Characters / Thief

A list of characters appearing in the Thief series. Mostly sorted by their faction and social group, though some are sorted by what larger role they play in the narrative of the installments.

This is a continuing work in progress, so remain patient and stay tuned.

Installment-specific characters and groups

The individual installments have their own pages too, each for their own particular casts of characters.

• Thief: The Dark Project
• Thief II: The Metal Age
• Thief: Deadly Shadows
• Thief (2014)

Main and recurring characters and groups

Garrett

"What is locked... can be opened. What is hidden... can be found. What is yours... can be mine."

Voiced by: Stephen Russell

The most promising acolyte left us. Not out of the lesser folly of sentiment, but the greater folly of anger. His heart was clouded, and his balance was lost, but his abilities were unmatched. Even then, we knew to watch him most carefully.

— Keeper Annals

A most promising acolyte, yes...but that was long ago. Now he is other. A thief - and probably worse...

— Letter to Keeper Orland, author unknown

The Keepers were training me to be one of them, but I found other uses for those skills.

— Garrett in "A Keeper's Training"

Our hero, though he'd prefer if we didn't call him that. A Master Thief, Garrett is capable of breaking in and out of just about any secure location in the City, regardless of how impregnable it seems. Years of training have honed his skills to the point where he can sneak and scramble around without being seen or heard, and he's well-known for being a particularly slippery person to track down.

As an orphaned boy, Garrett grew up pickpocketing on the streets, until one day he managed to make a lift from a Keeper- rather than punish him, said Keeper allowed Garrett into their order, where he trained in the arts of stealth and subterfuge. In the end, Garrett left their order, seeing it better to put his skills to supporting himself.

Unfortunately for him, he seems to have a way with getting caught up in things...

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• The Ace: Garrett was considered to be this in the field of stealth among the Keepers, thought to be their most promising student before his departure from their ranks, as well as by many in the field of independent professional thievery in his criminal life out in the City. His numerous often extremely difficult jobs, heists and accomplishments through the series only prove it beyond a doubt, and all the competition and enemies he racks up, gets the better of and survives in such a dangerous profession and place like the City.
• Actually Pretty Funny: When Garrett stops a young thief from picking his pocket, he repeats the thing Artemus said to him when he tried the same thing when he was a child: "It's not an easy thing to see a Keeper, especially one who does not wish to be seen." Garrett then smiles for the first time in the entire trilogy, well aware of the Irony.
• Anti-Hero: He's out for himself, but he has a sentimental streak he'd never acknowledge. That does not prevent him being ruthless, cold, or unpleasant, especially to people he believes are trying to use him or he finds generally detestable.
• Badass Boast: Garrett will throw these out occasionally, usually right before backing them up.
  "I've never robbed a god before. It'll be a challenge."
• Badass Normal: Goes hand in hand with being the City's undisputed master thief.
  • Empowered Badass Normal: After the events of Deadly Shadows, he's the sole owner of a glyph, which implies he's the only person, Keepers included, who can use its magic.
• Batman Gambit: A few of his more complicated capers tend to involve manipulating more than locks.
• Breakout Character: Marks Stephen Russell's most famous and influential voice acting role to date. Also, Garrett was this trope for Looking Glass Studios as well, since most of their previous games had Heroic Mimes or protagonists who simply lacked Garrett's charisma.
• Carry a Big Stick: Besides his bow and stealth training, his main "tool of the trade" is not his sword, but his trusty blackjack.
• Celibate Hero: The only known possible exception occurred when he took a purely physical interest in Basso's sister. Though he and Viktoria seemed to share romantic implications during the Metal Age, before her tragic Heroic Sacrifice rendered the matter a moot point.
• Character Development: While Garrett doesn't change drastically over the course of the series, he gradually becomes less of an abstained loner when his own selfish choices leads to severe consequences for someone he cares about in The Metal Age, and ends up reluctantly joining the Keepers for real as a mix of fulfilling his duties at last as well as furthering his own habits.
• The Chosen One: The Keepers believe he is this, a neutral person that is not swayed by any faction and will restore balance to their order and the city, due to many of their archived prophecies fitting the description of Garrett and his deeds. Garrett prefers to think of himself as The Unchosen One, dismissing those same prophecies as garbage that only the Keepers believe. Turns out he has a bit from both tropes.
• Consummate Professional: See Thou Shalt Not Kill. Garrett's not above killing if he really has to, but he views it as unprofessional and sloppy for a thief to have to resort to it. Besides which, murdering people tends to get a lot of people very angry at you, far moreso than simple thievery. On higher difficulties in the original trilogy, one of the typical failure conditions is killing anyone.
  • In a way, this actually winds up biting him hard. When he's contracted to retrieve the Eye, he ignores virtually every sign that the thing is an Artifact of Doom: it's in a locked-off section of the city, he can find documents that blame it for the zombie apocalypse that occurred there, and it talks to him and focuses on upholding his end of the deal. Constantine is considerably less concerned about upholding his, and uses the thing to kickstart The End of the World as We Know It. Oh, and he doesn't even pay Garrett.
• Cool Sword: Mostly averted by his own sword, an entirely unremarkable length of metal with a cutting edge, a point and a hilt. Furthermore, it's shiny (not very stealthy), he's not very skilled at wielding it, and it will barely see any use in a typical game outside cutting cloth. However, this trope is played straight for the latter two thirds of The Dark Project, where Garrett acquires and wields a special, more sophisticated sword that doesn't shine in the light and does a little more damage than his old one.
• The Cowl: You bet.
• Dark Is Not Evil: He wears darkly colored clothes and boots, a darkly colored hood and cloak and even his equipment is usually of darker color tones, and while he can be a snarky, biting jerkass at times and a cold, distant, selfish loner, he is never outright cruel or evil, avoids killing where possible, and ultimately ends up a Knight in Sour Armor. Justified, since he needs to blend in with the shadows as much as possible, to avoid being seen during his heists.
• Dating Catwoman: Deconstructed. Garrett has no small amount of unresolved sexual tension with Viktoria, and their conversations through Thief 2 suggest that their partnership might be taking a turn for Slap-Slap-Kiss territory; however, in spite of this, they have many differences that keep them bickering. This ultimately gets Viktoria killed before anything can come of the tension between them. Garrett's reaction, subtle though it is, makes it clear that he saw her as more than just a business partner.
• Deadpan Snarker: He elevates this trope to an art form.
• Did Not Get the Girl: Wood Nymph, really. Despite how much closer they got in ''Metal Age', the hints of a romantic dynamic forming between them, nothing ultimately becomes of him and Viktoria in the end, as she is forced to sacrifice herself to defeat Karras before it can.
• Did You Just Punch Out Cthulhu?: He outwits and defeats a Pagan God who is his unverse's equivalent to Satan and a powerful, ancient face-stealing Humanoid Abomination over the course of the trilogy.
• Dude, Where's My Respect?: At the end of the first game he is walking through the snow when one of the Keepers shows up and basically insults him, calling him "blind", to which he responds "In case you haven't noticed I just saved the world, yourself included."
• Enemy Mine: Garrett teams up with The Hammerites to stop The Trickster in TDP, Viktoria to defeat Father Karras in TMA, and with First Keeper Orland to fight The Hag in DS.
• Expy He is somewhat like a male Lara Croft, the main difference being most of the people he steals from are still alive. (with a few exceptions such as the Bonehoard, Lost City, etc.)
• Fast-Roping: In the first two games, he can climb rope arrows with impressive speed, making them useful getaway tools.
• Fatal Flaw: Three of them stand out the most. Greed, naturally, his lone wolf I Work Alone tendencies, and his Genre Blindness.
  • His greed at being offered a hundred thousand gold coins for doing a job in Dark Project caused him to overlook the glaring signs that there was more to Constantine and Viktoria than met the eye, nearly leading to his horrific death and the end of civilization.
  • His determined desire to be independent of others, to remain a solitary professional and keep them coldly at arms length and not get emotionally invested in anything or anyone causes him no shortage of troubles with others who are trying to help him, ignoring the warnings of Artemus and the Keepers, but especially when detaching from Viktoria, who he has grown close to, leads to her death in Metal Age.
  • His Genre Blindness meanwhile frequently leads him to think the world he is in is a Film Noir, leaving him vulnerable when the villains show him otherwise. Though to his credit, he does ultimately undergo Character Development after suffering the consequences of these flaws. Apart from the Genre Blindness, of course.
• First-Person Smartass: One of the classic Video Game examples.
• Genre Blindness: Garrett frequently seems to think himself in a grounded Film Noir, and while that is often indeed the case for him with his career as a thief in The City, it leads to him being blindsided by the supernatural horror stories that are the Trickster and the Hag, as well as the war/espionage genre that was Karras, the Mechanists and the Metal Age.
• Grappling-Hook Pistol: He uses rope arrows and climbing gloves as an equivalent.
• Greed: He could hardly have guessed at the extent of things, but Viktoria and Constantine offer Garrett an exorbitant sum to retrieve The Eye. Garrett ignores all the not-so-subtle signs The Eye may be an Artifact of Doom and instead focuses on the biggest payday of his career. He is then betrayed, maimed, and left for dead when he finally retrieves it for them, and it nearly allows Constantine/The Trickster to bring about what is effectively doomsday.
• Hardboiled Detective: Though he is a wise-cracking thief first and foremost, he shows elements of this trope in cases where he agrees to use his stealthiness to help someone with an urgent investigation. Being a Film Noir-inspired Anti-Hero with narrations before each mission, this isn't that much of a surprise.
• Heartbroken Badass: Subtly implied to be the case for him at the end of The Metal Age.
• The Hero: Of the "grumpy Lovable Rogue" variety.
• Heroic Neutral: He'd never admit it to anyone, but his experiences and general attitude to life have gradually shaped him into this kind of character.
• Humble Hero: Subverted in that his motives are obviously acquisitive, given that professional thievery is his livelihood. Played straight in that, while he likes his reputation of a wanted, infamous master thief, he doesn't revel in it. At most, he just quips One-Liner snarkings at what are obvious Poor Man's Substitute copycats, trying to pass themselves off as him by using his name.
• Impossible Thief: He's robbed from places you wouldn't believe and escaped from traps or stand-offs that seemed impossible.
• Ineffectual Loner: He claims he just wants to be left alone so he can concentrate on his combined livelihood and hobby: thieving. However, despite his constant proclamations about how he's going to "retire in style", he never seems to do so.
• In the Hood: His face or even individual facial features are rarely seen outside of cutscenes, and even then it is often obscured to various degrees by shadows and angles. After all, he likes to protect his identity, with all those "Wanted" posters◊ dotting the streets and squares.
• I Just Want to Be Free: Garrett cherishes his independence more than anything. Thievery was merely a means to an end for him to survive. Problem is, to be a truly free-spirit in this corrupt world without succumbing to its pitfalls and machinations, and without making allies, seems an impossible dream. He resents nobles, the mafia, most of his fellow criminals including the Downwind Thieves' Guild, the City Watch, Hammerites, Pagans, Mechanists and supernatural entities for trying to put a price on his head and/or coerce his services for themselves. He especially hates the Keepers for continually watching him, trying to reform him back among their ranks and trying to get him to do what they want. Though this aspect of his character is intricately deconstructed in Metal Age, leading to a good deal of Character Development.
• I Work Alone: His standard attitude. However, he isn't entirely above swallowing his pride and working with others, particularly if they're among the rare few individuals he tends to trust. This is painfully deconstructed in Metal Age when he tries to pull this on Viktoria after having worked together, outright stating the three words to her, despite how much closer they've become by this point, out of fear of getting killed. This leads her to have to attack Soulforge alone and sacrifice herself to stop Karras, devastating Garrett and leading him to finish what Viktoria started, defeat Karras and finally work with the Keepers.
• Jerk with a Heart of Gold: He always pretends that he's all about the Bystander Syndrome. Despite this, he seems to be pretty willing to help people that wound up in desperate situations or under overwhelming threats, turning him into a stealthy Knight in Sour Armor instead.
• Just Like Robin Hood: Cynically inverted most of the time, since he is willing to rob equally from the rich and the poor (though the rich have more stuff, obviously). On the other hand, he's less contemptuous for those in poverty and dislikes seeing them suffer on the whim of the upper-classes. On a visual level, being a hooded archer helps.
• Knight in Sour Armor: Gradually forms into this over the course of the Metal Age thanks to Viktoria's influence, slowly starting to care about what is happening to the world and people in it, and doing what is right... if reluctantly.
• Living Legend: In the thieving community, at any rate. To the point that he has some Ascended Fanboys by the time of Deadly Shadows. He doesn't care much and sticks to being a lone freelancer. It nearly gets him assassinated once or twice.
• Love Is a Weakness: His general opinion on all things romance. In a cutscene at the start of The Metal Age, he even snarks about Basso's and Jenivere's love for each other and explicitly says that he had always equated romance and relationships with getting caught. This attitude of his receives a tragic Ironic Echo by the end of that same installment, when it is plainly clear he had fallen for someone he ordinarily would have hated.
• Married to the Job: And he considers it both a livelihood and his true hobby. There are signs that he isn't telling the entire truth.
• Master-Apprentice Chain: Unintentionally starts one after re-joining the Keepers. A young girl tries to steal from him and he responds the same way Artemus did when Garrett was a child, hinting that he'd end up mentoring the girl like Artemus did to him.
• Master of Disguise: Notably averted. He only goes undercover once, in the appropriately titled mission "Undercover" from the first game. And even in that case, he needed careful preparation and a few contacts who could "pull some strings" in the background, in order to get him in.
• Master Swordsman: Completely averted. Garrett can wield his sword (TDP, TMA) or dagger (TDS) well enough, but he is no professional. Most gameplay revolves around avoiding direct confrontation with guards or other combat-capable opponents; attempting to fight even one guard head-on usually results in Garrett being heavily wounded. How good he really is at it depends on how good the player is. At the very most, Garrett will usually be using his cold steel melee weapon for sneaking up on monsters and backstabbing them. The dagger replaced the sword in Deadly Shadows mainly because the developers wanted to emphasize even further that Garrett's bladed weapons are meant to be defensive in their nature, of last resort rather than first.
• Master of Unlocking: Lockpicking is par for the course in most of the missions he conducts.
• Nay-Theist: Well aware of the existence of deities, yet regards the religious Hammers, Pagans and so on as "a bunch of fanatics not worth anyone's time".
• Not in This for Your Revolution: His general opinion on the whole "saving The City from an insane villain" business and on the Keeper prophecies that supposedly concern him.
• Only One Name: It's likely that he simply doesn't have a surname - such things are important only to the nobility, and he was a dirt-poor orphan from a very young age.
• Perpetual Poverty:
  • Uh, Garrett? Over the course of three games you've stolen thousands and thousands of gold. Why do you still have trouble paying the rent? Are you throwing it all away between each caper? Ale and whores? Seriously, hire an accountant or something, man. Jokes aside, it's subtly implied that he likes thieving so much, he wouldn't want to retire from it ever, so he always comes up with excuses concerning the rent or something to avoid it.
  • Then again it should come as no surprise. To be an independent master thief, uncaught for so long, he has to invest in equipment for upcoming jobs. And that custom-made stuff's not cheap. He has to pay lesser thieves for tips and inside-info. Garrett's expenses increase because he's always on the run from the law, and wrathful nobility who either want him dead, or want to employ him. And then there's his greedy landlords...
  • In The Metal Age it's shown that Garrett has hidden private chambers which are very richly decorated, while his main apartment is the usual dirt poor rat-hole. It's implied he actually lives pretty well, but has to do so in secret since he's a commoner in a feudal society (a non-noble flashing that kind of cash around would very quickly be identified as a thief). He gets driven out of his familiar boltholes during that game's events, however, and seems in poorer circumstances by the third game. And bitter about it.
• Phantom Thief: He isn't the protagonist of a classic stealth game series for nothing.
• Player Character: In every single installment of the series.
• Punch-Clock Hero: He falls into this role far too often for his liking.
• Refusal of the Call: Of nearly every instance where he has to aid in the saving of the city from a new threat. He usually gets convinced/coerced into to help anyway, but he'll complain the whole damn way.
  • The Call Knows Where You Live: As Artemus notes, no matter how "artistic a sneak" Garrett is, he can't escape his fate.
  • Resigned to the Call: Finally decides to stop running away from his destiny after Viktoria's death.
• Rule of Cool: While many aspects of is character are indeed cool, he is overall more of a conscious subversion. His creators deliberately avoided taking the trope too far, fearing that they'd turn him into a formulaic caricature.
• Screw This, I'm Outta Here: He pulled this on the Keepers before the start of the first game.
• Ship Tease: With Viktoria in Thief II.
• Stealth Expert: He impressed even the Keepers, who considered his skills to be the greatest they'd ever seen, and he's probably only improved since leaving them.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: Averted. Garrett has a set amount of time he can spend holding his breath underwater. If the breath indicator runs out, Garrett starts losing health rapidly and can easily drown. Breath potions can help remedy this issue during longer underwater swims.
• Tap on the Head: His preferred method of getting rid of guards or bystanders that could pose a threat to him is knocking them out with a blackjack.
• Technical Pacifist: Though, deep down, he has some moral convictions to do with it as well, his official reasoning for preferring to knock out people instead of killing them is "professionalism". He's not an assassin or a murderer. Killing people tends to upset other people, who come after you with big sticks. And it's messy.
• Thou Shalt Not Kill: Enforced by Expert difficulty which will outright fail you if you resort to murder. Even outside of that, he's characterized as a professional thief, not an amateur, and certainly not a mass-murderer. Though if need be, he can be pragmatic enough to kill depending on the situation, including giving Lotus a Mercy Kill, mercy killing all the Masked Servants by the end of the Metal Age, setting things up to kill the Trickster and Karras in a stealthy roundabout way, and killing sapient Chaos Beasts.
• Took a Level in Kindness: Downplayed, but evident in Deadly Shadows, after the Character Development he went through in Metal Age, being a good deal less cold, bitter, apathetic, biting and rude than he was before, working closely and willingly with Artemus and the Keepers this time around, though still remaining an obviously fed up Deadpan Snarker who doesn't like, agree with or get along with most of the Keepers.
• Trick Arrow: Part of his standard arsenal, with varying elemental flavors, along with an assortment of bombs.
• Tricked-Out Gloves: Due to certain Real Life Writes the Plot development issues, he uses climbing gloves instead of rope arrows in Deadly Shadows. Due to them being more cumbersome to use, they weren't as well received as the rope arrows and the series' fanbase and reviewers often consider them to be one of the few bigger flaws in the third game.
• Weak, but Skilled: As he himself is willing to admit, he's not a very good swordsman. Hence why he prefers stealth over direct confrontation. And while he is very skilled with climbing and traversing all kinds of terrain and obstacles, he is no ninja either.
• Weapon Twirling: If he has his dagger deployed in Deadly Shadows, one of the idle animations shows his hand playfully twirling the dagger.
• Well, Excuse Me, Princess!: Shared this dynamic with Viktoria throughout Metal Age, though it gradually softened.
• What You Are in the Dark: Garrett has the option to steal a half-crazed blind widow's fortune in the third game, but can opt not to. The game will acknowledge this, but his only reward is thanks from the widow.
• When He Smiles: It's only at the very end of the series that Garrett, finding an orphan waif with potential much like himself, cracks an amused, and possibly hopeful smile.
• Where Does He Get All Those Wonderful Toys?: Averting Easy Logistics, he has to personally go out and buy his special equipment on a regular basis from dingy little specialist shops, who know what he does and charge accordingly for their work and silence - which is where at least some of his stolen money goes.
• Wouldn't Hurt a Child: Implied. While there are no children in the games themselves, at the end of Deadly Shadows he catches a little girl trying to pick pocket him, in much the same way he was caught and recruited himself and, rather than get mad he seems to admire her stealth skills, the implication being he will train her to be a master thief as well.
• Would Not Shoot a Civilian: Not only does he have a rule against killing innocents, the game will often actively penalize you for it, and since civilians can always be knocked out no matter how alerted they are, there's no reason to kill them other than For the Evulz.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: While Garrett doesn't complain about them that much, he certainly isn't a fan of Giant Spiders or zombies.

