Skill consolidation

As I have been (more accurately tried then immediately stopped) using remove trap on test I am once again reminded at what a completely and utterly worthless skill it is, and it reminds me of my thoughts on consolidating some skills, because simply these skills are not worth 1/10th the skill points required to use them in their extremely narrow niches. Would probably just be easier to lump them in with other more useful skills than make the devs come up with little weird uses in quests/systems once every year or two.

Lockpicking + Remove Trap = Rogue's skills.  

Tracking + Detect Hidden + Camping = Survival.  

Cooking + Taste ID = Cooking.  

Imbuing + Item ID = Imbuing.

Animal Lore + Herding = Animal Lore.  
 
In closing remove trap is a horribly , horribly designed skill.  In my opinion it is hands down the worst skill.  It's a pain in the ass to train, it requires a 100 skill point investment in TWO other skills to even use, has almost no uses, unlike detect hidden it reveals you on use, is 100% trumped by a level 3 magery spell in all cases but meaningless treasure chest gobblers, and traps aren't even dangerous enough to kill anyone.  
Just... garbage.  

Though I would share here.  

I completely agree with you that a number of the skills lack any real meaning, occupying only a very small niche of gameplay ("weird little use") for a substantial skill point investment. These are hardly attractive fully fleshed out game systems which entice you into using them. (Taste ID, Item ID, Camping, Remove Trap, Herding, Arms Lore, Forensic ID....here's looking at you!)

However, I like the quantity of skills and the variety those different options bring to the game. For me, it would be preferable to build skills out rather than removing or condensing them. It would be nice if some skills had more substantial gameplay, but maybe these skills will always be "support" skills, useful only for specific situations.

I have been thinking for awhile now that it would be nice to rethink magic vs. technical systems as a whole. Perhaps they could change it so that Magery effected magic systems and lockpick, detect hidden, and remove trap effected mechanical systems. That'd be a pretty big re-work, so not sure anyone would want to tackle something like that. 

It could be set up so that each point had a counterpoint, but Magic only affected Magic and technical only effected technical.

Magery: Incognito (Reveal), Polymorph (Reveal), Invisibility (Reveal), Magic Lock (Unlock), Magic Trap (Untrap).

Technical: Disguise Kit (Detect Hidden), Poly Disguise Kit (Detect Hidden), Hiding (Detect Hidden), Tinkering (Lockpicking), Tinkering (Remove Trap).

Maybe there would be some sort of overlap up to 50/80 skill where magic could override technical, or technical could override magic, but at the higher levels those tiny trap components were just beyond the reach of a mage to undo, or someone with that level of hiding couldn't be seen even with a wizards third eye.

I would also say that anyone with the Camping skill gets an additional item and three stones of weight to whatever container they are carrying for every 10 points of skill. 10 Items and 30 stones of extra carry weight at 100 skill. Any bonded packies could get 1 item and 30 stones of weight for every 10 points of skill. 10 items and 300 extra carry weight for that pack horse if you have 100 Camping.

 I get what you are saying, my first gut reaction was going to be to disagree and go down the path of Arroth, in that I'd like to see them flesh out those skills better.

However, having thought about it, I may go down your path more.

One of my major gripes about UO for the last 10+ years, is they have only been focussing on a few set skills. Sampire, Sampire, Sampire and Tamer. They have been letting so many great playstyles die. Bards, Crafters, Pure Mages, Pure Warriors, Rogues, etc. I did not want to initially go down your route, because this just promotes that ethos, which I'm not happy about in the first place.

But thinking about it, you may have a point, maybe it makes it easier for them to promote those playstyles, if there are less skills. Maybe the playstyles themselves can achieve more. I certainly do think UO needs to rein back some of its complication, and strip out some of the redundant complicated stuff, or re-invent it with more meaning in the current game.

So overall, I maybe veer towards agreeing with you.

I'd just like to comment, Remove Trap, is one of my favourite skills.  

(As is Lockpicking, Detect Hiding).

