Thief — an All Difficulty Level complete-loot walkthrough (Original Thief and Thief Gold)

This mission uses a version number (starting with 1.0) independent of the main document.

At several places, additional information is available as tool tips. Move the mouse on the words looking like these to see them.

A few places are worth visiting, but is not needed to achieve your objectives. They do not even get you any powerups, so it is up to you whether to follow them. I will describe the main route like a regular walkthrough. Then at certain points I will mark excursion routes. At these points, if you want to have a look (and you should), save your game and follow the route. Click the excursion heading in this color and style to expand the route. After the voyage, just reload the game you saved at the Excursion starting point to continue the main route (note that excursions may not bring you back to the starting point). For those who don’t bother to go (I do not understand why anybody would want to skip the excursions), just ignore the milestone and continue straight on.

Being the last mission, you do not have any loots to collect. Nor are there any picks (that counts toward the pick count in the mission statistic) for you.

In this mission, different difficulty levels have access to very different amount of powerups. This walkthrough has included the powerups for all three difficulty levels.

The walkthrough is written to make use of the advanced features of IE4 and IE5 browsers. IE4 and IE5 show the same effects, but IE5 rendering much faster.

With the Builder’s Chisel, the High Priest wiped out all the beasts in the Trickster Temple. You made up a story for the Hammerites, where you were neither a Keeper initiate nor a Vine agent. They recognize your skills and offer you a good job. Constantine has built a gateway from the Maw of Chaos, through which his beasts can enter our world. The Maw has another gateway to the evil world of the Trickster, but the beasts are passing through it very slowly. To speed this up, Constantine is busily preparing a ritual to open up the gateway (for broadband access). When he is completed, all the beasts of his world can invade us without any obstacles.

Your job is to sneak into the Maw of Chaos to destroy the gate. You also need to find the altar where Constantine will be using the Eye in his rituals. Once there, you will swap the Eye with a Fake Eye that the Hammerites made to stop his further attempts at openning up a gateway.

You will run into all your friends plus the Cray Beast, but there is nothing for sell (even though you have 100 loot in the previous mission). Perhaps there are no shops in the Maw. You should be grateful that, unlike Terminator 2, you did not arrive naked.

While your mission objectives seem to imply that you need to move fast, ignore it. The Trickster will wait for you, and don’t bother about the hord of beasts passing to our world. Move slowly like a thief should.

As soon as you start the game, you are facing South and you can see a red tunnel right in front of you. Hide immediately to the right side of its entrance, because beasts are walking towards you very soon. At the shadow next to the red tunnel entrance, turn around to see a portal on your North. It is the one you just came through. It leads to our World, and is not the one you are after. Beasts will walk towards you and into this portal. On the other side, the Hammerites will be busily slaying them. All you need to do is to let them pass and make sure they let you pass peacefully. By the way, you are not coming back here. In this mission, you just go forward to the end, like in the previous one.

I tried hard to climb the red structure in this room to no avail. While waiting, read the Papyrus in your inventory, which is a letter the Hammerites gave you. This hint is only available to the Expert Difficulty because Normal and Hard do not need to destroy the Maw Portal. To destroy the Maw Portal (again, the other one, not this one), you need one elemental arrow of each kind: Moss Arrow, Water Arrow, Fire Arrow, and Gas Arrow. You already have one of each from the Hammerites, and there are plenty to pick in your journey ahead. You will be using Water Arrows on several Fire Elements (there are only three of them), and Gas Arrows on difficult AIs. There is hardly any chance to use the Fire Arrows you are going to pick up on your way. Remember to save one for the portal. And keep your Moss Arrows for the finale.

If you were playing Normal or Hard, then you have a different Papyrus in your inventory instead. It means it is harmful to touch the rocks of crystal. I will warn you when you come close to one.

The first thing you must know is: the Maw has an infinite supply of beasts sent from the other world. Every half minute or so, a pack of two to four beasts will arrive at the Stairway. Each pack usually consists an Insect Beast, one or two Ape Beasts with or without a Cray Beast, depending on the Difficulty level. In Thief Gold Expert Difficulty, I always find packs consisting of one of each, without exceptions. There is no point to kill any of these moving beasts. In contrast, a finite number of stationary beasts guards strategic locations, and you may bring them down as you see fit.

