Bloodlust

Keep hatcheries and treasuries clustered together. While most players do this for their Biles, this is generally good practice for all creatures. This especially applies if you have a large dungeon.

For some reason this seems to be the most effective in Skirmish mode, but you can use fear-traps to create a lot of chokepoints. You can make Gonzalez a complete and utter joke with these things. Get to the middle of the map, surround the portal with fear traps and you’ve basically won.

You will lose so, so many imps to the lightning traps in Torment. The children yearn for the 25,000 volts.

Literally dump all your fireflies. They’re next to worthless unless you’re trying to nab that one on Regicide. Then you’re spending a considerable chunk of the level stopping the little bastard from committing seppuku via sentry trap. Goblins are similarly worthless unless you’re genuinely desperate for an infantry force.

Mistresses, no matter how well-treated, love languishing in self-inflicted problems. My main problem is this: First they go and spend ages in the torture chamber. Then they do this for so long that they’ll forget to go eat, take wages and I’d say “go to the toilet” if that was an in-game feature but knowing them they’d keep that one in the chamber. Point is, they’re the polar opposite of my Trolls and Bile Demons; I don’t have to lock them in, I have to keep them out. If I don’t, they all suddenly remember they need all those things. Lastly, they’ll get mad at me, somehow continue forgetting to eat/sleep/get paid and when they’re finally sick of stomping about making angry noises, they all leave my dungeon en-masse.

Possess a salamander, camp in some lava and spit fireballs at your enemies until they keel over and die. I find this especially effective on Sparklydell/Carnage. You can also bait giants this way, as naturally your path won’t be blocked up by anything else.

The time-limit on Cherish isn’t as tight as you think it is, though I haven’t figured out how much real-life time it takes yet. I’d describe it as quite generous. Besides this, he’ll send forth his VTM LARP if you get onto his land. The Monks of Saint Cuthbert (the twice-martyr’d) are still good to have but the danger is vastly overstated when you combine them with enough freeze-traps.

Take out the diagonally-digging dwarves in Regicide as soon as possible. Trust me.

Embed your projectile traps in a 1x1 space against your walls to protect their sides. This does come at the cost of line-of-sight, but it’s good for defence.

Guards have stupidly long ranges and will hit you no matter how far away you are. This normally wouldn’t be a tip but I keep forgetting this one until I run face-first into a spear.

Bile Demons make for good training dummies in the combat pit. They do a lot of damage in higher levels though, so watch that they don’t smash up your aspiring skeleton army.

The joys of forced labour don’t have to be enjoyed by just your trolls and biles. You can impart these experiences onto your warlocks, wizards and vampires as well.

I’ve tried, and I’m here to tell you with absolute sadness that mazes don’t work on enemy units. They physically cannot comprehend the idea of getting lost.

Cheats

Like most games, Dungeon Keeper 2 has its share of cheats:

do not fear the reaper = Wins the current level.

feel the power = All your creatures are instantly levelled up to level 10.

fit the best = All traps and doors become available.

ha ha thisaway ha ha thataway = Gives you 100,000 Mana.

i believe its magic = All spells become available.

this is my church = All rooms become available.

now the rain has gone = Permanently reveals the entire map.

show me the money = Gives you gold.