16 points into Spot/Listen worth it?

[sir_blacksoutalot]

I'm sure this has been discussed many times before, but I'm not having any luck finding an answer. I find myself with an extra 33 skill points to spend, and am thinking it would be nice to be able to detect stealthers, even if only 25% of the time.

Spot and Listen are both cross-class skills for my char. Is it worth it to sink 16 points into one of these skills? I'm trying to understand how ineffective this might be so that I don't totally waste the points. Thanks for any feedback.

[kkrazlite]

Going to be honest with you...

While i do want to say "Go for it, if its flavor skill you want for your character".

Im going to have to say no.

Most stealther EXSPECIALLY now with access to high end hide and move silent gear from the combination of averus, the rouges den and the tavern in the dock district, can get around 50-60 hide and move silent with no issues... and thats just the lower end people as the more veteran players can reach the hundreds...

Again while i do want to try to give you some rp relif to adding flavor to your character im afraid that 16 spot / listen would be useless.

[Nyeleni]

Yes, against other players it will be mostly useless. However, against mobs it is sometimes useful. Although there aren't that many hiding specimens around.

For rp reasons I'd choose one of the social skills to dump these points in. If you didn't already. Like diplomacy, bluff, intimidate, sense motive and the like.

[Calodan]

Mechanically it is not going to be that useful.

Role Play Roll Play in DM events it would be at times. If you roll well.

Then there is the play your sheet. 0 Spot might mean you are a bit blind.............

[aaron22]

can you pick one and put the 33 points into that. that will go further than splitting them. i do this on my toons. having both is great but either one or the other is almost as good.

[sir_blacksoutalot]

Thanks all, that's exactly the feedback I was looking for. I recall that back in the day it used to be fairly easy to spot stealthers, but clearly that has changed over the years. I'll find another useful slot for those points.

[Deathgrowl]

Then there is the play your sheet. 0 Spot might mean you are a bit blind.............

The spot and listen skills aren't indicators of whether you have good or bad eyes, or how loudly you percieve sounds - they're indicators of how perceptive you are to visual signs and sounds.

I've seen people RP listen as:
Person: *yells something*
Listener: "GODS I HAVE EXTRA SENSITIVE HEARING PLEASE BE MORE QUIET!"

Which in my view is inaccurate.

What I mean is: A character can be the glasses needing type and have 33 ranks of spot. Perception.

[Hoihe]

Mechanically it is not going to be that useful.

Role Play Roll Play in DM events it would be at times. If you roll well.

Then there is the play your sheet. 0 Spot might mean you are a bit blind.............

"Play your sheet" interpretation is plain false.

Having 0 spot trained means you are an average joe without any training or work experience in a field that specially requires you to spot small visual details. Negative spot means you are indeed either vision impaired, or you glance over important details that an average individual would be able to notice.