I have found a place for the thief in my campaing

[Zulgyan]

...as an NPC class!!

As an NPC class the thief works perfectly well.

In OD&D we want players to find traps and stuff by critical thinking, role playing, description, etc. The thief class brings problems to that approach if played by a player.

But not if played as an NPC!

The DM knows where the trap is, so he can't play the NPC as if he where a player.

So the NPC thief has a percentage chance to find the trap!

Hmmmm... let me use an example to get it better.


DM: you see a long corridor.

PC 1: Oh, let's send our hired thief to search for traps.

(Now, the DM knows where the trap is and how it is found, so to simulate this situation he just rolls for the hired thief's chance to find traps)

DM: (playing the voice of the thief) "All clear!" (but he actually rolled badly on the secret roll).

PC 2: Hmmmmm.... I still thing there might be something here, let me try doing blah blah descriptive stuff we love in OD&D games.


I'm going to try this in my next game, by having a thief join the party somehow!

[geoffrey]

I think this is a case of great minds thinking alike.

Gary mentioned that few of the players in his Greyhawk campaign were ever interested in playing thieves. Consequently, thieves were typically NPCs hired for specific tasks: "We don't know what to do about that trapped idol down in the 7th level of the dungeon. Let's hire a thief to disarm the trap."

Note that since thieves are so likely to steal from the PCs, thieves were typically hired for specific tasks rather than as regular companions.

[Zulgyan]

I would use pickpockets as a chance of the thief to try to steal from it's own patron.

As thieves get better, they also get more greedy and treacherous!

[sham]

This is a great idea.

Remember, There Is No Honor Among Thieves!

In my past AD&D days, no one liked playing the Thief (and rarely the Cleric for that matter).

I particularly like the notion of a band of adventurers not wanting to have a Thief along as a regular member, but perhaps as a hired hand that can help out in certain situations. The trust level just isn't there, and further they KNOW the little sneak is going to try to rob them and slink off into the dark if he thinks he might get away with it.

[hackman]

That's a good idea if going three original books only. Of course, as a DM if you want to do a bit more work, one could describe where the thief is looking around etc. Then the party might be in the position of second guessing the thief, wounding their pride and making betrayel all the more likely. Or once back in town a big heist could happen.

[coffee]

Jun 9, 2008 0:19:21 GMT -6 geoffrey said:

Gary mentioned that few of the players in his Greyhawk campaign were ever interested in playing thieves. Consequently, thieves were typically NPCs hired for specific tasks: "We don't know what to do about that trapped idol down in the 7th level of the dungeon. Let's hire a thief to disarm the trap."

I think part of the problem that arouse outside of Lake Geneva (such as in my original group) was the multiclassing rules from AD&D. Some abilities were drastically limited, but every single non-human (or half-human) race could be a thief.

So there were fighter/thieves, cleric/thieves, magic-user thieves, etc. I remember some parties where everybody was a thief, at least to some extent.

[Speaking of stealing from the party: One guy had a wand. Another guy wanted it; everybody did. So he stole it. The guy sitting next to him at the table stole it from him, and that began the game. Everybody was honor bound to steal this wand from the guy next to him. Didn't progress far in the dungeon, but we all had a laugh.]

And that's a big part of why I don't want to use a thief as a pc class in my game. Zulgyan's suggestion of making them an NPC class works for me.

[I'd do the same thing with Druid, too, for 'special' druids. Otherwise, I'd use them as monsters, as in Greyhawk.]