Inquisitive Auto-Search Broken?

[MagicalDad]

My wife is running an Inquisitive on hardcore, and has a Search of 51 at lvl 14, we are doing lvl 10 quests on the way to 3K favor. She's not finding any trap boxes with the auto-search - have to stop and search every time, even though the documented Search DCs for these quests are 5-10 below her actual Search skill. Has anyone noticed this issue? We've both run many Inquisitives on the Khyber w/o seeing this issue.

 

[Blerkington]

Could the issue be her character's spot skill isn't high enough? Think the character has to perform both a successful spot and search for this to work.

 

[vryxnr]

As Blerkington said, Auto Find (afaik regardless of the source) actually use your Spot skill rather than (or in addition to) your Search -5 as the abilities say they should. So yeah, gotta raise your Spot to match.

Also, they have a limit on how many "traps" they can find at once. Each component of a trap counts against this limit, so if a single trap contains 10 spikes that shoot up from the ground, then walking near it counts as trying to find 11 traps (the 10 spikes and the one trap box). I don't know what the limit is, but if it's 8 for example, then you'll auto detect 8 of the 10 spikes and no trap box. If you then move away, out of range of the auto-detect, then move back in range, you will then find the rest of the components (up to the limit again vs the rest of the components).

Again, I do not know what the limit is, but I have observed this behavior many times in trap heavy places.

 

[Chacka]

To clarify, for auto-search to work effectively, you need BOTH enough spot skill AND search skill, and both must be sufficiently high. And as Vryxnr sayed already, auto-search unfortunately doesn't function exactly like normal search when too many trap objects are within range simultaneously. In such cases, you may only partially detect them, which can result in not uncovering the "trap box." As a workaround, you may still need to resort to normal searching or backtrack to cover missed areas.
I hope the developers will fix that one day.

 

[DYWYPI]

Using Nothing is Hidden: for traps a (Search check with a penalty) is performed immediately after any successful Spot check. It will automatically reveal traps but only if both; Spot skill and Search skills are high enough to find the trap, i.e. you won't need to make a separate Search check attempt if your Spot/Search skills were high enough.

Yes, the DDO Wiki mentions the in-game enhancement details for Mind Like Iron are vague. Hence the note with regards to the automatic trap detection aspect also requiring a successful Spot check first.

Both 'Nothing Is Hidden III' and 'Mind Like Iron' have the same text and function identically with regards to Traps. That behaviour is expected (no auto recheck) as it's performing a single search on a localised object at a given time frame and position.

Like mentioned above by vryxnr, "automatic search" methods have limitations; each spike is considered a separate object. NiH possibly could have a limitation on the amount of objects it can reveal (in that time frame) or a small radius. Moving out of Spot distance and going back usually reveals more or all hidden objects, or standard Search action reveals them all.

 

[Jeeboheebo]

Any ideas about the epic feat Watchful Eye? Wiki doesn't say there's an -5 search to the check, anyone tested if it's so or just a copy/paste...

 

[DYWYPI]

The feat 'Watchful Eye' feat doesn't have the (Search check with a penalty). Both 'Nothing is Hidden' or 'Mind Like Iron' do have a Search check penalty as mentioned in (Post #5). However, remember even if you have 'Watchful Eye' you'd still need the Trapfinding feat, if you were searching for difficult traps.

 

[Jeeboheebo]

The feat 'Watchful Eye' feat doesn't have the (Search check with a penalty). Both 'Nothing is Hidden' or 'Mind Like Iron' do have a Search check penalty as mentioned in (Post #5). However, remember even if you have 'Watchful Eye' you'd still need the Trapfinding feat, if you were searching for difficult traps.

So, if I had trapfinding and were too lazy to search manually, Watchful Eye would be the best choice since it doesn't have the - to search check. Ok.

Now to decide what I need more, racial AP's or an epic feat. Then again I could just search manually every time I spot something but... Sigh. Decisions.

 

[Lazuli]

Any ideas about the epic feat Watchful Eye? Wiki doesn't say there's an -5 search to the check, anyone tested if it's so or just a copy/paste...

If she's using an inquisitive, then she's using shiradi, and there's an enhancement in the ED (pierce deception) that gives you 5% doubleshot when you take the watchful eye feat. This undoubtedly increases its usefulness.

 

[l_remmie]

The ability works and is NOT bugged, it just doesn't follow the crappy description.

