NEwb theif help plz

[evolghoul]

hey i jsut started playign this game and was wondering do i need a theif?
for traps and stuff
and what skill disables a trap
is it open locks? becuz i cant diable a trap in the part with the slavers on
i think im on a boat
anyways how many points do i need in find traps and whatever disables them
is 100% enough for the whole game?
and is there a way to find traps faster becuz i like to move fast and i seem 2 be
finding traps sort of slow
oh also what you think is the strongest theif kit
thanks if u can hgelp

[Nightcloak]

Yes, it is reccomended you have a good Rogue to handle traps, pick pocketing (if you don't have a guilty concious), etc.

No you use the thief action icon in the tool bar for disabling traps. . . although I don't know how best to describe this.

I ponder the same question, as I am currently playing with a Swashbuckler. I plan to disregard pick pockets, but if 100 in skills is enough or maximum, then I can see my self putting points in it later. Although I believe i've seen the skill points go above 100.

Strongest thief kit? Well every kit is strong in their own right, and is played quite differently. A kit or class should reflect how you see your self or want your character to act like during the course of the game. This is choice is ultimatly yours. Of course, each class/kit maybe will have some advantages over others, and some classes/kits are just downright superior in terms of killing power/speed. However, every class can complete the game. Also, even if you choose a weak class/kit, you still have the dozens of NPC's that you will find along the way.

[SixOfSpades]

There are seven Thieving skills: Find/Disarm Traps, Open Locks, Pick Pockets, Hide in Shadows, Move Silently, Set Traps, and Detect Illusions. When you're allocating Thief skill points at the start of the game or when your Thief Levels Up, you'll have to scroll down to see all the skills.

Find Traps: The most important Thieving skill. Use your "Find Traps" button whenever you can--if you're near a Trap, it will glow red if your FT score is high enough to let you spot it. Once the Trap has been found, use your Thieving button to disarm the Trap. 75% in Find Traps is enough for the early part of the game.

Open Locks: The second most important Thieving skill. Whenever you find a Locked door or container, simply using your Thieving button on it is usually enough to open it. If you get the message "Lock Pick Failed," try again--if you fail 10 times in a row, give up--you're not skilled enough to open the lock yet. If it says "this is not a normal lock, and is likely warded against simple spells," then you've hit a specific lock that cannot be opened without a specific key. Again, 75% in Open Locks is sufficient for the early game.

Move Silently: A very important skill--even if you don't intend to Backstab anybody, the ability to become invisible whenever you want to is inestimably valuable for scouting out dangers and gaining the element of surprise. Use the Stealth button to go into Stealth mode--note that if any enemy is within your field of vision when you try to enter Stealth, you will automatically fail. Assuming you want to be able to use Stealth (some Swashbucklers might not want to), you should start the game with 100%.

Hide in Shadows: This is supposed to be your Thief's chance to successfully duck into Stealth on the first try. But Dundee Slaytern assures us that the engine actually looks at the average between HiS and MS for the odds of entering Stealth, and then MS alone for all subsequent rounds. In short, due to BioWare's wonky coding, Hide in Shadows is essentially useless--you might just as well pump everything into Move Silently.

Set Traps: This is your percentage chance to set a Trap on the floor, which will fire an arrow at any enemy within its range at the moment it is set off--which occurs when any enemy enters its range. The Trap is magical, and therefore does not need to be actually stepped on: A flying creature, such as a Wyvern, will trigger a Trap simply by coming within 15 feet of it. Traps penetrate Armor Class and magical protections, making them a quite popular cheese tactic among those who stoop to such things. Depending on the Thief's level, Traps do Missile, Missile + Fire, or Missile + Poison damage. When attempting to set a Trap, failure usually results in a portion of the damage being reflected against the Thief. How many points you wish to allocate into Set Traps is up to you.

Detect Illusions: Depending on how you look at it, this skill is either useless or invaluable. It enables a Thief to dispel all Illusion spells affecting enemy creatures, thus making them more easy to locate and defeat, simply by turning on the Find Traps button and taking no offensive action for that round. Now, while the spells of True Sight and True Seeing do the exact same thing, last longer than 1 round, and do not require the user to remain noncombative, those spells will be blocked by a Wizard protected by Spell Immunity: Divination. That same Wizard, however, is powerless to stay hidden against a Thief with a high Detect Illusion score. How many points you wish to allocate into Detect Illusions is up to you.

