What is the state of the thief in SotA? 7/20/14

There has been multiple thread speculating about whether the thief will have a place in SotA. I will list the threads on the bottom of this post.

A few questions maybe a developer can answer.
Will there be a thief skill?
Will there be lock picking?
Will there be traps and disarming traps?
Will you have to play a combat class in order to access these skills?

I understand that stealing would be a consensual act so you would have to flag for PvP if you wanted to use the skill.

If any Developer would like to comment on these questions I think many people are interested in this.
*Edit: Please if you are interested in this skill please comment on this post about what you would like to see implemented.
Previous threads:
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...at-would-a-rogues-skill-wheel-look-like.5660/
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...ef-acrobat-brute-trapan-assassin-ranger.2862/
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/f...s/hiding-versus-invisibility.2844/#post-39897
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/acrobatic-skills.2818/
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/parrying-with-daggers.2855/
https://www.shroudoftheavatar.com/forum/index.php?threads/stealing.9662/

 

From this article on Ten Ton Hammer:
We talked with Richard "Lord British" Garriott de Cayeux at E3 2014 about Shroud of the Avatar and while this article isn't about SotA it does apply heavly. In the middle of our discourse, I asked if SotA was going to have the ability for people to loot from homes like you could for awhile in Ultima Online. Believe it or not, he was taken aback and declared that SotA would have no such bugs.

Now, before we all get out the torches and pitchforks...remember what DarkStarr said:

I strongly support thieves and the skills that support that activity, against both NPCs and players. Given that the PvP loot system is more of a ransom and you can only take 1 item (or 2...), I believe that houses (and the storage chests) will be off limits. As to pick pocketing other players, unfortunately I also don't see that happening for Ep1. Perhaps they'll allow this activity against NPCs, but so far they haven't confirmed this can be done against other players.

Disarming traps and unlocking chests in dungeons might be doable though.

 

Nice compendium - well done.

 

The "thief/rogue" skills are important. The stealing skill is not as important to me than the martial arts skills.

• Sneak Attack (not just backstab, but suprise attacks where a rogue leaps out of a hidden position/stance, and strikes within a short time-frame)
• Trapfinding-and the option for the reverse (trap making)
• Hide with shadows/obsticles (with the ability to learn to move slowly and remain hidden. (have crouch, and crawl modes... "without a nameplate over your head")
• Uncanny dodge type skill- Makes you more difficult to be flanked/backstabbed, or be caught flatfooted even if the attacker is invisible. maybe it allows for awareness against pick pocketing too.
• and more

STUFF LIKE THAT

I'm not against stealing, but it might not go hand in hand with the story line as much as finding and removing traps, special attacks, and hiding effectively. Thievery, is more along the line of a fun skill that isn't a vital game component. So I can see them adding stealing, and building upon it (time permitting), but the other rogue skills are far more important skills on a whole.

Think about it this way. Only thieves use stealing, but a ranger/archer could use stealth. A wizard might want to learn how to disarm traps, or be

 

ya, its all about how you define the Rogue. Stealing is just one skill set to him. The rogue you speak of is very much a Ranger, except with swords or daggers. The camouflage/stealth skills are already in the game at least

 

my quote got cut off. I had a few more skills, but since I use the orange and green colors and bold and too much font stuff I think the website dumped half my post. I had to re-add some stuff.

 

The ranger could use stealth and archery too. I'm hoping that the skills can be used like that, but also have a more synergistic feel when used in the more traditional way... sneak attacks with a bladed weapon.

If I wanted to be an assassin, I wouldn't necessarily pick up tracking skills and archery. I would rather learn how to use poison along with my sneak attacks.

Then the assassin could crouch and crawl around following and observing a person for a period of time, and land a serious assassination attack.

 

I agree, for it is *snickers* more of my playstyle!

 

What if there is a climb wall skill?

How about ballance/tightrope walking?


Will we be able to use a grappling hook, with a rope, and climb to the roof of a cavern, and use focus to hang on to the top of the walkway? Then we can jump down on top of a person landing a sneak attack. Climbing could work similarly... using focus as we scale a wall.

