So you want to be a scoundrel, a thief, but you don’t want to get caught ? Here’s what you need to know about each skill in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2.
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Stealth always is a great way to play RPGs, and Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 is no exception.
Lockpicking, Stealth and Pickpocketing, How do they work?
Stealth Quick Guide
As you will need to be in stealth to achieve all your crimes, we first need to check how this system works.
Stealth is a skill you increase by moving around enemies undetected. Doing so also improves your agility, so it’s a win - win situation. To be more stealthy, you can increase your stats and perks but you still have to take care of one main thing first: your outfit.
There are 3 very important stats regarding stealth: Conspicuousness, Noise and Visibility.
- Your conspicuousness indicates how recognizable or noticeable you are. The lesser the rating, the better for stealth. To decrease it, wear bland, boring and average clothing. Don’t wear shiny armor, noble garments and don’t run around naked.
- Noise indicates how much noise your outfit makes. Cloth and Padder armor are the best for stealth, with Leather armor being a bit worse.
- Visibility indicates how visible you are. By default, you are way, way more visible at day than at night so, for the most part, try to enact your mischief at night. It will also increase or decrease depending on your clothes : shiny armor and colorful clothes aren’t the best for stealth.
While stealthing, don’t forget to still close doors, and avoid people. KCD 2 isn’t a game where you can crouch in front of someone and be invisible, be mindful of your surroundings.
You can also knock down people while in stealth, but you will need a dagger to kill someone.
Lockpicking Quick Guide
Lockpicking is a key feature of the Kingdom Come series. If you’ve already played the first one, this works in the same way as it did, just less clunky. It can still be a bit hard on the controller, but it should be better.
Locks come in different difficulties : Very Easy, Easy, Hard and Very Hard. You won’t be able to access Hard and Very Hard locks from the get go, and will have to get your skill level up to 4 and 9 respectively.
To lockpick, you will need lockpicking tools so at least one lockpick. Having more of them is a great idea, as they will break a lot especially while you’re getting used to the Lockpicking mini-game.
Then, find a door or a chest. Once you start the minigame, this should appear on your screen:
The mini-game has begun. First, move the yellow ball so it’s glowing as shown in the image. It indicates the lock’s weak spot. Once you find it, stay on it. Then, use the appropriate key bind to rotate the lock. It always rotates counter-clockwise and you want to keep the yellow ball in the weak spot while rotating the lock. If you fail, your lockpick will break. The harder the lock, the smaller the weak spot. And breaking lockpicks makes a lot of noise!
If you manage to keep track of the weak spot long enough during the rotation of the lock, you will unlock it! Good job!
Pickpocketing Quick Guide
Pickpocketing is a great way to get a lot of Groschen, and even find ways to avoid lockpicking. It has some complexity and requires a bit of dexterity. There are perks to make it easier, but the stealthier the better.
To pickpocket, aim for the little bag on the hips of your target. Make sure no one is watching you, and that your target is doing something keeping their attention (working, sleeping, etc.).
Once you activate the pickpocket option, this will appear on your screen.
This wheel indicates how much time you will have to pickpocket your target. If you wait long enough, you will have a lot of time but as the number in the center goes up, the wheel will slowly turn red. If it becomes fully red, your attempt will fail and you will be noticed.
If you aren’t too greedy, the second menu opens up.
Here, you can see a few things. The number in the center represents how much time you have to pickpocket. It’s the same as the time you choose to stay on the first minigame. The circles are filled with what you can steal: money, keys, dry food, and other stuff. The door at the top is your escape. You have to steal what you want and escape before the time runs out.
Usually, you want to aim for money and keys, that’s the good stuff. Keys will unlock a lot of doors and chests, and money is what everyone needs.
Once you’re done or if the time is running out, quickly go back to the door and escape! If you weren’t too greedy you should have a few more things in your bags.
During the process, make sure no one is watching.
Building the Best Stealth Character: Armor, Weapon, Perks & Skills
Now that you have all the information you need to play the game, how do you want to build Henry so he becomes the best thief or / and assassin in the world?
Stealth Build - Armor & Weapons
Regarding Armor, you still want to have 3 different armor sets. In Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2, you can save armor presets for different occasions. The most common recommendation is to prepare 3 sets:
- The main, stealth outfit. Aim for low scores in Noise, Conspicuousness and Visibility. If possible, put this outfit together during the night to see how low you could take your visibility score. By day, this score will be drastically superior because of, well, light.
- One for diplomacy, citizen life and speech. This would be an outfit made with impressive and beautiful clothes, to impress the local townsfolk and get a better chance at your speech skill check. Moving around in a brown / black gown with an ugly but useful small hat and peasant pants will help for stealth, but you want to be noticed when talking to other people.
