Thievery realism mod

[Miloch]

A lot of mods are out there to help make Baldur's Gate more realistic. There's a combat realism mod, thanks to Sword Coast Stratagems, dialog/plot realism thanks to the BG1 NPC project, even some economy-realism components in BG2 Tweaks or other packages.

 

Sure, SCS makes mages, spiders, kobolds and whatnot smarter... when you're fighting them. That's its goal as a strategy/tactics mod, and as such, it does great. But beyond combat, what about just a simple realism patch?

 

Here's an example. I start a new game with a thief character, go upstairs at the Candlekeep Inn, knock out a nobleman with my bare hands (so he can't call the guards and so I don't lose reputation), steal everything that isn't nailed down and proceed to fence it all back to the innkeep with a big grin on my face, no questions asked. Now Winthrop's a bit of a shifty character, what with his '5000 gp book entrance fee' joke. I'm prepared to believe he might even be shifty enough to go in on a deal with an old friend to rob his clients blind while they're sleeping. But there's a few problems here, reality-wise:

 

1) Almost *everyone* in the game locks their bureaus/chests/drawers what-have-you, but not their *doors*. Huh? When I get home or check into a hotel, I put my wallet on the counter or dresser or something, but I lock my door.

 

2) Except for occasional merchandise stolen from shopkeeps, *no one* questions stolen goods. Like some poor mage's apprentice walks into the only inn in town where he grew up, comes back downstairs with a gem worth 1000 gold and sells it to the innkeeper who doesn't even ask where he got it or look at him funny. Another example is when you raid the Beregost smithy at night, you can come back and sell that same smith his weapons by day. Like he wouldn't recognize his own work?

 

3) You can knock out a nobleman and when he comes to, with all his gold and jewelry missing, he doesn't call the guards or anything. Hmm... yeah.

 

4) You can steal weapons right out of trained soldiers' hands, even with mediocre pickpocketing ability. In particular I'm talking about the soldiers or bouncers in Nashkel, but also true in a lot of places. Ok, maybe the weapons are sheathed. But it's not exactly easy to pinch even a sheathed weapon from a marching guard.

 

I guess maybe what I'm suggesting is an 'anti-thieving' mod. Let's face it, stealing is way too easy in the game... you get in no trouble, lose no reputation if you know what to do, and get a hell of a lot richer. Of course, if such a patch came out, I'd raise a fuss, because stealing is half the fun of the game. But just once, it'd be nice to hear someone like Winthrop say, "So what do you have for me today, you thieving git?" Or reach for the shillelagh under the counter when I try to sell him a ring he must've just seen on the finger of the noble who checked in...

[Lemernis]

I agree that a mod that tweaks thieving in some ways would be welcome, but in games where I have spent time thieving it seemed to me that it required a fair bit of effort. The character does need to avoid detection by the home owners, or the guards will be called. The big scores, especially, such as Entar Silvershield's estate and the Duchal Palace, require considerable care and patience to burglarize without detection.

 

I've always found it unrealistic that the inhabitants of homes don't immediately call the authorities when you walk into their unlocked homes uninvited, or even after you have picked the locks to enter.

[berelinde]

It would be cool, but it would involve making changes to darned near every item and anonymous NPC in the game.

[Smoketest]

I too have issues with thievery in these games, and the original post covers many of them. I'll add three additional points that have irked me in recent games...

 

- Instead of checking to see if the thief is invisible, the container's trap script (that summons guards) should check if it can see any neutral NPCs. If not, then the thief can steal what's in the container without anyone seeing, regardless of how well hidden the thief might be at that moment. Since opening a container automatically dispels invisibility/stealth, this makes more sense. (I've changed a few scripts to test this out and it works quite well.)

 

- Invisibility/stealth is dispelled inconsistently. You can disarm a trap and remain invisible, but you're exposed as soon as you try to pick a lock. Unfortunately this behavior is hard-coded so nothing short of an EXE patch will fix it.

