@@Shywer Not that I know of but I could be wrong. The pickpocket UI doesn’t bring up your own Inventory…but maybe while pickpocketing you can press I and open it up?? I’ll need to try that lol
@@UmVtCg Good question, personally if I teleported out of there I’d bring 1 character (not the one who stole) and make my way back to that NPC. If they’re in there normal spot, you’re in the clear. If they’re walking around still, gotta wait for the heat to die down. You could always teleport then long rest and that should do it as well
Roll a nat one with a plus 7 total modifier on a item that had a target of two and got caught. That was when I learned they have critical failures in this game, and I started searching for mods to counteract that bullshit mechanic.
Use a high value simple item like a gemstone to barter for the items you want. Then pickpocket that gemstone back. Stealing a jade is much easier than stealing weapons. Keep using the gemstone to barter for the stuff you want. You can also gift the gemstone a few times using barter to get their attitude towards your high charisma character up, lowering the cost of the items you want. Just pretend you're telling the vendor "this is a different diamond, I swear!"
Larian should make the vendor check their inventory if they suspect anything so you can't sell them back the same stuff. At least not until like a day passed.
Tip: Once you have successfully pickpocketed an NPC, you can use your map to quickly teleport on the nearest portal instead of manually running away from the crime scene. This is more useful than going to camp which may trigger unplanned cut scenes.
Worth noting that if you kill them, the inventory you have to loot will be much less than what they were selling. If you switch to non-lethal damage and just knock them out, you get the entire shop (or nearly) including anything you traded them. Their dispostion won't be great when they wake up but you can work that back up.
Have your party be at least level 3, us Astarion or your own character as a rogue or bard with expertise in slight of hand, the Smugglers ring, and the amulet of guidance, have shadow heart use Enhance Ability Cats Grace, someone else use guidance, and have Gale use invisibility, do this all in tern based mode to maximize your time. I've ran through all the merchants in the Grove and Goblin Camp excluding Ethel all before 10 turns elapse.
So, another easier option is to toggle the non-lethal attack option on, cast something like darkness on the merchant as well as cast silence on the merchant (companions and or scrolls if need be depending on your party comp) and then make sure you're in turn-based mode, and have as many of your party members attack the merchant as is necessary to down them. Most merchants aren't particularly strong, or at the very least aren't a match for an entire party. Make sure you don't finish them off with anything that will trigger lethal damage through the non-lethal toggle (such as spells). Once they're down you can loot everything on them, go to camp, rest (i tend to long rest but haven't tested if partial rest is sufficient), and you can go back and they don't even know what hit them. Repeating this multiple times seems to eventually net you all their shit. You can also combine this with bartering like a normal person to actually end up with them liking you. Tell yourself its the brain damage that is causing the change in their disposition if you have to make it fit into RP. I've used this combined with gems or a certain egg of astonishing value to make all the merchants love me despite the weird surge in robberies that seem to follow my character wherever they go...
@@Faphand111 no you steal those - they have a 0 or 1 roll needed. Long rest - It also resets the stock and gold, so with a bit of patience you can get thousands of gold consumables from people
ALSO a find familiar cat can meow and the victem wil walk to the cat. or a spider doesnt have to do anything as soon as they see the spider they start chasing it around the whole map
Every class can get Sleight of Hands by choosing Urchin or Charlatan as background. In addition to Bard and Rogue also Rangers can get it by choosing Urban Tracker. To increase your chance let a Bard, Cleric, Druid or Sorcerer cast Enhance Ability: Dexterity on your pickpocketing character. It gives advantage, so you always do two dice rolls while pickpocketing and take the better one.
So 5E effectively made Bards better pickpockets than Rogues. (sigh) And basically anyone can now get abilities like pickpocketing (Slight of Hand), trap disarming and lockpicking, which way back in AD&D 2nd editiondays used to be iconic skills only a Rogue had. Rogues don't even get 8 skill points per level anymore as they used to in d20 D&D 3rd edition. So what is even the point of being a Rogue now? Sneak attacks? You don't even get a 2nd attack, unlike nearly every combat class.... even the damn Bard gets a 2nd attack, for crying out loud?
@@TF2CrunchyFrog You can stack sneak attack with 2nd attack from any martial class, getting dash, disengage, and hide as bonus actions is also great. Sub class wise Thief gives you an extra bonus action every turn and Assassin’s get auto crits and advantage on anyone that hasn’t moved yet. These are all great perks for many characters, Thief’s extra bonus action can effectively be an extra attack if you’re dual wielding and you get sneak attack damage as a bonus. Also I’d argue having multiple classes be able to do different out of combat skills is a far better course of action than feeling forced to take certain classes constantly.
@@FetchQuestsYT Yep it's invisible and can not only pickpocket but solve puzzles by pulling levers and switches and such. Pretty handy! Since I have a bad habit of treating any rogues I bring along as skill monkeys and use 'em for convenience, you can bet Astarion will never get out of the Arcane Trickster hole.
PSA: Larian changed it so that mage hand can't pickpocket, open doors, or a whole slew of other actions. I am not sure why or whether it will be reverted.
