Maximum utilization of available resources ..... or cheese?

[Yonjuro]

This thread is to discuss your favorite tactics which may or may not include cheesy exploits of game mechanics. Where that line is drawn is probably in the eyes of the beholder (you know, the person evaluating them, not the D&D monster  ).

 

In IE games, powerful tools with cheesy uses probably included thief traps, summoning spells etc.

 

So, when are these tools, when are they cheese (and, when they are cheese, when do you love using them anyway)?

 

 I admit to being a frequent user of summoning spells in BG2 and love having them available. It makes my game play more fun (though I was surprised in one play through when I accidently killed Irenicus using skeleton and hakeshar summons that were intended to soften him up. I guess they were a little overpowered at that point in the game  . Oh well, it still counts   ).

 

 

[rjshae]

Yes, at higher levels the skeletons in IE games were a massive HP soak, to the point where a troupe of skeletons always operated at point.

 

Pretty obvious tactic: target enemy spell casters as soon as possible with magic missiles then arrows.

 

I always liked to have a bless or prayer spell ready; that +1 bonus makes a big difference over the course of a battle. (I never used bard characters, but the bard song would work for that as well.)

 

D&D v3 haste spells were too useful not to cast on the whole party. Practically de rigeur after a while.

 

For me a standard tactic was to plant front line types at a blocking point, when facing a sizable enemy force. Even having one flank against a barrier helped prevent enemy infiltration.

 

Web the enemy rear forces to effectively split the foe in half.

 

if the enemy is attacking from two sides, use grease or choking cloud to hinder one of the forces while the other is ground down.

[Jarmo]

None of the first two smell to me.

 

I'm thinking of stuff like: 

 

- soften the enemy up a bit, retreat to the next room for a quick nap and then return to finish the fight.

- cast some area effect long duration spell (stinking cloud or something) to a location you know (because you reloaded) the enemy will appear,

- reload every turn unless you hit 

- fight ranged from a location you know the ai cant plot route to.

[Lephys]

Slightly off-topic, but related:

 

I think a system for traps would be a lot more interesting if different types of traps were more/less effective on different bits/types of terrain. Like... a stone corridor? Maybe you can't really hide a bear trap that well, so enemies are more likely to spot it. But, if you find a little mound of crypt dirt or something, you get a major concealment bonus to your trap.

 

It could even affect functionality. Same stone corridor? You can rig up a trip wire (trigger) to activate some kind of trap, but you don't really have any way of anchoring an actual trip wire (that trips people) in stone walls. But, if you find two statues across from one another, you can tie off an actual trip wire. Etc.

 

I think traps often get simplified to just "make this square/spot on the ground bad now." Then you have maybe a detect traps chance for enemies. And when they see them, they instantly hive-mind communicate their location to all their friends, so that no one steps on them. Of course, if we get lots of position-affecting abilities and such in P:E, you could always force people backwards into traps, etc, even if they aren't concealed.

 

Back on-topic, fully, I'm not really a fan of kiting. Not silly game kiting, at least. But, I DO like tactical "kiting." Have this fast/agile person draw this big, slow-moving Ogre (who's INSANELY strong and you reallllly don't want hitting anyone, not even your "tank") around the corner and into a snare, or hit him with Entangle or something. Then have people keep their distance with ranged weapons. Maybe even have people hide behind him, in the room he was initially drawn out of, so that he gets snared/trapped at a distance, facing away from everyone.

 

*shrug*. I like taking advantage of range, and speed differences, and disablement, but I prefer to actively produce advantages for me and disadvantages for my enemy, rather than jog around using passive ones all day. It gets a bit drab. And with something like kiting, I like when it's not really feasible against just all enemies ever. I use the above tactics on ogres in BG. I even have my tank-y Fighters switch to bows and slings and such. And, I think that's nice to be a really good tactic against something like an ogre. But not against just a bunch of kobolds or something. "Just run and occasionally turn and shoot!". I'd like if enemies would actually catch on to such tactics, decently quickly, and could do things to keep people who are trying to use such tactics on their toes.

[rjshae]

Traps are much more effective when they are covered by active forces. Placing a couple of traps in the approach zones of archers creates a real headache for attackers. Do they wait while the rogue clears the trap and suffer enemy fire, or do they bull through and suffer the consequences?