- And one for open road travels. You can and will be attacked on the road. Running is an option, but sometimes it won’t be possible. Having Chainmail armor and maybe even some plate pieces will make fighting you way harder, and will help you withstand sword strikes.
It’s very important to have those different sets when you can afford them. Note that you can roleplay as a mysterious assassin 100% of the time and always stay in your dark edgy outfit all the time for roleplay purposes, which is great, but it will have downsides in dialogue & combat.
Regarding Melee Weapons we don’t have a lot of options. First, a sword or a mace for your open world combat. I would always prefer a sword for the master striking option, but maces and axes are also great against heavy armored enemies. Secondly, you need a dagger to stealth kill. In the first zone, you can find a free dagger here (you will also find a few bandits).
Free dagger, and a free fight for a lot gold
Now, you can also play with a ranged weapon. The problem with bows and crossbows is that they aren’t great enough to actually kill a whole camp through stealth, as without perks you won’t one shot everyone. Later on though, it might be a good option, so it’s a great time to talk about perks and skills.
Stealth Build - Best Perks & Skills
Skills & Perks are what will really empower your character in Kingdom Come: Deliverance. Before we start with the best skills and perks to take, know that you will be able to pick almost everything in the late game if you manage to level up every skill to level 30. Aside from some choices that are exclusive to one another, you will be able to take everything, don’t stress too much. This section will mainly talk about the best perks to get right away.
Regarding Main Skills, your main focus will be Agility & Vitality. Strength is a strong secondary stat and Speech is helpful mainly for questing. You can find books and trainers around the world to improve every skill.
Here are the other skills & Perks you want to go for:
Stealth
- Rodent is one of the best perks in this tree. It will make you sneakier indoors but will lock you out of the Weasel boy perks which make you sneakier in the wild. It’s usually way harder to be sneaky around doors and in houses, so it’s a great choice.
- Quickhand is a great, great option to have, making you way sneakier while lockpicking or pickpocketing.
- Ambusher, increase damage to enemies that are unaware of your presence, great with bows!
- Stamping Ground, to help with stealth in human settlements.Stealth kill, this one should be pretty obvious.
You want to take most if not all the perks in this skill no matter what, but those are the most important ones.
Thievery
- Rapid flight lets you fail one pickpocket minigame for free every 3 minutes, huge especially early on.
- Silent fiddler makes you very quiet when you are picking locks.
- Toolmaster will make your tools way more durable.
- After all that, Mischief Artist will make you better at… everything Stealth or Thievery related for 2 minutes when you successfully rob someone or pick a lock.
- And finally, Trafficker to sell your stolen items.
You can also take Master Thief as soon as possible. It’s not required per say as it removes all the easiest mini games which you would have probably defeated but it will save you some time.
Speech
- Jack of all Trades, helps with all skill checks which is amazing.
Agility
- Deft hands I & II, lowers the agility requirements on weapons.
Strength
- Train Hard, Fight Easy I & II, just to lower the strength requirements on weapons.
Vitality
- Next to Godliness, to have a lot more ways to gain health points back.
Alchemy
- Secret of Equilibrium I & II, to make better potions.
- Secret of Matter I & II, to make more potions.
- Poison specialist I & II if you want to play more around your bow & crossbow to have deadlier arrows.
Craftsmanship
- Locksmith, giving you extra lockpicks while forging and making it easier to pick locks.
- Thorough Maintenance I & II, so your gear won’t break as often.
You can go and pick Martin’s Secret if you really like forging and want the best swords in the game, but it’s not directly related to a stealth build.
Scholarship
- Wonders of Man & Wonders of Nature, to gain experience faster.
- Explorer, to see all the points of interest on the map.
Unarmed
- No Pain No Gain, Unarmed combat is a great way to get more Agility, and this perk will really make your time fighting with your bare hands worth it.
- Sandman, to ease the process of killing or knocking someone out from stealth.
With those Perks, you should have a good start for your stealth build
FAQ
Why are you not recommending more bow perks ?
Even though bows are way (way) better than in the first game, it’s still a bit hard to make them work in a “Skyrim” fashion where you just one shot everyone. You can deal very good damage and, with a bit of training, will be good enough but it’s not the stealthiest approach. You can consider it but it will be harder than just sneaking around and putting daggers in throats.
Is Stealth the best possible build in Kingdom Come: Deliverance 2 ?
It’s hard to say so close to release, but it’s good enough to get around and do most quests. The minigames you have to play make it a bit clunky from time to time and you can’t one shot from a safe distance so it will ask you to play more with your brain than other combat focused builds but, once it’s set up, you can generate a lot of gold easily.
Why can’t I Stealth Kill an enemy ?
To stealth kill, you absolutely need a dagger which you don’t have when you start the game. Then having perks like Sandman and Stealth kill is pretty much mandatory.
