Stealth - the low down UPDATED!

[James McMurray]

LOL

Yes, of course you can still be seen, but use the rules for targeting thigs that can't be seen, even though you can be seen. That makes perfect sense. Why didn't I think of it?

LOL

 

[Branduil]

It seems simple enough to me. If you beat their perception, they can't see you and they have to guess.

 

[NaturalZero]

What do you mean they can't be seen? It does not say that at all... you use the rules for targeting creatures you cannot see.

Now that we have that all cleared up.

 

[Kitsune]

This thread is really depressing. Stealth was one of the most difficult things to adjudicate in 3E because the rules were not precise.

It sounds like it's the same way in 4E.

I had really hoped that 4E would fix things in this area, given that stealth is pretty much going to be attempted in every single game, given that it's a key tactic of the rogue.

Ken

It's not that hard! Follow the wording of the rules and it works just fine. People are trying to make it more complicated than it needs to be. Let's do a simple scenario:

A party enters a clearing in the woods, finding some hobgoblins around a fire. For unspecified reasons, the party decides to charge. The rogue slips off behind some trees to be sneaky.

The hobgoblins have a passive perception of 15. The rogue has +12 stealth. He wants to move his full 6 squares, so he's at a -5 penalty, bringing him down to +7. The player rolls a 9, succeeding against the passive perception, and moves without the hobgoblins noticing him, stopping behind a tree to maintain his cover.

Next round, he tosses a shuriken into some poor hobgoblin's eye. He is no longer stealthy as a result, and runs over behind some bushes. He attempts to run stealthily, but rolls a 3, so all of the hobs are aware of his presence. One of the hobgoblins (not the one with one eye!) comes out after him.

The rogue wants to keep moving, so he moves again with a new stealth check. He has to run if he's going to get to the next available spot with cover, though, so he's at -10 this time. Lucky him, rolls a 17, still good!

However, that one pesky hob isn't going to give up so easily. He decides to actively search around to find the rogue. As a standard action, he rolls perception in opposition to the rogue's stealth. The rogue's still at -10 'cause he was trying to be stealthy while running, so his stealth is only at +2 while the searching hobgoblin has a +5 perception. The hobgoblin rolls a 12, the rogue rolls a 9, bad luck for rogues.

At this point, the hobgoblin knows exactly where the rogue is. The other hobgoblins have no clue. As a free action, the searching hobgoblin yells, "Fire in the hole!" and points at the rogue. That's all he can do, since he blew his standard action looking around for the sneaky guy. But on his action, the hobgoblins' resident pyromaniac, Scorchy McTwoFingers, tosses a grenade at the spot that the first hobgoblin indicated. Scorchy doesn't see the rogue, and doesn't know the rogue's precise location. As per the "Targeting What You Can't See" rules, Scorchy picks a square in the general location that his buddy pointed out and lobs the grenade.

Unluckily for the rogue, the grenade plops down just five feet away before exploding. The rogue is now on fire, and as per the 'light source' rules under the stealth skill, is no longer hidden. Further, until he gets the fire out, it's impossible for him to hide. Hopefully the rest of the party's doing better on their end!


How else could this have gone? Well, the searching hobgoblin could have decided to move outwards from the ring of trees in the hopes of getting a clear line of sight to the rogue, which would have allowed him to immediately spot the sneaky git. (This assumes that there was enough light for the low-light-visioned hob to be able to see the rogue clearly. If it was dark enough that the rogue was in an obscured square, that would give sufficient concealment to stay hidden even without cover.) If that ploy worked, it would have left the hobgoblin with a free standard action to throw an axe at the rogue in addition to yelling for Scorchy to deploy an orbital strike.

See? Easy-peasy.

 

[Machus]

This thread is really depressing. Stealth was one of the most difficult things to adjudicate in 3E because the rules were not precise.
It sounds like it's the same way in 4E.

Sadly, it's actually not that confusing when you remove all the insane interpretations (emotional or just crazy).

