LTK (License to Kill) and DLTK (Dark License to Kill) are the most popular side leagues in The Elite, and many new players have taken some interest in them. While I had previously written a guide for getting started with LTK and DLTK, it's over 3 years old and quite outdated in many ways now, and I think a fresh new guide would be much better.
HistoryLTK with Pistols Only is the most common ruleset in Goldeneye multiplayer, creating the most balance, fun, and test of skill. It wasn't long after that players decided to play the single-player game in the same style using 007 mode and playing with 0% Enemy Health, while maxing out Enemy Damage, Accuracy, and Reaction Speed. It formed the most popular and active side league, and has been played since 1999. Many years later in 2003, Illu invented playing with max stats, which later became known as DLTK, where you play with all enemy settings maxed out. It took a long time for every level to be completed with Bozon finishing Silo in 2013, and myself finishing Attack Ship in 2014.
One of the reasons LTK has managed to become more popular than other side league concepts (such as Turbo, Enemy Rockets, Cheats, etc) is in almost all cases, it strictly increases the difficulty of the game, rather than just simply changing it for speedrunning purposes. It also creates more natural gameplay, rather than something along the sides of gimmicks, and rather than adding an additional ruleset to the 60 ILs, it simply created 40 new ILs per game. Its popularity was strong enough that it got its own side league rankings on the main site.
Today, multiple people have beaten every level in both games, almost every WR has been pushed to a respectable time, and many players have built up a strong ranking. Of course and as always, it's far less prestigious and competitive than normal mode, but is a very different form of playing that many people really enjoy.
Getting StartedIf you're new to the league, there are a few important things you should know before you start playing. First, to have access to 007/Perfect Dark mode, you have to complete the main game on 00A/PA. If you find yourself struggling to do so, you're probably not cut out for LTK or DLTK in the first place and should be improving your general skill first. Second, because you can't strictly see the stats and cheats during a run, they're required to be shown at some point before or after to demonstrate you've been playing under correct settings. For Goldeneye, this involves clicking on 007 mode and going to the cheats menu after, and for Perfect Dark, this involves clicking on Perfect Dark from the main menu (as cheats activated will give different messages on the stats endscreen and on the main menu). Proof calling is for every LTK time that's 90+ points and/or in the upper half of the rankings, and every DLTK time. Every other rule and proof regulation is the same as normal.
The challenge of LTK and DLTK initially is just completing the levels with no real regard for time. This allows a player to get a decent ranking in both games just by filling in their times page, but The Elite is ultimately a speedrunning community and you'll need to combine survival with playing quickly to reach the higher parts of the rankings. I generally recommend cycling around through the easy levels first to get some initial points, and then improving the times as you get more adept at both speed and surviving.
Compared to normal mode, playing LTK will improve your skills faster in defensive play, knowledge, guard animations, clutchness, and improvisation, as opposed to OCB/J, technique, grinding, 2.X, and specialty skill like R-leaning. You'll improve in everything regardless of which you play, but because success in LTK is based more around defensive abilities, you're naturally going to develop those a lot stronger first. A lot of strong LTK players are also some of the more knowledgeable in the game, although the most skillful players and highest in OCB/J have touched very little of LTK. It's your call with what you want to improve in, spend your time on, and have the most fun with.
Naturally, because of the differences in competition, LTK is generally less relevant until you're either achieving WRs, untieds, completing the hardest levels, and are around top 5/top 3 in GE/PD. Please don't unironically gloat about being top 10.
Choosing a LevelSince gameplay is vastly different that normal, it can be hard to determine what some good levels to pick are. Below is a listing of some of the best starter levels, and in the next section, a listing of levels in terms of relative difficulty. I suggest starting with some of these if you're not already an experienced player of the game.
Facility LTK - Facility offers you lots of ammo, explosives, lots of guards to maneuver and strategize around, and is pretty basic overall. It's a good mix of everything to teach you a little about all the basics.
Bunker 1 LTK - Bunker 1 is quite small and contained, and allows you to play with controlling space and guards. It's quite easy and very similar to 00A.
Silo LTK - Silo is a bit of a tough level, but the timer forces you to play methodically and with some sense of strategy. There are a ton of guards in linear fashion, but none of them are particularly difficult to kill. This level is great for initial development of your nerves and improvisation.
Frigate LTK - Frigate is very easy and simple to complete. With the hostage luck, it's a good level to start with actually speedrunning in LTK.
