Goblinworks Blog: Join Forces Underground


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Discussion thread for new blog entry Goblinworks Blog: Join Forces Underground.

Dark Archive Goblin Squad Member

Ooh hoo hoo!

This looks like fun!

Pardon me while I geek out a bit.

Goblin Squad Member

There is very little in this blog I don't like. My only concern is making sure the procedural generation of names has enough variance that people don't learn what the signs of one are.

Edit to add: Just to make sure I'm reading this right, the thread severing is from the Assassin flag. The penalty to the DI requires an assassination contract, and that the assassin be wearing an Assassin's Mask?

Goblinworks Blog wrote:
If a target dies while suffering the Being Observed debuff and the system would have added a masked assassin to his Killers list (if he wasn't an assassin), the target counts as being assassinated. This triggers the penalties to Development Indexes or structures discussed earlier.

Goblinworks Lead Game Designer

Actually Stephen wrote this blog entry, not me. Part of the text makes it sound like I wrote it; just wanted to be clear.

Goblin Squad Member

Hardin Steele wrote:

I get skilled in "Disguise" and look completely different, even though you know me, and might have worked with me. Compare the disguised me to your "Detect Disguise" skill, and now we have some dynamics in the spycraft archetype (I would guess this would be an "Aristocrat" category skill set). In this example things become much more complex and several layers of possible identifiers would have to be kept for your knowledge of who this disguised person is, as a separate entity from the Hardin you know.

It might not happen early on due to manpower constraints and technology, but mutiple identities seem like an important tool to eventually put into the toolkit for several categories of skills.

I am quoting myself from an entry just yesterday. I nailed this one pretty good. Yay me!

("Detect Disguise" is changed to "Observation" as a skill, but it was the right skill description.)

Goblin Squad Member

Very, very cool. I like the subterfuge involved in 'observing' just to spook somebody or 'observing' non-targets to keep the target guessing.

Teams of assassins sounds sweet.

It sounds like having a bunch of people disguised to observe, then 1 or more pop on their 'mask/s' which identify them as an 'Assassin' to make the kill will be a good strategy. The masked ones won't get a bounty and will potentially destroy their inventories if they die (so the avengers don't gain anything) and the rest walk away so long as their disguises haven't fallen off by the flood of people coming in to investigate =)

I think I can get behind this idea of assassination.

Goblin Squad Member

Looks good overall. I'm a bit disappointed that default anonymity won't be available, but I can understand the technical reasoning and limitations behind it. I am happy that disguise will be an option for limited anonymity, though. The use of the stacking debuff against your disguise is good, and the fact it degrades faster in combat and cannot be used to train is as well. The only thing I'm not a fan of is this:

Goblinworks Blog wrote:
Additionally, getting into combat increases this debuff quickly, and you won't be anonymous on players' attackers/killers lists even if you manage to hurt them without blowing your Disguise (unless you also have an assassin's mask—see below).

Again, I can see the technical reasons, but it's my least favorite thing in the whole blog.

The Observation feet is good, I really like that, and the fact that a squad of assassins can stack their observations is very nice. The risks the assassin takes for remaining anonymous during the kill are steep, but I think it's a good thing. Allowing an assassination to destabilize the settlement for a time is excellent.

Dark Archive Goblin Squad Member

A few things I thought of:

Will you be able to disguise yourself as a specific person? That does have the problem that you might meet yourself, pending hilarity if you can convince other people that you are actually the person you are disguised as, and run away as they beat up the poor guy.

Will the target know how many stacks of observation he has? I was thinking that the target getting an alert (such as line appearing in the chatbox or a voice saying something like "You are being watched") when he get his first stack, but otherwise is unable to tell if he is being watched by assassins. That way, an assassin can look at someone, then leave, but the target doesn't know if he is still being actively watched. Additionally, if the target can see how many stacks he has, he might be able to make a guess at how many assassins there are (e.g. 5 assassins start watching a target, target gets stacks in bunches of 5, target deduces that there are 5 assassins.)

