Stealthy non-stabber

[Rast]

This proposal was inspired by the recent assassin thread.

Right now the Stealth skill in Crawl is a little weird. It helps you avoid sleeping monsters and wandering monsters, yes, but it (sometimes) lets you sneak up on sleeping monsters so you can murder them one by one. It gives you a ridiculous damage multiplier on those same sleeping/helpless monsters that will usually OHKO them -- but only if you use a bad weapon (short blades). If you use a normal weapon, you just get a reasonable chunk of extra damage, which is nice but not amazing.

So this mechanic drives the stabber role, which uses Stealth and a bad weapon to silently murder every monster in the dungeon. However, monsters will sometimes wake up despite Stealth, or sometimes survive the stab, and then almost always shout to wake up all the other monsters. That leaves the stabber facing an encounter with its bad weapon and under-leveled skills (because it put points into Stealth instead of Fighting/etc). So the stabber role picks up the Enchanter background/book, which gives it spells to put monsters [back] to sleep, or otherwise disable them so its bad weapon can continue to get tons of bonus damage from the Stealth skill.

But what the game doesn't encourage -- at least not with a background -- is using stealth tactically to avoid fights or control the circumstances of the fight. So my suggestion is a melee Warrior who gets, instead of a shield or throwing nets, stealthiness. This could be the Assassin background if blowguns go to Hunter, or get a new name like "Scout".

+0 long sword
+0 robe
+0 boots
ring of stealth
Bread ration

Fighting: 2
Long Blades: 2
Dodging: 2
Stealth: 4

+5 Strength
+1 Intelligence
+6 Dexterity.

Thoughts?

[Berder]

That's already what an assassin is, aside from the blowgun. Do you mean to base this thread on some hypothetical change or removal of assassin?

[Pereza0]

Eh...

Its just a Gladiator with a ring instead of nets. Gladiator can easily use stealth the way you mention - to tactically avoid fight and all that -you don't need an extra background to do it. Nets are also great for this purpose. You can always worship Dith too

I am also unsure about having a background starting with jewelry either, no background other does.

[Lyrick]

using stealth tactically to avoid fights or control the circumstances of the fight.

What do you mean by using stealth to control the circumstances of the fight? Is this something distinct from avoiding the fight and coming back later when you're well-equipped?

[Sprucery]

I think it could mean something like sneaking around to a better position to fight.

[Rast]

Berder, this was based on the idea that the Assassin name would be available soon. However, it could possibly co-exist alongside the current Assassin.

Pereza0, this is more different from Gladiator (which starts with 0 Stealth) than Fighter is. I don't think it's too weird to have a a background that starts with a mediocre ring.

Lyrick: Sometimes it means setting exclusions on hard enemies and coming back later or never. And that's fine. More often (hopefully) it would mean preparing for the fight, clearing monsters from surrounding areas so they don't join in later, and what Sprucery said. Orc priests get a lot safer if you approach them from around a corner where there are no orcs. Ogres get a lot easier if you can use a ranged attack on them 7 times before they are adjacent to you. Etc.

[Pereza0]

Pereza0, this is more different from Gladiator (which starts with 0 Stealth) than Fighter is. I don't think it's too weird to have a a background that starts with a mediocre ring.

You don't need more that a couple of pips of stealth to use it tactically like you said in the OP (basically avoiding detection the first turn your step in their LOS). You don't need Stealth 4 AND a ring of stealth for that, that would make you far more stealthy than assassin or enchanter ever were.

I just gave HuGl a shot with this (training stealth a few levels along with long blades) and without swapping leather armour most monsters would not detect me the instant I stepped in their LOS. If you go with something with better stealth apt/enhancers like a vampire, a vine stalker, a merfolk or a high elf this could work pretty fine.

Not every playstyle needs to be represented by its own class, and these races with their natural bad armour aptitude and good stealth aptitude will naturally tend to this independently of their background