Absolum - Karl Skeleton build, mine. Easiest run ever.

By far the best run with Karl I've had so, far  (EDIT: ok that was written halfway thru run.  It got even easier, waaaaay easy. Easiest run out of any character.)

Referencing screenshot above: This guy said he summoned a "Skeletal HORDE!". No, sorry that's not a horde really... I wish I had a picture of how many skeletons I had on the screen; it was about 5 times what he's doing once I got the longevity upgrade. But he does have some nice videos regardless. 

RITUALS

Note:You gotta keep on picking Skeleton upgrades to get the super good skellie upgrades it seems. I need to look at my actual picks, but I bet it was only one or two other things besides Skellies. 

Skeletal arcana - lvl 2. Makes skellies when use an arcana. 

Skeleton dust - lvl 1. skels spawn w/ 3 sonic booms!!

Later got the 100% longer life skellies, 3 sonic booms on skellies, then drop throw-bones skellies, then 4 sec invulnerable + faster move thing for skellies (was all that rituals, I think so?). And I think that is roughly the order you get them in. 

Not important rituals- 

Lightning crit level 1 - barely ever mattered. 

Tornado skill lvl 2 - never mattered. 

ARCANA  

The Harpoon one. Important bcuz pushes enemies back while skellies protect you, which also keeps them at bay usually. And note… i have (typing as playing, it was offered to me midway thru) Rifle Bullet too, but it is not good for keepaway karl bcuz no pushback. 

Got 5 mana chunks (picked option for 2 extra but lower dmg). 

INSPIRATION 

Reload! Gotta have it. 

Just shoot and stay on one side. Shooting the harpoon is a little tricky to aim, but once you nail a boss, just keep it up. I often would shoot one, reload, shoot one, reload if I was ever low on mana to slowly inch back (-1, +2, -1, +2) to full. 

STUFF

Bone drop skellies. - came into play here and there at the end, yep.

Invul skellies  for 4 secs, and run fast. Sonic boom skellies.  

Reload mana. Critical for build. 

5 mana chunks bar. *** Important... more mana bars means more skellies and more leniency on reloading mana. 

Got 50% chrg up arcana.  Not important really, but did use it a couple times on end bosses, nice to have.

THOUGHTS

You dont need combo items.

Dont need air items. 

Do crit items help.?  Doubt  it. 

Need boots run speed? Doubt it.  

Skellies distract headcrabs. 

Harpoon pins Astra… Aslan,… Assslam… whatever his name is… to the wall easily protecting you. Had a ton of hp left… wonder if can deflect final final boss’s nuke autokill??

CONCLUSION

Yep. Broke-crashed game at final final boss.  Luckily it restarted in elevator .  Had so many skeletons and then so many bones on the ground. (transitioning screens, skels disappear usually) so, it was all the bones on ground and me speeding up stuff near the end i think.  Crash reported. 

But yeah, new hi score of 76,695 with Karl.  Did 48,310 dmg all run. Best combo dmg 1884. Easiest run, without a doubt.  Mass mass skeletons.  You get 4 sec fast and invulnerable  skellies near end. And spawn bones to throw.  Just shoot and stay on one side. Shooting the harpoon is a little tricky to aim, but once you nail a boss, just keep it up. I often would shoot one, reload, shoot one, reload if I was ever low on mana to slowly inch back (-1, +2, -1, +2) to full. 

Absolum - lists of useful info

 Before I look much at their list, my own from memory:

• you can I think up-dash (vertical up or down) out of certain things... was it a slow Skill move or something else that starts to lock you in and make you look like you'll die. I did see at the top of their list something about "Skill from a grab"... so was that what I'm thinking of? No, I think it was a dash to get you out of harms way mid-move. 
• UPDATE I REMEMBER: The reload for dwarf, definitely... you can dash up or down to cancel it and be safe if monsters approach. I'm 98.421% sure this was it. :)
• When you up-dash and keep holding up, you will stay put and attack. Same for down-dash and hold down.
• Otherwise, you up-dash and release, and it'll pop y ou back where you came from to "dodge and counter hit" kind of thing. 
• Can definitely sort-of-cancel into/outof things that you wouldn't expect. Try it out. 
• Maybe it was a slow super I was doing, and I did a dash or Skill to cancel it??? I need to remember. 

https://steamcommunity.com/app/1904480/discussions/0/600791791481239476/

Highlights from URL above:

>Everybody can Skill from a grab

>Cider can hold Skill to grab instead of pulling themselves

>>Both versions can Clash during the entire travel time of the arm, allowing ranged Clashes, but do not do damage on their own (unless you have a DPS Ritual on Skill ofc)

>Karl's Reload refills 2 Mana and launches on the ground

>>Refills 4 mana and hits multiple times/lasts longer in the air

>Galandra Sword Flurry can charge any of the 3 slashes if you got the charge Inspiration as well

>>That charge is almost instant btw, can unleash as soon as she backhands

>At the ship, if there is nobody leaning on the mast, ***keep hitting for free item! I shoulda known to keep trying!