Random NPCs in PC settlements. I don't know if this was actually said anywhere, but having a bunch of NPCs wandering around who use the same name generation as the disguise skill would help assassins (or unliked people) to walk around where they are not wanted. Killing friendly NPCs would cause bad stuff (riots?) so killing everyone you see would be a bad idea if you get watched.

Ooh! Just got an idea! A few assassins with very good disguise sit around watching a target, then a assassin who's better at combat comes in and taps the target.

Goblin Squad Member

First off, let me say "Well done" on another great post. I am very happy to see some details on the shadier side of the spectrum. As I have claimed in the past, and have no shame in doing so, I intend whole-heartedly to be an assassin and this blog was all for me and my brethren.

I am very happy to see the assassin being the ultimate stalker and mind f-er as those are all tools that accomplish the main goal, death to the target. While I am slightly upset that, despite my many ideas and suggestions for the 1 shot kill, it was not included, I find myself happy with the compromise and abilities that were included.

The disguise section was brilliant. It gives a purpose for it, a limit to its use and availability, and still gives it a powerful use. I can see merchants finding out that prices are higher for a certain item in a city they can't get into, so they use a disguise to go in, sell a few items (or buy them in reverse scenario) and get out "safely." It has it's uses for assassins and other "scouts."

I really, really, really like the concept and purpose given for assassination contracts. being able to cripple and limit the use of buildings, training, ect. by the means of eliminating the "leader" of said operations makes me finding work semi easy. I say semi because I still feel it should not be over used and expensive enough that not any tom, dick, and harry can perform.

The slight note at the end about teams of assassin makes me want to "convince" a few of my fellows to form a team and split the earnings.

My question to the devs is this, Will assassination contracts be able to be accepted by groups of people? and if so, do they all have to be assassins? meaning all fly the flag? Or could there be 1 assassin and some "friends" to help with guards ect if needed?

Another question. In the above question's case, does the killing blow have to be done by the assassin to get the effects of being assassinated, or does the assassin just need to participate in the battle for the effects to ensure?

Another question, more about the contracts themselves. Can someone of my own Company put out an assassination contract and allow me to accept it? If not, how does that work exactly if I want someone assassinated, but I want to be the one to do it?

Goblin Squad Member

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Golnor wrote:

A few things I thought of:

Will you be able to disguise yourself as a specific person? That does have the problem that you might meet yourself, pending hilarity if you can convince other people that you are actually the person you are disguised as, and run away as they beat up the poor guy.

Will the target know how many stacks of observation he has? I was thinking that the target getting an alert (such as line appearing in the chatbox or a voice saying something like "You are being watched") when he get his first stack, but otherwise is unable to tell if he is being watched by assassins. That way, an assassin can look at someone, then leave, but the target doesn't know if he is still being actively watched. Additionally, if the target can see how many stacks he has, he might be able to make a guess at how many assassins there are (e.g. 5 assassins start watching a target, target gets stacks in bunches of 5, target deduces that there are 5 assassins.)

Random NPCs in PC settlements. I don't know if this was actually said anywhere, but having a bunch of NPCs wandering around who use the same name generation as the disguise skill would help assassins (or unliked people) to walk around where they are not wanted. Killing friendly NPCs would cause bad stuff (riots?) so killing everyone you see would be a bad idea if you get watched.

Ooh! Just got an idea! A few assassins with very good disguise sit around watching a target, then a assassin who's better at combat comes in and taps the target.

+100%!!!!!!!! to the bold. I love the idea and it will give anyone using a disguise a better chance of not being "spotted" just because we are "a black man in a white neighborhood." Great idea.

Goblin Squad Member

Wow, sounds like GW has captured the true essence of what an assassin is, as much if a psychological weapon and a mortal one.

