That was Awesome, and I wish I had read it before posting my battle scene rewrite - which was only as good as it was by your help I might add! You ROCK D.Foxy!






I love it when they say that.

D.Foxy,

Congratulations on the continued brilliance of this thread! I honestly can't think of any significant TES stories that could not benefit from several or many aspects you highlight. There is indeed a great deal of help here. :goodjob:

I for one thank you for the positive influence it has had on my own writing.

My character does not wield a blade for example, but there is still so much here of help. Combat is so difficult to avoid in the lands of the Elder Scrolls...
- Combat thinking - both protagonist and antagonist.
- Reading ones enemy - and making tactical decisions based upon those observations.
- Killing an enemy that you have developed a personality for is much more interesting to read about than killing a generic enemy.

Now about non-weapons techniques in combat...

Many, many decades ago, when I was a rookie who fancied himself a bit of a hotshot in combat, my master took me aside and smiling avuncularly, told me that the best way to become a hotshot was to study and practice, and restudy and practice again, the basics. I only dimly understood what he said then. Now in my fifth decade on this earth I am beginning to understand.

The point about unarmed techniques in armed battle is that they are a SUPPLEMENT and an EMERGENCY tactic, NOT the main tactic. No matter how impressive unarmed combat techniques seem when when viewed on the screen, if skills are equal fighting with weapons is always better than fighting without. This is the first, basic fundamental.

The second fundamental is that since weapons are wielded by the hands, the FEET are the supplement to weapons that can be used in armed combat. Here, we must understand the importance of balance, especially in armour, and the proper use of feet.

All kicks destabilize the kicker. This is a fundamental fact. And the higher the kick, the more destabilizing it becomes. Here I would like to point out that I consider a knee strike to the groin area as equal to a kick, with an equivalent destabilizing level of about a below-the-knee height calf kick with the foot. If the knee strike is higher - to, say, the head - then the level of destabilization is proportionally higher.

Now an armed and armoured fighter already has his center of gravity heightened because of the weight of all the arms and amour he is carrying. If in spite of this he tries to throw a kick to the head, then he will become HUGELY destabilized, and if in addition to this he tries to throw a back or front flip (sorry, MalX1, but I had to say that) then he will become unbalanced and the time taken to regain that balance is crucial. TWIRLS and turns are different: both feet are not far from the ground, only a few feet, and the destabilization is very, very brief.

(I always stifle a giggle when I see in movies an armoured hero or villian doing acrobatic jumps and even back and front flips. HOO boy. )

Therefore the kick used in weapons combat is one that is aimed at the ankle, front shinbone, and ocassionally the knee of the enemy, especially the back of the knee. While not a spectacular move, it is NOT to be scorned - this unspectacular kick can get some pretty spectacular results.

Scenario one: An enemy charges you and swings from above at your head. You sidestep, knocking his blade as you parry, and at the same time you direct a swift kick at his ankle. If you time it right you can send the enemy crashing down to the ground from this very simple move, and since you are using the side of your foot which is encased in a boot you will not be doing any damage to yourself!

Scenario two: An enemy blocks your attack and now your two blades are locked. You can step in, stun him with a knee strike to the groin, and then drop your leg and hook one of his legs as you push forward at the same time. Again the enemy goes tumbling down, and most likely he will drop his weapon in the process!

Scenario three: An enemy thrusts at your belly and groin. You parry low, and as he is lunging forward you sweep the back of his forward leg, at the knee area, with a kick. He will go down as the front leg is swept out!

More later...

That's ok. The first one she was doing to mock him across the ring, the second one she felt she had to do to knock him down to her level and end up on her feet again. Plus I didn't have the benefit of your expertise in this article at the time. I may send all my fight scenes to you after they are written and have you critique them before I post them from now on, what your help did on that fight scene changed it from a yawn to a scene I was excited about writing and had to stop myself from making it too long! I couldn't have done that without your help, that is a fact!

I was dating a man before I met my husband that was like this chapter. We were camping and the man from the next campsite kept hanging around acting weird. The man I was dating was acting really nonchalant while he gathered whatever he could around him, even kicking one of the newer logs he had set on the campfire so it stuck out at one end. The next time the man came up acting weird he grabbed up that log and told him it would be best if the guy found another place to camp. The guy ran like a banshee and threw his stuff back in his car and left. There is a real sense of being protected for a woman to be with a man that is willing to use anything he can get his hands on to defend them. It is almost like a throwback to another era. After the weirdo left, the guy I was dating showed me what he was going to do with all these simple everyday things he had gathered. Gouging eyes with a three hook-(3 prong each) fishing jig, whacking his head with a burning log, etc. I mean to me - it was like MacGiver or something - like you would see in a movie! Very exciting and really a very protected feeling.


Oh, BTW D.Foxy - I was standing in line at the bank the other day and suddenly the man behind me started talking about pilots in the Korean war, Germany, etc. and how they would take the uniform, flight jackets, helmets etc. off the captured and take their planes, or disguise their own planes to try to make themselves and their planes look like the enemies to fool them in combat - but the American pilots could tell just by watching the plane fly if it was an American or allies flying that plane because there are subtle differences in how people are combat trained for flight. Acadian confirmed that to this day he can tell where a pilot has been trained. I was fascinated by this! Are there other things in combat that you know of that are subtle signals of who the enemy you are dealing with is, even if they come disguised?

Well, I guess I'll take supplemental kicks to armed combat, though I'm still waiting on pure, unadvlterated fist fighting.

I do agree that kicks will throw you off balance, and that the higher you go the less stable you become. However, I have to remind everyone that if one is not in armor or wielding a weapon, kicks to the stomach or even the head can be brutally efficient and dangerous. Of course, I expect that kind of thing will be covered soon

Ah yes, the basics. Comparing the number of times I've done a reverse tornado kick in a fight with the number of times I've done a punch or side kick simply isn't a fair anology; the fundamentals always make the bulk of someone's arsenal. In fact, I'd venture to say that one doesn't even need to fancy moves if they have the thinking part down. The strategy and planning are far more important for a fighter than how strong, fast, or tough they are.

And, in conclusion, I love me some kicks to the knees

This is certainly how Marines are trained for unarmed close quarters battle. Basically, keep any kicking below the knees for stability reasons. My SEAL friends have told me they are trained similarly.



Thank you for your confidence mALX. Just one example: Most US airline pilots are trained by the Air Force or Navy/Marine Corps. Years of long runways and gentle flared landings versus flying a glideslop until your jet slams into a very precise spot on the deck of a carrier. Although subtle, yes I can tell when a fellow carrier pilot lands an airliner.

I can only imagine, but I would not be surprised if a veteran swordsman can tell much simply from how his opponent wields a sword or any one of many other clues. Therein lies much of the beauty of the wisdom D.Foxy shares with us.

That would make a wonderful little detail to add to a story. "I could tell by the way he wielded his blade that he was from the Black Marsh. I looked closer, and sure enough, it was an Argonian!" (Lol).

That is completely different from your earlier question. Different cultures, regardless if they are a vet or a rookie, wield their weapons in a very different fashion. If you where to take a medieval Knight and compare him with a Feudal Samurai. You could instantly see they where trained different, just from their stance and their first move. (Never crude example btw)

Forgive me for not replying for a long time.

I am at present struggling with a long post...another short story, called "Assassin's Duel" where TWO assassins, contracted to kill a single mark by two different contractors, try to fulfill their contracts and eleminate each other at the same time. Stay tuned!

Evil Eye: I had written one and a half chapters of "Fountain of Youth" and then trashed it into the wastebin, for I was dissatisfied. Now I am rewriting all over again. That takes time. But THANKS for being a constant reader!

To all readers: many of your questions and comments will be elucidated in the upcoming story.

My question was serious, I apologize for the joke.

I apologies, I meant that to say MY example was very crude. I was running out the door to class when I answered. You question is a great one. I do not have enough experience to answer your first one, but like I say in my post; different cultures fight in different ways.

