History GameBreaker / BaldursGate

** Winning any boss battle with Finger of Death (or any other OneHitKill spell) is mostly a LuckBasedMission; the spell will slay any living creature who fails a save vs. death at -2. For reference, the Shadow Dragon has a save vs. death of 3 and 60% MagicResistance, meaning there's only a 15% chance Finger of Death will work on it (40% chance to penetrate magic resistance and then 25% of failing a save). Of course, canny players could simply SaveScum until that lucky event took place. Less gamey players could use the spells Lower Magic Resistance and Greater Malison to up the chance as high as 45%, but at that point you've already had at least three rounds of the dragon buffing itself and/or wailing on you before you potentially get to end the battle with a coin flip.

** Cloudkill and similar Area of Effect-spells. You can often cast them close to powerful creatures or a group of them, as they won't see you and probably won't move a spot. They also stacks. You can easly kill [[spoiler: Firkraag the Dragon]] with this trick.

* Cloudkill and similar Area of Effect spells. You can cast them near enemies and run away. If they don't see you through the Fog of War, they will likely just [[ArtificialStupidity stand there and die]]. You can easily kill [[spoiler:Firkraag the dragon]] with this trick. Unfortunately this has been patched out in the Enhanced Edition.

* Better editions of the game offers the Shield of Balduran. It reflects beholder rays, turning these DemonicSpiders into XP-dispensers.

** The combination of the Robe of Vecna and Amulet of Power (lower casting time) with the high-level spell "Improved Alacrity" (cast spells immediately one after the other, instead of a one spell per round limit), which allows a mage to pull off the magical version of BeamSpam. You could combine it with Time Stop (everything except the caster freezes in place for six rounds) to have your enormous Spell Spam assault hit the enemy with dozens of spells before he can do anything. If your enemies are still alive after that, just cast Wish to replenish your spells and do the entire thing over again. To increase effectiveness, you could turn on autopause and set it to "when casting ends". This way you will maximize number of castings during Improved Alacrity. Alternately, you could cast Simulacrum beforehand, which lets you do all of the aforementioned twice.
*** This combination is even more effective (if that's even possible) when you're a high-level sorcerer, when you can easily cast 9 of the most effective attack spells of every level, instead of only those of you memorised spells were atttack spells.
** Projected Image, a spell that created an illusory copy of the caster, including ''all of his spells''. Meaning that the Image could do everything already mentioned above, whilst leaving the actual wizard in complete safety. If, by some miracle, the Image was killed, then the wizard could just cast it again. Projected Image is also capable of doing some things your regular mage can't. For example, there's an "epic level" spell that lets you summon a planetar, a powerful fighter/mage/cleric hybrid that can contend with most monsters in the game. Downside? You're limited to one, but the projected image can make as many as six.
*** Another great thing about Simulacrum and Projected Image is that they copy the items in your quick slots as well. Buy some powerful scrolls, put those scrolls in your quickslots, create a copy of yourself, and let them use those spell scrolls without using up the original scrolls.
** Cloudkill and similar Area of Effect-spells. You can often cast them close to powerful creatures or a group of them, as they won't see you and probably won't move a spot. They also stacks.
*** You can easly kill [[spoiler: Firkraag the Dragon]] with this trick.

