jtr7 on 4/3/2008 at 09:55

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On the old Dark Project promo site, the acolyte Garrett is said to have been disgusted that the Keepers wouldn't use their power for personal gain. In the games, he seems not to care if people wield magic or not, as long as he isn't harmed , or otherwise inconvenienced by it, without profit. Really he's hard to pin down on purpose, so we can fill in the blanks for ourselves, with something of ourselves.

jtr7 on 4/3/2008 at 17:36

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Aaaahhh...now I know Beleg's secret.:sly:


He is unknowingly attracted to Terri Brosius's take on Thief. She did most of the story-writing for TDS, and this interview.

I suspect this quote from the quote list is at the root of some of her storylines:
Garrett: 'The city looks almost bearable from up here.'
Terri: 'God, what a cynic! Have a beer, Garrett.'

jtr7 on 4/3/2008 at 20:01

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Yeah. For the most part, the genius of the character is the neutrality that we, the individual players, can build from.

In TDP/Gold, Garrett either believed in luck, or felt it couldn't hurt to be superstitious, only help or do nothing. If you know what a Lucky Hand of Glory is, you know it couldn't work unless some super-hypnotism were involved, or psionic influence, or mind-altering chemical vapors that the holder would be immune to or protected from, and that's if it isn't magic. Or maybe it had a purely sentimental value for him. Maybe he knew the dead person it was taken from before it was made into a hand of glory. How did Issyt borrow Garrett's lucky hand of glory? Garrett helping a beggar out, than going through the extra trouble to take it back? Was it the principle of the matter? Anyway, he just seems comfortable with the concept of luck. Anyway, I find the hand of glory anomalous, and his belief in superstitions ambiguous overall.

From the Assassins! briefing, the best of Garrett's expressions concerning luck:
"...They'd been after me for years to join one of their stables,
but I'm not interested. Maybe they'll get the idea and give up. More likely
they'll just ramp up the threats. Nothing I can't handle if I'm careful...and
lucky. And my luck seems to have finally turned for the better...."

From the Thieves' Guild briefing, just a choice of words, not an expression of belief:
"Finding the vase may prove difficult, since I have no idea where it is. Should
be a hot topic of conversation among the Downwinders. Maybe I'll be lucky
enough to overhear where they're stashing it. Time to make a living...."

From the Framed! briefing, another choice of words without belief:
"I realize that breaking into Shoalsgate is like looking down a Burrick's mouth with
a lit match, but it would pay me enough to lay low for a while. And it doesn't hurt
to be giving the police some dirty laundry to deal with either. Besides, with my
luck, if I don't take this job I could end up in there anyway."

From the Trail of Blood briefing, an expression of new current belief, with a hint of the old belief:
"Meanwhile, I have no idea where I am or what I'll be up against and even if I did
there's no going back for supplies. If I believed in it, now it would be a good time
for me to wish for luck."

From the cutscene before Precious Cargo, a choice of words:
"...they must be connected somehow to the scripture. ...I should be so
lucky."

gar0703, just a choice of words: "Some people in this city are too rich for their own good, luckily they have me to give them a hand."

gar100, just a choice of words: "No luck here."

More magic:
M5dossier: "Dorcas Goodfellow
Blackbrook Underguild ambassador. Particular (importable) dominates include magical constructs, medicinals, and elemental crystals."

garm0605: "Magical traps. Guess he's serious about his privacy."

gar0212: "Jerm is the man that makes those magic lenses, there's probably some valuable lenses in here."

SG310200: "These Mages are not ones to be trifled with. Saw 'em use their magic on old Bradwort. The Mages caught 'im stealin' lupins from the tables of the meeting hall. One of 'em summoned great hurdling balls from the sky, glowing rocks from the moon they was, and they mashed in his poor skull!"

M6RAKEL: "Rakel's Tome of Magic, Introduction
It is the erudite practitioner of magic who, in these days of pseudo-wizards carelessly
wielding enchanted materials, retains the secrets of commanding the powerful sorcery
found in the world of nature. For it was from listening to the hidden whispers of
ancient oaks, of creeping vines, of desert sandstone pillars, that civilized people
first learned the abstruse ways of magic."

M6FLWR: "Compendium of Natural Magic, Chapter 15
Tatyana's Flowers
These flowers grow primarily in the icy mountain caves of the Esse range. By way of
defense, they have evolved a method of warming and swirling the magical energy of the
sentient plants and rocks discussed in the last chapter, lulling them to sleep. The
flowers are named after archemage Tatyana Yokobik who pioneered their use in the
temporary negation of magical spells and systems."

M12DPROJ: "The world as I once knew it was a place of magic - full of mystery and
inhabited by creatures of glamour and terror. The men who lived there lit their
bonfires and wondered at what crept and lurked in the darkness outside their weak
circles of light. All their dreams, their aspirations and dreads,
come from that darkness.
..."

M11BCKGD: "Though these be perhaps the final moments of our beloved cathedral and mine mortal life, I shall faithfully chronicle to the end. A great evil magic hath befallen us, and we battle with demon-kind on all sides. Our own fallen brethren rise from death and turn on us, cold light aflame in their eyes. Our mighty doors availed us naught, for the assault was from within. Soon I shall be found and slain, like the others. May The Builder save our souls."

g1_dru_idle: "(Drunk) ...Bffffff...MAGIC sword...gimmmabreak...pff...tss."

CitySectionObjectives_035000: "Obtain Dyan's magic thing in the Park to open the pumphouse."

CitySectionObjectives_033500: "Use Dyan's magic amulet to open the Pump House, then lower the water level so you can enter the canal."

SM3doversjournal:
"Keeper Dover - Journal Entry Number 2136
...and the glyph that Elder Beryl speculates must exist - though we have yet to find - one that enables shape-shifting. What a potent elixer of glyph magics that would be."

You get the idea. There are those who believe, those who don't, and those who leave it to others. That's most of it, some of it wasn't used in-game, but major portions were. The practioners of magic call it magic in their private journals.

Beleg Cúthalion on 9/3/2008 at 22:19

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These two elements of superstition (although surely secondary in their canonical importance) impress me still; they make the Thief world a little more organic. Some months ago a radio show reported about some old thievish tradition including leaving a piece of dung at the site of crime, often covered with paper or cloth, as a guardian (i.e. "living", warm part of the thief). Or, in a second way of interpretation, as an item in return for what had been stolen. I always wondered if guys like the Downwinders would do that and I have some evil plans for an FM. :sly:

I'd like to see Garrett being drawn to a lot of unnatural (or in this case simply intangible) things; just because intelligence should make him interested in them. Not that he'd fall for these things, but only to know what exists in the world around him.

Solabusca on 10/3/2008 at 06:16

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Yeah, well, that's what I'm around for...;)



That's actually a fairly good point. The City is steeped in folk-tales and ghost-stories, superstitions and odd beliefs - basically, ghosts, goblins (see end cutscene of TDS) and long-leggedy beasts, along with whatever actually goes bump in the night (the creatures the Trickster mentions in his notes).

Garrett seems to be in a unique position to actually have first hand knowledge of a lot of these things - he's had run-ins with ghosts, with the Hag, with zombies and haunts and willow-the-wisps and all sorts of things that are simply the stuff of legend for the common folk. For him, they're concrete realities (or outright fairy-tales). He's met and defeated a god, and yet he still clings to his odd little superstitions and personal rituals.



Interestingly enough, it sounds similar to a Hand of Glory type safety measure. I'm certain you can dig up a lot of odd 'just for luck' rituals done by those engaged in less wholesome activities.

.j.