Thief fan missions and campaigns

[Unkillable Cat]

A competition is due to land with its entries soon, but in the meantime a first-time Taffer released his virgin T2 FM called "The Greyquarter Heist" and considers it a Christmas present for the Thief-community.

And what a whopper of a present it is!

A part of town is on high lockdown by the coppers, but Garrett has been hired to pilfer an alchemist living there for his most prized possessions. Your sources suggest getting in via the sewers... but they forgot to fill you in on the details.

Like, for example, how this is one of the tightest cityscapes that adheres to the OM-style of missions. This isn't skacky type-cityscapes (it's a bit closer to Melan stuff) but it's still surprisingly massive. I played it for two hours straight and didn't even break the surface during all that time, there was so much to see and do underground!

It's not without its faults, though. There are a few minor technical glitches around (watch how locks you're picking remain still sometimes) and this FM has a COLOSSAL amount of keys to gather... and what's worse, almost all of them are hidden in sneaky places! Do you remember the old Incentive-games that used the Freescape-engine? How you had to conform to back-breaking positions to be able to see (and grab) some keys? That's your starting point here. Check EVERY surface, under EVERY frobbable, NOWHERE is sacred ground to hide a key! There's even a key where you have to crank up the lights to 11 just to see it. On Expert-level there's a steep loot amount, but let me tell you - the real loot amount in this FM is almost twice that number! And 16 secrets! There is content here for DAYS of taffing!

Merry Christmas taffers! Your package is a big one this year!

 

[Curratum]

this FM has a COLOSSAL amount of keys to gather... and what's worse, almost all of them are hidden in sneaky places!

I've never been turned off from something I was getting excited for.

There is nothing in Thief mission that I hate more than keys in retarded locations.

 

[Curratum]

Allright, Taffers! I have been collecting a bunch of FMs over the years, weeding out stuff that didn't grab me within the first 30 or so minutes.

I am posting my list of FMs that I liked enough within this first 30 minutes to keep installed / around. I have finished maybe 50-60% of them, definitely not all. Does that stop me from looking for more? Definitely not!

I would like to ask you discerning gentlemen to recommend any other good FMs that I'm missing. I'm not very picky about visuals but I'd like the FMs to look at least as good as the stock levels in the official games.

Thank you in advance! Here is what I already have:

 

[prengle]

Allright, Taffers! I have been collecting a bunch of FMs over the years, weeding out stuff that didn't grab me within the first 30 or so minutes.

I am posting my list of FMs that I liked enough within this first 30 minutes to keep installed / around. I have finished maybe 50-60% of them, definitely not all. Does that stop me from looking for more? Definitely not!

I would like to ask you discerning gentlemen to recommend any other good FMs that I'm missing. I'm not very picky about visuals but I'd like the FMs to look at least as good as the stock levels in the official games.

Thank you in advance! Here is what I already have:

nooooooooooooo you have to play every single fm on darkfate/thiefmissions.com/wherever the fuck fms are hosted now in sequential order!!

 

[Psych0sis]

The contest missions are now released, with more to follow hopefully. The dry spell is over.

https://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=151009

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Just finished trying out "Alcazar".

HOLY TAFFIN' HECK that was fun. Judging by how much loot I missed out on, I must have overlooked a whole area - but the way this thing is constructed, that's pretty much guaranteed.

 

[Melan]

That mission is a thing of beauty. It is also at 30,000 cells - 2000 below limit - despite being a limited-area footprint mission.

 

[Icewater]

nooooooooooooo you have to play every single fm on darkfate/thiefmissions.com/wherever the fuck fms are hosted now in sequential order!!

this but unironically

 

[Curratum]

Just finished trying out "Alcazar".

HOLY TAFFIN' HECK that was fun. Judging by how much loot I missed out on, I must have overlooked a whole area - but the way this thing is constructed, that's pretty much guaranteed.

Could not pickpocket the merchant, blackjacked a guard clean only to have him aggro on me. Deleted, sadly.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

... go reinstall and restart it, and try not being such a taffing idiot around the merchant next time.

(Also, there's a second Merchant Key and you can get into his house without needing either one of them. It's just for the front door.)

 

[Curratum]

... go reinstall and restart it, and try not being such a taffing idiot around the merchant next time.

(Also, there's a second Merchant Key and you can get into his house without needing either one of them. It's just for the front door.)

I waited for the merchant to enter the tavern and tried pickpocketing him from eleven different angles. How about you try not being a butthurt prick about this? Is this your FM, did I insult your work, what's with the prickly butthurt?