Goblin Squad Member

Dario wrote:
My only concern is making sure the procedural generation of names has enough variance that people don't learn what the signs of one are.

I can guarantee that members of The Seventh Veil, among others, will be recording names to look for patterns. I hope Golnor's idea of random-name NPCs appearing settlements is implementable, and/or that the procedural system has a huge domain-of-values to pull from.

Goblinworks Game Designer

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Dario wrote:
Edit to add: Just to make sure I'm reading this right, the thread severing is from the Assassin flag. The penalty to the DI requires an assassination contract, and that the assassin be wearing an Assassin's Mask?
Milo Goodfellow wrote:
how does that work exactly if I want someone assassinated, but I want to be the one to do it?

Technically, the contract is not required, just highly recommended if the target doesn't have a PvP or war flag that would let you kill him without resetting your own PvP flag. That is, in war or situations where everyone's flagged for PvP, Assassins may be able to use this system more as a traditional death attack (i.e., as a way to trade a little prep work for more damage on targets of opportunity).

We'll be looking carefully into whether that's too good, and we may want to limit it explicitly to situations where you have a contract.

We're still doing work on exactly how the contracts are set up, so it's too early to say whether you can write one for yourself (but, as noted, you should be able to assassinate your enemies at war without one).

Golnor wrote:

A few things I thought of:

Will you be able to disguise yourself as a specific person? That does have the problem that you might meet yourself, pending hilarity if you can convince other people that you are actually the person you are disguised as, and run away as they beat up the poor guy.

Not initially. Possibly in the long run if we have time to investigate potential drawbacks and design guards against them.

Quote:
Will the target know how many stacks of observation he has?

Yes, part of being a skilled assassin group is varying up your observations to keep the target from deduction. Being able to see the stack totals is part of the target's agency, in basically being able to figure out how close he's getting to being able to be one-shotted (e.g., a high-HP heavy armor wearer may be in the mood of "Bring It!" at one stack, but may start to get a little antsy as the number rises and he realizes he's not going to get to fight back unless he can figure out where the assassin is).

Quote:
Random NPCs in PC settlements.

Initially, being able to disguise as an NPC isn't available (as it would be more complex to use and require even more tech work to get you to show up in a way PCs don't normally show up), but we're definitely looking into making it available eventually. Games like The Ship and the Assassin's Creed multiplayer where you have to move like an NPC to not give yourself away are a lot of fun.

Quote:
Ooh! Just got an idea! A few assassins with very good disguise sit around watching a target, then a assassin who's better at combat comes in and taps the target.

Absolutely.

Milo Goodfellow wrote:

My question to the devs is this, Will assassination contracts be able to be accepted by groups of people? and if so, do they all have to be assassins? meaning all fly the flag? Or could there be 1 assassin and some "friends" to help with guards ect if needed?

Another question. In the above question's case, does the killing blow have to be done by the assassin to get the effects of being assassinated, or does the assassin just need to participate in the battle for the effects to ensure?

In general, we're assuming that when you're in a party you'll tend to share credit and opportunities, but as mentioned we don't have the exact specifics of the assassination contracts worked out. I'd suspect that being in a party will be sufficient to let anyone who contributes count toward completing a bounty or assassination held by one member of the group.

You don't have to do the killing blow, just get on the killers list (or be in a position where you should have been on the list, except being masked keeps that from happening). That generally means doing a certain percentage of the target's HP within a certain window of when he died. We're doing that instead of killing blow for a lot of situations to prevent last second kill steals or even friends offing a character to prevent enemies from getting credit.

Goblin Squad Member

Very good stuff here. Im impressed with the direction over all. As I will mostly be playing a Bandit I still have some direct use for this blog as it seems I should be able to use the disguise skill for recon and possibly black market deals/smuggling, if I understood correctly. Cant wait!

One question though. I am a little jealous about Assassins being able to get training from these shady assassins groups. Never liked the idea of Bandits NEEDING a settlement to train.

