Oblivion talk:Sneak/Archive 1

This is an archive of past Oblivion talk:Sneak discussions. Do not edit the contents of this page, except for maintenance such as updating links.

SI Units

Do SI monsters all have incredibly high sneak? I find it almost impossible to traverse the SI landscape without being detected by every Gnarl, Grummite and Elytra. 100 sneak BTW. Also, this still seems to occur in dungeon darknessl; trying to sneak on a grummite from behind ALWAYS fails, which hurts my thief character's chance of survival a lot.

Uncategorized Talk

I removed the tip about using pickpocket to raise the sneak skill. Breaking into houses to sneak (trespassing bounty if caught) and pickpocketing are just unnecessary and risky if all you want to do is raise the skill. The act of opening the pickpocket window, even if you do not end up stealing anything is tantamount to the theft itself. Getting caught is instant deguildment if you practice it on your guildmates (Fighters/Mages/Dark Brotherhood). As a tip, the best way to raise the skill is to just sneak aroud sleeping guards and guildmates. You don't have to be doing anything illegal to get raise sneak skill.

The article mentions sneak attack bonuses of 4/2 and 6/3, but I've definitely seen 8/4 at high sneak levels. Anyone else corrborate this? --McC 04:06, 23 July 2006 (EDT)

Never seen a sneak bonus of 8/4, even with a sneak skill level of 100. Th232 22:43, 27 January 2007 (EST)

Are you running any mods by any chance? It's quite possible to change this sort of thing with mods. --TheRealLurlock ^Talk 22:48, 27 January 2007 (EST)

Another good sneak target for training is a Fighters Guild porter. They stay awake 24 hours a day, they don't move around and there's one in each city. Enter the guild, let the porter follow you to a dark corner and start walking.

someone removed my imperial palace tip. why? Irishguy42 16:36, 27 January 2007 (EST)

I assume you mean the tip that I deleted in this edit. There's a section earlier in the page devoted to discussing how to increase sneak, and the points mentioned in your tip are already covered there or elsewhere. The Imperial Palace is just one of hundreds of places where you can "Sneak behind walls that hide you from nearby people or creatures." As the page states "Guardsmen in towns are good targets"; there's nothing I know of that makes the Imperial Palace guards better than any of fifty other locations where a guard is always standing. Using autorun is already described. Much more detailed information about how long it will take to train sneak is provided at Increasing Skills; that page also includes the necessary information on how to take into account whether sneak is a major or specialization skill.

Although the Imperial Palace may be your favorite spot to train sneak, it's not possible to provide a list of every person's favorites; the purpose is to provide information to readers in the most useful possible way. Therefore notes that repeat information already provided on the same page tend to get deleted. Especially when the notes provide first-person accounts (i.e., that you went to watch an episode of 24) that are not consistent with the site's style guidelines.

Please don't take this to mean that you shouldn't continue to contribute to the site. If you feel like information is missing from a page, please add it. And if you don't understand why a change was made, you should definitely ask (checking the page's edit history to see what reason was given for the change can also be worthwhile). I hope my answer helped you to understand my reasons :) --Nephele 22:51, 27 January 2007 (EST)

Right...okay, didn't see that. I will keep this in mind. (im kinda new to editing wiki's). Irishguy42 10:25, 28 January 2007 (EST)

Is it possible to give your followers items through pickpocketing? Acheeze 22:30, 7 July 2007 (EDT)

Only if they are 0 weight items. So, generally you will need to use the permanent bound items glitch if you wish to give them armour or weapons. --Saruuk 00:04, 8 July 2007 (EDT)

Is there a guaranteed way to make them equip them? Acheeze 02:05, 8 July 2007 (EDT)

Hit them. Really, really hard. Well no, not that hard... Get into a fight with them, and they should equip the best armour and weapons in their inventory. Then yield to them. --Saruuk 03:29, 8 July 2007 (EDT)

A full list of zero weight items can be found here. --Rpeh^Talk 14:25, 8 July 2007 (EDT)

Did anyone else notice how much more vulnerable you are if you stay stealthed while in combat? If the lighting and distance from other NPC's is favorable you can still avoid detection from others, keeping it a one on one fight, but you won't fight in top form. All attacks will be slow sneaking power attacks, and there seems to be a huge penalty to blocking and armor defense; all hits taken seem to deal heavier damage and power attacks frequently succeed in their effects.