So you example about your Argonian is 100% correct. You could tell from a distance that they swordsman was taught in the black marsh and/or an Argonian.

D Foxy I got that idea we were talking about working a bit.

http://www.gamesas.com/bgsforums/index.php?showtopic=1045091

Skip down to the Academy portion. If you want you could RP a part time instructor there. Even though it's an academy making use of the arcane, your talents would none the less be accepted. Think battle mage academy where you teach the "battle" aspect a bit more.

Good reading so far.

Whew; sometimes my humor is not appreciated by others, so I stay ready to apologize for it. What I find so fascinating about it is that something so subtle can become a part of your active knowledge base, and the only way I can think it would (would be through long periods of exposure)? Or is it something that could be taught to another?

I know in the military when you are being deployed the military trains you on things you should not do lest you offend the other culture you will be entering. (like for instance, you must never show the bottom of your shoe to an Iraqi) But do they also train you for things that will help you spot the other? (for example the insurgents in Iraq, because to an American since they are wearing the same clothing and basically look similar - are there subtle things that can be taught that would distinguish the insurgents from the native Iraqi?

Obviously they teach you...

But what's that gotta do with orcs n elves and magic potions and whatever else we're suppose to be prancing about

I look forward to this because I do not know much about of Assassin's fight.

A minor note on this thread - the OP is trying to add some of the final pieces for this thread; in order to get the info into one repository, we will allow this thread to briefly sneak past the 200 limit, if need be. Please do not do the normal post-limit pvssyr and let's let D.Foxy get the rest of the info in before we need to lock it. Thank you.

Well then let me just state this, since I have yet to post my praise.

D.Foxy, this is the best combat guide I have ever laid eyes on. I love swordsmanship and have a very, very basic knowledge, and this article has only improved me. I have bookmarked your thread, for sure, so regardless of whether it is stickied or not I will be reading it. Might be a while before all of this gets put into practice in my combat scenes though.

I do some strip fencing myself, so I understand the whole parrying idea, and I do wish I could learn from a swordsmanship dojo on proper techniques. Know any in Florida? Send me a PM please, or if you have MSN add me!

So here it is, the book on Assassin-craft, by the fictional D. 'Foxy' Reynard.

Since I am nearing the 200 post limit, would all those who wish to comment on this please PM their comments to me instead of posting in my thread? Then I can put all their posts, and perhaps my replies to them, in one post by the copy and paste method. If you have comments after that, PM me again with them, and I will put them into my post with the edit function. In this way we can condense 10 or more posts into one!

THE WAY OF THE ASSASSIN, BY DAMIEN REYNARD.

THE ETHOS OF THE ASSASSIN

The world is hard and cruel. The strong perpetually prey on the weak, and the weak ever seek to overthrow the strong. Never ending war is the fate of man. Sometimes that war is open, and armies fight against each other: and sometimes that war is masked, and men smile at each other in polite conversation while in their hearts they plot their enemies' ruin.

In all these situations only one thing is constant: the need for an assassination. And thus the Assassin is born.

The assassin becomes an assassin so that he may be the wolf and not the sheep. By being a member of a family of assassins he protects himself and his family, as they protect him: by carrying out assassinations he not only fulfills a need, but learns and practices a craft that will not only protect himself but ensure him a comfortable living.

THE ASSASSIN'S STRATEGIC GOALS

The Assassin's goal is Assassination. Assassination is the taking of a man's life. A man's life is always his most valuable possession. Therefore he will always guard it with all the resources he has and the ingenuity and skill he possesses. To be sucessful the Assassin must have resources more potent and an ingenuity of greater cunning, in addition to skill of greater depth and subtlety.

Since it is in the mind of man that his defences are first planned and conceived, the Asassin should know the mind of his enemy better than he himself knows it.

Since it is axiomatic that a man will defend his life with all his resources, the Assassin should know the enemy's resources better than the enemy himself. Forts, weapons, and guards are all resources. An assassin should know the map of a fort, the qualities, capabilities and types of weapons, and the number, training and quality of the enemy's guards better than the enemy himself.

Since it is true that every enemy and his guard have some skills that ensure their survival, the Assassin should know the skills of the enemy and his army better than the enemy himself.

Thus the Assassin should never strike before all this knowledge has been gained and understood. Superior knowledge is the first key to a successful Assassination.

THE ASSASSIN'S PHYSICAL QUALITIES AND SKILLS

These be the physical qualities of the Assassin:

Stealth: Speed: and Lethality.

The Assassin lives in shadow, and dies in sunlight. The Assassin thrives on silence, and wilts in sound.

Even as a fish moves through water and the water closes behind the fish and leaves no trace of his passage, so too the Assassin moves through his environment and is not heard, he stalks his environment and is not seen, he passes through his environment and leaves no evidence or trace of his passage.

Even a well hidden object will be discovered, given enough time. While the Assassin will need to practice the art of immobility, he will also need to move fast at need. The assassin must be both the statue and the snake, the invisible immobility of stone and the swift fluidity of the snake.

Even as the snake kills with a single stroke, so too the Assassin kills with a single blow. The Assassin is not a battle warrior. Nor is he a duellist. He is an Assassin who kills not for love of battle but for his mission. Thus the Assassin kills through surprise, the knowledge of the human body, special weapons, and poison.

THE ASSASSIN'S TACTICS: AN OVERVIEW.

The Assassin uses stealth and surprise as his main tactics. Should these fail, however, the Assassin may, and should, use these other tactics.

If the cloak of Invisibility is destroyed, the Assassin puts on his second cloak, the confusion of the enemy.

Let the Assassin confuse and disorient the enemy. Let the enemy know not where the Assassin is, or when he came or will come. Let the enemy see nine false Assassins for every true one. Let him hear ten rumours for every fact.

The Assassin's arm can be long, and the hands of death not his own.

The Assassin makes use of all means to his end. If the Assassin can make the enemy fight himself, he will do it through rumours or drugs or any other means. If the Assassin can kill safely at a distance, he will do it.

THESE BE THE SECRETS OF THE ASSASSIN, BUT THESE BE ONLY THE TIP OF THE DAGGER. THE BODY AND THE HANDLE SHALL BE TAUGHT BY THE MASTER IN PERSON OR FROM THE SECRET BOOKS.

THESE BE THE SECRETS OF THE ASSASSIN, BUT THIS IS BUT THE FIRST SIP OF THE MEDICINE. THE FULL DRAUGHT IS SWALLOWED THROUGH ENDLESS PRACTICE.

THESE BE THE SECRETS OF THE ASSASSIN, BUT KNOW YE THE TRAINING IS ONLY THE SHADOW. THE REALITY IS GAINED THROUGH MISSION EXPERIENCE!


STRATEGY: THE PLANNING OF THE ASSASSIN

To plan a mission depends on information, and information is guarded fiercely. To gain information is, therefore, the Assassin's first priority.

The first source of information are the guards. Guards usually frequent drinking places, and there they may be plied for information, which comes after alcohol has loosened their tongues.

The first mistake to avoid is the mistake that many beginner Assassins make - the reliance on only ONE source of information. The Assassin would do well to remember that the humble guard probably sees only one part of the entire picture, and that information given in a drunken state may not be totally reliable. Thus many sources should be relied on, and cross checked against each other.

The next mistake to avoid is the fallacy of thinking that only guards need to go in and out of your mission objective.

Every fortified place, be it a simple house all the way to the fully fortified and walled fort, needs supplies such as food, wine, raw iron to smelt and craft into weapons, and a hundred and one other things. Thus suppliers or buyers of these items will have to go into the objective from time to time. They may be probed for information in the same way as the guards, or in other ways such as gaining their confidence through friendship, or even blackmail.

