How does the Stalker stealth progression work?

Oxford_Guy

I was curious to see how the Stalker stealth progression worked, so I rolled up a Dex 19 elf Stalker (in BGT-Weidu), which starts with 65% stealth, I then used Shadowkeeper to give him enough XP to level-up to level 2, and was surprised to find he had 71% stealth on levelling. I'm thinking that perhaps you actually get +5% per level (is this capped at all BTW?), but where did the extra 1% come from?

Oxford_Guy

Anyone? I posted this as someone posted elsewhere implying that Stalkers only got a one-off 20% stealth bonus, and no progression, which I (correctly) thought was wrong, so I tested this, but the progression confuses me - looks like somewhere between 5% and 6%

Schneidend

All I know is that Rangers automatically get better at Stealth as they level. I've never really paid much attention to how much it progresses since I never bothered having Minsc sneak.

Oxford_Guy

Schneidend said:

All I know is that Rangers automatically get better at Stealth as they level. I've never really paid much attention to how much it progresses since I never bothered having Minsc sneak.

For a Stalker it's really worth it, though, as they can't wear metal armour anyway, and is useful for both scouting (which I like to use extensively for rangers and thieves) and for back-stabbing.

CamDawg

It runs 6-7% per level, and will eventually cap at 99% base (plus your racial and dex bonuses).

Oxford_Guy

CamDawg said:

It runs 6-7% per level, and will eventually cap at 99% base (plus your racial and dex bonuses).

Cool, elf Stalkers are definitely the way to go for this Kit then, the sword and bow +1THAC0 are nice too, as well as the possibility of 19 Dex.

CamDawg

And in the interests of shameful self-promotion, both the XP cap remover and allow stealth in heavy armor components from BG2 Tweaks move the cap for ranger stealth up to 200.

simone

Hi all
I have a problem.
I'm playing a human stalker with DEX 18.
I started with a 45 % of stealth skill now i'm at level 2 and i have 58%
Is it right? I don't think.

[Deleted User]

The user and all related content has been deleted.

Oxford_Guy

Bhaaldog said:

CamDawg said:

And in the interests of shameful self-promotion, both the XP cap remover and allow stealth in heavy armor components from BG2 Tweaks move the cap for ranger stealth up to 200.

Stealth in heavy armour...

I presume it means you can stealth in heavy armour, but get a big penalty (at least I *hope* that's what it means...)

Dazzu

It seems good early on, but by mid SoA, what's the point of having more than 100% chance to hide.

Oxford_Guy

Dazzu said:

It seems good early on, but by mid SoA, what's the point of having more than 100% chance to hide.

You need more than 100% to be able to reliably hide in daylight, as get a big penalty when doing that

DinsdalePiranha

Dazzu said:

It seems good early on, but by mid SoA, what's the point of having more than 100% chance to hide.

iirc you need 150% stealth to hide in dimly lit places, and 200% to hide in daylight with an almost assured success rate. (99% or so)

stealth ofc means the average of hide in shadows and move silently.

Roller12

Its 400%. 200% in hide and 200% in move silently. Or any other combination of those.

The "%" are not percentages, just numbers. And even they would cap at 100, "%" still wouldnt make sense, because for example lockpicking never succeeds if too low.


Still very possible with a thief. And very, very deadly.

simone

Is there someone who can help me with my stealth 58% at second level when at first level i had stealth 45% ?

TJ_Hooker

Roller12 said:

Its 400%. 200% in hide and 200% in move silently. Or any other combination of those.

That's what @DinsdalePiranha said. He said that you needed 200 in stealth, and then said stealth was the average of move silently and hide in shadows, the average being (MS+HIS)/2. This would correspond to 400 in total between the 2 skills.

Roller12

@simone
This number is correct ( stalkers get +20 bonus on stealth)

[Deleted User]

Do boots of stealth and the like work correctly for Rangers?

Oxford_Guy

Kaigen said:

Do boots of stealth and the like work correctly for Rangers?

Good question, they can wear them, so I assume so

[Deleted User]

Something else I'm going to have to test out. Depending on how the game handles bonuses to "hide" and "move silently" as separate skills when your character has "Stealth," the various stealth-boosting equipment could do a good job of getting Stalkers from the stealth cap to frequently hiding successfully in broad daylight.

Quartz

@Kaigen

Kaigen said:

Do boots of stealth and the like work correctly for Rangers?