 

- Hiding in Shadows is almost useless because anything you do besides standing still disables stealth (even disarming traps/picking locks while in dark places). Thus true invisibility is the only way to go. (Even enemy thieves prefer to use invisibility potions instead of stealth when doing their cheesy repeated back-stabbings.)

[Miloch]

It would be cool, but it would involve making changes to darned near every item and anonymous NPC in the game.

Would it? I don't know much about the code, but let's take this scenario.

 

Anytime you take something from a chest that someone would normally object to (if you didn't kill, charm or knock them out), you get some sort of counter augmented. This happens whether or not the someone alerts the guard. If this counter gets too high, you start to lose reputation. This is due to general mistrust - the fact a lot of people have seen you lurking about where you shouldn't be, sneaking into people's houses or abandoned buildings, etc. The counter could be fixed (e.g. steal 10 items, lose 1 rep point) or variable based on percentage chances.

 

Let's also say you could acquire a "disguise" at some shops or by improvising various materials. So if you're wearing this (say in a helmet slot), you have less of a chance to lose points/rep while you're burglarizing. But eventually the disguise will wear thin, either break or just become ineffective, and you'll have to get a new one.

 

Now (and this might be a little trickier, but not impossible), when you acquire items in this fashion, they become similarly tainted, again with a fixed or variable percentage chance. That means if you try to fence them back in the same town where you pinched them, the shopkeep might notice. Based on his alignment and other variables, he might have several reactions. If he's generally good and you're relatively weak, he might call the guards right then and there. If he's good and you're relatively strong, he might accept the items, then call the guards once you leave so you might run into them on the way out of town or something. If a reaction roll is borderline or the shopkeep is neutral, he might just look at you askance or make some snarky comment about where you got the stuff. If he's evil or just plain shifty, he might strike up a bargain where he becomes an actual fence on a regular basis... for a cut of the proceeds of course.

 

Here's another idea: rather than run afoul of the guards all the time and have to either kick their butts or get yours handed to you, why not have them be able to knock you out and you end up in jail somewhere? Then you have to either plead your case successfully to the local magister or pick the lock and escape... could be all sorts of possibilities.

[Lemernis]

- Hiding in Shadows is almost useless because anything you do besides standing still disables stealth (even disarming traps/picking locks while in dark places). Thus true invisibility is the only way to go. (Even enemy thieves prefer to use invisibility potions instead of stealth when doing their cheesy repeated back-stabbings.)

 

Ah, but if the thief's stealth is high enough, after leaving shadows one either has time to grab the loot and slip away while still stealthed, or even reenter stealth mode. Admittedly this can get a little hairy, especially in locations that are gaurded. But that element of danger adds to the fun of thieving.

[berelinde]

Every time you wanted a counter to increment, it would take a script block. Something like:

 

IF

PartyHasItem("scrl75")

AreaCheck("FW3449")

THEN

RESPONSE #100

IncrementGlobal("YouRottenThief","GLOBAL",1)

END

 

You could use area checks to avoid areas where you would be expected to get loot legitimately, but you'd still have to include a block for every item in every area. If that same area (a house in Beregost, IIRC), also had "misc42" it would require another script block.

 

This would have several disadvantages:

 

Your game would slow to a crawl.

If anyone came in and wrote a mod that did anything to FW3449, it might cause problems if a legitimate treasure included scrl75 in the above example.

It would involve a ton or writing.

 

You could do it without the area check, but then every scrl75 acquired would cause the variable to go up. You could do it without the item code, but then you'd cause the variable to go up even if nothing was taken.

 

You could get around it by assigning every item a unique identifier, but I don't even want to think about that.

[Miloch]

You could do it without the area check, but then every scrl75 acquired would cause the variable to go up. You could do it without the item code, but then you'd cause the variable to go up even if nothing was taken.

Hrm. Well the way it seems to be handled in the game by default, is that you can pick open a chest but some sort of alert goes off if you take something and someone notices who isn't otherwise charmed or incapacitated. It doesn't seem to really matter what you take - could be gold coins.

