Best way to assassinate someone?

Zaramis

Zaramis

Senior Member
Situation:


Essence 3, earth-aspect DB, 4 stamina, 2x Ox Body, 4 resistance 4 endurance with plenty of charms in those categories.


Protected by 9 elite troops at all times.


How would you go about assassinating him, if you were a DB? Send one super-talented assassin who can just slash through the 9 guards?


Send a Solar-dawn caste to kill him?


A spell?


Right now, we are pretty low power in the campaign, but Im trying to figure out ways my NPC's are going to try assassinating him in. The methods already tried:


Extreeeemely potent poison - Failure. Too much resistance, too many health levels, is now more paranoid than ever to eat. They had smuggled in antidote into the water of the servants, so the person who tried his food beforehands didnt get affected.


Armed assault - A group of 10 soldiers attacked him during a rare moment when he was alone. Unfortunately, a group of DB's ( the players ) had been notified of weird things and came to his rescue.


One guy, a mortal necromancer, is going to use a ghost with Possession to possess a loyal, very potent fighter to try to kill him when they are in private, the same moment as another potent ghost does a Hand of the Wind + Strike of Dead Hands to take him down a few health levels.


Any other plans? The enemies are generally mortals or DB dynasts.
 
You could always consider using Spy Who Walks In Darkness. The fact that it can move from one shadow to another shadow in a place it's never been miles away means it can circumvent most bodyguards and such like, and it has a good enough stealth pool that it should be possible for it to sneak up on the guy while he's asleep and put him in a clinch. And once the Spy has someone in a clinch, it can do damage very, very fast, not to mention the fact that you can cast sorcery through it.


All this guy's enemies need to do now is find out exactly where he sleeps, and voila. You've got a decent chance of assassinating him that is well within the reach of a moderately talented DB sorceror.
 
Zaramis said:
Situation:
Essence 3, earth-aspect DB, 4 stamina, 2x Ox Body, 4 resistance 4 endurance with plenty of charms in those categories.


Protected by 9 elite troops at all times.


One guy, a mortal necromancer, is going to use a ghost with Possession to possess a loyal, very potent fighter to try to kill him when they are in private, the same moment as another potent ghost does a Hand of the Wind + Strike of Dead Hands to take him down a few health levels.
Click to expand...
Is he going to possess one of the elite guards around him? That's how I would do it.


Set explosions are always a favorite in our group.


three words : Sniper. Tall Building.


Bribe a guard? if not to commit the act to merely turn the other way at said time on said day.


My personal favorite would be use any weakness he has for the human flesh... get him a girl (or a guy) and have that person poison him or slice his throat, or maybe inject him with something.


Hire a Day caste with that really awsome maggot thing thrown charm.


Are you in the south? How about a Fire Dust trap? Maybe boobie-trap his entire room/house with the stuff so anyone stupid enough to go in gets toasted...


Just some thoughts. But it's late, I'll be back with more.
 
Summon one or more particularly well suited demons.


-S
 
If you could make some sort of sleeping powder, and have it go off when him and his guards are walking around. Despite the db's resistance his guards would most likely go down. In the confusion a well suited killer should do fine.  Or even smoke bombs, something to distract the guards while a hit man/woman can do their work.
 
Rather than possessing a fighter to attack the DB, possess the DB directly, have him climb a really tall tower and jump.


Do agg damage that is either peircing or completely ignores soak.


Make him fall in love and then use it to your advantage.


Make his life so intolerably miserable (harm his loved ones, have his friends betray him, relentlessly harrass him with minions) so that he kills himself.


Make him irrelevant to your goals by removing him from his 'office', vicinity, making him run to the side of his lover, get transferred, and so forth.


Turn everyone against him by making him look like a complete bastard (character assassination). In a similar vein, spread rumours that suggest he shoots blanks and that all his kids have different fathers.


Hmm, there's more than one way to eradicate an enemy, sometimes death isn't the most interesting choice.
 
Try to set him up for treason or some other crime againest the empire.  


But that involves introducing politics into the game and that can get complex if you don't plan and have a good idea of various characters loyaties.
 
The game is intensely political already ,) its all politics actually..


The way it worked out was that one of the Peleps made a deal with a Cathak, who had the legitimate successor to the "throne" secretely tucked away, or so he thought. The Peleps gave the Cathak a name of an assassin who was rumored to be in the city, and they split the rewards 40/60. The Cathak is the lover to the person who is in charge of the security for the main guy.


Then, the Peleps guy who knew about the successor, told the Cathak guy that he would arrange a faked attack on Ragara Aki ( Cathak Rigaru's lover ), so the Cathak guy would have a reason to remove the guard force from Ragara Koji ( The guy to be assassinated ). So, Cathak Rigaru hears of an attack on Ragara Aki and sends all the guardsmen there to defend her. However, in the meantime, the assassin kills the girl who is the "secret" successor to Ragara Koji, and then proceeds to use sleeping powder on the 9 guards and follow up to kill the guy. The assassin is a DB.


