I wish I could relock items / what's worth getting?

[Smolder]

So one of the first things I learned about this game was that unlocking items is kinda bad. I'm sure I'm not the only one who has picked up a blue print and thought "oh hey, this sounds cool" only to use it and be incredibly disappointed with the item and then even more disappointed when it continues to drop. I even stared the game completely over so that I could only unlock what I wanted to use.

Currently I only really use firebrands, bombs, ice bombs, and the quick sword, everything else just seems kinda meh. What other items should I be unlocking? Like, what is so good that I MUST unlock them?

[Ribastante]

Frantic Sword is great, I even refrain from food pick ups when below 50% health with it.

Sometimes after getting hit, you can immediatly crit an enemy for almost all of your recently lost life back.

Since you use firebrands maybe get the oil grenade too... CD is low and there's sinergy.

[I'm Mr. Meseeks, look at me!ݴ]

The warspear is basically the best weapon in the game for everything but boss fights, and still pretty good on bossfights. It has massive range and crits when hitting multiple enemies, dealing one of the highest dpses to multiple enemies at once. You can get it from mecha spiders in prisoners cells.

[sirkipalot]

Hate it useless against flyers. Also too slow against them little blue cheezers. I am a frantic sword fan as well. I like it as you don't get so many cheap damage hits against you.

[Tarradax]

I hate the war spear with a passion, it's insanely slow - too slow for my playstyle. My personal must-have (Or max-as-soon-as-possible) list:
Weapons: Impaler, Hayabusa Boots, Dagger of the Sadistic Cult.
Shields: Spiked Shield, Force Shield, Blood Shield.
Utilities: Cluster Bomb, Magnetic Grenade, Toxic Cloud, Tonic, Ivy Grenade.

From the weapons you start with, I always max out Throwing Knives, Balanced Blade and The Nutcracker.

I don't like bows so I don't use them, same goes for the two crossbows.

[Stalkholm]

@Smolder, you should be prepared to get conflicting answers to this question. If there's one thing I've learned about the Dead Cells community it's that almost no one can agree on what's a good weapon and what's a bad weapon. One of my favorite weapons in game is the Broad Sword, it hits hard, has a wide arc, long range, nice animations, and good synergies.... meanwhile the community as a whole tends to really dislike it. What works for you may not work for others and vice versa, case in point: I can't stand any of the Whips, and there are lots of people for whom that is their favorite weapon.

For that reason I'll list the weapons that I enjoy the least, and let future commentors tear the list down.

Weapons:

• Blood Sword (Boring, and damn if it doesn't feel underpowered sometimes.)
  
• Cursed Sword (Because I'm a bad player.)
  
• Valmont's Whip (It's boring, and trying to set myself up for a crit tends to get me dead. Good against the Watcher though.)
  
• Wrenching Whip (Also boring, and doesn't really pull the enemy very far.)
  
• Spiked Boots (Fun in theory, dangerous in practice.)
  
• Bow and Infinite Arrows (I feel bad for saying boring again...)
  
• Hunter's Longbow (Just not my personal taste, but others may like it. Powerful though.)
  
• Shove Shield (Only useful when paired with the Impaler spear, and even then there are better options like the Assault Shield or Spartan Sandals.)
  
• Fire Torrent (Boring, and kind of weak.)
  

Skills:

• Corrupted Power (Meh. Only good for good players, and I'm not a good player.)
  
• Magnetic Grenade (Seriously. It's overpowered, the graphics obstruct the screen, it's just not fun in my opinion.)
  
• Ivy Grenade (Don't really know what the Devs were trying to achieve with this.)
  
• Turrets (Some are powerful, all are boring. Flamethrower Turret makes me irrationally angry.)
  
• Oil Grenade, maybe (It's only useful when a fire-something is equiped.)
  
• Tonic
  
• Vampirism (In my experience Vampirism only seems to work with a fast weapon like the Assassin's Blade or Balanced Blade and a Skill rating of four or above, and then only for really good players.)
  
• Lure, maybe (Depends on your play style. It's saved my butt a few times, really slaughtered enemies a few times, but more often than not it just sits unused on my bar.)
  
• Toxic Cloud (Useful with the right equipment, but always boring.)
  

Magnetic Grenade is extremely powerful, like extremely powerful, maybe even too powerful, but it's also useful and you may be handicapping yourself by not taking it. Some people love turrets, others don't, I think they're boring and too fragile to be especially useful. Corrupted Power and Vampirism are good, but only for good players with fast weapons. Just like weapons, what you enjoy will vary from what I enjoy, and fun is the name of the game in this... uhm... game.

Those are my subjective, personal, biased opinions on the matter. Not what I think is bad, necessarily, just what I don't enjoy. I'd encourage you to do a full play through and decide for yourself what you like and what you don't, because our opinions probably aren't the same on a lot of these.

Anyway, I hope you enjoy Dead Cells! Warning: It's addictive... I'll probably top a hundred hours this week. Damn I need a girlfriend.

