Ok, so say I want to play as a thief like character which are the class choices, and what are the overal differences? Which classes should I avoid altogether?

Checking out Bard, Ranger, and Shepherd both seem to have the 'sneak' skill. Are there any other options, or one that is better choice?

Is there a way to learn some skills I can learn throught he course of the game, and can avoid in the character design?

Tinker is probably the class most resembling the classic Rogue or Thief. Bard second, especially if you're gonna rely on missile weapons.

Are you planing to play a "sneaky" character, who relies on surprise attacks or sneaking past enemies? If so, I'm curious to learn how it turns out.

I want sneaky, with surprise attacks ya. I want a bow if possible. I'm not expecting a true 'thief:Dark Project' experience, but I want to see how the experience compares.

I just finished Arx Fatalis (and before that Dark Messiah) doing that. Although in those games I went for sneaky, bow, and combat skills for Dark Messiah. That game was particularly well designed for sneaking, and very thief like.

In Arx, I mixed it up alot of sneaking (for pick pocketing), some combat strength, and basic use of magic. Of course lock picking. I think I might have misused some points for some useless skill (intuition, which I think I could have used to improve my lockpicking more). But it didn't prevent me beating the game. Had plenty of potions for last boss, and just put my last few points so I could wear the Ylsid armor, and use the sword you forge in the dwarf area.

Haven't tried Arx Fatalis yet, but I really enjoyed Dark Messiah. I didn't go totally "thief" in DM, but played more like an assassin, using a combo of stealth and brute force. I always enjoy games where I play the hunter more then games in which I play the hunted (popamole Half-Life 2 where I soon could anticipate where enemies would pop up springs to mind).

There is no way to go truly 'thief' in Dark Messiah. Obviously nothing to actually steal. The best part was the backstabs. They functioned more or less like the backstabs in Deadly Shadows. The bow let you do some nice assassinations from the darkness. So ya, I went for very brutal assassin type. Because I wanted backstabbing I worked up stealth path as soon as possible in the game, and then up the bow tree later on. Combat skills towards the end.

The brute combat helped in the areas that were bright, and I needed to dispatch enemies quickly. Kill quick, and not worry about health or damage! If I ever get back to it I might try for a Mage/Cleric path.

Stealth in Arx Fatalis is somewhat useless. It helps move around enemies in some places, if their back is turned. But shadows are so few and far between, that it's only good for using them as sniping positions. YOu really have to have stealth points very high for it to be useful anyways. At least you can in theory get bow pretty early and doesn't require alot of points. I did find pickpocketing to be cool though. Though I couldn't figure out how many points and to what stat, make all items in someone's pocket visible. It helped to find a hidden shadow spot to pickpocket from, and pickpocket from a distance.

As for the tinker in Underworld. I don't see "stealth' listed on the character selection screen. Is that a skill I can learn later? It does have lockpicking as an option.

When I get these early games out of the way, I'll go finish Dishonored. I'm just been trying to get many of the games that inspired Dishonored off my playlist. So I can compare them.

I guess the Tinker is only half a thief. They have the skills to deal with traps and locks, but not the sneaking skill. So if sneaking is most important I guess maybe Ranger is the best.

So character stats are randomly generated every time you start a character. So no two 'rangers' for example will have the same stat layout.


It's interesting, I'm messing with the ranger. You can only choose two skills. It has sneaking, but no lockpicking. From what I could see. I think I end up choosing missiles for the second skill (that is bow or throwing knives?). Most of the second skills improve starting stats, it seems. So in a way its only half a thief too.

Bard, apparently gets three choices of skills. In the first only has lore and charm, and it has plenty of secondary options to choose from, sneaking or lockpicking, but not both. Then 3rd option you can choose from a handful of different combat styles. Missiles again probably a good option.

Shepherd is hard to figure out... It has three options. The first is the combat type, again I could choose missiles. Access to nearly every skill in second and third list, it has access to sneak, and traps skill. But no lockpicking in either.

Shame there is no free choice character option, that starts with no skills, but allows you to choose among all the skills, and lets you design the character based on the skills you want, but only access to a total of five. Plus the ability to manually choose the starting stats (instead of the random set of stats).

Well I ultimately decided to go with Tinker. Based on reading up on how ultima does things. Sneak skill essentially worthless apparently. having high rate of armor is much better thing. So I kept on rolling until I had a 27 strength (25 is needed for best armor in the game?).

Tinker is one of four classes that has the highest strength in the game.

I still decided to go with missile as one of my starting skills. Although slingshots are not particularly useful yet :p... I went with lockpicking for another skill.

No. Strenght only determines how much you can carry. Even if your character has a strength of 15 or lower he can wear full plate as long as he's not carrying too much else around.

The game mechanics of the Ultima Underworlds don't really reward a stealthy approach, but it's an RPG, one can always use one's imagination.

Also note that your starting skills only influence the very beginning of the game. Once you reach the first shrine, you can increase any skill you want (well, that you know the mantra for).