@@mishagaming1075 Maybe scavengers are basically just the ancients, but before technological advancement. Making basically a loop of civilisations, their ruins, said ruins being inhabited by early sapients and said sapients making a new civilisation. Would fit the theme and I think a lot of the dialogue supports it.
Scavengers start manufacturing their lamps differently during the ice age. If you show one to Moon, she will notice a powder inside it that produces heat. So, there is a lore reason for that mechanic.
You haven't gotten the full Arti experience until you've had to engage in trench warfare. A killsquad of scavs have decided to all hunker down in a choke point where if you rush them they will just obliterate you. Quarters are just to tight to get around them, looking at you, Pipeyards. You have to hunker down in a safe spot and take shots at them every so often and wait for a few to rush your position to take out individually. I find having the low ground usually give you an advantage in fighting them. I actually really like the challenge to the point I've gotten all the pearls as her and ascended although it is a massive test of patience and I've had my fair share of ragequits. I don't think anyone will disagree that Ruffles is the most fun scug to play.
My personal favorite is Artificer because it forced me to get really good at combat and I ended up feeling like The Doom Slayer fucking up everything in my way. Loved exploring Metropolis too… but I do agree that Ruffles is probably the objective best slugcat and is second favorite.
rivulet is the most fun to play but they suffer from being boring and a bit easy. the decreased cycle times are very fun but end up reverting to normal by halfway through. you could argue the rarefaction cell fetch quest evens this out, but after that, it just feels like playing survivor but you increased the speed by 40% i agree though, very fun. just gets old quick
in my experience The spear masters campaign is actually the easiest out of all the other campaigns except for maybe the monk. When ya have infinite spears moderate movement don’t have to collect many different types of food get through a bunch of scavengers or the other crap in other campaigns it’s relatively easy. And for it’s weakness against the lizards ya just have to be more skilled when fightin em. Get behind em or run from them and flip to get to there weak side. The spear master and the rivulet should definitely switch places in this tier list. I’d even put the rivulet lower in the tier list. It’s nice that the rivulet is fast but that’s its only strength. The spear masters ability is definitely much better. And in the rivulets campaign I don’t like how it rains so often.
Only just got to the Arti section and lemme tell you I agree 100%. I'm one of the few crazy people who enjoy scavs and getting chieftain, especially because I'm really bad at combat. So an entire campaign of just fighting scavs is hell. I love Arti on paper! She's so cool and awesome! I'd play her in a heartbeat if the entire point of her campaign wasn't committing mass genocide against scavengers.
@@Foxett25 You're everywhere where rainworld is involved, I never played Ori because it doesn't support ps4 and my laptop can't handle most games, so I dont get the reference
The experience of going to Five Pebbles' city topped all of the other annoying parts of Artificer's campaign, I didn't experience like half of the annoyances that were listed, like I enjoyed the difficulty and even if I got my ass kicked there was still the novelty that I was in 5P's mfing city which kept me hooked and wanting to explore as much as I could. I enjoy exploring all the little details and environmental storytelling in rw more than the gameplay + I only had to pass like one or two annoying scav karma gates to get to the exterior and to 5P himself. The fact that this campaign had no greater lore significance and was it's own adventure made it refreshing compared to some of the other DLC slugcats; apart from that it literally contained everything I had hoped for and was such a nice first character to play. Maybe I'm objectively wrong idgaf but I enjoyed Arti the most it had me fr fangirling the entire time through.
Metropolis is definitely S-tier, but I wouldn't say Artificer is. Subterenean is as good as blocked off unless you're lucky with cycle durations and deer AI. Farm Arrays is of course flawed by the deer not cooperating, but the scavs make any sort of waiting, trying again or taking another route impossible. This is not helped by Arti's disdain of water, making passing through Drainage System also near impossible.
@@merijngout39 I feel like that only applies to Arti if you're going for the unique but basically the same ascension ending, since that mainly applies to the other portion of the map. Ideally the entire experience should be consistent but with Arti I rly like the more tailored approach with that region having it's own ending. Ascension is way too hard to get with Arti for it to be the more intended path.
Objectively speaking, there's nothing wrong with Artificer, it's the campaign that's the issue. The scavenger AI is so erratic that it adds a fifth layer of RNG onto an already RNG heavy game. And relying on luck, especially if you're consistently unlucky, is the worst feeling because there's literally nothing you can do. And the only thing that really gives points for her campaign, other than the story, is metropolis. But even that can't entirely exempt the rest of the issues. It's nigh impossible to get to Five Pebble's bottom gate, Old Garbage Waste sucks (or sucked depending on if you played before the patch that added the tunnel lines), Waterfront doesn't even exist for her and Moon is fucking dead. The rest of the game is completely overcompensated with Scavengers meaning that it's either sink or swim and unless you're the Jesus of gaming, you're gonna be sinking 95% of the time because one spear from offscreen flew straight into you. Not to mention she probably has the simplest path of any campaign. It's not bad, but the length of the campaign also doesn't help. As opposed to literally all other campaigns where you have to visit an iterator than go do something far away, Artificer only has to meet Five Pebbles than go into his hair (city). It's not objectively bad, but it does limit what can be positively (and negatively) said about the campaign itself due to its length. And don't even get me started on how fucking horrid her spawns are for expedition mode. Yes, I'd love to spawn in Five Pebbles or Metropolis for the fifth time in a row when I need to collect fucking mushrooms. Artificer feels somewhat like the Monk of Downpour, but reversed. Monk is boring to play, while Artificer is way to advanced compared to all the other scugs. Monk's campaign is relaxing, while Artificer's is bloodshed. And both their stories are personal journeys, one for reuniting, and the other for revenge. But overall, both feel like afterthoughts when it comes to the rest of the game. Monk never really given any attention and Artificer never given any balance. Even more ironic is the parallels in their endings, Monk following the path of peace reuniting happily, and Artificer following the path of revenge forever trapped. Actually wow, those parallels really just came to me but those are way to coincidental to be coincidences. Definitely intentional. Cool.
15:25 Actually if you give it to Moon on Saint she says it was mixed with 'fire powder' (presumably from a gunpowder plant) for warmth by the scavengers.
Fun fact with the lanterns in saint, if you bring one to moon she says the same thing as every other character but says it also mixed with something called fire powder to give off warmth too! Plot hole solved.
Just a small correction: Scavs do only take one shot to kill. Some do however have a small window of "bleedout time" where they'll freak out and can take one more shot at you before keeling over dead on their own. Best you stab them a few times if you're fighting one close range. The initial shot will knock it out so you can just shank it again just in case it's one of the ones that has that extra bleedout time to take one last revenge shot. Most of the time it's not big issue if you're a little ways away. You can tell if a scav is really dead if it drops everything it's carrying.
I absolutely hate Spearmaster's campaign but I love this cat and his new lore unlocks all over the world made me appreciate him even more. Its fun to run around every region looking for that one lore satellite without looking at map on wiki.
@@laurenromero2134 he doesnt hate spearmaster just his campaign. A lot of people don't like it, Its pretty hard but I enjoyed it. There was a lot of new map to explore and seeing moon was !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@@laurenromero2134 in my personal opinion, having to carry around a very important, very easy to lose pearl in your hand without the ability to swallow it for safekeeping, making the dual wielding mechanic useless for more than half the campaign is, honestly, quite frustrating. And I say that with spearmaster being my favorite slugcat.
I had to spawn the bloody pearl in with cheats because I left it in pebbles chamber by accident and went into a shelter, not to mention the back and forth between 5-p and moon was really annoying, cyan lizards EVERYWHERE and way too many bottomless pits, I got stuck in exterior for the longest time trying to get to the wall so I could get to sky islands, the experience made me hate underhang. So yeah spear masters campaign sucks.
ngl artificer is my fav anyway. I do agree that it's quite annoying to drag scav's body to the gate but you need to do that only once in the whole playthrough. And I had so many good memories about exploring as artificer.
Did you know: if you go back into your finished rivulet save moon calls him “Ruffles” later in the game she talks to another slugcat and says that there once was one of its kind that had long since passed.
Moon says that to Saint (the next scug in the timeline). Considering I played Spearmaster --> Rivulet --> Saint, I was fresh off my Riv save when I got that dialogue and it made me smile
Daszombes during Artificer rating: "But we're rating campaigns here." - 1:49 Daszombes after that: *rates all the slucats on the overall gameplay instead of just the campaign* ... spearmaster *cough* Edit: In all honesty I agree with mostly everything on here except Arti and Gourmand. (I would put him higher as I like his gimmicks of crafting and becoming a meteor strike)
tbh, I liked rubicon, it did feel like the game itself was trying to stop me. But that was kinda the idea, to me rain world is a game where it doesn’t want you to win, and when you win that’s the true fun of the game. So when I kept dying in rubicon, I felt motivated, not frustrated. I can see where you’re coming from though.
solid tier list I definitely agree with the top 2 picks just because of how much fun I had with the lore and region changes/additions they had on my play-through of their campaigns (although rubicon was a crime against humanity)
It's worth noting that the lantern has custom dialog with Moon on Saint's campaign as they DON'T just use slime mold anymore. Also, all pearl dialog, including blank pearl dialog, is different for Spearmaster and Artificer because Moon has a different perspective before her fall and Pebbles is... Pebbles.
