Listen Seems To Get Inordinately High With Bards

[TurningLeaf]

Does Listen still work on someone who has Silence on?

[AstralUniverse]

Does Listen still work on someone who has Silence on?

Yeah but it's a short spell and you need to *exit stealth* to cast spells or use items, as was already mentioned. So it's situational in the same sense that True Seeing spell is situational.

[Ork]

Another thing to note is that even with silence activated, players can see the AoE effect even if they can't see you.

[Party in the forest at midnight]

I would love to see the silence spell improved to actually be useful.

[Scurvy Cur]

I like the idea of reverting amplify back to rounds/level. It was changed when bat totems lost their true sight as some sort of concession, but it should be an ability that bards activate to support their listen when they're in need of it, not an ability that is always online.

It was actually buffed when we took true seeing out back and shot it, and was made minutes/level so that it could be useful to non-bard classes (who suddenly found themselves needing a way to deal with minutes/level stealth buffs).

[Curve]

I would love it if all skill buffing spells and special abilities were gone and all we had was hard ranks, feats and gear.

[Aelryn Bloodmoon]

I would love it if all skill buffing spells and special abilities were gone and all we had was hard ranks, feats and gear.

I've been on servers where this is the case, and it makes stealth a very binary thing person to person. I get where you're coming from, but in a world where a person can turn themselves into a dragon (or anything other than a person, really), I don't really have that much issue with magic also being able to make a person sneakier or more perceptive - if anything, I might be on board with making the bonuses equal across the board.

As an example, amplify and camouflage are both first level spells. Camo provides +10 hide and amplify provides +20 listen, with both (on Arelith) working at turns/level (in vanilla amplify is rounds/lvl).

Clairaudience/clairvoyance is +10 to spot/listen as a third level spell for rounds/level. This doesn't really have a reciprocal.

In my perfect world, you'd have a skill boost spell (insert lore-appropriate name here) at levels 1, 3, 5, and 7, with scaling boosts. Whether they stack or not would be something to be determined overall, but the idea being that you can get about +30(max) in skill boosts, total, to hide, move silently, spot, and listen, equally across the board, all with the same duration (whether that's turns or rounds/lvl is something people better at that than me can decide.)

This leaves a further +20, occupying item requirements of 10 out of 11 item slots with +2 to the skills you're enhancing for the full +50.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

I don't see an issue with reverting amplify to rounds per level to make it so bards are not permanant spotters, but a lot of this thread completely ignores how good stealth is on certain builds and how it can be used to great effect in pvp. All you need is something to break los and you just reset the fight because most builds can't see you. And sure, they can use a true seeing scroll, but thats a whole round gone and it only lasts six seconds, plenty of time for you to find a new los breaker and do it again. Rinse repeat until they are out of ts scrolls.

Here's the thing that seems to be missed left and right in both threads regarding bards .... Yeah, they now have options for builds galore, perhaps more then any other class. But you still have to make choices. They are not better skill monkey's then rogues, rogues have too many skill points for that ever to be true. Rogues have more feats. Rogues have grenades (which admittedly could use a gander, since the best of them are often counter productive in group pvp), rogues have sneak attack. Bards still need to remove traps over 40 dc because they don't have rogue levels...

Now heading back to the op, I'm sorry but 88 stealth is not some premier stealther that should be able to sneak past everyone. Assuming a 40 dex build (you really should have 42 for a fighter rogue, but you can get by on 40) + the original 33 points + stealthy +the skill focuses you are at 63 stealth before the soft cap even starts. max out said soft cap, and you are 113 and 113. I promise you that even if that bard wasted two feats for the skill focuses and geared to max wisdom they are at best hitting 103-ish spot, since their base wisdom is not going to be higher then 10 and even that is unlikely. That means your max build vs their max build is a 50/50 for you to be spotted, since they roll a die 20. That sounds about right for two builds that maxed out for their respective skills to me. If you really want to be scared of a spotter build, hate the caster clerics or druids who build for it, not a generally 8 base wisdom build

[Curve]

I've been on servers where this is the case, and it makes stealth a very binary thing person to person. I get where you're coming from, but in a world where a person can turn themselves into a dragon (or anything other than a person, really), I don't really have that much issue with magic also being able to make a person sneakier or more perceptive - if anything, I might be on board with making the bonuses equal across the board.

I don’t care about the source of the temporary boosts being magic or mundane just that they exist and complicate a mechanic that does not need to be that complicated.

