UO:Renaissance - Thieving perfected (ongoing thread)

Good stuff, boss! Inspirational!

Jack, I think you got it wrong. I'm having a great time with the second oldest profession. Maybe you could make a thread outlining these problems you feel exist and they can be addressed.

Yeah I tried that with screenshots from era a year or two ago and got treated horribly, no thanks.

Jack would prefer things actually not be challenging at all because that is what he considers "fun".

He never was much of a storyteller though.

If by fun you mean closer to being Era accurate, then yes.

If by excessive fails, waiting out guardwhacks, blessed and heavy and newbie items, weights being off, the skill itself being off with stacks and etc, meaning no risk, then no.


But once again, someone who doesn't play a thief with the loudest opinion on earth about it. *pats you on the back*

First, thanks alot for the positive feedback. I simply try to have fun with the thief class and enjoy a different kind of pvp than the usual one. I hope that many players can witness the joy of this honorable business and get maybe inspired to try it out themselves (if so, just PM me or any other 5D member if you have questions).

Now Jack, I know that the thieving mechanics has some flaws (from our perspective). What annoys me most is the ethereal mounting where you loose your stealth (very hard dungeon stealing) and the absurd stacked stealing (which often means that I need 5 attempts or more for simple 100 regs --> no effective hampering with magic casters possible). And yeah, there still is a certain number of non-stealables (annoying), though I have the feeling one can very well speak with the staff here and they seriously care about your troubles. I also have very high fail rates for items above 7 stones, but I am not sure if that is era-accurate. In conclusion, hampering with mechanics is not fun, what a thief really should want is the interaction with his marks and to have to outsmart them and not the mechanics.

However, apart from these problems, this shard has so much to offer for thieves. I can't imagine anywhere else, where I could have done all the achievements that are shown in this thread. The player base is very solid and you find many marks. There is a fair chance for marks to secure their stuff and thieves to get something worthy. There are many customized events that can be exploited by thieves and which are very profitable. Staff listens and reacts very fast (e.g. CBD blessing was dealt with very fast when I mentioned it). Honestly, I can't compare the original OSI "golden thieving era" vs UO:R here. But I know that there have also been made many positive changes: Guardwhacking is in my opinion zero problematic here. There are ways and tricks to avoid being GW'd. You just have to follow some basic rules due to the mechanics and I am not sure if you are well aware of all available methods here (PM me if you want to discuss some mechanics related issues).

One last remark about the zero-risk that thieves face here: that's bullshit. Playtime is the most valuable ressource all players have. Every thief decides to "forfeit" 60k to 100k in GP per hour, when he decides to play for fun and not for boring Tamer-farming of some mobs. In my opinion the class with the lowest risk and highest amount of earnings are tamers. Their pets are totally safe and PKs are only able to slow the GP gathering a little bit. But there is no real risk of losing something valuable for tamers (especially with all that bonding slots). Bards also only risk minimal values (slayer instruments mainly). And dexxers are the real screwed ones that have to live with very high risks. If I had one wish, it would be to even out the risk in such a way that thieves and PKs can also get valuable stuff from tamers (e.g. like some items that have to be constantly used in order to command pets --> meat and feed with real value).

Actually, there is much more to be said/written about that topic, especially as I only cover the classic stealthed stealing approach... but I rather play a bit and enjoy the game.

failing on one stone items and always grey isn't even close to how stealing should operate

the gm skill should reflect stealing upwards of 10 stones of reg weight (or other stackables) not around 0-5ish

npcs weren't so liable to call guards

combine fails with steals and fails with disarms (and off topic, why the hell do you fail at gm med to med sometimes) and other fails and you have a char that fails more than he succeeds, that is not fun at all.

Blaise type folks like to talk about dungeon stealing like it was where thieves are supposed to be, but towns were always our main bread and butter

quite a few other things, the stealth and ethy thing is a big one, though I haven't had to deal with it

and as a gm thief, I shouldn't have to turn grey every time (this was a poor compromise to npcs not seeing through walls)

even some non thief related things bug me that didn't in era (teleport spots and line of sight are way different here) you can't teleport on brit bank the traditional way, you can't teleport to that little two tile spot next to brit bank for some reason (teleport was always one of my biggest allies)


I could go on, but the class def needs tweaking and adjusting and love.

http://uorforum.com/threads/use-of-old-website-screenshots-for-fel-accuracy.2345/

oh and another huge one, the delay in stealing after trades or buying from an npc, that kinda is a big FU to a stealth thief trying to nab out of a trade or unwitting shopper.

