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PROshadowthief

New Member
The Ultimate Thief/Assassin Guide
Recommended Perk Build (click)http://skyrimcalculator.com/#67745http://skyrimcalculator.com/#67745
Suggested Health/Stamina/Magicka Layout:
10%/90%/0%



Introduction

Hello! This is my first guide, so it may not be so good, so your suggestions would be greatly valued! This is a guide that is meant to help out players of the game Skyrim in becoming a perfect thief/assassin. I am righting this as I play my thief, a level 55 Khajiit, Assassino. Hopefully this will help, and you will enjoy playing a thief as much as I do!

Race Selection

As a race, I suggest either using Dark Elf, Khajiit or Argonian. Personally, I prefer the Khajiit, because of the amazing Black Panther looks you can achieve, and because of the massive +10 to sneak and +5 to other good thief skills. Also, it's racial ability, Unarmed Claws, helps tremendously in the beginning, where hitting 15 is huge.

Perk Trees

Alchemy:

I highly suggest using Alchemy and using the perks I chose in the tree above. This will help to maximize your poison damage, which can be very helpful when combined with the pickpocket perk, Poisoned. Reverse pickpocketing a poison onto a target then watching them slowly suffer never gets old.

Archery:

I highly suggest Archery, for obvious reasons. For one, it is pretty much necessary for long range kills, or places where sneaking up for a backstab is virtually impossible. Also, poisoning an arrow and long-range-killing a target is very satisfying.

Enchanting:

This is a very useful perk tree, later on. My dual Daedric daggers, HeartDrain (absorb 10 stamina) and SoulSap (absorb 10 health), are absolutely amazing, and I would highly recommend it. Sharpened, they are unstoppable when combined with the Shrouded Gloves and the perk Assassin's Blade. Also, enchanting your gear can be very useful, whether it be resistances or extra damage.

Lockpicking:

Lockpicking can be a very tough skill to master. As you can see in my perk tree, you do not need Master Locks once you get the amazing perk, Unbreakable. This causes your lockpicks never to break, and unlimited tries, so Master Locks is unnecessary. Lockpicking can be difficult. Quick Hands is a must, and is very useful. Golden Touch and Treasure Hunter can be used to improve your loot, therefore improving your profit.

One Handed:

One Handed is only used for Armsman. Doubling your damage is great, but the rest is useless as you will be getting mostly one-shot backstabs.

Pickpocket:

Pickpocket, ah, pickpocket, one of my very favorite skills. This skill is amazingly easy to level, as long as you have the Thief Stone (which you obviously should.) Once you max out pickpocketing and get the perks I listed, you have pretty much 90% chance at everything, including clothes and weapons. Very convenient for stripping your quarry of clothes and weapons then scoring a nice assassination kill.

Smithing:

You are going to want to follow my suggest path of perks for smithing. Smithing is mostly useful for sharpening/upgrading your weapons and creating new ones, and the coveted DragonScale Armor, the best Light armor in the game, defense-rating-wise. Also, Daedric Daggers are the dagger of choice for enchanting.

Sneak:

The master thief skill, Sneak. You will want to max this skill out as quickly as possible, as it helps an amazing amount. All of the perks are worthwhile; get them as soon as possible! You can choose to replace any perks with the Stealth perks; I find that a 5% increase per level isn't very efficient. Special mention goes to Assassin's Blade, one of the best perks in the game.

Speech:

You are going to want to invest in the speech skill for two perks, Fence and Investor. Fence is an amazing perk for thieves to sell there ill-gotten goods to anyone. This is amazingly helpful! Investor is best used in conjunction with Fence.



Guilds

I would HIGHLY suggest joining the Dark Brotherhood, and joining the Thieves guild is almost mandatory. The Dark Brotherhood will put your assassination skills to the test, and has a really fun questline, netting you an amazing house and a nice 20,000 septims at the end! The Thieves Guild should be at the top of your list, for obvious reasons, including good work, and access to many fences and trainers.



