Too bad there is no (proper) stealth gameplay in ESO

[Exilyth]

The current implementation of hiding mechanics, in combination with enemy placement and behaviour, is highly suboptimal. That's the nicest I can say about the current state of stealth without uttering daedric curses.

Ofc, the absolute basics are there:
Crouching makes you move slightly slower but allows you to become 'hidden' and greatly lowers the detection of (eutral and) enemy mobs. The detection is even lower outside the enemies field of view.

But most enemies come in groups of 2-3 and stand around right in the middle of a chokepoint. Being detected by or hitting one mob out of a group alerts the whole group. With the amount of health most mobs have, killing them in one hit is impossible (and even then the rest of the group is alerted).

Most enemies don't move (or if they do they wander unpredictably within a certain area). Only a few enemies have proper patrol routes and some patrol routes are ridiculously short, like a mob moving from one side of a chokepoint to the other.

On top of that there is a mob standing directly in front or on top of every second objective.
And most places you go are small cramped corridors packed to the brim with mobs.

This is further complicated by mobs being able to detect you through walls/floor/ceiling and sometimes even through other solid objects. That the hiding indicator likes to snap back to 'detected' every once in a while doesn't help either.

So, sneaking is pretty pointless because the number of fights you can't avoid is higher than the number of fights you can avoid.

Unless you're a nightblade - then you can just recast cloak until your mana runs out and avoid all but the boss fights. But that is 'the thing' of nightblades and this topic is about stealth and not nightblades.

Now, there are some pretty good ideas in the game already, like the "hiding spot" pots standing around in some places, or the disguise system (which makes non-sentry enemies neutral), or the sentries with lanterns patrolling some places (which completely prevent hiding in the illuminated area).

Ranting about what's wrong with the current sneaking mechanics is not very constructive. So, how could the current mechanics be improved upon?

- redesign locations: dungeons could have some more dead-ends, circular corridors, alternative routes and larger chambers added to them. It's okay for some places to be cramped and mostly linear, but not for most of them.
- add sneaky pathes: connecting two dungeon rooms with a small tunnel hidden behind foilage which doesn't show up on the minimap, or adding a high ledge to a corridor so the place can be traversed above the detection radus of the enemies
- sneak attack: the first attack on an enemies back arc while hidden could provide a boost to damage.
- giving longer/better patrol routes to more enemies, e.g. if there's a circular corridor, why not have enemies do their rounds through that corridor so that people could pass between two patrols.
- a skill to distract enemies: some ability which makes enemies leave their post for a short amount of time without being alerted to the players presence.
- the ability to (temporarily) disable light sources either using the lighting object (pressing e) or from a far via a skill.
- ghost images for respawning enemies: so you can step aside instead of having stuff respawn right on top of you
- last witness killed mechanic: killing the npc who witnessed your evil deeds (like attacking said npc) should erase the part of your bounty gained from that npc.
- opening a menu should not pull you out of the crouching stance. I had to unbind the crown store hotkey because accidentally hitting that instead of the map hotkey got on my nerves.

I could probably come up with more, but that's enough of a wall of text for now.

Out of the things I miss from other elder scrolls titles, proper stealth gameplay is the one I miss the most. After playing titles like the "Thief" series and "Dishonoured", stealth in ESO feels rather lackluster.



TL;DR:
What do you think about the current state of stealth in ESO?
What do you dis-/like about it?
How could it be improved?

[AC Denton]

1) TL;DRs go at the top.

2) You wrote all that explaining mechanics to the community that already knows.

3) It's an MMO, idk why people would expect real stealth. I for one am happy that they even went as far as they did catering to stealth, with pickpocketing, lockpicking and assassinations unlike other MMOs.

[Wolfstorm]

Everytime I read constructive criticism, there is always a fanboy who try to minimize it.

Sneaking is broken. For example, if you sneak behind a npc, that is talking to another npc, and have a 100% chance for pickpocketing, you are still detected by the other npc.

So, we have two solutions here: or the game dont show a 100% chance for pickpocketing, or you pickpocket just fine, because in real life, someone can pickpocket during a conversation and not be detected. Now, in the game, the other npc seems to have some psychic power, to detect a player that is even cloaked. This should be addressed.

