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Old 03-06-2020, 09:01 PM   #11
tbone
 
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Join Date: Aug 2004
Default Re: The necessity of thiefs

You'll probably find this post on the No School Grognard website interesting, on the problems of thief usefulness:
The Effectiveness of Thieves in Dungeon Fantasy

Reading that, I wrote this in turn:
The Talented Thief: Stealing the Spotlight in GURPS and DFRPG

My take in short: Yeah, thieves really don't have a lot going for them beyond lots of mundane skills at good levels. To get the best out of a thief, really finesse those skill choices, get the GM's help in making those skills useful, and - the bulk of the article - really crank up the skill levels using Talents. (DFRPG could use more thiefly Talents, several of which I humbly suggest.)

I think that part about GM involvement is really key. A thief in the party means there's a player who wants to sneak and steal and pick locks. And for a GM, these aren't difficult challenges to work into an adventure. With said challenges involving big skill penalties that demand a thief's unusually high skill levels. Or with said challenges occurring unusually often in no-mana zones. : )

GMs should also be lenient in letting thieves stray a bit from template. All the town-focused thief skills don't always see a lot of use in play. More than "thief", the label "treasure hunter" might better capture what some players have in mind, with fewer points in Filch, Pickpocket, etc. and more in Acrobatics, Climbing, Merchant, etc.

There are ways to bring a thief more into front-line play, too, which I didn't write about. One is as others here have noted: if there isn't a player keen on grabbing all the bow-and-tracking spotlight with a scout, then really go off template and fold scout abilities into the thief. It's a good fit.

The thief won't be as good at the outdoor stuff (including Tracking). That's OK; it's what the barbarian and maybe druid are for. But with DX 15 (and a good chance of being an elf or halfling to boot), a thief is more than ready to pick up the archer role. Shooting from the shadows or from an inaccessible perch makes for great synergy with other thief abilities. Plus, Weapon Master (Bow) is no problem; just swap WM (Knives) for WM (Bow). Strongbow is cheap. The only remaining tricky part is the expensive Heroic Archer. I'd scrounge most of those points by giving up Perfect Balance. (With DX 15, a thief doesn't actually need PB that much!)

The scout's "bounty hunter" role, in particular, fits well with thieves. Weapons like nets and bolas fit the job, and work their capture magic regardless of user ST (another thief shortcoming).

In short: A PC who's the go-to guy for stealthy/sneaky exploits and lock/trap work, as well as a solid ranged damage-dealer in combat, should be both vital to the party and fun.
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Old 03-06-2020, 11:28 PM   #12
Balor Patch
 
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Default Re: The necessity of thiefs

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Originally Posted by tbone View Post
I think that part about GM involvement is really key.
Published adventures don't help here. They do usually have some trapped or meteoric locks so the barbarian has to bleed to open them while the wizard sadly shakes his head. Mostly though, bashing doors is like playing bagpipes after midnight: it attracts wandering monsters, they get mashed, and the party goes on.

That's locks. When it comes to filch, pickpocket, and sleight of hand I don't remember any uses outside of Pagoda of Worlds. Forging and counterfeiting are also rare, although not entirely unexamined.
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Old 03-07-2020, 07:23 AM   #13
DouglasCole
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Default Re: The necessity of thiefs

Quote:
Originally Posted by Balor Patch View Post
Published adventures don't help here. They do usually have some trapped or meteoric locks so the barbarian has to bleed to open them while the wizard sadly shakes his head. Mostly though, bashing doors is like playing bagpipes after midnight: it attracts wandering monsters, they get mashed, and the party goes on.

That's locks. When it comes to filch, pickpocket, and sleight of hand I don't remember any uses outside of Pagoda of Worlds. Forging and counterfeiting are also rare, although not entirely unexamined.
For what it's worth, Kyle has a few quite novel uses of oddball thiefy skills in Dragons of Rosgarth.
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Old 03-07-2020, 08:17 AM   #14
Dalin
 
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Default Re: The necessity of thiefs

The only dedicated thief I've seen in any of my DFRPG games thus far was when folks picked up Kromm's pregen, Sir Godfrey Stephen Hauteville. He's a fun character, but hardly a traditional thief. In all of my other games, one of the other characters (bard or scout) has picked up a few key thief skills.
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Old 03-07-2020, 10:46 AM   #15
Michael Thayne
 
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Default Re: The necessity of thiefs

Kromm, years ago:
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Originally Posted by Kromm View Post
I don't think you can leave out the scout and thief, though . . . they're the outdoor and indoor sides of the "not getting bushwhacked" coin. Without one of each, the PCs will spend a lot of time being jumped, trapped, and tricked. How you get your melee firepower and spells is less vital. Just about any warrior template can bring melee to the table. Sacred spells are easier to grasp than wizardly ones, owing to the lack of prerequisite chains and a smaller list that doesn't induce decision paralysis.
I'm not sure I agree with the "needing both" part—skills that are useful for not getting bushwhacked indoors will also be useful for not getting bushwacked outdoors and vice-versa. And they aren't the only two options—if you aren't specifically dealing with a lot of mechanical traps and locks, Assassin (from a sidebar in Ninjas) might be preferable to Thief. That said, I have seen parties get a lot of mileage out of a guy who can sneak ahead and take out sentries. It's not just about disarming traps. Stealth is really value if the GM isn't just expecting the PCs to charge headlong into every fight.
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