Successful Burglary Strategies

I'm wondering whether there are any unusual tricks to burglary.

I say unusual because the obvious method of picking the locks, sneaking in, and stealing everything in sight is straightforeward enough. I'm thinking more along the lines of magick burglars. For example, is the Unlocking Cantrip and the Invisibility spell a workable combination? Are there other successful approaches? Can explosives be employed for burglary?

I would also like to know whether it's possible to knock your victims unconscious and steal their possessions without killing them.

Thanks.

 

My preferred method: Kill everyone inside, break the containers, steal the phat lewt.

Explosives can be employed but I generally find them a bit overrated when you've got an axe.

 

Magic burglary can be tricky as the Unlocking Cantrip is extremely loud.

 

Would Prowling help with concealing the Unlocking Cantrip? Hw about Invisibility?

 

No and no, methinks.

 

If they are not on the screen, they don't see you. If they don't see you, they don't hear you.

 

I suppose you could use the plastique to blow things up, but that stuff's expensive to make, if memory serves.

 

I was just playing around with using the Anesthetizer to knock my victims unconscious, and I must say the results were pretty disappointing.

It would be nice to be able to sneak up behind someone and drug them, but the Anesthetizer simply isn't potent enough.

 

Agreed; after spending all those points it just wasn't powerful enough to work on anyone who's actually a threat, and additionally it appears to be resisted by both constitution and magick aptitude.

Can I ask what tech aptitude you had when you made and used these? My chemist character was magickally aligned, I wondered if that's why it was so weak, or if it's just a crappy rip-off ability.

 

I just used invisibility to easily rob Caladon's treasury. I cast an unlock from the middle of the foyer and the Prince standing there pining didn't even notice, neither did the guard standing with his back to that door. I just strolled in up the west corridor, said 'hi' to the King, summoned undead to carve a path through the traps, and helped myself to the riches.

I wonder why that's never mentioned in the endgame epilogue: "Because you bankrupted Caladon for your own enrichment, it collapsed into the ghetto of the Unified Kingdom..."

 

The game should be more realistic in this matter. For example, I'd LOVE to cause worldwide bankruptcy, full unemployment and insanely high hyperinflation with my thievery.

 

Sounds like a job for Peter Molyneux

 

Ha! That's exactly the kind of thing I was talking about when I started this thread. I've also had some success with these spells, but you have to be very careful about positioning. Also, the Unlocking Cantrip seems to fail on a fair number of chests and doors. Presumably they're too tough for it to crack, for some reason.

It would be nice if you could open portals sealed with magick using the Unlocking Cantrip, because they can't be lockpicked. There are lots of portals that can be lockpicked, but can't be opened with magick.

That would be excellent. There should also be a massive manhunt for the thief after the robbery.

My next project is going to be to see whether it's feasible to use grenades to destroy doors and other obstacles to successful burglary. Grenades are much more plentiful that dynamite. Molotov cocktails are almost free.

 

For amusement purposes I carefully time it so npc's pick up the ticking time bomb explosives and watch the body parts fly.

 

My persuasive poisoner had very brutal but effective tactics: mind control, force the victim to batter open their own containers if they (implausibly) didn't have the key, then cut take them into the wild and cut their throats. But this means a shop couldn't be robbed twice. My puppetmaster was just too just to try something like that, but he did like the unlocking cantrip from a distance when he could get away with it.

Of course, all of these tactics are inelegant, unprofessional, and unbecoming of a true thief, who would have nothing but contempt for everyone posting to this thread, myself included. I did have a demolitions girl who could've blown the vaults of every major kingdom, but she was also a real thief and didn't do shoddy work like that.