@@JB-xl2jc Yep they can only throw things now or manipulate levers/switches. HUGE nerf. Major disappointment. One other thing they changed is the necklace that you can get to boost your Magic Missile damage from the vendor in the mushroom colony in the Underdark. That USED to add an additional 1d4 damage per missile. But now post nerf it only adds one extra projectile. Fun detected I guess
best thing you can do if you are gonna pickpocket is turn off the lights. all the fire and the fire pit means the NPCs can see you easier. Turn it off and its MUCH easier to sneak away or hide
Extra tips on this (specifically for robbing merchants): You can split stacks of gold in a merchants inventory by holding shift and dragging from the gold pile. Stacks of 100 gold with the sleight of hand +2 ring (by where you find Karlach) and +1 gloves (forgot where I got these), with a level 4 rogue, on explorer, is a 0 roll for success, i.e guaranteed with a halfling. 200 is a 3-4. ALSO, important note that I just tested in game, the search from the npc starts generally starts AFTER you exit the window, meaning you can steal a large amount of items in a chain if you split their stacks unless you fail a check. I've been testing this and after about 20 items they turned around and instantly initiated combat, so stealing about 10 at a time seems optimal. Also also, merchants reset after a long rest. Do with that what you will and happy thievery
I was about to comment this as I just tried. I bought many of the scam items Mattis sells and I also used her to dump some junk-ware. She had a nice 4k+ stack. It took a bit to split it all but I figured I would take the chance, since she kept running away from my elemental in isolated areas of Last LIght. Once I even failed the check and she didn't confront me. Earth Elemental muscle is useful ^^
If you plan on taking his stuff and not using that trader anymore, use knock out and instead of kill, that way you get to loot ALL his trading items, by killing him you only get some of it
@@gossymer.Thank you. This bugged me on killing a vendor and only getting 4 or 5 items. I demolished the entire Myconid Colony after accidentally getting into too much of their business and the old lady had a ton of stuff I had traded to her and when I put her down I got like 3 items and same goes for the lady by the Creche.
Don't forget "Enhance Ability", a lvl 2 spell for Druids and Clerics. You can buff your thief with dexterity and get advantage (best out of two rolls) on sleight of hand checks. Awesome for pickpocket or traps/locks. If you want to stack it with guidance, you need a second character as both spells require concentration. My Shadowheart is a master thief with Guidance coming from my main character using a guidance necklace and she casts enhance ability on herself (lasts until rest).
I forgot there's a guidance necklace! Hope that's there in the full game, guidance is so insanely helpful constantly throughout the game. I'm actually surprised they didn't limit it a bit more or something, because on tabletop guidance (due to its somatic and verbal components as well as the need to touch someone) wouldn't be usable in every situation. Imagine if you were talking to someone and they were trying to convince you of something, and their friend made a grand gesture with their hands while speaking magical words, and touched their shoulder, mid sentence hahaha. You'd be like "Wtf??"
@@JB-xl2jc The necklace can be found very early....right after crashing on the beach more or less. And later that amulet slot is really important because there are a lot of nice necklaces. So guidance just isn't a free resource for every class at all times.
This is the reason to have both Shadow heart and halsin/jaheira in the party - guidance and enhance ability buffs all active at the same time. If you're a warlock or have wyll, hex wisdom on the target so they have disadv on perception too
@@gossymer.That disadvantage on perception might not matter if it doesn't change the dc of the stealth or sleight check. I think normally in dnd it would be -5 passive perception, but that's totally the kind of thing that gets skipped over
Something I noticed was that my entire party isn't questioned when the party is grouped up. But if you toggle off group or just separate one character, each group of your party gets questioned.
Hello sir, It may be worth noting that killing traders should be avoided as its permanant and these can be the best ways to farm gear and gold on long rest spam
Very good point, thank you! I thought about including that but I figured each player wants to role play their own way. But I’m with you, I don’t plan on killing any merchants ❌
one of my favorite things to do in Divinity Original Sin 2 was to steal and pick pocket pretty much everything that wasn't nailed down to fuel my unhealthy obsession with buying spell tomes and such lol. Glad to see I'll be able to do it here as well and the turn based mode will make pickpocketing a lot easier to plan out!
What i didnt like by divinity 2 was, if you switch a akt you cant get back. The "optimal" way is literaly to kill every person on act 1 for their loot. You wont see them act 2 anyways.
@@anonym3852 I getcha, it was a little stressing to know once you left an area any missed quests and goodies were gone for good. didn't stop it from being an amazing game though, we'll have to see if Baldur's Gate 3 allows you to travel to old area hubs to complete left behind quests and such. that would be nice : )
Correction for the newer folks: Characters of any class can obtain slight of hand proficiency from one of a few background choices at character creation. So you can be any class and be proficient in the skill. But only bards and rogues can get Expertise (doubles the proficiency bonus of the skill) and they can choose to set it to Slight of Hand or any of their other skills as you see fit to choose.
If you finish the quest "Find the Missing Shipment" without attempting to unlock the cargo chest, Gloves of Thievery become available from the merchant (Brem) near the quest giver, they give Advantage on Sleight of Hand Checks, enjoy :)
If you dont want to lose admiration, only pick pocket while under "disguise self" Once you return to your normal self, they won't know that it was you!
Not while pickpocketing, but I'm interested to know if the old "Larian's Distraction" works in BG3... aka, dividing the party, one talks to the only NPC in a room, locking their point of view; change to someone on the other group and take everything on sight in the room now that the idiot is distracted. It works wonders in Divinity Original Sin 1 & 2
I appreciated the thorough overview of pickpocketing mechanics. I have over 80 hours in early access, yet somehow never did any pickpocketing. My first build on release is going to be a ranger/thief though so I'll definitely be up to no good. Hope to see you cover more interesting BG3 tips to come.
I really enjoyed the pickpocketing mechanic in DoS2, but it feels like NPCs are much more persistent in BG3. Been playing early access for a long time, but honestly haven't done much stealing because of how difficult - well, maybe tedious is a better word - it can be.
because - just like real life, they recognize you. find any way of disguising yourself (which there are many). Disguise yourself ,. enter turn based. steal away, move away- well well out of sight, then change back to yourself, exit turn based. you will get asked but it very obviously isn't you that stole so no more trouble from them. long rest (steal camp supplies) and they will reset they're stock and money
A very simple way to gather a LOT of NPCs is to play music. Druids (In cat form) can also meow to distract and force them to face the direction of your cat form which works repeatedly and doesn't require a spell slot.
