Playing In and Running the Thief Campaign (CTH)

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One of the great strengths of the AD&D® game and its attendant campaign worlds is the diversity of character types that will be present, both as NPCs and generally as PCs. The mixture of combat, stealth, sorcery, and spiritual abilities all add to the whole in ways that can help keep the game fresh and imaginative even after many years of play.
However, this should in no way inhibit players with similar interests from creating PCs of the same class. Indeed, there are many situations where such groups make ideal adventuring parties—a small group of captains commanding several companies of soldiers upon a mission of conquest, for example, might all be fighters.
Nowhere does this specialization lend itself so well to a campaign setting as when a band of thieves gather to embark upon missions of stealth. The presence of a fighter, with his heavy boots and clanking armor, can be a serious hindrance to such a group. Characters of all other classes will find sheer surfaces to be serious obstacles, even as the thieves are already scrambling down the far side. And indeed, no character can move so quietly, or remain hidden so effectively, as can a thief.
The tactics discussed in this section do not imply that a campaign must be populated exclusively with player character thieves. Players who wish to run characters of other classes should be able to do so, and the DM should be sure to provide appropriate challenges to all characters. However, if most PCs choose to play thief characters, a variety of adventure opportunities beckon. Additionally, interesting roles and activities for other character classes are easy to generate.
==Wizards Working With Thieves==
Of all the other classes, wizards might best perform with a band of thieves. They have no metal armor or heavy weapons to make noise, and spells such as levitate and silence can provide cover for themselves, and even enhance the abilities of the thieves. Magic users can be found in all alignments, and many have no particular moral qualms about engaging in theft and other illicit activities.
Wizards can provide a variety of useful services to thieves as well. Even at low levels, spells such as sleep, charm person, spider climb, and Tenser's floating disk offer obvious possibilities on a mission of thievery.
Many a thief guild has one or more wizards of low to medium level in its employ, even occasionally among its leadership. Of course, extremely high level wizards generally grow beyond the need for such companionship. High level wizards associated with thieves generally treat the latter as if they were slightly odiferous servants.
==Levels of Magic in the Thieves' Campaign==
Like any good campaign, the level of magic in use is a function of the players' and DM's desires, the cultural setting, and perhaps to an extent the experience levels of the PCs. Much of this decision should be based on the magical capabilities of the PCs (whether or not the thieves have a wizard working with them, for example) and the degree of reward to be gained by overcoming magical challenges.
In general, most challenges to thief PC missions should be found in forms the characters can cope with: mechanical traps instead of magical ones, for example, provide a better gaming obstacle to thieves.
However, a DM can certainly employ magical traps to protect things he doesn't want the PCs to get their hands on. Also, such traps add an element of tension to a mission that helps keep everyone on their toes. A mission of thievery involving an intrusion into the lair of some powerful wizard should always have an air of magical, mysterious danger.
==Multi- or Dual classed Thieves==
Thieves who can also perform the tasks of one or more other character classes also offer clear advantages when accompanying a mission. The fighter/thief, for example, will find many opportunities to wield his sword and perhaps a shield while his stealthy comrades go about their work.
However, thief characters who also exhibit knowledge of another character class will sometimes undergo the scorn and mistrust of their more "pure" comrades. Very rarely will a thief/wizard or thief/cleric rise to a position of prominence in a thieves guild. Fighter/thieves are subject to less prejudice, perhaps because their abilities are clearly understandable to thieves. Fighter/thieves are nonetheless considered by most thieves to be of somewhat lower status than themselves.
==Henchmen and Hirelings of Thieves==
Though thief characters often function as lone wolves, or in small, stealthy groups, they will often have need of the skills, or sometimes simply the reinforcing numbers, of others. Since thiefly activities generally flourish in urban environments, there is usually no shortage of NPCs for the characters to meet and use and henchmen or hirelings.
Hirelings are particularly easy to come by, and can include craftsman and merchants as well as those of the adventuring classes.
Hirelings, however, are not generally trusted with the knowledge of a guild or hideout. They will be contacted in their own place of residence or work, their information or services gained there, and then they will be left by the mysterious thief who disappears into the alleys and backstreets. Even when hirelings are used on a mission, they will often be joined at a rendezvous outside the guild, and left there when the mission is over.
This is not a hard and fast rule, however. Particularly in cases where a guild location is well known, or where hirelings are necessary to the functioning of the guild—there aren't enough PCs and henchmen to maintain a watch, for example—a hireling will be brought into the lair. Of course, generally some effort will be expended describing to the hireling the consequences of his betraying the great amount of trust that has just been shown him. Indeed, in large thieves guilds it is unrealistic to assume that most members will be PCs or the henchmen of those PCs.