When the first pack of beasts (don’t know why, but I always find an Ape Beast and an Insect Beast only, never a Cray Beast here) has gone past you (note that the Insect Beast walks much slower than the Ape Beasts and you often have to wait for it to go away), time to start moving.

Move to the end of the short red tunnel. If you so wish, you can hide on the shadows on either side of the exit to have a look around. The passage continues forward in a winding yellowish Stairway going down a long way. Since the beasts are marching up here, it is not where you should be going. Get into the Purple Tunnel on the right.

First Purple Tunnel

Second Purple Tunnel

Third Purple Tunnel

Fourth Purple Tunnel

From the last Purple Tunnel, peek out and see the base of the Stairway where it connects to a horizontal stone passage going South. The beasts now pass more on an individual basis. Always wait till an Ape Beast to pass (and be away far enough) before moving — he walks fast, and leaves more room behind him. On the other hand, Insect Beasts walk slowly, and not far behind is already the next beast.

Save your game and move forward along the South going passage, following the shadows. After two slight bends, you enters the hexagonal tunnel (so you now have a 2 metre ceiling instead of a 20 metre one). The shadows are less firm here, wait and run quickly into the hexgonal tunnel. Near the end of the tunnel is an opening (of a square tunnel) on the right. Ignore it and run forward to the end of the tunnel — it has half a meter of shadow for you to hide.

Turn around and wait till the next Ape Beast has past you. Starting from now, you may run head into beasts. In that case, retreat (they always hesitate before attacking) and send him a Gas Arrow. In the rest of the mission, you will need two Gas Arrows in the minimum, and I do not find opportunity to use more than six. With nine Gas Arrows at hand, use them freely.

Run into the opening now on your left (since you have turned around) into a square tunnel. On the other side of the tunnel is a semicircular ledge with lava on the left. Move quickly along the ledge. At the end of the ledge are steps going down. Locate the tiny patch of shadow on your right just before descending the stairs. Hide there because beasts are arriving from in front of you very soon.

When OK, descend the stairs towards the West into a cave with ample shadows on your right. Hide there and turn to face South. There are two tunnels on the South side: beasts are coming individually from the left one. Enter the right tunnel for an Bubble seeing Excursion.

Save your game and enter the tunnel where beasts come from. At the end, turn left and see the stone bridge ahead. Locate also the pillar, the hexagonal platform, and the floating bubbles. If you think the next beast is coming soon, crouch at the shadow on your left (near the junction between the stone bridge and the cave tunnel). When OK, run towards the pillar at the center of the hexagonal platform. The pillar has a niche opening towards you. Push yourself deep into the niche and turn around.

Face South West and lean right and you can see the opening you visited in the excursion. You are now on the hexagonal platform you saw earlier, and beasts land on the other side of the pillar and cross the stone bridge in front of you. We now run and drop to a ledge under where we are. Turn towards North. Look up and locate a “window” through which you see a little bit of blue sky. Aim towards somewhere between these two directions. When the stone bridge is clear, run forward and drop over the North side of the bridge. If you want to play safe, you can walk slowly and look and check before dropping. There is a ledge on the wall beyound the bridge, and you just run and fall safely on it.

Crouch and turn around (towards South). Ignore any beasts attracted by your noise. Look under the hexagonal platform. There are three small platforams under it. Move forward and drop to the platform in the middle (the one closest to you). Now you are safe from the beasts. From now on, you no longer share their path. You will still see flying bubbles from time to time but they are not threats to you.

The small platform on your right leads to nothing. Move to the small platform on your left and have a look at the lava fall in front of you. It may seem a dead end, but move forward to the North East extreme and lean forward to look down. There is another ledge below you. Drop safely to it and follow the ledge around a corner into a tunnel.

Follow the tunnel to go West and then South to an open area (no area is truely open, because we are underground, but the ceiling is high and you are no longer inside a tunnel). Strafe right (West) a few steps to have a look at the lava fall on your left, and the bubbles flying from beneath you to go South an then up to about your eye level and then towards East. Follow the L-shaped ledge along the wall and enter the next area where you see big Blue Crystals ahead.

