Morrowind:Sneak

Skill: Sneak
Governing Attribute: Agility
Specialization: Stealth
Increase: Successful Pick Pocket: +2.0 Avoid Notice: +0.25

The Sneak discipline is the art of moving unseen and unheard. Skilled sneaks are also adept pickpockets. Note that the skill does not improve simply from use and having the "sneak icon" on the screen. Despite the icon display, the skill only improves when within the detection range of a creature where they would notice the player. Sneak is a very useful skill, as it allows for critical hits.

Character Creation

The following races receive bonuses to their Sneak skill:

• +10 bonus: Wood Elf, +5 bonus: Khajiit

The following classes have Sneak as a Major skill:

• Acrobat, Agent, Assassin, Monk, Nightblade, Scout, Thief

The following classes have Sneak as a Minor skill:

• Archer, Witchhunter

Factions

The following factions include Sneak as one of their favored skills:

• Berne Clan
• Blades
• Camonna Tong (not joinable)
• Census and Excise (not joinable)
• Morag Tong
• Thieves Guild
• Twin Lamps

Trainers

Sneak is the only skill with two master trainers: Ri'Shajirr at Shenk's Shovel in Caldera, and Wadarkhu at Druegh-jigger's Rest in Gnaar Mok. Other trainers of note are:

• Aerin at the Andus Tradehouse in Maar Gan (up to 84)
• Ernse Llervu at The Abbey of St. Delyn the Wise in Vivec (up to 71)
• Todwendy at the Lucky Lockup in Balmora (up to 71)

See Sneak Trainers for the complete list.

Books

The following books will increase your Sneak skill:

• The Wolf Queen, Book VI
• 2920, Last Seed
• Azura and the Box
• Trap
• 36 Lessons of Vivec, Sermon 26

Sneak Mechanics

While Sneaking, a Sneak Check is performed periodically - once every couple of seconds for targets not in combat, to every few frames for targets that are actively looking for you. The chance that you can successfully remain hidden can be generalized as (Player's Elusiveness - Target's Spot Chance)%.

Elusiveness

The Player's Elusiveness is equal to
(Sneak + Agility/5 + Luck/10) * (0.5 + Distance to Target/500) * (0.75 + 0.5 * Current Fatigue/Maximum Fatigue) + Chameleon Magnitude

Distance to target can be determined via the GetDistance Console function (bring up the console, click on the target, and type GetDistance, "Player").

Spot Chance

The target's chance to spot the player while they are Sneaking is equal to
(Sneak + Agility/5 + Luck/10 - Blind Magnitude) * (0.75 + 0.5 * Current Fatigue/Maximum Fatigue) * Direction Multiplier

The Direction Multiplier is equal to 1.5 while the player is on either side or in front of the target, and equal to 0.5 while behind the target

