A silt horror!!"?
2. Even at the first attempt, if you aimed surprise, how could you surprise something that's totally aware of you?
3. Knowing animals' anatomy.. Good for you. But, how? Did your assassin even have 'skin', which's crucial to cut up an animal and examine its anatomy? Without cutting up, how could your assassin know where the heart, kidneys, lungs etc. is?
As an example, let's imagine one assassin aims a backstab against a bug. You know that most bugs can still reflexively react for some time even without a brain? (cut off the head of a fly, it still reacts to your touches, even the air currents for long. Stick a needle at its head and it keeps on living as a normal fly.. I know, I was a emotionless torture-fetish bitch in Bio labs but they were boring.) Brain is not crucial. There's possibly only trakea (I'm not sure about the spelling but the system which only has air channels through a bug's body to carry the air) system for respiration which disables any targetting to stop breathing. There's the exoskeleton everywhere, leaving nearly no weak spots if one corpse is not carefully examined before.
I don't think someone not knowing 'skin' should backstab at animals if he doesn't have a friend who hunts daily and knows a lot about animals.. Especially someone already having high archery skill would help more, since that person would know all the spots to aim at for critical arrow-shots.
[Edited to add]
4. Outdoor rooms are 'large'... You need to move from nearly a league to stabbing distance without being noticed, or at least without getting the creature aggravated. If one knew about [insert non-aggie, non-autofleeing NPC animal here] anatomy and moved aside it, offered the creature a tuber, then backstabbed the creature after he emoted the creature approaching, it would be plausible. It would be even way too original and realistic and I would _love_ it. You really think your scenario is fitting to your character's and the animal's abilities and behaviour?
[/Edited to add]
5. I hate when someone charges in hiding his identity to call other people's ideas 'stupid'.. I feel it's fine not to leak IC info, but I find it cheasy and coward when someone logs out just to call other people 'stupid', 'whining' etc.

QuoteLook.. I play a Assassin at the moment. Or a guy with the guild Assassin anyway.... and I think this post stupid. One: It is realistic to stab someone in the back more than one day! in fact it is realistic if you're quick enough to backstab someone twice in a fight. Because backstabs are suprise attacks, aiming for weak spots in the opponents anatomy, and sneaking up behind someone. In fact I've used backstab against a animal before, twice in a row. And that's because my character knew weak spots in the animals anatomy, and sneaked up on him the first time. This is realistic, and plausible. There is nothing to say it's not.

Incredible.  So your character took down an animal of the species, carefully dissected it, and studied where the internal organs were and the bone structures and exactly which gooey bits hurt the worst?

Sorry pal, but I just don't see it your way.  If someone sucker punches me (which has happened before) then I sure as Hell am not going to let them get the drop on me a second time anytime soon... not that hour, not that day, and certainly not that very same fight.

Unless the animal that you backstabbed twice was blind, deaf, and dazed, I don't see any way that you should have been able to do that.  An animal will instinctively do everything it can to lessen its vulnerability, especially when wounded.  Most of them could smell its own blood dripping from your blade if you ran away and came back, or would hear far more of your approach than any humanoid would.

Justify what you're doing, if you want, but to me it reeks of twinkiness.

Yeah, I think you have to be really careful about how you roleplay multiple backstab attempts.

The way I look at it, a "backstab" is a surprise attack, done with the intent of killing (and backed up by some expertise of how to do it).

I can understand maybe getting in a second attempt after running off and regrouping, if the victim is already pretty injured or extraordinarily careless.  But really - more than one or twice?  Unless they are practically dead already, I don't see it.  Especially if other people are around.  How are you going to regain the element of surprise over and over again?   I'd like to see someone explain how you could surprise the same person multiple times in one scene in that way.   If there is a realistic justification, more power to you, but it's hard to imagine.

[/flamewar]

What is unclear from this thread is whether our erstwhile assassin was alone.  If he or she was, then use of backstab might be a problem.  If not?  Well, it might be a different story.
[flamewar]

Okay, back to it, folks.

Morrolan

Personally, I like the 'art of surprise' idea behind backstab. I've never played a backstabbing character personally, but I'm currently playing around with sap, which is similar in a lot of ways. Since it is entirely possible to have the skill without sneak/hide, I would like to think there is enough room for interpretation to get the job done. For example, say I emoted sucker punching someone, then lifting ~mace while they were recovering. Is that good show, or am I being twinking for finding an excuse to use a sneaky skill on someone who is looking me in the face?

As for the poll, I don't like the idea of someone backstabbing someone, sneaking in and out, then backstabbing again. Or however such a string of activities would play out. Backstab is hardcore... The entire idea behind it is the single strike that will drop, or nearly drop, your opponent. If you fuck it up, that's it. You've ruined this particular opportunity. If they chase you, and you lie in wait somewhere, that's great. Amushing someone out from behind a heap of decay is a wonderful use of the skill, I believe. But riddling the same person (or animal) over and over again with backstabs in the same fight doesn't sit right with me.

I have my own opinion on what's right and wrong here but it's really on a case-by-case basis.  But, just because I can't resist, if an ass is fleeing and re-entering the room to perform a backstab, I'd be very interested to hear how they're justifying that.  If the victim flees to another location and the ass meets back up with them, then fine, redo the backstab.  

It's the same with all rogues and their skills.  A thief can't re-enter a room after a failed steal and steal from the same person (stealing from anyone within the vacinity of a failed steal isn't very wise or good form either).  Same general rules for all guilds really.  Magickers can't spam casts until they get one right, merchants can't spam offer continually until they get a good price (this was fixed a few years ago, before that you could just keep trying, heh).

Just for clarification, a backstab doesn't mean someone gets stabbed in the back, it means a someone got hit critically by surprise.  Hit somewhere on their body, and they weren't expecting it.  A lot of newbies get confused by that since the spam messages that follow make assumptions as to how you pulled off the move.  It's really up to the assassin to decide where they hit since the victim doesn't get much of a say.  If it's a real life-death fight then the assassin probably won't take the time to make that clarification emote during the fight though unless they had it prepared already.  

Never played a 'rinther, happy rinthing.    :-)

- HK

QuoteThe twink in the dark, hooded cloak backstabs the heck out of the honorable soldier.
The twink in the dark, hooded cloak flees west.
The twink in the dark, hooded cloak has arrived from the west.
The twink in the dark, hooded cloak backstabs the heck out of the honorable soldier.
...

How's this for a quick, probably-easy-to-do coded solution:
- If the stabber is NOT hidden and the victim is wielding a weapon, backstab is likely to fail.
- If the stabber is hidden, backstab works as usual.

This seems to me like it would work pretty intuitively:
- Assassin walks up to victim in the pub, asks him the time, and backstabs.
- Victim doesn't die, draws sword, and prepares to open a can.
- Assassin flees, returns, and is unable to get in another backstab.

If you're actually worried about being stabbed again (OP: "nervous, jumpy, and alert"), you *should* have your weapons out and be scanning like crazy.  Likewise, if the attacker really can sneak back into the room and hide without you noticing, you're legitimately dead meat.

Another possibility: instead of using weapon-holding to foil repeat-backstabbing, use the "You're too excited to quit!" timer that seems to be turned on after combat.

Quote from: "Ava"Likewise, if the attacker really can sneak back into the room and hide without you noticing, you're legitimately dead meat.

A thief can successfully re-enter and fail a steal from its 2nd time victim and fail a steal from them again, but it's commonly construed as bad form to do this as a thief.  Just because the code lets you doesn't mean you should, is my point.

Besides, a rogue's sneak and hide are not based IC'ly on being "hidden" per se, even though the code makes it seem this way.  A lot of a rogue's sneak and hide are based on blending in with the environment and its people, the fundamental way it's different than wilderness sneak and hide.  If you've been backstabbed, it's very likely people will back away from the icky bloody, almost-dead guy.  This makes a reappearing ass very lonely, sneaking around in that wide open dead space that's just been created, to say nothing of the sudden alertness of the victim.  I'm not saying it can't happen, I'm just saying it better be a pretty believable situation because it wouldn't be easy for that backstabber to repeat his attempt.

- HK

As a side note I haven't read anything but the poll. But just to say, I remember back in the day if an NPC/PC was low enough on hp you could no longer backstab them. You got the stock message:
They are hurt and suspicious.

But that was a long time ago and has since been changed for one reason or another, maybe a coder can chime in, because it's been changed for a while.

RM

Help Backstab wrote:

Quote
This skill is a generic term for 'critical strikes' against an opponent.
The victim of a backstab is not necessarily 'stabbed in the back'-- the
attack could be from any direction. If your character successfully
backstabs someone, the target has been 'hit in a vital location,' and will
be badly injured, the severity of the injury depending on your character's
backstab skill level.

Note that this says nothing about being sneaky, sneaking up, hiding...nothing.  It's a critical strike.  It's roughly equivalent to a warrior landing a brutal slash, in my opinion.

It certainly helps when you've got the element of surprise (and the code reflects this), but it isn't necessary.  It is a roguish critical strike, and anything else you want to roleplay it as is your own business.  You can "backstab" a person as many times as the code will allow.  Should you? Maybe.  The code doesn't set a limit for how many times a warrior can bash, kick, or disarm you, and most people are pretty liberal with their usage of these commands, especially when their succeeding is a matter of life and death (hell, even when it's not).  Sure, backstab can be nasty, but it has severe downsides, too.  (I lost a l337 backstabbing, heartbreaking, ass-whipping assassin a long time ago simply due to the command lag, so don't think it can't happen to you.)  Sure, there are aesthetically pleasing limits within which you should probably stay, but let's be honest with ourselves here:  if the only chance you have at survival is to spam backstab or kick or disarm or bash, chances are, you're going to go down backstabbing and kicking and disarming and bashing and doing whatever the hell it takes to get out alive.  The code sets a maximum limit, and since the limit can be changed, we can infer that the Imms are pleased with the limit as it is, for now.

Edited again to add:  Regarding backstabbing animals.  There are at least two ways to get close enough to a critter to backstab it, and that's on your own.  As far as "vital organs" go...well, it doesn't take a genius to figure out where to stab something to make it hurt, and the code will likely reflect your lack of knowledge for a long time.  Personally, I think if you're an assassin (even an assassin/hunter) on your own in the wilderness, you're a damn fool, with the recent changes to the storm and mount codes.  You'd be safer randomly backstabbing NPCs in the city. Trust me.  If you're with your crew in the boonies, fine. Stab away.  Just be sure to emote a little, so your buddies can get a clear picture of exactly what it is you're doing to that poor little tregil.

Edited to add:  Basically, if you're getting whipped by someone repeatedly backstabbing you, you're probably not good enough or smart enough to beat them toe-to-toe, anyway.  It's one thing to backstab;flee;backstab against an NPC...it's a whole different ballgame against a PC.  Especially one who knows what he's doing.  So, backstab spammers, beware.  You may think you've found a clever way to beat the system...but you'll get yours.  Oh, yes...you'll get yours.  If for no other reason than "what goes around comes around."  Trust me...you ain't the only one with the backstab skill, and some of us have been playing for a looooooooooooooooong time, with more PKills than you have PCs under your belt.  Think about it.  Think real hard.

Because, speaking for myself, it only takes one lame, twinking fool for me to take the gloves off, and I've killed many, many more than have killed me.

I totally agree with Synthesis. It's a critical strike, that's why skilled assassin's can do it while fighting. I personally have had people with guild assassin who worked as hunters and stuff, none of them were actual assassins. (and no they didn't normally use backstab against the animals, but tended to throw a weapon at the animals.... like a spear. Because it's perfectly realistic to throw something at a animal. I might've used backstab once or twice on the animals because like Synthesis says, it doesn't take a genius to work out a animals vital parts... I.E the neck. What do you guys think? do you think it's realistic to backstab animals?

P.S: Oh on the note of it's not safe for a assassin to go out on his own, I totally agree it's not safe, but ICly the guy will not know he has the guild Assassin, and think it's totally safe to go out. And so even if it's not safe for someone with the guild assassin to go out, they ICly don't know that, so they should still go out.

The skill of Backstab is inaccurately named, and if it is not, then it should be taken out. It should be named, Strike, simply.

The skill of Backstab is a skill just like kick and bash and disarm, etc, and the Immortals do not agree, but I'm telling you, for it to be a skill in any other aspect is not cool.

I've played Assassins, and I was very good in H2H, but I never got any good at BackStab, and that's because of the constant crap about BackStab. Don't use this, not here, not in sparring, etc....

I don't think anyone good with BackStab has not twinked in the eyes of the staff. I may be wrong, shit, I prolly am, but I never could figure up how to do it right. Therefore, I'll never play another. I feel like if I can't play it right, there's no use in playing it at all, since I'm no twink.

I'm trying something else now I've never tried, and I hope I can play it cool. But we'll see.

Quote from: "The7DeadlyVenomz"The skill of Backstab is inaccurately named, and if it is not, then it should be taken out. It should be named, Strike, simply.

The skill of Backstab is a skill just like kick and bash and disarm, etc, and the Immortals do not agree, but I'm telling you, for it to be a skill in any other aspect is not cool.

I've played Assassins, and I was very good in H2H, but I never got any good at BackStab, and that's because of the constant crap about BackStab. Don't use this, not here, not in sparring, etc....

I don't think anyone good with BackStab has not twinked in the eyes of the staff. I may be wrong, shit, I prolly am, but I never could figure up how to do it right. Therefore, I'll never play another. I feel like if I can't play it right, there's no use in playing it at all, since I'm no twink.

I'm trying something else now I've never tried, and I hope I can play it cool. But we'll see.

I agree with you in someways, but not in others. I mean it's true that it's hard to get to use backstab, but it's not the staff that tell us not too. I agree it shouldn't be used in sparring, but I think it can be used on animals and when in hunting, unless anyone has any arguments against me.

Quote from: "Ritley"
P.S: Oh on the note of it's not safe for a assassin to go out on his own, I totally agree it's not safe, but ICly the guy will not know he has the guild Assassin, and think it's totally safe to go out. And so even if it's not safe for someone with the guild assassin to go out, they ICly don't know that, so they should still go out.

everyone in zalanthas knows it's not safe for ANYONE to go out of the gates alone.

that's why there are so many people in the cities dealing with the templars and the filth and the overpopulation and the starvation. because IT'S EVEN WORSE OUT THERE.

Quote from: "Agent_137"

Quote from: "Ritley"
P.S: Oh on the note of it's not safe for a assassin to go out on his own, I totally agree it's not safe, but ICly the guy will not know he has the guild Assassin, and think it's totally safe to go out. And so even if it's not safe for someone with the guild assassin to go out, they ICly don't know that, so they should still go out.

everyone in zalanthas knows it's not safe for ANYONE to go out of the gates alone.

that's why there are so many people in the cities dealing with the templars and the filth and the overpopulation and the starvation. because IT'S EVEN WORSE OUT THERE.

I know, but that wasn't my point.

Quote from: "Synthesis"Because, speaking for myself, it only takes one lame, twinking fool for me to take the gloves off, and I've killed many, many more than have killed me.

Sometimes I wonder if this is what Armageddon is for a large fraction of the players: the search for a "lame twinking fool" to feel superior to.

Also, to give this kind of label to someone for some things done while playing a game, quite possibly in good conscience because she is still trying to "get it", and thereby denigrating her entire existence is an extreme overreaction.

Quote from: "Synthesis"Because, speaking for myself, it only takes one lame, twinking fool for me to take the gloves off, and I've killed many, many more than have killed me.

Also, this suggests that your actions in-game are influenced by your OOC perceptions and inclinations, which is not the hallmark of good roleplay. Shouldn't you be writing the account instead?

Too bad you threw this in, because the rest of your post was decent reading.

I think this is one of those situations where the person has broken an OOC trust issue...so you will no longer allow the the courtesy you would any other player...you'll fight them on their terms, which you know better than them.

...that sort of thing.

Personally,  I think that going into a room with an NPC, back stabbing, fleeing, then coming back to backstab it again is twinkish beyond words.  It is as much code abuse as attacking something until you are almost dead, fleeing, sleeping, then attacking again once you are healed.  Clearly, even the stupidest beast is not going to sit there and let you walk over to it and slash it in the jugular more then once.  Just because the code is stupid doesn't mean that you should take advantage of it.

If backstab was supposed to be something you could do multiple times, then it would let you use it like kick where you can do it successfully during a fight.

That said, I think that backstab is utterly impossible to get really good at without twinking out, a lame character concept that lets you slaughter NPCs (animal or 'rinth), imm intervention, or learning from someone who has done one of the above.  I almost wish that the imms would simply lock the skill at the n00b level for everyone and simply only let people raise it through imm intervention.  If you can't practice it through some sort of coded mechanism in training, there is no other way you are going to do it enough times short of slaughtering a pile of NPCs to get good.