Pick Pockets: The least important Thief skill. Sure, some very nice things can be gained by pickpocketing, but that hardly justifies the amount of % points you'd need to pump into Pick Pockets in order to be really good at it--points which you could put to so much more use in other skills. Add to this the fact that most people worth stealing from have HUGE Pickpocket modifiers (you'll need to crank your score well above 200 to have a good chance of success), there is ALWAYS a 1% chance of failure whenever you pickpocket someone, and anyone you Fail a pickpocket on (and anyone who saw you Fail) will be Hostile to you for the rest of the game. Put 0% in this skill and leave it there, unless you've got nothing better to do with your Thieving points.


"What's the strongest Thief kit?" God, how many times has THIS one been asked: The answer is simple: Whichever one you're using. Seriously, all of them, including the straight Thief, are good. Since you're new to the game, I would suggest Swashbuckler, since he's the best fighter, suffers no penalty to his Thieving skills, and you don't know how to Backstab yet anyway. But that is only temporary: Before the week is out, you'll know how to Backstab, and you might end up playing an Assassin. Read through the Kit Descriptions and see which one most sounds like what you'd like to play--if you're playing a Thief at all, that is. If you're not, just remember that any Thief in the game is going to be quite capable of supporting your entire party....except Nalia. Nalia is not a Thief, whatever her Description sheet says, she is a Mage who can use a bow.


More questions? Take the link in my sig.

[evolghoul]

thx for the help guys
and i think its open locks that helps
disable a trap i made a new assassin theif with
100% open locks and he disables traps fine now

[Magness]

Set Traps skill is particularly useful if you intend to continue on into ToB, since the best high level Thief abilities are trap related.

[White Lancer]

UAI is trap related??
Seriously, ive never used the 'trap related' HLAs. I probably should, as time stop would be great at times, but i usually plan to just get my thief UAI and then dual class to fighter (never actually played a thief that far yet [img]tongue.gif[/img] )

Back on topic, i thought it was find traps that was used to disarm traps? ive had bugger all in pick locks and been able to disarm them.

[Cerek]

Heya evolghoul. [img]graemlins/happywave.gif[/img]

WELCOME TO IRONWORKS!!!

You certainly can't go wrong following the advice from SixofSpades and/or Dundee Slaytern. Both of these fellas (along with a few more here) know this game inside and out.

The only thing I can offer in addition to the advice already given is a few advantages for each thief kit.

1) Swashbuckler - The best "fighting" thief in the game.They don't depend on stealth and backstabbing like other thieves. They are designed more for regular melee' combat. That's a nice advantage, but your BackStab attacks (made from Stealth mode) can do excessive damage, so that is a big loss for the Swashbuckler kit. You just have to decide if you want to concentrate your attacks into one sneak attack that might do an extraordinary amount of damage and either kill the opponent outright or take them down to Near Death, or if you want to stand toe-to-toe with them.

2) Assassin - One of the deadliest options available (pun intended). In addition to being able to do up to 7X damage with a Backstab (the highest damage multiplier available), the assassin can also poison their weapons and their traps to do even more damage with each attack. You don't want to be in the front lines with this guy, but if you are facing multiple spellcasters, an assassin firing poisoned arrows from the back of the party can take their spells out of the fight and turn them into fodder for the fighters (the poison keeps damaging them for a couple of rounds, preventing them from casting any spells). You just hit each spellcaster with one arrow and then concentrate the rest of your attacks on the weakest opponents left.

3) Bounty Hunter - The biggest advantage for this class is simple - TRAPS. You get to set more traps and specialized traps from the very beginning of the game...and the damage they do cannot be overlooked. I have literally killed HALF of an attacking party with nothing more than the traps set out by Yoshimo beforehand. And as you increase in level, your traps become even deadlier. Yes, some members think this is "cheesy". That's fine. As far as I'm concerned, it is simply taking advantage of the kit abilities. As long as you have a reasonable suspicion of meeting enemies or monsters, you have a good reason for setting traps - and your traps can often finish a battle before it even really begins.