Is Hide in Shadows needed in BG?

TheSwamper

I don't doubt it can be useful for scouting, but it seems to me that with exception of maybe one quest, it's really not needed.

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DJKajuru

Well, it really depends on your tactics - you always get the first hit if your hidden, and ranged attacks from the shadows (from a thief/ranger) prevent annoying opponents such as kobold commandos from killing you first.

Jared4242

I find a Ranger sniping from afar, hiding in shadows, and then shooting from a different direction, is a fantastic strategy to pick off enemy's.

szb

Found it very good against the flesh golems in the pirate cave. Without Montaron backstabbing them, it would have been a lot harder. I started using it lot more after that, beause I realized how usefull it is.

ZanathKariashi

DO you mean the thief skill or using stealth in general?

It's ridiculously awesome if used to backstab. And scouting is always useful, especially for areas that aren't likely to be trapped. Rangers get stealth ranks automatically, so might as well use it if you bring any along, and non-swashbuckler thieves will get most of their offensive punch from backstabbing (at least till they get a fair number of traps uses, though BS is still a massive damage asset). For stalkers...it's more of icing on the cake till x3+. Useful for saying hi to a mage, cleric, or to soften up a tough enemy, but lacks that satisfying punch till higher levels.

As for the thief skill...it's almost useless...Move silently is literally 2:1 better per point spent.

TJ_Hooker

@ZanathKariashi why is move silently so much more important than hide in shadows? I've read a lot of conflicting info on it; half of the things I've read say that your overall ability to stealth is just (HIS+MS)/2, the other half say that hide in shadows is your chance to enter stealth, move silently is your chance to remain stealthed every round thereafter.

Edit: I also remember reading somewhere that either HIS or MS determines how long your character stays stealthed after you get the "leaving shadows" message, either from failing a stealth check or by clicking to perform an action. No idea if that's true or not.

ZanathKariashi

Well..apparently MS contributes to both, with the same contribution as hide, but hide only applies to the actual act of hiding, while MS applies to both equally. I used to think it was just adding them up, but after messing around with Yoshimo for awhile...(starts with 100 MS, and like 25 hide, he almost never fails to high when in a shadow, and stays hidden ridiculously easily), it changed my opinions.

So I did a little test for myself. taking a human with 14 dex and maxed MS, and tried hiding, and the same thing, but with hide instead, and he consistently performed better with just the MS.

More then likely, MS is basically the stealth skill, and hide is just...kind of there...originally part of the same skill, but when they split them, they didn't give them equal contribution to overall stealth.

Like say, MS is 75% and hide is only 25%, or some crap....that's the best I've come up with.

Oxford_Guy

I always take an NPC who I can focus on stealth, either a ranger build (if good), in fact I'm thinking of playing a Stalker as my PC in my next "good" game (they get a bonus to stealth and can backstab) or a thief (Montaron in my current game), mostly to be able to reliably scout in daylight, it makes it so much easier to prepare and buff your party before major battles if you can scout out encounters beforehand. I also love to backstab, especially enemy casters. The only thing that is slightly annoying is that you can't go stealth and find traps/disable traps or open locks whilst stealth (but can if invisible or under sanctuary, one of the reasons why thief/mages and cleric/thieves are great, though you can't backstab from Sanctuary). One of the overlooked things about backstabbing is that you don't just get the x2/x3 etc/ damage multiplier, you also get a -4(?) bonus to your initial to-hit role.

TheSwamper

I am not in doubt of the usefulness of the skill, I was referring to need.

I was thinking that except for one spot, it seems to me you can easily cruise through the whole game (not sure about TOSC) without once having to use MS or HIS. Knowing this, my current party has one half thief (dual thi/fig 5/9) who I will be only putting points into OL and FT. Once they are both at 100, I'll look to the other skills if I have any points leftover.

In other words, if it wasn't for locks and traps, I wouldn't take a thief at all. I know they can do sweet backstab damage, but the time taken for setting it up doesn't seem worthwhile. You could have everything dead by the time the thief gets in position.

lunar

A thief with boots of speed and good backstab weapon (fast with at most + possible) is very useful. Send her stealthed into a dungeon and backstab those dangerous foes you don't want your fighters to go toe to toe with. (ghouls, ghasts, vampiric wolves, golems) Backstab and quickly run..run away and turn a corner and hide in shadows ASAP. The enemy may follow you but will stop, confused to where you are if you've hidden succesfuly. This leaves perfect opportunity for another backtab! Repeat the procesx until the enemy is dead. This is a fun and engagin way of killing monsters, and if done right your thief will not lose even one hit point.

lunar

Sorry, double post-funky internet connection and all

Pantalion

Need? No. Potentially find convenient to have?

Eh, maybe.