Blackmail, however, is a risky proposition that an Assassin would do well to avoid. There is no guarantee that the blackmailed person will not suffer a sudden attack of conscience and divulge the fact of the blackmail, either at once or at some time later in the future, to the mark. Should this happen the mark will not only be on his guard but may even be able to lay a trap for the Assassin!

The Assassin should think long and hard of doing a preliminary entry and reconnaissance of the objective before he does the actual Assassination. Here the arts of disguise and acting shall be found to be highly useful. A study of various support crafts, such as cooking, blacksmithing, or even the minstrel's art of singing, is useful here. Some of the greatest Assassins have entered the objective a full three to six months ahead of time, gaining employment in the above professions or other ones, so that when the actual assassination is done not only were they in place, but they were completely familiar with the objective.

Here the female Assassin has a resource not available to the male assassin, namely the use of her sixual favors to get close to the mark. If she chooses this mode of Assassination, she should remember that should the fact of an Assassination by a mistress be discovered, all future marks will be on their guard for female assassins who choose the sixual approach. Therefore in this approach the best way for the assassination to take place is to make the death appear to be natural, or an accident.

One resource frequently overlooked by many beginner Assassins are architects, builders, and carpenters. Every objective needs these to get built, and therefore the plans of the objective, and their construction - and some weaknesses that may be there - are intimately known to them. The information they know will not be readily divulged to a stranger, however. And this category of information is too detailed to be explained in a drunken reverie.

Therefore the best way to obtain this information is to appear to be a an architect, a builder, or a carpenter oneself, and elicit this information in professional discourse.

Therefore it will be seen that the Assassin must not only be a master of a dozen different weapons, but a chameleon capable of wearing a hundred different disguises and personalities. Only in this way will accurate information regarding the objective be gained.

And accurate information is more than half the battle.

THE TACTICS OF THE ASSASSIN.

Moving in the dark

The Assassin will most probably do the approach, the kill, and the escape from the objective in darkness. Of every hundred assassinations that the Assassin undertakes (presuming he will live that long) over ninety will take place in the dark.

Therefore it is an absolute necessity that the Assassin be trained in the art of moving swiftly and soundlessly in the dark. And yet many Assassins neglect this part of their training. They assume that moving in the dark is the same as moving in light, only slower, and with more concentration.

Nothing could be further from the truth. Nightwalking is a technique of its own. And Assassin's nightrunning is a further and higher development.

The assassin shall prepare his memory, his eyes, and his body before moving in the dark, and in addition he shall construct, bring along, and use the appropriate equipment for doing so.

The first and most basic preparation is the memory. The assassin should be able to visualize the entire plan of his objective without need to refer to a map. While it is true that for large objectives this may not be possible, nevertheless the assassin should try to memorize the objective as much as possible. He should also have alternate routes of approach and escape memorized in his mind.

The next preparation is for the eyes. The Assassin should allow little, or no light to enter his eyes in the hour before he begins his nightrun. This develops his night vision. Yet that night vision will be ruined, should the Assassin look long and hard at light after he has gained it. For that reason the Assassin must develop the technique of looking at night light, such as a campfire or a torch, indirectly through the corner of his night vision enabled eye.

The Assassin will learn footwork as well. He will learn the 'side slide' or the 'crab run' the walk in which the Assassin moves with his dominant side, either the left or the right, presented forward and the rear foot moved forward and over the front foot, with the entire weight of the body resting on the front foot while the move is taking place, and then the rear foot placed on the floor flat. When the foot is flat on the floor the rear foot is advance forward and sideways. If this walk is done correctly it creates not only silent, rapid movement, but also allows an equally silent, rapid retreat should such a move become necessary.

In very dark environments, the Assassin will feel ahead with him with a slim, long, and flexible cane, in the same way that a blind man uses a cane to feel the way ahead - or, indeed, a cat uses its whiskers to find obstacles in the dark.

In addition to the cane, the Assassin has other aids to moving silently. The flat and wide 'Assassin's Slippers' are indispensable when it comes to moving silently over a floor that has been specially built to squeak when someone walks over it.

Preparing the Way

There are many operational moves that may be done to prepare the way for a successful infiltration and assassination.

Gaining access to, and copying, all the keys of a house, castle, or fort is the most fundamental one, and should be considered at the planning stage of any operation.

Gaining access to the Castle's kitchen or wine cellar area is almost as good. The Assassin may then arrange for the soup, or the wine being served on the night of the operation to contain a sleeping draught.

Since torches soaked in oil are the means by which operational areas are lighted at night, gaining access to the storeroom of a castle is another way in which the way may be prepared. The torches for the operational night may be replaced with torches that have been soaked in oil that creates less light and more smoke.

If the Assassin has access to the area by day but not at night, pre-positioning heavy and bulky equipment beforehand in hidden caches should be considered.

The use of disguise

The usefulness of disguise for the Assassin needs no explanation. What is needed is an exposition on how to use the disguises to their highest efficiency.

Disguises should be easy to put on, take off, and compact and light to carry. It defeats the purpose of disguise should that disguise be so bulky and heavy that other equipment may not be carried.

Therefore the best disguises are those that are readily available on the spot: thus for example, the uniform of an assassinated guard may be stripped and worn. However, it may be that some disguises are not so easily available. Therefore the Assassin should number tailor's and dressmaker's shops among his resources, since all uniforms and dresses need to be made there.

It is important to note that not only the uniform, but the man behind the uniform, needs to be simulated. Thus if one wishes to take on the disguise of a guard, one must walk, talk, and otherwise behave like one.

Inside a Room

When the Assassin has to do business within a room which needs to be free from sudden interruption and discovery, he shall secure the room. The assassin's tool in doing thus is simplicity itself: it is a thin piece of hardwood, triangular in shape, that he wedges quietly under the door as soon as he enters a room. If the intent is to come and go unseen, only one piece is used: if the intent is to secure the door for a considerable amount of time and discovery of the assassin's coming and going is of no consequence, several wedges shall be used.

The single wedge will make the door stick, but not long enough to cause suspicion. It will gain enough time for the assassin to hide or escape, the places for doing so which the assassin will have lined up beforehand immediately on entering the room.

Should the Assassin need to do business in the room that must involve noise or other consequences that will cause discovery, several wedges on top, on the side, and below shall be used to jam the door almost as tight as if it were locked. For this the Assassin shall use the leather-covered, silent wooden hammer to jam the wedges in.

Note that if doors open outward - which is rare, but sometimes encountered - the Assassin may have to resort to the equally sticky, but much messier and less capable of concealment, device of the 'glue wad'. This is a strip of cloth on which glue is smeared on both sides, and which is them jammed into a door as it closes.

If the assassin should hide in the room he shall have a weapon capable of an instant kill or unconsciousness ready at hand, for it is an axiom that all hiding places have the potential for discovery.

The best way to search or operate in a room without fear of discovery, however, is the use of the small canine auxiliary. For this refer to the chapter on auxiliaries below.


Secrets of the Dark

The assassin will, in his silent nocturnal journeys, frequently see many secrets that are not visible in daytime. Much of these secrets will be concerning illicit or private sixual matters, since these take place mostly in locked bedrooms at night - precisely the type of place that assassins have to explore.

The Assassin will not linger over these scenes, no matter how engrossing or fascinating they may be, for time is ever precious for the Assassin. But he shall record them so that the information may be usefully used later. Infidelity is the first thing that should be watched for. If a person is unfaithful with another person's spouse, that information may well be used to create duels and dissension between the two houses. Furthermore, should a person be engaging in illicit sixual activity, this opens up an avenue for blackmail. Why that is not a reliabe method of gaining information or coercing action, others may perform blackmail: and a person being blackmailed may well be in need of cash, which may make him vulnerable to bribery. Thus one person blackmails another, using the knowledge of sixual illicitness: the Assassin may then step in and offer to help the blackmailed person with cash, in return for information. Or he may offer to assassinate the blackmailer, in return for information or service. Experience has shown that offering to kill a blackmailer usually arouses such gratitude in the blackmailed person that he will willingly perform many difficult services for the Assassin in return, such as allowing the Assassin to make copies of keys. Indeed, the Assassin may even set the scene and engage a confederate to blackmail a person who has a secret to hide: then when the blackmailed person has been driven to despair by the never ending demands of the blackmailer, the Assassin may suddenly step in and offer to remove the blackmailer - for a price: once the blackmailed person agrees, the Assassin simply tells the confederate to disappear. This will make the blackmailed person believe that the blackmailer has been efficiently and silently removed!