Any chance Bandits will be able to get thier training from NPC factions as well?

Goblin Squad Member

great response time and acceptable answers. Thank you very much, good sir.

Side note about the NPC thingy, I 100% agree with the idea that PCs would need to "Play the role" of NPC to lower chance to be noticed. I think what myself and Golnor was asking for is "Will there be random NPC's in the towns for us to blend in with, or will we be the only 'Bob the builder' in plain cloths walking around trying to blend in?"

Goblin Squad Member

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It's... It's... It's exactly EVERYTHING I EVER ASKED FOR! This is exactly how i was hoping an assassin would work and play out. Getting the slight preview of settlement mechanics was nice too :)

Goblin Squad Member

I'd like to run an LE Assassin, but I'm wondering how hard it will be to find the alliances. Any ideas yet on where I would go to locate them?

Goblin Squad Member

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cartomancer wrote:
I'd like to run an LE Assassin, but I'm wondering how hard it will be to find the alliances. Any ideas yet on where I would go to locate them?

You don't find them...they find you!!!!

RPG Superstar 2012 Top 16

Excellent design, and a great triple-hitter of a blog. I love the well focused and flavorful assassination mechanic. The disguise mechanic seems to strike a good balance in terms of name-vs-ID-anonymity,which has been a topic of considerable discussion recently, and it has clear applicability beyond assassination context. And in addition we get a first view of the settlement management mechanics and some specific effects of the aristocrat and expert skill chains. Including the seneschal skill.

I am replete.

PS is that a Muse lyric I see before me?

Goblin Squad Member

Friggin' brilliant. So happy with this.

And I can't wait to use my Champion-flagged perception skills to seek out, close with, and destroy assassins.

Goblin Squad Member

I like this a lot, however I have two requests for clarifications:

1. Is there any cost to putting up a contract (beyond the assassin's fee) that would deter an assassin or his buddy from just putting out "pro bono" contracts on whomever they like?

2. These NPC groups, will it be possible for others besides assassins to interact with them - for example, will groups be able to wage war or otherwise hamper their training facilities like they themselves are vulnerable to?

EDIT:

3. Will someone with the Disguise skill be able to Disguise someone else (perhaps with a skill penalty) ?

Goblin Squad Member

I would like the devs to reconsider the procedurally generated name and allow the option for PCs to enter in their own name. Sure, PCs might want to take the name of someone else playing "there are suddenly 2 Dirk Darings there" but I think that if the PC is trying to emulate someone important, everything else will scream "NO THIS IS A FAKE" to the observer (i.e. gear isn't exactly right, his status and rep are wrong, etc...) Essentially, you wouldn't really want to do that under most circumstances.

On the plus side, I think a lot of people might enjoy making up clever 'Disguise' names - think "Fletch" for inspiration among other places. And if they don't want to, there's always the Procedurally generated names.

Aside from that, great ideas all around! Having played some of the games that were very much about the ganking and the assassining (Assassining?) I like the balance between reward and effort here. And I can see the disguise as more than just assassination - I see it also as a great spying thing.

OOh, another thing - with disguise - at higher levels would you allow magical auras for items so that people might notice that your item radiates an appropriate school of magic? (if that's even a concern)

Goblin Squad Member

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Tuoweit wrote:

I like this a lot, however I have two requests for clarifications:

1. Is there any cost to putting up a contract (beyond the assassin's fee) that would deter an assassin or his buddy from just putting out "pro bono" contracts on whomever they like?

2. These NPC groups, will it be possible for others besides assassins to interact with them - for example, will groups be able to wage war or otherwise hamper their training facilities like they themselves are vulnerable to?

