What weapon does the Assassin use?

Daggers. In questlog.gg’s gear statistics for 286 public Assassin character builds, the Spiritforged Dagger is the most common weapon (22%), followed by the Enraged Kromede Silver Dagger (13%) and the Aulamus Dagger (10%).

Marks the Assassin engraves on enemies, up to five per target, lasting 10 seconds. Savage Roar’s chain, Savage Fang and the Exploit Weakness clones all add them. Insignia Explosion consumes them, and its damage and Stun chance rise with every stack.

Why do Assassins attack from behind?

Several bonuses only apply to back attacks. Ambush and Triniel’s Dagger deal 30% more damage from behind, and the Rear Smite passive adds a Back Attack Damage Boost. Shadowstrike and Infiltrate both teleport you behind the target, and Grobs recommends setting the boss orientation indicator to Back.

Can the Assassin use Stealth?

Yes, through stigmas. Shadow Walk grants 20 seconds of Stealth out of combat, and Shadowstep gives 3 seconds after a hit. Both are rare in PvE builds (6% each), because the damage stigmas matter more there.

AION 2 Assassin Build Guide (Global): Insignias, Stigmas & Skills

What is the best Assassin build in AION 2?

The standard Assassin build deals its damage with Quick Slice, Savage Roar, Heart Gore and Insignia Explosion, and runs Illusive Clone, Swift Contract and Triniel’s Dagger as stigmas. The fourth slot goes to Savage Fang, or to Evasion Stance while you are still learning the bosses. Those are the four stigmas most often on the skill bar across the 513 public Assassin skill builds on questlog.gg that slot stigmas, and Grobs’ builds, the most-liked Assassin builds there, use the same core.

Each part of the build has its own guide:

Guide	What it covers
Assassin PvE build	Skill levels, specializations, the stigma order, the macro, the burst opener and how to stay behind the boss
Assassin Daevanion build	What each of the five boards holds, the 82-point early board and two real level 45 boards
Best Assassin build	The most-liked builds compared, Savage Fang vs Evasion Stance, and which build fits each stage
Assassin gear guide	What Assassins wear in every slot, the best dagger, crafted vs dungeon routes, Arcana and gear lines
Assassin PvP build	Coming soon

Still choosing a class? See how the Assassin compares with the other seven in our classes overview. For other classes, go to the builds directory.

How does the Assassin deal damage?

The Assassin is a melee burst class. It builds marks on the enemy, turns critical hits into extra attacks, and hits hardest from behind. Four mechanics carry the class:

Insignias. Savage Roar and the two follow-ups in its chain each engrave one Insignia, Savage Fang engraves five, and the Exploit Weakness passive can summon clones that add more. Insignia Explosion then consumes them. Its damage and Stun chance rise with every stack up to five, so it should always fire into a full set.
Crits feed Heart Gore. Heart Gore can only be used after you land a critical hit. Illusive Clone removes its cooldown and adds 20% of your damage as extra damage for 10 seconds. At skill level 16, Heart Gore resets its own cooldown whenever it crits.
Back attacks. Ambush and Triniel’s Dagger deal 30% more from behind, and the Rear Smite passive boosts all back-attack damage. Shadowstrike and Infiltrate teleport you behind the target, and Flash Slice moves you to the other side of it.
Burst windows. Illusive Clone and Swift Contract (+20% Combat Speed) make you, in Grobs’ words, insanely strong for a short time. He stresses that Season 1 does not give you enough cooldown reduction to use them on every pull, so you save them for the moments that count.

Quick Slice is your left-click attack. It has no cooldown and restores MP with every hit, while Savage Roar spends MP. Grobs plays by holding the macro and Quick Slice together, so that the two cancel each other’s animations.

Which stigmas do Assassins slot most?

