The Castle Doctrine Forums

I have quickly become quite addicted to The Castle Doctrine. I noticed though that there is not much discussion on the ways in which people approach houses and traps.

A lot of people don't appreciate this type of discussion because they feel that it gives up their competitive edge by giving information to new players. This is partially true. I am a competitive FPS and fighting game player (and to a lesser extent MOBA games like Dota 2) - the CS:GO team I was on won Season 1 of CEVO and I have made top 32 at EVO, which is basically the world's largest fighting game championship. The beautiful thing about those games is that they really highlight how innovative some players can be. What drives innovation? When everyone knows the old tricks.

I am hoping to facilitate some discussion on people's mindsets when they approach houses and traps, as well as easiest, safest, cheapest ways to avoid them. I have had decent success robbing houses with minimal tools thanks to a mix of luck and intuition.

When you are attempting to rob a house (especially when you are just starting), one of the most important things you can remember is that it had to pass self-test.

Most new-ish players don't have the funds and/or know-how to build overwhelmingly complex houses, so that knowledge alone can help you rob most low-end houses. Because you know it had to pass self-test, there is no reason to explore any portion of the house that is unpassable without tools. For example, if a narrow hallway has a pit bull in it with no way to backtrack and get it behind you, don't even bother with that hallway. If the pit bull has already seen you, feed it and be on your merry way.

Granted, commit gates sometimes make this impossible - but the cheapest commit gates (usually electric floors) are easily thwarted with water, and in many houses a saw can also get you out of a tough situation or undo wiring.

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Onto trap mechanics. Trap mechanics are basically placements of traps specifically intended to trap the player.

Double-Sided Trap Door

This is one I see a lot.

The idea is, you don't know what's beyond the door until you open it. When you do, if you are unprepared, you are screwed. Best placement for these is so that your screen doesn't scroll until you enter the door. Ways out of it are:

• Brick the cat. In some situations chihuahuas are used in a reverse fashion where they walk towards you rather than away from you to hit the switch. If in range, brick the Chihuahua. Cost: 150

• If you can move at all without setting off the traps, do so, then pour water on the trap to walk back. Cost: 100

• Saw the wired wall connecting to the electric floor. Some constructions wire the walls on both sides - in this case, use your judgment. If it's easier to saw one and then walk through to a different hall, or saw both and walk out from whence you came. Cost: 400 or 800

• If you are suspicious (which I would be upon seeing the electric floor before the door), brick the door if you are really paranoid. However, good placement of this trap usually entails it being at the edge of your screen, making it hard to see past it. Cost: 150

Pit Bull Window Trap

Another one I see a lot is the pit bull trap where a pit bull gains line of sight on you through a window, then follows you to a door where the moment you open the door, you die:

The idea behind this one is that, a pit bull cannot pursue you the same move where it makes line of sight with you. So putting the pit-bull directly behind the door deters you, but does not kill you since you are able to walk away. Using this construction, the pit bull makes line of sight first and thus can attack you the moment you open the door. Ways out of it are:

• Be alert on whether you've seen any windows with a pit bull behind them. If you have, any doors you open are potentially unsafe until that pit bull is taken care of.

• Bricks can be used to open doors from a safe distance. If you are going to go this route, I HIGHLY suggest you leave one tile between you and the door (don't brick a door standing directly next to it) so that if the dog is on the other side, you have an even number of spaces between you. This way you can club it if absolutely necessary. Cost: 150+

• If you can reach the window, breaking it can lead the dog out of its hallway where it might be less of a threat. Cost: 150+

Doggie-Door Double Commit Gate

- Thanks to DethBringa for posting about this one and ventuswings for offering a correction!

This trap blocks your exit path unless you are prepared to kill the awaiting pit bull, which will be released no matter which hall you pick. It also requires that you commit to walking through the electrified hallway or at least spend several hundred on water to short out the electric floors. In this specific construction, simply shorting the power source in the hallway wouldn't help as the panic button is also connected to the electric floors and will still provide them with power.

Solutions:

• Get spooked and leave the house. Cost: 0 (and everything you were carrying in your backpack!)

• Shoot the pit bull blocking your exit. Cost: 1200

• Short the electric floors. Cost: 200+

Fire Floor

- Thanks to RockyBst for this one

Player walks into the house from the right. Up the top, there's open ground (with scary family protections and lots of dogs, maybe an electric door in plain view). Through the door could be anything, maybe even an angry pitbull!
So, because of his initially limited visibility, he takes a step down onto the first grid which doesn't seem to have any power. He sees the third grid around the corner, but figures he's still safe. However when he moves on to the second grid, suddenly the little doggie sees him and gets agitated. If he moves backwards, he gets fried. If he moves right, he gets fried. The only ways out are:

• Neutralize the dog (meat, brick, gun).

• Take a saw to the wall ... at which point, obviously, wall dog.

• Use some wire cutters

So, for $250 you have a basic trap which potentially costs $400 to circumvent. Upgrade the dog to a pitbull, you then have the choice of either drugging him and leaving a landmine in the passage, or spending $1,200 to shoot him.

Leap of Faith

There are two variants of this:

Simpler one (credit to Blip)

I say "simple" in construction only. Several players, including myself, struggled figuring this out.

This exploits players' initial reactions to immediately kill/drug dogs. The player must activate the traps first by stepping on them, then fetch the pit bull by keeping him two spaces away. When you step on the switch again, you deactivate the traps, allowing you to step onto the electric floor safely. Then the next step is the "leap of faith" which causes the dog to step on the switch, powering the trap door and allowing you to safely pass.

Assuming the mechanic is built correctly, there is no inexpensive way around the trap unless you are willing to cut through/torch/explode the walls. The only other way through is to correctly execute the opening of the trap using the dog.

Second variation dubbed Schrödinger's Corpse - thanks to RockyBst:

Reference regarding the name: Schrödinger's Cat - tl;dr version

Read up on precedence on the wiki if you want to understand this one.
The player moves.
Pet movement occurs.
House objects and electronics update.

Meaning you can step on to an electric grid which is powered on, then the pet moves onto a button, then the state of the electric floor (and your Schrödinger charred corpse) is determined.

This works on three levels. At the newbie level, opening the door at the top and seeing the scary pit incites them to turn around and go back the other way, where a cunningly inviting corridor filled with doggy death doors awaits them.
On the intermediate level, the fellow comes along and sees an unpowered trap door. But then he spies the dog, who will move down a tile when he does, hitting the button. So he bravely steps out into empty space, only to land heavily, crushing his legs and dying a lingering death.

Why did he die? Because there isn't actually any power coming into the pit from the dogs side. Instead the power to the trap door is turned on by doing a little magic dance somewhere far, far away in the maze. Oh, and incidentally this trap door works as a double bluff when it has been powered on. Because the even more eagle eyed expert viewers will notice that's a toggle pressure switch (starts on) which the dog is about to step on, which if they're wrong could switch off the power after all...

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Anyone else know of any commonly seen/used shenanigans and mechanics? I'd ideally like to get a discussion going in which we can almost sort of demystify the game for new and intermediate players.

If you remove a power source, it doesn't refund the money like with most other objects. Even if you remove it entirely, you don't get the money back. At least, I haven't been. This has caused some trial-and-error projects to become overly costly.

I think I noticed this with electric floors as well.

Is this intended? Or a bug?

I have two computers - a desktop and a laptop. They are both used solely by me but because I travel frequently for work, my laptop gets a lot of use. I just purchased TCD because the premise looks amazing and I love games of thought and pressure.

But I just wanted to know, will my download code work more than once?