Steal

Steal is a skill in Fallout, Fallout 2, and Fallout Tactics: Brotherhood of Steel.

The ability to make things of others your own. Can be used to steal from people or places.

Initial Level
Starting Steal skill is equal to 20% + (1% x Agility). The average character will have a 25% Steal skill.

Maximizing Your Chances
Stealing can be a tricky business, but there are ways to improve your odds (and reduce unfortunate shootings and/or stabbings).

General-Purpose Thievery
Stealing in general, such as from a desk or bookcase, depends on two factors: if there are any people nearby who might care, and visibility. Sneaking will help, but if there is a guard, you will need to get creative.

If, when you attempt to open a locker or search a bookcase, someone speaks up with a floating text along the lines of "Get away from there," the container is under the watchful eye of a guard. This guard needs to be dealt with if you are serious about gaining entry.

The simple solution - and the one which many an adventurer has used - is to remove the guard from the world of the living. This can be done noisily via combat, or by more insidious means, such as poison. However, death is not necessarily the only way to eliminate the hassles of security guards.

A guard's ability to notice, and therefore stop, your attempt at pilferage is tied to the NPC's Perception statistic. Reducing this stat will help you gain entry.

As an example: in the New California Republic police department, officers are on guard in the locker rooms, and will stop you - with force if necessary - from rummaging through those lockers. A player wanting to get in to those lockers could kill the guards. However, simply slipping them a few Perception-reducing doses of something, such as Rot Gut or booze, will often zero their Perception in no time. Four to five doses will usually do the job. After that, while sneaking (assuming a decent Sneak skill), one can usually pop the locks and make off with the goods, with the guards none the wiser.

Pickpocketing
Sometimes, it becomes necessary to relieve someone of an item they have on their person. This is called pickpocketing, and also falls under the Steal skill category. Participants in an adventure in pickpocketing are generally labeled thusly: the Pickpocket (self-explanatory), and the Mark (the pickpocketee).

Three considerations exist in pickpocketing:
 * The mark's Perception rating.
 * As with normal stealing, higher Perception means a higher chance of being caught. The Rot Gut trick works with pickpocketing, too.
 * The direction the mark is facing
 * The so-called "facing modifier." Odds of success are lowest if you are face-to-face with the mark, better if you approach from his side, and best if you approach from the rear.
 * The size of the object being lifted
 * The "size modifier." Physical size is not calculated; the modifier looks at the object's weight. Heavier objects are more likely to be missed when removed.

With this in mind, if one is just trying to practice stealing, trying to lift a few chips or a single Stimpak will be more likely to succeed than, say, trying to make off with a Micro Fusion Cell or a Turbo Plasma Rifle.

Applicable Perks
Three perks exist to aid a player in their creative procurement efforts:
 * Thief
 * Master Thief
 * Pickpocket

Of these, the entreprenurial pickpocket will find, predictably, the Pickpocket perk to be most useful, as it eliminates the size and facing modifiers from consideration.