Talk:The Master Key of Thievery

Removing traps

Are the traps of a door/container removed, if the Key is just [a]pplied for unlocking instead of #invocating it? --ZeroOne 02:23, 27 July 2006 (UTC)

• The base item the artifact uses is a skeleton key, so [a]pplying will work exactly the same way as a key, but with 10)% chance of success. -- Kalon 03:29, 31 October 2008 (UTC)

MKoT as a lawful wish

Had some comments reverted in this article, and I'm not at all sure why. I specifically said that for lawful non-Valkyries, and only those with an early wand of wishing, the MKoT is a good potential wish candidate. I'm actually going to posit something stronger here: If you are a lawful non-Valkyrie, there aren't yet any artifacts, and you have an early wand of wishing, I find it hard to justify not making the MKoT your second artiwish. It's just too powerful.

Half physical damage is absolutely stellar. Only considering the average damage of a monster's physical attacks, half physical damage is going to be roughly the equivalent of a 10 to 15 point improvement in AC. That's like wearing a second dragon scale mail. And no amount of AC can do what the MKoT does: actually reduce the maximum damage of a physical attack. (Better AC makes the maximum damage case much less likely, but it can still occur.) You can't get half physical damage any other way as a lawful non-Valk; the half-damage artifacts, particularly the half physical damage artifacts, are possibly the best items in the game.

On top of that, MKoT gives warning and teleport control; I've spent wishes on rings of teleport control before and you likely have also.

It's not my first choice for lawful artifact wishes (the Sceptre of Might is for the MR and hungerless conflict). And yes, you need the helm to even pick it up, but the MKoT is one of the only artifacts in the game conceiveably worth two wishes. With an early wand of wishing that's quite doable -- you're going to spend three wishes on the MR artifact, probably SDSM, probably some scrolls of charging. If you have the helm already, definitely the MKoT is your best next wish; if you have more than two wishes left in the wand (2/3rds of the time), MKoT+HoOA still leaves you with wishes for speed boots, magic markers, etc.; if you have only two wishes left I think MKoT plus intrinsic speed/riding is still better than no MKoT and extrinsic "very fast". The other artifact worth wishing for as a lawful (Grayswandir) you can always just sac for, and the Sceptre of Might is a good weapon on its own. For lawful cavepeople, I save the artiwish on the SoM and can get both Grayswandir and the MKoT if I like.

Later in the game loss of protection in conversion may make the MKoT a worse choice for lawful characters, but early on I think it's the second best artifact wish.

Codehappy 23:40, September 10, 2009 (UTC)