AND FURTHER COMMENTS FROM ME ON THEIR COMMENTS:

>Cider's air dash is only horizontal, unsure if it applies the effect of the dash-through attack Inspiration

Can now confirm it does.

Yeah knew this... do it vs. Headcrabs (Halflife 2 reference, not a lice reference, heh):

Anybody know how to escape from a grab? saw video of people done it, still couldn't figure out how.

I mash attack usually, never take more than 1 hit from grabs

BTW, My List of trivial but fun info:

• Karl the dwarf's Reload option shotgun shell (why is it a red shotgun shell? ... those old muskets were muzzle loaders weren't they?? And rifles are definitely not shotguns. Triply silly Brits... should not have had stupid guns in the game anyway /endrant) also will hit the enemy if you have the shellcasing homing missile upgrade. 
• Any shell from any gun thing will hit the enemy.
• Using that option for his harpoon gun Arcana is weak, only one shell for tiny extra dmg... should often better to pick something else I bet.  
• Gotta talk to other char.s to get quests. Obvious and not trivial per se, but I just opened up a new Karl quest today after talking to ToadFrog Brome. 
• Let's rant some more (you can tell I didn't sleep but half the night last night). The whole male-female frog overemphasis is annoying. I understand the immense frustration the planet has with ... some goobbermnt issues, and the need for loudmouths to outdo the other side's loudmouths, but seriously, get outta my entertainment. It's making me annoyed with stuff that shouldn't be annoying anyone. 
• 
  
• 
  
• 
  

Galandra - Mana from enemy Bounce; Lance charge Arcana super

Just randomly got things, and then it was made very apparant that the Mana Bounce + Lance Arcana (super) combo is like sick good. 

Screenshot is about halfway through the game. Well, I went on the handily beat the whole game, including the final final boss and had life to spare. By far the easiest Run I've had... and wasn't even trying to optimize much. Heh. 

How's it work?

Simple... once you get 3+ mana chunks up by your health bar, you can often just go to town, I mean GO TO TOWN using that Lance Charge thing. It'll push monsters over, bounce them, they drop mana... and you are right next to the mana to mostly auto pick up b/c of the way the super works! Do it to the right side, do it to the left. Rinse, repeat. You often are full on mana the entire time, if fighting big groups.

• Even level 2 mana bounce was doing fine... when I saw level 3 I grabbed it though. In any game I'm Greedy for mana you know. I think I finally got a single mana ring by the end. 
• Destroys the reptile dudes & gnolls & gnoll shamans in the swampy areas. Design-wise, I love having all the reptiles and gnolls in the swamp together, felt right and very fun. The funky plants and caterpillar type monsters fit in nicely, too. 
• Against solo bosses, it does lose some of its pep. But divekick just outright destroys so many bosses. 

Caveats:

• Well, I ended up using mostly bramble throwing weapons (got the split into 3 thingie, wow, powerful) towards the end of the run, come to think of it. That made the entire last city easy. When I was out of brambles, I'd mana bounce lance charge and vice versa. Dive kick to recharge on brambles. And throwing brambles was very helpful against the final final boss. 
• And I ended up with her down+attack dive kick which wrecks a ton of hard enemies, like really bad. And great against a lot of bosses. Also happened to have the "repeat carbon copy xerox ditto" thing on finisher, which trigged on every single dive kick. 
• So yeah, those other two ultra powerful things helped a lot. Plus I had the pet Ghost Sword, which is always nice. 

 

Cider - I did not know this. Plus analysis.

 Cider can pull with her vanilla arm skill?! I thought only the upgrade. 

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3590526648

-Vortex Grip
NEW MOVE: Hold Skill to Grab and throw an enemy. You spin the enemy around before throwing them, which hits surrounding enemies as well. You can hold forward or back to decide in which direction to throw the enemy, too. You can't do it in the air though.
NOTE: this does NOT remove your ability to pull enemies towards you with your base Skill: if you tap Skill, release the button, and then hold it again, you'll be able to do your basic pull Skill with your grappling arm. The timing is a little tight, so it may take some practice to pull it off.

Agree it's got faults. This is the one that looks like Vega (Claw) from Street Fighter's off the wall attack (one of his attacks, Flying Barcelona something thingie). 

