UberKnightMage's Thief Guide  

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THF Guide 1-60

Introduction

I'm not the foremost expert on Thief, but I though I would write my own Thief guide. This is just my opinion and in no way should you think you have to do things the way I do...this is just a guide and things that I considered to be helpful. I have not yet reached lvl 75, but as I level I will update this guide. I hope this helps.

Thief - It can be a fun yet challenging job to master. At times invites are slow. So you will learn to setup your own exp parties. Thief is unique because they are the only job you can set hate on another player, so be careful, because you can also easily kill other people too.

Important Job Abilities and Traits

  • Perfect Dodge - This is our two hour ability. Pretty self explanatory, use it and the enemy misses...great for those time you are picking a coffer or check on it turns into a mimic...use perfect dodge...warp item...safe.

  • Level 15 � Sneak Attack (SA) � Ahhh...finally you are useful. Sneak Attack combined with a NON-ELEMENTAL Weapon Skill can do great damage. This is when invites will start picking up a little more. Based on DEX.

  • Level 15 � Treasure Hunter (TH) � Can it be farm time now plz? This increases the drop rate of items when killing mobs�great for farming! From my experience this only helps with the drop rate not the item that drops.

  • Level 25 � Flee � This ability increases your movement speed, this is great when you are in trouble (this has saved me from death numerous times).

  • Level 30 � Trick Attack (TA) � Ah yes, now you are a very effective DD. Trick attack will set enmity on the person you are behind when you hit the mob (this can be done at any angle). You can now stack SA and TA combine it with a weapon skill (WS) behind the tank or you trick partner and set hate on them. (I will go in more depth later on in this guide.) Based on AGI.

  • Level 45 � Hide � You become invisible. You can also shed hate when you use this. This comes in when you do not have a trick partner. SA on the mob you now have, use hide to shed some of the hate. Now there has been some discussion on whether or not SATA + Hide does more damage or not, I have yet to test this. The thread and be found Here.

  • Level 45 � Treasure Hunter II � Pretty much TH + 1, SE has confirmed it does not increase the drop rate of rare/ex items, it just adds onto TH. But in my opinion the more items that drop then better chance of getting a rare/ex item.

  • Level 55 � Triple Attack � Chance to attack the target three time in a single attack. Base Triple Attack rate from Thief trait is about 5%.

  • Level 60 � Assassin � Trick Attack is now very useful on its own. This turns TA into a guaranteed critical hit like SA when you are BEHIND another person. Note: This does not increase SATA damage. And you do not have to be behind the target mob.

  • Evasion Bonuses I-IV - Thieves are masters of evasion...need I say more?

Getting Started

For those of you who have just started playing the game I would suggest first: leveling Thief to level 18, then do the subjob quest Elder Memories in Selbina. Second: Level Warrior to 30 or 37. Third: Do the Ninja Flag Quest and unlock Ninja(your main subjob) and level it to level 37 and obtain Utsusemi: Ichi and Ni. You can also do the Ranger Flag Quest and unlock Ranger, Wide Scan comes in handy when camping NMs.

Concerning Race

Mithra - This would be the best starting race for THF due to their high DEX.

Hume - You fall in second place...you have good all around base stats, but gear can fix what you lack.

Other Races - Don't let your lack of stats think you have to limit your job leveling range...you can always get gear to improve on what you lack.

Concerning Stats

Dexterity - This is the stat that powers Sneak Attack. For every two points of DEX a character has, his/her accuracy is raised by one point. ach point of DEX adds 1 to your weapon damage for the Sneak attack hit. It is said that each point of Dexterity raises critical hit rate by 0.1%.

Agility - On of the biggest things AGI does for Thief is it powers Trick Attack. It also increases evasion, parry, and ranged accuracy. For every two points of Agility a character has, these stats are raised by one point.

Strength - Don't worry to much about STR, where as most of our weapon skills use mostly DEX mods. Every two points of Strength raises your characters Attack and Ranged Attack by 1 point.

The Journey

Levels 1-10

These levels go kind of slow. Daggers do not have a great damage output so use a sword, but keep dagger capped always (dagger is our weapon).