Stealing is often buggy and broken. It can turn the ENTIRE MAP in the act against you. Yes the entire map. I accidentally picked up an object near the necromancer in act 2. He got mad, and followed me for many screens. Then i went to last light inn, and moonrise towers and every npc would follow me and be suspicious! Totally buggy and broken. Another tip is to cast darkness on the merchant. Then line of sight from NPCs is no issue. However it takes coordinating with your caster and your pickpocketer, especially since pickpocketing requires an action
It is not just enough to pass the skill check when pickpocketting, you also have to get out of sight in time. Otherwise, the victim will conclude that it was you who robbed him.
I used Shadowhearts blessing and turnbased mode,Stealung spells/Potions and anything around 9 dice check,i robbed everything lol,Was able to teach gale loads of spells
The merchant in the Myconid village doesn't have everything he sells when you kill him to loot him. I was doing a good playthrough but somehow my decisions led to the myconid extinction lol i even chose to help them. Anyway, i pickpocketed him (the hobgoblin) and he had so much to steal. I reloaded and killed him and the loot was very small.
Kill everyone in the goblin camp except the merchant while having disguise self on all party members. Each level up or so you can come back and use knock out or sleep to rob him blind over and over. Since you were disguise while killing them he shouldn't be mad at seeing you. You can also gift then steal back items such as the owlbear egg to make merchants love you. If you decide to take Karlach you can also knock out the lady paladin for her items before killing her.
My experience: 1. crouch with your fully leveled thief (which seems to be a completely useless subclass in this game) rouge 2. go into turn based mode. 3. save. 4. attempt your first pickpocket. 5. reload about 10,000x times until you get what you want, or get frustrated a say f*ck it.
The better way to do it is to use imobilisation spell on the trader with a wizard Ur main speak to trader Swtich to ombrecoeur buff the rogue with bless dex And u can whole the empty trader and just tp after to portal or camp U can even do this on streets with many npcs arround Just be in turn mode with thief bonus action + Bcs immobilisation spell is put on the trader when the dialogue is currently going on with ur main Its not even count u 1 turn for the whole time 🎉
Depending on how hard some of the locks, traps and pickpocket attempts are, you might be able to just get away with only being "Proficient" with Sleight of Hand, which means you wouldn't need to bring someone like Astarion, because you could just take a background that gives it to you like Charlatan or Urchin. Urchin is probably the best one too overall for utility, but Charlatan gives your "face" more dialogue options. Even better if your character will be the face and is a CHA based class.
I keep forgetting about entering turn-based mode. Would have made doing a few things on my EA playthrough a few weeks ago a lot easier. Thanks for the reminder, really useful!
I found the easiest way is just speak to the merchant and dont exit the dialogue menu then switch to the character who have better pickpocket skill like Astarian then steal whatever you want even if you failed you can steal again without any problem or loading save game again
One thing I don't like is how killing an npc doesn't net you all of their loot. Traders won't have their gold, enemies with strong armor won't have it on their bodies, etc. Crime should pay big time, but it should come at a terrible risk/cost. Just like irl.
In DOS:2, you could simply drop the stolen items on the ground so that when you were questioned, they wouldn't find the goods on you. I wonder if this works in BG3
not a bad video, i still believe a lot of people like me are under the assumption that sleight of hand skill stacks upon itself by picking it more than once like for a criminal background rogue at the beginning, which to me it seems like it really doesnt and it looks like a troll option meant to trap newbs like me, since it does absolutely nothing 😂
talk to a vendor, then cast hold person on them with someone else, you can now do infinite checks without ever getting caught (as long as there is no one nearby) If the NPC saves the check on hold person, they may become hostile. this is a 100% reliable method. you can also go to camp with your thief to get around the confrontations with guards. they can only check your innocent characters
If you talk to the merchant, switch to your thief, and then pickpocket, they will only come out of the conversation when you are caught. You can literally steal everything they have if you are good enough or lucky enough. Note, they will notice the picket pocketing after the conversation ends. I learned this with the old hag.
So I understand about the mechanics of how pickpockets works however im confused on one thing. If I successfully pickpocket an item or multiple items by passing the dice roll the guards and/or the victim still approach me about the stolen goods?
Ill just put everyone inside the building im gonna ransack to sleep with the glyph ward. You can get a glove with slight of hand +1 early in the game, its from one of those gobos that attacked the grove gate.
So what I am getting out of this video is that they have changed how pickpocketing works in this game compared to how they did it in Original Sin 2. In BG3 you can just rob people blind and just go back and do it again once they've restocked. DOS2 only allowed each character to do it once per NPC for those who are curious.
Very good guide. No nonsense. Also you speaking clearly and, in this case, a bit slower than most, makes it so much more understandable for a non-native english speaker, like miself :) TY!
You only get SOME of the items when you kill vendors and almost never their gold, much better to leave them alive so you can continue to steal from them.
1. Bards also get Expertise, but not until level 3. 2. Anybody can train in Sleight of Hand using a Background like Charlatan or Urchin, you don't have to be a Bard or Rogue.
I feel like Im going to meet a NPC I stole from in the third act and they will tell me about how they became homeless and their dog died because they couldnt afford its medication.
If i go to prison in multiplayer will it force the other players into jail? I dont wanna upset my new party memebers but I also wanna casually just handout a dozen magical items at camp with zero explanation.
I've been thinking about respeccing into a bard to get those cones out of my way. I've not picked pockets for the 30 hours I already have in the game... lv4 team or party I mean.
I think my game is bugged. I can't pickpocket after my game froze. I was in the middle of pickpocketing and my game froze. Now I can't do it. I hit the prompt and nothing happens.
