Galaer on 8/3/2020 at 12:40
I watched your Thief 2 Demo report on Youtube, klatremus. And I must say that I disagree with your interpretation of grabbing plans through painting in Karras Office. You said it's not a supreme bust, because you can imagine that Garrett slips his hand behind painting. But you can clearly hear sound of something being locked after frobbing the painting. And painting only moves after pressing the switch, so there is mechanism behind it. Which means painting is actually camuflated safe door. Which means there is really no space for Garrett slips his hand into. Because safe doors have this ability of hermetically close space between wall and safe door. That's why I believe your action was exploit and also a supreme bust.
klatremus on 9/3/2020 at 17:13
Yes, that situation is debatable for sure. Taking items through banners have always been allowed for Supreme (unless Garrett physically pushes through them, as in transmigration), but not through doors or walls. Paintings are somewhere in between i guess. Is it only when you see a gap, like when i took the loot in chest beyind banner at Shemenov's, or is it dependent on the solidity of the surface? Engine exploits are vague, both in the rules and during execution. I understand your argument. It might be worthy of a discussion in (
https://www.ttlg.com/forums/showthread.php?t=148487) THIS thread.
Galaer on 9/3/2020 at 17:38
Hey there. Not a report, but a discovery. It's about Sabotage at Soulforge. I found out that first watcher from the very beginning of the mission is ghostable. I know that alert from it is excused by community, but I found a way to avoid even first alert from it. Well, it's not without sacrifices. The idea is to buy invisibility potion and immediately after starting the mission use it. You really want to bind invisibility potion to single button. Timing is tricky and I found that mashing buttons didn't work for me. You need the proper timing. But it's really not that hard. Every time it take me just few tries. The sacrifice is that you can only achieve chemical ghost success that way. In current times it's probably just a fun fact rather than useful trick.
klatremus on 9/3/2020 at 22:04
This is awesome work Galaer! I was not aware that the community as a whole has excused this. If so, I certainly don't agree with it, as it clearly busts ghost. My report certainly claimed this to be a failed ghost. Perhaps people think it's a scripted response from the watcher, as it's a part of the story where Karras starts talking to you. But if you were able to avoid the alert, then it proves it's not a script. Chemical success is certainly a lot better than failure!
Galaer on 10/3/2020 at 14:29
I heard about that from travis whitsitt supreme ghost video first. But if you read existing Soulforge reports, you will notice nobody mention this first watcher as a reason of ghost failure. It meant to not be a ghost bust probably because of cinematic before that, which shows Garrett being seen by a watcher. So by avoiding this watcher I created some kind of paradox.
After finding this trick I read your own report, klatremus. And I noticed that you mention trying to use invisibility potion, but you failed. I don't know if it matters what version you play, but to be clear I played final version of Tafferpatcher.
klatremus on 10/3/2020 at 18:55
No but I never bound it directly to a key. I had to pull it up then use it, which is 2 keystrokes. I never made it but was close, so this is totally cool Galaer.
Galaer on 10/3/2020 at 20:02
I checked your method and yes, using twice "previous item" button to select invisibility potion and then use it is slightly too slow. By the time I'm using potion, I get second alert. After 20 failed attempts I used my method and ghosted this watcher on my first try. So it's possible to do it consistently.
I also heard that there are some functions in Controls added in Newdark. So I wonder is binding invisibility potions was even possible in Olddark?
klatremus on 10/3/2020 at 20:56
Oh I think it was. I remember setting invisio potion to a certain button, then I just had to press it and 'use' to turn invisible, but it was never fast enough. How do you set a key to use invisibility potion directly?
Galaer on 10/3/2020 at 22:08
I have "U" for invisibility potion, but it can be any other button and default RMB for using items. After starting the mission you need wait a split of second for mission to load and then you have split of second of pressing both buttons one after another. And when I succeed it feels like I pressed only one button instead of two. At least that's how I feel. The first time I was even surprised by this thought. But really it's not that hard.
Galaer on 16/3/2020 at 21:02
RUNNING INTERFERENCE ON HARD DIFFICULTY
EXPLANATION
You will probably ask right now why do I ghost this mission on Hard difficulty instead on Expert. And then I will ask you: is Expert really the hardest difficulty for ghosting this mission? No, it's actually opposite. Normal and Hard are much harder, because they don't have knockout objective. Nobody ever achieved beating this mission without any knockouts. Time to change that.
So what are the other changes between Hard and Expert. Well, I have more health. But for ghost mode doesn't allow damage from enemies. And that's the only damage you can really score in this mission. Smaller loot objective, but let's be honest - getting all loot in this mission is very easy.
