True Sight, Cornersneaking, and Amplify

[AstralUniverse]

Confused with the movement speed difference part.

When is the corner sneaker moving slower? During stealth? That's fine they don't need to move fast if they can't be detected.

Except with a 25 lore scroll at any point?

I will also mention that many builds have access to permanent blinding speed and rogues move fast when stealthed.

This is a good point.
For very very long time (until I gave up) I was very vocal about full bab classes having access to perma-speed (like invisible blade, swashbuckler and previously all AA for very short time until it was reverted) being a questionable idea for this very specific reason. This is because someone who can corner sneak and also have high ab and max apr shouldnt also have perma-speed. When we consider sneak attacks and flat-footed targets, every apr is exponentially more valuable. Fortunately enough, there are no build options right now who get perma blinding speed, AND bonus movement from rogue, AND relevant damage output outside of that first flurry out of stealth. Those builds also have dramatically low will save to exploit and they cannot use Freedom to shrug off AoE saveless slows without breaking stealth and defeating the purpose of their corner sneaking. We're still alright in this regard imo. There are counters.

I have recently had two encounters with corner sneakers. I do not think TS scrolls would have helped at all, as soon as they see it they need only gain some distance and corner sneak again in 6 seconds, it's not hard, I can't catch them during those 6 seconds.

The other side of the coin here is that the stealther is thinking "Oof! I can never close the distance fast enough to attack this guy before they pop another TS scroll and instantly counter the entirety of my build deep investments and forcing me to just return to a corner once more".

So it's all pretty well balanced by the movement speed difference.

I still hate HiPS tho.

[and break onetwothreefourfive]

Yeah, so this sounds like an accessibility issue more than a stealth issue.

It can be both.

[Dreams]

It can also be neither!

[Deep Fried Thinking Emoji]

It's not rogues; there's a reason Weapon Masters, Vigis, Clerics, Wizards, Hemos, Arcane Archers - anything that can dip hide/ms - is taking it. When was the last time a non-corner sneaker won an Arena style pvp event? Corner sneaking is overtuned.

That sounds like the problem is that classes that are already strong without stealth can access the mechanic too easily. Nerfing cornersneaking as a whole would just be a nerf to rogues, assassins, and SDs, since they can't fuction properly without cornersneaking, but the other classes can.

Maybe slapping said CD on the stealth button if 2/3 of your levels are not in a class/classes with hide and ms as class skills could work, but it shouldn't be a global thing.

[Morgy]

It's not rogues; there's a reason Weapon Masters, Vigis, Clerics, Wizards, Hemos, Arcane Archers - anything that can dip hide/ms - is taking it. When was the last time a non-corner sneaker won an Arena style pvp event? Corner sneaking is overtuned.

That sounds like the problem is that classes that are already strong without stealth can access the mechanic too easily. Nerfing cornersneaking as a whole would just be a nerf to rogues, assassins, and SDs, since they can't fuction properly without cornersneaking, but the other classes can.

Maybe slapping said CD on the stealth button if 2/3 of your levels are not in a class/classes with hide and ms as class skills could work, but it shouldn't be a global thing.

I think that final idea is quite good, but I would hope it includes things like shadow mages/seeker paths too!

[Hazard]

It's not rogues; there's a reason Weapon Masters, Vigis, Clerics, Wizards, Hemos, Arcane Archers - anything that can dip hide/ms - is taking it. When was the last time a non-corner sneaker won an Arena style pvp event? Corner sneaking is overtuned.

That sounds like the problem is that classes that are already strong without stealth can access the mechanic too easily. Nerfing cornersneaking as a whole would just be a nerf to rogues, assassins, and SDs, since they can't fuction properly without cornersneaking, but the other classes can.

Maybe slapping said CD on the stealth button if 2/3 of your levels are not in a class/classes with hide and ms as class skills could work, but it shouldn't be a global thing.

