True Sight, Cornersneaking, and Amplify

[and break onetwothreefourfive]

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?

Soft skill cap bonus is +50. For gear, you can run +2 in 5 slots, 2x Rings of Hiding, Elven boots and a +3/+4 chest depending on which one you want. That's 26 from gear. Gift of Sneak is +4. Camouflage and One With The Land is +14, at 10min/lvl from wands or pots that are incredibly cheap (like 2000 gold for a 50 cast wand of either) = +44.

63+44 = 107 for a dex based sneaker.

If you're a str based weapon master or cleric/wiz/whatever, that will drop down to around 95ish. Without SF and a few pieces of gear, you're still in the 80s which is more than enough against anyone without 65+spot and keen senses.

I want to reiterate my point that I am not against stealthers being able to hide with investment; I am against the ease of access/utility for hide/ms dipped classes to abuse the Corner Sneak mechanic.

[magistrasa]

If you're not hitting 100+ you're not in stealth.

You gotta remember, there are more variables than just what's on your character sheet. Time of day, movement, indoors vs outdoors, nearby light sources, all invisibly affect your stealth and detection abilities.

And there's something else that comes with the need to hit high Hide/MS numbers: Your stealth gear is usually a completely different set of equipment than your combat gear. Sure, you might reuse a couple of the same crafted pieces depending on your build, but if your stealther also needs Discipline, Spellcraft, Lore, Intimidate, Spot, Unisaves, STR, DEX, and CON to perform reliably in combat, you're always going to want to prioritize the stuff that keeps you alive and helps you fight good. Which means you're not going to be at the top of your stealth capabilities at all times. Stealth has niche usefulness that you can generally prepare for ahead of time, so the gear you're walking around in might not have anything helping your stealth skills at all, leaving you at a standing _60-70 Hide/MS. Anyone with 33 points in Spot can pop a couple items and make your stealth tactics pretty much impossible to rely on.

Taking ESF:Hide/MS means I couldn't take ESF:Disc. Sinking 66 skill points in stealth means I couldn't invest into Lore. Focusing my ability points into DEX means I don't do a lot of damage. Gearing for stealth means I'm losing out on saves. Every choice comes at a fair and equal cost. Stealth takes patience, practice, and tactical application to get any actual use out of. I don't think it's unfair to expect that countering stealth tactics should require the same.

Ok I'm not posting in this thread anymore this time for real don't @ me I'm not responding.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

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?

Soft skill cap bonus is +50. For gear, you can run +2 in 5 slots, 2x Rings of Hiding, Elven boots and a +3/+4 chest depending on which one you want. That's 26 from gear. Gift of Sneak is +4. Camouflage and One With The Land is +14, at 10min/lvl from wands or pots that are incredibly cheap (like 2000 gold for a 50 cast wand of either) = +44.

63+44 = 107 for a dex based sneaker.

If you're a str based weapon master or cleric/wiz/whatever, that will drop down to around 95ish. Without SF and a few pieces of gear, you're still in the 80s which is more than enough against anyone without 65+spot and keen senses.

I want to reiterate my point that I am not against stealthers being able to hide with investment; I am against the ease of access/utility for hide/ms dipped classes to abuse the Corner Sneak mechanic.

You guys missed a few bonuses here and there, and spot is a lot easier to hit the +50 cap than stealth is. I'm fairly certain the only ones who can get there on the stealth side are rogues, or rogue adjacent classes that can get the bonuses they give from grenades/feats.

As far as I can tell, there are three major issues that probably need to be addressed.

1) Spot seems like a wasted skill to many because almost every other skill has a qol boost, and spot does not.

2) the only build that i can come up with that can go toe to toe maxed spot vs max stealth while still being able to put pressure on the stealther is a zen archer, in particular with heavy AA investment. And they probably can't go heavy stealth at the same time, meaning they are gimping themselves to get there. You could make the case for battle clerics and the like having high enough wisdom to be relevant against a truly dedicated stealther, but remember equal numbers means 50/50 you spot them. even 5 points less can turn that into 25/75.

3) powerful classes dipping for stealth. I called this a nothing burger earlier in the thread, but i have been convinced otherwise primarily because of 1. And it does seem silly that an otherwise powerful build has access to the most broken mechanic in the game.

Three things that can be done until if/when something changes.

1) Run away. Someone said this earlier in the thread, and frankly its good advice. I would wait to see how they work the corners, because again it's a skill thing and if they are bad at it they can easily be got, but once it's obvious that that fight isn't going to end one way or another for an hour, even if you win you lost. Thats a lot of wasted time chasing the mole about.

2) If you have a functional level of spot, and you happen to get the roll you need to spot, pretend like you don't see them until they get close.

3) Build a time machine and take us back to a point where nwn was not about pvp, at least on rp servers, pvp was just a small part of the game. Let me know if you figure out how to do this, because I want in.

[Flower Power]

but remember equal numbers means 50/50 you spot them. even 5 points less can turn that into 25/75.

