Rewriting Thief 2's Storyline

[The Shroud]

I figured this topic deserves its own thread now that we're veering away from how a particular cutscene in Thief 2 should have ended, and branching out into how the whole game should have been structured.

Just a small causalities would make it feel more connected and organic, i think.
Also, motivation would be more clear and internal.

My 5 minute rewrite )

Garrett helps Basso because of some old favor/sister + loot. Emphasize friendship or thief's camaraderie, since it will be needed/used later for motivation.
He finds at Rumford mansion some corrupt document about shipment, or even better, Jenivere being sold to some smugglers as slave.
At warehouses, he finds all sorts of kids and beggars being held imprisoned in one of warehouses.
Man signed on document regarding 'slave trade' is Hagen. Garrett sabotages the 'slave trade'. Jenivere dead? Turned into Servant later?
Because of all that, 'somebody' (Victoria is already watching at this point, if not from beginning; maybe some shadows on windows who leave flowers and moss arrows) wants him to frame Hagen. Also, gold and deleting his own 'crime list' from records, so motivation is personal/internal.
Hagen needs to be Tier 3 bad guy, with a little more volume to him.
Because of Framed he needs to be Ambushed, not some cryptic stuff like 'Sammy sold me out'.
Full Mechanists/City Watch ambush. Needs to feel important in term of plot. Revenge for Hagen or something like that.
Here events pick up the pace.
Ambush and Framed can even swap places.
Anyway, Keepers point to Eavesdropping, which leads to Bank, which leads to Blackmail. All well.
Trace the courier and Trial of Blood = chase; all well.

Here is the main twist. Basso turned Pagan sometimes between T1 and T2, maybe he was Pagan all the time. He killed Truart. Extra motivated by death of his sister/Jenivere.
That can soften up Garrett' logic and wish for revenge on Victoria.
There should be one dialog between Basso, Garrett and Victoria that clears everything up.
Also, before this point we need to have a clear idea that Mechanists are real bad news. Corrupted, ready to kill and annihilate, while wearing the mask of progress.
Later in story Basso goes on mission for Victoria on Markham's, and he is Lotus. That way, Garrett's mercy killing a friend has a high reverberation throughout the story.

After that is all well, with 'bring the villain down' structure going on, and closing remaining story threads up.
Some missions could be tweaked left or right, but structurally, it holds.
And Servants needs to be more fleshed out. I played T2x long time ago, but as i remember, they had Servant production being central to the plot. That is excellent choice.

But.. BUT..!
It is easy to be a general after the battle, so.. i love T2 anyway, with all it's 'flaws' )

Here is my own rough rewrite:

Mission 1: Shipping... and Receiving. I think the storyline should actually omit Running Interference entirely, since rescuing Jenivere from Lady Rumford's manor has nothing whatsoever to do with the rest of the plot. And rather than contrive some connection between that mission and the next in order to justify its inclusion, my approach is to simply cut it and prioritize the story over everything else. So I think the plot should begin with Shipping... and Receiving (which does a far better job at establishing how the city has changed in the past year, and introduces both Sheriff Truart and the Mechanists) — conveying that business has been running pretty slow for Garrett lately and he needs some quick cash to afford his rent. Redirecting an important shipment from Gilver's Exporting to his fence should yield a sufficient payoff. Honestly, this mission already feels like the actual start of the game to me just from how Garrett sets the scene in the briefing. This isn't about doing friendly favors for someone or stealing a bit of loot on the side — this is about staying in business and avoiding having "to go back to picking pockets on the streets."