I understand why artificer is so low on this tier list, but I don't agree. I just remember having a bad day at uni, going home and killing scavengers in metropolis for hours. My favorite strategy was to go to their camp, throw a bomb at them and run away. Then I'd find a pipe with both ends horizontal and near the ground, hide there, steal spears from any scaveners that dare try to go in. Pile up on corpses, kill a few elite scavs, go back to the shelter and either die on the way back or add a few dozen scavs to your kill count. Sleep, repeat. But then I met the echo and went for "drown in a hallucinogenic pond" ending 10/10, would explode again
A cool alternative to Artificer's Karma system could've been that she's locked at Karma 1 but if she eats a scavenger it will increase by 1 or half up to Survivor karma. BUT, her karma decreases by 1 every cycle so it still encourages players to hunt scavengers. This could have some lore tie in like "Her anger is satiated with every taste of revenge she feels," or something like that but most importantly, it would be WAY more fun, it adds in a consequence to dying (I.E. your Karma will go down meaning that you will need to hunt more scavengers) but it still lets her ACTUALLY interact with the Karma mechanic from the get go albeit with one that's a lot more restrictive. It actually adds a layer of strategy and descision making rather than locking you at "Oh just bring a scavenger corpse to this gate."
I feel like Artificer is my favorite campaign because of her abilities and karma system it makes her focus on her gimmick of murdering scavs and fighting them and i feel like her game rewards mastering combat and strategy I personally love the scav combat since i learned a lot on how to fight the only thing i majorly agree with is the fact they can see you on the other screen and kill you Also her whole gimmick is the fact she has the most complicated combat and movement that you can learn and in my opinion the most op slugcat
I love artificer because it's really combat focused and doesn't really punish you that hard for dying, so it gives me more room to do sick plays, but I can understand perfectly why a lot of people really dislike her Edit: Mauling is god-tier
I still love hunter. Now that you can remove the cycle limit its survivor but for the more experienced, which I think is awesome. I still play hunter often as it provides a nice balanced challenge that isn't as linear as the downpour campaigns but is still harder than survivor. Plus I just love his abilities. While they all are outclassed by other slugcats, I feel its a nice upgrade to survivor without having some overpowered advantage like downpour slugs.
As someone who is a rain world god in terms of combat, I would personally put arti above the OG three. Its genuinely a lot of fun for me to just rapidly gut every scav in a ten meter radius when i bomb a toll like a drone. Though since i am aware not everyone enjoys the jank that comes with RW combat, i fully understand the placement at nearly bottom tier
I agree, the campaign is fun for rain world players that enjoy combat and are good at it. I personally also enjoyed it alot, but that's only because I'm good enough to not die all the time. I totally get why someone would rank it so low.
Arti is my favorite campaign honestly, I love traversing pebble's city with the jumps and the combat is way less unfair than with others. Also waterfront facility offers a new challenge with her, which I really enjoyed.
Spearmaster might be a multistage fetchquest, but I love the story behind it`s campaign - seeing another Iterator indirectly intervening the events and trying to connect with Pebbles is extremely sad. Spearmaster gets to listen to Iterator logs, to learn of their worries and thoughts, and the messages SRS sends about feeling attached to their messenger is very bittersweet. This campaign lays the groundwork for the Saint to give the game a proper emotinoal ending, and is the second most emotional story of the slugcats (second only to Saint, of course). Also the anatomy of Spearmaster is a little...disturbing. Why did SRS had the wonderful idea of transporting a pearl inside animal`s Chest Cavity I have absolutely no clue.
Have you not read the lore? Most animals in rainworld are artificial. Purposed organisms. The original inhabitants rebuilt animal life to suit their needs. Ancestors of Slugcats were literally pipe cleaners. So repurposing animals for their bidding is kind of their theme.
I’m new to rainworld and I really love monk. I’m terrible at video games so the chance to be able to enjoy rainworld in an easier mode and cutting down on some of the frustration felt when playing as the other slug cats is very welcome to me.
It was very interesting to get another person's opinion who has been through all the companies. I don't know what my personal top would look like, but most likely at the very bottom would be Master of the Spear. For him, even just raising the sleep food meter is already a challenge. And the fact that he can't reuse needles already cast for power doesn't make the game any easier. Even the technician with his two disadvantages (karma, and scavengers) didn't fuck me so much (in a way, the lack of karma helps me not to lose so much when dying in fights with scavengers).
Spearmaster while the pearl is still inside him: A tier Spearmaster when the pearl is no longer inside him and you have to carry it around: C tier Spearmaster while in the Vents subregion of LttM: F tier
The thing about Artificer is that it's a combat focused campaign. While for Hunter and Gourmand it's just completing objectives, Arti is MADE to cannonball through the screens and slaughter all they come across. I mean, all other campaigns can be done as a pacifist if you try harder enough. Arti? Can't even leave the initial region without slaughtering the scavs. It's just pure rage
I guess I have a diffrent perspective (or just am a basic bitch) but to me Survivor is the uncontested S tier. When I think of Rain World 8 times out of 10 it's about his campaign, all the others are just variants of his one. It's crazy to me to call him boring, cause he's the first and definitive plauthrough of Rain World, the most interesting gaming experience I ever had. But it's not just that he's the first and therefore the best, it's also very clear that the whole game has been specifically designed around him and his mobility. Obviously the rest have some changes to accomodate them (Saint specifically) but it's just not comparable to having the whole world made from the ground up with him in mind.
I dont think Rivulet is that good. Too annoying with bad time limit. Story was great tho. And exploring the world was rly cool. But the time limit makes you skip enemies which is the coolest thing about rainworld.
Your first experiences with saint and riv were very different to mine. I took the direction through rubicon that didnt lead to the M i r o s D i m e n s i o n and enjoyed it quite a bit. And in submerged superstructure, i simply got lost for two hours because i couldnt see the exit door. So my thoughts on these campaigns pretty much line up with yours as a whole and if this were my tierlist, i would have put saint in S alongside riv oh yeah i also got trapped by a shelter failure at the top of chimney canopy while playing riv and that was pretty funny
Another Rubicon enjoyer here. Honestly a huge skill issue. I loved the color palette, completely obliterating miros vultures, and flying above open voids
slight saint spoiler, i actually gave moon a lamp and she said "Oh they seem to have also put fire dust in it" or something like that, which makes it hot, so thats why 15:30
Random fact: Hunter can actually dual-wield using a whiplash/slide-flip as long as there isn't a spear on his back. Afterwards, he can carry one on his back and still have two in his paws.
@@Khanical Hunter is the only slugcat capable of pulling it off, Spearmaster can automatically dual wield without any advanced movement tech. Attempting to do so as any other scug doesn't work. Trust me, I've tried.
artificer fans trying to explain why its fun to fight groups of enemies that can instant kill you from off screen with nigh-perfect prediction aiming that sit right outside your shelter waiting to spawn camp you
I actually agreed with every single ranking you did! I was skeptical at first, but once you explained, you had me sold on the placement. I admire your ability to articulate your thoughts, as I am awful at it lol. S Tier channel ngl 🤙
Artificer fixed the worst part of the game for me, which were karma gates. No more grinding in areas hard to get food - you died? Who gives a shit, the goal hasn’t moved, just try again. Also, you’re never low on food since you can feast on your enemies. Arti’s a hero to me
yeah i agree with this, only thing is i'd put Gourmand higher and put Arti right above hunter, but i definitely understand the reasoning for putting them where you did. solid ranking of one of my favourite games' campaigns. can't wait for the next iterator logs and whatever else you've got in store :)
it's weird, cause for me it was really easy to do saint's power, so rubicon wasn't that bad, meanwhile you said you got lost with rivulet for an hour at five pebbles and... god i wish it was only an hour. as for the parry mechanic... it's much easier to just use your parry the moment you are near a scav, it stuns them and then you can just kill them easily, you don't have to *actually* parry with it
I agree with this list, good job 👍. My favorite is spear master. Maybe you could do a mod tier list at some point with modded slugcats, or just mods in general. I think that could be interesting
Big arti fan here and yeah I agree with a lot of your points on her. Luckily you don't need to use the karma system when going through the main campaign (gw>sh>uw>mt) but it is soo annoying when trying to do anything else. I haven't had too many issues with scavs sniping me but the few times it has happened we're super annoying. And the boss fight... I'm torn on it. It's not amazingly fun but it doesn't feel horrible to me either. Overall my favourite aspect of her campaign is the movement, also murdering scavs is really fun lmao
It was one of the reasons I created Aim Helper mod yeah! Even without snapping feature just being able to have verticality in combat and having actual high ground advantage makes the game a lot more fun. Not having to pinpoint accuracy every shot really does make the combat feels less punishing.
