Cow vs Grimrock - Solo Character Victory

[Saice]

Good show.

Now someone needs to beat he game solo without spending skill points.

[Drax]

Good show.

Now someone needs to beat he game solo without spending skill points.

As a Mage.

[Chiller]

Wow, that's pretty good. I think a solo rogue can easily be better than the Ranger, but doing it as a mage... impressive.

[Draken]

Good show.

Now someone needs to beat he game solo without spending skill points.

As a Mage.

ha ha ha ha! OVERKILL.

OP: thank you for this, you've given me the idea to... well, RP my game, im currently playing a 1 fighter, 1 rogue, 2 mages hard, old school game... maybe as my third playthrough i'll do a solo game with... i dont know.

[Deionarra]

Fighter's Challenge?

It was pretty tough I won't lie, I managed it at about level 11 after 'lots' of failed tries and fumbling to keep making new potions while constantly under attack. I burnt through about 40 potions, all my bombs and some other charged items to do so I decided to reload and come back later. I wasn't that much stronger when I finally came back to do it but I discovered some tricks to help me do it much, much easier this time.

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- I had a spare gold key so I could quickly fight my way towards the gate, open it and then back into the corridor where only 1 at a time could attack me
- I put on the full armour of Valour set just for that fight to give me as much protection as possible
- I discovered you can activate the teleporter that takes you into the challenge by placing an item on the ground, it stays active then without you having to walk through it and you can throw things through it. I threw a very large number of bombs through before I charged in.
- I went in with invisibility to make it less likely I'd get blocked in before I could reach the door
- Frost bombs make for a nice 'time out' to let me brew some more potions

Wow, that is impressive! I like your backstory too. I'm kind of amazed you had no points in staff defense. Did you rely on manual dodging a lot? Did you die a lot?

I was surprised as well that I ended up not putting points into staff defence, I'd assumed at the start I would be spreading points between Air and Staff defence with maybe a few in spellcraft for utility. In the end though it seemed better just to dance and kite around the enemy and not let them hit me while maximizing the damage I could do. Lightning Bolt turned out to be really strong so I wanted to be able to cast as many as possible at the start of every fight. I didn't die nearly as much as I'd expected to but some parts were more challenging so when I did die my deaths would usually be cluster together and then I'd go a long way without trouble again.

Charged weapons don't recharge so you're definitely right to not use them carelessly but, yes, that does tend to make it so you horde them and never use them. I used mine on the fighters challenge. Most of the time I had the cutlass in the right hand. The sword in the picture I had at the end..

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.. was one I'd literally just found on level 13 and figured I'd use it since it seemed like it was the end of the game

Insectoid fighter would be interesting to try, especially since the general opinion seems to be that evasion is much better than protection. I've made one in my new party to see how well it works.

OP: thank you for this, you've given me the idea to... well, RP my game, im currently playing a 1 fighter, 1 rogue, 2 mages hard, old school game... maybe as my third playthrough i'll do a solo game with... i dont know.

Thanks, I hope you have fun doing that. Someone else inspired me a while ago to re-evaluate the way I play games and to put the 'R' back into RPGs. Without the 'R'ole it just becomes 'P'ower 'G'aming (PGs). I've found a lot more enjoyment from cRPGs since adjusting my approach to them.

Here's a detailed run down of how I found the combat on various levels:
(Lots of spoilers!)

My general strategy in areas where there were a lot of monsters was to target down the weakest ones first and nuke them quickly with lightning so that I'd have more space to maneuver around and avoid getting surrounded and then switch up to a bow with enchanted arrows or my cutlass to finish off the stronger foes. In some areas towards the end of the game I also found invisibility really useful for making sure I could get good positioning before engaging a battle.

Level 1

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Easy of course but rather slow as I had no magic at the start.

Level 2

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No real difficulties but I left the "enter thy grave" room and came back to that later as I lacked the burst damage to kill a skeleton quickly.

