With respect to Stoneskin, a sufficiently high level wizard actually *can* keep this spell up forever. It lasts 12 hours, so a mage can cast it before bed, rest 8 hours to recover her spells, and then cast it when she wakes up. With 2 or more copies memorized, she can essentially be protected all the time unless she is actually attacked.

Also, now that the thief has shown up and walked away, the mage is now aware that the thief is around and can take action.

And a sufficiently high level thief can acquire the means necessary to remove stone skin. Or make plans to acquire the wizard's spell book.

Any moderately intelligent thief planning to kill a wizard is going to make a point of doing it right the first time. He is not going to walk up while visible, declare his intention to kill, and then walk away when the wizard (rightfully) casts protection spells. The thief is going to approach while invisible and place his knife square between the shoulder blades of the said squishy wizard when the wizard is unaware of him.

If the wizard in question happens to be an enemy, however, the wizard will cast True Sight, and that spell can't be interrupted (because the wizard's AI script uses ForceSpell() rather than CastSpell()).

This might not be exactly fair (because how would the wizard know to cast the spell), but that's the way it works.

Also, a thief needs to use up a potion or item charge to do this, whereas the wizard's strategy doesn't use up anything that can't be recovered with just some rest.

Also, as I mentioned, the knife will hit a skin made of stone and have no effect, allowing the wizard to wake up. (Also, keep in mind that PfMW is near instant cast.)

I've never met a wizard yet that my thief character can't take out. Also, my wizard character, all prepared, has been taken out plenty of times by Brennan Riesling in the Den of the Seven Vales, and by other rogues in other places.

A thief doesn't have to rest to be able to use Hide In Shadows repeatedly. Walk close enough to trigger casting of True Sight, then walk away before casting is complete and wait for it to run out. Rinse and repeat. Other repeatable invisibility options include the Ring of Air Control, Ring of Invisibility, and Ring of Gaxx, all 3+ of which recover with some rest.

The stoneskin will not block additional effects, like rapid ticks of poison damage. Or a scroll of Remove Magic.

And if you really want to get technical: since stone skin keeps the knife out, you're attempting to dodge the issue by precluding part of the statement: a knife between the shoulder blades.

That won't work. Because the True Sight is cast via ForceSpell(), the wizard can just keep casting the spell, *even if it's not memorized*. In other words, this enemy wizard, because of how the game is scripted, doesn't have to rest to keep using True Sight. Yes, it's not fair, but that's the way the game works.

Yes, the enemy AI cheats in this game.

(Incidentally, from what I have read, at least one popular challenge mod at least tries to not make the enemies cheat.)

Heh. I don't know what version you're talking about, but I have repeatedly run enemy wizards out of true sight spells. It was simply part of my standard tactics with my thief.

Non-detection, cloak or spell. You can also shut down a targeted casting by drinking a potion of invisibility.

Only in scripted events, and there *is* a limit to how many times (2 usually) a spell can be cast. Also, that is irrelevant in BG1, and what if the wizard is less than level 6 in BG2? Or the wizard is a Conjuror? A thief always has options.

Meanwhile the wizard summons a couple of demons and various other nasties.

You mean one arrow of dispelling later and I can just wait to clean up, just like with a lich? Sweet! :D

And you are permanently out that arrow of dispelling.

If you were a mage, you wouldn't need to permanently use up resources like that.

(Before anyone mentions it, thieves can't equip Vhailor's Helm without Use Any Item (at which point the mage is summoning Planetars which can't be dispelled so easily), and using it without equipping it requires some trickery with item swapping that was probably not intended.)

So? I'll happily trade a single arrow of dispelling to kill a mage who is capable of summoning demons. That's a hugely cheap deal in my favor. You are dead, I get your stuff, and I might even get a bunch of XP.

And I'd say thieves are much, much scarier than mages after a couple of high level abilities.

Except that, as a high-level mage, I can do the following:

1. Cast Project Image.

2. Have the image use the spells. This way, I am only out one 7th level spell slot, yet I get a whole bunch of spells off for that small cost.

3. Have the image drink a potion to boost her wisdom (this doesn't use up the *real* potion), then have her cast Wish. If lucky, this will allow me to regain all the spells that I cast, giving more opportunities to cast spells.

This works even better if I'm a sorcerer, because I can have different images use different spells; one image can stop time and summon planetars, and (after that image gets killed) a different image can try to Wish my spells back.

If things go really badly and I use up all my images, I still have my own 9th level spells available for a few extra tries as Wishing my spells back.

Also, I can point out that thieves can't heal others without using things like Rods of Resurrection; mages can at high levels.