Thie... Treasure Hunter ideas

[AyinDygra]

Given the replies so far are directed mostly at Entice (I should have probably put that in the middle of the group, since people seem to latch onto the last idea presented in groups, even if it's the least important of the bunch), I'm guessing most liked the new options to steal temporary items and intangibles. I hope SE also thinks thieves should be stealing more often and more things. That being the case, Caution and Distract are two of my favorite ideas for Thief, bringing back a useful trait that made me more likely to make one of my characters a Thief in past games and an ability that allows Thief to use its abilities in not-so-perfect situations.

---

Hopefully, those new steal abilities WILL allow thieves to focus on being better damage dealers. Clearly "Snatch" would be dependent on what SE's monster designers make available to be stolen from each monster (probably family-based at first, to make the ability usable on all monsters, aside from NMs that could have unique items and battle dynamics). In this way, snatch could present new opportunities to enhance THF damage potential on NMs in the form of temp items normally found only in special battlefields.

Snatch considerations: I'm not saying monsters would give you a revitalizer every 1min or something crazy, but I could see a lower powered/duration version of stalwart's tonic, a +5 stat version of Braver's drink that has a lower duration, as well as little potions (as you may remember most monsters in FF6 dropped potions.) Beastmen may have items like grenades and bombs (Qiqirn). Now, I wouldn't be opposed to another adjustment to the "Snatch" command: Temporary Items gained through this command, once used, could potentially reset the "snatch" cooldown timer to higher than 1min, if they're stronger items. Just a thought, to keep it from being "overpowered."

---

Another idea I had tossed around would be a steal command like "Sabotage" that could do unique things to newer monsters, especially NMs, changing the mode of an enemy. Notice how this could be integrated into 2 existing examples of monster behavior:
* Mamool Ja, Qutrub, Lamia and Imp enemies: you could Sabotage their weapons without needing to break the weapon with a crit.
* Acroliths: you could Sabotage them by making them blow up parts of their body, disabling different special attacks.
A couple new examples:
* The Bird family: you could Sabotage their flight feathers, decreasing their attack speed.
* The Uragnite family: You could sabotage their shell, reducing their physical damage resistance.

To make the "Sabotage" idea work, it would be best if alternate methods of changing the monsters modes existed, as can be demonstrated with the Mamool Ja (crits) and Acroliths (body parts are blown up by the NM's own actions). In this way, groups that do not include a Thief could still benefit from these monster quirks, but including a Thf would make them triggerable.

edit: the more I think about Sabotage, the more it sounds like a way to make Despoil more useful. Of course, I'd like to see Despoil's timer split from steal as well, especially if this effect is added to it. Then... maybe make Sabotage a 99Merit Trait that adds this effect to Despoil, although, I'd like to see this in use before level 99.

---

Just some more thoughts.