Thieves and the Criminal Underworld

The faction in general

We chose our profession in defiance of the greed of the monarchy. We will not live for the sake of taxes to fatten the noble's pockets. We choose to live the only life available to those who would truly be free. We are Thieves.

— credo of the Downwind Thieves' Guild

These are the characters that make up the seedy underbelly of the ancient sprawling metropolis known as The City. From amateur pickpockets on the streets to professional freelancers or feared crime bosses, the criminal underworld of The City is as equally manifold as its regular society.

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• The City Narrows: Where you can commonly find most of the criminal and thieving-related establishments, and incidentally where Garrett tends to live.
• Con Man: Some of The City's criminals.
• Honor Among Thieves: Thieves' guilds, fences and thieving shop owners tend to have a code of honour instead of just being disorganized bands of thugs.
• Lovable Rogue: Most of the fences and other independent co-workers in the business that Garrett visits throughout the series. Unsurprisingly, most of them are of the Justified Criminal kind.
• The Mob Boss Is Scarier: Frequently implied in the notes and letters left by crime bosses for their underlings. Even the high-ranking ones. If you're working in the City's criminal underground, you best not anger a powerful crime boss. Unless you're Garrett. And even then, he tries to stay out of their way.
• Phantom Thief: Some of them, though none seem to match Garrett.
• The Syndicate: The most powerful crime bosses of The City, known euphemistically as "The City Wardens". Some of their number occasionally try to bring Garrett to heel as their personal cutpurse/thief, prompting him to rob them blind in retaliation.
• Thieves' Guild: There are several (and frequently competing) in the City. The only named one in the canon is The Downwind Thieves' Guild.
• Wretched Hive

Basso "The Boxman"

Voiced by: Neil Forman

Garrett's long-term pal and colleague, appearing physically in The Dark Project and The Metal Age. His nickname comes from the fact that he's an expert lockpicker, probably one of the most skilled ones in the whole City. Garrett busts him out of Cragscleft Prison in the first game and helps him with rescuing his fiancée Jennivere early in the second game.

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• Alliterative Name: Well, alliterative nickname.
• Early-Bird Cameo: He makes an appearance in one of the first missions of The Dark Project - all of it spent unconscious - but has no on-screen speaking roles until the second game.
• The Load: Rather literally in his first appearance in the series. Unfortunately, he isn't very useful during the Cragscleft Prison mission, since he's unconscious the entire time. Garrett has to carry him all the way out during the return trip and make sure he doesn't die or drown.
• Master of Unlocking: Considered a real expert by many. Hence his nickname. Even Garrett admits that Basso is probably better than he is, though he's a terrible sneak.
• One Last Job: The first mission of The Metal Age has Basso talking Garrett into going along with him to rescue Jennivere from her servant indenture so she and Basso can leave The City and put his life of crime behind them. Garrett is unmoved by Basso's situation, but goes along with it because breaking into Rumford Mannor promises to be a simple and lucrative job.

Cutty

See here

Felix

See here

Bernard Farkus

See here

Ramirez

See here

Reuben and Donal

See here

Thom

See here

Giry

See here

Raputo

See here

Webster

See here

Captain Davidson

See here

Captain William "Dark" Markham

See here

Armed thieves and thieves' guild guards

Voiced by: Michael Romatelli, Mike Chrzanowski

See here

Thugs, pirates and looters

Voiced by: Lonnie Farmer, George Ledoux, Chloe Leamon

See here

Hammerites (The Order of the Hammer)

The faction in general

In the beginning we lived as thieves, stealing fur and fang of beasts for survival. Then came the Builder who brought us the Hammer. And with it we forged a new way of life. To reject the Hammer is to denounce the Builder.

— The Hammer Book of Tenets

The stone cannot know why the chisel cleaves it, the iron cannot know why the fire scorches it. When thy life is cleft and scorched, when death and despair leap at thee, beat not thy breast and curse thy evil fate, but thank the Builder for the trials that shape thee.

— The Hammer Book of Tenets

Vigilance is our shield, that protects us from our squalid past. Knowledge is our weapon, with which we carve a path to an enlightened future.

Builder lead me, against the dark, towards the light. Fire of the forge, water of the chalice, hammer of the God...

— Prayers and proverbs heard among Hammerite guards

The main church in the City: worshipers of the Master Builder, whom they believe gifted the human race with tools and metal-working to drive back the wilderness and create civilization. Their proper dedicates are all male, though they permit lay-women to attend masses. Powerful and zealous, they hunt blasphemy and criminality and punish both harshly, using their signature massive warhammers and the gifts of red-hot branding irons, steel blades, and boiling water. Many fear them far more than the City Watch due to their highly organized and unrelenting assault on "heresy". All that said, they are not purely militant; charity, healing and shelter are all potentially available from the Hammerites, provided one is penitent. In addition, some of the threats they pursue are very real and very dangerous - the wilderness, for instance, didn't give up its hold on humanity without a fight, and has yet to be truly defeated...

