You're right, it's very annoying that this happens, but correct me if I'm wrong, this was originally a nerf to pickpocketing, and an attempt to make tension rooms/pits more difficult in the new versions? This monster behavior is not in the old versions (pre 1.2)

Anyways, if this rfe doesn't get passed, my way around it is to move to or create an opening so that I'm fighting against 2 monsters, with only 1 monster with the crowd behind it, then pick the isolated one, kill, move, repeat. It ends up wasting 2 moves per monster, but saves a big headache.

I always felt odd about pickpocketing monsters you're going to kill anyway. This doesn't make any sense for me at all. If monsters were generated with inventories from which PC could still and the same inventory was dropped once monster dies - there were no such @#$% RFEs for making pickpoketing monsters you're going to kill easier...
Sorry, I don't really like it. It's UI improvement for the feature that I think should be either removed or changed.

I agree here.

One interesting thing about the game is it's already a lot easier to pickpocket non-hostile/friendly monsters (i.e. monsters who haven't noticed you, or monsters who don't see you as a threat - you have a much higher success rate), I wonder if maybe the game could be changed so that *only* those sorts of monsters could be pick-pocketed? It would do away with this scummy "pick pocket every hostile monster in a vault" stuff and make it more of "sneak up on an unsuspecting monster and rob it blind." It would also, consequently, greatly reward stealthy and invisible NPCs, and especially Thieves.

I think as a corollary to balance it out, if the game is changed to only allow pick pocketing non-hostiles, the chance of *something* being picked should be vastly increased (50%) , and maybe the quality upped a bit as well.

Pick Pockets are an "exchange additional danger for additional loot" feature, so there is nothing wrong with the current behavior from gameplay standpoint - rather, modifying it would kill most of its usefulness.
And though "how can it be that they don't drop the same items?" is a viable question, one can have some kind of in-universe explanation, i.e. that there is a curse that destroys those items if the monster dies (it would also explain why monsters don't always drop their corpses).
If you don't like that behavior - make such an RFE; but if the current behavior stays I think it is better to improve the UI for it.

This! Backstabbing already works this way, so it should be easy to implement. It's sort of absurd that you can somehow sneak up close enough to a hostile enemy, who is actively trying to kill you, to dip your hand in their pocket and extract something.

Typically the killing of pickpocketed monsters is done to get rid of the crowd.
Of course the byproduct of this is that they might drop something after dying.

I don't think it's strange that you can pickpocket monsters and then have them drop items upon death.
The idea behind pickpocketing is to, well, pick pockets, hence the weight limitation that lets you only lift 10s items or lighter.
Then, when a monster drops something like a halberd or a plate mail, I assume it's the piece of inventory that was somehow on the monster (worn) or in some other way entangled in the pile of loot monsters apparently carry around and impossible to otherwise loot.
That way, it's reasonable that you cannot steal such items yet when you successfully pick some pockets and then kill the monster affected, it might drop those other, previously unobtainable items.
Perhaps there was some hidden pocket under their clothes/tunics/body cavities, which even a skilled thief could not loot while the monster was alive, which explains them dropping potions, rings, amulets etc. after dying, even if such items have already been poickpocketed from them.
Then, only after death, more looting was possible.

Monsters swapping places - if this idea was indeed conceived to make pickpocketing more difficult - is a terrible choice, one that only makes things more annoying and boring.
Those that pickpocketed would continue to do so anyway. I never ever pickpocket stuff with any class other than a thief.
However, when I do play a thief, I expect the activity, so immediately associated with their "trade", to be streamlined in terms of UI and simplicity of use.
Thus, I vote yes since this RFE would largely do that for me.

On a side note, stealing from neutral/friendly monsters is a chaotic act so N and L thieves are out of luck, which is why I'm strongly against the change to make only those monsters pickpocketable.
This would prevent me from roleplaying Robinhood-like chars, which steal from evil creatures and give to the innocent/poor/downtrodden.
What is so evil about stealing from a non-hostile outlaw/thief/mugger/orc/kobold/goblin... etc?
Why is stealing from initially hostile lawful monsters not considered evil?
Until these questions are addressed, I'd refrain from distinguishing pickpocketable monsters on some arbitrary basis, like hostility or lack thereof towards the PC, irrespective of alignment.

