LE Thievery detection overhaul

[Emton]

The problem: I start out all my games poor, in rags, with nothing in a random place. So sometimes I have to steal, a lot. Thing is it's just too easy, I can wander into royal palaces, guard houses, rooms with multiple npcs, and as long as none of them have a line of sight to me I can take whatever I want, open chests, tables, wardrobes, anything.

 

The solution: If the npcs took sound into account when stealing it could make it a lot more challenging. So when you pick up an item it makes a sound, the higher your sneak skill the smaller the sound radius and the lighter the item the smaller the radius, if an NPC is inside the sound radius when you pick up the item you are caught for stealing. If you open a chest it makes a sound that brings an NPC (guard or owner) to investigate, tables and wardrobes could have smaller sound radius. Finally when you steal something there is a cool-down period of 1 game hour, during that time if you get in the personal space of a guard or owner you get caught for stealing. This way after you take something then you gotta find a way out avoiding the owner or guard who will be able to "sense" that you have a stolen item.

 

Well that's it pretty simple right, I guess an even simpler version could just have a fixed sound radius of 3 to 4 meters, this would prevent easy stealing when NPCs are right next to you.

[Valkasha]

You might like:

http://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/54402/?

 

Shop owners in vanilla already investigate when you sneak outside of their vision, probably because they're used to shoplifters. However if you are visiting the jarl that's usually as a honored guest, they won't expect you to steal anything because they think you're a good person. Also who would expect a thief to have the audacity to steal from a guard house?

[Emton]

No no I'm not an honored guest at any Jarl's house, I'm a bum that wandered in from the streets and why wouldn't a thief steal from a guard house if he could get away with it. The problem is the NPCs are completely deaf and if they could hear you stealing then they could catch you better. I shouldn't be able to steal items in the immediate vicinity of an NPC unless I have a very high sneak skill. Basically if the NPCs could hear you stealing it would go a long way towards making their AI seem a lot better.