Should a 50-foot Stealth Power Be Augmented?

[cohRock]

I am leveling up a Bane Spider, and one of his powers is Cloaking Device.  It has a stealth radius of 50 feet.  When they buffed the Concealment:Stealth power, it was brought to 55 feet to make it effectively an invisibility power.  This seems curious if 50 feet works fine as invisibility for spiders.  My question then is, should I put a Celerity Stealth enhancement in Sprint to bring the total factor to 80 feet?

[Lazarillo]

You can, but the way Stealth and Perception work in the game, you generally don't need it.  Like a lot of things, it's partially influenced by enemy rank (and possibly level scaling?...not sure about that), so at "only" 50, standing too close to a Boss or higher, for too long, might get you spotted, and bumping it up with the Celerity enhancement basically you can afk while being nose-to-nose with them.  That's nice for some folks, and it's not like there's anything else to put in Sprint as far as special effects.

 

But it's generally overkill, and enemies that are programmed to be extra perspective typically just ignore stealth no matter how much you have (Rikti drones, KoA, snipers).  So it's not like you're doing yourself any good there.

[Major_Decoy]

I do put a stealth into combat jumping or sprint on my Bane because sometimes I like to take the time to position myself inside of a cluster before attacking. I found that, without the celerity, I could usually do build-up and shatter or whatever, but sometimes they'd get in hit before I did.

 

That said, this is probably a topic better suited for the Soldiers of Arachnos forum.

Edited January 4, 2022 by Major_Decoy

[Snarky]

Generally no.  Any full stealth (the +stealth celerity is not full) is fine.  Then….there are things you cannot be stealthed from. Rularuu eyeballs. Ritki drones. Some Nemesis troops. Any ambush (98%?) run right to you stealth or no.  You get to know them.  

[Wavicle]

It depends on playstyle. I do have extra stealth on my Bane, but it's totally personal taste. It's not "necessary".

[GM Impervium]

Moved to the SoA sub-forum 😃

As others have said, you're already imperceptible to 95% of the stuff in the game. The stuff that can still see you? You'd need a LOT more stealth to bypass them than what the celerity will provide, so in this case, probably not worth it.

[Bopper]

2 hours ago, cohRock said:

I am leveling up a Bane Spider, and one of his powers is Cloaking Device.  It has a stealth radius of 50 feet.  When they buffed the Concealment:Stealth power, it was brought to 55 feet to make it effectively an invisibility power.  This seems curious if 50 feet works fine as invisibility for spiders.  My question then is, should I put a Celerity Stealth enhancement in Sprint to bring the total factor to 80 feet?

You have access to 5 sprints, so yes, you should always slot one of them with Celerity (or Unbounded Leap if you want a cheaper option). You don't need to use it regularly, but you'll have it available if you ever need more stealth.

[cohRock]

9 hours ago, Major_Decoy said:

I do put a stealth into combat jumping or sprint on my Bane because sometimes I like to take the time to position myself inside of a cluster before attacking. I found that, without the celerity, I could usually do build-up and shatter or whatever, but sometimes they'd get in hit before I did.

 

That said, this is probably a topic better suited for the Soldiers of Arachnos forum.

Thanks all for responding.  Sounds like it can make a difference, so I'll eventually slot the Celerity.

 

I posted originally in General because I did not know if there were other 50-foot powers, so I wasn't thinking of it as necessarily a VEAT-related post.

[Doomguide2005]

     The HCwiki article on Stealth should still be fairly accurate with regards to our stealth powers and afaik totally accurate with respect to foe perception.

     Minions - 45ft

     Lieutenants - 50ft

     Boss, EB, AV/Hero - 54ft

     Turret, GM - 100ft

     Sniper - 149ft 

Perception minus stealth equals the number of feet at which you'll be seen.  So if zero or less you're effectively invisible.  Which means your Bane should be 100% concealed (invisible) to Lts and minions.  AFAIK level difference plays no part in this (Rank clearly does).  Bosses, EBs and AV/Heroes will spot you if you get closer than 4ft.  So yes to my mind I'd want a bit more.  A stealth IO is an effective way to add some stealth to your overall value.  Snipers will be the most common threat that doesn't outright ignore stealth.  They can ruin your day by spotting you from a distance.   If they attack and hit they'll suppress your stealth and now that mob you've safely approached sees you and all hell breaks loose.  Note also the new Aeon SF has foes especially at the higher challenge ratings whose Perception base has been buffed (seems to be a fairly universal 66ft) but also may run Tactics or Tactics type powers.

 

     

 

Edited January 4, 2022 by Doomguide2005
Oops bad math corrected

[Wavicle]

14 hours ago, GM Impervium said:

Moved to the SoA sub-forum 😃

As others have said, you're already imperceptible to 95% of the stuff in the game. The stuff that can still see you? You'd need a LOT more stealth to bypass them than what the celerity will provide, so in this case, probably not worth it.

minions and lts 

 

bosses can still see you if you get close enough

[cohRock]

8 hours ago, Doomguide2005 said:

...

     Minions - 45ft

     Lieutenants - 50ft

     Boss, EB, AV/Hero - 54ft

     Turret, GM - 100ft

     Sniper - 149ft 

...