Mission 2: Ambush! Almost like a cruel repeat of what happened to Cutty before Garrett could deliver Bafford's scepter to him, misfortune strikes again and Garrett's current fence, Sammy, gets arrested by the bluecoats just after Gilver's shipment arrives at his address. Turns out one of Sammy's associates tipped off the City Watch about his black market dealings and they set up a sting to bust him. Worse yet: Sammy cracked under pressure, informing on Garrett's thefts, and the Watch set up an ambush for Garrett at Sammy's residence — lying in wait for him when he comes to collect his payment for the Gilver shipment. Luckily for Garrett, though, he senses something amiss when he gets to Sammy's place (Sammy left some obscure clue to warn Garrett that something's wrong — perhaps some sort of prearranged signal like a burning candle in a certain window, or a hastily written note hidden under the doormat at the backdoor where Garrett usually enters, or some other subtle cue that only Garrett would recognize), and narrowly avoids walking into the Watch's trap. Wise to their setup, Garrett sneaks into Sammy's house, avoiding the lurking officers, and Sammy whispers to him that the bluecoats are looking for him all over the South Quarter, and it'll only be a matter of time before they find his tenement (whose address Garrett never gave to Sammy, so the bluecoats are going door to door, asking questions of all the residents in the neighborhood). Garrett sneaks back out and makes his way through the streets, avoiding Watch patrols, and overhears a conversation between the Watch captain and her officers outside his tenement: their orders, issued from the Sheriff himself, are to kill Garrett on sight — which is highly unusual, even for the bluecoats. Garrett sneaks into his tenement, grabs his stash, and gets to his safe house in Shalebridge without being spotted.

Mission 3: Payback. No one tries to have Garrett killed and gets away with it. Just like he taught a lesson to Ramirez after his thugs tried to assassinate him, Garrett decides to break into Sheriff Truart's estate and loot his valuables — and find something incriminating he can use against him while he's there, as well as try to find out why Truart wants him dead. While in the mansion, Garrett finds some evidence of the Sheriff's corruption which he can use to blackmail him and coerce him into calling off his 'bulls' (probably something to do with the corrupt City Wardens Truart is covering for, as well as the prostitute he's steering his officers away from investigating). But just after writing the Sheriff a threatening letter and leaving it for him in his bedroom, Garrett overhears Truart penning a letter of his own in his study — reading some parts of it aloud to himself as he writes it — and grows curious about whom Truart is writing to, since what portions he overhears hint that the recipient might be the one who wants Garrett killed. Garrett decides he needs to find out where this letter is being sent, so he resolves to tail the Watch officer whom the Sheriff tasks with delivering it. Mysteriously, Truart doesn't even reveal the recipient's name to the officer, just instructs him to leave the letter at the "usual drop location." Garrett sneaks out of the mansion and begins shadowing the messenger through the streets leading away from the Sheriff's estate.

Mission 4: Trace the Courier. Garrett follows the messenger through the city until the man drops the letter he's carrying on the street near a certain address and doubles back. Garrett then sneaks over and reads the letter, which reveals that the recipient (who is left unnamed) is the one who hired Truart to kill him, with Truart assuring his co-conspirator that though Garrett has eluded his officers for the moment, the thief will be found and disposed of soon. The letter also expresses curiosity about what could be so concerning about some simple thief that his employer would go to such trouble to ensure his demise, and then goes on to discuss Truart's "other" arrangement with the recipient:

"I must say I am impressed by what you've done with the tramps I delivered to you. The transformation is spectacular! Indeed, "neither want, nor worry" have they now, just as you said. Lucky fellows! Strange you should mention worries, though, because I do have one. It's not that the money's not right, no, it's just that I need to be convinced you've taken the proper precautions. The Truart name is untainted by scandal and I will not be the one to bring it humiliation and ruin. I appreciate your assurances that the Baron need never know, and I'm glad your Builder 'guides' you, as you say, but it would make me feel even more confident if you were to let me in on your whole scheme. Come, now. What's the crux of it all, ey? Tell me what's so special about your new servants? Once I know more about your plans, I can supply more subjects for your project: vagabonds, street scum, prostitutes — those who will not be missed by anyone of consequence. They'll be rounded up, charges invented, etc. Still, there's always risk. So I will give you twenty — no more. For your part, you'll remember to keep our transactions absolutely secret. And of course, deliver my payment in advance, in full, tomorrow. I don't trust you, so you'll receive the subjects only after I confirm the payment."