The music starts and it is time to dance, well I mean save. Avoid the big Blue Crystals: they are not your Water Crystals, and it hurts to touch them. They are the rocks of crystal, and what you are hearing is the song of doom. Check the mission map and you find that you arrived at the second part, the one with crystals.

On the frozen pool, ski carefully and collect seven Water Arrows from near the Blue Crystals. To move slowly, stay crouched, and always get ready to brake with the back key. When possible, stick to a rocky wall. Move 45 degrees into the wall so that part of your momentum is pressed against the wall and only part of it is used for forward motion. It also increase the friction and further slows your movement.

After you got the Water Arrows, save again and move down a small icy slope and listen. Three Frog Beasts are waiting for you. It is difficult enough to stand still on the slope and shooting the jumping beasts is simply maddening. However, you can indeed stabilise yourself on the right side of the slope, and at one point the Frog Beasts stay longer than normal before it jumps away. If you cannot catch that point, then the only solution is to drop down yourself. When they see you, they will hesitate long enough for you to shoot. The key is, try to let them see you one by one, or you would not be able to shoot fast enough. You may also consider sending them Gas Arrows. The benefit is, you do not need to hit exactly the target to bring down the Frog Beast. The walkthrough only uses three Gas Arrows, and you have 9 at hand.

So when two of the Frog Beasts have jumped down the slope ahead, drop down yourself to handle the lone Frog Beast. Then hide and save and wait for a chance to hit the second one. And hopefully when you explode the second one, you kill the third one as well. Remember that you do not have Healing Potions with you.

After you have tamed the Frog Beasts, go back to the Blue Crystal at the bottom of the icy slope (near the corner on the left when you are sliding down). Go to the wall corner and carefully lean to grab two Water Arrows behind the Blue Crystal. Then slowly move down the rocky slope ahead (towards the North) and after passing two blocks of Blue Crystals you are approaching the end of it. Or maybe the end of your life.

It is so interesting that you wonder why this has not appeared in earlier missions. A long slope of ice, with Blue Crystals here and there. Before you start, align yourself with the Blue Crystal at the center line and save game. Crouch and keeping pressing the back key to slow you down. Use the strafe keys to evade the center Blue Crystal when you get close, just like you were on a slalom ski race. When you reach the rocky bottom, keep pressing the back key till you really stopped, or you would run into the Blue Crystals ahead. Seems I slide faster in Thief Gold than in Original Thief, but I am not that sure about it.

Turn right and move carefully among the shadows to the next area. Most of the time, you find a Fire Elemental at the far East wall, and two more standing side by side on your South East. However I have seen cases where the two on the South East are widely separated from each other. In Thief Gold, they like to wander around, but if you wait for a dozen seconds or so, they usually settle down at these locations as well.

In the normal case, use a Water Arrow at the wall between the twin Fire Elementals. Should douse them both at the same time (if you kill one first, you aroused the other). The third one should be ignorant of the murder, so you can move closer and give him a Water Arrow. However, if they are not sitting ducks, then you need to do some good shooting to bring them down. In that case, stay at your shadows and they will have a hard time locating you.

When they are done, move East cross the lava river. On the East bank of the lava river, crouch and lean to get three Fire Arrows (get five/six of them when playing Hard/Normal Difficulties). Go to the far East side to look beyond. Outside an opening, you see a small lava lake below, with several Fire Arrows along the edge. If you want to, you can skip a small part of the journey by jumping forward to the edge of the lake. For the rest, go back and leave the area via the exit on the South (near the Blue Crystals). The exit is dark, so you need to really near before you can locate it.

Slowly down the slope (don’t overshoot and fall!), you arrive at walls with a texture that has an alien feeling. You can also see bubbles flying below. Go left and at the Blue Crystal turn right (you have no other choice anyway) and proceed to the top of the slope. When the slope begins to go downhill, look left. You can see Blue Crystals and next to them is the lava pool (hidden behind the rocky wall) we saw a little earlier. Go to the lake and lean forward to collect five Fire Arrows. Go back to the top of the slope and proceed forward. It first goes East, and then South to an abrupt end. It is dark here, so move carefully and do not overstep!

