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Yay! Another convert to the arts of Larceny!
Why not try a basic thief first? If you take a Swashbuckler, you'll miss out on the fine art of backstabbing! It's a great tactical art.
If you take the basic thief pattern, you'll advance with the special thief skills fastest.
Most people will tell you that the Hide-in-Shadows and Move-Silent are ones to develop to the maximum. Well don't be fooled. There are many many items that assist with this, and potions & rings of invisibility that make them quite redundant. Do the Thief Guild missions as soon as you can, to get the stronghold, and some cool basic magical equipment for your profession.
Picking locks and Finding Traps are critical skills. Find Trap is used to disarm traps, and is perhaps the MOST important of all skills, as NO ONE else can do this but a thief. A mage can Knock open any door, and even a dumb burly fighter can crash a lock open (with a strength potion).
Set Traps is a NASTY weapon, very useful for when you are going to camp, and unequalled as a fast killer.
I love to set a string of traps, sneak into an enemy position, do my backstab and then retreat along the trap line. Set traps in doorways - any narrow passage. Inside a dungeon, it can save you if your party has to retreat fast.
Bounty Hunter is a great Kit, giving some special "Throwable" traps.
Finally don't neglect the Detect Illusion skill. It can break down some powerful mage defenses.
Of all the Thief Kits, I found the Assassin kit to be the most disappointing, but I'm playing through now with an assassin to high levels to see if she can overcome the weaknesses of poor points and a low THAC0 eventually. Poisoning a set of arrows or darts can give a HUGE amount of damage to a Party's total firepower per round - 3 darts doing additional 12 points poison over time equals 36 extra points of damage. This works best against multiple opponents, but you'll have to pause and retarget frequently.
Not too shabby for darts eh?
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