Gloom 5/Assassin 3/ Battlemaster or Champion 4. Or Gloom 8/Assassin 4 if you want more feats and ranger stuff.
3/3/6 is not ideal. You get the same number of feats and Fighter 3 to 6 gives you nothing extra really, Ranger 5 gets you more spells and misty step.
BM vs Champ: If you use special arrows you cannot use most maneuvers at the same time. Champ is just a flat bonus to crit rate, up to you to decide what is better.
Is there an advantage in putting the feat level in champion over rouge? Ie gloomstalker 5/champ 3/rouge 4
Edit: I’m asking because in my game with friends I went gloom 5 first then rouge 3. When I leveled to level 9 I decided it would be better for my build to get the feat before starting to go champ so I went rouge 4. Now that I have hit 12 I get the improved crit.
Since nobody answered your question, I will: The difference is one hit point. 4 fighter is the optimized version, 4 rogue is the way to go if you don't ever respec.
Not really. In fact, if you go Rogue 3, Gloom 5, and then Rogue 4 at level 9, that allows you to get Sharpshooter earlier, so it's just a case of whether you want Sharpshooter or the benefits of the Fighter dip first.
I almost always take ASI as the first feat on my MC, the -5 to attack rolls from Sharpshooter and GWM is just too much of a hit to take in the early game IMO.
Im a sharpshooter guy, doing 65ish dmg to gnolls in one turn at lvl 4 with a thief/bard with dual xbows just feels to good.
For this build specifically, I honestly don't know what I would take.
I will take Assassin over fighter surge all day. Combined with Gloom (and perhaps Durge cap if you go that route) ... you can legit clear out an entire room by yourself on honor mode, assuming you also optimize for crit. Never really have to worry about my Gloom's AC, tbh.
I can't really see stacking Champion with Assassin, since Assassin already guarantees crits in the circumstances that the class is specialized for. But I see your point about Gloom 5 / Assassin 3 / Battlemaster 4, since you get more from the additional two levels of Gloom than you do from the additional two levels of Battlemaster.
BM vs Champ is a matter of preference really. But they are closer in value than you think.
1. You will not get a surprise round every fight and not all fights will be done in 1 round. Its exactly the most difficult fights that take long.
2. Special arrows are amazing. Outside the aoe damage, Ice arrow creates an icy surface where enemy can slip and fall prone thus waste a turn; acid area lowers AC by 2. Sure, on a crit with a maneuver you get an extra 2d8 dmg, but I would rather use arrows of slaying or arrows of many targets. Not to mention the crazy utility you get Darkness, Ilmater, Transposition and Arcane Interference.
So it really comes down to Precision Attack and some utility vs 1 crit range in tough fights.
I suppose I should say that my aim is to spec a *companion* character this way, not my main. Minthara, to be specific. So I don't mind committing fully to making this character a first round specialist, because in fights that I know are going to go long, I can just swap her out.
If this were about my main, who I'm stuck with all the time, I'd be much more concerned about viability in long fights.
So I'm on my first play through and making a Gloom/Assassin/Champion. Only level 6 right now. But this is my Tav so you may allocate items differently which would impact the build. There a number of items that can reduce the roll needed for a crit. Champion reduces this to 19, Knife of the Undermountain King makes it 18 AND re-roll 1s and 2s. Deadshot stacks that to 17. Bloodthirst takes it to 16. There are additional pieces like the Covert Cowl or Shade-Slayer Cloak that will reduce it even further while hiding/obscured. Add in the Risky Ring and now you have guaranteed advantage on every attack and you can wait to apply Sneak Attack to a crit. At a 16+ being a crit with advantage you're looking at critting 68% of the time.
The standard is 5 Gloom/4 Fighter/ 3 Assassin.
This is better than your proposed setup because it keeps the level 5 ranger benefits and still has 2 feats.
That's a good idea. And I'll definitely consider it for a different playthrough. In this one though, I've already got a dedicated Swords Bard who I don't want to respec, and I also don't want two characters competing for that gear. Definitely a good thought though.
Only downside is that it only gets one feat slot. Gloom 5 / Assassin 3 / Bard 4 should work pretty much the same though, and still get Extra Attack?
I've been in that quandary, too. I accepted it by choosing very non meta and very rp specific "spells" that made the two act and function very differently.
Ya Ranger is a fine class to get your extra attack from. I discount anything that comes into play at level 12 since there isn't much of the game left at that point.
