You can't use pickpocket in combat at all. I also tried it on an (always-hostile) enemy out of combat, using invisibility, and while the Pickpocket option did appear in the menu, it didn't do anything (yes I was also Sneaking). So your pickpocketing options might not even be possible.
Pickpocketing may only work on NPC's who are by default non-hostile and can change to hostile later. It may not work on always-hostile monsters (the majority of enemies.)
***
My zany idea for improving Charisma is simply to merge Leadership with it.
Removing all bonuses to abilities from equipment might have a lot more far-reaching balance ramifications than you think. I guess you'll find out later.
Lame about pickpocketing. Wasn't sure if it was possible or not. Seems like a needles limitation. They'll probably remove it in D:OS 2 anyway with how they enjoy reverse pickpocketing poison health potions and whatnot. Might have to just give some NPCs good stuff to pickpocket, but I'd love to give combat abilities for pickpocket. Might just have to make pickpocket give you abilities that do my suggestions instead of having it work through the pickpocket window.
It definitely is a big change to remove ability bonuses from equipment. With fewer bonuses available to loot, you might tend to actually get better combat loot overall and find more +attribute gear. Crafting, at least early on, will be a little less useful for gaining a bunch of Whether that will be counterbalanced by needing to invest a lot more ability points into skills is questionable. Without improve the weaker abilities, I definitely think removing ability bonuses would make the game a lot harder, and in a way, a lot more railroaded into forcing you to pick combat abilities. So all abilities need to be good for this change to be a net positive of actually diversifying options while still making the game harder.
I'm curious if you see other major factors that I'm not considering that removing abilities will create, or if you just think it's hard to predict what kind of subtle effects it will have, mostly late game.
As for level scaling, it's the easiest, most elegant solution from a modder's perspective. Encounter/Goal XP is a good idea too, but I don't think it really fundamentally solves the issue that people who do a lot of side-content are going to get overleveled. You either force people to do side content, which even in tactician mode, I don't know if that's the best idea, or you let side content make people really overpowered. Scaling, at the cost of immersion, and a bit of irksomeness that enemies in the first zone will still provide challenge even at level 20 (though really, you're still going to decimate them with all your powerful skills at that point), lets people choose to do side content or not and they still get a balanced experience.
"But doing side content should be rewarding!" I think the best way to deal with this is to let side content give you special loot, new abilities, and just more fun stuff to play with. Doing side content should make you more powerful, but a level advantage over your opponents is just too big of a bonus with how level differentials work in D:OS. Maybe instead of scaling, level differentials could give a minimal bonus or malus, but that's not something that's easy to mod. Higher level enemies should have more abilities and better tactics, not just better stats.
