Are type fields pure evil?

Question

As discusses in The c++ Programming Language 3rd Edition in section 12.2.5, type fields tend to create code that is less versatile, error-prone, less intuitive, and less maintai

Answer 1

I am thinking of using a type field to solve the problem of vector slicing. That is, I want a vector of hierarchical objects. For example I want my vector to be a vector of shapes, but I want to store circles, rectangles, triangles etc.

You can't do that in the most obvious simple way because of slicing. So the normal solution is to have a vector of pointers or smart pointers instead. But I think there are cases where using a type field will be a simpler solution, (avoids new/delete or alternative lifecycle techniques).