Veteran players of the Assassin's Creed series will remember how easy it was to take down enemies with the hidden blade in the pre-origins era. The formula later changed to a more level-based system where players had to level up to assassinate higher-level targets. Thankfully, Assassin's Creed Shadows allows players to enable guaranteed one-hit assassinations, so they can also easily take down enemies in one swoop, regardless of their level.
Assassin's Creed Shadows: How To Increase & Refill Scouts
Scouts are important when it comes to finding out the next quest objective in Assassin's Creed Shadows, here's how to increase & refill them.
How to Turn on Guaranteed One-Hit Assassinations in AC Shadows
Players can turn on the Guaranteed Assassinations option in two ways in Assassin's Creed Shadows. The first chance to turn it on is while starting a new game. You'll be tweaking various settings before starting the game, including the difficulty tuning options that include Guaranteed one-hit Assassinations.
However, AC Shadows allows players to turn Guaranteed Assassinations on at any point in gameplay. First, you need to make sure you aren't engaged in an encounter with any enemies. Secondly, make sure to exit any hostile zones like enemy camps, or castles.
Once you're in the clear, simply head into settings, switch over to the Gameplay tab, and enter Difficulty Tuning settings. Inside the Difficulty Turning menu, turn on the Guaranteed Assassinations option. Now, the game may reload for you, but you won't lose any unsaved progress due to auto-save. Once the game loads back, you'll be able to assassinate almost all enemies regardless of their in-game level.
If you're planning on playing Assassin's Creed Shadows with Guaranteed Assassinations, you should Reset Masteries for Naoe's Assassin skill tree. You won't need to invest points in skills like Assassination Damage.
Should You Turn on Guaranteed One-Hit Assassinations?
Now the big question arises: Should you even turn on Guaranteed Assassinations, which can easily one-hit enemies in AC Shadows? The answer isn't simple, but here's a quick explanation.
Turning on Guaranteed Assassinations will remove the aspect of working your way to earning mastery points in AC Shadows and investing in Assassination damage (the grind, basically). Now, this could be great for some, but too simple for others.
So, the decision really falls on the player if they want the game to feel like older Assassin's Creed entries or want the assassination mechanic to work as the developers intended for Shadows.
On a quick side note, several armored/heavy enemies may still block your assassination attempts. This can make one-hit Guaranteed Assassinations a bit pointless in those situations.
Assassin's Creed Shadows
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OpenCritic Reviews
- Top Critic Avg: 81 /100 Critics Rec: 82%
- Released
- March 20, 2025
- ESRB
- Mature 17+ // Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Language
- Developer(s)
- Ubisoft Quebec
- Publisher(s)
- Ubisoft
WHERE TO PLAY
- Engine
- AnvilNext
- Franchise
- Assassin's Creed
- Number of Players
- 1
- Steam Deck Compatibility
- Unknown
- PC Release Date
- March 20, 2025
- Xbox Series X|S Release Date
- March 20, 2025
- PS5 Release Date
- March 20, 2025
- Platform(s)
- PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X, Xbox Series S, PC
- X|S Optimized
- Yes
