Assassins being a royal pain

[Muagan_ra]

When I try to employ assassins (a lot of them) I have such a miserable success rate - despite the law of averages you might assume would make things easier.

Given the difficulty in using assassins in this game, especially against family members, why is it that the AI has a seemingly superhuman cadre of murders who very frequently slay my governers? Or worse still, my generals in the field mid-campaign? On many turns I can loose three family members at once, which is especially a problem in my middle-eastern posessions so far away from the homeland. Sending replacements is quite a feat.

I've taken to attaching a spy and few assassins to every field-general and every governer, which does help, but the AI is still taking out an alarming number of my family members.

Aside from assigning them assassins of their own, and trying to assassinate the assassins - is there any other way to protect against this? Why is it that the AI seems to have better ability with assassins than the player?

[Jianadaren]

I don't think AI assassins are any better than human assassins, it's just that the AI's natural passivity (some would say patience) is inherently advantageous at training and deploying assassins. Assassins are arguably the only agent in the game that is not capable of doing anything useful out of the oven - they need to be trained over several (and sometimes dozens) of turns before they can accomplish goals like assassinating family members. In turn, the AI trains those agents better than some humans do.

Furthermore Assassins, like Spies, have subterfuge, so ennemy agents can go undetected even in your FOV. They could easily have way more agents than you can even fathom.

Or, they simply have an AssHQ and a Pleasure Palace, and are spamming Dexters. Destroy those buildings, set-up a couple army and agent factories in these hostile territories and beat them at their own game.

Or make-do with captains.

[Muagan_ra]

Of course you're probably right, the OP was my frustration talking! French Assassins used to be the main problem, but my solution was beatifully simple: I destroyed them, erego no more assassins!

I reckon I should work on attaining an Assassins Guild.

[richmagpies]

On a related point, I had 2 or 3 really good assassins (took a while to build them up on easy targets) and then used them every turn to kill foreign merchants, diplomats, family members, army captains etc. Is there any point killing army captains as they are just replaced by another one each time? The assassins do have an upkeep cost (I think?).

Also is there much point in using them to destroy buildings via sabotage instead of the killing option? For example if I wanted to take a castle would it make sense to use them to destoy all the buildings capable of making soldiers? Does this really affect the enemies ability to use them and does a building have to be 100% destroyed or will say 25% destroyed have the same effect?

Cheers

[Silent Assassin]

Also is there much point in using them to destroy buildings via sabotage instead of the killing option? For example if I wanted to take a castle would it make sense to use them to destoy all the buildings capable of making soldiers? Does this really affect the enemies ability to use them and does a building have to be 100% destroyed or will say 25% destroyed have the same effect?

Cheers

For your question here: The thing that he good with sabotage is that let's say you sabotage a faction that as like two region left and you want to make them your vassals. So you block their Ports, place armies on their Land to cause devastation siege their settlements and then use your spies to destroy, ports, barracks, churches etc this could cost thei cities to Rebel, cause them heavy money loses etc.

[Silent Assassin]

You just need to pratice your on Rebel captains and you wll see them get good traits and better at killing. Sabotage dosen't give them more skills for killing either as some members think.

Assassin Guild would definatly help you, if you need help to trigger it check my guide

[Jianadaren]

Successful Sabotage missions increase Subterfuge. Higher Subterfuge ratings increase success rates of Assassination attempts.

[Silent Assassin]

Successful Sabotage missions increase Subterfuge. Higher Subterfuge ratings increase success rates of Assassination attempts.

In my experience no

[Conquistatore]

Successful Sabotage missions increase Subterfuge. Higher Subterfuge ratings increase success rates of Assassination attempts.

As stated, the more subterfuge, the better the chance of a successful mission no matter how it is gained, of course traits like 'successful saboteur' don't give subterfuge bonuses, only saboteur bonuses. Also as the OP suggested, carry agents with your important members to protect them somewhat. I find that they have a higher chance of surviving assassins if they are in a city as governor, rather than out in the field.

Not sure if this is true, but it seems that's what i've experienced in my games.

[Callawyn]

Having spies stacked with your Generals may help some (not entirely sure on this), having assassins stacked with them has no effect.

Best thing to do is assassinate all AI assassins you can. Illuminate your lands with watchtowers and bring spies with your armies when you invade enemy lands, so you can see where the AI assassins are. Bring an assassin or two with your generals when you invade, but not for defense, their job is to assassinate the enemy assassin before he gets a shot at your general. Success rates for this are actually quite high, so its not difficult.

