Faction thieves, help save a borderline out the door player ;)

[Gellor]

I'm looking for a bit of info on faction thieves. So a few questions:

Does the amount of stealing skill mater? Is there a point in factions that equate to guaranteed steal of sigils?

What are some "good" faction thief templates? Stealth and hiding seem to be a must... ninja and resist a good idea?

Is it worth combining the thief into a trap remover also?

Is faction silver worth anything?

I'm one of those players that is borderline out the door and I am hoping factions will get me "into the UO mood" again Kind of up in the air on what shard to hit but that is another story Nope... no WOW after UO for me.

 

[Zara]

Hey there,

I play a faction thief and actually there are just so many different templates you can use on a faction thief now it's unreal. My own thief has the following skills:

Hiding, Stealth, Stealing, Detect Hidden, Remove Trap, Ninja, Lockpicking (for remove trap) and a small amount of Chiv.

Basically she's a sitting duck, she can't fight and can't really heal without the use of potions but she can be helpful in so many other ways.

To steal a sigil you need 80 stealing and you can achieve this through real skill or enhanced skill with jewels ect. If you have enough skill even in stat you can steal sigils with the right enhancements.

Playing a thief is one of the funner things I have done in factions and will absolutely get your blood pumping! Trying to stealth into a guarded base can, at times, make your blood pressure raise and your heart thump. Plan on dying A LOT. But really, half the fun is seeing how far you can get into that base without being caught.

Some amazing thieves you should talk to are Nonel and Tinkz, there really aren't much better than the two of them on this shard and each of them has their own unique tactics and skill sets. Well unless you decided to go into TB, do NOT listen to Nonel, Alchemy is BAD, you do not want that skill.

*Whispers* If you decide to come to Minax, then Alchemy would be okay with me.

I promise you this though, factions and pvp is the absolute hardest thing you will do in this game and if you haven't tried them yet then do yourself a favor and come give it a shot. There is no harder monster to beat in this game than that of another player.

Oh! Faction silver is actually used for many different things. You must have silver to makes traps and trap removal kits, to buy faction war horses and to craft faction based items. Silver is not the easiest thing to come by as killing a single creatue the most you can get is 30 silver and it takes 250 silver to make one trap. Each faction is allowed 15 traps at one time and the sigils will be in play every three days so if a faction is utilizing their traps during these times then you can expect to go through at least 7500 silver a week which amounts to killing 250 Demons.

I hoped some of this helped you and I am sure other thieves will join and give opinions as well.

Please keep your hands in feet inside the car at all times, do not stand up until the ride has come to a full and complete stop and Thank you for riding the faction express!

 

[tink'r_toiz]

First, thank you Zara, I am honored to me mentioned in the same sentence with Nonel. He is, in large part, responsible for who and what Tinkz has become.

Welcome to the wonderful world of thieves Gellor! It truly is the most fun I could ever imagine. After you play a thief, you are addicted. As Zara said, many thieves are sitting ducks with little offense. Exceptions are Nonel and Michel. Both have unique abilities to kill and do so regularly and to good pvp players...and Zara is right, alchemy is great if the person possessing it is on your side... LOL

If you have questions, please contact any of us. We will be glad to share what we know and some template ideas ... unless of course you are considering joining Minax, then you are on your own ... JUST KIDDING!

 

[Zara]

Ohh geez I don't know how in the heck I forgot Michael! He is the resident ostard and pain in my butt! He's sneaky and relentless just like Tinkz and Nonel! There is also Grace who plays a damn good thief as well.

 

[Tina Small]

Gellor, my faction thieves on various shards are getting dustier and rustier by the day, but I had a lot of fun with them in the past. Here's the template they all use, with maybe a few minor differences among them:

100 Hiding
90 Stealthing
100 Tracking
100 Detect Hidden
80 Stealing (This is the minimum required to steal sigils; have never failed an attempt yet with this amount.)
100 Magery
100 Remove Trap
50 Lockpicking (This is the minimum required to have Remove Trap Skill.)

Thieves with this template are not good offensively, but with the GM magery (bumped to 110 occasionally with a spell book or jewels), they can rez, dispel summons, and cast gates successfully on the first try most of the time. They can help out with casting fields in a pinch for a while before mana runs out, but the fields aren't very effective with no eval. (They're mostly for appearance, I guess. ) My main enjoyment from these characters came from stealing sigils, tracking down pesky enemies (rarely able to kill them though), and being a scout.

I have another template that includes stealing and is also quite fun, but I really only used these characters for stealing the sigils off the posts in the base after they corrupted and handing them off to others to run them back to town. Their main purpose was always guarding the sigil room and tracking down and killing enemies hidden in the base.