 

Ohh, I have not even thought about that! I would be in favor of however putting rope on a corpse's legs and pulling hiim home! ;P

 

We already do have some stealth skills but not much has been said about how they work in and out of combat.

Moon Magic: Stealth

Active

• Night Vision: Ups the Ambient light level
• Vanish: Makes the player difficult to see as long as he stands still
• Shadow form: Makes the player appear only as a shadow
• Fascinate: A mesmerizing type spell
• Summon Wil-o-wisp: A light source pet that fights for you
• Celestial blessing: Increases resistance towards magic
• Moon Glow: Glow that produces a damage buff but has % to do defense debuff
• Moonlight Trance: Buffs focus regen rate on allies. Debuffs focus regen on hostiles

Innate:

• Moon Worship: Buffs base stats while in moonlight
• Moon Eater: extra % HP per sec while in moonlight

That's basically it...nothing about detecting/disarming traps, unlocking chests, etc.

But at least there's some there and could prove useful to hide in the shadows, poison your arrows using alchemy and fire away at unsuspecting MOBs or PCs. Plus, we know there's line of sight for attacks, so backstabs would be more effective too.

 

THIS IS A GREAT IDEA. This could be used in a dungeon or even a player owned structure that is flagged for PvP to create traps for attackers.

Also the rogue could crawl on the roof sneak past possible enemies to scout ahead, or to avoid conflict. They should get XP for successfully hiding and maintaining the use of these skills in dangerous situations where attackers could harm them if spotted.

Also the climb on walls and roofs could be a skill that monsters (like spiders) could also level up in. Say the maximum for a human is 10, a spider is 100 in that climbing skill so it uses no focus for a spider to crawl above you. ALso spiders climbing on roofs should be treated as stealth too.

 

That's magic though. Although these are similar type abilities, it is more of a spell caster. It is a classless system so a person who is rogue at heart should be able to learn these, but it would be nice to have a non-spell/reagent using skill that has similar function, but less wimsical.

So a person could be this shadow mage with the ability to conceal him/herself, and also cast death magic and wind magic for instance. That could be one way this manifests. Another way is a rogue who takes a little bit of this magic to round out their skills, or even a rogue that takes none of this magic tree, and relies on human ability to be stealthy.

There needs to be rogue specific skills.

 

I really hope that a rogue does not have to use magic to do their stealthing. Theives are theives, there profession should be all about picking pockets, dealing with locks, knowing just how to be quiet and quick and sneaky without the use of magic spells. I think moon magic should have limitations and that they dont make you quite as stealthy as someone who specializes in the non-magical stealth skill.
I also dont want to see anyone whose full-blown theif to be some kinda of awesome fighter who takes out dragons, or wins hundreds of fights in PvP. I feel that anyone who specializes in theivery should have all other skills compromised. I think that theif skills should be very very easy to raise compared to all other skills but I would prefer that theif skills compromise all other skills more than any other skill. I want to avoid bringing back the UO theif at all costs. I got sick of hearing things like "hehehe I took all his regs then put on my spear, he attacked me and I pwned him." I want to hear a story more like this "I stealthed around in the house and found an AWESOME looking chest and for days I wondered how I could open it. I talked around town to get a feel of when the NPC owner left and what they did and what the box was made of, the type of lock and finally I cracked it open and made enough gold to buy a whole new house of my own! SWEET!"
Theiving should depend on the PLAYER not the character's skills. What im trying to say is, it shouldnt be "at 50 skill you can unlock level 2 chests, at 70 skill you can unlock level 4 chests... blah blah blah". If YOU know what your doing you should be able to find amazing treasures. But picking will be harder at 10 skill.

 

I didn't really like the UO thief to be honest. Their skills were too computerized. You knew they were stealing from you and you couldn't just grab their hands and say I know you're a thief. You had to call guards and fight them. Later they could even disarm you and try to steal your weapon. I hope that kind of thief isn't available in any other game again. That doesn't mean there shouldn't be a stealing skill though. Just let the mechanics be more realistic. It is 2014, not 1997, make a better thief.

