Expedition: general discussions.

Of course, there are usually other must-have stats in the game (health, for example).

Health is certainly an important parameter, and you shouldn't forget about it, but it's rarely a priority for most players. Initiative, on the other hand, will be important for every combat character, but especially for assassins. And, unlike health, it can easily compete with critical stats for a build. If a player can choose, say, between doubling their strength or doubling their initiative, they will, with a high probability, choose the latter. The actual damage from this will hardly decrease, and may even increase. One very powerful attack is almost always worse than two less powerful ones. Exceptions are only situations involving things like "Colossi." This is not to mention that additional actions give the character more flexibility in terms of behavior and will most likely help them recover faster from all sorts of stuns. With a sufficient speed stat, melee opponents can simply be kited. But surely the creator of Erephir knows this? The aforementioned assassins will be able to attack and then go invisible, making them even more overpowered than before. Especially if they still have abilities with instant kills. However, this rather suggests that these abilities, as well as the ability to become invisible during combat, should be taken away from them (and from others as well).

Added 13 minutes later

It's better to tie initiative to charisma, so there are fewer ugly characters with charisma 5...

And were there characters with beauty -5 and charisma 10?