Heists: a few bugs and need-to-knows

SerpentbreeD · April 2016

Things I noticed within heists that either need some looking into from the developer's side or a "special workaround" in order to beat it:

Elites. Those with stealth detect absolutely excel at it. Meaning, long before you're even in their circle, they can spot you and knock you out of stealth.
Patrols are broken. Besides guards patrolling areas without any kinds of hiding spots, there is the occasional guard with a lamp just standing idle in front of a chest you're supposed to loot. Usually in a group with other guards. I suspect this is because if a guard dies, it's replaced with another random guard. So if you kill one, standing near a chest, it may well be replaced by a guard with a lamp.
Stealth circles have a chance to disappear with every action you perform. Can easily be fixed by going out of stealth and back in. Still annoying. Has caused me to fail a few times.
Stealth circles are not affected by line of sight. May be impossible game coding-wise, I don't know much about that. If you hide behind a rock or a book case, fully in the shadows and a guard with lantern walks past you, spam press sneak and 9 times out of 10 it won't notice you. Sure, that 10th time is annoying, but it's better than nothing with the broken patrols.
Traps are sometimes invisible. Clutter hides the traps completely, you can't sabotage them but you can definitely trigger them. No real workaround. Other traps, even if you sabotage them, will trigger on top of you. Finally, if a trap looks sabotaged, it may very well still be intact and will trigger when you walk over it.

Also, get yourself 5 pieces of the Night's Silence set. It ignores your movement speed penalty while sneaking. In order to get the timed rewards, this is a must have.

I may add more as I come across it. Feel free to add to it if you encounter something broken that needs mentioning here.

daemonios · April 2016

Just do 15 heists to get the achievement and forget about them. They were fun to do, but essentially a gimmick. Not a single reason to do them after getting the achievement.

ChrispyRambo · April 2016

Along with everything you listed I keep getting a glitch where I collect all the treasure then head back to talk to the guy at the first of the level to end the mission but I can't turn it in. As time keeps counting down a random enemy runs in attacks me cancelling my time to zero so i can't fully complete it. Its weird and really annoying. It happens all the time even though I haven't been spotted.

rfennell_ESO · April 2016

SerpentbreeD wrote: »

Things I noticed within heists that either need some looking into from the developer's side or a "special workaround" in order to beat it:
Stealth circles are not affected by line of sight. May be impossible game coding-wise, I don't know much about that. If you hide behind a rock or a book case, fully in the shadows and a guard with lantern walks past you, spam press sneak and 9 times out of 10 it won't notice you. Sure, that 10th time is annoying, but it's better than nothing with the broken patrols.

Just an in general point about this bulletpoint:

LOS can be used on everything and anything as long as you can get it. You can open chests in the middle of crowded rooms in IC if you are behind a los object from the mobs and do not move out of los during the animation to open the chest.

rfennell_ESO · April 2016

went to edit post, ended up quoting the post with the edit. lol.

SerpentbreeD · April 2016

A bit of an additional note, just in case people don't know this: invisibility helps a huge amount. Naturally this means Nightblades have an easier time with heists. Besides that, the Night's Silence 5 piece set bonus helps a huge amount. It ignores the movement speed penalty while sneaking.

Seriously. Craft it. Rarity doesn't even matter.

Guess I'll put it in the first post, just because it's that important.

rfennell_ESO · April 2016

SerpentbreeD wrote: »

A bit of an additional note, just in case people don't know this: invisibility helps a huge amount. Naturally this means Nightblades have an easier time with heists. Besides that, the Night's Silence 5 piece set bonus helps a huge amount. It ignores the movement speed penalty while sneaking.

Seriously. Craft it. Rarity doesn't even matter.

Guess I'll put it in the first post, just because it's that important.

Or being a vampire works the same way.

Nestor · April 2016

ChrispyRambo wrote: »

Along with everything you listed I keep getting a glitch where I collect all the treasure then head back to talk to the guy at the first of the level to end the mission but I can't turn it in. As time keeps counting down a random enemy runs in attacks me cancelling my time to zero so i can't fully complete it. Its weird and really annoying. It happens all the time even though I haven't been spotted.

lol, when I enter a Heist instance, I park my character at the entrance for 8 minutes until the timer runs out, then treat the Heist as a Dungeon Run. Its much more fun that way and I don't get all the error messages yelling at me that I am not doing it right. One day I might try to sneak one all the way through or do the timed run, but its not that important to me (and I hate, not dislike, but hate, timed events in games)

I wish we were given a choice on the timed run in the beginning, then the instance would be set which ever way we choose.

SerpentbreeD · April 2016

ChrispyRambo wrote: »

Along with everything you listed I keep getting a glitch where I collect all the treasure then head back to talk to the guy at the first of the level to end the mission but I can't turn it in. As time keeps counting down a random enemy runs in attacks me cancelling my time to zero so i can't fully complete it. Its weird and really annoying. It happens all the time even though I haven't been spotted.

Sounds to me like you do get spotted earlier. The "Return to Fa'ren-dar" objective won't complete unless you're out of combat. Which, considering the nature of the mission, is somewhat understandable. Note that things such as traps don't help at all. Usually when a trap expires, the enemy will come running after you.

daemonios · April 2016

ChrispyRambo wrote: »

Along with everything you listed I keep getting a glitch where I collect all the treasure then head back to talk to the guy at the first of the level to end the mission but I can't turn it in. As time keeps counting down a random enemy runs in attacks me cancelling my time to zero so i can't fully complete it. Its weird and really annoying. It happens all the time even though I haven't been spotted.

Some of the heists require you to get 3 chests AND a special treasure. The quest journal entry isn't very clear on that. They are two separate goals. I think you may be getting the chests, but not the treasure.

Elephant42 · April 2016

Nestor wrote: »

-snip-(and I hate, not dislike, but hate, timed events in games)-snip-

Hah - me too!

+eleventy billion

Enemy-of-Coldharbour · April 2016

Agreed. I hate timed events.

SerpentbreeD · April 2016

I do enjoy heists... the countless bugs found in them, not so much. Should they ever decide to fix everything they messed up with those heist missions and maybe add a few extra locations, I'd absolutely love doing them. I actually feel they should expand on the concept, maybe add some really challenging heist achievements, possibly make them a bit more lucrative...

Could be such a fun bit of extra content.