Wiki Classes Thief

Thief

A hidden class for veteran rogues, built around backstabs from concealment, poisons, traps and taking things that are not yours.

The Thief is what a Rogue becomes when it stops being a skirmisher and starts being a professional. The combat kit narrows and sharpens around one idea, which is hitting something that has not seen you coming, and the utility half of the class widens enormously: locks, pockets, containers, traps, poisons, disguises, con jobs and outright theft. Where a Rogue has a broad toolbox, a Thief has a very good set of picks and a very sharp knife.

It is a hidden class. It does not appear in the remort listing, and you cannot pick it at creation. To join, you must have taken a Rogue to level 100 and still be a Rogue when you go looking for the guild. Reaching 100 is what records the class as completed on your account, and unlike the open promoted classes there is no way around it here, since a hidden class checks that you currently are the prerequisite class as well. The Thieves Guild has an entrance in Aurin and a second way in through the city sewers, and unlike the Rogue guild it does not take walk-ins, so a guildmaster has to grant you admittance or induct you directly before join thief will do anything. Be ready for what happens next: joining resets you to level 1 with no experience and wipes your old class skills, so a finished Rogue starts the whole climb again as a Thief. Push that Thief to 100 in turn and you unlock the Assassin.

Resources#

Thieves spend SP, the middle pool on score, and nothing else. A dash in the tables below means the skill costs no SP at all, which covers most of the passives and a fair number of the cheap utility skills. Set Trap is the one variable cost in the class and runs from 10 to 120 SP depending on which trap you are laying.

The class also carries a physical pouch, shared with the Rogue and managed by the Thief Supplies skill at level 6. Trade tools and poison vials both live in it, and a skill with an empty slot behind it simply fails. Type supplies to see what you have and restock at a Rogue Supplies counter with list and buy. Carry caps rise with level, and Perfect Pockets at 50 raises them by half again.

Pouch item	Feeds
Garrote wire	Garrote
Leather gag	Gag
Disguise kit	Disguise
Tripwire	Tripwire, Set Trap
Smoke bomb	Smoke Bomb, Smoke Cut
Blinding flash	Blinding Flash
Throwing dagger	Thrown attacks
Poison vials	Poison

Thieves wear leather. Plate, mail and cloth are all closed to you, though uncategorised gear carries no class restriction and is worn by anyone.

Talent Trees#

Stealth#

Concealment and silent movement, and the branch that makes everything else work. Sneak and Shadow get you into position, Cat's Eyes lets you work without a light, Skulk and Footpad handle noisy ground, and Vanishing Act drops you back into stealth off a critical hit. At the top the tree becomes an offensive line in its own right with Ambush, Shadowstep and Assassinate.

Subterfuge#

Larceny, tools and social manipulation, and the biggest branch by a wide margin. Lockpicking, trap finding and disarming, pickpocketing and outright theft, poison application, disguises, fast talk, bribery, threats and eavesdropping all live here, along with the passives that make each of those things more reliable. If you are wondering where the Thief's reputation comes from, it is this tree.

Skirmish#

Melee burst and dirty combat. Backstab is the first skill you learn and remains the centre of the class, with Blindside, Shiv, Shank and Garrote filling in around it and Quietus Strike closing fights at the top end. Evasion and Blind Fighting are the defensive entries, and Dagger Mastery at 96 makes the obvious weapon choice the correct one.

Dirty Fighting at 55 is unusual: rather than a command of its own it unlocks a whole combat stance, switched on with style dirty. The style itself is gated at level 24 and restricted to thieves, so by the time the skill lists it you already meet the requirement.

Trickery#

A single skill borrowed from the Rogue line. Swindle lets you talk a merchant or NPC out of small valuables on a chance roll.

Precision#

Also a single borrowed skill. Backstabber is the passive that raises Backstab damage and shortens its cooldown, and given how much of the class runs through Backstab it is one of the better levels you will hit.

Mobility#

One more shared passive. Slippery gives you a chance to shrug off roots and slows, which matters because a thief that cannot move cannot disengage.

