Merchants don't turn hostile after a thief's stealing ability fails

kangaxx

Couldn't find a similiar report here, so there it is:

Current behavior:
When you fail to steal something, the merchant's trading window get closed but he doesn't turn hostile immediately. If you pause the game right after the trade window has been closed you can interrupt the merchant turning hostile by talking to him right after resuming the game.

Expected behavior:
If you fail to steal, the merchant should turn hostile and after that the trading window should get closed.

Winthal

to be honest, I always hated the way failing with thievery was handled. fail at pickpocketing 2 gold pieces from a peasant and the entire town map suddenly becomes murderous, guards attack on sight and won't stop until you're dead. I wish they could implement a system that accounts for the severity of the crime, and react accordingly. If you try to steal 5 gp, at worst the guards should come and demand a fine or throw you into the brig for a night or two... or maybe just let you off with a warning. As it stands, failing means you can't even speak to people anymore, and usually your party members react to the hostile townsfolk by attacking them on sight, especially if they have ranged weapons equipped, a harmless theft of a few gold pieces suddenly turns into a murdering rampage.... ughh... it's so messy!

kangaxx

Well, what if you don't know if your theft has been successful or not? There should be a delay of (say at least a couple of real time minutes - maybe a random number within an interval to make waiting on purpose a pain).

If you fail, you'll get punished by loosing reputation or paying gold. If not, then nothing will happen.

In my opinion that would prevent gamers from loading/saving and trying.

In the end, you would use your ability with caution and not too often because of the risk (unless you skilled very high)

What do you think?

Winthal

well, a delay wouldn't work very well since if you succeed you'll see items added to your inventory or your gold amount change... unless you mean that the actual attempt takes a full minute? That would probably make most people simply ignore using it altogether except maybe on targets you *know* carry some goodies and might be worth the wait/effort...

How about this: when you fail a pickpocket/store theft attempt, you loose reputation and the guards are summoned, but no one actually turns hostile (similar to getting caught within candlekeep, you can choose to fight the guards if you wish, or pay a fine and loose whatever you stole).

If your reputation is high, you loose more reputation at a time for getting caught (since its more of a scandal if the shiny heroes of the sword coast actually turn out to be thieves), but if your reputation already is low (3-5 or something) a guard patrol will be summoned who will simply attack immediately since you are already a well known evil-doer.

kangaxx

well, a delay wouldn't work very well since if you succeed you'll see items added to your inventory or your gold amount change... unless you mean that the actual attempt takes a full minute? That would probably make most people simply ignore using it altogether except maybe on targets you *know* carry some goodies and might be worth the wait/effort...

I try to be more specific and clearer and expand my idea:

You select an item and press the "Steal" button. This leads to three different outcomes:

1) You are successful. Nothing happens, but you get the item for free. YAY.

2) You immediately fail. Normal game rules follow or @Winthal's rules/ideas take place.

3) You get the item, but still fail (and don't notice), "because the merchant finds out later", which means, that a penalty follows later when you've processed the game.

geselle

It should be a simple solution, so if you get caught stealing, you should pay a fine and lose reputation, but the reputation shouldn't drop below 5, because it would be really weird, that the guards and cowled mages would hunt a mere thief on every occasion. And the townsfolk shouldn't go on a mass rampage of course.
Why the simple solution? It will be an enhanced edition, not a complete remake, there are bigger fish to fry.

kangaxx

Why the simple solution? It will be an enhanced edition, not a complete remake, there are bigger fish to fry.

Yeah, right. As long as they fix the initial problem...

Communard

To be honest I woud like to be able to surrender and get sent to jail, plead my case to the judge (finally a use for Charisma!) or try and find a way to escape. I very rarely use thieving skills these days because opening a box leads to guards trying to murder you, which really doesn't seem that realistic to me.

paulsifer42

I don't think I've seen a game yet where this feels right. I think it stems from punishment being complicated. If I steal 5 gold from a beggar, it seems like a slap on the wrist is appropriate, while stealing the crown from a king should be punished by death, but there's a host of stuff in between that makes punishment difficult for devs. EVERY theft would have to be looked at separately for it to feel just right. Including who you stole from and what you stole.

Balquo

This has been... altered.

Anduin

@balquo How... Please spill the beans, we are going nuts here waiting!

Tanthalas

Merchants have guns now.

kangaxx

Nice. They've fixed it. Wasn't expecting that my first comment comes back to me someday

Balquo

@Anduin There are a few new features with stealing from merchants. I'll not go into details but one of the features is that the guards get summoned. This was always supposed to be the case even in vBG1 but due to the way the script was run it didn't work.

Anduin

@balquo Yeah! A fix! And a proper, originally put in game but never implemented one, at that too!

Can't wait to see if my thief can slip past the guards as well... I'm sure this was why potions of invisibility were in the game in the first place...