Assassin Tips
Being an assassin is great fun. Rolling around slitting throats is a great way to spend your days. Here are some tips:

  • Try to practice your stealth as much as possible.
  • Always, Always, ALWAYS go for the 30x Back stab. It will save your life, and solve world hunger.
  • DO NOT, UDER ANY CIRCUMSTANCES, KILL SHOPKEEPERS. THEY DO NOT RESPAWN!
  • Try to get an Absorb Health and/or Absorb Stamina dagger. The Blade of Woe is a great dagger that you can get as soon as you enter the DB Sanctuary, through the level 100 pickpocket perk and pickpocketing Astrid.
  • Always wear the Shrouded Gloves. This doubles your backstab damage from 15x to 30x. This is a substantial raise in power, and should not be questioned/neglected.


Thief Tips

  • When looking for shops to case, go for Apothecary shops first! Take anything worth anything, including all ingredients and potions.
  • Whenever you can, pickpocket as much jewelry as possible. Silver Garnet Rings, at a value of 160 and not at all rare, are a great find. Literally all jewelry is a good steal.
  • Big cities such as Solitude, Markarth and Windhelm are your best friend. Work through each city, casing every joint you see on the way (focus on stores and manors). Sell for big profit.
  • Buy a house!! At 5,000, BreezeHome is an amazing investment. Free storage everywhere! This will eventually pay off big time.
  • These tips will be updated frequently. Your contributions are greatly appreciated.


Equipment

Armor:

I recommend the Shrouded gear, obtained through entering the Dark Brotherhood Sanctuary. It has great bonuses. The shrouded gloves, give double backstab damage, is a must.

Weapon:

Bow- I would suggest the best bow you can find, damage-wise. As an enchantment, I would suggest frost damage to lower how quickly they can charge you, while still doing damage.

Daggers- I suggest dual daggers. The Blade of Woe, of which you can obtain 2 of through the pickpocket perk Misdirection, is a great starting, or ending point for your daggers, as it has higher base damage then a Daedric dagger. I would suggest Drain Stamina or Drain Health enchantments.

Dragons
Dragons will be extremely difficult for you to slay in the beginnings. I suggest just whipping out a bow and shooting it until it is dead. Melee isn't a viable option in the beginning, with your sparse armor rating. Remember, cover is your best friend, be it a tree or a boulder!

The End! If you want more content added, post and I will edit with it. Thanks for reading, and have fun as a thief/assassin!


Always remember the difference between Then and Than; I'd rather be pissed off than pissed on OR pissed off then pissed on​
 

Zingrayz

Member
this is a good set up for a rogue but i would sugest the nightengale bow for a bow. And for a begining sword/dagger the nightengale sword witch you can get from the theifs gulid.
 

Zingrayz

Member
this is a good set up for a rogue but i would sugest the nightengale bow for a bow. And for a begining sword/dagger the nightengale sword witch you can get from the theifs gulid.
you can also use mehrunes razor by doing the pices of the past quest
 

asparticus_maraudius

I am asparticus fear my wrath!!!!!!
okay I have a new character she is a high elf i did not like the dark elf because they are the masters of stealth but do not use illusion magic enough a high elf does.

but I want to train her in sneaking night stealing and assassin killing.

but I want to use and will have a bit of fun using illusion spells with her and casting invisibility I want to be a swords person and an archer but I need her skills sort of soon because I have only just started with a new game.

should I have chosen a dark elf but I just prefer the female hign elf.
 

Chileno4Live

New Member
Very nice guide sir! I used your advice and went witb Argonian. Underwater can be handy for sneaking and it has pretty good starting trees. Thanks for the guide :)

Sent from my GT-I9000 using Tapatalk
 

Necromis

Well-Known Member
You need stamina for a sneak to run away also for the zoom in perkon bow.