I do agree that the buffs to detection and stealth should be equal.

[Hazard]

you really should have 42 for a fighter rogue

*Cries in human.*

[La Villa Strangiato]

stuff or whatever

Come on. Stealth is not astronomically good. It's good, but people seem to think all stealth builds are some GANK MACHINE where you deal 28384723847733747 damage on a sneak attack and you're immediately and eternally unseeable as soon as you round the corner, as if everyone who has ever played a shadowdancer was in the top percentile of PvPers on the server.

In reality my build does like 100 damage on a sneak attack. Slightly less, even. Grenades aren't always situationally appropriate (lol friendly fire) unless it's a fight against a couple vampires or palemasters. It's by no means a bad build, even with the GARBAGE AND TERRIBLE 88 move silently and 95 hide, as you have so graciously pointed out (because it's not a human, i don't take ESF hide/ms), but rogue is ultimately a class that sneaks solo and fights in a group, scoring sneak attacks on mages and other dexoids.

People seem to think I am some sort of advocate of NEVER EVER BEING SPOTTED, I WANT MY CLASS TO BE DA BEST 5EVER. No, I just think a class that can have thirty minutes of what is basically true sight that can spot quite literally every stealth class on the server is kind of excessive. "B-b-but you're just being countered" okay and true sight is a counter but as was said, it's a scroll that takes a second and it's not something everyone necessarily has access to. The crux of my argument is that they don't need to have a listen score that's that high for that long.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

stuff or whatever

Come on. Stealth is not astronomically good. People seem to think all stealth builds are some GANK MACHINE where you deal 28384723847733747 damage on a sneak attack and you're immediately and eternally unseeable as soon as you round the corner, as if everyone who has ever played a shadowdancer was in the top percentile of PvPers on the server.

In reality my build does like 100 damage on a sneak attack. Slightly less, even. Grenades aren't always situationally appropriate (lol friendly fire) unless it's a fight against a couple vampires or palemasters. It's by no means a bad build, even with the GARBAGE AND TERRIBLE 88 move silently and 95 hide, as you have so graciously with your massive brain (because it's not a human, i don't take ESF hide/ms), but rogue is ultimately a class that sneaks solo and fights in a group, scoring sneak attacks on mages and other dexoids.

People seem to think I am some sort of advocate of NEVER EVER BEING SPOTTED, I WANT MY CLASS TO BE DA BEST 5EVER. No, I just think a class that can have thirty minutes of what is basically true sight that can spot quite literally every stealth class on the server is kind of excessive. "B-b-but you're just being countered" okay and true sight is a counter but as was said, it's a scroll that takes a second and it's not something everyone necessarily has access to. The crux of my argument is that they don't need to have a listen score that's that high for that long.

1) My point about stealth was not that you could come out of sneak attack and insta kill people, but rather that you can extend the fight indefinitely. And as long as you want to win bad enough to do that, people will get bored and get sloppy after 45 minutes of chasing the gofer about. I know, I have seen it first hand, and while in this situation they abused transitions as well they could have easily done what they did without the transitions. And i was a 33 ranks and another 20 from gear spot guy. Your 95-88 is more then enough to do that to 95% of the builds on the server, primarily because unlike other skills spot is only good for two things; catching disguisers and catching you. I think at this point its literally the only skill that gives 0 benefit to pve content, making it a wildly unpopular choice to build for.

2) I agree and mentioned in my post that grenades need an upgrade/lateral shift, because they are awful in a group.

3) I didn't mean to imply your stealth was not good enough, its probably fine for what you want to do. Sorry that you read it that way. You just can't expect to be able to get by every person that's trying to spot you with those numbers. And if a bard puts 33 ranks in listen, ten into gear, and another 40 from the song and amplify i think they qualify as someone who is actively trying to spot you. And the numbers would be right too based on that comparison if your ms wasn't dragging 7 points behind your hide, which may be an issue with not enough ways to boost ms to combat listen. Neither have invested heavily into feats, and it would be about 50/50 if your ms was as high as your hide. But its not a bard problem, since any class can get the soft +50 to the detect skills be it through light gear, bard song and a detect spell or a bit more gear and a few detect spells. Amplify is not some scroll that is hard to use after all, nor is clairvoyance. TS takes a bit of dedication, but that gives long lasting bonuses to spot and listen as well. And all of this is before you take into account terrain negatives/bonuses, which others have mentioned are quite heavy in certain areas.