I don't know about taking damage, but you do attack (considerably) slower while in sneak mode. Makes sense really, considering that you're crouching down and crawling about on yours knees; not really a prime stance to adopt in good ol' fashioned fisticuffs fight. --Saruuk 17:44, 9 August 2007 (EDT)

I just bought a house in Leyawiin, and noticed that I can pickpocket Martin and Jauffre to no end, right in front of them, and they never catch me when we're inside the house. Is this intentional?

lol everyone forgot about the best way to train sneak, the stalker you get for beating the arena faction quests

Remaining undetected

Maybe someone else can confirm this; hugging a wall seems to make a huge difference, in your chance of detection, even moreso than light levels. So many times I've been caught stepping around a corner or out of a corridor into the light, then reloaded and came through at about the same pace, holding close to a wall, and walked within 10 degrees of line of sight without being detected, in the same lighting conditions.

Multiple sneak attack

Yes, it is possible. However, it's not in the way the article describes. Multiple sneak attack is done when your enemy still haven't detect you after the first hit. This is possible when you either have high chameleon or high sneak/agility. Without chameleon, you'll need at least the journeyman skill perk to do this. 75.15.147.205 06:36, 20 August 2007 (EDT)

It's very easy, if you remain directly behind the target, and keep attacking while they're still reacting to your previous attack. Lighting conditions are at least as important as sneak and chameleon, and the more perceptive your target, the higher you need some combination of the three. If sneak and chameleon are high enough, you don't even have to worry about the target's line of sight to do this successfully. 97.81.107.242 07:28, 17 September 2007 (EDT)

Indeed. The article is wrong: being directly behind an enemy certainly makes it easier, but is by no means a requirement. If you have a high enough relative Sneak skill (and good light etc) you can make multiple SA's even while standing directly in front of the target, and with a suitable distraction (i.e. a Summon) and a bit of luck you can happily position yourself slightly to the side and land as many as you "need". You can even get the bonus while the eye is fully "lit" - apparently all that matters is that you're not the enemy's focused target.

(In combat, the AI gets a 50 point "detection bonus", meaning they're significantly more likely to spot you then even if they couldn't before you started fighting, which is why you can't (normally) just make an SA and then HIPS and do it again).

Lighting conditions are far more important than Sneak if you're in someone's line of sight: even with a 90 point "advantage" you'll almost certainly be spotted once you get within 30 feet of them if there's as much as a candle nearby. For situations like that you definitely need Chameleon, and the more the better. — Unsigned comment by Aliana (talk • contribs) at 16:23 on 12 October 2008

Stealing Oddity

Okay, in two different games I've been able to do this, and the second one was a completely fresh install, albeit with all the same patches: One of the first quests I did was the Thoronir quest, and naturally, I stole the Debaser off of Agarmir before going to the tomb. It shows up in my inventory as stolen. Later, when I got back to the shops, I put it down and picked it back up again. It's no longer marked as stolen, and I can sell it just fine. Several other early-game items also exhibit the same behaviour. When I try to steal something now, however, then drop it and pick it back up, it remains stolen. Any ideas?

I do have several mods installed, but even with all of them disabled, I can still drop and pick up the Debaser and other items, and they will be "unstolen". Here's the patch/mod list, in case it's something that somehow affects the item regardless of the presence of the mod:

• Shivering Isles
• Official Patch 1.2.0416
• All 8 official plug-ins
• Baldurdash Unofficial Patch 2.2
• Baldurdash Unofficial Mods Patch v8
• Baldurdash Shivering Isles Patch 1.0
• Haldur's Alternate Skeleton Key
• Kobu's Character Advancement System 2.4.1
• No More How Many Prompts
• No More Annoying Messages Lite v1.2
• Pitcher Plant Harvestable v1.1

--Robin Hood 15:03, 15 October 2007 (EDT)

Artificial Stats

Does anyone know if using magic/enchanted items to raise Sneak and/or Agility makes any difference and in what? --Mqduck 18:53, 15 October 2007 (EDT)

As far as I know, raising Sneak reduces your chances of getting seen and increases pickpocketing success rate. It might even give you the bonuses if you raise it past a level (Journeyman, Expert) however on that I am less sure. Increasing your agility will increase the amount of damage you do with bows and reduce chances of getting knocked down in combat. There may be other benefits, but these are the only ones I am aware of. --Vesna 18:17, 17 October 2007

As Vesna said, using any type of Fortify Sneak effect (this includes spells, enchantments, potions, etc.) will increase your sneak and pickpocket success, but only up to sneak=100. Increasing sneak skill past 100 will have no further benefit. Also, Fortify Sneak will not give you any of the mastery perks (i.e., fortifying sneak from 20 to 30 will not increase the sneak damage multipliers). The article on Fortify Skill provides more details on how this effect works.

