Items vs time.

[Torres, The Devourer]

The increasing difficulty in this game really kicks my ass, but when I try to rush through the first levels I find myself very low on items. I want to get better at this game because it’s really fun, but I feel like I’m just not good enough. Do you guys have any tips that I can use to strike a good balance between time management and gaining items?

[gruetoo]

The general consensus is to shoot for 5 minutes per level on monsoon, with more leeway on easier difficulties, and to save chests around the teleporter for after charging to minimize travel time spending the money gained after it.

Exceptions are made for levels with guaranteed legendary chests, always farm to open them.

Once you get far enough in where you start getting more money than you know what to do with, obviously this breaks down and you just run around hoovering up chests before moving on.

[Ninja Zyborg]

Originally posted by gruetoo:

The general consensus is to shoot for 5 minutes per level on monsoon

the general consensus within the group of people who claim there is a general consensus for stage times on monsoon is 5 minutes.

I say 8-10 and I do fine.

[Nibbie]

Originally posted by Ninja Zyborg:

Originally posted by gruetoo:

The general consensus is to shoot for 5 minutes per level on monsoon

the general consensus within the group of people who claim there is a general consensus for stage times on monsoon is 5 minutes.

I say 8-10 and I do fine.

I don't think you know what a general consensus is...

[Ittrix]

Originally posted by gruetoo:

The general consensus is to shoot for 5 minutes per level on monsoon

The general idea here is that early game cash flow sucks. If you push through a stage quickly by starting the teleporter event early, the game master will more aggressively spawn enemies ($$$) and also spawn a boss ($$$).
You want to do the bare minimum of preparing yourself to fight the boss (I usually grab 2 items and then go for it), kill the boss, and then spend your cash gathering items (because money not spent is the time spent getting the money wasted), provided the items aren't super far away.
This *usually* takes about five minutes, hence the consensus. Just saying the consensus is five minutes without saying why can give many players the wrong idea.

It's not that five minutes is a magical number. It's that you're trying to get the most bang for your buck within the same amount of time. If there are interactables on the stage which will offer $$$ like the teleporter event, then you don't follow the five minute rule
Combat Shrines, Blood Shrines, etc. This is also why the idea of five minutes rapidly breaks down whenever you start to move faster and cash flow gets much better mid to late game.

It's also worth noting that this idea came in when cash flow was a thousand times worse early game. It's been marginally improved, which is why a lot of players (Like ninja zyborg) don't use it at all and do just fine.

[Torres, The Devourer]

Thanks guys!

[Matty Knacker]

I had this confosation in another thread and from the man's math he showed me it doesn't matter all that much just go for a full clear or close to do and just use your time wisely

Even full clearing first stage with worth

(Sorry forgot the forum so can't direcet you to the math)

[ArtemisHunt]

EDIT: Whoops, the numbers are correct for stage 5 (which is not the moon). But it should demonstrate the difference a prior stage, it only ramps up more as time goes on.

I made a spreadsheet that actually compares difficulty of single player monsoon runs based on time in level. So before people start being scrubs, let's actually look at the math.

Let's say you just do 5 stages.
5 minute stages, You start Stage 5 with some 7.5 Difficulty
8 minute stages, You start Stage 5 with some 10.7 difficulty

But what does that mean?
It means for your 5 minute stage runs your final enemies will be lvl 20 and hit 21 during the stage. It means your 8 minute stage runs your final enemies will be Lvl 30 and hit 31 during the stage. Stage 5 only has 3 enemies so let's see what that turns into

8 minute runs will have:
Golems with:
- 4860 more health
- 70 more damage

Wisps with
- 2550 more health
- 30 more damage

Exploders with
- 540 more health
- 22 more damage

Mithrix will have
- 4200 more health (which is a lot more effective health when you remember the adaptive armor)
- 32 more damage

It's worth remembering that there are only a limited number of chest spawns per stage and while mobile characters could probably get away with full clearing, slower characters like Arti are going to get hit in the difficulty for their trouble if they try to full clear.

[Torres, The Devourer]

Originally posted by ArtemisHunt:

I made a spreadsheet that actually compares difficulty of single player monsoon runs based on time in level. So before people start being scrubs, let's actually look at the math.