Learning backstab on scrabs is like a Ninja heading out into the forest and learning how to backstab on wolves.  It is lame, end of story.  I highly doubt that any decent assassin in history learned how to assassinate people practicing on forest creatures.  I imagine every single one of them practiced, practiced, and then practiced some more.

Quote from: "Rindan"Personally,  I think that going into a room with an NPC, back stabbing, fleeing, then coming back to backstab it again is twinkish beyond words.......

So is it twinkish to flee and just use kill? Honestly it's just a break in combat. And depending on how you view the backstab skill. Whether it's sticking someone in the ribs, the back, the femoral artery in the leg, or even the jugular, whatever. You're just breaking away from combat and trying again.

I say if they are doing it 5+ times on the same NPC yes that's fucked up. But on a PC I say it's fair game.

Quote from: "RunningMountain"So is it twinkish to flee and just use kill? Honestly it's just a break in combat. And depending on how you view the backstab skill. Whether it's sticking someone in the ribs, the back, the femoral artery in the leg, or even the jugular, whatever. You're just breaking away from combat and trying again.

I say if they are doing it 5+ times on the same NPC yes that's fucked up. But on a PC I say it's fair game.

Without question, backstab relies upon NOT being in combat.  This means that you need some element of surprise.  Maybe you can justify sneaking up in a barren wasteland on a wild animal once and backstabbing it, but twice?  That is just silly.  It is going to either flee from you or fight you the second it sees you.  That goes double if you are fighting a humanoid.  If the NPC behaved as it SHOUD, which is to instantly attack or flee, you would not be able to backstab.  The fact that it doesn't is simply because NPCs are stupid.  Just because and NPC is stupid doesn't mean you should use the code to abuse the hell out of it.  Again, it the same as fighting an NPC down until you are almost dead, fleeing, sleeping, then fighting it some more.  It is lame and twinkish.

PCs are the same way.  Unless you manage to hide and actually surprise them, it is lame, lame, lame to backstab more then once.  If they see you coming, they clearly are going to be in a fighting stance and ready for you.  They are effectively 'in combat', even if they have not codedly entered combat.  They might be trying to RP with you instead of instantly handing it off the code or they simply might have a slow connection and can't hit kill before the backstab lag is done.  Backstabbing someone who KNOWS that you are a danger is utterly twinkish.  It is roughly equivalent to the guy who pointedly points their hand on their sword and a twink pick pocket steals it anyways.  In my opinion, it is coded abuse of the worst kind, pure and simple.

If you could bust out a backstab against an opponent who was prepared for you, then you would be able to bust them out during combat.  The fact that you can't spam backstab in combat should be a pretty damn clear indication that it is a maneuver that you can not perform on someone who is staring at you and knows that you are going to try and hurt them.  If you want to backstab a person more the once, surprise them more then once.

Ok. Here's a plan.

I think that Backstab should be removed and replaced with Strike. The helpfile should be revamped and read something along these lines:


Skill Strike  (Combat)  


This skill is a generic term for 'critical strikes' against an opponent. If your character successfully 'strikes' someone, the target has been 'hit in a vital location,' and will be badly injured, the severity of the injury depending on your character's 'strike' skill level.


Syntax:


strike (target)

Example:


> strike raider

Notes:


It is possible, though difficult, to strike fighting victims. It is much easier to open a fight with a strike, but once the foe is fighting, you can still use
a strike against him.

You must always use a 'stabbing' weapon, which is a subset of the
'piercing' category.

Strike is an excellent method of attack if one's presence ought to be
unnoticed by soldiers of city-states. (Of course, any ensuing fight can
attract attention.)

Your character does not need to be hidden for him/her to
attempt a strike. A person who has access to the skill of strike is
considered to have conducted at least rudimentery study on the vital
locations of creatures. Strike is seen to be a reflection of the aggressor
finding the vital locations on a foe and going for those areas, as opposed
to a typical warrior, who hacks and slashs his way to victory in a typically
uneducated manner.

Delay:


before


Strike would be a skill useable in a fight just like kick, bash, etc, but it's delay would be twice as long. This allows a fighter to get good at it without the need to twink it out. It should not be considered a spar-illegal move unless kick and bash and disarm are also illegal in that senario.

This brings us to the hide-attack skill which is so great for assassins and makes them feared. Here's the solution. Instead of backstab, we introduce the idea that hiding and attacking with any weapon at all can increase your damage by 4 times. Instead of saying that only a dagger can instakill you, a skilled hider who is good with his weapon can, instead of doing 20 damage to you, do 80 damage to you. This solves two problems. You can now be a killer with any chosen style, provided you have a good enough hide skill, and, there is no longer any way to classify an assassin from a fighter.

Several other notes are as follows:

Fighters will now have access to the strike skill, as will rangers and assassins. It is no longer solely an assassin talent. Assassins will have the highest cap in it.

The hide and attack feature is additionally available to anyone who has hide skills. However, assassins have an higher cap in hide than any class but thief, and a much higher cap in weapon skills than thieves. Assassins now have the added skills of disarm and bash at a very low cap.

There seem to be two camps regarding the backstab skill.

:arrow:  Backstab is a lethal strike that should only be done with proper amounts of surprise and anatomical knowledge.

:arrow:  Backstab is a strike that takes advantage of the character's training to initiate combat with a crippling attack.

There is merit to both arguements because, like many character skills, backstab is forced to cover so many possible scenarios.  It can be used on an open plain, sparsely wooded forest, shadowed alleyway, cluttered warehouse, immaculate hallway, crowded street and many more, each with their own unique set of conditions.  And just like every other skill, there is a certain degree of maturity, self restraint and patience that should go along with both its practice and use.

Let's address a few of the main complaints/debates:

:!: Backstab shouldn't be practiced on animals.

The main arguement to this point is that an animals behavior and anatomy is not similar enough to that of humanoid to justify learning anything from using the backstab skill.  There is some debate as to how specific the knowledge of anatomy needs to be; obviously eye, throat and head might all be considered universally vulnerable while other locations may depend upon the actual anatomy of the particular beast.

The problem is that backstab consists of more than simply knowing where to strike, it consists of many parts: approach, surprise, timing, aim, delivery, anatomical knowledge and proper application of strength.  Another argument might be that if the majority of these are being performed during the strike, something might be learned.

If backstab would not profit from an exchange with an animal, why would weapon skills (slashing, piercing), bash, kick, archery, etc... be any different?  The reason they do count is because every skill depends on more than one factor to be successful.  There are elements of each skill that can be honed without requiring either the exact target or most common situation for something to be learned.

:!: Backstab shouldn't be used more than once in combat.

The main arguement seems to be if you've already backstabbed someone once, the element of surprise is gone and they won't allow you the opportunity to backstab you again.  This may be interpreted different ways dependant upon the way you feel backstab works as a skill.  Do you need to surprise them with your physical presence (i.e. hiding behind a crate) or could someone surprise you by their movements (i.e. turning around quickly while you are chasing after them)?

There is both a delay before and after a backstab.  Another question would be if you have been backstabbed once, why are you allowing the character to backstab you again?  If your point is that you would engage them before they got another chance, by all means - do it!  If the reason you cannot do it is because the assassin is sneaking/hiding and using the environment to set up an ambush, then perhaps you should consider removing yourself from the equation to avoid getting backstabbed.

Some players have compared backstab to other close quarter combat skills such as kick, bash and disarm, which don't seem to have any of the sames stigmas attached to spamming.  I don't know if some of you have been kicked by a character with a high percentage skill or not, but it's not exactly minimal and doesn't seem to require any surprise to do.  Even if you kicked 15 times in a row, that 16th one comes at me whether I feel my character would anticipate it or not.

:!: You can't increase the backstab skill without twnking.

If you are of the camp that believes backstabbing animals should profit a character nothing and are not in a position to have a line of humanoid adversaries lined up before you, then you may be of the opinion there is no way for you to effectively increase your skill without doing something taht you consider is "twinkish".

A more accurate statement is that backstab will progress slowly if you do not choose to target beasts or have any sort of immediate enemies.  I've made suggestions in past threads that if your character is going to be a trained assassin there are other ways in which to increase your skill (i.e. mentor, dummy practice sessions, preying upon an IC pool such as southerners if you're a northern assassin).

:!: Solution?

I don't agree that the solution is to change backstab to strike and give it to the warrior and ranger classes.  Warriors and rangers are already formidable foes without adding yet another ability to their impressive arsenal.

If multiple backstabs ever became such a problem that the Imm Staff were looking at ways to curb it, I would propose a limitation that was linked with the same flag that disallows you to quit when you've recently fought someone.  The idea that once someone is engaged they are in combat for the next 5 RL minutes.  Make it so that if someone has this in_combat flag on their character, they can only be backstabbed from someone hidden.

This would make it impossible for assassins to perform multiple backstabs anywhere but within the city and require them to sneak/hide if they wanted to make an additional backstab attempt, otherwise it may simply give them a message such as, "The massive, black-eyed man is too excited to approach."

Anyhow, just some points for consideration.

-LoD

Quote from: "Rindan"Personally,  I think that going into a room with an NPC, back stabbing, fleeing, then coming back to backstab it again is twinkish beyond words.  It is as much code abuse as attacking something until you are almost dead, fleeing, sleeping, then attacking again once you are healed.  Clearly, even the stupidest beast is not going to sit there and let you walk over to it and slash it in the jugular more then once.  Just because the code is stupid doesn't mean that you should take advantage of it.

If backstab was supposed to be something you could do multiple times, then it would let you use it like kick where you can do it successfully during a fight.

That said, I think that backstab is utterly impossible to get really good at without twinking out, a lame character concept that lets you slaughter NPCs (animal or 'rinth), imm intervention, or learning from someone who has done one of the above.  I almost wish that the imms would simply lock the skill at the n00b level for everyone and simply only let people raise it through imm intervention.  If you can't practice it through some sort of coded mechanism in training, there is no other way you are going to do it enough times short of slaughtering a pile of NPCs to get good.

Learning backstab on scrabs is like a Ninja heading out into the forest and learning how to backstab on wolves.  It is lame, end of story.  I highly doubt that any decent assassin in history learned how to assassinate people practicing on forest creatures.  I imagine every single one of them practiced, practiced, and then practiced some more.

Difference is Assassins aren't Ninja's, and the other difference is Assassin's are -not- always city based. Some Assassin's might've spent their whole life learning how to sneak up on animals and backstab 'em. Like some Burglars might've spent most of their time in the forest, learning to cut tree's down.  If a Assassin was like a Ninja who spent their whole life learning how to assinate people, then fair game, but if they are assassin's that hunt... e.t.c, then they should be able to backstab on animals provided they have the experiece.

Quote from: "Ritley"Difference is Assassins aren't Ninja's, and the other difference is Assassin's are -not- always city based. Some Assassin's might've spent their whole life learning how to sneak up on animals and backstab 'em.

The problem is that the game already -has- a class for that kind of Assassin.  It's called Ranger.  Assassins don't have wilderness sneak, and therefore couldn't have been learning how to sneak up on animals in the wild, which, BTW is -really- -hard-.  There's a reason that no one in real life goes out hunting animals with a dagger; they use bows or crossbows or guns or thrown spears or slings.  Wild animals run away when they smell/hear/see/feel/psionically sense you coming.  Or, worse, they come after -you-.

I think backstabbing an animal could be appropriate in a -group- hunting situation, but running out there solo with a knife and expecting to backstab a duskhorn?  Sorry, that's just foolish.

Quote from: "joyofdiscord"

Quote from: "Ritley"Difference is Assassins aren't Ninja's, and the other difference is Assassin's are -not- always city based. Some Assassin's might've spent their whole life learning how to sneak up on animals and backstab 'em.

The problem is that the game already -has- a class for that kind of Assassin.  It's called Ranger.  Assassins don't have wilderness sneak, and therefore couldn't have been learning how to sneak up on animals in the wild, which, BTW is -really- -hard-.  There's a reason that no one in real life goes out hunting animals with a dagger; they use bows or crossbows or guns or thrown spears or slings.  Wild animals run away when they smell/hear/see/feel/psionically sense you coming.  Or, worse, they come after -you-.

I think backstabbing an animal could be appropriate in a -group- hunting situation, but running out there solo with a knife and expecting to backstab a duskhorn?  Sorry, that's just foolish.

I'm sorry, but I'd have to say you're wrong. People do it all the time.  And Assassins can still sneak in the wilderness just not as well. The ability to sneak indoors and outdoors are connected to a certain extent.

Desert Elves don't get a chance to pick the assassin guild, so I disagree with you Ritley. Any assassin would learn quickly in their career that trying to sneak up and jump on any animal is going to be 10 times harder than using a bow and an arrow, or throwing a sword at the damn thing.

It's possible, but any independant hunter is soon going to correlate to this thing.

The closer you get to the animal, the closer it gets to you.
The closer it gets to you, the better chance it has of biting you and inflicting any type of wound.
Wounds take time to heal.
If you hunt again, and get hurt, (a 50% chance of getting hurt, since you are already hurt) then you can't hunt anything worthwhile for a longer time.


Any hunter is soon going to realize that getting close enough to kill something has a lot more risk than attacking from a distance. More chances to fuck up, more chances to get nothing, more chances to get hurt.

And dead is dead. If it came there from an arrow at 5 feet, or slipping on 45' High dive only to land on the diving board 3 inches from the water. A dead animal is a dead animal.

Hunting close range is a whole lot harder than hunting with a bow.

Quote from: "Maybe42or54"Desert Elves don't get a chance to pick the assassin guild, so I disagree with you Ritley. Any assassin would learn quickly in their career that trying to sneak up and jump on any animal is going to be 10 times harder than using a bow and an arrow, or throwing a sword at the damn thing.

It's possible, but any independant hunter is soon going to correlate to this thing.

The closer you get to the animal, the closer it gets to you.
The closer it gets to you, the better chance it has of biting you and inflicting any type of wound.
Wounds take time to heal.
If you hunt again, and get hurt, (a 50% chance of getting hurt, since you are already hurt) then you can't hunt anything worthwhile for a longer time.


Any hunter is soon going to realize that getting close enough to kill something has a lot more risk than attacking from a distance. More chances to fuck up, more chances to get nothing, more chances to get hurt.

And dead is dead. If it came there from an arrow at 5 feet, or slipping on 45' High dive only to land on the diving board 3 inches from the water. A dead animal is a dead animal.

Hunting close range is a whole lot harder than hunting with a bow.

Then I will just stick with using throw then  :)

Screw it just rename backstab to critical hit. Heh. Backstab is just the 10 year old word that never got changed.

Quote from: "Ritley"Difference is Assassins aren't Ninja's, and the other difference is Assassin's are -not- always city based. Some Assassin's might've spent their whole life learning how to sneak up on animals and backstab 'em. Like some Burglars might've spent most of their time in the forest, learning to cut tree's down.  If a Assassin was like a Ninja who spent their whole life learning how to assinate people, then fair game, but if they are assassin's that hunt... e.t.c, then they should be able to backstab on animals provided they have the experiece.

Burglars who spend all their time cutting down trees don't get good at lock picking.  Assassins that spend all their time trying to sneak in the wilderness don't get good at sneaking inside of a city.  If you really want to play an outdoorsy character, why on earth would you pick an assassin?  Of all the character classes you could possibly pick, assassin has the most city only skills out of them all.

Maybe you can justify backstabbing an animal once.  I still think it is twinky because of the fact that most animals would either try and stomp you or run, but let's suspend disbelief and say that Zalanthas animals tend to not fear humans.  Doing it more then once is flat out coded abuse.  Further, if this is the manner that you train backstabbing, sneaking through the desert to whack an animal probably larger then you are, you have not learned how to do this in a city better then any idiot warrior who walks through the desert and tries to slash an animal across its neck.  So, if someone is going to "train" backstab in the desert, I hope that they don't turn around and use it in a city, as even though their skills might allow it, they have no real IC training as to how to sneak through a crowd and whack a human.

Assassins learn through practice, practice, and practice.  They don't learn by creating a mountain of bodies.  Even if you can justify in your mind taking your Tuluki to Allanak and randomly assassinating the denizens, you still are going to have to create a horrifically unrealistic mountain of corpses to ever get decent at backstabbing.  The trail to being a skilled assassin should not involve a few hundred dead NPCs, animal or otherwise.  With the rules on using practice weapons being what they are for backstab, the only realistic way to ever get good at backstabbing is imm intervention or for the stars to align and to find a master.

Quote from: "Rindan"Assassins learn through practice, practice, and practice.  They don't learn by creating a mountain of bodies.  Even if you can justify in your mind taking your Tuluki to Allanak and randomly assassinating the denizens, you still are going to have to create a horrifically unrealistic mountain of corpses to ever get decent at backstabbing.  The trail to being a skilled assassin should not involve a few hundred dead NPCs, animal or otherwise.  With the rules on using practice weapons being what they are for backstab, the only realistic way to ever get good at backstabbing is imm intervention or for the stars to align and to find a master.

