Scarlet (solo Nightmare)

[NeloDante]

So Scarlet was the last character to do a solo nightmare clear for me, I was never able to do it because the moment I went into werewolf form I'd simply die even with lifesteal and even if I used the i-frames to avoid things.
Until I unlocked the trait that let me stay as human that is, then first try cleared the thing without transforming into werewolf once and got the hidden skin that way too without even knowing.

So I'll ask you guys, what's the deal with Scarlet then? I have no damn idea how to survive when she's a WW and it's atrocious when it happens out of control too.

[optimistic realization]

It was the opposite for me on Darkness. Tbh, I probably wouldn't have been able to do it on nightmare. The biggest help on my run was the eat any non boss character skill. That sped up clearing camps out for me and at least reach level 11. I didn't have a very lucky run. It might be possibly with a lucky run and similar talents and items, just more damage item drops. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3462055975

The one item that makes the biggest difference is every health orb adds 1 damage until death. If you get that early, first stage, you stand a good chance of beating it. Without it I can rarely go about 70 damage by the 3rd boss. With it, I've gone up to 172 damage once. I think stacking health regen on low health is also strong.

[Plumber]

She's got pretty safe damage in human form, very high stagger in wolf form, and her second pair of ults are basically character defining if you pair them with Shapeshifter, since she trades a pretty underwhelming pair of ults that don't scale well for several seconds of doing whatever you want or instantly deleting corrupted heavies, and thanks to Shapeshifter, being able to do both in the same encounter when necessary. You might not get XP for instakilling things with In The Belly, but the time saved is significant even when solo.

There are encounters that human form handles better, like piles of big ghouls that won't stop overlapping each others' attacks, and encounters that wolf form handles better, like more easily manipulable enemies or stagger-gates like crabs. While Shapeshifter definitely isn't required to win with her, it's by far the most interesting of the starting talents: the manual transform has dodge frames and can chain seamlessly from H.Power or W.Special; you have full access to her kit and can use the correct form for each fight; and you can defy the whole issue of "dang I'm stuck in the wrong form and now this clear is slow" since you can offset your CDs by swapping to the other form which makes extra charges just as appealing as CDR, like opting for Thunderstones over Raven Beaks, and Nibelungen Ring says hi too.

This is all to lead into the main thing I want to advertise which will dramatically improve your opinion of wolf form, where the character really clicked for me: get the Double Strike and Fan of Knives talents and at least one Charmstone and/or Seven-League Boots. Wolf is pretty slow. Dash attacks are not slow. Wolf's dash attack is fast, cancels into other abilities including itself, generates a ton of combo or burns it extremely efficiently with the Fan of Knives talent, and both the attack and Fan of Knives are eligible for Wolf Defense's lifesteal buff. Your big brick of a wolf is now a lightning-fast brick that staggers incredibly fast, has amazing sustain, and still has access to Power/Special for safety. While dash builds aren't really unique to Scarlet, she has by far the easiest time getting one off the ground; basically maximum priority talents to me. Pair this with the Murderous Intent talent and stacking up for big Powers is still possible. The Savagery and Adrenaline talents are obvious matches too.

Oh, and you can also do dumb things with Adder Stone stacking like buffering multiple Human Defenses back to back to walk through an entire army of enemies at a red POI, grab the item, and leave.

[NeloDante]

Originally posted by optimistic realization:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3462055975

I forgot, how can you check the history of runs again? I don't remember that screen at the end of a run either.

Originally posted by Plumber:

Oh, and you can also do dumb things with Adder Stone stacking like buffering multiple Human Defenses back to back to walk through an entire army of enemies at a red POI, grab the item, and leave.

Yeah I've done that, it's great. I really enjoy her human form it's just the wolf that doesn't cut it for me.

I've also done the dash build you mentioned, but it's more of the same meanwhile it's crazy the damage wolf does I just simply don't survive. Trees spell death if I'm in wolf form, pigs can be devastating if there's too many of them, red cultist is a big no no as well... Then if I make it to act 2 after spending all my feathers, it just takes a very bad combination of (usually the pink Djinns) and I'm forced to waste time running away (to die later due to lack of resources) or stand there and hope I can outdps it which honestly sometimes it works but I'm not very fond of taking risks.

If you're curious, these are the levels of each character once I got them to do a solo nightmare run with each.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3462067744

[optimistic realization]

Originally posted by NeloDante:

Originally posted by optimistic realization:

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3462055975

I forgot, how can you check the history of runs again? I don't remember that screen at the end of a run either.

Originally posted by Plumber:

Oh, and you can also do dumb things with Adder Stone stacking like buffering multiple Human Defenses back to back to walk through an entire army of enemies at a red POI, grab the item, and leave.

Yeah I've done that, it's great. I really enjoy her human form it's just the wolf that doesn't cut it for me.

I've also done the dash build you mentioned, but it's more of the same meanwhile it's crazy the damage wolf does I just simply don't survive. Trees spell death if I'm in wolf form, pigs can be devastating if there's too many of them, red cultist is a big no no as well... Then if I make it to act 2 after spending all my feathers, it just takes a very bad combination of (usually the pink Djinns) and I'm forced to waste time running away (to die later due to lack of resources) or stand there and hope I can outdps it which honestly sometimes it works but I'm not very fond of taking risks.

