Script: Stealth in GURPS
You know the classic party composition – a
fighter, a cleric, a wizard, and a rogue. What is the main skill of the rogue?
That’s right, Stealth. Is Stealth simple in GURPS? Hell no, it’s very
confusing. You would expect something that comes up very often in games, and
Stealth does come up often, to be clearly explained, but it just isn’t. So,
let’s make sense of it. This is going to be useful for me, and, hopefully, for
you as well.
First of all, what skills are used to do
stealthy things in GURPS? GURPS has three stealth skills – Camouflage,
Shadowing, and Stealth. Let’s talk about Stealth first, because it’s one of the
most complicated skills, and definitely the most complicated stealth skill.
What might be surprising, is that Stealth in GURPS is less granular than in
D&D 3.5. If you remember, that system had Hide and Move Silently as
separate skills, but in GURPS, Stealth covers both of these applications.
Stealth
has four applications – concealing yourself anywhere except in a totally bare
room, move silently, stalk game, or follow someone without being noticed but not through a crowd – for that use
Shadowing!
Sounds
simple, right? Things get more complicated – Stealth works differently
depending on if there is somebody specifically
on the alert for intruders or not. If nobody is on the lookout, then you make
an unopposed Stealth roll. If somebody is
on the lookout, this becomes a Quick Contest of Stealth against Perception or
Observation. Things get more difficult when you have to sneak through an area
that has somebody on the alert for intruders and somebody who is not. In that
case, your Stealth roll will be contested against some creatures, but not
others.
-
If
you are sneaking past an unaware target, simply roll Stealth with all the
appropriate modifiers described in the skill – I will talk about them later –
and all bonuses from advantages and equipment.
-
If you fail, then we have another split.
o
If
you are in the target’s arc of vision, then he makes a Vision roll to notice
you. This Vision roll is modified for range using the normal range penalties,
is modified by your posture (use melee attack penalties), cover (use to-hit
penalties), darkness, your Size Modifier, and certain modifiers from your
advantages and equipment. You should keep in mind that a person using Stealth
very rarely counts as a person in plain sight, so most of the time, there is no
+10 bonus for that.
§ If he succeeds, he spots you.
§ If he fails,
he does not spot you.
-
If you succeed on your initial
Stealth roll or in any other case, the target might still hear you!
The target rolls Hearing modified for background noise (remember that total
silence is very rare), and at a penalty that depends on how well you rolled
your Stealth. I will show you a fragment of the Loudness Levels table from page
21 of GURPS Powers: Enhanced Senses. This table says that a failed Stealth roll
produces a sound that can be heard with an unmodified Hearing roll on a
distance of 1 yard. Each step on this table, which usually means each doubling
of distance, imposes a -1 penalty. So, if you failed your Stealth check while
you are 4 yards away, the target can hear you with a Hearing-2 roll. A critical
failure on Stealth gives a base hearing distance of 8 yards. A successful
Stealth roll has a base hearing range of 9 inches. This means that if you
succeeded on a Stealth roll while 1 yard away from the target, the target can
roll Hearing-2 to hear you. A critical success on a Stealth roll gives a base
hearing distance of 1 inch. This means that if you critically succeeded on a
Stealth roll while 1 yard away from the target, the target can roll Hearing-5
to hear you. It is easier to just determine the penalty for a failed Stealth
check then add an additional -2 if you actually succeeded or -5 if you
succeeded critically.
Then, if the target failed to detect
you, he is unaware of your presence. If he succeeded, he might be aware of you,
but depending on the distance it might be too late.
That’s too many rolls, isn’t it?
Especially if you include smell. You can simplify this process by making the
target only roll against their best
sense for that specific case. Or, if the target is unaware, you can simply
treat a successful Stealth roll as successfully sneaking up to the target
within one yard. This is absolutely okay, and, if I am correct, this is
actually how it is supposed to work. All the complications that I have talked
about earlier arise from the Loudness Levels table. It’s all up to you, you
have to choose the resolution mechanic that suits your game.