The ability is in fact pretty useless if you use swap gear for that search and disable. Since it won't warn you by revealing anything.

 

[Mindos]

However, remember even if you have 'Watchful Eye' you'd still need the Trapfinding feat, if you were searching for difficult traps.

https://ddowiki.com/page/Find_Traps

Boom! This could work, right?

 

[DYWYPI]

Yes, the "Find Traps" spell would temporarily grant the equivalent of the required Trapfinding feat.

 

[Dielzen]

If she's using an inquisitive, then she's using shiradi, and there's an enhancement in the ED (pierce deception) that gives you 5% doubleshot when you take the watchful eye feat. This undoubtedly increases its usefulness.

Shiradi at level 14 is an accomplisment

 

[Lazuli]

Shiradi at level 14 is an accomplisment

I was responding to a post that asked about the epic feat watchful eye, obviously that is for epic levels.

 

[Drunken.dx]

To clarify, for auto-search to work effectively, you need BOTH enough spot skill AND search skill, and both must be sufficiently high. And as Vryxnr sayed already, auto-search unfortunately doesn't function exactly like normal search when too many trap objects are within range simultaneously. In such cases, you may only partially detect them, which can result in not uncovering the "trap box." As a workaround, you may still need to resort to normal searching or backtrack to cover missed areas.
I hope the developers will fix that one day.

This is why I stopped taking auto search feats/enhancements.

Better just to stack spot/search and manually search

Worst part is that when auto finds partially spot stops notifying you of rest of traps.

 

[Alco]

As stated above, the ability works with the Search and Spot skills with a -5 penalty, so you need to beef up those skills for it to work.

If you don't know where all the traps are in a dungeon, then I would also beef up your reflex so when you stumble into one you aren't skewered (or fried, or frozen, etc) and then you can search for the box of the trap you discovered. (FYI, this is also known as the Barbarian Trap Finding method.)

 

[Lazuli]

As stated above, the ability works with the Search and Spot skills with a -5 penalty, so you need to beef up those skills for it to work.

If you don't know where all the traps are in a dungeon, then I would also beef up your reflex so when you stumble into one you aren't skewered (or fried, or frozen, etc) and then you can search for the box of the trap you discovered. (FYI, this is also known as the Barbarian Trap Finding method.)

Oh yeah the Barbarian Trap Finding method is a proud method that comes from the first editions of D&D. In my pnp game, when a trapper is missing, the players always say "barbarian goes first". It's hard to be a barbarian!

 

[Jhml]

Oh yeah the Barbarian Trap Finding method is a proud method that comes from the first editions of D&D. In my pnp game, when a trapper is missing, the players always say "barbarian goes first". It's hard to be a barbarian!

Yup, reminded me of this classic flick & scene (33m 50s in):

 

[TedSandyman]

As Blerkington said, Auto Find (afaik regardless of the source) actually use your Spot skill rather than (or in addition to) your Search -5 as the abilities say they should. So yeah, gotta raise your Spot to match.

Also, they have a limit on how many "traps" they can find at once. Each component of a trap counts against this limit, so if a single trap contains 10 spikes that shoot up from the ground, then walking near it counts as trying to find 11 traps (the 10 spikes and the one trap box). I don't know what the limit is, but if it's 8 for example, then you'll auto detect 8 of the 10 spikes and no trap box. If you then move away, out of range of the auto-detect, then move back in range, you will then find the rest of the components (up to the limit again vs the rest of the components).

Again, I do not know what the limit is, but I have observed this behavior many times in trap heavy places.

Yes, this is true. Usually if you get anything, just do a manual search to find out if there is more if you don't see a box.

But I have seen autosearch show only three or four spikes even though there is more.

I have also seen it where sometimes I know there is a trap and I have the auto search and it simply doesn't show anything when I know my skills are high enough. I will occasionally run a dungeon twice in a row and think "I had trouble with this last time" but it pops right up when I get there.

SO yes you have to have spot AND more search than normal, which is the problem for people who don't know. But there is something not quite right or consistant about autosearch too.

 

[Ying]

The autosearch feature, whether that's Inquisitive or Watchful Eye, is not reliable. It will find some but not all traps if your Spot and Search are high enough. Examples: In Master Artificer, the optional has three trap boxes. I've run up to them and only two were auto-discovered; that happened routinely. In VON 3, the first force trap has two boxes. There are times that autosearch only finds one of them.