Escaping out of a trade window and stealing the item is as close to a scam as you can get. In most cases it probably is a scam. It is one thing to tell players to watch out for thieves in this game. Allowing thieving via the secure trading window seems like a recipe for disaster. Every day there are people in IRC asking stuff like "if I want to upgrade my house do I place the new one over it?". Trying to teach them that the trade window is secure kind of but not really, would probably make them ask themselves why they are even bothering to learn the game.

As for stealing from stacks, that is the era behavior I think.

And what do these bean-counting tamers forfeit, when they decide to play for gold instead of fun?

I agree about the trade window cancel thing to an extent, but on the other hand from the non cancel stealth thief's perspective, you f'd the hell out of them right there.


And we all played just fine back in the old days, so all of the excuses of why we need trammel here don't really pan out unless you're just saying you lack the ability to teach people how to play the game like tens of thousands of us did for years.

Yeah, apart from the canceling scammer all thieves have been nerfed (also the ones that stealth to the location of the deal and waits patiently).

Hey Jack, are you sure about npc vendor thing, that there is also a wait time for stealing? I think on player vendors there isn't such a wait time, or?

Still, it's UO:R perfected, I don't see any reason, why mechanics shouldn't be changed, if it's about obvious flaws of the old OSI era (many of your links to crazyjoes site are dealing with exploits).

I'm not 100% sure, but I know I camped a vendor last year that had a rare and when the guy bought it I was unable to steal it before he got away (I got a you can't message) so it might have been the nature of the item, but I thought it was the same as the trade window thing.

I'm not huge on the trade window thing being reverted, I was just pointing out it was another huge blow to the class. I've never wanted to drive anyone off so I"m all for balance. Just not a balance that leaves the thief class broken and no fun and shitty compared to how it was.


Perma grey, wait to rez, and things like that are and should be balances to the thief class. You get gw so easily here it's dumb to steal with a wep or regs or bandies or anything here around a bank or you'll just lose it and not have any defense if you do manage to not get auto killed.

The non thief stealing from the thief to find out if they are perma, and a thief stealing from a thief and still being able to call guards should be addressed too.

I think I could support an allowance for stealth players to have a minimized mounting time for ethereals, should they go through the trouble to actually get one. Perhaps a 2s Reduction for GM Hiding and another for GM Stealth, so you could mount up in 1s. I don't feel you should be able to completely mount up without reveal though. That's a bit far fetched.

I also think Jack's got some merit in his feelings about stealing from stacks that could be adjusted.

However, I always think that town stealing should be the hardest, because it makes the most sense. Stealing from mobs to pass the time, waiting for marks in the dungeons might be a good incentive to get more thieves out of town.

I'd be down to see the always flagged grey mechanic removed in exchange for a 5 minute moratorium on removing the stolen items from your pack. Plenty of time for me to chase you down and kick your ass for it so you can't just bank and lol.

BlackEye, as to the risk posed, EVERYONE "risks" play time. We're talking about tangible transferable goods at risk here. Your time is your problem, as is mine. Effectively though I guess, your theft is stealing MY time if I have to replace anything of value so technically....I'll always be risking more than you as well. I also mostly have played dexxers so the risk of all my gear is always on my mind. You're right on with the scale of risk for Tamers>Bards>Dexxers, but don't pretend like you're bringing more than a handful of scraps out with you when you're stealing things. We all lose time playing the game.