I love playing my dungeon rogue, and it relaxes me no end, to go hunting chests, and the fun of removing traps etc. However, you are completely correct, it is a completely broken skill, everything you said is correct. I've mentioned this before, and for the first and only time ever, I believe I got a like from Kyronix on Stratics when I detailed the same broken process you have just mentioned. This entire skill needs a fix, it is a lovely skill in itself, if it were made relevant and fixed.

Cookie, I love my dungeon rogue too, but to hunt in Exodus I have hiding, stealth, stealing, lockpick, detect hidden and snooping with just enough magery to reliably cast invis. I don't have ninja, no room. I'd like to use remove trap, especially if it didn't reveal you, but where the heck would I fit it in?

I don't agree that other playstyles are dying, I find my bard to be really powerful and is my favourite character for doing mini champs, I don't have a sampire (and in my personal opinion the template should never have been possible) My archer has no bushido, but can solo at least 2 different champion spawns and my samurai without necro is my character of choice for the cavern of the discarded or joining my alliance mates for Zippy.

Tag @Kyronix or he won't read it, but I agree on the OPs post.

I don't think Remove Trap is the worst skill. Taste ID gets that. I wonder what this green potion is...

That said, Remove Trap is really difficult to train, and it's utility has gotten worse over time. Years and years ago before Lower Reagent Cost, Remove Trap was useful to my character since it was free and I could get into the chest before someone using Magery. But it has so many issues now, I moved it to a soul stone for sentimental reasons. 

I'm torn on skill consolidation. It seems to me to be a question between Balance (all skills being roughly the same value) and other meta concerns (player exploration of the game system, verisimilitude, and what would happen to those of us with the skills if they were consolidated). 

Some additional thoughts on Remove Trap (and Thief skills in general):

A
To me, Remove Trap needs to be rescaled to difficulty. With 100 Remove Trap, you should have some chance to disarm high level traps. As it is now, my T-hunter will almost always fail to remove a trap on higher level chests. Yes, I am one of those few who stubbornly keeps Remove Trap on my T-hunter in the hopes that someday, someway, it will be useful. For now, like everyone else, I just step away, use Telekinesis, and save myself even trying with Remove Trap. Argh!

Maybe casting Telekinesis and causing the trap to detonate, should also blow up some of the things in the chest? A successful Remove Trap would preserve all items for you to loot?

B
Stealing, Snooping, Lockpicking, Detect Hidden, and Remove Trap could all function similarly and scale your chance of being revealed when using those skills to your Hiding skill. Or, maybe Hiding is just the action of Hiding and Stealth would more appropriately cover the actions you take while hidden?

Giving the Thief the option to remain hidden (through skill point investment) would allow use of thief skills over magic skills. Which seems more in line with, you know, a thief. (You could also have stuff in dungeon chests be destroyed if Telekinesis was used to detonate the trap, instead of the trap being removed.)

C
Could Hiding be on a separate timer from the other thief skills? This way, if hiding was available and the Stealing or Remove Trap attempt failed, you could immediately re-hide. This would allow the player to rely solely on Thief skills, removing the need for Magery to cast Invisibility. This might also create some more engaging gameplay for the Thief play style, requiring you to balance your thief skills and use them appropriately. I know, invisibility potions, but having the skills work together seems preferable, with potions as a fallback.

D
Going out on a limb here, but maybe Tinkering could allow players to place traps, lures, snares, etc. in the game world for PvE gameplay. Hiding could help keep them unseen by animals/monsters via checks against Detect Hidden. Remove Trap could be used to recover traps, both placed by the player and traps spawned randomly in dungeons.  

After the amount of time spent working with pets, other play styles need some love! 

Maybe they can fit in some changes to Thief stuff during the upcoming High Seas publish, as treasure chests and ship's holds could function similarly.

Just remember @Kyronix, if you build it, they might not come, but if you don't build it, they can't. 🙂

(That's meant tongue in cheek, not personal. Also, I suppose at the end of the day, it is a business and a lot more money can be made from pets of a thousand stripes, then lures & snares. At least until you come up with a new design that knocks the industries socks off!)