-Magnetic Jump
Wall Jump is possible. Press Strike to follow with a diving blade attack. This is Cider's stinker Inspiration... For how cool it is in concept, Wall Jumps are way too infrequent to implement easily in your gameplan. It's a shame, because it looks very cool, and the follow up attack is rad too! I'd advise against picking it up in a serious run, but hey, it's a lot of fun to mess with.

I loved using this one with both gadget Arcanas. I guess it was luck I got both, (didn't I get both?).

Recycle
Gadget-based Arcanas spawn Mana orbs when disappearing. This applies to Clockwork marionette, Spider mine, and Flying shredder, and allows you to spam these a lot, especially if you have Arcana Mastery. It unfortunately does nothing for the other three Arcanas.

I didn't know that! Free money!

-Cashback
When no Throwable is equipped, use gold to throw a damaging coin. The coin will disappear if it hits an enemy, but you'll be able to pick it back up if it lands on the ground. Keep in mind that your co-op partner can also pick up the coins you throw. This can be annoying, but you can also use that to give them extra gold if they need it to buy a Trinket. If you have Throwable Replicator, you'll throw three coins for the price of one...

Need to try:

-Gyro Drop
NEW MOVE: Up + Skill while Grabbing or in the air. Landing spot can be controlled. This is a versatile move that can help keep you safe during intense situations as you become invincible when you execute it and you can relocate to a safer spot on the screen, or slam your victim against a group of enemies to scatter them. It's a great way to finish your combo when you reach Overpressure as it deals a lot of damage, which gets boosted by the Overpressure hit. Plus, it just looks so cool.

This I loved combining with jump=gale:

-Pneumatic Heels - - Gain 2 additional Dashes and allows to Air Dash.

I did not know this... so apparently each char gets a super Arcana upgrade after quests:

Unlocked from Cider's personal quest:
-Arcana Mastery
Give brand new properties to your equipped Arcanas.
Kinetic gear hits six times instead of three.
Spider mine turns into three mines that track enemies automatically. (((note to self, so the doppelganger was not cheating afterall)))
Tinker blade fires five kunai instead of three. By the way, did you know you can aim them up and down when using the Arcana in the air?
Clockwork marionette Clashes enemy attacks instead of Deflecting them.
Flying shredder launches an additional drone that spins around the first one.
Rising drill hits and Clashes in a significantly bigger area of effect, lasts longer and hits more.

UPDATE:

Honestly her low baseline makes up for the fact of how nutty her tools are.

Mid-air clash is hard to get used to. But once you get used to it you're extremely hard to kill.

Failing that you've got a range clash

Double aerial combo finishers (Up+ attack counts as a finisher for arcanes though that might be a bug)

She has on demand finishers using aforementioned aerial arcane.

And despite how annoying some bosses are due to instant anti-airs, I think it more then makes up for it with how cool Absolum feels to fight with Cider.

Not to mention how bananas clockwork marionette can be

UPDATE, OH YEAH I knew this, it is awesome:

Raise luck and critical chance, and get the power that paralizes enemies in crono stasis when hit with critical hits.

WIth THOSE Cider is invincible. If you add to those the power up that makes her rotating blade hit more times then it's almost a cheat code. 

Brome - a few observations

 Mana Burst - this is the thing that makes his neutral Skill get huge. You can cheese some monsters by walking "above" them on the screen, then using this charged up skill to hit them from far enough away they can't touch you. Also tends to work great spamming it in the corner when surrounded by badguys b/c they'll wall bounce and take a ton of dmg. 

Infused Staff - yes, I really like this one. They forget to mention it makes it hit twice (doesn't it? I saw it happen on the sign in the misty hole, b/c one attack = two hits). It does hit further and harder. Getting extra mana chunks is obviously the goal, but I think I had 4 mana chunks when it really shone, and loved it. Even 2 or 3 seems enough. 

Nice, Hadn't thought of: 

-Projectile Dispel
Clash a projectile to spawn a homing missile. Clashing a projectile can be a daunting task, but the returns are worth it. Some boss attacks generate a lot of projectiles that you can Clash all at once, like the Underking's flamethrower or the Lizard King's belly slam...

Resonance Field - Oh yeah I love this one. Skill hits charge up next Arcana 20% more dmg. Crazy dmg, let's go Bromey. 

Telekinesis - I'm not a huge fan either. Rotating things ... it becomes tricky to aim. And then it is fire all at once. Maybe a niche use somewhere, but if they disappear as the screen changes (they do apparently), that's not great. Maybe good for CoOp play, with a partner that spawns a ton of throwables. 