 

So would you have to script at the item level, or couldn't you work it in conjunction with whatever "alert" is getting triggered? And just store it in a variable or stat somewhat like reputation?

 

As for the "tainted" items, that seems to get set somehow when you steal from a store, and if you try to sell such an item back the shopkeep will say "I don't deal in fenced goods." So some sort of generic toggle gets set on the item to indicate it has been stolen. I always had a couple problems with this:

 

1) Referring to something as "fenced" means it has been successfully sold to a fence (dealer in stolen goods). He should say "I don't deal in stolen goods" or whatever.

 

2) If you try to sell something back to the same guy you stole it from, either you have to be pretty stupid, or the shopkeep has to be, as in failing an intelligence check or something. More often than not, he should recognize his own merchandise and attack you and/or call the guards.

 

3) Apart from situation 2) above, how is the shopkeep going to know it's stolen? It's not like the item is branded or something to say you didn't legitimately acquire it. So you should have a pretty good chance to sell it to someone else, unless your reputation is pretty low - then they may have heard of you and your thieving antics.

 

4) There probably *are* some shifty shopkeeps who *do* deal in stolen goods (as I described above, for a considerable cut of the proceeds). I believe there is a fence in Song & Silence or SoA but you have to progress through the game pretty far to get there. Dishonest shopkeeps shouldn't be that rare.

 

Would this involve major recoding of shopkeeps or items? I dunno. But maybe it could be worked similarly to BG2 Tweaks retool of how shopkeeps handle identifying items. Instead of being based on their lore rating and/or class (mage/bard), this might have to do with intelligence (whether someone would be dumb enough to buy their own stolen property back) and alignment (whether they would consider dealing in stolen goods).

 

Another thing. I seem to recall that thieves had to invest in a set of tools if they wanted to do any sort of lockpicking. Otherwise they'd probably be reduced to trying to improvise with whatever they had on hand - daggers, fingernails, hairpins, probably at a massive reduction to their skill rating. The potion of master thievery always struck me as rather lame - the availability of different grades of lockpicks would be more realistic.

 

One more item I recall - the blackjack, aka the sap. With this rogue-only weapon, a thief doesn't inflict any real damage, but has a much greater chance to knock someone out than using his bare hands.

 

Maybe this should be moved to the Song & Silence forum if they're willing to run with it. It does add some thief items but again, not til later in the game.

[berelinde]

To be honest, I do not understand the inner workings of the game well enough to respond to this. It could be as you say, but thinking about it any more gives me a headache.

[Gorilym]

About the blackjack: I've noticed that there's already a (unused) proficiency slot for it in-game.

 

Maybe this should be moved to the Song & Silence forum if they're willing to run with it. It does add some thief items but again, not til later in the game.

 

How is the Nashkel Carnival "later in the game"?

[Lemernis]

With Song and Silence, Raoul is found at the Nashkel Fair, but IIRC he sells bardic items. Black Lily in the Baldur's Gate Thieves Guild has been upgraded with new thief items. I don't recall if she fences stolen items as well.

 

The overall design I see from what you're suggesting:

 

* give more locks throughout the game a higher level of difficulty to pick

* thieves require a lockpicking kit to pick locks--the lockpicking skill alone is not enough

* lockpicking kits come in various skill grades, and work (or won't) in combination with the thief's level of lockpicking skill, i.e.,

- a minimum number of skill points is required to use each kit

- the higher the combination of skill points and kit, the better the chance of successfully picking the lock

* modify potions of master thievery and potions of perception to remove the lockpicking boost

* lock the doors of all private homes in the game (though if folks are home, would everyone would feel the need to lock their door? probably not)

* require that some or all stolen goods can only be sold to a fence

 

That would be an enormous amount of work! I wouldn't get my hopes up for anyone taking it on.

[Gorilym]

With Song and Silence, Raoul is found at the Nashkel Fair, but IIRC he sells bardic items.

 

Ah, that's true. Nevermind.

