Attacking From Stealth

[beaushinkle]

I'm having trouble adjudicating some stealth-related play, so I'd like some help going through some sample scenarios.

Scenario 1: Single Hunter, Single Prey

A single Prey with Per-13 stands 20 yards north on a path facing away from a hunter. The Prey is alert, but not looking south. The Hunter has Stealth-17 and wants to attack the Prey from behind, unnoticed.

Scenario 2: Multiple Hunters, Single Prey

A single Prey with Per-13 stands 20 yards north on a path facing away from a group of 10 hunters. The Prey is alert, but not looking south. The Hunters have Stealth-17 and wants to attack the Prey from behind, unnoticed.

Scenario 3: Multiple Hunters, Multiple Prey

4 Prey with Per-13 stands 20 yards north on a path facing away from a group of 10 hunters. The Prey are looking north. The Hunters have Stealth-17 and wants to attack the Prey from behind, unnoticed.

Goals

• I would like for whatever solution to be generic in that it applies fairly to both players and monsters.
• The solution should reflect that getting 10 Hunters to simultaneously ambush a party is more difficult than 1 Hunter.
• The solution should reflect that ambushing multiple alert Prey is more difficult than a single alert Prey.
• The solution should avoid rolling to failure (having all 10 hunters make individual rolls against all 4 prey has an extremely high chance of at least one failure.)
• The solution should avoid spotlighting the least stealthy player (rather than spotlighting the most stealthy). IE: If we're always making the player with the lowest stealth do the rolling, why did the highest-stealth player invest the points? See the alexandrian.

RAW
The rules as written talk about Surprise Attacks on DFE26 and then folks are mentally stunned. The RAW uses worst Stealth, which is misuse of spotlight IMO. If Surprise is achieved, it doesn't provide guidance for how you could begin combat by attacking someone from behind.

The rules mention Backstabbing on DFE57, but specify that at least half of the party remains conspicuous as a diversion. That means that Backstabbing is off the table for the Single Hunter. Never mind that the concept of enemies teleporting infinite distance, are required to all be behind the nearest target (and thus all pile up exactly in the same hex), and that Backstabbing doesn't interact with a Sentry's Perception or Observation, or the Backstabber's SM are all very weird.

[beaushinkle]

Here's what I have so far:

It's a quick contest of The Hunter's Stealth vs The Prey's Perception or Observation.

The best of the Hunters roll Stealth modified by

• encumbrance
• -5 if moving faster than Move 1
• -1 for each Hunter without training in Stealth
• Group Size: Use the Size and Speed/Range Table. Treat the number of Hunters as Yards, and use the associated Range penalty. So, 9 hunters would be a -4.

The best of the Prey roll Perception or Observation modified by

• +5 if using vision and the Hunter needs to come into an open area
• light penalties if using vision
• ambient noise penalties from blind fighting for hearing (DFA32)
• Group Size: Use the Size and Speed/Range Table. Treat the number of Alert Prey as Yards, and use the associated SM bonus. So, 20 Prey would be a +6.

Purposefully not included are range penalties to Perception. They're used to calculate detection distance.

If the Hunters win the contest, they're able to start the fight from whatever position they'd like, and the Prey side has Mental Stun. On the other hand, we use regular initiative order, which may mean that the Prey gets to act first (though they're stunned). Finally, when combat starts, we let any Alert Prey decide which direction they are facing after the tokens are on the map.

If the Prey win the contest, we use that to calculate how far away the Prey notice them, using the Speed/Range table again. For instance, if the Prey won the contest by 5, they wouldn't have won the contest if they had a -6 range penalty, which happens at 16 yards. Thus, the Hunters were noticed at 15 yards (the -5 range penalty row in the table). The hunters arrange themselves to be 15 yards away, the Prey choose their facing, and are mentally stunned, and combat begins.

