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Sneak attacking and power attacking are effective means of combat, more effective then straight weapon damage hoping for a critical in a combat situation. While causing lots of damage can certainly kill somebody, I don't see that as assassination.
Assassination, by the mechanic alone as regards Assassin and as a feature of this ninja design, hit points are not even in the equation. Your opponent could have a million hits points and it doesn't matter a whit. You study your target from an unseen position, you make your opportunity and strike. If successful (failed FORT save) they're slain. Only this is assassination.
I'll add if you can make your opponent helpless, then do a Coup de Grace, that too is assassination, but these two examples are the only ones.
Anything less than that is just effective combat, and combat is something that the best ninja never ever sees.
Granted this is Pathfinder, so no doubt the ninja will find himself in combat at some time, but this class shouln't be designed for that optimally. So he gets by, hoping that the rest of his party can help him survive to perform a real assassination down the road. My players call wizards, sorcerers and ninja as 'hidests'. They are present when they can be most effective, otherwise they are mostly gone, so they won't be targets. Combat is for the warriors, not for the ninja.
Which is all well and good, and illustrates why the ninja does not need sneak attack.
I would argue ninjas are skilled enough fighters to be full BaB, with the trade off being they don't get any of the added damage modifiers the other full BaB's get in exchange for poison use and the limited arcane spell selection on the ranger/paladin scale.
That would meet all of the criteria of the Wikipedia ninja, unlike the current proposal.
As I've stated many times, I am developing my own oriental setting, Kaidan, which will definitely include Shinobi classes, being archetypes of multiple classes, including Monk, Ranger, Rogue and Sorcerer - not a one class concept as Paizo's here.
I see it like the Detective concept in the APG being Detective Bard, Investigator Rogue, Urban Ranger, Urban Druid. Multiple classes each fitting the same niche in slightly different ways, but cohesively could work as an organization of specialized classes fitting the larger niche.
My shinobi are a village/organization/clan that include many classes to specialize in different aspects of stealth/information gathering/assassination.
I still want Paizo's ninja to have a best design, so I can consider it compatible with Kaidan, thus my concern in these threads. Still I have no need to rely on it as necessary to Kaidan.
And no offense to your point, but I don't rely on Wikipedia as a source of accurate information, since I so often find inaccuracies when I look at. If Wikipedia is the only source of information for a given topic, then there is no source, IMO. When looking up a question to be answered on a google search, I look to any other source as possible option, never Wikipedia. My definition of ninja and Wikipedia's do not coincide - and I have no problem with that.
GP
Ninja Assassination or Sneak attack can be solved in two manners, i.e. fighter BAB or rogue sneak attack, with stealth. I believe it would be more in line using the same lineage of skills and attacks as the Samurai, so fighter BAB would win the day, as they must fight samurai as part of their duty, and often they act alone.
However, they have to implement other means beyond the direct access to armor, ancestral weapons, etc. to perform their duties. So they implement the secret art of ninjitsu, or whatever you want to call it, that implement arcane or ki powers, with special weapons and tools.
But most implementations in D&D get stuck using the rogue as a template.
But pathfinder doesn't properly emulate espionage
pathfinder, like it's father, dungeons and dragons is designed around one major thing. and that is combat. the reason crafting, social encounters and espionage don't function so well is because of the extreme focus on the system's primary function. combat.
you are talking about a nearly 40 year old franchise based off of tabletop WARgames.
the main premise behind this ancient franchise is glorified banditry
seek out the target
kill the target
steal the target's stuff
how do you expect a game to ignore it's primary function?
it's like playing rummy without a deck of cards.
the target is usually an orc or some other fantastical creature.
but either way, no matter what alignment you play, you are a murdering pickpocket. in other words, the quintessential bandit. whether you kill orcs, drow, trolls, or even your other fellow humans.
and purely because of the game's inherent overfocus on combat. the ninja should have access to sneak attack or a similar combat related ability. i still vote for keeping the beta ninja rogue archtype.
but i say, make a rogue talent that gives the rogue something similar to a Ki pool. we can call it a luck pool for all we care.
Yet the assassin and the assassination mechanic exists in D&D/Pathfinder with nary a problem in its mechanics to simulate the act. Are you suggesting that assassination by the rules of play doesn't really work. And we are forced to run back to combat as that is what D&D is all about???
I've played plenty of D&D/Pathfinder with assassins in play and assassination works just fine.
I've also played plenty of D&D over the past 30 years with espionage elements in the game, when playing espionage is plays just fine too. I've had no problem playing espionage in my games, why are you having problems with it?
In my Kaidan setting, I have included: Ki Potential as a trait, which allows those possessing it to access Activate Ki feat, which provides a minimal ki pool to any class - rogue, monk, fighter included. So I make ki pool available to non-ki classes (who get a larger ki pool) than those with just the trait and feats.