#2 as much as it sucks, it is only fair that we assassins have the same threat to training that the others have so I support this concept.

as for #1, I also am wondering this because I want there to be a bit of rarity and exoticness to assassin contracts. After all, if we become a "dime a dozen" then my fee goes down in order to stay in business and that makes me upset. I want assassination contracts to be similar to Death Curses. Side note, wasn't it said somewhere that doing an assassin contract will cost rep? I could be wrong, but maybe that could be thrown up there as I feel would give it that feel of, "no matter what, I want him dead!!!" that the assassin's contract should have. Side note, in the movie "Ninja Assassin" they refer to the "cost of a life" as = 10 pounds of gold. Even today, that is expensive. Remember that when you seek my services.....

Goblin Squad Member

**** yes! By Achaekek's merciless poison dripping sabre, I've been waiting for this one.

Goblin Squad Member

Wow, that is some killer design!

I especially like how we are seeing the broader design goals shine through in the the specific mechanics

Goblin Squad Member

Bluddwolf wrote:
Wow, sounds like GW has captured the true essence of what an assassin is, as much if a psychological weapon and a mortal one.

Agree. This role sounds fun just for the challenge and skill let alone the influential ripple effects it might have on a whole other scale than a single win/loss combat.

Tbh, no matter how mind-blown I am with this blog, it's the little details that do it for me the most:

Goblin Works Blog wrote:
Upgraded masks give you the option to have your husk automatically destroy itself on death, removing all evidence of your existence and keeping your killers from getting your stuff.

Too good.

Goblin Squad Member

This sounds like such a fun system. The randomly generated named/descriptions and disguises remind me of spy party http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B-7tgWQKJh8

BTW Nice Muse reference.

Goblin Squad Member

My main question:

What happens if the potential assassin targets (master smith, expert farmer, etc.) are alts who only come on long enough to do their chore as needed?

Its hard to assassinate a master smith who only comes on long enough to craft armor for a friend, then goes off and comes back as a main.

Scarab Sages Goblin Squad Member

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Dario wrote:
My only concern is making sure the procedural generation of names has enough variance that people don't learn what the signs of one are.

"So, Marfblafglejhgkslsl! We meet again! But this time you will not escape justice!"

Goblin Squad Member

Milo Goodfellow wrote:


The slight note at the end about teams of assassin makes me want to "convince" a few of my fellows to form a team and split the earnings.

I'm up for that.

Goblin Squad Member

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Wow. Assassin players will be in for a treat. Love the disguise system. Again, you guys took what was actually in the pathfinder game andn translated it.

Goblin Squad Member

So who will be the other side of the coin?

Rangers, Thiefs ?

There should always be a counter, say Rangers as scouts get a better chance or easier
Training for detecting these killers, or whoever.

This would make them targets that have to be removed, before the final kill.

Perhaps an active and a passive skill, one you get a sense something is wrong, then
You can use active skill to try to find , each using the detect system still.

When active you do not count against the kill for the assassin.

Just a thought to add more interaction and to insure that there is an active counter.

Scouts should help counter them, makes scouts useful in war and in townships.

Nothing auto just better chance as they are trained to look for ambushes, other scouts, and
Dangerous items.

Maybe have two types urban and wilderness to choose from each works better than nothing but works best in the correct setting.

Lee

Scarab Sages Goblin Squad Member

"My name is [Random Bystander Number 03647]. You killed my father. Prepare to die."

Scarab Sages Goblin Squad Member

Jazzlvraz wrote:
Dario wrote:
My only concern is making sure the procedural generation of names has enough variance that people don't learn what the signs of one are.
I can guarantee that members of The Seventh Veil, among others, will be recording names to look for patterns. I hope Golnor's idea of random-name NPCs appearing settlements is implementable, and/or that the procedural system has a huge domain-of-values to pull from.

If there are NPCs with procedurally-generated names in settlements, and the assassin alias is generated by the same procedure, then looking for patterns will be much less useful. If PCs are the only people seen on the street, then cracking the pattern would be valuable.

Of course, assassin groups could start periodically sending innocent disguised characters into major settlements, to discourage random killing of likely named characters, but that's a lot of time and effort.