Three stigmas are close to universal: Illusive Clone, Swift Contract and Triniel’s Dagger. The fourth slot is usually Savage Fang, with the defensive Evasion Stance as the main alternative. These shares count only the stigmas placed on the skill bar: many public builds also list stigmas they have levelled but not equipped, or none at all. On 2026-10-11, 513 of the 751 public Assassin skill builds on questlog.gg had at least one stigma on the bar, and 332 of them had exactly four.

Stigma	Share of 513 builds	What it does
Illusive Clone	96%	Removes Heart Gore’s cooldown and adds 20% of your damage as extra damage for 10s
Swift Contract	89%	+20% Combat Speed for 10s
Triniel’s Dagger	83%	Heavy hit, 30% more from behind; at level 10 it cuts all your cooldowns by 10%
Savage Fang	67%	Hits up to 4 enemies and engraves 5 Insignias; 50 Stagger damage
Evasion Stance	32%	Briefly evades all damage; restores MP and Stamina on an evade
Smoke Bomb	15%	Blinds a target within 10m for 5s
Throw Shadowblade	7%	20m throw that slows by 40%
Shadow Walk	6%	20s of Stealth out of combat
Spiral Slice	5%	Rushes a target and strips a buff for extra damage

The other four (Shadowstep, Evasion Contract, Aerial Bind and Assault Ambush) each appear in 6% of builds or fewer. The order to level them in is covered in the Assassin PvE build.

Which active skills appear in most Assassin builds?

The four damage skills and both teleports are in almost every build. Storm Rampage, which only works on a staggered boss, comes next. Shadow Fall and Defiance are the least common.

Active skill	Share of 513 builds
Insignia Explosion	99%
Heart Gore	98%
Shadowstrike	98%
Savage Roar	98%
Quick Slice	98%
Flash Slice	97%
Infiltrate	96%
Storm Rampage	88%
Ambush	69%
Whirlwind Slice	65%
Defiance	37%
Shadow Fall	32%

Ambush and Whirlwind Slice sit lower for a reason: both Grobs and Nellan97 found them to be little or no gain in their rotations, and Ambush roots you in place for a moment.

What does every Assassin skill do?

The Assassin has 35 skills: 12 actives, 13 stigmas and 10 passives. The descriptions below summarize the Global client data. Damage numbers are left out because they scale with skill level, and specializations change several of these effects.

Active skills

Skill	Effect
Quick Slice	Hits up to 4 enemies within 4m and restores MP; a three-hit chain. Your basic attack.
Savage Roar	Hits up to 4 enemies within 4m and engraves 1 Insignia for 10s; each hit of its chain engraves another.
Insignia Explosion	Hits up to 4 enemies around a target 20m away with a chance to Stun for 3s. Damage and Stun chance rise with each Insignia, up to 5 (10% Stun chance per stack, doubled on NPCs).
Heart Gore	Usable after you land a critical hit; hits up to 4 enemies within 4m and restores 100 MP.
Shadowstrike	Jumps behind a target within 20m, hits it and stuns it for 3s.
Infiltrate	After a dodge or while flying, jumps behind a target within 10m and hits it with a 50% chance to Blind (always blinds NPCs).
Flash Slice	Moves to the other side of a target within 4m and hits up to 4 enemies, with a 40% chance to Blind (always blinds NPCs).
Ambush	Hits a target within 4m; 30% more damage from behind.
Whirlwind Slice	Hits a target within 4m after you evade, with a 40% chance to Stun (always stuns NPCs).
Storm Rampage	Usable only on a Staggered target within 4m.
Shadow Fall	Jumps to a stunned target within 10m and knocks it down for 3s; 5% chance to trigger against targets immune to incapacitation.
Defiance	Removes Stun, Knockdown, Airborne, Grab, Frost and Fear and grants 5s of status-effect immunity.

