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-   -   Discussion on Thieves (http://www.ironworksforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=55618)

Northraven 07-18-2001 04:04 AM

Having made my first thief recently (an assassin)I'm curious on the thoughts of others regarding favorite kits,etc. Any expert thieves out there wanting to share their wisdom and experience? Pure thief or Dual/Multi-classed one?

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"I am death come for thee. Surrender and thy passage shall be...swifter"

"Kneel before the cow god!"

Istaron 07-18-2001 06:18 AM

I have played with thief very little, but ALWAYS, all classes do pure, no multi/dual.
You may get a little bit weaker then, but the roleplaying is far more fun in single than multi.

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We call him Bobby Corwen
http://www.finalfantasy.nu/forum/minichoco.gif

The Silent One 07-18-2001 08:43 AM

I once played a pure thief, just to give it a try. Finding myself a weak fighter, i looked at what a thief should do and decided to make major money out of picking pockets.

I bought 3-4 Potions of master thievery at the Inn where Mae Var lairs, drunk them dry and proceeded to steal virtually everything (including 7 more of these potions) from the store.
Selling my loot at the bridge district, i accidentially sold my Cloak of Non detection, so i stole it back.
The dealer would have bought it a second time, so what the heck, i recycled my most expensive items a few times and walked away laden with gold coins.

Guess we were both happy with it... ("Oh my, isn`t that the young gentleman who sold me those twentyfive Holy Avenger Swors, all namd CARSOMYR? Now where did i put all of them...")

Ridiculous but profitable. Once you equip the Thief with some decent Items he is quite nice to play.

Have Fun,

TSO

Immoral 07-18-2001 09:33 AM

Personally I prefer a MC Fighter/Thief to the *pure* Thief. Reason being, pure Thieves never really get a good THAC0. So, the later skills, such as Assasination, Gr. Whirlwind Attack and even the Time Stop Traps are almost useless to a pure Thief as they have a very hard time being able to hit the low AC enemies.

Now, a MC Halfling Fighter/Thief does not have this problem. His Fighter portion just keeps getting better and better. So, now with this low (-3 to -5) THAC0, he can make excellent use out of the aforementioned high level skills.

Oh, and have I mentioned that Halflings get excellent saving throws? They are excellent fighters as well. My level 23 MC Halfling Fighter/Thief can kick the crap outta my level 18 Inquisitor. Of course he is weilding Celestial Fury, but that's another discussion.

Also, with being a Fighter/Thief they have many more options as far as armor and weapon selection. They can wear helmets (which pure Thieves cannot). They can use shields larger than the crappy buckler that pure Thieves are stuck with. And they can wear heavier armor than studded leather (though this does disable their stealth ability, but then we do get a ton of invisibility potions http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...miles/wink.gif) which can get you a very low AC. I've been able to get -14 AC without really trying, with a Fighter Thief.

So, bottom line is a *pure* thief is good for looting and scouting, but if you want your "Hero" to be able to mix it up, get a MC Fighter/Thief. I suggest Halfling for the saving throw bonus.

BTW: I have tried all the Thief kits and pure thief a few times before I cam to this conclusion.

Hope it helps.

-Immoral

Robin, Thief of Hearts 07-19-2001 04:01 PM

Hey this could be a great thief thread. Let's keep it going.

Since there's a shortage of good NPC thieves in the game, compared to the other classes, it's a good complementary choice for players to use.

Let me make a case for the most basic of thieves- the Plain Old Thief!

Why should you use a Thief at all- ?
Well, you need to penetrate the environment. That means you need to get past doors that are locked, retrieve objects that are trapped, sneak past enemies that are too powerful, capture items from enemies, and occasionally kill a select guard or magician. Unlike the brute force approach taken by fighters - or the fireworks of magic users, Thieves are silent, and get the job done without the enemy knowing about it.

The main thing thieves have that other classes don't is the special skills. Oh, and of course, the coolness. http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...iles/smile.gif
Now the sub kits have a variety of advantages and all that, but they suffer the limitation of less points to be deployed into the special skills. Except the Swashbuckler, unless I'm mistaken.
You can take a Plain Old Thief, and by picking areas of specialisation, make your very own "kit". As Plain Old Thieves, you'll advance in your chosen fields faster than the kitted guys( more points per level).

-The Burglar.
Burglary means breaking and entering. But most importantly, it means leaving at least mostly in one piece. Bilbo Baggins, the Halfling, was a Burglar.
Areas of specialisation would be Lockpicking, Detect Trap, and maybe Pickpocketing. At advanced levels, Burglars might opt for Detect Illusion, a very useful skill when in combat. Burglars are non-offensive thieves, generally.
If you want, you could use a Swashbuckler to do this, and grab additional fighting ability without sacrificing skills. Since they cannot backstab, you won't really need to work on stealth much. Your fighting will be up front. Swashbuckler kit makes a strong burglar.

- The Murderer.
This is a Thief that specialises in the ugly wet work of elimination. It's not an Assassin necessarily, but a character that uses the Thieves' greatest weapon- the Backstab. To focus on this area, you'll need to HIDE and SNEAK. Penetrating the environment is not as important as penetrating the enemy's kidney for this type of thief: you won't have to rely much on other skills.