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• Anti-Magical Faction: Subverted, despite appearances. While they hate the Pagans and Pagan nature magic, their priests can summon minor magical projectiles when the need for combat arises.
• Arc Symbol: The Hammer. They see it as a holy gift of the Builder to humanity - the gift for reshaping nature, for creating new skills, crafts and works to advance humanity, and for the purposes of defence and war (as a warhammer, including those wielded by Hammerite guards, soldiers and knights). They indulge in hammer-based Sigil Spam on their property due to religious purposes. Holy water also appears as an occasional secondary symbol, but is usually not displayed as a part of their iconography.
• Ascetic Aesthetic: Of the straight-lined, minimalistic, drab, "Techno-Gothic" kind, not the "shiny and smooth" kind.
• Batman Cold Open: Their faction's introductory cutscene in Deadly Shadows, complete with a gradual Fade to Black involving the appearance of their symbol, the hammer.
• Church of Saint Genericus: Not so much their own church as a whole, but individual church buildings invoke this: St. Yora's Cloister, Saint Edgar's Cathedral, etc.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: Their main traditional colours are red and argent white, probably meant to reflect their work as blacksmiths and metalurgists.
• Corrupt Church: Given the Grey-and-Grey Morality of the setting, this and Saintly Church both crop up, just like a lot of churches in reality. On one side, the Hammerites are often overly self-righteous, protectionist, moralistically condescending towards the secular world and often intolerant, with heathen-smiting, persecution and imprisonment of troublemakers common. On other plus side, they are advocates of advancing human knowledge, industry and reasonable technological progress in a safe fashion; they vow to guard the City and ensure its survival and the well-being of nobles and commoners alike, they do not scoff at nature despite their hatred of the Pagans and praise for human industry, and many of the individual Hammerites are thoroughly good, kindly and self-sacrificing people.
• Crystal Dragon Jesus: The Builder, the one god. A combination of the Abrahamic God and of the Greek mythical figure of Prometheus. The Promethean part of The Builder's characterization comes from the notion that he gave the hammer (and other tools) to humanity so it could rise from savagery and shape the surrounding world according to its needs, much like Prometheus and his gift of fire. The Hammerites don't seem to have an equivalent of a Jesus figure, but some of their past saints - like Saint Edgar and "The Smith-in-Exile" - are highly revered.
• Dark Is Not Evil: Despite their dour, grim, uptight and zealous personalities and deeply conservative beliefs and policies, along with muted color schemes, they are generally incorruptible, serve the City by keeping law and order, protecting its citizens from criminals and Chaos Beasts alike and running prisons for offenders, where other law enforcement factions like the Baron's Police and City Watch are shown to be largely inept and openly corrupt, hiring criminals or taking bribes from them, where they are executed immediately when they try to bribe Hammerites. They also refuse to exterminate their Pagan enemies or scoff at or destroy nature, instead seeking to convert and tame both into a better path, and want the progression of technology to be done at a careful and gradual pace instead of out of control and in the hands of the worst of people, as the Mechanists do. Their counterpart the Mechanist faction by contrast is clearly Light Is Not Good, and the opposite of them in all ways.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance: Occurs to show the more shady and dogmatic side of this faction.
• Elves vs. Dwarves: The Dwarves to the Pagans' Elves.
• The Extremist Was Right: Where most folk of the City have become complacent and stopped believing in supernatural things like the Trickster and Chaos Beasts, writing it off as Hammerite superstition, considering them too zealous for their own good, the Hammerites are indeed proven correct about their existence and the threat they still pose, with Garrett admitting to such.
• Fantastic Rank System: High Priests seem to be equivalent of bishops (alternatively, the High Priest is only one and acts as an analogue of the Real Life Pope), while Temple Priests are lower-ranking Hammerite priests overseeing individual temples (i.e. churches, cathedrals, monasteries). A Master Forger is a type of secondary priest, serving as a master of ceremonies during industrially-themed rituals in Hammerite temples. Besides that, he also oversees the Hammerite workshops and industrial facilities adjoined to the temple. The bulk of the regular members of the order is made up of the Engineers and Craftsmen (technological and religious training), the Hammer Warriors (combat training, military service) and the Temple Guards (combat training, guard duty). Hammerite novices are simply called Novices. Regular members of the order use Fantastic Honorifics and address each other as "Brother".
• Hurricane of Puns: Many of their hammer-themed or industry-themed battle cries, heard while they are attacking an opponent or trespasser, to the point of becoming amusing catchphrases.
  Hammerite guard (attacking Garrett): Lay thyself upon mine anvil!
• In-Series Nickname: The Order of the Hammer is colloquially known as the "Hammerites". Common people (Garrett included) tend to abbreviate it even further, to just "(the) Hammers". After all, they're heavy, blunt, mostly made of metal and not especially easy to negotiate with.
• Jerkass: For every kind monk in this order, there's ten horrible ones. A shining example was Garrett overhearing a conversation between two Hammerites that a young novice accidentally severely scalded himself working. Both mock his fate, stating he was too flawed to ever be worthy of The Builder, and the fact that he's currently dying of his burns only proves it. They also ridicule and ostracize their Hammerite brother Inspector Drept as a crackpot for being more open minded and reasonable than them, willing to associate with non Hammerites and think outside their introverted box.
• Knight Templar: They are actually not much into holy wars and offensive crusading, but they are definitely determined to sacrifice their lives in the defence of their faith and the ideals it stands for, and for stamping out criminals and evil as they see it.
• Leitmotif: As one would expect, their ambient music themes in the series are a mixture of industrial ambience, the pounding of hammers and various chants and choir pieces. In The Dark Project, their incidental themes can be heard among the varying ambience of the missions "Break from Cragscleft Prison" and "Undercover" and in the opening third of some of the briefings. Deadly Shadows gives the Hammerites a unified ambient theme heard throughout the game ("The Hammerites"). An interesting touch applied to the Hammerite chants heard in the first game is that they sound like a combination of Gregorian and Buddhist chanting (probably done to emphasize the otherworldly nature of the setting and the faith of the Builder).
• Mirroring Factions: They share the same amount of virtues and vices with the Pagans.
• Misery Builds Character: One of their religion's core tenets, as stated in one of the Hammerite proverbs.
  "And the man didst stand before The Builder, and didst the Builder ask, 'Wilt thou undergo trial and hazard, for Me?' And didst the man say, 'No, I do not wish pain.' And thus did The Builder slay the man, that he wisht not the pain of a true life."
• Ninja Pirate Zombie Robot: Medieval fantasy Techno-Gothic Crystal Dragon Jesus Catholics.
• Order vs. Chaos: They are at the "Order" end of the scale and they see themselves as protectors of The City from chaos. Particularly the Pagans, considered to be the very embodiment of Chaos, being Trickster worshippers.
• Self-Inflicted Hell: In a literal case of Clap Your Hands If You Believe, these worshippers believe they cannot find eternal rest until they get a proper burial, with the proper rituals, and that their grave remains untainted by evil forces. Needless to say, there are a LOT of undead Hammers running around thanks to these exacting beliefs, and most of them aren't friendly.
• Single-Precept Religion: Averted. Their religion has a detailed and fairly complex mythology and tenets, as well as holy books, sacred texts, rituals, prayers, sermons, and a hierarchical and stratified clergy.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: Unlike the Mechanist order, women are not allowed to join the official ranks of the Hammerites or serve in military or enforcement roles. They are allowed to worship the Master Builder, attend church services, and serve as laywomen to aid the Hammerites while not being ordained members of the Order of the Hammer.
• Steampunk: They're the main reason why the setting has so many steampunkish or clockpunkish inventions and "early industrial revolution" trappings, despite still being predominantly medieval. Fridge Brilliance is fully in play here, since the Hammerite religion worships the works of man and the industriousness and intellect of human beings. It makes sense that they would spearhead efforts at stimulating technological progress and the rise of advancements in heavy industry.
• Ye Olde Butcherede Englishe: Being fantasy medieval churchmen, they revel in a King James Bible-esque style of speech, based off of deliberately exaggerated Elizabethan English.
• Well-Intentioned Extremist: Despite how tough and brutal they and their methods are, their reasons for being in conflict with the Pagans seem less out of blind hatred and a wish to exterminate them, and more about wanting to save their souls by converting them, forcibly if need be, to worship the Master Builder, seeing them as dangerous nature worshiping savages, just as they too once were before the Builder granted them the tools and technology to better themselves. Hammerites respect nature a great deal and make use of its materials while not expanding too fast or destroying plant life and groves of trees, but not to the point of worship, which is blasphemy to them, and they do protect the City and its denizens from dangerous Chaos Beasts of nature. Of course Karras and the Mechanists lose these good intentions entirely and simply want to carry out genocide against the Pagans and destroy tree and plant life, and, in the case of at least Karras, all organic life, while ironically worshiping material of nature themselves.

Brother Murus

See here

Brother Renault

See here

Brother Martello

See here

Brother Uriel

See here

Master Forger Greidus

See here

Brother Roland

See here

Brother Thorgrim

See here

Brother Reginald

See here

Inspector Drept

See here

Hammerite guards

Voiced by: Stephen Russell, Joffrey Spaulding, Geoffrey Stewart, John Haag, Jerry Kissel, Ronald Hayden

• Brutish Character, Brutish Weapon: And you better believe they're ready to strike you with their powerful warhammers once they find you sneaking around the premises... though the Hammer Warriors (including knights) that serve alongside The City's standing military also use swords and other weapons, Hammerite brothers assigned as Temple Guards always wield exclusively hammers and no other weapons.
• Insistent Terminology: Canonically, all armed Hammerites you see in-game are the Temple Guards. The Hammer Warriors, who form the order's Church Militant, only appear in flavour texts and the backstory. This is justified by them being the standing military of the order, while the guards Garrett comes across are tasked with protecting and policing Hammerite property and have therefore different combat training.
• Patrolling Mook: They patrol and guard Hammerite-inhabited areas and bases in The Dark Project and Deadly Shadows. A few armed Hammerites (effectively armed the same as the guards) also occur on occasion in The Metal Age, but most of these don't patrol an area.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: Fully in place. There are only male guards.

Hammerite priests

Voiced by: Joffrey Spaulding, Jerry Kissel

• Logical Weakness: Sneaking up on them while they're unaware of Garrett's presence, then pickpocketing their wand and throwing it away renders them incapable of combat. However, this is only possible in Deadly Shadows, because the priests from the first two games perform magic without wands.
• Magic Wand: Introduced and present only in Deadly Shadows. They need their wands to cast magic spells effectively. Rob them of these by pickpocketing them, and they'll need to call reinforcements in order to pose any sort of threat to you.
• Non-Action Guy: As with the Pagan shamans and Keeper Elders, Hammerite Priests have minor defensive combat capability, but that's about it.
• Patrolling Mook: Only in Deadly Shadows. The priests in The Dark Project are usually not seen patrolling. Naturally, priests occur in or nearby Hammerite-inhabited areas.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: Fully in place. There are only male priests.
• Squishy Wizard: Priests are able to cast magical projectiles as a form of defence and to bolster attacking guards.

Hammerite engineers and novices

Voiced by: John Haag, Stephen Russell

• The Blacksmith: The Hammerite engineer Non Player Characters, introduced in Deadly Shadows.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: Hammerite novices wear a green tabard with a red hammer symbol on the chest.
• The Engineer: The Hammerite engineers again, as befits their name.
• Non-Action Guy: Being unarmed, the engineers and novices are civilian Non Player Characters even more so than Hammerite priests, for all intents and purposes.
• Never Hurt an Innocent: They count as civilian characters, so you mustn't kill them on higher difficulty levels.
• New Meat: The Hammerite novice Non Player Characters.

Pagans

The faction in general

Sings we a dances of wolfs, who smells fear and slays the coward. Sings we a dances of mans, who smells gold and slays his brother.

— Pagan saying

Bes him many-named, Him that's called the Woodsie One...The Leafy Lord...the Harvester...

— fragmentary text on parchment

Builds your roofs of dead wood. Builds your walls of dead stone. Builds your dreams of dead thoughts. Comes crying laughing singing back to life, takes what you steal, and pulls the skins from your dead bones shrieking.

— Clay tablet in an abandoned Trickster temple

• Appeal to Nature: They're distrustful of the 'city-folk', of urbanization and urban society, and of any kind of advanced (i.e. industrial) technology. Some take it further than others, to the point of the Pagan leaders becoming the (mostly unseen) antagonists in The Dark Project. In a bit of dramatic irony, by the time of Deadly Shadows, Pagan agents were forced to infiltrate some of the abandoned parts of The City, many of them the same run-down factories or warehouses that the more fanatical Pagans so despise.
• Arc Symbol: A stylized Trickster's Eye, formed by the silhouette of a blooming flower. It is rather rare, but can be occasionally glimpsed on wood or stone carvings, tome covers or painted on walls.
• Batman Cold Open: Their faction's introductory cutscene in Deadly Shadows, complete with a gradual Fade to Black involving the appearance of their symbol, the stylized Trickster's Eye formed by a flower.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: Their main colours are light green and various earthy colour tones.
• Deliberate Values Dissonance: Occurs to show the more shadier and dogmatic side of this faction.
• Elves vs. Dwarves: The Elves to the Hammerites' Dwarves.
• Floral Theme Naming: Most of their personal names. Also, most of the religious honorifics they use for their god.
• Green Thumb: Most of the common Pagan folk live as simple farmers in more remote villages situated in greater wilderness.
• La Résistance: Forms one in The Metal Age, due to the Mechanists attaining way too much power for the Pagans to face head on.
• Leitmotif: Most prominently "Trail of Blood" in The Metal Age and "The Pagans" in Deadly Shadows. In The Dark Project, their incidental themes can be heard among the varying ambience of some of the more supernaturally-themed missions, as well as in the opening third of some of the briefings. All of the Pagan ambient themes are an interesting blend of mild sinisterness and soothing atmospheric tunes.
• Mirroring Factions: They share the same virtues and vices as the Hammerites.
• Nature Hero: The more heroic Pagan characters certainly count.
• Order vs. Chaos: They are considered to be at the "Chaos" end of the scale and they see themselves as protectors of wilderness and the old ways of living from the technological, industrial and urban encroachment of The City. They oppose advanced technology and particularly the Hammerites.
• Organic Technology: Of the magical variety.
• Perfect Pacifist People: Played with, since the setting likes to give a degree of complexity and nuance to its various factions and their individual members. Pagans as a whole faction (and some of the segments of the faction) can indeed be threatening, uncompromising and even outright warmongering. However, the average member of the Pagan folk, male or female, is generally a person who prefers peace and non-violence if possible.
• Single-Precept Religion: As with the Hammerites, this is averted. However, a lot of their beliefs and rituals remain unknown or unexplained in greater detail.
• Unusual Dysphemism: While they are on the receiving end of Fantastic Racism by the Hammerites and Mechanists, they themselves aren't much better in this regard when dealing with 'city-folk' or 'city-men', as they call them. This is encapsulated by their frequently heard expletive 'manfool'.
• Unusual Euphemism: In Deadly Shadows, if they come across a murdered person or threaten someone with murder, they say the person was or will be "sapped".
• You No Take Candle: Their peculiar, often funny-sounding dialect which also relies on Pluralses.

Viktoria

Voiced by: Terri Brosius

A mysterious young woman with connections to the Pagan faction. Is eventually revealed to be part of the faction's highest leadership.

