NPC thief?

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The only thing is that if you bash locks open and trigger traps, you are losing the experience points given by picking/disarming those same locks and traps. Meagre as it can be, EXP is always welcome.

 

I think people are missing the point here. Sure Imoen has the bare minimum of thievery skills, but there are 8 (including backstab) thief skills! Not 2. What about Set Traps, Detect Illusions, Backstabbing, Scouting, and Pick pockets? Sure, what Thyorna said makes a little sense, but I don't always want to play with Valygar, Keldorn and Haer'Dalis. Anyway, the point is you can never have too many NPC's, and I think we've no more need for sorcerers.

And the XP from chests and traps isn't that meager. There's probably 200,000xp in SoA.

 

Jan would be the logical choice until you get Imoen.or create your main character as a thief and don't worry about it.

 

I find thieves to be rather underpowered due to their pathetic 1 attack per round however fighter/thieves kick ass. Detect illusions can be fun but what's the point? It's not like you're NOT going to have a mage or cleric who can easily cast true sight or whatever.

 

they are only pathetic for a few levels, thieves are not supposed to be melee fighters anyway. set your tanks up front and have a thief come in from behind with some massive backstab damage. plus you have someone for all the nasty traps, locked chests, and so on.

 

Fighter-thieves make quite good versatile frontliner PCs (especially with the ToB skills) or archers, I think...
To be honest, though, Nalia and later Imoen provide enough of a thief to merely get along for traps and chests. The other skills can be useful at times, but are not necessary. Detect illusions... I always set the book of infinite spells on True Sight as this spell is needed a few times anyway, a ranger or invisible warrior is a very good scout, and the backstabbing... well, you could do with or without it. It is one of the reasons I like Valygar, though - with the Celestial fury he becomes good enough for that. Setting traps... well, until you get the special traps it's not that useful, and I think bards can set special traps anyway. There could be more thieves around, but there are a few classes than are even less represented - bards (the standard type, Haer'dalis is not exactly that), monks, barbarians, sorcerers...
Maybe after BG I the designers thought they'd overdone it with thieves, what do you think?

 

possibly,I am looking forward to seeing how it is going to be in BG3. Anyone ever played an assasin. I have soloed with one and enjoyed it.

 

hmm, so there's two vanilla thieves and one overpowered fighter/thief. how overpowered is valen?
SKing Imoen into a pure theif is a good idea. That way,I have a good theif and don't feel guilty about ditching her.
People seem to like theif/mages, such as Jan. I wonder, though, what are good strategies to use as a theif / mage? Spell combinations etc.

I really wish there was a archer type theif who could do some backstab damage using a short bow. That would be so deadly.

 

Cut and pasted from Chris Lee's thief gutide

Normal traps,

Level 6 Trap: Deals 2d8+5 damage to any enemies within the area
of effect of the Trap when it goes off. This is non-magical damage
so Magic Resistence can't stop it (as is the same for all initial
damage of later Traps).
Level 11 Trap: Deals 2d8+5 damage to any enemies within the area
of effect of the Trap when it goes off. In addition, for the next
three rounds, it deals 2d6 poison damage per round (hence
resistence or vulnerability to poison also affects the damage).
In addition, this extra damage also disrupts spell casting (like
Melf's Acid Arrow).
Level 16 Trap: Deals 3d8+5 damage plus 4d8+2 fire damage to any
enemies within the area of effect of the Trap when it goes off.
Like poison, any vulnerability or resistence to fire also effects
the extra damage.
Level 21 Trap: Deals 3d8+5 damage plus 20 poison damage to any
enemies within the area of effect of the Trap when it goes off.
Plus, enemies must Save vs Death with a +4 bonus or die instantly.
Again, the poison damage can be reduced or increased according to
resistence/vulnerability.

The guide is over here

 

Undoubtedly, normal traps are incredibly powerful. That's one major reason why I won't allow Imoen as my theif: she can't set traps.

@dmc: hahahahhahaha!!

 

*sigh*

I have a sense I've made this argument before. Regardless, I'll do it again.