Because of the low THAC0 that thieves get, You'll need to have the following- a high strength stat, an accurate bladed weapon, proficiency in SINGLE Weapon style to improve your chance for a crit hit, proficiency in the weapon class of your choice, and whatever equipment you can find that helps THAC0 and stealth.

Unlike the Stalker cousins, who just become steathier with age, Thieves have to actively choose to improve their ability. A little known fact about stabbing-
the Move Silent Skill is related to the length of time you remain invisible after coming out of hiding. With a fast weapon, it's QUITE possible to swipe, miss, and swipe again, getting off a good backstab. But your Move Silent Skill has to be well developed - over 100 at least, preferably more. The Hide in Shadows skill isn't nearly so important.

The Assassin class which is limited to just 15 points per level, is very very constrained. You'll need to be a very high level before you can branch out into other fields. On the bright side, your backstabs can get as high as times 7 as a multiplier - wow!

It's probably more effective to dual or multiclass with fighter types to become a better Murderer, than it is to select the Assassin class.





Northraven 07-19-2001 04:08 PM

Robin I have one question about my thief...if I equip a long sword or Celestial Fury can I still do a backstab attack? I have read in many threads that these weapons render backstab unusable.

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"I am death come for thee. Surrender and thy passage shall be...swifter"

"Kneel before the cow god!"

dimon37 07-19-2001 04:10 PM

no, you can backstab with both longswords and katanas. Even with staff (but not with Staff of Magi)

Robin, Thief of Hearts 07-19-2001 04:25 PM

Everything You Wanted to Know About Backstabs but were Afraid to Ask. <- wish somebody would write the book http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...les/tongue.gif

Ok, this is what I know from experimentation -
ALL bladed weapons that you can hold in ONE hand can be used, EXCEPT axes and bastard swords. Axes are for Dwarfs. Bastard Swords are for... um... well... http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...miles/tdo9.gif

As far as I know, you cannot use a staff to backstab because a) it is a 2 handed weapon, and b) it has no blade. I've tried it with the Staff of the Magi. Don't remember trying with any other staff. I'd say that if it works it's probably a bug. SHH! Thieves need all the help they can get, and there's a Code of Silence, remember?

Amergin 07-20-2001 05:37 AM

since my pnp days many years ago i have always favored elven fighter/thieves. while halflings do get better saves, i try not to build my character out of stats but rather the other way around.

mentioned already was the ease of gaining tons of items and cash through picking pockets and robbing merchants. in a real game the blatant excessiveness of this wouldn't exist, as no DM is as stupid as the merchants in this game. also, you don't really need the cash or the items. most of the stuff a thief will want to use is either found or a gift. for this game i really haven't found anywhere i absolutely had to use pick pockets, and as it really doesn't fit in with the way i play my character, that stat stayed minimum.

i primarily concentrate on stealth and traps. if there's a lock that needs opening i can either bash it open or use a knock spell. with the boots of speed and high stealth i can scout out an entire area and then plan my route accordingly.

the nice thing about having the main character able to use shadows is many of the interactions can take place while you're hidden, then the bad guys turn red but can't see you, allowing you to neutralize their "surprise" advantage rather than having all of them blast the few members that were visible simply bacause your party was strung out due to bad pathfinding.

my favorite character brought in from bg1
STR 19 (was 18/58 but used the tome)
DEX 20 (was 19, tome, blah blah blah)
CON 9 (it's an elf http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...les/tongue.gif, besides i get to choose my fights very easily)
INT 11
WIS 8 (believe me, i play this semi-low stat with perverted glee http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...miles/wink.gif)
CHA 19 (was 18, very nice with helm of glory, nymph cloak, and blade of roses for a melt their panties 23; i figure this will come in handy when he retires from adventuring to become a politician, or perhaps emporer...)

Desuma_Malevois 07-20-2001 06:36 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by Robin, Thief of Hearts:
Everything You Wanted to Know About Backstabs but were Afraid to Ask. <- wish somebody would write the book http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...les/tongue.gif

Ok, this is what I know from experimentation -
ALL bladed weapons that you can hold in ONE hand can be used, EXCEPT axes and bastard swords. Axes are for Dwarfs. Bastard Swords are for... um... well... http://www.tgeweb.com/cgi-bin/ubb/no...miles/tdo9.gif

As far as I know, you cannot use a staff to backstab because a) it is a 2 handed weapon, and b) it has no blade. I've tried it with the Staff of the Magi. Don't remember trying with any other staff. I'd say that if it works it's probably a bug. SHH! Thieves need all the help they can get, and there's a Code of Silence, remember?

You cannot backstab with the Staff of the Magi because it isn't usable by thieves, but most other staves are OK, as my half-orc Cleric/Thief can attest (clubs are also good). I just tried him out with the Staff of Striking (1d6+9 damage) - for a two handed weapon, it can cause some *serious* hurt in the hands of a thief.



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