Rindan, usually you have some great and wonderful insight to offer on every subject you take the time to disciss, but for some reason this whole backstab issue seems to irritate you to the point of being ridiculous.

You don't have to wade through bodies in order to achieve some small measure of success in your training.  I imagine some combination of work on animals, RP with targets or anatomy and natural conflict within the MUD should provide you with enough material to improve the skill.  Most of your desired alternatives propose some kind of way to practice backstab without ever getting into a real fight (i.e. practicing on allies).

And why not?  Warriors do it.  Well, the damage potential for backstab can far outweigh commands such as kick, bash and regular combat.  And because of this difference in potential, the skill should reside within the same realm as skills like archery and sap, spells that inflict damage and situations in combat where you deliver a blow to someone in a subdued position.  

No one in their right mind should ever volunteer to serve as practice for these kinds of activities.  And so that leaves the alternatives people have mentioned as methods by which you could improve the backstab skill.  You may not be comfortable with them, but claiming that immortal intervention is the only way someone can advance in the skill is both incorrect and a bit outrageous.

There are ways to improve.  They may not be swift.  They may not mirror your opinion of how it should be, but they are present if you simply put forth a little effort and accept some playability over realism here and there.  I'm not telling you to go backstab rats like people do, but I'm also not against using the skill occasionally in environments that at least present a somewhat rational explanation.  Why don't I see threads from you on magickers who flamestrike themselves or shooting their friends with "blunted arrows"?

There is advancement beyond Imm intervention.  Whether the situation you create for yourself allows you to take advantage of that advancement is a personal issue, not a code nor playability issue.

-LoD

It's a little iffy, but I can see it.

The assassin stabs (either from the crowds or from the shadows). He immediately backs off and sprints off into the shadows, then sneaks up again and does the same thing. It can happen. The 'rinth is a very shadowy place. The streets of 'nak is a very crowded place.

Quote from: "Rindan"Maybe you can justify backstabbing an animal once.  I still think it is twinky because of the fact that most animals would either try and stomp you or run, but let's suspend disbelief and say that Zalanthas animals tend to not fear humans.  Doing it more then once is flat out coded abuse.  Further, if this is the manner that you train backstabbing, sneaking through the desert to whack an animal probably larger then you are, you have not learned how to do this in a city better then any idiot warrior who walks through the desert and tries to slash an animal across its neck.  So, if someone is going to "train" backstab in the desert, I hope that they don't turn around and use it in a city, as even though their skills might allow it, they have no real IC training as to how to sneak through a crowd and whack a human.

Believe me, if an animal can see/hear you, they're gonna try to stomp you or run away. That's where the sneak and hide skills come into play.

A: "That jozhal right there, he's PISSED and he's coming back for more. Led him this way after that first run, though, so I'll duck behind this dune here until he draws near, and..."

B: "That jozhal right there, he's shook up after that, and he's got a close eye on his surroundings. Gonna take off if he sees anything come near. I'll keep my head low and see if I can get a good angle on him. Then.."

If I know how to masterfully slink through the underbrush and jump out from behind a far more paranoid, alert and aggressive gortok with better sight/hearing than a human, for example, I don't think I'm gonna have a terribly difficult time at least attempting to slink through a bunch of noisy, chattering tavern patrons and planting a knife in some drunkard's back.

Through some part of their methods, the city just suits the assassin like how the wilderness suits the ranger. Just because my ranger hasn't ever left the city doesn't mean he should be disallowed the use of his listen skill when he finally does. Just because it's storming out and they've never fought in a storm before doesn't mean my character should sheath his weapons and let themselves be massacred because I haven't fought in those conditions. There are coded penalties to the use of those skills, but if my character is good enough to overcome these penalties, then I guess they're just plain skilled enough in what they do to supercede the fact that there is a better, more efficient rangerly/assassinly way to go about my business in the wilderness/city. The ability to move silently or strike a vital location (at least on another mammal) is not mutually exclusive to whether or not city streets are present or not.

I'm not sure I'd have an assassin attempt to backstab a giant beetle or something, because beetles don't have necks or obvious vital spots other than right in their heads, and I think that's where they could see you from. But at the same time that doesn't mean I shouldn't be able to try doing just that. I do think it might be good if some sort of penalty was assessed for attempting to backstab certain insectoid creatures, silt horrors, or anything with well-concealed vitals.

Quote from: "Rindan"Assassins learn through practice, practice, and practice.  They don't learn by creating a mountain of bodies.  Even if you can justify in your mind taking your Tuluki to Allanak and randomly assassinating the denizens, you still are going to have to create a horrifically unrealistic mountain of corpses to ever get decent at backstabbing.  The trail to being a skilled assassin should not involve a few hundred dead NPCs, animal or otherwise.  With the rules on using practice weapons being what they are for backstab, the only realistic way to ever get good at backstabbing is imm intervention or for the stars to align and to find a master.

I'm pretty sure creating a mountain of bodies will learn you a little something along the way, Rindan. How do you think these "masters" initially learned how? Granted, it's likely the slower and more risky way to go, but it also may be the most reasonable being that these masters are so rare that the stars must align for you to find them, no?

But it'll also draw ire from places you don't likely want ire from. If you start just murdering citizens in the streets, there WILL be reactions and I think you know this, Rindan. Anyone who chooses this way to learn such a craft will likely meet a very quick end and a mantis head not long after. If this same guy sticks to poking hapless, unaffiliated wanderers that stumble into the wrong alley where he thinks they'll bleed the most, keeps a low profile and doesn't piss anyone off for a long enough time, I don't think it's ridiculous to think they might just learn a thing or two on their own.

I'm getting a little sick of all the self-imposed limits folks are told to have to place on themselves. The assassin is probably the skillset with by far the least flexible overall application to begin with, and is also likely the most difficult to ever grow to a point beyond utter uselessness where it really outshines anyone at anything at all, and even then with a very limited array of unique strengths.

Quote from: "LoD"
Most of your desired alternatives propose some kind of way to practice backstab without ever getting into a real fight (i.e. practicing on allies).

The code is built to advance assuming that you use backstab with a hack and slash mentality.  In other words, it advances the way you expect it to advance if most people train it by going out into the forest and pwning wolves, camping orc spawns, and terrorizing the smurf village.  It advances the way you expect a skill that is used a hundred times would advance.

Unless you make up lame excuses to take your silk clad city based assassin to wander the forest and pwn wolves, you can never expect to slaughter enough NPCs to advance the skill through coded use.  The skill is designed with the idea that you will advance by killing a mountain of NPCs, not that you carefully employ it five times against living and breathing humans.  You need to set out with the intent to murder more times then anyone could ever consider even vaguely realistic unless you are making up excuses to go out and slaughter NPC animals (pwning wolves in the forest).

QuoteNo one in their right mind should ever volunteer to serve as practice for these kinds of activities.

I am fairly sure any person, skilled or otherwise, can modulate between driving a dagger with all of their might into someone's back, and tapping someone on their spine or giving them a moderately forceful whack over a piece of armor.  You can train without the intent to murder.  In the same way we assume a warrior isn't going to intentionally try and gouge out his opponents eye during training, you can assume that an assassin wouldn't intentionally try and cripple his target.  He would hit hard enough to make the blow known and call it a day.  The current code represents this pretty well, even if it is not used.  Backstabbing someone with a training weapon doesn't kill them.  It doesn't even do serious damage.  It whacks off enough HP to say that you got a hit, they felt it, and maybe at the end of the day they will have a bruise as bad as any other sparring injury.

QuoteAnd so that leaves the alternatives people have mentioned as methods by which you could improve the backstab skill.  You may not be comfortable with them, but claiming that immortal intervention is the only way someone can advance in the skill is both incorrect and a bit outrageous.

I never said you couldn't advance backstab.  I am pretty sure I could jack up my backstabbing skills fairly quickly.  I could take my assassin out into the desert and wander around hunt the NPCs for the sake up upping my skills.  You might consider it narrow minded, but that is not how I envision "RPing" the training of my super elite city assassin - murdering animals in the desert.

QuoteWhy don't I see threads from you on magickers who flamestrike themselves or shooting their friends with "blunted arrows"?

Spells can be practiced using 'nil'.  Archery is a skill that someone can expect to use many times in their life time.  If you are a hunter and you kill a few hundred creatures in your life time, you are probably playing the role properly.  That said, I DO think that you should be able to learn archery to a certain level using a target.  A militiaman should be able to learn how to use a bow without ever leaving the city.  He might not ever be as good as a hunter, but he can figure out which end the pointy end is.  Backstab has no 'nil' way of being trained and few people set out with the intent to murder using backstab dozens, much less hundreds of times in their life.

QuoteThere is advancement beyond Imm intervention.  Whether the situation you create for yourself allows you to take advantage of that advancement is a personal issue, not a code nor playability issue.

Here is my real problem.  I can play a mercenary or a military man and spend the next 30 days worth of play time training.  He might see a dozen or so instances of action in his entire life.  The vast majority of his time will be spent training and guarding things that never come under attack.  You can play out the mercenary or military life style without slaughtering hundreds of NPCs and in the end find that when you do enter a real life or death situation your training has paid off.

If you have ever seen the movie Jarhead, that is exactly what I am talking about.  You can do what happens in Jarhead.  Train, train, and train some more, probably be pretty competent at what you do, and never once see action.  Hell, this is the very foundation of most modern militaries.  Most modern militaries never see actions, yet somehow the soldiers have some level of competence that far exceeds an untrained civilian.

This is not the case for assassins.  You can play out the assassin lifestyle in a realistic manner that never once involves leaving the city, but when it comes time to employ your skills one of the half a dozen or so times you can expect to employee it, you will be whacking at them with a n00b backstab skill.  Why?  Because instead of going out scrab hunting or murdering NPCs, you role played training, training, and more training.  Unless an imm intervened and upped your skills or you had a master to use teach at you, you never once made your backstab skills go up.

I would rather people role play and practice in a realistic manner, rather then go find excuses to murder NPCs.  Role play and practice should be the realistic manner of advancement, not stalking the desert.

Quote from: "Rindan"I would rather people role play and practice in a realistic manner, rather then go find excuses to murder NPCs.  Role play and practice should be the realistic manner of advancement, not stalking the desert.

Why is it so difficult for you to imagine a scenario where a PC might have cause to murder PC's and exact some manner of practice out of the real thing in addition to whatever "training" they do in private?  You continue to perpetuate this kind of narrow view that there are no legitimite scenarios in which any PC might actually engage other NPC's or PC's in actual combat without "stalking the desert" or going on "murderous rampages".  You should know better than most from experience that conflict is a very easy thing to find in this game, even moreso when you have cause to seek it out.

Quote from: "Rindan"I am fairly sure any person, skilled or otherwise, can modulate between driving a dagger with all of their might into someone's back, and tapping someone on their spine or giving them a moderately forceful whack over a piece of armor. You can train without the intent to murder.

While I don't agree the code supports a way to train backstab that differentiates between the will to murder and the will to train, perhaps you could champion the cause to institute a 'nil' version of certain skills to allow for the style of training you want.  Something like a "mock" arguement that stops the skill at the point of initiating combat with the same penalties to advancement the magickal counterpart carries.

I'm fairly certain we'll just have to agree to disagree on most of the points regarding backstab since our arguements haven't changed between multiple threads, and I don't wish to continue the same discussion in a new environment.

I'll leave it to say that backstab has been as it is for many, many years without any real need to see it redone.  In the few characters I have had over the past 5 years, there have been precious few that have met the unfriendly point of a knife in my back, and I can't say I'd like that to change.  A smart and well trained assassin should be a valued and rare thing.  If that ever changes, then I'll have the same issues with them as I have with sorcerers being capable of amassing a great amount of power without having to risk life and limb in order to attain it.

-LoD

Quote from: "Rindan"
Unless you make up lame excuses to take your silk clad city based assassin to wander the forest and pwn wolves, you can never expect to slaughter enough NPCs to advance the skill through coded use.  The skill is designed with the idea that you will advance by killing a mountain of NPCs, not that you carefully employ it five times against living and breathing humans.  You need to set out with the intent to murder more times then anyone could ever consider even vaguely realistic unless you are making up excuses to go out and slaughter NPC animals (pwning wolves in the forest).

You know, there is a basic problem to this argument.  It implies that when someone is starting out they actually _kill_ their intended victim.  The reality is - the assassin will likely fail at everything and run away.  To make the try another day.

It is only when an assassin becomes skilled that you'd actually start seeing bodies piling up.

I really don't understand this whole set of arguments.  It is very realistic to make an attempt at someone and to fail - then to get the hell out of dodge.  Or, perhaps, to circle back around and try again.  

You can even make a case for an assassin fleeing from combat, running back into the room, and trying for another backstab - backstab is not directly linked to sneak and / or hide.  There is no requirement to be hidden to backstab.  There is no requirement to be sneaking to backstab.  There is a delay before and after backstab - plenty of delay for an alert PC to either move or make the first attack.

Fleeing against non-aggressive npcs and re-backstabbing is a lot like standing in the room next to some wild beasty and tossing knives at them or shooting them with arrows.  So, if someone considers re-backstabbing lame then I hope they consider shooting at a living target a few times the same way.  Some self restraint is probably a good idea.

Backstabbing against animated npcs or PCs - go nuts.  The code handles those last few steps and you can imagine them to be anything you like - from someone up on their tippy-toes to feinting in one direction to lure a person to expose a weak spot.

I don't see much wrong with backstabbing animals - you are going through the basic movements of the attack.  It is the same as kick being used on a gith, halfling, half-giant, scrab, or bahamet.  The basic mechanism of the kick is the same although where one kicks differs.  

I just don't understand the basic crux of the arguments here - why is backstab being treated so differently for the sake of this discussion from any other combat skill?  The fundamentals are similar no matter the target one makes use of the skill.  This is the same with archery, throw, kick, bash, disarm, and any of the weapons skills.  

If arm had a more robust combat system where it took into account one's proficiency against creature types I can see people using the argument to great effect.  But arm's combat system does not differentiate between fighting a human versus fighting a mekillot.

At the same time, why not:

1. Make backstab obsolete.
2. Implement a combination of the hide skill and a weapon skill, which simply amplifies natural damage, and give assassins the best possible results, if not the only results.

I really think that this would be the best all-around solution.

because that would be too far from the norm.

What?

I dunno, V.  I'd rather it were a skill so you can get better at it.

I understand that.

But, then again, wouldn't the same thing still be happening, since you'd be using a combination of the weapon skill being used and the hide skill to create situational results, and the higher your skill in, say, slashing and hide, the better multiplier you get for your end damage...

For number's sake:

You have hide at 10.
You have sword at 10.

You get a final damage total of 8. Shiiiity damage.

But ... hide and sword are added together for a total of 20. Your damage total of 8 is divided by 20 for a result of .4. 0.4 means that the initial damage will be multiplied by 4, for a total of 32.

By the end of this equation, your newbie assassin has landed a hit, from hiding, at 32 damage.

Someone will argue that suddenly, assassins will be overpowered. But how? They still won't hit a warrior 99 percent of the time, or a ranger 70 percent of the time. But geez, they really should be able to scar a fucking merchant right off the bat. Let's be realistic here.

I agree.
Let's fix it by making backstab easy to do, hard to learn?

Quote from: "Maybe42or54"I agree.
Let's fix it by making backstab easy to do, hard to learn?

Wouldn't that be what it is now?

I don't think any changes are needed for backstab.  It plays its role, provides  a couple of classes with a unique tool and doesn't seem to off balance the game in any gross way.  Why add work to something that isn't broken?

-LoD

There is another discussion again backstab, and I see very similar points are being covered.  So I won't touch there.

But in response to original post, I don't see anything wrong with backstabbing the same person twice, or more.  Especially if it is done on PCs.  Because a PC has the advantage of fast-thinking and quick-retailating being behind the character, just like the assassin does.  So if an assassin has backstabbed you, scored a hit, and if you just whacked him a bit in melee, then he fled, yes, he might come again and score a hit.  So you better solve the problem real quick.

1) Bash the assassin.  Do not let him freely run away and come back, and do what he does the best in his career.
2) You hit him first.  The code does give you the advantage over that.  The assassin has to be measuring his strike or surprising you with a feint, sure.  So he needs time (codewise, it is the backstab delay), and you should not give him that time.  Follow him where he ran to, you hit first, and do not give him time to use a trick.
3)  If you think you might not survive another hit, and if you think the assassin was too quick in fleeing and quicker in hiding, then you run too.  Run away, and keep moving.  Do not slow down, and give the assassin a chance to spot your flank again.

Basically this is all you should be doing.  An assassin might flee, and backstab you again, but you have enough options to stop that.  Since you have some way to avoid it, it can not be unfair from the assassin's point of view.