Letters, too, are a highly prized item for the blackmailer. This is why the Assassin should have a perfect visual memory. There are many scenarios where the information in a hidden letter is vital, and yet the letter itself must not be disturbed. An assassin that can remember the words of any letter after glancing at it but once is therefore highly valuable.

Auxiliaries and Assistants

While it is best that the Assassin work alone, sometimes it may be necessary to use assistants and auxiliaries. Before using them the Assassin shall satisfy himself completely on their discretion and that they may not be agents for the enemy offering their services.

Very small assistants, or midgets, can be very useful in scenarios requiring entry and exit into confined and narrow spaces. They are also extremely useful in climbing scenarios, for due to their greater strength in relation to their small size they can easily climb high and steep walls with the assistance of steel claw gloves and boots, and if sentries come along they may freeze with little chance of being seen. While they cannot carry large loads, they may climb up with a light line which can be used to draw up a heavy line, which can hold the weight of the Assassin and his pack.

The use of Canines as sentries or scouts in an operation is rare, for they require time to train and they also need to have certain modifications, but should they be trained properly there are many advantages to bringing them along on certain types of operations. Canines are preferred to other types of beasts due to their blind loyalty to their owner, and to their intelligence which enables their owners to train them in specialized techniques.

The first and most important modification is the surgical removal of the vocal cords, which is necessary for the silent work the Assassin has to do. Since the canine cannot bark now, it will have to be trained to alert its owner, the Assassin, by other means, such as by scratching or nipping him. As the scent sensing, hearing and night sight abilities of the canine are greater than human Assassins, they may be used for sentry and scouting.

A technique which may be used is the 'backpack' where a very small canine is carried in a backpack frame which is built so that the head of the canine peers over and above the assassin's head. The canine can now alert the Assassin to the approach or proximity of enemies by scratching. Since the senses of the canine are more sensitive than the Assassin, he can now sense the enemy before the enemy senses him.

This applies only to scouting canines. Attack canines are a different category. It is rare for attack canines to be carried into an operational area, yet sometimes it may be unavoidable if the area is heavily defended. Stealth will be compromised, yet attack canines are tremendously useful as a force multiplier.

Attack canines may also be used in sacrifice missions. One classic technique is to load and tie a large poison gas bladder on the back of a canine, then send him to attack a group of enemies. As the enemies slash at the canine they will burst the bladder, which will then spew forth poison gasses. This will either kill all the enemies, or incapacitate them so severely that the Assassin may dispatch them at ease. The canine will be sacrificed for this mission: this is to be accepted if no other way to destroy the enemy can be achieved.

Deceive the eye, deceive the mind

Mice, and bats, can be used as distractions. It is an axiom that in any conflict between the visual and other senses, the average enemy will believe the vision over its other senses. Thus, should an enemy sentry hear a suspicious noise, and then see a mouse crawling away from the direction of that noise, the enemy will at first believe that the mouse made the noise, even though that noise may have been too loud and too uncharacteristic to have been made by a mouse. Bats, too, if released in the vicinity of enemies, will draw eyes up and away - an excellent resource to use if the Assassin is crouching and sneaking.

Many are the distractions that may be used to confuse and distract the enemy and draw his eyes and senses away from the Assassin. One classic one is the false pile of dung. A lump of soft, flexible clay is molded to look like a pile of animal dung, and colored appropriately to complete the illusion. It is then placed on one side of a sentry's walk. The sentry's eyes will immediately be drawn to the false scat, and he will change his walk to go to the opposite side of the dung while continually glancing at it so as not to step into it. If the Assassin has secreted himself on that opposite side this will make the sentry pass close to the Assassin while having his head turned away from him. This makes the task of silently killing the sentry much easier.

Light distracters using bioluminescent mushrooms are also an excellent way of distracting sentries on dark nights. These 'Foxfire' mushrooms are collected and carefully arranged on the skin of a small leather ball, that has been inflated so that it may bounce when thrown. Tossing it in an arc creates a ball of ghostly green light that flashes through the sky, and when the ball bounces on the ground it creates a further ghostly effect of a light that appears to silently roll around on the ground. Every sentry within visual range is guaranteed to stare wide eyed at this ghostly vision, while the Assassin can quietly sneak through while their heads are turned!

The Assassin's Kill: the Art of Silent Death.

Of the thousand and one ways of killing, none can match the 'King of Targets' - the spine where it meets the head, or the neck-spine.

Living beings vary tremendously in their reaction to pain, and resistance to trauma. Some may live for some minutes, and even have the strength to shout or deliver one last retaliatory blow, even after a stab straight through the heart, while others may simply collapse silently on the spot.

But no matter how strong the being, it will not survive the slashing of the spinal cord at the neck, nor can it move or make a sound after that cord is severed. Thus the classic kill of the assassin is the severing of that cord, from behind. Behind is far preferred to the front, because to sever the spinal cord from the front will involve cutting the throat, and when the windpipe is severed a surprising amount of noise can be created from the gurgling of air and blood as the lungs are emptied of air and filled with blood!

Some Assassins prefer strangulation, but this is not as noiseless as some may think. It takes some time for the mark being strangled to die, and he also flails out with his hands and feet while dying. Thus the only benefit to strangling a mark or enemy is that he cannot shout.

The preferred weapon to perform spinal cord snap is the chisel blade, and the blade is used with one hand gripping the handle and the palm of the other hand on the base, which is widened to accept it,. A sharp blow and thrust, and the neck and spinal cord are severed with very little blood and no noise at all.

The blade of the hand or a blunt instrument swung at the back of the neck with force can also do the same, through trauma, but these techniques are not as sure or as silent as the chisel.

The Assassin's Escape

What is to be avoided during the infiltration and kill, may be used to great effect during the escape.

Noise and light are to be avoided during the infiltration, for obvious reasons: yet during the escape they may well be used to create panic and diversion through which the Assassin may escape.

And the best way to create noise, light, and panic is FIRE.

Therefore, if an escape becomes difficult - because of, say, an unexpectedly high number of guards suddenly and unexpectedly blocking an escape route - the Assassin may create a fire at the opposite end of his escape route as a diversion. If disguise is used in conjunction with fire, the probability of escape becomes excellent.

Regardless of whether he uses fire or not, the Assassin should have more than one escape route planned for every operation.

The Assassin's security.

" The Assassin lives in shadow, and dies in sunlight. The Assassin thrives on silence, and wilts in sound. "

The security of the Assassin depends on stealth, and stealth encompasses far more than just the invisibility of the Assassin during his operation.

Should the world at large learn of the techniques and resources of the Assassin, he may count himself as dead or even worse, defeated, even before his operation starts.

Therefore let not the world learn the secrets of the Assassin. Let none not of the Brotherhood know our ways, our weapons, our subterfuges. Thus this book, and the knowledge of it, shall be concealed from all who are not us.

Furthermore, the Assassin shall not leave tracks. He shall not leave behind clues after an operation that could give away the secrets of the Assassin. Should such clues be nonetheless left behind, the Brotherhood shall mount an immediate operation to erase them.

Here are the comments! I shall add to them as they come in, in this thread. As I have said before, if you want to comment on this, just PM me with your comment and I shall post them HERE. This is to save post count - I have quite a lot more to say here before this thread must close!

MalX1 on 8 Nov 2009:

Awesome! You have added to what you sent me! I love the tips, Foxy you have to try and get that thread pinned! People will always need to refer back to it, it is an instructional manual for the writers!

