Section 2: Gaining Skill
2.6: Snooping (training info and an explanation of how it works.)
**Note: Getting rid of the anti-macro code did more than get rid of gaining skill on the open sea while sailing boats.
There were two different "anti-macros." One was to force the player to move 8 tiles between gains. The other was to force
players to use multiple targets. Although you aren't actually targeting anything with a cross-hair with the Snooping
skill, this is true for Snooping as well. The best and easiest way to gain Snooping these days is to stand next to a guild
member in Trammel or a friend in Felucca, double click their backpack in their paper doll, and hold down your Last Object
macro. No multiple packs needed all the way to GM. It will take you about 3 hours.
Another way to do this is the find an NPC in felucca in a room that has a lot of tables and shelves. Find a spot in the
room where you can trap them onto a single tile. You can say "[name] move" until the NPC moves to the correct tile.
Snooping hasn't changed much over the years- the only big change was the anti-macro code implimented a few years back.
(A sure fire way to save time is to do place a bag in a bag in a bag in bag etc etc etc. Have a friend hold the bags for
you. When you have snooped them all, close all but the top bag, then snoop again. He found that he kept gaining skill off
of the same bags over and over. No need to change targets. With UOAssist, get yourself 1 bag, and 99 pouches. Snoop all 99
pouches off a buddy - and be nice and hold 99 pouches for him as well. I say 99, because the opening of pouches can be
recorded with UOasssit to save your poor fingers from falling off for quite some time. Once you hit 85 skill, you need to
actually get about 396 pouches and divide those into 4 bags and change bags often.)
The UOA macro should look something like:
- Use Item (pouch)
- Pause 1000
- Repeated for all the pouches in the stack. Make one of these macros for each stack of pouches you have, and then simply
- Play one macro with the corrosponding pouches on your friend, and if you gain repeat the macro; if you do not gain after
going through the entire stack, simply move one to the next stack and next macro.
- You will need a good deal of pouches- approx. 600.
Remember, snooping is considered a "target based" skill, which means that after each bag you snoop, if you do not gain,
you will not have a chance to gain off that bag again until either you gain (off of another bag) or the server resets.
In plain english, that means if you gain off of one stack of bags, go ahead and try that stack again, if not, go to the
next one. If you go through all the bags without gaining, you need to either get more bags or wait until the next day after
the server goes down (resets).
A quote from my reply to a PM I recieved regarding if snooping is an active or passive skill and exactly how it works:
Snooping is an active, not passive skill. It is not triggered when stealing- the only time snooping is triggered is
when you attempt to open a container belonging to anybody but yourself (note that you may only do this in Felucca).
Case in point:
When I walk up to a person in Felucca and open their paperdoll and then double click their backpack, snooping is
triggered (by the actual action of attempting to open their backpack). It is also triggered if I attempt to open any
sub-containers (example: pouches within the backpack, etc.). You must be standing on a tile directly next to your
target to snoop them. Note also that a successful snoop will allow you to remain hidden, while a failed snoop will
display a message for all to see ("You notice (name) peeking into your belongings!") and reveal you if you are hidden.
At GM snooping you will never fail (and thus never be noticed or revealed, which is also why there is no such thing as
a snooping powerscroll).