There are two "types" of theives in the game. The minimalist thief, and the do-everything thief. For the sake of brevity, I'm only going to gloss over the minimalist thief, as any thief in the game (including Nalia) fits this criteria. I'll spend most of the time takling about the do-everything thief.

The Minimalist Thief: This is a thief who only does the basic thieving skills, namely picking locks and disarming traps. Once you acquire the ring of lock picks, and the ring of danger sense, you should have more than enough skill points to pick 90% of the locks, and 90% of the traps in the game. You may have to carry around a couple of potions of master thievery (for picking locks) and potions of perception (for finding and disarming traps) but any of the standard NPCs who are part thief can fulfill this option.

The do-everything thief: This is for players who want to be able to do all of the thief skills either by having a thief that can do everything, or a combination of characters that can do everything. This one requires a bit of doing, but it is still more than possible. Here, Imoen and Nalia are no longer viable options, as they don't get enough skill points. Your options here are a PC multi-class (single classed thieves are a waste IMO) or Jan.

The first thing you have to do is look at your party, and see which of the other thieving skills other members of your party can provide. For example, do you have an Inquisitor? There's really no need to beef up detect illusions if you do. Do you have a stalker? Moving silently and hide in shadows can be put off indefinitely if the stalker is your primary backstabber. Do you have a bard? He'll take care of most of your pickpocketing needs. Are we talking about Jan? In that case he has some very useful 2nd level spells like Invisibility that works well in place of hide in shadows and move silently. Also, strength will help you backstab for more damage. You have to answer these questions first as they will determine what areas you are going to sink your points into, so your thief will accomplish everything you need him/her to do.

The next thing you have to think about is what type of equipment your thief is going to have access to, and there is a ton! I'm only going to list items that don't interfere with spell casting, but it should be noted that there are armors in the game that enhance moving silently and hiding in shadows if you have a PC fighter/thief.

The list of VERY easy to acquire items include:

Cloak of non-detection: With this equipped, you don't have to place any points into hide in shadows or move silently provided you have a ring of invisibility or a mage who can provide this spell for/on you. You won't be seen with this cloak.

Ring of Lock Picks: A nice boost to your lockpicking skills.

Ring of Danger Sense: A boost to detecting and disarming traps.

Mercykiller Ring: This one needs to be purchased from the bonus merchant, and would be primarily used to boost your trap setting, although it does provide some extra stealth ability.

Boots of Stealth: Boosts move silently and hide in shadows.

Gloves of Pickpocketing: Boost to pick pockets.

As you can see, with this arsenal of equipment, you can improve all of your theif skills except detect illusion. As far as I know, there is no thief-specific item that provides this skill other than Jan's Goggles. The point being of course, is that you don't have to max out all of your thief skills to 100%. For most cases, 75%-80% is going to be sufficient with these extra items, and when you're talking about a multi-classed theif, it's a whole lot easier to get these items so you can become proficient in everything as early as possible.

Note: If you really don't like switching gear around on your thief, then get the Item Upgrade Mod. One of the upgrades allows you to combine the gloves of pickpocketing, the ring of danger sense, the ring of lock picking, and two rings of protection +1 to make a set of gauntlets that gives the combined effects of all of these items. This is especeially helpful for thieves like Jan, as there are many rings in the game that increase spell casting. Even if you still wear the mercykiller ring, you'll still have a free ring space for the Ring of Acuity or the like.

Lastly, I'd like to specifically mention backstabbing, as a frequently cited complaint of Jan is that he isn't a good backstabber. Well, it's nothing that a strength enhancing item or the second level mage spell can't fix! It's not like there's a need for a whole lot of 2nd level mage spells, so you should be more than able to spare a few spell slots for strength. That will raise Jan's strength to 18/50, which will help tremendously when it comes to backstabbing. The other option is a strength enhancing item. I'll assume that you'll make Crom Faeyr, so the Gauntlets of Ogre Strength and the Girdle of Storm Giant strength are not available to you. Well, there's a lot more than that! There's the Girdle of Hill Giant Strength at Ribalds, the Girdle of Fire Giant Strength in Suldenesselar and Girdle of (Storm?) Giant Strength in Yaga-Shura's Enclave. Add in Crom Faeyr, and you have FOUR strength enhancing items. Certainly you can spare one for your thief.

