Trouble with Surprise rounds

[TheBlueFox]

Can someone explain to me a few weird oddities and if they are intended or not?

Issue 1. You cannot get surprise on YELLOW enemies.
Explanation: When attacking yellow (Non hostile) npcs from stealth, the enemy will get struck and then give you a "Reputation loss". They will turn around and wiggle their finger at you, scold you, and THEN become hostile and engage. This removes the possibility of getting a surprise round.

Issue 2. KILLING your foe does not grant surprise on the rest of the enemy group
Explanation: If you manage to completely kill your target from stealth, combat does not immediately begin. Instead, an enemy will look at the corpse, find you (Because you are no longer in stealth unless you're in turn based mode and use a bonus action hide afterward) and then engage in normal combat


Do any of you have these issues?

[TripSin]

I think it's intended this way. The advantage you get is that you got to act first in initiative before the enemy. If you ungroup your party, have them all stealth outside of vision range, go into TB mode and then attack with each, you can have them all attack before the enemy gets to act.

[TheBlueFox]

Well the thing is, I'm specifically trying to go for "Surprise", Because as an assassin rogue, that's the benefit. Guaranteed critical hits on surprised foes.

So having some situations where stabbing a knife into someone's back that DOESN'T result in a surprise round is vexing. And it's NOT because I failed a stealth check.

[Jack the Roamer]

Yellow is neutral and if NPCs know you are in the location, any hostile activity will turn them instantly or they intended to attack you anyways. For example, just being next to "neutral" NPCs that have hostile intent, will cause them to attack you. Especially if they are scripted to pull you into a cut scene.

I find that turn based just breaks the game and is a good way to get your characters alpha'd by the entire camp while your crew gets pulled into combat and has to wait out the entire brigade...

Generally I think this is a case where the player creativity that is unaccounted for by the devs.

Use you STR mule to pick up corpses you don't want to be seen. Being in the vicinity of a crime is pretty obvious. Surprise rounds will work if the enemy did not expect you to attack them first, but I find that this is dictated more by script. Sometimes I have trouble surprising enemies despite opening an attack with invisibility

[Kyutaru]

You totally can get surprise on yellow NPCs. It's how I defeated the Surgeon for the achievement. They exploded and I still had my surprise round afterwards.

[TheBlueFox]

Originally posted by Jack the Roamer:

Yellow is neutral and if NPCs know you are in the location, any hostile activity will turn them instantly or they intended to attack you anyways. For example, just being next to "neutral" NPCs that have hostile intent, will cause them to attack you. Especially if they are scripted to pull you into a cut scene.

I find that turn based just breaks the game and is a good way to get your characters alpha'd by the entire camp while your crew gets pulled into combat and has to wait out the entire brigade...

Generally I think this is a case where the player creativity that is unaccounted for by the devs.

Use you STR mule to pick up corpses you don't want to be seen. Being in the vicinity of a crime is pretty obvious. Surprise rounds will work if the enemy did not expect you to attack them first, but I find that this is dictated more by script. Sometimes I have trouble surprising enemies despite opening an attack with invisibility

The way surprise works is that when you attack from stealth (I believe it MUST BE from stealth), If the foe survives every enemy in the area makes a Perception check challenged by your stealth check. If your stealth check beats EVERY SINGLE ENEMY's Perception check, you gain a surprise round.

I don't yet know if your allies must roll it too.

But you will notice "CHARNAME failed a stealth check" always appears in the combat log when you do not get a surprise round

[Jack the Roamer]

Originally posted by TheBlueFox:

Well the thing is, I'm specifically trying to go for "Surprise", Because as an assassin rogue, that's the benefit. Guaranteed critical hits on surprised foes.

So having some situations where stabbing a knife into someone's back that DOESN'T result in a surprise round is vexing. And it's NOT because I failed a stealth check.

I killed all the non-scripted goblins in the camp, including prison, but making sure there are shadows or no light-sources where they are, and far enough that there isn't a lot of noise (basically out of sight). I never get pulled into combat if they are one shot. If it's an NPC that has a dialogue event, it will trigger EVERYTHING (more often than not).

[TheBlueFox]

Originally posted by Kyutaru:

You totally can get surprise on yellow NPCs. It's how I defeated the Surgeon for the achievement. They exploded and I still had my surprise round afterwards.

That's very interesting. Did they die in the first hit?

[Jaggid Edje]

Try activating turn-based mode BEFORE you initiate the combats. It helps a lot.

[TheBlueFox]

Originally posted by Jack the Roamer:

Originally posted by TheBlueFox:

Well the thing is, I'm specifically trying to go for "Surprise", Because as an assassin rogue, that's the benefit. Guaranteed critical hits on surprised foes.

So having some situations where stabbing a knife into someone's back that DOESN'T result in a surprise round is vexing. And it's NOT because I failed a stealth check.

I killed all the non-scripted goblins in the camp, including prison, but making sure there are shadows or no light-sources where they are, and far enough that there isn't a lot of noise (basically out of sight). I never get pulled into combat if they are one shot. If it's an NPC that has a dialogue event, it will trigger EVERYTHING (more often than not).

Oh yes, I understand that well. If you kill the enemy combat doesn't even begin. However, unless you're in turn based mode, or like you said, VERY secluded, you are out of stealth when the attack is done. So you're spotted unless you can enter stealth before being seen. Bonus action hide helps with this.

Its when they survive and I don't get the surprise round that is annoying. Or when you kill them, DON'T begin combat, and someone spots you, thus ruining surprise

[TheBlueFox]

Originally posted by Jaggid Edje:

Try activating turn-based mode BEFORE you initiate the combats. It helps a lot.

Yeah, It definitely does, but sometimes I just wanna click a dude...

[FailedLegacy]

Was googling to see if there's a better way known atm. Evidently not yet.

If you use one character to attack first (changing the NPC from yellow to red) and follow immediately with a second character in stealth, they will get surprised still.

(Warning) It seems to be a very short window of time between that working or it being too late & rolling for initiative after the first attack. Requires further testing to figure out how to make it consistently surprise, but I've got it to work for me 2-4 times in my co-op Honor mode playthrough so far. Gonna test on a lover difficulty to re-load saves until I get it right.

What may be the most consistent is just having 2 characters attack at essentially the same exact time (1 with a VERY short delay)🤷

Glad this game has so many options already, but I for one would love just being able to surprise non-hostile enemies as well. Just doesn't make sense, needing to get into a conversation to then go hostile. Maybe make it a "reaction" type moment if you stealth a yellow where the game asks if you really want to take the surprising them option? (to avoid accidental killing of non-hostile creatures via mis-clicking)

[Punkaralho]

I stabbed a goblin in stealth, with all my party stealthed and in TB. Goblins just go "oh hey ik u stabbed me, but i'm taking you to jail lol". Surprise attacks rarely work and is very fustrating cuz it's the only rogue subclass that can 1 shot someone early game.
Prob at range it works better, but then again, i can only play assassin if i play gloomstalker then? Larian needs to fix this, if u attack someone, ur ofc going to be already hostile, like, wtf, my dagger didn't slip u know.