omg that last artifact at the hydra boss, on top of everything else, like the game was picking them for you. Btw, when you have Crooked Dice, it is a big risk to fight elites in the Void. I had one of them roll a 5 as the die that got destroyed whenever it got rolled, and it nearly ended my run. I had like 3 turns in a row with almost no dice at all, as all of my 6's and 5's got destroyed, with the Ice Mage guy. Hah! AFTER I wrote this, the exact same thing happened to you at 51:38! At least you were very close to killing when it happened. Hmm, weird. You passed up on Ashen Plating at the final store before fighting an elite and the final boss, keeping the totally useless heal on kill spell. Ashen Plating would have been very nice, a scaling down in cost big block spell.
Your comments about self-damage just not being good, and your analysis of the starting cards really resonate with me. I've had so many Azar D runs where the spells/relics just haven't aligned for me and all the self-damage racked up so I fizzled out before the first boss. Some of that is due to mutators and me still learning the game/lack of personal skill, of course. I only got my first win with Azar D while watching this and was incredibly jealous of the amazing relic luck you got!
I do think it's fun seeing the thought process behind picking different mutations across different characters and different people. Given that the mutations have been perfectly lining up woth rhapsodys options for a couple days now
Something about runs where the game hands it to ya on a silver platter, specifically right after it smokes you, might be the best kind of feeling in gaming.
This run was so lucky I almost wonder if scarcity has a slight compensating factor with the 'give you want you want' boost. And so for something super niche like self dmg you just get all the good synergy goodies.
I was able to pull of a self damage with load out C. I got the lose heath gain power and the lose health gain power roll dice spells. Plus I had the artifact that gained power on health loss. Even with my 4x attack a heal spell, and 8+ power every turn I felt like I barely won. Self Damage needs a buff somehow.
Just thinking out loud here. Each would give you a use on the spell and then 3 dices back, in total 4 uses. So that's 8 uses of bloody 3s, for +16 damage to leech, and almost 3 free triggers to Vindictive Strike. That's a lot of value.
Fun to watch Reto thank you. Self damage is too weak though. It a penalty by itself. This isn't accounting for Azar's multi hit/power scaling which is easy enough to hit in most loadouts by comparison. I watched your interviewed the devs and you've modded games you love previously, so some ideas to help if you're interested: - Vigor of blood (reroll adding wound) needs to give more of a benefit beyond the reroll/+1 die on two uses. If the self damage architype is leaning into countdown largely, increasing the value of rolled die I think would make it so much easier to cast the spells. - Some of the other starting sets have "starter spell but better" but self damage doesn't. E.g. Azar's split die build with damage per die spent has the ability to find Meteor etc. I think this would make a difference because you need more of a reward for hurting yourself without power gain etc. than 2 damage on one spell. - A status spell or artifact that on health loss, gain power and drain per instance. Could be an unrestorable spell like the bulwark option for block builds - Health for block exchange upgrade could be like 5hp = 20 block, with upgrades to decrease health loss & block but increase charges and another that increases health cost & block even further. - Common spell for block but on combat start lose 1 health and gain wounded status, where once per turn you roll a die with wounded. Better than the 2 block gain 1 power option.
Leech is unfortunately a very whelming spell to have to build around, what a lucky (and well played) run! At the very least, Leech needs to scale damage by 4 or even more than that.
are you considering streaking on lower difficulties? a lot of the higher level downgrades (scarcity, enemy healing, diminishment) make the game less fun for me, especially as i feel like some of them do not give you enough points for how hard they are to deal with
I will definitely consider it, the hope is just that some of the brutal mutators just get the amount of points they deserve. A couple honestly should be worth ~15, and unless they fix a couple forced losses on certain mutator/elite combos a few might not even be worth it at 20 if you are trying to streak lol.
For a self damage build, I dont think you ever fell under 50%. By the end, you were tanky enough to take 14 damage and just heal back up. I think that shows how much healing can be done well also taking damage.
Leech needs to be damage gain per turn, not per combat and one of the other mediocre damage spells should have the leech ability in some form. This puts the ability in the wild and leaves leech as OK with bouts of good.
I'm just curious if it's even possible to win with all mutations on level 6 I haven't been able to do it yet but I really want to get at least one win with it
One day we will get the final ‘defeat elite battles without taking damage’ however I somehow don’t think that is happening in a self damage run
omg that last artifact at the hydra boss, on top of everything else, like the game was picking them for you. Btw, when you have Crooked Dice, it is a big risk to fight elites in the Void. I had one of them roll a 5 as the die that got destroyed whenever it got rolled, and it nearly ended my run. I had like 3 turns in a row with almost no dice at all, as all of my 6's and 5's got destroyed, with the Ice Mage guy. Hah! AFTER I wrote this, the exact same thing happened to you at 51:38! At least you were very close to killing when it happened.
