Solo thief

[phektus]

I'm currently playing a solo thief, more on the role playing side but a little bit of power game utilizing backstab and traps up to 7 (ToB installed). Are there any tips you can give me overall, the thief seems week on combat... Or at least a good quest sequence? He's a vanilla thief BTW, and I just liked the idea of being a thief in the shadows with no party to help me with.

Also, I would like to have the skin of most Shadow thieves (i.e., Renal bloodscalp / opening sequence thief) to use for my character... The one with a red hood and a really cool stance. How do I go about this?

Thanks

[Thrifalas]

For the thief, search for a program called "shadow keeper" which is an easy to use program for minor game alteration, such as appearence. Know that the avatars are hardcoded into the game though, and this specific assassin moves faster than regular characters - so changing appearence would also boost your speed and could be considered cheating.

About soloing the game as a vanilla thief, I dont really know, but I suppose it isn't that very different from being a thief/fighter. Do easy quest and gain experience, like copper coronet+slaver compound, get the HLA UAI, then start cheesing away. Be sure to pick up Carso, Crom and SotM for different occations.

Eventually, being able to use *any* weapon combined with scrolls, traps, and if worst comes to worst - slayer shape - you should be able to take on most. I've no idea about Melissan though, really comes down to you as a player.

[Crenshinibon]

What you really need for a solo thief is at least 100 in traps, and at LEAST 200 in Hide in Shadows and Move Silently. Also, don't dual wield. Your THAC0 is too low for that. Get yourself a nice weapon with a good THAC0 boost. Always sacrifice damage for the TAHC0 boost. You don't really need any of the weapons mentioned in the above post as you're not head to head material without the use of scrolls. Early on you should be able to get the Sword of the Mask +4, which is very nice for early game. (About 19k at the Watcher's Keep store if you have ToB), but in the end you'll want the Staff of the Ram +6. If you don't have ToB installed you'll want Short Sword of Backstabbing +3 at the start and later switch over to Cutthroat +4. Remember, if you do have ToB and get Use Any Item, you can only backstab with weapons a normal thief can use without the ability. For abilities I suggest Assassination, Use Any Item, Spike Trap, Time Trap and perhaps any defensive abilities, although you wouldn't need them. Staff of the Magi is a must for running away to hide in shadows.

[Deadalready]

Personally I use a staff throughout the game on my thief, an effective easy to get weapon is a Staff of Striking available from temples. It gives +9 to damage and a considerable bonus to thaco. A cleric's staff is another good and easy to collect weapon early on too, I use the cleric's staff mainly but for critical backstabs (like killing mages) I use the staff of Striking.

If you can collect and upgrade the Staff of Ram you can drop the above staves.

~

Don't bother with using thieves in melee battle, you'll sadly get killed quite often, use hide in shadows liberally and learn how to use corners of buildings and doors to get into sneaking position.

Aim to get an extremely high Hide in Shadows skill over Move Silently.

Keep every potion of haste you find and if you pick up some boots of speed make sure you have the fix patch for them. Getting a potion holder thingy is a great help.

When talking about HLAs, get Use Any Item first and avoid potion and scroll creation.

Traps are extremely useful and cheesy, the bounty hunter ones are probably the best. Once you have access to HLA go for spike trap first (as far as traps go).

[Thrifalas]

What you really need for a solo thief is at least 100 in traps, and at LEAST 200 in Hide in Shadows and Move Silently. Also, don't dual wield. Your THAC0 is too low for that. Get yourself a nice weapon with a good THAC0 boost. Always sacrifice damage for the TAHC0 boost. You don't really need any of the weapons mentioned in the above post as you're not head to head material without the use of scrolls. Early on you should be able to get the Sword of the Mask +4, which is very nice for early game. (About 19k at the Watcher's Keep store if you have ToB), but in the end you'll want the Staff of the Ram +6. If you don't have ToB installed you'll want Short Sword of Backstabbing +3 at the start and later switch over to Cutthroat +4. Remember, if you do have ToB and get Use Any Item, you can only backstab with weapons a normal thief can use without the ability. For abilities I suggest Assassination, Use Any Item, Spike Trap, Time Trap and perhaps any defensive abilities, although you wouldn't need them. Staff of the Magi is a must for running away to hide in shadows.