In the case of NPCs, it still can be considered a fair game.  Why, most of the NPCs get aggro once you attack them, and follow after you, and attack you anyway.  Since they do not have any delay, they have a pretty good chance to avoid your second backstab anyway.  Still, I can understand if someone does not like a multiple backstabber if he is doing it to kill an NPC, because NPCs are like mindless zombies and staff can't be watching would be assassins all the day to make it realistic from the NPCs point of view.

QuoteYou can even make a case for an assassin fleeing from combat, running back into the room, and trying for another backstab - backstab is not directly linked to sneak and / or hide. There is no requirement to be hidden to backstab. There is no requirement to be sneaking to backstab. There is a delay before and after backstab - plenty of delay for an alert PC to either move or make the first attack.

QuoteFleeing against non-aggressive npcs and re-backstabbing is a lot like standing in the room next to some wild beasty and tossing knives at them or shooting them with arrows. So, if someone considers re-backstabbing lame then I hope they consider shooting at a living target a few times the same way. Some self restraint is probably a good idea.

QuoteBackstabbing against animated npcs or PCs - go nuts. The code handles those last few steps and you can imagine them to be anything you like - from someone up on their tippy-toes to feinting in one direction to lure a person to expose a weak spot.

QuoteI don't see much wrong with backstabbing animals - you are going through the basic movements of the attack. It is the same as kick being used on a gith, halfling, half-giant, scrab, or bahamet. The basic mechanism of the kick is the same although where one kicks differs.

QuoteBut in response to original post, I don't see anything wrong with backstabbing the same person twice, or more. Especially if it is done on PCs. Because a PC has the advantage of fast-thinking and quick-retailating being behind the character, just like the assassin does. So if an assassin has backstabbed you, scored a hit, and if you just whacked him a bit in melee, then he fled, yes, he might come again and score a hit. So you better solve the problem real quick.

QuoteIn the case of NPCs, it still can be considered a fair game. Why, most of the NPCs get aggro once you attack them, and follow after you, and attack you anyway. Since they do not have any delay, they have a pretty good chance to avoid your second backstab anyway. Still, I can understand if someone does not like a multiple backstabber if he is doing it to kill an NPC, because NPCs are like mindless zombies and staff can't be watching would be assassins all the day to make it realistic from the NPCs point of view.

So... from this conversation I have gathered the following.

1)  You can launch a backstab at any time.  Backstab is a code word for "launching critical strike on any opponent at any time, regardless if they know it is coming or not".  So, if the warrior is dropped into a combat stance and beckoning you to come get some you can backstab him past his readied weapons and in the face.

2)  If an NPC or PC doesn't stop you from performing a follow up backstab, that is their fault.  NPCs and PCs that don't implicitly type kill can not stop your attempted backstab.  They are fair game.  You can use backstab against a target as many time as the target lets you.  If it is a stupid NPC that doesn't agro once you flee and return, that is okay.  Backstab away.

3)  This isn't a city based skill.  It is a-okay to do it in the desert, city, or anywhere the code lets you.  If you can type 'backstab' and get a hit off before something stops you, it is fair game.

4)  Backstabbing animals is a fine way to get awesome at backstab.  This is a fine way for an assassin to learn the fine art of sneaking up on someone and killing them.  You can use killing stuff in the desert as a valid method of training.

So, next time I want to make a Kuraci assassin I am gathering that it is a-okay to run find an animal, backstab it, flee, back stab, flee, rinse and repeat until it is dead.  This is good RPed use of backstab as it simply is a critical strike that can be performed on anything that doesn't jump into combat with you before the delay finishes.  Further, this is a perfectly reasonable to train backstab.

I take back everything I said about backstab being hard to train because there is no realistic way to train.  If the above is a-okay and realistic, then backstab is a terribly easy skill to train.  Go make a northerner, wander out into the plains, and just stab back stabbing stuff.  RP out that you are training to become a super elite assassin while you do this, and everything will be fine and realistic.

I personally always suffered under the delusional belief that the path to being an assassin came through constant RPed training with the occasional coded assassin game with a partner.  Turns out alls I needed was a desert, a knife, and a few NPCs.

I will not argue on animal killing NPCs.  There might be some instances an assassins going on animals can be called fair.  So I would rather not go and argue whether it is bad RP or not for an assassin to go backstabbing animals.  In general, assassins are not meant to be lurking in the wilderness looking for a kill.  Their skills are meant to be used in the cities, and it is not very reasonable for an assassin to be backstabbing animals just because he can.  But there might be a reason.  I think a year or so ago, some anon poster started a backstab thread with a long post, explaining how reasonable for his character to use backstab on animals.  It is a whole different thread to talk about whether it is realistic to be assassin-hunting-animals than just mentioning it as a derailment here, I think.

In the case of original post again, I will restate my opinion:  It is a fair game if it is done on PCs.

For first, fleeing from combat is not running away for miles.  It is backing away from the fight.  The code does not support you from breaking the combat, by retreating several meters, you have to flee all the way to the other room.  Realistically, you can fight somebody in the same room, breaking from the fight, and starting again all over the room.  But code does not give you that.  That is why it looks silly, running away a room and coming back.  It might quite be like, you are stepping away from the melee range, and just returning back into it.
It is even more silly in the desert (because of the desert rooms being rather huge), since in the desert you are running away like a few miles away just to stop punching someone.  Which is ridiculous beyond words.

Second, surprising someone a second time is not that difficult.  Back away from the fight, if the guy is chasing after you and trying to keep it in melee, make a sharp turn, there you have your surprise element.  If your opponent is standing there , and not following after you backed away from the fight, stop, watch his movements.  And start launching into melee, keep watching his move, make a feint, and attempt a strike from where he is not expecting.  If your opponent is running away from you after you backed away, start following, catch him, stab in the back.

Anyone read Salvatore?  In the book, "The halfling's gem" there is a fight of a master assassin and blademaster.  And the assassin does surprise his victim twice.. (or was it more?)
So realistically I think you can picture the action in your mind.  I can picture it in my mind.  

And if it is realistic, all we are left is with the code.  Codewise, the assassin does get the penalty of the backstab delay for running away and closing in for another backstab again.  And the defender does get the advantage of choosing whether running away, or avoiding, or pressing on first to not give the assassin that advantage, or can press on the assassin (bash) to not give him the chance to back away from the fight.

Quote from: "Rindan"If an NPC or PC doesn't stop you from performing a follow up backstab, that is their fault. NPCs and PCs that don't implicitly type kill can not stop your attempted backstab. They are fair game. You can use backstab against a target as many time as the target lets you. If it is a stupid NPC that doesn't agro once you flee and return, that is okay. Backstab away.

I am not saying it is PC/NPC's fault.  I am saying there are ways to avoid it.  Against a PC I do believe it is a fair game.  Against an NPC, it is more of a gray area, I would rather not say if it is alright or not, but since NPCs are not controlled by someone else, it can be called unfair.  They do have some way to avoid it, but it is not the same as it is with the PCs.

So, what I see is: it is realistic therefore RPable, and the code backs it up.  I think it is a fair game to retreat and attempt a surprise again.
(Can be arguable for some NPCs)

Quote from: "Rindan"This is good RPed use of backstab as it simply is a critical strike that can be performed on anything that doesn't jump into combat with you before the delay finishes.  Further, this is a perfectly reasonable to train backstab.

I take back everything I said about backstab being hard to train because there is no realistic way to train.  If the above is a-okay and realistic, then backstab is a terribly easy skill to train.  Go make a northerner, wander out into the plains, and just stab back stabbing stuff.  RP out that you are training to become a super elite assassin while you do this, and everything will be fine and realistic.

I personally always suffered under the delusional belief that the path to being an assassin came through constant RPed training with the occasional coded assassin game with a partner.  Turns out alls I needed was a desert, a knife, and a few NPCs.

I think the point people were trying to make, Rindan, is that there could be times, with proper RP, that some of these things that people have said are no good, actually would be IC and not twinkish.  There are situations/times...with the proper RP.  Do it like a spam-hunting ranger, you're doing it wrong, yeah.  That's not what anyone is saying.

Quote from: "Rindan"

Quote from: "Ritley"Difference is Assassins aren't Ninja's, and the other difference is Assassin's are -not- always city based. Some Assassin's might've spent their whole life learning how to sneak up on animals and backstab 'em. Like some Burglars might've spent most of their time in the forest, learning to cut tree's down.  If a Assassin was like a Ninja who spent their whole life learning how to assinate people, then fair game, but if they are assassin's that hunt... e.t.c, then they should be able to backstab on animals provided they have the experiece.

Burglars who spend all their time cutting down trees don't get good at lock picking.  Assassins that spend all their time trying to sneak in the wilderness don't get good at sneaking inside of a city.  If you really want to play an outdoorsy character, why on earth would you pick an assassin?  Of all the character classes you could possibly pick, assassin has the most city only skills out of them all.

Maybe you can justify backstabbing an animal once.  I still think it is twinky because of the fact that most animals would either try and stomp you or run, but let's suspend disbelief and say that Zalanthas animals tend to not fear humans.  Doing it more then once is flat out coded abuse.  Further, if this is the manner that you train backstabbing, sneaking through the desert to whack an animal probably larger then you are, you have not learned how to do this in a city better then any idiot warrior who walks through the desert and tries to slash an animal across its neck.  So, if someone is going to "train" backstab in the desert, I hope that they don't turn around and use it in a city, as even though their skills might allow it, they have no real IC training as to how to sneak through a crowd and whack a human.

Assassins learn through practice, practice, and practice.  They don't learn by creating a mountain of bodies.  Even if you can justify in your mind taking your Tuluki to Allanak and randomly assassinating the denizens, you still are going to have to create a horrifically unrealistic mountain of corpses to ever get decent at backstabbing.  The trail to being a skilled assassin should not involve a few hundred dead NPCs, animal or otherwise.  With the rules on using practice weapons being what they are for backstab, the only realistic way to ever get good at backstabbing is imm intervention or for the stars to align and to find a master.

Ok, I won't backstab animals then.  That was not my point anyway, I was saying if a assassin trained all his life to hunt animals, he could backstab them. Of course it wouldn't be realistic afterwards to become a assassin for a city, but that was not what I was saying.

Reason I would choose a assassin even if he might be outdoorsy would be according to his background, not how I can get the biggest advantage, and make things easier for myself. So... for example say if his background included him being a assassin once upon a time, but now he wanted to be... let's say... a desert wanderer, I would pick assassin instead of ranger. Reason is because he is more of a assassin in his background than he is ranger.

This is what I got out of your conversation:

Quote from: "Rindan"So, next time I want to make a Kuraci assassin I am gathering that it is a-okay to run find an animal, backstab it, flee, back stab, flee, rinse and repeat until it is dead.  This is good RPed use of backstab as it simply is a critical strike that can be performed on anything that doesn't jump into combat with you before the delay finishes.  Further, this is a perfectly reasonable to train backstab.

I take back everything I said about backstab being hard to train because there is no realistic way to train.  If the above is a-okay and realistic, then backstab is a terribly easy skill to train.  Go make a northerner, wander out into the plains, and just stab back stabbing stuff.  RP out that you are training to become a super elite assassin while you do this, and everything will be fine and realistic.

I personally always suffered under the delusional belief that the path to being an assassin came through constant RPed training with the occasional coded assassin game with a partner. Turns out alls I needed was a desert, a knife, and a few NPCs.

All people are saying is that there are viable options for the use of backstab outside of the two methods of skill advancement you continue to tout as the only acceptable practices: Imm intervention and RP'd training with a partner.

To reinforce what spawnloser mentioned, there are times when it may be appropriate to hunt quickly, or to disarm in quick succession, or to run and then attempt to grapple someone.  I do believe it would be considered twinkish by players and staff alike to flee;backstab an animal, but not to flee;backstab someone chasing you through an alleyway.  The problem is you cannot label a "practice" as good or bad because there will be situations when it is "bad' and situations when it is "good".

This issue is not black and white, and you simply refuse to see the grey.

-LoD

Thank you, Wikipedia.

Assassination Techniques

It is entirely likely that the first strategy used by a political or religious killer was a remarkably simple one: find the leader and stab or bludgeon them to death with whatever weapons were available. This would likely have occurred only in close-knit groups where security was not thought needed, such as amongst nomadic or early sedentary peoples in Mesopotamia where disagreements would be solved with vigilantism (however it is important to note that information from this far back is very sketchy and debatable in nature). As civilization took root, however, any leaders in groups began to have more and more a position of importance, and they would become more detached from the groups they ruled. For the first time, subterfuge would become a major factor in engaging in assassination.

From ancient times, then, through to the medieval period, as the rate of technology was slow so, too, would be the changes in assassins' tactics. Infiltration was now the name of the game, and commonly a would-be killer would attempt to gain access to an official or person's guard or staff and utilize a variety of methods for exterminating them, be it the same close-contact stabbing or smothering or a more advanced method, such as using poison to induce death. This, however, must be distinguished from efforts by a person or group to remove a person in order to replace them in the power structure; for more on this, see coup d'état.

With the advent of gunpowder and far more effective ranged weaponry, however, bodyguards were no longer enough to hold back determined killers, who no longer needed to directly engage or even subvert the guard to kill the leader in question; it could be done from a great distance in a crowded square or even at a church, as with the Pazzi Conspiracy, for example. Often, muskets or rifles might be used to take down a leader from a rooftop, at greater distance, dramatically increasing the chances for survival of an assassin. Also, explosives became increasingly en vogue for deeds requiring a larger touch; for an example of this, see the article on the Gunpowder Plot to blow up Parliament on the state opening.

In whatever case, it is interesting to note that just because more modern methods of killing became available does not mean older ones were replaced; indeed, in nations like India killings by knife or sword remain quite popular, as they do in sub-Saharan Africa (for example, with the machete). In fact, since the development of gunpowder each region of the world seems to have its preferred methods of contract murder; besides those mentioned, explosives are quite popular in not only the Middle East but in most of Europe as well, save Northern Europe where shootings become more common, whereas in the Americas assassinations are almost exclusively performed by gunshot. One can make various cases for any of these, including range, detectability, concealability, likelihood of kill, etc.

As the Renaissance gave way to the Industrial Revolution, assassination became more and more sophisticated, right up to today. Explosives, especially the car bomb, became far more common, and grenades and landmines were not unheard of either, especially in the Middle East and Balkans (the initial attempt on Archduke Franz Ferdinand's life was with a grenade; he was on his way to visit an aide injured in the first attack when his driver stopped to ask directions and he and his wife were shot). Also, Rocket propelled grenades (RPGs) became an especially useful tool, given the popularity of armored cars discussed below. Today, any manner of different techniques for the elimination of an enemy - popular or not - might be utilized; the sky, as it were, is the limit. One remarkable recent example involved a political figure who made the mistake of keeping to a regular route and schedule. Assassins were able to plan for his travel, and detonated an explosive charge beside the roadway, which propelled a metal plate through the target's vehicle at lethal speed, killing him.

One option glamorized in the media is using a sniper rifle, such as the L96. The problem with this method is that using a sniper rifle generally attracts the attention of police and government authorities, which every smart bounty-hunter wishes to avoid. A far more useful tool is the handgun. Deployed correctly and left at the scene of the incident, the completion of the contract can even be portrayed as a suicide.

Thank you again, Wikipedia

One of the earliest forms of defense against assassins is without doubt the bodyguard. Essentially, the bodyguard functions as a counter-assassin, attempting to neutralize the killer before they can make contact with or inflict harm upon the "principal", or protected/targeted official. This function was often executed by the leader's most loyal warriors, and was extremely effective throughout most of early human history, to the point where a direct assassination had to be replaced with carefully-planned subterfuge, such as poison (which was answered by the food taster such as the Beefeaters protecting the English monarchs), and even then such methods were often thwarted. Notable examples of bodyguards would include the Roman Praetorian Guard or the Ottoman janissaries — although, in both cases, it should be noted that the protectors often became assassins themselves, exploiting their power to make the head of state a virtual hostage at their whim or eliminating threatening leaders altogether. Indeed, assassinations both then and today are most often effective when they have the support, tacit or open, of other powerful figures. This is less a concern in the West, where organizations such as the British Special Branch and American Secret Service are noted as well-trained and apolitical protective forces. Disloyal protectors continue to be a problem in developing nations, however; Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi met such an end in 1984.

The race was on with the Middle Ages between leaders and assassins as gunpowder became predominant, each in turn trying to develop stronger and better checks against the increasing abilities of the other. One of the first reactions was to simply increase the guard, creating what at times might seem a small army trailing every leader; another was to begin clearing large areas whenever a leader was present, to the point where entire sections of a city might be shut down. Heads of state began to cease taking their armies onto the field personally around this time as well, although this was likely as much due to the increasing skills required for generalship and division of power within the government as it was for safety concerns.

