Grimrock

The only one I used since I always a had a mage was the crystal shield which was amazing!! (Party Heal is ridiculously awesome for boss battles)
I never tend to use charged equipment either since I stow it and rarely take it out. and that goes for all games I play.
However when I push myself to utilize the skills and magicks it always adds new potency to my playthrough. Especially at higher levels.
in LOG2 I would save it all for the shield though and get it asap. Boss fights become very easy with it and if you track how they placed the red crystals their seems to be intent there.
In fact most everything has been intentionally laid out as far as I can tell for a use if one chooses to or has the skill to use it.

It is interesting that they have magicks with no charge and others that have charge. It is a bit of a puzzle for me to see some of them such as the lightning wand which has shock on it but also hits for shock damage??

sapientCrow wrote:The only one I used since I always a had a mage was the crystal shield which was amazing!! (Party Heal is ridiculously awesome for boss battles)
It is interesting that they have magicks with no charge and others that have charge. It is a bit of a puzzle for me to see some of them such as the lightning wand which has shock on it but also hits for shock damage??

For back rankers and people who don't want to rely on accuracy to hit something. Shock is also an AoE (hits everything in the square) where swinging the rod only hits one monster even if there are multiples present in the square.

In my HISU (hard/ironman/singleusecrystal) game I actually find myself using a lot of the charged items with my alchemist. I gave her concentration 2 partially so she can use the charged items. I use them up, then discard them. There's enough charged items out there so she has plenty of things to play with when she's not throwing bombs or shooting guns.

I usually avoid using an item with charges in videogames. I believe it's related with wanting to save as many things as possible in case I need them later, which tends to end up with me not using them at all.

However, I did an effort in Grimrock 2 to use weapons with charges, such as the Meteor Shield, Crystal Shield (Awesome) or that Orb that can cast shock, for the sake of using what I had and employing a wide range of attacks, and it was actually worthwhile. Stepping out of my comfort zone was a good, different experience.

Though it was indeed a bit bothersome having to sacrifice melee characters skill points into concentration, but that was my choice.

I often forget I have them, either because they're too valueable to "waste" and they're not really part of my tactics, or they're useless.

I really think the less powerful ones shouldn't have finite use. Take the Shaman Staff for example, a pretty decent mage staff that can cast poison bolt and it doesn't have limited charges, this lack of charges doesn't make it unbalanced or OP.


I think limited charges should be reserved for unique or powerful effects/spells, the Crystal Shield is a good example.

I'm always struck with that mindset "I might need it later" and then I never use it, I keep getting bored with my parties and make a new one so I haven't gotten to the wizard yet, but I suppose I'll be using everything I've saved there.

I have to agree. Not just the charge on weapons, but everything that was limited. I never went below 100 pellets for guns. I never used a single healing, restoration, or recharge crystal. I never used a single weapon that had a limited charge except the Meteor hammer, and even then I just used the hammer normally, never used the charged spell on it.

I have the same OCD quality. I always get to the final boss with 1,000 potions, materials, weapon charges, bombs, etc. I can't count how many times I had to shuffle around bombs because I never used them and they were pretty heavy in mass quantities. My brother just started playing LOG2 and I told him, "Use your bombs, don't save them". The charged weapons are a cool concept in theory, but apart from the shield (which is amazing and probably in the top 3 items), I found their charged abilities to be pretty worthless. If you have a mage, you don't need them. If you don't have a mage, it's a lot of investment to be ABLE to use them. And they are limited. And you probably have a better way to use your energy. I wish there were more items like the shield, that had unique usable abilities, but I know that means a lot more development time. When I love a game as much as I love LoG2, this is all nitpicking.

I also don't use them. IN log 1 I did used the fire blade in the fighters challenge and the lighting rod. But it didnt required charging and no special skill.

SO yep I don't use the LOG2 charged weapons The dmg is simply to weak. It should of been something a bit more special.

trancelistic wrote:It should of been something a bit more special.

With battlemages taking magic and combat skills, they should have made the elemental weapons with elemental attacks have no charge, but require light/heavy weapon, Con, and 2-3 of the element. This way battlemages could have their own kinda weapons.

They get less energy, and because of needing so many other skills, access to less spells, but can use Elemental weapons for Elemental damage, and use the spells on the weapons unlimited times.

Generally, no. I won't use an item with limited charges. I think my resistance comes from a number of places. The scavenger mindset, saying "I might need this later". I already try to cover my weaknesses, so my frontline guys don't necessarily NEED a fireball because they can already throw rocks or something as a ranged attack. And also? In games, I've generally been unflattered by non-rechargeable items; I think, partially, I inherently flag them as inferior. "Oh, great, a wand with...two charges of Magic Missile, Caster Level 1. I don't even care about the 2copper I'd get for selling this." An item really has to earn a limited number of charges, through some truly powerful effect, for me to actually stop and take notice.

However, I will and do, liberally, use the Heal Shield. It's in my mage's offhand, because the alternative offhand item is...what? Like, another 15 energy? Please. I've got 2 or 3 red shards, so I'm not horribly worried about charge limitations at the moment. Once I spend my last shard, I'm sure I'll become far more discerning about whether or not it's time to use the shield. But since it has an ability that is comparatively rare by Grimrock standards, I think it's definitely worthwhile.