~~Spoiler warning!!~~

And I imagine you're going to backstab Melissan to death? The Ravager? Abazigal? Far from everything is backstabable, and far from every battle allows you to repeatedly hide in shadows. In bg1 you could solo everything with BoS and DoV, but this isn't it.

There will be fights where you have to go face-to-face with enemies, and in those occations, 50% MR+Dispel, 25 STR, Spell Shield+Constant invis can be quite nice.

No, trust me on this one, the key to soloing a thief is called knowledge, UAI and traps. Backstabbing became useless somewhere in the underdark.

[Crenshinibon]

In the instances you do have to go into combat, you'd buff yourself with scrolls. I used backstab through the entire game, wherever appropriate. Scrolls play a big part in survival and don't forget that you have a very handy Vhalior's helm (if you have special edition) that can give you a Simulacarum so you don't have to waste your abilities. It makes things that much easier. The final battle was a breeze and to the poster above me, I ask that you insert a spoiler tag as not to spoil the player's experience.

[Thrifalas]

Yes, you do. Scrolls and appropriate weapons, ie UAI. Traps are also well-known to be able to deal with most of the stuff in the vanilla game and can be very overpowered. And of cource, Vhailor's Helm is a must-have for every soloing character. And if you're referring to scrolls as "abilties", you can just pick up the rift device and ring of ram and one-shot everything in the game.

As for the spoiler warning, fair enough.

[Celacena]

And if you're referring to scrolls as "abilties", you can just pick up the rift device and ring of ram and one-shot everything in the game.

eh? I thought that removing the rift device was an instakill on the PC

staff of the ram is very good though.

I like using Celestial Fury for backstabs - in another thread, the damage of various BS weapons was dscussed, but with the stun effect and extra (%)damage, it is a good weapon.
I use daystar as the BS weapon v undead. points in longsword and single weapon are useful to the thief character, considering that Blackrazor is available if you know the trick.

[Crenshinibon]

There are a few bugs that let you take it out of the sewers. Well, if you use the rift device for the entire game then it's not that interesting. I was trying to stay away from bugs as I believe that they shouldn't be used on the first playthrough.

[phektus]

Thanks for the tips, guys. I managed to get hold of the Shadow Keeper app and changed my thief to a cool looking shadow thief. I also noticed that the speed was a bit more, so I think that this might be exploitation of the hardcoded buffs.

I did the basic quests, not much problem so far. Traps + Backstabbing is a very useful combination, though it tends to prolong the battle on some tough characters. Right now I'm trying to get hold of Boots of Speed, and I'm about to enter through the Haerdalis portal to rescue the theater guys. I'm not yet sure how to handle the initial battle, invisibility maybe (I have the cloak of non-detection from the promenade hostile party).

That should make backstabbing easier, but I am mostly relying on traps to kill enemies. Set the traps, go invisible, backstab, let them run after me, traps set off, repeat. I hardly get into melee, because I know that is not a nice tactic for a thief, role playing wise.

I also have ToB installed (which is why I posted it here), so my traps are limited, which helps me not to abuse it by laying too many in a level. Still low level (14) and under Chapter 2. Remember , this is a vanilla thief, so I'm more into the role play than cheesing, though I'm not restricting myself to that and I'll do what's necessary considering the fact that it's a solo game. I'll try my best to stay away from abusing bugs as much as possible. I've done a solo game before as a monk, but I lost interest in the early parts of ToB after Watcher's Keep. I'll be trying to acquire the items mentioned here, and see them for myself. I'll keep you guys updated.

[Thrifalas]

There are a few bugs that let you take it out of the sewers. Well, if you use the rift device for the entire game then it's not that interesting. I was trying to stay away from bugs as I believe that they shouldn't be used on the first playthrough.

Using Simulacrum to copy certain scrolls/items, say Pro-Magic, is just as cheesy as using the rift device. That stuff even makes fights such as Eclipse party easy.