It was very hard not to post on the thread and give you the Kudos you deserve for it, but as you see, I have been obedient, lol.

Acadian on 9 Nov 2009

D.Foxy,

As all your 'how to' entries, this is beyond helpful. It is inspirational and makes one want to run off and create an assassin character! I marvel at your ability to clearly instruct, as in this article. I marvel more to ponder that the same author can change gears and pen such a powerfully beautiful image:

"Here Morkwin paused, and his eyes rested on a butterfly. Shimmering and opalescent, its wings made a visual poem of a tender beauty in the air as it danced on the soft breeze. Strange how I had never noticed before, how much like a woman's eyelashes the dark border on the edge of its wings looked?.it landed on a tiger orchid, even as Morkwin continued ?" (yes, this is a not so subtle hint that we look forward to more of your other thread).

At any rate, well done, my friend!

I note your concern with post count. I have, over the course of your thread, made several posts. Should you merely say the word, I shall ask Mistress Leydenne to delete my old posts on this thread to free up some flexibility for you.

Acadian

Wooly Mammoth 45 9 Nov 2009

Foxy, you have all of this saved on file, correct?

Reply: Yes, and you haven't been reading the plea in my last post! I must ask Leydenne to delete you post - but never fear, all comments will end up HERE

Sub Rosa 10 Nov 2009

Hi Foxy,

I have a comment for your BFA topic, and unlike some people decided to send it to you in a PM as you requested.

I really liked your treatise on assassination. It is very thoughtful, covering things like surveillance, pre-planning, memorization, disguises, all sorts of things that many writers and especially films gloss over.

One thing I noticed quickly is that rather than being Oblivion-specific, it is rather a general guide, meaning that it can be applied to any setting. That makes it doubly valuable, as it does not rely upon things like Chameleon potions, night eye spells, and the like which would be missing elsewhere.

You are very perceptive. Majika has been deliberately left out of this guide, for the reason that this guide was originally set in an alternate Morrowind/Oblivion universe which I was writing, where powerful 'Silence Stones' radiated Majika null fields denying the use of Majika. While these stones were far too large to be portable, they were built into forts, castles, and even some houses, effectively denying the use of Majika in them!

This of course gave a whole new character to that universe. Majika was now used only on the open road, or in poorer areas such as inns: in their houses the rich and powerful were completely immune from Majika, for the power of the Silence Stones was (in the Foxy world) effective not only against spoken spells, but also against enchanted items as well.

One note: this is actually (just) in keeping with the lore, for you will remember in Morrowind that the final battle takes place in a Majika null field, where the hero has to destroy the Heart of Lorkhan!

Another note: nearly all the techniques described in my treatise are taken from real life Japanese and Chinese Ninja manuals!

Lorca 10 Nov 2009

Having read your treatise on assassination I can find no fault in it, nor anything that contradicts the lore. However, I would say that many assassins have a greater purpose than simple murder and assassination for its own sake, depending on the assassin of course.

Morag Tong assassins for example murder in the name of Mephala, who (with Boethia) helped to create the Great Houses of Morrowind. Morag Tong writs therefore often involve the Houses, maintaining the delicate power balance. They may also murder in the name of honour, finding the wronging of another mer's honour to be well worth killing over.

The Dark Brotherhood is a different creature, murdering for the void of Sithis and glory of the Night Mother. In contrast to the Morag Tong, there appears to be no 'preferred' target or any hint of honour, anyone may be murdered through the invocation of the Night Mother.

We don't have a great deal of information in regards to freelance assassins (the greatest assassins of Remans, Potentates and Septims always belonging to an organisation); it's possible that the established guilds frown upon independent murder (as the Thieves Guild dislikes independent thievery), as it takes their work. If you murder a mark in Morrowind without a writ for example, the Morag Tong will scold you for attempting to anticipate them. The benefits for an assassin working in an organised guild are numerous; information, equipment and a safe haven.

Rumpleteaza 20 Nov 2009

Well, you asked comments on The Way Of The Assassin to be PMed to you... et voila!

The first thing that struck me is how wonderfully this would slot into any Elder Scrolls game as an in-game book. You've managed to capture the feel of those lore snippets beautifully - reading this made me feel the same way I did when I read Confessions Of A Thief in Daggerfall more than ten years ago now. (Ten years? Be still my heart...!) It also reminded me a lot of the Thief games - are you a fan? Some of the descriptions of the importance of stealth, particularly the metaphor of the fish gliding through water, were incredibly concisely evocative.

Random point: the word "axiomatic" delights me.

The account itself is exhaustive in a very good way - if you were a lecturer and asked if there were any questions at the end of the class, my hand would be down - and my hand is ALWAYS up!

I probably would agree with Lorca - that to make this truly ES-specific, a mention of the religious aspects of many Tamriellic assassin's guilds would have been interesting - but the document does not lack anything without it. I really think we need to campaign to have this added to the next game!

Oh yes...I am a great fan of the Thief and Hitman series of games, and have played them to "Death and the afterlife beyond".

Iain Mc 19 Dec 2009
Bookmarked this, thanks a lot Foxy, this is awesome! Your really talented at writing!

I had to remove this to consever post count. Thanks, Ian!

Acadian on 20 Dec 2009

Ahah! Quite the blending of training and entertainment. Plenty of stealthy mental gymnastics here.

The fight at the end was fascinating in how you blended the thinking of Darkwing with the action. Very powerful.

And of course the foreshadowing at the very end leaves us drooling for part deux from the deus of combat. . .

Sub Rosa on 20 Dec 2009

Very exciting. The quick pace in your sentences make up for the length of the piece, keeping us ever moving forward though the story.
I think you did a good job of portraying the religion philosophy of the Dark Brotherhood assassin. It felt like a near seamless blending of Sithis worship from the game with real-world shinobi philosophy (or maybe ethos is the right word).

MaLX1 on 20 Dec 2009

Foxy Training 101 - Thanks to your great teaching I know what to look for !!! Awesome write!

Foxy - if you need to delete any of my old comments you have my permission, I probably spammed your thread enough that it will make a ton of room, lol.

Rumpleteaza on 21 Dec 2009

Wow. Fast-paced and dynamic! I love the counting at the start, it brings you into the scene beautifully and provides a great starting point for the resultant explosion of action. I love how logically and methodically the assassin thinks his every step through, and how that breaks down when it all starts to get very chaotic at the end. You create a wonderful sense of urgency descending into confusion as everything starts to go wrong. And then... Kothringi!! What a wonderful bit of lore! I also loved your added mentions of the religious nature of the Dark Brotherhood.

Loved it Foxy, bravo!

Evil Eye on 20 Dec 2009

I've been somewhat inactive as of late but decided to drop in and see if there were any new stories.
Your thread was there so I decided to read those last 5 pages or so. I was going to post there but then I saw Leydenne's (wow, I can spell that ) post.
Anyway, I love it and as long as you're coming up with good stuff somewhere I don't mind the wait too much.


Haute Ecole Rider on 21 Dec 2009

QUOTE (D.Foxy @ Dec 20 2009, 11:40 AM)

The gloves' razor claws slashed through the soft skin of both throats with savage efficiency and curled around their thoraxes, creating both excruciating pain and blocking all ability to shout.

Wonderful writing. I just worked my way through all ten pages of this thread because I feel my combat scenes can use a lot of improvement. While I already know some stuff, I found other stuff enlightening . . . and inspiring!

Just one tiny criticism about your last post, D. Foxy, spoken by someone who is very familiar with anatomy (due to my line of work): I think you meant "tracheas," not "thoraxes."

Trachea is the windpipe and is found in the front of the neck - closing off the trachea cuts off the ability to shout.

Thorax refers to the chest area of the trunk, as encased by the ribs and bounded by the neck at the top and the diaphragm (the muscle wall separating the chest cavity from the abdominal cavity within the body).