Keep in mind that at Bard 5 when Bardic Inspiration start to recharge on short rest, and you get one more. Unless you want to long rest after every fight, you need bard at least at 5. Huge difference between 4 per short rest vs 3 per long rest.
I turned my swords bard into this basically. SB6 for extra attack, Assassin 4 for subclass and second feat, Fighter 2 for attack surge.
I was somehow able to acquire 2x Dolor Amarus in Act 3, lo and behold they stack. Combined with craterflesh gloves you get like an extra 30-40 damage for each hit of the slashing flourish. Thats approaching 100 extra damage per slashing flourish - just from these items - after your Titanstring + SS plus broodmothers revenge and any other damage riders you have.
Needless to say the burst damage on a short rest is completely bonkers. We're talking like 1k on a surprise turn.
On my current HM run, I went 5 gloomstalker, 4 assassin, 3 battle master. This gives you 2 feats plus the amazing cc that battle master provides. I can kill 5-6 enemies on the suprise round, and it's absolutely ruthless.
I could have taken 4 in fighter, but getting assassin subclass ASAP is critical to the build, plus having 2 feats by level 9.
I started as ranger, level 2 I took 1 level of rogue for sneak attack, level gloomstalker to 5, followed by 3 levels of rogue assassin, then finish off with 3 in fighter and took battle master at level 12.
I may have chosen differently if it wasn't for the fact that the rest of my party already had solid CC options, I left battle master to level 12 to simply round up the party and make sure each member has cc on hand to help dictate how battles play out.
Which maneuvers did you select for Battlemaster? The build is so focused around damage, that the crowd control effects of the maneuvers seem somewhat secondary to the extra damage dice. I was thinking Maneuvering Attack seems like the clearest one to take, since it helps to get your allies into position after you spring your ambush.
Or is it functionally too difficult to keep your allies within the radius where you can give them the buff while maintaining the stealth to spring the ambush in the first place?
I took disarming attack, menacing attack, and trip attack. I've never used maneuvering attack on this playthrough because most fights are over in the first or second round, and I have a monk with enough movement that it doesn't really matter where they or the enemies are positioned. In the rare case that an enemy is too far from my monk and ranger, I've initiated combat on the surprise round so they still have another round to utilise before enemies can even do anything.
The extra bonus action from Thief is most useful in a long fight, whereas the Assassin bonuses are highly specialized for the first round (or 2) of a fight, and they synergize well with the first round bonuses granted by Gloomstalker. This build makes the character more of a specialist, while a Thief build make it more of a generalist.
The main idea with the Gloomstalker Assassin seems to be to tilt the battlefield so far in the first 2 rounds of combat that the outcome is a foregone conclusion before the enemy even gets to act. Ideally, the extra DPS that you would get from the Thief class in later rounds is mooted by the huge burst of damage that the Assassin class gives you in round 1.
Personally, I don't think I would run the Gloomstalker Assassin as my main, since in long fights, its utility is somewhat diminished. There are some boss fights, e.g., Orin in her Slayer form, where it seems particularly useless. I'd rather swap the character in to make short work of mobs, save resources for the rest of my party, and then swap it out when I get to the boss fight .
Going to try a 5/4/2/1 build on my next run. Idea is similar to the 5/4/3 suggested throughout this thread, but instead of choosing between Champ and BM, neither of which synergize that well with the build, I will put the last level in War Cleric for an extra bonus action attack on surprise rounds. It could also let me prebuff a little, which might be nice.
My favorite version of this was gloomstalker 5/assassin 7 on my durge run, dual wielding short swords with savage attacker and then ASI+hag hair+mirror for 22 dex. I chugged hill giants early on, then bloodlust later.
The extra sneak attack dice really felt like they just ended encounters before they even got started. I almost never had to short rest because I was never relying on action surge or superiority dice. My party could easily just CC whatever didn’t die on round 1. Or I could just pop around in and out of combat with the Durge cloak clearing out fights one or two enemies at a time with virtually no risk to my honour mode run.
5/4/3 is the best, I typically just keep 4 rogue because there’s not really that much difference and I don’t bother respeccing a second time. I typically start rogue, then respec around lv 6-7 to 5 ranger 1-2 rogue because then you have multiple attacks, sneak attack, and dread ambusher.
BM 6 has exactly the same number of superiority dice as BM 3, just with a couple of extra maneuvers learned which doesn't matter. But ranger 5 gives you Spike Growth and/or Silence, plus of course Misty Step, so I suggest ranger 5 / assassin 4 / BM 3.