But what if the target is on the lookout for intruders? Then
you have to roll a Quick Contest of Stealth versus the target’s Perception. The
same modifiers apply, and depending on your relative position, the target might
be using Vision, Hearing, or both. You may either roll them separately or, just
like I said before, use the best sense for that situation. If you lose in this
Quick Contest, you get spotted. But you might ask, if this is resolved as a
Quick Contest, how does Hearing work then? You must know the base hearing
distance, but there’s no such thing as failure or success in a Quick Contest,
so you cannot determine your base hearing distance from it. Fortunately, Kromm
has a post on the forums that states that in this case, your base hearing
distance is equal to your Move. I will link this post in the description.
I hope that this is clearer to you
now, and I really hope that I did not make any mistakes – this is not something
I am an expert in. Now, I’d like to mention modifiers that the Stealth skill
takes. First of all, it is penalized by your encumbrance level. If you are hiding
from sight, then you are at -5 to hide in an area without “natural” hiding
places, or +3 or more if there are many hiding places. You are at -5 when
trying to fool those with Discriminatory Smell. Also, if you are trying to move
silently faster than at Move 1, then you are at -5 to Stealth. Again, Kromm
suggests replacing the last penalty with a penalty equal to your Move. There
are some additional modifiers that depend on the surroundings, gear,
advantages, disadvantages, and many other factors, but the ones I listed are
the most generic ones.
One question that might arise is how
often do you have to roll Stealth? Do you have to roll every second while
you’re hiding? I recall seeing Kromm say on the forums that you only have to
roll again if the conditions change for the worse for you, but I cannot find
that post for the life of me.
I would also like to link some
reading material for you.
First, an unofficial GURPS FAQ post
about Stealth where Kromm explains some things about Stealth.
Second, another forum post that
presents a house rule that expands the Stealth mechanics, making them both more
intuitive and granular, while staying within the existence rules framework.
Definitely check this one out, it seems to be very good.
Third, I’d like to give a shout-out
to a GURPS blog called GURPS: Shooting things for fun and profit. The author of
the blog has two posts that describe everything related to Stealth and
Camouflage in great detail. While it is intended for games set in contemporary
time periods, it is nonetheless very useful for low-tech or ultra-tech games.
Give it a read. All links are in the description.
I
mentioned Camouflage. How is it different from Stealth. First of all,
Camouflage is an Easy difficulty skill. Unlike Stealth, it only works against
Vision, it does not hide you from Hearing or Smell. It can be used to
Camouflage your position or to at least break up your outline to give a -1 to
hit you with ranged attacks. Unlike Stealth, Camouflage can work on others – you can use it to camouflage
another person, a vehicle, a camp, or a trap. Unlike Stealth, Camouflage always
is opposed by Vision in a Quick Contest. It does not replace Stealth, but it
can complement it. For example, if you fail a Stealth roll while camouflaged
and get heard, the target must still see through your camouflage to find you!
The aforementioned Stealth guide that I linked in the description also talks
about Camouflage in great detail.
Finally,
there’s Shadowing, another skill for stealthy characters. This skill is more
limited – it lets you follow another character through a crowd unnoticed. Roll
a Quick Contest of Shadowing vs. the subject’s Vision every 10 minutes. If you
lose, you lost the subject; if you lose by more than 5, you were seen. Once the
subject is aware of the fact that you are shadowing him, roll a Quick Contest every
five minutes: your Shadowing skill vs. his Shadowing or Stealth skill. If he
wins, he eludes you. If he loses by more than 5, he thinks he eluded you. If
you critically fail, you lose him and follow the wrong person. And that’s
basically it. As you can see, this skill is only useful in urban environments.
Unofficial GURPS FAQ about Stealth -
http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.php?p=1825829&postcount=69
House Rule: Stealth - http://forums.sjgames.com/showpost.php?p=1329938&postcount=8
GURPS Stealth and Camouflage Guide
Part 1 - http://gurpsshooting.blogspot.com/2019/08/gurps-stealth-and-camouflage-guide-part.html
GURPS Stealth and Camouflage Guide
Part 2 - http://gurpsshooting.blogspot.com/2019/10/gurps-stealth-and-camouflage-guide-part.html
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