Yet, overall, I'm in awe of your writing and the short stories I've seen here! And yes, I'm finding it quite inspiring! I think I will go and rewrite some of the combat scenes I've already written, and yes, I'm bookmarking this thread for future reference!

Thanks! I will now correct 'thorax' to 'tracheas'. My knowledge of anatomical terms is indeed rusty!

Here is the first of a four-part series, the 'Assassin's Duel' I have mentioned as being the story of the legendary retirement battle of our Damien 'Foxy' Reynard. In telling the story I have also tried to give instruction in the technique and mind of the Assassin, as is the purpose of this thread, but also, more importantly, I have tried to incorporate the religious doctrines of the Brotherhood and other Assassins as well. I have made some extensive studies of the UESP wiki: I hope they have borne fruit here.

I have decided that those who would like to comment should be free do so, and so please DO comment! After the comments reach the post count of 215 or so, I will copy and paste them all into the common comment post above this post, then ask our Gentle Leydenne to remove your posts so that the post count is rolled back to 196 again. In this way I intend to finish this story at the 200 post count, where it will then be locked and hopefully become a sticky.
And now, without further ado, let me present....

Assassin's Duel

He dropped to the ground like a cat.

Immediately his eyes swiveled to the right. Sentry approaching from that direction, ten-to twelve count from now. From the corner of his eye he saw his rope sliding fast back up the wall, pulled back by his confederate on the other side.

One. Two. Three...

Star and moonlight, shadows dark and flickering. All colors are black and grey at night, the same as those on his ghillie suit. The tip of the poison blowpipe was the only sharp point protruding from the lumpy, shapeless, featureless camouflage. The bat stirred nervously in his hand...

...Six. Seven...

The Assassin willed himself to relax. His senses expanded to hyper alertness.

He could not only hear but even faintly feel the vibrations of the guards' boots, as one guard on the wall walked further away from him and another on the ground, still invisible around the corner, came closer. The quiver of the trembling bat in his hands gave a sensory counterpoint to the feel of the cold and slightly damp night air on the few areas of bare skin exposed by his camouflage suit. His night-sensitive eyes saw the gleam of dew on the paving stones as well as the tips of the grass stems, quivering slightly as the vibrations of the guard's marching feet grew nearer.

His mouth opened, enabling him to breathe deep with no sound. No white of teeth gave his face away. They had been blackened for tonight.

...Eight. Nine...

One hand hooked into his belt, the guard appeared around the corner, helmeted head nodding up and down with the rhythm of his march, his bored eyes sweeping the ground forward of him from training and habit. His eyes looked straight at the shapeless lump of the crouching Assassin in the Ghillie suit only ten feet away, tucked close up against the gray and black wall ...

...and unseen. The eye is a creature of habit, and assumes all humanoids must have recognizable arm, body and leg shapes. Things which do not fit are ignored. Such as a large and shapeless, blotched, black and grayish multicolored lump in the half-light of the torchlight and moonglow.
But even the mind of a bored guard would eventually see and recognize the lump as something out of the ordinary, unless it was distracted by -

Release.

The stunned guard gaped open-mouthed as an eerily glowing green bat burst into his visual field, fluttered its wings, flew erratically and jerkily away, and then suddenly dropped to the ground a mere ten yards away. In the dark of night its bioluminescent fungi coating glowed as bright as a lamp as it hobbled on the ground.

Immediately the guard was sprinting towards the faintly glowing and wriggling ball of light, passing the Assassin so closely he could have touched him if he had only bent his knees slightly. The mud flying off his boots actually splattered the ghillie suit.

As the guard shot past the Assassin released the almost invisible rope of hair by which he was tethering the bat. Its restraint freed, the bat suddenly flew off again. The guard continued to fruitlessly chase into the dark after the glowing green illusion.

The Assassin swiftly and silently raced into the opposite direction, down the path the guard had just come.

Fourteen racing steps. Guardroom door will be on left. Key under stone two steps beyond.

Swift as a serpent his hand slid under the stone and found the key. A quick wipe on a ready oil rag, and the key was free of dirt. He was in the guardroom an instant later. The door, opened just enough to let him in, had been closed instantly. A loud creak had accompanied the opening and closing of the door, but that did not make the Assassin hesitate or slow down in the slightest. Even as the door had been shut closed he was gliding to the corner of the guardroom which he knew to be darkest. The blowpipe was at his lips in one smooth movement.

Eight guards, in bed, but not all may be asleep...ah, yes...

One of the guards was stirring. The creak of the door while it had opened and shut had jarred him out of his half-doze.

The stone. Be the stone. Still, silent, invisible.

The guard's eyes were moving from the door to the areas near it, and then settled directly on the Assassin.

Look from the side, never stare directly into the enemy's eyes: and aim your insurance weapon in the same way.

The guard looked straight at the Assassin twenty feet away and never saw him. The shapelessness of the ghillie suit and the absolute stillness of the Assassin, combined with the half light of the night torchlight and the lack of eye-glint from a direct stare, fooled the guard's eye into seeing nothing where there was something.

As the guard's eye flicked away from a direct gaze the Assassin's blowpipe moved silently into position, aiming at the exposed face of the guard sitting up in bed. The rest of his body was still in the cat's crouch of complete relaxation and stillness.

During a long hundred-count and twelve over, the guard remained sitting up in bed, blinking, looking around and listening.

What he saw were sleeping comrades, beds, lockers, and the shapeless immobile lump in the corner that was part of the wall. In his unsuspecting mind it had always been there. Nothing, it was nothing, just a dream perhaps -

His body's demand for sleep overcame his half-awake mind and eyes. Slowly, he yawned and sank back to a horizontal position. Moving a few times on the mattress, he subsided into the motionlessness of slumber.

For yet another two-hundred count the Assassin remained motionless, waiting for the guard to fall completely asleep. The Assassin drew breath through his mouth, the blowpipe now hanging in its sheath near his neck. Only his eyes moved in his rock-still head. His arms and legs were relaxed in the cat's pose of complete readiness: his mind simultaneously doing the count, preparing for an emergency attack in case of discovery, and plotting the next step into the depths of the castle, simultaneously....

The guardroom settled into the night rhythm of sleep and silence.

At the count of two hundred the Assassin moved, but not towards the sleeping guards. First he moved back towards the door and slipped a glue wedge under it, pushing it tight silently with the strength of his arms, wrist and fingers alone.

Rescue being blocked, death entered the room.

The flickering shadows cast by the torchlight now watched over a scene of slaughter as quietly complete as it was efficient and merciless. Starting from one corner, the Assassin methodically moved down the line of beds, gently dripping poison from a syringe into the half-open mouths of all the sleeping guards, dispensing death in silence and stealth in a grotesque parody of a nurse making her rounds.

None refused the deadly gift; in their sleep some guards murmured half-words, various unknown names as their last gift to the air; others simply licked their lips and dreaming or dreamlessly slid down the path of the poison, the slaughtered sleeper's silent descent into oblivion, their souls emptying into the void.

To Sithis, by way of the Night Mother. The Void is all.

The Assassin had arranged his kill trail so that the last poisoning took place at the bed nearest the door leading towards the castle. As the last of the eight drank down the dew of death he moved towards the door and swiftly stepped into the passage. The door shut on a guardroom of eight quietly dying soldiers, felled without any battle.

Passage to the main hall, forty-three paces, four torches. Extinguish torches while passing.

As he passed the torches he reached into his pack and smoothly slid a water-soaked wooden stopper on each. He did this while looking at the torches only out of the corner of his eyes, keeping his night vision intact. The torches died without his eyes ever having received enough light to spoil the night eye: the passage was plunged in a darkness as deep as the deaths of the guards behind. He came up to a closed door at the forty-third movement of his feet since entering the passage, exactly as he had calculated before.