@@awrilynn Thats actually the one I use! It provides 90% of the ability of Aim Anywhere without the downside of not working very well in co-op or split screen, I nicknamed it the Deadeye mod lmao. Its certainly well made!
I agree with almost everything on here, but personally I rank Spearmaster lower. I love his spear creating and eating mechanics, I love the lore and collectible chatlogs, and the green spiders were a very funny addition. My big issues with Spearmaster are the fact that you need to carry a pearl with you for the majority of his run, and along with being very difficult, I find Moon to be pretty boring pre-collapse. Her structure is, understandably, very similar to Five Pebble's, and since the Exterior and Five Pebbles himself are my least favorite regions, I didn't exactly love Moon's. I still find the pearl to be a bigger issue, partially because I encountered the only real bug I found in this expansion, which just erased the pearl half of the time and made his campaign very frustrating towards the end of it, but I also don't like carrying the pearl around constantly because it gets rid of his dual wielding unless you put it down somewhere and pick it up later. Having to ferry the pearl around removes one of his few mechanics, and that, combined with the fact that you can't create spears while moving, really brings down his gameplay for me. I know that that second point is maybe to balance him but it was just annoying to me, his biggest mechanic is printing spears but once you throw them, especially if you still need food, you have to stop somewhere to make more and it slows down his combat. Maybe I just need to get good but I wish he had other downsides, something that compliments his abilities rather than just getting in the way of them.
Artificer was one of the best ones for me. You know that "finally, a worty opponent" meme ? Well that's arti's campaign, yeah the spear throws from the other screen sure are annoying but it's not like most other common ennemies pose a real threat (except white and cyan lizards) + arti has high mobility with the double jump so if the timing of the parry is too hard for you, you can just fart away. I had no issues with the karma system of arti too, thought it was original, also you have no issues related to the bodie's weight since arti s strong af. Also i though it was cool that we get to explore a more slugcat oriented campaing, where it's just an animal doing it's own thing. Sure we interact with 5p but that's not the core of the narrative. We already get plenty of iterator lore in the next campaingns, variety isn't bad.
Okay maybe not the best place to ask this, but can someone explain cycles to me? I legit just got the game today (on Nintendo switch if that matters) and all I knew were, survival game, you play as a slugcat, lizard=beeg nom nom boi And me being me which doesn't help at all because I can almost guarantee the only thing anyone reading this knows about me is this comment, I practically speedran cycles, I would go out, eat, and run straight back to the shelter. There was one time I stayed out a little longer and ended up getting lost and dying in the rain. I knew near nothing about the game and I still know.. a little farther from nothing.
Having your finger on the throw button and holding a spear all the time had me get through the campaign with ease: every time i needed a scavenger to pass a gate i just see a bunch and throw a spear. Horizontally facing transport tubes and tubes in general makes it stupidly easy to kill them, so if you know how to deal with them scavengers are not a problem, but of help. The key to winning a fight to a scavenger is that you, as a slugcat are able to throw spears instantly, while the scavenger has to aim first, which takes about a quarter of a second - which is A LOT. You are also able to pickup and throw spears only in the span of a few frames, while the scavengers need more time than that
I feel like Arti's campaign is really held back by the fixed camera. I can't count how many times I moved through screens and was immediately one shot by a scav that I could've never seen. When you have the upper hand, they're really fun though. My personal rankings would be S: rivulet A: spearmaster, hunter, gourmand B: artificer, survivor C: saint, monk
15:25 Actually ☝🤓,there is an explenation, if you bring a lantern to moon as Saint she explains that the scavengers coated the inside with a sort of fire powder, which explains the warmth and why most scavengers are carrying lanterns even outside.
Call me crazy, but I've always loved monk the best. I'm a switch player with no downpour so that may change, but I love being able to explore and admire the game at my own pace with no worries! not to mention the lizard taming mechanic is so, so cute. I always play monk when I can, and I never really get bored. maybe that's just me, though?
I loved the artificer campaign. And I think her karma mechanics fits it perfectly . Having just reduced karma limit would have not worked. With Arti it is just a matter of a lucky cycle or few to get a stash of scav bodies in a shelter, which would have fed her straight to enlightenment (if she could have it unlocked). While working on Pilgrimage achievement I had to farm karma few times. It was trivial. The real challenge was in finding a karma flower and getting alive to the Echo with its effect on me. I once sat for dozen of cycles, gorging on the bodies of my prey. It went so long that I'd not be surprised if I would got the Gourmand stats for few cycles. As for the changes in Garbage Wastes - I loved them too. I didn't like the original GW. The one I saw in Arti's campaign, with industrial buildings with acid pools in them, finally gave the region a unique feel. Also I properly explored it after wandering for 30 or 50 cycles all around the world and getting okay with Arti's combat. So I had lots of fun slaughtering all the top predators. Having many monster dens, scav dens and migration paths right next to shelters was a perfect recipe for good time.
The arti campaign stuff, to me, is actually quite accurate. Except that killing scavangers gives me bloodlust and dopamine so the campaign gets extra fun. (i love nuking scavanger tolls with bombs)
I honestly agree with Artificer. I wish it was a lot better because the difficulty design makes it more of an ordeal than a challenge. Spoilers: Also, I agree with your tier list. But in my experience, Saint is an S tier. Ironically enough, I didn’t struggle as much in Rubicon.
To me, I feel like in a post downpour world, Arti being targeted by the enemy that you normally avoid pissing off serves the purpose of getting the player to engage with combat. In pre downpour, unless you did a Hunter run combat was decently avoidable, and that time limit scares a lot of people off. But with Arti not having that issue or even karma to worry about, it gives players a great way to learn combat outside of the arena. Which really combat in Arena is so different from singleplayer it's hard to call skills there transferable to main game aside from things like movement tech. Granted, this is only valuable if you didn't engage with the combat until you got to Artifcer. Which is far from universal. But I know I was sure that player, so it felt like a real jolt to the system. However, I agree with the rest of your points now that I am more familiar with the combat.
because i’m a crackhead dipshit, i really enjoy having The Horde trying to kill you in arti’s campaign. i never befriend scavs in other campaigns and tend to either kill or ignore them completely, and while you’re right that scavs really arent designed to be fought, she’s equipped to deal with them far better than any other slugcat. the only times i’ve actually had an issue with the scavs is at the outposts cause of the terrible screen transitions,but i’d argue that they’re significantly less annoying than things like rivulet’s short rain timer, gourmand’s exhaustion, or saint’s fragility. in the end it comes down to playstyle i guess, if you dont like killing literally everything i can see why you’d dislike arti.