It sounds like a limitation on your games part, not the game itself.
but tell me, even though you haven't had problems with the mechanics for assassinations and espionage.
have you had players that were too dull witted to think of the idea?
that is another factor. todays generation of gamers want to engage in glorified banditry. and i haven't seen a player bother to split up from the party to infiltrate the enemy's base, let alone, scouting or shopping. most of todays RPG parties tend to be closely tied together. as if an invisibile thread connects each of them by thier left pinky.
older players may have been more creative with a simpler ruleset, but that's because of the lack of rules involved and the required amount of creativity to survive the older editions. but pathfinder has none of the lethality of it's ancestors. and due to this lack of lethality, and also due to the boring simplicity of MMOs. players are less creative with thier tactics.
espionage is totally out of the range of the gamers of today's generation. especially those with a background of 'point the mouse and left click to kill the monster' or 'press the X button to attack'. even with my poor background of freeform, if you can build a godmodey enough character, you don't even need intellegence. however, if you want to be capable of subtle godmoding, it still requires elaboracy. which just makes you Ichihara Yuko instead of Son Goku.
a lot of newer gamers are not as capable of coming up with the same level of planning the older ones could accomplish.
a great part of this has to do with how simple videogames have become.
here is something.
join a freeform community, study all of the other members you can for 5 years, watch how each new set of players bumps up the bar. and watch the power level quickly rise.
watch yesterday's godmode become tomorrow's underpowered trash.
players almost never split the party anymore, even for scouting or to enter a different part of town. don't expect them to bathe or take potty breaks unless they are having a projectile defecation contest. that's what predestigitation spells are for.
and the mechanics for 'assassination' are so completely nonviable. expecting a high score that an assassin can ill afford because of the game's inherent combat focus. and 3 rounds of doing nothing is worthless because your foe will be dead much faster through actual combat. the assassinate ability arguably autofails against any target who recognizes you as an enemy. so the best you can do for an assassination mechanic is to have the fighter coup de grace the sleeping foe with a scythe.
To answer your question, "No." Our youngest player is the assassin in the party. He never misses an opportunity to assassinate if possible.
That may be a problem for 'new generatation gamers' I can't really say. Our group consists of 26 to 49 year olds, and only one of us play video games and he's the oldest one. None of the rest of us play video, console or PC games at all - so we don't know this problem you speak of. We have either been playing D&D for 30+ years, or for our younger players, they are the children of people we've been playing for 30 years.
As I said, we have no problems playing espionage in our D&D games, in fact we almost depend upon opportunities to do so, just to widen the gaming possibilities. How younger players cannot do this, or have been 'video trained' not to do this, is beyond my understanding (or care for that matter). If they are too dull-witted to figure it out, perhaps they should just keep to video games, so they can play a game they understand.
In our D&D game there is no mouse, no video screen, there's only pen/pencil, paper, dice, minis, books and people talking - the problems and conditions you speak of, are alien concepts to me and my gamers.
How could you not figure it out? Are kids that simple today, that this is beyond their ken? I think its very sad.
GP
where i happen to be. tabletop gaming groups are hard to find and the requisite books are a rare commodity. video games are alarmingly common and gamers are too lazy to do anything but simplistic hack and slash.
where i happen to be. tabletop gaming groups are hard to find and the requisite books are a rare commodity. video games are alarmingly common and gamers are too lazy to do anything but simplistic hack and slash.
Perhaps its because I don't look, but I'm sure many of the people I know or meet have console games at home, I don't ask, as its non-issue with me. But surprisingly I constantly find folks I've known for years but did not know they were P&P gamers, or customers of my shop who are gamers. My community is only 18,000+ population in large county with only 100,000 people total - very rural. So its very surprising to constantly discover new people who play the game.
Perhaps, you're not looking hard enough, because my area can't be unique, there seems to be lots of tabletop gamers where I am from, and I haven't gamed with most of them.
Economy is fairly bad here, so I'm not suggesting you move here, but maybe move to where the gamers are, because your situations unique compared to where I'm from - and that is rural hole.
Still, the creators of Tales of Gaeia (I don't play) is from my town. Another guy is designing his own class-less RPG, though he GMs Pathfinder games (I only learned this last month). Of course, I am designing Kaidan as well as being a pro fantasy cartographer. So lots 'industry' people here too, apparently.
But we're getting way off topic here, so let's go back ninja discussion...
GP
unfortunately. i am a mentally disabled dependant adult. i live on a fixed income and due to specific mental disabilities, i cannot be trusted with a driver's license. mostly because of an undying lack of common sense being a part of them.
What did people think of the Rokugan Ninja class? It had Fighter BAB and full Sneak Attack progression. It only had 4 skill points, but it had a good list of class skills. Hit Die was still a d6.
It was lacking in the special class features department, having only Evasion, Poison Use, Uncanny and Improved Uncanny Dodge, an ability that added their Int. modifier to initiative, lacked good Reflex saves (it had good Will only), gains Blind-Fight and Deflect Arrows feats for free real late, added Con. bonus x 5 to their speed if wearing no armor or light armor, and had Ninja Dodge (which was +1 at level 1, increased +1 every 5 levels, basically a Dodge that you can split the bonuses to different enemies per turn or stack them all on one enemy.
Not my idea of the ideal fantasy ninja class, but it had a few good starts.
What did people think of the Rokugan Ninja class? It had Fighter BAB and full Sneak Attack progression. It only had 4 skill points, but it had a good list of class skills. Hit Die was still a d6.
It was lacking in the special class features department, having only Evasion, Poison Use, Uncanny and Improved Uncanny Dodge, an ability that added their Int. modifier to initiative, lacked good Reflex saves (it had good Will only), gains Blind-Fight and Deflect Arrows feats for free real late, added Con. bonus x 5 to their speed if wearing no armor or light armor, and had Ninja Dodge (which was +1 at level 1, increased +1 every 5 levels, basically a Dodge that you can split the bonuses to different enemies per turn or stack them all on one enemy.
Not my idea of the ideal fantasy ninja class, but it had a few good starts.
I agree it was a little flat, but I liked the concept better when compared against the Dragon magazine issue Ninja (whatever number) where it was more based on magic with ki powers to disappear, etc.
So I guess you can never please everyone.