[Yonjuro]

Yes, at higher levels the skeletons in IE games were a massive HP soak, to the point where a troupe of skeletons always operated at point.

 

 

Yup, and hasted skeletons vs. mindflayers are a beautiful thing.

 

I also sometimes used the lower level skeletons (plus an invisible character to control them) as decoys. Windspear Hills dungeon had that nice ambush area and lots of enemy mobs (vampires and werewolves especially) that were good to keep your party away from if you went there at a low level (that is, early in the game). The vampires in particular could dominate your decoy if you used a party member instead of a skeleton.

 

They were also immune to stinking cloud so even the low level skeletons could beat the unconscious enemies to death while you waited. Sort of the undead equivalent of spider spawn + web.

 

 

 

Web the enemy rear forces to effectively split the foe in half.

 

if the enemy is attacking from two sides, use grease or choking cloud to hinder one of the forces while the other is ground down.

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 Sure. The bounty hunter kit traps were another good way to divide enemies if you used them strategically.

[Yonjuro]

None of the first two smell to me.

 

I'm thinking of stuff like: 

 

- soften the enemy up a bit, retreat to the next room for a quick nap and then return to finish the fight.

 

 

 

Or, worse, retreat one step out of an enemy's visual horizon and rest. I saw a youtube video with this tactic (I must admit that it was a virtuso performance of cheese and showed a good understanding of how the engine worked; I'm not sure that it would be fun to play though).

 

 

- cast some area effect long duration spell (stinking cloud or something) to a location you know (because you reloaded) the enemy will appear,

- reload every turn unless you hit 

 

Hmmm, maybe any tactic that includes the word 'reload' is too cheesy. As compared to, say, getting a high level mage to waste his timestop on you low level skeleton summon. That's cheesy in the sense that it is exploiting bad AI (I suppose the mage should be beating the skeleton to dust with a quarter staff and saving the timestop for you, right?), but it isn't as immersion breaking as reloading. So maybe it's cheesy but fun?

 

 

 

 

- fight ranged from a location you know the ai cant plot route to.

 

 I like this tactic for, say, the windspear hills ambush area. The goblin archers use it on you and then you use it on others. I don't like it if there is no plausible reason that would make it work apart from broken ai.

[Yonjuro]

Slightly off-topic, but related:

 

I think a system for traps would be a lot more interesting if different types of traps were more/less effective on different bits/types of terrain.

 

 

 

 

 I like where you're going with this. Clever tactics that you employ through your character are interesting to me. Clever abuses of the game engine that the player can do (like closing a door and having the high intelligence mage on the other side stand there like an idiot) are not so interesting.

 

 

 

 

 But, I DO like tactical "kiting." 

 

 One example that I liked was in BG1 cloakwood mines. If you triggered the battle horror traps on the lowest level, the battle horrors would follow you through the level exits. Luckily you just acquired boots of speed and could lure them far away and lose them. Much nicer tactic (for a solo playthrough where you don't have a thief to disarm the traps) than whack them upside the head, run out the door, repeat ad nauseum. 

[teknoman2]

my favourite trick in BG was to have a mage thief and cast something like cloud kill, then hide in shadows. the enemies could not target me so they just stayed put and got the whole damage. also, since the invisibility spell did not  break if the thief was looking for or disarming traps, i was casting it as soon as i got into a dungeon and went ahead unseen, exploring the place, disarming all traps, and making notes of where and what enemy i had to face. then i just cleaned the place out without having to worry about traps or wether an enemy may come around the corner

[JFSOCC]

hmm, reflection time. What degenerate ways do I play in?

 

 

Well, for one, I always give the best equipment to my character, even if my companions are horribly under-equipped. They can get what-ever is left over. This often means my character is much stronger than the others.

 

I tend not to move on from an area unless I'm sure I've done everything I could. I don't want to miss content I don't have to. This usually means I reach the level cap fairly quickly in a game.

 

I hoard consumables. From potions to ammunition. I'd pick melee combat simply because I don't want to buy arrows. (I lose them, after all) Sometimes I finish a game having used none of the consumables. In some games I've noticed I only use consumables to clear inventory space or because another is lying on the floor and I can only pick it up if I decrease my stack. In that case it's "Ok, no money out of my pocket"

I actually enjoyed doing Old World Blues a lot at level 8, because it was too difficult not to use even the consumables. I really had to manage what I had, and holding on to these items was a challenge.