Hi Petra,

This is my dungeon rogue suit, to get the skills, it's all skill based. I have an original stealth robe that I'm very proud of, and the other 4 leather parts, are +25 LRC for mage spells.

Re other playstyles dying, you are a far more relaxed character than I am. It's a lovely quality, and I'm not going to argue.

Cookie said:

 I get what you are saying, my first gut reaction was going to be to disagree and go down the path of Arroth, in that I'd like to see them flesh out those skills better.

However, having thought about it, I may go down your path more.

One of my major gripes about UO for the last 10+ years, is they have only been focussing on a few set skills. Sampire, Sampire, Sampire and Tamer. They have been letting so many great playstyles die. Bards, Crafters, Pure Mages, Pure Warriors, Rogues, etc. I did not want to initially go down your route, because this just promotes that ethos, which I'm not happy about in the first place.

But thinking about it, you may have a point, maybe it makes it easier for them to promote those playstyles, if there are less skills. Maybe the playstyles themselves can achieve more. I certainly do think UO needs to rein back some of its complication, and strip out some of the redundant complicated stuff, or re-invent it with more meaning in the current game.

So overall, I maybe veer towards agreeing with you.

I'd just like to comment, Remove Trap, is one of my favourite skills.  

(As is Lockpicking, Detect Hiding).

I love playing my dungeon rogue, and it relaxes me no end, to go hunting chests, and the fun of removing traps etc. However, you are completely correct, it is a completely broken skill, everything you said is correct. I've mentioned this before, and for the first and only time ever, I believe I got a like from Kyronix on Stratics when I detailed the same broken process you have just mentioned. This entire skill needs a fix, it is a lovely skill in itself, if it were made relevant and fixed.

I think that one of the reasons I think some of these skills should be consolidated is exactly what you mentioned, so that they could lead to actually playable styles.  The "Dungeoneer" style rogue specifically.  I mean after adding up all the skills you need to do your rogue stuff, which in the dungeon is fairly limited in scope of activity, you are left with hardly any skill room to defend yourself.  Hide, Stealth, LP, DH, RT, Stealing... that leaves you maybe 120 skill points.  You can't contribute to combat in any meaningful way with less than 300 skill points.  

As for loving remove trap, I WANT to love it.  Desperately.  I can remember when the added it, I was super excited because it's always been my desire to be a classic d&d style rogue so I went to work GMing it right away.  After all of that stress, work and skill commitment I realized that it was LESS useful than a single level 3 mage spell.  It's very disheartening.  🙁

Arroth_Thaiel said:

Some additional thoughts on Remove Trap (and Thief skills in general):

A
To me, Remove Trap needs to be rescaled to difficulty. With 100 Remove Trap, you should have some chance to disarm high level traps. As it is now, my T-hunter will almost always fail to remove a trap on higher level chests. Yes, I am one of those few who stubbornly keeps Remove Trap on my T-hunter in the hopes that someday, someway, it will be useful. For now, like everyone else, I just step away, use Telekinesis, and save myself even trying with Remove Trap. Argh!

Maybe casting Telekinesis and causing the trap to detonate, should also blow up some of the things in the chest? A successful Remove Trap would preserve all items for you to loot?

B
Stealing, Snooping, Lockpicking, Detect Hidden, and Remove Trap could all function similarly and scale your chance of being revealed when using those skills to your Hiding skill. Or, maybe Hiding is just the action of Hiding and Stealth would more appropriately cover the actions you take while hidden?

Giving the Thief the option to remain hidden (through skill point investment) would allow use of thief skills over magic skills. Which seems more in line with, you know, a thief. (You could also have stuff in dungeon chests be destroyed if Telekinesis was used to detonate the trap, instead of the trap being removed.)