Race is really not important more than personal taste after the first few levels. Because if you spend your points right they will all end up being around the exact same stats in the end. That being said, though, you can choose high elf for the added magika bonus and regen rate if you are worried about running out early on.
 

Quanah

Bosmer Shadowscale
Tell me, what is an assassin without the savage strike perk?
 

Necromis

Well-Known Member
Really savage strike is uncessary for an assassin. Especially if that assassin uses a bow. With the DB gloves I have never once need more than a normal backstab with a dagger to insta kill any npc. that 30X damage from backstab perk and gloves is amazing.
 

Raine

Nightingale
Ah! This is actually the guide I found directly on Google. Very helpful. :)
 

x-INFERNO-FIRE-x

New Member
This guide is your first?! :O Its a really good guide, shows what race to use, what equipment is useful, and how to earn some cash. I'll definitely go for Khajiit though, as they have the highest sneak at the start of the game, they look awesome when you create them, and the claws are really good for brawls, saves time standing there, over.. and over. But yeah, i'll definitely be following this guide, and you should also do some more guides!
 

Noroxas

New Member
okay I have a new character she is a high elf i did not like the dark elf because they are the masters of stealth but do not use illusion magic enough a high elf does.

but I want to train her in sneaking night stealing and assassin killing.

but I want to use and will have a bit of fun using illusion spells with her and casting invisibility I want to be a swords person and an archer but I need her skills sort of soon because I have only just started with a new game.

should I have chosen a dark elf but I just prefer the female hign elf.

If you're looking to make a thief/assasin type character dark elfs would be better to start out because of the few extra points, but in the long run your high elf will make a fine thief assassin. At level 50 plus he/ she will be just as good as any dark elf
 
Why that many perks into lockpicking? You can pick locks pretty easily without, also it helps a lot to get all 5 levels from the stealth perk, and why no perks in light armor? Yeah you shouldn't be detected, but I guarantee as someone who has played 3 stealth characters that light armor is a must otherwise you get one or two shot by everything.
 

WerewolfofSkyrim

Night Mother's Beloved
I really think this is neat,but not for my tastes.I just kill and don't look back.Look for a guy named Seth for life in youtube to see what I mean.
 

Necromis

Well-Known Member
To be honest perk points are subjective in some trees, and optional and up to the individual tastes of the chacter/player. For some they see no need for lockpick perks as they get enough to not worry about running out of picks, for others the like to improve it to make it an easier task and to show their increas in ability of that character. Honestly, IMO all 5 in the stealth perk of sneak is not necessary, as with the muffle perk and/or muffle gear it really is over kill and no one will hear you regardless. I would however invest at least a couple into it, but for my sneak builds I try to concentrate on the right side of the tree before hitting the left. Light armour helps if you get caught, but if you sneak right you won't have to worry about getting hit. I have one sneak charcter that never got to raise a point in light armour because no one ever detected him.
 

Daggertotheback

Article Writer
I would reccommend putting more perks into health, because when the crap hits the fan, you're going to want to be able to take some hits. I would also advise perks into dual flurry to help for if you get detected. It won't always be possible to kill everyone without being detected. And if you plan on doing most of the guild quests, they require going through Nordic burial grounds, where you will almost always get into some sort of big fight, where you're going to want some perks in armor.
 

Necromis

Well-Known Member
Ah, valid points if you want to be a stand up fighter. However, IMO better to put the level points into stamina vs health, and forget dual flury all together. As a sneak you are meant to get your ass handed to you in a straight up fight, you are not a coward if you run, you are making a strategic withdrawl to find an alternate route to sneak up on your prey. Assassins/sneaks are not meant to be fighters.
 

Skarv

Member
Hey, I want to start an Assassin, but I am stuck between races. I really like the Argonian and the Khajiit, the Khajiit starts off with much better stats and an amazing racial ability, while the Argonian only has the looks. Any help on choosing?
 

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