Yes. It increases your Stealth by 18%, which is half of its 35% (20% Move Silently 15% Hide in Shadows) rounded up.

[Deleted User]

Okay, so if the ranger caps at 99% Stealth, plus 8% for being an Elf and 18% for having 20 Dex. Add 18 for Boots of Stealth, 10 for the Night's Gift armor, for 153%, or 77% (assuming it rounds up) in broad daylight. Good enough for opening fights with backstab, and reasonably reliable for running away and hiding to backstab again mid-fight. Luckily most of the game takes place indoors or underground. You could get another 25% stealth with the Cloak of Elvenkind, but that means no Non-Detection. Any other stealth boosting items I'm missing? Last I checked, Rangers can't use the Mercykiller Ring, so that's out.

Mykra

Bhaaldog said:

CamDawg said:

And in the interests of shameful self-promotion, both the XP cap remover and allow stealth in heavy armor components from BG2 Tweaks move the cap for ranger stealth up to 200.

Stealth in heavy armour...

It's the old pen and paper statistics. So yes, you could stealth in plate, you just will take a 95% loss to the attempt. In BG1 - unless you overload the ability - you still will want to wear leather if you want to hide in shadows with any skill.

DinsdalePiranha

Roller12 said:

Its 400%. 200% in hide and 200% in move silently. Or any other combination of those.

The "%" are not percentages, just numbers. And even they would cap at 100, "%" still wouldnt make sense, because for example lockpicking never succeeds if too low.


Still very possible with a thief. And very, very deadly.

as previously pointed out, averages. and iirc both IWD and BG1 used percentages, which also sound pretty solid - with 100% find traps (before other modifiers), you can find any and all traps, with 100% open locks, you can open any lock, and with 100% stealth... well, you know it.

TJ_Hooker

DinsdalePiranha said:

Roller12 said:

Its 400%. 200% in hide and 200% in move silently. Or any other combination of those.

The "%" are not percentages, just numbers. And even they would cap at 100, "%" still wouldnt make sense, because for example lockpicking never succeeds if too low.


Still very possible with a thief. And very, very deadly.

as previously pointed out, averages. and iirc both IWD and BG1 used percentages, which also sound pretty solid - with 100% find traps (before other modifiers), you can find any and all traps, with 100% open locks, you can open any lock, and with 100% stealth... well, you know it.

I think he was getting at the fact that some of the thief skills are threshold-based, rather than be based on random chance, with the odds being determind by your respective skill.

ZanathKariashi

For locks and traps it's threshold based. if you don't at least meet the threshold, you'll never succeed. Being equal or up to 4 points higher is a 50% success chance per attempt (no penalty for failures), and 5 points or more over the threshhold is 100% success.

In PnP locks and trap disarming really is success % equal to your skill but you can never have more then a 95% success chance for any skill, and can't even place points to raise a skill (after race and dex mods) higher then 95 until level 10+. Certain well made locks or traps reduced your effective success chance by so much, so going over 95 did have benefit, but on the other hand, if you failed, you could never reattempt to disarm or unlock that particular lock or trap. (unless you somehow gained an additional level during the dungeon).

Hiding while in a shadow (your character is darkened) is equivalent to hiding in the lowest light level, so if you duck into a shadow and hide, anything above 50% has a decent chance of working per attempt)

[Deleted User]

ZanathKariashi said:

Hiding while in a shadow (your character is darkened) is equivalent to hiding in the lowest light level, so if you duck into a shadow and hide, anything above 50% has a decent chance of working per attempt)

Assuming the light map for the area is accurate, of course. Sometimes it'll look like your character is in shadow but you'll still have a surprisingly difficult time hiding. It's part of the reason why I like to push the stealth skills well past the 100% point.

CamDawg

simone said:

Is there someone who can help me with my stealth 58% at second level when at first level i had stealth 45% ?

Level two is correct, but the initial is wrong. Rangers should get a base stealth (15 from skillrng) plus bonuses from dexterity (10 from skilldex) and race (7 from skillrac) for a starting stealth of 32. Stalkers get an extra 20 on top of that for a starting score of 52, which should progress to 58 at level two. I'll look into why this is in error.

Oxford_Guy

Thanks! :-) Stalkers are my favourit ranger class, more how I imagine rangers to be, stealthy fighters

hammernanvil

Beastmaster starts at only 40 also should be 47.

ReadingRambo

I can't remember how is a stalkers spells implemented? Are they special abilities or in there spell list? Contemplating a dualed stalker at 13