Since everyone is putting their personal tier lists in the comments, I decided to make my own. (Keep in mind that these are ranked from personal experience and biases rather than actual objective points) S Tier: Survivor and Saint. My main reason for Survivor to be in S tier is because, as someone who played the game before the downpour expansion released, it just felt amazing getting to learn about a world that is alien to you. It especially worked for me because of the immersion the games tries so hard to give to you (which its successful on). None of the other campaigns (excluding Spearmaster and Saint) give this feeling of the unknown to me. Gameplay and story wise, compared to the other scugs, they're just okay, but honestly, my first experience just gave me an everlasting impact. Now, my main reason for Saint to be in S tier, is because of the amazing lore that gets revealed thorough their campaign, and just getting to see the world in the far future felt great too. However, the reason as to why Saint is still below Survivor, is because of their gameplay. I did like being a pussy all the way through the campaign, but then it just felt odd having to fight in Rubicon (especially against the apex predators) A Tier: Rivulet and Spearmaster. Now, now, before you get mad at me, I would've put Riv in S tier, but the main reason as to why I didn't actually put their campaign in S tier, is because of how short it felt. It could either be me getting good at the game, but I just died only like 2 times with this character and I went through the usual path I go through, which lead to me beating it extremely quickly. I loved everything else about it though, from getting to explore Moon's submerged superstructure, to seeing what the peak of the rot looks like, to the immaculate movement they have. I know this is also going to be a controversial opinion, but I loved Spearmaster's campaign. Seeing the earliest time frame possible just adds a bunch of points to their campaign, ESPECIALLY because you get to explore Moon's superstructure before her downfall. It also helps that they are probably the most difficult of the slugcats (i'm a masochist). Despite this, their campaign is probably the most tedious near the end. (excluding the dialogue, of course) B Tier: Gourmand and Artificer. The reason as to why Gourmand isn't lower (like some people would like them to be) is because, despite the getting exhausted mechanic being annoying, they still have relatively decent movement when tired. My main reason as to why it's on a relatively okay spot is, while the campaign is not as unique, I really like the mechanics they have. For example, the food quest, the body slam, the roll, etc. My main bias towards the campaign is the fact that it introduces Outer Expanse (which is frankly my favorite zone in the ENTIRE game, Downpour and Vanilla included) Now, for Artificer. I like the campaign and character, she has the most offensive capabilities out of all the slugcats. In fact, she would be my favorite Scug if it wasn't because of her main thing. The fucking Scavengers. I'm not gonna explain why they suck. It also doesn't help that there's an infinite spawn of Scavengers, which means you just have to deal with them all the time if you refuse to run away. What's the point of making her offensively capable if it's not to absolutely demolish entire tribes? Metropolis has to be one of my favorite zones, though. This and her capabilities are the only two reasons I don't put her lower on the list. I also have issue with her story, but I'd rather not talk about that. C Tier: Hunter. Never had fun with this campaign, the cycle limit being the main mechanic that tatters it for me. Its a cool idea, but the fact that I have to deal with karma gates too does really make it kind of annoying to me. It also does due to the fact that I love exploration (as i've probably made it clear) I like that it introduced new enemy variants, though. D Tier: Monk. They literally have nothing that is unique to the campaign other than Unfortunate Development being different. Now, as for Inv, not gonna talk about it for the sake of this comment. Just know that I despise it with my entire being.
i played arti with the mod that gives you karma on scav death for the majority of it, and i can DEFINITELY say it improves the experience. the scavs are annoying, i got more deaths than i did in any other campaign, [roughly ~120, if youre curious] and while the lows were low the highs were HIGH. half of the issue with metropolis and why i had to start from the beginning so often was probably because i decided to bring a pup along for the ride, so ignoring that [since it's not vanilla] its still pretty solid imo! of course you shouldnt need a mod to make a campaign good, relying on mods to make your game enjoyable isnt ideal, but it does improve the overall experience for what its worth.
honestly i think the whole no progression of karma in arti's campaign is supposed to be a counter to how frequently you'll die by now I've completed her campaign like 4 times and I still die if the karma was affected by that it would have been a lot more frustrating also the gate issue can be ignored a little considering the fact that theres 1000 scavs per room honestly shes a lot more enjoyable if you have the parry mechanionc down, how would you do that? well just go left in the first room there you can find and fight a bunch of scavs sorry if this sounds like a rant also sorry for any bad grammar as english is my second language also nice vid
I think the tier list I made a few weeks back is nearly identical to yours (the differences being Inv being in his own tier, arti being in F and hunter being in A behind spearmaster)
They're all great, in my opinion. (spoilers for everything) Survivor is a great beginning, not easy, not hard, but decent anyways. Quite easy to learn, tough hard in the beginning. Monk, while seemingly easier in the gameplay, doesn't have quite the same immersion as survivor, and without downpour, they do not have lore. Hunter, has the ultimate weapon, extra spear! But they also have 20 days to live (5 more if you visit a god on the way), and ends up horribly. But you know, that extra spear makes up for it :) Artificer, while great in both combat and mobility, just as you said, has scavenger problems. Tough i cannot admit that i don't enjoy murdering scavengers for fun. Gourmand is great in combat, but doesn't have that extra mobility like artificer. And while slides work great, they're not very useful when you're tired. and while you can leap, throw boost and such, it's still more useful to go the long way than... Do whatever you have to. Spearmaster, is a bit harsh. Very harsh, in my opinion. Things like underhang are quite hard, as you have to eat, carry the pearl, a grapple worm (If you do go to pebbles first, like me) and don't get me started on the horrible, long jumps at precipice. Rivulet, is in my opinion, great. While the shortened cycles make it tough sometimes (I am reffering to my painful, near death moment in painige system, literaly 1 second from drowing), it's quite fun to just run past everything, and yeet across everything. The rot wasn't too bar for me, quite fun actually! Just jumped trough it for the cell. Saint... While there's no spears, the cold is dangerous, and the lizard instakill... You know, the lore is fun, and the whole god thing, it's cool! Enot/inv/???/sofanthiel/paincat is simply a fucking retard. Nobody likes their campaign outside of the dating sim. Thanks for coming to my ted talk (My hands hurt awh)
Honestly tho… like there’s literally scavs everywhere in this campaign and its literally made to have scavs always mad at u and if you can’t kill a scav… ur just bad
In Saint campaign, Moon says: "It's been mixed with fire powder for warmth." About the lanterns
So basically the scavengers also adapted, neat.
oh thats cool
@@mishagaming1075 Maybe scavengers are basically just the ancients, but before technological advancement. Making basically a loop of civilisations, their ruins, said ruins being inhabited by early sapients and said sapients making a new civilisation. Would fit the theme and I think a lot of the dialogue supports it.
@@generalvoid1630 Rain World new dlc: Scavengers are now the new ancients and they build new iterators
@@generalvoid1630 "Were we the tenth civilisation, or the thousandth?"
Scavengers start manufacturing their lamps differently during the ice age. If you show one to Moon, she will notice a powder inside it that produces heat. So, there is a lore reason for that mechanic.
Oh, that's awesome!
How dare you not put slugcat in tier
Is that an ori pfp? Based AF
I know! How dare he have OPINION on SLUGCAT. SLUGCAT should go in TIER!
Slugcat was the most slugcat ever
@@mkayyu7201 truly a slugcat moment of all time
As a slugcat i agree
I can't believe it was confirmed that rubicon is literally just slugcat hell.
Also all the slugpups go there (100% spawn rate if you manually allow them to spawn there or whatever iirc)
because according to the devs all sluppies go to hell
@@mikoajciemiega8018 Why does this word exist
@@mikoajciemiega8018 WHY!?
You haven't gotten the full Arti experience until you've had to engage in trench warfare. A killsquad of scavs have decided to all hunker down in a choke point where if you rush them they will just obliterate you. Quarters are just to tight to get around them, looking at you, Pipeyards. You have to hunker down in a safe spot and take shots at them every so often and wait for a few to rush your position to take out individually. I find having the low ground usually give you an advantage in fighting them. I actually really like the challenge to the point I've gotten all the pearls as her and ascended although it is a massive test of patience and I've had my fair share of ragequits. I don't think anyone will disagree that Ruffles is the most fun scug to play.
My personal favorite is Artificer because it forced me to get really good at combat and I ended up feeling like The Doom Slayer fucking up everything in my way. Loved exploring Metropolis too… but I do agree that Ruffles is probably the objective best slugcat and is second favorite.
@@mr.randomguys7629same! I used to struggle so much with Scavs it was embarrassing, but after Arti killing 3 Elite Scavs is a joy
rivulet is the most fun to play but they suffer from being boring and a bit easy. the decreased cycle times are very fun but end up reverting to normal by halfway through. you could argue the rarefaction cell fetch quest evens this out, but after that, it just feels like playing survivor but you increased the speed by 40%
i agree though, very fun. just gets old quick
That's the "issue" with Arti.
If you don't like fighting scavs in the first place you'll hate arti.
If you like fighting scavs.
You'll love arti.
@@AdaTheWatcher true
I like rivulet the most then spearmaster but saint's lore and story literally gave me goosebumps and he's cute AF so he's the bestest boy
Also got named after a snack
@@The_whales which snack?
@@fluffycuddles8008 ruffles chips
in my experience The spear masters campaign is actually the easiest out of all the other campaigns except for maybe the monk. When ya have infinite spears moderate movement don’t have to collect many different types of food get through a bunch of scavengers or the other crap in other campaigns it’s relatively easy. And for it’s weakness against the lizards ya just have to be more skilled when fightin em. Get behind em or run from them and flip to get to there weak side.
The spear master and the rivulet should definitely switch places in this tier list. I’d even put the rivulet lower in the tier list. It’s nice that the rivulet is fast but that’s its only strength. The spear masters ability is definitely much better. And in the rivulets campaign I don’t like how it rains so often.
Hes not a boy hes a scug
Only just got to the Arti section and lemme tell you I agree 100%. I'm one of the few crazy people who enjoy scavs and getting chieftain, especially because I'm really bad at combat. So an entire campaign of just fighting scavs is hell. I love Arti on paper! She's so cool and awesome! I'd play her in a heartbeat if the entire point of her campaign wasn't committing mass genocide against scavengers.