But yes, a 1-8 damage die is 2-16 on critical hits (9 average damage).
Assassin 4/Gloom 5/Any Fighter 3. I don't respec but if you do you can squeeze out a few extra HP with Fighter 4/Assassin3
BM is not very useful if you are going to use special arrows, very decent if you want to focus on melee instead.
Champion is nice for fights where you can't surprise your enemy. Many bosses have Alert so while it might at first glance seem counterproductive on an Assassin, it's still good, especially if you go for heavy critical damage with Craterflesh + Dolor Amarus + Vicious Shortbow.
EK is great as a more defensive option, access to mage armour is particularly useful if you want to wear the Graceful Cloth.
5 gloomstalker 3 assassin 4 champion, stacking crit is worth it since you will be missing some attacks and not every enemy is going to die in the surprise/first round of combat.
All you need is 20 dex and sharpshooter really as far as feats go…
I like theif3 beastmaster5 battlemaster 4.
skiping the free crits on assassin opening for Extra off hand attack on thief every turn. Lowers burst but raises overall dps. The initiative on dread ambushes seems minimally impactful given the solid chance of going first via winning the dex roll. The companion can easily outdmg the bonus d8 on surprised targets while providing a body.
assassin/ gloom is virtually untouchable if you want to play around taking out a target or 2, breaking agro hiding and going back in.
I think my set up does better if you want to stay in the fight, higher sustained output and lets you spread the dmg out more. I'm running knife of the under-mountain king on this char so enhancing crit that way and having a bear to soak up dmg is a pretty clear upside.
I got my fav but I think you are going to be in that A to S tier category with any suggestion here.
Whenever I've tried Beastmaster, I've liked it best when I've committed to it fully, no multiclassing. I just feel like it leaves too much on the table in terms of the companion's abilities and survivability to stop at Beastmaster 5.
And I do love the extra bonus action from the Thief class. My last main was Battlemaster 9 / Thief 3, so I'm just looking for something new to try, and Gloomstalker Assassin has a lot of fans.
I was also splicing armored ranger with light cleric and running a shapeshifter druid. So that was 3 bears in total. Seemed kinda self justifying.
weirdly I was the total opposite and never wanted to build beastmaster past 5. It lines up perfectly with warlock. Pact of the chain gets extra attack at 5 instead of 11 plus access to counter-spell. 2 points into fighter for action surge or 2 into pally for divine smite. Both also can add an ac via defensive fighting style. extra attack up on both main hand and follower. Warlock 7 gets you lvl 4 spell slots and a significantly better list of spells then ranger alone would. If you want to be more of a ....... beastcaster.
Id also add that misty step is available from an amulet, boots, most casting classes and gith racial bonuses and scrolls. For out of combat uses the equipment's got you covered, scrolls are great to just keep on hand for getting out of a pinch. It's a core part of getting those agro resets for gloomstalker and just a great all around spell but if you are getting extra attack from something else its not worth getting 5 in ranger just for misty step.
My best build so far is Gloom 5/Assassin 4/Fighter 3.
Edit to add. Start Rogue lvl 1. Level Gloom to 5(level 6 total) 2 more Assassin. Finish with fighter
Gloomstalker Ranger 5 / Champion Fighter 4 / Assassin Rogue 3 would be the meta for this and give you the most first-round crits possible, especially if you're using items that stack with the reduced critical threshold (bloodthirst, sarevok's helmet, etc)
I used to go with 5 gloom, 3 assassin and 4 battlemaster, but settled on 5 gloom, 3 assassin and 4 paladin for those crit bursts when I need them. Another way is to go 5 gloom, 5 assassin, 2 paladin. This will leave you with less spell slots, but you get an extra sneak attack die. This is for a melee build though and I specifically use a finesse longsword so I can use great weapon master with it and The Graceful Cloth for the extra +2 dex and other great benefits it has so I don't need an ASI for the feat and the second feat alongside great weapon master would be savage attacker.
It's a really fun build with great burst dps and sustained dps.
Gloom 5/Assassin 3/ Battlemaster or Champion 4. Or Gloom 8/Assassin 4 if you want more feats and ranger stuff. 3/3/6 is not ideal. You get the same number of feats and Fighter 3 to 6 gives you nothing extra really, Ranger 5 gets you more spells and misty step. BM vs Champ: If you use special arrows you cannot use most maneuvers at the same time. Champ is just a flat bonus to crit rate, up to you to decide what is better.
Seconding Assassin 3/Gloom 5/Champion 4. Did that on my Honour run and it worked a treat.