Just kill the mobs outside of your home nation. I would also suggest working on marksmanship. I would by a crossbow and try and keep marksmanship capped, because sadly, most of the time you are the resident puller in EXP parties. As far as gear goes anything will work.

Levels 11-20

I would suggest partying in Valkrum Dunes or Korroloka Tunnel. Up until level 15 your damage output is anything but great. But alas, Sneak Attack, you can now do a fair amount of damage especially when you stack it with a non-elemental weapon skill, such as Fast Blade. Keep in mind it will not stack with Burning Blade or elemental dagger weapon skills like Gust Slash. Don�t get yourself killed! You will find that you will steal hate from the tank often, the best thing I can suggest is don�t do this at the beginning of the fight. Wait until the end to SA; give the tank some time to build hate before you decide to steal it and die. If you are not careful during the pre-trick attack stage you might die a lot.

You now have a subjob, I would suggest to sub Warrior until level 20, seeing as how that�s when it is some what useful because of dual wield. You could sub Warrior up until level 24 until you get Utsusemi. You now also have Treasure Hunter, its time to start farming!

Levels 20-25

You will most likely be XP�ing in Qufim Island. I hate this place, it is very dangerous at night because of all of the undead. At level 24 for you will now have Utsusemi: Ichi, so at this point you might want to switch your subjob over to Ninja if you haven�t already. Shadows come in handy when you have those long pulls. Remember to keep your Dagger skill capped as you will still be using a sword.

Levels 26-30

At about 24-30 you will start partying in Yuhtunga Jungle and then at about level 28ish go to Yhoator Jungle. You have now moved on to Kazham and at level 30 your struggle is over. You have just learned Trick Attack. You will find that if you don�t know what you are doing you will kill other party members, I can promise you they will not be happy. You need to understand your job and know you role in the Party.

Odds are is that others in our party won�t understand your job either. Setting up SATA can be rather tedious at times, especially if the tank and other melee jobs are inexperienced. Be patient, and be sure to explain before you start killing.

When the mob comes, have the non-tank provoke first (this will be your trick partner), then you can SATA + WS on the tank setting massive hate on the tank. People might not understand the concept, but this is the way it works. Remember to keep your Dagger skill capped, you will soon find out why.

THF---> TANK---> MOB---> <---DD or THF--->DD--->MOB---><---TANK

Levels 31-54

There are few different places you will be partying at. 30-35 You will be in Garlaige Citadel or Eastern Altepa Desert. 35-43 go to the Crawlers' Nest. Kill Worker Crawlers until 38 then swith to Soldier Crawler/Hornfly until level 43. Levels 43-51 Quicksand Caves and kill Beetles and Anticans. 52-55 Kuftal Tunnel and kill Robber Crabs. Then I hope you kept your Dagger skill capped�if not do it now. If you did you have learned Viper Bite the pi�ce de r�sistance of Thief up until Dancing Edge. Viper Bite alone is useless, but when you combine it with SATA�you can do massive amounts of damage�when closing the skill chain (SC) you will also notices it causes massive amounts of damage. During these levels I found that the most common SC you will be closing is distortion. So be sure to setup a SC before you start killing to kill�em faster.

At this point you potential of killing other party members is great�so you need to be careful. Learn from mistakes you make�I�m sure you will make a few like I did. Play it safe, be sure to set most of the damage you do on the tank (your main goal for SATA) before you SATA on your trick partner.

Levels 54-60

Here comes the easy part at 54-58 go to Wajaom Woodlands and kill Lesser Colibri then at 58-60 zone to Bhaflau Thickets and kill Lesser Colibri/Aht Urhgan Attercorp. You have now learned Triple Attack, ASSASSIN, and Dancing Edge! Up until this point there wasn�t a real need for Accuracy Gear, but with our new toy, Dancing Edge, that is about to change. Dancing Edge misses a lot. Do your best to max out on accuracy.