4) Despite all the doom and gloom above for stealthers prospects, against most classes including bards you have a 10-11 point head start. Your skill boosting stat is the same stat you want for everything else you do, from ab to ac. That's not true of anyone going detect skills save for clerics/druids/shamans, with rangers and paladins being slightly better then the rest of the sufferers.

5) If all you wanted to do was get amplify reverted back to rounds per level, you probably could have just said "bards can hit the +50 soft cap with two pieces of +5 gear, amplify and bard song going and stay that way for a long time thanks to the duration of songs and amplify now being turns per level" and you would have gotten a half a page worth of responses of people saying that sounds like something that needs to be fixed, myself included. But the moment you started comparing numbers you opened up the door for the number crunchers to get involved.

6) I hope this chapter of "stuff or whatever" helped you see that the last chapter wasn't intended to be a personal attack to your build choice, but rather that in your initial post it sounded like you expected your numbers to make you super stealth guy when in reality based on the numbers you are at best a middling stealther. And there is nothing wrong with that, a middling stealther is good enough for the vast majority of the player base, especially with spot not having alternate uses like every other skill does.

[La Villa Strangiato]

snip snop

1. Well that does objectively suck. Have you encountered a lot of prolonging fights, or was it just this one thing? I haven't seen many "prolonged annoying fights" that weren't in an arena so I'd like your perspective. And abusing transition is, well, a reportable thing, which I presume you already reported.

2. Yeah I'm glad we agree. Rogue consumables are kinda mid.

3-4. Sorry, I must have sounded genuinely upset when I just exaggerate a lot of things for comedic effect/I don't take myself too seriously on the forums, or anywhere in public. I would also say that once the bard hype dies down, this will probably be less of an issue.

5. Yeah I listened to what the first three people had to say about the whole thing and then decided in my second post, which is about partway down the first page, "I guess amplify should probably just be reverted". I feel like even if I hadn't used numbers people would have come in and used numbers anyway.

6. I wouldn't really consider those numbers middling, probably like "not optimal for a stealther but pretty good", with middling more like 60/70 scores but it doesn't really matter. I'm sorry if I bothered you by snipping your reply by putting "stuff or whatever" in there, like I said I'm not taking this too seriously.

[Babylon System is the Vampire]

snip snop

I'm sorry if I bothered you by snipping your reply by putting "stuff or whatever" in there, like I said I'm not taking this too seriously.

We're all good. The only time I get annoyed on these forums is when people take something I said out of context and try to attribute it to some hidden motivation that really isn't what I am about. I just found the "stuff or whatever" amusing so I added it to my response

[Hazard]

stuff or whatever

Come on. Stealth is not astronomically good. It's good, but people seem to think all stealth builds are some GANK MACHINE where you deal 28384723847733747 damage on a sneak attack and you're immediately and eternally unseeable as soon as you round the corner, as if everyone who has ever played a shadowdancer was in the top percentile of PvPers on the server.

In reality my build does like 100 damage on a sneak attack. Slightly less, even. Grenades aren't always situationally appropriate (lol friendly fire) unless it's a fight against a couple vampires or palemasters. It's by no means a bad build, even with the GARBAGE AND TERRIBLE 88 move silently and 95 hide, as you have so graciously pointed out (because it's not a human, i don't take ESF hide/ms), but rogue is ultimately a class that sneaks solo and fights in a group, scoring sneak attacks on mages and other dexoids.

People seem to think I am some sort of advocate of NEVER EVER BEING SPOTTED, I WANT MY CLASS TO BE DA BEST 5EVER. No, I just think a class that can have thirty minutes of what is basically true sight that can spot quite literally every stealth class on the server is kind of excessive. "B-b-but you're just being countered" okay and true sight is a counter but as was said, it's a scroll that takes a second and it's not something everyone necessarily has access to. The crux of my argument is that they don't need to have a listen score that's that high for that long.

Too lazy to type out my own thoughts so I just quote other people who said it far better, for me.
Cheers.

[Hazard]

It's been some months and bards godly skills still haven't been reigned in. Just wondering what's up? Is there any sort of balance thing in the pipeline or being considered? Genuinely curious if the team thinks it should stay as it is.

[Yvesza]

The only way to deal with a bard is with another bard, maybe they shouldn't be getting the full benefit of their own songs? I don't know but I've absolutely accepted that every bard is going to be able to detect everyone trying to stealth that isn't also a bard.

