this makes me sad, so in this Divinity being a thief type isn't really an option.
Well, I've gotten away with it pretty cleanly. My sticky-fingered mega mage build still hasn't gotten caught, after stealing from every skill book vendor and Zaleskar. Granted, you can just eat skill books to make them disappear, so that's a little different. But yeah, picking stuff up off the ground is surprisingly hard to get away with, so I totally understand where you're coming from.