 

* give more locks throughout the game a higher level of difficulty to pick

* thieves require a lockpicking kit to pick locks--the lockpicking skill alone is not enough

* require that some or all stolen goods can only be sold to a fence

 

These three might be doable without too much effort, possibly adapting code from SimDing0's DEFJAM mod to raise the difficulty level of all locks - if a minimum difficulty of about ~120 (or similar) was set, a thief would either need "superhuman" lockpicking skills (and thus less points for the other skills etc.) OR the help of items such as lockpicking kits to pick any lock at all. I don't recall if there are any proper fences in BG1, but Black Lily fits the bill even if she doesn't currently buy stolen goods, and it should be a small matter to add a new fence NPC to one of the more seedy taverns of Beregost, for instance.

[Lemernis]

There aren't any particularly seedy taverns or inns in Beregost, though the Jovial Juggler is the rowdiest per canon.

 

Maybe open a new store in one of the private homes a la Kagain, a merchant deals in something benign (perhaps other than weapons, armor, or potions). That is of course just the front for the fencing business.

 

Here's a more elaborate version of mod if someone wanted to go to town with it:

 

Create a newly started thieve's guild whose territory is Beregost, Nashkel, and Ulgoth's Beard. This guild would require a quest in Beregost to join. The only way to use the fence in Beregost is to join to this guild.

 

Regular guild dues would be required. This decreases the profit from theiving, but any quests could yield some nice loot.

 

Perhaps place this smaller fledgling guild at odds with the large, established one in Baldur's Gate, with another quest flowing from that.

 

There's lots you could do to make it interesting. Fun to think about, but who would want to code all that? The folks with those skills in the BG modding community all have their own projects going, and probably have a long list of their own ideas that will never be realized.

[Lemernis]

Edit: Thought of some further wrinkles:

 

For those who refuse to join the new theive's guild, the Nashkel store owner will buy stolen items. But he does so for very low prices. And there are some other very serious consequences:

 

First, the thieve's guild that you refused to join will, through their various contacts, manage to put a bug in the ear of the authorities to keep an eye on you. The chance of getting caught by the town guard when burglarizing places then increases dramatically. You are eventually visited by Flaming Fist wizards almost immediately upon breaking into homes.

 

Second, now 'marked', you can no longer buy your reputation back by donating to temples. You suffer a low reputation and low prices wherever you go.

 

Third, you will eventually be confronted by the upstart thieve's guild and have to fight off constant ambush attacks by their assassins.

 

There'd be an opportunity to mend things and join the guild that lasts for a while. But kill too many of the guild's assassins and you will never be allowed to join. And you'll be fighting them off for the rest of the game.

[Miloch]

The overall design I see from what you're suggesting:

 

* give more locks throughout the game a higher level of difficulty to pick

* thieves require a lockpicking kit to pick locks--the lockpicking skill alone is not enough

* lockpicking kits come in various skill grades, and work (or won't) in combination with the thief's level of lockpicking skill, i.e.,

- a minimum number of skill points is required to use each kit

- the higher the combination of skill points and kit, the better the chance of successfully picking the lock

* modify potions of master thievery and potions of perception to remove the lockpicking boost

* lock the doors of all private homes in the game (though if folks are home, would everyone would feel the need to lock their door? probably not)

* require that some or all stolen goods can only be sold to a fence

 

That would be an enormous amount of work! I wouldn't get my hopes up for anyone taking it on.

Well I dunno if I was suggesting all that. Good ideas, though!

 

Ok, reading back maybe I did suggest most of that at some point. But to begin with, you could start small and implement some of the easier (I think) points:

 

1) Whenever you steal (I confirmed that it's just the opening of a container, not the picking of it or taking items from it) you get some sort of variable augmented. If that counter gets too high, you have a good chance to lose reputation.

2) Add items to a store (yes, a shady inn or house would do) early in the game: disguise, blackjack, lockpick

3) Modify the potions of thievery and perception as you suggest to account for the lockpicks

 

The thieves guild idea is good too but as you say, that (as well as my jail idea) would involve significant coding.