Pickpocketing

[Robert]

Pickpocket option! A chance of failing, reduced by certain intruments, and if it fails, you still get the item possibly, but it shows up on the events screen! Just run through a city stealing everything and continue!

[The Industriallist]

Pickpocket option! A chance of failing, reduced by certain intruments, and if it fails, you still get the item possibly, but it shows up on the events screen! Just run through a city stealing everything and continue!

Pickpocketing might be a decent feature. But you've just given the best reason why it might not be as well. Stupid random thieves don't need to be any more annoying.

[Spider]

Pickpocketing a crossbow and iron shield, happy day

[Agar]

What you all should be doing is lying to people about why you need a bunch of steel (we're making a boat, honest! No wait, a container!) then getting some 'associates' to come with you, make a handful of crowbars, find a van, do some carjacking / joyriding.

[The Industriallist]

Carjacking is dangerous...you'd better have an escape path of navigable roads. Tandem bikes are much safer.

[Agar]

But how many people can you have helping with a lockpicking project? And you need to drag the current occupants, if any, out. Once you've done that, can your associates all fit on that tandem bike?

Or do you want to steal a van?

[Revanael]

Vans are so much better than tandem bikes. Though... I'd love to get a half-dozen characters together and go screaming round the main island on dirt motorbikes... Though I've only seen one on the whole island, so far.

[Robert]

Pickpocket a ton of iron. Like they wouldn't notice THAT! Oh, and it would add realism to the game for crooks to be that much more annoying, and maybe add in a variable of weight.

[NetherSpawn]

If pickpocketing were a project rather than an immediate interaction, it would get around the primary problem of it being too easy.

Also, you could make failure chance be based on the weight of what you are trying to pickpocket (crossbows are pretty big), possibly with some other factor involved if someone can come up with a pickpocketing tool.

[SekoETC]

Pickpocketing a crossbow? No way! That's far too big. Now if it was called robbing and not pickpocketing, maybe then, but the victim (if not suffering from the sleeping sickness) would surely notice and fight back. So the thief pulls the item away and the victim tries to pull it back. When the project is on, they cannot attack but others can attack them and if one gets hit, he or she automatically lets go. Or maybe the damage must be more than one or two points.

[NetherSpawn]

You can't deny characters the right to attack because someone is trying to rob them. That's just insane.
Plus, one person tries to swipe the crossbow, the other punches the crossbow holder. You get to steal the crossbow merely by nature of having two people.

[SekoETC]

Yeah that's why there's the limit. It would need to be more than bare fist. And after the weapon is gone, the victim can attack them both (if they have not run away).

[The Industriallist]

So two people with one longbow could take two items from every person in town? Or at least every unshielded person and every person who failled to block, if you could block with a shield someone was trying to take away.

Pickpocketing in cantr would presumably be made less effective than IRL, not more so.

Also, this mechanic would mean that the larger army could always win by surprise attack - have a bunch of grunts grab everyone's weapon or shield and then have a couple extra people to provide injuries.

[SekoETC]

Oh, I forgot about that stupid thing... If Cantr was realistic then of course everybody would notice someone being robbed in the middle of their city and there could be no extra attacks. Or then people could set autodefend on themselves and some people they consider friends.

[NetherSpawn]

Actually, in real life, it is possible to steal things in broad daylight without anyone noticing. I prefer this to struggling with someone over control of their item.
Autodefend just guarantees the attacker the advantage, unless he misses. The defender is injured when he/she retaliates.
Finally, in real life, you could just hit the other character in the back of the head with a billy club. Then they'd be totally at your mercy. The attacker almost always wins in reality, at least if he's not expected.