In addition to the benefits mentioned by Vesna, Fortify Agility will also increase your fatigue, increase sneak success, and make the lockpicking game easier. As detailed on the Agility article, some of these benefits also apply for increases in Agility past 100. --Nephele^Talk 03:24, 20 October 2007 (EDT)

Poison damage

Who has tested that the sneak attack multiplier does not apply to poisons and enchantments? Previously there were many mentions on this wiki saying exactly the opposite, and my own experience pre-patch seemed to bear this out. I did not do rigorous tests but "boss" enemies would hardly take three steps before dying after hit by a sneaky arrow with a strong poison. Is there perhaps a difference before and after the official patch? --Potion Addict

I did a lot of testing of this, although I was not the first persosn to report it. I checked it by watching the enemy health stats in the console while doing many combinations of enchanted items, poison, no sneak, sneaking with dagger, and sneaking with bow. So I'd say the tests were pretty rigorous. I'm pretty sure the tests were with the 1.1.511 patch installed, but not the 1.2 patch, although I didn't make explicit notes of the patch version. It's not something that's mentioned in any of the Patch notes, so in the absence of someone finding clear evidence that the patch changed this behaviour I don't think it's appropriate to speculate that it changed. Especially just based on it previously being stated multiple times on the wiki: there are many cases of one person mistakenly stating something, everyone assuming that it's true, and therefore copying the information elsewhere. In this particular case, I know I contributed to propagating the false information by adding it to a few pages before finally taking the time to test it. --Nephele^Talk 13:17, 13 November 2007 (EST)

Thank you. I never patched the game at all but you're right that it should have been mentioned someplace if they chose to change that. Must have just been my imagination after reading the wiki (and high alchemy skill) making me think stealthy poisons were ultimate weapons. I thought it was really cool how powerful a backstab poison could have been, but it never really made any sense. Guess this means "weakness to poison" is the answer for quicker kills. ;-) --Potion Addict

I've noticed poisons to be really effective as well (more than I'd expect). I haven't tested this, but it seems like they're not affected by the difficulty slider. You can kill the goblins in the starting dungeon with a single poison on the highest difficulty, for example. --75.163.142.34 05:02, 9 November 2009 (UTC) Um the Muse

Bound Boots/Cloak

Because the weight of your boots is important for sneaking, wouldn't a pair of bound boots be perfect for sneaking? Also, some cloaks cover everything but the head (arena raiments and such) would these be "really heavy boots"

Yes, perma-bound armor is great for a lot of things, being Daedric quality and weightless, but Sneak is so easy and useful to raise to Journeyman level you may as well do it, unless you're RPing.

2 years late, but this is a good question (or two) that merits an answer.

Bound Boots are genuinely weightless, so yes, they are effective as going barefoot.

The second one is the exact opposite of what you thought: those also count as going barefoot. This is one of the reasons why the DB armor is so good for sneaky characters. So, as ridiculous as it seems, you actually sneak better in the 72lb Arena Heavy Raiment than you do naked except for a pair of Sack Cloth Sandals.

--Aliana 07:48, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

umm, except that there's a penalty for wearing anything on your feet at all, which I forgot about. So: Barefoot (which includes the DB and Arena outfits) is MUCH better than Bound Boots, which are infinitesimally better than Fur Boots, which are infinitesimally better than most shoes, which are much better than Iron Boots.

--Aliana 08:14, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Removing Stolen Tag on Items

Not really sure where to ask this but I'll ask it here. I'm collecting Guard Uniforms and I had to steal some so now they've got the Stolen Tag. I've read of ways to get rid of it, but as of now, I've forgotten where those methods were written down. Any help? ImmortalKaine 00:04, 15 January 2008 (EST)

Fence them. Sell them to a Thieves Guild fence and buy them back. You may lose a bit of money but you'll clear the stolen flag. –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 02:30, 15 January 2008 (EST)

What Is The Limit For Leveling In Sneak

Im trying to figure this out, but no one has the answer - hopefully some of you might. Im level 104ish in sneak - when do I click over to master? I thought that 100 was master, but I was wrong :( thanks! ~Gizimomo

You're not wrong - 100 is master level. If you have something fortifying your sneak skill, you need to remember to subtract that to find your current base skill level. Check on the active effects tab to see if there's anything boosting your skills. –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 12:40, 12 February 2008 (EST)

Pretty much what Rpeh said, if that skill number is green then its fortified. The Grand Champ 23:42, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

