Can I hide using Cunning Sneak with Wilderness Skirmisher?

Question

The cunning sneak feature allows a creature to make a hidden check if they have any concealment or any cover. The wilderness skirmisher feat enables them to gain partial cover against ranged attacks when in a square of difficult terrain.

It seems that this should allow them to find quicksand, shallow bogs, and rubble and roll to go hidden. Does partial cover to ranged attacks provide the cover required for cunning sneak in order to roll hidden (and imo become incredibly op).

One counter I thought to this is a creature having reach. There would be no partial cover to this creatures melee attack, and so the rogue would not be able to become hidden to it.

EDIT: Will a person with Crossbow expertise, which lets them ignore the partial cover when attacking with a crossbow, be unable to be hidden from by the rogue due to wilderness skirmisher?

Cunning Sneak You don’t take a penalty to Stealth checks for moving more than 2 squares, and you take a –5 penalty instead of a -10 penalty to Stealth checks for running.

If you end your movement at least 3 squares away from your starting position, you can make a Stealth check to become hidden if you have any concealment or any cover, except for cover provided by intervening allies.

Wilderness Skirmisher Benefit: When in a square of difficult terrain, you gain partial cover against ranged attacks. Also, you gain a +2 feat bonus to Acrobatics and Athletics checks.

Crossbow Expertise Benefit: You gain a +1 feat bonus to weapon attack rolls that you make with a crossbow. This bonus increases to +2 at 11th level and +3 at 21st level. Also, you ignore partial cover and superior cover with weapon attacks you make with a crossbow

Answer 1

No

First I would direct you to The Rules of Hidden Club. The Rules of Hidden Club is a guide encapsulating all of the rules and terms of stealth in 4e.

Cunning sneak does provide you the ability to become hidden when you have partial cover, but the key point is that Wilderness Skirmisher only gives you partial cover against ranged attacks. An important concept in 4e is that feats, powers, features, etc. only do exactly what they say (and nothing else). As such, Wilderness Skirmisher only gives you partial cover against ranged attacks, not against enemies who can make ranged attacks or are out of melee range, etc.

Answer 2

I like your thinking, but unfortunately this combo doesn't quite work, and the problem with your idea is timing.

Wilderness Skirmisher gives you partial cover against ranged attacks, and only at that specific moment. Cunning Sneak requires you to have cover at the end of your movement, which is not a ranged attack. Even if someone interrupts your movement with a ranged attack, you would only have the partial cover status during the actual ranged attack, and then the partial cover status would go away when the attack is completed and your movement resumes.

As a descriptive example, if a Cunning Sneak rogue is moving though a forest and a goblin archer sees him and fires off a snap shot, the rogue's Wilderness Skirmisher experience allows him to weave behind trees and bushes in the rough terrain to make that shot harder to connect with, but it doesn't automatically cause a bush to appear at the spot where the rogue will end up at the end of those 6 seconds.

Answer 3

I seem to recall that Stealth is not a part of the creature trying to hide but a relationship it has with other creatures. Consider a very black but otherwise empty and featureless room in the underdark with three people: A Rogue, a Human enemy and a Drow enemy. Both enemies have 20 Passive Perception.

The Rogue has partial Concealment from the Human enemy, and no concealment from the Drow enemy.

The Rogue uses their Cunning Sneak class feature (Because they have Partial Concealment from the Human) and rolls 25, higher than the Passive Perception of both enemies, yet the Rogue is hidden only from the Human enemy.

Now analogize to your example: Does the rogue have the ability to become Hidden from an Archer five squares away? I would say no - because the Rogue does not have concealment (Of any kind) against the Archer - if the Archer had a Reach 5 melee attack, the Archer could use that with no penalty; there is no difficulty perceiving the Rogue, only in attacking with Ranged weapons.

(Technically, I guess you COULD make a claim that you can be hidden from the Archer for the purpose of Ranged Attacks yet not hidden for the purpose of Melee Attacks but that doesn't actually make any difference because what you want to be hidden for, is for the purpose of Archer knowing which square you're standing in.)