InAvowed,one of the first things you are able to do in the game is perform a stealth kill. In fact, it’s a Godlike ability and the first one you earn. There is even some nice tall grass to hide in to make your way around the enemies and attack them from behind.Everything in the game wants you to perform acts of stealth, including an entire mission that gives you an optional way to win if you sneak by. However, that turns out to be almost impossible, and the game often punishes you for it.
Even a goodRanger build inAvowedwants you to be stealthy. There areabilities like Shadowing Beyond that allow you to become invisibleand increase your Stealth Attack and Movement Speed. Certain pieces of unique gear will do the same thing. There is even a Sniper ability that would allow you to attack enemies from further away without being noticed. When it comes down to it, however, stealth proves to be almost useless.
Stealth In Avowed Doesn’t Do That Much
A Disappointing Experience When You Want To Take Down Enemies
The first time you use a stealth kill, your enemy will fall at your feet dead. This may happen a few more times, but as soon as you enter any area with enemies of a higher tier than you - that is to say, all of them - you will no longer be able to take that enemy down in one go. This means that that enemy will be alerted,and so will every other enemy on the map nearby.
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It is near impossible to take down the enemies without alerting everyone else. Even if you are in the tall grass and “hidden,” as soon as you perform the Stealth Attack, every other enemy will know about it. That means, at best,stealth works once per enemy camp. Early in the game, I was attempting to take down the Yellowband Camp, which is one of thebounties inAvowed, and I was hoping to take a few of them out stealthily. It never worked, no matter which enemy I went after, and I had solid gear at the time.
The Ranger abilities, like Shadowing Beyond,only work out of combat. So you can use it to sneak past an enemy, but as soon as you perform that Stealth Attack, you will instantly be revealed. In a similar vein, I dropped the Sniper ability because it never worked more than once per camp, and it was frustrating to try to make it work. Moreover, if you have Companions with you, they will immediately start fighting, making any further attempt at Stealth useless.
Avowed Would Feel Fantastic As A Stealth Game
The Right Mechanics Are Already In Place
The gameplay, specifically the Ranger, feels like it wants to be a high-stealth character. Actual sniping mechanics would feel amazing, as there are tons of places that you canparkour inAvowedto get to a high vantage point. Being able to take down enemies without being seen andputting the rifles to good use would be fun, and it could allow for some interesting roleplaying options as well.
There are already some good pieces of gear for it, and if you could grab items a little more sneakily, you could possibly even pickpocket the characters around you. You wouldn’t necessarily have to take out every enemy camp, or you could do so from a distance or from a hidden position. It’s one of the mechanics that feels like it should be better than it is, and there are so many opportunities for it to be useful. It’s a shame that it is not.
Good Stealth Wouldn’t Require Major Changes In Avowed
The Most Critical Pieces Are Present In The Game
All of the right ingredients are already present in Avowed.There is a lot of tall grass around every enemy camp, which made me think I could get away with stealth more than I actually could. There are also a lot of ways into almost every area, and you’re able to make your way in much sneakier. The Yellowband Camp, for instance, has at least four entrances and most of them have tall grass around them.
One of the characters even suggests to you that going in the front door would be a mistake. It’s a Bounty, so you do have to kill them, but if you attempt to enter with stealth as suggested,you won’t be able to take any of the enemies down and the whole camp will descend on you in an instant no matter what. The enemies would have to be tweaked a little, so that they don’t notice if you take someone else down while hidden, but that feels like a small change.
There’s another quest, much later, that asks you to collect banners without killing any enemies. The banners are in the middle of enemy camps. If you don’t have Shadowing Beyond, you just have to hope for the best. But if you do kill anyone, even by accident or because your companions started fighting when you were spotted,you will lose the optional quest objective.
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Doing so will lock you out of the best choice in that situation, even when the game otherwise really wanted you to go in stealthily. I got as close to the banners as I could without being seen, and as soon as I was close enough I darted in, collected the banner,and sprinted out hoping my companions wouldn’t kill anyone. It luckily worked for me this time, but I don’t think it would work that way all the time. But the ideas are there, it’s just nearly impossible to not get noticed as soon as you leave the grass.
But the sneaky entrances, the tall grass, the guns and bows that could easily be modified to be ranged stealth weapons, the Ranger abilities, and the daggers are all already in place. There is evengear for Rangersthat lets you trigger certain stealth mechanics as well. There are so many quests that already ask you to be more discreet and those would feel a lot better, and better stealth could give players a way to get through the game in a more pacifist style.Avowedalready wants to be a stealth game, so let me actually be stealthy.
