Reverse pick pocket?

[Wehr Wulf]

I ended up with a Masterwork piece of Samurai armor, but it has Empire faction uniform label. I dont want it to be a faction uniform or a disguise though.
I did some research and Shidan said a way to removethe faction uniform status off the armor would be to to "reverse pickpocket" the armor into a potential recruit, then hire the recruit, and grab the armor off of them.

So how exactly am I supposed to do this though? The only two ways I can think of putting items into someones inventory is if theyre asleep, in a cage or knocked out.
Ive never seen the recruitable characters in a bed (before I recruit them) so thats not an option.

Option B is to knock em out. Okay, well the problem with that is recruitable NPCs tend to be in bars/ close to other people .
Right now even with my stealth skill at 81 I cannot sneak into a bar and just knock someone out without the people 2 feet away at the same table seeing me and raising an alarm. Is that just part of the process then? Do I knock them out, press pause, access their inventory and give them the armor, then unpause the game and run (or go to jail), then come back later with a different character who doesnt have a bounty and recruit the NPC?


Id really appreciate it if someone could help me out :(
I feel like im missing something.

[Wehr Wulf]

Okay, so apparently knocking someone the hell out in the middle of a bar isnt against the law? I feel dumb because I really thought assaulting someone would be a No No but I just did it no problem with a few people having red lines on me (they saw me).....
I put the armor on the unconscious guy, recruited him when he woke up but the armor still have the blue symbol on the chest and its still called "Empire Samurai Armor". However, under that it no longer specifies that its a uniform anywhere....
Does this mean its still technically a uniform that Ill get in trouble for wearing?

[Shidan]

That's just the name of the armour, as long as the uniform tag is gone you should be good. It's just a slightly inferior variation of normal samurai armour.

As for getting in trouble, the reason it was seen as okay is because the Drifters faction is seen as "not real", which marks a faction as it not being a crime to perform hostile actions on. Mostly used for wildlife and stuff, but there are cases like the Drifters where it's not.

[Wehr Wulf]

Originally posted by Shidan:

That's just the name of the armour, as long as the uniform tag is gone you should be good. It's just a slightly inferior variation of normal samurai armour.

As for getting in trouble, the reason it was seen as okay is because the Drifters faction is seen as "not real", which marks a faction as it not being a crime to perform hostile actions on. Mostly used for wildlife and stuff, but there are cases like the Drifters where it's not.

Ahhh okay. I knew for certain I had been caught trying to stealth KO people before and been attacked. Mustve been a Noble or something (:
I try not to do exploits like this, but in my mind if I were in the world of kenshi and got masterwork samurai armor that was part of a uniform, id alter it to remove any trace of the uniform, I wouldnt just get rid of it. Masterwork isnt something I want to just pass on :p


Kewl beans. So as far as "pick pocketing", that just means looting someone when theyre sleeping, in a cell or KO right? Theres not actually a pickpocket feature im missing?

[Shidan]

Correct. I used the term because the devs called looting someone who is asleep pickpocketing, so I kinda just rolled with it. :)

[Pyrrhus]

I kept some empire samurai gears as faction uniforms for disguise. Faction uniform labels cannot be removed. Stolen label can be removed by putting in certain containers or crossbow locker or item furnace. You can get caught for wearing faction uniform which would upset their faction if your stealth skills isn't high enough. Samurai gears have stealth penalties, not useful for pickpocket, stealing, etc, just good enough for walking into towns to trade with other factions in UC towns without troubles.

[Jonneh]

It can be removed by doing what was described above

[L3wt]

Originally posted by Xepheon <3:

I ended up with a Masterwork piece of Samurai armor, but it has Empire faction uniform label. I dont want it to be a faction uniform or a disguise though.
I did some research and Shidan said a way to removethe faction uniform status off the armor would be to to "reverse pickpocket" the armor into a potential recruit, then hire the recruit, and grab the armor off of them.

So how exactly am I supposed to do this though? The only two ways I can think of putting items into someones inventory is if theyre asleep, in a cage or knocked out.
Ive never seen the recruitable characters in a bed (before I recruit them) so thats not an option.