The end-result is that Cathak Rigaru used his own power to enable the assassination, only to be screwed by his own actions, losing both his lover and the throne in one swift stroke, Peleps take home the victory.


And the ghosts never got involved because of a bunch of stupid DB's who took a monk with them and cleared out the Ancestor-Cult's headquarters :P
 
Pretty girl+poison=dead Dynast.  


Especially if the girl is morally and physically flexible.  


Seriously.  Involved plans are great, but simple is sometimes better.  Like a special surprise while he's sleeping off the effects of some good, good, good lovin'.  Insert needle into corner of eye or base of the skull and stir gently.  Rinse. Repeat.  No more Dynast.  Especially if your assassin has a handy goodie that lets her discorporate to leave.


Does this fella get off on group scenes in the bedroom?  9 guards all the time?  Does he whizz with 9 fellas holding his jimmy?  There are plenty of times when he will be vulnerable, and your crew just needs to watch to isolate those times.


Food taster?  Probably.  Takes his constitutionals on grounds that he trusts.  Maybe even has good guard dogs on the grounds as well.  A few Charms to make friend with the mutts, and a cool, clear evening, a fine companion, who likes moonlight, and your Dyanst is open and vulnerable to a hefty charge of arrows with all sorts of Essence laden goodies upon them.  Oops.


How about a general chunking with a few charges of Firedust.  Not so much to blow him up, but distract the guards, and then while they're beating down the flames, and covering the usual approaches, drop another barrel or two down, for good measure.  Then, as they deal with that, then fire arrows into their midst while they're all Chamed out...


Exhaust the guard's Essence and then pick them off one by one if you're really lazy and uncreative.  Then, pick off the Dynast as he has spent how much on relfexives to protect his ass from falling buckets of Firedust and the odd chakaram...


When DBs run out of Essence it's just a crying shame...


I would favor the morally and physically limber girl option before the loud and obnoxious one...
 
Jakk's probably right, simple has fewer variables to stuff up, and therefore assures the most predictable outcome (if all the variables are controlled). Introduce more variables then there's too much to manage, too many crazy NPCs with their fingers in the pie. Of course, complex is something I like because it generates huge potential for 'drama' and that is what I find fun.


In the spirit of lower power levels.


A group of mortals, well prepared could probably kill the DB and bodyguards with a series of deadly traps. Jakk has suggested explosive devices, but gas, poisoned spikes, pits, and the rest will all work. There's lots of opportunity to include mortals in this approach, have one fix the plumbing in the toilet and install a wide variety of traps around the bathroom. If the DB doesn't have someone with the Larceny skills to check it thoroughly then they'll miss it, and hey presto, dead DB.


A God-Blooded with the ability to attune to the 5MM could use a wide variety of artefacts to achieve effective attacks on a powerful DB. Wings of the Raptor for example. Grapple the DB, pick him up and fly him as high as possible before dropping him to the ground. Air Aspects have the advantage of being able to land without problem should something go wrong. Trawl your books for other suitable artefacts.


If we go as far as DBs then my vote would be for an Air Aspect. Stack the effects of the following Thrown Charms, Invisibly Hidden Chakram Method and Persistent Hornet Attack at the DB which will result in death by Ping (6 auto attacks for 3 turns at Essence 3). Stack with Stealth Charms for the element of surprise, and discretion, and use multiple actions to eradicate the bodyguards. If you're assassin is skilled then include the Dodge Charm: Safety Among Enemies to use the bodyguard's attacks to increase the number of attacks on the main target.


There are many other options with DBs.


Combine such effects as well. Mortals can maintain the traps, lure the DB (if Exalts are guilty of one thing, it's underestimating mortals) and harrass from a distance. God-Blooded/DB leader types can draw different behaviours from the enemy, and enhance the attack.


For example, the mortal PC who uses the ghost/spirit to possess one of the bodyguards could use that victim to lure the DB into a trap, or to provide 'false' expert information.


HTH
 
One of the problems they had was that it wasn't his 9 guards. He had made mistakes before, and almost died, so the house representant for his House ordered 9 guards to be with him at all times until the funeral was over ( a week ), even in the bathroom or when he was with girls.


Actually, she also forbid him to be with anyone that she hadn't checked on beforehands. Or to leave the fortified manse.


The problem with poison was that he was -stacked- on stamina and endurance, and soak, charms. :P Earth aspect made for surviving, sort of, just like his father who had survived several assassination attempts.
 
Well manses need maintenance and those teams often come from those architecture companies. You could always try getting an agent into one of the teams and sabotaging the manse so that it goes boom. Looks like an accident and probably leaves no one alive.
 
Explosives...!


get a cannon and blow the ever-loving-crap out of the manse.


Are the elite guards just mortals?


if so poison them, then shoot the guy.
 
The mortal guards should not be that difficult to get rid of, so I won't dwell on that.


 As for the Dynast...well, no matter how high his Stamina and Resistance, he has to charm to survive the really nasty stuff, right?


 Read Caste Book: Twilight, about how Feyn takes down the DB hunting him without engaging him in combat (and losing).
 
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