• Ascended Extra: In The Metal Age. She's more of a Bit Character in The Dark Project.
• Beware the Nice Ones: She is highly polite and to-the-point in serious discussions, but whenever she shows her anger or powers, be afraid. She is legitimately terrifying and seriously powerful.
• Blood Oath: With Garrett in The Metal Age. Being a nymph/dryad, it's more of a "sap oath" on her part...
• Brainy Brunette: While she shows signs of being rather hot-headed in her decision making, she's very intelligent and cunning, leading the Pagan agents in the City.
• The Bus Came Back: After the question of her whereabouts was Left Hanging since we last see her in The Dark Project, she came back as a major character in The Metal Age.
• Censor Shadow: Is very clearly implied to be completely nude throughout all her scenes in The Metal Age, but her full body is only ever shown as a dark silhouette... helped along with her scenes taking place in a dark room at night, but still.
• Character Development: Receives plenty of it in The Metal Age, especially after she allies with Garrett and slowly befriends him.
• Cute Monster Girl: On a good day, due to being outwardly attractive when posing as a human woman and when she's in her true dryad form. She can be significantly more alarming when she wants.
• Dark Action Girl: Represents an antagonistic version in The Dark Project and a more morally grey and borderline heroic version in The Metal Age.
• Dark Mistress: Maybe, when she was serving the man known as Constantine. It's never made clear.
• The Dragon: To Constantine.
• Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Her guise while working undercover in The City during The Dark Project.
• Enigmatic Minion: Her loyalties seem pretty clear and straightforward in The Dark Project, but it gets subverted after her reappearance in The Metal Age.
• Expy: Think of her as Irene Adler, if Adler had nature-based superpowers. Some of her demeanour is also reminescent of Rachael from Blade Runner.
• Femme Fatale: Somewhat present (but downplayed) in her characterization in The Dark Project. Justified, because she's acting as an undercover agent of her faction and its leader.
• Friendly Enemy: Becomes one with Garrett in The Metal Age, initially out of rather pragmatic reasons. Despite this, an honest friendship eventually forms between the two.
• Hair-Trigger Temper: She has a few justified Berserk Buttons and doesn't shy away from insinuating what her opinion is of persons who have wronged her. Also, in terms of taking action against threats, she is rather happy-go-lucky. Unfortunately, this second kind of behaviour is what brings her to her doom in The Metal Age, after having a Conflict Ball argument with Garrett over how to stop the Mechanists in time.
• Heroic Sacrifice: In The Metal Age.
• It Has Been an Honor: To Garrett in The Metal Age, after she realizes her plan backfired and the only way she can give them a fighting chance against the main villain is to sacrifice herself by tearing herself to pieces, covering the surroundings with plants. As usual, Garrett doesn't approve of her move and is furious, but he's powerless to stop her. The moment just before Viktoria commits suicide is followed by Garrett's only anguished scream heard in the entire series.
• Killed Off for Real: Dies to prevent Karras' doomsday plan from suceeding.
• The Lancer: To Garrett in The Metal Age. An odder variation, since they don't work together on the spot and conduct their missions separately.
• Late-Arrival Spoiler: She's working for the main bad guy in The Dark Project, and later games don't avoid mentioning this when relevant.
• Leitmotif: Accompanied with a rather soothing (but slightly odd) repeating riff when Garrett mentions her for the first time.
• Mysterious Woman: Counts overall, but especially while she is using her fake identity during The Dark Project.
• Nature Spirit: Emphasis on the wild and chaotic aspects of nature, not the sweet and cuddly ones.
• Only One Name: Like all the Pagan faction characters in the series.
• Overcome Their Differences: She's actually the one who proposes this trope to Garrett, so they could work together on saving The City from a new threat.
• The Reveal: Both metaphorically and literally when she and her boss reveal their true identities to Garrett in The Dark Project.
• Revenge Myopia: She has the guts to spill her desire to avenge the Trickster to Garrett. This comes from the lady who not only mutilated Garrett (as ordered by the Trickster) and left him for inevitable death by being devoured by monsters, but is fully aware that the same "friend", who along with her betrayed Garrett, was going to destroy The City and kill most of its population, our protagonist included. Downplayed, as she quickly renounces her desire for revenge on the basis of now having a mutual enemy.
• Ship Tease: With Garrett in The Metal Age. Some of their conversations are... well, thinly-veiled, let's say. But due to their mutually antagonistic history with each other and very different natures and personalities, they remain snarky friends at best and bickering allies at worst.
• Sinister Silhouettes: The way she's portrayed in cutscenes that show her whole body, especially during moments when she's using her powers.
• Slasher Smile: For a brief moment in The Dark Project, shortly before the reveal of her true identity, a close-up of her otherwise pretty face shows the most disturbing smile you can think of.
• Spell My Name With An S: Occasionally spelt by some characters with a "c". Most of her appearances have her name spelt with a "k".
• Voluntary Shapeshifting: Her basic set of powers with a very plant-like quality to it.
• What Happened to the Mouse?: She disappears from the narrative of The Dark Project after the reveal of her true identity and only comes back as a major character in The Metal Age.

Lotus

See here

Dyan

• Continuity Nod: Her unique NPC model in Deadly Shadows has the same tattoos that she had in the animated cutscene in which she made her first appearance during the storyline of The Metal Age.
• Magic Staff: Is seen holding one during her The Metal Age cameo.
• Magic Wand: Trades the staff for a wand (the same type other Pagan shamans have) in Deadly Shadows.
• Number Two: Of Viktoria.
• Punny Name: Dye + Diane = Dyan. Combined with Meaningful Name, since Diane/Diana was the Godess of Hunting in the Roman pantheon.
• Squishy Wizard: A female Pagan shaman.
• The Voiceless: In her first appearance during a cutscene in The Metal Age. Averted in Deadly Shadows, where she is voice acted.

Larkspur

• Continuity Nod: His unique NPC model in Deadly Shadows has the same tattos that he had in the animated cutscene in which he made his first appearance during the storyline of The Metal Age.
• Da Chief: Seems to be the commander-in-chief of the human and probably also beastman warriors of the Pagan faction, as of The Metal Age.
• Heroes Prefer Swords: Armed with one in Deadly Shadows and presumably also in The Metal Age.
• Number Two: Of Viktoria.

Leafer

See here

Shaman Woodbine

See here

Pagan swordsmen

Voiced by: Brian Hoffman, Chip Philips, Sarah Newhouse, Paula Plum

• Patrolling Mook: They patrol and guard Pagan-inhabited areas and bases in Deadly Shadows.
• Second Episode Introduction: Well, third. They're first introduced as distinct guard Non Player Characters only in Deadly Shadows.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: There are both male and female Pagan Shamans. Male swordsmen seem more common.

Pagan bowmen

Voiced by: Brian Hoffman, Chip Philips

• Patrolling Mook: They patrol and guard Pagan-inhabited areas and bases in Deadly Shadows.
• Second Episode Introduction: Well, third. They're first introduced as distinct guard Non Player Characters only in Deadly Shadows.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: Skewed to one gender. All Pagan bowmen are male.

Pagan shamans

Voiced by: Brian Hoffman, Chip Philips, Paula Plum

• Logical Weakness: Sneaking up on them while they're unaware of Garrett's presence, then pickpocketing their wand and throwing it away renders them incapable of combat.
• Magic Wand: They need their wands to cast magic spells effectively. Rob them of these by pickpocketing them, and they'll need to call reinforcements in order to pose any sort of threat to you.
• Non-Action Guy: As with the Hammerite or Mechanist priests and Keeper Elders, Pagan shamans have minor defensive combat capability, but that's about it.
• Patrolling Mook: They often patrol Pagan-inhabited areas and bases in Deadly Shadows.
• Second Episode Introduction: Well, third. They're first introduced as distinct Non Player Characters only in Deadly Shadows.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: There are both male and female Pagan Shamans. Both are almost equally common. Gameplay-wise, their abilities are the same as those of the Hammerite priests and Keeper Elders.
• Squishy Wizard: Shamans are able to cast magical projectiles as a form of defence and to bolster attacking guards.

The Keepers

The faction in general

The essence of balance is detachment. To embrace a cause, to grow fond or spiteful, is to lose one's balance, after which, no action can be trusted. Our burden is not for the dependent of spirit.

— Mayar, Third Keeper

As Keepers, it is our duty to remain apart - secret - invisible. To become part of The City would exert influences.

— From The Eight Principles (Amended)

There are those to whom knowledge is a shield, and those to whom it is a weapon. Neither view is balanced, but one is less unwise.

— Keeper annals

• Adventurer Archaeologist: They occasionally send out small expeditions to look for ancient, long-lost artifacts.
• Ancient Keeper: Well, of course. They aren't called "Keepers" for nothing... in their secret compound, the libraries alone are huge.
• Ancient Tradition: Their order is at least as old as the Order of the Hammer and the Pagans. One of the reasons the Keepers exist is to keep the balance between the two factions, so that neither of them could gain too much power and topple the other, then becoming tyrants of the City.
• Arc Symbol: Keys and a keyhole. Sometimes appearing individually, instead of being part of one combined symbol. You can usually tell if you're in one of their hidden compounds thanks to the attending key-based Sigil Spam.
• Artificial Script: The Keeper Glyphs.
• Balance Between Good and Evil: This forms part of the foundation of their order's ideology, along with the Balance of Power. They believe balance is the best way to achieve at least some degree of peace, stability and coexistence in The City and its surrounding world.
• Batman Cold Open: Their faction's introductory cutscene in Deadly Shadows, complete with a gradual Fade to Black involving the appearance of one of their main symbols, a keyhole.
• Bitch in Sheep's Clothing: While they may seem like the "nice" faction, particularily compared to the other two (Hammerites and Pagans) at the end of second game it's revealed they knew what would happen all along but didn't do anything about it while in Deadly Shadows they actively start trying to kill Garret, at which point we learn they have some very scary assassin Mooks working for them
• A Day in the Limelight: Deadly Shadows focuses on their faction in a more in-depth way and concentrates most of the narrative on the developing crisis within the Keeper order.
• Invisible to Normals: How they hide their existence from the world, with very few outside their order being able to get past their Jedi Mind Trick and perceive them at all. Garrett came to their attention as a child specifically because he saw one of them and tried to pick his pocket. Their Glyph Magic certainly helps with that a lot.
• Instant Runes: Elder and more experienced Keepers have usually mastered Glyph Magic, which is unique to their faction.
• Leitmotif: In the first two games, the Keepers are associated with a few shorter ambient themes, but it's not until Deadly Shadows that they receive a wholly unique theme for their faction. It is heard mainly within the Keeper Compound and its library, and therefore called "The Keeper Library".
• Masquerade: From the rest of The City and its society, while acting as its behind-the-scenes protectors.
• Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane: It is left vague whether their stealth abilities and skills also have a magical or supernatural component to them or whether your average Keeper operative just has excellent stealth training.
• Mysterious Backer: Fulfills this role, alongside Mysterious Protector, towards certain individuals (like Garrett) and towards The City in general.
• Mystery Cult: A benevolent example of a closed secret society that doesn't reveal its secrets so easily. It's further subverted by the Keepers being scholars and overseers first and foremost, mystics second.
• Only Sane Man: They seem to be by far the most peaceable and reasonable of three main factions (Keepers, Hammerites, Pagans). This is subverted big time in Deadly Shadows, where they actively try to assassinate Garrett at one point.
• The Order: They are very monastic in their overall esthetics, right down to their monk-like hooded robes (though female Keepers have a slightly different style of robes). However, the Keepers are not a religiously driven faction, being scholars, mystics and protectors instead.
• Shout-Out: The esthetics and atmosphere of their faction take some degree of inspiration from The Name of the Rose. Two huge council halls in their secret compound closely match the description and layout of the ancient library from the novel (as well as the version of the library from the novel's film adaptation).
• The Stoic: Part of the social mores of the order's members is that they try to avoid falling into overly emotional states. Keepers can and do get emotional at times, but they believe stoicism is healthy for maintaining their sacred ideal of balance.
• The Watcher: Their policy is to not interfere openly in The City's affairs or the affairs of the various factions and groups. If they must influence them, they always try to do it as secretly as possible.

Artemus

Voiced by: Nate Wells

The Age of Darkness will be the child of two fathers... and their names are Ignorance and Fear.

— from the journal of Keeper Artemus

One of the Keeper Elders. Along with Garrett, the main recurring character of the series. Fittingly, he's also the second one to be introduced, mere seconds after the introduction of Garrett. Artemus brought Garrett into the Keeper order as a young boy and oversaw his education and stealth training until Garrett rebelled and left the order sometime after reaching adulthood. Despite their somewhat strained relationship, Artemus remains one of the few Keepers that Garrett is willing to trust and talk to even after having left the order.

• Big Good: As close as it gets to this trope, in terms of the setting's multitudes of flawed heroic characters. Even when the Keepers are undergoing a major crisis during the events of Deadly Shadows, he still tries to overcome his fear and stay as calm and collected as possible, all the while helping Garrett.
• Cool Old Guy: Though in his 50s or 60s and slowly greying, he remains an experienced scholar and one of the few people whose stealth abilities are on par with Garrett's (even among the ranks of the Keepers).
• Gentleman Snarker: You never hear him laugh, but he does scoff with mild amusement in a few scenes throughout the series.
• Gentleman and a Scholar: One of his most distinctive personal traits, making him stand out even among other Keepers, where this trope is fairly commonplace.
• Intergenerational Friendship: Despite their occasional familial bickering, Artemus is one of the few Keepers that Garrett fully respects as a friend and associate.
• Ironic Echo: When Garrett tried to pickpocket Artemus in his youth, Artemus caught him and told him he had talent for being able to see a Keeper, especially when he doesn't want to be seen. At the end of the third game, when a little girl tries to pickpocket Garrett, Garrett says the same thing and smiles at the memory.
• Killed Offscreen: He is murdered by The Hag off-screen shortly before the finale of Deadly Shadows.
• Mr. Exposition: One of his primary roles in the series, if he makes an appearance between missions (whether physically or in cutscenes). Lampshaded in Deadly Shadows by Garrett. Taken to a logical extreme in The Dark Project's tutorial mission, which he narrates, gradually explaining the various stealth skills and equipment to Garrett, then a young Keeper apprentice.
• No Name Given: Played straight in the first two games. His name was finally revealed in Deadly Shadows, in which he also plays a far more substantial role than in the two preceding installments.
• Non-Action Guy: Almost ridiculously adept at Stealth Hi/Bye, but he's no warrior and genuinely avoids committing violence.
• Old Master: To Garrett, being his mentor and teacher of Keeper knowledge and skills.
• Parental Substitute: The Alfred Pennyworth to Garrett's Batman. Throughout the series, the "father figure" aspect of Artemus' relationship to his apprentice is subtly brought up or hinted at numerous times.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Wise, professional, self-sacrificing and well-meaning.
• Stealth Hi/Bye: Most of his meetings with Garrett begin and end this way. It gets hilariously lampshaded several times in Deadly Shadows.
• The Stoic: Even among the ranks of he Keepers, he is one of the best examples of this trope. While he has his moments of voicing concern or slight amusement, his style of speech sounds almost always matter-of-factly, delivered with deadpan seriousness.

First Keeper Orland

Voiced by: Dan Thron (TMA) & Ken Webster (TDS)

• Conflict Ball: With Garrett, almost perpetually. The two just plain don't trust each other, ever. From Orland's side, Garrett is a liability that knows of their existence and refuses to fall in line. From Garrett's, Orland is yet another pompous Keeper trying to control him and keep him from his thievery.
• Early-Bird Cameo: In a single cutscene of The Metal Age, along with Interpreter Caduca and Translator Gamall.
• Gentleman Snarker: Nearly every conversation he has with Garrett is pure Snark-to-Snark Combat.
• Jerkass: He is well-meaning and just wants to preserve the Keeper order and its function, but frequently shows incompetence or comes across as abrassive and paranoid.
• Killed Off for Real: Murdered by The Hag shortly before the finale of Deadly Shadows.
• Obstructive Bureaucrat: Some of the short-sighted decisions he makes during the Keeper crisis in Deadly Shadows inadvertently play into The Hag's secret plan.
• Properly Paranoid: He and the other Keeper Elders are legitimatelly worried and rather distrustful, but it turns out they've been focusing on the wrong people and the wrong events, instead of the real cause of the Keeper crisis.
• Red Herring: He is framed as the culprit for a short while during the Keeper crisis in Deadly Shadows. Turns out he really had nothing to do with the accusations leveled at him. The same goes for similar accusations he made about Garrett during the same string of events.