Main hall beyond the door. Two sentries will be patrolling in opposite directions. Only a seven hundred count since their shift. Roughly a two thousand count left. No torches: the Silence Stones give more than enough light.

He stripped off the chameleon suit and shrugged off the pack underneath in one fluid motion. Now he was revealed.

As a guard.

The disguise was very good indeed: only a very close inspection would have revealed that the helmet was made of the thinnest of wood, painted to look like iron, and the apparent steel chain mail armour was actually light leather painted to look like steel chain mail. It mimicked heavy armour while weighing only a fifth as much.

Taking a small bottle from his pack, he opened it to smear a red liquid all over his abdomen, and face as well.

The two eagle gloves were put on next, with the greatest of care. They were supple leather gloves, but they ended in wickedly curved razor-sharp steel claws a full inch (two and a half centimeters) long. The steel had been painted black, except at the sharp tip and the razor edges: it did not gleam in the gloom of the passage.

Waiting until the two guards had almost reached each other in their patrol, he burst out of the door, reeling like a heavily wounded man. He waved unsteadily at the openmouthed guards.

" Help...Sw-word brothers...Hel-llp..."

His voice was a strangled croak, the voice of a heavily wounded man. Unidentifiable.

He knew that Duke Varenthon's guards addressed each other as 'sword-brothers' and the sight of a seemingly wounded, bloody and staggering comrade who addressed them in their own familiar slang completely won the two guards over. At once they rushed to help their supposedly wounded colleague.

Staggering and reeling over to meet them, the Assassin kept his head down and his gloved hands out of sight, supposedly covering his wounds. As the guards reached him he appeared to stagger and then fall to one knee. The natural reaction of all humanoids is to catch a wounded comrade falling thus and pull him up towards them, and the guards were all too human.

Even as they raised him, he suddenly straightened his legs and sprang up with his hands slashing forward -

- and squeezing both their throats in a strangle hold.

His explosive speed, assisted not only by his own strength but by their own, surprised and caught the soldiers completely off guard. The gloves' razor claws slashed through the soft skin of both throats with savage efficiency and curled around their tracheas, creating both excruciating pain and blocking all ability to shout.

Instinctively and uncontrollably, the guards jerked back their heads in agony and seized and tried to pull away the terrible hands tearing at their bleeding throats, which was exactly what he expected.

The Assassin jumped up with his knees drawn back to his chest. Resting his two knees on the chests of the two voicelessly struggling guards, he pushed hard with both thighs while at the same time arching backwards and pulling his claw-embedded hands hard back and up with all the strength in his wiry arms.

The combination of the razor claws, two powerful thighs pushing back in opposition to the strength of not only the Assassin's arms, but also the instinctive pulling of the guard's arms as well, was too much for flesh and cartilage. With a sickeningly wet, ripping sound both throats tore out. An explosive fountain of blood, air, and white flecks of crushed bone erupted, forever silencing the voices of two warriors. A surprisingly loud noise of gurgling air and gushing blood also broke out, but this was much quieter than the screams of agony which the guards were now forever unable to make. A man cannot scream when he is drowning in his own blood.

In any case there was no one to hear. The guards in the guardroom were all dead, as would also be the two writhing and voiceless guards in the main hall after a hundred-count - but the Assassin, now covered in real blood, was not there to see them finish dying.

Even as they lay in their death-throes he had ran back to the passage, slung his pack back on, re-suited himself in the ghillie suit, and now was running past the dying bodies jerking in an ever-widening pool of blood.

His path was to the stairs leading to the main objective: the Duke's bedroom. At the foot of the stairs he stopped running, and kneeled into a crouch. He drew three deep, slow breaths to steady himself.

My map stops here. I have never been in the objective, and have had access to no one who has. Now all the time I have saved up to now, I must spend back here.

In shadow he quietly inched up the stairs, one step at a time. Still in a crouch, he slid like a specter towards the door of the bedroom. There he paused, steadying himself.

The door stood in ominous silence.

He took another long, deep breath, and began.

With slow, deliberate moves executed in infinite patience and steadiness, he methodically and soundlessly picked the lock on the door. Five picks were changed before he found the one best suited, and even then one of the picks broke while he was picking the lock. Patiently the Assassin picked out the tiny bits of metal with a pair of tweezers, and resumed his deliberate lockpicking. The second pick opened the door with a satisfying click.

In the velvet hush of night it sounded as loud as a dropped sword.

Patience. Wait. Listen. Three hundred count used on the lock, still two thousand left before the next shift. Empty the mind. Be the void.

In the silence the darkness swelled up into a living, brooding thing.

His mind reached out into the room beyond, willing his ears to hear the slightest sound within. The silence rejected his query, yet he forced himself into patience, waiting for the one mistake, the one relaxation of the enemy that would reveal himself through the slightest of sounds.

He waited.

As time slid into the third hundred count measured in the background of his mind he slowly pushed open the door, taking a full hundred count to do so.
In the darkness the outline of a canopied bed, with a vague shape suggesting a sleeping figure could be seen. Deliberately, the Assassin looked at it from the corner of his eye so that he could see the slightest movement. None was seen.

From his pack he took the final killing tool, fitting together the two sections of the noose spear.

A steel wire garrote at the end of a spear, with one end of the noose running down its length through ringbolts, and pulled from the end of the spear so that the thrust of the spearhead would also tighten the noose. With the weapon extended he glided forward into the dark bedroom.

The shape in the bed began to resolve into a head on a pillow. A shadow within a shadow, the noose slowly began to move towards the head, preparatory to its deathhold on the neck. The figure on the bed lay unmoving.

The shadow seemed to climb up the body to the neck, then stop there.

The Assassin mentally whispered the words of his creed.

"Death is the void. Let Sithis be known."

The garrote was jerked back with one hand even as the spear was thrust with the other. As the noose tightened around the neck, the point of the spear was pushed deep into it, creating a ripping sound -

- of ... CLOTH?

A Dummy! A Cloth dummy!

Everything seemed to happen at once.

There was a thundering crash from the door he had come in, and from the corner of his eye he saw that something large had fallen across the doorway. Even before the echoes and vibrations of the sound had died away, he heard the unmistakable sound of a flint striking, and light began to glow from above.

But the Assassin was already rolling and weaving in a trained reflex action that was designed to dodge an ambush in a situation where the positions of enemies were not known. Dropping his spear he dove to the floor and rolled left, then right, then somersaulted back towards the door he had come from. He knew something new was there, and from the sound it was heavy...

His hand touched unmovable steel bars, and he knew he was trapped. A barred steel door - they had known he was coming, and had prepared a trap -

More light was slowly coming from above, but the Assassin did not look directly at it. Instead, keeping the light from above in the corner of his eye, he moved around the room in unpredictable jerks, looking to see from where the ambush would be sprung.

The light from above now had grown enough for him to see that there was a chandelier hanging from the high ceiling, and that the candles in it were being lit one by one. He could also see a shape moving near the candles on top, but still he refused to give it his sole attention: he was sure that the real ambush would come from somewhere within the room. A secret chamber, suddenly opening to reveal swordsmen... a window from where darts would be shot...

"Fret not, executioner. There is only me."

Scaleface's voice. So he has decided to trap me himself!

The Assassin moved his back to the nearest wall, and now gave his full attention to the chandelier.

A large figure was climbing around the frame of the massive chandelier lighting candle after candle, and in the light the Assassin could see that it was indeed Duke Scaleface. The chandelier swayed rhythmically from the weight of the Duke moving from side to side, lighting its myriad of candles: the shadows cast by their swaying flicker danced madly around the room, changing the appearance of the furniture and the bed into fleeting, grotesque shapes, but the Assassin never glanced once at them. He only had eyes for the Duke.

Duke Scaleface was wearing a full leather suit, including gloves, with two daggers sheathed on his hips, and the Assassin noted that as usual his whole body except for his face was covered. The Duke seemed intent only on lighting the candles, giving none of his attention to the Assassin ten feet below.
Seizing the opportunity, the Assassin raised the blowpipe to his lips and blew in a single motion. Even as the first dart was flying he reached for another.