Reverse Pickpocketing murder

if you were to enchant a zero weight armor with somthing like "10pts fire damage for 10 seconds and reverse pickpocket someone with it and they died would you get charged with murder?--Marleysexton 15:38, 20 February 2008 (EST)

No. Planting a cursed item on someone is a recognised assassination technique. –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 15:40, 20 February 2008 (EST)

So would you get the dark brotherhood message from doing it?--Marleysexton 15:43, 20 February 2008 (EST)

No. It's not murder! You're giving someone a present. The fact it's fatal to someone that wears it is what fools the game, but it's not murder so NONE of the normal murder effects apply. –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 15:54, 20 February 2008 (EST)

It should be noted that if you let your target for the Dark Brotherhood die this way in a public place that it will forfeit your bonus. It's just cut-and-paste from another section of the site, but this way you at least know;) - Korunox 16:51, 20 February 2008 (EST)

Weight of quest items

Does the actual weight of quest items count for the sneak penalty, or do they count as zero? The Boots of Springheel Jak and Boots of the Crusader come to mind - they actually weigh 1.5 and 9-18, but are 0 in your inventory (until The Path of the Righteous is complete.) Krenn 13:38, 16 June 2008 (EDT)

Also, on the Clothing page, it says that shoes "are better than boots for sneaking, though still not as good as going barefoot". Is this universally true, given that most shoes weigh more than leather or fur boots? Do shoes carry some sort of bonus for not being armour, or are they simply better than most boots, by virtue of their weight? 84.9.112.220 08:49, 22 February 2009 (EST)

On your first question, I don't think they do until the quest for that item is complete, or at least until you do whatever you're supposed to do with the item. For ex. in the Fighters Guild quest the Desolate Mine, as soon as you give the weapons to the people, they have weight. Like if they die during the quest, you can take back the weapons and they have weight. For your second, yes, shoes are better than boots for sneaking, but no, they do not carry a bonus. The lighter your shoe the better. It depends soley on weight. However, once you reach Journeyman level, the weight of your shoes no longer matters. Hikarou411 10:18, 29 November 2009 (UTC)

Remember, if you're having problems with sneaking, you can always don a 100% chameleon suit, or if that's currently beyond your character's capabilities, simply cast an invisibility spell and boost your Sneak skill a bit. But to the matter at hand, I tested both before and after the Boots of the Crusader had weight, and it seemed as if they performed a tad bit better when weightless. This could be the placebo effect on my part, but I kept my sneak level constant (it was Apprentice, not sure exactly which level), and always used the same characters to skulk around. Hope this helps. Tweezer510 08:52, 9 March 2010 (UTC)

My guess would be overwhelmingly that the true weight is what's used. Experiments with other quest items (notably Umbra) show that "weightless" items merely do not count towards encumbrance: in every other way (e.g. Fatigue drain for Umbra) they behave exactly as their "non-quest versions". However, even if they are "weightless", they are still significantly inferior to going barefoot.

re shoes, what Hikarou411 said. Only the weight matters.

--Aliana 08:08, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Heh. Well, THAT was easy. And conclusive. My current char is at 49 Sneak, and my second-newest save was an inch away from a sleeping Prelate about to pickpocket him. Which she successfully did, before. I added a pair of 180lb Daedric Boots, made them a quest item, equipped them, and started to back away. The guy jumped out of his bed like it was on fire before I'd even gone 1ft, 3 times in a row. :P --Aliana 08:45, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

Reverse Pick-pocket torches?

If you reverse pick-pocket a torch (zero weight) onto an NPC, will they equip it at night? Dio 225 14:25, 25 June 2008 (EST)

yes it will! Dio 225

Pickpocketing

I noticed it said that when you're pickpocketing you should be closer to the NPC I tryed that but i always got caught but when i was farther away I got away with it most of the time but I would like more opinonsJay480 08:46, 14 August 2008 (EDT)

As far as I know, your proximity to your target makes no difference, just as long as you actually see the sneak icon. I'm not 100% sure of that, however. --Robin Hood (Talk • E-mail • Contribs) 13:19, 21 August 2008 (EDT)

I'm removing that note from the article. Nothing in the CS supports it, and empirically it appears to be not merely untrue but outright bad advice, as Jay says: the closer you are, the more likely you are to be detected sneaking, which can make pickpocketing hostiles impossible (although, oddly, whether you're seen or not seems to make no difference at all if you're pickpocketing someone non-hostile). --Aliana 06:33, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

To clarify that last part: being seen doesn't affect your ABILITY to pickpocket someone non-hostile, or even your chances of doing so SUCCESSFULLY (i.e. obtaining the items), only consequences of it. --Aliana 07:21, 24 April 2010 (UTC)

NPC detection factors

It says in several places on the site than an NPC's Speed attribute is what determines their ability to detect you. Although that MAY be true since there's no official info on it, it seems far more likely that it's actually their OWN Sneak value that's used as a sort of "opposed roll" to your own. The big hint is the Blind Moth Priests, who have a special spawn script that (a) makes them Blind, but also (b) gives them a Sneak bonus. Since NPC's never actually sneak (except in specific Follower cases) the only reason for that would be to make them harder to sneak AGAINST. Guards also have Sneak as a Major Skill, which again makes no sense unless it's also used for detection.

