[435] Combat State - it's pointless to attack before seen

In Pillars of Eternity, characters passive abilities and talents do not activate until the combat state has begun. This creates an issue where if you attack from Stealth (you know, where you're supposed to get an advantage) or you attack a neutral NPC to initiate combat you get NONE of the bonuses from your talents or passive abilities.

I can understand things like Chants not working until combat has begun but stuff like the Rogue's passives like Deep Wounds, Dirty Fighting, and all of that stuff only activates in combat - therefore if you play like a proper Rogue with a high stealth, stealth in and make a sneak attack to open combat, you get none of your passive bonuses.

This forces you as the player to let enemies see you first just so you can get the bonuses. So if I'm in stealth as a Rogue, I have to press ALT and exit Stealth mode just to get my passive abilities to activate, so that the combat state begins before I make my attack.

This is incredibly annoying, unintuitive and gamey - and I think it will short out a lot of players, especially new players, from the bonuses they should be getting in combat.

For attacking neutral NPCs, this forces you to open with a character that doesn't have any passives to waste, such as using a Fighter Knock Down instead of opening with your Rogue. After the Fighter's Knockdown has past the hit frame, you have to wait a split second for all the passives to activate THEN attack with your Rogue or whatever. It's really annoying.

I will paste a list of all of the stuff that does not activate when you do this, that should always be activated as a passive ability rather than enabling and disabling itself at the beginning and end of combat - which also pastes needless stuff into the combat log.

• Dirty Fighting - should be always active, like Weapon Focus
• Deep Wounds - should be always active, like Weapon Focus
• Reckless Assault - should be always active when enabled
• Zealous Focus - - should be always active when enabled

Edited February 15, 201510 yr by Sensuki