As for the "rogue" type character there is no reason it shouldn't be an effective PvPer. You said a thief shouldn't be good in PvP, and I might agree with that statement, but this is a classless game. A player could take on skills and still be effective in any form of combat.

Also the "rogue" is more of a blanket statement about the style of character. There are swashbuckling rogues that are experts at sword play, but wear light or no armor at all. There are assassins (if you say they shouldn't be dangerous in PvP I think you might be bonkers)... that said, the assassin would have to be more of a finesse PvPer because if they want to utilize the full set of stealth skills, light or no armor might be best. There's a give and take, and a different style of play.

Why couldn't a rogue kill a dragon? It should be difficult for anybody to kill a dragon. One on one this should be an impossible task for all except the greatest of heroes. Of course a wizard could be a hero, and a warrior can be a hero, why can't the crafty rogue be a hero (that can come up with a plan of attack that catches the dragon off guard, and uses every skill available to avoid being killed while finding a way to slay the dragon with precision strikes).

 

I've never met a person who could become completely invisible without magic. If thieves can hide in plain sight, there should be a "perception" skill or attribute that can counter it, if you're looking to dodge the magic element. But then, on the flip side, if you could work magic that made you invisible, made you light as a feather, made you completely silent in all that you do--it's entirely possible you might use that sorcery for thieving, yes? Why not have both options? Could be the mundane path is cheaper but less effective unless you invest heavily in thieving physical attributes (intelligence, dexterity, and agility), while the magical path requires no stats besides what's required to cast the spell but is much more expensive in terms of skill points (or possibly required reagents).

 

Who says you need to hide in plain sight? What if the skill lowers the distance at which the character becomes visible to you, while modified by cover.

If the archery system is going to leverage cover to determine the difficulty to hit a person who is partially covered, why not also allow for a stealth system that hides your name tag for one thing, and also causes your character not to be rendered by another player's video card unless the character specifically looks really hard.

Maybe have a perception skill that can be activated, and work passively. If you are in combat, or distracted in some way, how can you attractively search for stealthy players though?

Rogues should have skills, and the ability to use special tools to distract people. Throwing a rock could distract somebody. It might make the same sound as a rogue missing a skill check! That way a person won't know if there is a rogue down the hall behind him just because they perceive a sound. It might be a rock thrown down the hall and the rogue immediately jumps and attacks when they turn to look. (or if the person thinks it is a rock trick and it is not they could look the opposite direction of the sound, and the rogue who missed the check could also attack). These skills would keep you on your toes. Also there should be some indicator to tell where the sound came from in case people don't have surround sound.

In non-pvp situations throwing a rock or creating a diversion could be useful for less intelligent creatures in dungeons too.

 

Rouges should get some kind of dash ability they can use to get away as I play rouge types as hit and run characters.

 

I championed the Thief career for quite a while in the beginning of this project, but kind of gave up when I realized that playing as a full time thief would not be very deep in this game. I was actually able to corner lord british in chat and ask him directly if playing as a thief was a viable career in SotA, and he said probably not.

Granted, I'm personally much more invested in the idea of PvE thievery as opposed to PvP, but the skills and theorem mostly cross over. To add to the list of previously discussed threads, this seems like a great time to revive my original thievery thread, started all the way back in May of 2013 (jeez):

Ruminations on PvE thievery, stealth mechanics, and related shenanigans

 

RG says thief will not be a viable career in SotA???? =(
Now im sad. Why?? Why does he hate thievery? I guess he wants us to all be good avatars.
When im bored of mining, lumberjacking, smithing, and killing monsters, maybe ill want to try robbing some houses and castles(NPC owned of course). I guess the most ill probably get is some sort of locksmithing skill were you recall to dungeons and unlock chests, or treasure hunting. This was all fun but i'd like to see it developed more than what it was in UO. It was even fun picking those little boxes in the stores in the towns too and grabbing the semi-rares in them. But I want more detail and quest design put into this sort of thing.