Town stealing should only be hardest when the player is attended and calling guards


not afk and the npcs doing it for them


You shouldn't be able to bank stolen items until blue anyhow (unless you don't fail by old mechanics and stay blue and get the steal, even on prodo this wasn't as common as just going grey, I'm just against the auto guardwhacks in town mostly)

And seeing as how most people hot key pvp with razor, quite a few in groups, I see playing as a thief more challenging since you have to open packs within packs, set targets, manage to get a steal right next to them while they are running (this can be tricky when people stay on the move) and etc

I would risk carrying gear (pots, pouches, regs, armor, etc) but why bother when an npc almost a full screen away looking off into another direction kills you when at gm you get noticed stealing a rune or some other nonsense.

And as more balance, instead of auto protecting players, how about a detective class boost (which could be tough, but I'm sure we could brainstorm out some balances) thief and thief hunter fights are always fun in town.

There already was a detective boost when Forensics was updated to provide clear verbiage to indicate whether a player is a thief, a thief in perma-grey status or not a thief at all.

Detect Hidden presently blows major goats though for area of effect. You get the best results targeting yourself and can't reveal players unless you target their exact tile, it seems.

What's the matter, why should I risk valuable items? What are tamers risking, who have the highest output in terms of GP?

And about my "scraps": as you can possibly see from my screens (or my loot), I bring everytime regs, invis scrolls, trapped pouches and runes with me. I also risk previously stolen goods if it's worth another steal. I don't get it, why I should risk more. Armor is in conflict with hide/stealth. Weapons are totally useless to me as on this shard any thief with more than ZERO LONG TERM COUNTS (yeah, not short term) is not able to steal anymore. Though, I can add a book titled "Beware of Blaise the troll king" in my inventory, if you like so. If the honorable Mr. Pfniffel is willing to write a poem with said title, I would be very much obliged and add that too.

My main aim since begining to play here has been buying an ethereal with the money from thefts (in order to get out of cities). Halfway, I learned about the several seconds casting time and now I am very indecisive whether I should get one. An improvement like that would definitely be great, give any thief a long term goal and drive them out of cities.

IMO, this would be far worse than the perma grey. Now it's 2 minutes to bank or recall. Five minutes gives everybody the time to get their trackers out on the field, like Blaise wrote.
I really don't even see the trouble with being perma grey for the mark (who cares, you just have to remember from whom you stole something, and there are so few "detectives" out there mostly with RP guild titles or names like Hercule Poirot etc).
And there simply is no problem with automatic guard whacking. I thought so myself the very first month I played here. But as soon as you understand the mechanics, there isn't. Reallyyyyyy. The success rates and guard calling is far worse than auto GWs.

If the target has GM hiding, it can be quite though to reveal the person. My guess from experience is, it's roughly 50% chance.

See also: a handful of scraps
If you haven't stashed your take yet, that's your own fault I'd say.

Five minutes may be too long but in reality thieves can quite literally just run laps for 2 minutes to another bank. There's no mount fatigue so as long as they get on a horse, it's pretty much done. Weapons aren't worthless to you, they could be your bread and butter. Thieves typically have a fence in order to get profits from their take, no?

Seeing thieves go gray to all on theft is akin to the victim calling out "STOP, THIEF" and everyone nearby having an opportunity to exact player justice.

Ok, now the trolling starts to take over and I hope we can stop the discussion now (wrong thread).

I invite every thief to add his/her story of thieving, preferably with some screenshots, to this thread.

No screenshots, sadly. I'll get the hang of that someday.

I heard the call go out: Stormhold was being invaded by the elves! Once more, adventure and opportunity awaited! I hurriedly donned a disguise and recalled into downtown Stormhold. Invasion indeed! I was set upon by elves the moment I arrived. I ran for my life. Soon, a shadow gave me security as I slipped into the night. I made my way amongst the defenders, searching their packs for something of interest when one dropped to the ground. I checked the still warm body and found a red scroll! Magnificent! I quickly pocketed the scroll and hid once more, unnoticed for now. I stayed to the shadows and made my way far from the fracas. As soon as my conscience was clear and my heart stopped racing, I recalled to Moonglow to safeguard my new treasure.

I returned to the event to find a crew of murderous nihlists joining the invasion against Stormhold. I stayed to the shadows once more, and though I spied a white scroll in a pocket, the prize eluded me for the rest of the evening. I gained nothing more of value, but it was exciting nonetheless.