I do not bother with this crap anymore. When i "success" i always have to talk my self out of the situation. I'd be a success if the victim wouldn't call me a thief after 3-5 seconds. it is just a pretty weird definition of "success". Every thief with a brain only would call it a good job after getting away unnoticed. is that new to some people? I don't know...maybe. xD
Thank you for explaining it like I'm 5. Seriously. All the videos act like I'm a D&D grand Master or wizard or whatever. I need some break it ALL the way down videos.❤
Allow me to introduce to you a master thief's most devastating skill: Save Scumming. There is no way a merchant would actually have all that stuff hiding in their pockets, so a 20% chance of success is just some bullshit when in reality a rogue in dnd would be finding it alot easier to steal lets say a shield or a staff, if those items are in crates or on display in the store and not in a merchants pocket dimension. The second thing i find to be bullshit in this game, when i successfully pickpocket someone and i abscond with my prize. The fucking NPC i robbed immediately will channel the courier from skyrim and hunt me down so i have to do this thing where i send the items to a character that isnt there, like some interdimensional mail. Im a faily experienced Dungeon Master for a dnd group, and I LOVE this game, but damn if it's mechanics don't annoy me sometimes. Point is, save scumming is my way of telling the game that i can also play dirty.
i cant steal anything in this game, whenever i pocket a "red" item some troglodyte comes running across the map from SOMEWHERE and "catches me redhanded". makes no sense at all recently tried performing with my bard to lure the attention away from the birdsnest with the key in the grove, stole it with my rogue, snook away, some random dude finds the item on my bard after i stop the performance... the theft system is absolutely retarded dont even get me started on pickpocketing, same stuff. doesnt even matter if i succeed the roll or not killing everyone is the new pickpocketing
I don't understand why a guard will still hassle you. Despite successfully pickpocketing, despite being hidden, desite being out of all red areas and despite me sending all stolen items to camp in a barrel. Like wtf
So I figured out a solution to the merchant questioning all your party members and one of them not having any options besides paying or atack go to your camp immediately after asterion stole something and ask him to stay at camp and bring will or someone else when I did that and left camp he just stayed where he we all walked by and got left alone
Is there any penalty to just using the deception dialogue choice each time (if you are good at it) to say you saw someone else do it? can you only use it once or does the difficulty increase if you do it repeatedly?
What’s the most surprising thing that’s happened to you while stealing items? 💰💰💰
Thank you for being here!
Can you try steal something and put it into another Npc Pocket?
What if you fast travel when getting chaced by a susipicous vendor? How long before they stop looking?
@@Shywer Not that I know of but I could be wrong. The pickpocket UI doesn’t bring up your own Inventory…but maybe while pickpocketing you can press I and open it up?? I’ll need to try that lol
@@UmVtCg Good question, personally if I teleported out of there I’d bring 1 character (not the one who stole) and make my way back to that NPC. If they’re in there normal spot, you’re in the clear. If they’re walking around still, gotta wait for the heat to die down.
You could always teleport then long rest and that should do it as well
Roll a nat one with a plus 7 total modifier on a item that had a target of two and got caught.
That was when I learned they have critical failures in this game, and I started searching for mods to counteract that bullshit mechanic.
Use a high value simple item like a gemstone to barter for the items you want. Then pickpocket that gemstone back. Stealing a jade is much easier than stealing weapons. Keep using the gemstone to barter for the stuff you want. You can also gift the gemstone a few times using barter to get their attitude towards your high charisma character up, lowering the cost of the items you want.
Just pretend you're telling the vendor "this is a different diamond, I swear!"
That's hilarious and useful
I sense that this will be part of an exploit video by The Spiffin' Brit in the future.
@@Yuusou. DG3 Is a perfectly balanced game.
Larian should make the vendor check their inventory if they suspect anything so you can't sell them back the same stuff. At least not until like a day passed.
That seems unlikely, but since you gifted me all those gemstones I believe you. Now where did I put that stack of gemstones?
Fun fact, if you are caught stealing and bribe the npc, you can again steal that gold.
I have yet to find a NPC that actually takes my bribe for that.
@@rafaelcamarena5449 I think it was fixed because I couldn't do it anymore lol
Tip: Once you have successfully pickpocketed an NPC, you can use your map to quickly teleport on the nearest portal instead of manually running away from the crime scene. This is more useful than going to camp which may trigger unplanned cut scenes.
Thank you.
Worth noting that if you kill them, the inventory you have to loot will be much less than what they were selling. If you switch to non-lethal damage and just knock them out, you get the entire shop (or nearly) including anything you traded them. Their dispostion won't be great when they wake up but you can work that back up.
Knocking them out is a great tip, thank you!
How do you make that switch?
@@liam-398 It is a toggle in your action bar under the Passives tab. Toggle Non-Lethal Attacks
Wow wish i knew that lol
Note that it doesn't work this way anymore!
Have your party be at least level 3, us Astarion or your own character as a rogue or bard with expertise in slight of hand, the Smugglers ring, and the amulet of guidance, have shadow heart use Enhance Ability Cats Grace, someone else use guidance, and have Gale use invisibility, do this all in tern based mode to maximize your time. I've ran through all the merchants in the Grove and Goblin Camp excluding Ethel all before 10 turns elapse.
So, another easier option is to toggle the non-lethal attack option on, cast something like darkness on the merchant as well as cast silence on the merchant (companions and or scrolls if need be depending on your party comp) and then make sure you're in turn-based mode, and have as many of your party members attack the merchant as is necessary to down them. Most merchants aren't particularly strong, or at the very least aren't a match for an entire party. Make sure you don't finish them off with anything that will trigger lethal damage through the non-lethal toggle (such as spells). Once they're down you can loot everything on them, go to camp, rest (i tend to long rest but haven't tested if partial rest is sufficient), and you can go back and they don't even know what hit them.