[FeierFox]

İlk olarak Wolfstorm tarafından gönderildi:

Everytime I read constructive criticism, there is always a fanboy who try to minimize it.

Sneaking is broken. For example, if you sneak behind a npc, that is talking to another npc, and have a 100% chance for pickpocketing, you are still detected by the other npc.

So, we have two solutions here: or the game dont show a 100% chance for pickpocketing, or you pickpocket just fine, because in real life, someone can pickpocket during a conversation and not be detected. Now, in the game, the other npc seems to have some psychic power, to detect a player that is even cloaked. This should be addressed.

Well, there are two indicators of success --> 100% refers to pickpocket change, not to detection.
If the eye symbol remains open, you'll be detected, if it's closed, you won't.

[Pterolycus_Aigars1983]

İlk olarak Wolfstorm tarafından gönderildi:

Everytime I read constructive criticism, there is always a fanboy who try to minimize it.

Sneaking is broken. For example, if you sneak behind a npc, that is talking to another npc, and have a 100% chance for pickpocketing, you are still detected by the other npc.

So, we have two solutions here: or the game dont show a 100% chance for pickpocketing, or you pickpocket just fine, because in real life, someone can pickpocket during a conversation and not be detected. Now, in the game, the other npc seems to have some psychic power, to detect a player that is even cloaked. This should be addressed.

whays wrong in it stealth isnt invisibility you would be detected in real life so you get detected in game nothing bad i se there :)

[Requimatic]

One-shotting an enemy from Sneak is entirely dependent on your class, gear, and stats.

For example, my Nightblade can use Surprise Attack, from Sneak, for 37k damage. That one-shots most mobs, but a lot of them get left with such little health that I can use my execute, kill them instantly, and heal any damage I may have took from the other mob(s) standing in the group.

Other classes may or may not have the same experience with that; Nightblades get passives and such for Critical Damage, and with Surprise Attack always being a critical from Sneak.. well, there you have it.

Other stats that would definitely come in to play for this, regardless of class:

* Critical
* Critical Damage
* Weapon Damage
* Physical Penetration

I'll agree, though; Sneak is fairly imbalanced in the favor of NPCs in the beginning. Once you're a little higher level, or have the right ability/equipment, it's definitely more in your favor.

The only thing about Sneak that's broken is "lol I crouch so you can't see me now".. since real life was brought up, who the hell couldn't see someone crouched down coming towards you or your group of people, even in mid-conversation, trying to pick your pockets?

I'll also agree, though, that it's always felt kind of weird that at least Nightblades didn't have some kind of Illusionary invisibility spell, though.. since they're like the "thief" archetype in ESO.

[Wolfstorm]

İlk olarak Gentin Smith tarafından gönderildi:

Well, there are two indicators of success --> 100% refers to pickpocket change, not to detection.
If the eye symbol remains open, you'll be detected, if it's closed, you won't.

Yeah, but it is closed. I've even got detected while cloaked.

[Space is the Place]

You need to invest in stealth... like in any RPG.

I have a level 27 Khajit with Legerdmain at 19 and I can enter any enemy camp and not get caught. And even if I do, my stamina and the Steed stone are enough to get me out of the situation. Also, the shadow ability will net you 2,7-3 seconds of invisibility, pretty usefull on those situations where the enmies are choking a narrow space.

I do have to agree though that there´s a lot of potential lost. The disguise system, the hidding spots for the thieves guild(I don´t think they exist outside that DLC, but I haven´t get myself into the Dark brotherhood yet)... those are great ideas. But the whole "one hit killer" that most of us would expect in an RPG with stealth builds SHOULD be present. Even with the sneak bonuses, the critical output of classes, bow passives and racial for Khajhit, you´re still making less damage that expected. ANd initially I though it was for balance pourposes for PvP, but apparently PvP already works quite different than PvE for a lot of skills, so I don´t get why there can´t be the same difference with critical with bows.

All of that said, I also understand the people that says that, being an MMO, there are some limitations to steatlh. There´s def room for improvement though.