Skills#

Stealth#

Level	Skill	Type	Cost	Cooldown	Effect
4	Sneak	Utility	-	180s	Move silently and undetected by sound until you attack.
17	Cat's Eyes	Passive	-	-	See in the dark with no light source.
21	Quick Escape	Utility	40 SP	120s	Leave combat instantly for a safe nearby room.
24	Shadow	Utility	-	300s	Slip into shadow and stay invisible until you attack.
34	Vanishing Act	Passive	-	-	A 10% chance to return to stealth after a critical hit.
65	Hobble	Combat	40 SP	120s	Halve a target's movement for 8 seconds.
71	Skulk	Utility	30 SP	60s	Move at half pace but in total silence.
88	Scout	Utility	15 SP	20s	Reveal who is in adjacent rooms without entering them.
94	Ambush	Combat	60 SP	90s	Heavy opening strike delivered from stealth.
97	Shadowstep	Utility	40 SP	120s	Short range teleport to behind a target.
99	Assassinate	Combat	50 SP	120s	Execution attempt on a target below a quarter health, lethal if it lands.

Subterfuge#

Level	Skill	Type	Cost	Cooldown	Effect
3	Peek	Utility	-	30s	Look into an adjacent room or a container without opening it.
6	Thief Supplies	Utility	-	-	List, inspect and refill your carried kit.
9	Detect Traps	Utility	-	15s	Reveal whether the current room holds traps.
11	Bribe	Utility	-	60s	Pay an NPC off to soften it or open new dialogue.
12	Mug	Combat	60 SP	600s	Attack with a chance to take coin on the hit.
14	Slip	Utility	-	20s	Break off from combat with a brief movement bonus.
16	Palm	Utility	-	20s	Lift a small item from an NPC's visible carry.
19	Fasttalk	Utility	10 SP	30s	Bluff or smooth-talk an NPC into going along with you.
22	Lockpick	Utility	20 SP	15s	Pick a lock on a skill check against its difficulty.
26	Snakebite	Passive	-	-	Poison applications last twice as long.
27	Detect Trap	Utility	20 SP	30s	Inspect one specific spot for a hidden trap.
29	Attention	Utility	30 SP	90s	Pull a target's focus onto you deliberately.
30	Assess	Utility	50 SP	10s	Reveal a target's health, current ability and recent intent.
32	Poison	Utility	50 SP	5s	Coat your weapon so the next hits add poison damage.
35	Lookout	Utility	35 SP	30s	Read the room for hostiles and ambush risk.
40	Mark	Utility	-	45s	Mark a target so your next attack on it gains a crit bonus.
45	Pilfer	Utility	-	30s	Take small items from a container without opening it noisily.
48	Disarm	Utility	50 SP	30s	Disarm a found trap on a check against its level.
50	Perfect Pockets	Passive	-	-	Carry half again as many supplies.
52	Blinding Flash	Utility	90 SP	240s	Blind everything in a small radius.
53	Disguise	Utility	40 SP	300s	Pass as an ordinary traveller until you attack.
58	Eavesdrop	Utility	20 SP + 5 per round	60s	Listen to conversation in adjacent rooms.
61	Slit Purse	Utility	15 SP	60s	Cut a purse open for a better haul than Mug.
66	Lockbreaker	Passive	-	-	20% better lockpicking and picks no longer break.
68	Swagger	Buff	60 SP	90s	10% to-hit and crit for 30 seconds.
70	Gag	Utility	200 SP	120s	Silence a target for 6 seconds.
73	Threaten	Utility	20 SP	60s	Cut a target's damage and possibly send it running.
76	Study Foe	Utility	-	-	Analyse a foe for 10% more damage against it for 60 seconds.
78	Steal	Utility	50 SP	300s	Take an item straight off a target on a skill check.
79	Smoke Bomb	Utility	40 SP	60s	Area concealment that breaks line of sight.
83	Light Fingers	Passive	-	-	20% better stealing and less chance of being caught.
84	Set Trap	Utility	10 to 120 SP by trap	-	Lay a trap from your carried supplies.
86	Tripwire	Utility	40 SP	120s	Set a wire that trips the target and briefly disarms it.
89	Footpad	Utility	30 SP	120s	Cross loose ground without making a sound.