The espionage/counter-espionage struggles in PFO could end up producing the kind of epic stories that arise from corporate infiltration in EVE.

Goblin Squad Member

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robert4818 wrote:

My main question:

What happens if the potential assassin targets (master smith, expert farmer, etc.) are alts who only come on long enough to do their chore as needed?

Its hard to assassinate a master smith who only comes on long enough to craft armor for a friend, then goes off and comes back as a main.

I expect that the character who is in charge of a particular building must spend a certain amount of time online in order for the settlement to receive the particular buff appropriate to the building.

Goblin Squad Member

First of all, Ideas: Brilliant!

By the way, I'm curious, while we don't have much information about mass battles, and ideas on how assassins can play a role in those large confirmations. Is it possible that assissins that can slay certain commander types might be able to impact battles in more than making the person have to respawn far away - for instance, resting certain commander timers or imparing certain commander skills.

For that matter, is it possible to have assassins's kills of targets inhibit players in other ways - not necessarily make them unplayable, but neutralize certain key aspects of their roles for a penalty - such as carrying capacity, spellcasting, speed, etc.

Just some thoughts.

Goblin Squad Member

LeeSw wrote:

So who will be the other side of the coin?

Rangers, Thiefs ?

There should always be a counter, say Rangers as scouts get a better chance or easier Training for detecting these killers, or whoever.

I hope the role of Spymaster will be viable in a settlement (any settlement) for this purpose, whatever their class - as Tony's fond of saying, even Lawful Good types have need of some shady skills occasionally. Hence my question about disguising someone else, having someone disguise a VIP so they can escape a dangerous situation like assassination is at least as strong of a fantasy trope as having assassinations in the first place :)

Scarab Sages Goblin Squad Member

If the bounty hunting system has as much thought put into it as this system, killing for hire is going to be a blast for both professions.

Disguise could be useful for so many people: Spymasters and their agents, bounty hunters, black marketeers, and anyone who wants to be the mysterious stranger in the back of the tavern. For the cost of a suit of armor, it sounds like a wizard or a monk could pose as a fighter until combat begins, then unexpectedly start slinging spells or swinging deadly fists. An elite army unit disguised as grunts could do a lot of damage when they're underestimated and engaged.


I love this system. A lot. And I look forward to beating the tar out of these knife-tossing punks. That'll show 'em!
What? They already killed their target? Well, better late than never!


Quote:
While in Disguise, you'll be constantly contesting your Disguise skill with the Perception skills of other players and NPC guards. Each time you lose, you'll gain a few stacks of the "Failing Disguise" debuff; this isn't visible to other players, but if it exceeds the quality rating of your Disguise outfit, your Disguise is blown and you'll suddenly lose all your anonymity

What exactly happens when somebody sees thru the Disguise (but it isn't blown yet)?

Do they see your true identity and all flags, etc? Do you retain (some?) anonymity, but they know you are Disguised?

About the Assassinations in War scenario, I think a good balance to make it not just too good would be to enforce logistics of assassination contracts, so assassination contracts can't just be issued in the field, accepted, and instantly kill the next dude, and you can't use the Assassination Death Attack without a contract (kind of hokey, but if all Assassination is tied into mystical murder cults, it seems plausible... blessing of Achaekek et al).

Perhaps the contract logistics could key in with the Assassin Cults, that the contracts must be 'activated' by the Cult: Assassins must go to these Cults to receive/pick-up the order, and buyers (or an intermediary agent of the Cult to keep buyers at arms-length), must go there as well to deposit/activate the contract at the Cult). Buyers need to know a contact who can 'deposit' their contract at the Assassin Cult, or be given a 'key' to enter the Guild themself...?