Dagger Weapon Skills

Name Skill Level DescriptionObtainable
Wasp Sting 10 Poisons target. Level 3
Gust Slash 40 Wind based damage. Level 13
Shadowstitch 70 Binds target. Level 23
Viper Bite 100 Poisons target and deals damage. Level 33
Cyclone 125 Area wind based attack. Level 41
Energy Steal 150 Steals MP. Level 49
Energy Drain 175 Steals MP. Level 55
Dancing Edge 200 5x hit. Level 60
Shark Bite 225 2x Hit. Level 66
Evisceration 230 5x Hit. Level 67

Equipment Guide

Just a few of suggestions on equipment�1-10 anything will work.

Weapon

Dagger

  • Levels 1-30 upgrade as you can�you won�t be using it much. Make sure if you are using two daggers with different base damages, you put the dagger with the higher base damage in your main hand, because that is the hand weapon skill damage is calculated from.
Level Name Stats Notes
25 Federation Knife Dmg: 13 Dly: 180 Accuracy: 2 Attack: 5
34 Kingdom Dagger Damage: 14 Delay: 173 Accuracy: 3 Outside Nation's Control: Agility: 2
34 Federation Kukri Dmg: 15 Dly: 182 Accuracy: 3 Outside Nation's Control: Attack: 7
40 Marauder's Knife (AF Weapon) Dmg: 15 Dly: 195 DEX: 2 AGI: 2 It has lower DPS than Federation Kukri, but has nice DEX/AGI bonuses.
42 Calveley's Dagger Dmg: 14 Dly: 183 DEX: 3 Lower DPS than earlier daggers, but has DEX+3.
46 Bone Knife +1 Dmg: 18 Dly: 190 Vs. Light: -5 Accuracy: 5 Attack: 5 If you are missing a lot, do x2.
48 Hornetneedle Dmg: 16 Dly: 150 DEX: 1 AGI: 1
50 Mercurial Kris (optional) Dmg: 8 Dly: 192 Occasionally attacks 2 to 3 times. Optional
50 Corsair's Knife Dmg: 21 Dly: 206 Attack: 10
51 Lust Dagger (optional) Dmg: 20 Dly: 201 STR: -1 DEX: -1 VIT: -1 AGI: 7 INT: -1 MND: -1 CHR: -1 Optional. I like this for the +7 AGI
56 Kidney Dagger (optional) Dmg: 18 Dly: 183 Critical Hit Rate: 5% Optional
59 Darksteel Kukri Dmg: 22 Dly: 200

Sword

  • This will pretty much be your weapon until you get Viper Bite
Level Name Stats Notes
10 Royal Archer's Sword Dmg: 10 Dly: 228
13 Scimitar Dmg: 13 Dly: 236
15 San d'Orian Sword Dmg: 11 Dly: 222 HP: 4
19 Small Sword Dmg: 13 Dly: 226 DEX: 2 Nice DEX Bonus. If you get this skip Platoon Spatha.
20 Platoon Spatha Dmg: 15 Dly: 231
24 Nadrs Dmg: 18 Dly: 236 Vs. Water: 3 Additional Effect: Poison Rare/Ex; drop from Cargo Crab Colin.
28 Mithran Scimitar (x2 if possible) Dmg: 19 Dly: 236 DEX: 3 Nice DEX Bonus.

Armor

Level Name Stats Notes
9 Compound Eye Circlet Def: 4 Evasion: 5 A very nice piece for the evasion boost.
10 Royal Footman's Bandana Def: 5 AGI: 1
24 Emperor Hairpin HP: -15 DEX: 3 AGI: 3 Evasion: 10 Great Evasion stat and the much needed DEX and AGI. If you can get this great�this will last you until you can get the O Hat. I would try and get this because this will last you a long time.
30 Mercenary Captain's Headgear Def: 10 STR: 1 DEX: 1
44 Corsair's Hat Def: 14 DEX: 1 Vs. Fire: 8 Vs. Water: 8 VS. Lightning: -6
54 Rogue's Bonnet (AF Head) Def: 23 HP: 13 INT: 5 Parrying Skill: 10 Steal: 1 I don't plan on getting this until my Maat fight, it isn't very useful until then.
70 War Beret Def: 20 HP: 10 INT: -3 Accuracy: 7, Ranged Accuracy: 7
70 Optical Hat Accuracy: 10, Evasion: 10, Ranged Accuracy: 10 (Rare/Ex)

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This page last modified 2009-01-18 17:54:05.