Playing the thief.
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I've been playing a Hand of Misadventure of late. A good natured cleric /rogue halfling character. I'm looking for some feedback on how you folks would play a character with the pick pocket skills. Some of the things I have been doing are rolling pp checks, and making obvious emotes when I take something special from a body or chest. I like to try and give people a chance to notice what I am doing and play it out. I've been a bit surprised that people havent been more inquisitive about my characters pocket stuffing. Is it just being ignored, or am I not being obvious enough? What have some of you done to make thieving fun for not only yourself, but others? My character winds up giving most of what he gets away in the end because the thrill of stealing is of far more value to a follower of Brandobaris than the actual items. My goal is to keep the light fingered concept of the character, without pissing of any of my friends in the player base. Help me walk this fine line!
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Emote bumping into people, don't be afraid to get caught OOC, because if you do it'll only add to the fun factor in my opinion. But it looks like you're doing this bit already.
You will inevitably piss someone off playing a concept like this, people don't like having hard earned stuff taken from them even if there is RP involved
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I like to try and give people a chance to notice what I am doing and play it out. I've been a bit surprised that people havent been more inquisitive about my characters pocket stuffing. Is it just being ignored, or am I not being obvious enough?
I would suggest being -very- obvious. When I encounter a party member stealing from the rest of the party, I tend to shut them out of future quests and warn other players ICly about them. Sometimes I confront them in at the time of the theft, sometimes not, as most people I have witnessed stealing seem to enjoy PvP as well, and I do not.
This is a tricky concept, to try to make it fun for other when your character's purpose is to gain an advantage at the expense of others. The way to make it fun for others would be to make it so you make it clear the reason you steal is for the RP, and to make that RP enjoyable.
However, don't be surprised if people do not invite you into their party more than once.
As for pick pocketing, it's never fun losing something rare or valuable to a thief. Figure out how you will handle someone catching your or suspecting you of stealing from them. This is the sort of situation that can easily become sticky, especially if a DM is not on. If the thrill for you is stealing without getting caught, the challenge will be to make this rp fun for others, if you don't want to be treated like a criminal.
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With a character like this, I think it's important not to overdo the pickpocketing. Brandobaris emphasises pranks, for example, so rather than pickpocketing at every opportunity, wait until you've picked an excellent target for a 'prank' and pickpocket them - then return the item in a dramatic and amusing fashion.
Another way might be to give people the opportunity to get their items back after them telling a joke, a story, or perform an amazing adventurous exploit, perhaps?
Even just repeatedly handing items directly back to their owner would be amusing, I think.
Like - oh, this orc looks tough, better take this ring - "Wait! Isn't this MY ring?"
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I think you should ask yourself what kind of excitement would give this behaviour to other participants.
So, for instance if I see:
his eyes dart left and right, his hand moves swiftly inside the chest and into his pockets while he utters By the Maiden of Misfortune! This chest is empty!
I think: how would my character react?
Answer would range from beating you up and getting back what I though you could have stolen (there's a roll invlved to see if you steal things ig I remember well), doing nothing, scolding you verbally. These are all "answers" that appear legit to me.
Moreover I won't have you onboard of my next quest, unless my character has a special reason to do so (i.e. you are a fantastic trap springer and there's no one else around).
Would this add something to the experience? Not sure about it.If the pickpocketing is of a "generalized" kind (i.e. grab all I can) I don't think it could add fun but if you give to your character some flavor -then- it could add to the rp experience.
An example? You steal only amulets (or rings) and when collecting your share of treasure you go for the amulet first. (yes, even if it is a copper one and you could have chosen the "ring of the ultimate rogue +5").
Or you could "bump" into random people (i was doing it a lot withone of my halfling rogues) occasionally stealing something and occasionally giving them items (wether those items were theirs or not) saying that they might have accidentally dropped.
Give flavor to your actions and it will add to everyonoe's experience!
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Some great suggestions here. I thank you all for them. I haven't experimented with picking a players pockets yet. Would people be opposed to a tell before hand to the intended victim to get things started?
What I'd like to avoid is bad flavor for other players, and being black listed from quests and gatherings. My thieving with Sage has been limited mostly to a single, obvious pilferage under peoples noses. I usually like to have an element of humor involved too. My goal has been for the other characters to view Sage's habits as beneficial to the party, or at the worst a minor annoyance. The entire point of the concept is not that he steals to gain some advantage, but that he does it for fun, and out of religious obligation. I'm not sure how I would play this off exactly, but I'd like to at some point do the monthly offering of some trinket to Brandobaris to seek his blessing. I'd need a dm and a way to involve others, which could be tricky.
Anyways, thanks again for the feedbacks! Keep them coming.
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You're doing it wrong though, halfling pick-pockets need to be LE. I trust you dress exclusively in black?
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What you will get is alot of ooc crap from the players you do it to.Also you will get others shouting rules at you about always setting peaple to hostile before you pp them even when you infact haven't your just setting them up for a later date.
…........................................................................................................Drawn a line under that as thats the bad you will get from some players now the good.
LOTS AND LOTS OF RP seriously as a pickpocket your staple is meeting new characters with mine i had one simple rule i would only pp somone once per week now i may emote touching and bumping into them or sit chatting with them and take there hand at the right moment things like that and the beauty of it was they never knew if i had stolen anything or not,well apart from those that caught her and that just led to more fun RP.
