Stealth Attacks?

[Arinbor]

Hey again.
Ran a session last night, and something came up that I couldn't find answers or rules for in the books. There was a large cave system where a large number of orcs were encamped. the party sent the Hobbit in to scout it out and get a headcount. he succeeded in his stealth checks getting inside, then came to a doorway with a solitary orc blocking the way with its back to the Hobbit. He wanted to try stealth kill him. I didn't find any rules for enabling such a thing so I made him make a stealth check to get close, gave him some bonus success dice for succeeding and being behind. He only ended up doing 5 dmg with his sword (not enough to kill it outright) but I then gave him initiative as it turned around and he managed to kill it.
Is this an appropriate way to handle such an event?
How have other Loremasters handled players wanting to attack from stealth?

[zedturtle]

I think that (per the rules on Ambush), giving the hobbit the Initiative was correct. I might even have allowed the 'surprise round'. But killing an enemy by stabbing them in the back? It's Shadow time.

Not because killing an Orc guard is wrong. And not even because backstabbing is wrong. But it is not the model of a noble deed that the heroes would have in their minds (and that we have in our minds from the source material). So the Shadow comes from the fact that the hero took a desperate action... not an Evil action, just a regrettable one.

[Arinbor]

Interesting. I never thought to give him a shadow point due to killing something evil. So doing anything that might not be considered noble or brave in combat will result in shadow is what you are saying?

[Otaku-sempai]

Interesting. I never thought to give him a shadow point due to killing something evil. So doing anything that might not be considered noble or brave in combat will result in shadow is what you are saying?

This was actually a hotly debated topic not very long ago. There was a fair amount of discussion about the ethics of dispatching a subject who might be predominantly evil, but who is not immediately threatening anyone. Needless killing might indeed incur a point of Shadow. In this case I think that the hobbit was taking a foolish risk that could have alerted the Orcs prematurely, but his action was also not one of desperation or necessity.

[zedturtle]

Interesting. I never thought to give him a shadow point due to killing something evil. So doing anything that might not be considered noble or brave in combat will result in shadow is what you are saying?

Well, at least a chance of Shadow. In other words, I might well have called for a Corruption Test (but not automatically awarded Shadow). As OS mentions, this is a subject where there's a spectrum of opinions... no one can say that they're objectively right, just tell you what they might have done, and why.

EDITED TO ADD:

Think about it this way... Bilbo could have done the ultimate sneak attack on Gollum as he tried to escape the Goblin Tunnels. But he didn't. His act of mercy allows the salvation of the Free Peoples and the destruction of Mordor.

Sparing an orc in your game might not have such spectacular results, but it should never be the 'wrong' (morally, at least) choice. For me, the game is all about what it means to be a hero... to make the moral choice even when its the suboptimal choice.

[Glorelendil]

I think you handled the combat well. I wouldn't have given him any bonus dice by default. My default recommendation would be to let him roll Battle and if he gets extra dice he can describe how he sneaks right up to the orc and gets the drop on him.

However, even as I started typing the above, it occurred to me that a decent house-rule for sneak attacks might be to let heroes sneaking up on unsuspecting targest to treat the Stealth roll as the preliminary roll: i.e., if you succeed at the Stealth you get free Initiative, but if you get extra successes you can use them in the combat.

And/or maybe even ignore the Parry rating of an unsuspecting opponent. If you want to be really generous.

But beyond that...I don't believe heroes in Middle Earth would be likely have the training in assassination to get much more than one or two bonus dice and an improved chance to hit.

And as for the Shadow side of things, I agree with everything Zed says. (In general, really.)

[Arinbor]

All brilliant points. Coming from game systems such as Deadlands, Cthulhu and DnD variants sneak attacks and the like are just that. Never thought of the consequences on the characters mental wellbeing etc. Great input guys, love the community here.
And yes I was quite generous with the success dice. I agree with making battle rolls instead of automatic success dice. I personally will also use a corruption test rather than an automatic shadow point as well, depending on the circumstance of course.
Cheers again guys!

[Stormcrow]

In the case of attacking an unaware orc from behind, I'd typically consider it a kill-or-not-kill kind of situation, and treat it as per the rules for "Loremaster characters as obstacles." That is, just set a difficulty to slay the orc immediately. If the roll is failed, combat would then commence, or the orc would run and get help, or whatever.

[Yepesnopes]

I had this same issue one session ago. I resolved it with a single Stealth check.

You may want to check this thread
viewtopic.php?f=7&t=4551

[Glorelendil]

In the case of attacking an unaware orc from behind, I'd typically consider it a kill-or-not-kill kind of situation, and treat it as per the rules for "Loremaster characters as obstacles." That is, just set a difficulty to slay the orc immediately. If the roll is failed, combat would then commence, or the orc would run and get help, or whatever.

If the consequences of not killing the orc silently are catastrophic (i.e., tower is alerted and party dies) then regardless of whether it's resolved in a single roll the LM has introduced a problematic scenario. (I'm pretty sure you agree with that.)

And if the consequences are not so binary then there's not really a problem with resolving it as a normal combat, perhaps with some kind of bonus for successfully sneaking up, as discussed. Unless the heroes spend a lot of time sneaking around assassinating orcs so that this is a normal occurence, this event should be a tense scene, and I'd rather make it a sequence of actions/rolls than a simple one-roll resolution.

But, again, it really comes down to personal taste. Like Zed I find this sort of killing to be very un-heroic, so the last thing I'd want to do is enable it with a simple skill roll.