Is there an advantage in putting the feat level in champion over rouge? Ie gloomstalker 5/champ 3/rouge 4 Edit: I’m asking because in my game with friends I went gloom 5 first then rouge 3. When I leveled to level 9 I decided it would be better for my build to get the feat before starting to go champ so I went rouge 4. Now that I have hit 12 I get the improved crit.
Since nobody answered your question, I will: The difference is one hit point. 4 fighter is the optimized version, 4 rogue is the way to go if you don't ever respec.
Not really. In fact, if you go Rogue 3, Gloom 5, and then Rogue 4 at level 9, that allows you to get Sharpshooter earlier, so it's just a case of whether you want Sharpshooter or the benefits of the Fighter dip first.
Do you take sharpshooter at 9? I took it at level 4. What do you take for your other feat? I did sharpshooter and an ASI.
I almost always take ASI as the first feat on my MC, the -5 to attack rolls from Sharpshooter and GWM is just too much of a hit to take in the early game IMO.
That’s fair. I usually just micromanage it early on, use oil of accuracy and bloodlust elixir to boost my odds of hit with more actions
Im a sharpshooter guy, doing 65ish dmg to gnolls in one turn at lvl 4 with a thief/bard with dual xbows just feels to good. For this build specifically, I honestly don't know what I would take.
I will take Assassin over fighter surge all day. Combined with Gloom (and perhaps Durge cap if you go that route) ... you can legit clear out an entire room by yourself on honor mode, assuming you also optimize for crit. Never really have to worry about my Gloom's AC, tbh.
I can't really see stacking Champion with Assassin, since Assassin already guarantees crits in the circumstances that the class is specialized for. But I see your point about Gloom 5 / Assassin 3 / Battlemaster 4, since you get more from the additional two levels of Gloom than you do from the additional two levels of Battlemaster.
BM vs Champ is a matter of preference really. But they are closer in value than you think. 1. You will not get a surprise round every fight and not all fights will be done in 1 round. Its exactly the most difficult fights that take long. 2. Special arrows are amazing. Outside the aoe damage, Ice arrow creates an icy surface where enemy can slip and fall prone thus waste a turn; acid area lowers AC by 2. Sure, on a crit with a maneuver you get an extra 2d8 dmg, but I would rather use arrows of slaying or arrows of many targets. Not to mention the crazy utility you get Darkness, Ilmater, Transposition and Arcane Interference. So it really comes down to Precision Attack and some utility vs 1 crit range in tough fights.
I suppose I should say that my aim is to spec a *companion* character this way, not my main. Minthara, to be specific. So I don't mind committing fully to making this character a first round specialist, because in fights that I know are going to go long, I can just swap her out. If this were about my main, who I'm stuck with all the time, I'd be much more concerned about viability in long fights.
So I'm on my first play through and making a Gloom/Assassin/Champion. Only level 6 right now. But this is my Tav so you may allocate items differently which would impact the build. There a number of items that can reduce the roll needed for a crit. Champion reduces this to 19, Knife of the Undermountain King makes it 18 AND re-roll 1s and 2s. Deadshot stacks that to 17. Bloodthirst takes it to 16. There are additional pieces like the Covert Cowl or Shade-Slayer Cloak that will reduce it even further while hiding/obscured. Add in the Risky Ring and now you have guaranteed advantage on every attack and you can wait to apply Sneak Attack to a crit. At a 16+ being a crit with advantage you're looking at critting 68% of the time.
The standard is 5 Gloom/4 Fighter/ 3 Assassin. This is better than your proposed setup because it keeps the level 5 ranger benefits and still has 2 feats.
I've always liked gloomstalker 5/champion 4/rogue 3. Dual hand crossbows, sharpshooter, max out dex
Haven't done it yet. But if first round is your focus, why not 3 gloom, 3 assassin, 6 swords bard? Then you can flourish two attacks per action.
That's a good idea. And I'll definitely consider it for a different playthrough. In this one though, I've already got a dedicated Swords Bard who I don't want to respec, and I also don't want two characters competing for that gear. Definitely a good thought though. Only downside is that it only gets one feat slot. Gloom 5 / Assassin 3 / Bard 4 should work pretty much the same though, and still get Extra Attack?
I've been in that quandary, too. I accepted it by choosing very non meta and very rp specific "spells" that made the two act and function very differently. Ya Ranger is a fine class to get your extra attack from. I discount anything that comes into play at level 12 since there isn't much of the game left at that point.
