Rogue dilemma

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My party for my next complete playthrough (Evil alignment only so no Jan/Imoen) seems to dictate that my protagonist is a thief of sorts, most likely Fighter/Thief.

However, what do you guys do about the fact that using your thief "correctly", aka backstabbing and sneaking, is mutually exclusive to improving his skills as lockpicker and trap disarmer?

I know that soon after I'm out of Chateau Irenicus in BG2 I'll have enough thief points to do both well enough, but it's a long way from Candlekeep using only half of your abilities.

Any clever solutions, apart from dragging along an extra thief for utility skills through EasyTutu?

 

Well, ignoring skill points for a moment, I think that conceptually, sneaking and backstabbing would be a lot trickier to master than lock picking and trap disarming, so IMO there is nothing wrong with a reasonably intelligent thief just starting out to focus at first on the easier skills rather than the harder ones. And from a practical perspective, although I never really tried backstabbing in BG1, my impression is that, even with enough skill points, your THAC0 might not be high enough in the early stages to allow successful backstabs (at least against enemies who would be worth the effort); I could be wrong, though.

 

With 18 dex in Tutu even half-orcs or humans who don't get racial thieving skill bonuses can get both locks and traps up to 50 at level 2, far more than you need early in the game, so you can put points into stealth from the beginning. For the hardest locks and traps late in the game you don't need much more, so even a multiclass can put far more 100 skill points into other thieving skills.

You'll even find boots and shadowed leather which increase stealth even more during the game, an evil backstabber doesn't even need move silently, there's enough time for a backstab with hide in shadows.

 

I'd put my points to lockpicking and trapfinding in the early going (given that there's no utility thief), maybe for the first 3 thief levels or so. As said above, low THACO with just a x2 multiplier means missed or non-lethal backstabs - unless you plan to backstab xvarts and the like. On the other hand, it does give a certain thrill to leave shadows behind the ogre berserker without even scratching it .Some traps in the game IMO must be disarmed, like the ones in Nashkel mines, especially if or when you're there with a low-level party. Potions would be an easy solution, but not the most cost-effective one. I don't know how well bashing locks works in Tutu, as I always have a thief in the party.

I actually had to start an evil run also, thanks to reading the playing evil-thread. Started with a F/M/T, which meant I had to think about this same dilemma, the answer being Montaron (as an assassin).

 

Backstabbing *does* start rather weak - double damage hit that may not even connect isn't really much to write home about. Additionally, multiclass thieves can only ever hope to get triple damage backstabs during BG1 barring exp cap removal, and single-class thieves still aren't great fighters when they get to quadruple-damage backstabs. It's one of those irritating "would have been nice - a few levels ago" things, at least for a dirty powergamer like me.

So game mechanics wise I'm leaning towards using my protagonist for the locks and traps and boosting stealth later on, just as Splunge noted. Just wanted to hear if you guys have used any more creative solutions. Monty as Assassin (via Level1NPCs, I presume) being the best I've heard so far.

 

Swashbuckler is a reasonable alternative for a non-backstabber. But in general you really don't need to focus on a lot of points in anything -- there are rings, boots, armor and gloves that will aid any thief (the Mercykiller Ring is wonderful).

With high dex and the starting thieving points you can create a very proficient thief (if Imoen can open nearly any lock and disable any trap you know you don't really need high marks in either). You don't even need to pick a good thieving race (go ahead make that evil half-orc F/T ... you know you want that strength).

I like starting with a good pickpocket it's a great way to pick up some very powerful items early on (the gloves are available fairly early to help with that .. or you can hold off and just get a bunch of potions first); then move on to traps and locks (neither needs to be above 75, 60 may be good enough). MS and HiS becomes a focus after ten or so levels -- by then you should have boots of stealth, the Night's Gift and the Mercykiller Ring (it will only take a few levels to become a backstabbing terror after acquiring those). You want to be at 100 for both of those (with equipment) at 13th level.

 

If you don't mind clearing areas at non-traditional order or resting in dangerous places, you'll get enough xp for sufficient thief skills before you actually need them. Basilisk hunting with 2 characters isn't that hard .

 

Don't forget that Invisbility is just perfect for a backstabber. Finding as many invisibility potions and invisibility rings as possible is never a bad thing. Investing points in stealth and the like is not necessarily a priority.

Early on investing in Lockpicking and Finding Traps is also very useful in order to get extra XP and level up so you can invest in other thief abilities.

 

Finding and removing traps will save your life. Boost those first. If you have a mage in the party, have him take Knock and Invisibility until you boost your Lock Pick and Hide proficiencies. Save the back stabbing for when it really counts, late in the game.

 

Ofcourse, open locks/disable traps skills are essential, esp. if you are the only thief in the party. Traps are outright deadly in low levels. Nothing, nothing scares me more than activating a lightning bolt trap in a narrow dungeon corridor (which BG1 has plenty) as it bounces everywhere and easily toasts and perma-kills your vulnerable party members. That is nasty stuff!

But people don't use the other thieving abilities much, whereas they are very useful:

I personally love Detect Illusions and Set Traps skills in a TuTu game. Detect illusions I find particularly useful, when your mages/clerics do not have many diviniation spells or fill their spell slots for better spells at low levels. It may be my game though, since I have SCS, enemies use a lot of nasty illusions, and always being able to dispel them easily is a great boon. You can use it any time, unlike Inquisitor's limited True Sight. (and it will actually get blocked by SI: Divination later at SoA)

Set Traps skill speaks for himself. You can get great damage with them even without being cheesy. If anything, I always set up traps before resting in wilderness, because all sorts of critters have a nasty tendency to disturb your sleep in TuTu games. That ogre berserker will have a nasty suprise waiting for him now.

 

By my recollection, there's no more than three (3) locks in whole EasyTutu that won't budge with 75 Lockpicking, all of them in lower levels of Durlag's or after your second visit in Candlekeep. Or rather, I only ever needed three Potions of Perception with Imoen to take care of absolutely everything the game could throw at me.

Similarly, Yoshimo's 65 points in Lockpicking solved all my early SoA lockpicking worries, short of three of the treasure rooms at the very end of Cult of the Eyeless quest.