Stealth

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Stealth

Effect type

Effect

Stacking

Duration

Game link

“

Currently invisible. Ends if you deal damage.

— In-game description

Stealth, also known as cloaking or invisibility, is an effect which allows the stealthed character to be invisible to enemy players and avoid being detected by hostile NPCs.

A stealthed player character will appear as a transparent outline to allies. Hostile NPCs will stop attacking if their target goes in stealth, although they will not lose their accumulated aggro towards the target and the stealthed character won't immediately break away from combat. When thieves enter stealth, their first weapon skill changes to a Stealth Attack, which can only be used while they remain in stealth. Characters in stealth cannot be targeted by enemies, but can still be hit by attacks and take damage without breaking stealth.

Hitting a foe with an attack breaks stealth for the attacker; if the attack was made out of range, misses, was blocked, or was evaded, they will not break stealth. Abilities that do not deal direct damage (like Caltrops, or the Traps which do not deal direct damage) will not break stealth, even though they apply damaging conditions. When a character breaks stealth, they gain the Revealed effect which prevents the user from re-entering stealth for several seconds, regardless of the skill used. The Revealed effect is not applied if the stealth ends normally.

Related skills

A thief prepares to enter stealth mode.

Weapon skills that grant stealth

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   Cloak and Dagger
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   Hunter's Shot
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   The Prestige

Healing skills that grant stealth

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   Hide in Shadows

Utility skills that grant stealth

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   Blinding Powder
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   Shadow Refuge
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   Decoy
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   Signet of Midnight
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   Veil
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   Shadow Gust

Elite skills that grant stealth

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   Mass Invisibility
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   Sneak Gyro
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   Shadow Meld

Skills with special conditions that grant stealth

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   Toss Elixir S (tool belt skill for Elixir S)
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   Detonate Elixir S (Underwater sequence skill for Toss Elixir S)
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   Stalk (Jaguar pet skill)
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   Blinding Tuft (stolen from Thieves)
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   Throw Feathers (stolen)
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   Shadow Pursuit (Sequence skill of a triggered Shadow Trap)
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   Sniper's Cover (replaces Kneel when traited with Silent Scope)
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   Prowl (with Become the Snow Leopard)
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   Blinding Tuft ( foraged)
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   Throw Feathers ( foraged)

Downed skills that grant stealth

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   Smoke Bomb
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   Deception

Drowning skills that grant stealth

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   Vanish in the Deep
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   Deception

Combos that grant stealth

•  Combo Field: Smoke ×  Combo Finisher: Blast
•  Combo Field: Smoke ×  Combo Finisher: Leap

Bundle and activity skills that grant Stealth

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   Aetheric Cloak
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   Create Distraction
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   Second Shadow
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   Throw Feathers
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   Visibility Impediment Dynamo

Related traits

Traits that apply stealth

•  Merciful Ambush - Stealth yourself and your target when reviving an ally. You revive allies faster.
•  Hidden Thief - Stealing grants you stealth.
•  Last Refuge - Use Lesser Blinding Powder when your health reaches a certain threshold or when you take falling damage. You take less falling damage.
•  Cloaked in Shadow - Gaining stealth blinds nearby foes. You cannot be critically hit while stealthed.
•  Silent Scope - Kneel becomes Sniper's Cover, which has an increased initiative cost and grants stealth. Rifle skill critical hit chance increased while kneeling.
•  Celestial Shadow - Grants superspeed and stealth to nearby allies when leaving celestial avatar form.
•  Desperate Decoy - Cloak and leave a clone of yourself behind if you take damage while below the health threshold.

Traits that affect stealth

•  Meld with Shadows - Stealth skills last longer.
•  Prismatic Understanding - Increased stealth duration from mesmer skills. Gain random boons while you are in stealth.

Traits that benefit from stealth on self

•  Cloaked in Shadow - Gaining stealth blinds nearby foes. You cannot be critically hit while stealthed.
•  Hidden Killer - Gain bonus critical-hit chance while stealthed. This bonus lingers for a short duration after you've been revealed.
•  Shadow Protector - When you grant stealth to an ally, they gain regeneration.
•  Shadow's Embrace - Remove conditions periodically while in stealth.
•  Shadow's Rejuvenation - Regenerate health and initiative while in stealth.
•  Rending Shade - Steal boons from enemies you strike with stealth attacks. Incoming damage from enemies without boons is reduced.
•  Resilience of Shadows - Stealth effects that you apply reduce incoming attack damage.
•  Revealed Malice - Being revealed from a stealthed state grants malice and might.
  (Requires a marked target.)
•  Prismatic Understanding - Increased stealth duration from mesmer skills. Gain random boons while you are in stealth.

Related runes

Runes that grant stealth

• Rune of the Trapper
• Rune of Infiltration

Notes

Bugs:

• When a creature loses stealth during an action, from the point of view of clients who couldn't see the model while it was cloaked, the animation for that action will play from the start, or not at all, instead playing from the frame corresponding with the moment at which it was revealed.
• Losing either stealth, camouflage or the Hide in Shadows effect will cause the player to become visible, even if he/she still has any of those effects active when it ends (this happens even if the player did not get the Revealed effect). If the remaining effect is stealth, thief traits and skills will still benefit from it, but the player will be visible until a new invisibility effect has been applied.

• The revealed effect lasts 1 second longer in sPvP (note heart of the mists is currently bugged making revealed last only 3 seconds)
• There are 2 similar effects to stealth, these are:
  • Camouflage - An effect provided by Ash Legion Spy Kits that is lost when movement occurs.
  • Hide in Shadows (effect) - An effect identical to stealth created by some mesmer skills.
  • These other 2 effects do not stack with stealth, and don't trigger traits or skills affecting stealth.
• If an enemy is channeling an attack on a player that goes into stealth, it will often continue to do so until the channeling ends or the player moves far enough away.
• Striking an opponent with a channeled melee skill such as Whirling Wrath or Hundred Blades immediately before and after the target enters stealth will often times cancel the cast of the skill, even if the skill requires no target to execute.
• Reflecting a projectile while stealthed will break stealth.
• Stealth is able to be stacked up to 5 times. When capped, new stacks with a longer duration will be able to replace current stacks with a shorter duration. However the current active stack cannot be replaced.
• Stealth does not work on Miniatures.

Version history

Patch	Changes
August 25, 2015	Fixed a bug that allowed players in stealth to be finishable by enemies.
May 05, 2015	Fixed a bug that could result in characters permanently keeping stealth on death.
March 31, 2015	Fixed a bug that could result in characters permanently keeping stealth on death.
February 26, 2013	Changed the way monsters react to players using stealth. Using stealth no longer resets NPC aggression tables.
August 28, 2012	Game release: Stealth has been added to the game.

Trivia

• Prior to the February 26 2013 update, going stealth would reset aggro of enemies.

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Effects (stacking)

Boons

Conditions

Control effects

Miscellaneous