Isn't the point of hollow knight is to commit genocide against every non merchant creature?
@@GlyphidGuard i mean count in Ori.
@@Foxett25 You're everywhere where rainworld is involved, I never played Ori because it doesn't support ps4 and my laptop can't handle most games, so I dont get the reference
Expedition mode is great because you get full karma and scavs don't hate you
Me too...!
The experience of going to Five Pebbles' city topped all of the other annoying parts of Artificer's campaign, I didn't experience like half of the annoyances that were listed, like I enjoyed the difficulty and even if I got my ass kicked there was still the novelty that I was in 5P's mfing city which kept me hooked and wanting to explore as much as I could. I enjoy exploring all the little details and environmental storytelling in rw more than the gameplay + I only had to pass like one or two annoying scav karma gates to get to the exterior and to 5P himself. The fact that this campaign had no greater lore significance and was it's own adventure made it refreshing compared to some of the other DLC slugcats; apart from that it literally contained everything I had hoped for and was such a nice first character to play. Maybe I'm objectively wrong idgaf but I enjoyed Arti the most it had me fr fangirling the entire time through.
SAME!!! I'd put arti and saint in S tier, as those were my two favorite scugs, artificer was super fun, ESPECIALLY metropolis.
@@St4rStormy yeah same and i'm curious if i'm the only person who would put gourmand in F tier
Metropolis is definitely S-tier, but I wouldn't say Artificer is. Subterenean is as good as blocked off unless you're lucky with cycle durations and deer AI. Farm Arrays is of course flawed by the deer not cooperating, but the scavs make any sort of waiting, trying again or taking another route impossible.
This is not helped by Arti's disdain of water, making passing through Drainage System also near impossible.
@@merijngout39 I feel like that only applies to Arti if you're going for the unique but basically the same ascension ending, since that mainly applies to the other portion of the map. Ideally the entire experience should be consistent but with Arti I rly like the more tailored approach with that region having it's own ending. Ascension is way too hard to get with Arti for it to be the more intended path.
Objectively speaking, there's nothing wrong with Artificer, it's the campaign that's the issue. The scavenger AI is so erratic that it adds a fifth layer of RNG onto an already RNG heavy game. And relying on luck, especially if you're consistently unlucky, is the worst feeling because there's literally nothing you can do. And the only thing that really gives points for her campaign, other than the story, is metropolis. But even that can't entirely exempt the rest of the issues. It's nigh impossible to get to Five Pebble's bottom gate, Old Garbage Waste sucks (or sucked depending on if you played before the patch that added the tunnel lines), Waterfront doesn't even exist for her and Moon is fucking dead. The rest of the game is completely overcompensated with Scavengers meaning that it's either sink or swim and unless you're the Jesus of gaming, you're gonna be sinking 95% of the time because one spear from offscreen flew straight into you. Not to mention she probably has the simplest path of any campaign. It's not bad, but the length of the campaign also doesn't help. As opposed to literally all other campaigns where you have to visit an iterator than go do something far away, Artificer only has to meet Five Pebbles than go into his hair (city). It's not objectively bad, but it does limit what can be positively (and negatively) said about the campaign itself due to its length.
And don't even get me started on how fucking horrid her spawns are for expedition mode. Yes, I'd love to spawn in Five Pebbles or Metropolis for the fifth time in a row when I need to collect fucking mushrooms.
Artificer feels somewhat like the Monk of Downpour, but reversed. Monk is boring to play, while Artificer is way to advanced compared to all the other scugs. Monk's campaign is relaxing, while Artificer's is bloodshed. And both their stories are personal journeys, one for reuniting, and the other for revenge. But overall, both feel like afterthoughts when it comes to the rest of the game. Monk never really given any attention and Artificer never given any balance. Even more ironic is the parallels in their endings, Monk following the path of peace reuniting happily, and Artificer following the path of revenge forever trapped.
Actually wow, those parallels really just came to me but those are way to coincidental to be coincidences. Definitely intentional. Cool.
15:25 Actually if you give it to Moon on Saint she says it was mixed with 'fire powder' (presumably from a gunpowder plant) for warmth by the scavengers.
Fun fact with the lanterns in saint, if you bring one to moon she says the same thing as every other character but says it also mixed with something called fire powder to give off warmth too! Plot hole solved.
Just a small correction: Scavs do only take one shot to kill. Some do however have a small window of "bleedout time" where they'll freak out and can take one more shot at you before keeling over dead on their own. Best you stab them a few times if you're fighting one close range. The initial shot will knock it out so you can just shank it again just in case it's one of the ones that has that extra bleedout time to take one last revenge shot. Most of the time it's not big issue if you're a little ways away. You can tell if a scav is really dead if it drops everything it's carrying.
I absolutely hate Spearmaster's campaign but I love this cat and his new lore unlocks all over the world made me appreciate him even more. Its fun to run around every region looking for that one lore satellite without looking at map on wiki.
Why do you hate spearmaster
@@laurenromero2134 he doesnt hate spearmaster just his campaign. A lot of people don't like it, Its pretty hard but I enjoyed it. There was a lot of new map to explore and seeing moon was !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
@@laurenromero2134 in my personal opinion, having to carry around a very important, very easy to lose pearl in your hand without the ability to swallow it for safekeeping, making the dual wielding mechanic useless for more than half the campaign is, honestly, quite frustrating. And I say that with spearmaster being my favorite slugcat.
I had to spawn the bloody pearl in with cheats because I left it in pebbles chamber by accident and went into a shelter, not to mention the back and forth between 5-p and moon was really annoying, cyan lizards EVERYWHERE and way too many bottomless pits, I got stuck in exterior for the longest time trying to get to the wall so I could get to sky islands, the experience made me hate underhang. So yeah spear masters campaign sucks.
@@loftwingheropon2743 never ever in my life I would think that DLL infested Underhang is better than one without Rot at all.
ngl artificer is my fav anyway. I do agree that it's quite annoying to drag scav's body to the gate but you need to do that only once in the whole playthrough.
And I had so many good memories about exploring as artificer.
you need to do it three times no? from garbage to industrial, and industrial to chimney tops, and chimney to wall. Or did i miss a shorter path?
@@theminecraft4202 there is a shortcut from garbage to shaded near the starting room
@@theminecraft4202 from garbage to shaded, then to exterior and then up the wall to five pebbles
@@ballSucker344 ohhh ok thx
The reason he doesn't like artificer's campaign is: 🎉🎉 skill issue 🎉🎉
Did you know: if you go back into your finished rivulet save moon calls him “Ruffles” later in the game she talks to another slugcat and says that there once was one of its kind that had long since passed.
Moon says that to Saint (the next scug in the timeline). Considering I played Spearmaster --> Rivulet --> Saint, I was fresh off my Riv save when I got that dialogue and it made me smile
Daszombes during Artificer rating: "But we're rating campaigns here." - 1:49
Daszombes after that: *rates all the slucats on the overall gameplay instead of just the campaign* ... spearmaster *cough*
Edit: In all honesty I agree with mostly everything on here except Arti and Gourmand. (I would put him higher as I like his gimmicks of crafting and becoming a meteor strike)
tbh, I liked rubicon, it did feel like the game itself was trying to stop me. But that was kinda the idea, to me rain world is a game where it doesn’t want you to win, and when you win that’s the true fun of the game. So when I kept dying in rubicon, I felt motivated, not frustrated. I can see where you’re coming from though.
solid tier list I definitely agree with the top 2 picks just because of how much fun I had with the lore and region changes/additions they had on my play-through of their campaigns (although rubicon was a crime against humanity)
Sunny pfp based
It's worth noting that the lantern has custom dialog with Moon on Saint's campaign as they DON'T just use slime mold anymore. Also, all pearl dialog, including blank pearl dialog, is different for Spearmaster and Artificer because Moon has a different perspective before her fall and Pebbles is... Pebbles.
I understand why artificer is so low on this tier list, but I don't agree.
I just remember having a bad day at uni, going home and killing scavengers in metropolis for hours. My favorite strategy was to go to their camp, throw a bomb at them and run away. Then I'd find a pipe with both ends horizontal and near the ground, hide there, steal spears from any scaveners that dare try to go in. Pile up on corpses, kill a few elite scavs, go back to the shelter and either die on the way back or add a few dozen scavs to your kill count. Sleep, repeat.
