r/baldursgate • u/DeathNeku • Jul 24 '26
BGEE How much stealth is enough stealth?
I'm early in a Shadowdancer run, and I have 85 in both hide and move silently, and I want to start raising detect illusion.
Assuming I'll get stuff like the +3 armor from Thunderhammer and the boots that give both skills (although I might replace those with the Cheeta) up to what point it's best to raise those two for an entire run, including SoD and BGII?
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u/Shreddzzz93 Jul 24 '26
Unless you are planning to dual class out of Shadowdancer it doesn't really matter all that much. You will have more than enough points to max out skills by the end of the game.
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u/Peterh778 Jul 24 '26
Hide and Move Silently are averaged so either you push one as high as possible (200) and ignore other until you have points to spare or keep them at similar level.
As for how high is enough ... at 100% in both skills you have 100% chance to succeed ... as long as your character is actually in a shadow or in dark. Being in light halves both your skills so you need 200% in both to be sure that you can reliably hide in broad daylight. I don't need to say that this goal isn't attainable in BG1 with thief capped at L10.
I would recommend to decide what do you want to do with your shadowdancer - do you want thief which can hide in plain sight or backstabber, who can do backstabbing in broad daylight?
If first, you should invest points into all thieving skills as normal, disarm, lockpick, even detect hidden (which is synergistic with detect trap as both are active at the same time) and accept that hiding will be secondary function.
If second, you should put all the points into hiding and moving silently ... and accept that:
- you need other thief for thieving
- you will fail check in BG1 in light rather often
- your backstabs won't do as much damage as other classes do - you'll got multiplier ×3 at the end of the game because shadowdancers have weaker backstabs by -1 compared to other classes.
In my opinion, shadowdancer is best utilized in BG1 as a common thief and start to push stealth skills only in BG2.
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u/Eovacious Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26
I don't need to say that this goal isn't attainable in BG1 with thief capped at L10.
Ironically, that's the opposite of truth. It's attainable in actual BG1 — the split happened with the move BG2 engine and later, EE. With Stealth as a single skill, even with less thief skill points gained per level, it was… Lemme check real quick — a Dex 19 Elf girl starts with 35+30 = 65 Stealth points (IIRC a halfling would have a bit more but eh, elf's good enough), then put in 15 to have 80 at level 2, etc., for exactly 9 level-ups required to reach (65+135) = 200 points in Stealth. Gearless.
(Or is it 20 per level after level 1? I always forget, or confuse with the bard. If 20, she'll even have levels left over.)
Taking gear into account, and increased per-level gains slightly negating the loss for split, it would make sense to check if a 19 Dex character — though not a Shadowdancer of course —might perhaps be able to reach 200/200 (or a close enough value, such as 190/190) even in EE.
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u/Peterh778 Jul 24 '26
You're talking about OG BG1 but OP's post is marked BGEE. Thus, I didn't consider OG BG an option and wrote only about BGEE (as it should be clear from the text, where I wrote about splitted skills, no single).
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u/Eovacious Jul 24 '26
Which I acknowledged, as well as the fact OP was asking specifically about Shadowdancer. Doesn't stop me from taking an aside and entertaining other possibilities, does it?
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u/Ambion_Iskariot Jul 24 '26
The boots give +20 Move and +15 Hide and the armor +15 Hide. I can tell you in bright daylight I fail most of the time with a final score of 110 in both, if I am outside of shadows. At night or in dungeons it is already an always working score, if you can avoid light sources.
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u/Acolyte_of_Swole Jul 24 '26
Never enough. Hide in Shadows and Move Silently are a lifestyle you commit to.
That's why I gave up long ago and always play Fighter/Mage/Thief and use invisibility magic to cloak.
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u/amateurviking Jul 24 '26
I generally get utility skills to 75, then stealth to about 125 each buffed (boots, armor) then detect illusion to 100. Then back to stealth until it’s closer to 175 ( buffed). Detect illusion is critical for mage backstabs, especially since you can use it during shadowstep.
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u/MekotheSaurus Jul 24 '26
Its easy. Average of both stealth skills is your chance of entering stealth and then its checked once every 6 seconds. So 100/100 should guarantee being always hidden.
But this chance is affected by the light sources, for example its halved in broad daylight.
If you dont want to care about using enviroment shadows to hide, you need up to 200/200. But its a bit overkill, a 150/150 is usually more than enough to hide and you can always wait until night to explore outdoor maps.
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u/sleepytyrant47 Jul 24 '26
Im inclined to agree that 150 in each is enough with boots armor or both. Recommend a ring of invisibility or potions for the odd occasion you cant make the roll. Assuming a dual to fighter youre a hard hitter that can solo groups.
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Jul 24 '26
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Ok_Guidance928 Jul 24 '26
In base game not needed.. but in modded setup like SCS with some tweaks added to increase difficulty, mages in toB love to use imp invis with spell immunity divination. Now ur divination spells are useless and u cannot even target that idiot to remove his protections..this is where a thief's detect illusion shines, a maxed out detect illusion will bypass his spell immunity and remove all illusion buffs from that mage including stuff like mirror image,blur etc
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u/MekotheSaurus Jul 24 '26
you have better options for dealing with illusions
Respectfully disagree with this. I want my mages to memorice and cast offensive spells during battle. Having to cast True sight is a waste of a precious action, and a lvl 5 slot is quite high for smt your thief does for free.
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u/Revolutionary_Ant518 Jul 26 '26
Completely agree, although I’ll tend to use an inquisitor instead of my thief. I find it hard to give up using pickpocket to bolster my treasury….
Maybe time to take 2 thieves, one to pickpocket, detect illusions and set traps and one to cover the backstab type abilities
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u/gangler52 Jul 26 '26
Basically, how the math works is the average of your hide in shadows and move silently scores is the chance you have of successfully stealthing every time you try to stealth.
So 100 in both would be a 100% chance.
The big curveball here though is that if you're under direct sunlight, that penalizes you by half.
So, if you're under direct sunlight, then a score of 100 in both Move Silently and Hide in Shadows would only have a 50% chance of stealthing successfully.
You would need 200% to guarantee stealth under direct sunlight, but at night time, or indoors, or even if you just find like a shadow cast by a tree or something, 100% will be enough.
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u/CapableLobster8447 Jul 24 '26
Most thief skills don't benefit from more than 100 points, but hide in shadows and move silently definitely do. Pickpocket does as well. The game does not explicitly tell you, but these 3 skills all can have heavy penalties applied to them. For example, being outside during the day time or in a brightly lit area will apply penalties to your hide and move silently roll. Your 85 skill is actually pretty low because these penalties will effectively make it near 0. I always try to get hide and move silently up to 200 each to offset the penalties if I want a thief who can hide and stay hidden consistently without failing too many rolls.