How high do you need to go into Find Traps and Open Locks in BG1/BGEE?

Oxford_Guy

I'm trying to work out whether I can get away with only having a single multi-class thief (Montaron) in my evil party to deal with all locks and traps, and still have enough points left to reliably stealth in daylight for scouting and backstab duties (with some help from Boots of Stealth and the Shadow Armour).

How many points do you need to put into Find Traps and Open Locks to see you through *most* of BG1/BGEE? What about for Durlag's Tower and the Candlekeep Catacombs? If I *only* use Monty, I don't want to waste thief points unnecessarily...

If Monty won't have enough points for all the above, I may have to consider taking Safana (or possibly Imoen, though she'll moan about hanging out with "riff raff"...) along too...

Am not bothered about pickpockets (I'll just backstab those I want to steal from...) or Detect Illusions (I'll have 2 mages) and place traps (not essential) BTW, though guess I could put some points into those if I have two thieves.

Mungri

75 in open locks with using master thievery potions.

Nothing in open locks if you have an extra mage and load up knock spells.

If you want to comfortably handle traps + locks without potions or spells, 95 in each plus tome of dexterity.

Try and make sure you get 95 points into detect traps though, you need to be able to find traps reliably, while open locks can be neglected.

Crystark

In the manual they say you're not needed to go over 100% but for pick pocket.

Edit - Here's the quote :

Official Manual said:

Thieving (Pick Pockets, Open Locks, Remove Traps)
Thieves can pick pockets (random chance of an item carried by the hapless
victim), pick locks, and remove traps as well. This is achieved by selecting the
Thieving button and clicking on the desired target. Note that only Pick Pockets
may benefit from scores higher than 100.

Oxford_Guy

Crystark said:

In the manual they say you're not needed to go over 100% but for pick pocket.

Edit - Here's the quote :

Official Manual said:

Thieving (Pick Pockets, Open Locks, Remove Traps)
Thieves can pick pockets (random chance of an item carried by the hapless
victim), pick locks, and remove traps as well. This is achieved by selecting the
Thieving button and clicking on the desired target. Note that only Pick Pockets
may benefit from scores higher than 100.

Hide in Shadows/Move Silently need to be over 100% to relaibly hide and stay stealthed in daylight, due to the large penalty this gives, though am not exactly sure how big a penalty it is

Oxford_Guy

Would it be true to say that you only need 75 in each of lock and traps for most of the game, apart from Durlag's Tower and the Candlekeep Catacombs, or do you need higher before then?

Mungri

I thought that first, but then you will easily miss detecting some traps. You can't tell where traps are without detecting them, but you can find locks and use knock or a potion.

Oxford_Guy

Mungri said:

I thought that first, but then you will easily miss detecting some traps. You can't tell where traps are without detecting them, but you can find locks and use knock or a potion.

So, it's worth going for 95-100 in Find Traps even quite early on (possibly at the expense of open locks)?

CaptRory

Probably. Also consider that no Plot Importart container is locked, but may be trapped.

Mungri

Oh yes, you will need high find traps for the plot important containers in the bandit camp, otherwise your game will end if you fail a save against the traps.

Oxford_Guy

What would be enough in Open Locks BG1 for the majority of traps (excluding occasional v, hard one, which I could use Knock for)?

Mungri

70 open locks is enough for that, then it will become 75 with tome of dex. In BG2 you get +25 open and detect traps rings too, plus master thievery potions in both games.

Mungri

Ok just to bump this up again for more opinions.

Due to playing my first solo run with the standard XP cap, I can only go up to level 6 swashbuckler before dual classing, and that leaves me very short on thieving points.

So I'm wondering if you think the following number of points will be enough (without tome of dex):

Open locks - 65 (at level 1)
Find Traps - 80 or 85
25 points in hide in shadows + move silently plus stealth boots for sneaking
remaining points into set traps to use snares.

Then with the tome of dex I would have 70 open locks, 85 / 90 find traps, 30 stealth skills, and I dont know how much the set traps will be yet, hopefully around 50 points so I can set snares with minimal reloading.

Actually I'm going to restart the game because the star sapphire lock can be picked with just 60 open locks not 65. Then I wont put anymore points in open locks and use potions / knock if needed on harder locks.