This results in a good amount of transit to and from a site of battle (unless it's raging nearby the Assassin's Cult). Or actually, since that creates the scenario where a Cult's area could be surrounded to disallow Assassins to transit (or only Assassins of the Settlement surrounding it), it's probably better to just allow ad-hoc Cult 'Franchises' to be built anywhere... Some of them could be publicly 'visible' buildings, but others could be 'hidden' buildings to represent cult hide-aways, and work similar to Bandit Hide-Aways? Even allow them to be setup in Settlements that you don't own [insidious cult infiltration!], they don't function as benefits to Settlement DI, they are just located where they are located (also possibly in Inns or Bandit Dens, Wilderness, etc). Only if the building the Cult Hide-Out is 'attached' to is razed, is the Cult Hide-Out destroyed. Since these Cults are not really PC organizations, perhaps PCs would need to fund creation of new Cult Hide-Outs, but once created they are simply property of the Cult (so PCs can't exclude other PCs who join the NPC Cult group... of course, they can just kill other PCs they don't like, reveal their Asssassin status to the public, etc).

To make it so assassination contracts can't be issued RELATIVELY instantly if a Cult Hide-Out is near-by, give the contracts a 'casting time' (30 min game time?) for activation by the mystic murder cult, this makes them a non-instantaneous thing... Still could be used well within the scope of a war, but not nearly as much as a non-stop combat means.

Goblin Squad Member

KarlBob wrote:
Disguise could be useful for so many people: Spymasters and their agents, bounty hunters, black marketeers, and anyone who wants to be the mysterious stranger in the back of the tavern. For the cost of a suit of armor, it sounds like a wizard or a monk could pose as a fighter until combat begins, then unexpectedly start slinging spells or swinging deadly fists. An elite army unit disguised as grunts could do a lot of damage when they're underestimated and engaged.

That may be possible, but if I understand how it works, one's armor will be severely impaired since the Disguise has to be equipped in lieu of your usual gear.

Goblin Squad Member

I'd like to see some way to hide who is in charge of an organization. I think that could be interesting -- did you just kill the Lord or the Lord's stand-in? Might not be feasible, but depending on how transparent an organization's roster is, it could work.

Goblin Squad Member

Quandary wrote:

What exactly happens when somebody sees thru the Disguise (but it isn't blown yet)?

Do they see your true identity and all flags, etc? Do you retain (some?) anonymity, but they know you are Disguised?
Ryan Dancey wrote:
Like being invisible, being in disguise has to be binary. Once the disguise is blown for anyone, it's blown for everyone (else 3rd party tools will create an information disadvantage).

I think these together mean no one will see through your disguise without it being blown. Is that reasonable?

Goblin Squad Member

If they are going to these lengths, then I can hardly wait to learn what else they have in mind. I should think non-evil Bards would have access to disguise. Rangers should have camoflage and sniping skills.

Imagine how valuable people who have trained up perception, and/or have spells of true seeing might become.

Scarab Sages Goblin Squad Member

Tuoweit wrote:
LeeSw wrote:

So who will be the other side of the coin?

Rangers, Thiefs ?

There should always be a counter, say Rangers as scouts get a better chance or easier Training for detecting these killers, or whoever.

I hope the role of Spymaster will be viable in a settlement (any settlement) for this purpose, whatever their class - as Tony's fond of saying, even Lawful Good types have need of some shady skills occasionally. Hence my question about disguising someone else, having someone disguise a VIP so they can escape a dangerous situation like assassination is at least as strong of a fantasy trope as having assassinations in the first place :)

The counter to Assassins are the Enforcer and Champion flags. As an assassin gets bonuses to stealth, they get bonuses to perception. I am sure these roles will have just as much depth as the Assassins, and if they are good they have the ability to make an assassin's job much more difficult. These flags can be used by anyone, but I would think that Fighters, Paladins, Monks, and Rangers would be quite good at these roles.

Goblin Squad Member

Can you pve under disguise to set up confidence capers? Can you keep the same generated name until the disguise is broken? Does the observation debuff effect all damage, like from a pve source? Basically I want to pretend to be a cleric and party with my mark and have him killed by a pve element. I am a bit dastardly and this blog has really excited me.