Henchmen, of course, are another matter. They will generally be trusted to know almost everything the PC knows. As with any PC, some henchmen might be gained from the ranks of hirelings who have served loyally and bravely through the years.
Ideally, however, the player and DM should give some thought to interesting backgrounds for other henchmen, based specifically on the player character's background. This is especially important if the character adventures in the same city or nation where he spent his childhood and youth. It is likely that some contacts would have been made during that period—contacts that now offer the potential of valuable help to the aggressive young thief.
In the tangled world of the thief, such longrunning relationships are often the best way to develop a trustworthy companion. Players and DMs should combine to define a henchmen character drawn from a PC's background. Such a character should not be too powerful, but should be given a few useful abilities. If the henchmen is of an adventuring class, he should be of lower level than the player character.
==Dens and Hideouts==
Of course, the guildhouse is the most common type of thieves' den, but nearly all thieves will require some sort of secret lair from which to conduct their illicit activities. Dens and guildhouses will vary by size, in relationship to the number of thieves living or working there; and by obscurity, appropriate to the level of secrecy the guild needs to maintain in the community.
Some societies expect thieves to flourish in their midst, and among these cities the guild will often be a large, perhaps even prominent building. Of course, it is not likely to have a sign posted, describing the building's nature, but a few discreet inquiries will usually allow one to discover the guildhall. Its location will certainly be known to the city watch or other law enforcers. Indeed, sometimes a watch captain or lord-mayor might allow a thieves guild to function in a known location simply to keep better tabs on it.
But more often the guildhall's location will be a secret, guarded jealously and ruthlessly by the guild. Likewise, a den or hideout serving as a shelter for a small group of thieves will have a discreet and carefully protected location.
Privacy can be found underground, of course. Subterranean thieves lairs offer the advantage that their presence is easily concealed from the outside world. However, many humans and demi-humans (excluding dwarves, of course) dislike the chilly, damp nature of underground living quarters. Thieves who risk their lives to gain objects of value are not likely to hide their wealth and themselves away in a hole in the ground.
Additionally, the underground lair presents problems in construction. Large amounts of dirt must be hauled away, much labor is required in order to create a lair of any size. Both considerations add major difficulties to the secrecy of lair construction. A wizard with a dig spell, on the other hand, can make the excavation a whole lot easier, but doesn't solve the problem of dirt disposal.
The easiest type of lair to set up is found in some already existing structure, or perhaps group of structures. A long row of town houses, for example, might be interconnected into a single, convoluted guildhouse. Or the attic of some merchant's shop can be taken by a small band to use as a hideout until they can get something better. Of course, if the merchant doesn't know about the thieves, chances of discovery increase dramatically. The best hideouts are buildings inhabited only by thieves, or by thieves and those who are in league with them.
In some cities it will be necessary for the hideout to maintain some kind of cover. Perhaps it is enough that the neighbors think it abandoned. Maintaining this appearance requires diligence on the part of the thieves, however, for a pattern of noise or light detected from the "abandoned" house will be sure to arouse suspicions.
If a cover is necessary, often a cooperative merchant or craftsman will labor in part of the house, maintaining the pretense of a place of business. Such a worker might even be a thief, but unless he can put forth a reasonable appearance of knowing his cover occupation, the craftsman and the hideout can both be in danger.
Guildhouses and dens may also be maintained as private residences. Such locales are not so likely to be visited by strangers as are cover locations in places of business. However, the residents of the house will probably be known to the neighbors, at least by sight. Large numbers of strangers may give rise to suspicion.
The hideout should ideally have several entrances, at least one of which is a block or two away from the actual den. A large guildhouse will have several such access points, usually connected via underground passages or secret corridors passing through surrounding buildings.
Thus, in a secret guild, the number of people entering and leaving the hall will not be visible to neighbors or other observers. Indeed, if an access route is sufficiently torturous, a visitor can be brought into the guild without being shown the building's exact location. He might know nothing more than that the guild is within several blocks of a certain alley where he stepped through a secret trapdoor in the ground.
A major guildhall will also have several built-in traps to deter unwelcome intruders. If enough thieves man the lair (more than a dozen or so), a full-time watch will be maintained.
Only the most permanent of thieves' dens will have a built-in vault or storage chamber for the loot. When such a chamber exists it is only used for the temporary storage of objects that cannot quickly be fenced. Thieves know only to well that such storage sites are all too easily penetrated. It is much more likely that the thieves will maintain their hoard in some other, nearby but secret location. Of course, thieves who are very brazen about their activities, or very confident that they face no competition in a given locale, may well keep large amounts of valuables in their guildhall. Such a hoard might even be a source of pride to the guild, a sort of challenge to the unwary.