Weapon shops are fairly useless

[Donitz]

After getting a weapon shop and restarting some 6-7 times in a row in the Dwellings, how many of you agree that weapon shops are useless. Even if they have a box of bombs, it's still not as good as the jumping boots, glasses or climbing gloves early on.

I mean, what use is a cross bow, knife or shotgun. This game isn't about damage per second, but about agility and being able to carry things.

[Leviathan]

Well, indeed they're not really useful. Shotgun jumps help a lot overall when you don't have climbing gloves+Vlad's cape, but you can get a shotgun every run. Just steal it. Also you can use crossbow to create temporary platforms but again, that's only useful when you don't have platforming items.

That said, Machete is really useful. It's just that it's not worth carrying from 1-2 to CO when you may find one in a crate there, and because you also have to carry the bow. But it's useful. It cuts webs, stuns npcs, removes bodies (useful in temple to avoid necromancers reviving stuff). And you can still carry stuff: Just have a hired hand carry either the machete or whatever you want to carry.

Also a bomb box may help a ton in run with low items. Getting a bomb box allows you to keep Udjat eye in Volcana, so even if you don't get spectacles you may see items inside walls. Being able to not interact with the drill has saved a ton of runs for me, because of what I mentioned or because of just unsafe drills with tons of lava pools, kali altars, shops, etc. That said, a bomb box in a weapon shop is lackluster when you can find it with paste in a bomb shop.

[Leviathan]

I forgot to say. It's true that you want to get spring shoes, spectacles or climbing gloves in 1-2 (Because those are great items), but as I said before, Udjat eye covers most of spectacles usefulness. and you can actually get climbing gloves every single run although the effort is only worthy if you want to go to SC and have no other way, or if you want to go to CO.

The way to do it is... go to Tide Pool, find Tusk's shop. If there is a 4-1 altar steal the dice and sacrifice them while they sum 10. Otherwise, make sure Tusk does not die, go to 4-2 with one dice and get a hired hand to carry the clone gun. Keep going through the levels until you find an altar, then clone the dice and sacrifice them while they sum 10. Worst case scenario, you have to raid Tusk at 6-3 and use that altar.

Of course, whenever you find a casino and an altar in the same level you can get the climbing gloves... Tusk's dice and clone gun are sort of a last resort, and you sacrifice 24 bombs/ropes and the chance to get the alien compass and the elixir.

[Hand's Hermit Permit]

Camera seems super useful to me. Stuns even some bosses, makes ghost not a problem for longer, stuns even shopkeepers and other NPCs for a full stun duration. Stunning random enemies seems as good as killing them honestly since you can always follow up with spike boots to the head.

Then there's the absolute best use in my opinion; the full stun duration on any character without damaging them. Lets you bring every single enemy or other character on the whole level to the sacrificial altar without issue.

Edit: There's also the fact you can effortlessly steal camera, dodge shopkeeper for the next level by stunning him at the end, and get forgiven from shopkeeper rage after.

[Donitz]

Originally posted by Hand's Hermit Permit:

Camera seems super useful to me. Stuns even some bosses, makes ghost not a problem for longer, stuns even shopkeepers and other NPCs for a full stun duration. Stunning random enemies seems as good as killing them honestly since you can always follow up with spike boots to the head.

Then there's the absolute best use in my opinion; the full stun duration on any character without damaging them. Lets you bring every single enemy or other character on the whole level to the sacrificial altar without issue.

Edit: There's also the fact you can effortlessly steal camera, dodge shopkeeper for the next level by stunning him at the end, and get forgiven from shopkeeper rage after.

It would be useful if you're not used to fighting the enemies, but at some point you pretty much got the pattern down for all the enemies in the game, then carrying any weapon around becomes a burden and an inconvenience rather than helpful.

Btw, if you're going for the Cosmic Ocean full completion, is it a bad idea to aggro the ghost shopkeep? I'm still not sure whether that's a good idea for that sweet sweet lootbag.

[Herr Quezt]

Originally posted by Donitz:

Btw, if you're going for the Cosmic Ocean full completion, is it a bad idea to aggro the ghost shopkeep? I'm still not sure whether that's a good idea for that sweet sweet lootbag.

I'd say it depends on route since Tidepool will almost always net you 99/99 resources the ghist shop won't be as impactful but it can probably be nice for a temple run IF you don't mind being cursed for a bit, you also get a guaranteed altar in CoG. True crown runs basically have no downside to robbing ghist either.