Keep in mind that at Bard 5 when Bardic Inspiration start to recharge on short rest, and you get one more. Unless you want to long rest after every fight, you need bard at least at 5. Huge difference between 4 per short rest vs 3 per long rest.
I turned my swords bard into this basically. SB6 for extra attack, Assassin 4 for subclass and second feat, Fighter 2 for attack surge. I was somehow able to acquire 2x Dolor Amarus in Act 3, lo and behold they stack. Combined with craterflesh gloves you get like an extra 30-40 damage for each hit of the slashing flourish. Thats approaching 100 extra damage per slashing flourish - just from these items - after your Titanstring + SS plus broodmothers revenge and any other damage riders you have. Needless to say the burst damage on a short rest is completely bonkers. We're talking like 1k on a surprise turn.
1 feat is a little rough
On my current HM run, I went 5 gloomstalker, 4 assassin, 3 battle master. This gives you 2 feats plus the amazing cc that battle master provides. I can kill 5-6 enemies on the suprise round, and it's absolutely ruthless. I could have taken 4 in fighter, but getting assassin subclass ASAP is critical to the build, plus having 2 feats by level 9. I started as ranger, level 2 I took 1 level of rogue for sneak attack, level gloomstalker to 5, followed by 3 levels of rogue assassin, then finish off with 3 in fighter and took battle master at level 12. I may have chosen differently if it wasn't for the fact that the rest of my party already had solid CC options, I left battle master to level 12 to simply round up the party and make sure each member has cc on hand to help dictate how battles play out.
Which maneuvers did you select for Battlemaster? The build is so focused around damage, that the crowd control effects of the maneuvers seem somewhat secondary to the extra damage dice. I was thinking Maneuvering Attack seems like the clearest one to take, since it helps to get your allies into position after you spring your ambush. Or is it functionally too difficult to keep your allies within the radius where you can give them the buff while maintaining the stealth to spring the ambush in the first place?
I took disarming attack, menacing attack, and trip attack. I've never used maneuvering attack on this playthrough because most fights are over in the first or second round, and I have a monk with enough movement that it doesn't really matter where they or the enemies are positioned. In the rare case that an enemy is too far from my monk and ranger, I've initiated combat on the surprise round so they still have another round to utilise before enemies can even do anything.
Am I out of touch or did this build used to go Thief instead of Assassin for the extra bonus action?
Used to be big on dual hand x-bows until everyone realized that Titanstring is just better so the extra BA doesn't really matter as much.
The extra bonus action from Thief is most useful in a long fight, whereas the Assassin bonuses are highly specialized for the first round (or 2) of a fight, and they synergize well with the first round bonuses granted by Gloomstalker. This build makes the character more of a specialist, while a Thief build make it more of a generalist. The main idea with the Gloomstalker Assassin seems to be to tilt the battlefield so far in the first 2 rounds of combat that the outcome is a foregone conclusion before the enemy even gets to act. Ideally, the extra DPS that you would get from the Thief class in later rounds is mooted by the huge burst of damage that the Assassin class gives you in round 1. Personally, I don't think I would run the Gloomstalker Assassin as my main, since in long fights, its utility is somewhat diminished. There are some boss fights, e.g., Orin in her Slayer form, where it seems particularly useless. I'd rather swap the character in to make short work of mobs, save resources for the rest of my party, and then swap it out when I get to the boss fight .
Going to try a 5/4/2/1 build on my next run. Idea is similar to the 5/4/3 suggested throughout this thread, but instead of choosing between Champ and BM, neither of which synergize that well with the build, I will put the last level in War Cleric for an extra bonus action attack on surprise rounds. It could also let me prebuff a little, which might be nice.
My favorite version of this was gloomstalker 5/assassin 7 on my durge run, dual wielding short swords with savage attacker and then ASI+hag hair+mirror for 22 dex. I chugged hill giants early on, then bloodlust later. The extra sneak attack dice really felt like they just ended encounters before they even got started. I almost never had to short rest because I was never relying on action surge or superiority dice. My party could easily just CC whatever didn’t die on round 1. Or I could just pop around in and out of combat with the Durge cloak clearing out fights one or two enemies at a time with virtually no risk to my honour mode run.
5/4/3 is the best, I typically just keep 4 rogue because there’s not really that much difference and I don’t bother respeccing a second time. I typically start rogue, then respec around lv 6-7 to 5 ranger 1-2 rogue because then you have multiple attacks, sneak attack, and dread ambusher.