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I'm not being butthurt, I'm being very disappointed in you. My stake is not being the author (both of them are reading this BTW) but watching a fellow Thief-player making an ass of himself.

If you had taken a moment to "case the joint" that is the tavern and the nearby locale, you would have realized that they're all friendly. Including the guard, who even greets you.

Here's a suggestion for Alcazar: leave the people at the tavern alone, go outside and look around. You'll soon find the merchant's house and you have the foreknowledge that you can get in another way. Find it. Then go take a look in the merchant's basement. You should be able to figure things out from there.

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Meanwhile, I wrapped up "The Turning of the Leaves". nicked returns and delivers a very fine mission overall... but at the same time this constant feel of annoyance kept looming overhead.

Navigating this is a bit tricky, but nicked anticipated this and created a very good and very understandable in-game map that updates itself. (There's even a bonus objective if you fill out the entire map.) Readables and dialogue are both top-notch, and the temple has this sense of dread around it. Overall I enjoyed myself...

...but there were three points that bothered me, to the point that I had to sleep on them and try again in the morning. The first one is a particular puzzle involving rotating some things to unlock a hidden panel. Finding those things is easy enough, especially as a readable (and portable!) clue is provided. The troubles start when simply doing as the note says doesn't yield any immediate results. This led me (and will probably lead others as well) into overthinking the problem. Is the clue provided explaining the current set-up, or a planned future setup that hasn't been implemented yet? Do the rotating things need to be pointed precisely as instructed, or merely in the general direction? Does this FM require the newest scripts, because nothing is happening. Then I went to bed, woke up this morning and gave it another go and there's a button over there in the room that needs to be pressed afterwards.

(If there's any reason for a fix for this, one suggestion is easy: Change the readable from being a straight-up note on the counter to being a crumpled-up one on the floor somewhere, indicating that the note's contents are a past issue that has been dealt with.)

Then there's the flowers. There are lots of flowers to pick up in this FM, and they even respawn so that you never run out. They act as reagents so that you can mix at least one potion that serves some purpose, and possibly some others (why would the flowers respawn otherwise?). At least that's the general vibe I get, but then I'm forced to check the official TTLG-thread because I'm carrying half a flowershop in my bottomless pants and I haven't even found a recipe to mix, let alone anyplace to do so. It's supposed to be in a secret room in the hideout and "should be rather obvious once you see it"... but then I'm clearly missing the obvious, because I can't find it. I'm currently at the half-way mark with the secrets, but clearly that isn't good enough. What's bothering me is this: If this feature of the FM is made so apparent, why is so much effort being made to completely hide it away? I get the part where keeping some of it hidden to encourage the player to go look for it, but giving some clues should be a start, because I wouldn't be surprised if you get players who go through this FM, realize that they can pick up all these flowers and think "Oh, that's nice" and then don't give a second thought about it at all until it's all over... because they have no reason to think they're useful. Even if they stumble across the 'problem' they're supposed to solve.

The third part concerns the end, oddly enough. "Find a warm, safe and dry place" seems easy enough for an Exit Objective. There's even a fireplace there that accepts firewood and means to start the fire, but in truth this part doesn't matter because starting the fire is filed under one of the three Bonus Objectives, instead of being part of the Exit Objective. The troubles start if you decide to do this anyway, because if you've completed all other objectives except start the fire, the mission ends before you can do anything. It seems pointless, to be honest.

 

[Curratum]

I'm frankly amazed by your desire to invest so much time and effort into an experience you are overall unhappy with.

To my mind, there are way too many good FMs and good different games altogether to self-hypnotize oneself into thinking you need to fully experience every FM, no matter how many quirks and problems it has.

 

[Scrounger]

It's the difference between the nice and possibly bothersome mission! :D
Nick likes to update and hone his skills and a critical eye is always a good thing here! And for every future taffer also...

Anyway, it's really sad to leave the Alcazar unfinished. It didn't brake your rule of 10-15 minutes (I hope, but still..) and mission is so sweet and cool!
From design point it's not at all difficult or meta-hard like some more known FMs.

 

[Scrounger]

In any case, as you said, there are many cool missions so pick whatever you feel like!

I've started to play FMs during lockdowns and it was very cool experience in my limited gaming time, until now of course!
I will add some cool missions that I played in the list which were not mentioned that much. Some brief reviews also!