Empirically, Conjurers and Necromancers are also "good" at spotting players, and they too both have Sneak as a Major Skill. Vampires are significantly harder to sneak past than non-Vampires, and though the ridiculous bonuses for full vampirism include +20 Speed, they also include +20 Sneak.

See this spell. I've tested it, and it works. It means that at the least the Speed attribute has influence on how well an actor can detect you. --Timenn < talk > 11:21, 11 October 2008 (EDT)

No, it doesn't mean that at all. See http://www.uesp.net/wiki/Oblivion:Speed for why it works, which isn't the reason you think. (Then update the text on the spells page if you're feeling energetic). Note: that doesn't mean Speed doesn't have ANY impact on detection: nobody's proven or disproven that in any way, but it's far less likely than Sneak and if you're going to state theories as fact on the wiki you might as well at least go with the most plausible one. Aliana 12:30, 11 October 2008 (EDT)

The golden example. Umbra has *100* Speed. Umbra can't spot you if you're carrying a torch and are close enough to pickpocket her. Literally, a TORCH.

You're drawing conclusions from a series of assumptions you have not deduced that they are valid for the general case of detection. 100 Speed does not mean that the actor should always detect you. 100 Speed is not equal to 100% detection, no attribute works that way. Furthermore, basing the importance of Sneak just on a script that fortifies it on certain actor sounds very weak. Scripts just execute functions, nowhere does it explain why it does that. Even comments can be wrong, they just say what the programmer thinks is going on.

In-game testing shows that setting an actor's Speed attribute to 0 drastically reduces its ability to detect you. They can still detect you if you manouver right in front of them, but they can't keep track if you, causing them to break off pursuit immediately. Setting Sneak to 0 doesn't give these results.

There are more skills that have no benefit for a NPC. Think of Alchemy, Security and Speechcraft. --Timenn < talk > 09:45, 12 October 2008 (EDT)

If you insist on only ever using the special case of 0 Speed and acting as if it was also true for 1-100 Speed, that's your choice. Talk about the pot calling the kettle black when it comes to "assumptions".

Other things that are trivially provable are:

• If you blind an actor, like the Moth Priests, Sneak is clearly the only factor # that affects detection. An NPC with 100 Speed and 10 Sneak can't detect a PC running around them with 25 Sneak, but an NPC with 10 Speed and 100 Sneak locks onto them instantly.
• If you unblind that actor, Sneak is STILL clearly the only factor # that affects detection, other than line-of-sight (although actors have a field of view that's almost indistinguishable from 180 degrees). If Eyja is sitting downstairs with 100 Speed and 10 Sneak, and you have 100 Sneak, she'll pick you up when you reach the garlic pillar. If she has 10 Speed and 100 Sneak, she'll pick you up as soon as you move from the bottom of the stairs, until you're behind her. If you cut your Sneak to 25 at that point, she'll pick you up again instantly.

(# "only" of Sneak and Speed, but I'm not going to check random things like Alchemy just in case they do too).

Myth Busted.  :)

Incidentally, SDT 6 shows "how much" something is detected, but only when it's already in combat with the player, so it's not especially helpful for this, although you can see the impact of changing both party's Sneak skills around after getting it active.

Please, show me exactly where I have my an assumption in my previous post. I don't like it when people twist my words for their own benefit.

For the record, I was not saying Sneak would not affect detection, I was merely saying that you shouldn't base that conclusion on a script and NPC settings. Your latest tests seem to point out that Sneak indeed plays a role in Detection. It had me searching the CS and our friends at the CS Wiki have some interesting details as well at Category:Detection. If you would have used these test results earlier to prove your point, and not dwelt on accusatory behavior, it would have saved us a headache. --Timenn < talk > 05:47, 14 October 2008 (EDT)

I'll highlight the assumptions if you really want to keep fighting over it, but I'd rather drop it and call it a miscommunication. There are more productive things for both of us to do. What's important is that we do have "the answers" now, not the squabbles along the way.

