A commander with the Assassin ability may attempt to assassinate a random enemy non-hidden commander in the same province. Assassination attempts occur before many other events in the turn order, such as movement. If the assassin is in a province where there is a fort under siege, they must have the Scale Walls ability to be able to go in or out to assassinate a commander.

Assassins from a third party not sieging the fort cannot assassinate anyone in a sieged fort province without the Scale Walls ability. (Is this still true for Dom6?)

If there is a non-hiding enemy commander in the province, an assassin will always find a target and trigger an assassination battle. There is a 50% ( is it still 50%?) chance that an assassination will occur at night, which has potential to incur some darkness penalties. Commanders that are assassinated are considered to be surprised and will disregard any scripted orders they are given, including conservative gem usage. The assassin however will carry out their script as normal.

Assassinations are not just a player-versus-player phenomenon. Various random events can result in one of your commanders falling prey to an impromptu duel with a neutral foe; aside from professionals hired by shady third parties, there are also squatters in certain magic sites, dungeon monsters waylaying adventurers, antagonists in certain nation-specific questlines, and (new to Dominions 6) the occasional concerned parent of one of your Blood Slaves. A couple late-age nations even have the misfortune of internal politics, resulting in Assassination battles between two commanders belonging to the same faction, should their master make the mistake of hosting them in the same province.

Before Dominions 6, all Assassination battles took place in an outdoor arena, significantly smaller than the standard battlefield. Dominions 6 adds new locations where Assassinations may take place, notably indoor ones which are even smaller:

• In the target's home
• In a tavern (filled with neutral Commoners and furniture)
• In a study (filled with bookshelves)
• (there are probably more)

A potential assassination victim can have bodyguards, which are units under their command with the Guard Commander order. Each bodyguard has a base 50% chance to be present in the assassination, which is increased by the Bodyguard ability.

Similarly, the value listed on the assassin ability is the patience score, which reduces the odds of any bodyguards being present at an assassination attempt. Each point of Patience reduces the chance of a bodyguard showing up by 10%. Each point of Bodyguard increases the chance of that particular bodyguard showing up by 10%.

Bodyguards do not follow their "bodyguard" tactics like they do in normal combat; they will move forward aggressively and try to kill the assassin.

In Dominions 5, Blood Slaves had the same rules as Bodyguards for showing up in Assassinations. They are units (err, people), after all, and they aren't stored in the same pouch as your gems. This may seem counterintuitive for the Assassin themselves, though.

(does it still work that way?)

A unit with the seduction trait can effectively serve as an assassin, though with some randomness added. Seducers will attempt an Assassination under one of the following circumstances:

• The target they pick has the same sex as them (i.e. Female if they are also Female)
• The target they pick is Mindless
• The target they pick is immune to being Charmed
• The DRN Seduction roll is lower than the target's defensive Morale roll

The seducer wants their Seduction roll to be higher than the target's defensive Morale roll; in that case, they charm the target. This is typically better than just killing the target. There are a few drawbacks for using seducers like assassins, though. The first is that the seduction must take place in a province adjacent to one of your own, unless the seducer is able to fly to your home territory in a single turn's worth of Map Movement. The second is that, if the Seduction/Morale rolls go through and the result is a tie, nothing happens.

There are other traits with mostly the same function, but one or two distinguishing features; Corruptor disregards sex, for example, while Dream Seduction partially ignores sex but first has to penetrate Magic Resistance.

Successful Charm or Enslave Mind during assassination results in a charmed unit attacking its current province at the regular battle phase. Still true for Dom6?