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Stealing 101

  • For all the in town spawns you will need a thief character, I would recommend you set your stealing skill to 50 from the start and probably lock picking at 50 as well.

  • Stealing is crucial to start at 50. The fastest way to raise stealing skill is to partner up with a Buddy and steal from each other. However you can currently do that now only if you are 1-In the same Clan or 2-In the thieves Guild.

  • If you have clan mates it wont be difficult, but if you don't its going to be tough to get into the Thieves Guild. First you need to be what they call "a week old" which means 40 Hours of play time with that character. Then you will need a stealing skill of 60. It doesn't seem like a Big jump from 50 to 60 But believe me it is. The piddaly items you will be able to steal from NPCs are not going to raise skill quickly. Items from chests will raise skill fairly quickly as their are some heavier items to practice on, but be ready to die a LOT, in fact the things you will gain skill on are the type of things your Probably going to be noticed stealing, so have nothing of value and practice away, choose places near healers because you will honestly spend well over 1/2 of power Hour as a Ghost :)

    Not to worry though, Their are Ways still of Stealing successfully even when at only 50 Skill Level.

  • The main thing to think is that you will defiantly Die, so only have items that you can afford to loose on you. My Personal choice for stealing is my Newbie Cloths, or a Dyed Death robe (I hate running around in a plain death robe looking like the other 150 thieves, so I Dye 1 death robe, and never loose my Newbie Shoes. lol Fashion..) I havent figured it out yet. (Its on the roster tho) but some Professions seem to get cooler Newbie cloths than others. I started a few throw away characters to get a Newbified fancy shirt, some nice pants, and decent shoes. I gave them to a friend of mine to hold and logged out, after few tries I had a nice set of newbiefied cloths that didn't look like the lame rags newbies are normally issued. Vanity is Optional, but if you role play the vain type that's the way to go! :)

    So I only carry my newbie cloths, 3 Lockpicks, my newbie dagger, spell book, 3 garlic and 3 Ginsing (to cast heal for the Posion traps) and 2 spare packs. 1 pack has the 3 picks and the cure reagents in it. The other is a "Hot sell bag" (UO Assist Function) when I steal non rares from shops I always sell them to the shop keeps on my way out, so they go into that one bag.

    When I do die, if some Lamer loots my Body all he is going to get is about 50 gold worth of stuff.

    The nice thing about having all the items in 2 bags is it saves drastically on pickup time in between deaths.

    The first several times I died as a thief I would be their picking up 8 or 9 lockpicks, several regents, food, a pitcher, gold, cloths, etc...

    It either took to long, or someone stole it before I got back, so I learned 2 packs, nothing of value.

    When you are still at the lower levels if you steal a rare from the in town chests GO BANK IT. Then come back for other rares. Otherwise you will just Die with rares on you, and it will burn your britches even harder when you get back to find the item you have waited 30 minutes for has been stolen from you! :)

  • All that applies for newbie thieves. Now there is a trick to not being caught, and that is to not steal when other NPCs are right there watching.

    I know that should be obvious, but from the amount of time we as thieves Die I think its not Obvious and it wouldn't hurt to read it a few hundred times lol.

  • On another web site I was reading that you can be caught stealing if an NPC is up to 15 Paces away. Maybe that is True, but I have to say that I have never been caught at 15 Paces, and I'm rarely caught at 12 paces, even with heavy items and 50 skill characters.

  • My experience indicates that the closer an NPC is the better chance they have of "Reporting" me stealing. They might see it the way anyone else does at the bank in Felucca, but NPCs seem to report more often when they are close to you. Also More NPCs ups the odds of you being caught.

  • A few other Observations are walls, some shops an NPC can be standing 2 squares form you outside the wall and not report you for stealing. Yet other structures in town will get you nailed in 2 seconds flat.

    Im not certain what the differences are in walls as far as the computer is concerned but it sees them differently than we do as players.

  • One area that all thieves seem to die to a few times is Multi Leveled structures. You might be alone on an entire floor of a structure, but if their is an NPC below or Above you and you steal they will still call the guards on you.

    So for in town spawns try and pick your spots for several factors.

    Mine are:

    1-Amount of Crates/barrels to steal from
    2-Competitors (other thief players)
    3-How many People or NPCs will be right there to call
    The guards on me while I'm stealing all the worthless
    heavy items out of the Crates.
    4-How far from the healers
    5-How far from the bank

    Most thieves only look at the amount of items to steal. Because of that they miss out on a lot of Choice loot.

  • Basically you need to be a Master thief to steal a 10lb item and get away with it. But if no one is around, Your 50 skill thief can steal that same item just as easily. It only takes a moment for an NPC to walk off screen, and if there is no one there other than you, the item is yours, just grab it fast! :)