Is sneaking any good?

[fetchystick]

(This is sneaking, or avoiding detection by enemies; this is not sneak attack, the extra damage on non-aggro'd enemies)

So I am planning on making a 13 rogue 7 wizard and getting the archmage enhancements with it. Of the enhancements that allow you to cast spells for 1 SP, the invisibility option rose up as the best option to me, as the ability to keep your party invisible almost 100% of the time seemed rather cool: fights are much easier to set up, you can introduce aggro at the proper time, etc.

But I remembered reading somewhere in the starting a class guides that many higher level monsters have some form of tremorsense or other sense that allows them to always detect a sneaking character regardless of absolutely everything else in play. My specific question is should I invest in the invisibility spell for archmage or should I grab another, the broader question (which I still would like answered): is sneaking even worth it?

[AZgreentea]

It really depends on your playstyle. There are certainly quests that reward subtlety. However, you will always need a backup if you come across something that sneaking will not help you with.

If you have invisibility, you will still need Move Silently. A loud invisible person will still attract attention. You are right though, some monsters have tremor sense. They are mostly creatures like spiders and ooze. The inteligent monsters will normally only notice you if you do something like get to close or draw their attention somehow. There is a cone in front of each monster where they will immediately notice your presence even if you are invisible or sneaking. The wiki has some tips. http://ddowiki.com/page/Sneak

I cant answer your Archmage question, though. Casters are not my strong suit. I like Rogues.

[fetchystick]

thanks, what I might add is how frequently do the monsters with tremor sense or other similar senses appear throughout the game. I don't want to invest in sneak if 99% of the monsters I meet negate it entirely.

[SableShadow]

You might find this thread relevant.
Particularly keep an eye on Ghoste's posts; he's pretty much the go-to guy on stealth.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Yes.... but....

not easy to use in DDO.

Some people use sneaking very well and have a lot of fun with it.

... most fail and decide that sneaking is useless.




You need to research and practice.

Spiders are the most common creature you will encounter that has "tremorsense". Spiders are at all levels of play in DDO.

[sandypaws]

Anti-sneaks are spiders and oozes. Scorpions, to a lesser degree.

On a side-note, it's worth figuring out how to sneak even with horrid move silent/hide ability. You're not readily visible to monsters, and can use the sound of your poor sneaking to separate critters out from clumps.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Anti-sneaks are spiders and oozes. Scorpions, to a lesser degree.

On a side-note, it's worth figuring out how to sneak even with horrid move silent/hide ability. You're not readily visible to monsters, and can use the sound of your poor sneaking to separate critters out from clumps.

People keep saying "scorpians" but that is not true.

In somce cases monsters spawn when you enter a spot, possible some scorps do this, and in this case are close enough to you to auto-detect you.

Some scorpians hide very well and get bumped into (Monastery).

Ones in claw move fast, and if a roaming one sees you the ambushers spawn and tend to catch people too close to them.

But..... Scorpians do not have any special senses to detect you when sneaking or invised.

(neither do most undead btw... but similar conditions as scorps can make people think they do) (dread Wraiths though have Life Sense and canno tbe snuck by. Not sure if this is universal, but true about ones in Orchard explorer area.)

[fco-karatekid]

As far as Invis - it is handy, but keep in mind a lot of high-level stuff has See Invis, OR True Seeing.

Sneak can be quite powerful in this game; but keep in mind you have to want to be stealthy and build for it AND most players (if you group) do not appreciate the loss of speed.

A good sneak is a beautiful thing to watch in action, tho.

Invis followed in rapid succession with a decent sneak score can shed aggro and pursuing monsters (yes, to a certain extent, even in DA Red with their clairvoyance or cloak of Karnak or whatever it is they gain) nearly instantly if done right. That tactic has saved my characters' lives on numerous occasions when I had nothing else ready to deal with them and got overrun.

[fco-karatekid]

People keep saying "scorpians" but that is not true....

Monstrous Scorps have tremorsense 60'..

