Is scouting useless?

[Seppo87]

I'm playing a stygian slayer, dex-based, maximized stealth. LV8.


There's this guy in my party who says I shouldn't try and scout ahead because it's supposedly so ineffective as a strategy, especially after a certain level when every enemy has see invisibility scent and other ways to bypass it, that it actually lowers our chance of success as a party.
It's not difficult to imagine how he prevents me from being stealthy, that's pretty easy to do if you try.

Fact is, a boss is wrecking us, and I think we'd have better chances if I was allowed to go on silently and find out that it was there, waiting for us., We could have prepared, we had information about its abilities and tactics from a previous encounter, and we didn't.
This boss btw does not have see invisibility 24/7, scent, or any of the aforementioned abilities.

There are other issues at stake concerning cooperative play, social contract and stuff like that, the situation has gotten pretty hairy
(i.e.: I'm playing a character designed to do that, let me play my role please)
but that's another story.
[fun fact: I found myself discussing philosophy and morals of liability and responsibility, and its practical applications, this went on for a few hours. This happened because apparently he didn't agree that the idea of responsibility, in the context of making a gentleman agreement, was relevant in any way.
Whatever]


What I'm asking here is, in your experience, does scouting in general enhance or reduce the chances of a party success,
how
and why
?

Perhaps, is it a bad idea to play an infiltrator? Should everyone avoid this role tout-cour and always kick every door without a second thought? Is the latter best for survivability?

thank you

[BWR]

I can't think of a single situation where intelligence/information makes no difference to the outcome or makes it worse (ignoring misleading issues).
I can think of situations where people have tried to get hold of information and been discovered, which is often worse for the PCs than a surprise attack with no info would be.
Your fellow player's point is very real and relevant, but only valid if you do not take steps to avoid sch methods of detection. This doesn't excuse being a **** about it.

In general, scouting is useful, but you have to be careful. Expecting some sort of immunity to detection and traps because you are sneaking is a quick way to getting caught or killed.

[Necroticplague]

If we wrecks you as a party, he'll completely slaughter you as a solo scout. You're gambling a small possibility of a slight advantage on a very large probability of you dying. In terms of stealth, you have to succeed every time a check comes up. He only has to succeed once to know you're there (thus turning the tables, for he now has time to prepare for you, even if he isn't entirely sure what 'you' is).

[Kurald Galain]

It depends highly on the campaign style.

This forum post (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?317715-Very-Long-Combat-as-Sport-vs-Combat-as-War-a-Key-Difference-in-D-amp-D-Play-Styles) outlines the difference between Combat As Sport playstyle as opposed to Combat As War. Scouting very much belongs in the latter category, and not in the former. It appears to me that you're interested in a CAW game whereas your party member is looking for CAS.

Related to this, if the campaign revolves around "kick in the door, defeat the enemy, go to the next room" then scouting thematically doesn't fit. If the GM ensures that every fight is a level-appropriate challenge, or has lots of easy encounters in general, then scouting isn't necessary. Both of these are usually examples of CAS.

[Eladrinblade]

Of course scouting isn't useless. It's built into the game as something a party is supposed to do.

Knowing what is ahead, where it is, what gear it has, etc, is immensely helpful. You can base your spells around it, your weapon/gear usage, your positioning, your plans. You can then ambush it, which you couldn't do if you stumbled upon it.

Your friend is a low-wisdom know-it-all, which D&D is chock full of.

Yes it has risks, but everything in D&D does, so what? Scent is imprecise and a bit slow, see invisibility only matters if they beat your stealth check, tremorsense requires you to not be flying, etc. With spell-support (which any well-rounded party should have), your scouting is damn well worth it.

In my personal experience, I've seen it cause lots of problems, but that's either because most people don't do it right (in D&D? NO WAY!!!!) or because the DM is a douche (I've seen plenty of both). However, I am supremely experience in playing with AND DMing groups who don't scout, and the costs are about as face-palming as you'd expect.

As with most things in life, the problem with D&D is bad people.

[Beheld]

1) You have to beat every possible way of being detected, known and unknown to you beforehand. If you don't, he detects you, and then he gets a lot more benefit from you do, including possibly just murdering you right then and there.