95 Taming (Must bump higher with jewelry.)
100 Lore (Probably need to bump at least a little with jewelry.)
90 Vet
95 Magery (Probably will want to bump occasionally with jewelry or spell book.)
90 Hiding
100 Detect Hidden
100 Tracking
50 Stealing (Must bump to 80 with jewelry or clothing to steal sigils.)

 

[Gellor]

Good news is I'm not a novice to PvP(probably 6 years worth)... not great at it yet but I can survive I haven't done any significant PvM except for skill gains

So the general consensus is 80 stealing is enough.

I played a thief/scout way back in the days and it was fun. I just don't know the differences in playing a faction thief.

Odds are I'll end up on Sonoma, Pac, Origin, or even Napa since that is where most of my resources are.

On the silver, I actually meant just in terms of trade ability

 

[Sasori]

Everyone Hit it pretty much on the head. just want to let you know that faction silver can be used to craft faction armour and weapons that when crafted and u choose to make it a faction item it is enchanted as a blessed item for 3 weeks includes all armour and weapons cloths ect. Though your faction has to be in control of at least one town cause you have to be in your faction controled town to craft faction items oh yea and in the right shop like tailor shop or blacksmiths to craft the items and you have to have the silver on you!
weapons 1000 silver
armour 750 silver
cloths 250 silver
faction traps 250 silver

faction traps can be crafted in your home you dont need to be in town for these. Oh im on Atlantic True Britannians.

 

[Nonel]

I wrote a whole long rant on thieving...but decided: A) I gave away way too many of my tricks. B) You asked specific questions and probably aren't looking for someone to talk to you like you're some newbie, so I wont insult you.



Does the amount of stealing skill mater? Is there a point in factions that equate to guaranteed steal of sigils?
80 stealing. You must have 80 stealing to steal a sig, and at this point you cannot fail to steal it. So if you're going pure faction thief (not a real thief) then 80 will work for you.


What are some "good" faction thief templates? Stealth and hiding seem to be a must... ninja and resist a good idea?

I've actually saved sigs from an enemy base without ever hiding or stealthing a single time. Sometimes speed is better than sneakiness. However, it is the staple of a thief and I don't recommend removing it. At 120 stealth a GM tracker/detector will only have a 50% chance of tracking you. Take into account that he has 3 different forms to check, and you can be a hard one to find. Also, the 120 stealth will allow you to absorb most EQ's and Meteor Swarms without being revealed, as well as allow you to stealth while DP'ed.

Ninja will save you in many different ways. First, animal form. Wolf adds 20 HP. Unicorn makes you immune to those pesky low-level nox fields (this wont be a problem if you have 120 stealth, as nox wont reveal you anyway.) Out of refresh pots? Kirin will save you there. Even Cu Sidhe, though slow, will give you a whole extra form of healing. Mirror images can be used to not only block your pursuers, but also to lessen the effects of those damned archers and their LDC. Shurikens/Fukiyas can be useful for disrupting a fielder. Smoke bombs can REALLY save you in a pinch (unless you're some punk with invis items, in which case you SHOULD be virtually impossible to kill). All-in-all, ninjitsu can be the greatest friend of a thief.

Is it worth combining the thief into a trap remover also?

It really can be, especially if you're a solo thief. To be effective at it it can eat up as much as 250 skill points....but getting rid of those traps can make your job of stealthing in 10x's easier, not to mention its a good pre-raid tactic.

Is faction silver worth anything?

Its worthy for traps. Also, for your typical "suicide nakie thief" it can be useful, as you just throw on a suit of some crappy blessed low-level-runic-crafted armor. But, as a thief, chances are you can only wear 4 or so pieces of said armor.

 

[Gellor]

Thanks for all the replies. Very helpful

While I am a UO vet(98') and PvP experienced(02'??), I'd definitely call myself a faction newbie.

Thanks for the confirm that 80 steal is all that's needed. I wasn't aware of the high stealth benefits though

In terms of playstyle, I am probably going to be a solo thief. So more stealing sigils just to screw up the works. Maybe be a GM bolo'r if I find a fight

I am leaning toward doing the remove traps route. But it hurts to tie up 250 points in that. It is halfway tempting to put some more survivability skills on

After more reading and searching, another couple of questions then:
1) Do you have to hold a rank to place traps? Or can anyone with the "deed" place one?
2) Can faction crafted armor be made with runic kits? Can a piece of armor be later "factioned"? Or is it just plain GM made armor turned runic?
3) Any way to tell what the current faction tithing is? Or is it the famous, join and pray for low?