C
Could Hiding be on a separate timer from the other thief skills? This way, if hiding was available and the Stealing or Remove Trap attempt failed, you could immediately re-hide. This would allow the player to rely solely on Thief skills, removing the need for Magery to cast Invisibility. This might also create some more engaging gameplay for the Thief play style, requiring you to balance your thief skills and use them appropriately. I know, invisibility potions, but having the skills work together seems preferable, with potions as a fallback.

D
Going out on a limb here, but maybe Tinkering could allow players to place traps, lures, snares, etc. in the game world for PvE gameplay. Hiding could help keep them unseen by animals/monsters via checks against Detect Hidden. Remove Trap could be used to recover traps, both placed by the player and traps spawned randomly in dungeons.  

After the amount of time spent working with pets, other play styles need some love! 

Maybe they can fit in some changes to Thief stuff during the upcoming High Seas publish, as treasure chests and ship's holds could function similarly.

Just remember @ Kyronix, if you build it, they might not come, but if you don't build it, they can't. 🙂

(That's meant tongue in cheek, not personal. Also, I suppose at the end of the day, it is a business and a lot more money can be made from pets of a thousand stripes, then lures & snares. At least until you come up with a new design that knocks the industries socks off!)

Yeah a lot of good ideas.  I also thought that perhaps pairing skill investment of Tinkering with "Rogue Skills" would allow a player to place traps and things, which would be a new playstyle.  

The most essential improvement I can see for remove trap as a unique skill would be to a) have a chance to not unhide, b) dramatically increase it's success rate at 100%, and c) remove it's skill requirements.  I would also add in a "bonus" loot roll from a unique table (including some interesting rare deco stuff), if you successfully use remove trap on a trapped box rather than setting off the trap by whatever means.  

I like the idea of skill point investment impacting your chance to not unhide when using a rogue skill.  I would even include stealing in that.  If you have 700 skill points devoted strictly to rouge skills you deserve a chance to get away scott free.  Would also be a chance to revitalize pvp stealing.  Make it 1% chance per ever 10 skill points in a rogue skill?  So if you had just the standard Hide, Stealth, Snoop, Steal you'd have a 40% chance, but if you went all in you'd be defenseless and have a 72% chance.  

Anyway, there are things that could be done for sure, though I think the man power is unlikely to shift that a way.  

Uvtha said:

...

I like the idea of skill point investment impacting your chance to not unhide when using a rogue skill.  I would even include stealing in that.  If you have 700 skill points devoted strictly to rouge skills you deserve a chance to get away scott free.  Would also be a chance to revitalize pvp stealing.  Make it 1% chance per ever 10 skill points in a rogue skill?  So if you had just the standard Hide, Stealth, Snoop, Steal you'd have a 40% chance, but if you went all in you'd be defenseless and have a 72% chance.  

Anyway, there are things that could be done for sure, though I think the man power is unlikely to shift that a way.  

Thief skills working to buff each other would be, in my opinion, an excellent addition. Also, there is precedent, since the bard skills already do that. (I don't remember now, but I think Kyronix may have been involved in developing those bard skill interactions, or was that before his time?)

Having Remove Trap roll from an additional loot table is also a great idea. You'd get the incentive to use Remove Trap without any changes to current play. I like this idea a lot.

Hopefully they can find time to do something with thief skills, or at the minimum Remove Trap. Have to see what next years development cycle holds.

Instead of allowing RT in the temp to prevent items from getting destroyed during picking, they simply added a special key. They have no plans of actually fixing RT, do you @Kyronix ? Or will it get fixed when spawning chests in Ilsh actually have items in them ? 

I agree RT is probably one of, if not the, most undervalued skills in game.  One of my favorite templates to play is my thief and using telekinesis scrolls always felt pretty lame whilst dungeon crawling.  Any change to RT would come in the context of a broader "rogue" update that would hope to address some of the other concerns that have popped up related to this template.  I'll also pre-preemptively answer the "Why can't you just fix RT and be done with it?"  Nothing is ever that simple, and without additional work elsewhere what exactly are we fixing RT to work with?  Just to force people to train it on their templates to go after chests that may or may not have worthwhile loot inside?  How does all this tie into the broader concern of loot in general and how do we balance that against other methods of acquiring loot?  What about treasure chests?  