* In a game full of potentially-overpowered companions, Keldorn stands alone. You can immediately acquire him in Chapter 2 by accepting a mission in the Temple District and finding him in the Athkatla sewers. He comes equipped with a unique set of Full Plate Mail +1 armor (with several bonuses, including Free Action), the best Paladin kit in the game, the Dispel Magic and True Sight abilities (which makes magic-wielding enemy encounters a breeze) and, once you get him Carsomyr from Firkraag's dungeon and the Gauntlets of Dexterity, he becomes a juggernaut. It says something when, in a game where most bosses' HP top out at just over 200, Keldorn with Carsomyr can dole out 30-35 damage per successful swing. He can solo Irenicus in his second form via spamming True Sight, and he even makes Insanity playthroughs insultingly easy.
** Even 'worse', the Dispel Magic innate ability his class kit gets has special rules which allow it to be cast instantly (speed factor 1), and at DOUBLE his class level. This makes it almost the most broken spell in the entire game, as it means Keldorn can dispel any level-appropriate mage encounter with a nearly 100% success rate, then slaughter him inside two rounds. His True Sight innate ability also makes a lot of enemies which rely on abusing Improved Invisibility (cannot be targeted by spells) trivially easy to lock down and obliterate.
** Assassin's poisons if you use them in ways the developers probably didn't intend for you to.
* Is your character a mage? With even halfway decent stats? Then you've got dozens of ways to break the game.
* Cloudkill and similar Area of Effect spells. You can cast them near enemies and run away. If they don't see you through the Fog of War, they will likely just [[ArtificialStupidity stand there and die]]. You can easily kill [[spoiler:Firkraag the dragon]] with this trick.
** Unfortunately this has been patched out in the Enhanced Edition.

* Inexperienced players sometimes underrate Aerie as a mage because she doesn't gain access to the most powerful arcane spells, but the ability to use divine as well as arcane spells with power-amplifying setups like Sequencers and Contingencies more than makes up for it if you know what you're doing. Although, being a multi-class, she won't actually level up enough to get Sequencers until very late in the game.
** More horrifyingly (in a good way), being a mage gives her access to the robe of Vecna, which decreases ''all' casting times. Including her cleric spells. Stack on the Amulet of Power and Heal spells become a viable method of in-combat instant healing.

* The various "kill undead instantly unless they save" weapons, which allow you to instantly kill any undead boss in a single round, since there is no effective defense against it whatsoever and you could easily get up to 8-10 attacks per combat round even in medium levels. It even turns nasty BonusBoss Kangaxx, considered the strongest opponent in ''Shadows of Amn'', into an AnticlimaxBoss. Despite the fact that, normally, the Mace of Disruption wouldn't be able to harm him, as it maxes as a +2 weapon (Though as per it's PnP incarnation, it can hit as if +5); demi-liches can't normally be hurt by anything less than a +4 weapon, of which there's only a very small number in Shadows of Amn (a dagger, two halberds, two staves, and two two-handed swords, one only Paladins can wield and the other only Evil characters can wield).
* The Staff Of The Magi. Upon equipping it, it makes the character using it go invisible. You can walk up to someone, hit them (thus breaking your invisibility), and then immediately go into your inventory and just by clicking on the staff, re-equip it, including reactivating the invisibility. Rinse and repeat, and very very few enemies can do a thing about it.
** Before an ObviousRulePatch fixed it, it was also possible to use it for backstabbing.
* Several minibosses/dragons were vulnerable to the instant kill spell Finger of Death, such as the Shadow Dragon - A creature that the game assumes most lower level characters would want to quietly sneak past. Most bosses /minibosses in the game were immune to instant kill though.
** Finger of Death is still effective in the Enhanced Edition. Have fun CherryTapping all those dragons!

** The Berserker/Mage has almost all the advantages of the kensai/mage, but trades lower melee damage output and accuracy for a berserker mode that {{No Sell}}s almost every StandardStatusEffect in the game, including mazing and imprisonment, and the ability to wear armour and bracers. Furthermore, berserkers are much less of a GlassCannon than a Kensai and are much more worthwhile in ''BaldursGate 1''.

The ''VideoGame/BaldursGate'' series has featured many game breakers throughout its various installments.

** Even worse if you are a mage/thief, in which case you will get the backstab to the top of it. ...or an ''assassin'' with the Use Any Item high-level ability.
** Incorrect. Only items usable by single-class thieves (without UAI) can backstab, even if the item is normally a weapon that they could backstab with. The staff of the magi and Scarlet Ninja-to, despite being weapon types available to thives are specific to mages and monks only, respectively, and can't be used to backstab even with UAI or Multi-classing. Also the invisibility disappears the instant the weapon is switched, making it impossible to even take advantage of for backstabbing purposes.