2) Even if you aren't detected, you have to find him, and then glean actually useful information, that last one is really really hard. Unless your DM is being really kind, there is little reason to think that you being around for a short while undetected is going to tell you anything substantially useful.

3) If you are detected in any way, you get stomped unless you have an instant out. That's bad.

4) On a purely metagame level, the stealth rules are poorly written, in particular, they are poorly written in a way that takes a long time to resolve. So you are going to have to roll over and over again while taking actions one at a time, for possibly a really long time. What is the rest of your party doing while this happens? Playing Smash Brothers in the corner while you hog the spotlight? Yeah, the Wizard could spend 35 hours asking Contact Other Plane questions until he gets bored, but the main reason he doesn't isn't because of any particular concern about spell slot usage on off days, it's because he doesn't want to eat up hours of game time while everyone else waits for him. I suspect this is a consideration of the other player.

Truthfully, if you don't have a teleport escape, I don't recommend scouting ahead. If you do, then go right ahead.

[Beheld]

This forum post (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?317715-Very-Long-Combat-as-Sport-vs-Combat-as-War-a-Key-Difference-in-D-amp-D-Play-Styles) outlines the difference between Combat As Sport playstyle as opposed to Combat As War. Scouting very much belongs in the latter category, and not in the former. It appears to me that you're interested in a CAW game whereas your party member is looking for CAS.

Ugh really. If we are going to have some pretensions *******s make up a derogatory false dichotomy that they themselves don't even understand and then use those terms to mislead people about every issue on this forum, can we at least let me be the pretensions ******* that comes up with the name of the terms, I guarantee I can do better than this one.

[Gnaeus]

I got pretty jaded by years of werewolf LARPing in which I discovered a pattern. One of 2 things would inevitably result.
1: scout goes in. Gets spotted. Everyone rushes in to save scout. General melee results.
2. Scout makes it out. Gives info. Leaders spend an hour developing a complicated plan. On about step 2 or 3 of complicated plan, someone makes a mistake or rolls poorly. General melee results.

So, while in theory I can see the benefits, in practice I would usually prefer to skip the hour and a half of playing video games on my phone and move on to the general melee.

It's kind of the same way I feel about explosives in games. In theory, they are incredibly handy. In practice, I have seen lots more parties destroyed by their own explosives than successful plans that actually made anything easier.

Part of it is that many DMs are invested in their fight encounters, so if something will trivialize it or allow PCs to bypass it, they are really looking for a reason to make that as hard as possible. Because they had the general melee all planned out. Part of it is that some PCs are designed for the general melee and they don't want to trivialize/bypass encounters that might lead to challenging fights, and so will actively or passively sabotage plans that would make the most use of the scouts information. And of course, in D&D, they may want to murder the enemy in order to loot bodies.

[Seppo87]

So you are going to have to roll over and over again while taking actions one at a time, for possibly a really long time. What is the rest of your party doing while this happens? Playing Smash Brothers in the corner while you hog the spotlight?



So, while in theory I can see the benefits, in practice I would usually prefer to skip the hour and a half of playing video games on my phone and move on to the general melee.

In this regard, I want to say that I would agree on shortening the stealthy exploration part if it happens to "steal time" by making fewer rolls in a generalized fashion.

Also, before the game was started, I wasn't warned that making a character specialized in stealth would be rendered regularly useless. The GM had no idea this would happen, it's a unilateral decision of that specific player (however, it's allowed).
If I knew I might have accepted it and rolled a BSF instead.


Part of it is that many DMs are invested in their fight encounters, so if something will trivialize it or allow PCs to bypass it, they are really looking for a reason to make that as hard as possible. Because they had the general melee all planned out. Part of it is that some PCs are designed for the general melee and they don't want to trivialize/bypass encounters that might lead to challenging fights, and so will actively or passively sabotage plans that would make the most use of the scouts information. And of course, in D&D, they may want to murder the enemy in order to loot bodies. I believe the best thing would be to decide these things together in advance, but not everybody on this table, especially the player that's sabotaging stealth, think that off game agreements should come first.
So it's somewhat impossible to make agreements, as the guy thinks agreements are meaningless, he wants to play his character as he pleases no matter what, unless it breaks hard rules (the ones written on the book).