 

[Zara]

Here are the answers that I know:

1. Anyone in the faction can place the trap. However, there is restrictions on the types of traps and how many can be placed. For instance, each faction can place 15 traps. You can only place gas traps inside the base but you can place the other traps inside a faction town.

2. I really don't know the answer to this question. Any time I have crafted a faction item it's just been crafted from the crafting menu. I've never really tried to enhance an item to be faction.

3. The faction tithing will differ. Each Commanding Lord of a faction will set the tithe rate so you would need to contact someone in the faction you are wanting to join on the shard you are going to join on.

 

[Tina Small]

Some friends recently tried their hand at making faction items and I'm pretty sure they were able to bring up the menu to bestow faction properties on an item that they had just created by using a runic tool. However, there are a lot of conditions that have to be satisfied first for making faction-blessed items: I believe the crafter has to declare themselves a faction crafter for a specific skill via the faction stone's "merchant" option, has to have at least GM-level skill, has to make the item in the appropriate shop in a town controlled by his or her faction, and have an adequate supply of silver in his or her backpack.

When you access the faction sign-up stone to join a faction, the gump will tell you who the CL is and the current tithing rate. After you've joined, you should be able to find out what the tithing rate is by accessing the faction stone in the sigil room.

 

[Sasori]

Ok let me get more into detail about the faction crafting since so far im the only one doing it on Atlantic. Your rank in the faction determines how many faction items you can wear a commanding lord can wear up to 10 items he/she is the only one that can wear that many with out holding a high rank. When you craft the item the item auto blesses it self and you can choose between the two colors of your faction for example TB two colors are gold and purple the item stays a faction item and blessed for 3 weeks then turns into a regular item. Yes you can use runic kits to craft faction items again you have to have the silver on your character and be in a town shop that your faction controls to be able to craft the faction items for example if you want to make tailor stuff you must be in a tailor shop in a town your faction controls to be able to access the faction menu. You cannot enhance armour to be faction armour it be nice in near future if they made that possible. The faction sign up stone will tell you the titheing of the faction under the commanding lords name of the faction if it says 0% max to faction that means that players in that faction are receiveing the max silver a faction creature can give out which is 30 silver. the silver will be placed in your backpack after you slay the creature no looting required.

 

[Gellor]

Thanks for all the info.

I think the remove trap thief is going to fit my playstyle of more harassment since my current guild isn't doing factions. Now I just need to raise remove

What I'm looking at is something like:
GM detect
GM remove
50 lockpick
100+ ninja
80 steal
GM hide
100+ stealth
remainder in chiv

I've got a solid start on the template on a few shards(probably 8) so now I just need to pick one (I've got hide, detect, and stealth all worked up)

I know that stealth of 80 with light clothes is no fail. But are the benefits of 100+ that good? Just debating that extra 40 points there.

In terms of stats, is there any reason to raise dex on this template? I thinking 125 strength, 10 dex, and everything else in int.

Equipment wise, what should I consider? I'm thinking getting 3/6 or 4/6 fc/fcr would be very good idea for ninja and chiv.

Should I go with the theory of sitting duck and not worry too much about resists?

 

[Kat]

My main character is a faction thief on Siege. She doesn't get to kill much, but I've killed a few thieves without much trouble, with shurikens/mindblast. This character is by far, the most fun I've ever had.

110 Magery
80 med
100 Hiding
110 Stealing [We get 1 blessed item, I bless a burglars bandana]
70 Stealth [Adding more to stealth as we speak]
120 Ninja
100 Detect [To find traps, other thieves and hiders]
100 Spellweave [To help with base defence & GoL]

 

[Tina Small]

Gellor, you probably already know this, but just in case you don't and for the benefit of anyone else reading this because they're thinking of making a faction thief, I wanted to point out that a lot of the skills you plan to use have a skill use timer that takes into account use of any of the skills (e.g., Remove Trap, Detect Hidden, Hiding, Stealing). Also, when you use Remove Trap or Stealing skill, your character becomes visible. Since you won't be using magery, you will want to make sure you have access to a good supply of smoke bombs and/or invisibility potions to help you hide quickly if necessary, rather than waiting out the timer and hoping you can pull off a successful use of the Hiding skill.

 

[Tina Small]

Thanks for all the info.

I know that stealth of 80 with light clothes is no fail. But are the benefits of 100+ that good? Just debating that extra 40 points there.

In terms of stats, is there any reason to raise dex on this template? I thinking 125 strength, 10 dex, and everything else in int.