After reading the letter, Garrett drops it where he found it, hides and lies in wait for whoever is coming to claim it — who turns out to be a Mechanist acolyte. Garrett tails the acolyte further across the city until he reaches the Mechanist seminary, where he eavesdrops on the messenger delivering the letter to Father Karras. Karras has a brief conversation with his head priestess, Vilnia, about the progress of their operations, before instructing her to proceed with the next phase of his plans, which he mentions are detailed in some notes he's left for her in his office. Garrett resolves to sneak into Karras's office and steal his notes before Vilnia gets there, but along the way, commotion sounds as the Mechanists are attacked by a band of pagan agents — which delays Vilnia as she joins the fight. Garrett capitalizes on the distraction and sneaks into Karras's office — only to find that the notes have already been stolen when he gets there. Just then, he overhears the Mechanists shouting to stop one of the intruders who is escaping with Karras's notes, and begins pursuing the fleeing pagan. The Mechanists also give chase, and the pagan leads his pursuers away from the seminary, through the streets, and into a nearby cemetery — but not before one of the Mechanists wounds him with her crossbow. Though hurt, the pagan manages to elude the Mechanists' sight and they search the cemetery for him to no avail. Garrett, however, manages to track the wounded pagan's blood trail, which leads him to a magical portal hidden in one of the crypts. He steps through it and is transported to an unfamiliar grove...

Mission 5: Trail of Blood. This mission proceeds pretty much as we remember it, except that when Garrett finally finds the pagan's body, he reads the notes the man took from the seminary and gains some important information about Karras's plans — including the location of a Mechanist facility in the city where the tramps and petty criminals Truart delivered to Karras were taken to be "transformed" into servants. Then the cutscene following Trail of Blood plays — with Viktoria proposing an alliance and Garrett refusing, still harboring a seething hatred for her and her thistleaids, and choosing to work alone.

I'll pause it here for now, but my subsequent ideas include Basso's sister (whom Garrett has been seeing for over a year now) being one of the unfortunate "prostitutes" (either legitimately or falsely charged) that Truart delivered to Karras, among other friendly associates of Garrett's, and Garrett having to break into the facility to rescue them — and put an end to its operations. Another mission would involve destroying the primary Mechanist factory which manufactures all their automatons and other weaponry (thereby hindering the Mechanists' ability to proceed with a hostile takeover of the city), and another would deal with destroying or otherwise sabotaging the Mechanists' main chemical plant where they develop their rust gas cultivators. I would preserve Life of the Party, Precious Cargo, Kidnap (though rather than kidnapping Cavador, Garrett would just steal his notes), and Sabotage at Soulforge, while removing Framed, First City Bank and Trust, Casing the Joint, and Masks. And much of Blackmail and some of Eavesdropping would be preserved in Payback and Trace the Courier, respectively. Also, after Mission 9 (probably Life of the Party), I would add a cutscene where Garrett finally meets with the Keepers — effectively switching places between the post-Ambush cutscene and the post-Trail of Blood cutscene, with Garrett rejecting Viktoria and the pagans instead of the Keepers earlier in the story, and grudgingly agreeing to work with the Keepers instead of Viktoria and the pagans later on. Garrett doesn't exactly like working with the Keepers either, but at least he doesn't harbor the kind of burning hatred against them that he holds for Viktoria — and he still considers at least one of them trustworthy enough to listen to.

[Mandragora]

Sounds cool. I have a few things to throw in the mix, more like a brainstorming session

Purpose of attack of Pagans on Mechanists? To steal Karrass' plans?
Shouldn't they use subterfuge instead of frontal attack?
I learned about a FM (didn't play it yet) where you compete with rival assassin/thief.
That sounds very cool, maybe something like that instead of frontal attack, and then you have to outthief the thief.

If you are cutting missions out, then you can change everything,
and maybe the trailing mechanic/mission isn't needed and can be substituted with something more thiefy/'exciting'.

Sister/Jenivere being turned to servant is great, but that is why you need Rumford mission, to establish characters and connections (or something other than Rumford, but early in campaign).
We need/want to care.

Take care not to make the same mistake T2 team did, and that is envisioning cool settings for missions, but disregarding the story basic structure.
Structure and motivations, i think that is the key to solid story.

[Mandragora]

If you plan for Garrett to refuse Victoria, but later work with her, then you need a serious reason for him to return (otherwise, you just repeat story beat).
He went to Hammerites after being beaten and losing an eye, and them he just didn't like.
She betrayed him and pluck his eye, so for him to return after refusing, he should have a good reason, meaning he should be really down.