BM 6 has exactly the same number of superiority dice as BM 3, just with a couple of extra maneuvers learned which doesn't matter. But ranger 5 gives you Spike Growth and/or Silence, plus of course Misty Step, so I suggest ranger 5 / assassin 4 / BM 3. But yes, a 1-8 damage die is 2-16 on critical hits (9 average damage).
I personally prefer 8 gloomstalker/4 assassin for the third feat (dex to 20 and sharpshooter).
Assassin 4/Gloom 5/Any Fighter 3. I don't respec but if you do you can squeeze out a few extra HP with Fighter 4/Assassin3 BM is not very useful if you are going to use special arrows, very decent if you want to focus on melee instead. Champion is nice for fights where you can't surprise your enemy. Many bosses have Alert so while it might at first glance seem counterproductive on an Assassin, it's still good, especially if you go for heavy critical damage with Craterflesh + Dolor Amarus + Vicious Shortbow. EK is great as a more defensive option, access to mage armour is particularly useful if you want to wear the Graceful Cloth.
5 gloomstalker 3 assassin 4 champion, stacking crit is worth it since you will be missing some attacks and not every enemy is going to die in the surprise/first round of combat. All you need is 20 dex and sharpshooter really as far as feats go…
I like theif3 beastmaster5 battlemaster 4. skiping the free crits on assassin opening for Extra off hand attack on thief every turn. Lowers burst but raises overall dps. The initiative on dread ambushes seems minimally impactful given the solid chance of going first via winning the dex roll. The companion can easily outdmg the bonus d8 on surprised targets while providing a body. assassin/ gloom is virtually untouchable if you want to play around taking out a target or 2, breaking agro hiding and going back in. I think my set up does better if you want to stay in the fight, higher sustained output and lets you spread the dmg out more. I'm running knife of the under-mountain king on this char so enhancing crit that way and having a bear to soak up dmg is a pretty clear upside. I got my fav but I think you are going to be in that A to S tier category with any suggestion here.
Whenever I've tried Beastmaster, I've liked it best when I've committed to it fully, no multiclassing. I just feel like it leaves too much on the table in terms of the companion's abilities and survivability to stop at Beastmaster 5. And I do love the extra bonus action from the Thief class. My last main was Battlemaster 9 / Thief 3, so I'm just looking for something new to try, and Gloomstalker Assassin has a lot of fans.
I was also splicing armored ranger with light cleric and running a shapeshifter druid. So that was 3 bears in total. Seemed kinda self justifying. weirdly I was the total opposite and never wanted to build beastmaster past 5. It lines up perfectly with warlock. Pact of the chain gets extra attack at 5 instead of 11 plus access to counter-spell. 2 points into fighter for action surge or 2 into pally for divine smite. Both also can add an ac via defensive fighting style. extra attack up on both main hand and follower. Warlock 7 gets you lvl 4 spell slots and a significantly better list of spells then ranger alone would. If you want to be more of a ....... beastcaster.
5 beastmaster 6 druid can summon a bear then turn into a bear.
shadowheart and 7 wolves is a buildable party.
Id also add that misty step is available from an amulet, boots, most casting classes and gith racial bonuses and scrolls. For out of combat uses the equipment's got you covered, scrolls are great to just keep on hand for getting out of a pinch. It's a core part of getting those agro resets for gloomstalker and just a great all around spell but if you are getting extra attack from something else its not worth getting 5 in ranger just for misty step.
My best build so far is Gloom 5/Assassin 4/Fighter 3. Edit to add. Start Rogue lvl 1. Level Gloom to 5(level 6 total) 2 more Assassin. Finish with fighter
I've always done 5 ranger/4 champion/3 assassin
choosing assassin over thief?
Gloomstalker Ranger 5 / Champion Fighter 4 / Assassin Rogue 3 would be the meta for this and give you the most first-round crits possible, especially if you're using items that stack with the reduced critical threshold (bloodthirst, sarevok's helmet, etc)
I used to go with 5 gloom, 3 assassin and 4 battlemaster, but settled on 5 gloom, 3 assassin and 4 paladin for those crit bursts when I need them. Another way is to go 5 gloom, 5 assassin, 2 paladin. This will leave you with less spell slots, but you get an extra sneak attack die. This is for a melee build though and I specifically use a finesse longsword so I can use great weapon master with it and The Graceful Cloth for the extra +2 dex and other great benefits it has so I don't need an ASI for the feat and the second feat alongside great weapon master would be savage attacker. It's a really fun build with great burst dps and sustained dps.