Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

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akortunov
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Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by akortunov »

As you know, pickpocketing mechanics in Morrowind is pretty broken, and according to OpenMW Research page "shouldn't be used as it is".

Can we add an option to alternate pickpocketing formula? I think it is worth to fix for Thief role playing.
In this case we can use stack weight instead of cost to determine stealing difficulty, as MCP does.

Any ideas?
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Thunderforge
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by Thunderforge »

Are there reasons to keep the vanilla way of pickpocketing? Is it an obvious bug, like prices going up as your Mercantile skill increases? Or is it something that some would want and so we would want a switch for?
bwill
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by bwill »

Ill just post the description from the Morrowind Code Patch fix. It is still sort of a "subjective bug" but I think a lot of people prefer the the MCP fix to vanilla mechanic.
Pickpocket in vanilla Morrowind is a broken mechanic. Any character, no matter what level or stats, has the minimum chance (about 5%) to steal any item valued over 100 septims. An early game thief character with 40 sneak and 60 agility has under 60% probability to steal a 15 septim item from a merchant with minimum countering skill (5 sneak), and is often caught just closing the pickpocket window. This is the easiest scenario, which should be a reliable success of over 90%, and only gets worse when picking an NPC with real sneak skill. Finally, the pickpocket chance is capped at 75%, but is tested both when taking an item and when closing the window. Together this gives a 44% chance of being detected, no matter your skills.

This option re-works the whole pickpocket calculation to be based on weight, and lessens the chances of being detected. It is generally much easier to get started if you choose a thief, and the best things to steal are the lightest - jewellery and gold. You will have to pick your targets carefully, as scouts, other thieves and seasoned adventurers are more likely to notice you. Grabbing anything noticeably heavy such as a weapon, is very likely to give you away. There is no longer a cap on pickpocket chance, and anyone with basic thief skills will not be detected when closing the pickpocket window.
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jvoisin
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by jvoisin »

The vanilla mechanic can be considered as buggy I think.
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akortunov
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by akortunov »

Maybe we can get a decent result without source code patching, something like:

iPickMinChance = 5
iPickMaxChance = 90
fPickPocketMod = 0.01

Results are fine for me: an experienced thief easily can steal items with cost near 1000-2000 from non-thief victims.

The main issue in this case: there is no difference between claymore and and stack of money (a game does not take item weight in account).
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lysol
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by lysol »

I agree that pickpocket should at least have a selectable alternative formula. I tried searching, but couldn't find if Zini has said anything specific about this issue.

@Zini, if you happen to read this thread, is there any reason to only include the broken vanilla behaviour for 1.0?
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silentthief
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by silentthief »

ap0 wrote: 06 Aug 2017, 19:48 The vanilla mechanic can be considered as buggy I think.
http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Morrowind:Sneak --> "Pickpocketing doesn't take your stats into consideration properly, making successful pickpocketing extremely difficult regardless of your Sneak Skill. (PC Only) This bug is fixed by the Morrowind Code Patch." -- it does not identify the formula on this page, nor in that wiki afaict, but the vanilla mechanic is generally considered buggy, and I would agree. The mechanic seemed to make it so that you were almost guaranteed to fail.

ST
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Thunderforge
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by Thunderforge »

Well if vanilla pickpocketing doesn't actually take Sneak into account, that seems like a pretty serious bug that ought to be patched in OpenMW.
JohnMaster
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by JohnMaster »

Probably an opportune time to link to the MCP section on the wiki for all the other changes and mention version 2.4 was released as well.

https://wiki.openmw.org/index.php?title=MCP
http://www.nexusmods.com/morrowind/mods/19510/
http://en.uesp.net/wiki/Tes3Mod:Morrowind_Code_Patch
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akortunov
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Re: Pickpocketing mechanics in OpenMW

Post by akortunov »

pickpocketing doesn't actually take Sneak into account
Actually, does for both PC and target.
There are other problems with default formula:
1) It does not take in account item weight (as in later TES games)
2) Even with high Sneak, Luck, and Agility you will get a decent chance to steal only for items with low cost (50 dr. or so).

The second one can be solved by reducing fPickPocketMod GMST value.
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