Great link, thanks. re the "Heavy boots make more noise than bare feet" on that page, it's more exactly "HeavIER boots make more noise than lighter boots which make ..." and so on, i.e. each lb of boot weight, all the way down to "Cloth" shoes, still counts. In theory, this is another benefit of the DB outfit, which technically has 0 Boot Weight (in fact, you can theoretically sneak better in the Arena Heavy Raiment than in a set of Fur armor, which amuses me). One other interesting detail (which we'll never really know the answer to, unfortunately) is exactly how the Journeyman perk fits in. If it effectively just changes fSneakBootWeightMult to 0, you may well still be paying the fSneakBootWeightBase penalty for wearing boots at all, and both the CS Wiki and a literal reading of the perk description suggest that you actually are. We could probably make an informed guess someday with enough testing, but I've had about as much sneaking around Eyja as I can stomach for now. :) Aliana 20:16, 14 October 2008 (EDT)

As the crow flies

Timmen:

• Remember that sound is not blocked by walls. If a wall stands between you and a NPC, it will detect you as easily as if there was open space between it and you (and the NPC's has its back turned to you, otherwise it could simply see you).

People are going to read that as "if you're in a room with a layout like "E 3" (like one of the standard Ayleid sets) and you're in the SW corner with an NPC in the NW one". It's not just "wall", it's "20 feet of solid rock" too. If you want to try and make the section clearer, by all means go ahead, but you lost a critical piece of the actual meaning / behavior with that version.

Than use "thick wall" or something like that. It makes the piece of text much clearer than what it currently is; describing only a special case, that is not even well documented. In the end it's about the difference in effect if the player and target have only wall between them or only open space; nothing. --Timenn < talk > 01:54, 30 October 2008 (EDT)

Pfft. Take it.

Rather than list every NPC that doesn't mind if you pickpocket them, does anybody know what factors are necessary to get the result? Looking at the list so far, they all have a responsibility of 10 or below (except Eyja) and very low aggression (0 or 5). Is that the deciding factor? Or is it their disposition? If there's a way of generating a list, I'd prefer to put all the affected NPCs into a category rather than listing them all here. –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 01:00, 26 January 2009 (EST)

"except Eyja" is enough to disqualify Responsibility. I accidentally pickpocketed Mathilde Petit in Summitmist and got a pfft. She's 50 Resp. She's also 5 Aggression, but unfortunately she was also 100 Disposition at the time. You can pickpocket Ocheeva (and indeed, all the DB) without fear of reprisal. All your fellow assassins are Disp 100 to you unless you do something stupid. Ocheeva is 30 Aggression.

Those are some pretty strong hints, but... there's a rather obvious character that's been overlooked. Marana Rian. She's only 6 Aggression, but guess what's in her script every 5 seconds while master training is active? moddisposition player 100. :D

Note that Marana also disproves this claim in the article: "If you are caught pickpocketing, you will not be able to pickpocket that NPC again until the next day; the reset occurs at midnight."

Marana's script is the clincher. Clicky Amusei, moddisposition 14 0: Amusei wubs you: 100. Fail to pickpocket his shortsword, pfft. moddisposition 14 0: Amusei likes you: 75. moddisposition 14 -50. Fail to pickpocket his shortsword, "Give that back!"... You have been cast out of the Thieves Guild.

Someone else can try and figure out exactly where the safe point is, but 100 is definitely >= it.

I can state that the item value is either meaningless or so heavily downscaled that it might as well be: I pickpocketed the last piece of Daedric I needed off Mazoga once upon a time, and she still didn't care.

Stole Amusei's 4GP at 100: he didn't care, but I took the same 25 point Disposition hit as I did for his 25GP sword, so that's pretty clear too.

--Aliana 10:06, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

I thought I'd try a few more "just in case" things before updating the article. I set Amusei's Aggression, Confidence, and Responsibility to 0, to see if that affected the Disposition hit at all. It doesn't.

Messed around a bit with Mazoga. I was VERY surprised to find that her disposition to me was still 100 after a failed theft, and I thought I might have been mistaken, but happily I wasn't. Reloading and using moddisposition 14 -50, she was STILL reported as 100, and it took a second -50 to bring her down to 77. From there, it continued to drop by the expected 25 every time.

What's really interesting about Mazoga though is WHY she, almost uniquely, can be pickpocketed at will. Even when you've reduced her disposition to 0, she doesn't REACT to pickpocketing... until you change her Responsibility from 0 to ANYTHING non-zero (even just 1) in the console: THEN she'll jump out of bed if she catches you.