Equipment wise, what should I consider? I'm thinking getting 3/6 or 4/6 fc/fcr would be very good idea for ninja and chiv.

Should I go with the theory of sitting duck and not worry too much about resists?

I think Nonel gave a pretty good description of the reasons to go with higher stealthing skill.

As far as dex goes, don't forget the push-through issue in Fel. You may not be trying to push through other players' characters all that often, but you will very likely run into situations where you have to push through guards or vendors. I don't think 10 dex will be sufficient unless you are perhaps also going to put on necro skill and flit around in wraith form.

You will want some decent resists on your armor in order to survive failed attemps at removing traps and/or if you plan to go with higher stealthing so you can stealth over traps and through fields.

 

[Gellor]

As far as dex goes, don't forget the push-through issue in Fel. You may not be trying to push through other players' characters all that often, but you will very likely run into situations where you have to push through guards or vendors. I don't think 10 dex will be sufficient unless you are perhaps also going to put on necro skill and flit around in wraith form.

Wouldn't a lower dex/stam be very good especially with "high" stam regen? *confused* You can push through with 10 dex/stam and get the lose back almost immediately right? *confused*

 

[Nonel]

Nah. You lose a set amount of stam for every push...so really itd be the same.

However, someone using stamina leech will be keeping your stam redlined almost constantly.

If you chug refresh pots or have REAL high stam leech you'll be fine with low stam, though (used to run 20 for a while...till I got parry).

 

[Arabella]

Thanks for all the info.

I think the remove trap thief is going to fit my playstyle of more harassment

What I'm looking at is something like:
GM detect
GM remove
50 lockpick
100+ ninja
80 steal
GM hide
100+ stealth
remainder in chiv

QUOTE]

That is basically the skills I have on Gracie, but I have a suit built around hp regen which when i put on my bracelet of health I have the max hp regen possible......I would suggest you find that, a crimson and totem of the void those 3 items will give you 14 hp regen. But since I only have 65 ninja, most of the time I use a fire ruby bracelet with is 10 ninjia and 15 enhanced pots and the eruc citrine ring, to give a total of 65 ep. With those items and the use of either smoke bombs or invis items (yes I am one of those punks, Nonel ), I am usually successful in my escape from the opposing factions.

To work your remove trap, LOL refer to the stickies up top, Tina Small is a big big help working that skill, so pm her if you have problems!! Good to see you posting Ma'am

With Chiv, your karma is gonna be low on a thief, so I am not for sure how that will work.

But I love playing my thief, she is one of my most favorite characters to play, Good luck with yours!

 

[Nonel]

Hehe, I used them for a while, myself. But the fun wore off once people realized what they were. My favorite part was, "Hes hacking! He can hide before the skill timer is up!" Lol.

 

[Arabella]

I still use them, thanks to a huge supply I got out of an idoc! But I still have to remember to change my dress macro when I have to switch one after the uses are gone, oh my that isn't very pretty

 

[Gellor]

With Chiv, your karma is gonna be low on a thief, so I am not for sure how that will work.

I thought you only lost karma from stealing from people? Didn't know stealing objects like sigils or crate items lost karma *confused*

 

[Arabella]

I dont think you lose karma for stealing the sigils, I never paid any attention to the message, but you lose karma for stealing from crates and such. If I remember correctly, the ability to cure posion with chiv is based on your karma.

 

[Drugist (UZI)]

Know who was a good thief. That guy Fausto.

 

[Arabella]

Yep, soooooo does that mean your coming back now???

 

[Lynk]

If I remember correctly, the ability to cure posion with chiv is based on your karma.

Incorrect, the amount of damage dealt to yourself when using cleanse by fire is based on your karma.

The effectiveness of your cure attempt is deteremined by your chivalry.

 

[tink'r_toiz]

Know who was a good thief. That guy Fausto.

DITTO what Arabella said.... you coming back????? *smiles hopefully*

 

[Arabella]

Incorrect, the amount of damage dealt to yourself when using cleanse by fire is based on your karma.

The effectiveness of your cure attempt is deteremined by your chivalry.

Ok I am really confused now, Cleanse by Fire does damage to you? It just cures the poison.

 

[Arabella]

DITTO what Arabella said.... you coming back????? *smiles hopefully*

Whew we had a lot of fun with Fausto at Minax, now we can really have fun since we are all green!

 

[Nonel]

Yep. Cleanse by fire deals damage to you. At high karma it does 0. Go Dread and it actually hurts a little.

Remove curse, on the other hand, is completely useless at even mediocre karma.