But then I met the echo and went for "drown in a hallucinogenic pond" ending
10/10, would explode again
A cool alternative to Artificer's Karma system could've been that she's locked at Karma 1 but if she eats a scavenger it will increase by 1 or half up to Survivor karma. BUT, her karma decreases by 1 every cycle so it still encourages players to hunt scavengers. This could have some lore tie in like "Her anger is satiated with every taste of revenge she feels," or something like that but most importantly, it would be WAY more fun, it adds in a consequence to dying (I.E. your Karma will go down meaning that you will need to hunt more scavengers) but it still lets her ACTUALLY interact with the Karma mechanic from the get go albeit with one that's a lot more restrictive. It actually adds a layer of strategy and descision making rather than locking you at "Oh just bring a scavenger corpse to this gate."
that doesnt fit to the lore of the game though
@@airiden4734 Yeah... good ludonarrative interaction is hard. But like, I really hate playing Artificer despite really liking her story in general. 😭
I feel like Artificer is my favorite campaign because of her abilities and karma system it makes her focus on her gimmick of murdering scavs and fighting them and i feel like her game rewards mastering combat and strategy
I personally love the scav combat since i learned a lot on how to fight the only thing i majorly agree with is the fact they can see you on the other screen and kill you
Also her whole gimmick is the fact she has the most complicated combat and movement that you can learn and in my opinion the most op slugcat
I love artificer because it's really combat focused and doesn't really punish you that hard for dying, so it gives me more room to do sick plays, but I can understand perfectly why a lot of people really dislike her
Edit: Mauling is god-tier
Amen
I csnt understand why someone woukdnt like Arti.
I still love hunter. Now that you can remove the cycle limit its survivor but for the more experienced, which I think is awesome.
I still play hunter often as it provides a nice balanced challenge that isn't as linear as the downpour campaigns but is still harder than survivor.
Plus I just love his abilities. While they all are outclassed by other slugcats, I feel its a nice upgrade to survivor without having some overpowered advantage like downpour slugs.
As someone who is a rain world god in terms of combat, I would personally put arti above the OG three. Its genuinely a lot of fun for me to just rapidly gut every scav in a ten meter radius when i bomb a toll like a drone. Though since i am aware not everyone enjoys the jank that comes with RW combat, i fully understand the placement at nearly bottom tier
I agree, the campaign is fun for rain world players that enjoy combat and are good at it. I personally also enjoyed it alot, but that's only because I'm good enough to not die all the time. I totally get why someone would rank it so low.
Arti is my favorite campaign honestly, I love traversing pebble's city with the jumps and the combat is way less unfair than with others.
Also waterfront facility offers a new challenge with her, which I really enjoyed.
I love how all the responses here are peppered with a tiny amount of smug self-affirmation about how good everyone is at combat.
@@RoundusMongus thats called confidence in each own skills and being able to like artificer is being good at combat
Spearmaster might be a multistage fetchquest, but I love the story behind it`s campaign - seeing another Iterator indirectly intervening the events and trying to connect with Pebbles is extremely sad. Spearmaster gets to listen to Iterator logs, to learn of their worries and thoughts, and the messages SRS sends about feeling attached to their messenger is very bittersweet. This campaign lays the groundwork for the Saint to give the game a proper emotinoal ending, and is the second most emotional story of the slugcats (second only to Saint, of course).
Also the anatomy of Spearmaster is a little...disturbing. Why did SRS had the wonderful idea of transporting a pearl inside animal`s Chest Cavity I have absolutely no clue.
Have you not read the lore? Most animals in rainworld are artificial. Purposed organisms. The original inhabitants rebuilt animal life to suit their needs. Ancestors of Slugcats were literally pipe cleaners. So repurposing animals for their bidding is kind of their theme.
The spear master is 100% the best!
I’m new to rainworld and I really love monk. I’m terrible at video games so the chance to be able to enjoy rainworld in an easier mode and cutting down on some of the frustration felt when playing as the other slug cats is very welcome to me.
I guess the only saving grace for monk is that In downpour they gave him a sub-quest to give Moon DAT DRIP.
You can get that in any campaign between Hunter and Rivulet
@@the_phantom_cat7912 why would they do that.. would be a cool quirky think for monk players to have
It was very interesting to get another person's opinion who has been through all the companies.
I don't know what my personal top would look like, but most likely at the very bottom would be Master of the Spear. For him, even just raising the sleep food meter is already a challenge. And the fact that he can't reuse needles already cast for power doesn't make the game any easier. Even the technician with his two disadvantages (karma, and scavengers) didn't fuck me so much (in a way, the lack of karma helps me not to lose so much when dying in fights with scavengers).
8:47 Scavs using 101% of their brain power:
Game devs: Rivulet can breath underwater
Me: Fucking drowns
Spearmaster while the pearl is still inside him: A tier
Spearmaster when the pearl is no longer inside him and you have to carry it around: C tier
Spearmaster while in the Vents subregion of LttM: F tier
The thing about Artificer is that it's a combat focused campaign. While for Hunter and Gourmand it's just completing objectives, Arti is MADE to cannonball through the screens and slaughter all they come across. I mean, all other campaigns can be done as a pacifist if you try harder enough. Arti? Can't even leave the initial region without slaughtering the scavs. It's just pure rage
can't believe the nuclear weed scug isn't in S tier
bro env deserves a solid S tier, i love the nachos
Nachos will never be the same 😢
SACRILEGE! SACRILEGE! ARTIFICER (sniffles) (snot drips on kebyoard) WAS THE BEST CAPGAPI!n! YOU ARE WRONG! WRONG!! IM WRITNG NOT YYUIOO
Real as fuck
Just gotta say I love your iterator avatar, holy crow it looks so freaking good.
I loved rivulets campaign for the constant rain. Very cool atmosphere
Same
I guess I have a diffrent perspective (or just am a basic bitch) but to me Survivor is the uncontested S tier. When I think of Rain World 8 times out of 10 it's about his campaign, all the others are just variants of his one. It's crazy to me to call him boring, cause he's the first and definitive plauthrough of Rain World, the most interesting gaming experience I ever had.
But it's not just that he's the first and therefore the best, it's also very clear that the whole game has been specifically designed around him and his mobility. Obviously the rest have some changes to accomodate them (Saint specifically) but it's just not comparable to having the whole world made from the ground up with him in mind.
Rivulet is gonna be S isnt it?
Who didn't expect it lmao
I dont think Rivulet is that good. Too annoying with bad time limit.
Story was great tho. And exploring the world was rly cool. But the time limit makes you skip enemies which is the coolest thing about rainworld.
15:30 pretty sure if you give lantern as saint to moon she mentions that is has chery bomb powder or something
Yeah she mentions it had "fire powder" smeared on the inside, which is what provides the heat.
@@redwes99 and this is only in saints campaign
altho I suppose could be of use to be mentioned somewhere in the start of it
instead of said by moon
Your first experiences with saint and riv were very different to mine. I took the direction through rubicon that didnt lead to the M i r o s D i m e n s i o n and enjoyed it quite a bit. And in submerged superstructure, i simply got lost for two hours because i couldnt see the exit door.
So my thoughts on these campaigns pretty much line up with yours as a whole and if this were my tierlist, i would have put saint in S alongside riv
oh yeah i also got trapped by a shelter failure at the top of chimney canopy while playing riv and that was pretty funny
average Lizor Land enjoyer.
Hard agree just gonna have to say zombes got a skill issue with saint fr fr rubicon is a goated area
Glad to know I'm not the only person who enjoyed Rubicon! It felt really thrilling to play.
Another Rubicon enjoyer here. Honestly a huge skill issue. I loved the color palette, completely obliterating miros vultures, and flying above open voids
slight saint spoiler, i actually gave moon a lamp and she said "Oh they seem to have also put fire dust in it" or something like that, which makes it hot, so thats why 15:30
Random fact: Hunter can actually dual-wield using a whiplash/slide-flip as long as there isn't a spear on his back. Afterwards, he can carry one on his back and still have two in his paws.
Well, he can't duel wield that's just abusing giltches
@@Khanical Hunter is the only slugcat capable of pulling it off, Spearmaster can automatically dual wield without any advanced movement tech.
Attempting to do so as any other scug doesn't work. Trust me, I've tried.
15:23 if you take the glow lantern in saint’s campaign to moon, she will say it has fire powder or something in it that produces heat
Holy fuck, bro just permanently murdered arty.
Artificer complaints are simply: mad cos bad. LMAO
artificer fans trying to explain why its fun to fight groups of enemies that can instant kill you from off screen with nigh-perfect prediction aiming that sit right outside your shelter waiting to spawn camp you
7:23 bro emoted
i mean, i loved Arti because combat is one of my favorite things in game. Jumping around cover and styling on Scavs is one of my favorite things
I am both offended and pleasently surprised you put my beloved fat boy where he is
0:01 Wash them balls
I actually agreed with every single ranking you did! I was skeptical at first, but once you explained, you had me sold on the placement. I admire your ability to articulate your thoughts, as I am awful at it lol.