This suggests that since Amusei's Responsibility is NOT 0, continued attempts should eventually trip the "hostile" case and make him un-pickpocketable, and testing shows this is exactly what happens.

So, to sum up: NPCs with a Responsibility of 0 can ALWAYS be pickpocketed without repercussions, and indefinitely so. NPCs with a high enough Disposition to you will let you get away with it once or twice, but since the act itself reduces Disposition, continued attempts WILL eventually provoke a "hostile" reaction.

--Aliana 12:31, 22 April 2010 (UTC)

every time i've pickpocketed armand cristophe i got pfft but i did once get kicked out of the guild for it. P.S you can break into armand's house any time you want and he won't care. when he's facing away from his dinner table, you can grab a flawless diamond for selling. again, make sure his back is turned or you'll be caught by the guards and lose your diamond.

NPC Sneak Attacks

Is it possible for a sneaking NPC to Sneak Attack enemies, or get the Sneak Attack bonus? I first ran into this question in the Dark Brotherhood Murderer discussion, and would like to know if it is possible (making the Dark Brotherhood Archer usefull.) — Unsigned comment by 24.23.88.49 (talk) on 21 March 2009

Perfect Pickpocket

• If you have 100 sneak and 100 luck, does that mean it is impossble to fail pickpocketing, AKA 100% chance of pickpocketing. — Unsigned comment by Dadrak (talk • contribs) on 28 March 2009

You can still fail. You can even fail with 100 sneak, 100 luck and 100% chameleon. –Rpeh^{•T•C•E•} 15:17, 28 March 2009 (EDT)

• Is there any possible way to get a 100% chance of pickpocketing without mods? (I mean this seriously, not carrying a torch right in front of them in full view.) — Unsigned comment by Dadrak (talk • contribs) on 08 April 2009

No, but the closest you can get would probably be about 98% or 99% --Darth NANAME 15:41, 8 April 2009 (EDT)

No, the closest you can get is 85%. Bethesda are obviously fond of that as an upper limit on some things.  :) --Aliana 10:26, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

• Well, how do you get the highest chance of pickpocketing?

tips?

any tips for pickpocketing people like The Gray Fox for his armour? they have high sneak levels — Unsigned comment by Repeater (talk • contribs) on 21 April 2009

See the Gray Cowl page for more info on the Gray Fox in particular. For other NPCs, a high Sneak yourself is absolutely necessary, a Chameleon enchant is useful and possibly a dark surrounding or when they are sleeping. --SerCenKing ^Talk 15:01, 21 April 2009 (EDT)

Stuck with Power Attacks in Sneak Mode

For some reason my character always does Power Attacks while sneaking, even when I'm just tapping the trigger. I've tried restarting, clearing the cache, changed weapon, but nothing worked. Anyone who has experienced this too and know how to make it go away? I'm playing the 360 version. Icko 17:11, 24 May 2009 (EDT)

That's standard vanilla oblivion for you. When in sneak mode, all (melee) attacks made are power attacks. (And my question is, why WOULDN'T you want your x6/4 damage attack to be a power attack?)

I don't know what you mean by "...all (melee) attacks are made power attacks." But anyway, the answer for your question is simple; when *not* sneaking standard attacks do a little damage and only uses a litte fatuige and Power Attacks do a lot of damage but also uses a lot of fatuige and they are slower. When sneaking it's almost the same, except for one thing, Power Attacks don't do more damage than standard attacks, but still uses more fatuige and are slower. I hope that you now understand why I don't want to waste fatuige on nothing. Icko 14:38, 10 June 2009 (EDT)

Couple of Points

I see that a couple of my edits were reverted, and rather than continually edit the page back and forth, they should be discussed here.

The reason that you wouldn't want to pickpocket Armand Christophe is because he's a member of the Thieves' Guild. Unless you are wearing the Gray Cowl of Nocturnal, you will be kicked out of the guild if he catches you.

The second reason is that any NPC with a Responsibility of 100 will instantly report any crime committed against them. For example, Varel Morvayn could be murdered while the player is wearing 100% Chameleon armor, and the player could then proceed to wait/fast travel/do anything else they couldn't do if guards were pursuing them. However, you will receive the 1000 bounty every single time. 68.32.250.200 00:38, 17 June 2009 (EDT)

Just because you steal does not mean you are a member of the Thieves Guild. We cannot generalize that notion. --Mr. Oblivion^(T-C) 17:31, 22 June 2009 (EDT)

Moved here from the page

A way to make sure you don't get caught while pickpocketing, when in the NPC's inventory, try to reverse pickpocket a non-zero weight item. It will fail, but exiting NPC inventory won't make you being caught. (Need to be proved.)