That sounds pretty reasonable!

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

I personally think that's a solution for a problem that doesn't exist. While a weapons master with 80 stealth sounds terrifying if you have nothing toward spot, 80 is not an unbeatable number for anyone who does. The problem comes in when you have a build that passes 100 stealth or so, because now the only classes that can keep up on spot are heavy wisdom builds-meaning caster clerics, favored souls, and druids- all of whom don't really have the power to put any real pressure on the corner sneaker.

While it's true that arcane archer is the scariest stealth build right now, simply because of the expanded range they can hit you from (thus making it easier to hit the corners) with stelar accuracy and decent damage, offensive power is not really the issue at hand here. How well it goes for the corner sneaker really comes down to patience. This has been true since nwn was a baby and remains true today. The more you annoy your opponent by making them chase the mole with their fuzzy mallet, the sloppier they are going to get.

You don't have to believe me, and I know many of you won't. But if you feel you have real skill, try it out. I guarantee you will find I am right.

[Choofed]

Just want to point out that we're not all playing from the same place with the same latency and that this is an RPG, in-character roleplaying server. Playerskill should be as little (as realistically possible) the deciding factor in fights, because we aren't fighting player skill vs player skill, ideally. We're fighting character vs character.

Sadly Hazard your player skill nearly entirely defines your character. Their social skills are entirely pegged to the ability of the player to effectively be social and understand social situations. Their intelligence is entirely tied to it's players intelligence. Even in pen and paper, a wizard who is an idiot may have 40 intelligence but they're still a blazing idiot.

A player who makes more effective combat decisions in the moment for their character is going to have a more effective character in combat, the moment we add choices in any capacity, we add a skill which deprives those people who make the wrong choices. And making those wrong choices are skill issues.

The server has had a lot of development in making the gameplay look interesting, dynamic and with a lot of choices. NeverWinterNights had lots of these too when you purchased the game. I doubt you want the combat dumbed down to pre-determined outcomes from the sheet of your character before it even starts, and thus skill will always be a factor.

[Hazard]

Just want to point out that we're not all playing from the same place with the same latency and that this is an RPG, in-character roleplaying server. Playerskill should be as little (as realistically possible) the deciding factor in fights, because we aren't fighting player skill vs player skill, ideally. We're fighting character vs character.

Sadly Hazard your player skill nearly entirely defines your character. Their social skills are entirely pegged to the ability of the player to effectively be social and understand social situations. Their intelligence is entirely tied to it's players intelligence. Even in pen and paper, a wizard who is an idiot may have 40 intelligence but they're still a blazing idiot.

A player who makes more effective combat decisions in the moment for their character is going to have a more effective character in combat, the moment we add choices in any capacity, we add a skill which deprives those people who make the wrong choices. And making those wrong choices are skill issues.

The server has had a lot of development in making the gameplay look interesting, dynamic and with a lot of choices. NeverWinterNights had lots of these too when you purchased the game. I doubt you want the combat dumbed down to pre-determined outcomes from the sheet of your character before it even starts, and thus skill will always be a factor.

Yeah, I acknowledge that as true. You're right.

but ... Personally, I'm totally fine with a dicebag & 'pre-determined outcomes from the sheet of my character' being the entirety of combat for me here. I get my PvP fix elsewhere. I don't care in the slightest if I roll a 1 here and fall over. It isn't me, it's my character.

Don't worry though I'm well aware that isn't possible. I just think when it is possible, in my opinion, we should lean towards it. I understand many disagree, especially these days.

[and break onetwothreefourfive]

I personally think that's a solution for a problem that doesn't exist. While a weapons master with 80 stealth sounds terrifying if you have nothing toward spot, 80 is not an unbeatable number for anyone who does.

