Endless Mode seems to need some balancing...

[Jaybird33]

I play with a buddy of mine and we run on G4, typically without issue. We were excited for endless, but got slapped pretty hard. Failed 3 runs without getting much further than the 1st boss. The rooms are like endgame rooms in the very beginning, you get no guns, barely any powercells to buy anything, and some of the glitches are absolutely awful. We may not be top tier players, but were not bad and we got trounced.

I hope they balance the early part of endless mode. It sounds great but atm its just not fun.

[Barakel]

I'm in the same boat, ran out of things to do and now I'm trying Endless and the first 2 stages are fun enough, more challenging than a normal run but I kept up, but then I have to fight the final phase of the final boss in a tiny arena with another boss filling the room with fire and I'm just not going to be prepared for that without an excessive amount of practice, at which point the stages will be way too easy. "Endless Mode" feels more like "Only 2 Levels And Then The Run Ends Mode" and I'm going to wait for a balance patch.

[Neocronic]

You should try Recon, this class not need weapon, means you just lvl up once then reroll for dagger upgrade into sword and thats it. You will use your weapons only like stat sticks, you even not need to upgrade it you never use it in battle. You will have tons of armor and insta healing even before stage 10, then there just grind grind grind till you will reach any stage you want.

[Bärenpower]

I totally feel the same

[gabelstapler]

Yeah, some boss combos are just insane. the double drillers and anything involving final phase Iris is just an insane spike in difficulty. If i had to balance the mode dual bosses would only show up at around stage 6

[Kefrosc]

Feel the same here. I think duo bosses should start appearing later in the run, not at the second stage.

[Dwarf]

I really hate when fun rogue lites get an endless mode just for it to be ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. Double bosses would be fine if there's a cooldown on attacks and like you said the glitch's are absolute pain in the ass

[Jimmy Hunter]

Gotta say, the double bosses having such small arenas is baffling. Why on earth would you add a SECOND boss, and then half the size of the area you'd normally fight them in alone? Like who on earth thought this would ever be a logical decision?

The glitches also are incredibly unfun. Have the path paved over the course of level 1 for you to start working towards an explosive Auto-crit build? Oh here, have a -25% chance to auto crit for the rest of the run.

The fact there's been zero developer comments on any of the discussion posts here or in response to the news post discussions is not giving much hope that things will improve. Seems absolutely counter intuitive that I should have to drop the difficulty from G4, specifically because the double bosses weren't tested on anything higher then Standard.

[Orange Madness]

The first rooms aren't too bad, but it is always the double boss rooms that are completely unfair. I think the double boss rooms need to be toned down with the bullet hells they provide, but also greatly expand on the room size.

Anyone else feel that 2 Diggy Moles upchucking balls of death at the same time from 2 corners of a tiny arena is just a bit overkill?

[Jimmy Hunter]

Originally posted by Orange Madness:

Anyone else feel that 2 Diggy Moles upchucking balls of death at the same time from 2 corners of a tiny arena is just a bit overkill?

You better believe it is. There's no real synergy or attack pattern any of the bosses have together. It's just random things happening at random times. My favorite is when IRIS 2 Laser Walls at the same instance that Diggy Mole decides to machine gun at you. Better hope those Laser Walls let you continue moving in one direction instead of needing to stand still for the Lasers to go around you.

I'm completely confused who thought this concept was a good idea, and I'm even more confused who gave this a greenlight to go to the Live build.

[Orange Madness]

Originally posted by Jimmy Hunter:

I'm completely confused who thought this concept was a good idea, and I'm even more confused who gave this a greenlight to go to the Live build.

The map progression as a story mode is engaging to the player, as the difficulty ramps up as you go forward. The further along you are, the more enemies, map, and damage you will need to avoid and deal. In doing so, the player gets access to branching paths that can give them favorable odds, but every instance of a new area or half-way point gives the players time to invest into goodies!

Meanwhile, in Endless Mode, there are little to no goods to buy, let alone choose to use. What I had just described from the base run-and-gun story is what endless mode needs to be, but sadly this didn't get the approval of the sick, twisted mind behind this project. The bosses are so bad, it can be compared to a parent expecting their physically incapacitated child to swim in a pool, but they are paralyzed from the waste down, and said parents are calling their child's cries for help a skill issue!

[Jimmy Hunter]

Originally posted by Orange Madness:

Meanwhile, in Endless Mode, there are little to no goods to buy, let alone choose to use.

I see the opposite. I have no Powercells to actually afford anything. Either I upgrade my weapon, or I buy 1, maybe 2 items. Although I will say most of the items end up being useless for what's been given to me (Summoning boosting items without summons, elemental increases while using non-elemental, Explosive increases while using bullets without an explosive alt fire/ability).

Roboquest really suffers from a massive pool of items, without any means of limiting down the pool. It's another problem that Endless has, because you're more apt to see something that won't help you, or may not even apply to you until you get some other perks/upgrades. But none of that matters in Endless, where the end generally ends up being two bosses that were never designed or thought to be added together in a meaningful way.

Oh, and don't get me started at Beetle only having 1 row of platforms to destroy before you lose your footing. Or Catacoaster existing and the arena randomly flooding/receeding with no visual or audio cue.

[Dwarf]

I like the glitch that limits your chest options to only 2. Really good design choice

[Orange Madness]

Originally posted by Dwarf:

I like the glitch that limits your chest options to only 2. Really good design choice :captainclown:

The glitches aren't a problem, for I understand their intention to throw a wrench at the player to make a challenge appear randomly. However, as Endless Mode stands, it seems to be a janky clutter of enemies and your objective is to use a Nerf Super Soaker to storm Area 51 with, while also avoiding the endless barrage of projectiles, bombs, and bullets.

[Vicforce]

Here's my thoughts as to the balances needed for the update.

The singularities and glitches are a bit much atm. From what I can see, there are 3 main ways to solve this:
A. Nerf several of the modifiers
B. Change the modifiers to buff the enemies only rather than hinder the player
C. Give the player agency as to what modifiers they receive

As for the double bosses, they need a split health bar, and to give the remaining one a buff when one is killed. Increase the arena size, and lower the attack speed of the bosses (Not by a whole lot). I find that I am constantly pinned against a wall whilst dodging endless spam from the bosses. Combined with some modifiers (Namely the less jetpack fuel one) they are downright impossible to do hitless.

I also find that the base difficulty of endless is outright harder than normal. Me and a buddy would breeze through the game on hard, boot up endless, then hardly ever make it more than a few stages in.

[Vicforce]

Forgot to mention, the powercell economy is pretty poor as well.