To sum up, yes RT needs a rework, but there are a lot of other questions and items to think about with regard to that change.  If a major "rogue" update is something the community would like to see, threads like this are especially helpful in planning purposes!

Kyronix said:

I agree RT is probably one of, if not the, most undervalued skills in game.  One of my favorite templates to play is my thief and using telekinesis scrolls always felt pretty lame whilst dungeon crawling.  Any change to RT would come in the context of a broader "rogue" update that would hope to address some of the other concerns that have popped up related to this template.  I'll also pre-preemptively answer the "Why can't you just fix RT and be done with it?"  Nothing is ever that simple, and without additional work elsewhere what exactly are we fixing RT to work with?  Just to force people to train it on their templates to go after chests that may or may not have worthwhile loot inside?  How does all this tie into the broader concern of loot in general and how do we balance that against other methods of acquiring loot?  What about treasure chests?  

To sum up, yes RT needs a rework, but there are a lot of other questions and items to think about with regard to that change.  If a major "rogue" update is something the community would like to see, threads like this are especially helpful in planning purposes!

Hi Kyronix, a good response and whilst I get your point......

I think Remove Trap is something that can be fixed on its own. Just get it working like it should be working, completely independently of anything. What are you fixing it to work with? - The current rogue process of stealthing up to a chest and opening it in a smooth fun way.

Rogues are a fun character, and Remove Trap is a fun skill, if it were working properly, it would be great in itself.

Of course, as a secondary step, I believe many players would like a Rogue publish, with enhanced content for them. But the way you are going, is ok for now, a bit slow, but you're making progress. Adding Scrappers ingredients into Khaldun is a perfect touch. Having mining Gems in Underwater Sunken ship is good. The Kotl hidden chests were cool, as is Exodus. I believe if you spread different content around like this, it would enhance things for rogues, until you come up with a publish that really tied things up and balanced loot off.

While I would like to see a rogue publish, I could add another half a dozen things that would need to go with it (such as making the burglar's bandanna and shadow dancer leggings alterable!)

I don't have a problem with telekinesis popping traps for a few reasons:
1) Nearly anything trapped has more than 1 trap these days. It's overkill. (especially in comparison to the paltry loot)

2) The traps on high-level things can't be successfully undone (golden toolkit is a prime example) The scaling is all wrong. GM RT should work ~90% of the time.

3) Even on some low-level things, you fail a ridiculous amount. Again, improper scaling.

There need to be areas in the game where someone could naturally train RT from 0 to GM without resorting to illicit programs. 

Bumping up NPC training to 40 (which needs to be done FOR ALL SKILLS!) and then adding low-level trapped (plus some hidden) containers to Old Haven would be a prime solution. A few simple "raise the skill to 50" quests and you make training less onerous. You could learn DH, RT, lockpicking, and thievery plus get the quests from 'a shadowy figure' lurking somewhere in New Haven.

Other ideas include incorporating more stolen items into craftables, or to give them a use beyond deco. (dried herbs/flowers/onions, rolling pins, chisels, etc.)

Kyronix said:

...Any change to RT would come in the context of a broader "rogue" update that would hope to address some of the other concerns that have popped up related to this template....and without additional work elsewhere what exactly are we fixing RT to work with?  Just to force people to train it on their templates to go after chests that may or may not have worthwhile loot inside?  How does all this tie into the broader concern of loot in general and how do we balance that against other methods of acquiring loot?  What about treasure chests?...  

So, I'll try to put some thought into this and reply, probably in stages. I'm really looking forward to reading what others have to add and the ideas that might get generated.

My initial thoughts would be, I personally don't think I'll start using the term "rogue". I think I'll just stick with "Thieves' Guild". Fighter-Mage-Thief is pretty well established in gaming in general, and it's also already in UO, so I'll just roll with that.