S Tier channel ngl 🤙
Artificer fixed the worst part of the game for me, which were karma gates. No more grinding in areas hard to get food - you died? Who gives a shit, the goal hasn’t moved, just try again.
Also, you’re never low on food since you can feast on your enemies. Arti’s a hero to me
(Monk goes into the boring trio) meanwhile me whos playing as monk while watching:"wait, what"
yeah i agree with this, only thing is i'd put Gourmand higher and put Arti right above hunter, but i definitely understand the reasoning for putting them where you did. solid ranking of one of my favourite games' campaigns. can't wait for the next iterator logs and whatever else you've got in store :)
it's weird, cause for me it was really easy to do saint's power, so rubicon wasn't that bad, meanwhile you said you got lost with rivulet for an hour at five pebbles and... god i wish it was only an hour. as for the parry mechanic... it's much easier to just use your parry the moment you are near a scav, it stuns them and then you can just kill them easily, you don't have to *actually* parry with it
I agree with this list, good job 👍. My favorite is spear master. Maybe you could do a mod tier list at some point with modded slugcats, or just mods in general. I think that could be interesting
Big arti fan here and yeah I agree with a lot of your points on her. Luckily you don't need to use the karma system when going through the main campaign (gw>sh>uw>mt) but it is soo annoying when trying to do anything else. I haven't had too many issues with scavs sniping me but the few times it has happened we're super annoying.
And the boss fight... I'm torn on it. It's not amazingly fun but it doesn't feel horrible to me either.
Overall my favourite aspect of her campaign is the movement, also murdering scavs is really fun lmao
You should try Arti with CameraScroll and one of the 3 aim helper mods - turns from bullshit into a decently fun 2d shooter
camerascroll is pretty much a must for arti's campaign
I prefer Screen Peek
It was one of the reasons I created Aim Helper mod yeah!
Even without snapping feature just being able to have verticality in combat and having actual high ground advantage makes the game a lot more fun. Not having to pinpoint accuracy every shot really does make the combat feels less punishing.
@@awrilynn Thats actually the one I use! It provides 90% of the ability of Aim Anywhere without the downside of not working very well in co-op or split screen, I nicknamed it the Deadeye mod lmao. Its certainly well made!
i also suggest Artificer-revive-on-kill mod for ultimate canon doom slayer experience
14:58, Wet mouse! Wet mouse!!WET MOUSE!!!
INV ISNT A BOTTOM!!
HE IS ALPHA GIGACHAD WITH UNSPOKEN RIZZ AND ALWAYS ON TOP(except for spearmaster maybe)
The Rizzmaster
15:32 i remember what you said in stream!
"Ah! My vegan bones!" *Dies*
I agree with almost everything on here, but personally I rank Spearmaster lower. I love his spear creating and eating mechanics, I love the lore and collectible chatlogs, and the green spiders were a very funny addition. My big issues with Spearmaster are the fact that you need to carry a pearl with you for the majority of his run, and along with being very difficult, I find Moon to be pretty boring pre-collapse. Her structure is, understandably, very similar to Five Pebble's, and since the Exterior and Five Pebbles himself are my least favorite regions, I didn't exactly love Moon's. I still find the pearl to be a bigger issue, partially because I encountered the only real bug I found in this expansion, which just erased the pearl half of the time and made his campaign very frustrating towards the end of it, but I also don't like carrying the pearl around constantly because it gets rid of his dual wielding unless you put it down somewhere and pick it up later. Having to ferry the pearl around removes one of his few mechanics, and that, combined with the fact that you can't create spears while moving, really brings down his gameplay for me. I know that that second point is maybe to balance him but it was just annoying to me, his biggest mechanic is printing spears but once you throw them, especially if you still need food, you have to stop somewhere to make more and it slows down his combat. Maybe I just need to get good but I wish he had other downsides, something that compliments his abilities rather than just getting in the way of them.
moon also says that the scavengers modified the lanterns to be warm
Artificer was one of the best ones for me. You know that "finally, a worty opponent" meme ? Well that's arti's campaign, yeah the spear throws from the other screen sure are annoying but it's not like most other common ennemies pose a real threat (except white and cyan lizards) + arti has high mobility with the double jump so if the timing of the parry is too hard for you, you can just fart away. I had no issues with the karma system of arti too, thought it was original, also you have no issues related to the bodie's weight since arti s strong af. Also i though it was cool that we get to explore a more slugcat oriented campaing, where it's just an animal doing it's own thing. Sure we interact with 5p but that's not the core of the narrative. We already get plenty of iterator lore in the next campaingns, variety isn't bad.
Bro made a triangle.
Man I’m really exited for Artificer once downpour is on Nintendo Switch, because I’ll be able to massacre scavengers without feeling bad.
Okay maybe not the best place to ask this, but can someone explain cycles to me? I legit just got the game today (on Nintendo switch if that matters) and all I knew were, survival game, you play as a slugcat, lizard=beeg nom nom boi
And me being me which doesn't help at all because I can almost guarantee the only thing anyone reading this knows about me is this comment, I practically speedran cycles, I would go out, eat, and run straight back to the shelter. There was one time I stayed out a little longer and ended up getting lost and dying in the rain. I knew near nothing about the game and I still know.. a little farther from nothing.
surprised the rivulet section didn't come with moon thirsting lmao
ruffles is truly top tier
i am so glad that it forms a bell curve, that brings me unending joy
Having your finger on the throw button and holding a spear all the time had me get through the campaign with ease: every time i needed a scavenger to pass a gate i just see a bunch and throw a spear. Horizontally facing transport tubes and tubes in general makes it stupidly easy to kill them, so if you know how to deal with them scavengers are not a problem, but of help.
The key to winning a fight to a scavenger is that you, as a slugcat are able to throw spears instantly, while the scavenger has to aim first, which takes about a quarter of a second - which is A LOT. You are also able to pickup and throw spears only in the span of a few frames, while the scavengers need more time than that
As someone who has never played the game I think they should all go in S
self-proclaimed "saints" when they get their hands on triple damage spears and instakill sticky bombs:
I feel like Arti's campaign is really held back by the fixed camera. I can't count how many times I moved through screens and was immediately one shot by a scav that I could've never seen. When you have the upper hand, they're really fun though.
My personal rankings would be
S: rivulet
A: spearmaster, hunter, gourmand
B: artificer, survivor
C: saint, monk
the parry challenge took my longer than any other challenge, i swear to god i hate parries so much
Ey Daszombes, could you make a Creature Tier list after the (possible) Flora and Fauna Video?
15:25 Actually ☝🤓,there is an explenation, if you bring a lantern to moon as Saint she explains that the scavengers coated the inside with a sort of fire powder, which explains the warmth and why most scavengers are carrying lanterns even outside.
Call me crazy, but I've always loved monk the best. I'm a switch player with no downpour so that may change, but I love being able to explore and admire the game at my own pace with no worries! not to mention the lizard taming mechanic is so, so cute. I always play monk when I can, and I never really get bored. maybe that's just me, though?
14:40 omg I can’t believe you didn’t do a double roll into a pounce into a slide when you fell from that slightly tall height
I loved the artificer campaign. And I think her karma mechanics fits it perfectly . Having just reduced karma limit would have not worked. With Arti it is just a matter of a lucky cycle or few to get a stash of scav bodies in a shelter, which would have fed her straight to enlightenment (if she could have it unlocked). While working on Pilgrimage achievement I had to farm karma few times. It was trivial. The real challenge was in finding a karma flower and getting alive to the Echo with its effect on me. I once sat for dozen of cycles, gorging on the bodies of my prey. It went so long that I'd not be surprised if I would got the Gourmand stats for few cycles.
As for the changes in Garbage Wastes - I loved them too. I didn't like the original GW. The one I saw in Arti's campaign, with industrial buildings with acid pools in them, finally gave the region a unique feel. Also I properly explored it after wandering for 30 or 50 cycles all around the world and getting okay with Arti's combat. So I had lots of fun slaughtering all the top predators. Having many monster dens, scav dens and migration paths right next to shelters was a perfect recipe for good time.
Omg it's you again, I just watched your gem anime video and now I'm watching the eco Sim video, so cool
Yay, a Tier List!
The arti campaign stuff, to me, is actually quite accurate.
Except that killing scavangers gives me bloodlust and dopamine so the campaign gets extra fun.
(i love nuking scavanger tolls with bombs)
I honestly agree with Artificer. I wish it was a lot better because the difficulty design makes it more of an ordeal than a challenge.
Spoilers:
Also, I agree with your tier list. But in my experience, Saint is an S tier. Ironically enough, I didn’t struggle as much in Rubicon.