Goblin Squad Member

OOOOH YEEAAA! Me and my poisoned daggers are SOOO happy to read this. GW really picked the true identity of an assassin in my opinion! I don't know if I could be happier with this post! To all my fellow Assassin Brethren out then, I tip my hat to you, and can't wait to strike fear into the hearts of many!

Goblin Squad Member

Skwiziks wrote:
KarlBob wrote:
Disguise could be useful for so many people: Spymasters and their agents, bounty hunters, black marketeers, and anyone who wants to be the mysterious stranger in the back of the tavern. For the cost of a suit of armor, it sounds like a wizard or a monk could pose as a fighter until combat begins, then unexpectedly start slinging spells or swinging deadly fists. An elite army unit disguised as grunts could do a lot of damage when they're underestimated and engaged.
That may be possible, but if I understand how it works, one's armor will be severely impaired since the Disguise has to be equipped in lieu of your usual gear.

Also I'm curious that Assassins will need the sanction/affiliation of their body they are a member of:

Goblin Works Blog wrote:
Alliances like the Red Mantis, Church of Norgorber, and Daggermark will happily train you if you throw in your lot with them.

Also, I suspect Alignment?

Goblin Works Blog wrote:
We outlined a number of PvP flags, one of which was Assassin. This flag can be flown by evil characters

Rob's question about the leaders requiring game time to be realistic targets, meaning these leaders will need to actually exist in the game world for a sufficient amount of time, again as public figures this matches the assassination target and debilitating of.

Both good questions on the role of assassin.

-

I think the anonymity of the assassin contract (ie the discretion of the assassins not feeding that info on) and actual assassinations successful but not known who is ordering them, has loads of potential.

Think I might save up to hire an assassin at some stage, possibly if I've got an eye to be the settlement's chief of...


cartomancer wrote:
Quandary wrote:

What exactly happens when somebody sees thru the Disguise (but it isn't blown yet)?

Do they see your true identity and all flags, etc? Do you retain (some?) anonymity, but they know you are Disguised?
Ryan Dancey wrote:
Like being invisible, being in disguise has to be binary. Once the disguise is blown for anyone, it's blown for everyone (else 3rd party tools will create an information disadvantage).
I think these together mean no one will to see through your disguise without it being blown. Is that reasonable?

I'm still not clear on this, but perhaps it means that when somebody's Perception beats your Disguise, they don't really 'see thru the disguise' or gain any information, it JUST applies a debuff to the Disguise HPs. That isn't what I assumed from reading 'each time [your Disguise] lose[s]... to the Perception skills of other players...' and it goes against expectations of 'seeing thru a disguise' from real-world and tabletop, but I suppose that could be the mechanic.

Quote:
While in Disguise, you'll be constantly contesting your Disguise skill with the Perception skills of other players and NPC guards. Each time you lose, you'll gain a few stacks of the "Failing Disguise" debuff; this isn't visible to other players, but if it exceeds the quality rating of your Disguise outfit, your Disguise is blown and you'll suddenly lose all your anonymity

It does beg the question of how 'special' Perception abilities work, True Seeing, etc...

Would they just let that person see thru the Disguise, or would they just instantly destroy the Disguise of anybody they see?
Possibly expressed as very large amount of 'damage' to the Disguise, instantly destroying most Disguises but not necessarily the best ones?


Being wrote:
If they are going to these lengths, then I can hardly wait to learn what else they have in mind. I should think non-evil Bards would have access to disguise. Rangers should have camoflage and sniping skills.

Anybody should have access to Disguise, although I can see it requiring non-Lawful, or usage of it having a minor Chaotic effect. Assassination is Evil-only (and should push you more Evil when you use it), but none of this is Class Specific, and of course 'multiclassing' is even more fluid than tabletop Pathfinder.

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