Combat Assassin

Combat Assassins tend to prefer working alongside a group, whether that be a team of fellow assassins or an adventuring party they have grown a fondness for. They seek to give their group the advantage in combat they need to win, taking out their targets quickly and efficiently by pointing out and creating whatever openings they identify, then leading the strike towards a finishing blow.

The Combat Assassin is usually quite confident, after spending much of their lives honing both their blades and themselves into a terrifying killing force, and they know the weaknesses of melee combatants all too well and how to take advantage of them.

In relation to alignment, they are chaotic, and tend to kill whenever they deem it necessary. Assassins don't always see each other as good and evil, instead distinguishing by the reasons they kill. An Assassin that kills to help only themself is considered "evil", while an assassin that kills because they must improve the world is considered "good". A “neutral” assassin usually kills for some alternative purpose, one that is neither inherently good nor evil in nature, but usually these assassins see themselves as morally correct despite their cause’s more ambiguous nature.

Save DC for Combat Assassins = 8 + Dex modifier + proficiency bonus

Shadow Blend

Starting at 3rd level, when you are in dim light or darkness, you can Hide even when in plain sight.

Stance Breaker

At 3rd level, you can use your bonus action to impose disadvantage on any attacks made by a creature you hit with a melee attack until the start of your next turn, or until they take a bonus action to recover.

If the chosen creature makes an attack and misses, all creatures in line of sight of the missed attack have advantage on attacks made against that creature until the start of its next turn.

Combat Assassin Techniques

Also at 3rd level, you begin to implement special combat techniques, by foregoing damage for destabilizing your enemies instead. When you hit a creature with a Sneak Attack, you remove two sneak attack die to, instead, apply one of the following techniques below:

Crippling Strike. Choose between Dexterity, or Constitution. The target has disadvantage on checks and saves made with the chosen ability until the end of your next turn.

Capture. The target makes a Constitution saving throw. On a failed save, the target is stunned until the start of your next turn.

If the target rolls a 1 on the save, on the first turn the target is not suffering the stunned condition from Capture they must succeed a wisdom saving throw or become frightened for 1 minute. At the start of every turn after becoming frightened, they may attempt another wisdom saving throw to stop being frightened. 

Flank Attack. When you hit a creature, you attempt to expose a critical vulnerability in its defenses for your allies to capitalize upon. The creature must make a Constitution saving throw. On a failed save, until the start of your next turn, the first ally that hits the creature with an attack rolls a number of additional damage die equal to your proficiency bonus.

Golden Opportunity

At 9th level, whenever a creature within your melee attack range misses an attack, you can use your reaction to make a melee weapon attack against it.

Defensive Roll

At 13th level, when you would be reduced to 0 hit points by a melee attack, you can use a reaction to take 5 feet of movement and reduce the damage taken to 0. You can’t use this feature again until you finish a long rest.

Killing Strike

At 17th level, you aim to slay a target in a single move. When you hit a target with a melee weapon attack that benefits from your sneak attack additional damage, you can choose to use your bonus action to take the attack action again without advantage, and if it hits the additional attack also benefits from your sneak attack additional damage.

On a failure, you can't use your Sneak Attack again until the end of your next turn.