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About this mod
I love sneaking around, it\'s one of the most fun parts of the game. Unfortunately once you reach a certain sneak level there is no challenge in it. If you avoid bright light and stay behind your enemies they never see you, no matter what you do. This mod aims to make sneaking a bit more challenging even for characters with a sneak skill of 75+.
- Permissions and credits
== Sneak Penalties ==
REQUIRES OBSE
I love sneaking around, it's one of the most fun parts of the game. Unfortunately once you reach a certain sneak level there is no challenge in it. If you avoid bright light and stay behind your enemies they never see you, no matter what you do. This mod aims to make sneaking a bit more challenging even for characters with a sneak skill of 75+. So here is what the mod does:
1. Walking and running increases your chance of being detected, but what about looking around and rotating your body? I always found it odd that my character can act like a whirling dervish in front of an enemy as long as he doesn't walk and stays in the dark. Now you'll get a penalty for rotating/looking around (moving the camera along the z-axis). The faster you rotate, the higher the penalty will be. If you hear something behind you and turn around by 180° in a split second for example your chances of being detected will greatly increase.
2. I'm not sure whether jumping has an impact in the vanilla sneak system (at least it is not mentioned on the detection page of the CS Wiki), but if it has the impact is far too low. Jumping is loud and a fast moving body can easily be spotted. This mod gives a sneak penalty if you jump or fall down.
3. The higher your sneak skill, the easier sneaking becomes. Sounds good, but after a certain point it becomes too easy in my opinion. I made a setting that reduces the effectiveness of your sneak skill depending on its value. Very high values will be less efficient than before (albeit still more efficient than lower values of course) while low values will be almost as efficient as in vanilla so you can still sneak around with a sneak skill of 25 without being detected all the time. By default the setting will decrease the efficieny of a sneak value of 100 to what you would get
with a sneak value of 80 in vanilla. A low sneak value like 20 for example will be as efficient as in vanilla (almost at least, for statistic freaks: it will be as efficient as 19.2 points in vanilla).
4. While it can be hard already to sneak in front of someone with a line of sight it is incredibly easy to sneak up on someone with no line of sight. The principle stays the same (sneaking is much, much easier if enemies have no line of sight), but I altered a game setting so you need to be a bit careful at least when you approach someone from behind.
5. If you stand still in a dark spot in vanilla nobody will ever see you, even if the person is only a few feet away from you with a direct line of sight. This mod gives your character a penalty for standing still. Doesn't sound right at first, but no worries, standing still is more effective than walking around even with this penalty. But it's not equal to invisibility like in vanilla.
6. If an enemy has a line of sight while you wear a torch or have a light spell active you get a penalty for sneaking by default already due to the light that shines on you. But if enemies don't have a line of sight you don't get any penalty, which is quite unrealistic if you approach someone from behind while wearing a torch. Even the most stupid person would notice that someone is behind him if suddenly the whole room around him would light up and if he'd hear a burning torch behind him. Now there is a penalty for wearing a torch or using a light spell, line of sight or not.
7. By default if an actor is in 'alerted state' (if they say things like 'Who's there?' etc) they don't move at all. They're frozen in place and look in the direction they were facing when they got into the alerted state. Once the alert is over ('Must have been the rats' etc) they return to their normal behavior and start to walk around again. Now they will start to look around slowly in alerted state. They won't suddenly look in the opposite direction, but the longer they are in alerted state the more they will look around so you need to be careful and adjust the angle at which you approach them if they're alerted.
8. While feature number 5 already makes it easier for enemies to spot you while you stand still it is not enough as I noticed. Some enemies still bumped into me while I was waiting and I even managed to sneak past a goblin right in front of his nose (I even bumped him to the side since there was not enough space for both of us!). Now there is a minimum distance at which someone with a direct line of sight will always spot you. If you come within someone's reach while he's looking in your direction the fun is over, 100 sneak or not.
9. You get a small penalty for being in combat with another enemy while in sneak mode, but it's still pretty easy to fight enemies undetected with other enemies standing nearby as long as you don't leave sneak mode. Now you'll get a huge penalty for being in combat. To make it more interesting I added a timer so you always get a second chance before other enemies are alerted. If your first sneak hit didn't kill the enemy you get a few seconds to finish him off before all hell breaks loose. If you manage to kill him during that time nothing will happen and no one will notice you. I also made sure that this part of the mod is compatible with SM Combat Hide, the penalty is removed after a few seconds in combat (enough time to alert all enemies around you, but it's not impossible to hide afterwards if you use Combat Hide or a similar mod).
All penalties can be adjusted in an ini file.
= Installation =
Put the content of the archive into your Oblivion\Data folder. Check the 'PTSneakPenalties.esp' in the launcher. Don't forget that you can adjust all the penalties in the ini file in Data\ini.
= Compatibility =
All this mod adds is a self-contained script. Thus it is theoretically compatible with every other mod out there. Please note that the mod messes with some sneak game settings though. If other mods attempt to change them they may conflict. Nothing serious will happen, but you might see unexpected AI behavior in that case. Most stealth mods should work fine though, I use a few of them myself.