* The various "kill undead instantly unless they save" weapons, which allow you to instantly kill any undead boss in a single round, since there is no effective defense against it whatsoever and you could easily get up to 8-10 attacks per combat round even in medium levels. It even turns nasty BonusBoss Kangaxx, considered the strongest opponent in ''Shadows of Amn'', into an AnticlimaxBoss. Despite the fact that, normally, the Mace of Disruption wouldn't be able to harm him, as it maxes as a +2 weapon; demi-liches can't normally be hurt by anything less than a +4 weapon, of which there's only a very small number in Shadows of Amn (a dagger, two halberds, two staves, and two two-handed swords, one only Paladins can wield and the other only Evil characters can wield).

* Similar to the Kensai/Mage example above is the Wild Mage, normally only available in ''Throne of Bhaal'', but which can be modded to be playable in the first game. The class ''exemplifies'' MagikarpPower, especially through use of a [[GoodBadBugs glitch]] where piling Chaos Shields in a Minor Sequenecer, and later a Spell Sequencer, led to the shield bonus stacking. The result was about an 80% defense from wild surges, meaning you could use Nahal's Reckless Dweomer with impunity. For those who don't know, Nahal's Reckless Dweomer is basically a spell that lets you cast ''any spell in your spellbook''. [[MyRulesAreNotYourRules It doesn't matter if you don't have it memorized or if you aren't high level enough to cast it]]--with that Dweomer, you can start flinging around Disintegrates and Horrid Wiltings as low as ''[[ThereIsNoKillLikeOverkill level nine]]''. [[ButWaitTheresMore That's not the end of it, though]]--the spell Limited Wish, with high enough Wisdom, allows you to restore all low level spells. Nahal's Reckless Dweomer is one of those spells, and, as said, can then be used to cast Limited Wish again. Since Limited Wish can also be used to restore your health, this ''effectively eliminates the need for the Wild Mage to rest''--s/he can just keep fighting for the entire game without ''once'' going to sleep.

* The various "kill undead instantly unless they save" weapons, which allow you to instantly kill any undead boss in a single round, since there is no effective defense against it whatsoever and you could easily get up to 8-10 attacks per combat round even in medium levels. It even turns nasty BonusBoss Kangaxx, considered the strongest opponent in ''Shadows of Amn'', into an AnticlimaxBoss. Despite the fact that, normally, the Mace of Disruption wouldn't be able to harm him, as it maxes as a +2 weapon; demi-liches can't normally be hurt by anything less than a +4 weapon, of which there's only a very small number in Shadows of Amn (a dagger, two halberds, two staves, and a two-handed sword only Evil characters can wield).

* The various "kill undead instantly unless they save" weapons, which allow you to instantly kill any undead boss in a single round, since there is no effective defense against it whatsoever and you could easily get up to 8-10 attacks per combat round even in medium levels. It even turns nasty BonusBoss Kangaxx, considered the strongest opponent in ''Shadows of Amn'', into an AnticlimaxBoss.
* The Staff Of The Magi. upon equipping it, it makes the character using it go invisible. You can walk up to someone, hit them (thus breaking your invisibility), and then immediately go into your inventory and just by clicking on the staff, re-equip it, including reactivating the invisibility. Rinse and repeat, and very very few enemies can do a thing about it.

* The Multiplayer system allows for an incredible gamebreaker during the Kangaxx fight. Import a high-level fighter/mage armed with the aforementioned undead-killing weapon, cast Time Stop, and beat him over the head until he fails a save. You now have the Ring of Gaxx, an incredibly potent item. Now, give it to someone, save the game, take it off them, then import them from that save. Congratulations, you now have two of the most powerful item in the game. Give them to it, save, take, import. Repeat until you've got twelve. A nimble-fingered rogue can even steal one if you click 'pickpocket' at the right time (as it respawns when he moves into his demi-lich form), thus speeding up the importation. This can also be done with any item or character in the game, and the machine of Lum the Mad.