[ChewieMuse]

I had an assasin who assasinated a king with a 6% sucsess rate... Lmfao I was just like.... O.O... I actually took the time to call my girlfriend and Tell her about this Lol shes just liek ._.

[Conquistatore]

haha well done, you'd be surprised but those really low chances of success like less than 10% have a a surprisingly good chance to succeed, while the 90%+ attempts can fail quite a lot... seems it is left to randomness and chance sometimes...

[Haakon]

I have comitted regicide using low skilled assasins. Even if they all have 10% chance it doesnt take that many tries before you suceeed. But usually I dont use assasins at all. I keep some in cities together with spies so when my spies reveal enemy spies I use the assasins to kill them off.

[Pink Beard]

i barely users assasins and spies. these buggers have a 25% rating to actually complete a mission with "chance of succes: 95%"

they are lame

[sinosleep]

i barely users assasins and spies. these buggers have a 25% rating to actually complete a mission with "chance of succes: 95%"

they are lame

I've found that actually using them on missions isn't all that important any way, at least for spies. So long as they can get a visual you'll get all the same info you would had you actually gotten a peak at the settlement or army you were curious about. So now that's all I ever do with them. I walk them close enough to where I can double click on the enemy army or building and get the info I wanted.

[Pink Beard]

yes i've noticed it before if you have a spy right next to the city (and not in) u can also see EVERYTHING

so no need to risk our hides there

but the assasins stay the same... dieing on a 95% merchant...

[Callawyn]

i barely users assasins and spies. these buggers have a 25% rating to actually complete a mission with "chance of succes: 95%"

they are lame

I'm always invading something, having spies around just to illuminate is very well worth the expense. I'll have them spy anything they have a high % chance on until they get +3 to their spotting range, then just position them as scouts, without risking them on any missions. I've been burnt a few times invading enemy territory blind, spies are cheap and effective scouts, I want to see everything within a turns move of my field armies. Using spies to open gates can be huge, and incredibly easy (so much so that I never do it, game is too easy as it is). I'll occassionally put spies in my own cities if the AI is active with spies/assassins, they definitely reduce success rates. This is particularly key if there's plague in AI cities that border your territory, as the AI will occassionally use spies to spread plague. Speaking of which, if you spot plague anywhere, send 3 or 4 spies to spread it around AI territory, while parking a few spies defensively in your cities to stop the AI from doing the same to you. Its amazing how much damage you can do with this. The other big use for spies is to cause unrest in enemy cities, causing them to rebel. This is pretty easy if the circumstances are right, as the AI is pretty stupid about maintaining order in cities at risk of rebellion. There's also a nice ancillary you can get for your spies just by parking in enemy city if you can get happiness below 70%, even if the city doesn't rebel. My rule of thumb is to have 2 spies for every field army I'm maintaining.

Assassins I find most useful for killing enemy agents. Priests of opposing religion, enemy assassins, high skilled enemy merchants, enemy princesses and diplomats are all easy targets. I also use assassins to sabotage buildings in regions I'm trying to force into rebellion. As mentioned above, there is a trait line that gives subterfuge for sabotage. As for assassinating enemy generals, I consider this a high risk mission as my assassins die far more often than not, so I rarely do it. Best way to skill up is to assassinate a rebel captain repeatedly. From about turn 40 I'll have 6-10 assassins active for the rest of the game.

[Yojimbo]

Target army captains (not geenrals) and keep killign them as they are easy to kill. Low influance diplomats are good targets too. After just a few kills them become much more useful and you can start targeting oppsing assasins and generals. Sabotage missions usaly have a much better chance of sucess also and are useful for rasing agent skill. Train lots of agents so you get the assasians guid to give them more subdefuge from the start.

[Muagan_ra]

In my experience subterfuge does not increse from sabotage missions.

Anyway, I do have a few decently skilled assassins, but the scale of assassinations I'm having to deal with is overwhelming. Principally because I'm in a long (long) war with most of Europe, on all fronts, and they refuse to make peace even though they are the aggressors (I'm playing Milan, so I guess it makes sense.)

[Yojimbo]

In my experience subterfuge does not increse from sabotage missions.

Anyway, I do have a few decently skilled assassins, but the scale of assassinations I'm having to deal with is overwhelming. Principally because I'm in a long (long) war with most of Europe, on all fronts, and they refuse to make peace even though they are the aggressors (I'm playing Milan, so I guess it makes sense.)

Well it does. both sabotage and assasination give/improve traits relating to subterfuge. Station spies in your own cities i think they help detect assasins Watchtowers might also he helpful in detecting incoming asssasins.