Full skill points plus Spot in every piece of gear, including MH and OH, is 33+22=55. You'll need 5 more from other sources just to hit 60, to roll a 20 against a hide/ms of 80. If you don't have keen senses (elf or rogue 10), it's even worse. It's easy to gear for hide/ms with the items/spell available; the amount of gear with more than +2 hide/ms far exceeds the amount of items that give more than +2 spot. There's even a wizard/sorc shirt that gives +4 hide/ms (lol?). The hide/ms potionable/wandable spells are min/ level, as opposed to their seconds/lvl counterparts. It's not easy to gear for spot, and these are the low numbers. My avariel spellsword was a dedicated spotbot due to racial bonuses, keen senses, feat and gear choices that severely limited him in comparison to what gearing/feating for hide/ms does to my current PCs.

You don't have to believe me, and I know many of you won't. But if you feel you have real skill, try it out. I guarantee you will find I am right.

Do you mean real pvp skill? Because I'd posit the opposite. Although there's very little data to support either position, and this just might all be anecdotal fallacies, what we do have are IC PvP arena results - with the winners (and even top 3) overwhelmingly being classes (no matter what they are) that use corner sneaking.

It's a problem that exists, even if it's in its own little pvp niche. A cooldown on the stealth button for classes that aren't majority hide/ms sounds amazing.

[MRFTW]

Final Verdict: Skill Issue

Nailed it.

Spotters win the detection vs stealth war. Pay your skill tax.

[DeepWebAssassin]

what we do have are IC PvP arena results

I think this is something I see people often bring up in balance discussions and it has always kind of bothered me. There's a lot of times where the entire metric for balance appears to be taken from arena fights limited to 1 small area, with the rulesets commonly imposed IC for those fights (restricted healing, allotted time for pre-buffing, the fact that you MUST secure a kill to advance, etc).

Certain tactics, builds, and playstyles that win you an arena fight might heavily underperform outside of an arena. Sure, there's overlap and data is still useful even if it's incomplete -- I just think it's worth pointing out that these arena events don't really tell the whole story and especially in a discussion about using terrain to your advantage, it's worth considering that there are certain areas where effective corner-sneaking is FAR less viable. Meanwhile, the non-stealth build generally operates pretty consistently from area to area.

[and break onetwothreefourfive]

Certain tactics, builds, and playstyles that win you an arena fight might heavily underperform outside of an arena. Sure, there's overlap and data is still useful even if it's incomplete -- I just think it's worth pointing out that these arena events don't really tell the whole story and especially in a discussion about using terrain to your advantage, it's worth considering that there are certain areas where effective corner-sneaking is FAR less viable. Meanwhile, the non-stealth build generally operates pretty consistently from area to area.

I agree! My point of contention is the non-traditional-stealth builds (see: above) that are able to also effectively use corner sneaking tactics with no trade off - with a simple bard or rogue dip (not touching vigi's built in skillet in this thread), dips that are taken anyways because of tumble/umd. Limiting stealth timers to non-majority Hide/MS classes could counterbalance it. But I would still think that unless the CD/lockout was hefty, characters would still use it; corner sneaking is just that good in many situations.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

Confused me.

We are on the same side here. Corner stealthing is broken, and all these people saying it isn't will be saying it is by the end of the summer, and pretending they never said it wasn't. Their group think just hasn't caught up yet.

But the threshold for where it starts to break is 100 stealth. That doesn't mean it can't be good at 80, or even less, depending on who you are fighting. But my capacity to match your stealth step for step with spot against everything except the classes that get extra bonuses to stealth that no one else can get (rogues, and the new rogue adjecent prcs) is there save for the one big difference maker-

Every stealth character wants max dex. No one that can kill a stealth character effectively wants anywhere near close to max wisdom. So if my 8 base wisdom character gets it up to 20 with gear and potions, it has to compete with the stealthie's 40 (or 42, or even 44 on some subraces) dexterity. Thats a plus ten + difference, thus making a roll check always land in the stealthie's favor.