I moved it here (with some minor changes, since it wouldn't make sense without them), because, as the original author said, it needs to be verified. It sounds rather unlikely and I can't see how that works but who knows? Wolok gro-Barok 21:24, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

master heavy armour

if you are 100 in heavy armor and are not encumbered by it does this increase your chance of sneaking(would it be as good if not better than light armor) — Unsigned comment by 195.93.21.2 (talk) on 4 August 2009

As far as I'm aware, only the weight of your boots affects your ability to sneak, and even then only until you're a journeyman of sneak, and since your boots weigh nothing at master level...Sevvy 02:26, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Sure, they may weigh nothing but it's still the category of armor they are in. Remember when it says "The weight of the boots affect how well you sneak"? Well its talking about if the boots are either heavy or light armor. The Grand Champ 23:50, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

No, it isn't. It says Weight and it means Weight, though since even the heaviest Light boots are lighter than the lightest Heavy boots, Light boots are uniformly better to sneak in than Heavy boots. Daedric boots are not the same as Iron boots though.

This is the same question as "Quest Item Boots" above, and the same comments there apply. I'll test it in a bit.

Done, see above. In a word, "no". --Aliana 08:48, 21 April 2010 (UTC)

gaurd not noticing

it says on the page that if you kill a person in sneak mode and no one sees you you will not gain a bounty, unless the effect is different with enchanted weapons i have never had a murder where i am undetected without incuring a bounty, i can even remember having a bounty at 100% invisibiliyt so this cannot be true. Anyone want to say anything about this?— Unsigned comment by 195.93.21.2 (talk) on 22 August 2009

Sometimes it is hard to remain undetected. And Invisibility never worked for me because it dispels once you perform an action. –Elliot ^talk 08:28, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

The same thing happened to me, I was sneaking behind someone, and killed them in 1 hit with an arrow, the crosshair was clear, but a Guard ran up to me arresting me when I traveled back to the Waterfront. 68.113.150.31 20:33, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Well, if it was a guard you killed, you ALWAYS get a murder bounty (1000 gold) but if not, they also can realsie you killed someone if you hang around and are seen. (Seems they have to check the body first though and you are just standing around) If those arent why though, then I dont know. — Unsigned comment by 173.52.92.163 (talk) on 8 December 2009

Completely Random?

Moderately new player attempting to learn how to play well :p In Imperial City's Market District, the Coinpurse Shop I saved my game, then lockpicked the door. Didn't go in, my little Sneak eye was dim, and a few seconds later the guard comes in. I reload my save, do it again, go inside, still with a dim eye, and nobody bats an eyelid!? Can anyone explain? Thanks in advance :) 80.176.145.76 15:25, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

It's almost certainly a case of the guard seeing you just at the last second before you went in. The eye was probably just barely starting to brighten, but it wasn't yet noticeable. I've had similar issues before, so I always make a point of saving before illegally entering somewhere, just in case. —Robin Hood ^{(Talk • E-mail • Contribs)} 22:59, 25 August 2009 (UTC)

Actually, the factor in that one is a little tricky, which for me is easily figured out. If you saw the guard while in sneak mode and the eye is dim but yet the guard is in your view and nothing is blocking your line of sight from him and you attempt the crime the guard will come and see you. Another factor is distance. As mentioned, you see the guard with eye dim and he's close he'll get you but if he is far away then you are free to do crime, as long another guard isn't in close or medium range. The Grand Champ 23:56, 2 April 2010 (UTC)

How To Modify The Sneak Damage Multiplier In The Oblivion.ini?

I have always disliked that you are unable to get any damage mulitplier while sneak-attaking with a 2-handed weapon (even if it is a smaller multiplier than the standard 6x). Is there a specific line in the Oblivion.ini that I can modify to fix that problem for 2h weapons? If so, I would appreciate if anyone could help me out. Vashmanseven 23:40, 17 November 2009 (UTC)

I don't know what you're talking about, all 2h weapons and 1h weapons get the same multiplier (With the exception of bows which only get a 3x multi(2x if sneak is under 25)). Jesseguy1 03:46, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

1-handed weapons do not get a sneak multiplier (or more specifically a 1x). I know because I was watching my friend play and he didn't believe me when I told him. --DKong27 00:59, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

You must mean two-handed weapons, and no, they don't get a damage multiplier. You will get a message saying "Sneak attack x1 damage", but it actually doesn't increase the damage you do. --S'drassa ^•T2M 01:31, 13 February 2010 (UTC)

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