As the 20th century dawned, the prevalence of assassins and their capabilities skyrocketed, and so did measures to protect against them. For the first time, armored cars or armored limousines were put into service for safer transport, with modern versions rendering them virtually invulnerable to small arms fire. Bulletproof vests were also commissioned, though not often used for political reasons. Access to famous persons, too, became more and more restrictive; potential visitors would be forced through dozens of different checks and double-checks before being granted access to the official in question, and as communication became better and information technology more prevalent, it has become next-to-impossible for a would-be killer to get close enough to the personage at work to effect an attempt on his or her life, especially given the common use of metal and bomb detectors. As such most modern assassinations have been committed either during a public performance or during transport, both due to weaker security and security lapses, such as with US President John F. Kennedy or as part of coups d'état where security is either overwhelmed or completely removed, such as with Patrice Lumumba and possibly also Salvador Allende.

Some of the wilder and arguably stranger methods used for protection by famous people of both today and yesterday have evoked many reactions from different people, some resenting the separation from their officials or major figures, some comforted by the security and some lamenting the state of society that such measures are necessary. One example might be traveling in a car protected by a bubble of clear bulletproof glass, such as the Popemobile of Pope John Paul II (built following an extremist's attempt at his life). Frederick William I of Prussia had an entire command of soldiers above two meters of height, and would reportedly go to great lengths to obtain more. Many leaders, such as Josef Stalin or the Argentinean junta were so possessed by paranoia that they executed their opponents en masse, with the death toll ranging from hundreds to millions. Still others go into seclusion, rarely heard from or seen in public afterwards, such as writer Salman Rushdie or eccentric inventor Howard Hughes, though it is more likely that Hughes was concerned about germs than about assassination. A more exotic form of protection is the use of a body double. A body double in this case is a person who is built similar to the person he is expected to protect and made up to look like him. The body double then takes the place of the person in high risk situations. Fidel Castro, Adolf Hitler and Saddam Hussein are known to have used body doubles.

It is important to note that, in the final analysis, it is thought by many that if a person or group is committed beyond reason or concerns for self-preservation towards the removal of a certain person or leader from not only their position but this plane of existence, then the chances are better than fair that any security measures taken will come to naught. The ninja of Japan and suicide attackers are both groups known for pursuing every avenue for however long necessary to accomplish their 'hit'. Often, such people or groups would operate without concern for their own life in order to gain the slightest chance of eliminating their mark. Certain leaders, notably Abraham Lincoln, were thought to have wrestled with this supposed inevitability during difficult times (with some, like Lincoln's, proving prophetic). In the end it comes down to will - if the will of the would-be assassins to execute their target surpasses that of their security to save them, or the will of the targeted person to survive, then success for a killer may be a matter of time.

Well LoD, I looked for and found your secret message too.

Quote from: "LoD"
All people are saying is that there are viable options for the use of backstab outside of the two methods of skill advancement you continue to tout as the only acceptable practices: Imm intervention and RP'd training with a partner.

To reinforce what spawnloser mentioned, there are times when it may be appropriate to hunt quickly, or to disarm in quick succession, or to run and then attempt to grapple someone.  I do believe it would be considered twinkish by players and staff alike to flee;backstab an animal, but not to flee;backstab someone chasing you through an alleyway.  The problem is you cannot label a "practice" as or bad because there will be situations when it is "bad' and situations when it is "good".

This issue is not black and white, and you simply refuse to see the grey.

Sadly, you missed my real secret message.

QuoteSo, next time I want to make a Kuraci assassin I am gathering that it is a-okay to run find an animal, backstab it, flee, back stab, flee, rinse and repeat until it is dead. This is good RPed use of backstab as it simply is a critical strike that can be performed on anything that doesn't jump into combat with you before the delay finishes. Further, this is a perfectly reasonable to train backstab.

I take back everything I said about backstab being hard to train because there is no realistic way to train. If the above is a-okay and realistic, then backstab is a terribly easy skill to train. Go make a northerner, wander out into the plains, and just stab back stabbing stuff. RP out that you are training to become a super elite assassin while you do this, and everything will be fine and realistic.

I personally always suffered under the delusional belief that the path to being an assassin came through constant RPed training with the occasional coded assassin game with a partner. Turns out alls I needed was a desert, a knife, and a few NPC.

Joking aside, I my core point is that as an assassin, there is a certain lifestyle you are expected to live.  Utterly ignore code for just a few seconds.  If you lived on a vast desert planet where the only centers of civilization were two cities, and you wanted to train to be an assassin for clan X, how would you really do it.  Again, ignoring the game and the code of a moment, what are the steps you would go through to become a better assassin for House Borsail or the Tuluki templarate?  Would any of them involve leaving the city?  Would it involve a partner to train with?  How many times in your life would you really expect to swing your blade with the intent to kill?

These are the questions I ask well before I start asking what the code will allow me to do.  I don't know about you, but when I answer those questions without thought to how the code works or how skills advance, wandering in the desert is roughly the last thing that comes to my mind.  I don't expect an assassin to swing his blade with the intent to murder more then a dozen times in his life.  If you are a super assassin, you might attempt a few dozen kills over the course of your entire life.  

What I see in an assassin is a lifestyle of training and discipline.  Sure, at the end of the road their might be a chance to put your skill to the test, but for the most part it is a mentality of training and practice for a singular purpose of the utmost danger and importance.  I think that when an assassin finally goes to actually kill someone, it isn't the hundredth time he has swung his blade with murder on his mind.  It is his first time or second time.  When your moment of murder came, you would learn a lot.  It wouldn't take a hundred kills to become a master.  An assassin who has made just five kills over the course of his life is veteran, and he probably learned a lot from all five kills.

Now, when we bring code into the game you can certainly kludge into place ways of whacking a few NPCs.  Join Kurac or Byn and go out on patrols and backstab everything you run across.  If you are a lone Tuluki looking to work for the Templerate you can certainly go 'hunting' for skins and 'critical strike' every NPC you hunt in the face.  If you are a 'rinther, well, I am sure you can think of something.

Personally, if I set out to really role play an assassin, I would want to play it as an assassin, not a weak mercenary/soldier who can critical strike people in the face.  My assassins don't go hunting wolves in the woods, and they don't make up reasons to go use the code.  My mercenaries don't slaughter Gith to get better, my pick pockets don't steal things they don't really want or sneak when they don't have to, and my military men don't go out hunting to get better weapon skills.  Thankfully, in all the above instances the code gives you plenty of ways to advance your profession without resorting to blatant NPC slaughter or twinkish behavior.  I don't make an exception for assassins.  If my military guy can live without ever setting foot in the 'rinth or desert, so can my assassins.  That might screw you over code wise unless there is imm intervention, but I think it is better then the alternative.

I agree with Rindan's point of view, and I agree with LoD, as well, since via different view points, you still both come to a realistic solution.

My biggest issue with the current method is the confusion around the entire backstab skill as a whole. Is it safe to train it this way, and can I be IC about it, etc, etc, etc.

This is the reason why I think that either the parameters around the backstab skill must be changed, or, my solution must be put into effect. Doing either of these things should change the murky cloud surrounding the path of a killer.

Quote....you wanted to train to be an assassin for clan X, how would you really do it.  Again, ignoring the game and the code of a moment, what are the steps you would go through to become a better assassin for House Borsail or the Tuluki templarate?

Rindan, I don't necessarily disagree with what you've said. There's only one problem: that entire post of yours assumes that just because your skillset is that of an assassin, this is the kind of life you chose and this is the only kind of life you can choose which could put those skills to work. In truth, anyone of virtually any profession could have this skillset, but only those who fight and kill (or plan to fight and kill) for a living would really put this aspect (critical strikes, surprise attacks, the "backstab" skill) of their talents into play. While instruction may be one way to learn what makes things bleed the most, plain-and-simple personal experience in attempting to make things bleed suddenly and without warning cannot be discredited.

As others have said, no one necessarily believes that backstab should not be used with any amount of personal responsibility and realism in mind, but skill improvement derived from everything aside from the teach command or Immortal intervention should not be ruled out as impossible, unrealistic, and twinky.

If that were actually the case, you'd think that the skill would simply have been made so that it were literally impossible to learn outside of those two methods, which I'm sure would not be difficult at all to code.

I was just about to write exactly what Conspiracy Theory wrote.

A class does not make the role

The most successful assassins that I've ever known about in Arm were not assassin class.

Being a successful assassin is a different discussion than talking about the backstab skill.

Quote from: "marko"The most successful assassins that I've ever known about in Arm were not assassin class.

If what you say is true, and it applies to the mud as a whole, then the assassin class is underpowered.

Why does a class called "assassin" even exist if it's easier to become an assassin by selecting another class?

The fact that you don't have to live your life as an assassin if you pick the assassin class is rather irrelevant to the discussion at hand.

The fact that there's a dusty post in Ask the Staff which asks for a realistic way to train the backstab skill that none of the staff saw fit to respond to, is more relevant.

I have to agree with Rindan that if you want to get good at killing humans, going out into the wastes and practicing killing bizarre creatures whose only resemblance to humans is that both species possess limbs seems rather silly.

It also seems imminently fatal.

Wandering around the city and murdering people you don't like seems like a slightly better way to learn how to kill humans, since such an activity involves the killing of humans.

It however, also seems imminently fatal.  On a world like Zalanthas, it won't be long before you try to kill the wrong person.  No friends and neighbors, it won't be long at all.

Some organizations have entire groups of spies and assassins in their clan documentation.  Since they exist, it seems rather implicit to me that the leaders of of these organizations have discovered a training regimen to make their recruits into effective killing machines that doesn't kill 90% of them.  Because organizations, you know, don't tend to last long if that happens.

Of course, as far as I've seen, all of these organizations have something in common in that they're virtual.

So I ask again, why does a class called assassin even exist when the current environment doesn't support it?

I was always under the impression that some clans do train player assassins, and have effective options to do so. Once upon a time, I was part of a clan who did this, and the person in question never needed to go out and stab random animals or humans. Could be that it takes a crafty leader PC to do this, I dont think the tools are available to anyone who feels the urge to train some pet assassins.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"So I ask again, why does a class called assassin even exist when the current environment doesn't support it?

Each guild is not defined by one particular skill, but a collection.

The assassin[/i] class is a grouping of skills, nothing more.  You can choose to label the guild whatever you wish since much of the documentation and skill names has not changed significantly from its Diku roots.  The grouping of skills, however, does provide a player with a good variety of abilities with which to approach, observe, hunt and kill their prey.

No one has said that you cannot practice backstab as Rindan suggests, but I'll be damned if I ever agree to subject any character to anything but the RP preceeding the actual coded strike.  I completely understand Rindan's point, and if we were striving to make some perfect and realistic replica of how it might be accomplished on Earth, then fine.

My problem with using backstab in practice is twofold:

One is that the code doesn't differentiate between when you are "practicing" the skill and when you are trying to use it to murder someone.  This applies to all of the combat oriented skills, but is especially valid when considering a skill that has as much potential for real and serious injury as a strike specifically aimed for a vulnerable part of the body.  

Two is that practicing backstab with a partner behind closed doors represents no challenge or danger to the would-be assassin.  And there should be a risk associated with reward.  If you could provide some kind of risk associated with that method of skill advacncement, then perhaps I'd be less judgemental in agreeing with it.

-LoD

Quote from: "LoD"Each guild is not defined by one particular skill, but a collection.

The assassin[/i] class is a grouping of skills, nothing more.  You can choose to label the guild whatever you wish since much of the documentation and skill names has not changed significantly from its Diku roots.  The grouping of skills, however, does provide a player with a good variety of abilities with which to approach, observe, hunt and kill their prey.

Then perhaps my real question is why the backstab skill exists if there isn't any coded support for it.  Perhaps a better way to phrase it is, why does the backstab skill exist if there isn't any coded support for it that won't get you labelled as a twink.  My assumption in my previous arguement is that the afore-mentioned organizations would offer to teach their initiates a skill such as backstab, since its value to a spy or assassin in a primitive world is rather obvious.  So in my arguement, go ahead and assume that when I say assassin it is equivalent to the phrase "dude that wants to get good at backstabbing."

Quote from: "LoD"No one has said that you cannot practice backstab as Rindan suggests, but I'll be damned if I ever agree to subject any character to anything but the RP preceeding the actual coded strike.  I completely understand Rindan's point, and if we were striving to make some perfect and realistic replica of how it might be accomplished on Earth, then fine.

Here you're saying that subjecting yourself to backstab is too risky.

Quote from: "LoD"Two is that practicing backstab with a partner behind closed doors represents no challenge or danger to the would-be assassin.  And there should be a risk associated with reward.  If you could provide some kind of risk associated with that method of skill advacncement, then perhaps I'd be less judgemental in agreeing with it.

And here you're saying that there is no challenge or danger to the would-be assassin.

It seems to me that you're either contradicting yourself, or failing to realize an implicit connection between your two points.

If it's the latter case, then try explaining this to my dwarf runner who was very nearly kicked out of the Byn because he killed two of his sparring partners over the course of his year of training.

I also take issue with your bias against the assassin class.  Nearly every organization in the game is completely devoted to cranking out bad-ass warriors without any challenge or danger to the would-be warrior.

Yeah, that's right.  They call it sparring.

Quote from: "LoD"

Quote from: "Maybe42or54"I agree.
Let's fix it by making backstab easy to do, hard to learn?

Wouldn't that be what it is now?

I don't think any changes are needed for backstab.  It plays its role, provides  a couple of classes with a unique tool and doesn't seem to off balance the game in any gross way.  Why add work to something that isn't broken?

-LoD

Perhaps something even better. You get bonuses when certain skills are in effect, like listen, hide, sneak, scan, time spent in a room.

(These numbers and anything else can be changed)

So having sneak and hide maxxed out you would get +10-20 (each) bonus for backstab. While listen and scan would give you a bonus of 5-10.

So having a maxed sneak, hide, listen, and scan could possibly give you +60 points to your backstab skill?

Something along those lines.

How do you know something like that isn't in use already?

It doesn't work very well then.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"Here you're saying that subjecting yourself to backstab is too risky.

Yes, subjecting my character to someone else's backstab would be too risky for any of my PC's to allow someone to "practice" on them.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"And here you're saying that there is no challenge or danger to the would-be assassin.  It seems to me that you're either contradicting yourself, or failing to realize an implicit connection between your two points.

I'm neither contradicting my point nor failing to realize any connection.  You seem to be confused on my two points however, so let me place them side by side to eliminate that confusion:

1. I wouldn't allow any PC to "backstab" my PC for training.
2. There should be some risk to the reward of a proficient backstab.

This means that someone shouldn't be able to sit behind closed doors and backstab their buddy until it's maxxed out (REWARD) without ever having to place their character in any danger (RISK).  This same risk vs. reward should also apply to anyone sapping friends, subdue;hitting friends and sorcerers/mages casting damage spells on themselves IMHO.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"If it's the latter case, then try explaining this to my dwarf runner who was very nearly kicked out of the Byn because he killed two of his sparring partners over the course of his year of training.

It was actualy neither case, so my guess for why your dwarven runner was nearly kicked out of the Byn when he killed two of his sparring partners was neither you nor your partners realized when to stop.

I guess because I wasn't there.  You were, however, so you should know.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"I also take issue with your bias against the assassin class. Nearly every organization in the game is completely devoted to cranking out bad-ass warriors without any challenge or danger to the would-be warrior.

Yeah, that's right. They call it sparring.

Do they also practice subdue kills?  Saps?  Fireballs?  If not, then I'd say any assassins in said clan will walk away from the "sparring" they do with just as much chance of improvement and advancement as the warriors.  As they are equal, then I don't see any relevance to your point.  Backstab is not equal to a kick, disarm or bash.  Its potential is higher.

-LoD

Quote from: "LoD"
1. I wouldn't allow any PC to "backstab" my PC for training.
2. There should be some risk to the reward of a proficient backstab.

This means that someone shouldn't be able to sit behind closed doors and backstab their buddy until it's maxxed out (REWARD) without ever having to place their character in any danger (RISK).  This same risk vs. reward should also apply to anyone sapping friends, subdue;hitting friends and sorcerers/mages casting damage spells on themselves IMHO.

I would allow someone to backstab my character with a training weapon.  Code wise, the damage it does is minimal.  I would let my n00b ranger turn his back to a door and try and hear an assassin come in long before I had my 20 day old warrior train a newbie half giant in a sparring ring.  One of those activities can leave you dead; it isn't the backstabbing training.  The code simulates a guy whacking you hard enough to feel it without making it anywhere near lethal just fine.  RP wise, I am pretty damn sure that you can RP the difference between driving a dagger into someone as hard as you can and hitting them hard enough to let them know that you are there.  The code and the RP to do it are both there.

