Active Ability details for Steal  

You have to be 75 to unlock Aura Steal, but when i got it i went from using Steal once every blue-moon to using it everytime its up. Steal = fun again!

Factors:
*Level of THF job in relation to mob (big success increase as mob becomes EM or less)
*Steal+ gear (especially important vs. EM or higher, but also very useful for anything that gives exp and possibly TW+)
*Positioning around mob (being behind helps, but only if the mob is Sight-based.)
*Hide (pretty sure only if Rogue Ring is equipped)
*Moon phase. Full moon good, New moon bad.

Things I haven't tested:
*In or out of combat, but from experience i'd say this isn't a factor. Although I could see an out-of-combat steal vs and unagroing Sound-based mob helping your success.
*sleeping mob. If it is true, it would help get a much needed edge over Sound-based mobs.

1) Steal is the ability to get items from mobs, and your best bet for stealing is from beastmen (gobs, yags, orcs and NMs), all of which will provide you with a steady stream of plain, silver, mythril, gold or platinum beastcoins. But you can steal from many other mobs.

2) INT does not help steal. Interview with SE confirmed this. Probably does help with coffer and chest picking.

3) + Steal: Rabbit charm; AF gear; thief's kotes (lvl 70), rogue's ring (activate when in red if I recall correctly). Do the quest in Bastok for the key ring belt (Steal +1, plus skele keys on demand). Bart's Knife.

4) Had more success with stealing when in battle with the mob. Definite increase in drop rate. Rate of success drops rapidly when mob's level is greater than thief's level.

5) On thief forum, I posted a question on what helps, and the only answer I got that seems to make sense is a greater percentage of steals on earthday. As I seem to recall, steal is a wind-based ability, so if earthday is good for results, iceday is probably crappy.

6) Once one thief successfully steals from the mob, that depletes its inventory of snatchable stuff; second thief trying to steal from the same mob will come up empty.

7) To know when steal or mug are available again, use Recast: My recast macro was:

/recast "Steal"
/recast "Mug"
/recast "Flee"
/recast "Sneak Attack"
/recast "Trick Attack"
/recast "Perfect Dodge"

Edited, Apr 19th 2008 5:54pm by CRJR

Tons of good feedback here, however i see one question unadressed that i would like confirmed. What stat governs Steal>.> I have a 73RDM bud that says he ran into a site that confirmed it was INT based,giving taru thf's and defenite easier time with Maat fight. Please someone confirm this "only" if u know for sure :P thanks

Steal is one of the best traits ever... i'm a THF 54 right now and my static party is fighting spiders. During battle I can use steal and have a chance at stealing spider webs wich sell for a lot. Also another thing my 64 THF friend fights high lvl beastmen in his party wich he can steal gold beastcoins from. So as a suggestions to THF's use steal in partys to make lots of gil!!

One thing I thought was interesting was that when you steal from tigers, depending on what area the tiger is in, you can get different items. For instance, tigers in Jugner Forest yield G.Sheep Meat, tigers in Battalia Downs yield land crab meat, and tigers in Sauromougue Champaign yield cockatrice meat. I guess they're trying to show you what the tiger eats in each area.

So I am a 55SAM/WAR, but I farm with a THF sub for obvious reasons. Whenever I am going to steal from a mob, I always try to approach from behind, and have Sneak Attack activated. I have never really taken down any stats or gone through and methodically tested this, but it definitely SEEMS to me that SA and approaching from behind increases my success rate with steal. I have also noticed that what day it is seems to have a very dramatic effect on success rate as well. Has anyone else noticed any of these things? Just thought I would toss it out there for everyone to ponder and maybe try themselves. Next time I make a serious farming run, I will try to pin down what days seem good and what days seem not-so-good.

edit: changed some wording

Edited, Sat Feb 5 17:03:25 2005

I just recently started Thief, and I just happened to have a 4 leaf mandragora bud handy. After eating one, I can definately say it increases the success rate of steal.

... Ok

It initiates combat wether you fail or succeed
The exact stats that affect it are unknown, but the chance goes up with level
It steal gil not items
It has a chance to steal from basically any monster with few exceptions
Position does affect chance
Time it during combat for during there attack will raise chances

Too bad you can't steal the enemy's weapon so it can't kill your party ;)

Edited, Sun Jun 13 01:06:09 2004

is there a way to macro steal so when u use it, it gives an echo message when u can use is again 5 mins later?
the /wait macro line can only be 20 secs max. so that aint going to work i think. any other commands that makes it able to wait 5 mins?

what i would like to know is what stats affect STEAL. i have read on some posts agility, and even intelligence (though this seems doubtful.) i have tried DEX and AGI boost items but don't seem to notice more successes in steal. do we get a set number of STEAL ability at certain levels and only rabbit charm (lvl 7) or thief's gloves (only available to thfs of very high lvls) can boost it? any info would be appreciated.

It will steal all kinds of wierd stuff, I know you can get some rabbit meat off rarabs, and you get pebbles from worms easy. I usually reserve it for Madragora/Pygmaioi, Fungars and Beastmen in that order.

Yes it initiates combat... or makes the mob attack you at least. So far in my 8 levels of thieving (and 3 of having steal and using it every 5 minuets) I have been unable to steal from trees, birds or lizards. I got a few beastcoins from Quadavs and a fishing rod from a Fisher, but no luck with normal monsters.

Does anyone know about how often steal works, does it just steal gil, does it initiate combat if you fail?