The "sneak" skill

[FuryMGS]

Hi ! ^^

I was wondering something about the sneak skill. I usually don't use it, and don't upgrade it. I thought that "sneak" only use is to allow the player to walk in front of someone without being detected, but actually I never really knew what it was for.

Does this skill has a special effect, such as increasing the chances of a successful use of "steal" skill, or critical hit at the start of combat ?

Excuse me if this is a dumb or already answered question, but I searched a little and I didn't find.

Thanks in advance. ^^

 

[Per]

I once tried to measure Stealing success with and without sneaking, and didn't see any difference. Sneaking is a requisite for getting the Silent Death bonus, but other than that I doubt it affects combat.

 

[FuryMGS]

Thanks for your reply. ^^

 

[LionXavier]

The only "special effect", if you wanna call it that, the sneak skill has regarding combat that I can think of, is that with high enough skill you can end combat without leaving the current map and with enemies still alive and chasing you. You just have to be in sneak mode, move away from the foes and hit the end combat (not end turn) button. The higher the skill, the closest to an enemy you can exit combat mode (also depending on the enemy's Perception score, of course).

If you get into this "combat style", you'll meet a sensibly different battle experience than before: instead of facing groups of enemies, all of them attacking you at the same time, you can stalk them, dividing and taking them one by one. It's an especially useful tactic in random encounters, where, just when the map is loading, you can press the "1" key, the key for the sneak skill, and begin the encounter without being detected by the enemy (and thus without entering combat), so you can place yourself and manage the battle as you wish (an alternative to pressing the "A" key, the key for begin combat, in the same circumstances).

Arguably, mastering this technique makes combat, specially ranged combat, a walk in the park.