As far as you argument about risk vs reward, I don't buy it.  Sparring with a normal human has almost no risk.  So long as you don't do something blatantly stupid like take a complete newbie and set him up against a duel wielding mul, you are not going to die sparring unless the other guy is setting out to really harm you.  There are countless coded ways to make the danger in sparring minimal.  Your magiker can do something silly like casting fire balls at himself, or he can live a long utterly safe life using nil.  There are very few skills in the game that demand you take a stupid risk to train them.  Nearly all skills in Armageddon merely require time and RP.  I don't know about anyone else here, but my character's don't die practicing skills.  I never experience a "risk vs reward".

Balance in Armageddon goes far beyond simply seeing who can become the most elite killer fasts code wise.  RP is supposed to act as a balancing factor as well.  Muls can slaughter everyone.  Elementalist are death incarnate.  Sorcerers are frigging gods.  What holds these positions in balance are the RPed requirements surrounding them.  Sure, your sorcerer can become a minor god, but you should expect an imm sponsored beat down if you go wander to a far corner of Zalanthas and spam cast all day until.  Your mul might be able to tear everyone a new one, but you are expected to play a broken creature who is hunted by everyone.  Further, you are expected to not wander the desert all day slaughtering NPCs to up your combat skills.  You can bring a mul, elementalist, or sorcerer to ungodly power if you utterly ignore your environment and put no RPed controls on your behavior.  You can become a mini god without any risk whatsoever.  Hell, you can bring a generic human warrior to incredible power without any risk if you ignore RP.
Assassins should be no different.  The limit on their potential should not be some coded risk Vs reward any more then it is for a sorcerer or mul.  Role play should be the break that keeps an assassin from sitting in a room all day twinking out his backstab skill.  Role playing learning how to backstab should not involve artificially seeking out risk.  The incentive to not improperly train backstab should be the same one applied to not improperly training any combat skill, an imm sponsored beat down if you twink it out.  If you are training to be a Borsail assassin, it isn't a 90% chance of dying each time that prevents you from practicing how to backstab, it is the RPed restrictions inherent in such a role that moderate your pace to something reasonable.

I would much rather see a guy who trains backstabbing in a realistic RPed manner and use it with the intent to hurt someone less the a dozen times over the course of his entire life, then I would like to see a guy training to be an assassin who looks for reasons to whack animals or vagrants because he knows if he doesn't use the skill a couple hundred times he will never make his skill go up.  You should be able to train as an assassin without ever leaving a city to hunt wolves or wandering the alleyways looking to harm vagrants.  You shouldn't have to set out with reasons and excuses that give you the intent to murder a few hundred times to become moderatly skilled.

It might take 500 backstab attempts to reach a moderate skill with backstab.  You shouldn't have to seek out and try to murder 500 people and animals to get there.  In my opinion, if you use backstab on something you want to kill a dozen times in your life time, you are probably doing it right.

Quote from: "Ghost"I think it is a fair game to retreat and attempt a surprise again.
(Can be arguable for some NPCs)

So why is this not okay for thieves?  Without searching I'll bet I can find plenty of threads containing a general consensus that it's twinkish to fail a steal (Actually Nen's thieving bible mentions not to do this to NPCs or PCs at the very top of the article), sneak back into the room and try to steal from the same victim again.  Is that not twinking the steal skill?  So the only way to justify backstabbing PC, sneaking out, then back in again and backstabbing again, is to disassociate itself from thievery on Arm.

Backstabbing is not like throwing, throwing can be done at a distance.  It's more like stealing.  Backstabbing requires you be within arm's distance and that you're not already engaged in combat.  It's laughable to me that someone who just got "backstabbed" would be so open to receive another "critical" strike (by the way there's no way to defend against this, just like there's no way to defend against steal.  You either go on the offensive and try to kill them (possibly getting crim-flagged) or run away - just like stealing).  Just like it's laughable to me that someone who'd gotten stole from (or just noticed hands in their pockets) would be susceptible to getting stole from again (a skill that IS based on stealth or misdirection) -right- after it happened.  Just like steal, if you backstab someone and they run off and you catch up to them, then sure, the environment has changed, the character is no longer around other characters who now know what's going on, etc.  Plausible.

It could be that my impression of backstab as a surprise attack is not correct, and don't get me wrong, that's -fine- by me.  :-P  It's easier for sneakier types.  The only reason I can think of for backstabbing and stealing to be treated differently is because it's often easier to get away after a steal attempt.  If that's the case though I'd like an official confirmation from an imm as this could use clarification.

- HK

Quote from: "Rindan"Assassins should be no different.  The limit on their potential should not be some coded risk Vs reward any more then it is for a sorcerer or mul.

Muls and sorcerers are also karma classes that are not able to be played by a brand new player who doesn't know any better.  There's a large difference there, because people who are allowed to play mul and sorcerer roles should have a firm understanding of what their potential for death equates to in responsibility on them as a good RPer to not abuse it.

There is no such barrier to a new player selecting the assassin class.

-LoD

Quote from: "LoD"This means that someone shouldn't be able to sit behind closed doors and backstab their buddy until it's maxxed out (REWARD) without ever having to place their character in any danger (RISK).  This same risk vs. reward should also apply to anyone sapping friends, subdue;hitting friends and sorcerers/mages casting damage spells on themselves IMHO.

According to -you-, their buddy would be in danger after being subjected to the horrors of the backstab skill.  And according to -you,- when their buddy turned around and said "My turn, let me backstab you a few hundred times" then they too would be in danger.  That you don't recognize this or else have chosen not to address it is the contradiction I'm seeing in the underlying theme of your posts.

Quote from: "LoD"It was actualy neither case, so my guess for why your dwarven runner was nearly kicked out of the Byn when he killed two of his sparring partners was neither you nor your partners realized when to stop.

I guess because I wasn't there.  You were, however, so you should know.

Fair enough, I shall elaborate.  My dwarven runner killed his partners not because neither realized when to stop, but because my dwarven runner had kick-ass strength and agility and was subjecting anyone who stepped into the ring with him to mortal danger.  He only rarely lost matches, even when fighting against people with considerable more skill than him.  I recall that his first fight was with his Byn Sergeant (an assassin).  He won by a thin margin.

Since by the time he graduated he was regularly churning out horrendouses to the head with his sparring clubs, it really wasn't an issue of not stopping in time.  The issue was beginning to spar in the first place.

Since this was before the mercy code was implimented, it actually surprises me that his kill total didn't climb above two.

Anyway, if the correlation this story has to the power of assassins and risk vs. reward isn't apparent, I can always draw out the conclusions myself in a further post.

The fact is, that skilled warriors (or even unskilled if they're of the right race and you get a little luck on your stat rolls) pose a huge amount of threat to the average character, far more than any assassin I'm aware of ever has.

I have been assassinated by warriors before.  I have never been assassinated, killed, or seriously threatened by an assassin, ever, unless I wasn't able to discern that they were an assassin because they never used backstab, sap, throw, or trap while killing me, in which case my point is still essentially serviced.

Quote from: "LoD"Do they also practice subdue kills?  Saps?  Fireballs?  If not, then I'd say any assassins in said clan will walk away from the "sparring" they do with just as much chance of improvement and advancement as the warriors.  As they are equal, then I don't see any relevance to your point.  Backstab is not equal to a kick, disarm or bash.  Its potential is higher.

Kick, disarm, or bash may not be the equal of backstab, but the complete warrior skillset is more than a match, and a warrior has every opportunity to practice everything that shows up on their list without exposing themselves to a hint of risk or even suspicion.

Sap is a special case... essentially the same arguments I would have for backstab, I would hold for that skill as well.

Subdue-killing isn't a skill.  You can get better at the skills -necessary- to become better at subdue-killing without exposing yourself to a shred of risk.

Blowing people up is a skill that a magicker can practice without a shred of risk.

The underlying theme of all these examples seem to be that they all serve to erode your arguement.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"According to -you-, their buddy would be in danger after being subjected to the horrors of the backstab skill.  And according to -you,- when their buddy turned around and said "My turn, let me backstab you a few hundred times" then they too would be in danger.  That you don't recognize this or else have chosen not to address it is the contradiction I'm seeing in the underlying theme of your posts.

What is there to recognize if there is only one assassin, which was my example?  There is no contradiction.  There is no failure to recognize any relationship.  One person says, "Hey, turn around, I'm gonna drive this dagger at your throat, but don't worry - I'll make sure I don't kill you."  

You're telling me that someone would agree to that?  Maybe you would.
I wouldn't.  And that's the simple fact.  Yes, according to -me- backstabbing a friend, in any setting and with any setup is the same as fireballing your friend, subduing and hitting your friend or sapping your friend, and that's why I wouldn't condone or participate in it.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"The fact is, that skilled warriors (or even unskilled if they're of the right race and you get a little luck on your stat rolls) pose a huge amount of threat to the average character, far more than any assassin I'm aware of ever has.

Is that because an assassin has a lesser potential for successful PK's or because a warrior's skill set is more easily practiced?  An assassin can train and use skills that would kill a warrior without him ever knowing who the killer was, without ever touching the warrior physically, without ever entering into combat with the warrior.

Warriors cannot do this.  My contention for why this may be is because most people favor the path of least resistance and don't have the patience or imagination to take on the role of a skilled and competent assassin.  Anyone can play a warrior, but as you've mentioned in your post - not everyone can play a successful assassin since you've never been killed by one to your knowledge.

I have.  And they are frightening when they are skilled.

Warriors and assassins are situational.  The warrior may be both more accessible and more widely used, but there are circumstances that will disallow a warrior from even being able to attempt what an assassin may be able to do successfully.  Having played a 100 day warrior, I am well aware of what they are capable of, how long it takes to get there and my vulnerabilities.  And there are situations in which my warrior would have been ill equipped or completely unable to reach a point an assassin could have with a different skill set.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"Sap is a special case... essentially the same arguments I would have for backstab, I would hold for that skill as well.

Again, -I- just cannot agree to wrapping a towel inside my helm to protect me against blunt trauma striking me with enough force to render me unconcious and feel "okay" about it.  Probably just as much as Rindan cannot condone backstabbing a rat.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"Subdue-killing isn't a skill.  You can get better at the skills -necessary- to become better at subdue-killing without exposing yourself to a shred of risk.

Yes, but the point is that this is a tactic some people use as a devastating attack upon another person.  When you practice it, do you actually follow through with the strike or do you simply stop at the subdue?  If you DO stop at the subdue, then why would you ever proceed with a coded backstab or sap?  

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"Blowing people up is a skill that a magicker can practice without a shred of risk.

Yes, but would you allow someone to practice their fireball on you?  Would you allow them to "only singe you a little bit" because you've wrapped yourself in flame retardent clothing?  Since uber fire only does a little damage at the lowest level, you wouldn't mind your character being burned even a little by magickal fire for the good of a % point increase?  

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"The underlying theme of all these examples seem to be that they all serve to erode your arguement.

The underlying theme connecting each of these skills and their practice is that they all hold the potential for great personal harm to someone.  Being struck by a club in sparring has a chance to causing to personal harm as well, but it is much less likely than practicing a skill which is specifically targetting not only a vulnerable, but also a lethal, location on your body.

I swordfight with some people, and I -might- get smacked in the crotch by accident sometimes when we fight, even though that's not my intention.  I  would not, however, be interested in the slightest should one of them ask me if they can practice their "crotch shot" -- even if they offered to pad me up real good because the potential[/i] for personal harm is greatly increased and their education isn't worth the potential loss.

What I mean by risk vs. reward pertains to these skills that could, feasibly, kill someone in a single shot.  I've never been killed by a warrior in one shot, but I have been killed by assassins in such a manner.  Skills or tactics that could end a character's life in one practical application should not be an easily practiced thing behind closed doors.  There should be some element of risk involved with gaining the power, or there is no accountability or responsibility.

If you didn't have to work for something, you won't respect it.

I am arguing principles, because I do sympathize and agree with Rindan on many counts that backstab is one of the few skills that is difficult to practice because its lack of practical scenarios in which one can advance their proficiency, especially if you (the player) feels strongly about not using one of the alternative methods such as fighting animals, humanoids or having a role that holds a fair chance of meeting up with sentient enemies that need a little murdering.

I just don't mind it being difficult to practice as much as he does.

What I do appreciate about his posts, however, is that he mostly strays from sarcasm and insulting the other poster.  I wish you'd follow his example.

-LoD

QuoteSo why is this not okay for thieves? Without searching I'll bet I can find plenty of threads containing a general consensus that it's twinkish to fail a steal (Actually Nen's thieving bible mentions not to do this to NPCs or PCs at the very top of the article), sneak back into the room and try to steal from the same victim again. Is that not twinking the steal skill? So the only way to justify backstabbing PC, sneaking out, then back in again and backstabbing again, is to disassociate itself from thievery on Arm.

Picking pockets and backstabbing is not relevant to each other.  In a backstab attempt, you immediately get crim-flagged to start with, and you start a combat. You are already in a bad shape anyway.  If you don't finish off your target, you will be reported as a would-be-killer and there you will confront your local templar.
Yet still, I would not mind you trying it again after fail on PCs.  Because PCs again can do something like calling a templar and giving a report about you immediately.  Or if you sucked too bad and got crimflagged, they will bash your PC and whack you good for it.  You might still desperately be trying to steal, RPing properly in that as well, but you will face the templar, or the angry PC in one way or another.

But pickpocketing NPCs after they start shouting "Thief! Thief!", that, is a bad RP, as you can see:

Quote from: "http://www.armageddon.org/general/rules.htm"Examples of inappropriate play:

   * Actions designed purely to advance skills, such as spamming commands, with no regard for roleplay.
   * Disregarding the game world, such as stealing repeatedly from an NPC who is shouting "Thief!"

Now it is a bad RP.  Because you did not suck in stealing too badly, you did not get crim-flagged, and you just got the victim suspicious, but not whom to suspect.  A crafty PC will realize who the would-be thief is.  But an NPC does not have that option.  An NPC won't be able to contact to a templar/soldier and give who might be the suspect(s) trying to steal from him.  A PC on the other hand will have a good chance to get you busted.

Provided you RP it properly.  You don't just steal from someone from half a room away.  So make sure you have not just emoted you are far away from the victim, just before your steal attempt.  Or if you are going to attempt a few times repeatedly on the same victim, make sure you have emoted standing near him.  Because the code does not give any idea where you are when the action takes place in stealing.

If RPed properly, I would find it fair to try steal on the same victim (PC) a few times.  If it is NPC however, I would expect you not to try it if he starts shouting "Thief!  Thief!".

If a PC is sitting there holding his belt and emoting being paranoid, I REALLY hope you don't think that it is okay keep trying to steal from them.  If they go back to drinking their ale, perhaps you can justify trying again.  If they are pretty clearly aware that something is up, stealing again is just twinkish.  Just because the code lets you do something doesn't mean that you should do it.

The issue with backstabbing someone in the face who has their weapons drawn and stealing from a guy emoting being paranoid is that the code doesn't care what their state of alertness is.  Critical strike or no, whacking a big mean pissed off warrior when he is in a combat stance is hard.  It is a hell of a lot harder then whacking him when he is surprised by the attack.  The same goes for stealing from someone who is on the lookout for a thief.  A guy looking for stray hands is a hell of a lot more difficult of a target then a guy quietly enjoying his ale at the bar.  

Unfortunately, there is no coded way to be paranoid.  As far as the code is concerned, all characters not in combat are in a blissful state of unawareness.  This lets your assassin who could not land a blow on a warrior in normal combat to save his life some how magically by pass his weapons and land a critical strike even when he is staring at you with his weapons ready expecting you to come.  This also lets your elven thief merrily loot a dagger that someone has RPed putting their hand on.

Until there is a way to intentionally cripple your own skills to reflect the increased challenge in stealing/backstabbing someone who is aware of your presence or there is a way for victims to make themselves alert and dramatically harm your chances for success, I personally think it is just code abuse to steal or backstab someone who is expecting it.  If you want to steal again, wait until they stop RPing being paranoid.  If you want to backstab someone in the face again, either use shadow/hide and truly surprise them again, or get them to RP dropping their guard.  Using these skills on a fully alert victim when you know that your chance to succeed is exactly the same as if they had their back turned and were totally unaware of you is just twinkish in my opinion.

We have the no-quit flag, which disallows someone from quitting out right after a fight. Why not use that same flag to decrease the chances of a second, third, etc, backstab? Simply put, if that flag is on, the code will reduce your final backstab roll by ... say, 25%, even 50%.

Would that account for the alertness?

Quote from: "The7DeadlyVenomz"We have the no-quit flag, which disallows someone from quitting out right after a fight. Why not use that same flag to decrease the chances of a second, third, etc, backstab? Simply put, if that flag is on, the code will reduce your final backstab roll by ... say, 25%, even 50%.

Sounds like a kludgy solution.  The effect should not be to make the assassin less skilled, but to make that particular victim harder to pull one over on.