Caverns LTK - Caverns has a ton of ammo and a ton of guards, giving you a very high amount of action. It can be fairly challenging to make it through the whole level, but is great practice for learning to kill guards efficiently and effectively.
Rescue LTK - Rescue is quite tough for beginners, but is very linear and fair for the whole level. You have to be quite smart with proper positioning and shooting.
Pelagic 2 LTK - Pelagic 2 has a lot of guards in enclosed space. It's pretty basic overall, but you'll want some extra knowledge with how alarm guards work and how to maneuver throughout the level.
Ruins LTK - In Ruins, most of the Skedar are unarmed, turning you into a killing machine. You'll need to be a little delicate with the Reaper Skedar and the King fight, but it's pretty easy overall.
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Overall, GE LTK tends to be easier than PD LTK, but PD DLTK tends to be easier than GE DLTK. If you want additional, more in-depth tips, you can use my
GE LTK Tutorials and
PD DLTK Tutorials. Bozon also has a collection of
GE LTK and
GE DLTK tutorials. And of course, you're more than welcome to ask the LTK community for any help you may need.
Difficulty Tier ListThis is my personal tier list on the difficulty of each level in both games on both LTK and DLTK. Naturally as they are all incredibly different, there's a lot of subjectivity, personal bias, and requirement of different skills, but I think will capture a rough idea of the difficulty. Levels within the same tier are roughly sorted by individual difficulty, which is of course even moreso subjective. Goldeneye levels are in red, Perfect Dark levels are in green, and DLTK levels are in bold.
Tier 1:
SiloTier 2:
TrainTier 3:
Attack Ship,
Control,
Jungle,
Aztec,
CavernsTier 4:
Streets,
Escape,
Bunker 2,
Defense,
DepotTier 5:
Villa,
Cradle,
Dam,
G5,
Surface 1,
Egypt,
EscapeTier 6:
Crash Site,
Jungle,
Bunker 1,
Silo,
Streets,
Frigate,
Infiltration,
Deep Sea,
Control,
Aztec,
Train,
Surface 1,
Defection,
Air Base,
Bunker 2,
Caverns,
Statue,
Runway,
RunwayTier 7:
Dam,
Villa,
Defense,
Air Force One,
Attack Ship,
Extraction,
G5,
War,
Pelagic 2,
Maian SOS,
Deep Sea,
Investigation,
Air Force One,
InvestigationTier 8:
War,
Depot,
Ruins,
Infiltration,
Crash Site,
Defection,
Rescue,
Rescue,
Facility,
Pelagic 2,
Archives,
ChicagoTier 9:
Air Base,
Surface 2,
Extraction,
MBR,
Maian SOS,
Facility,
Chicago,
Statue,
Ruins,
Bunker 1,
Archives,
MBR,
FrigateTier 10:
Egypt,
Surface 2,
Cradle,
Duel,
DuelAgain, take the rankings with a grain of salt. As a rule of thumb and starting from the bottom, each tier upwards requires a good amount of improvement in both skill and knowledge to be able to beat the levels. No, I'm not interested in discussing these rankings.
Some General Tips-Learn as much as you can about the games on a very detailed, technical level. It will significantly help in playing and improving your confidence. Read a lot, study a lot, ask a lot, watch alot.
-Practice using cheats when formulating strategies. You can also play with Enemy Damage minimized to test when you can get hit.
-Auto-aim is generally recommended on for LTK, and generally recommended off for DLTK.
-Learn to control noise where you're able to prevent alerting multiple guards, but also be able to lure them in a controlled fashion.
-For various DLTK levels, it helps to improve ammo management, including less shots intended for stunning, higher accuracy, and skipping guards.
-Various weapons in both games can pierce through boxes, doors, guards, and other objects. Some weapons can pierce by different amounts, and learning these facts is very helpful for many levels.
-Explosives insta-kill any NPC except for those with Body Armor. Learn which guards have BA.
-In Perfect Dark, all sliding doors that go from right-to-left can be blocked if you're positioned against them.
-Some guards in both games can clone themselves when they hear loud noise. They will infinitely clone guards until they either die or you view them at some point.
-When you're able to recognize guard animations, you can predict where they'll go and where they'll aim. Knowing this subconsciously will significantly improve survival and speed.