Level 3

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Surprisingly easy, I somehow only died once to the spiders and managed to quickly hit the button to open the door and then run back out at the part where 2 spiders ambush you. I made a lot of use of the 2x2 room with the door in the spider area to lock myself in with 1 at a time and duel them to the death. I think it helped that the spiders were scary enough to make me really cautious about everything here.

Slimed

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I've just got to this part with my new party of 4 and I'm not really finding this any easier than I did with just 1 character. I tried to avoid exploiting stair or doors as much as possible but either as 1 or 4 people it seems pretty much sure to happen a bit anyway in this area unless you leave it and come back much latter. There's no room to maneuver and there's too many of them to stand and fight. I died a few times on this part as I tried to fight them as fairly as possible but in the end it just took a lot of time and patience to work through them.

Level 4

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Mostly just a puzzle level, the catacombs were the only challenging fight at first and I backed out through the teleporter so that the skeletons would follow me into the main room where there was plenty on room to kite them. The final part was tougher, I pulled the critters down the corridor into the first room of the level where I could separate a few of them out and dance around them but I still died once or twice when getting surrounded.

Level 5

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I died a once or twice early in the level getting boxed in by the blue flying guys but they were ok as long as I was more careful. The crabs were fine to deal with on this level as there's always a lot of space to dodge around them. My general strategy (as above) worked well in the part where you get locked in with a crab and a bunch of herders and it was quite thrilling to manage that first time without dying, a few bombs helped as well.

Level 6

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I died going down the first time. Second time I went in with invisibility, ran away from the spiders and found a door to hide behind. I used that little room like I did on level 3 to lure them in one by one and duel them to the death. With them gone the Ogre was simple enough, I ran away once to rest and regain energy but two full bars worth of lightning bolt took him out. I died the first time trying to get the Orb, wasn't ready for a crab ambush, but invisibility and running helped me again the second time. It was nice to finaly have a light source. (the game looks great though going around in the dark, illuminated just by torches on the walls)
Hardest part of the level, other than the fighters challenge (see above), was the pit with all the Crowers and I died a lot in there before getting a run through in where I killed enough of them to clear a path and escape with invisibility. I also died when I found the 'Golden Grave' but repeated it successfully with a frost bomb ready in hand the second time.

Level 7

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Start of the level was much like the 'slimed' level as although there is some more room to move around I couldn't single out the slimes or lock myself in a room with them as they all have buttons on the outside. More running up and down the stairs unfortunately. Only really tough part of the level in the pit with all the poison bolt traps, I somehow managed to run out of it the first time without dying (barely) but I did die quite a few times trying to go back down and kill all the monsters there. Falling on top on one of the crabs helped.

Level 8

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My high lighting resistance and lightning shield spell helped me out a lot on this level so the traps were no real problem. I died once from the Ogre ambush early on and so was more careful after that. The hardest part was the room filled with herders and I died a few times there. I had to blast my way through a few of the weaker ones and then use the last of my energy to cast invisibility and make a break for the way out without getting trapped.

Level 9

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Guardians were never a really big problem to me as my biggest problem was getting boxed in by enemies and they tended to stay at range and throw fire that I could dodge easily enough, they'd usually drop to 2 lighting bolts as well. The Ice Lizards, on the other hand, trapped me a few times around the entrance to their area as I kept assuming their couldn't possibly be too many more of them after killing so many already.
I was trying to take them out and retreating down the corridor with the spinners when needed, resting a lot with the door to their area closed before going back in to fight more of them. Eventually I realised they were re-spawning and so snuck through the area with invisibility.
I died once to the two flying bug things (I really hate those) when I first met them and wasn't ready for how fast they were. I also died once again at the end of the level to the second Ogre in the passage when I got over confident and didn't rest after killing the first one easily, I didn't have enough energy to kill it quickly and didn't notice until too late that the passage had shut behind me as I was kiting it with my crossbow.

