When is a good time to catch you?

Evenings (PST) and weekends. As with other Immortals, if you are having trouble getting a hold of me, or just miss me, you can send me a note in-game or an e-mail (Qaledus@carrionfields.com) as appropriate.

Do I have to be a thief to worship/follow you?

No. Too, just because you're a thief does not mean you can either.

But you're the Patron of Thieves, why not?

"help religion" & "help sphere"

So what does being the Patron mean?

Currently it requires the intervention of an Immortal to make a
character the Kingpin (there are various titles for this) of each
guild. That also means anyone wanting to take the job away from
their Kingpin is going to needs Immortal intervention, too. So I
hold myself out for those people specifically as well as a general
thief God. ('help kingpin')

In addition to the above, I try to make sure that ingredients and
thiefy items make their way into the game and that various aspects
of commerce and bartering are unsucked as best I can.

Like bartering for more than one of something?

Exactly (thanks, Zulghinlour).

And adding things like barter-only mobs which are a little more
Outlander-friendly than normal shoppies.

What is the difference between ingredients I buy found ones?

The primary difference is that store-bought ingredients decay faster
than ones you find out in the wild. Since time is money, there is a
tradeoff between just buying the darn things or harvesting them.

While not every possible different kind of trap ingredient may be
sold in the shops, there is no poison you can't make easily from
store-bought ingredients. (Remember, you can take a lot of various
low end poison ingredients and combine them into something pretty
terrifying).

My poisons suck. What can I do?

Experiment with different combinations. Not only does experimenting
help you improve your concocting skills, it teaches you that some
ingredients will give a poison you know how to make an extra kick.

My traps suck. What can I do?

A good start is to keep setting traps and trying to get your skills
up in them. Many traps have the potential for extra effects which
are partial dependent on your skill level.

I've heard of Commerce Experience (CXP) and special skills. What's that?

The primary methods of gaining CXP are simply through selling things
to NPCs or bartering goods with them. You'll have to experiment on
in it in-game (and read the helpfiles), but that's a good pointer.
If you're doing the above and earning nothing, that doesn't mean
something is wrong with the system necessarily. The better deal you
strike for your character, the more likely they are to get CXP out
of it.

Periodically, if you accumulate enough CXP you'll suddenly learn a
new skill related to these activities. The skills aren't crazy-good,
but if you've earned them, they're better than a poke with a stick.
Read the helpfile for inspect goods as an example.

When do I get them?

If you earn CXP very rarely, don't worry about them.
If you earn CXP all the time, soon.

What's this about bounty hunting?

'help bounty' and 'help carve' answers most of that, but the basic
premise is that you can place bounties on people in your PK (if you
want to bounty someone not in your PK, find someone in their PK to
do it). Having slain someone with a bounty on them, you can carve
off a piece of them to return to the bounty office for payment.

There are a few bounty offices in Thera and you need to find one to
check up on existing bounties.

Keep in mind that the 'bounty list' command performs like a 'who
bounty', so if nobody with a bounty is on it will come up empty.

Help spice up the lives of those around you, place some bounties!