I'm currently soloing a thief, and I can get past that blasted Tarnesh. You remember the first loser bounty hunter that tries to off you? Well I have killed him once successfully but that involved keeping him unaware of my presence entirely and I only got 12 exp. out of it. If I do it any other way I get slaughtered when he casts his magic missles. I am hasted and immune to fear at the time, but he casts mirror image. anyone know how long that lasts in real time?(minutes seconds?) Anyway to deal with him the traditional way or do I have to settle for the 12 exp?

If you don't want to live with gaining twelve xp for killing, wait until you're stronger to come and face him. There are still many quests you can undertake that require less difficult fighting, and tarnesh won't get bored with waiting to kill you...

also, another option, which works in bg2, but i can't remember whether or not it works in bg1, is that, you can chug a potion of invis. and hang out until the durtaion of his mirror image wears out, and then you could backstab him for mucho damage (depending on your level)...
i dunno. just a though.

Thanks for the assist, but I dropped his sorry bum like a bad habbit. I didn't feel like waiting for the spell to wear off so I did the next best thing. As soon as he cast mirror image I retreated to the inn and took a nap. I hid in shadows before I left the inn and backstabbed the bugger for 17 damage at level 1. hehe.

Now I have a new problem. I'm at Beregost and I'm already a level 3 thief. I need to know when I should dual him to a cleric as those are my plans. what level will I still be able to reclaim my thief abilities at?

If you have TotSC installed you can wait until lvl 7 (40.000xp) before dualing - but you'll have to wait a long time before regaing your thieving skills (cleric lvl 8 = 110.000xp)

I'd dual your thief to a cleric once you hit level five as a rogue. That's the advantage of being a thief - you're already at level five with a mere ten thousand experience points. This way, you'll be decent at lockpicking and disarming traps (provided you put all your skill points into these two catagories, which I strongly recommend), plus you'll still be able to get these skills back relatively quickly once you dual to a cleric.