hiring courtesans and thieves

[spaceboy]

A couple things I've noticed about hiring courtesans and thieves:

First you hire them by pressing Triangle (PS3) and then they'll follow you.  When you find the guards you want them to distract simply hit L1 to "concentrate" on one of the guards in the group essentially selecting them, and then hit triangle again.  Ezio says "you know what to do" and either the courtesans will start flirting or the thieves will run up and mess with the guards and then run away.

Courtesans:  These lovely ladies will walk along with you and provide you with an ongoing blend.  It's kind of nice to be able to move as you wish past all guards with a blend that follows you.  You can run and they'll run after you, catch up and blend again.

Thieves:  These guys are great, they won't blend with you but they'll follow you anywhere including rooftops (sometimes finding they're own way).  AND they'll fight along side you in any guard scuffles.  I hired them once specifically to go up a tower and take on some guards with me.  It was great fighting against and with all these NPCs.  And they fought too, actually downing some guards and coming to my aid once.  Really cool.  I lost 3 of my 5 men in the battle but the other two faithfully followed me along.  Pretty good loyalty for only 150 florins!

[PZ]

Thanks for the tip space, do you need to accomplish something before this feature becomes available?  I found a group of 4 courtesans, but nothing in the menu of keys shows up regarding hiring/following or such.

[spaceboy]

Yes, this comes after a little bit, but still early in the game.  I believe you have to meet the head mistress at one of the brothels who is the sister of your family's housemaid.  Just keep following the story missions (the exclamation marks) as much as possible (at least until you get your villa) - that's when the game really opens up full fledged.

I'll post more answers to your questions on the other thread.

[spaceboy]

by the way, the ladies can be quite fickle...I've hired a group of courtesans and I was on 0% notoriety, but as we passed a few groups of guards on the way to our destination, I lost a few ladies to them.  I was left with 2 out of 5 - and they eventually left me as well.

Actually it seemed organic to the environment though.  It'd probably draw attention to me if the ladies ignored their advances.  No big deal, I was pretty much just experimenting anyways.

It' much easier to make your way around in this game than the first.  You can control your notoriety easily. 

[PZ]

I visited with Pauola (the Madame) and she trained me in blending techniques, after which I was able to hire the courtesans to walk with me.  Even at a maxed out "notorious" level, I was still able to walk past the guards  :-X

[spaceboy]

Here's a good one concerning both groups... I had to save/escort 3 different groups of thieves and the first two times I lost a couple along the way to guards/archers.  The third group I thought I'd get smart and hired a group of courtesans to see if we could all blend.  It was awesome watching a group of 10 of us out on the town (it was evening too).  5 gals and 5 men (including me).  I swear those thieves' spirits really lifted once I asked the ladies to join us.  It was fun to watch and be a part of.

Then we "lost" a couple ladies to a group of guards...remember they'll start chatting up some guards even if you haven't directed them to.  This is good and bad I guess.  Anyways - all 4 thieves made it to our destination - I bid them farewell and they heartily thanked me for my help.

Venice....I own that town.  8)

[PZ]

I really enjoyed this quest too - only I walked my guys along the street level and just avoided the guards altogether - was easy and I lost only one guy out of the three groups, and that is because the butter fingers fell off the roof when I went to deliver him!

[PZ]

**SPOILER**


I had a great time with a mission to assassinate someone high in the Templar organization - while I did not notice it at first (because I'd done so many assassination missions) my task this time was to do so undetected.  (I actually desynchronized the first time I tried because the mark saw me coming at him.)  In other words, I had to ensure that he did not see it coming.  What made it difficult was the fact that he was in a passageway between two courtyards, and the passageway had a roof so I couldn't drop on him from above.  To compound the issue, there were 4 guards at either end of the passageway with him between.

My solution: hire a group of thugs to start a fight at one end of the passageway - I then quickly climbed over the building to the opposite side - both the victim and the guards watching on that side rushed to watch the fight on the opposite side.  A quick sneak up behind the target with the wrist blades and it was all over.