Template I've been playing with, still tweaking. Working nicely so far. Prodo, good defense, good (not great) offense
Real (Boosted)
100 (120) stealing
25 (75) stealth
100 SWeaving
100 Hiding
100 Snooping
90 (120) ninjitsu
95 (120) wrestling
110 (120) resist spells
Elf, 100 str, 30 dex, 125 int...dex is there for stam for running and such (if anyone knows a way to circumvent that need, lemme know!)
Explanation past gear load out
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Insurance-free gear:
Corgul's Enchanted Sash
Cloak of Silence
Royal Guard Investigator
Tangle
Earrings of Protection
Snake Skin Boots
Talisman of Cu, Ferret
Conjuror's Grimoire
regular scrapper's
Corgul's undead book
Stuff that costs money when I die:
Inquisitor's
Shadow Dancer Leggings
RBC
Imbued woodland neck, arms...mage armor, lmc, mr, sr, enhanced with bloodwood to make up resists
Imbued Ring/Brace, +30 ninjitsu, 25 wrestling, 50 enhance potions (ecru), bunch of dci and hci on them, forgot how much
Another set of ring/brace, +30 magery, +30 Necro, 40 LRC (eventually will add 24 ss for ****s and giggles)
Mana Phasing Orb DCI, LMC, LRC
that alchy talisman
bloodwood spirit
Chaos Shield museum replica
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Concerns/Criticisms:
Burglar's bandana would easily free up another 20 points and is blessable, and is, of course, for pimping burglars. That 20 points could be put in magery, stack on those magery items above and you have 70 magery without breaking a sweat. Mark? Yes please.
I use weaving for the HoT, gift of life, the pixies, nature's fury, and attunement. This could easily be dropped to 80, possibly lower, provided you have a server that does unskilled circles. Pacific does not typically do so, and I am required to stay at 100.
I hate elf. Such is the price of woodland armor.
My defenses:
I like operating in clothing only. I like having a certain minimum skill in snooping and stealing. I really like magery, but in most of my thefts, most of the spells I love aren't even used. Do I suffer from their loss? In the event that a well timed para, invis, dispel field or energy field would have saved me, yes. I haven't run into that event, and I'm convinced that the playerbase of Pacific is no longer skilled enough to make me miss them. I find spellweaving comes into regular play in most field play and hit-n-run-n-return sprees. This is personal preference, but pixies seem to be as much if not more of a distraction than energy field
In this day and age, the usefulness of resist appears to be debatable. I like it. I hate mana drain, I hate para, and I like naked resists.
The gear is built almost exclusively around two items: Inquisitor's Resolution and the non-replica version of Royal Guard. I refuse to take them off, I am proud of the former's theft and the latter's purchase with profits FROM theft. I understand inquis is pretty easily replacable and my suit would actually be far, far easier to construct with imbued gloves and items making up the FCR elsewhere. I would love to work in my orny instead of skill/dci/hci bracelets, but I can't see how.
The gear is also based around the idea of being able to operate almost as well naked as in full gear. In this case, blessed clothing as opposed to full gear, but yeah. I could achieve this better by dropping weaving altogether and simply being a thief, but...well, its prodo.
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Pros: Resist, stun punches, pixies, can swap for necro or magery jewels for easy wraith form for crowds, heal, wall of stone, whatever, can operate (mostly) with just clothes and SDL
Cons: No magery, inquisitor's resolution, elf, 70% lrc when swapping to magery/necro gear
Wants: Owned by No One talismans...Crystalline Ring...+magery, +lrc scrappers...a shard that does unskilled circles...and the will to actually lower snooping/stealing to 90
Please note, this character is not and won't be in Factions. I don't play for any team but the GOR team.
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I have another more run of the mill thief. Human
120 stealing
120 stealth
100 hiding
100 snooping
120 magery
120 ninjitsu
40 tracking
Virtue armor set, swords of prosperity, dci hci lrc 50 ep ring, orny, corgul's sash, corgul's undead, ninja belt, trapped boxes, potions
He functions almost as well defensively and was much, much, much easier to put together gear wise, the template is tried and true...its just not as fun to me as the other guy. I still recommend it though, especially for new folks or people returning that aren't used to gear stats.
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Forgive the obscenely long post, trying to be as constructive as possible in my return to the community