HALP ME building character. Previously "Thief suggestions?"

Discussion in 'Arcanum Hints & Tips' started by Sleek_Jeek, Sep 12, 2013.

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  1. Sleek_Jeek

    Sleek_Jeek New Member

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    Hi, thanks to the "powers at sea" I am now capable of running the patched edition of GoG's version of Arcanum on my mac.

    Soooo...

    IDK what I'm doing, played the game YEARS ago, probably 8 years ago. What do I do? I remember the game as a swamp of situations where I was incessantly wishing I'd played a situation differently. I believe I want to play through as a charismatic thief with a pistol. I don't care about setting traps, but I do care about disarming them. I just want to steal stuff so I don't have to pay for it and I'd like to be able to talk myself into and out of situations, but at the same time I feel like shooting people could be fun too... Soooo...

    Should I - start with Charlatan's Protege, or Miracle Operation?
    - put points into skills or stats to start off?
    - specialize in melee or firearms? should I start with one and then slowly grind into the other?
    - put all of my points into skills and ignore the technological colleges?
    - put all my points into prowling, spot trap, and pick locks?

    Any advice given would be appreciated.
     
  2. Jojobobo

    Jojobobo Well-Known Member

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    Personally I would go for a female half-orc Débutante, that way you get a nice mix of social skills without compromising on combat potential too much (the initial half-orc bonuses to melee and dodge mean they can still be levelled fully with the Débutante background unlike the other races). In my experience, I've found the Miracle Operation background to be quite debilitating in terms of carry weight and for making the character generally feeble early in the game; however if you want Charlatan's Protégé then I would go for a dwarf as you can steal Magnus's Mysterious Dwarven Gauntlets for a nice +2 dexterity as well as +1 strength and constitution (but only when they are equipped by a dwarf).

    To start off with, I'd go for two points in melee, one in herbology (for a very easy means of healing early on) and then two in persuasion. As you level, I'd put points into electric (up to level 3) and intelligence as charged rings will save you putting points into dexterity and the flow specktrometer negates any need to put points into spot traps (if you equip it in your off hand and have batteries it will detect all traps), as well as pick pocket, dodge and backstab with prowling. I would focus on melee instead of firearms initially as it will stop you wasting money on so many bullets. For a pistol wielding thief, I'd recommend stealing the Sharpshooter's Pistol carried by the salesman in the gun store in Tarant - as far as I know it doesn't have a high minimum strength requirement and is a pretty decent gun for most the game, plus it will save you investing heavily in gun smithy if you didn't want to.

    For pick locks I would only invest 3 points as for most locks when people aren't around you can just smash them open anyway. For the majority of persuasion checks in the game you will only need 3 points in persuasion too, so bear that in mind if you didn't feel like trying to master it. Strength isn't a huge deal if you're going to be backstabbing people, so I would put enough points in to offset the weight of how ever many bullets you want to carry. Personally I wouldn't bother with disarm traps, as it is just as easy to avoid them once they've been spotted with the specktrometer, but if you do want to as you said then you can get Trapmaker's Spectacles from the mastery quest which give you both +2 dexterity and +2 perception.

    Other than that, other goodies you may want to look out for are eye gear to boost your perception (+2, can be found in the BMC) and the Jewel of Hebe which boosts both beauty and charisma and can be found in Tarant (+2 and +1, technologists don't really get many good necklaces anyway so it's pretty handy). If you're fine waiting almost until the end game to level up most of you skills, you can get 3 character points put into each of melee, dodge, pickpocket, firearms and persuasion as well as +4 into dexterity from Velorien's Blessing; if not then completing the the first two circles of the gods as well all the blessings up to but not including Kaitan in the last one will give you good relevant bonuses too (+2 perception, +2 backstab, +1 melee, +1 prowling, +1 persuasion, +1 strength, +1 dexterity, +1 pick pocket and +1 pick locks). The gypsy blessing in Tarant is also nice for a +1 charisma boost early on.

    Hopefully this was some help, obviously it's always better to create a character in your own vision anyway so you can just think of these as loose guidelines.
     