You realize, though, the entire reason you're strongly opposed to it is a rather dubious gameplay mechanic right?

If it's not chaotic to attack or even backstab nonhostile monsters (not peaceful, just nonhostile) why on Earth should it be chaotic to rob them? Why not just change that too?

Also, nonawareness/nonhostility of the PC is hardly arbitrary - it's also a requirement for backstabbing, and seems completely logical for pilfering something off of someone's person, not "completely arbitrary." I mean, just thing of pickpocketing irl.

How is it dubious gameplay mechanic? It's a known feature in many games and a firmly established mechanism.
It's the misguided people that brand it as dubious because it doesn't fit into their perfect image.
Anything that requires more effort, more clicks, more actions is by quite a few deemed to be bad mechanism.
What they fail to realize is that the implementation is at the core of the problem, not the feature itself.
This RFE addresses the problem of poor implementation of pickpocketing in ADOM and tries to find a way to counter that, instead of seeking to remove PP altogether as some advocate.

But it is chaotic to attack/backstab non-hostiles. It's also chaotic to attack hostile lawful creatures even when the PC was not the one that made them hostile.

I never said it should be chaotic to rob non-hostile monsters. I think you misunderstood me.
The current situation is this: you pickpocket a non-hostile creature of ANY alignment, your alignment drops.
If you pickpocket any hostile creature of ANY alignment, your alignment does not drop.
We're assuming that the PC did not trigger the hostility, i.e. the hostile monster was hostile upon level creation.

All I'm suggesting is making PC's alignment drop dependent on the creature's alignment instead of its hostility status.
For an N or L character, a non-hostile balor is no less evil than a hostile one, thus stealing stuff from it is not an evil act, quite the opposite.
Unless of course you employ morality based on actions without greater context, yet still without encroaching on the grey zone of "ends justify the means" philosophy.
For attacking/killing, the situation would benefit from the same approach - L char attacking a non-hostile balor should never be penalized by alignment drop.

What ixi and Dogbreath said. It makes no sense to pickpocket someone and then kill them. I never pickpocket in ADOM for several reasons, one of them being that it's a total immersion breaker. It should be changed in such a way that it pays off to pickpocket neutral and friendly monsters hoping not to be seen, rather than to mindlessly and tediously grind enemies for some extra loot that apparently comes from nowhere.

To be fair, there's no *proof* the loot comes from nowhere.
Any time you pickpocket a monster successfully maybe that loot *would* have dropped if you had just killed them. But you stole it first, so who knows?


(Yes, you can find supporting evidence in that your loot counts are higher if you pickpocket a bunch of monsters and then kill rather than just kill... but that's not proof - maybe those just happened to have extra loot? )


Of course, it's still tedious....

See, I was always under the impression of since monsters pockets are in the front, not in their backpack, that the very act of killing them destroyed items on their body, so potions shatter from the fall, scrolls get bloody, etc. so pickpocketing is the only way to get these items before they die.

This is basically how I always saw it. This, and the fact that they might want to drink that potion of healing or scroll of teleportation before you kill them.
Sure, the game doesn't implement pickpocketing and monster inventories quite like that, but it makes enough sense to keep immersion.

I suspect an idea to give monsters some items (potions, scrolls, rings, wands, missiles), teach them to use these items, let monsters drop these items once killed (before items used) and finally let PC pickpocket these monsters to get these items before they were used could be heavily downvoted. Not sure why. Otherwise it must be hard to implement for TB, especially taking into account higher priority issues.

Otherwise I'd submit an RFE...

Just remove pick pockets and grant entrance to guild through shoplifting. That would be totally awesome.

Screw the guild and entrance, pickpocketing skill should stay.
Don't like it? Don't use it.
Playing a thief once in ~20 chars, I actually enjoy it, since I don't ever do this on any other class.
At worst, make pickpockets only guaranteed for thieves and increase chance to get stuff and/or maximum mass of items stolen.

I wish Thomas modified the Thieves' Guild membership quest, because I find it too grindy. I think Detect Traps is very useful in the Pyramid mainly to prevent item destruction. That's why I get the skill every time, but carrying out the quest is very boring. For now, I think I will pick a PC that has Detect Traps from the get-go.