Appears motionless?[]
"When used in conjunction with Blooded, Thug, and Superior Initiative, computer opponents who are surprised will appear motionless allowing one to attack and retreat around a corner before they can respond. Excellent feat for rogues and assassins."
Could someone explain this note? There is no surprise in NWN, and "appear motionless" in this context somehow seems completely wrong in a multiplayer game. The nearest I can come to explaining this is that the PC in question came around a corner, attacked, then retreated back around the corner before the NPCs had a chance to react. However, such a scenario has nothing to do with initiative; it has to do with AI perception events not firing that rapidly. --The Krit 00:12, April 27, 2012 (UTC).
- "Appears motionless" and "surprise" are here subjective descriptions and are not intended as a technical description of game engine mechanics.
- In the past, there have been comments on this wiki suggesting that initiative has no appreciable effect in NWN. Perhaps it could be explained how a character with all initiative feats is able to move around a corner and implement a complete attack sequence, then retreat, while one without these feats in the exact same scenario cannot. The scenario is perhaps too complicated to explain with initiative alone but involves AI perception events as well. The original note is open to revision. -- Pigron 18:01, 29 April 2012 (UTC)
- Unable to reproduce. I had a PC with blooded, thug, improved initiative, and superior initiative (and high dexterity to boot) going around a corner to attack a low-dex monster (tried both with and without stealth mode), and every time, the monster responded to the first flurry of attacks (if not earlier). There was no opportunity to retreat after the initial attack and before the counterattack, much less retreating after three flurries (a complete attack sequence) without the monster reacting. --The Krit 15:39, May 23, 2012 (UTC)
- Quite sure that's an AI problem, this "appear motionless" could be seen when Henchman Inventory & Battle AI[1] is in function. Guess this AI just goto walk-and-search mode when its enemy is not on its perceive list while official AI simply strike back at the attacker. --The Priest (talk) 13:12, October 13, 2012 (UTC)
- Seems plausible, but can you explain how initiative would factor in? (Pigron reported that a low-initiative PC could not pull off the same stunt.) I'm also not sure how one could consistently get in a complete (three flurry) attack sequence before the NPC's perception event fired, but I'll still call it "plausible" in the absence of a better explanation. --The Krit (talk) 16:53, October 13, 2012 (UTC)
- Note removed pending better directions as to how this can be reproduced. --The Krit 16:57, June 19, 2012 (UTC)