Example
10 Bugbears with Stealth-16 try to sneak up on a sleeping camp of 4 PCs and 4 Pack Ponies at night. One PC (Per-14) and One Pony (Per-10) is awake. It's night (-4 vision) and dead silent. Entering into the PC's campsite has 10 yards of clearing.

The bugbears roll stealth vs : 16 - 1 (light encumbrance) - 4 (group size) = 11 and get a 12. Margin: -1.

The party rolls an 11 for perception. Vision would be: 14 + 5 (open area) -4 (night) = 15. Margin: 4. Hearing would be 14. Margin: 3.

The alert sentry wins vision by 5, and would detect the Bugbears at 10 yards with vision (when they come into the clearing). They win hearing by 4, and would detect at 16 yards with hearing.

[restlessgriffin]

Originally Posted by beaushinkle

I'm having trouble adjudicating some stealth-related play, so I'd like some help going through some sample scenarios.

Scenario 1: Single Hunter, Single Prey

A single Prey with Per-13 stands 20 yards north on a path facing away from a hunter. The Prey is alert, but not looking south. The Hunter has Stealth-17 and wants to attack the Prey from behind, unnoticed.

Are you ingnoring use of ranged attacks? A Scout using a bow with high skill has a great chance at one free attack at high prob of success (he can aim). Not much movement so stealth shouldn't be much of a problem.

Scenario 2: Multiple Hunters, Single Prey

A single Prey with Per-13 stands 20 yards north on a path facing away from a group of 10 hunters. The Prey is alert, but not looking south. The Hunters have Stealth-17 and wants to attack the Prey from behind, unnoticed.

Why do all 10 need to attack simultaneously? Ranged attack with ones who have it. Sneak with others, especially ones with high Stealth and good melee skills. The weakest links on Stealth should stay still until the prey is attacked, and then they join in.

What happened to the mages? Use magic to improve chances -- Bless, Grace, Invisibility, Hush, Mage-Stealth, No-Smell, Silence, ...

Scenario 3: Multiple Hunters, Multiple Prey

4 Prey with Per-13 stands 20 yards north on a path facing away from a group of 10 hunters. The Prey are looking north. The Hunters have Stealth-17 and wants to attack the Prey from behind, unnoticed.

Use magic if possible, see above.

Goals

• The solution should avoid spotlighting the least stealthy player (rather than spotlighting the most stealthy). IE: If we're always making the player with the lowest stealth do the rolling, why did the highest-stealth player invest the points? See the alexandrian.

Spotlighting means the most Stealthy player uses their Stealth to get in first attack OR to provide the diversion. Pick of stranglers one by one, remove guards, forward observers. Move to area away from the main party in different direction and provide diversion THERE so the prey is distracted and the main party can move in quickly with less stealth.

As to Spotlighting it highlights one characters abilities. They should be able to count on other party members NOT to screw things up by doing dumb things where their lack of skill is a hinderence. It the Scout and Thief have Stealth-17 but the Barbarian and Knight only have Stealth-11, then they need to have less Stealthy characters need to take a different approach. BTW, there is also spotlight for Leadership and Tactics! Make a plan and execute it. Work as a team. Magic users should buff other characters and/or the environment to improve odds in their favor.

RAW
The rules as written talk about Surprise Attacks on DFE26 and then folks are mentally stunned. The RAW uses worst Stealth, which is misuse of spotlight IMO. If Surprise is achieved, it doesn't provide guidance for how you could begin combat by attacking someone from behind.

If you're going to attack someone from behind, start with being very stealthy. Don't lead with the klutz or allow them to screw things up. Leave them behind or buff, so they are more stealthy.

The rules mention Backstabbing on DFE57, but specify that at least half of the party remains conspicuous as a diversion. That means that Backstabbing is off the table for the Single Hunter. Never mind that the concept of enemies teleporting infinite distance, are required to all be behind the nearest target (and thus all pile up exactly in the same hex), and that Backstabbing doesn't interact with a Sentry's Perception or Observation, or the Backstabber's SM are all very weird.