Repeating this multiple times seems to eventually net you all their shit. You can also combine this with bartering like a normal person to actually end up with them liking you. Tell yourself its the brain damage that is causing the change in their disposition if you have to make it fit into RP. I've used this combined with gems or a certain egg of astonishing value to make all the merchants love me despite the weird surge in robberies that seem to follow my character wherever they go...
I recommend using pickpocketing just before your long rest. Then use the map to go to camp and rest so the heat of the theft has abated.
Des it work?
This also taxes you for your much needed camp supplies.
@@Faphand111 no you steal those - they have a 0 or 1 roll needed. Long rest - It also resets the stock and gold, so with a bit of patience you can get thousands of gold consumables from people
If you have a Bard in your team, you can make him play music to attract NPCs far from the stealing zone.
That is so cool
You can place boxes and chests in the line of sight too, blocking visions. ^^
@LobanWu wow thanks I didn't think about that :)
ALSO a find familiar cat can meow and the victem wil walk to the cat. or a spider doesnt have to do anything as soon as they see the spider they start chasing it around the whole map
Yup. I don’t steal, but I use my bard to frequently distract enemies and set up for multi kills
Every class can get Sleight of Hands by choosing Urchin or Charlatan as background. In addition to Bard and Rogue also Rangers can get it by choosing Urban Tracker. To increase your chance let a Bard, Cleric, Druid or Sorcerer cast Enhance Ability: Dexterity on your pickpocketing character. It gives advantage, so you always do two dice rolls while pickpocketing and take the better one.
So 5E effectively made Bards better pickpockets than Rogues. (sigh) And basically anyone can now get abilities like pickpocketing (Slight of Hand), trap disarming and lockpicking, which way back in AD&D 2nd editiondays used to be iconic skills only a Rogue had. Rogues don't even get 8 skill points per level anymore as they used to in d20 D&D 3rd edition. So what is even the point of being a Rogue now? Sneak attacks? You don't even get a 2nd attack, unlike nearly every combat class.... even the damn Bard gets a 2nd attack, for crying out loud?
@@TF2CrunchyFrog lowest xp level up if i remember correctly. Not played for a long time. Is 5th ed all the same xp level for all classes?
@@TF2CrunchyFrog You can stack sneak attack with 2nd attack from any martial class, getting dash, disengage, and hide as bonus actions is also great. Sub class wise Thief gives you an extra bonus action every turn and Assassin’s get auto crits and advantage on anyone that hasn’t moved yet. These are all great perks for many characters, Thief’s extra bonus action can effectively be an extra attack if you’re dual wielding and you get sneak attack damage as a bonus. Also I’d argue having multiple classes be able to do different out of combat skills is a far better course of action than feeling forced to take certain classes constantly.
the cat familiar or the cat druid form is useful to pull npcs away so you can shift cones of sight to wear u want them or don't want them
Also minor illusion.
For such a thorough tutorial on pickpocketing, I'm surprised there wasn't a section on the Arcane Trickster's ability to do it with a mage hand.
You make an excellent point! I forgot to include that 😊 the Arcane Trickster’s is invisible right?
@@FetchQuestsYT Yep it's invisible and can not only pickpocket but solve puzzles by pulling levers and switches and such. Pretty handy! Since I have a bad habit of treating any rogues I bring along as skill monkeys and use 'em for convenience, you can bet Astarion will never get out of the Arcane Trickster hole.
what, you’re not supposed to do that with rogues?
PSA: Larian changed it so that mage hand can't pickpocket, open doors, or a whole slew of other actions. I am not sure why or whether it will be reverted.
@@JB-xl2jc Yep they can only throw things now or manipulate levers/switches. HUGE nerf. Major disappointment. One other thing they changed is the necklace that you can get to boost your Magic Missile damage from the vendor in the mushroom colony in the Underdark. That USED to add an additional 1d4 damage per missile. But now post nerf it only adds one extra projectile. Fun detected I guess
best thing you can do if you are gonna pickpocket is turn off the lights. all the fire and the fire pit means the NPCs can see you easier. Turn it off and its MUCH easier to sneak away or hide
Or cast fog cloud
Extra tips on this (specifically for robbing merchants): You can split stacks of gold in a merchants inventory by holding shift and dragging from the gold pile. Stacks of 100 gold with the sleight of hand +2 ring (by where you find Karlach) and +1 gloves (forgot where I got these), with a level 4 rogue, on explorer, is a 0 roll for success, i.e guaranteed with a halfling. 200 is a 3-4. ALSO, important note that I just tested in game, the search from the npc starts generally starts AFTER you exit the window, meaning you can steal a large amount of items in a chain if you split their stacks unless you fail a check. I've been testing this and after about 20 items they turned around and instantly initiated combat, so stealing about 10 at a time seems optimal. Also also, merchants reset after a long rest. Do with that what you will and happy thievery
I was about to comment this as I just tried.
I bought many of the scam items Mattis sells and I also used her to dump some junk-ware. She had a nice 4k+ stack.
It took a bit to split it all but I figured I would take the chance, since she kept running away from my elemental in isolated areas of Last LIght. Once I even failed the check and she didn't confront me. Earth Elemental muscle is useful ^^
If you plan on taking his stuff and not using that trader anymore, use knock out and instead of kill, that way you get to loot ALL his trading items, by killing him you only get some of it
You can toggle knock out for all fighting and then pick pocket all the people who aren't dead 😂 definitely more loot than killing outright
@@gossymer. yup thats what i mean :) toggle knock out instead of killing :)
just be warned, he will not stay there forever, so take all his stuff before leaving :)
@@gossymer.Thank you. This bugged me on killing a vendor and only getting 4 or 5 items. I demolished the entire Myconid Colony after accidentally getting into too much of their business and the old lady had a ton of stuff I had traded to her and when I put her down I got like 3 items and same goes for the lady by the Creche.