If you're curious, these are the levels of each character once I got them to do a solo nightmare run with each.
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3462067744

At the end of a run, you can hit the x button on a controller to see statistics, not sure which keyboard key it would be, same as the attack button.

[Plumber]

green/white trees definitely demand the most respect of any ch1 enemy, especially since the roots can sometimes just be invisible hitboxes if they're attacking through terrain or near slopes. I don't really mind pigs since even if corrupted pigs can OHKO you they're very easy to manipulate and crowd up; usually they're the fastest to clear as a result

pink jinns are prime In The Belly execute targets, yeah, since the xp they reward is not commensurate with how much of a pain in the ass it is to maneuver around them or slowly chip them down as they teleport or wall you out with waves of projectiles. Just being able to say "no thanks I'll pass bye" to a corrupted heavy is so, SO convenient on Scarlet, and it's why I always take her second ult, especially since once the run gets going you have no shortage of dashes and abilities to rotate through that the first ult typically acts as filler for. The first ult has only felt impactful in the tail end of ch1 for me

I'm very fond of taking risks for comparison - my favorite character is Sun Wukong and I almost always take Stone Monkey to style on everything or die trying - but I can sympathize with the highest of highs not being very appealing if you have to shoulder the lowest of lows to get them.

[NeloDante]

Originally posted by Plumber:

I'm very fond of taking risks for comparison - my favorite character is Sun Wukong and I almost always take Stone Monkey to style on everything or die trying - but I can sympathize with the highest of highs not being very appealing if you have to shoulder the lowest of lows to get them.

Funny enough Wukong is also my favourite and Stone Monkey is also my go-to choice. However, with Wukong I have control of the risk I take meanwhile I don't feel that I'm in control with Scarlet unless I pick that talent to avoid being a werewolf alltogether.

[Plumber]

yeah, that's why Shapeshifter is so cool - it gives you that same kind of control, and while Wukong is about frequently changing your stats to suit the pace of the fight (or just building him so you stay in red stance and never leave it), Scarlet w/ Shapeshifter plays best when you route fights around creating situations where it's safe to dump everything you have in one form and then mop up with the other one.

if I haven't already heavily advertised it enough, it's my favorite of her starting talents by a mile and i agree that she feels pretty naked without it

[rev11ve おそれる]

Scarlet is one of the most completed character in RW so far. The strongest combo is now basic ATK. Pick the 4th trait that let you control the form yourself instead of day-night transform.

[Aetemes]

Scarlet imo can get away with a lot in difficult settings compared to others mainly due to:

Stealth:
If you can sneak a box/eye/whatever, that's a huuuge time saver or at least a way to get a boost to your power before clearing a camp (sometimes you need to clear the camp anyways just to keep up xp wise). Being able to drop aggro faster is a big deal imo.

Shifting/Innate Health Sustain/Iframes/Good scaling/no need to scale talents:

When I want to try hard Scarlet, imo the shifting starting talent is too good to pass up, being able to reset your spells/self heal/utilise a specific form is just too valuable.

Both Wolf/Human forms defence spells are really good, and with holy grail/charges/cd reduction/a little bit of armor, she has an easy time becoming very tanky, and having good ways to heal back up without needing any items.

She does have a lot of talents that are not worth upgrading, but she has the AA damage/fan of knives talents that are super impact-full when upgraded. That actually is not a bad thing, cause the talents that are not worth upgrading are super good as is (well some are straight up bad all together, but all characters have those lol).

So you can use up shards on other stuff, or just not need shards as much to be effective overall, I think that makes her a very good candidate for "everything is expensive" custom mode modifier.

The Fan of Knives/AA damage/Eternal Roses/Dash spam build, with perhaps a Black Lotus (life steal on AA), Mermaid tear or two, makes her have an easy time.

Wolf's eat stuff ultimate, if you manage to reduce cd/get a charge, that ultimate can be suuuper helpful in helping you snowball, while you do lose the xp that you'd get of killing the enemy, being able to kill a cursed super obnoxious enemy is imo super good, things like grimoires are a lot safer, and the ultimate does not really need any power scaling to "work", that potentially helps you snowball further even if your luck in the run hasn't been the greatest so far.

The Smoke ultimate also is a life saver and very strong. Having charges/cd reduction/shifting, the things you can do with this are a lot. The second ultimate is what I "think about" when playing in group higher difficulty settings, and why pick Scarlet at all from a sweaty gaming perspective.

However there is something to be said about that the first ultimate is perhaps more useful overall on solo settings if you don't manage to reduce the cd/get charges, it has a shorter cd, and the cleave/stagger damage is good in solo, although it was repeatedly nerfed I think xD. I tend to try to go hard for second ult shenanigans more now.

She has great stagger bar damage value through the special, and getting special/power charges acts as extra "iframes" on power on both wolf/human form, and special with wolf. She has innate talent to apply vulnerability as well.

The only thing that Scarlet is "scary" about to me, is that taking the shift talent does reduce your hp alot, and she doesn't have the best cleave especially at the beginning, but that's something that other characters suffer from in much worse ways than she does, and they don't have her many "gimmicks" to pad the problem.