This build has been archived and is not updated by the GuildWiki community. This build is only maintained for historical reference and may contain incorrect or outdated information. Reason: Nightfall release made Assassin skills for assassins better for Melee.

The Axe-assin is an axe-wielding assassin build designed to strike multiple adjacent opponents with a high rate of critical hits. It differs from usual assassin builds in dealing unfocused AoE damage instead of focused damage to a single target.

This build is primarily intended for PvE, though it can be adapted for Competitive Missions and Alliance Battles that have several NPCs.

Attributes and Skills

Assassin / Warrior	Attribute Rank
Critical Strikes	11 + (1-3)* + 1
Shadow Arts	10 + 1
Axe Mastery	10

Triple Chop

Cyclone Axe

Wild Blow

Critical Eye

Way of Perfection

Critical Defenses

Shadow Refuge

Resurrection Signet

Equipment

• Vampiric axe of Fortitude. Dragoncrest Axe (unique) is ideal.
• Alternate weapon: Sundering axe of Enchanting, such as a Totem Axe (unique).
• A shield granting an unconditional health bonus and damage reduction mods. The Exalted Aegis (unique) or a Bronze Shield crafted by Manzo is ideal.
• Two Keen Masks*, one with a minor and the other with a superior Critical Strikes rune, to be swapped around based on danger and DP.

Usage

• Target clumped enemies.
• Before the attacks, cast Critical Eye, Way of Perfection and Critical Defenses. This should take care of your energy management and health.
  • Be careful when using Critical Defenses, though, as its duration is very short (6 seconds). Make sure you are in combat before using it. Using an enchanting axe will increase the duration of Critical Defenses to 7.2 seconds, giving the extra time needed to hit with Wild Blow again.
• Spam Triple Chop and Cyclone Axe whenever they are recharged.
• Use Wild Blow, when needed, to keep Critical Defenses up (should your ~35% chance of criticals fail you).
• Use Shadow Refuge for health management.

Weaknesses

• Single strong opponents render Triple Chop, Cyclone Axe, and the Critical Strikes skills less effective.
• Assassins have weaker armor than warriors. This short-coming is somewhat ameliorated by Critical Defenses.
• This build has all the standard melee weaknesses. Empathy, Spiteful Spirit, Reckless Haste, blindness and weakness are great counters.

Variants

Wild Blow, though useful, is a wildcard. Suggested replacements:

• Return or Dash to get out of the fray quickly.
• Penetrating Chop/Blow for high priority, low AL targets (such as casters).
• Sharpen Daggers to spread bleeding.
• An increased Tactics score would enable assassins to gain the full benefit of shields, but the loss to the other scores prevents this variant from being in the standard build. Special shields like the Peppermint Shield are useful for this build.

Wild Blow is necessary, however, to guarantee the maintenance of Critical Defenses when using an enchanting axe. Using it as soon as it recharges will keep your defenses up.

There is an option to use sword instead of axe. If you want to deal more damage to a single target, you can use the skills Seeking Blade and Hundred Blades instead of the axe skills. Hundred Blades will give you more chances to perform a Critical Hit. Wild Blow will still be necessary.

Notes

• The critical hit chance is 34.7%, 35.7% or 36.7%, depending on rune choice.

Templates

The Skills Template for this build is: AXMik+pj7A+UKBF9HBcA6yEA