 

I have at times abused (especially in stealth games) the "alertness level reset"

You damage someone, you flee, you return later when that npc has reverted back to being neutral or in a lower alert state, and re-engage.

As long as the game saves the damage you've previously done, you should be able to slowly take out some harder targets. Luckily many games don't allow for these shenanigans. I hope that an alerted guard will not say "Guess it was nothing" and return on patrol after encountering the corpse of a friend. That makes no sense. I think this ties in with allowing players to screw up and fail. If you've created a situation where you can no longer succeed, you can always choose to reload. It's not the responsibility of the game to make sure you can always proceed.

 

lastly, while I don't like to think of myself as a min-maxer, I do tend to max out one stat, often persuasion. which has sometimes resulted in being able to bull**** my way past more encounters than would be realistic.

[Yonjuro]

hmm, reflection time. What degenerate ways do I play in?

....

 

 

 

 'Degenerate' seems like a strong word for most of these (except maybe the "alertness level reset" thing    ).

 

 

 

I hoard consumables. From potions to ammunition. ....

 

 

 As an aside, you might have fun soloing BG1 as an Archer (using Tutu) or a fighter putting all pips in bows (using the vanilla game). With this build, I can't think of a way to beat the game without creative use of potions and arrows. I think I (at least partially) cured my hoarding tendencies by doing something like this. 

 

Anyway, for these two examples, 'alertness level reset' and 'hoarding' : I think I would prefer that P:E fixes the former (by not resetting the alertness level), but for hoarding tendencies, I think it would be annoying if, say, potions had an expiration date (or worse, if arrows had an expiration date). I think I'd rather try to fix that one in my own game play. What do you think?

Edited August 14, 2013 by Yonjuro

[JFSOCC]

I think the game should be difficult enough that using consumables is going to get you through combat which you would otherwise fail.

I'm sure those with great RPG combat skills could still do without them, but the general combatant should be constantly wanting to use it. It should be a challenge not to use it rather than vice versa.

[Lephys]

my favourite trick in BG was to have a mage thief and cast something like cloud kill, then hide in shadows. the enemies could not target me so they just stayed put and got the whole damage. also, since the invisibility spell did not  break if the thief was looking for or disarming traps, i was casting it as soon as i got into a dungeon and went ahead unseen, exploring the place, disarming all traps, and making notes of where and what enemy i had to face. then i just cleaned the place out without having to worry about traps or wether an enemy may come around the corner

I actually have no problem with that type of technique working, so long as it doesn't just ALWAYS work against all enemies, everywhere. But, if you can combine AOE offense with stealth evasion effectively sometimes, I say awesome. Makes for a pretty nice "They never even really saw what killed them or knew what was going on. They just saw me for a moment, then they saw me vanish, and a cloud of death filled their room."

 

But, yeah, basically... this and pretty much ANY tactics need to be situationally feasible. It's when something's ALWAYS feasible and always convenient/easy that it becomes "cheap"/problematic.

[Micamo]

So, when are these tools, when are they cheese (and, when they are cheese, when do you love using them anyway)?

My sniff test for cheese is two questions.

 

First, is it something the designers obviously didn't intend for the player to do?

 

Second, is it overpowered to the point of ruining the fun of the game?

 

 

Both questions are sorta subjective, but some cases are clearer than others. Pretty much any case where the player gets their hands on something intended for NPCs only qualifies, like Wish Traps, Pun Pun, or Beholder Mage.

 

Is it unintended, but not overpowered? Sure, why not.

 

Is it overpowered, but completely intentionally so? Shame on you, developers. You're completely incompetent. If a player wants to use it though I'm inclined to try my best to whip up a houserule fix instead of saying no.

 

Is it unintended and overpowered? Cheese. If you try to use this in an actual game, especially by slipping it past a DM who doesn't know any better, you are a jerk.

Edited August 15, 2013 by Micamo

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

The closest thing I've done to cheese is actually outright cheating. In BGT, I would use SK or L1NPCs to give multi-classed characters kits or let a dual-class character dual-class from a vanilla class to a kit. IMO, every character should have access to a kit if they wanted, so I was just fixing what I saw as a stupid ass rule.

 

I'm not fond of exploits like the PnP "Nasty Gentleman", because I find them "unfun". I like fair challenge, and exploiting dumb AI or loopholes in the rules takes away both fair and challenge for me.