So, bottom line: Jan can do it all, and really can be quite good by mid-SoA. By late SoA, he has all of skills near 100%, and by ToB, he can be as skilled as any single-classed theif you could have made yourself (and that doesn't even come CLOSE to including what he can do as a mage.

 

Unfortunately Jan is the most annoying NPC ever. I got sick of him very quickly the first time and he has never been in any of my parties since.

 

Geoff...

About you post way up there: Mislead is practically the only spell a mage/thief needs to have, since it allows for unlimited backstabbing, i.e., you don't become visible after you backstab.

Aldeth...

Girdle of Stone Giant STR is in Suldanesselar, Girdle of Fire Giant STR is in Yaga-Shura's crib. And there's the Thieve's Hood that you can get from one of the demons in Watcher's Keep, and upgrade later, which can cast True Sight 3 times per day(IIRC).

 

Mislead.. heh, that's what I was thinking:
searched around the sight for a minute or two and rediscovered this idea:
1.)Mislead
2.)Improved Invisibilty the illusion
3.)Spell Immunity: Divination (against true sight)

mmm... mince meat..

 

Geoff: While not a thief that can backstab with a shortbow, I did make a missile - combat oriented thief kit called the Sharpshooter.

Though there's no NPC which uses it, it might make a change if you want a PC thief who is a little different.

You can find out more over at http://www.gibberlings3.net/sharpshooter/index.html

Oh, and the ReadMe:

http://www.gibberlings3.net/readmes/readme-sharpshooter.html

 

Oooo, looks like fun He would make an excellent mage killer.
I've always wondered about poisen though:

quote:
- May coat his missile weapon in poison once per day per 4 levels. The next hit with that weapon will inject the poison into the target, dealing out 1 damage per second for 24 seconds (3 damage for the first 6 seconds). A saving throw vs. poison limits damage to 12 total.

Does that mean that the poisen does 3 damage in the first 6 secons (1 damage every 2 seconds) or 3 damage every second for the first six seconds (18 damage total).
And if the saving throw vs. poison is made, how does that affect the damage over the first six seconds?

I think I'm going to have to try this thief out

 

The latter.

And the save halves it, I think.

 

cool. Does the save effect the first 6 seconds? If so, does it reduce it to 2 damage a second, because that's what I've been seeing, I think. Unless they take 1 damage one second and two damage the next second.

Anywho, this kit is so much fun The first thing I did after escaping the dungeon (using good ol' DungeonBeGone) was (after selling my stuff, of course) went to the Mithrest Inn and killed Mencar and his croonies, with no help from other NPCs.

Firing poison arrows is indeed powerful. Thieves generally have a better thaco with arrows than with swords, so the chance of hitting with the poison arrow is greater. Also, you don't have to move from one place to another in order to poison another enemy.

I'm greatly enjoying this character Andyr! Thanks so much!

 

This statement is true, although being a thief does not automatically give you a better THAC0 with missile weapons. In fact, it has nothing to do with it. Melee weapons get a bonus to hit for high strength, whereas missile weapons get a bonus to hit for high dexterity. Since thieves tend to have higher dexterity than strength, they get a bigger bonus with a missile weapon. On the other hand, most fighter-types have a higher strength than dexterity, so they get a bigger bonus with melee weapons.

That having been said, ANY character class that has an average strength score but a high dexterity will get a bonus to hit using missile weapons, regardless of whether they are a thief or not. Take Mazzy as a perfect example - she has a better THAC0 using her bow than her sword (unless you give her some type of girdle of giant strength of course). Bottom line - it's your stats - specifically your strength and dexterity - that will determine whether or not you will get a better THAC0 with a missile or melee weapon. That statement assumes all other things are equal, i.e., we are comparing the same class, at the same level, with the same number of proficiencies for the weapon in question.