 

[Curratum]

It's the difference between the nice and possibly bothersome mission! :D
Nick likes to update and hone his skills and a critical eye is always a good thing here! And for every future taffer also...

Anyway, it's really sad to leave the Alcazar unfinished. It didn't brake your rule of 10-15 minutes (I hope, but still..) and mission is so sweet and cool!
From design point it's not at all difficult or meta-hard like some more known FMs.

If you're alluding to Into the Odd, I can't stand its guts! :D

 

[Unkillable Cat]

Wrapped up "A Midnight's Summer Heist", a mansion-affair break-in from the sewers.

It ticks off all the boxes, does everything right, does nothing wrong, looks pretty as a peach and yet... it doesn't stand out, at least compared to the previous two entries.

 

[Curratum]

I swear to god, you get off on some weird stuff, you guys...

To me, "A Midsummer Night's Heist" was easily the best mission in the competition so far, with very little competition.

"Sinister Night" felt a completely pitch black pointless slog with a tacky usable lantern and

Spoiler

Amnesia monster reskinned ratmen or god knows what

. Saw two floors of empty, tiny rooms with new props and pitch blackness everywhere before I gave up.
I wanted to like "The Turning of the Leaves" but I couldn't finish it or enjoy my time with it an awful lot, largely because of the flower inventory you mentioned and the extreme tightness of most spaces, contest limits notwithstanding.
"The Perdurance" I played until I hit the

Spoiler

big pitch black possibly invincible super-monster

. I don't like missions with BPBPISMs in them, at all. The detail and ruined interiors were quite nice but that's it for me.

I did give "Alcazar" another go and I'm enjoying it a lot more so far, lovely detailing and atmosphere, will probably post back once I finish it. Still think the unpickpocketable merchant is just bad, as it contradicts a universal game mechanic that all missions and FMs share.

I don't see how in the face of this sort of competition you could write such a deflated post about Midnight Summer Heist.

I won't lie, I'm pretty triggered because the MSH is very obviously made by the guy who made one of my all-time favorite FMs, the visual style, texturing and those sewers are unmistakable, but still...

Edit: I had imagined the submissions were anonymous like before, but they aren't, I'm just blind. To my eyes, MSH rips Heart of Bohn so hard in terms of texture use and visuals, it would be grounds for a lawsuit if those were commercial games, not mods. But hey, Heart of Bohn is one of my favorite T2 FMs, so I'm not complaining at all! :D

 

[Unkillable Cat]

I've had a run through all the *current* entries so far, I'll withhold further comment until the other entries are in and I've given them a go. But then I'm rating all of them. And for those despairing, what you've read here previously (with the exception of "Turning of the Leaves", which more and more sounds like I nailed in the first shot) is just initial thoughts, first reactions. More detailed impressions will be coming later.

 

[Curratum]

Right. Got round to playing Alzacar properly. Finished it on Hard in just under an hour. What a wild ride that was!

Just the use of space, the layouts, the imaginative locations and the connectivity and verticality of this thing makes me want to rate it higher than Midsummer Night's Heist, and I'd usually take a vanilla mansion heist over undead any day, but my god, Alcazar is so good!

Thank you, Unkillable Cat for making me play it properly!

 

[Mechs Delight]

Yes, I am quite surprised by how much I've enjoyed "Alcazar," especially since one of the preview shots I saw resembled something from the dreaded "Into the Odd."

I really like the ideas of both "The Perdurance" and "The Turning of the Leaves," but I felt a bit turned off by the former by the "mechanical mummies," and the latter had too many flowers and (probably due to contest limitations) feels a bit short and compressed for its material.

I've just barely started "A Midsummer Night's Heist," but at least it looks very nice, and have no real burning desire to play Terra's mission (never liked his missions before).

 

[Mechs Delight]

Played through most of "Heist," and while it's nothing innovative, it's a well-done, stylish mansion with a few quite amusing readables.

 

[Max_b5]

A Midnight Summer's Heist is clearly (well, I think so) inspired by Mystic Gems 2: Heart of Bohn, and the excellent Heist Society. People who enjoyed both of those can have a good time with this one.

 

[Curratum]

A Midnight Summer's Heist is clearly (well, I think so) inspired by Mystic Gems 2: Heart of Bohn, and the excellent Heist Society. People who enjoyed both of those can have a good time with this one.

"Inspired" is putting it mildly, I'm seeing literally the same texture pairings and the sewers are the same, down to the shape of the triangular arches and same non-stock textures.