Inch forward and lean to have a look. A steep rocky slope.

Save your game and give it a try. As if it isn’t exciting enough, the bottom of the rocky slope is connected to an ice slope! When you are dead, restore.

From near the end of the path, move forward to start sliding down. As before, keep pressing the back key, and strafe to the right with all your might. If you still cannot reach the right wall, try this: from the path before the slope, run towards the right while falling off the edge. This way, you will actually be flying off the edge, but before soon you hit the right wall in mid air and drop softly to the slope and slow down soon.

The point of reaching the right wall is not simply to slow you down. At the bottom of the rocky slope, there is a small ledge on the right side. If you keep yourself to the right wall, you will stop there (move further to the right and stable yourself) instead of being sent down the ice slope at a high initial velocity.

When you stop down, look around you. A stone bridge extends from your position over the ice slope towards to left wall. Follow this bridge and go East to the left wall. Near the end of the bridge, you will find a Fire Arrow resting on the bridge.

Go back towards the right wall. At the West end, look carefully and you find you are at a T-junction. Instead of turning right and go back, turn left and go further down. The stone bridge will again cross the ice slope towards the opposite wall. This time, you find several plants near the end, and under them four precious Healing Fruits.

From the stone bridge, look down to study the ice slope. Unfortunately, I haven’t found any way to drop down from the stone bridge without getting hurt. Therefore retrace back to the start of the stone bridge (ie where the rocky slope ends).

From the bottom of the rocky slope, save and slide down the ice slope. Remember to crouch and press back key. It is best to stay at about the center line of the slope. Strafe left and right to evade the Blue Crystals when necessary.

At the bottom of the ice slope is a small rocky plain area. You can already see a big blue Well.

The big Well is the exit of this area. The rim of the Well is made of the same Blue Crystal that can hurt you. The only way to get inside the Well is to drop down from the pool of water above it (look up and see). We will ride the waterfall to go to the pool.

Save your game and jump into the waterfall. It pulls you up to a river flowing West and then South. Reorient yourself and get ready to dive. At the next left turn, you have to go underwater. Swim forward (East) until the end where the water column brings you up to the next level. Turn right (South) and get ready.

After the rise, water will continue to carry you East. Mantle on your right (where you should already be facing) to a small empty cave where you can catch your breath (yours and Garrett’s) and save your game. Look up: you can see another stream of water right above the one in front of you. Another upflow will bring you there. The stream above is upside-down: the river bed is above and the water surface is below. Therefore you cannot breath (if you stick your head below the water/air interface, you drop out of the river).

Turn your back to the water. Look up and you can make out a ledge near the top of the cave. There is your second resting place. The river will bring you there and you rush into that ledge, hopefully not overshooting and falling down here.

Drop back into water and continue East. At the East end, dive and swim forward with the water to increase your speed (and shorten the time underwater). Remember to stay away from the walls when you need speed. Water column carries you up another level and go back West. You are now in the upside-down stream you have seen earlier. There isn’t air above, only air below which is inaccessible to you. Keep moving forward at top speed. At the end, it will make an 180° turn in the left direction and you will nearly be out of breath. Just after the turn, there is a vertical pool (actually an air/water surface) on your left. Swim into it. Beyond the vertical surface is air, and a very small ledge you can stand on. If you overshoot, you will fall to the cave below and you have to swim up here again.

After you have regaineded your breath, look down. It is the cave you mantled into a little earlier. Save game and run back to water. This will be the most difficult part.

Dive East along the current and you finally arrive at a big pool with a hole on the bottom. Dive towards the bottom and locate the Well beneath you. This part is the most difficult one: dive past the water surface and drop into the Well. It is difficult because you are running out of breath here. And since you have a forward momentum, it is difficult to aim at the Well. Just like bombing from a fighter plane. Consider settling with losing some health when you become tired of diving.

You will probably drop down to nearly the bottom of the water. Resurface to gasp for air. If you resurface on the wrong side, you will find yourself still inside the Well. In that case, dive to the bottom and the current brings you into an opening leading North. Resurface on that side, and a tunnel goes North. After a left turn, you arrive at the Tree Land.