[Therigar]

auto-detect

I've used high Hide and Move Silent skill to sneak a lot. AFAIK there is no auto-detect.

If you literally walk into a mob it will notice you, but, you can miss it by just the smallest amount and it will be oblivious.

Of course, there may be some mechanism that I don't know about or Talon could be discussing the same thing -- literally walking into the mob -- just using different words.

As far as Invisibility goes, there are mobs that have innate See Invisibility or innate True Seeing, often on bosses. People often dump Hide and count on Invisibility but get detected by those types of mobs.

Tremorsense has already been covered.

[GeneralDiomedes]

If you have skill points to spare, by all means invest in it.

For parties, there are situational uses to grab levers undetected, etc. but very few groups will have the patience to wait around when they can just kill everything.

Also, there is the fact that having a very high Hide and a very low Move Silently is the most effective way of body-pulling in the game (mobs hear you but don't see you).

Finally, sneaking is really slow ..

Overall, I'd have to say unless you are soloing/duoing with a friend or playing some kind of restricted ruleset that really encourages tactics .. probably not worth it.

BTW Invis is mostly used for running by stuff not battle strategies .. although it is kind of a neat idea to surround the enemy Invis and then strike. But in the end will probably just make the quest take longer.

[Wipey]

It's not worth it. There are few quests, Sins, Running with the devils, Monastery, Bastion which can be done by sneaking. But you still need brute dps for end boss.
Few invis clickies or umd scrolls are enough to get devious for the rest if you are solo/duoing and want the bonus. many lowbie quests, Missing, Ruined Halls, Tangleroot, Lordsmarch chain, Sane Asylum, Maraud the mines, etc.
Invis is great for skipping parts of quests/wilderness.
Only one where the group might appreciate sneaking one person is Claw.
Stealth approach with more people ends up with alert and deaths.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

I've used high Hide and Move Silent skill to sneak a lot. AFAIK there is no auto-detect.

If you literally walk into a mob it will notice you, but, you can miss it by just the smallest amount and it will be oblivious.

Of course, there may be some mechanism that I don't know about or Talon could be discussing the same thing -- literally walking into the mob -- just using different words.

As far as Invisibility goes, there are mobs that have innate See Invisibility or innate True Seeing, often on bosses. People often dump Hide and count on Invisibility but get detected by those types of mobs.

Tremorsense has already been covered.

Well, this is what MrCow says:

If you are invisible, but not sneaking, lighting doesn't matter. A monster can eventually see you if you linger in its sight for too long.

If you are sneaking, then lighting does matter. The following is a picture to help visualize things.

The red area is the "auto-detect" visual arc. If you step into that visual range, you will be detected.
The orange areas are the "lighting-detect" visual arcs. If you step into that visual range, you will be spotted if you linger in the monster's sight too long. Depending on how dark it is where you are sneaking depends how far the monster's vision is to eventually see you.
Beyond is the monsters "normal sight". If you sneak in a monster's normal sight, you have to made a hide check or be immediately spotted.




From best to worst:

• 
• 
• 
• 
• 
• (At this point, your hide skill comes into play)
• 
• 

Basically, I was talking about the small zone right in front of their nose. This is usually entered when you and/or the monster bump into each other.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

Monstrous Scorps have tremorsense 60'..

In DDO?

What quest?

Cause I cannot think of any quest where the scorpians have seemed to possess tremorsense in DDO.

( I could be wrong of course)(as I do not enjoy soloing)(But I have done a lot of sneaking, especially in lower level quests)


But this comes up in every thread about sneaking.... someone always mentions Scorpians. Some mention Vermin.

Undead is another common one that people think you cannot sneak by. The only (non-named) undead that I think cannot be snuck by is the Dread Wraiths in the Orchard. (although there may be Dread Wraiths in a quest somewhere as well, but I cannot recall any for sure.... possibly the shadow quests, but I think I have snuck past those...)