[Kurald Galain]

Part of it is that many DMs are invested in their fight encounters, so if something will trivialize it or allow PCs to bypass it, they are really looking for a reason to make that as hard as possible.

That strikes me as railroading though, I'd prefer if DMs improvise more.

[OldTrees1]

Well at a baseline scouting is a risk/reward action.

IF No Scout -> Enter combat blind (baseline)
IF Scout -> IF Caught -> Party fights at a disadvantage either by losing the scout or suffering an action economy cost to come to the scout's aid.
IF Scout -> IF Not Caught -> Party fights at an advantage from the information the scout gains.

The risk of being caught, the cost of being caught, and the reward if not caught are different functions with the same independent variable.
Expected value for a given X is: ( 1-Risk(X) ) * Reward(X) - Risk(X) * Cost(X)

Without going into specifics, all I can say is that Scouting is sometimes a good idea and sometimes a bad idea.

[SwordChucks]

In Pathfinder scent isn't an autodetect as far as I can tell. It gives a +8 to detect by smell, and likely ignores invisibility, but the creature with scent still has to roll for it. See invisibility makes it easier to make the perception check, but it doesn't automatically spot stealthy characters either.

Blindsight and tremor sense are still a concern but it may be that your partymate doesn't know the rules as well as they think they do.

Also, if he's clanging around in a dungeon you should get a bonus to stealth as he draws all of the attention. Just don't stand near him and get your sneak attack on.

[Gnaeus]

That strikes me as railroading though, I'd prefer if DMs improvise more.

It is. And they should. But they don't always.

I'm not saying that they will all actively prevent ways around combat. Maybe just the DCs to to avoid it tend to creep up a little. Or they give a little more weight to the reason the plan might not work...

[Berenger]

Well at a baseline scouting is a risk/reward action.

IF No Scout -> Enter combat blind (baseline)
IF Scout -> IF Caught -> Party fights at a disadvantage either by losing the scout or suffering an action economy cost to come to the scout's aid.
IF Scout -> IF Not Caught -> Party fights at an advantage from the information the scout gains.

The risk of being caught, the cost of being caught, and the reward if not caught are different functions with the same independent variable.
Expected value for a given X is: ( 1-Risk(X) ) * Reward(X) - Risk(X) * Cost(X)

Without going into specifics, all I can say is that Scouting is sometimes a good idea and sometimes a bad idea.


This assumes that a fight takes place either way, so I'd like to add the possibility that the scout discovers something that is NOT an unavoidable level appropriate encounter.

[OldTrees1]

This assumes that a fight takes place either way, so I'd like to add the possibility that the scout discovers something that is NOT an unavoidable level appropriate encounter.

*cough* *cough*
Reward(X)

Edit:
Oh, did you meant if the scout discovers an encounter that otherwise would have been missed? That would be split between both Reward(X) and Cost(X). I had not thought about that case but I am glad the formula can be made to overcome that oversight.

[Psyren]

Whether scouting is useful unfortunately depends on your GM. For myself, I always include some kind of benefit to a successful scout - for example, the PCs get a surprise round, or they may even get multiple rounds to buff up unnoticed, or there's some trick to the encounter that they get clued into like a trap. ("As the golems pace silently through the hall, you notice clusters of small holes in the walls, with each cluster paced evenly at 10ft. intervals. You think the holes are too smooth to have occurred naturally.")

I think the key here though is for GMs to be consistent. It can be very frustrating to have a GM who pushes the party to scout but never allows it to actually provide any benefits, or worse the one who encourages scouting and then uses it as a way to screw the party over (scout gets kidnapped/crippled/killed, the PCs get surprised instead of the monsters etc.) I'm not saying this should never happen, but this is just as much a **** move as destroying the party wizard's spellbook and should be very rare if used at all.

[Berenger]

*cough* *cough*
Reward(X)

Edit:
Oh, did you meant if the scout discovers an encounter that otherwise would have been missed? That would be split between both Reward(X) and Cost(X). I had not thought about that case but I am glad the formula can be made to overcome that oversight.

I meant the possibility that the scout discovers an enemy force too powerful to confront in direct combat without a high risk of TPK in which case "blind combat", "combat with advantage" and "combat with disadvantage" don't apply because the best solution is to avoid combat altogether and rely on stealth, diplomacy or retreat. These non-combat options are lost when there is no scouting.