JUST LIKE DOS2 IM STEALING EVERYTHING NOT NAILED DOWN REVIVE SCROLLS WEAPONS AND ALL FOR "FREE" 😅😅😅
LMAO😂
100%. Steal everything not nailed to the floor
A hoarders dream
@RetroFox64 You my good sir just helped me tremendously.
I remember you could only pickpocket a npc once , is that correct?? Or was i playing divinity original sin 2 all wrong ??
Don't forget "Enhance Ability", a lvl 2 spell for Druids and Clerics. You can buff your thief with dexterity and get advantage (best out of two rolls) on sleight of hand checks. Awesome for pickpocket or traps/locks. If you want to stack it with guidance, you need a second character as both spells require concentration. My Shadowheart is a master thief with Guidance coming from my main character using a guidance necklace and she casts enhance ability on herself (lasts until rest).
I forgot there's a guidance necklace! Hope that's there in the full game, guidance is so insanely helpful constantly throughout the game. I'm actually surprised they didn't limit it a bit more or something, because on tabletop guidance (due to its somatic and verbal components as well as the need to touch someone) wouldn't be usable in every situation. Imagine if you were talking to someone and they were trying to convince you of something, and their friend made a grand gesture with their hands while speaking magical words, and touched their shoulder, mid sentence hahaha. You'd be like "Wtf??"
@@JB-xl2jc The necklace can be found very early....right after crashing on the beach more or less. And later that amulet slot is really important because there are a lot of nice necklaces. So guidance just isn't a free resource for every class at all times.
This is the reason to have both Shadow heart and halsin/jaheira in the party - guidance and enhance ability buffs all active at the same time. If you're a warlock or have wyll, hex wisdom on the target so they have disadv on perception too
@@gossymer.That disadvantage on perception might not matter if it doesn't change the dc of the stealth or sleight check. I think normally in dnd it would be -5 passive perception, but that's totally the kind of thing that gets skipped over
Something I noticed was that my entire party isn't questioned when the party is grouped up. But if you toggle off group or just separate one character, each group of your party gets questioned.
Thanks for speaking slowly and clearly and explaining basics like 1D4 and dialogue view! Super helpful!
poor halfling needs to endure so much just for this social experiment to happen ;(
Hello sir, It may be worth noting that killing traders should be avoided as its permanant and these can be the best ways to farm gear and gold on long rest spam
Very good point, thank you! I thought about including that but I figured each player wants to role play their own way.
But I’m with you, I don’t plan on killing any merchants ❌
@@FetchQuestsYT nice video btw, keep it up.
one of my favorite things to do in Divinity Original Sin 2 was to steal and pick pocket pretty much everything that wasn't nailed down to fuel my unhealthy obsession with buying spell tomes and such lol. Glad to see I'll be able to do it here as well and the turn based mode will make pickpocketing a lot easier to plan out!
What i didnt like by divinity 2 was, if you switch a akt you cant get back.
The "optimal" way is literaly to kill every person on act 1 for their loot. You wont see them act 2 anyways.
@@anonym3852 I getcha, it was a little stressing to know once you left an area any missed quests and goodies were gone for good. didn't stop it from being an amazing game though, we'll have to see if Baldur's Gate 3 allows you to travel to old area hubs to complete left behind quests and such. that would be nice : )
Correction for the newer folks: Characters of any class can obtain slight of hand proficiency from one of a few background choices at character creation. So you can be any class and be proficient in the skill. But only bards and rogues can get Expertise (doubles the proficiency bonus of the skill) and they can choose to set it to Slight of Hand or any of their other skills as you see fit to choose.
I learned to use dialog history to read the roll detail and change the game to turn based. Nice 👍
If you finish the quest "Find the Missing Shipment" without attempting to unlock the cargo chest, Gloves of Thievery become available from the merchant (Brem) near the quest giver, they give Advantage on Sleight of Hand Checks, enjoy :)
If you dont want to lose admiration, only pick pocket while under "disguise self"
Once you return to your normal self, they won't know that it was you!
Not while pickpocketing, but I'm interested to know if the old "Larian's Distraction" works in BG3... aka, dividing the party, one talks to the only NPC in a room, locking their point of view; change to someone on the other group and take everything on sight in the room now that the idiot is distracted.
It works wonders in Divinity Original Sin 1 & 2
It does with lots of choices how you choose to do it as well.
After you pick pocket just send it to camp so it’s not in your inventory
I appreciated the thorough overview of pickpocketing mechanics. I have over 80 hours in early access, yet somehow never did any pickpocketing. My first build on release is going to be a ranger/thief though so I'll definitely be up to no good. Hope to see you cover more interesting BG3 tips to come.
Ranger/Thief sounds so fun!!! Can’t wait, it’ll be here in just a few hours
168 hours and only recently started stealing stuff lol,i love being a thief in other games so i had to try and now i am hooked
I really enjoyed the pickpocketing mechanic in DoS2, but it feels like NPCs are much more persistent in BG3. Been playing early access for a long time, but honestly haven't done much stealing because of how difficult - well, maybe tedious is a better word - it can be.
because - just like real life, they recognize you. find any way of disguising yourself (which there are many). Disguise yourself ,. enter turn based. steal away, move away- well well out of sight, then change back to yourself, exit turn based. you will get asked but it very obviously isn't you that stole so no more trouble from them. long rest (steal camp supplies) and they will reset they're stock and money
Thanks for presenting info straight to the point
Quick question, will a Paladin custom character in the party become an Oathbreaker if Astarian pick pockets NPCs?