From what I read on wiki, guards are all the same sensitive on all difficulties. Number of guards is also the same. On Hard though door leading to 3rd floor are open, but grabbing key to it on Expert isn't very problematic.
The biggest difference is lack of knockout objective. This means that supreme ghost is just not possible. I will score many 1st alerts and do some other supreme busts. For the loot run the only problem is passing guard on short patrol on top of stairs at the start of mansion. I do it by entering side room, when guard will pass I quickly run on the other side. I doubt this guard can be supreme ghosted.
PREPARATIONS
On Basso's route is 4 obstacles. Obstacle #1 is 2 guards in lookout room. But you can douse torch to beat it.
Next is Obstacle #2 - stationary guard in narrow corridor. The intended solution is of course to KO him, but I can't do it. My first idea was to nudge him into storage and then push him into left corner. To do that I pushed all barrels under wall to 3 crates. But after I nudged him into storage, I realized that he's looking into kitchen's direction, so nudging him left is out of question.
I decided to nudge him past door leading to kitchen. It's not easy, because he's actually sensitive and can easily second alert if you are slightly to the side and you will move too fast. I tested if I can enter and leave kitchen without 2nd alert and tested if I can pass archer and go to Jenivere's cell without scoring 2nd alert from nudged guard. It worked. By the way, nudging guard took me 40 min.
Obstacle #3 is servant in kitchen. Problem with him is he's moving in random patrol routes. The idea is to pass him when he's going to wine cellar. Another problem is he's entering little storage where I will need to time archer. So I decided to douse torch in this room as well.
Obstacle #4 is archer patrolling corridor. North part of corridor near storage - archer turns around by turning left. Timing his turn is necessary to return to storage after saving Jenivere. South part of corridor - archer can stop and turn around in 2 ways. If he stops in the middle of south corridor, then to turn around he will turn right. So don't try to ghost him then. Instead wait for second way: archer stops at the beginning of south corridor, there is no gap to go to Jenivere. Then he will do 2 steps forward and in order to turn around he will turn left. And that's the way to pass him.
Other than that, I'm leaving all doors on Basso's route open and also door leading to Servant Quarters open. I noticed that Basso can waste a second in order to try to open door. One last thing. I heard opinion that saving and loading during Basso's going through basement can broke his route. I can tell you it's just a myth. Game never broke for me.
ESCORTING BASSO
Time to return Basso and use birdcall. Run all the way to door to kitchen to block Basso. You need to time servant when he's walking from middle of room to wine cellar. Move forward to doorway leading to archer's corridor to block Basso. Basso will stop in storage for about 5 seconds, then walk to you. You need to wait for archer to go to south end after using this turn that you can't ghost. Because he alternate his turning on south part regularly. You also need to worry about servant.
When archer will pass Servant Quarters door release Basso and hide in Servant Quarters. Basso will walk to almost the end of corridor, then he will start running and pass archer during his turning animation. Wait for archer to pass you and run to block Basso and Jenivere from leaving.
ESCAPE
Originally I thought that I can only release only Basso first and pray for him to pass archer during his turning animation and pray for servant to move to wine cellar at that moment. Then do the same with Jenivere. Guess what, it's much easier.
After archer will walk north for a few seconds release both Jenivere and Basso. Go behind them and hide in Servants Quarters. Archer will only first alert to them. Now you need servant to walk to wine cellar or walk into storage. Even if he bump into them in dark storage, he will not alert! He can only spot them when he's in the kitchen and they are travelling in front of him. After they left kitchen, I returned to close all doors and left mansion.
STATS:
Time: 1 hour 18 min 36 s; Loot: 1295/1295
Pockets Picked: 5/9
Back Stabs: 0; Knock Outs: 0
Damage Dealt: 0; Damage Taken: 0; Healing Taken: 0
Innocents killed: 0; Others killed: 0
Secrets: 3/3
GHOST: SUCCESS
PERFECT GHOST: SUCCESS
SUPREME GHOST: IMPOSSIBLE. I scored a lot of 1st alerts, nudged a guard and douse 2 torches.
FINAL NOTES
And that's the end of this challenge. It was actually more easy than I thought. That way it's possible to ghost this mission without KO-ing anyone. One thing I don't understand is loot count. Somehow on Hard difficulty you can get 10 loot more than on Expert. Yes, 1295 isn't a typo like I originally thought. I didn't notice any new loot piece, so that means one loot piece is just worth more. Weird.