Stigma skills

Stigma	Effect
Illusive Clone	Removes Heart Gore’s cooldown and deals 20% of your damage as extra damage for 10s. Specializations add Status Effect Chance, +20% Critical Damage Boost, ×1.5 Exploit Weakness and a chance for extra damage on crits.
Swift Contract	+20% Combat Speed for 10s. Specializations cut MP costs, multiply Rear Smite and Assault Stance by 1.5 and add another 10% Combat Speed.
Triniel’s Dagger	Hits a target within 4m and lengthens its skill cooldowns by 5%; 30% more damage from behind. At level 10 it cuts all your cooldowns by 10% on hit.
Savage Fang	Hits up to 4 enemies within 4m and engraves 5 Insignias; 50 Stagger damage, plus 50 more from level 10.
Evasion Stance	Evades all damage for a brief moment and restores 110 MP and Stamina once on an evade.
Smoke Bomb	Hits a target within 10m and Blinds it for 5s.
Shadow Walk	20s of Stealth; usable only out of combat until level 15.
Spiral Slice	Rushes a target within 20m, removes a buff and deals extra damage per buff removed.
Throw Shadowblade	Hits a target 20m away and slows it by 40% for 5s.
Shadowstep	Hits a target within 4m, then you jump back and gain 3s of Stealth.
Evasion Contract	Removes Slow and Root, grants immunity to both and +200 Evasion for 10s.
Aerial Bind	Hits a target within 4m with a 50% chance to launch it Airborne, guaranteed at 5 Insignias.
Assault Ambush	Hits up to 4 enemies around a target 20m away with a 30% chance to Blind, and raises your Defense per target hit.

Passive skills

Passive	Effect
Exploit Weakness	More Critical Hit, a 25% chance to raise your Attack for 10s, and a 7% chance on a crit to summon up to five clones that deal damage and engrave Insignias.
Rear Smite	More Back Attack Damage Boost, PvE Damage Boost and PvP Damage Boost.
Assault Stance	More Critical Damage Boost.
Impact Hit	More Impact-type Chance and Double Chance.
Ambush Stance	After a rush or movement skill, 10s in which your hits have a 50% chance to deal extra damage (1s cooldown).
Determination	Extra damage when you hit a target at 30% HP or less (1s cooldown).
Defense Break	−12% Defense and −11% Status Effect Resist on a Staggered or Impact-afflicted target for 10s (20s cooldown).
Apply Poison	15% chance to poison a target for 10s and cut its Incoming Heal by 12%.
Heightened Sixth Sense	More Evasion, HP and Max HP, and heals you when you evade (3s cooldown).
Revitalization Contract	Status Effect Resist that stacks while you are crowd-controlled, and restores 35% Max HP when you fall to 10% HP (60s cooldown).

Is the Assassin hard to play?

It asks more of you than most classes, mostly in positioning. Grobs tells players not to skip the class out of fear: it has just two harder mechanics, timing the self-buffs and attacking from behind, and even imperfect play still deals a lot of damage.

Nellan97, who has played the class since early access, is blunter. In his runs the average Assassin did the least damage in the party, especially without a good macro. His advice is to treat positioning as the job:

Use the teleports instead of running after the boss.
Learn to dodge without stepping away.
Aim for 85–90% of your damage from back attacks in every fight.

If you are new, both creators’ setups help. Grobs keeps the leveling macro to a single line, and Nellan97 recommends Evasion Stance as a safety button until you know the fights.

Grobs — The Only Assassin PvE Guide You Need

Which sources is this Assassin guide based on?

Skill descriptions: the Global game client data in questlog.gg’s skill builder (checked 2026-10-09).
Usage statistics: all 751 public Global Assassin skill builds on questlog.gg, counted on 2026-10-11. Stigma and skill shares count only skills placed on the skill bar, in the 513 builds that have at least one stigma there. Weapon shares come from 286 character builds with gear on questlog.gg’s Assassin class page (checked 2026-10-09). Shares will shift as more players publish builds.
Playstyle: Grobs’ The Only Assassin PvE Guide You Need (2026-09-26) and Nellan97’s How to Deal DMG with Assassin on Global (2026-10-04).