The Lost.

[Phaper]

I read a character ranking thread on here recently, and was surprised at how many players rank The Lost as one of the stronger (or even strongest) characters in the game. Why exactly is that?

[Gold♥Shield]

Starts out with D4 and The Mantle. D4 can make some pretty insane combos from a pathetic run. Dodging is pretty easy anyways, so The Mantle just adds to his survival.

Basically, The Lost requires more skill to play and most players who bother ranking the characters are good enough they can dodge 95% of all enemies in this game with relative ease.

[Phaper]

D4 is neither a positive or a negative by itself because you don't know what you're going to get. Losing Holy Mantle would put it into the negatives a bit.

Basically, The Lost requires more skill to play and most players who bother ranking the characters are good enough they can dodge 95% of all enemies in this game with relative ease.

Woudn't that still put the Lost at the bottom of the totem pole?

If most things can be dodged, then characters with HP to absorb bad spawns (large rooms with Brimstone ghosts, for example) and REALLY bad rooms (double Bloat, Daddy Long Legs, and Conquest come to mind) should all be ranked higher.

[burn1none]

He can take a hit every single room, no other character can do that even if you get lucky with hearts. Also free and almost guaranteed devil deals. Basically if you can dodge well he's op as heck. Talking about Afterbirth obviously, in Rebirth he's a turd sandwich

[Phaper]

Originally posted by burn1none:

He can take a hit every single room, no other character can do that even if you get lucky with hearts.

The flip side is that he can take only one hit per room.

Also free

That's not as big of a deal as you make it.

It pre-supposes that a Devil Room spawns instead of an Angel Room, the Devil Room contains items (as opposed to Krampus or Red Chests), and that the items are useful to the Lost, or are items that would be considered worth the heart containers on a 'normal' character (thinking of items like Necromonicon, Brother Bobby, The Nail, etc).

With all items unlocked, there are a total of 50 items that can be for sale in a Devil Deal.

Of those 50, 11 have no effect (or an extremely negligible effect, like Lord of the Pit's small speed up) on The Lost: Razor Blade, Satanic Bible, Atheme, Betrayal, Cambion Conception, Dark Bum, Gimpy, Missing Page 2, My Shadow, Judas' Shadow, Lord of the Pit, and Spirit of the Night.

Of the remaining 39, an additional 12 either aren't very useful in general, or just aren't very useful to the Lost: Book of Sin, Necromonicon, We Need To Go Deeper!, The Nail, Black Powder, Brother Bobby, Demon Baby (auto-firing is dangerous for the Lost), Ghost Baby, Headless Baby, Multidimensional Baby, Sister Maggy, and Maw of the Void.

Of the remaining 27, 6 of those grant health in some form, so they're 'free' normally: The Pact, Abaddon, The Mark, Empty Vessel, Dead Cat, and Ceremonial Robes.

So that's 21 items, or less than half the item pool.

The value placed on them being free also pre-supposes a player will usually not have enough health to take one normally. Given the number of health upgrades in the boss item pool, I find this very unlikely.

and almost guaranteed devil deals.

According to the wiki stats page, unless he has Goat Head, you're more likely to average a Devil/Angel Room every other floor.

[jester]

if you're good at the game and can dodge, he is really one of the stronger characters in isaac but only after you unlock the mantle for him. you also get deals with the devil for free and they're almost guaranteed since you have no health. the real cancer character is the keeper but you can make him work with swallowed penny or something.

[burn1none]

Originally posted by Phaper:

Originally posted by burn1none:

He can take a hit every single room, no other character can do that even if you get lucky with hearts.

The flip side is that he can take only one hit per room.

Also free

That's not as big of a deal as you make it.

It pre-supposes that a Devil Room spawns instead of an Angel Room, the Devil Room contains items (as opposed to Krampus or Red Chests), and that the items are useful to the Lost, or are items that would be considered worth the heart containers on a 'normal' character (thinking of items like Necromonicon, Brother Bobby, The Nail, etc).

With all items unlocked, there are a total of 50 items that can be for sale in a Devil Deal.

Of those 50, 11 have no effect (or an extremely negligible effect, like Lord of the Pit's small speed up) on The Lost: Razor Blade, Satanic Bible, Atheme, Betrayal, Cambion Conception, Dark Bum, Gimpy, Missing Page 2, My Shadow, Judas' Shadow, Lord of the Pit, and Spirit of the Night.

Of the remaining 39, an additional 12 either aren't very useful in general, or just aren't very useful to the Lost: Book of Sin, Necromonicon, We Need To Go Deeper!, The Nail, Black Powder, Brother Bobby, Demon Baby (auto-firing is dangerous for the Lost), Ghost Baby, Headless Baby, Multidimensional Baby, Sister Maggy, and Maw of the Void.

Of the remaining 27, 6 of those grant health in some form, so they're 'free' normally: The Pact, Abaddon, The Mark, Empty Vessel, Dead Cat, and Ceremonial Robes.

So that's 21 items, or less than half the item pool.

The value placed on them being free also pre-supposes a player will usually not have enough health to take one normally. Given the number of health upgrades in the boss item pool, I find this very unlikely.

and almost guaranteed devil deals.

