DDOGamer: Sneaking In Plain Sight – Why Stealth is Broken as a DDO Play Style

[geoffhanna]

Severlin asked what about Stealth was broken.

-> So really, this is his fault.

[Saekee]

HI geoff, I agree that there are aspects of stealth that do not work sometimes. Specific quests have the annoying 'kill all to proceed' mechanic to stop invisi runs but they end up ruining the fun for us skulkers. Certainly, a group that is not dedicated to stealthing will mean that it really can only be used selectively.

Assassins are not the only stealthy builds. See the build in my sig for an example of a non-assassinating stealth approach. A good stealth build should have full trapping, improved evasion, shadow veil invisi, extended invisi and melee helps like displacement. I find that assassinate works on far too limited a pool of creatures--too many undead etc, so I prefer an approach of one who is stealthy but can fight toe to toe in bursts.

Mobs do not unerringly find you once you make noise. That was before the revamp. Now you just need to get away from them and put something between you and them, like a wall. They eventually give up.

Low level quests are hard to stealth since it is a PITA to gear out every level. So I just zerg them. It is fun, instead, to stealth high level and epic quests. I was able to get to the end fight of heroic elite Mirror with one kill at level(or something like that) and it is fun to stealth quests like Old Grey Garl. The nice thing about epic play is that one can choose what quest to play--this happens anyway with many players.

[Grosbeak07]

The problem is less with stealth, put with the ease at which Invisibility can be gotten in game. Much of what you find frustrating about stealth play was designed to stop players from simply using a pot and then bypassing 99% of the dungeon, activating but creating impossible paths for the mobs, likely adding to lag.

As has often been the case in DDO's history, they fumbled how to deal with this. Dungeon Alert (While a a good idea) is spiky and clumsy at times. Adding in kill requirements (such as End of the Road), prevented players from invalidating 99% of the quest, takes the stealth aspect away (and because assassination is so slow at times, it makes the game slow down too much).

They could just take the invis spell away, and pots. Or make them just give a bonus to your move silently skill (the option I like). But the player outrage would be deafening.

When you are making quests for "one size fits all", it will be very difficult to make everyone happy. Think how many people skip "Stealthy Repossession" in the harbor, because they can't simply smash everything in the dungeon!

In a perfect world, there would be multiple ways to complete a quest (direct fighting, stealth options, skill options (Bluff, diplo etc. Think Party Crashers), but I think the best option would be to add "stealth optionals", allowing those who do wish to invest the time and effort into stealth or sneaking to get extra xp and loot. After all that's why we play.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

I use stealth in groups all the time.


But granted, I only use it to not get agro and to grab soul stones....
Maybe to loot chests and recall out of certain dungeons...

Invisibility is sometimes necessary or at least makes it easier.
(like running invisible to keep up with a party.)

Faster sneaking helps a lot. (and makes it more enjoyable)

[FuzzyDuck81]

In a perfect world, there would be multiple ways to complete a quest (direct fighting, stealth options, skill options (Bluff, diplo etc. Think Party Crashers), but I think the best option would be to add "stealth optionals", allowing those who do wish to invest the time and effort into stealth or sneaking to get extra xp and loot. After all that's why we play.

There are a few quests that *do* cater to this - haunted halls is probably the most recent which has a number of places where stealth & exploration is a valid option, but sadly a number of the encounters don't let you properly run with the concept. Frame work is a quest where the stealthy option can be a lot of fun though, but probably the only quest i can think of where a total no-kill stealth run is not only possible but actually encouraged as an option is Claw of Vulkoor in the Red Fens - unless you also count a couple of the bits in tangleroot where the objective is just to run through to the next area.

The stealthy & dialogue route is why i like the Fallout games & Torment so much - nothing like talking down the end boss into splatting himself

[Lonnbeimnech]

There are a few quests that *do* cater to this - haunted halls is probably the most recent which has a number of places where stealth & exploration is a valid option, but sadly a number of the encounters don't let you properly run with the concept. Frame work is a quest where the stealthy option can be a lot of fun though, but probably the only quest i can think of where a total no-kill stealth run is not only possible but actually encouraged as an option is Claw of Vulkoor in the Red Fens - unless you also count a couple of the bits in tangleroot where the objective is just to run through to the next area.

The stealthy & dialogue route is why i like the Fallout games & Torment so much - nothing like talking down the end boss into splatting himself

Blockade Buster

[FuzzyDuck81]

Blockade Buster

Ahh yeah always forget about that one, i like going all errol flynn on it

[digital_terror1]

Blockade Buster

Stealth really is broken in another way, at least in heroic levels. No matter how high your stealth scores, as soon as you assassinate anything in heroic levels everything within 30-40 feet of the kill knows exactly where you are at from then on, unerringly. No matter if they were sleeping (as several kobolds are in one of the ship holds), on the other side of a wall, etc. Makes Blockade Buster nearly impossible to do the stealth optionals because one of the now alerted kobolds will always beeline for the alarm gong.

And then as soon as you hit the epic levels, it flip flops the other way. You can assassinate something with someone else staring your target in the face, and they won't bat an eye over it.

This information is based on a toon that was on his 3rd rogue life, Shadar Kai, with all possible bonuses to hide and move silent, +15 gear, +6 to dex skills gear, and while not a maxed out dex (intel based as an assassin) it was his 2nd highest stat, all the rogue related ship buffs, +4 tomes, etc.
No problem at all with using stealth to reach the holds, the problem lay in everything instantly having aggro on me the moment I assassinated any kobold in there, even though assassinate did not break stealth and the target died.

[Saekee]

Stealth really is broken in another way, at least in heroic levels. No matter how high your stealth scores, as soon as you assassinate anything in heroic levels everything within 30-40 feet of the kill knows exactly where you are at from then on, unerringly. No matter if they were sleeping (as several kobolds are in one of the ship holds), on the other side of a wall, etc. Makes Blockade Buster nearly impossible to do the stealth optionals because one of the now alerted kobolds will always beeline for the alarm gong.

And then as soon as you hit the epic levels, it flip flops the other way. You can assassinate something with someone else staring your target in the face, and they won't bat an eye over it.

This information is based on a toon that was on his 3rd rogue life, Shadar Kai, with all possible bonuses to hide and move silent, +15 gear, +6 to dex skills gear, and while not a maxed out dex (intel based as an assassin) it was his 2nd highest stat, all the rogue related ship buffs, +4 tomes, etc.
No problem at all with using stealth to reach the holds, the problem lay in everything instantly having aggro on me the moment I assassinated any kobold in there, even though assassinate did not break stealth and the target died.

hi digital_terror (love the name btw), that is fair but then, that is an issue with assassinate, not stealth

[Saekee]

There are a few quests that *do* cater to this - haunted halls is probably the most recent which has a number of places where stealth & exploration is a valid option, but sadly a number of the encounters don't let you properly run with the concept. Frame work is a quest where the stealthy option can be a lot of fun though, but probably the only quest i can think of where a total no-kill stealth run is not only possible but actually encouraged as an option is Claw of Vulkoor in the Red Fens - unless you also count a couple of the bits in tangleroot where the objective is just to run through to the next area.

The stealthy & dialogue route is why i like the Fallout games & Torment so much - nothing like talking down the end boss into splatting himself

hi FuzzyDuck (congratz on player council!), there are also many quests that work very well in epics with stealth, like Through a Mirror Darkly, Old Grey Garl, etc. I should try to come up with a full list sometime but we avoided a list for the stealth guide. I guess I am still studying what can and cannot be done.