Option B is to knock em out. Okay, well the problem with that is recruitable NPCs tend to be in bars/ close to other people .
Right now even with my stealth skill at 81 I cannot sneak into a bar and just knock someone out without the people 2 feet away at the same table seeing me and raising an alarm. Is that just part of the process then? Do I knock them out, press pause, access their inventory and give them the armor, then unpause the game and run (or go to jail), then come back later with a different character who doesnt have a bounty and recruit the NPC?


Id really appreciate it if someone could help me out :(
I feel like im missing something.

Dude just knock out every NPC who has eyes on your victim. This should always be your first vector of attack when honing in on a prize. You can also "move" NPCs around buy walking into them to get possible knockouts. This is how I robbed the armor king bone dry. You can also use their own stupidity against them when they follow you around the shop keeping an eye on you. So many creative ways to do what you need.

[Morkonan]

Originally posted by Shidan:

...
As for getting in trouble, the reason it was seen as okay is because the Drifters faction is seen as "not real", which marks a faction as it not being a crime to perform hostile actions on. Mostly used for wildlife and stuff, but there are cases like the Drifters where it's not.

Oooh...

How is this handled? Are "Drifters" just a faction that can't have anything other than "0" faction relations or are they part of some truly special faction mechanic thingie? (ie: Just has a "label" but no faction mechanics for them at all?)

[L3wt]

Also remember to knockout people even if they are sleeping because your chances of looting something will always go over 100% that way. Even if it's an item in a barrel downstairs, if there is one guy awake you didn't knock out your chances of stealing it are low. That's why assassination is more important before lockpicking.

[Wehr Wulf]

Originally posted by 123:

Originally posted by Xepheon <3:

I ended up with a Masterwork piece of Samurai armor, but it has Empire faction uniform label. I dont want it to be a faction uniform or a disguise though.
I did some research and Shidan said a way to removethe faction uniform status off the armor would be to to "reverse pickpocket" the armor into a potential recruit, then hire the recruit, and grab the armor off of them.

So how exactly am I supposed to do this though? The only two ways I can think of putting items into someones inventory is if theyre asleep, in a cage or knocked out.
Ive never seen the recruitable characters in a bed (before I recruit them) so thats not an option.

Option B is to knock em out. Okay, well the problem with that is recruitable NPCs tend to be in bars/ close to other people .
Right now even with my stealth skill at 81 I cannot sneak into a bar and just knock someone out without the people 2 feet away at the same table seeing me and raising an alarm. Is that just part of the process then? Do I knock them out, press pause, access their inventory and give them the armor, then unpause the game and run (or go to jail), then come back later with a different character who doesnt have a bounty and recruit the NPC?


Id really appreciate it if someone could help me out :(
I feel like im missing something.

Dude just knock out every NPC who has eyes on your victim. This should always be your first vector of attack when honing in on a prize. You can also "move" NPCs around buy walking into them to get possible knockouts. This is how I robbed the armor king bone dry. You can also use their own stupidity against them when they follow you around the shop keeping an eye on you. So many creative ways to do what you need.

I think there is a major flaw in your logic.
If you read my post I said I was trying to KO a guy in a bar but I couldnt because I didnt want to get caught. When I snuck up to the NPC to knock him out people could see me.

So...how exactly am I going to knock out the other people in the bar, if I cannot knock someone out in the bar? It doesnt matter which person I sneak up to in a small crowded bar, others will see me.
I could try and find one person who isnt as close to so many people perhaps and wait patiently for the perfect moment when the stealth reticle is blue and knock them out, and hope to repeat this process over and over until no one remains, unfortunately, people only stay uncon for so long and it certainly isnt long enough for me to repeat this process with up to a dozen bar patrons. By the time I got to the third or fourth person, the first person would be getting up..Not to mention some of the bar goers are guards, mercenaries etc that arent easy to KO, even without anyone else around.

Walking into people doesnt work for me, maybe my game is messed up. First of all, many people in the bar are sitting in chairs or on the floor and walking into them doesnt move them at all. The others are stationary guards and the shopkeeper and if I repeatedly walk into them and they get too far away from their starting position they just walk around my character and go back to their post.

Another way my game seems to differ from yours is NPCs never follow me around to keep an eye on me. The only time Ive ever seen this is with the Armor King and there isnt a recruitable NPC in his store so thats not very helpful for my situation. I have seen guards in a shop occasionally change positions, but this isnt to follow me around. I know this because there have been multiple times where I was in a room alone with a guard and they left the room to take up position somewhere else leaving me to steal.