I always thought that connection between Karras > Garrett's eye was missed opportunity.
I mean, genius like Karras would built in that eye at least something to spy through Garrett while he is on his thieving escapades, or something to try to control him.
Maybe that can be the moment when he decides he needs Victoria - his mechanical eye goes berserk and he can be controlled by Karras.
Mission where you play Garrett, but objectives are one that benefit Karras, since he is 'driving' you?
Like 'kill the sheriff', maybe :))

[Mandragora]

And while i am at it, here is the jewel brought to us by Joseph Campbell!
I present thee - The Monomyth (in Karras' voice) :))

This is the structural core of almost all 'hero' stories created by humankind, almost a blueprint.
Well, i guess if you are rule bending/breaking writer genius, then you don't need to care about this and call it 'cliche'.
It is interesting to see how many elements are present in both Thief storylines, in one form or the other.
Also, it is nice read and good guide for storytelling.

This is a 12 steps version, there is also a 17 steps original Campbell's version, and variations.

The Ordinary World
This is the original world of the hero, which "suffers from a symbolic deficiency."
The hero is lacking something, or something is taken from him.

The Call to Adventure
The hero is given a challenge, problem, or adventure.
Often it appears as a blunder, or chance.
This stage establishes the goal of the hero.

The Refusal of the Call
The (often) reluctant hero has to be set along the correct path.
He must weigh the consequences and be excited by a stronger motivation to proceed further.

Meeting with the Mentor
The hero encounters a wise figure who prepares him for the journey.
This figure (or item) gives advice, guidance, or an item, but cannot go with the hero.

Crossing the Threshold
The hero has committed to his task, and enters the special world.
Often he is met by a threshold guardian.

Tests, Allies, and Enemies
In the special world, the hero learns the new rules
by meeting people and obtaining new information.
There is often a "local watering hole" component.
This is where the true characteristics of the hero are revealed.

Approach to the Innermost Cave
Now our hero, and often his allies, have come to the edge
of the dangerous place where the "object of the quest" is hidden.
This stage often is the land of the dead.

The Supreme Ordeal
The hero faces danger, often a life-or-death moment that is either physical or psychological.

Reward, or Seizing the Sword
After surviving, our hero takes possession of the object,
typically a treasure, weapon, knowledge, token, or reconciliation.

The Road Back
The hero must now deal with the consequences of their actions.
They may be pursued by remaining forces.
They now face the decision to return to the ordinary world.

Resurrection
One final test is required for the purification and rebirth of the hero.
Alternatively, it may be a miraculous transformation.

Return with the Elixir
The triumphant hero returns to the ordinary world bearing the elixir.
Common elixirs are treasure, love, freedom, wisdom, or knowledge.
A defeated hero is doomed to repeat the lesson.

[The Shroud]

Sounds cool. I have a few things to throw in the mix, more like a brainstorming session

Purpose of attack of Pagans on Mechanists? To steal Karrass' plans?

That is my current thought, yeah. The actual attackers are probably on a suicide mission to create just enough of a diversion for one of their agents to break into Karras's office and steal his notes. It would also establish an earlier sign that the Mechanists and pagans are at war with each other (i.e. as early as Mission 4 instead of not until Mission 9 in the original plot structure) — and that the latter are woefully outgunned and clearly losing.

Shouldn't they use subterfuge instead of frontal attack?

I was thinking it would be more of a guerilla strike, with a relatively small team of spies, apebeasts and witches sneaking into the Mechanist seminary's grounds (their agents were likely tailing the same acolyte Garrett was, having discovered these regular dead drops some time ago). Unfortunately for them their spies aren't as stealthy as Garrett (especially in the city, far from their native forests), so the only viable way for one of their agents to slip into Karras's office undetected is to create a major distraction, and thus open a momentary window in the Mechanists' security.

I learned about a FM (didn't play it yet) where you compete with rival assassin/thief.
That sounds very cool, maybe something like that instead of frontal attack, and then you have to outthief the thief.

I thought about that, but ultimately I'm just aiming for a reason for Garrett to tail the pagan from the seminary to the city's graveyard, rather than trying to actually pit two skilled thieves against each other (again — story first, cool missions and gameplay concepts second). This is more like when the player had to find Namon in Break from Cragscleft Prison after he'd slipped his bonds and stolen Felix's notes from the Hammerites' evidence box — an incentive for Garrett to follow a pagan into the next mission (Trail of Blood), since without that he'd really never care much about investigating what the pagans are up to, and would never end up in the Maw.

