Tome of Prowess (3.5e Sourcebook)/Stealth

Stealth

Key Attribute: Dexterity

The stealth skill is a movement skill involving cover, concealment, and blind spots. With it you can walk past guards without their noticing, sneak up on a sentry, or tip toe past a creature that sees everything touching the earth nearby. Return to Top

Base DCs and Modifiers

Absolute Vs. Relative Size Modifiers

Absolute size modifiers need to die in a fire. Giants are not at a hiding disadvantage against other giants in giant sized surroundings. Gnomes are not at a hiding advantage in their own communities. These two things only happen because we have absolute stealth penalties for size and no cancelling adjustments for spotters of varying size. Relative bonuses and penalties for being bigger or smaller than your surroundings are fine however, and size bonuses have been converted to these contextual things.

Relative Size	Check Modifier	Example
Three or more sizes larger than environment and searcher	-10	Tarrasque in a human city.
Two sizes larger than environment and searcher	-5	Hill giant in a Pixie village.
One size larger than environment and searcher	-2	Human in a gnome burrow.
Same size as environment and searcher	+0	Halfling in a gnome burrow.
One size smaller than environment and searcher	+2	Halfling in a human bar.
Two sizes smaller than environment and searcher	+5	Dwarf in a storm giant's home.
Three or more sizes smaller than environment and searcher	+10	Gnome in a titan's home.
Drawing Attention	Check Modifier	Example
Moving at a hustle, or faster, along with a dense crowd	+5	Running with the bulls.
Moving along with a crowd	+0	Pressing a fence for an autograph.
Moving with a crowd, but not as fast	-2	Meandering though a bustling market.
Standing still within or moving against a quickly moving crowd	-5	Standing against a panicked crowd.
Standing still in a clear space	+5	Leaning against a streetlight.
Moving at an unhurried pace in a clear space	+0	Walking down a street.
Moving at a hustle in a clear space	-5	Jogging away from the scene of a robbery.
Moving flat-out in a clear space	-10	Running across a castle wall.
Involved in a fight or other disturbance	-15	Any tavern brawl ever.

Untrained Uses

Avoid Notice

Anyone can keep their head down and their hood up when they have to. If someone is searching a crowd for you, or you are being generally observed but haven’t been specifically picked out, you may make a stealth check to continue to avoid notice. This check is a free action, and is made at the end of your turn with modifiers based on what you did during your turn. Your check result sets the base DC for a searcher’s perception check to notice you, and you must make a new check each round that you attempt to avoid notice. Your check result may not exceed 25 at this level of skill.

This ability is used to sneak up behind someone; if you reach them before they notice you they are flatfooted against your attack. Attacking someone alerts them to the square you are in, and carries sufficient penalties that they probably notice you, but it's not guaranteed. It is difficult, but not impossible, to sneak up on someone and stab them in the back while remaining effectively hidden, though they would certainly be aware of the attack and take measures to protect themselves if possible.

If you are noticed, you can’t continue to avoid their notice with a check anymore. Worse, they can point you out or describe you to their friends, granting them bonuses to locating you. You must escape or confuse their ability to detect you before you can make any additional stealth checks to avoid notice from any person who has noticed you. Some ways to accomplish this are running around a corner and hiding in a box while they don’t see you, disappearing into a crowd, gaining full concealment or full cover, or using the Combat Distraction ability of bluff to make them look away just long enough for a quick getaway. This doesn’t mean they don’t know where you’ve gone, just that you get to start making checks again for them to miss you when they come looking. If they see you disappear around a corner and then can’t find you, it might be perfectly reasonable for them to lightning bolt or web the alley to try and bring you out of hiding. Even after you break line of sight and can make new checks, they gain a bonus to finding you in the future because they know what they're looking for.

You take a penalty to this check if you draw attention to yourself. The most common ways to draw attention to yourself are moving in ways that stand out or becoming involved in a fight or commotion; these modifiers are included in the table above. Note that you suffer no penalty if you are traveling with a group of fast moving people, as not moving as quickly as everyone else would make you stand out instead of blend in. Other ways of drawing attention to yourself may include being painted the wrong color during a festival or singing the wrong words while hiding in a choir. These less common ways of drawing attention to yourself may carry a penalty of up to -10 on your roll. The exact penalty is determined by the DM, and they are not required to tell you what the penalty is until after you make your check. You simply don't have the skill to determine the penalty before you have taken the action.

Base DC: None.
Check Result: Your check result sets the DC for an observer to spot you while you attempt to observe them from cover. You may not exceed 25 with this level of skill.

Clandestine Surveillance

You can hide behind a curtain, a well, or a hill and people on the other side of it can’t see you; they may not be able to hear or smell or otherwise sense you either. This isn’t a skill or ability; it’s just what happens when something sits between people. While that’s useful, and not anything you should ever roll for, sometimes you need to expose yourself and break cover to check out the people on the other side. That’s where a stealth check would be useful. Remaining hidden while observing is a free action, made in conjunction with any perception check that requires you to expose yourself. For purposes of this check, you are treated as being only as big as your exposed parts. This is generally three or more sizes smaller than your environment, and so you probably gain a substantial bonus on this check as indicated on the table above.

Base DC: None.
Check Result: Your check result sets the DC for an observer to spot you while you attempt to observe them from cover. You may not exceed 25 with this level of skill.

Rank 4 Uses

Avoid Detection

There is no limit to your check result with the Avoid Notice or Clandestine Surveillance abilities. You are also trained enough to know how large a penalty to your stealth check you would take from uncommon attention drawing conditions, like those described above, and can plan your route and actions better as a result. Mechanically, this means that you can ask the DM ahead of time what the numeric result of doing something would be if it isn’t listed, and they have to tell you, even if they'd rather not.

Rank 6 Uses

Team Player

Sometimes you have to bring the team with you into the shadows, and they may not have any idea what they’re doing. If you accept a -6 penalty to your stealth check, you may use your base check as the base result for every member of your group within 30’ for the purposes of avoiding detection. Each member suffers penalties individually based on their actions for the round however.

Alternately, your group can each make individual checks to avoid notice or detection, as appropriate for each character, and you may then reduce the result of your check to boost the checks of others. For every 1 point that you reduce your check by, you may increase the check of an ally by 2. You may not increase an ally’s check above your own reduced check with this ability, though you may increase their results above 25 if they would be limited from lack of training.

Rank 10 Uses

Foil Senses

When you hide, you can even mask your echo and vibrations. You show poorly against tremorsense, blindsense, and blindsight, and creatures must make a perception check to locate you with these abilities. These abilities are checked by the creature when they make a notice check against your avoid detection DC. This is an automatic ability that occurs whenever you try to avoid detection, though you may cancel it or reinstate it at any time as a free action. It does not apply to anyone you are assisting with the Team Player ability.

Rank 12 Uses

Fade Into the Background

People have a really hard time keeping an eye on you, even when they know you’re there. You can attempt a stealth check after someone has spotted you without first breaking line of sight or otherwise losing your pursuer, or while you are under any other sort of direct observation. You gain no special benefit to your roll, and may have a hard time pulling it off as your pursuer still gains a benefit from knowing what to look for.

If you also have the Hide In Plain Sight class feature, the bonus a spotter gains from having seen you is reduced by half.

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