4:04 Scavengers also have aimbot assist and can see + attack between screen transitions.
To me, I feel like in a post downpour world, Arti being targeted by the enemy that you normally avoid pissing off serves the purpose of getting the player to engage with combat. In pre downpour, unless you did a Hunter run combat was decently avoidable, and that time limit scares a lot of people off. But with Arti not having that issue or even karma to worry about, it gives players a great way to learn combat outside of the arena. Which really combat in Arena is so different from singleplayer it's hard to call skills there transferable to main game aside from things like movement tech. Granted, this is only valuable if you didn't engage with the combat until you got to Artifcer. Which is far from universal. But I know I was sure that player, so it felt like a real jolt to the system. However, I agree with the rest of your points now that I am more familiar with the combat.
because i’m a crackhead dipshit, i really enjoy having The Horde trying to kill you in arti’s campaign. i never befriend scavs in other campaigns and tend to either kill or ignore them completely, and while you’re right that scavs really arent designed to be fought, she’s equipped to deal with them far better than any other slugcat. the only times i’ve actually had an issue with the scavs is at the outposts cause of the terrible screen transitions,but i’d argue that they’re significantly less annoying than things like rivulet’s short rain timer, gourmand’s exhaustion, or saint’s fragility. in the end it comes down to playstyle i guess, if you dont like killing literally everything i can see why you’d dislike arti.
Since everyone is putting their personal tier lists in the comments, I decided to make my own. (Keep in mind that these are ranked from personal experience and biases rather than actual objective points)
S Tier: Survivor and Saint.
My main reason for Survivor to be in S tier is because, as someone who played the game before the downpour expansion released, it just felt amazing getting to learn about a world that is alien to you. It especially worked for me because of the immersion the games tries so hard to give to you (which its successful on). None of the other campaigns (excluding Spearmaster and Saint) give this feeling of the unknown to me.
Gameplay and story wise, compared to the other scugs, they're just okay, but honestly, my first experience just gave me an everlasting impact.
Now, my main reason for Saint to be in S tier, is because of the amazing lore that gets revealed thorough their campaign, and just getting to see the world in the far future felt great too.
However, the reason as to why Saint is still below Survivor, is because of their gameplay. I did like being a pussy all the way through the campaign, but then it just felt odd having to fight in Rubicon (especially against the apex predators)
A Tier: Rivulet and Spearmaster.
Now, now, before you get mad at me, I would've put Riv in S tier, but the main reason as to why I didn't actually put their campaign in S tier, is because of how short it felt. It could either be me getting good at the game, but I just died only like 2 times with this character and I went through the usual path I go through, which lead to me beating it extremely quickly. I loved everything else about it though, from getting to explore Moon's submerged superstructure, to seeing what the peak of the rot looks like, to the immaculate movement they have.
I know this is also going to be a controversial opinion, but I loved Spearmaster's campaign. Seeing the earliest time frame possible just adds a bunch of points to their campaign, ESPECIALLY because you get to explore Moon's superstructure before her downfall.
It also helps that they are probably the most difficult of the slugcats (i'm a masochist).
Despite this, their campaign is probably the most tedious near the end. (excluding the dialogue, of course)
B Tier: Gourmand and Artificer.
The reason as to why Gourmand isn't lower (like some people would like them to be) is because, despite the getting exhausted mechanic being annoying, they still have relatively decent movement when tired. My main reason as to why it's on a relatively okay spot is, while the campaign is not as unique, I really like the mechanics they have. For example, the food quest, the body slam, the roll, etc.
My main bias towards the campaign is the fact that it introduces Outer Expanse (which is frankly my favorite zone in the ENTIRE game, Downpour and Vanilla included)
Now, for Artificer. I like the campaign and character, she has the most offensive capabilities out of all the slugcats. In fact, she would be my favorite Scug if it wasn't because of her main thing.
The fucking Scavengers. I'm not gonna explain why they suck.
It also doesn't help that there's an infinite spawn of Scavengers, which means you just have to deal with them all the time if you refuse to run away. What's the point of making her offensively capable if it's not to absolutely demolish entire tribes?
Metropolis has to be one of my favorite zones, though. This and her capabilities are the only two reasons I don't put her lower on the list.
I also have issue with her story, but I'd rather not talk about that.
C Tier: Hunter.
Never had fun with this campaign, the cycle limit being the main mechanic that tatters it for me.
Its a cool idea, but the fact that I have to deal with karma gates too does really make it kind of annoying to me. It also does due to the fact that I love exploration (as i've probably made it clear)
I like that it introduced new enemy variants, though.
D Tier: Monk.
They literally have nothing that is unique to the campaign other than Unfortunate Development being different.
Now, as for Inv, not gonna talk about it for the sake of this comment.
Just know that I despise it with my entire being.
But I thought you were a masochist, you should love Inv
@@hajimehinata5854 there's a point where even masochists don't enjoy pain
13:27 as spearmaster, once u mastered the crouch throw or slide throw, u can face lizard with 2 spears and it's gg
i played arti with the mod that gives you karma on scav death for the majority of it, and i can DEFINITELY say it improves the experience. the scavs are annoying, i got more deaths than i did in any other campaign, [roughly ~120, if youre curious] and while the lows were low the highs were HIGH. half of the issue with metropolis and why i had to start from the beginning so often was probably because i decided to bring a pup along for the ride, so ignoring that [since it's not vanilla] its still pretty solid imo! of course you shouldnt need a mod to make a campaign good, relying on mods to make your game enjoyable isnt ideal, but it does improve the overall experience for what its worth.
I love the cracked sluggy
Close combat is super easy for artificer since you have a dedicated stun button
honestly i think the whole no progression of karma in arti's campaign is supposed to be a counter to how frequently you'll die by now I've completed her campaign like 4 times and I still die
if the karma was affected by that it would have been a lot more frustrating also the gate issue can be ignored a little considering the fact that theres 1000 scavs per room honestly shes a lot more enjoyable if you have the parry mechanionc down, how would you do that? well just go left in the first room there you can find and fight a bunch of scavs
sorry if this sounds like a rant
also sorry for any bad grammar as english is my second language
also nice vid
*mechanic
I think the tier list I made a few weeks back is nearly identical to yours (the differences being Inv being in his own tier, arti being in F and hunter being in A behind spearmaster)
5:32
I have never once utilized the mushrooms until I played Arti for THIS REASON ALONE 😭😭
I actually enjoyed fighting scavangers as artificer. I don't know why. Probably the explosives.
Bonus points for Rivulet: She is the cutest of the slugcats.
They're all great, in my opinion. (spoilers for everything)
Survivor is a great beginning, not easy, not hard, but decent anyways. Quite easy to learn, tough hard in the beginning.
Monk, while seemingly easier in the gameplay, doesn't have quite the same immersion as survivor, and without downpour, they do not have lore.
Hunter, has the ultimate weapon, extra spear! But they also have 20 days to live (5 more if you visit a god on the way), and ends up horribly. But you know, that extra spear makes up for it :)
Artificer, while great in both combat and mobility, just as you said, has scavenger problems. Tough i cannot admit that i don't enjoy murdering scavengers for fun.
Gourmand is great in combat, but doesn't have that extra mobility like artificer. And while slides work great, they're not very useful when you're tired. and while you can leap, throw boost and such, it's still more useful to go the long way than... Do whatever you have to.
Spearmaster, is a bit harsh. Very harsh, in my opinion. Things like underhang are quite hard, as you have to eat, carry the pearl, a grapple worm (If you do go to pebbles first, like me) and don't get me started on the horrible, long jumps at precipice.
Rivulet, is in my opinion, great. While the shortened cycles make it tough sometimes (I am reffering to my painful, near death moment in painige system, literaly 1 second from drowing), it's quite fun to just run past everything, and yeet across everything. The rot wasn't too bar for me, quite fun actually! Just jumped trough it for the cell.
Saint... While there's no spears, the cold is dangerous, and the lizard instakill... You know, the lore is fun, and the whole god thing, it's cool!
Enot/inv/???/sofanthiel/paincat is simply a fucking retard. Nobody likes their campaign outside of the dating sim.
Thanks for coming to my ted talk (My hands hurt awh)
sofanthiel is only for G A M E R S
That INV opinion gave me extreme whiplash. I never expected you to talk like that, holy shit.
I think she hates it guys, I don't know.
@@simplymax1337 i do have some based opinions.
oh boy, I'm gonna have to play the rest of this expansion, because I played artificer and fuckin loved it
You only ranked artificer badly cuz skill issue...
Honestly tho… like there’s literally scavs everywhere in this campaign and its literally made to have scavs always mad at u and if you can’t kill a scav… ur just bad