Skirmish#

Level	Skill	Type	Cost	Cooldown	Effect
1	Backstab	Combat	10 SP	-	Strike from stealth or from behind at a critical damage multiplier.
8	Blindside	Combat	15 SP	6s	Hit from the flank for bonus damage and a brief stagger.
37	Shiv	Combat	20 SP	10s	Quick piercing strike that opens a bleed.
43	Feint	Combat	25 SP	15s	Fake an attack to open a hole in the target's defence.
47	Shank	Combat	50 SP	30s	Hidden blade strike, worth more against an unaware target.
55	Dirty Fighting (planned)	Utility	-	-	Unlocks the dirty combat stance, switched on with `style dirty`.
57	Garrote	Combat	20 SP	60s	Strangle from behind for heavy piercing damage and a 4 second silence.
60	Dirty Trick	Combat	30 SP	20s	Improvised debris to the face for a brief blind and a damage penalty.
63	Smoke Cut	Combat	60 SP	45s	Strike from behind a smoke bomb for a guaranteed critical hit.
81	Evasion	Buff	60 SP	-	Gain 40% dodge chance for 6 seconds.
91	Blind Fighting	Passive	-	-	Halves the penalty for being blinded or fighting the unseen.
92	Quietus Strike	Combat	150 SP	-	Silent finishing blow for heavy damage and a silence.
96	Dagger Mastery	Passive	-	-	15% more dagger damage and 5% more dagger crit.

Trickery#

Level	Skill	Type	Cost	Cooldown	Effect
39	Swindle	Utility	-	300s	Con a merchant or NPC out of small valuables on a chance roll.

Precision#

Level	Skill	Type	Cost	Cooldown	Effect
42	Backstabber	Passive	-	-	30% more Backstab damage and a shorter cooldown on it.

Mobility#

Level	Skill	Type	Cost	Cooldown	Effect
74	Slippery	Passive	-	-	A 25% chance to evade roots and slows.

Playing a Thief#

You arrive at level 1 with a hundred levels of rogue experience and one skill, Backstab, which is the entire class in miniature. It costs 10 SP, it has no cooldown, and it does terrible things to anything that has not noticed you. Everything else you learn is either a way of getting into position for it, a way of stopping the target from getting away afterwards, or a way of making money without fighting at all.

The early climb is fast because so much of it is cheap and useful straight away. Peek at 3 means you never walk blind into a room again. Sneak at 4 gets you the Backstab opener properly. Thief Supplies at 6 is the one to actually read, since half the class runs out of that pouch and running dry mid-fight is a self-inflicted wound. Blindside at 8 gives you a second opener for when you are already in melee and cannot get behind anything. By the low twenties you have Lockpick and Shadow and the class starts paying for itself.

The core loop, once assembled, is short: Sneak or Shadow into the room, Poison your blade if the fight is going to last, Backstab, then Blindside and Shiv while the target is still working out what happened, and Hobble if it looks like running. Mark at 40 is worth folding in before the opener, since it turns your first strike into a much better one. Slip and Quick Escape are your two ways out, and you should be using them well before you think you need to.

At level 60 you choose a subclass mastery, which is a permanent specialisation on top of the normal skill list. Thieves pick between Poison Mastery, which deepens brewing and applying toxins, Trap Mastery, which opens advanced mechanical devices, and Burglary, which pushes lockpicking towards safecracking and infiltration. It is one of only five classes that gets this choice, so it is worth thinking about well before you reach the level.

Do not neglect the non-combat half. Lockpick, Pilfer, Steal, Slit Purse, Palm and Swindle all generate income with no risk of a corpse run, and Fasttalk, Bribe and Disguise open doors that other classes have to fight through. Detect Traps and Disarm make you the person who walks in front of the party, which is a job worth having. A thief who only backstabs is playing about half the class.

In a group you are single target damage and a specialist. Take the caster out with Gag, take the runner down with Hobble, take the boss apart with Study Foe up. You cannot tank and you cannot heal, and with leather armour and no self sustain you will die quickly if you are the one being hit. Late on, Ambush, Shadowstep and Assassinate turn the stealth tree into a genuine kill chain: step behind the target, ambush it, and if it drops below a quarter health, end it outright.