Notes

• The weight of your footwear negatively affects your ability to sneak, but in the unmodded game it only works for clothing and not for armor.
  • Morrowind Code Patch has an option to enable it for armor as well. OpenMW always has it enabled. Your sneak skill is essentially subtracted by the boots' weight.
• Unlike looking in owned containers, 'just looking' while pickpocketing is considered a crime and will get you a bounty if caught, as well as expelled if performed on a fellow faction member.
• Items may randomly not be visible in target inventories when pickpocketing while detected or with a low chance of success.
• Without an optional patch from the Morrowind Code Patch, pickpocket chance is effectively capped at 56% as it is rolled twice with a cap of 75% both when taking an item and when closing the pickpocket window. Item weight is also not factored in without the patch.
• Pickpocket chance is determined by the value of the item(s), your Sneak level, Luck, detection state (whether or not the hand-and-coinpurse icon is visible), and your target's Sneak level. Invisibility and Chameleon affect your detection state rather than pickpocketing directly, and despite governing Sneak, your Agility has no effect on your pickpocketing chances ^{[verification needed — see talk page]}. Your Sneak skill level has the largest direct effect on your pickpocket success chance; however, even at 100 Sneak, pickpocketing high-value items is nearly impossible. One easy way around this, assuming you can obtain a Fortify Skill effect for spellmaking, is to create a custom spell or enchant with one or more 1-second Fortify Sneak 100 on self effects, and cast it immediately before attempting a pickpocket. Do not include any other effects, an extremely high Sneak is all that is needed.
  • If you are playing the base game without Tribunal or Bloodmoon, you will not be able to access a Fortify Skill effect and therefore must make a much stronger Fortify Luck spell or enchant. If you also have a low (<35 or so) sneak skill and find it hard to remain undetected, you may also need a Chameleon or Invisibility effect to remain undetected, and wait for the hand-and-coinpurse icon to show up before attempting to pickpocket.
• Knocked down and calmed NPCs can be pickpocketed of any items(except equipped clothing/jewelry) without a chance of being caught. Though if any nearby NPC is observing this, they will still report the crime.
  • To keep NPCs from going permanently hostile, or the act counting as an assault, frenzy them first. The sequence should be Frenzy -> (optional) Destroy their armor/weapons with disintegrate spells so they would unequip them -> (optional)Drain their fatigue with spells -> Knockdown using Hand-to-Hand -> Calm -> Pickpocket.
  • Sometimes NPCs will rise up instantly after the calm, disallowing a proper knockdown-pickpocket. Simply repeating the sequence, in this case, won't help. To compensate for this, have your calm effect be long enough for you to be able to repeat the sequence before the initial calm expires. This refreshes the calm, instead of initiating it, and leaves the target knocked down.
  • Though Oblivion/Skyrim have similar mechanics that work through fatigue and paralysis - in Morrowind paralysis doesn't aid pickpocketing.
• An exploit for auto-raising Sneak skill: Being undetected within observation range of an NPC will raise Sneak continuously. If playing on PC, the Morrowind Code Patch project allows the Sneak mode to be toggled. Otherwise bind Sneak to a convenient key and hold it down with a small and heavy object, such as a hammer. On the Xbox, you can simply double click the joystick down to enter an always-Sneak mode to get the same effect. Leave the game alone for a while and the Sneak skill will keep increasing, as long as one or more NPCs are within observation range and are not detecting you. If you want to be guaranteed to not be detected while you are away, you can stack constant-effect Chameleon to (ideally) 100. This trick will only work if NPCs or creatures are within visual range to detect you, such as in a room full of people, or a busy area with walking NPCs. If you have low Sneak from character creation, you will almost certainly need to train it first or use strong Chameleon effects for this to be viable.
  • Another method is to Sneak up on animals outside of town. This can be dangerous since they will usually attack you if you fail. Sneaking up on scribs is safe. Fortified Luck and/or Agility can make this technique very effective – it can increase your Sneak by 2 or 3 points if your Sneak skill is quite low.
• The Chameleon effect will help hide you while sneaking. This is best done by stacking items, spells, and potions to get 100 points of Chameleon.
• If you steal an item while sneaking and while in range of an NPC, a sneak check is performed to determine if you succeed in stealing the item unnoticed. This check appears to use the sneak detection formula and not the pickpocket formula, so it it does not suffer from the issues pickpocketing chance does. The icon depicting a hand reaching into a bag does not mean you will succeed in stealing items, as a sneak check happens the moment you steal something.
• Unlike later games, critical hits carry the same multiplier regardless of weapon type used. This means Short Blades pair poorly with Sneak but greataxes and warhammers are extremely effective.

Bugs

• Pickpocketing doesn't take your stats into consideration properly (chance caps at 75% but is checked twice), making successful pickpocketing extremely difficult regardless of your Sneak Skill.
  • The Morrowind Code Patch fixes this bug.
• For some quests, when NPCs are supposed to give you item/s from their inventory, they don't check whether or not they still have the item/s. Even if you've already pickpocketed the item/s before the quest, they will still give you a second copy of the item/s when you undertake the quest. ^?
  • For example, you can pickpocket five samples of Treated Bittergreen Petals before receiving five more during Mephala's Quest. You can also pickpocket weapons from Lucan Ostorius; he will give you four more when you agree to undertake his quest.
  • By damaging their armor first, you can force Hisin Deep-Raed and Pemenie to take off their armor, which you can then pickpocket. After you've helped them out, they will still reward you with another copy of their armor.