I'd rather see something like an "Alert" status effect that shows up when you type stat.  You can NEVER induce this effect upon yourself, but if someone uses backstab on you and you live, or uses steal on you and fails, then you automatically recieve the effect and until it wears off, it becomes much harder or impossible for someone to use those skills on you.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"
Sounds like a kludgy solution.  The effect should not be to make the assassin less skilled, but to make that particular victim harder to pull one over on.

I'd rather see something like an "Alert" status effect that shows up when you type stat.  You can NEVER induce this effect upon yourself, but if someone uses backstab on you and you live, or uses steal on you and fails, then you automatically recieve the effect and until it wears off, it becomes much harder or impossible for someone to use those skills on you.

I personally would prefer "alert" to be something you can simply toggle on.  If you don't toggle it on every minute or so, it wears off.  It can only be done standing.  Every time you type it in, you echo dropping into a combat stance, so it isn't something you are going to realistically be doing every minute of your life.  Anyone in combat is automatically 'alert'.  As to what 'alert' would do, it would depend upon the skill being used.  

For a skill like steal it would dramatically drop the chances of a successful steal by upping your perception skills for the purposes of making steal checks.  I would make it so that it offers a moderate bonus to your chance of spotting sneaking people as well.  For skills like sap or backstab, I would make it so that instead of doing skill checks Vs perception skills to see if the backstab hits, it does a skill check against combat skills.  If you are facing off against someone who knows you are coming, you need to get past their weapons, not move so quietly.  Your assassin might be able to slam a hunk of obsidian into a 40 day old warrior while he is having an ale and has his back turned, but when he is standing, looking at you, has two long sharp hunks of obsidian held in either hand, and is pissed off, your chances of landing a blow probably sink close to zero.  On the other hand, merchant might very well be looking you in the face as you easily avoid his flailing hands and shank him in the gut.  Hence, it makes sense to do backstab skill checks against alert people against their weapon skills.

Quote from: "LoD"What is there to recognize if there is only one assassin, which was my example?  There is no contradiction.  There is no failure to recognize any relationship.  One person says, "Hey, turn around, I'm gonna drive this dagger at your throat, but don't worry - I'll make sure I don't kill you."

Perhaps then there is a flaw in your example.  I don't think you'll see many assassins joining the Byn, thinking "I'm going to practice my backstab on all those warriors without the faintest fear of ever getting hurt in turn."  I did something along those lines when I was a bit more naive and unsure of the appropriate use of the backstab skill.  I learned that it doesn't work.

But whether or not it's more likely two assassins will practice or an assassin will practice with another class isn't something that's really worth arguing about.

Quote from: "LoD"You're telling me that someone would agree to that?  Maybe you would.
I wouldn't.  And that's the simple fact.  Yes, according to -me- backstabbing a friend, in any setting and with any setup is the same as fireballing your friend, subduing and hitting your friend or sapping your friend, and that's why I wouldn't condone or participate in it.

I suppose we'll just have to agree to disagree.  I've used all of these tactics and I'd really have to say that backstab and sap are the dangerous, far less dangerous than ordinary sparring.

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"Is that because an assassin has a lesser potential for successful PK's or because a warrior's skill set is more easily practiced?  An assassin can train and use skills that would kill a warrior without him ever knowing who the killer was, without ever touching the warrior physically, without ever entering into combat with the warrior.

Yes, but it isn't easy.  And I would say that the primary focus of this discussion is the backstab skill, which is a melee skill, and does in fact require its user to enter combat.

And I would have to say that if my goal was to kill someone, then making a warrior and joining the Byn for a few years and then finding a way to get to a secluded area with that person is probably the best way to do it.  It's been done to me, and the attackers have gotten away with it.  I've done it to others and gotten away with it.  I've taken 63 damage from a dual-wielding warrior who saw it fit to dish out a surprise attack on me.  I'd be honestly surprised if an assassin equally as skilled as that warrior (who probably didn't have an obscenely large amount of playing time on her) could accomplish the same feat with backstab.

Yes it's true, not everyone can play an assassin.  Both the warrior and assassin seem to me to be classes that require spending their days engaging in melee combat.  But playing a warrior is far more effective in my opinion if you desire to engage in melee combat of any sort, including assassinations.

Quote from: "LoD"Yes, but the point is that this is a tactic some people use as a devastating attack upon another person.  When you practice it, do you actually follow through with the strike or do you simply stop at the subdue?  If you DO stop at the subdue, then why would you ever proceed with a coded backstab or sap?

The point is that yes, subdue-killing is extremely deadly, but comes with absolutely none of the risk/reward that an assassin supposedly must contend with.

Quote from: "LoD"Yes, but would you allow someone to practice their fireball on you?  Would you allow them to "only singe you a little bit" because you've wrapped yourself in flame retardent clothing?  Since uber fire only does a little damage at the lowest level, you wouldn't mind your character being burned even a little by magickal fire for the good of a % point increase?

If I was playing a dude that blows things up, I wouldn't agree to a spell-sparring match with my friend who also blows things up.  I also wouldn't agree to pretend I don't notice him so he can sneak up on me and try to blow me up.

However, if I was playing a dude that likes to stab things with knives, I would agree to a knife-sparring match in which we pretend we're fighting and attempt to stab each other with sparring knives.  That's because there's a general consensus that when sparring, even though you might take a bit of damage, you can still RP it as mere bruises that you can easily recover from.  I'd also let my friend try to sneak up on me and stab me with a sparring knife, for generally the same reasons.  If I'm well-armored, I don't expect to recieve any serious injuries from a silly little wooden knife that doesn't even have a real point.

Quote from: "LoD"The underlying theme connecting each of these skills and their practice is that they all hold the potential for great personal harm to someone.  Being struck by a club in sparring has a chance to causing to personal harm as well, but it is much less likely than practicing a skill which is specifically targetting not only a vulnerable, but also a lethal, location on your body.

I believe the code would disagree with you if you're suggesting that, for example, sparring with a 5 day dwarven warrior with a club in each hand is more dangerous than sneak attack training with a 5 day assassin who has a dagger in one hand.

Quote from: "LoD"What I mean by risk vs. reward pertains to these skills that could, feasibly, kill someone in a single shot.  I've never been killed by a warrior in one shot, but I have been killed by assassins in such a manner.  Skills or tactics that could end a character's life in one practical application should not be an easily practiced thing behind closed doors.  There should be some element of risk involved with gaining the power, or there is no accountability or responsibility.

I assume you don't particularly care for any magicker class, then.

I disagree with your risk vs. reward arguement.  I don't want assassins to be able to amass power so quickly that a newbie could roll one up and start slaughtering the population with impunity after a few hours, but nor do I want powerful assassins to be so rare that I'd have to have played this MUD for ten or eleven years before I finally run into one that has even the vaguest ability to kill me.

Skilled assassins are good for the environment.  When you step on a nobles toes in Tuluk, and she smiles at you, and then two weeks later you've mysteriously vanished and everyone who once new you suddenly seems to have trouble remembering you existed, that is good for the environment.  When a southern noble starts stepping on the toes of the blue-robes and throwing his money in places that he'd be advised not to throw his money into... and then has an accident, that is good for the environment.

Assassins are to leaders what gortok are to newbie rangers.  They are the threat of death, which should appear more frequently in those higher sectors.  Commoners struggle to earn something to eat, and nobles struggle to avoid eating something that hasn't been laced with poison.  That is the world that the documentation suggests, and that is the world that I'd like to see a reality.  Removing the bias on training the backstab skill is just one step in the right direction.

As for sarcasm and insults, I'm honestly puzzled as to why you continually accuse me of such things when I try to be as respectful and as neutrally toned as possible, but thankfully, I'm past the point of taking the baseless accusations of people on the internet seriously.  Clearly there has been a misunderstanding somewhere, but accusation and persecution seems to be unlikely to resolve it.

And have a great day.

I really don't see why backstab couldn't be trained just like any other skill. I've taken martial arts and I have practiced many techniques that could potentially break man's arm. I repeatedly practiced this on my sparring/training partners and they practiced the same techniques on me. And you know what? No one was ever injured. It was just a matter of holding back just before the right amount of force was exerted. I admit I had a good deal of trust for my partner, I knew that no one was going to intentionally hurt me. (though, this is only a small comfort when my instructer was flopping me around like a rag doll)

Now, I know that sneaking up on a guy for a stab and practicing a standard arm bar techniques are not the same thing. But the general argument seems to be that backstab should not be trained with another   that skill is -always- used with an attempt to harm.  Realistically 'the backstab skill' could be trained in a way similar to my martial arts class. All movements associated with the skill would be the same as those used by the assasin, just the eventual stab would be held back or reduced in some way. However I would agree that nobody would practice this skill with Joe Tavern Sitter they just met and didn't trust

From a in game perspective, I think the stigma surrounding the skill occurs becuase there is no way to practice the skill without incurring a good deal of damage. I think there should be a practice backstab command. Something like the 'nil' of spellcasting. It would be a way of practicing the skill without harming the partner. The catch would be that you would need a willing partner. Somone who wouldn't mind pretending to be unaware that his death creeps up on him. We also should have an echo, just so that Assasin McNoob doesn't walk into a tavern and then spam the command until he maxes his skill. I'd even say that it should have a hostile responce when used on npc's for similar reasons.

Thoughts?

Quote from: "Martial Kank"
From a in game perspective, I think the stigma surrounding the skill occurs becuase there is no way to practice the skill without incurring a good deal of damage. I think there should be a practice backstab command. Something like the 'nil' of spellcasting. It would be a way of practicing the skill without harming the partner. The catch would be that you would need a willing partner. Somone who wouldn't mind pretending to be unaware that his death creeps up on him. We also should have an echo, just so that Assasin McNoob doesn't walk into a tavern and then spam the command until he maxes his skill. I'd even say that it should have a hostile responce when used on npc's for similar reasons.

I don't think a new command is needed.  From my experience as someone who has helped to train an assassin by being his pin cushion, getting backstabed with a training dagger will not hurt you enough to require you to sleep to heal.  The only thing needed to make coded training of backstabbing is for it to be an acceptable practice OOCly.  Personally, I have absolutely no problem with Kurac or a noble house training assassins by making up assassin games.  That said, unless it has changed, the official imm line is that you are not allowed to train backstab in any coded manner.

A possible method to implement a nil backstab would be as simple as checking for the mercy flag's status, and adjusting the damage multiplier accordingly. We use mercy to keep spars non-fatal, do the same with the backstab and sap skills and approve their training.

Quote from: "The7DeadlyVenomz"A possible method to implement a nil backstab would be as simple as checking for the mercy flag's status, and adjusting the damage multiplier accordingly. We use mercy to keep spars non-fatal, do the same with the backstab and sap skills and approve their training.

Good idea.  Incorporate the mercy flag already implemented.

- HK

Quote from: "EvilRoeSlade"I'd also let my friend try to sneak up on me and stab me with a sparring knife, for generally the same reasons.  If I'm well-armored, I don't expect to recieve any serious injuries from a silly little wooden knife that doesn't even have a real point.

When I saw this, I thought "well, gee, then those training daggers should be breaking all the time if people were allowed to practice backstab with them".  But then, maybe that would be a good thing.

I have always had the impression that the policy on backstab was as much motivated by OOC considerations as by IC realism.  If there were a coded, safe, accessible way to practice them regularly, no matter how realistic that is, it would probably be a bad thing for the game.  As it is now, it's self limiting - it's hard to get good at those things, so you don't get a lot of PCs who are good at them.  I think that's a good thing, but I do kind of wish there were a middle ground.  Maybe something coded like special training dummies/equipment, with strict limitations on access.  I don't know, but I think too easy to train would be worse for the game than too hard to train.

I usually don't emote when I'm backstabbing people. It tends to take away from the element of suprise.

I once had this character who would backstab everyone that pissed him off. Sometimes, people would piss him off so he'd chase after them and then kill them with a quick, precise backstab. Then he'd take all their loot and sell it and get lots of coins for it.

He also liked flowers. He told me he wanted to collect lots of flowers so I dressed him up and got him a nice basket to collect flowers in. So he went out into a field and collected lots of flowers. He got all different colors and sizes of flowers and he brought them back to his house. Then he tried to backstab somebody who pissed him off with one of his best flowers but it didn't work so he just gave the flower to the guy and then backstabbed him.

I should make a character exactly like this again, I think it would enroll many people in highly-developed, detailed RP that is good for the game.

Backstabbing is fun, but don't emote when you do it.

Oh, on a side note, it's really fun backstabbing dwarves.

I usually don't emote when I'm backstabbing people. It tends to take away from the element of suprise.

I once had this character who would backstab everyone that pissed him off. Sometimes, people would piss him off so he'd chase after them and then kill them with a quick, precise backstab. Then he'd take all their loot and sell it and get lots of coins for it.

He also liked flowers. He told me he wanted to collect lots of flowers so I dressed him up and got him a nice basket to collect flowers in. So he went out into a field and collected lots of flowers. He got all different colors and sizes of flowers and he brought them back to his house. Then he tried to backstab somebody who pissed him off with one of his best flowers but it didn't work so he just gave the flower to the guy and then backstabbed him.

I should make a character exactly like this again, I think it would enroll many people in highly-developed, detailed RP that is good for the game.

Backstabbing is fun, but don't emote when you do it.

Oh, on a side note, it's really fun backstabbing dwarves.

Quote from: "flurry"
I have always had the impression that the policy on backstab was as much motivated by OOC considerations as by IC realism.  If there were a coded, safe, accessible way to practice them regularly, no matter how realistic that is, it would probably be a bad thing for the game.  As it is now, it's self limiting - it's hard to get good at those things, so you don't get a lot of PCs who are good at them.  I think that's a good thing, but I do kind of wish there were a middle ground.  Maybe something coded like special training dummies/equipment, with strict limitations on access.  I don't know, but I think too easy to train would be worse for the game than too hard to train.

I'm totally with you on this...  I also believe that this skill once achieved is a very strong skill and
must be limited or positioned in a manor  thus to protect us from abuse and power gamming of it.  
It is not impossible to get good at backstab, its just hard to twink its progression without being
noticed of it.  I personally don't feel it is correct to backstab rats or to do it to someone in sparring.  
The idea, in my thoughts, is to be able to position yourself into a situation that would allow you  to
slip through someone's defenses and strike a critical area.  I don't see this happening  in a sparring
ring.  I do however believe there are other ways to go about learning Backstab..  Figure out ways
you can rp out learning the skill, write the Imms, if they approve then your on a road to something.  
If I am correct you don't necessary have to engage  the skill to get better at it, there's always rp
and possible advancement for it.

I skipped over reading most of this article because I am a lazy, impatient bastard, so this may have been said before, but here goes:

I see backstab as a combinatiion of all three: anatomy, location, and suprise.  I honestly think the skill is very difficult to pull off even once, correctly. Basically, here is the way it works: you have to sneak up on the person, distract them, keep tthem unaware of your presence. Then you have to calculate where you will hit them, and from what angle. Then you have to pull it off. The person can't move, or it'll throw your aim off. The person has to basically be a sitting duck, and you have to be excellent with the placement of your weapon for it to be good. Youpretty much have to be a master for a backstab to kill in just one hit. That would be for the ideal backstab anyways.

Now...to attempt to backstab in combat might be that your character is just skilled at aiming for critical areas. He makes his hits count.

I think the solution to this problem would be a lot of work. The division of the skill. One skill, backstab, lets you attempt a one hit kill, if it hits, it does a hell of a lot of damage. The other would be critical strike skill, which lets you add a set amount of damage to your attacks with a certain success rate.

Too much work. I.e. don't be twinky. Aiming in combat is dificult, much less hitting the person. The only way I can see backstbbing in combat would be maybe after a successfu parry, or three successfull hits. I dunno. It really just boils down to using one's best judgement.

Thoughts?

I just can't understand why, if there is no non-twinky way to make a particular skill better, that the people running this game would hand it out to newbies like candy.

Why should there be only one skill in the game which can only be trained by roleplaying? A skill that is extremely important if you want assassins to be differentiated from other classes in any way. (well, there seems to be that or poisoning someone).

*doesnt understand any of this at all*

I just can't understand why you think there are any skills in the game that can be trained without roleplaying.  This is an RP-required MUD.

-- X

This a common mistake. Done a lot by a Turkish friend too.. Raising skills is RP. So let's say, if my human warrior attends every sparring session and spars to raise his skills, if a human ranger seeks a master archer and takes lessons from him then the codewise teach, if an elementalist walks to a spot in rhyme with his element and performs a training session which causes a branch, it's still RP.

Raising skills in an unrealistic manner is twinking. I train spells with my every mage, spar with my every warrior, hunt harder and harder animals with my every ranger, steal a logical amount from PCs and NPCs and backstab a logical amount of NPCs in 'rinth with my every assassin. I have never received a bad note and I don't think I will. IRL we study lessons, work out in body building saloons and read books etc etc... It is a part of life we live. Just the same, IG our characters practice skills and it's a part of their lives.