Level 10

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Damn those flying bugs, the two that ambush you when the wall opens up killed me near the start of the level and then I used the gates to my advantage the second time to get rid of them. I won't lie, I did abuse the doors a little bit on this level when fighting those bugs.
I legged it when I first saw these one of those lovecraftian priests and thought they were going to be the end of me when I hit one with a lightning bolt for 0 damage on his shield and then again with a bolt from my crossbow. I think I took out his shield with with my first few attacks before switching to my sword so at first I thought they were immune to all ranged attacks and spells. Also they aren't fooled by invisibility so I had to fight them.
In the end they turned out to be about the easiest enemy for me to kill on the lower levels, they love casting lighting with just tickled me by that point and I was only really bothered by their Ice Shards as it's the harder attack to dodge. Being ranged enemies they never really threatened to surround me. One or two lightning bolts and a few swings of my sword took their shield down and they were easy to kill then. I only died to them once in total and that was because I was resting in a 'safe' room.
Yet again, one of the hardest areas of this level was the pit under the cavers filled with slimes and I died a few time here before finding my way to the stairs and then slowly whittled them down as usual.

Level 11

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Nothing to say about this one really (unless you count the pit under the cavers, see Level 10). Oh wait there was an enemy I remember, I took a look down one of the pits and regretted it instantly when one of the bloody flies killed me.

Level 12

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Again, not much to say about this level. Tentacle faced wizards took some decent punishment but didn't kill me. The golems are just like tougher Ogres and I made sure to only fight them 1v1, I think i died to them once just due to carelessness as they did take quite some patience to take them down.

Level 13

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AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

That about sums that level up. I died here, a lot. Did I mention yet that I hate those flying bugs?

I managed eventually though with liberal use of invisibility to make sure I got the first strike in with lightning followed by lots of running and screaming as I tried not to die in 2 seconds when I failed to one shot them and scrambled to zap them again with the weaker lightning spell to finish them. I ran to the teleporter a lot to get out of there and then rested up and repeated until I got rid of them all.

Final Fight

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Level 13 had trained me well to run away and that instinct served me well. When I came back to fight the boss I got swarmed by a bunch of flies and had to jump down a pit to escape. Fortunately that seemed to have drawn them to one side of the level because when I went back up I was able to fight the boss 1v1 without any of the other monsters getting involved. That made it pretty easy and I didn't actually die to him but I'm sure that would have been a lot worse with even one of those flies around.

An Ice Lizard finally wondered over as the boss was dying and I shared my blueberry pie with him as the mountain fell around us.

However you chose to play Grimrock, I hope you all have fun doing so.

[Darklord]

All I can say is Well Played!

Daniel.

[Raddra]

Insectoid fighter would be interesting to try

One of my two fighters is an insectoid, he was tough to start off with but he's ended up as a very good tank and has outlived my big tough minotaur fighter more than once.

[Megami]

It's a great feat, don't get me wrong. Had to cost you a lot of patience and frustration. On the other hand it is also a proof that the door trick and 2x2 tactics are just way too powerful and should be dealt with in the upcoming patches (+ let monsters heal up while the party rests).

[Whisper]

Wow, that is impressive! I like your backstory too. I'm kind of amazed you had no points in staff defense. Did you rely on manual dodging a lot? Did you die a lot?

It is useless as any protection/evasion skill IF you have patience&decent dexterity as player.

There SHOULD be way to counter-balance player ability to basicly "dance around" every enemy to death.

[Whisper]

On the other hand it is also a proof that the door trick and 2x2 tactics are just way too powerful and should be dealt with in the upcoming patches

If you can turn auto-leveling off, it is possible to win game with just default starting party (which is far from optimal) and default (aka none) equipment, all game at level 1 of party and on Hard. Just need patience and dexterity.

I think maybe game was designed more for exploration and puzzles in mind, and combat and monsters was just there as extra.

Or maybe it was designed with casuals in mind, they dont like challenging combat, so it is not challenging.