Honestly, I always found Garrett's motives for following the pagan in Trace the Courier and Trail of Blood to be pretty weak, considering that discovering the pagans were Mosley's theretofore unidentified co-conspirators was probably enough to satisfy Garrett's curiosity about who was behind the Sheriff's murder — and that fact became apparent as soon as Garrett read Mosley's letter and saw the pagan who came to claim it. Once Garrett knew some pagan was conspiring with Mosley and he understood their reasons for assassinating the Sheriff, did he really need to keep following the messenger to learn which pagan it was? I feel like he didn't — especially since Truart (and maybe Karras) was his real concern at that point, not Truart's killers. So I feel trying to obtain Karras's notes is a far stronger objective (and thus, motive for tailing the pagan) for Garrett than trying to discover which specific individual Mosley was corresponding with.

If you are cutting missions out, then you can change everything,
and maybe the trailing mechanic/mission isn't needed and can be substituted with something more thiefy/'exciting'.

Well, while I do think some missions should be cut, I'm selecting those on a basis of which ones drive the real plot and which don't, rather than arbitrarily removing missions or cutting them to replace them with something more thief-themed or more exciting. I do think both Trace the Courier and Trail of Blood serve the story enough to justify their inclusion (and the latter relies strongly on the former), and even beyond that I think the 'trailing a target' gameplay is very theme-appropriate and belongs in the game (it certainly worked very well in Assassins). I'm somewhat conservative with this (though not too much), in that I don't want to remove something unless I feel it's really more fat than meat — but there really are a number of missions which exhibit that condition.

Ironically, this means cutting some missions which I actually really enjoy in terms of theme and gameplay (Running Interference, Framed, First City Bank and Trust, Casing the Joint, Masks), while preserving others (or portions of others) which I don't particularly care for as much myself (Shipping... and Receiving, Eavesdropping, Blackmail, Trail of Blood, Precious Cargo, Kidnap, Sabotage at Soulforge — some of these being more enjoyable for me than the rest, but none of them are really my favorites). But that's the purpose of this: not serving my own subjective biases of which missions I personally like the most or the least, but rather taking a more objective view of all these missions and scrutinizing them based solely on their roles in the plot. Everything must earn its place.

Sister/Jenivere being turned to servant is great, but that is why you need Rumford mission, to establish characters and connections (or something other than Rumford, but early in campaign).
We need/want to care.

I don't actually think Running Interference is necessary (definitely unnecessary if it's Basso's sister who gets abducted). Hell, we know nothing more about Basso himself than what little is in Break from Cragscleft Prison and Garrett's mentioning, "An old associate of mine, Basso the Boxman," "Guess prison life spoiled his taste for thievery," in Running Interference — much less Jenivere. The only reason we even care at all about Jenivere is because this "old associate" of Garrett's named Basso wants to marry her. Even in Break from Cragscleft Prison, rescuing Basso was merely a secondary objective on Expert mode, barely enough to genuinely care about him as a character from the player's perspective.

So adding an objective to rescue Basso's sister in this rewrite would basically be the same kind of scenario — a character we as players don't care about, but Garrett does. This is what's known about her (from Break from Cragscleft Prison's Expert objectives): "You've had your eye on Basso the Boxman's sister for a while now. If you break him out of Cragscleft, she'll probably be VERY grateful." So we can assume that Garrett has been seeing her ever since he freed Basso from Cragscleft, which is a little over a year or so. That's more than enough basis for Garrett to care about her — plus, his old friend Basso obviously cares about rescuing his sister, and Garrett has at least as much cause to help with that as he would have to help him rescue his bride to be. Besides, much like rescuing Basso himself in Break from Cragscleft Prison was a secondary objective, this too can be a secondary objective for Garrett in freeing the captives Truart delivered to Karras — his primary objective being to thwart Karras's servant project. Granted, that still requires Garrett to care about countering Karras's scheme, but that's what we need him to be primarily concerned about anyway.

Take care not to make the same mistake T2 team did, and that is envisioning cool settings for missions, but disregarding the story basic structure.
Structure and motivations, i think that is the key to solid story.

