Thief Profession Round-up by octopusx

[Bella]

Great post by octopusx over here at mmosite that pulls together a ton of information about the thief profession all in one neat little package.

For those that prefer to read it without opening a new window, here you go:

Introduction:

Thieves are adept at the art of stealth. They utilize surprise and shadow to get close to their enemies, and they're deadly in one-on-one combat. They have an affinity for setting traps and going where they were never meant to go. As an adventurer profession, thieves wear medium armor. While other professions rely on recharge rate for their weapon skills in combat, thieves rely on Initiative. Thieves have ten points of Initiative to use, and they gain back one point every second. Weapon skills cost Initiative points, but they have no recharge time, so thieves can use them back-to-back. This allows the thief to keep their options open at all times or unleash a rapid flurry of powerful attacks.

Traits:

Thieves have the following trait lines: Deadly Arts, Critical Strikes, Shadow Arts, Acrobatics, and Trickery.

Weapons:

Two-handed
Shortbow — ranged mobile weapon with AoE attacks and shadow step ability.
Main-hand
Sword — flanking sword attacks provide extra evasiveness and controls enemy movement.
Dagger — jump on a foe, attack quickly and inflict many conditions on them.
Pistol — ranged shots from pistol leave enemies vulnerable to following attacks.
Off-hand
Dagger — gives access to close range skills which allow quick escape by crippling the enemy or vanishing from sight.
Pistol — ranged weapon used to quickly retreat or to daze the target by a shot to the head or from a pistol whip.
Aquatic
Harpoon — rapid melee attacks spiced up with the usual thief tricks.
Speargun — bombard enemy with ranged attacks or pull them in, stab them and shadow step away.

There are seven possible weapon sets for this profession and two weapon sets while underwater. The thief can switch between two weapon sets in combat.

Armor:

The thief is an adventurer profession and thus wears medium armor.


Skills:

*Profession mechanic skills

Skill types unique to Thief:

Dual wield skills — available only to the thief profession, these weapon skills are determined by the combination of main-hand and off-hand weapons equipped. They generally use the highest amount of initiative.
Shadow stepping — certain skills allow the thief to disappear from one location and then instantly appear at a different location by traveling through the shadows.
Stealth — thieves have access to multiple skills which make them invisible to enemy players and ignore aggro. While stealthed the thief is not targettable, but can still be damaged by AoEs/Ground-targeted skills, and attacking will break the deception.
Stealth skills — while in stealth, the first weapon skill of the thief's skill bar is replaced by a special skill only usable while stealthed.
Traps — placed at a thief's current location, they trigger and cause an effect whenever an enemy steps onto one.

Thank you so much, octopusx for combining all this profession-related info into one easy-to-read article!

Bella