So, in "The Revenue Men" (when you hit london), they’ll search your ship for hidden goods. It’s a veils check, which is affected by Contraband Concealment. It’s only used if you select the "Set Something Aside" option. It’s not used for any other option.
(the 1.68 converts the behind-the-scenes value into an actual skill value.)
This means that with, say, menaces 2, the skill requred in-game is 176.
With Contraband Concealment from the Concealed Compartment (it gives 20), it drops to 143.
That’s a good point. 1) Concealed compartments should have an effect on more than just the "Set something aside" option and 2) it should make more of a difference.
Are you certain these numbers are accurate, though? I usually have a very "low risk" challenge for setting items aside (or at least I did, with my last captain) and the maximum veils is nowhere near that amount. It’s possible it’s been changed recently, I suppose…
If the player is going to shell out and use the space for smuggling cargo with the concealed cargo container, then it better damn well work!
It should create a new option in the menu, just so there’s more "tell" for the player, to know that their investment in the the item was worth it, and it needs to raise the amount to at LEAST 50 (maybe even 70) concealment looking at those numbers and how they interact with suspicion levels.
Also your chart is misleading because that’s the stat required to make there be no chance of failing at all, which is clearly not supposed to happen if you have more than a minute amount of suspicion, and doesn’t include 0 suspicion (which admittedly takes 42 veils for straightforward without the compartment.)
If you’ve got more than one or two suspicion chances are they basically know you’re involved in smuggling and you’re going to need more than a removeable floor tile to hide stuff.
I think just a note on "set something aside" that’s like "If you have a concealed compartment equiped, this challenge is easier" would be all you’d need for signposting. edited by WormApotheote on 2/23/2015
Let’s presume you’re smuggling enough to warrant purchase. You’re probably at 2 or 3 menaces. At that point the 750 echo investment just isn’t worth it to improve your chances of not being found by a few percent. You’re better off stopping somewhere to burn your SAY and skipping the entire mechanic. I mean. It’s either concealed or it’s not. This gives the impression you’ve kicked the goods under a rug and the lump is sticking out noticeably.
It may be concealed but that doesn’t mean they can’t find the compartment.
What chance of success does the challenge score actually represent? 70%? 80%? It looks to me like the Concealed Compartment is effectively a +33 Veils on hide checks, which iono, seems like quite a lot? At least, when it’s useful. The rest of the time obviously you’ll want to have something else equipped.
Veils is a broad 60 stat, so basically, when your stat is equal to the challenge difficulty, you have a 60 percent chance of success.
And it scales linearly with 0 veils being 0 percent chance of success, and 5/3rds (1.67x) of the difficulty being 100 percent chance of success.
The concealed storage reduces the challenge difficulty by 20, so for 100 percent success rate its effectively 33 points of veils. If you’re going for 60 percent success rate, it’d be 20 points of veils. Etc. edited by WormApotheote on 2/24/2015
Ok. I mean. All the stats are the same (and yes, 1.67 not 1.68, thank you, I didn’t consider rounding), but ok. Yes, you’re adding 33 to veils, but when at 3 menaces you require 244 of them, then it’s a tiny percentage. While I agree that there’s no other thing which adds so many points, it’s for a very specific case, and it’s also comparatively very expensive.
For comparison, the Avid Suppressor costs only 50 echoes more, fits in the same slot, and has constant utility, arguably more valuable than 33 in any stat, due to fact that it makes the game playable once you know your way around. Or the discouragement gun, which is an excellent aft weapon, is only 500 echoes.
It just seems overpriced, and therefore performs far worse than you’d expect. 33 veils for 2 checks in the entire game, for 750 echoes and a slot is a ridiculous thing. See also: Rattus Farberger, and, for that matter, the Milebreaker. There are lots of things whose prices just seem entirely off.