Hmm, weird. You passed up on Ashen Plating at the final store before fighting an elite and the final boss, keeping the totally useless heal on kill spell. Ashen Plating would have been very nice, a scaling down in cost big block spell.
Your comments about self-damage just not being good, and your analysis of the starting cards really resonate with me. I've had so many Azar D runs where the spells/relics just haven't aligned for me and all the self-damage racked up so I fizzled out before the first boss. Some of that is due to mutators and me still learning the game/lack of personal skill, of course. I only got my first win with Azar D while watching this and was incredibly jealous of the amazing relic luck you got!
I do think it's fun seeing the thought process behind picking different mutations across different characters and different people. Given that the mutations have been perfectly lining up woth rhapsodys options for a couple days now
it is definitely an interesting system, e.g. some are free for Lapis, but a death sentence for Azar.
I really like that you did a salty run to show off what this build could be like. Many would have just moved on, so thanks for sticking with it!
I think this is the only run where you've kept all the starting spells!
yeeeep, which is more symbolic of the archetype than it is of me haha
Can't believe Reto actually manifested both of his boss relics
Something about runs where the game hands it to ya on a silver platter, specifically right after it smokes you, might be the best kind of feeling in gaming.
The game was downright apologetic.
This run was so lucky I almost wonder if scarcity has a slight compensating factor with the 'give you want you want' boost. And so for something super niche like self dmg you just get all the good synergy goodies.
I was able to pull of a self damage with load out C. I got the lose heath gain power and the lose health gain power roll dice spells. Plus I had the artifact that gained power on health loss. Even with my 4x attack a heal spell, and 8+ power every turn I felt like I barely won. Self Damage needs a buff somehow.
Wow that run came together amazingly for having very limited choice
Such a fun run. I'm wondering if you considered adding spell charge to Mana Symmetry to go crazy on bloody 3s and ramp up.
Just thinking out loud here. Each would give you a use on the spell and then 3 dices back, in total 4 uses. So that's 8 uses of bloody 3s, for +16 damage to leech, and almost 3 free triggers to Vindictive Strike. That's a lot of value.
Fun to watch Reto thank you. Self damage is too weak though. It a penalty by itself. This isn't accounting for Azar's multi hit/power scaling which is easy enough to hit in most loadouts by comparison. I watched your interviewed the devs and you've modded games you love previously, so some ideas to help if you're interested:
- Vigor of blood (reroll adding wound) needs to give more of a benefit beyond the reroll/+1 die on two uses. If the self damage architype is leaning into countdown largely, increasing the value of rolled die I think would make it so much easier to cast the spells.
- Some of the other starting sets have "starter spell but better" but self damage doesn't. E.g. Azar's split die build with damage per die spent has the ability to find Meteor etc. I think this would make a difference because you need more of a reward for hurting yourself without power gain etc. than 2 damage on one spell.
- A status spell or artifact that on health loss, gain power and drain per instance. Could be an unrestorable spell like the bulwark option for block builds
- Health for block exchange upgrade could be like 5hp = 20 block, with upgrades to decrease health loss & block but increase charges and another that increases health cost & block even further.
- Common spell for block but on combat start lose 1 health and gain wounded status, where once per turn you roll a die with wounded. Better than the 2 block gain 1 power option.
Your ideas at the end were also really good btw :)
Leech is unfortunately a very whelming spell to have to build around, what a lucky (and well played) run! At the very least, Leech needs to scale damage by 4 or even more than that.
Should buy a lottery ticket today)
are you considering streaking on lower difficulties? a lot of the higher level downgrades (scarcity, enemy healing, diminishment) make the game less fun for me, especially as i feel like some of them do not give you enough points for how hard they are to deal with
I will definitely consider it, the hope is just that some of the brutal mutators just get the amount of points they deserve. A couple honestly should be worth ~15, and unless they fix a couple forced losses on certain mutator/elite combos a few might not even be worth it at 20 if you are trying to streak lol.
For a self damage build, I dont think you ever fell under 50%. By the end, you were tanky enough to take 14 damage and just heal back up. I think that shows how much healing can be done well also taking damage.
yep that is 100% the "take 1 less damage difference" it slows down your scaling a little but it makes the build infinitely safer
Leech needs to be damage gain per turn, not per combat and one of the other mediocre damage spells should have the leech ability in some form. This puts the ability in the wild and leaves leech as OK with bouts of good.
Smh I can't believe retromation would pre-record a run
I'm just curious if it's even possible to win with all mutations on level 6 I haven't been able to do it yet but I really want to get at least one win with it
depending on what set of mutators you get, absolutely you could
for the algoritihim
second
first