Also want to know.
no because the paladin is not the one doing the stealing, It is only the paladins actions that cause oathbreaker
I like the idea of being a rouge bard. Kinda like the guy in the movie. I just want to steal the big cool shiny things.
A very simple way to gather a LOT of NPCs is to play music. Druids (In cat form) can also meow to distract and force them to face the direction of your cat form which works repeatedly and doesn't require a spell slot.
Cool video, thanks! I wasn't planning on making my bard particularly thiefy but now I kinda want to... 😀
Stealing is often buggy and broken. It can turn the ENTIRE MAP in the act against you. Yes the entire map. I accidentally picked up an object near the necromancer in act 2. He got mad, and followed me for many screens. Then i went to last light inn, and moonrise towers and every npc would follow me and be suspicious! Totally buggy and broken.
Another tip is to cast darkness on the merchant. Then line of sight from NPCs is no issue. However it takes coordinating with your caster and your pickpocketer, especially since pickpocketing requires an action
It is not just enough to pass the skill check when pickpocketting, you also have to get out of sight in time. Otherwise, the victim will conclude that it was you who robbed him.
1:52 Also Ranger's can have some "Sleight of hand" proficency. For sure mine got
I used Shadowhearts blessing and turnbased mode,Stealung spells/Potions and anything around 9 dice check,i robbed everything lol,Was able to teach gale loads of spells
The merchant in the Myconid village doesn't have everything he sells when you kill him to loot him. I was doing a good playthrough but somehow my decisions led to the myconid extinction lol i even chose to help them. Anyway, i pickpocketed him (the hobgoblin) and he had so much to steal. I reloaded and killed him and the loot was very small.
Kill everyone in the goblin camp except the merchant while having disguise self on all party members. Each level up or so you can come back and use knock out or sleep to rob him blind over and over. Since you were disguise while killing them he shouldn't be mad at seeing you. You can also gift then steal back items such as the owlbear egg to make merchants love you.
If you decide to take Karlach you can also knock out the lady paladin for her items before killing her.
you don't need disguise on every one. only the thief, just make sure they are separated from your party
That was great man im planning to go with a thief for my first playthrough and i suspect there will be alot of stealing 😄
My experience:
1. crouch with your fully leveled thief (which seems to be a completely useless subclass in this game) rouge
2. go into turn based mode.
3. save.
4. attempt your first pickpocket.
5. reload about 10,000x times until you get what you want, or get frustrated a say f*ck it.
Thanks for this, it helps a ton
The better way to do it is to use imobilisation spell on the trader with a wizard
Ur main speak to trader
Swtich to ombrecoeur buff the rogue with bless dex
And u can whole the empty trader and just tp after to portal or camp
U can even do this on streets with many npcs arround
Just be in turn mode with thief bonus action +
Bcs immobilisation spell is put on the trader when the dialogue is currently going on with ur main
Its not even count u 1 turn for the whole time 🎉
Depending on how hard some of the locks, traps and pickpocket attempts are, you might be able to just get away with only being "Proficient" with Sleight of Hand, which means you wouldn't need to bring someone like Astarion, because you could just take a background that gives it to you like Charlatan or Urchin. Urchin is probably the best one too overall for utility, but Charlatan gives your "face" more dialogue options. Even better if your character will be the face and is a CHA based class.
Great Video and good luck on your channel got one more sub !
You could also have the thief move away completely and he will give up after a short distance
Steal and run away, if the mark talks to another character but the theif is gone. The mark usually give up on my play.
Ty for the guide. But do you suggest we pickpocket once/more per npc or if you really need the item?
Thanks, just wanted to make sure I got away with Shadowheart's panties.
Cracking up at you nearly falling to your death just to run away after pickpocketing 😂
I keep forgetting about entering turn-based mode. Would have made doing a few things on my EA playthrough a few weeks ago a lot easier. Thanks for the reminder, really useful!
I found the easiest way is just speak to the merchant and dont exit the dialogue menu then switch to the character who have better pickpocket skill like Astarian then steal whatever you want even if you failed you can steal again without any problem or loading save game again
Thanks for the video, now im good to go for my stealing adventure :D
One thing I don't like is how killing an npc doesn't net you all of their loot. Traders won't have their gold, enemies with strong armor won't have it on their bodies, etc. Crime should pay big time, but it should come at a terrible risk/cost. Just like irl.
In DOS:2, you could simply drop the stolen items on the ground so that when you were questioned, they wouldn't find the goods on you. I wonder if this works in BG3
not a bad video, i still believe a lot of people like me are under the assumption that sleight of hand skill stacks upon itself by picking it more than once like for a criminal background rogue at the beginning, which to me it seems like it really doesnt and it looks like a troll option meant to trap newbs like me, since it does absolutely nothing 😂
talk to a vendor, then cast hold person on them with someone else, you can now do infinite checks without ever getting caught (as long as there is no one nearby)
If the NPC saves the check on hold person, they may become hostile.
this is a 100% reliable method. you can also go to camp with your thief to get around the confrontations with guards. they can only check your innocent characters
You can just teleport to a waypoint far away after stealing. They'll never catch you.
Thanks mate. I'm now a master thief!
Or you can use mage hand to steal from so far away.
If you talk to the merchant, switch to your thief, and then pickpocket, they will only come out of the conversation when you are caught. You can literally steal everything they have if you are good enough or lucky enough. Note, they will notice the picket pocketing after the conversation ends. I learned this with the old hag.
So I understand about the mechanics of how pickpockets works however im confused on one thing. If I successfully pickpocket an item or multiple items by passing the dice roll the guards and/or the victim still approach me about the stolen goods?
They might if you stay in the area.