Single hunter needs to provide their own distraction. The old throw a stone over in another direction or something similar, the noiser the better. For sentry's you may need to slit throat while simultaneously muffling them.

[beaushinkle]

Let me clarify: I'm not looking for tactical advice for the Hunters for the Prey. I'm looking for a non-ambiguous way to mechanically arbitrate Hunters attempting to Stealth up to Prey and melee them.

Assume this is the only thing relevant to the situation. No magic, no ranged, no shenanigans. Just trying to figure out what happens when folks with stealth try to use it, as above, according to the above design goals.

[sjmdw45]

Originally Posted by beaushinkle

Goals

• The solution should avoid spotlighting the least stealthy player (rather than spotlighting the most stealthy). IE: If we're always making the player with the lowest stealth do the rolling, why did the highest-stealth player invest the points? See the alexandrian.

This goal is a deal-breaker for anything I'd come up with, because having stealth attempts spotlight the weakest link[1] is both absolutely realistic and a common trope in fiction. It only takes seeing one enemy soldier to realize you're under attack, no matter how many other enemy soldiers you didn't see. (Note: you may make poor decisions though if you don't realize how many enemy soldiers you didn't see.)

Traditionally the way you deal with non-stealthy characters on stealthy missions is you leave them behind until sentries are dealt with. In a DFRPG setting it might also be reasonable to apply range penalties to Vision rolls opposing Stealth/Camouflage and double range penalties to Hearing rolls opposing Stealth, but fundamentally there's still that opportunity for the newbie to mess up and make a loud noise, and get threatened by some grizzled old sergeant, "You give away our position one more time, I'll bleed you, real quiet, and leave you here. Got that?" (Predator.)

I think this goal is in conflict with all of your other goals. What you need instead is a way for very stealthy characters to benefit from their stealthiness even if there are non-stealthy characters in the party, and splitting the party (or at least letting some members lag far behind) is how you accomplish that.

[1] Note that combat (especially ranged combat) also tends to spotlight the character with the worst defenses, rather than the best, unless you keep them out of combat.

Originally Posted by beaushinkle

Let me clarify: I'm not looking for tactical advice for the Hunters for the Prey. I'm looking for a non-ambiguous way to mechanically arbitrate Hunters attempting to Stealth up to Prey and melee them.

Assume this is the only thing relevant to the situation. No magic, no ranged, no shenanigans. Just trying to figure out what happens when folks with stealth try to use it, as above, according to the above design goals.

Well if we ignore the problematic goal, all of your three scenarios are pretty simple in my opinion. The prey are roughly three seconds away from you at top speed (although you won't be moving at top speed), so (spitballing based on GURPS patterns and assuming I want a rule for repeated use and not just a ruling for one situation) I'd take the logarithm of the number of prey from the size/speed/range table as a bonus to the best prey perception (yards = number of prey, size modifier = bonus to best Perception but never worse than +0), and I'd roll a Quick Contest between that and the worst Stealth of all the hunters in motion after adding the logarithm from the size/speed/range table to the Stealth of all the Hunters (yards = distance away from nearest Prey at the moment of contact, size modifier = bonus to Stealth) penalized by the log number of seconds you'd have to move in the open to reach the prey (in this case 3, so a -1 penalty, although there's no implication that you'll actually move at top speed while sneaking).

Scenario 1: Stealth-16 (because hunter is approaching into melee, modifier +0, over 3 seconds, modifier -1) vs. Perception-13. Hunter will probably all sneak up right behind prey successfully; 71.9% chance of successfully sneaking.

Scenario 2: No change, still 16 vs. 13. (This is a concession to simplicity, and in practice there would usually be a weak link with worse stealth than the others.)

Scenario 3: Stealth-16 vs. Perception-15 (+2 for 4 observers, according to the usual pattern of rounding categories up on the size/speed range table, but really it doesn't matter which way you choose to round as long as you're consistent). 54.9% chance of success. Still doable but significantly harder, enough to pass the sniff test. With six prey the odds would go down to 45.9%--it's fairly likely that SOMEONE out of the six observers will hear you or turn enough to spot you before you finish your sneak.

