Difficulty level selection | Hints Thief Guide

Apart by setting the difficulty level to Master, you can make the game even more difficult and interesting, in various other ways

In Thief there basically are three standard difficulty levels to choose from. At the lowest level (Rogue) the enemies' alertness in considerably lower and additionally, Garrett can easily obtain the elements of his equipment. I recommend against this difficulty level, even if you have not spent much time playing sneaking games, and action games in general. The normal difficulty level is Thief and it stands out as the one where the biggest threat comes from the hostile characters, and also where obtaining items for the inventory is more difficult. At the highest difficulty level (Master) the enemies are a bit more alert and, additionally, obtaining items is considerably more difficult. Nevertheless, I recommend that you that you select this mode, especially if you plan on constant staying in shadows and avoiding possible confrontations with the hostile guards.

Regardless of the difficulty level that you have selected, it is also possible to activate various modifiers, which allow you to alter the selected aspects of the game. The aim of this is to ensure you with even more challenge and obtain even more points for the completion of the individual stages. I recommend that you change modifiers only after you decide to beat the game for the second time because, in most cases, they require of you very good knowledge of the maps that you explore. You can view and alter the modifiers by clicking on the Custom option. They also have been listed below:

"Classic Thief modes" modifiers:

• Save only after a chapter is completed (+180 points) - this modifier makes the game considerably more difficult because it clocks both quick and auto saves (checkpoints). The majority of the main chapters, of the campaign mode, are long and this means that in the case, in which you fail, you may have to repeat the last several tens of minutes of the game.
• No focus (+50 points) - this modifier shuts down the Focus option completely, including its upgrades (focus points). This is not a considerable obstruction, although it is worth noting that focus is sometimes useful at fast lockpicking, quiet movement or finding the interactive objects in the environment.
• Takedowns only from hiding (+50 points) - this modifier blocks off the ability to neutralize enemies in direct combat and by jumping onto them from the ledges above. If you activate it, this should in no way influence the gameplay, especially if you try playing stealthily without stunning the opponents.
• No crosshair (+30 points) - this modifier disables the crosshair, while firing the bow. This tends to be troublesome, if you want to, e.g. put out a candle by firing your bow from a longer distance, although you can do well without the crosshair.

"Legendary Thief Modes" modifiers:

• Only special arrows (+50 points) - this modifier narrows down the availability of arrows, to four kinds only - broad, water, fire and rope. As a result, you can easily activate this modifier, because the rest of the arrows are used while playing the aggressive game and, as a result, if you want to stay in shadows for the whole time, you should not be using them anyways.
• No food and poppy (+100 points) - this modifier blocks off the ability to find food ( health regeneration) or poppy (focus regeneration). I recommend activating it, especially to the high value in points that it provides. As far as you make no mistakes, food is completely useless to you. You can also do easily without regenerating focus, especially that id does not deactivate completely after its meter reaches zero.
• No damage (+60 points) - this modifier causes failing the mission at the moment at which Garrett takes damage. If you are operating from shadows for the whole time, this should not bother you and, as a result, you can activate this modifier.
• Expensive equipment (+70 points) - this modifier increases the prices charged on arrows, flashbombs food and poppy. It is worth noting that this does not influence the prices on upgrades on new elements of the equipment (e.g. key) so, this is not as troublesome as it may seem at first, especially that thorough exploration of the area should provide you with sufficient amount of arrows and the other consumables.
• Slower movement (+45 points) - this modifier considerably decreases the speed of movement for the protagonist (walking and running). This may, unfortunately, make it considerably more difficult to move around across the better-lit locations, or reaching covers. Therefore, I recommend that you activate this modifier the second time around, when you already know all the routes of the enemies and good covers.

"Ultimate Thief modes" modifiers:

• Iron Man (+250 points) - This is DEFINITELY the most demanding modifier. In the case of failing a mission (Garrett's death, etc.), this erases the current progress and requires you to start the entire campaign mode over. Therefore, I recommend that you activate this mode only if you have completed this game for multiple times and learned perfectly all the maps, as well as Garrett's abilities.
• No upgrades (+100 points) - this modifier blocks off all the upgrades that are not connected with progressing the storyline. This is another unpleasant modifier because many of the available upgrades help you explore and avoid enemies.
• No killing and stunning (+170 points) - this modifier causes a mission to be failed at the moment at which Garrett kills or stuns someone. If you have planned to complete the game with "clean record", right at the beginning, you can activate this one although, I recommend that you decide on that step only after you have beaten the campaign mode already. Note - this modifier becomes active only at the beginning of the first chapter of the game!
• No alarms (+145 points) - This modifier causes a mission to be failed at the moment at which an enemy, or an animal (e.g. dog in the cage) is alarmed. Again, I recommend that you activate this only if you play for the second time, because you will have already learned the positions of the enemy forces and, as a result, nothing will be able to surprise you.