[OldTrees1]

I meant the possibility that the scout discovers an enemy force too powerful to confront in direct combat without a high risk of TPK in which case "blind combat", "combat with advantage" and "combat with disadvantage" don't apply because the best solution is to avoid combat altogether and rely on stealth, diplomacy or retreat. These non-combat options are lost when there is no scouting.

Cost(X) in that case is: Cost incurred in retreating when discovered and the additional difficulty of circumnavigating them.
Reward(X) is that case is: Avoiding all the costs that would have been incurred in a blind retreat from such a fight AND the additional ease the information gives for circumnavigating the enemy.

So most of that is covered in Reward(X).

[CharonsHelper]

It depends highly on the campaign style.

This forum post (http://www.enworld.org/forum/showthread.php?317715-Very-Long-Combat-as-Sport-vs-Combat-as-War-a-Key-Difference-in-D-amp-D-Play-Styles) outlines the difference between Combat As Sport playstyle as opposed to Combat As War. Scouting very much belongs in the latter category, and not in the former. It appears to me that you're interested in a CAW game whereas your party member is looking for CAS,

I've seen that post referenced before. While probably true to some degree, his example of CAW is dumb.

1. The mud & layers of clothing work against bees in the real world because they have tiny stingers which can't pierce them. That is not true of giant bees.

2. In a world with giant bees, an owl bear isn't going to be dumb enough to get too close to an entire colony of them. You can tell, because owl bears exist and haven't been wiped out by giant bees.


In addition, the post implies either/or. Most players are somewhere between the two extremes. (And he definitely implies that CAW is better.)

[Seppo87]

And he definitely implies that CAW is better
(small OT)
I was under the opposite impression, because he goes to great lengths to describe as CAS is a complete playstyle involving both action and tactics as long as this produces an interesting encounter,
on the other hand, CAW is described as a cowardly playstyle (the emphasis on people running away!) that makes everything slow and boring

[Beheld]

I think Combat as Sport/War is primarily a false dichotomy, before and above anything else. It's people who want to play the game one way declaring all other people to be playing another way, even though the people who don't play "as War" don't do so for a variety of reasons that are on opposite ends of a spectrum.

Of the top of my head, their are people who just want to beer and pretzels, and then there are people who correctly notice that "Combat as War" plans would never actually work or accomplish their goals, as PCs don't have advance information, and they can't outrun 95% of the Monster Manuals so escaping is not an option, and when they do take 576 days to drown a Basilisk in it's burrow (actual Combat as War proposal to get something out of a Basilisk Burrow without fighting the Basilisk) the world should move around them, and intelligent enemies would respond to tactics and negate them.

If your dichotomous labels classify both those people as the same type of person, then it is clearly failing.


(small OT)
I was under the opposite impression, because he goes to great lengths to describe as CAS is a complete playstyle involving both action and tactics as long as this produces an interesting encounter,
on the other hand, CAW is described as a cowardly playstyle (the emphasis on people running away!) that makes everything slow and boring

I am literally amazed that anyone could make that mistake. Literally every part of his distinction is designed to **** talk "Combat as Sport". Also he very specifically prefers "Combat as War" and the post is about how to do it in the newest edition.

[icefractal]

Re: CAS/CAW - I don't think much of the concept. There's something there, in that there legitimately are different things that people want out of "combat" in RPGs, but the description is too broad and too slanted.

For example, what about "combat as SWAT team"? That would be where you try to blitz through an area, handling each enemy as quickly as possible and avoiding the need to rest, so that your total time from entry to goal is less than an hour, less than 15 minutes if you can manage it, therefore giving the enemies little time to respond? Bypassing fights is still on the table, but extensive scouting or winning by slowly flooding the place are right out. IMO, this strategy works better (in general) than traditional "CAW" tactics.

Or "combat as ninjas", where your primary goal is to avoid giving anyone information about you or your capabilities? Not even dead people, if there's a way to bring them back. There are a lot of "realistic" models different than the siege/trickery thing, is what I'm saying.

