Thieves' Guild/Training

The Thieves' Guild, unlike most other guilds, is geared towards training. After expanding the guild with capers, a wide range of training opportunities open up with a lot of earning potential. Training in the guild is fun and can be fast with determination and dedication.

Training in the Guild
The fastest way to get experience and hankies is with a blackjack, but if you don't think you can loot a single victim fast enough you can try the chests for experience. However, blackjack training is still the fastest method for obtaining hankies.



Pickpocketing
One can pickpocket the pickpocketing trainer or pickpocketing volunteer to get one hanky point and thieving xp (changes according to a player's thieving level) for each successful pickpocket. If the player fails, the trainer will hit them for 1 LP (this damage is all but inconsequential, so there should be no need for food). It is possible to still pickpocket the trainer after maximum amount of points has been acquired, although obviously, without gain. When you fail to pickpocket successfully, the pickpocketing trainer will say, "No, no, not like that," while the pickpocketing volunteer will say, "Spotted you."

Chest Looting
There is a small jail hallway with 6 Practice Chests. The chests on the north side will always give blue handkerchiefs and 30 Thieving experience when opened. (Prior to the 25 May 2010 update, these chests gave 120 Thieving experience when opened.) The chests on the south side will always give red handkerchiefs (if you have done the first caper) and 180 experience (although they require a lockpick to crack). The doors to the chests will close after 5 minutes and can be reopened for experience. North side doors will give 210 Thieving experience, while the south side will give 280 (also requiring a lockpick). A player can continue looting the chests and opening doors even if the player already has the maximum amount of Hanky Points.

South side hourly experience is approximately 70K per hour. This is based on 3 hours with a player that normally opens the door with competition.

Safecracking
After a player completes two capers in the Guild, they may practice cracking safes. Every safe that is cracked grants the player 1 hanky point and 75 thieving experience. Failing to crack a safe results in the player being temporarily stunned by rubber spikes from the ground. Due to the slow speed of safecracking, it is not suggested to use this as a means of obtaining experience or hankies. It should also be noted that stethoscopes, bought from Martin Thwait's Store in the Rogues' Den, can be used on the wallsafes and will decrease the chance of being caught.

Blackjacking
After two miniquests after the quest is complete, a player may practice pickpocketing with the use of blackjacks. To do this, right-click on one of the cosh instructers/volunteers while wielding a rubber blackjack (rubber blackjacks can be bought at the Guild store (after The Feud quest) for 1 gp) or a Rubber Chicken and select "Lure" to distract them. (Be sure to click both 'Click here to continue' lines in the resulting conversation, or the lure will not occur.) Once they are distracted, you can select "Knock-out" to render them unconscious with the blackjack and allowing you to loot their body. It is possible to loot the victim multiple times before they regain consciousness. 4 Hanky points and thieving experience are earned for each loot (the amount of thieving experience received depends on your thieving level), so this is a very fast way to get hanky points AND experience, as multiple loots (up to 4, with skill and timing) are possible.

Hanky points and experience rewards
The maximum hanky points and the experience per point are both affected by the player's Thieving level. Succeeding at a thieving task reveals a blue or red hanky, depending on the difficulty of the task. Blue hankies are worth 1 hanky point; red hankies are worth 4 hanky points. You can collect up to your maximum hanky points for the week, hand them in for the reward, and then collect up to your maximum hanky points again but you will have to wait until the next week to claim the reward for them (The option becomes available once more after the seventh 00:00 (UTC) has passed since the last collection). Once you have your maximum amount of hanky points, you can continue the activities to gain more experience but, each time you succeed, you will get a message saying, "You have reached the maximum amount of hanky points you are allowed at your level." To find out how many hanky points you have, or to trade your points in for the experience reward, speak to any of the trainers or volunteers, or right click certain trainers or volunteers and select the 'Check-points' option (not all trainers and volunteers have this right-click option, however).

Note: Hankies are not items that go in your inventory, they are just mentioned in the chat log. For example, in the southern (more challenging) pickable chests: "There is a single red handkerchief inside." This is probably because the user replaces the hanky after they take them.

Teaching Darren
By asking Darren Lightfinger to pickpocket the dummy next to him, he is amazed by your skills and asks you to teach him some pickpocketing. After agreeing, pickpocket the dummy until the character says "Now relax.", and continue the conversation. The reward for this is one-time 2,000 Thieving experience. This is very useful at low level thieving, and highly recommended, as there is no chance of failing.