According to the wiki stats page, unless he has Goat Head, you're more likely to average a Devil/Angel Room every other floor.

One hit is plenty when it's literally every room of the game, even when I take moms knife I can just ram every enemy in a room quickly before the i-frames wear off. I disagree with your aren't very useful list too, pretty much everything on that list is a good replacement for d4 or is pretty good. How can you even say Maw, headless baby, the nail or demon baby isn't good? In my experience you are less likely to get a devil deal next floor if you take every item from every devil deal, if you pick and choose your items (what a normal character does anyways) you have more of a chance of a devil deal. Most health up items are garbage anyways if you are trying to have no red hearts after getting the Poloroid oo Negative anyways so I usually avoid them when I can even with other characters. Also he starts with flying and spectral which doesn't sound like much but is a pretty huge advantage. The other easy character is Azazel because he has flying and Brimstone but he wouldn't be nearly as easy if he didn't have flying.

Again, lost is good if you already have good habits and don't need extra hearts to get hit all the time. If you aren't at that point then he would suck I agree. To me though he's really fun to play and there is actually some tension when I'm fighting hush or a big room full of bosses when I know I can't tank like 10 hits.

[StopItGetSomeHelp]

•You get free devil deals(nine lives, brimstone, mom's knife etc)
•Start with holy mantle and d4(possible to reroll insane item combos)
•Start with flight and spectral tears
•Free curse rooms with holy mantle means higher chance of getting nine lives and becoming guppy
•Able to pause greed mode spawns for free(no health consumed)

[Phaper]

One hit is plenty when it's literally every room of the game, even when I take moms knife I can just ram every enemy in a room quickly before the i-frames wear off.

Mom's Knife is also one of the best damage items in the game. You're basing that assertion off of being very powerful already, and having a damage-dealing contact item (I think it's the highest damage contact item in the game, aside from having BFFs). In addition, that fails to take into account large rooms, bosses with invulerable 'forms', and more dangerous champions.

How can you even say Maw, headless baby, the nail or demon baby isn't good?

Maw has a charge and requires the Lost to get close to enemies. I consider that a liability because of the damage = death mechanic.

Headless Baby is not great because the creep damage isn't all that high and it's useless against flying enemies.

The Nail's temp damage bonus is nice, but it's a six room charge for a damage boost AND it's a speed down for that room (makes dodging harder) AND you also break stuff, which makes it untenable in rooms with 'special' rocks.

I mentioned Demon Baby's auto-fire for a reason: exploding enemies.

In my experience you are less likely to get a devil deal next floor if you take every item from every devil deal, if you pick and choose your items (what a normal character does anyways) you have more of a chance of a devil deal.

Okay.

But the game's coding doesn't base Devil Room generation off of whether items are taken. It's based off what previous floors, if any, it spawned from.

Also he starts with flying and spectral which doesn't sound like much but is a pretty huge advantage.

You're right, spectral + flying as default are really good without context. When the context is a character that dies if he ever takes damage as any point, then you have to weigh that against the downside. Those bonuses don't exist in a vacuum.

I played Rebirth Lost, as did you. Spectral was necessary, and I don't want to consider a Lost without flying.

I'd also note you keep equating Devil Deal with Devil Room. You will almost certainly get Krampy at one point (which is REALLY bad), and red chest rooms are possible as well.

lost is good if you already have good habits and don't need extra hearts to get hit all the time.

If you already have good habits and don't need extra hearts all the time, you can just pay those hearts for the Devil Deals on any other character. and not have the Lost's downside.

None of this was to say free Devil Deals forever isn't nice. It's to emphasize it's not nearly as good as you think it is.

[burn1none]

I'm not trying to argue with you, you asked why he's at the top of the list. For me those are reasons why. I'd compare lost with the Golden Gun in Goldeneye or Energy Sword in Halo. They are very powerful if used correctly and if you can mitigate their downsides

[Phaper]

I don't mean to argue.

Argue is more 'ur a but and ur opinion is poo'.

This is an exchange of ideas and viewpoints, and I'm open to being wrong. If I'm wrong, I get to learn something, so that's still a positive thing.

[burn1none]

I dont think there is a right or wrong if we are just ranking characters based on personal preference. Personally I find Lost to be most fun, Isaac would be second I guess if I want an easy win. Honestly I don't even really play most the other characters anymore because they don't offer much challenge even though I only play hard mode. For me the Lost ranks highest because he has the most potential for an op run with the way I play while also being the most fun because my run could end very easily so it makes me excited to play him. I do fun runs with him and have beaten hush and Mega Stan just for the lulz. On the other end of the spectrum I wouldn't play ??? or Keeper ever again if I don't have to because they are difficult without even having any really good benefits (until the new dlc comes out of course)

[Phaper]

When I finally finished the completion marks for Keeper on my first save file and got the 'Keeper now starts with a penny', I was confused and then thought 'oh, that must mean Swallowed Penny.'

When I started another Keeper run and realized it meant literally one cent, I was not happy.

In terms of power ranking, I was thinking more in terms of which ones offer the best chance to win the run with minimal help along the way. I know people enjoy playing different characters, and that's cool.

I personally hate playing Azazel because I find him boring, and enjoy Eve and sometimes Keeper.