Also, when you start heading down the path of 'more realistic' and 'cost/benefit analysis', you run into the other question - why are you fighting things at all? Spend weeks flooding a dungeon so you can go loot the treasure in peace (hopefully the water ruined most of the traps)? Why not spend those weeks in a city becoming rich as hell with no fighting needed? Wizards, in particular, have a lot of ways to make money that don't involve dungeons.

[nedz]

Well at a baseline scouting is a risk/reward action.

IF No Scout -> Enter combat blind (baseline)
IF Scout -> IF Caught -> Party fights at a disadvantage either by losing the scout or suffering an action economy cost to come to the scout's aid.
IF Scout -> IF Not Caught -> Party fights at an advantage from the information the scout gains.

The risk of being caught, the cost of being caught, and the reward if not caught are different functions with the same independent variable.
Expected value for a given X is: ( 1-Risk(X) ) * Reward(X) - Risk(X) * Cost(X)
A good scout will have a plan to deal with being detected - cause a distraction, split the enemy, leading them into a trap, hide again and play hide and seek or simply just bugging out.

Whether scouting is useful unfortunately depends on your GM. For myself, I always include some kind of benefit to a successful scout - for example, the PCs get a surprise round, or they may even get multiple rounds to buff up unnoticed, or there's some trick to the encounter that they get clued into like a trap. ("As the golems pace silently through the hall, you notice clusters of small holes in the walls, with each cluster paced evenly at 10ft. intervals. You think the holes are too smooth to have occurred naturally.")

I think the key here though is for GMs to be consistent. It can be very frustrating to have a GM who pushes the party to scout but never allows it to actually provide any benefits, or worse the one who encourages scouting and then uses it as a way to screw the party over (scout gets kidnapped/crippled/killed, the PCs get surprised instead of the monsters etc.) I'm not saying this should never happen, but this is just as much a **** move as destroying the party wizard's spellbook and should be very rare if used at all.
this really
Whether it works or not depends largely upon the DM - are they open to the option, do they provide terrain, etc. It also depends upon the party to a degree - as the OP has discovered.
What you have is a clash of play-styles for which there is no real answer.

[Honest Tiefling]

I've seen scouting be absolutely useless in a high optimization game. I've been a part of a two-man scouting group (we had 2 rogues) that worked out well. It really depends on your DM and how they build encounters. So I think it can be useful, but depends a lot on the DM.

So I'd just ask the DM as to what their recommendation is.

[OldTrees1]

A good scout will have a plan to deal with being detected - cause a distraction, split the enemy, leading them into a trap, hide again and play hide and seek or simply just bugging out.

Correct. This (the scout having a plan) would help keep Cost(X) low.

[CasualViking]

IME, going into every fight with a maximum stack of buffs already up because you're blitzing the area is very effective.

[Telok]

I'll reiterate: It depends on the game/gm.

I've been in games where scouting allowed the party to split, avoid, or trick enemies and the scout could take precautions to avoid detection. I've been in games where scouting had a flat 20% chance of failing, made no difference in where or how a fight went, surprise offered no benefit beyond minor first round advantages, and there were no rewards for anything but beating enemies to zero hit points.

[Crake]

I'd have to say how valuable scouting is depends on how good you can hide. If you're a rogue 7/shadowdancer 1 with 22 dex, max ranks in hide and move silently, a +5 item for both, skill focus (from locations of power of course, not gonna spend actual feat slots on that) and a masterwork item, you're looking at something like +27 to hide/move silently. With darkstalker, and if your DM allows you to take 10, you can get a 37, meaning anyone with less than +17 cannot even detect you while you stand right in front of them thanks to shadowdancer's hide in plain sight, even if they have scent, blindsight, blindsense, tremorsense, or the like.

Even if your DM doesn't let you take 10, at worst you have a 28, meaning enemies without +8 or more still cannot detect you. At level 8, without significant investment into wisdom, and with most classes having spot/listen as cross class, you won't have much competition.

With that level of ability, where you can literally stab someone from hiding, then 5ft step away and return to being unseen, scouting carries very little opportunity cost. If you want the other players to be involved, create a rary's telepathic bond with the group so that it can become a group experience, maybe even a shared sensory link if you have a psion in the party.

