I made a thief character to RP on at one point because it easily allowed me to a good excuse to approach lonesome strangers on my own and start up some RP with them. Firstly I'd say letting someone know doesn't always defeat the entire purpose. People can't know you've stolen anything ICly if they don't know OOCly either!
If you're wanting to steal from someone you could go with the simple case of emoting, like you said - trying to steal, and seeing what happens... either dealing with the situation if they catch you, or trying to get away with it. Maybe later on they find you trying to sell what you stole and the chase begins again, maybe you try to sell it back to them - maybe it gets broke, who knows. What's more important than the act of actually thieving is what RP you can make out of it.
Secondly, get in touch with someone and mention that you're a thief RPer, and if they're looking to have some possession of theirs taken or their house broken into for the same of some story or something, you can be the one to do it. Or perhaps someone's RPing a character who had some precious heirloom stolen in their backstory, but the person who stole it is just an anonymous thief who only exists on paper for the sake of the character's story. If you could offer your own character to be that thief instead, that opens up some options and reasons to RP with that person and is far more exciting than just saying it was a random anonymous guy.
And if you're not out thieving, there's other ways your character can give away their nature just through how they normally behave. Constantly looking at people's coinpurses as they walk by, checking over their shoulder just to make sure they aren't being watched by some guardsman or authority figure, that sort of thing.
If you're wanting to steal from someone you could go with the simple case of emoting, like you said - trying to steal, and seeing what happens... either dealing with the situation if they catch you, or trying to get away with it. Maybe later on they find you trying to sell what you stole and the chase begins again, maybe you try to sell it back to them - maybe it gets broke, who knows. What's more important than the act of actually thieving is what RP you can make out of it.
Secondly, get in touch with someone and mention that you're a thief RPer, and if they're looking to have some possession of theirs taken or their house broken into for the same of some story or something, you can be the one to do it. Or perhaps someone's RPing a character who had some precious heirloom stolen in their backstory, but the person who stole it is just an anonymous thief who only exists on paper for the sake of the character's story. If you could offer your own character to be that thief instead, that opens up some options and reasons to RP with that person and is far more exciting than just saying it was a random anonymous guy.
And if you're not out thieving, there's other ways your character can give away their nature just through how they normally behave. Constantly looking at people's coinpurses as they walk by, checking over their shoulder just to make sure they aren't being watched by some guardsman or authority figure, that sort of thing.