Garrett will remark “Now that’s BIG!”. Save and move along the rim of the big cave towards your right (counterclockwise around the Tree). Look up and to your North West: you can see two pillars of blue crystals high up the cave. That is Blue Gate, exit of this area.

Three Ape Beasts are patroling this cave, but since it is big and dark, you should have little problem knocking them down. It takes quite sometime for them to walk to your side, and it seems you have to move around before they start moving. Stay on the East half of the cave while doing this. When all are down, go to the West side of the Tree to locate its entry. Three Spiders are roaming inside. Save your game, stay outside and ambush them with Broadhead Arrows. Choose Spiders which wander to the edges and corners to shoot — if you shoot one in the middle, the others will soon discover its body.

Use any many Broadhead Arrows as you wish, since you do not need them any more. After the Spiders turn over, move into the Tree. Walk along the footpath and get a Healing Fruit from each side of you. The one on the left is between two glowing mushrooms, the one on the right is next to another mushroom. Go forward to a veritcal strip of sparkling lights. This is the Particle Pole that you can climb like a ladder. Gather one more Healing Fruit near its base.

While you can climb the Particle Pole to the top, very likely a Spider Beast will notice you and attack when you are in mid air. Instead, turn around and move a few steps to climb up a ledge on your right. It is too high to mantle, but you can use a Rope Arrow to climb up there. Find two Moss Arrows and mantle up the ledge on your right. Do a running jump to the ledge on the other side of the Particle Pole to collect two more Moss Arrows. You may also first shoot a Rope Arrow at the opposite ledge and do a running jump to the rope. In either case, remember to jump early: the edge of your ledge slopes downwards and you cannot jump from that slope surface.

Now on the other side of the Particle Pole, crouch and move to the right (against the next ledge above you). The Spider Beast is on the next ledge, and hopefully you have not aroused it. Anyway, save game and move backwards until you can aim at the Spider Beast above. While it is possible to shoot it down with a Broadhead Arrow if you have not aroused it, consider using a Gas Arrow which saves lots of your time (you have lots of Gas Arrows anyway, and you only need two in the remaining journey).

Mantle to the ledge with the Spider Beast to find a Moss Arrow. Mantle to the circular ledge above it to find another Moss Arrow. Walk along the circular ledge going clockwise to the Particle Pole. Near the end, find a Moss Arrow on the ledge. Go back to the North side of the ledge near where you mantled from the ledge below. Jump and mantle up the slope to leave.

Leave via a slope and you can see the two Blue Crsytal pillars ahead. When the rising slope suddenly reduces the steepness to a gentle slope, stop there and crouch. A little beyond the Blue Gate is a Spider Beast hiding in the shadow. Locate it: it is on the same foot path as you are, not in the caves beyond. Even though I know it is directly ahead, I can seldom locate it (with the zooming feature of the arrows) until it spins around. So pull an arrow, look straight ahead and look hard. Shoot it down with a Gas Arrow, or you would wake up all the Spiders in the cave. After this, you only need to use one more Gas Arrow: at the Maw Portal. Use the rest as you wish.

Go forward to the shadow near the dead Spider Beast. Look inside. This is a horrifying cave. There are two more Spider Beasts and five Huge Spiders (the big black ones, in other words, not the tiny grey Sewer Spiders) inside. Forget about fighting with them, although you can try to gas/shoot most of them. The big cave has a single exit on the right.

In Original Thief, the cave is darker and you can sneak inside. Save game and move quietly along the rim of the cave wall towards your right. The first area is dark enough so you should move slowly, and stay out of the way of crawling Spiders. Get near the slope, and prepare for running. Run North up the small slope to the higher platform and turn right to run into the rectangular tunnel opening on your right (East).

In Thief Gold, the cave is a little brighter and there is no way to hide yourself. Just save game and run towards the right. Near the end, turn left and run up the ramp. On the higher platform, turn right to run into the rectangular tunnel opening on your right (East).

Once you get inside the tunnel, you are safe from the Spiders. Cross the interesting Particle Bridge and have a look at the bubbles travelling underneath. Enter the next long hall lined with purple lights.

