Dishonored-inspired Stealth and Retreat Mechanics

[Hormalakh]

I think that alerts should work within audible ranges. An enemy who spots something becomes alert. He looks in that general direction. If he sees danger, he alerts his neighbors this is within a sound range. If he carries a horn, the sound range increases.

 

Similarly, sound ranges can work on the type of ground you walk on. So even if stealth skill is high, walking on bubble wrap will not be advantageous.

 

E: Either audible alerts or line of vision should alert enemies. These should be working in mutual harmony.

Edited January 22, 2013 by Hormalakh

[Lephys]

3) I still don't think sneaking should give you extra xp. It should be an alternative activity that should be rewarded in a different way, i.e. by substantially improving the outcome of the quest. i.e. you snuck past the guards so that they did not kill the hostages.

 

I agree that every footstep you take, undetected, should not yield XP (and, therefore, every enemy you sneak past), but the entire act of sneaking and actually accomplishing something (especially when it's something that could not be accomplished with straight-up combat) should be rewarded with "extra" XP.

 

Example: There are combatants, and hostages (you guys already had a little hostage pseudo-example going). If you attack, they kill the hostages. Therefore, you have to get to the hostages BEFORE attacking to save them. But, obviously nothing in the specifics of this scenario prevent you from ALSO killing all the combatants who were holding the hostages. So, killing all the combatatants should be one objective (regardless of however XP is actually dished out, it should be dished out in some form or fashion specifically for handling the group of hostile hostage-takers), and successfully rescuing the hostages (happens to require some form of stealth) should be another.

 

So, in the way that you're looking at the XP, if you sneak in and rescue the hostages and get out without fighting, then the decision to fight, instead, after rescuing the hostages would reward "extra" XP (on top of the saving of the hostages.) And vice versa. However, you can't fight and THEN sneak, obviously. But, you can still do both, or either one alone. Both objectives would be potentially "extra."

 

 

Inchresting!

 

I'm curious if there'll be some (not insignificant) combat penalties for a party that has been spotted, like a penalty to defense for instance?

Or will such a party be as combat ready as a party that went directly on the foe, weapons unsheathed, with the intention to fight?

 

There's always the "surprise attack!" idea from turn-based RPGs of the old console days we could work into the math somehow. Which pretty much lines up with what you're suggesting, anyway. Whether it's a defense penalty, or a bonus to all the enemies' first attack rolls (in the old turn-based RPGs, then enemies that ambushed you all got to go first), I'm all for it.

 

And @Osvir, I like the idea of traversability/accessibility being a big factor. Like climb. It's not that you're a master of shadows, but if your people suck at climbing, they can't scale that 15-foot smoothish stone wall. Someone who knows how to climb and/or knows how to use a grappling hook might could do it. Of course, you still might have the element of "listen for the patrolling guard on the other side of the wall so that you don't throw a grappling hook and make a *TINK* 5 feet away from his head right as he's passing."

 

Which brings me to another interesting (to me, at least) facet of stealth. The ability to perceive that which you are trying to avoid's ability to detect.

 

For example, if we have relatively elaborate stealth (compared to the traditional binary "You're either stealthed or you aren't!"), what if the whole "Your non-Rogue folk can be sneaky, too, but not as well as your Rogueish folk" notion was based heavily upon the fact that only Rogues (or people with the much, much higher stealth abilities, a la deliberate focused skill point spending) could accurately "SEE" the enemies' detection ranges/radii?

 

In the exact same scenario, in a dimly-lit corridor, you might have a patrol of guards. Maybe there are shadowy alcoves along the length of it, but you don't have a masterful Rogue, so you think you could move about halfway when the guards are marching away from you, duck into the alcoves, wait for them to pass, then continue on until you round a corner and are out-of-sight, but you aren't sure. You might just have to fight, or you could risk it to find out.

 

Same scenario, you DO have a masterful Sneakster, and his knowledge of how much noise you could make exactly how close to those guards, and how far they could detect someone in this lighting, both moving and standing still (maybe different parts of the "vision" cone, *shrug*) would translate into UI indicators for the player.

 

In other words, what if part of Stealth was the detailed information of paths, vision ranges, and hearing ranges?