I appreciate your advice though, it is good advice, but a lot of it just is not practical for my situation. :/

[L3wt]

Originally posted by Xepheon <3:

Originally posted by Jonneh:

It can be removed by doing what was described above [/quote



I know they can be used as a disguise, but like I said, it was Masterwork Samurai armor so I wanted my character to wear it full time and I dont want to risk getting caught wearing a faction uniform all the time so I just wanted it off.
But yeah, like my original post said also, Shidan had already said it can be removed in a different post, this post was just clarifying the method. Shidan then replied and confirmed this so yes, it can absolutely be removed which I did.

I didnt know about the stolen item label being taken off though, that is EXTREMELY helpful. Im on the fence of whether or not I consider it a cheat... I mean, in the world of kenshi if I steal a sword from town A, and go to town B, how are they going to know its stolen? There is no way. There are so many identical items theres no way to tell if something is stolen or not. Unless obviously its a faction outfit and im not a member of said faction.
A practical way would be if you steal enough times in a town the town catches onto the fact things go missing when youre around so you develop a negative reputation with that faction. So if you try and sell stolen gear to a different city (same faction) then they have a chance of figuring it out. Also, time would have to pass inbetween the theft of the item and the selling of the item. When I steal from a shop and immediately walk to the next town over, im pretty sure nobody else beat me there to report the theft.
In game, the more time that passes after an item is stolen could increase the liklihood of it being found out. This could translate into people filing it missing to local police, word travelling to neighboring towns etc.

I know those are pretty complex mechanics for a game but still. Itd be kewl

The dev stated the stolen tag was a bandaid solution for becoming OP with too much money. Of course in real life you can pawn anything/scrape serial numbers but it's the easiest they could do for Kenshi without going too deep into the code for a single mechanic. Maybe with a decent size team and budget or proper mod support it would be possible. I know there are a few games that do this really well.

Although I don't think the stolen tag being removed from storing it was intended but probably too complex to fix. Maybe Kenshi 2 solves these issues hopefully.

[L3wt]

Originally posted by Xepheon <3:

Originally posted by 123:

Dude just knock out every NPC who has eyes on your victim. This should always be your first vector of attack when honing in on a prize. You can also "move" NPCs around buy walking into them to get possible knockouts. This is how I robbed the armor king bone dry. You can also use their own stupidity against them when they follow you around the shop keeping an eye on you. So many creative ways to do what you need.

I think there is a major flaw in your logic.
If you read my post I said I was trying to KO a guy in a bar but I couldnt because I didnt want to get caught. When I snuck up to the NPC to knock him out people could see me.

So...how exactly am I going to knock out the other people in the bar, if I cannot knock someone out in the bar? It doesnt matter which person I sneak up to in a small crowded bar, others will see me.
I could try and find one person who isnt as close to so many people perhaps and wait patiently for the perfect moment when the stealth reticle is blue and knock them out, and hope to repeat this process over and over until no one remains, unfortunately, people only stay uncon for so long and it certainly isnt long enough for me to repeat this process with up to a dozen bar patrons. By the time I got to the third or fourth person, the first person would be getting up..Not to mention some of the bar goers are guards, mercenaries etc that arent easy to KO, even without anyone else around.

Walking into people doesnt work for me, maybe my game is messed up. First of all, many people in the bar are sitting in chairs or on the floor and walking into them doesnt move them at all. The others are stationary guards and the shopkeeper and if I repeatedly walk into them and they get too far away from their starting position they just walk around my character and go back to their post.

Another way my game seems to differ from yours is NPCs never follow me around to keep an eye on me. The only time Ive ever seen this is with the Armor King and there isnt a recruitable NPC in his store so thats not very helpful for my situation. I have seen guards in a shop occasionally change positions, but this isnt to follow me around. I know this because there have been multiple times where I was in a room alone with a guard and they left the room to take up position somewhere else leaving me to steal.