= Changelog =
v1.0
- Initial release
v1.1
- fixed a small oversight were a sneak penalty would stick if you went out of sneak mode while standing still (which would be removed the next time you sneak, but whatever)
- added two new features
- slightly reduced the difficulty for the default ini settings (just play with the ini if you think it's too easy now)
v1.2
- fixed a few bugs with the 'alerted state' behavior and made it look a bit better
- added another variable to the ini so you can adjust the amount of alertness
v1.2
- added a minimum distance at which enemies will always spot you if they have a line of sight
- added a penalty for being in combat while in sneak mode
- made sure the player is not affected by the token script (don't ask)
REQUIRES OBSE
I love sneaking around, it's one of the most fun parts of the game. Unfortunately once you reach a certain sneak level there is no challenge in it. If you avoid bright light and stay behind your enemies they never see you, no matter what you do. This mod aims to make sneaking a bit more challenging even for characters with a sneak skill of 75+. So here is what the mod does:
1. Walking and running increases your chance of being detected, but what about looking around and rotating your body? I always found it odd that my character can act like a whirling dervish in front of an enemy as long as he doesn't walk and stays in the dark. Now you'll get a penalty for rotating/looking around (moving the camera along the z-axis). The faster you rotate, the higher the penalty will be. If you hear something behind you and turn around by 180° in a split second for example your chances of being detected will greatly increase.
2. I'm not sure whether jumping has an impact in the vanilla sneak system (at least it is not mentioned on the detection page of the CS Wiki), but if it has the impact is far too low. Jumping is loud and a fast moving body can easily be spotted. This mod gives a sneak penalty if you jump or fall down.
3. The higher your sneak skill, the easier sneaking becomes. Sounds good, but after a certain point it becomes too easy in my opinion. I made a setting that reduces the effectiveness of your sneak skill depending on its value. Very high values will be less efficient than before (albeit still more efficient than lower values of course) while low values will be almost as efficient as in vanilla so you can still sneak around with a sneak skill of 25 without being detected all the time. By default the setting will decrease the efficieny of a sneak value of 100 to what you would get
with a sneak value of 80 in vanilla. A low sneak value like 20 for example will be as efficient as in vanilla (almost at least, for statistic freaks: it will be as efficient as 19.2 points in vanilla).
4. While it can be hard already to sneak in front of someone with a line of sight it is incredibly easy to sneak up on someone with no line of sight. The principle stays the same (sneaking is much, much easier if enemies have no line of sight), but I altered a game setting so you need to be a bit careful at least when you approach someone from behind.
5. If you stand still in a dark spot in vanilla nobody will ever see you, even if the person is only a few feet away from you with a direct line of sight. This mod gives your character a penalty for standing still. Doesn't sound right at first, but no worries, standing still is more effective than walking around even with this penalty. But it's not equal to invisibility like in vanilla.
6. If an enemy has a line of sight while you wear a torch or have a light spell active you get a penalty for sneaking by default already due to the light that shines on you. But if enemies don't have a line of sight you don't get any penalty, which is quite unrealistic if you approach someone from behind while wearing a torch. Even the most stupid person would notice that someone is behind him if suddenly the whole room around him would light up and if he'd hear a burning torch behind him. Now there is a penalty for wearing a torch or using a light spell, line of sight or not.
7. By default if an actor is in 'alerted state' (if they say things like 'Who's there?' etc) they don't move at all. They're frozen in place and look in the direction they were facing when they got into the alerted state. Once the alert is over ('Must have been the rats' etc) they return to their normal behavior and start to walk around again. Now they will start to look around slowly in alerted state. They won't suddenly look in the opposite direction, but the longer they are in alerted state the more they will look around so you need to be careful and adjust the angle at which you approach them if they're alerted.
8. While feature number 5 already makes it easier for enemies to spot you while you stand still it is not enough as I noticed. Some enemies still bumped into me while I was waiting and I even managed to sneak past a goblin right in front of his nose (I even bumped him to the side since there was not enough space for both of us!). Now there is a minimum distance at which someone with a direct line of sight will always spot you. If you come within someone's reach while he's looking in your direction the fun is over, 100 sneak or not.
9. You get a small penalty for being in combat with another enemy while in sneak mode, but it's still pretty easy to fight enemies undetected with other enemies standing nearby as long as you don't leave sneak mode. Now you'll get a huge penalty for being in combat. To make it more interesting I added a timer so you always get a second chance before other enemies are alerted. If your first sneak hit didn't kill the enemy you get a few seconds to finish him off before all hell breaks loose. If you manage to kill him during that time nothing will happen and no one will notice you. I also made sure that this part of the mod is compatible with SM Combat Hide, the penalty is removed after a few seconds in combat (enough time to alert all enemies around you, but it's not impossible to hide afterwards if you use Combat Hide or a similar mod).
All penalties can be adjusted in an ini file.
= Installation =
Put the content of the archive into your Oblivion\Data folder. Check the 'PTSneakPenalties.esp' in the launcher. Don't forget that you can adjust all the penalties in the ini file in Data\ini.
= Compatibility =
All this mod adds is a self-contained script. Thus it is theoretically compatible with every other mod out there. Please note that the mod messes with some sneak game settings though. If other mods attempt to change them they may conflict. Nothing serious will happen, but you might see unexpected AI behavior in that case. Most stealth mods should work fine though, I use a few of them myself.
= Changelog =
v1.0
- Initial release
v1.1
- fixed a small oversight were a sneak penalty would stick if you went out of sneak mode while standing still (which would be removed the next time you sneak, but whatever)
- added two new features
- slightly reduced the difficulty for the default ini settings (just play with the ini if you think it's too easy now)
v1.2
- fixed a few bugs with the 'alerted state' behavior and made it look a bit better
- added another variable to the ini so you can adjust the amount of alertness
v1.2
- added a minimum distance at which enemies will always spot you if they have a line of sight
- added a penalty for being in combat while in sneak mode
- made sure the player is not affected by the token script (don't ask)