I just noticed that the Superior Invisibility power of an Illusionist has a 200-foot radius.  However, for controllers, anyway, the radius is capped at 80 feet.  Is the cap larger for a dominator?  I'm trying to figure out why they give it such a large radius, only to cap it at less than half that value.

Edited January 5, 2022 by cohRock

[Wavicle]

2 minutes ago, cohRock said:

I just noticed that the Superior Invisibility power of an Illusionist has a 200-foot radius.  However, for controllers, anyway, the radius is capped at 80 feet.  Is the cap larger for a dominator?  I'm trying to figure out why they give it such a large radius, only to cap it at less than half that value.

Dominators don’t get illusions.

 

 The answer is the original Devs couldn’t do math, which is the answer to most CoH “why is this stupid” questions.

Edited January 5, 2022 by Wavicle

[cohRock]

12 minutes ago, Wavicle said:

Dominators don’t get illusions.

 

 The answer is the original Devs couldn’t do math, which is the answer to most CoH “why is this stupid” questions.

I didn't realize that about Dominators.

 

Thinking a bit deeper, this might not be a matter of stupidity.  Some powers, such as Ice Control's Arctic Air, have a -Stealth effect, which Mids documents at -35 feet.  So in the case of Superior Invisibility, the Illusionist can laugh at this effect, because 200 minus 35 is still way above 80.

Edited January 5, 2022 by cohRock

[Doomguide2005]

3 hours ago, cohRock said:

I just noticed that the Superior Invisibility power of an Illusionist has a 200-foot radius.  However, for controllers, anyway, the radius is capped at 80 feet.  Is the cap larger for a dominator?  I'm trying to figure out why they give it such a large radius, only to cap it at less than half that value.

     Where are you seeing this 80ft Controller cap?  The hard cap per the HCwiki is listed at 200ft from level 32+.  That does imply it scales up presumably starting at 8th level, the earliest it's available for an Illusion Controller.  Using the slider in CoD it's still 200ft at lvl 8 so ... ?

 

     Also curious what you mean by "radius" as the power is a single target 'self' effecting power.

Edited January 5, 2022 by Doomguide2005

[cohRock]

6 hours ago, Doomguide2005 said:

     Where are you seeing this 80ft Controller cap?  The hard cap per the HCwiki is listed at 200ft from level 32+.  That does imply it scales up presumably starting at 8th level, the earliest it's available for an Illusion Controller.  Using the slider in CoD it's still 200ft at lvl 8 so ... ?

 

     Also curious what you mean by "radius" as the power is a single target 'self' effecting power.

I checked on a new controller who had just turned level 8 and chose Superior Invisibility.  So the cap might get higher as he levels up; I don't know.  The cap can be seen in the Base tab of the Combat Attributes window.  It is my understanding that the numbers shown here are "real" for the current time viewed.  I don't think they get out of date as a set of numbers stored in a separate text file might do.

 

ADD: He's 10 now, and the cap is at 90 feet.  So it does scale as the character levels up.

Edited January 5, 2022 by cohRock
added the ADD

[Doomguide2005]

5 hours ago, cohRock said:

I checked on a new controller who had just turned level 8 and chose Superior Invisibility.  So the cap might get higher as he levels up; I don't know.  The cap can be seen in the Base tab of the Combat Attributes window.  It is my understanding that the numbers shown here are "real" for the current time viewed.  I don't think they get out of date as a set of numbers stored in a separate text file might do.

 

ADD: He's 10 now, and the cap is at 90 feet.  So it does scale as the character levels up.

Cool, thanks good to know.

And that works out to adding 5ft per level until the controller reaches 32 and 200ft

Edited January 5, 2022 by Doomguide2005

[cohRock]

On 1/5/2022 at 9:48 AM, Doomguide2005 said:

Cool, thanks good to know.

And that works out to adding 5ft per level until the controller reaches 32 and 200ft

The 5 ft/level adds have continued apace.  He is level 22 now, with an active 150-foot stealth radius.  He's ahead of those lame snipers now, with their puny 149 feet.  🙂

Edited January 13, 2022 by cohRock

[Doomguide2005]

1 hour ago, cohRock said:

The 5 ft/level adds have continued apace.  He is level 22 now, with an active 150-foot stealth radius.  He's ahead of those lame snipers now, with their puny 149 feet.  🙂

And with his next level I would expect him to exceed a Stalker in Hide

[cohRock]

On 1/5/2022 at 9:48 AM, Doomguide2005 said:

Cool, thanks good to know.

And that works out to adding 5ft per level until the controller reaches 32 and 200ft

Verified correct.  At level 32, he achieved full access to all 200 feet of his stealth radius.

[Crasical]

I didn't realize that the cloaking device wasn't perfect stealth until I was level 50. I was hunting Circle of Thorns outside Grandville and had to pause for a second to let Shatter and Placate recharge, so I took a minute to just take a close-up look at one of the CoT Succubus-es wandering around on the beach, since you don't often get to take in all the details of enemy models in this game.

 

Boy was I surprised when she noticed me and slapped a third of my health bar off.

EDIT: Anyway you're probably fine without enhancing it, it's fine in almost every situation.

Edited January 17, 2022 by Crasical

[ScarySai]

It stands to reason that the dedicated stealth specializations should have better stealth powers. I don't even think this is even a question.

 

You can debate fort if you want, but NW/Bane should get stalker-level stealth without much of an argument.

 

Edited February 9, 2022 by ScarySai