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Bah you actually made me unlurk.
What I am going to say will most likely be considered heresy.
For an Assassin, forget longswords and katanas.
Shortswords, daggers, and darts are where it's at.
Shortswords and daggers are an Assassin's best friend.
Just starting out, Arbanes is very powerful. It casts hast and makes you immune to hold person. Short Sword of Backstabbing gives you a raw +3 to hit. Which you need. Backstabbing and poison is no good if you can't connect. There is Kundane, it has a zero speed factor and an extra APR. Ilbratha is a young Assassin's best friend. Mirror Image is a life saver. For punching through tough foes with good AC, Cutthroat is a nice +4 short sword. It's also very damaging.
Daggers is where the fun begins. Pixie Prick. Nothing like backstabbing somebody with a poisoned dagger. They fall down to take a nap, blissfully unaware of the venom burning their blood. They never wake up. Stilleto of Demarchess is a cruel weapon. It stuns. Backstab somebody, and watch them die as they look at you pitifully, unable to do anything, frozen in place. Firetooth. Powerful throwing dagger. Can be used with the Buckler +1 to improve your AC if it's needed and still provides a powerful ranged attack. With poison, it's very icky. There is a +4 dagger, Boneblade, which is good if you need to bottom out your THAC0 to hit something.
Darts. High rate of fire and some of them are just plain nasty. Darts of stunning and wounding are fantastic with poison weapon.
While bows and crossbows are fun and fine and good, and bolts and arrows of biting are great, you get a lot more mileage out of other weapons. Like it or not, there are occasions when you get bite off more then you can chew or get ambushed. Being able to use a shield, in particular, the Buckler +1 is a valuable asset, and, two handed weapons prevent that. Darts are a better delivery system for poison. Or Firetooth. And in SoA, with few exceptions (Staff of Striking for example) all of the best backstabbing weapons are single handed.
Relurk
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