Having said that, rogue to me always brings to mind a kind of backstabbing stealthy character from D&D, and the combat portion always seems to be the focus, rather than stealing, lockpicking, and trapping. Taking that and building a bit on what Petra was saying earlier, there isn't a lot of space on the template if you take all the thief skills. Maybe that's the way it should be? When we look at the fighter skills, we don't take all of them. We take a weapon skill, tactics, and sometimes parry. We don't take Macefighting, Swordsmanship, Fencing, Archery, Parry, and Wrestling, and then complain we don't have enough template space. We make a choice up front as to the type of fighter we want and work from there. Maybe we should apply the same concept to the thief skills. (Granted, many of the fighting skills do the same thing, while thief skills do not.)

If we group the thief skills, I think you can see three different play styles emerge: actually stealing things (Stealing & Snooping), breaking and entering (Lockpick, Detect Hidden, & Remove Trap), and Combat (Poisoning - Maybe Trapping). Hiding and Stealth could be seen as a basis for those play styles.

However, even if you only took a portion of the thief skills and focused on one play style, the templates would still be snug.

Stealing: Hiding, Stealth, Stealing, Snooping
B&E: Hiding, Stealth, Lockpicking, Detect Hidden, Remove Trap
Combat: Hiding, Stealth, Poisoning (Maybe Tinkering)

The B&E template would be really tight, but you'd be focusing on thieving, not combat. Maybe that's a good thing? Maybe UO is too combat focused and we need to build out other ways of playing rather than just combat? I'd say yes, but I'm rarely in the majority.

I think one of the saving graces might be that most of the thief skills only go to 100. Maybe, and this is going out on a limb, but maybe you could rescale Stealing and Stealth to only go to 100. That way all thief skills would behave the same way. I'm not saying nerf them, just rescale so that the current success chance at 120 would become the new success chance at 100. I don't know, that might be way to big a thing dealing with powerscrolls and skill caps, but if you're seriously considering thief stuff, I think having continuity among the thief skills would be great. It would also reduce the skill requirements and free up some much needed skill points. 

Anyway, my first thoughts. I'll try to get back to you with something more coherent about how RT would fit and loot, but I've had a Leinenkugel Grapefruit Shandy and am going to log off for awhile!  

Arroth_Thaiel said:

When we look at the fighter skills, we don't take all of them. We take a weapon skill, tactics, and sometimes parry. We don't take Macefighting, Swordsmanship, Fencing, Archery, Parry, and Wrestling, and then complain we don't have enough template space. We make a choice up front as to the type of fighter we want and work from there. Maybe we should apply the same concept to the thief skills. (Granted, many of the fighting skills do the same thing, while thief skills do not.)

Yeah, this is exactly the issue.  Rogue skills are essentially "resource gathering" skills rather than adventuring/pvm/pve skills.  A pure rogue cannot defend themselves, cannot impact a pvm encounter, cannot heal, really can't do anything at all outside of the small niche of game elements designed specifically for them to interact with.  There's really little benefit to using rogue skills outside of fel if you are doing anything other than just scouring dungeons for stealable artifacts/hidden event boxes.  

Obviously people want to play a dungeon rogue and have that mean something other than a floor sweeper but the game not only doesn't reward that gameplay, it gives it nothing at all to do outside of unlocking, and disarming dug up treasure chests.

To be a rogue you must "multiclass" or you will have nothing to do 99% of the time. That is why the 100 skill point requirement on RT (along with it's noted lack of value) 

At minimum there should be "Rogue weapons" like mage weapons.  So rogues could at very least defend themselves without further de-rogueifying thier template.  I don't even see why this really needs to be tested.  We have mage weapons, and it would just be a different skill checked by that same type of property, if you could apply that to an assassin honed weapon, you might actually be able to help out in combat as a rogue, and remain thematic.  