[AstralUniverse]

It's been some months and bards godly skills still haven't been reigned in. Just wondering what's up? Is there any sort of balance thing in the pipeline or being considered? Genuinely curious if the team thinks it should stay as it is.

Bard took a nerf to song's ac (and curse song's ac), and besides that some other nerfs were added but soon reverted after. It's a mystery.

As a bard player, I think the individual songs skill bonuses are out of control. They are situational and dont all work together but when you also dont often need them all at once so you have the huge boosts for when you need them and those bonuses are insane. I wouldnt complain if suddenly all skill bonuses (penalties from curses) in total were shaved off by 30% value for all levels more or less.

[Hazard]

The only way to deal with a bard is with another bard, maybe they shouldn't be getting the full benefit of their own songs? I don't know but I've absolutely accepted that every bard is going to be able to detect everyone trying to stealth that isn't also a bard.

Not getting the full benefit of your own song seems fair. Solves solo QBing issues. Solves OP skill issues. Solves perma-truesight(more or less) issues. How does a song make you better a listening anyway, or for that matter better at being quiet? Better than SILENCE? Alright, I know it's magic, but damn.

[Yvesza]

It'd do a lot for bringing bards down to more reasonable levels, as it stands bards don't even really need to invest into a lot into skills to be good at them, no need for SF's & ESF's as they can effectively do *everything* because their innate song bonuses and high skill ranks per level allow them to be not just a jack of all trades but the master of them too.

[Flower Power]

I would love it if all skill buffing spells and special abilities were gone and all we had was hard ranks, feats and gear.

I've been on servers where this is the case, and it makes stealth a very binary thing person to person. I get where you're coming from, but in a world where a person can turn themselves into a dragon (or anything other than a person, really), I don't really have that much issue with magic also being able to make a person sneakier or more perceptive - if anything, I might be on board with making the bonuses equal across the board.

As an example, amplify and camouflage are both first level spells. Camo provides +10 hide and amplify provides +20 listen, with both (on Arelith) working at turns/level (in vanilla amplify is rounds/lvl).

Clairaudience/clairvoyance is +10 to spot/listen as a third level spell for rounds/level. This doesn't really have a reciprocal.

In my perfect world, you'd have a skill boost spell (insert lore-appropriate name here) at levels 1, 3, 5, and 7, with scaling boosts. Whether they stack or not would be something to be determined overall, but the idea being that you can get about +30(max) in skill boosts, total, to hide, move silently, spot, and listen, equally across the board, all with the same duration (whether that's turns or rounds/lvl is something people better at that than me can decide.)

This leaves a further +20, occupying item requirements of 10 out of 11 item slots with +2 to the skills you're enhancing for the full +50.

Detection bonuses from spells are higher because it's easier to sneak than it is to detect; outside of Detection Mode (i.e., moving at a snail's pace unless you're an elf vs. stealthers who have movement speed buffs in the form of situational out-of-combat movement speed buffs from Rangers, movement-speed-in-stealth buffs for Rogues, or easy access to instant action Haste for most DEX builds/long lasting haste buffs for casters) people attempting detection roll 1d10 + 1/2 Skill vs. 1d20 + Full Skill for stealthers.

On top of that, there are a lot more situational maluses for Detection than their are for stealth. With the exception of popping out a True Sight, stealth was already substantially easier than detection even in the base game - and Arelith has only skewed things further in favor of sneaks.

[Yvesza]

I don't think any of this really excuses the benefits bards get from their own songs because it's really just leaning towards bards being the best at every possible type of skill that exists, even without much stat or feat investment into them.
Want to be the best at...
Sneaking? Bard.
Solo QB? Bard.
Listening? Bard.
The list really does go on and on but I'll leave it at those three.

I'm really convinced lowering the benefit bards get from their own song is the way forward, they'll remain exceptionally powerful but it'll remove the unhealthy aspects of bard and allow other classes to fill in their own niches without being overshadowed.

[ElvenEdibles]

Cordor and the Arcane Tower also have a large invisible hide/ms debuff as well. It's in between -10 and -20 points. It would be very nice if these debuffs were visible so people knew it was happening. I saw no mention of this ever being fixed, so I imagine the debuff is still there. I have no idea how many other zones have it, I only know for sure it's in Cordor and the Arcane Tower.

I think a hide and listen debuff + a spot (not for disguise piercing purposes) and move silently buff would make far more logical sense