Let's say you just do 5 stages.
5 minute stages, You start Stage 5 with some 7.5 Difficulty
8 minute stages, You start Stage 5 with some 10.7 difficulty

But what does that mean?
It means for your 5 minute stage runs your final enemies will be lvl 20 and hit 21 during the stage. It means your 8 minute stage runs your final enemies will be Lvl 30 and hit 31 during the stage. Stage 5 only has 3 enemies so let's see what that turns into

8 minute runs will have:
Golems with:
- 4860 more health
- 70 more damage

Wisps with
- 2550 more health
- 30 more damage

Exploders with
- 540 more health
- 22 more damage

Mithrix will have
- 4200 more health (which is a lot more effective health when you remember the adaptive armor)
- 32 more damage

It's worth remembering that there are only a limited number of chest spawns per stage and while mobile characters could probably get away with full clearing, slower characters like Arti are going to get hit in the difficulty for their trouble if they try to full clear.

Interesting, thanks for the stats! It helps.

[Ittrix]

I feel as though that spreadsheet sort of misses the spot, so to speak... 5 minute stage runs ramp up into snowball territory faster. You don't go at 5 per the whole time.
By pushing quickly, cash flow will get better faster because moving up stages also changes the difficulty modifier. It gets you out of the early game slump and strongly into the mid game, which imo is the hardest part.

[ArtemisHunt]

Originally posted by Ittrix:

I feel as though that spreadsheet sort of misses the spot, so to speak... 5 minute stage runs ramp up into snowball territory faster. You don't go at 5 per the whole time.
By pushing quickly, cash flow will get better faster because moving up stages also changes the difficulty modifier. It gets you out of the early game slump and strongly into the mid game, which imo is the hardest part.

Even if you take all of this into consideration, as long as you arrive in Stage 5 at the times listed, the stats provided will be accurate. So you could spend 3 minutes stage 1, 5 on stage 2, 7 on stage 3, and 5 on stage 4 and the you will have the difficulty listed because it's based on

- Players in game
- Stages completed
- Difficulty (Monsoon)
- Time played

Nothing else is factored into the calculation.

Now it might be worth fiddling with some early game difficulty clearing because iirc chest rarities are calculated based on difficulty at stage beginning so theoretically if you wanted to roll the dice you could gamble on like a really high difficulty Stage 3 and Stage 4 with plans to zoom through it ASAP by sandbagging stages 1 and 2 but I haven't dug into that kind of spreadsheeting yet.

[Ittrix]

Originally posted by ArtemisHunt:

Originally posted by Ittrix:

I feel as though that spreadsheet sort of misses the spot, so to speak... 5 minute stage runs ramp up into snowball territory faster. You don't go at 5 per the whole time.
By pushing quickly, cash flow will get better faster because moving up stages also changes the difficulty modifier. It gets you out of the early game slump and strongly into the mid game, which imo is the hardest part.

Even if you take all of this into consideration, as long as you arrive in Stage 5 at the times listed

If you take all of this into consideration you won't arrive at stage 5 at the times listed is what I'm saying.

[ArtemisHunt]

Originally posted by Ittrix:

Originally posted by ArtemisHunt:

Even if you take all of this into consideration, as long as you arrive in Stage 5 at the times listed

If you take all of this into consideration you won't arrive at stage 5 at the times listed is what I'm saying.

There's no reason you can't. I go over a minute or 2 sometimes depending on drops when I play but I easily get to stage 5 around 18-22 regularly.

[Ninja Zyborg]

Originally posted by Nibbie:

Originally posted by Ninja Zyborg:

the general consensus within the group of people who claim there is a general consensus for stage times on monsoon is 5 minutes.

I say 8-10 and I do fine.

I don't think you know what a general consensus is...

a thing that people generally agree on. which, in this context, people don't.

[Malthar]

Originally posted by Ninja Zyborg:

Originally posted by Nibbie:

I don't think you know what a general consensus is...

a thing that people generally agree on. which, in this context, people don't.

like 4 people disagreeing out of the hundreds who do? wat

[Torres, The Devourer]

Ok, so how much time should I stick around in a level on monsoon? Five? Eight? I’m getting mixed measages.