You find that you are on a big long piece of rock, with gaps on both left and right where you can see the lava lake below. Bubbles are flying beneath you: arriving from the South East and leaving at North West. Forget about the bubbles. You need to go East on the rock without stepping on the light regions. If you step on them, the cave wall will shoot fireballs at you.

There are three ways to leave this hall on the other (East) side. First, you can run forward at top speed and knock the Ape Beast guarding the exit before he can respond. In Thief Gold, it is all the better because there isn’t an Ape Beast on the other side. I don’t know why, but this is the only AI who appears in Original Thief but not in Thief Gold. Yet even in Thief Gold, it is not very prudent to do so. Outside the exit is a ledge where two Ape Beasts patrol. They may be far away, but they may walk all the way to the hall exit. You run the risk of arousing them with your noise.

The second method is interesting but only applies to Original Thief. Deliberately attract the attention of the Ape Beast at the exit. When he start walking towards you, he will run into the trap and get killed. After he is dead, you still need one of the other methods to cross the hall. This is nice, but sometimes the trap doesn’t stop, and as a result I cannot leave the hall myself.

The prudent way is to sneak along the shadows, going left and right to follow the strips. At one point, the shadow is disconnected, but you can run past that point without triggering the trap. If playing Original Thief, creep up to the Ape Beast and knock him down when you arrive on the East end.

As yet another alternative, you can stick to either side and crawl forward. You’ll triger the traps, but they will fly above your head.

Hide in the shadow outside the exit. In front of you is a lava lake (down below) with a circular ledge around it. Two Ape Beasts are patroling this ledge (and somewhere ahead). When they are away, move forward to shadows at corner points of the ledge and wait for them.

When one of them walks past you, knock him down. Before taking action, remember to check whether the other one can see you. Hide the body, or you can throw him into the lava lake (not easy: you have to inch forward and throw forward). Wait for the second one. You can move around the ledge to find another point of ambush, but do not go up the slope. The ledge will become a narrow tunnel where you will run into the Ape Beast head on. When both are done, leave via the East end of the ledge into a short tunnel.

Emerge from the tunnel to another ledge and another lava lake, at a higher altitude than the one before. Move forward and see a lava river flowing down a slope towards your left to the previous lake. Jump across the gap and run along the ledge to the South East exit. Takes you to a spiraling ledge around a big cave, with a lava lake below. Continue running and leave on the East side, going South. Look back across the lava lake and you notice a ledge below the spiraling ledge, near the entrance. There is nothing on the ledge, and there is no way to get there. Just ignore it and continue.

Follow the tunnel to run South down the slope, then turn right to go West. At the end, drop down the ledge to go a few steps to the South to a T-junction. The left branch goes up (East) and is a blind alley. Go right to go further West. After one more left turn and one more right turn (looks confusing, but you have choice other than the T-junction mentioned above; and actually you just keep on descending), pass an arch to arrive at the final lava lake.

Hide in the shadows. Across the lava lake, you can see the red Maw Portal you came for. Let’s just disable that portal and give the Hammers a fighting chance. Bubbles come through it and start moving East. You cannot jump to the ledge containing the Maw Portal, but you don’t need to anyway.

Move forward till you have past the circular reagion facing the portal and arrived at the straight part leaving this area. Locate the four elements at the four corners, neatly arranged so that you can shoot them easily:

• Lower Right: Brown ball with green glow is Earth
• Lower Left: Blue ball with blue glow is Water
• Upper Right: Yellow ball with orange glow is Fire
• Upper Left: White ball is Air

Save your game. First, shoot a Gas Arrow at the brown ball of Earth. Remember Gas Arrows travel in straight lines, so aim with the top of the aiming rectangle. Now you no longer need any Gas Arrows. If you have some (you should have a lot) left, gas the Insect Beast and the Ape Beast guarding the Maw Portal. You have no more opportunity to use Gas Arrows anyway.

Then, shoot a Water Arrow at the orange ball of Fire. Water Arrows have parabolic trajectories, and for that distance you have to shoot real high. Sort of place the yellow ball below the whole aiming rectangle. Since you have no more use of Water Arrows, never mind losing some. Keep shooting until you make it.

