[not a bug] Robbers seeking to deliver their ultimatum ignore stealth

[marginoferror]

When you are hiding successfully, robbers who have not yet delivered their ultimatum will still home in on you regardless. This happens whether the robbers saw you (encountered them on the wilderness map and zoomed in close) or they didn't even see you (you sneak up on them while zoomed in from far away).

[Sami]

In cases like this it's really hard to get a good picture of what happened there. A gameplay footage would be the only way to break things down properly.

But somebody might see you even if you don't see yourself that this somebody notices you.
I mean, if NPC spots you from behind, out of your sight, you are not told of being noticed and may think that you are succesfully hiding from everybody - although, in reality you are succefully hiding only from those in sight.

[PALU]

It's true in reality, but UrW's rules are somewhat different, as you're brought out of stealth when somebody notices you in UrW (and refused from entering stealth when seen by somebody/thing you're unaware of, such as a bird behind your back just after zooming in). However, there are two exceptions to that in UrW that I know of:
- Robber homing. They always find you, regardless of stealth and darkness as far as I've seen, unless you manage to get away by zooming out (which may require a running sprint to get sufficiently far away). I have to admit I haven't done much testing, as my approach is to get out of there as quickly as possible when I see robbers (unless in the elimination stage of a robber quest, where I want to close the distance in a controlled manner with no hirelings in front of my character and not too many of them straggling far behind).
- Njerp aggro homing: When you fire an arrow that hits a previously unaware Njerp he'll run towards you, and change course doing so, even if you're still in stealth and moves away at an angle. Past experience indicates they can lose you in darkness, but probably only after dropping out of aggro.

However, I don't think I've ever been brought out of hiding by being spotted by an unseen critter.

[marginoferror]

I think this has happened to me twice, once when I was approaching sedentary robbers for a quest and once when they ambushed me and I was trying to ski away.

Next time it happens I'll save scum and record some different scenarios to see if I can demonstrate there's an issue.

I did have a dog on both occasions; that doesn't seem to affect stealth much with animals but I wonder if robbers are different?

[Sami]

Had some time to double-check this on code level and there's no bugs involved.
Robbers are not immune to stealth, they do not ingnore those checks, and their visual observation routines work the same as with other humans too. If they can't see you they can still hear something they want to check out - this is true with all the creatures/animals.  Robbers do move in somewhat unique patterns, effectively scouting the terrain for what they find suspicious/interesting, so it is very likely to that someone will eventually come so close to the character that they are seen.

[JP_Finn]

Had some time to double-check this on code level and there's no bugs involved.
Robbers are not immune to stealth, they do not ingnore those checks, and their visual observation routines work the same as with other humans too. If they can't see you they can still hear something they want to check out - this is true with all the creatures/animals.  Robbers do move in somewhat unique patterns, effectively scouting the terrain for what they find suspicious/interesting, so it is very likely to that someone will eventually come so close to the character that they are seen.

I was just shot through thorax by robber, killing my character, while hidden *green overlay* with 100 on Stealth. must be hell of an archer to shoot wild with terminal accuracy. (I did get 2 of his pals with instakill headshots)

[pissed off rant] I'm getting to the point of waiting for 4.62 with adjustable/less robbers spawning. I rather deal with wandering Njerps than robbers with their better hearing than lynx. FFS. Unless there's a mod to disable robbers fully. Doesn't matter where my character resides & wanders, it's always robbers. Can't even sneak away from them with max Stealth. Kills effectively a lone hermit playstyle.
[/pissed off rant]

[PALU]

While I've found the only way to get away from robber is to run and zoom out, I don't buy the complaint that you're attacked back while sniping (and killing).

It can also be noted that you CAN yield (and it's not the usual outcome to die when encountering robbers: they're unexpectedly merciful in just robbing and dumping you after having killed some of their buddies most of the time).

I've encountered robbers that were extremely good fighters, though, where the only way to stop them from mowing down my posse was to move and attack from behind, as all attacks from the front were either blocked or counter attacked, with my highly skilled characters losing out. Some robbers, on the other hand, go down almost immediately.