[Exilyth]

İlk olarak Space is the Place tarafından gönderildi:

I do have to agree though that there´s a lot of potential lost. The disguise system, the hidding spots for the thieves guild(I don´t think they exist outside that DLC, but I haven´t get myself into the Dark brotherhood yet)... those are great ideas. But the whole "one hit killer" that most of us would expect in an RPG with stealth builds SHOULD be present. Even with the sneak bonuses, the critical output of classes, bow passives and racial for Khajhit, you´re still making less damage that expected.

Some places in vardenfell (morrowind dlc) and the gold coast (dark brotherhood dlc) also have hiding (s)pots.


As for the 1-hit-kill:
The dark brotherhood dlc adds the blade of woe ability/skill which allows you to sneak close (but not too close) to a weak/generic npc and press a button (default: x) to kill that npc. The blade odf woe would warrant its own topic - it's overpowered when it works, but sometimes it doesn't, especially when the npc in question is close to some object/wall. And some of the animations take quite long, so there's no "wait for the other enemy to look away, kill their partner and dissappear again" - by the time you're done stabbing the target like some backalley brute, the other npc will have turned around again.

It all comes back to: if more enemies could be avoided, e.g. by slipping through the opening between two patrols, there would be less of a need to kill them in one hit.

If attacking an npc started a short timer before they trigger the alarm (which would e.g. make their friends sitting in a corner playing dice/cards come over and attack), killing them within that timeframe would suffice.

It's not so much about killing enemies instantly - it's more about killing them silently.

[Space is the Place]

İlk olarak Exilyth tarafından gönderildi:

...

Yeah, I do own the Dark brotherhood DLC, but it still mostly for NPCs rather than mobs as far as I´ve experienced, it can work with humanoids but you get far less xp (I haven´t deal with the quest line yet, so my oppinion on the topic is very bias, maybe it gets more useful and I´m talking out of my anus). Regardless I was mostly talking about PvE bow, maybe not a "one hit" skill perse, but having several passives spend on stealth and bow I think the damage output should be higher, specially your first hit if you´re hidden/cloaked from a very long distance and you charge the shot.

I´m still quiet satisfy with the stealth system myself none the less, I´ve play quite the few MMOs over the years and very few I can remember had any sense of stealth mechanics beyond passives for a smaller detection radius or archers having enough shooting distance that the first hit was always "a sneak hit".

[Exilyth]

I'm playing the dark brotherhood questline currently. So far, it hasn't made any difference whether I sneaked through or not - there are certain events I won't spoil which make all sneakery completely pointless.

Let's just that for a "backstab things and don't get seen" type of questline, the boss fights are too "drunk nord barbarian running in axes swinging" style. *sigh*

[Wolfstorm]

They need to dump PvP first. After they dump it, they can focus in fixing these issues.

Too much noise caused by the toxic PvP community leads to useless nerfs. Instead of fixing AI code (like these stealth issues, for example), devs are losing their time with so-called "balance".

Dump Cheatodiil to the ground, and focus in fixing AI code. With better npcs, serious players will not need to PvP against the cheating cancer. Without PvP, there is no need to "balance" classes.

I just imagine how many players have left after the devs butchered the sorcerer class. Players that would mostly play PvE and would spend their money in the game.

Fix stealth, shows the correct percentage, or then dont let the other npc sees it. In real life, its possible to pickpocket people which are talking, in crowded areas. The devs cant put too much npcs in the cities (it would impact performance), but we assume they are crowded, and thats why we have the "hidden" status.

[TheGREENMAN]

Lol I did the first mission for Dark Brotherhood.. by the end of the mission I had to pay a 1100 gold bounty (that was with me legitimately trying to be sneaky) So I abandoned the quest.

[Wolfstorm]

İlk olarak TheGREENMAN tarafından gönderildi:

Lol I did the first mission for Dark Brotherhood.. by the end of the mission I had to pay a 1100 gold bounty (that was with me legitimately trying to be sneaky) So I abandoned the quest.

The bounty declines over time. If you return to this character two days later, it will not be there anymore.

[microwave my skull]

İlk olarak TheGREENMAN tarafından gönderildi:

Lol I did the first mission for Dark Brotherhood.. by the end of the mission I had to pay a 1100 gold bounty (that was with me legitimately trying to be sneaky) So I abandoned the quest.

hehe the first time i did that one i sneaked all the way through and it took a looooong time
just running through it was a lot easier and I just waited out the boutny