Interpreter Caduca

Voiced by: Esra Gaffin (TMA) & Paula Rester (TDS)

• Blind Seer: She's blind, but can "read" the Keeper glyphs by touching them. Blindness isn't a requirement of the position, and her predecessor praised her for the unique clarity she had when reading the glyphs in this manner when he recommended her for promotion into his role.
• Cloudcuckoolander: She might come across as this due to how extremely focused she is on her role within the Keeper order. However, if you meet her in-game character model personally in Deadly Shadows, she'll talk and react like any other person (though with a more tired and elderly tone).
• Early-Bird Cameo: In a single cutscene of The Metal Age, along with Translator Gamall and future First Keeper Orland.
• Meaningful Name: In Real Life, 'Caduc-' is a Latin root, standing for 'old', such as in the word 'caducous'.
• Odd Couple: One half of the prophecy-reading team of the Keepers, the other being Gamall.
• Younger Than They Look: Though she looks like a really old, withered lady, it is implied that all Keepers who adopt her role within the order age at a far more rapid pace. This occurs presumably due to the far greater exposure to the Keeper's powerful Glyph Magic.

Translator Gamall

Voiced by: Nancy Taylor (TMA) & Terri Brosius (TDS)

• Creepy Child: Oh, yes...
• Creepy Monotone: Her style of speech, even outside of her Translator trance.
• Early-Bird Cameo: In a single cutscene of The Metal Age, along with Interpreter Caduca and future First Keeper Orland.
• Eerie Pale-Skinned Brunette: Is she ever... And a child version, at that.
• Meaningful Name: In Real Life, the word "gamall" is Scandinavian (and Tolkien-talk) for "old".
• The Mole: She's the Hag.
• Odd Couple: One half of the prophecy-reading team of the Keepers, the other being Caduca.
• Oracular Urchin: Subverted by the fact that she and Caduca need to work together as a team in order to read and translate prophecies. Gamall doesn't read the prophecies, she only translates Caduca's readings in ancient or secret languages in which the prophecies were written.
• The Reveal: While there was definitely something unsettling about her appearance already in the second game, the twist about Gamall's true nature in the third game is really shocking.
• Tomato in the Mirror: In Deadly Shadows, when Garrett stumbles upon an image of someone who looks exactly the same as her.
• Troubling Unchildlike Behavior: Double subverted. In The Metal Age and for most of her appearances in Deadly Shadows, you chalk up her oddly emotionless, stoic personality to her upbringing by the Keepers and her function as the order's Prophecy Translator. But when the plot thickens in the later parts of Deadly Shadows, you'll learn that Gamall's hiding more from the Keepers than they or Garrett would believe at face value...

Elder Blake

See here

Elder Logan

See here

Keeper Nate

See here

Keeper Rafe

See here

Keeper elders

Voiced by: Jerry Kissel, Ken Carberry, Julie Perkins

• Logical Weakness: Sneaking up on them while they're unaware of Garrett's presence, then pickpocketing their wand and throwing it away renders them incapable of combat.
• Magic Wand: They need their wands to cast magic spells effectively. Rob them of these by pickpocketing them, and they'll need to call reinforcements in order to pose any sort of threat to you.
• Non-Action Guy: As with the Hammerite or Mechanist priests and Pagans shamans, Keeper Elders have minor defensive combat capability, but that's about it.
• Patrolling Mook: At least in the libraries, scriptoriums and living quarters of the Keeper Compound during the events of Deadly Shadows.
• Second Episode Introduction: An interesting subversion. Keeper elders are present in every game as story characters, but they're fully-fledged Non-Player Character units only in Deadly Shadows.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: There are both male and female Keeper Elders. Both are almost equally common. Gameplay-wise, their abilities are the same as those of the Hammerite priests and Pagan shamans.
• Squishy Wizard: Elders are able to cast magical projectiles as a form of defence and to bolster attacking guards.

Keeper guards

Voiced by: Ken Carberry, Marc Carver

• In the Hood: The upper part of their face is pretty much constantly hidden beneath their hoods. Fitting, given their employment in the Order of the Keepers.
• Patrolling Mook: Some of them stand guard at entrances to restricted sections of the Keeper Compound, but most of them patrol its hallways, living quarters, libraries and workplaces.
• Second Episode Introduction: Well, third. While they're hinted at in the first two games, their first appearance as distinct guard Non Player Characters occurs only in Deadly Shadows.
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: Guards seem to be one of the few functions in the Keeper order that is reserved purely for male members.
• The Stoic: As one would expect from members of the Keeper faction.

Keeper Enforcers

See here

Keeper instructors

Voiced by: Josh Randall

A pair of two Keeper characters, unique to the first game's tutorial mission. They act as Garrett's training instructors during the tutorial mission in the first game.

• Non-Action Guy
• In the Hood:
  Instructor: Very good. I did not hear you traverse the room...
• Stern Teacher
• The Stoic

The Hand Brotherhood

See here

Mechanists

See here

The Precursors

When we looked at the relics of the Precursors, we saw the height civilization can attain. When we looked at their ruins, we marked the danger of that height.

— Keeper annals

An extinct faction that is mostly only relevant to the backstory and its members don't make any direct appearances in the actual missions. It was an ancient civilization which once lived in an advanced city roughly on the spot of the later City. In Garrett's own words: "Some kind of cataclysm buried the place underground ages ago..."

• Acceptable Breaks from Reality: When you find ancient scrolls and other readables among the Precursor city's ruins, you can read them perfectly, despite the Precursor tongue being a long-dead language that Garrett wouldn't be familiar with.
• Advanced Ancient Acropolis: In a very subtle way. You'll notice something off about how the Precursors lit the interiors of their buildings. This trope is further expanded upon when Garrett revisits the city in The Metal Age and finds out interesting stuff about the Mechanists' archeological expedition to the city's ruins. Fan works often elaborate the trope even further, incorporating it into fan fics and fan missions and such...
• Adventurer Archaeologist: Garrett gets to play Indiana Jones numerous times in the series, but The Lost City mission takes the cake in terms of sheer troperifficness.
• Culture Chop Suey: The Precursor's society, culture, art and architecture are a deliberate "generic ancient" mix of Mayincatec and Ancient Egypt elements, with the occasional dash of Ancient Grome.
• Eldritch Abomination: Some of the deities the Precursors seemed to have worshipped certainly are portrayed like this. When Garrett comes across one of the few surviving statues, depicting some kind of monstrous god, you'll hear him whisper this aptly scripted quip:
  "Creepy..."
• Ghost City: Destroyed and abandoned many millennia ago. The only thing you'll find there besides Precursor architecture and artefacts are burricks , fire elementals and a few groups of Hand Brotherhood mages on an expedition to retrieve one of the Elemental Talismans. Also, there is one particular place with remains of an old Keeper archaelogical expedition that didn't quite make it.
• Land of One City: Implied to have been a city state, headed by an emperor of the local natives.
• No Name Given: At first, you only know it under its colloquial name, The Lost City. Later on, as you find various readables while exploring the ruins, you'll learn that the Precursors called their city Karath Din. This specific name also reappears in The Metal Age, where the Mechanists have apparently learned of it as well during their secret archaeological digs for Precursor artefacts.
• Precursors: The actual name of the civilization that inhabited Karath Din is unknown. Everyone in The City during Garrett's time just calls this ancient nation "The Precursors".
• Remixed Level: When Garrett gets an opportunity to explore the Lost City again in The Metal Age.
• Ruins for Ruins' Sake: Averted. What remains of the Lost City are believable ruins, with clear and logical distinctions between city squares, public buildings and spaces, lavish governmental or religious buildings, burial tombs of the townsfolk and individual housing.
• Under City: What's left of it is buried in deep and expansive underground caverns below The City. There is a fair amount of volcanic activity going on in parts of the whole cavern system. It is implied that a gigantic earthquake combined with a volcanic explosion was the root cause of the cataclysm that buried the whole ancient settlement.

The Nobility

This group of characters in general

Choose your immortality wisely, whether it be the treasure you amass, or the family who succeed you.

— Advice to a Patriarch, Baron Bresling

• Aristocrats Are Evil: Some of them are unpleasant people, but it's usually subverted by most of them being a bit more complex than that, or being in a morally grey area.
• Blue Blood: Most of the old nobility of The City.
• Feuding Families: A common occurrence among The City's nobility.
• Intrepid Merchant: A lot of the families, e.g. the Shemenovs, became wealthy and influential due to manufacturing and trading various products.
• Nouveau Riche: A lot of the newer nobility or wealthy townsmen are of this variety, unlike the older, traditional type of nobility.
• Upper-Class Twit: Just about any of the overheard conversations between the nobility carry shades of this, in all three games. In the third game, even one of the nobles has had enough of their "Quite!" and "Yes!" and storms off in frustration.

The Baron

Along with the members of the city council, the hereditary ruler of The City.

• The Ghost: The Baron is quite often mentioned, but never seen throughout the entire series.
• No Name Given: The only baron mentioned by name is a long-dead historical one, baron Bresling. The current baron of The City is never seen and his name is never mentioned. (The 2014 reboot added the family names Black, Eydark, Flevanter, Marlham, and Northcrest as past and present dynasties to hold the title of Baron, in addition to the Breslings. How canonical these names are is anyone's guess, given that the 2014 game is a continuity reboot and is set several centuries after the original three games.)
• Royals Who Actually Do Something: Oversees the rule of The City along with the city council and is the commander-in-chief of The City's armies. The Baron of Garrett's times was frequently away from The City, on a military campaign against the rival city state of Blackbrook. As we find out from readables in The Dark Project and The Metal Age, the City Watch was originally founded by the barons, though it only became a fully professional law enforcement institution during the events that preceded The Metal Age.

Lord Bafford

• The Caligula: Implied by the cutscenes where he makes his sole direct appearance, and by some of the readables.
• The Mafia: Has semi-voluntary ties to Ramirez and his underlings.
• Only One Name: Revealed to be his family name in Deadly Shadows, since he has a sister named Olivia Bafford.
• Plucky Comic Relief: Virtually every reference to him that you come across in the series has a comedic tone.
• Recurring Character: He's mentioned throughout all three games on various occasions, usually in readables and correspondence. You never get to see him in person, though.
• Small Name, Big Ego: He has a small mock-throne room deep inside his manor house, complete with throne and a rare, exquisite jeweled sceptre. Said piece of loot is why Garrett pays him a visit in the first proper mission of the series. While he's stealing the sceptre, he makes a snarky comment about Bafford's vanity.
• The Unseen: We never meet him in-game and outside of an image in a cutscene, we don't even get a glimpse of him.

Lady Valerius

See here

Raoul

See here

Ian Cribs

See here

Lord and Lady Rumford

See here

Lord Porter

See here

Venik Kilgor

See here

Lady Van Vernon

See here

Master Willey

See here

Lord Bram Gervasius

• Ascended Extra: In Thief I, he had a text-only mention in "The Lost City", where he offers to buy any masks and headdresses you find. In Thief II, his mansion is the site of two consecutive levels due to his collection including some plot-relevant artifacts.
• Collector of the Strange: His expansive collection of ancient masks and headdresses turns out to be important in Thief II, since it includes the slave masks the Mechanists need for their evil plan.
• Man of Wealth and Taste

Lord Julian Rutherford

See here

Lord Ember Rutherford

See here

Lady Elizabeth

See here

Captain Robert Moira

See here

Edwina Moira

See here

Opera guests

See here

Townsmen, Servants and Common Folk

This group of characters in general

Voiced by: Dorian Hart, Emil Pagliarulo, Stephen Russell, Sara Verilli, Karen Saltus, Lulu LaMer, Joffrey Spaulding, Alex Duran, Karen Wolff

• Audience Surrogate: At times, since they tend to react to new events or obstacles (e.g. the metal Watchers in The Metal Age, etc.) like a player would.
• Invulnerable Civilians: Averted. But you're encouraged not to exploit this, especially on higher difficulty levels.
• Muggles: The most clear-cut example, representing everyday citizens of The City who dabble neither in advanced technology, nor arcane knowledge and magic, nor fighting or a life of crime.
• Never Hurt an Innocent: As higher difficulties have non-killing of unarmed civilians as a mandatory objective.

Jenivere

Voiced by: Karen Saltus

See here

Jason Rampone & N. Rampone

See here

Lucky Selentura

See here

Noah Jerm

See here

T. M. Blackheart

See here

E. B. Bramrich

See here

D. M. Gilver

See here

Sven Mynell

See here

Mistress Mastiff

See here

Ginny

See here

Prisoners

Voiced by: Geoffrey Stewart, Andy Meuse, Robert Caminos

• Bit Character: Garrett can visit a prison with celled prisoners in two particular levels of the The Metal Age and Deadly Shadows.

The City Watch

The faction in general

Ah, The City. Obey the law, and there's no need to worry about the residents. The City Watch are the guys who want to lock me up, though - gotta keep my eye out for them.

