The Potential Adventures of Brambit the Theif

[Vroqren]

Hello again everyone, I'm back for another playthrough (Once I actually finish my current one)!
I've had such a fun time playing as the pacifist Qui-Gon, that I'm going to attempt a greater pacifist, and only get the 1 necessary kill: General Ghorrs.

My plan for this character is to make him a thief with no weapons, who simply sneaks past everything. I will use the plasma wand on Ghorrs.
Here's what I've got planned so far:
1. Roll a 15 in END, CON, and DEX. Others are unimportant. All attribute points throughout the game will go into these.
2. Become an Agnostic Rouge, in order to start with, instead of a weapon, the ability to pick locks.
3. Put all of my skill points into Mercantile.
4. Buy every invisibility potion I come across.
5. Make my way, invisible the whole way, through the theives arcadia.
6. Train all skills Zeblin teaches to 8, then read book for all.
That's about as far as I've got. While looking for information though, I've run into some problems and questions, that I was hoping you could answer:

Even after looking at the topic on Hide in Shadows and Move Silently, I have been unable to actually learn their uses, and put them to my advantage.
Which skills does what, and which will be more useful to sneak past every enemy in the game? Should I try to balance them, or train one higher than the other, etc.

While reading up on the best way to meet the challenges I found a couple of posts that scare me. They mentioned some stuff about doors not being openable in Talushorn without the right key.
Not sure if I read it right, but just to make it clear, are there any doors that are part of the main quest line, that there is no way to open with pick locks? I have no qualms with throwing rocks or bashing stuff with an untrained weapon penalty, but is there anywhere that requires me to get a kill to advance?

Thanks in advance guys! I'll probably start this playthrough as soon as I finish watching the final cutscene for Qui-Gon.

[Randomizer]

You might want to get a decent Perception to help find traps.

Fathamurk is the only place where there are doors that can only be opened by killing things. You need to kill two monsters for candecium dust and the golem for the candecium jewel.

All doors that require keys can be picked with enough lockpicking skill and dexterity. There is the door on the lowest level of Hammerlorne that has to be battered down.

Hide in Shadows can work better than invisibility at high enough levels and in relative darkness. I take torches to increase darkness.

Move Silently is also needed if you wear armor. You don't need as much without armor.

[Vroqren]

Awesome, thanks a ton.
I had never even thought of taking torches (probably because I've never played with HiS, go figure), but that's brilliant.
Just to get this correct, if I'm not planning on wearing any armor (except for bells), I don't need Move Silently?

I, unfortunately, will not be attempting Fathamurk on this playthrough, but it's good to know that there aren't any necessary game kills other than Ghorrs. Unless... I know there's another key into Hammerlorne, but does your plot line advance without killing Sparrow? I know you complete that quest and gain the next one when you kill her, is there a way around that?

EDIT: I just realized, I've never actually betrayed Darus, what skills can Zeblin train? I would think Pick Locks, Skullduggery, HiS, are there any others, or was I wrong on any?

[Randomizer]

I don't remember, but I think the Move Silently level you need decreases significantly without armor. At least to a trainable level.

There was a bug in the first released version that the game wouldn't advance past getting the Crux of Fire if you didn't kill Sparrow, but that got fixed. Now you can steal a key in Durmore or pick the lock to enter Hammerlorne.

Zeblin trains Pick Locks, Hide in Shadows, and Move Silently. No one teaches Skullduggery, but there is a book and light armor gloves.

[Painted Lady]

Is Qui-Gon able to level up occasionally? As a pacifist does he kill things like Sentinal Stalks, etc.?

[Lord_P]

You have to kill Mor-something-beholder-thing and his red-colored friend in Lorewitch if you want the Plasma Wand. Also, Ghorr's armor is resistant to plasma damage, so the wand won't do much.

[Lord_P]

How much skill do you need to pick a level 10 lock?

[Randomizer]

From: http://www.basiliskgames.com/forums/vie ... =12&t=3512

Lock picking formula:
Chance to pick% = pick locks skill level * 3 + dexterity/3 + 50 - Lock Level * 10
Maximum success rate is 99%, minimum success rate is 1%

So for a level 10 lock:
Chance to pick% = pick locks skill level * 3 + dexterity/3 - 50

From your build description you will probably get dexterity over 30 so you will need pick lock skill over 15 with items. You can swap items to improve pick locks and dexterity just for the lock.

[Vroqren]

Wow, I left for the week, and useful stuff happened! This is awesome thanks guys.
I didn't even know it was possible to get into the final chamber without killing ghorrs. That means I've got a new goal: 0 kill game.

Anything that counts as a 'kill', as far as the game is concerned (even sentinel stalks) will not be done.

[Vroqren]

Sorry for the double post: I just thought I'd let you all know that I will once again be out of town until Thursday, with no wi-fi, so Qui-Gon and Brambit will have to wait.