Implementing the Thief

[tombowings]

[Hi everyone. Greeting from the country of Georgia. It's been a while, but after three months of training in the Peace Corps, I have finally been placed in my tiny, tiny village and have more free time that I ever thought possible (for now).]


We've all seen the debates over how thief skills are a poor mechanics, the thief as a class is almost purely self justifying, makes it so that other classes must in incompetent in the thief's area of expertise, or that it just doesn't fit into the scheme presented in the LBB.

This is NOT what this thread is about.

I'm interested in actually seeing what people have done with the thief as a class, and their experiences with these new designed in actual play. So, post what you're got.

[bestialwarlust]

I use the class in my game, though I use Delving Deeper. It's similar enough to OD&D, but the optional thief class there uses the built in d6 system that's already in OD&D (though in DD it's rolls of 5-6 instead of 1-2 when the d6 roll is called for). And much like OD&D anyone can try anything and the "skill roll" uses the d6 so most adventures if a roll is required would succeed at any thiefly skills on a roll of 5+ where as the thief does all of his skills on a 3+

With that out of the way here's how I run it or try to thanks to Gronan's clarifications of how thief skills were intended to be implemented. When I require a roll it's usually under stressful conditions or if there's a chance for complication (I try not to make it binary -- pass or fail) so for example the party is in town and fleeing for whatever reason from a group of per suers. Up ahead is the stonewall that surrounds the town. It's extremely rough built so no special skill or tools are needed to climb it.

Assuming the group has a good enough lead I'd let them know they have a round or two before the people they are running from catch up.

"You see the thief nimbly climb the wall like a spider disappearing over the wall and melting into the shadows as she does. Every one else roll a d6 and tell me what you get."

*dice roll*

I decide the ones wearing leather or less only need a 3+ (notice I didn't make the thief roll) everyone else wearing heavy armor (chain or plate) need to roll a 5+. Dice are done being rolled almost everyone lucks out and rolls a 5+ except for the player wearing chain he rolls a 2.

"Though not as nimbly nearly everyone makes it over the wall" then with a smile I turn to the player who rolled a 2. "Except you, while trying to scramble over the wall you manage to get your sword belt hung slowing your climb. While fiddling with the snag the guards come around the corner and spot you two fire arrows."

*I roll attack rolls and miss*

"As the arrows clatter off the wall you manage to work the snag loose and make it over the wall and go to join your friends who you see already disappearing into the edge of the forest."


In other cases I rule only a thief can attempt it because the situation is so difficult that the thiefs near supernatural ability gives him the training.

"You see a chest across the room, however the floor is old wood and very creaky. You also notice it's covered in dry crunchy leaves." something like that I'd rule it takes a thief because of his training if they wanted someone to sneak across the room on that floor.

[makofan]

HP, exp, fighting and saves as Cleric
Leather, no shield, small weapons
Level 1-4, all skills 1-3 on a d6
Level 5-8, all skills 1-4 on a d6
Level 9-12, all skills 1-5 on a d6
Level 13+, all skills 1-6 on a d6

Skills are whatever DM decides, typically Open Locks, Disarm Traps, Hear Noise, Move Silently, Climb Walls, Activate a scroll, Read treasure maps, Pick pockets etc
DM can assign a +1 or -1 modifier where warranted (-1 if picking a high level pocket, +1 to disarm a simple trap, for example)

This makes thieves useful at level 1

It works well in practice, although our thief died at level 4 to a pit of green slime

[Deleted]

I don't use the skills listed, instead each thief picks a archetype that his character represents. It can be anything such as tomb-raider, burglar, assassin, charlatan, etc. Whatever the player wants. When the character tries something that fits his archetype he gets a bonus. It has the advantages of a choose-your-own skill system (such as 2e and 3e have) without the book keeping. I also help avoid the problem you get with players cherry picking the better skills.

One of the earliest games I played in (I only DMed the first couple years), was Gamelord's Thieves Guild. That game added a variety of new skills for thieves, such as Disguise, Trailing, Sense Ambush, etc. It's a pretty decent resource for ideas about thieves and thiefly adventures. I'll look over my books tonight and write-up the various new skills that game had. It kinda went overboard in some areas (two pages of rules on sensing by smell).

[oakesspalding]

1) Everyone can sneak, climb, etc. if only unencumbered (minimum 10 lb. or so, no metal armor, heavy weapons or bulging knapsacks).

2) Thieves have these distinguishing characteristics:

a. They have a 2 in 6 chance of dodging blows if lightly encumbered, 3 in 6 if unencumbered. This gives Thieves more of an incentive to be the sneaky, climbing guy. At lower levels, the dodging ability is not as good as wearing plate armor, but it gives them a better chance of surviving a melee than the standard. I prefer this to giving them an AC adjustment for two reasons: I like preserving AC as actual physical protection, and it gives Thieves something cool to do.

b. They may Hide in Shadows if lightly encumbered or unencumbered.

c. Hit die and attack table progression is as for Clerics. This makes Fighting-Men better if one simply wants to fight, but it also, again, gives Thieves more of a chance in melee than the standard.

d. Scroll use is as given in Greyhawk.

e. Other abilities--lock picking, picking pockets, street smarts, etc.--are up to the DM, perhaps decided on a case by case basis.