— Garrett

• Arch-Enemy: Despite widespread corruption, the City Watch takes its role of policing The City and locking up criminals quite seriously. While a lot of crime bosses get away scot-free thanks to influence and bribes, individual thieves doing the dirty work are a welcomed target for the Watch. So, from the point of view of the player (and Garrett), the City Watch is are the greatest regular enemy while on The City's streets...
• City Guards: Well, obviously. One of the more detailed examples in fantasy video games, since you do get to learn quite a bit about the faction's background, inner events, and its role in The City's political and social developments. This counts particularly in The Metal Age, where the Watch receives a great deal of expansion and empowerment as an organization within The City's society, and where a lot of the main plot and storyline intersects with events concerning the Watch and its leadership.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: Despite the changes to their uniforms over the years, their common colours include dark blue, black and grey.
• Da Chief: The traditional title for the head of the City Watch has always been "Sheriff". While The Baron rules the city state and is the commander-in-chief of its standing army, the City Watch is a civilian branch of the government and has its own separate commander.
• A Day in the Limelight: Appear in all three games, but have the largest direct impact on the setting and the storyline in The Metal Age, and Garrett infiltrates the City Watch's main station during the story.
• Dirty Cop: A given in such a frequently Wretched Hive Fantastic Noir city. However, while many of the average City Watch guards are fallible people, not all of them are completely unpleasant. Some genuinely seem to like their work and believe in protecting basic law and order in The City.
• Early-Installment Weirdness: Though integrated into the series' overarching story in an interesting way. It's implied in The Dark Project that the CW at the time was still less of a separate police institution in the more modern sense, and more of an offshoot of The City's regular army, assigned by The Baron to uphold order within The City itself. Hence why it was known more commonly as "The Baron's Police". It seems to have been smaller, ineffectual and rife with corruption. Law enforcement seems to have been shared with the Hammerites (as evidenced by Cragscleft Prison and Garrett's remarks). The City Watch was wholly restructured in The Metal Age, under Truart's tenure, becoming a fully separate law enforcement branch of The City's government.
• Fantasy Gun Control: Much like all other guards in the series, they only wield swords and bows. However, the Mechanists do supply some of their larger police stations and penitentiaries with automatic cannon turrets triggered by Mechanist surveillance cameras.
• In-Series Nickname: Commonly abbreviated to "The Watch". Also referred to more rarely as "The Baron's Police" (only in the Dark Project) and "The Bulldogs" (in The Metal Age, especially the raid-conducting "Truart's Finest").
• Irony: If the diary and letter of Lieutenant Mosley are to be believed, a lot of the watchmen recruited into Truart's reformed Watch actually came from the ranks of The City's underworld, including former members of the Downwind Thieves' Guild. So, Truart cunningly "purged" many of the thieves and crime bosses by integrating them into his forces and keep them there with a regular paycheck. This way, he easily gained new experienced recruits and got rid of old nuisances, killing two birds with one stone.
• Law Enforcement, Inc.: Despite the City Watch being a de iure state-run law enforcement agency, you'd be forgiven for thinking that Truart made it into his very own private enterprise during his tenure as sheriff in The Metal Age. After the fall of Truart and his lackeys, The City's government gradually retightened its grip on the Watch and its new leaders in Deadly Shadows.
• Plucky Comic Relief: Several of the individual CW guards tend to play this role quite often. Particularly the fan favourite duo of "Dumb Guard" and "Smart Guard", voiced by Stephen Russell and Dan Thron. Curiously, the duo also keeps popping up among hired mercenary guards.
• Police Are Useless: Mostly averted, frequently subverted. During its struggling impromptu years (seen in The Dark Project), the force was mostly corrupt and increasingly ineffective. But after it became a full-time professional police force, the Watch became a faction to be reckoned with by the inhabitants of The City. Despite this, the average CW guard or watchman can be outwitted and disposed of fairly easily. And Garrett being Garrett, he can find ways of infiltrating even heavily-guarded police stations or escape from their prisons.
• Police Brutality: They don't have a soft spot for petty criminals and thieves to begin with. Sheriff Truart's reorganization of the CW during The Metal Age ramps up the amount of police raids and police actions, with even lesser care paid to the arrested people. Said increase in The Watch's diligence actually becomes a plot point during the game's storyline.
• Sigil Spam: The banners of the City Watch, strewn around their police stations and bureaus throughout The City. Not shown in The Dark Project and changed their appearance somewhat between The Metal Age (where they included a fancier coat of arms, with a helmet as a crest and halberds as supporters◊) and Deadly Shadows (seen above to the right; where the coat of arms was replaced with a heraldic black eagle, presumably representing The City or the Baron). Despite this, all City Watch banners include a stylized eye - presumably a symbol of the Watch's vigilance or of the "all-seeing eye of the law".
• Sliding Scale of Gender Inequality: During The Metal Age era of the Watch, it recruited both male and female guards. While it isn't explained why, it is possible that this was a populist move on Truart's part and that it was inspired by his backers and allies, the Mechanists. Sadly, as the Watch became more conservative and strapped for cash again in Deadly Shadows, female City Watch members disappeared.
• Shout-Out: Implied. They're often like a Darker and Edgier version of the Ankh-Morpork City Guards, even down to the often comedic characters and their wackier day-to-day antics.
• Trick Bomb: Though they are never seen using them in-game, the weapon lockers at their stations commonly contain flashbombs, flashmines and other non-lethal explosives. Presumably used during raids on criminal dens and hideouts or during apprehending of suspects. Naturally, if you find their weapon lockers, you can help yourself and replenish your stocks of weaponry by stealing directly from under the City Watch's nose.

City Watch guardsmen and officers

• Cool Helmet: In a funny piece of Anachronism Stew, during The Metal Age, they trade their regular medieval helmets (seen in The Dark Project) for more modern-shaped metal helmets that evoke the classic "Bobby Hat" shape. When the Watch's influence and technological edge wanes a bit after the events of the game, they return to more humble, old-school helmets and uniforms in Deadly Shadows.
• Guys Smash, Girls Shoot: Averted in The Metal Age. Both male and female guards can be armed with either a sword or a bow.
• Elite Mook: In The Metal Age, guards with steel helmets (instead of lighter, weaker helmets) cannot be blackjacked, making them harder to dispose of by the player without stirring up much ruckus. Arguably, this trope also applies to the City Watch Officer Non Player Characters, who have a somewhat higher number of hitpoints and deal a bit more damage than regular CW guards.
• Fantasy Gun Control: Much like all other guards in the series, they only wield swords and bows.
• Mooks: The commonest human mooks in the game, outside of mercenary guards hired by various nobles and townsmen.
• Patrolling Mook: Mostly seen patrolling The City's streets, and the vicinity of some governmental and public establishments (including City Watch stations and outposts).

Hired Guards and Mercenaries

This group of characters in general

Voiced by: Stephen Russell, Dan Thron, Geoffrey Stewart, Kevin Callow, Bill Farquhar, Daniel Krikorian, George Ledoux, Scott Dickson, Jerry Kissel

• Butt-Monkey: Of you if you wish to do so, since you can rob from right under their noses, knock them out, play various tricks on them from the shadows, etc.
• Colour-Coded for Your Convenience: They wear differently coloured and patterned uniforms, tabards and helmets based on which employer they're working for. This is particularly prevalent in The Dark Project and Deadly Shadows. In The Metal Age, they wear a smaller array of more standardized uniforms, but still with widely different textures and some variations between Non-Player Character models.
• Conservation of Ninjutsu: Forget it, this and Mook Chivalry are averted all the way. The more guards Garrett alerts of his presence, the worse he has it (unless he hides in a safe spot and waits for them to cool down). While it is not wholly impossible to fight and kill several guards, it is very hard, especially on higher difficulties. And it's mostly more trouble than it's worth. Expect a Curb-Stomp Battle if the guards gang up on you and chase you into a corner.
• Enemy Chatter: Many memorable examples. From the player's point of view, their conversations are both a good source of overheard intel and a good source of various amusing anecdotes and quotes.
• The Guards Must Be Crazy: Unless you come into their view in a well-lit space, leave knocked out bodies in plain sight or make a lot of ruckus, they will dismiss the occasional sound made by you as either having a natural cause or only being a brief figment of their imagination.
• Hired Guns: Well, Hired Swords and Hired Bows. Since they all work to receive their pay, this is unsurprising.
• It's Probably Nothing: Given how often you can accidentally alert them if you're not careful enough, each guard Non-Player Character in a given mission has a long list of unique phrases for this kind of situation. The phrases "Must've been rats..." or "Must be one o'them grubbers again!" uttered by some guards had become minor memes in the series' fanbase.
• Mooks: They are the commonest human adversaries in all three games, the second most common being the guards of the City Watch.
• Patrolling Mook: Usually patrol in a solitary fashion, but some guards may patrol in small groups.
• Tap on the Head: As with most of the human guard Non Player Characters of the other factions, the easiest and safest way to dispose of them as a threat is to sneak upon them from behind and hit them over the head with a blackjack.
• [Verb] This!: A common type of threats when they discover you and chase you. Usually something to the effect of "Take that!"
• Video Game Caring Potential: Due to the higher difficulty levels, general focus on stealth over direct confrontation and the believable personalities of individual guards, players will often find themselves caring about the guards and either evading them or knocking them out instead of killing them.
• What Measure Is a Mook?: Averted, as already hinted at in the above entry. Since the series focuses on stealthily solving problems and avoiding violent confrontations (with human characters, in any case), you're encouraged to avoid killing the guards as much as you are encouraged to not kill unarmed civilians.
• You Will Not Evade Me: Once a guard starts chasing you or shooting at you, he will let out one of the many variations of threats available to his Non-Player Character. Including ones containing the famous "taffer" swearword.

Dumb Guard ("Benny")

Voiced by: Stephen Russell

Member of an infamous recurring duo of guards, one smart and cunning, the other... less so.

• The Alcoholic: Frequently seen drunk or only semi-sober. Even his normal voice has a slurred quality to it.
• Book Dumb: Of the lovable uneducated kind.
• Buddy Cop Show: With his BFF, the Smart Guard.
• Complaining About Complaining: A favourite pastime of his, especially on occasions when he's seen guarding alone. He likes to mumble complaints quite a bit, as well as often voicing his annoyance in front of his pal, Smart Guard.
• Establishing Character Moment: The by now memetic "bearpits conversation". It's the very first debate he has with Smart Guard in the series, triggered and overheard by the player after exploring merely the first couple of meters in the first proper mission of The Dark Project. The Dumb Guard is the first person you hear in the conversation.
• In-Series Nickname: He is called "Benny" by one of the Non Player Characters (a barmaid) while he's drunk in the dining room of a mansion in The Metal Age. Outside of "Benny", the character also makes appearances under the names "Bertram" and "Sinclair".
• The Fool: Quite a bit, especially in the eyes of his pal, Smart Guard.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: Despite their contrasting personalities, he and Smart Guard are Vitriolic Best Buds.
• Large Ham: Even lampshaded by a barmaid in The Metal Age, when he goes off on a drunk Small Name, Big Ego tirade in front of her.
• Manchild: Frequently displayed. Reaches childlike levels of naivete when a prostitute tries to flirt with him, but is eventually turned off when she realises what a numbskull he is.
• Mascot Mook: Along with Smart Guard, thanks to the nature of their characters.
• New Job as the Plot Demands: Played for Laughs. He and Smart Guard are seen as often in the ranks of private security guards as they are seen among the ranks of the City Watch.
• Plucky Comic Relief: Probably the most famous example in the whole series.
• Recurring Character: Throughout the whole series, along with Smart Guard, to the point that their funny conversations became the series' comedic Show Within a Show.

Smart Guard ("Nick"/"Jored")

Voiced by: Dan Thron

Member of an infamous recurring duo of guards, one smart and cunning, the other... less so.

• Buddy Cop Show: With his BFF, the Dumb Guard.
• Commander Contrarian: To Dumb Guard. He tends to patronize him for all sorts of bizarre, naive or hare-brained assumptions he makes.
• Deadpan Snarker: Almost a Snark Knight at times.
• Establishing Character Moment: The by now memetic "bearpits conversation". It's the very first debate he has with Dumb Guard in the series, triggered and overheard by the player after walking forward the first couple of meters in the first proper mission of The Dark Project. The Smart Guard is the second person you hear in the conversation.
• Hidden Depths: That's why he's the Smart Guard.
• Heterosexual Life-Partners: Despite their contrasting personalities, he and Dumb Guard are Vitriolic Best Buds.
• Mascot Mook: Along with Dumb Guard, thanks to the nature of their characters.
• New Job as the Plot Demands: Played for Laughs. He and Dumb Guard are seen as often in the ranks of private security guards as they are seen among the ranks of the City Watch.
• Plucky Comic Relief: Less obviously than Dumb Guard, but he tends to be a bit of a Miles Gloriosus at times.
• Recurring Character: Throughout the whole series, along with Dumb Guard, to the point that their funny conversations became the series' comedic Show Within a Show.
• Small Name, Big Ego: He is certainly smarter and more cunning than his pal, but he's no mental athlete either.
• The Smart Guy: Naturally. The street-wise, cynical, snarky friend of the almost childishly naive Dumb Guard.
• Straight Man: To Dumb Guard.
• Surrounded by Idiots: While he is Dumb Guard's pal, he does make a brief rant in front of him in The Metal Age, blaming his stupid questions for getting the two of them into trouble numerous times.

The guards of the Van Vernon family and of "Master Willey"

See here

Bob

See here

Others

The Library Ghost

See here

Lauryl

See here

The Villains

The main villains in general

• Allegorical Character: They basically represent the worst, weakest and darkest aspects of their respective factions, being a power-mad and megalomaniac extension of a faction's flaws and failings. Each villain symbolizes the fall from grace of a particular faction, threatening to steer the group into total corruption or madness, if he/she is not stopped in time.
• Bond Villain Stupidity: All of them suffer it in their blinding arrogance, grossly underestimating Garrett despite each of them knowing damn well what he is capable of.
• Card-Carrying Villain: All three of them, but it is often played with in interesting ways.
• Contrasting Sequel Antagonist:
  • The villains of the first two games are associated with the Pagans and Mechanists, respectively, with the former wanting to replace civilisation with nature using magic, and the latter wanting to use technology to replace organic life with machines.
  • The villain of the third game is associated with the Keepers, and contrasts the other two by being selfishly motivated to extend their own lifespan, while the other two have more clearly defined ideologies and goals relating to them.
• Drunk with Power: All of them descended into power-hungry madness due to their opportunity to gain unlimited power.
• Evil Gloating: All of them engage in it, especially as they are close to fulfilling their evil plans.
• Evil Is Petty: All of them are prone to kicking the dog and then some.
• Generic Doomsday Villain: All around averted. Each of the main villains has a reason for what they do, desire or believe in. They're driven by goals that range from high concept ones to completely petty ones, but they don't do what they do just For the Evulz.
• A God Am I: All three of them are immensely self-centered sociopaths with a God complex and a grudge against anyone who doesn't share their narrow worldview... and it's likely that even if someone agrees with them, well, they're obviously expendable despite their loyalty.
• Hoist by His Own Petard: All of them are ironically undone and defeated in the end by Garrett through the very tools and methods they intended to use to bring about their evil plans.
• Moral Sociopathy: What gradually dooms all three of them to become what they are.
• Near-Villain Victory: All three come within a hairbreadth of completing their evil plans before being foiled by Garrett.
• Omnicidal Maniac: Each of them either wants to see the wholesale destruction of some trait of civilization or the world that he/she despises or to enslave everybody to do his/her bidding.
• The Unfought: Since Garrett isn't much of a fighter, he has to defeat each one of them via a combination of stealth and subterfuge.
• With Great Power Comes Great Insanity

The Trickster

See here

Father Karras

See here

The Hag

See here

Undead and Elemental Creatures

This group of characters in general

• Our Ghosts Are Different: Outside of the classic, generic zombies, ghosts and the different kind of zombies all fit these tropes like a glove.
• Revive Kills Zombie: Virtually all undead creatures are susceptible to holy water, especially if you attack them with it in a stealthy manner (i.e. without them noticing you first).
• Was Once a Man: Outside of elementals, all of the undead or ghostly creatures in the series were once human in some way, shape or form.