Equal numbers means you spot them 50/50 of the time if you are:

1) An Elf, or
2) Have a substantial number of Rogue levels, or
3) Are willing to chain yourself to Walking Speed, making it more difficult for you to chase them or remain mobile to respond to any other threats around you.

Otherwise you're rolling 1d10 + 1/2 Spot vs. 1d20 + Full Stealth - and there are a variety of other nasty debuffs that can be applied to you ontop of that (like suffering an effective additional -10 Spot if you're being attacked by another individual, or the sneak receiving a scaling bonus from distance if you opted to not pursue them.)

The numbers only look like it's an equitable match up on paper - in practice, Stealth massively favors the sneak outside of True Sight spam/dealing with elves or a few niche builds, and every point of Stealth functionally has double the value of every point of Spot/Listen unless you're willing to effectively hand up the initiative to the Sneak in order to go into Detect Mode (which just gives them an advantage in a different way.)

The only real solution to the dilemma is to get rid of the weird NWN-ism of the 1/2 skill debuff of passive detection and effectively give everyone Keen Senses, but every time it has been suggested in the past it has immediately been met with a massive outpouring of 'Ach waily waily waily!' and rejected out of hand by the Devs with zero real discussion.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

Two things.

1) Elves are the master race and therefore need to be the best at everything.

2) While I get where you are coming from, there is plenty of noise from players on these forums that want to tell you how bad your idea is and how much you suck because you don't fit into their vision of how and outsider to the OG arelith clique should speak to their royal majesties, none of their opinions matter either.

And not once have I ever, as an opinionated person that has taken my share fare of beatings, felt like anyone part of the team on Arelith (dev, dm, admin) just wanted me to shut up about my opinions. Some of my choice in words? Sure. Apparently calling a moron a moron is a bad thing these days, even if they just took it that way rather than you outright saying it. And sure, there is probably a mod or two (ok just one) that is way too opinionated themselves to be in a position that dictates what's an acceptable tone for a conversation.

But none of that equates to being silenced, and frankly those that are part of the actual team and not just gold star players have never treated me with anything but respect, even if they don't like my ideas. And those gold star players that do? They mean nothing to me. I just imagine cartman doing a jig while yelling "Respect my authoriti!" and I'm right back to my cheery disposition.

You should really think about what I wrote here and apply it to yourself in some fashion that fits, because this game is not worth getting mad over.

Also, good call on the variations in combat to stealth, I actually forgot about some of them.

[Android Sufferer]

Quick and dirty detect advice.

Being small, or tiny, is a better buff to detect than keen senses. (+4 / +8)

Staying still for 0.2 seconds, or tapping detect mode on and off will do the same thing as keen senses. This is easy to perform as you're faster than a stealther and should be able to do this safely most of the time.

In fact, because of detect modifiers you absolutely want to be out of combat and standing still even if you have keen senses, because you aren't going to detect anything if you aren't, unless your opposition has an atrocious stealth score. In this situation, you don't need keen senses!

Elves are far from the best at detect.

That aside, I do believe a buff to true seeing to a 2 rounds base would be a healthy improvement to counter corner sneaking for the relatively uninvested.

[msterswrdsmn]

Thank you and break onetwothreefourfive. I had a hard time remembering what the exact cap is.

Small caveat I haven't seen mentioned yet; a lot of the more "crowded" areas of the server have a hidden hide/ms penalty. Cordor had this, though i'm not sure if the new version of it still has it. The penalty was something harsh, like -20 or -30 if I recall.

Theres also the fact spot/listen checks get additional bonus/penalties depending on whats going on:

Additional modifiers
Spot
+10 DC if the spotter is in combat.
+5 DC if the target is standing still.
-5 DC if the spotter is standing still.
Size modifiers (tiny: +8, small: +4, medium: 0, large: -4, huge: -8).
Area spot check modifiers.
+5 DC for stealthed players (only), if they are in the back arc.
+5 DC at night if the spotter does not have a light (or darkvision).
-10 DC at night if the target has a light source on them.

Listen
+10 DC if the listener is in combat.
+5 DC if the target is standing still.
-5 DC if the listener is standing still.
+1 DC for every 3 meters between listener and target.
Size modifiers (tiny: +8, small: +4, medium: 0, large: -4, huge: -8).
+5 DC for every 40cm of object (including creatures) between listener and target in outdoor areas.
+2 DC in indoor areas if the line of sight is blocked and the target is within 4 tiles.
Area listen check modifiers.

Objectively, these are skewed against the person trying to detect someone.

[Kalthariam]

I'm confused, why do people say people stealthing are slow? I've seen people whom are stealthing move faster than base running speed.

I've traveled with a rogue and unless I had haste and they didn't, they were faster than I was while stealthing.

[Achsah]

one thing to keep in mind is to engage only on your terms if possible and fight the sneaker where it he cant easily turn a corner. arelith is a dexer friendly place in my guestimation . to friendly in fact. but thats just my opinion based on the many finesse weapons available that hit way harder then the traditional vanilla rules. As far as amplify goes I'm happy to know it works well with listen.