THE DARK MOD

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Mission 1: A New Job

 

LOOT LIST

VIDEO REPORT

 

 

Although there is no official campaign for this mod, this is the mission recommended for new players, after finishing the training mission. It’s a short, but nice introduction on how to apply your skills in a real burglary situation. Nothing special, but good enough to be enjoyable. I found all the loot on the first playthrough also, which doesn’t happen too often. I am slowly but surely taking a real liking to The Dark Mod. Seeing as it is 14 years old now, it’s about time.

 

 

All I had to do was break into the Canonbury Tavern and steal Rothwick’s ruby collection. There was also a 640 loot requirement, before finally meeting my contact in Royston Court. Besides that I wanted to get used to and experiment quite a bit with enemy alert levels. The biggest difference between TDM and Thief is their ‘Suspicious’ level, which includes two types of alerts; a first alert with only verbal remarks like in Thief, but also a more severe type of alert where they give a verbal cue, but also stops to look for you. This last one isn’t the same as hunt mode in Thief, because they don’t leave their route or station, but they are suspicious enough to take the time to look. As of writing this report, we are still unsure whether this latter type of alert should be allowed for regular Ghost or not. All alert types are disallowed for Supreme, which is my preferred mode.

 

Streets

I started in a side alley south of the tavern. A homeless guy close by didn’t alert to my presence in any way that impacted ghosting. I had to pass through a small plaza just west of here, and I assume the intended way through was mantling onto a large pipe by stacking one of the smaller crates. For Supreme, this crate would have to be returned and there was no way of doing that and still end the mission later. Experimenting a bit, I found I could instead jump to the pipe directly from a barrel with a bag on top of it (left image below). The mantling action is different, but much better, in TDM. If the mantle is difficult, Garrett takes a bit longer to pull himself up. This is more realistic, but can also be misleading, because at first it seems like you won’t make it.

 

 

 

After listening to the guards and dropping to the street level around the tavern, I played around with alert levels some. I had previously downloaded a Stealth Statistic tool made by Dragofer, found here. This makes it possible to check your stealth statistics from a radable in your inventory. It updated real time, which was just perfect to gauge what guards allowed or not. Both alert levels 1 and 2 triggered the ‘Suspicious’ category of the document. The only way to distinguish it further was to read the end statistics when finishing the mission. You can cheat your way there prematurely by pulling up the console (ctrl+alt+tilde) and writing ‘tdm_end_mission’, sort of like the ctrl+shift+alt+end cheat in Thief.

 

Only one piece of loot existed on this side of the tavern; a ring in a bird’s nest in the west alley. I mantled up a few overhangs and a nearby wooden roof to get closer. There was a small pipe crossing the streets below that had to be traversed. Dropping onto the pipe made a lot of noise, but mantling up it did not. There is no silent outer edge of surfaces in TDM, so mantling thus becomes a more important ability in this regard. To get back from the top pipe without alerts, I had to do a running jump all the way to the wooden roof (right image above). This made noise, but not enough to trigger any alerts if the patrollers were far away.

 

The side door to the basement was the intended way into the tavern, but it was pickable and not possible to relock. The front door, however, was unlocked, and it was no problem to sneak in behind the helmeted sentry’s back unseen.

 

The Canonbury Tavern

I headed upstairs straight away, after reading the guest log. The lone guard up there was wearing an eye patch; the game even made an audio cue about it. I assumed that meant he was blind on his left side, and indeed he was. He stopped at either end of the hallway, plus directly outside room III. I snuck in after him as he headed down to the end and slipped into Rothwick’s chambers (room IV). The sir was sleeping, but woke up if I stepped too loudly. His loot-filled footlocker was pickable, but the key on his belt also worked. In those cases, Supreme requires relocking it, and since I wanted to avoid the unnecessary lockpick count, I snagged the key from his snoring side. It was stuck to my inventory and couldn’t be dropped, just like many keys in Thief. I’m not sure if I could’ve replaced it without waking him up. He didn’t hear any sounds from the footlocker or the cabinet, but as pointed out in Galaer’s ghost report, he does “alert” to opening the secretary desk. The only reason I could confirm this was from the stealth statistics document. Rothwick neither woke up, nor made any verbal or physical remarks of any kind. Closing the desk didn’t trigger any further alerts, nor did opening it a second time. This is thus a type of alert unique to TDM, one that never would’ve been detected in Thief, and one that without the stealth tool would’ve been near impossible to know where came from. I suspect this to be poor coding of the engine rather than a proper alert worthy of a Supreme bust. I’m not sure if there is a property in the editor that determines whether sleeping enemies will give alerts of type 1 or not. Perhaps not.

 

After discussing this situation with Galaer on the forums, he claimed he had been able to pass Rothwick’s room without any alerts at all. I had a hard time believing this, but I went back to try nonetheless. Voila! He was right indeed! When I triggered the alert earlier, it must’ve been from my feet tapping on the wood and not from the desk. If you move without creeping, even in the slightest, an alert will trigger in the stats. As long as you hold creep, you are good, but you must keep creep pressed until after letting go of run forward. As  you can see from the screenshot below to the left, I have obtained the diary from the desk without any alerts whatsoever.

 

 

 

I haven’t found a way to eavesdrop on doors in TDM yet, so I had to guess a bit when leaving Rothwick’s room. Or perhaps it’s just not as effective, as I didn’t hear much of a volume increase leaning into the door. I grabbed the loot from room III also and headed back downstairs. The innkeeper’s room wasn’t that tough as long as I creep-crouched. I could mantle over his bed unseen. I knew the safe combination from the wine bottle in the basement in my first playthrough. Successfully relocked the safe with no alerts also. I was even able to get his cash box key from the desk unseen (right image above). Just like Rothwick’s key from upstairs, this one couldn’t be dropped back, but was necessary to relock the cash box behind the bar counter.

 

The restaurant itself wasn’t that tricky. I stole the cash when the maid was out. She even headed down to the basement occasionally, in which case she was gone for quite a while. Although I didn’t need to get to the north end of the restaurant, creep-crouching along the bar counter did the trick. I was far enough away from any of the lights to avoid alerts.

 

Left via the front door and met my contact in Royston court. No big deal. Successful Perfect Supreme!

 

 

Statistics:

Ghost - Success!

Perfect Thief - Success!

Supreme Ghost - Success!

Perfect Supreme - Success!

Time - 38:26

Times saved - 42

Damage Dealt: 0 Damage Received: 0

Health Restored - 0

Pockets Picked - 1

Loot Acquired - 703 out of 703

Killed by the Player - 0

KOed by the Player - 0

Bodies found by AI - 0

Alerts - 0 Suspicious, 0 Searches, 0 Sightings

Stealth Score - 0

Consumables - None