Perception - Another Look

[Aazenius]

The more I read about Perception, the more I realize that everyone will want to have this ability maxed, and those who don't will simply not be up to par with those who do. Much of this is not new - but I wanted to gather it all under one roof.

So what is Perception all about?
Consider perception as "a bubble around your character". Depending on your skills, familiarity with an area, line of sight, movement rate, etc. this "bubble" expands and contracts allowing you to see and realize what's going on around you. If, due to your current activity, your perception is limited you may well miss an encounter that, had your perception been more encompassing, you would have noticed otherwise. The example Jeff gave us was: If you're wandering through high grass as a Halfling, you're running as fast as you can, and you're not familiar with the area, your range of perception will be very small, compared to rather healthy perception of the wolves that are stalking you.

Traveling with a ranger or a druid could help this if you are traveling outdoors, for they have a better knowledge of the areas, and perceive things within the environment that other characters might not.

ADVENTURING SPHERE
Combat

• The greater awareness you have about the monster you are fighting, the better you are in dealing with that monster and ultimately in countering its offense.
• As you learn a monster’s fighting styles and special abilities you can grow to turn those abilities back against the creature
• As you make awareness checks new options open up within combat.
• If you are familiar enough with a particular special attack you may have the opportunity quickly defend against it and suffer less or no damage.
• If you’re even more experienced or aware then a successful defense may open up special counter-attack moves.
• Instead of queuing up a traditional series of attacks, you are interactively involved in what’s happening.
• A Rogue does not simply position himself behind a creature and backstab until he pulls too much aggro. Instead his awareness makes constant checks to find opportunities for attack. Knowing the right chinks in the armor, knowing just where to stick a certain monster, all lead to positioning for the strike and delivering.
• If that Rogue is grouped with a Fighter, and that Fighter is tackling the creature while the Rogue takes his strike, it may open up new offensive options for the entire party.
• If you encounter a melee creature that uses an unfamiliar special attack, your fighter may eventually learn the same maneuver himself.
  

Spellcasting

• Counter-spells are broken into three areas, dispersion, reflection, and divergence.
• Opportunities to cast these counter-spells is again based on your awareness of what an enemy spell-caster is doing. In other words, the more often you see a spell, the more likely your character will be to know how to counter it.
• Take a classic fireball spell for example. As you gain awareness of how enemies use a fireball against you or your party you develop greater opportunities to cast these counter-spells against it.
• With dispersion you may simply eliminate the fireball before it reaches the party.
• With reflection you may send the fireball back on the caster.
• With divergence spells you may be able to alter the fireball into a positive effect. For example a divergent fireball may actually heal whomever it hits instead of damaging them.
• If you go into a dungeon and find a spell-caster that casts an unfamiliar spell in your caster’s line of spells then you may, over time, actually learn how to cast that spell by watching and defending against him.

The Dual Targeting System

• A character may have an offensive and defensive target.
• For example a fighter may have his offensive target set to the main monster, with his defensive target set to a vulnerable spell caster. Depending on how ‘aware’ the fighter is of the battle, he may have special opportunities not just to inflict damage, but to also protect vulnerable party members from taking damage. Should the creature turn, for example, on an overzealous spell caster, then there’s a varying chance that the fighter will leap in at the last second and take the damage, or regain the creatures attention, or even find a new opportunity to lay a devastating blow.
• Similarly a healer may pick a primary defense target, and special defensive, protective, or healing spells may appear at a crucial moment.

HARVESTING SPHERE
There are not many hard facts about how Perception will affect Harvesting, but I will guess that it will play a role in the quality of the item you harvest, and how many of said item are harvested at a time.

CRAFTING SPHERE
There are not many hard facts about how Perception will affect Crafting, but there is good chance it will affect the quality of the item made, and your ability to counter problems as your making items.

DIPLOMACY SPHERE
Not much has been said about Diplomacy, however I am guessing that Perception may also act as a sort of "sense motive" vs. a NPC's attempt to "bluff" the character, and vice versa.


Disclaimer: This info has been gathered from the various sites that attended E3, and from comments made by the Devs. The bulk of this was gathered here

[Delvie]

Harvesting - There is an example by one of the Devs in one of the E3 reports that talks about if you will even notice a resource. It will depend on how fast you're travelling (that effects perception) and something else - I'll look for the specific report and post a link later.

Crafting - I'm not sure I've read anything 'official' about perception in crafting - the big thing there appears to be experimentation allowing you to learn new recipes - and Silius has said that he doesn't expect spoiler sites to help a lot with those recipes (I'm assuming then that there's an element of chance in what triggers the learning of recipes this way). There's been a lot of speculation that perception might play a part by watching other master craftsman though.

Diplomacy - Again I don't remember anything 'official' about perception here but I can just imagine that your parlaying away with the court jester and they pull a new technique on you, not only successfully resisting your efforts but almost convincing you that their way is better. The higher your perception the better your chances to learn the new technique.