And that doesn't even begin to break down the truth that maxing stealth has other benefits in game than pvp. Maxing spot really doesn't (I would consider breaking disguises pvp even if it's not bash you pvp). And that's why you have good experiences with just 80 stealth, and probably will continue too.

My point about skill was that it takes practice to weave in and out of the fight and taking advantage of the corners, because you have to be aware primarily of when your opponents can see you. But you can do it with just about any build, it doesn't even have to be a premium pvp build, if you max out stealth. Rogue with a gonne will work just as much as a weaponsmaster out of stealth as long as you are willing to be patient and let their frustration take over. It's just going to take a lot longer.

[Hazard]

For characters that devote 'everything possible' to stealth, it can be pretty crappy to be countered by what often feels like a lesser investment, when not corner-sneaking. When just trying to go around and spy on people and stuff.

It'd be nice if whatever solution was found to the corner-sneaking problem, if it didn't make it even more difficult for stealth RP outside of corner-sneaking.

Maybe making faerie fire affect ones ability to stealth (penalty hide/ms)?
Those rods are pretty common and everyone can use them, plus it can be put into wands/scrolls iirc.

I don't know it's 5am I had an idea. Might be dumb.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

For characters that devote 'everything possible' to stealth, it can be pretty crappy to be countered by what often feels like a lesser investment, when not corner-sneaking. When just trying to go around and spy on people and stuff.

And therein lies the dilemma. You lower stealth too much, and every bard is spotting you because they can hit the +50 cap with ease. It's definitely a lot easier to get to the +50 cap on detect skills then it is the stealth skills thanks to clairvoyance/amplify/true sites +15 to spot/listen for rounds per level, which forces the stealther to go all in on stealth so they can make sure they can still outpace +50 with hard bonuses.

I think ultimately a 2 or 3 round cooldown on stealth will end up being the answer. This way, when you do catch them on a corner, they can't just run to the next corner and refresh it, you have some time to get them without completely neutering what they do. But I also think people need to see it for themselves, because this has mostly been a non-issue for years now unless you happened to run into someone using it right. And those people have been few and far between.

I personally think Arcane Archer is going to change that, because it's a lot easier to corner when you can pose a threat from a distance, and the only reason it hasn't already is because it wasn't that long ago that kiting was nerfed. Kiting was even better than corner stealthing, and when it was nerfed everyone just sort of gave up on arcane archer. But it's going to make a comeback this summer for certain, and I feel pretty confident in saying corner stealthing is going to play a big role in that.

In other words, Bruno's recommendation is to let this simmer for a bit and bring it back up when everyone is on the same page. I'll likely be knee deep in Madden at that point, so it won't be me bringing it back up.

[Anomandaris]

I got killed by someone corner sneaking a few weeks ago. Not much I could have done about it. But you know what I definitely could have done? I could have left. I could have relocated to an open area. They probably would not have followed if they were smart, because the terrain would have shifted against them, and I would have had the upper hand again.... see the point?

I decided to keep chasing them and died for it. That doesn't mean corner hiding is OP. It means it's dangerous, I should respect it, and didn't.

I also have a high investment stealth char (24Rogue/6Fighter) and use corner sneaking often. It's absolutely extremely powerful, but has its limits (CORNERS).

Please don't nerf this because it's spooky and hard to deal with. I'm so tired of nerfing everything we don't like. It's not like most can even often one round you (with a few exceptions - and these str builds suffer to hit higher stealth #'s). I wouldn't be surprised to hear people arguing for getting rid of stealth entirely tbh.

It's usually battle of attrition we were just not smart enough to leave.

[Inf]

There's a lot of times where the entire metric for balance appears to be taken from arena fights limited to 1 small area, with the rulesets commonly imposed IC for those fights (restricted healing, allotted time for pre-buffing, the fact that you MUST secure a kill to advance, etc).

It's an imperfect measurement but it's the closest thing to a controlled "fair" fight. Most battles that happen outside of the arenas are so skewed before they even start that they're not worth mentioning.