You make a stealth check when you have cover or concealment, with a minor action (at least). Allies count as cover just as stated in the rules (with qualifications in the rules too).
If targets want to find you, they can eliminate the cover/concealment (lighting a torch in dim light, or moving to a position where they can clearly see you). On their turn, they can also use a minor action to look for you (perception check vs your last stealth roll). If they still can't see you and want to attack you, they can use the targeting what you cant' see rules, or an area attack (burst, blast, wall) and suffer no penalty (assuming they catch you in one of the squares).


If you saw an opponent go behind a crate, and you never saw them leave, you don't need to roll die to guess which square they are in. Why would someone suggest that....
You don't disappear from their mind.

 

[clearstream]

Quote:
Originally Posted by the_LICH
And further quoting from the infamous "targeting what you cant see" sidebar:.

Go away for a couple of days, and what happens...

With the FAQ out, that decides RAW. the_Lich nearly correctly points out that in play (as HiFructose already deduced) that means there are two distinct kinds of Perception. Three, in fact, but only two deal with Stealth.

The first kind of Perception is passive against an initial Stealth check or a check forced by an action taken by the hider. If the hider beats this number the quality of their Stealth changes as if they had put on Harry Potter's handy cloak.

The second kind of Perception is then an active check using a minor action. You only use this if the hider beat your passive number. Success means knowing the direction of the creature or its square depending on the roll. Since you know the passive failed, and since you know the active can't be higher than the passive +10, you know that only a 20 could possibly produce an exact location at this point.

I have now updated my explanations to follow the FAQ.

To my mind, Stealth is unhelpfully good: DMs are likely to hit problems with it. It beats the defensive benefits of many encounter powers, while also offering an offensive bonus. It becomes a mono-strategy: all Rangers, Rogues and Warlocks should take Stealth (use multiclass cheese for Warlock) and Skill Focus it. Other classes should seriously consider it, or throw it in untrained. It's At-Will. It's also very mysterious that some powers seem to feel the need to change hiding into invisibility, even though in at least one instance that has no game effect. Just bad editing...?

-vk

 

[James McMurray]

It's also very mysterious that some powers seem to feel the need to change hiding into invisibility, even though in at least one instance that has no game effect.

Which power is that? All the ones I saw in a search of the PHB have a very definite effect.

 

[Xorn]

Did anyone else find the FAQ update completely useless?

I already KNOW what the benefit of being hidden is. I want to know the mechanics for using Stealth to gain Combat Advantage during combat (after you become noticed). That FAQ doesn't clarify that. So far, the best source for actually seeing examples is to read the tactics sections in the Monster Manual, Kobold Hall, Keep on the Shadowfell, Heathen, Sleeper in the Tomb of Dreams, and I'm willing to bet Thunderspire Layrinth and the new adventure path are also going to have clear cut examples of using stealth in combat.

In Heathen, there's a fight against creatures that literally radiate dim light (concealment). It specifically says in their tactics that they will move into an area of dim light (thus their aura makes it no light--Total Concealment) and attack with combat advantage. Yet there's no mention at all of this creature with +14 Stealth using that Stealth to gain combat advantage once it's been spotted.

But they did mention using Stealth before being spotted to gain combat advantage.

Stealth in my campaign avoids notice; it doesn't erase it. The joy I've found with this is that using published adventures I notice that's exactly how the Tactics sections suggest using Stealth. If you want to use cover/concealment to flee the battle with Stealth--great. I'm not finding that to be a hard part of using Stealth in Combat.

 

[James McMurray]

I'm not finding that to be a hard part of using Stealth in Combat.

Which part are you finding hard?

 

[clearstream]

Which power is that? All the ones I saw in a search of the PHB have a very definite effect.

PHB123 Hide in Plain Sight

It changes your hidden status to invisible. You can't leave your current square without ending that. Being hidden, you had Cover or Concealment.

You can manufacture skill or power chains that can lead to you hidden in the middle of a room without Cover or Concealment, but to be brutally frank the text of many powers, and the body of published material, makes me believe WotC's designers hadn't joined up the dots on Stealth.

Their ruling in the FAQ is the best one given the books are printed, bound and on the shelves, but it is exceedingly poor in many other respects.

-vk