I appreciate your advice though, it is good advice, but a lot of it just is not practical for my situation. :/

Okay so carry an enemy in upstairs to get everyone up and about and wait for your opportunity or lure them outside with something at night time and then strike? Getting people moving in Kenshi is very simple but yes I do use a few mods and overhauls so some of my advice probably wont help you. Things should still be doable in vanilla with a bit of creativity though.

[Wehr Wulf]

Originally posted by Shidan:

That's just the name of the armour, as long as the uniform tag is gone you should be good. It's just a slightly inferior variation of normal samurai armour.

As for getting in trouble, the reason it was seen as okay is because the Drifters faction is seen as "not real", which marks a faction as it not being a crime to perform hostile actions on. Mostly used for wildlife and stuff, but there are cases like the Drifters where it's not.

Originally posted by Pyrrhus:

I kept some empire samurai gears as faction uniforms for disguise. Faction uniform labels cannot be removed. Stolen label can be removed by putting in certain containers or crossbow locker or item furnace. You can get caught for wearing faction uniform which would upset their faction if your stealth skills isn't high enough. Samurai gears have stealth penalties, not useful for pickpocket, stealing, etc, just good enough for walking into towns to trade with other factions in UC towns without troubles.

I appreciate your reply but Im guessing you didnt read the other responses before replying? hehe...
I use disguises occasionally too, but like I said, it was Masterwork Samurai armor so I wanted my character to just be able wear it full time without risking getting caught wearing a faction uniform and always having to remember to remove it before entering their turf or wearing it around their enemy etc etc etc. Just wanted to avoid the hassle. The armor is far too good to just use it occasionally as a disguise.

I wasnt asking asking whether or not a faction uniform label could be removed tho, like my original post said- Shidan, who is a moderator, had already said it can be removed in a different post,so I knew it could be taken off... my post was simply clarifying the details of the method. Shidan then replied before you did and confirmed this so yes, it can absolutely be removed (which I did). Just so you know in case you need to do it in the future :)

I didnt know about the stolen item label being able to be taken off though, that is EXTREMELY helpful. Im on the fence about whether or not I would consider it cheating though... I mean, in the world of Kenshi if I steal a sword from town A, and immediately go to town B to sell it, how would town B know its stolen? There is no way. There are so many identical items theres no way to tell if something is stolen or not. Obviously the exception is if its a faction outfit and im not a member of said faction...Suspension of disbelief only goes so far and NPCs magically and instantly knowing things are stolen kinda hurts the immersion....

A practical way to implement this idea would be if you steal enough times in a certain town, the townspeople begin to catch onto the fact that things go missing whenever youre around so you will eventually develop a bad reputation (lose relation) with that faction. So if you try and sell that stolen gear to a different city (same faction) then the vendor has a chance of knowing the item is stolen because 1) their faction knows youre shady and 2) theyve heard rumors of items like the ones youre selling have been stolen. 1+1=2. The downside here is, even though you technically dont get caught stealing red handed, youre still penalized with negative faction relations which seems unfair, even if realistic. Maybe this would help make stealing less OP than it is. idk.

Also, time could have to pass in between the theft of the item and the selling of the item before an NPC vendor has a chance of knowing its stolen. When I steal from a shop and immediately walk to the next town over to sell the equipment there is no possible way they would know that.
So in game, the more time that passes after an item is stolen could increase the likelihood of it being found out. This could translate into people having time to realize their stuff is missing, report it stolen to local police and word of the theft travelling to neighboring towns etc. This shouldnt happen instantly, but over the course of a day or two.

I know those are pretty complex mechanics for a game and they definitely arent perfect but itd be kewl and make the world feel far more alive

[L3wt]

Originally posted by Xepheon <3:

1+1=2.

Your arithmetic is impeccable! Let me guess...Stanford?

[KalkiKrosah]

You can also "pay" to remove the faction tag. Steal it, then sell it to a fence, close out the transaction (that part is important) and then talk to them again and buy it back.

My main thief and even my secondary one are very skilled at stealing by now. I can steal a piece of armor and then sell it to the weapons trader in the same town with zero risk of getting caught. So I usually do it this way now.

You can also make your own armor too. Scorchlanders get a bonus to weapon and armor smithing. I steal stuff, sell off the haul and use my new found inco.e to purchase crafting supplies. I can now make masterwork grade armor at will. Might be worth investing in since you probably won't find masterwork armor all that often in the shops.