Zombies

Voiced by: Mark Lampert, Ricardo Bare, Steve Allen

• Everything Fades: Averted in The Dark Project and The Metal Age, where the remaining chunks of their destroyed bodies remained in place after exploding all over the room. Played a bit straighter in Deadly Shadows, where killing them results in them disintegrating into dust. Mind, the third game otherwise averts this trope, making the standard zombie disintegrations a bit of an exception from the rule.
• Everything's Deader with Zombies: Especially in "Down in the Bonehoard", the mission that contains probably the highest number of them. Granted, a lot of the ruined parts of The City (and ruins in its environs) often contain a fair amount of these standard zombies.
• Flesh-Eating Zombie: Ye olde classic semi-naked, grey-skinned, rotting, slowly shambling, horror film zombie.
• Kill It with Water: Besides Holy Water mentioned above, regular water arrows will incapacitate them for a short while, and if you find a deep body of water and drop them there, they will stay down. Even better, lure them into water, and after a few steps they will collapse.
• Zerg Rush: While they are slow, stupid, and their attack is not particularly damaging, their strength is in numbers. They tend to gang up on you and try to make you enter more cramped spaces, where you can become easy pickings for getting battered to death by a horde.

Hammer Haunts

Voiced by: Dan Thron, Mark Lampert, Ricardo Bare, Steve Allen

• The Cameo: The appearance of a single haunt in The Metal Age, an otherwise Haunt-less installment of the series.
• A Day in the Limelight: The "Return to the Cathedral" mission in The Dark Project and the quests in Fort Ironwood in Deadly Shadows.
• Dem Bones: The only undead in the series that fulfill this trope to a tee.
• Early-Bird Cameo: In "Down in the Bonehoard" purely in Thief Gold and in "The Haunted Cathedral" in all versions of The Dark Project.
• Elite Mooks: Usually one of, if not the most, dangerous (and terrifying) enemies in each game; they are hardy (being vulnerable only to holy water and fire arrows, and still require several), alert, and most dangerously, frighteningly fast; being able to outrun the player and land a dozen strikes within the span of a couple of seconds. You are absolutely encouraged to sneak past them.
• Evil Counterpart: Of the Hammerite guards and soldiers.
• Evil Laugh: And how! Particularly in The Dark Project. You might get genuinely unnerved by it.
• Hell Is That Noise: As soon as you hear their voices - often already from a longer distance away - you'll realize you're going against something really dangerous and unpleasant.
• Implausible Fencing Powers: One of the things that makes them so deadly to the player character once they notice him.
• Super-Speed: Another combat trait of their's that encourages the player to avoid a direct confrontation with them, trying stealthy evasion or a stealthy kill instead.
• Weaksauce Weakness: Can be killed with a single stealthy backstab, provided that you haven't already alerted the Haunt. And, as with other Thief-verse undead, they are vulnerable to holy water, fire and explosives and flashes of bright light.

Fire Shadows

• Humanoid Abomination: A humanoid bearded figure with its head and hands consumed by flames that can be only driven away, not killed.
• Invincible Minor Minion: Completely unkillable, no matter how many water arrows you shoot at them. This is a good thing though: when driven off, they leave behind fire arrows. They only appear in places where fire arrows are required to proceed, ensuring the player doesn't run out.
• Man on Fire: Their hands and head are on fire, not that it bothers them.
• Super-Speed: When damaged enough, they will run off and retreat at incredible speed.
• Remember the New Guy?: Non-existant in the original version of The Dark Project, added in Thief Gold.

Apparitions

Voiced by: Randy Smith, Terri Brosius, etc.

• Back from the Dead: Unlike most of the undead, Apparitions will continue to get back up after they're defeated, being a permanently unkillable enemy.
• Ballistic Bone: A typical magical projectile conjured up and thrown at the player by malicious apparitions is a slightly flaming skull.
• Black-and-Gray Morality: Most apparitions you meet are enemies of the Squishy Wizard variety. Some apparitions are non-malicious, being the ghosts of innocent people who were murdered without getting a proper burial and are therefore Barred from the Afterlife.
• Squishy Wizard: The evil apparitions' ability to conjure magical projectiles and hurl them at Garrett.

The Puppets

See here

Fire Elementals

• Elemental Embodiment
• Elemental Powers
• Energy Being
• Nature Spirit
• Kill It with Water: Their Weaksauce Weakness.
• Pure Magic Being

Wisps

• Beware the Nice Ones: Harmless, but can give away the player's position to any nearby guards.
• Energy Being
• Nature Spirit
• Non-Action Guy: Are harmless to the player, outside of floating close to him and giving his position away by illuminating the area he is standing in.
• Patrolling Mook: Something of a magical surveillance system of the Pagans, albeit a simple one. Could be described as a moving floodlight for revealing potential intruders during night-time.
• Pure Magic Being: A small glowing ball or cloud of energy that flies around.
• Will-o'-the-Wisp: A classic example.

Stone statues

See here

Non-human Sapient Races (Beastmen)

Tropes about these NPCs in general

• All There in the Manual: Most of their actual species names don't pop up directly in-game.
• Beast Man: Well, duh. Notably, most of them reflect animals that are small, stay close to the ground and might be considered repulsive by humans.
• Mooks: While many of them live on their own in the wilderness or among abandoned ruins, some are servants or allies of the Pagans and the Trickster.
• Was Once a Man: Never brought up, but some of them might be humans cursed into animalistic forms. Maybe.

Apebeasts

Voiced by: Dan Thron and Joffrey Spaulding

• Maniac Monkeys: They'll attack you on sight and are pretty aggressive and relentless (especially in the first game).
• Mooks: Fulfill this role within the ranks of Big Bad's forces in The Dark Project. In The Metal Age, they serve as guard mooks of Pagan territory.
• The Other Darrin: Undergo a complete change in appearance and armaments in The Metal Age, to the point that you could very well consider the idea that there are two distinct species of apebeasts. If anything, TMA's apebeasts live up to their name a bit more accurately, looking like actual apes.
• Inexplicably Tailless: They have tails in Thief I, but not Thief II, among many other changes to their appearance. Considering they're Apebeasts, the inverse is true of their Thief I appearance, since by definition, an ape does not have a tail.
• Intelligent Gerbil: Look like mischievous tall apes in The Metal Age and like clothes-wearing oversized humanoid monkeys in The Dark Project. The "monkey version" of them even includes a tail, for extra distinction. Unfortunately, this, coupled with the rather low-poly characters and low-res textures in The Dark Project, led some players to assume that these creatures were some kind of humanoid rats.
• Patrolling Mook: Both versions. The one seen in The Dark Project behaves fairly similarly to human guards with swords, though with more animalistic motions.
• Pintsize Powerhouse: They are only about 5 feet tall, and have less health than most human enemies, but make up for it with their Super-Speed and fighting skills.
• Was Once a Man: The clothing worn and swords wielded by the The Dark Project apebeasts are very similar to the ones of Constantine's human guards. Draw your own conclusions.
• You No Take Candle: Share this style of speech with the human Pagans, along with the attendant Pluralses.
  Apebeast swordsman: Gets the sneaksie!

Ratbeasts

Voiced by: Ricardo Bare and Ryan Wickerham

• Expy: The role they fulfill in Deadly Shadows is essentially the same as the apebeasts did in the first two games, except for the fact they're not under anyone's command.
• Mythology Gag: Their presence in Deadly Shadows was meant as a nod at the confusion fans experienced with the first version of the Apebeasts. As mentioned earlier, many at first thought the apebeasts are meant to be giant humanoid rats.
• Intelligent Gerbil: They're quite ugly and fairly gluttonous rat humanoids. They're also surprisingly tall.
• Patrolling Mook: Prowling around the ruins of the Kurshok city, particularly the Kurshok hatcheries.
• Remember the New Guy?: They first appear in Deadly Shadows and are only present in a single mission.
• You No Take Candle: Share this style of speech with the human Pagans, sharing the same tendency to Pluralses.

Kurshok

Voiced by: Eric Brosius and Mark Stevick

• Early-Bird Cameo: Prior to the mission where you visit the Kurshok Citadel, you can find a single Kurshok imprisoned by the City Watch at their local station in Stonemarket. You can choose to ignore the Kurshok's pleas for help or you can pick the lock on his cell and let him go. If you chose the latter, he'll try to make a run for it and Hilarity Ensues in the Stonemarket streets.
• Fish People: Highly intelligent newt-like humanoids, with some prehensile fins scattered here or there on parts of their bodies. Their young are born from eggs stored in hatcheries. Before its fall, they had the most developed civilization of all beastman species, comparable to advanced human city-dwellers.
• Future Imperfect: Their remaining population lives a far simpler life than their ancestors, trying to eke out an existence among the ruins of their once great civilization. Due to all the destruction, shortages, depopulation and isolation from the rest of the world that has befallen them, many of them consider the surviving records on their history as merely exaggerated myths.
• Hidden Elf Village: Well, a hidden remnant of one of their once-great cities. A rather sad example of this trope, since it's implied their species is declining and might be on their way out.
• How the Mighty Have Fallen: Though they probably didn't deserve it. The Trickster had a hand in undermining and destroying their civilization just because they dared to disagree with his self-centered authoritarian efforts at uniting beastmen and human Pagans.
• Patrolling Mook: The Kurshok guards, armed with large swords.
• Remember the New Guy?: They first appear in Deadly Shadows and are only present in a single mission.
• Scavenger World: While they have not lost all of their once great culture, their lifestyle and level of knowledge during the time of Deadly Shadows is a terribly far cry from their Glory Days.
• Shout-Out: They look a lot like the eponymous character from the 1950s monster movie Creature from the Black Lagoon. Their appearance also shares some features with Abe Sapien.
• Unusual Dysphemism: Members of surviving Kurshok society who doubt the Future Imperfect interpretations of their history and myths are frequently ostracized and disparagingly branded as "headsick" or "brainsick".
  One click for the brainsick ones...thinking the aboveworld is real place.
  — Kurshok Text

Tree beasts

• Boss in Mook Clothing: They are powerful opponents and it's best not to get into a tussle with one of them. Or, worse yet, with several of them!
• Expy: They are rather reminiscent of Tolkien's huorns and also similar to ents.
• Kill It with Fire: If you really have no other choice but to kill them once they start chasing you, your best bet is shooting fire arrows at them. They are largely immune to all your other projectiles. Broadhead arrows won't even annoy them and stick into the bark of their bodies.
• The Lost Woods: Their natural habitat. However, subverted in Deadly Shadows, where they also inhabit some of the abandoned outskirts of The City, since they work as helpers of the human Pagans (in that particular case, Pagan agents).
• Mighty Glacier: The biggest, toughest, hardest-hitting and slowest opponents in the series from the ranks of natural creatures.
• Patrolling Mook: Mainly the Deadly Shadows version. The ones in The Metal Age usually stand inanimate and only come to life once you've accidentally exposed yourself to their sight in brightly lit spaces.
• Plant Person: Of the tree variety.
• The Unintelligible: They do produce some rather creepy sounds, but they are incapable of speech.
• Unique Enemy: Appear in only a single mission in both The Metal Age and Deadly Shadows.
• Weaksauce Weakness: If you're unnoticed by them in The Metal Age, you can take a treebeast out with a single backstab. But beware, this tactic doesn't work in Deadly Shadows.
• When Trees Attack: Once they spot you, it's time to run like hell and hide somewhere while they calm down, or get your sword and fire arrows ready.

Bugbeasts

• Abnormal Ammo: They can belch out semi-magical swarms of agressively stinging flies that hurt the player character once they reach him.
• Beware the Silly Ones: They have a generally hilarious-looking, though appropriately insect-like gait. Some fans of the series that find the bugbeasts annoying or goofy-looking created a minor meme, in which "the bugbeasts are kindly advised to go visit the Ministry of Silly Walks".
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: That can attack you by belching out clouds of monstrous little flies that sting like crazy. The bugbeasts also make some pretty unnerving sounds while they're around: oddly feminine purrs, though with some animalistic chirps thrown in. And when you blackjack them or kill them with a backstab, they let out an insanely disturbing and cacophonous mix of shrieks and squeals.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: They never make an appearance after The Dark Project and are hardly referenced at all in the later installments.
• Patrolling Mook: One that you will genuinely learn to worry about, given their powerful attack and the way it disperses over an area.
• Red Eyes, Take Warning: And you really should. They can be a pretty deadly enemy when they are cooperating with groups of other monsters or beastmen.
• The Unintelligible: Well, they lack a human-like mouth, so it's a given.
• Vocal Dissonance: While they don't talk, they make some weirdly highpitched sound effects for such large creatures.
• Weaksauce Weakness: If you sneak upon them without them noticing you, you can blackjack them or kill them with a single backstab.

Craymen

• Barehanded Blade Block: Among the few monsters that can actually "fence" with Garrett, using their large pincer-like front limbs as impromptu swords.
• Beware the Silly Ones: They are as genuinely potentially dangerous to a player as they are genuinely all-around goofy Non Player Characters.
• Butt-Monkey: Most players can easily evade them, outrun them or sneak up on them and give them a humiliating Tap on the Head with a blackjack or a backstab with the sword.
• Chuck Cunningham Syndrome: They never make an appearance after The Dark Project and are hardly referenced at all in the later installments.
• Giant Enemy Crab: Well, crayfish-like, not crab-like. And while taller than an average human (to the point that they're too heavy to be carried on Garrett's shoulder), they aren't exactly giant.
• Our Monsters Are Weird: Humanoid crayfish. And, for one, they lack the usual crayfish tail.
• Patrolling Mook: In some missions. In others, you just come across them very closely, and you have to avoid alerting them. They tend to patrol fairly small areas in the environments they inhabit.
• Riddle for the Ages: While the craybeasts work for the Trickster, the origin of the craymen (who don't seem to work for anyone and just live alone in caves, sometimes with a few other craymen) is a mystery. The strategy guide suggests they might be some kind of prototype version of the craybeasts, which the Trickster abandoned once he created the their more powerful counterparts.
• Super Not-Drowning Skills: Since they are crayfish-like, they feel right at home in water (on the rare occasion when you might lure them into deep water by accident).
• The Unintelligible: Again, as with the bugbeasts or treebeasts, their "speech" and sounds are unintelligible to human beings. Their language sounds like variations of high-pitched chirping.