[MechaTails]

Originally posted by kirinelm:

. If there's one thing I've learned about the Dead Cells community it's that almost no one can agree on what's a good weapon and what's a bad weapon.

I will gladly take that kind of community over something like Warframe's where if you like a weapon no one else does you become a pariah.

[PsynFyr]

I agree; I'd love the ability to disable certain weapons/skills, maybe only at the beginning of a run. Sometimes there's just a certain combo you really feel like running, or an item you just never enjoy. I unlocked the Cursed Sword, but after trying it a few times, I actively avoid it. Being a one-hit wonder is great for speedrunning, but less so when I just want to have fun.

[Morphic]

Granted I've only been playing for ~40 hours, I basically don't care what type of item I'm picking up. I only care about the affixes on the item.

When I first started I loved Ice Grenades, thought they were amazing ... until I started finding plain Grenades that could Slow/Poison/Stun/whatever. Used to always grab Twin Daggers ... until I found that Nutcracker that also did "enemies explode".

Honestly the only item type I actually always want on me, even if it's crap, is a Shield. A lot of the people I was talking to, friends included, told me Shields were crap and "Oh just git gud with rolling. You played Dark Souls right?". However once I realized by "perfect blocking" enemy attacks you stunned them or reflected certain projectiles ... I always use a Shield lol.

Though I really hate Turrets. I was totally hyped when I found my first one ... until I realize it feels like hours for it to setup and does absolute crap damage. Even after I tried going Skill to use one, they still seem like crap.

TLDR: I just use whatever I can that has Affixes I want on it. Half the time I'll go for favored moveset weapons; like Twin Daggers but end up dropping them for something like a Nutcracker that does +100% dmg against X when I have a Grenade/Skill/Weapon that does X afflction. Really liked having Kunai that did "Afflict Poison" and a Broadsword that did "+100% dmg against Poison. Enemies burst into Toxic Clouds on death." lol.

[Frosthaven]

Just going to copypasta some of my thoughts from another similar thread:

My counterpoint is that rogue-lites are often built around the concept of "surviving the harsh game mechanics with whatever tools the universe gives to you". In that line of thought, it would make more sense from a design standpoint to not use an unlock system that allows opting out or selective blueprint unlocks at all - as it runs counter to what I view as the very fabric of the rogue-lite gameplay loop.

In my view, games like this do a lot more justice to their core game philosophy by removing that layer of player choice (instead relegating the choice behind what the player accepts or declines in a given run). Forcing players into uneven terrain and placing their feet on the hot coals is a part of the enjoyment people have from rogue-lites from my experience. To me, allowing players complete control over their destiny every run detracts from the entire point of a rogue-infused game.

My hopes in this comment is not to invalidate other points of view, but rather to broaden the represented spectrum of viewpoints without resorting to low-level intolerance. All the best.

One of my favorite weapons in game is the Broad Sword, it hits hard, has a wide arc, long range, nice animations, and good synergies.... meanwhile the community as a whole tends to really dislike it.

I absolutely love the broadsword. I liked it more when it was a bit slower (and I loved the original spear before it became a fast hitting war spear). Just something about the forced change in pace I really enjoyed, as not many weapons in this game really force you to change your approach.

Not all hope is lost despite balancing concerns at least, as just about every load-out you can have has beaten the game so far!

[Smolder]

Originally posted by Frosthaven:

My counterpoint is that rogue-lites are often built around the concept of "surviving the harsh game mechanics with whatever tools the universe gives to you". In that line of thought, it would make more sense from a design standpoint to not use an unlock system that allows opting out or selective blueprint unlocks at all - as it runs counter to what I view as the very fabric of the rogue-lite gameplay loop.

In my view, games like this do a lot more justice to their core game philosophy by removing that layer of player choice (instead relegating the choice behind what the player accepts or declines in a given run). Forcing players into uneven terrain and placing their feet on the hot coals is a part of the enjoyment people have from rogue-lites from my experience. To me, allowing players complete control over their destiny every run detracts from the entire point of a rogue-infused game.

I definitely agree with you here. I've been comparing this game to Binding of Isaac (which I have played A LOT) and it uses a system where you unlock items by progression and can't really complete the game without unlocking things. I admit that it is odd to want choices removed but I too think that is part of what makes a rogue-lite fun; being forced into items that make you adapt your gameplay to fit them. For me that element greatly increases the replay value of a game.

I'm not sure of how that could be implemented in this game other than having blueprints drop and when they do the item is automatically unlocked; not giving players the option to refuse to pick up the blueprints or not spending the cells to unlock them. I guess if I really want that experience I could just unlock everything :p

[Kyle Katarn]

I'd like to see some kind of single slot for weapon and another for skill. If you put some in slots, they'll never spawn and devs could get statistic about which ones need balance. I think, it's OK to exclude 1 of each item from rotation.