Any purpose to knocking people unconscious?
Rhyme
Member Posts: 190
I was reading up on the rogues rebalancing mod, and it has a couple references to skills that knock an enemy unconscious instead of killing it. It got me to thinking. It's been a long time since I've knocked somebody unconscious. It generally only happens in the early game if my weapon breaks. But while knocking an enemy unconscious is an interesting little quirk of the game, to the best of my knowledge, it serves no actual purpose. Have I been missing something?
I ask because I think that there COULD be instances where that game mechanic was put to good use, but it isn't. I remember the first time I played the game, and I ran into Marl. He attacked me, and I killed him. But because he was a grieving, drunk father, I felt terrible about that decision, and decided to try again. This time, I unequipped my weapon and knocked him out. It seemed like an excellent solution to the problem. Only after I did that, I was still considered to be in combat. II couldn't talk to the innkeeper until I re-equipped my weapon and chunked Marl's unconscious body. After I had converted his sleeping body into a lifeless corpse, it was as though everybody in the inn breathed a sigh of relief and was ready to move on. Meanwhile, I feel like a cold-blooded murderer, and I want to scream at the people in the inn, "WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?!?"
I thought I had been really clever. I think that knocking Marl unconscious and telling his buddy, "Get your friend out of here, he's drunk," ought to be a valid solution for that encounter. You shouldn't have to be either a perfect diplomat or a murderer. And there are a good handful of those situations in the game; people who flip out and attack you who just need to be knocked out. And I can either knock them unconscious and move on, or knock them unconscious, wake them up, and move them along.
I'm thinking about creating a feature request. But before I do, I wanted to make sure I hadn't been missing out on some functional uses of the KO feature. Did I abandon my "punch everything to sleep" strategy too early? Does it have an actual use that I haven't heard about?
And if punching people unconscious DOESN'T currently serve any purpose, would you like it to? Or am I alone in my weird desire to punch the entire Sword Coast into sweet, sweet slumber? If I put in a feature request, I'd like to be able to propose specific instances (like my Marl example) where a KO instead of a kill could add something to the game experience, so I'd appreciate help in compiling examples.
I ask because I think that there COULD be instances where that game mechanic was put to good use, but it isn't. I remember the first time I played the game, and I ran into Marl. He attacked me, and I killed him. But because he was a grieving, drunk father, I felt terrible about that decision, and decided to try again. This time, I unequipped my weapon and knocked him out. It seemed like an excellent solution to the problem. Only after I did that, I was still considered to be in combat. II couldn't talk to the innkeeper until I re-equipped my weapon and chunked Marl's unconscious body. After I had converted his sleeping body into a lifeless corpse, it was as though everybody in the inn breathed a sigh of relief and was ready to move on. Meanwhile, I feel like a cold-blooded murderer, and I want to scream at the people in the inn, "WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU?!?"
I thought I had been really clever. I think that knocking Marl unconscious and telling his buddy, "Get your friend out of here, he's drunk," ought to be a valid solution for that encounter. You shouldn't have to be either a perfect diplomat or a murderer. And there are a good handful of those situations in the game; people who flip out and attack you who just need to be knocked out. And I can either knock them unconscious and move on, or knock them unconscious, wake them up, and move them along.
I'm thinking about creating a feature request. But before I do, I wanted to make sure I hadn't been missing out on some functional uses of the KO feature. Did I abandon my "punch everything to sleep" strategy too early? Does it have an actual use that I haven't heard about?
And if punching people unconscious DOESN'T currently serve any purpose, would you like it to? Or am I alone in my weird desire to punch the entire Sword Coast into sweet, sweet slumber? If I put in a feature request, I'd like to be able to propose specific instances (like my Marl example) where a KO instead of a kill could add something to the game experience, so I'd appreciate help in compiling examples.
2
Comments
Should maybe give the sap a try...
i was also wondering about the implementation of "knocking people out" with monks now included, because obviously they don't. so only monks can kill people with their barefists?
Added proper spoiler tag. -Jalily
bare your fists and knock 'em out!
Of course it could have if they had bothered to code it in. There's absolutely no reason to think the technology wouldn't have supported it, and I have no idea what you believe this would entail to give you that idea.
IIRC correctly, original BG let you beat the gnoll ludrug in his challenge unconscious to circumvent killing him. After he woke up, he'd concede.