Roleplaying Backstab - it seems almost like an oxymoron. How do you roleplay trying to severely wound someone with one strike? How can you possibly train this skill?

To attempt to backstab someone is a direct statement: you are my target, and I aim to kill you. How could someone possibly volunteer to help someone train their skill in this, when life is very precious in Arm and the person could die?

Sparring dummies don't work because sparring dummies don't react, and it's the reaction, the movement and manners of the target that make backstab so hard.

And with regards to backstab and sap training - realistic to train on beasts? Realistic to use on beasts, or are they humanoid-only skills?

Ideas?

I think it makes sense to use backstab on beasts, sometimes.

Roleplaying backstab can be simplified to two steps: Aim, and the accuracy against the reaction.

Aim is basically that.  Aim.  You paint a spot in the target, and you attempt to strike there with all your strength.  How close you are, will determine your accuracy.  If you can hit nearly on the spot when you use all your strength and speed, then you have the perfect aim.  That can be roleplayed on everything.  Including beasts, kids, normal people, dummies, boxes...etc.  Just pick a spot and try to hit exactly there.

The second and more important part is the race against your opponent.  Considering you are now facing a real opponent with the instincts of survival, you will not find it easy to reach the spot you mark.  He will attempt to dodge it, parry it, block it, cover it and you will have to get past the defense.  You can achive this by speed (by being quicker than your opponent's reaction time) or by stealth (not letting him know you are going for the kill) by surprise (faking that you are aiming for somewhere else) or by sheer strength (breaking down whatever gets in the way and still reaching the spot).  This can be Roleplayed with people with a little combat experience and animals (to some point).  

Because everybody will have a basic instict for survival, they will not let you reach to their vital spots.  A veteran fighter will probably have a lot of ways to cover his vital spots than a novice fighter.  But still, it will require some trick to get past the novice fighter.

The thing about the animals is that, you can practice it with animals too.  Because they will have a survival instinct and they will not be handing you their neck without a fight.  They usually have their own ways to respond to a threat. The basic animal instinct that responds to your threat to its vital points will be very similar nearly at each attempt.  Like dodging, covering the spot with its furs and what not.  At some points it will be similar to fighting a novice warrior.  So yes, even at "the fighting against the instinct part" you can train with animals, but it will be for a short period of time (depending on the reaction time and fighting capabilities of the animal).  You will have to take it against more and more advanced opponents in fight, and responding more like a normal person in a fight... So you will need to take it to a real combat (veteran, humanoid fighter), after some level.

Basically I am saying.. Yes you can train on anything for a short while and you can train with animals for maybe a little longer than you can train with "anything".  And in order to master it, you will have to take it to the real combat (veteran humanoid warrior).

EDIT:  By real combat, I mean, fighting an experienced humanoid fighter.

I have no problem with using backstab/sap on beasts.  If we want you not to gain skill when attacking non-humanoids, we'll reflect that in the code (it wouldn't be hard, maybe it already does that).

-- X

Quote from: "Xygax"I have no problem with using backstab/sap on beasts.  If we want you not to gain skill when attacking non-humanoids, we'll reflect that in the code (it wouldn't be hard, maybe it already does that).

-- X

I think it already does reflect it.  I do believe, on a one to one fight, animals are more prone to backstab/sap, thus making it easier to success and impossible to maximize the skill.

Ok, thanks for the tips.

Quote from: "Xygax"I have no problem with using backstab/sap on beasts.  If we want you not to gain skill when attacking non-humanoids, we'll reflect that in the code (it wouldn't be hard, maybe it already does that).

-- X

Eh, careful, Xygax.  You might not remember the people getting karma nerfed for buying a kank, taking it outside the gates by three rooms, and backstabbing it, but I do.

There is a school of Armageddoners who feels that practicing backstab on rats, kanks, or other animals is poor form for the reasons Larrath already mentioned (predominantly differences in anatomy).

It is possible to get better at a skill without "practicing" it.  You just use it when you need to, and you'll eventually get better.  Need/want to kill a guy? Backstab him and finish the job. Yes, it's slow, but it does happen.  I played a magicker like this - I only cast the spells that I needed to cast, and then only when I needed them.  I wasn't the uberest of all ubers, but I had fun. The key is to spend your time in life/death situations where you can do this rather than warming a chair in a tavern.

I think the main complaint has been that, with code differences between rangers, warriors, and assassins, assassins have arguably come out of the deal with the short end of the stick overall.  The perfect generalists with a specialty that is so hotly contended most RPers wouldn't touch it. I also agree with the other poster who said that, if there are few very successful assassin-classed assassins, it might be a sign that the class is underpowered relative to other guilds.

No, it's not IC to volunteer to let someone attempt to backstab you. While the help file does not imply a measure of stealth the skill itself does - at least to me. Doing this against a dummy makes little IC sense, either. Animals don't share the same anatomy... so....

... unless backstab improves on a vastly faster curve than other guilds combat skills, assassins are pretty nerfed.  But, the guild also seems to attract the types of players who are more likely to powergame than to role play.  And that's just unfortunate.

I personally think it's Allanaki flame cheese to bs, flee, hide, sneak, e, bs, (wash rinse repeat). The code lets you do it, sure, but I don't feel that it represents stellar RP in most contexts.  Then again, if you're crazy enough to wander into a lawless zone, I guess it's best you figured out your own way to fend off the assassin who only really has one good skill to carry him.

Either way, I'm sure this topic has been beaten to death by the players - and maybe even by the staff.  I'm sure that staff members have even come up with great ways to change backstab.  I'm also sure there are reasons it hasn't been changed.

If staff opinion about it is as diverse as the player opinion on it, though, I'm pretty sure I wouldn't touch it with a twenty foot pole.

I personally don't see any problem backstabbing animals. In the backstab help file, it reads:

"This skill is a generic term for 'critical strikes' against an opponent.
The victim of a backstab is not necessarily 'stabbed in the back'"

Animals may have different anatomies, but they still have weak-points, and if you are good enough at backstab, you should be able to tell how you can drop -anything- and where to hit them in one blow. The code already reflects this IMO (You start off shitty, so you can't really tell where to hit them. As you get better, you learn where to hit them).

Even in these cases, though, discretion should definitely be used. I'm definitely not for people doing the good old sneak;e;backstab sorceror;disen;hide;backstab sorceror;disen;hide etc. But, not my place to say whether that's proper or not.

Alot of emphasis is given on studying anatomy when talking about traing backstab, but the truth is, the real skill behind backstab is approaching your target and striking where you want to strike.  Given that, there's no reason you shouldn't be able to backstab animals.

Also, you might want to stop and think a moment about how those who backstab and retreat might be burglars who have learned the skill.  It seems to me that burglars have even less proficiency in combat than assassins.

That said, I think it's utter crap to backstab and retreat against NPCs who are never going to move.

I'd be opposed to practicing backstab on kanks, but not on erdlus.  

Insectoids are just too alien, what with the exoskeleton and all.  But most mammals, lizards and other animals that live on land (don't fly or swim)  and have a spine are basically put together out of the same kind of bits.  Sliding your dagger between a jozhal's ribs is similar to doing the same thing to a human, but perhaps even slightly more difficult because jozhals are smaller and jumpier than most humans.


Angela Christine

Quote from: "davien"Eh, careful, Xygax.  You might not remember the people getting karma nerfed for buying a kank, taking it outside the gates by three rooms, and backstabbing it, but I do.

Why would anyone want to buy an expencive animal and then just kill it few steps out the gate? I mean, are you sure this karma-nerfing was about the backstab itself?

Quote from: "Angela Christine"Insectoids are just too alien, what with the exoskeleton and all.  But most mammals, lizards and other animals that live on land (don't fly or swim)  and have a spine are basically put together out of the same kind of bits.  Sliding your dagger between a jozhal's ribs is similar to doing the same thing to a human, but perhaps even slightly more difficult because jozhals are smaller and jumpier than most humans.

If you run an insect through with something, it's just as bad off as a reptile or mammal.  If you just figure out where a ganglion or two is, maybe the lungs or a few other systems, and you've got it made.  Hell, you could probably slice up a few joints and leave the thing crippled.

See?  It's that simple.  Learn a little about your target, alot abot how to run up to it, and you've got a good thing going : backstab.

I'm still looking for a way to actually train the damn skill.

Backstabbing in sparring isn't allowed and attacking NPCs on the rinth or the wastes just leaves a bad taste in my mouth.

I'll drop a series of hints to my clan leaders but they just tell me to go sparring with everyone else.

I once sent a few logs to the mud email in which my character detailed some of his knowledge on knife-work. But I never got an answer back.

Please let me know if you guys find something, allright?

Stop thinking of the skillset as a table-top rogue assassin. It is a skillset, yes. And it is a skill set for rogues. But it doesn't demand we RP it out in a certain way. If we have ranger merchants/guards/aids, etc then an assassin can be a hunter/warrior/aids also. Do not allow the skillset and conception of the guild decide your roleplay.

I say roleplay the use of backstab however you like. Be it a warrior who when faced with an enemy uses speed and wit to get past their foe's shield/defences, or a hunter who lies in waiting, buried in the sand until a duskhorn grazes nearby, leaping up and gutting the poor creature, or, of course, a thief who stabs people in the back.

If I want to play a hunter who knows how to serious wound animals/what have you in the form of the coded skill backstab - guess what. Im going to, and no player here is going to stop me, with the exception of the staff (who i dont believe have a stance currently)

I am a nurse by profession, so believe me when i say i have seen my fair share of knife-wounds. All you really need to do to serious hurt someone is get an object more then 3 inches into the body. You have muscles that can be cut and damaged, blood loss and shock can all be used to describe the damage "Backstab" Can do. It doesn't just have to be a killing blow, even if it has the ability to do it.

Quote from: "Xygax"I just can't understand why you think there are any skills in the game that can be trained without roleplaying.  This is an RP-required MUD.

-- X

I'm sorry Xygax, I must not have been clear enough.

What I meant was this.

Some people here are saying that THE ONLY WAY to train backstab should be via roleplaying and sending a log to the immortals showing that you have been practicing and asking them to raise your skill level.

Is there any other single skill that people are suggesting SHOULD NEVER be trained by ACTUALLY using the command? I have been scanning through the boards and havent seen one.

If typing "backstab blah" is wrong or cant be justified in any way other than using it to kill a vicitm or play a psycho mass murderer;
If the only way to increase this skill (barring being a mass murderer) is by submitting logs to the IMMS

THEN

Perhaps it should be a karma required class. Either of these things are expecting a lot from a n00b.

It isnt a karma required class so should we assume that practicing on friends or via hit and run are ok?

Thanks for clarifying.  As I said above, there is nothing wrong with using backstab while hunting.  (Frankly, I don't even care if you backstab a million kanks -- though that seems like an expensive approach to training)

-- X

Quote from: "Anonymous"Perhaps it should be a karma required class. Either of these things are expecting a lot from a n00b.

It isnt a karma required class so should we assume that practicing on friends or via hit and run are ok?

I always thought it should be, at least a karma 1 or 2. I don't think a newbie right out of hack and slash land should be playing that role.

Quote from: "ShaLeah"I always thought it should be, at least a karma 1 or 2. I don't think a newbie right out of hack and slash land should be playing that role.

Why not?  They'll get killed soon enough.

...and in the meantime, cause a bit of chaos, not to mention being jarringly silly as most noob assassins are.

Quote from: "spawnloser"...and in the meantime, cause a bit of chaos, not to mention being jarringly silly as most noob assassins are.

The same could be said of any new player who is getting acclimated to the game environment.

"Newb" dwarven warriors going on a killing spree in the 'rinth or in the streets of either city-state is just as bad. Let's not start limiting what roles are open to new players.

There are plenty of roles still open to them.  Personally, I think that anyone's first character should be limited to human and in one of the two major city-states.  I mean just the first character, here, not that's the only bit available with 0 karma.  New players bitch about how hard stuff is, well, let's make sure they're in a populated area with plenty of role-models and oppurtunities to learn what the game is all about?

I'd personally restrict merchant guild and assassin from new characters, too.  These two guilds almost REQUIRE knowledge of the game world to do successfully.

You know what?  There's still a few options (and really, there are still thousands of options, because race and guild don't make a character, they're only two pieces of the character), and I don't think those options are too bad at all for someone that needs to learn still.

There seems to be a chicken and the egg paradox happening here. Does the role define the skills or do the skills define the role.

I'd be willing to argue that skills define the role for one reason. If the role did not define the skills, the skills would not be organized into guilds.

If the makers of the game really wanted us to freely form our roles as Annarchy suggested they would have given us a free-form skill system that doesen't make use of guilds and primary skills.

Secondly, one guild could never defeat another guild at it's intended role. Sure an assasin could pull off being a ranger until he comes against another ranger in the wild. Or a burglar could train in the t'zai byn for awhile but never come close to a warrior's fighting abilitiy. Their right when they say you can mix up your roles anyway you want.

But if you actually want to compete you'll need to specialize in your guild's primary skills. And for the most part, this works well. Warriors are good at fighting, pick-pockets are good at theft, merchants are the best crafters/sellers and etc. This seems to work fine for the most part.

The problem occurs with the assasin class. Judging from recent posts, the assasin guild does not make the best silencer. If you want someone dead you don't go find a skilled assasin to use backstab on him. You find a skilled warrior and lock him in a room with your enemy. I think this is th problem.

Maybe I'm just jaded from IC experience and posts made on the GDB. But from what I've seen, the above is the typical example.

As for the ambiguity with training backstab I think it's the same reason with the training of archery. I have feeling that because both skills are potentially very powerful, they are impossible to train without the danger of a lawless zone. Immz feel free to bore a proboscis into my skull if I'm way off on this.

During my time with a fairly long-lived assassin, I found it extremely hard to actually finish the job. Backstab can bring them down a few hps but then my offence sucked, couldn't land a hit and lost almost every time, to PCs and NPCs both.

Assassins are not that hard to train. Play in the 'rinth, get involved, live on the margin.

The last guest post was made by me.

Quote from: "ThirdEye"During my time with a fairly long-lived assassin, I found it extremely hard to actually finish the job. Backstab can bring them down a few hps but then my offence sucked, couldn't land a hit and lost almost every time, to PCs and NPCs both.

Then you aren't trying hard enough, or are going about it wrong.  I had a long-lived burglar who never even branched backstab and he was -quite- the effective killer when necessary.

Quote from: "spawnloser"There are plenty of roles still open to them.  Personally, I think that anyone's first character should be limited to human and in one of the two major city-states.

I can tell you with no uncertainty, had I been limited to only this option, I would never have even tried arm.  I doubt I am the only one.

Quote from: "joyofdiscord"

Quote from: "ThirdEye"During my time with a fairly long-lived assassin, I found it extremely hard to actually finish the job. Backstab can bring them down a few hps but then my offence sucked, couldn't land a hit and lost almost every time, to PCs and NPCs both.

Then you aren't trying hard enough, or are going about it wrong.  I had a long-lived burglar who never even branched backstab and he was -quite- the effective killer when necessary.

Not true. His backstab got pretty damn amazing. Had a couple one hit kills, but if I couldn't finish with stab then I was gonna have a rough time.....Hmmmm, maybe it was just because I was fighting rather tough PCs :P

If you could not raise backstab that much, then flee and use 'shadow' to follow the victim to where he'll rest then retry, use poison on your knife or simply find a brute partner for yourself.

If my krathi cannot kill something with fireballs, he tries another way, or he finds an elkran ally.. This is the usual way to solve problems.

Just a litle spark on the already heated debate

Has anyone thought of cheapshot fighting? What if our assassin friend has thrown his first backstab and his mark doesn't die, draws a blade and gets ready to open a can (I love that). Our assassin friend thinking he wants this fight over as quickly as possible, uses his advantage of positioning and readiness to knee the mark in the nads, stomp on his foot, elbow the mark in the gut. Anything to throw the mark off guard while he's jerking his sword out (I personally like the elbow to the gut approach)  and using the genuine keeling over response to stab our friend the mark in choice locations once or twice more?

Editted for insight: Final words my backstab using wannabe ninja assassin buddies. Throw a little variety in your technique. That backstab not killing your mark? Use poison or when you run, hurl something pointy and sharp, or hard and heavy towards the mark instead of doing this ridiculous flee and backstab thing. Its lame and puts assassin PC's everywhere to shame by lowering the standard. Now then....the only remote way I'd accept this fleeting tralala movement (backstab, flee backstab, flee, emote makes a rude hand gesture and backstabs you, flee) as a pheasible technique is if you were in a dark secluded place where you could see your target but they couldn't see you. Anyone seen horror flicks? The evil flash-across-the-screen-as-a-dark-mishappen-blur movement might actually be possible for an experienced killer in his own element....but don't make a habit of doing it elsewhere.

Misaki out.