Kyronix said:

I agree RT is probably one of, if not the, most undervalued skills in game.  One of my favorite templates to play is my thief and using telekinesis scrolls always felt pretty lame whilst dungeon crawling.  Any change to RT would come in the context of a broader "rogue" update that would hope to address some of the other concerns that have popped up related to this template.  I'll also pre-preemptively answer the "Why can't you just fix RT and be done with it?"  Nothing is ever that simple, and without additional work elsewhere what exactly are we fixing RT to work with?  Just to force people to train it on their templates to go after chests that may or may not have worthwhile loot inside?  How does all this tie into the broader concern of loot in general and how do we balance that against other methods of acquiring loot?  What about treasure chests?  

To sum up, yes RT needs a rework, but there are a lot of other questions and items to think about with regard to that change.  If a major "rogue" update is something the community would like to see, threads like this are especially helpful in planning purposes!

I don't see how it's possibly undervalued in anyway other than thematically.  In that I agree, it's really cool to disarm traps... but all the baggage getting it in your template, and the fact that it's flat out worse than telekinesis a spell that requires zero skill investment for humans, I don't see it being undervalued.  It's over valued if anything, because people want to use it despite it being not only not as good as other methods, but actually functionally detrimental to your character build.  

Is tele disarming trap (or just setting them off and taking the damage) lame?  Absolutely, but its just 1000000% a better way to do it.  

As for a major rogue update, that would be amazing, and is long long overdue.  I would suggest adding a new dungeon with lots of locks and traps one where getting through without a rogue would be a real pain, fix RT so that it's at least on par with telekinesis, ideally superior to telekinesis is some way (chance of remaining hidden a good suggestion), more hidden things that need DH to reveal, "rogue weapons" that work like mage weapons but with stealing, better access to assassin honed items and other similar kinds of properties that would aid in stealthy/shady combat, more and better things to steal from monsters, setting traps, etc.  

In my mind a rogue in a non pvp zone party should serve two major functions 1) granting access/avoiding danger: getting the party into areas/loot they wouldn't otherwise be able to get to.  This could be simply disabling trap, and opening locks, or it could be stealthing past some deady guards to activate a teleporter elsewhere for the party to bypass the area.  2) a non direct combatant.  Someone who does critical hits to engaged enemies, has dirty fighting techniques, but can't stand in direct combat.  The second part you can do now, but not really while also doing dungeon based thief stuff on the same character.  You have to choose non combat chest/artifact stealing rogue or hiding/stealth/ninja rogue.    

As someone who was a pvp thief for the first few years of UO's life, I was super sad to see my playstyle essentially destroyed with tram, and then again on siege when the population died, but I was also someone who wanted to do the dnd kind of essential party utility role, and I've been waiting for those kind of updates, so, yeah, I'd 100% be supportive of that idea myself as rogues have really only gotten a bone here and there over the years.    

Let's be honest about the old rogues of yesteryear, the only ones enjoying it then were the rogues themselves. I just want to see a change to the overall system. There's currently very little risk and absolutely very little reward for having all of the rogue skills in the template. Sure, I can stealth around Destard and unlock and untrap chests all day, for 250 gold, 10 arrows and a couple of random potions each time, but on Siege with instant reveal after RT...very high risk, very pitiful reward. I would like to see loot get a huge bump and the danger get a huge bump as well. Traps can only be removed with the skill, no more pick, back up , cast,..and the risk, occasionally or quite often the trap goes off with disastrous results that not only kill the rogue but destroy parts or all of a suit. Vendors would be well stocked with Rogue suits :-)

I enjoy playing my totally non-pvp thief very much, stealing from monsters and especially in Exodus. I'm having a lovely time with Khaldun and look forward to it going live. Cookie has told me how to fit remove trap into my template, but is 60 real stealing skill really enough to get the nicer things? and 30 real stealth keep you hidden?

In exodus hiding, stealth, lockpick and detect is enough to empty the boxes, but I like to steal from the zealots too, and that needs stealing and snooping. snooping isn't actually used actively, but if you don't have it in your template you can only get gold from the zealots - and my current stock of ML ingredients has mostly come from them.

Disarm (remove trap) was a valuable skill to have when factions was still around.  I miss having a reason to use my faction trap remover characters.