Oh, absolutely — and that's exactly what I'm doing. Which is why I'm suggesting cutting Running Interference, Framed, First City Bank and Trust, Casing the Joint, and Masks, as well as portions of Eavesdropping, and altering parts of Ambush!, Blackmail, and Trace the Courier. None of that is about envisioning cool settings for missions; it's entirely about driving the plot. The same goes for including missions in which Garrett frees the captives who are about to be transformed into masked servants (very relevant to opposing Karras's plans), destroys the Mechanist factory producing all the automatons (relevant to weakening the Mechanists in general), and sabotages the Mechanist chemical plant synthesizing the rust gas (obviously crucial for ending the threat the Mechanists pose to the city). Rescue missions and blowing up industrial sites may not be very thief-themed, but it would definitely serve the story.

If anything, the mission I'm most concerned about being able to justify is the almost universally beloved Life of the Party, which is fantastic for thief-themed gameplay but largely 'fat' in terms of necessity to the plot (only a portion of Angelwatch itself is actually driving the story — the rest is just a lot of loose fun, honestly). I'll have to think of ways to make that mission more critical because as it stands now, its importance to the story is rather tenuous.

If you plan for Garrett to refuse Victoria, but later work with her, then you need a serious reason for him to return (otherwise, you just repeat story beat).
He went to Hammerites after being beaten and losing an eye, and them he just didn't like.
She betrayed him and pluck his eye, so for him to return after refusing, he should have a good reason, meaning he should be really down.

Yeah, I had initially considered having Garrett change his mind and work with the pagans at the eleventh hour, in the same way that he teams up with the Hammerites in (literally) the eleventh and penultimate mission of TDP, but the more I think on it the less need I feel there actually is for such an alliance. Rather, I think the role Viktoria and her forces play in the final mission can simply be a failed attempt to stop Karras themselves (which is what happened in the original story anyway) — which, while unsuccessful on its own, nonetheless provides an opportunity for Garrett to take advantage of their efforts and succeed where they did not. In this way, the pagans still achieve a certain impact on the final showdown without actually being allied with Garrett and the Keepers. Viktoria can even still say some of what she says to Garrett in the pre-Sabotage at Soulforge cutscene (about how she has failed and did not spread enough plant life to sustain the reaction, but there is still one more thing she can do and then it will be up to Garrett — before sacrificing herself and spreading her own plant material).

Maybe Viktoria even bitterly admits that she was wrong to have done what she did to Garrett, and might have prevailed in her present mission had she acted differently in the past (anticipating one's imminent demise can have a way of opening their eyes to their previous errors in judgment and regretting their worst mistakes) — thereby offering a poignant commentary on how bad choices and moral failures beget unforeseen consequences and karmic punishments. That actually might have been quite moving just before she martyrs herself. Without that admission of wrongdoing, her sacrifice seems far less tragic to me — far less meaningful overall, since she effectively dies the same haughty, heartless b**** she always was instead of the redeemed, lamenting anti-heroine she could have been. Similar to how we feel about Darth Vader in his final moments, telling Luke that he was right about him, a villain finally confessing her wrongs and acknowledging guilt shortly before perishing can pay off a long-unaddressed injustice and offer a kind of bittersweet closure.

I always thought that connection between Karras > Garrett's eye was missed opportunity.
I mean, genius like Karras would built in that eye at least something to spy through Garrett while he is on his thieving escapades, or something to try to control him.
Maybe that can be the moment when he decides he needs Victoria - his mechanical eye goes berserk and he can be controlled by Karras.
Mission where you play Garrett, but objectives are one that benefit Karras, since he is 'driving' you?
Like 'kill the sheriff', maybe )

Eh... That removes agency from the player and I honestly don't really care for that angle. I will admit that they just sort of left that thread hanging, which does make one think about missed story opportunities, but ultimately I would just ditch the connection between Garrett's mechanical eye and Karras altogether. It's not really necessary to the plot, more of a contrivance really. To be perfectly honest, I'm not even convinced that Garrett needed to have a mechanical eye in the first place, story-wise (that's right, I'm even questioning TDP's ending a bit) — I feel like Garrett's own flesh eye (which he triumphantly retrieved, only to then do nothing with) could have been magically reattached to his optic nerve somehow if a Keeper mage had used some gylphs or something, or maybe one of the Hammerite clerics could have done something with their holy rites and healing potions. I would have had no trouble believing that if I'd seen it in a cutscene, given the significant presence of magic in Thief's setting.

