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what he said. you can get the unlock cantrip which is a 2nd level (i.e. cheap) spell and iirc on your way to teleportation. quite useful. and yes you can bash things open. to force combat i think you ctrl/click on the object.
here's the tricky part: you'll damage the hell out of whatever weapon you use, or yourself if you're unarmed. of course, you can always have a cheap ax or something handy to use if needed. also, unless you call all your followers off, they'll tear up their weapons on the chests too.