Ill just put everyone inside the building im gonna ransack to sleep with the glyph ward. You can get a glove with slight of hand +1 early in the game, its from one of those gobos that attacked the grove gate.
dont kill him.. you can Farm elemental Arrows from him. I use them to combo with Water and Grease
So what I am getting out of this video is that they have changed how pickpocketing works in this game compared to how they did it in Original Sin 2. In BG3 you can just rob people blind and just go back and do it again once they've restocked.
DOS2 only allowed each character to do it once per NPC for those who are curious.
Very good guide. No nonsense. Also you speaking clearly and, in this case, a bit slower than most, makes it so much more understandable for a non-native english speaker, like miself :) TY!
I wonder if there is a way to pickpocket and ACTUALLY get away with it? Like, without them chasing you down assuming you did it
I think you map to camp and long rest? Not sure if that works in the full game tho
instead of "pickpocketing" a corpse...you should at least knock them out ...since you know they are still alive and not murdered...
You only get SOME of the items when you kill vendors and almost never their gold, much better to leave them alive so you can continue to steal from them.
1. Bards also get Expertise, but not until level 3.
2. Anybody can train in Sleight of Hand using a Background like Charlatan or Urchin, you don't have to be a Bard or Rogue.
I feel like Im going to meet a NPC I stole from in the third act and they will tell me about how they became homeless and their dog died because they couldnt afford its medication.
Knowing they restock after long rests allays those fears 😂
If i go to prison in multiplayer will it force the other players into jail? I dont wanna upset my new party memebers but I also wanna casually just handout a dozen magical items at camp with zero explanation.
I've been thinking about respeccing into a bard to get those cones out of my way. I've not picked pockets for the 30 hours I already have in the game... lv4 team or party I mean.
i wonder what happens if you throw away or give the stolen items another party member. you could abuse that in divinity 2 and always get away with it.
NPCs always turn to face me, so I can't pickpocket. And now I'm stuck on a quest where I HAVE to pickpocket to continue.
What a fantastic video, it was so funny that he was still waiting for you.🤣
I think my game is bugged. I can't pickpocket after my game froze. I was in the middle of pickpocketing and my game froze. Now I can't do it. I hit the prompt and nothing happens.
subbed. Amazing voice and editing. You could show this to a 5 year old and they would understand.
I drive for DoorDash. I literally do fetch quests for a living
I do not bother with this crap anymore. When i "success" i always have to talk my self out of the situation. I'd be a success if the victim wouldn't call me a thief after 3-5 seconds. it is just a pretty weird definition of "success". Every thief with a brain only would call it a good job after getting away unnoticed. is that new to some people? I don't know...maybe. xD
Thank you for explaining it like I'm 5. Seriously. All the videos act like I'm a D&D grand Master or wizard or whatever. I need some break it ALL the way down videos.❤
Allow me to introduce to you a master thief's most devastating skill: Save Scumming. There is no way a merchant would actually have all that stuff hiding in their pockets, so a 20% chance of success is just some bullshit when in reality a rogue in dnd would be finding it alot easier to steal lets say a shield or a staff, if those items are in crates or on display in the store and not in a merchants pocket dimension. The second thing i find to be bullshit in this game, when i successfully pickpocket someone and i abscond with my prize. The fucking NPC i robbed immediately will channel the courier from skyrim and hunt me down so i have to do this thing where i send the items to a character that isnt there, like some interdimensional mail. Im a faily experienced Dungeon Master for a dnd group, and I LOVE this game, but damn if it's mechanics don't annoy me sometimes. Point is, save scumming is my way of telling the game that i can also play dirty.
i cant steal anything in this game, whenever i pocket a "red" item some troglodyte comes running across the map from SOMEWHERE and "catches me redhanded". makes no sense at all
recently tried performing with my bard to lure the attention away from the birdsnest with the key in the grove, stole it with my rogue, snook away, some random dude finds the item on my bard after i stop the performance... the theft system is absolutely retarded
dont even get me started on pickpocketing, same stuff. doesnt even matter if i succeed the roll or not
killing everyone is the new pickpocketing
Get the lightfoot halfling rogue hireling. Send them in alone while you wait at camp.
Great video! Super useful as I’m just about to start the game. Torn between Druid, Paladin and Sorcerer… so hard to choose
Im good at pickpocketing but then they always catch mr when i try to run away :(
My Astarion has crazy high sleight of hand and yet I keep fucking failing anyway. I don't understand. I go invisible, I hide, etc.
I don't understand why a guard will still hassle you. Despite successfully pickpocketing, despite being hidden, desite being out of all red areas and despite me sending all stolen items to camp in a barrel.
Like wtf
Commenting for the algorythm gods
Lol you’re the best
So I figured out a solution to the merchant questioning all your party members and one of them not having any options besides paying or atack go to your camp immediately after asterion stole something and ask him to stay at camp and bring will or someone else when I did that and left camp he just stayed where he we all walked by and got left alone
There's something hilarious about folks catching you doing wrong and giving you that stink eye + fold arms combo lmao.
Is there any penalty to just using the deception dialogue choice each time (if you are good at it) to say you saw someone else do it? can you only use it once or does the difficulty increase if you do it repeatedly?
how do one even get the pickpocket skill to begin with?
😂😂😂… I’ve been stealing with the Rogue in realtime mode & used the nearby cave entrance to the cmdrs area to reset the aggro to get it to drop!!! 😂😂😂
Everyone should know when a merchant is killed. You won’t get their full stock. So be sure to steal what you really want before the death option
sooo what if I use the invisibility spells?
I know there is the smugglers ring but I thought there was another ring that helped with this as well in act 1-2 am I remembering wrong?
I think something is bugged on xbox SX since i’m using +9 SoH, guidance, advantage on dex and still failing