That said, the only place corner sneaking isn't viable is entirely open areas - which there aren't many of, because that's boring. Most areas have the opportunity to sneak (and you always have the choice of avoiding an area you can't utilize it in).

Final Verdict: Skill Issue

If you're a DEX based character that needs stealth to win a battle I think this is a fair take. So the defensiveness and tone about it being changed is somewhat justified.

I agree with other posters that the real problem is powerful builds that could exist without corner sneaking but with it dominate characters that don't have a strong counter. That being - a very high Spot/Listen or ESF: Divination for more effective True Seeing.

[and break onetwothreefourfive]

I also have a high investment stealth char (24Rogue/6Fighter) and use corner sneaking often. It's absolutely extremely powerful, but has its limits (CORNERS).

The proposed nerf to corner sneaking that others have suggested wouldn't affect a 24rogue/6 fighter. It would affect those with builds who have less hide/ms Classes than non hide/ms Classes. Rogues have it tough enough as is, and this might give them an inadvertent pvp buff/niche - because right now, rogues are the least scary corner sneakers out there.

[hi chat]

Fully agreed with the post. Cornersneaking is a fun mechanic to use - but it's absolutely horrific to fight against, especially if you're not a ESF div caster. I don't want to see it go away, but using TS scrolls to fight sneakers is terribly expensive and terribly janky because of the long as hell animations.

There's a reason everyone these days is dipping hide/ms.

[Itikar]

I make the small mention of the fact that there have also been nerfs to detection that were unwarranted. The thought goes to the Sentinel Song that was made useless for buffing Listen of the bard himself.

Bards used often to be a way to detect sneakers that were not fully maxed out. Now they can still get the meager bonus from Selfish Solo, but that song in a group context is almost always meaningless unless there is another bard available. I never understood what was the purpose of nerfing bard detection when it was one of their well established roles since vanilla.

[AstralUniverse]

Divination foci is nice but the true power of the True Sight scroll is that detects, even if it was for a second, which is already enough to keep the stealther in your sight until they corner-sneak again. Divination Foci creates more kill pressure because it opens up the option to chase the stealther past the terrain (and of course, seeing people in Sanctuary for a bit longer but that's unrelated) but the counter to corner sneaking itself is already within the first instant of the true sight activation.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

If i see a scroll animation, I am going to head to the next corner and mentally count out six seconds before hitting it. The best part of a true seeing scroll is the +15 to spot for 9 rounds, but that only matters if I am built for spot.

[-XXX-]

Problem with stealth is that a deep hide/ms investment has a wide range of uses both in PvP and PvE, whereas a deep spot/listen investment has a singular use that often verges on meme.

Another issue are the actual skill values - while people often bemoan the mandatory competitive thresholds for skills like discipline or sail, even the ballpark of 80 spot might not be good enough to counter some deep stealth builds.

[msterswrdsmn]

I'm genuinely curious how many people are running around with 100 hide/ms? I've played a few stealthers and I don't think i've broken the 100 mark. 33 base stats+15 from 40 dex+15 from skill focuses gets a base total of 63. With a guesstimate bonus of 20 bonuses from items and spells (spells count towards the soft cap, yes? no? I don't remember), this only gets you around 83? Its possible to crank this higher, but we're getting into the territory of diminishing returns from here.

I wouldn't factor bards into this either, on either side. I can't say i've seen many bards recently, and the ones that did typically neither focused heavily in stealth (bards suffer skillpoint and feat shortages, and 2-3 feats and 66 skillpoints is a lot to ask for) or constantly had amplify with maxed listen/clairvoiyance up. I've had bards pop amplify once they got an idea they were being followed by something in stealth, but its not something i've either used or seen others use 24/7

I think you need to be near a bard now to benefit from their songs, so I can't just ask to be buffed with a song then run off 5 areas away either.