[psykopeta]

mrcow does elite monastery (of course, solo xD) with 38 move silently + 39 hide (or invis, but invis w/o move silently = useless)

so maybe those are the values you should aim to

there are really few mobs that can spot/hear you with high values, but is quite easier to cast invis, run like mad and hey... what's that yellow alert? then harried and finally gang bang

lets take as example tangleroot quests(one of those "enter the stronghold"), you can skip mobs while invis, but you will notice em moving to you(lol the have heard something quite clearly XD) when you reach to the door, open it and cast invis, and when you are close to the end... uh? dungeon alert?

while sneaking you can reach the door, turn back to see if some mob came to you(can kill it because rest of mobs are far away from the door) open it, sneak and continue

tons of mobs have true seing or see invisibility, a few have tremorsense, and less have a decent spot/listen

[Therigar]

Well, this is what MrCow says:

<original has excerpt from MrCow>

Basically, I was talking about the small zone right in front of their nose. This is usually entered when you and/or the monster bump into each other.

I think we're talking the same thing. Thanks for the visual.

MrCow's bit on invisibility vs hiding/sneaking is so true. When invisible stuff will see you if you hang around, even if not moving.

When sneaking it seems like you have to bump into them or they have to bump into you. That's what it looks like to me on the screen anyway. So I'm sure we're talking about the same thing there. It might be that there is a very small auto-detect area right in front of a mob. I usually am approaching from the other direction.

Oh, FWIW, I can sneak right up to every scorpion I've ever encountered and have it not notice me.

[Talon_Moonshadow]

I think we're talking the same thing. Thanks for the visual.

MrCow's bit on invisibility vs hiding/sneaking is so true. When invisible stuff will see you if you hang around, even if not moving.

When sneaking it seems like you have to bump into them or they have to bump into you. That's what it looks like to me on the screen anyway. So I'm sure we're talking about the same thing there. It might be that there is a very small auto-detect area right in front of a mob. I usually am approaching from the other direction.

Oh, FWIW, I can sneak right up to every scorpion I've ever encountered and have it not notice me.

Thx. (about the scorps. )

MrCow knows exactly how far it is.
I usually say it is about 3 feet in front of their nose. lol.
But sometimes I get seen when I was sure I was far enough away.
and sometimes I make it past things that I was sure was going to see me.

But yeah, it's a very smalll area. Somewhere MrCow had another diagram that showed the actual distance and angles.


On the Invis/standing still note. I was actually trying to demonstrate some sneaking stuff to a guy, in Claw. I stood still too long trying to explain why I needed to move a scorpian away from the button.... and got seen by another one!

Some teacher I turned out to be......lol.

[Merlin-ator]

Nope. The DCs are set so absurdly high it's nigh impossible to sneak a quest, and then you usually still must contend with the endboss.

[Therigar]

MrCow knows exactly how far it is.
<snip>
Some teacher I turned out to be......lol.

Great story.

I'm absolutely certain that MrCow is precisely correct. If anyone ought to know it is he.

I am still in the "it feels this way" or "it looks this way to me" stage. Probably stuck there forever.

[Therigar]

The DCs are set so absurdly high it's nigh impossible to sneak a quest, and then you usually still must contend with the endboss.

Actually, there are a lot of examples around where players DO sneak all or most of a quest. And, there use to be a group on one of the servers that did that routinely as part of their game play.

The bigger part of sneaking is that you need a group dedicated to doing it and that puts enough skill points into Hide and Move Silently. It helps to also invest in hide or move silently gear.

What crushes a lot of sneak efforts is the tendency of groups to not have very good sills and the predilection for just relying on brute force.

I ran Collaborator earlier today on a brand new character with a rogue group leader. Rogue and I were sneaking, silly hireling of course was not. It is things like this that are problems -- hirelings, pet doggies -- along with the obvious things like the Leroy Jenkins' approach to questing that dooms most sneak attempts.

Oh, and I know Collaborator isn't that hard of a quest. That's not the point. It is about the other things that get in the way. DC really isn't one of them if players invest in the needed skills and gear.