-Jap helps significantly for GE LTK/DLTK as it provides slightly better auto-aim, and every Body Armor in the game.
Suggested ViewingsMarc's Facility LTK 1:04 - Rampage through Facility and taking out all the guards who comes along. Note: comes with Marc's infamous "aggressive audio".
Boss's Silo DLTK 8:16 - An extremely fast completion of the hardest level. The run is filled with lots of innovative strategies and the description provides a ton of detail and information.
Clemens' Surface 2 LTK 1:25 - Uses the window shot and beats almost everyone's time on 00A. Note: he proved stats/cheats in a different video.
Bozon's Bunker 2 DLTK 5:58 - A very cool run that's filled with AI abuse, lots of tricks, and is extremely well planned out on every detail.
Bozon's Statue DLTK 2:26 - Manages to run by all the guards and also gets the best FR. Very lucky run.
Flicker's Streets DLTK 3:52 - Lightning fast speed on a very luck-based and technical level.
Ace's Caverns LTK 3:03 - High OCB and high action with Ace slaughtering every guard along the way.
Bozon's Aztec DLTK 3:44 - Utter insanity with luck and risk-taking for one of the hardest levels to complete.
Ace's Egypt LTK 0:45 - Pops each Baron with essentially a rapid-fire Golden Gun and gets a rare 1:0.
Ace's G5 LTK 0:50 - Top-level OCJ and excitement with one of the more popular and entertaining levels.
Boss's Air Base LTK 2:08 - Boss blasts through one of the hard to survive PA levels and gets a very good time in doing so.
Flicker's AFO DLTK 1:21 - Showing off one of the cool differences with DLTK, this technical run is essentially a super SA run and with a similar time to boot.
Boss's Crash Site 1:47 - This run uses all the modern strategies of the level in LTK style.
Ace's Pelagic 2 LTK 1:57 - Ace goes all-out with running and gunning with incredible OCJ.
Flicker's Attack Ship DLTK 8:45 - A very fast completion of Perfect Dark's hardest DLTK level, with a ton of technical strategies and luck.
Boss's Ruins DLTK 3:31 - Fights both the King and Skedar army simultaneously to get a stellar run.
Flicker's Maian SOS DLTK 2:59 - Catches a very fast lift cycle and makes the big sub 3 by careful control of the guards and lots of technical play.
Flicker's War LTK 0:52 - With use of the modernized open door strat, Flicker gets a completion that is as fast as the PA untied.
Icy's War DLTK 1:22 - With superb dodging and defensive play, I get past every Skedar throughout the level.
Common Questions"Why do guards with maxed accuracy still miss?"
Maxed accuracy means if a guard is capable of hitting you, they will, not that they can whenever they fire. For example, if you run around a guard or close a door as he's firing, he won't hit you.
"Why can't guards fire in certain places?"
Guards can only fire when they can directly see you. In Goldeneye, this means they can't fire over railings or most short walls. We generally refer to these as "false walls". There are a few cases in Perfect Dark where you can also do this or otherwise confuse the guard's AI and make them for easy targets.
"Why is AFO DLTK faster than AFO LTK?"
There are many NPCs in Perfect Dark who are damaged either at the start of the level, or during a certain action, such as the Rocket Launcher guard on Infiltration, or the extra Maian on Attack Ship. However, with max health, they actually end up surviving. The AFO pilots who turn on auto-pilot are such a case, so on DLTK, it's not necessary to go back up and turn on auto-pilot, saving time.
"Why is there so much pausing on PD LTK?"
Unlike Goldeneye, pausing on Perfect Dark is significantly faster, you can buffer inputs, and aim for those insta-kill headshots. Playing with raw gameplay is faster and each pause is a loss in time, so hypothetically as runs become more optimized, there will be very few pauses. Nobody has really reached a skill level where they can play at such speeds on DLTK.
"Why are most WRs untied?"
Due to both less competition and significantly more complex gameplay, a good run can vary by a lot of time, and so most WRs end up being untieds. Likewise when a player choose to go for a WR, they generally decide to go for the untied by similar reasoning. There are some simpler, more accessible levels that have a lot of tied WRs, such as Cradle LTK.
ClosingI hope this provides you with all the information needed to get a basic grasp of LTK and how to start playing. LTK is a lot of fun, feels very natural to play, and is far more knowledge-based and brain-powered, and if that all happens to be your style, give it a try! If you ever have any questions or need help, ask around!