Thwack and the first poisoned dart hit the Duke on his shoulder, and already the second dart was being loaded. The Assassin moved his blowpipe automatically to compensate for the jerk of the target feeling the poison, and prepared to shoot again.

Except that the Duke didn't move.

With widening eyes the Assassin saw the Duke, still with his back to him, continue to light the last of the candles. Another dart, this time hitting the Duke on the thigh, had the same non-effect as the first.

" I am immune to poison - but then, you didn't know that, did you?"

Scaleface now turned smiling towards the Assassin, and contemptuously plucked out the darts in his shoulder and thigh. He flicked them at the Assassin, and as the Assassin flinched away he jumped from the Chandelier to the floor.

The crash of his landing sent vibrations all the way up the Assassin's spine: he must be wearing armour underneath to be so heavy, he thought, and he shed the now useless ghillie suit and drew his shortsword and dagger in the same movement. He crouched down in the guard position.

Scaleface saw, and smiled. The effect was ghastly.

His face was disfigured with scale-like growths, similar to an argonian's skin, which were glinting a metallic silver in the flickering candlelight. Only the skin near his eyes and mouth were free of the scales, and as this skin was fish-belly white it offered no contrast to the ghastly glittering whiteness of his face, with only his black, glittering eyes and equally black hair contrasting with the deathly white facemask.

Slowly, he raised his hands, and turned the palms to the Assassin showing them empty.

"The Void is truly nothing, Assassin. Nothing in its philosophy, nothing in its rewards, nothing in its acolytes, and nothing in the end. Just as the nothing in my hands - so - "

He suddenly clapped his hands, and when his hands were still again they each held a dagger.

"- is made into something, not by the superstitious incantations of your nihilistic creed, but by the will and action of he who dares to act. Your creed sneers at fear, and teaches that only he who surrenders to the Void and knows the nature of Sithis is free from fear: I laugh at you and your creed, and tell you to your face that the night you worship is the blackness of ignorance and fear. You fear the unknown, and you have made the whispers of your Night Mother and the blackness of the unknowable into talismans to guard against that fear, trying to conquer the darkness by embracing it. "

He was expecting me all the time. And he was prepared to sacrifice his guards for it. Now he has the advantage, and I will probably not survive this.

Do not listen to his mockery, but prepare to fight and die. Empty your mind of hope and fear. Prepare to meet the Void. And face this mocking traitor with the contempt he deserves.

"Scaleface, your words are the taunts of a traitor. You have dishonored the Night Mother, mocked and revealed our Brotherhood's secrets, rebelled against your superiors and even murdered them. For your treason we give you enmity, for your murders the void, and for your mockery the eternal torment of Sithis!"

"And you think I fear thee, Darkwing 'Nightwalker' Reynaud? Yes, I know who you are. Or think you I fear your Brotherhood, which I spit upon for a pack of superstitious fools led by manipulative and ambitious liars? Those who see through the Brotherhood are superior men, who have seen through the lies of your 'Void' - you who remain are fools and tools, taking mere training to be the truth of the warrior's way, and parroting formulaic slogans instead of thinking for themselves...."

Scaleface's deathwhite face seemed to close down, with his eyes narrowing to slits. Slowly, the two daggers came up to guard position, and his massive body began to move forward.

"But what use is the truth to fanatics like you? Therefore, say the prayer of your creed, Assassin, and go to your Father who does not exist, hollow be his name - die for the nothing that you have worshipped all your life. At least you will die at night. Fitting, isn't it, Darkwing Nightwalker?"

Darkwing looked straight into the black eyes, and prepared to die fighting. He mentally whispered the final prayer.

"As I walk into jaws of the darkness,
I shall fear not the night -
for My Dread Father is the Void
and l am reborn in its darkness. "

And with prayer ended, Darkwing launched into his last assault.

Lunging forward with a stamp of his leading foot, he flicked a half-thrust with the sword at the face, stopped before the full lunge. The feint was intended to invite a parry with the dagger in Scaleface's mirror hand, and it succeeded. Moving with the parry, Darkwing flexed his wrist and used the force of the parry to swing his sword under and around it, then sprang forward in a lunge to thrust at Scaleface's belly, where the needs of flexibility meant that chain armour at most would be encountered.

So fast was this thrust that the tip of Darkwing's blade reached the belly even as Scaleface twisted and parried with the other dagger, and with his hyper - awakened battle senses Darkwing saw his blade begin to penetrate the leather armour...

...and felt resistance beyond, which slowed down the tip, but it was still penetrating...

....and then a resistance so hard that he knew it must be steel, impossible, there couldn't be plate armour in the belly area -

- Scaleface twisted away from the lunge while smacking aside the plunging shortsword blade with his other dagger. Darkwing felt his blade catch in Scaleface's belly as it was shoved to the side, then suddenly it slid and slipped out. At once he retreated back into the guard position.

Even as he was moving back he felt Scaleface's parrying dagger thrust in a counter strike to Darkwing's lunge. The riposte followed as fast as Darkwing's retreat, so that even as he was pulling his shortsword back Scaleface's dagger was reaching for his throat.

He moved back just out of reach, seeing the dagger stop and then snap back, and then he was two steps back and out of range.

I've slashed open his belly, and yet he's not bleeding. Armour? Under the Leather? But I struck what felt like solid steel plate, and that's not possible - he couldn't move his waist like that if he was wearing plate steel there.
I must attack his face, armpits, wrists and back of the knees. Those are the only places I can be sure are unarmoured.

Scaleface moved forward slowly, then drew back both daggers to his cheeks, pointing straight up so that they appeared to be grotesquely pointed ears. He crouched deep down.

Darkwing prepared for a dagger throw attack, but he was wrong.

Scaleface sprang forward, thrusting -

with both hands.

Never having encountered an ambidextrous fighter before, Darkwing was caught completely off guard. His right hand, with the shortsword, managed to parry the dagger thrust by Scaleface's left: his weaker left hand defense was both too slow and too weak.

Scaleface's right hand dagger smashed through the defense and stabbed Darkwing under the chin, through the mouth and into the brain, paralyzing him instantly.

As the momentum of the attack brought the two face to face, Darkwing found himself paralyzed and pinned by the dagger. Strangely, he felt no pain. As if in a dream he heard the clatter of his weapons falling to the floor, and stared into the glittering black eyes now only inches from his own.

He felt nothing below his neck, yet still he did not fall. He realized Scaleface was holding him up with the one hand gripping the dagger stuck in his throat and brain, an amazing display of strength and balance.

Scaleface smiled a ghastly leer only inches from his face, and whispered ...

"It isn't so easy to puncture a Kothringi's skin, is it? Now die with that knowledge, Darkwing Reynard!"

Darkwing's eyes stared at the last vision he would see. His dying mind saw images, ten thousand and more, flashing and racing before him...the briefing he had been given before his last mission...the faces and cries of those whose lives he had taken...the first days of training in the Dark Brotherhood...his childhood days...

His vision blurred. He saw only the blackness.

The Void is calling.

Before he fell into its welcoming darkness, his last thought was, Damien -

(TO BE CONTINUED)

Poisoning all those guards seemed an overkill. Why then did he not kill the sentry on the wall?

Kothringi's skin. My knowledge of the lore is a bit shabby on this subject. Is it armour or actual skin?

Ironically, I just bought Assassin's Creed...

Fantastic guide (and assasin duel!). Just wonderful. :goodjob:

EDIT: I am really sorry. I didnt see that I was supposed to PM any comments... Extremly sorry. As something to (perhaps) weigh up this useless post I will add that it would propably be very good to make an index in the first post which links to each part of this topic (not really sure how to do it myself). Or atleast says in which order they are coming in and in which page they can be found in. Sorry.