Save game and send a Moss Arrow at the white ball of Air. Note that Moss Arrows curves even more than Water Arrows. And you still have need for a handful of Moss Arrows. Reload game if you sent too many Moss Arrows to nowhere. Notice that when the Moss Arrow hits the target, it becomes a Moss Crystal again and falls to the ground.

When all is well, shoot a Fire Arrow at the blue ball of Water. Needless to say, Fire Arrows travels in a straight line. When it makes the hit, the portal will disppear.

If the two beasts guarding the Maw Portal were still standing there, they would be aroused by your Fire Arrow. The Insect Beast may be sending you explosive Fly Swarms. Therefore, turn around and run along the ledge to the West (West, not where you came from).

Follow the tunnel to turn left and after two more turns, arrive at a big boulder. Three vines are dangling in front of the boulder. Save your game for the finale.

When you climb the vine to the top, the Trickster will start the ritual. If for any reason you climb back down, the Trickster will stop and wait for you. This is true all the way till the end of the mission.

On top of the boulder, find vines on the other side and climb down. Move forward quietly and stay in shadows.

The most important thing you must learn is, there is no way you can kill the Trickster. And if you ever need to use the Healing Fruits here, you will probably be killed before soon. Excursion: save game and let him see you. He has a large variety of attacks. Even if you run away (opposite you is an area you can climb up and hide), he has a spell that harms you no matter where you are (makes everything untouchable).

Another excursion: sneak to the opposite side and explore. From the opposite side, you can move up all the way to several ledges you can see from your starting location.

In front of you is a Seven Point Star altar. The Eye is in the center. On the outer points of the star (the seven convex corners) are seven pedestals. Remember what they are? They mark the Compass Borning, the Compass Leaf, the Stormsie Compass, the Flamesie Compass, the Compass Tidestream, the Compass Stone, the Compass Darkness. On the inner points of the star (the seven concave corners) are seven gems you can ignore. The Trickster is busily casting spells at the seven pedestals. When you arrive, he is probably working on the second (you can see the magical effects on the pedestals on which he has completed his spells.

Plan your path to the Eye (a straight line from you location). Cover your path with Moss Arrows (well you can use Rope Arrows at the ceiling for a change). You have eight Moss Arrows and you should have spent only one at the Maw Portal, so you should have plenty left. Save your game. Now you need to swap the Eye with the Fake Eye.

Excursion: sit still and do not swap the Eye. See what happens after the Trickster completes his ritual.

When the Trickster is walking away from you, run to the Eye to swap it. All you need to do is to walk up to the Eye and press right mouse button (as if you want to pick it up). You do not have to “ready” the Faked Eye yourself. The eyes will be swapped and you hear the tune for an new mission objective. Don’t worry, just run back to your hiding place. The Trickster needs about twenty seconds for each spell, and a dozen more for walking from point to point. So move quickly but quietly (when not on moss) If he ever hears you, you are doomed.

Stay hidden and watch the show until you are bored to death, and then continue to sit there till the end. The finale is disappointing.

Reader Wes taught me a better way to swap the Eye. I think his way is what the designers had in mind.

From where you are, you can see a rocky area on the other side of the altar. So creep along the right side to get there. Do not walk on the red area, because that is noisy (unless you cover it with moss). After the second alcove that you crossed, you will notice a ledge on the right wall that you can mantle up onto. This leads to yet another small ledge that you can mantle up onto. This second ledge over looks the ritual pit.

Shoot a Rope Arrow at the center of the roof so that it hangs above the Eye. Do a running jump to grab the rope. When the Trickster is not watching, lower yourself to swap the Eye. Climb back up and stay on the rope to watch the show beneath you.

The ending video is not bad. Actually the quality is higher than all the other missions. Yet the anticlimax hardly fits this otherwise superb game. But it fits the story of the game. And you learn more about Keepers if you haven’t so.

Somehow you get back to our world. The Hammerites give you a well earned gift. You think that you have just saved the world, but to the Keepers, you only have completed what was written in the books.

You decide to follow the path you have chosen. And not to pay attention to the Keeper’s warnings. That the balance has been disturbed, that with the Trickster dead, the Metal Age is coming…

And yes, Thief II — The Metal Age is available at the stores!