[martixy]

I'd have to say how valuable scouting is depends on how good you can hide. If you're a rogue 7/shadowdancer 1 with 22 dex, max ranks in hide and move silently, a +5 item for both, skill focus (from locations of power of course, not gonna spend actual feat slots on that) and a masterwork item, you're looking at something like +27 to hide/move silently. With darkstalker, and if your DM allows you to take 10, you can get a 37, meaning anyone with less than +17 cannot even detect you while you stand right in front of them thanks to shadowdancer's hide in plain sight, even if they have scent, blindsight, blindsense, tremorsense, or the like.

Even if your DM doesn't let you take 10, at worst you have a 28, meaning enemies without +8 or more still cannot detect you. At level 8, without significant investment into wisdom, and with most classes having spot/listen as cross class, you won't have much competition.

With that level of ability, where you can literally stab someone from hiding, then 5ft step away and return to being unseen, scouting carries very little opportunity cost. If you want the other players to be involved, create a rary's telepathic bond with the group so that it can become a group experience, maybe even a shared sensory link if you have a psion in the party.

That's neat, of course, and is usually how it should work.
However encounter design and DM fiat still play a bigger role.
Also, you need not spend a level for this, as a continuous collar of umbral metamorphosis provides the same variant of Hide in Plain Sight + a bunch of other directly relevant goodies(+8 hide/+6 MS, +10 speed and Dark/Low-light vision if you don't already have it).

P.S. The item is found in Tome of Magic, p.156 and costs 22K gp. 11K for the non-continuous version(which still grants 10 minutes of use in chunks of 1 min).

[Seppo87]

I'm playing Pathfinder.
No umbral metamorphosis, no darkstalker, no locations of power.
The lack of Darkstalker is what hurts me the most. I really miss that feat... as I miss Knowledge Devotion and Craven, for obvious reasons... well, whatever.
Gotta work with what I have.

At my current level (8, main class is Slayer, stygian archetype) I don't have Hips yet (I will tho) and my current Stealth bonus is 22, + the occasional invisibility (self-casted), + occasionally Reduce Person (which would be casted by the party's medium, who unfortunately also happens to be the guy who does not like stealth)
and I can take 10

I'm not getting Skill Focus because I made a combat-heavy build that also happens to be a good skill-monkey (I had to make some compromises, but I'm pretty happy with the results so far)
For the same reason I'm delaying access to Shadowdancer for a while - I want gaseous form and opportunist asap

I think this character is pretty good at stealth, I could min-max it some more but I believe my score is enough for most situations.
Also, starting from next level my character will maximize UMD and make sure to get some scrolls to get out of the way should anything go wrong.

[Madwand99]

Scouting can work, but it needs a specialized build. It is not sufficient to just have high stealth skills. Your PC has to be really dedicated to mitigating the risks involved in scouting. There are several ways I have been successful in doing this, all in 3.5:

A binder with Malphas bound gets a free raven scout they can see through. Very effective for scouting, and no real risk involved. Combine with Anima Mage for access to very useful divination spells (always helpful in general).

A tibbit swordsage/erudite. Could get 50+ in hide skill, plus access to numerous psychic abilities that complimented scouting. Psychic divination is also even better than arcane divinations. Darkstalker, of course, and numerous abilities that allowed the PC to escape if detected. A very successful scout. Being tiny sized, and being able to Reduce your size to fine, is quite helpful.

A mage with Otherworldly who Alter Self into an Minor Xorn. That 20' burrow speed, along with some investment in stealth, and very careful scouting ("I only stick an eyeball out of the wall") allowed for high-value minimal-risk scouting. Combine with divination spells to taste.

You'll note that all these builds rely on Tier 1 abilities to do scouting really well. That is no coincidence: I would never try scouting with a Tier 3 build, it's just too risky and there are too many failure modes. If your GM doesn't want to cooperate with you (a serious consideration with scouting), then it's impossible without access to Tier 1 spells and powers.

Above all, scouting is challenging, dangerous, but highly rewarding. The player needs to be smart. it is as much about out-thinking the GM as out-thinking monsters and NPCs. It requires a deep understanding of the rules, the ability to be diplomatic with your GM and players, and an understanding of the metagame, so as to make your scouting valuable to the other players rather than an annoyance. Good luck.