Craybeasts

• Elite Mooks: Appear in the final mission of The Dark Project and are one of the more elite monster guards present there.
• Palette Swap: Actually subverted. They are somewhat taller than Craymen and they have higher endurance stats (hence their Elite Mooks status).
• Patrolling Mook: They patrol parts of the Maw of Chaos.
• Shadow Archetype: Of the average craymen, being their Evil Counterpart. They are slightly larger, somewhat more powerful and work purely for the Trickster and his army of monsters.
• Unique Enemy: Of the final mission in The Dark Project.

Animals, Plants and Various Creatures

This group of characters in general

• What Measure Is a Non-Human?: Unlike with human civilians, you will not get a failed objective if you kill any of these Non Player Characters, even on the highest difficulty.

Burricks

• Beware the Silly Ones: They are generally docile creatures that look like pudgey dinosaur-lizard things, but piss them off (or intrude into their tunnels if they're feral) and they won't hesitate for a moment to attack you with their only means of defence (see the following trope).
• Breath Weapon: They belch out large greenish clouds of digestive fumes that can suffocate any living adversary. Worse, the gas is flammable, and a badly placed fire arrow will cause trouble for Garrett.
• Lethal Joke Weapon: Their noxious digestive fumes. It's not even meant to be a weapon - burricks are burrowing animals who use their acidic breath to clear out stone and soil.
• Mascot Mook: Considered to be this for the series by many, along with the characters of the Dumb Guard and Smart Guard.
• Our Dragons Are Different: The closest thing to a dragon in the whole setting (well, at least as far as the City and its outskirts are concerned). Given the setting's Low Fantasy nature, the fact that burricks act as a goofy, down-to-earth mockery of usual fantasy dragons isn't all that surprising.
• Rule of Funny: At least half of the reason why they exist in the setting in the first place.
• Shoo Out the Clowns: While they feature often in the first and second acts of The Dark Project, they stop appearing in the last few missions of that installment, once the going gets tough and the missions become increasingly serious. Due to the more urban-based nature of The Metal Age and Deadly Shadows, they only appear as occasional references or as hunting trophies in those two sequels.
• Video Game Caring Potential: They let loose sad cries if they discover the body of a fellow burrick (even if it's just unconscious, but nobody ever said they were very bright). The players who find them cute (if goofy) try to avoid killing them, preferring to ignore them or knock them out so they won't hear this cry.

Spiders

• All Webbed Up: Unlike the naturally occurring spiders that only have a melee attack, the Chaos Spider that is unique to the later missions of The Dark Project can shoot webs at the player character, rendering him powerless for at least a few seconds (the player can untangle himself with rapid clicks of the mouse, but it takes at least 4-5 clicks to do so, making him vulnerable for another Chaos Spider shot).
• Big Creepy-Crawlies: Naturally, with even the smallest being bigger than a human's foot.
• Boss in Mook Clothing: The red-coloured Chaos Spider. Don't be fooled by its similarity to the green-coloured spider, it is far more dangerous than that one. Thankfully, this creature is very rare, and much like the Craybeast, it is less of a wild animal and more of an obedient member of the Trickster's army of monsters.
• Color-Coded for Your Convenience: Yellow spiders, green spiders, red spiders.
• Giant Spider: They come in size varieties ranging from the size of a dinner plate to that of a medium-sized adult dog. The size varieties probably denote species - though with spiders, you never know...
• I Ate WHAT?!: In the Thief II mission "Shipping and Receiving", Garett can enter a famous steakhouse's storage unit in search of trade secrets, and is disgusted to find it full of caged spiders.
• Pintsized Powerhouse: The little yellowish spiders are weaker and less dangerous than their larger brethren, but they make up for it by being really fast and nimble and swarming their enemies from multiple directions.
• Put on a Bus: After The Metal Age.
• Shadow Archetype: The Chaos Spiders are this to the normal big green spiders.
• Unique Enemy: The red Chaos Spiders, which only appear in two missions in The Dark Project.
• Why Did It Have to Be Snakes?: While Garrett doesn't complain about them that much, he certainly isn't a fan of these annoying creepy crawlies.

Frogbeasts

• Beware the Silly Ones: Their sole form of attack is damaging enough to Garrett's health to make them a real annoyance.
• Call a Smeerp a "Rabbit": They share both similarities and differences with real frogs and toads. Furthermore, they're not supposed to be a fantasy substitute for actual frogs in the series' setting. Their relation to real frogs or toads if any is left unexplained.
• Live Item: Only in The Metal Age. Specifically, the item itself is a frogbeast egg - when deployed, it hatches a frogbeast, which then hops over to the nearest enemy to do its thing...
• Living Weapon: Their only lot in life is to find a moving character (including you), hop all the way towards him and then spontaneously burst into a gory little explosion that can injure said character. They are enemy Non Player Characters in The Dark Project, but in The Metal Age, you can weaponize them against your opponents via the use of frogbeast eggs.
• Put on a Bus: After The Metal Age.
• Ridiculously Cute Critter: Despite their annoyingness, they are rather cutesy and make pretty hilarious sounds.
• Rule of Funny: Pretty much the "Rule of Funny: The Character" of the whole series.
• Shout-Out: Among other quips, the list of developer quotes found in an Easter Egg in The Metal Age contains the following:
  "Frogbeast, I choose you!"

Cats

• Acceptable Breaks from Reality: The cat Non Player Characters in Deadly Shadows won't react to rats at all, and vice versa. Even if the two are standing right next to each other. Since both Non Player Characters rarely appear together in the same room, most players won't even notice this amusing Fridge Logic bit of programming.
• Cuteness Proximity: When that wandering kitty Non-Player Character starts its silly meowing...
• Non-Player Character: Little more than an incidental set-dressing critter.
• Second Episode Introduction: Though they were referenced in the first two games (including an anecdote about a bumbling thief told by a Downwind Thieves' Guild member), cats finally appeared as physical Non Player Characters only in the third game.
• The Unseen: Until Deadly Shadows.

Rats

• Acceptable Breaks from Reality: The rat Non Player Characters in Deadly Shadows won't react to cats at all, and vice versa. Even if the two are standing right next to each other. Since both Non Player Characters rarely appear together in the same room, most players won't even notice this amusing Fridge Logic bit of programming.
• Art Evolution: Their models in The Metal Age and Deadly Shadows, due to a change in engine and more advanced graphics.
• Even the Rats Won't Touch It: A sinister variation. You'll notice that while rats are ubiquitous all around The City (especially in sewers, basements and rundown areas), areas reputed to be haunted will lack even a single rodent.
• It's Probably Nothing: Guards and commoners startled by the occasional minor ruckus caused by Garrett will often blame mice or rats for the sounds in question.
• Non-Player Character: Little more than an incidental set-dressing critter.
• Second Episode Introduction: Referenced a lot throughout the series, but didn't appear as physical Non Player Characters in the first game, The Dark Project. They were introduced in The Metal Age and became even more widespread in Deadly Shadows.
• The Unseen: Until The Metal Age.

Rust Mites

• Big Creepy-Crawlies: Subverted by them being quite friendly-looking beetles, as well as completely harmless Non Player Characters. The only danger they present is if you destroy them, since they vanish in a burst of very real flame.
• Meaningful Name: They're oversized bugs that like to feed on metallic materials. This, and the fact that their bodily fluids cause the spread of corrosion, makes them pests in the eyes of the Hammerites.
• Remember the New Guy?: Introduced in Deadly Shadows. Despite much being made of them being a pest to Hammerite and City industry and machinery, they were never mentioned or seen prior to this installment.
• Suspiciously Similar Substitute: Averted. Though one might be tempted to think they are this to the giant spiders of previous installments, they actually fulfill a very different gameplay role than the spiders and are not enemies at all.

Eyeball Plants

Plants that have eyeballs on the ends of their stalks, like a really weird flower. They turn up deep in areas touched by chaos, mostly to be freaky.

• Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Eyeball Plants. Plants that are eyeballs.
• Faceless Eye: It's weird. It wouldn't be so weird if they didn't turn to keep watching you.

The City

The City increased quickly. The lack of planning evidences itself in the closeness of the structures... the strange twist of a street...

— Keeper Archives

Nobody knows the whole city, how old it is, how many times it's been built over. Not the Hammerites, nobody.

— Servant at Rutherford Castle

Yes, as seen throughout the series, even The City itself can be regarded as an inanimate character of sorts...

• Absurdly Spacious Sewer: Played with. Most sewers subvert this, built to accomodate maintenance staff, and therefore being of a reasonable size and fairly cramped. However, some sewer areas play it dead straight, with very spacious sewers and underground waterways, probably even centuries old.
• Bizarrchitecture: Mostly averted in The City itself, but some of the buildings in its abandoned parts or within its outskirts (e.g. Constantine's Mansion, The Mage Towers) really fit the bill.
• Capital City: It's a gigantic, sprawling medieval metropolis, unlike any city of the Real Life Middle Ages. Based on the descriptions throughout the series, it seems to be the biggest, most powerful and most advanced of all the local city states within the part of the world it lies in, being a Hub City for trade and commerce as a result. While this is never confirmed, it might also be one of the oldest cities in the whole general area.
• City of Adventure: A blessing and a curse In-Universe, as well as for the player.
• City of Canals: Not the entire City, but many of its quarters have canals and waterways of various shapes and sizes.
• City Noir: Arguably one of the most iconic examples in gaming.
• City with No Name: Well, if you don't count its name being explicitly "The City".
• Continuity Nod: Though not all, several of the City's quarters and streets make repeated appearances throughout the series.
• Crapsack World: Played straight a lot, but also often subverted. While there is a lot of vice, crime, injustice and danger in The City, many of its inhabitants are good at heart or at least a Knight in Sour Armor. The frequent moments of humour seen among the various inhabitants of The City bring an air of lightheartedness, hope and relief to its often foreboding atmosphere. And the setting is not adverse to the occasional moments of heartwarming either.
• Cyberpunk Is Techno: As far as some of the series' intro and outro music themes are concerned, it's more like "Medieval Steampunk Is Drum & Bass".
• Doom Magnet: It's never truly explored, but there seems to be something seriously wrong with the area that the City is built in; Between the combined earthquake and volcanic explosion that buried the Lost City that occupied the region in ancient times, to the "Cataclysm" that destroyed part of the Old Quarter, to Constantine, Father Karras and The Hag's machinations, something about the region just seems to attract disaster.
• Dungeon Punk: Some parts of The City reflect this trope quite clearly.
• Eldritch Location: Some of its abandoned parts that are reputed to be haunted or overrun by weird creatures. The ones Garrett gets to visit throughout the series definitely have plenty of unsettling Genius Loci. Justified, in that the entire city hides a gigantic Glyph.
• Fantastic Noir: The City's skylines alone (that you see in many cutscenes and as backdrops to mission maps) make The City look like some ungodly medieval version of Los Angeles from Blade Runner, with omnipresent steampunk technology in lieu of cyberpunk esthetics.
• Industrial Ghetto: Glimpses of this are caught throughout several of the city districts, particularly in The Metal Age. Fan missions tend to portray this aspect of The City frequently.
• Land of One City: From all the canon information available, it seems to be a very large city state. It is ruled by a nobleman with the title of "Baron" and a city council.
• Mega City: It definitely seems larger than any European medieval city that ever existed.
• Merchant City: Both legal and illegal trade are the City's economic lifeblood.
• New Weird: A varied place, where you can experience gritty noir tales as well as heartwarming experiences, laugh-out-loud humour as well as terrifying horror, use magical and clockpunkish gadgets in equal measure, see the heights of opulence among the wealthy and the crushing poverty of the destitute, take a calm relaxing stroll to soothing ambient music or be on edge all the time as you explore abandoned streets and flee pursuers. The City's inhabitants, even many humans, are often peculiar individuals. And that's not even getting into the cavalcade of bizarre fantasy creatures and beings, once you scratch the seemingly mundane-medieval surface. Though not exactly Jeff Vandermeer's Ambergris, China Miéville's New Crobuzon, or Terry Pratchett's Ankh-Morpork (her stylistic cousins), The City proudly shares their odd-fantasy DNA, and is no slouch when it comes to a steady stream of the weird and wonderful (and not so wonderful).
• Outlaw Town: The Downwind Thieves' Guild is a subterranean version of this, complete with living quarters, storage rooms and even an illegal gambling den for paying above-ground customers. The whole complex makes heavy use of the local sewers and is accessed via several secret entrances from an incospicuous local tavern. It also has secret doors leading to the mansions of Reuben and Donal, the two main leaders of the guild.
• Purely Aesthetic Era: Medieval? Baroque? Victorian? Feudal or industrial? The City is its own unique blend of Real Life inspirations and influences.
• Ruins for Ruins' Sake: Averted. Even the run-down, ruined and long-abandoned parts of The City make up a logical whole, feel genuinely "lived-in" and show clear signs of what they were formerly used for.
• Science Fantasy: As even the trailer for Deadly Shadows notes, it's "...an ancient city, where magic and technology clash...".
• Spell My Name with a "The": Because its actual name is The City.
• Urban Fantasy: More literal than most examples of this trope. It fits both the traditional definition (i.e. magic and mythical beings crawling over into an otherwise modern, industrialized setting) and a literal definition (since a predominant part of the storylines and Garrett's adventures take part within the various parts of The City).
• Vice City: Especially in its criminal underworld and in the households of some more excessive nobles.
• Wretched Hive: The poorer parts of it, and also any place that is a haven for the local criminal underground and general lowlifes. Subverted by the fact that many of the most famous and successful crime bosses are rich enough to afford an openly opulent lifestyle, often rivaling even that of the local nobility and Nouveau Riche.

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There is nothing as promising as the opening of a book. There is nothing as final as its shutting.

— Keeper Scribe Lessons, Part 4

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