Anyhow, I'll pause here for now.

[Mandragora]

Few thoughts, in random order:

It doesn't always have to be 'story, story, story'.
Sometimes, it is ok to have a little bit of fun on the side, with very loose connection to the main plot.
Let it breathe.
But it has to be 'structure, structure, structure'. :)

And to be 'the devil's advocate' - in interactive media, purpose of plot is to make you care, engage, but more importantly, to carry you over to next cool playground to play in. So, plot and cool setting are equally important.

Garrett's description of Basso is all my imagination needs; i instantly love Basso's character. He is the definition of 'less is more'. Just a few cool remarks and descriptions from already established very cool character (Garrett), and my mind feels the gaps.
Especially since guy like Garrett is willing to carry him out of Cragscleft.
Basso is cool!

Problem with 'love interest' is that if she is kidnapped, Garrett is emotionally involved on very different level. If Jenevere is kidnapped, you can show the process of Servant production without putting Garrett in emotional spotlight. You put proxy (Basso) in spotlight, and have the best of both worlds - emotional kick and cool protagonist to save the day (or not).
On the other hand, if Garrett is directly involved, her kidnapping should have a much bigger role in plot, because of before mentioned emotional involvement.
But if you kidnap his 'love interest' (even if she is just 'being grateful for a year') and put her rescue as 'optional', then his deep morality is compromised and flawed.

Regarding agency.. I don't think that if you play 'mind controlled' Garret, you have removed players agency.
Just a little mindf**k with the player to make you do what you don't want to do.
Let's say you are mind controlled and have to kill.. Basso.. Victoria.. whatever.
Did you play Shadow Tactics Blades of Shogun?
*spoilers*
There is a moment where you have to kill one of main characters with whom you played most of game, and character is really cool.
They just rotate camera around him, he is down on his knees with sword pointing at his stomach, and game is waiting for you to just click the mouse.. And you are like 'noooo'.. i don't want to click. He then does seppuku.
Brilliant moment!

And, after all, we are playing the game of rewrite, so we can add and remove anything we like, just to experiment 'from the inside'.
Or we can set up rules - 'all missions must stay as they are' and try to see flexibility of existent story playing with it 'from the outside'.
It seems to me you are taking this more rigid and serious than i, but that is great, since I am awaiting curiously for your continuation of plot and your version of events!
Go, go, go! :))

[downwinder]

i got a interesting thought,what if at the end of thief 1 dark project/gold, you have a choice on how thief 2 goes,either you kill woodsie lord by switching eye and get what you are all talking about above,or you can let the woodsie lord live and have a alt version of thief 2 where the pagans are more powerful and could make for an interesting mix,then you can have more magic /etc

the idea of having a couple paths in a 3 part series would be nice,i think one of those space games did it with people who died in your crew,and in later games they were dead/etc

so thief dark project/gold could have 2 paths at end and thief 2 metal age can have say 3 paths at the end one of course being a secret way ,and thief 3 can have 4 possible endings,one can be how it happen in thief 3 also could add you join the hag and one can be you join keepers and final one can be a secret one where you find out you are a piece of tofu and the massive impact it has on garrett

[Mandragora]

Yes! YES!
And it should all end in 27 versions of cinematic spectacle that is ThiAf - The ultimate Commando Assassin, set in WW2, with you being sent from future to steal Herr Bafford's nuclear scepter.
Now with less emphasis on that slow and boring stealth gameplay, and much more of cinematic adrenaline pumping action.
No jumping, because, when did you jump last time in real life? It breaks immersion!
Open world with randomly generated quests and procedurally generated levels.
Let's not forget micro transaction loot box shop, where you can unlock 'more cinematic takedown' or 'extended magazine size for your automatic-fire bow' for your hard earned cash.
And Garrett is not some skinny whimp in rags, he is body building champion in kevlar with million dollar smile and heart of gold!
Also.. tofu that sings: 'Oh, man, you so deep i can't even comprehend it! My head spins!' while moving his little tofu hips in obscene back-and-forth movement, waving his little tofu hands.
Boom! Profit!

[The Shroud]

It seems to me you are taking this more rigid and serious than i

Evidently.