The point is so long as your doing it for the fun rather than the reward of loot the peaple you interact with will on the whole be fine and you will gets alot of fun from the character while giving others the same.P.S. Never stealth PP it's lame as you haven't earned the right to there loot,rp then rob them.
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Don't let the multitude of threats against you never being allowed to "quest" with people ever again if you're caught doing what you do, put you off what you/your character enjoys doing. I used to play someone who Pickpocketed, no one ever really discovered him unless he failed a roll because of the way I went about such. Eventually, I'm sure, you'll come across a few selfless people who can turn a blind eye to a thief here and there ;}
Above suggestions are good, don't do it silently. For me, it was easy as I was playing a charisma rogue, so he would abuse the ability to loiter in peoples' personal space and had plenty of fanciful hand movements and manerisms to cover his klepto ways. Also, keeping close to WASD do allow for minute character movements add to it, even if people don't notice. Worth a mention is my personal opinion on stealth PPing - if you're emoting the actions you do, even if you aren't spotted and people don't see your dialogue, I can hardly see a problem with it - but then again, I suppose that comment needs a rule verification.
Basically, if you're RPing through the whole "ordeal" (As people REALLY don't like thieves oocly here ;P) I'd say you're golden and have more than covered the server rule of "deserve to do what you do."
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I think Sage is great- I think his feeling that it's a requirement of his religion is a great angle and makes it all fun. (It's a little Kender/Dragonlancy, but I always preferred them to hobbits anyway.)
If you want to keep the thieving fun and a character trait, rather than a griefing tool you can always:
1. try to be the guy who splits the gold up after a quest; overpay everyone a little for their hard work and then pick pocket them when they are celebrating the extra money. Offer to buy everyone drinks with the money you steal to celebrate.
2. Pull items from players (or chests), but hand them out as rewards for their good service. Nothing like getting your own gloves as a prize mid-quest.
3. Turn "item-steal mode" on, announce what you're taking from chests and see if anyone calls you on it. If no one notices or says anything, pull items you've looted out of your pocket and play with them announcing, "I can't imagine life without my new ____. To think I've only owned it for like 10 minutes." See if anyone says anything about you being in the dungeon for half an hour. When confronted, offer to share or sell it to them for 5 gold. Then if someone complains you're looting, you have an accomplice to back you up. If anyone throws a fit, offer to steal something for them the next chest you run into.
Use you powers for the "good" of the party. Distribute items to the characters you think might actually use what you find as you go. Saves time and may save the party's ass, as opposed to putting everything in a special bag that can't be touched until it's divvied up at the end. People may get together and re-distribute your "gifts" afterward, but try to spin it as a positive.
Hopefully most people will catch on that you're not experiencing any major gain and live with it. I think the character is well played and it's very easy to get what he's doing and why. I'd rather have him than one of my vanilla CG rogues who dutifully opens chests and meticulously records all gains to be equally divided later. If people can't see the value in having Sage over Thiefy McBackstab in their party, then screw them.
Make friends with the Red Harts- this sort of thief is always great fun around Paladins. The paladin always reprimanding the thief, thinking they're showing a good but mis-guided rogue the ways of true goodness, and the thief "doing the little stuff" the paladin can't due to their code and protecting his overly orderly big brother.
Good work so far. Keep it up.
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I also agree, I like Sage alot, and your Thieving is -super- obvious and not excessive at all. Something that I've done, and I've see people do is, say you Pickpocket someone and you get their helmet, start wearing it, once they discover you are wearing it, then the game is over.
Steal stupid things, theres a large chest full of gold, gems, items, and a normal arrow, take the normal arrow and just emote taking something.
I know of a very charismatic rogue from the past that always emoted talking with their hands and touching people alot as he talked to them. It wasnt know by many people at all that each time he did, he was picking their pockets.
Anything that makes it fun, instead of being the silent person in the back thats stealing 500 gold from each quest is, in my opinion, completely fine.
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I skimmed over some of the responses, so this might have been suggested, but there are many ways you can turn pickpocketing into a fun RP experience. One idea would be to team up with some other characters, and organize some funny and entertaining distractions (like a drunken street brawl, a loud arguement in the market, etc.) while your character goes around picking pockets, pretending to be just another spectator. Something like this would at least get other people involved, and I don't think many people would mind losing 27 gold to a pick pocket once they realized that you've put some effort into the whole thing. I would suggest not doing it in stealth mode and emoting something when you make the pick pocket attempt; Tugs on the mans cloak to get his attention even would at least demonstrate that your character RPing the pickpocketing and not just trying to use the skill to take peoples gold. I'm sure with a little effort a thieving character could be played really well and people would begin to accept him as an interesting addition to the server (even if they got robbed by him themselves).
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I remember Gorga469 had a pretty cool PPer (or bung nipper, in cant) called Nefari, he had some good methods for dipping people without stealthing or anything like that. This is one of the posts he made, hope you find it useful.
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I remember Gorga469 had a pretty cool PPer (or bung nipper, in cant) called Nefari, he had some good methods for dipping people without stealthing or anything like that. This is one of the posts he made, hope you find it useful.
What he said…