If there were a wall or jungle foliage between you and the prey so that you're not sneaking out in the open, you wouldn't have that -1 penalty, and your odds of success would improve by a notch to 79.4% in scenario 1-2 and 63.8% in scenario 3.

P.S. You can probably tell I'm a fan of GURPS: GULLIVER.

[mburr0003]

Originally Posted by restlessgriffin

Goals

• The solution should avoid spotlighting the least stealthy player (rather than spotlighting the most stealthy). IE: If we're always making the player with the lowest stealth do the rolling, why did the highest-stealth player invest the points? See the alexandrian.

This is why I use GURPS Action 2 Exploits Teamwork! rules, and sometimes modify them.

In a nut shell, take the highest skill, add a bonus equal to the number of people in the group who have points in the skill (regardless of level), and subtract the group size. This gives the Spotlight to the PC with the highest skill and still penalizes the group if someone is completely without the skill.

Note, Action is a ruleset for cinematic games, so you're dialing down the 'realism'.

Also, if you still want everyone rolling, but for the highest skill PC to be able to offset a low skill, or poor roll from someone else, then I'd mix the Complimentary Skills and Teamwork rules. In this case everyone but the highest skill, the "team leader" so to speak, rolls. Every success adds +1, critical success adds +2, failure adds 0, critical failure adds -1, then again subtract group size and have the 'team leader' roll using the resulting bonus or penalty.

You can use individual Margins to decide combat order, with critical failures being "surprised" the first round of combat (this works especially well when both groups have high and low skills, so the ambushers and ambushees aren't split into "free to act" and "stunned" as groups, but often split as individuals).

[ravenfish]

The obvious way to spotlight a player with a high stealth skill would be to have everyone roll stealth separately, and be hidden or detected individually. If Stealthy Sam wins his stealth contest but his comrade Clumsy Carl fails his, then Carl is spotted and the fight is on, but Sam remains undetected for the moment and has a wonderful opportunity to open up with a backstab while the opponents are focusing on Carl.

[Dalin]

Originally Posted by mburr0003

This is why I use GURPS Action 2 Exploits Teamwork! rules, and sometimes modify them.

In a nut shell, take the highest skill, add a bonus equal to the number of people in the group who have points in the skill (regardless of level), and subtract the group size. This gives the Spotlight to the PC with the highest skill and still penalizes the group if someone is completely without the skill.

I didn't realize that the teamwork rules were different in Action and DFRPG. In DFRPG Exploits, p. 6, there's a section called "Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem." The mechanic here is to take the highest skill and subtract for the number of people with no points in the skill. No bonus for companions who have the skill.

Has anyone on here tried both versions?

[sjmdw45]

Originally Posted by Dalin

I didn't realize that the teamwork rules were different in Action and DFRPG. In DFRPG Exploits, p. 6, there's a section called "Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem." The mechanic here is to take the highest skill and subtract for the number of people with no points in the skill. No bonus for companions who have the skill.

Has anyone on here tried both versions?

They sound equivalent to me, just worded differently.

[beaushinkle]

Originally Posted by Dalin

I didn't realize that the teamwork rules were different in Action and DFRPG. In DFRPG Exploits, p. 6, there's a section called "Part of the Solution or Part of the Problem." The mechanic here is to take the highest skill and subtract for the number of people with no points in the skill. No bonus for companions who have the skill.

Has anyone on here tried both versions?

Imagine that you have Thief with Stealth 16, a Bard with Stealth-12, a Swashbuckler with Stealth-12, and a Wizard with no Stealth.

In the DFRPG rules, it would be 16 -1(for the wizard) = 15

In the Action 2 rules, it would be 16 + 3 (thief, bard, swash) - 4 (group size) = 15

They should always be equivalent: adding the number of people with the skill, and then subtracting the group size is equivalent to subtracting the number of folks without the skill.

The DFRPG wording is less math!