Personally I never go for ghist in single player (except True crown) and always go for it in multiplayer run since the cursed player can just die and respawn with normal health.

TL;DR Preference, there are no drawbacks except being cursed until you find an altar.

[Leviathan]

Originally posted by Hand's Hermit Permit:

Camera seems super useful to me. Stuns even some bosses, makes ghost not a problem for longer, stuns even shopkeepers and other NPCs for a full stun duration. Stunning random enemies seems as good as killing them honestly since you can always follow up with spike boots to the head.

Then there's the absolute best use in my opinion; the full stun duration on any character without damaging them. Lets you bring every single enemy or other character on the whole level to the sacrificial altar without issue.

All of them are good points about the camera, but where it shines the most is in CO. I mean, it would before CO but you gotta carry stuff around so you can't fully enjoy it.

Originally posted by Hand's Hermit Permit:

Edit: There's also the fact you can effortlessly steal camera, dodge shopkeeper for the next level by stunning him at the end, and get forgiven from shopkeeper rage after.

Combine this one with the previous one: You can use it to sacrifice the shopkeeper which doesn't count as killing him.

Another good thing about the camera is that it stuns through walls, from below, and it has aoe, so you don't have to aim that well. You can also use it to fully illuminate dark levels.

About using it in CO:
- In Dwelling levels it triggers arrow traps and stuns/kills everything else (not spiders if they're already jumping).
- In Volcana levels it kills imps, triggers robots (use with care), stops ladybugs flame.
- In jungle levels it destroys witch doctors curse skull (I think it respawns but it makes for a safer kill if you can't stun it from your position), kills mosquitos and stuns stuff (doesn't work on monkeys and I don't think it's that useful with spiders)
- In tide pool it kills all the undead, kills the fish, stuns everything else excluding Pangxie.
- In temple levels it stuns crocs turning it into a S-tier item. Crocs are so random that they can troll you so badly if they get angry and somehow manage to fall into wherever you are. After stunned by the camera they'll be happy again, so it's a run saver. It also kills undead including cat mummy and stops the Cobra from spitting (Just kill it but if you can't you can still stop it from angering a croc man). Stuns everything else.
- In Ice caves levels it kills ufos without giving them a parabola trajectory, so if you camera them while they have floor below you can kill them without generating chaos in the level (Having a falling ufo looping around is horrible).
- In neobab levels... same as before with ufos.
- In Sunken City levels you can kill tadpoles, make frogs jump away, if I remember correctly it kills fire frogs (They start the timer to expode). Most important, triggers arrow traps, opens egg sacs and kills worms (So with two camera shots you can have a blood rain on you from an egg sac).

Having the camera makes it very enjoyable to go through CO :), it's an amazing item. One of the best. My preferred item to have in CO unless I manage to bring the plasma cannon (I have done it like... three times?).

Originally posted by Donitz:

It would be useful if you're not used to fighting the enemies, but at some point you pretty much got the pattern down for all the enemies in the game, then carrying any weapon around becomes a burden and an inconvenience rather than helpful.

I mean you're not wrong, but sometimes you want to kill an enemy in the safest way possible. For example, you don't want to take any chances with a witch doctor in CO, because if you fail to do so you'll either get cursed or get thrown away, and both things are lethal in CO.

If I don't have the camera I usually tend to either bomb them to oblivion, throw something at them or avoid them completely (or shoot them with the plasma cannon from far away). Camera makes it a lot easier to deal with them, and camera is pretty common in CO.

Overall I like how the weapon items are all (not crossbow and shotgun) useful in CO.

[1/4 pounder]

i love going volcana then temple of anubis but i have the same feeling if i don't find sticky's or spike boots, any kind of pack is just a bomb strapped to the character in my opinion, and ive usually deposited my weapon at Waddler, I'm pretty useless fighting "Egyptian god of death" with out one of these 3 things. not getting good RNG for the black market is also the reason i'll stick with this path

[Zempest]

freeze gun is the best weapon in the game. Allows you to rob shops for free in multiplayer and it's able to kill crocs in CO temple.

[Leviathan]

Originally posted by Zempest:

freeze gun is the best weapon in the game. Allows you to rob shops for free in multiplayer and it's able to kill crocs in CO temple.

Camera also allows you to rob shops (they do get angry) and is able to stun crocs in CO temple. From behind a wall, from above, or from below.