3) For multiple reasons I have replaced Clerics with Thieves. I think the above:

a. Makes Thieves interesting and powerful enough to play without making them too powerful.

b. Preserves the ability of ANY character to do sneaky, fiddly, acrobatic, etc. things, but gives an incentive for the Thief to be the go-to man for them.

c. Halts "skill creep" and holds the line for role-playing against roll-playing.

[Deleted]

Aug 3, 2013 1:00:27 GMT -6 oakesspalding said:

a. They have a 2 in 6 chance of dodging blows if lightly encumbered, 3 in 6 if unencumbered. This gives Thieves more of an incentive to be the sneaky, climbing guy. At lower levels, the dodging ability is not as good as wearing plate armor, but it gives them a better chance of surviving a melee than the standard. I prefer this to giving them an AC adjustment for two reasons: I like preserving AC as actual physical protection, and it gives Thieves something cool to do.

Against a 1rst level attackers, leather armor prevents 18% of hits, chainmail 35% and platemail 55% (taken as the hits avoided that otherwise would have hit AC9). So a 1 in 6 save is close to leather, 2 in 6 is close to chainmail and 3 in 6 is close to platemail. Note that as the characters increase in level, the effectiveness of armor will decrease whereas the effectiveness of a dodge save will remain constant.

[oakesspalding]

Thanks for your comment.

I figure it this way:

AC*Armor*Number to Hit*Chance to Hit*Chance with 2in 6 Dodge*Chance with 3 in 6 Dodge
9*No Armor*10*55%*37%*28%
8*Shield Only*11*50%*34%
7*Leather Armor*12*45%*30%
6*Leather & Shield*13*40%*27%
5*Mail*14*35%
4*Mail & Shield*15*30%
3*Plate Armor*16*25%
2*Plate Armor & Shield*17*20%

You only get the 3 in 6 if you're practically naked, whereas leather and shield would give you 2 in 6. So 28% or 27% is the lowest the Thief could go, as opposed to 20% for the Fighter.

I have gone back and forth on this, originally choosing 2 in 6 and 1 in 6 (yielding 37% and 33%) . That might make more sense. However, the point is to make the Thief attractive enough. He's already sacrificing some hit dice and attack potential as well perhaps as certain magical items only available to Fighting-Men, in return (under my scheme) mainly for the extra ability to hide in shadows and various possible miscellaneous tricks and advantages that might add flavor and fun but not a lot of, so to speak, dungeon crawling power. The basic question, I guess is how attractive the different schemes would be for players. You want a few players to pick the Thief, but not everyone to do so. I suppose that since we know from experience (or at least my experience) that players like playing standard OD&D Thieves despite their (in my view) practically anemic powers and defenses at lower levels, that argues for a more conservative approach to the dodge ability. I'm still pondering it.

[tec97]

Jul 31, 2013 7:29:14 GMT -6 makofan said:

HP, exp, fighting and saves as Cleric
Leather, no shield, small weapons
Level 1-4, all skills 1-3 on a d6
Level 5-8, all skills 1-4 on a d6
Level 9-12, all skills 1-5 on a d6
Level 13+, all skills 1-6 on a d6

Skills are whatever DM decides, typically Open Locks, Disarm Traps, Hear Noise, Move Silently, Climb Walls, Activate a scroll, Read treasure maps, Pick pockets etc
DM can assign a +1 or -1 modifier where warranted (-1 if picking a high level pocket, +1 to disarm a simple trap, for example)

This makes thieves useful at level 1

This I really like!

[talysman]

Mostly, I just assume thief skills are based on surprise and give them a bonus equal to hit dice on the surprise roll. I've regularized surprise to be 5+ on 1d6, so if a monster is harder to surprise, the player subtracts 1 from the roll... and therefore a thief add hit dice directly to the surprise dice when sneaking/hiding in shadows. Instead of backstab, I have surprise attacks; they don't multiply damage, but instead add the surprise result (including thief bonus) to damage. Pick pockets, open locks, and remove traps use the same mechanic and could be interpreted as surprise, or as subtlety and guile, which is the explanation for the thief's expertise at surprise.

Normal people thus can do many of the same things as thieves, just by rolling surprise without the bonus. But they can't necessarily do them in all the same conditions; thieves can hide in shadows instead of behind an object; they can open magical locks, which no one with mundane locksmith training can do.

Hit dice used are the pre-Greyhawk thief (basically, start at 1 hit die, gain another die every two levels, get a non-cumulative +1 hit point on even levels.)

[Deleted]

Aug 3, 2013 8:40:35 GMT -6 oakesspalding said:

AC*Armor*Number to Hit*Chance to Hit*Chance with 2in 6 Dodge*Chance with 3 in 6 Dodge
9*No Armor*10*55%*37%*28%
8*Shield Only*11*50%*34%
7*Leather Armor*12*45%*30%
6*Leather & Shield*13*40%*27%
5*Mail*14*35%

I see what you're doing. As the characters face larger monsters with higher hit dice, the dodge save will improve relative to armor. I've been thinking about that and I now kinda like that idea. A nimble thief should have a much easier time dodging the slow powerful blows of a giant or dragon.

[kesher]

Hey, Tom! Welcome back!

That's all.