[UpgrayeDD]

I hope that alerting one guard doesn't automatically mean you've alerted the entire base

is should depend on the kinds of enemies you're fighting.  Enemies with mind powers or strong magics would make sense to have easy communication methods

[Lephys]

 

I hope that alerting one guard doesn't automatically mean you've alerted the entire base

is should depend on the kinds of enemies you're fighting.  Enemies with mind powers or strong magics would make sense to have easy communication methods

 

An excellent point. However, I will say that if you alert Psychic Thingy Steve, and he basically relays his exact first-hand sense-based info telepathically to Psychic Thingy Bill (who is 100 feet away around a bunch of corners), then you KILL Steve before Bill gets to you, you should still be able to surprise Bill to some degree (who only has knowledge of your location and position from the moment up 'til Steve died.)

 

If you slay Steve, then hide in a different room, Psychic Thingy Bill should come into the room you WERE in, where now-deceased Steve is, and remain extremely cautious while he decides how best to search for you. He should not have a GPS tracker on you forevermore once he is alerted to your sheer presence as an intruder.

 

That goes doubly for non-psychic thingies without cool names. u_u

[JFSOCC]

 

I hope that alerting one guard doesn't automatically mean you've alerted the entire base

is should depend on the kinds of enemies you're fighting.  Enemies with mind powers or strong magics would make sense to have easy communication methods

of course, there might be some situations where it does happen, but it shouldn't be an auto-fail whenever you're playing. otherwise stealth becomes fairly useless till you've maxed out your skill

[Osvir]

I hope that alerting one guard doesn't automatically mean you've alerted the entire base

 

I agree, but if the alarm goes off it goes off. If every guard is notified, then I think it's fair to say that the entire base gets alerted. P:E might introduce some Steampunk, reading on the Rogue on the wikia and you might come to the same conclusion.

 

So an alarm/megaphone or whatever is screaming in the Castle and every Guard knows what to relate that noise too (infiltration/danger/defend etc.etc. it's an alarm!), then I think they should be alerted. But if you take down one or two that saw you but didn't get to the button and/or you took them down quickly enough before they could yell or whatever, then the base shouldn't be alerted.

 

In Dishonored, the Guards start yelling "Help!" on High Chaos which alerts those close by, if they press the "Alarm" button, there's going to be guards upon guards coming at you (Fable style) and I didn't mind it to be honest.

 

Similarly, if I go into a base, take down some guys non-lethally then leave(and even if I dump the bodies somewhere) the M.I.A status of their fellow guards (or they wake up) should alert some slight confusion. If you took down some lethally and left midway, a high chance is that someone would find the body/the blood and alert the castle, and if you go back it might be harder to get around (Guards get +1 to Hearing dice-rolls).

[Osvir]

 

 

I hope that alerting one guard doesn't automatically mean you've alerted the entire base

is should depend on the kinds of enemies you're fighting.  Enemies with mind powers or strong magics would make sense to have easy communication methods

 

An excellent point. However, I will say that if you alert Psychic Thingy Steve, and he basically relays his exact first-hand sense-based info telepathically to Psychic Thingy Bill (who is 100 feet away around a bunch of corners), then you KILL Steve before Bill gets to you, you should still be able to surprise Bill to some degree (who only has knowledge of your location and position from the moment up 'til Steve died.)

 

If you slay Steve, then hide in a different room, Psychic Thingy Bill should come into the room you WERE in, where now-deceased Steve is, and remain extremely cautious while he decides how best to search for you. He should not have a GPS tracker on you forevermore once he is alerted to your sheer presence as an intruder.

 

That goes doubly for non-psychic thingies without cool names. u_u

 

Well, if you'd have abilities to spot someone on the map from far away (which I advocate for, [Clairvoyance] or whatnot), simply spotting a Cipher through the Fog of War they could be alerted by your presence, as you are manipulating souls around them to see where they are at. They should definitively have a good sense of Magic and manipulation of Souls around them.

 

If you send out a [sense Surrounding]-Scout thing with whatever Class, let's take Cipher as an example, perhaps an enemy Cipher can feel it, if you threw it out carelessly. If you don't shield your [Presence], then they could possibly have a "Oh hello I can see you on the entire map" homing in GPS. 

[Hormalakh]

The question really is how deep down the rabbit hole do the devs want to go with "stealth-type" mechanics? There are a plethora of game elements they could implement. Will these game elements allow interesting things to happen outside of stealth? The development time isn't unlimited and stealth isn't the main purview of the game.

 

Sound elements, enemies noticing comrades not on path, enemies noticing bodies/blood, enemies alerting allies, etc etc. These can be complex elements or fairly shallow. But do they add to other aspects of the game as well?

[JFSOCC]

I think a fairly small amount of mechanics can still lead to fairly deep gameplay. But I already made that argument in another thread.