Lockpicking
From OblivioWiki
Lockpicking is one of the mini-games you can play in order to accomplish a simple task in Oblivion. You can choose to pick the lock by chance or you can do it manually. Lockpicking requires that you have at least one lockpick in your inventory. Without a lockpick, even the lowest level locks will require magic to open.
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[edit] Security
The ability to pick a lock is controlled by the stealth skill, Security.
As your rank in security is raised, the number of pins that remain locked in place when you break a pick will increase in the following manner.
- Novice – No pins remain in place
- Apprentice – One pin remains in place
- Journeyman – Two pins remain in place
- Expert – Three pins remain in place
- Master – Pins always remain in place
[edit] Picking a lock
Depending on the difficulty of the lock, there can be anywhere from 1-5 pins in the down position of a lock. The pins in a lock have different tensions in the spring holding them in place. When you move your mouse side-to-side, the pick will move from pin-to-pin and when you move your mouse forward, it will push the pin up. After you push the pin up, you must click the left mouse button (or press the SPACE bar) when the pin reaches the top of the lock; if you don't time it right, the pin will fall back down and the pick will break. If you break a pick, some pins (depending on your lockpick skill level) will fall to the down position and you must start over. After you have set all the pins in the up position, the lock will open. It is important to note that the tension on the spring varies with each test in a cyclic fashion. When the tension on the spring is highest the pin shoots downward faster than usual then goes back upward slower. When this happens it will stick in the top position for longer than usual, giving you ample time to set it in place. Conversely, when the tension is lower, the pin falls slowly, goes up faster and hardly sticks at the top at all. In this case it is very difficult to set regardless of your security skill.
Addition: Not sure if a pin will set if you click the mouse button when it reaches the top, but however when you push a pin up, you will hear a slight tink sound. Listen closely and keep doing it. You will occasionally hear a double tink sound, tink-tink. That is when you click to set the pin. I have picked very hard locks, with one pick, with a security skill of only 7. It may help to close your eyes and simply listen for the second higher pitched tink. As soon as you hear it, lock the pin.
Another possible technique for lockpicking is to wait for the one push when the pin instantly reaches the top. Once you have seen this one, you can be mildly sure that the next push will be easier, and you should try to click for the next one when it reaches the top.
The in-game book "Advances in Lock Picking" recommends holding a torch close to the lock while picking it. [1] (Having a torch equipped when you approach the lock to pick it.) This supposedly softens the springs on the pins, thus slowing their return to the down position. The downside to this technique is that you make yourself much more visible.
If you are visually oriented, watch the gap between the end of the lockpick and the bottom of the pin as it moves upward. If that gap widens, the pin is moving too quickly to set. If that gap stays constant as the pin rises, that's the pin speed you want. Set the pin (click mouse) the instant the pin reaches the top. It's a good idea to cycle the pin a few times to get a better sense of the various speeds. This approach helped me a lot when I had trouble distinguishing the sounds mentioned above.
Alternatively, for the Xbox 360 version, when pushing forward on the left thumbstick to test the tension of each pin, the pin will move up either very quickly or relatively more slowly. To set a pin in the up position, press A when the pin moves more slowly; doing so when it moves quickly will break the pick.
[edit] Auto-attempt
If you do not feel like manually trying to pick the lock, you can press the Auto-Attempt button at the bottom of the lock-picking interface. Auto-attempt is essentially a dice-roll based on the difficulty level of the lock and your Security skill. The lock either opens or the pick breaks. Simply continue pressing Auto-Attempt until the lock successfully opens. If your security level is low (relative to the lock difficulty), you will likely break many more picks than performing the procedure manually. Even the hardest locks can be picked using only one pick i.e. no broken picks at as low as the apprentice level, possibly even the novice level, if your timing is right.
On the other hand, auto-attempt can pick even very hard locks on one attempt. It's essentially a gamble, and one you can possibly use to your advantage: First of all, save before attempting the lock; then manually pick it to get a 'feel' for it. If you break an unacceptable amount of picks it's usually better to reload and then continually auto-attempt the lock, reloading if you keep breaking a lot of picks.
Auto-attempt can also be used to raise your security skill at an accelerated rate when using the Skeleton Key- if picking manually, previously raised pins never fall back on failure like they do when using normal lockpicks, so the number of successful pin sets is limited to the number of pins used by the lock. However, the auto-attempt option seems to treat the skeleton key like a normal lockpick, failing at your usual rate, just never with the result of a broken pick. This results in a greater net number of set pins per lock picked.
[edit] Alternatives
Lockpicking can also be accomplished by Open Lock spells, based on Alteration. Magicka regenerates for free, so this is often a cheaper/faster alternative to lock-picking by hand. Open Very Hard Lock spells do not seem to exist at vendors but can be made yourself at the Arcane University.
A simple way of bypassing lockpicking is to complete the quest at the Shrine of Nocturnal. This will give you the Skeleton Key lockpick which along with a +40 to security, never breaks allowing you to succeed at opening all locks with auto attempt
[edit] Notes
- It takes in-game time to cast the Open Lock spells, whereas the game pauses while you attempt this minigame. Therefore, if you need to pick a lock "quickly" in game-time (e.g. before the guard gets around a corner), using the mini-game is better.
- Using an open lock spell does not count as a crime where picking with lockpicks is a crime.
- Skill-ups for Security occur from locking the pins, rather than from actually opening the locked container. If you want to gain skill all you need to do is exit the lock before locking the final pin. This allows you to use one locked container for as many skill-ups as you want.
- If you need additional lockpicks and you want to use the console, press the tilde (~) button on your keyboard, then type: "player.additem 0000000a X" (without the quotes), where X is the number of lockpicks you want. If you want additional Skeleton Keys, change the 0000000a to 0000000b.
- The Thieves Den plug-in comes with a lockpick training chest that will instantly lock itself after unlocking it.