  3. ytzk

    ytzk Well-Known Member

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    My two cents...

    Start with abilities in this order: DX, PE then CH. DX is by far the most powerful ability.

    Put a couple of points in each: Melee, firearms, persuasion, then other thief skills. Then raise them as you like.

    spot traps mastery gives the best item with unlimited teleports, so it pays for itself right there. Also, prowling can be very powerful.

    As for charisma, be sure to also raise your IN to 12 to get every opportunity at persuasion.
     
  4. Ruda

    Ruda Active Member

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    I haven't tried it out myself, but there is a silenced revolver somewhere in the gunsmith discipline that should be pretty useful for a sneaky sharpshooter. It's probably not as effective as backstabbing (and the stats suggests that it's pretty weak) but it could be worth checking out.
     
  5. Sleek_Jeek

    Sleek_Jeek New Member

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    Thanks for the help before but to be perfectly, painfully honest, I forgot what this game was like. After a few mis-starts I decided to allow my stat decisions to be guided by the Oatmeal's idealized version of Nicolai Tesla ( http://theoatmeal.com/comics/tesla ). Namely - put points into charisma, and electrical technology. So far I have 2 levels of persuasion, Electrical Associate, Herbology Novice, 13 charisma thanks to Madame Toussade's blessing, 11 intelligence from leveling up, 13 dexterity from 1 point I added + charged rings, my character is also a melee apprentice just for the sake of self defense. My followers are Virgil, Magnus, and Sogg Meadmug. My character is level 10.

    I'm holding onto one point because I'm just not sure where to go from here. I could level up persuasion for the 3rd time and become a persuasion expert... Or I could put it into INT so I can get to the 4th level of electrical tech in 2 more levels... Or I could put it into firearms and buy a fancy revolver or rifle or something.

    Eventually I want to invest some points into the firearms skill because of the tesla rod and tesla gun, but I'm not sure how fast I'll get there. Obviously I'll need to get 2nd level chemistry to make charges, but I'm not quite there yet.

    Do you think I'm spreading myself too thin? Should I stick with persuasion for now? Should I play it safe and invest a point into intelligence?

    Will I eventually benefit from the gun-smithing skill if I stick to my present course of action?

    If it matters at all I'm about to be finished with the Tarant side quests and go kill the P. Schuyler and son's clerk so I can move on to the next town.
     
  6. Jojobobo

    Jojobobo Well-Known Member

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    If you wanting to be shooting people with some accuracy you should probably have yourself around three dots in it, and then some sort of + to hit % weapon. Apart from that you could always way in more into charisma to get more followers (I think that's at CH 15), and then look into getting Gar or the dog or similar to help out (some people don't like going to Ashbury before you're supposed to in the main quest, but with there being a train there I don't ever see a problem with it). Honestly if you're getting a horde of followers you don't need to worry too much about making yourself a heavy hitter early on.
     
  7. Leonidus

    Leonidus Member

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    Basically the only thing you will NEED for your build are:

    2 points in melee
    3 points in firearms
    1 point in persuasion
    1 in herbology

    What you will WANT for your build are:

    3 points in melee
    4 points in firearms
    3 points in persuasion
    3 points in lockpicking
    1 in herbology

    This is all you need for decent combat. Get expert training in melee, firearms, and persuasion. Use a fate point to 100% successfully pickpocket the hand cannon from the halfling insulter Sammy White (i think his name is) in Tarant, near the park subway booth.

    What you are definitely going to want much later as a luxury is 7 points maxed in Electricity so that you can make the Tesla Rod, required for the Tesla Gun. The other component can be taken from the firearms master, and the necessary gunsmithing can be acquired from university tomes.

    If you crave deranged gunsmithing as part of the character, it's best to get explosives and gunsmithing together. There's a lot of combinations with that, wheras only 2 with electricity (charged accelerator gun is the 2nd).

    Full schematic guide here:

    http://www.rpgcodex.net/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=54412

    My FAQ for new players here:

    http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/914155-arcan ... faqs/63974
     
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