I tend to agree with this, only they act like it is too good. It's just right. ;) The drill:

Drill Rush
NEW MOVE: Run + Skill. Also works in the air with Forward, Forward + Skill. This Inspiration is very, very dumb. Though only the start of it has a Clash window, it starts up so fast that you can do it at the very last moment against an enemy's attack. Because it is a Running attack, you can also do it after any Strike or after your regular Skill too. It's good offense, and great defense. Amazing to plow through a crowd of non-armoured enemies as well.

Wait, what is this?! A way to upgrade his dmg even more (i've got 2 more froglets to find):

Unlocked from Brome's personal quest:
-Arcana Mastery
Give brand new properties to your equipped Arcanas.
Wrath beam deals more hits and more damage.
Doom orb grows bigger and inflicts more damage. (((note to self, finally this might be useful)))
Sigil of hate cover a bigger area and inflicts more damage.  (((note to self, finally this might be useful)))
Wall of contempt turns into three walls that last an extra 2 seconds. (((Cool)))
Spiteful tempest spawns four extra tornadoes that spin around the first four in the opposite direction.(((Sounds powerful)))
Rage barrage fires its projectiles quicker.

Referencing this to remember the names of things: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3590526648

Brome; someone else's build

Let's analyze this build. It has a lot of good points, don't know if I can argue with them. 

I'm interested in the skill+direction Drill Rush part... I've definitely used it a ton in the later stages of the game (end of the undead area, etc.). Drill, neutral Skill burst, Drill back the other way repeat is great in many cases. Also great to get past a lot of junk in that undead boss area. 

BTW, List of all inspirations they say: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3590526648

For the analysis, here we go on Brome's (and I like their Cider info too. I don't want to keep reading though, b/c it'll squash my creativity). 

 https://www.ofzenandcomputing.com/all-characters-absolum-builds/ quoting:

Arcana Selection: Rage Barrage is the perfect set-and-forget ability for Brome’s aggressive playstyle. It summons several homing magical projectiles that automatically track and damage enemies while you focus on mobility and melee attacks. This creates a beautiful dual-threat scenario – enemies must deal with your projectiles while you’re in their face with melee attacks.

Inspirations Power: Drill Rush is Brome’s signature inspiration and the core of this build. It unlocks a devastating hit-and-run playstyle where you deal insane damage while controlling the battlefield through rapid movement. Resonance Field and Battle Rage complement this perfectly – Resonance Field creates defensive barriers during your rushes, while Battle Rage increases your damage as your combo counter grows.

Ritual Synergy: Mana Flow is essential for Brome, as it generates more mana on hits as your combo counter increases. Since you’ll be maintaining high combo counts with Drill Rush, this ensures you never run out of resources. Lightning Skill adds chain lightning effects to your skills, while Fiery Arcana creates a burning ring around you during arcana casts. The combination creates a deadly elemental storm that follows you everywhere.

Trinket Philosophy: Brome’s trinkets should amplify his aggressive nature. Juggernaut Helmet boosts his running attack damage by 40%, which is perfect since you’ll be constantly moving with Drill Rush. Jaroba Oil increases movement speed by 50% (despite the friction downside), making you even harder to pin down. Tentacle Charm boosts multi-target attacks by 15%, while Ring of Magic increases mana gained by 20%, fueling your aggressive playstyle.

Advanced Tips: Brome excels at controlling the pace of battle. Use Drill Rush not just for damage, but for positioning – you can dash through enemies to reposition yourself advantageously. Keep your combo counter high at all times, as it directly feeds into your mana generation through Mana Flow. In co-op play, Brome works incredibly well with characters who can group enemies together, maximizing the effectiveness of your area-of-effect abilities.

Absolum the other secret in Fireswamp!!!

 So this time there was no purple pond (or hidden bramble chest), but the yellow green pond with the 3 rocks was there.  Dashed in and dis the triple air dash (had upgrade) with Karl dwarf and bam, a chest popped out! Was on crystals but finally I found the dern thing.  

Can probably dash float with Brome frog, too.  

Absolum - crazy Brome Damage Build

 This turned out to be a perfectly fun run. I started out by buying two of the Patient Idols, just for the heck of it to see how crazy it'd be. It gets expensive when you buy more than one fancy item like that, I think 400 crystals for the 2nd one... so you can't do it very often. 

Anyway, sometimes when I'd wait for 5 seconds, and have charged up the Arcana (super move) ... and First hit against a monster... and triple dmg Arcana for double mana cost... it would do some STUPID A55 Damage, let me tell you. Quite fun. If you want to buy 3 of the idols to get to 900% then some of the other things on the list below... yeah you can get even crazier, but it would probably be too powerful and not that fun. But yeah, as it was, this was a heck of a fun run. 

Bought

Double Patient Idol for 600%

Didn’t do 900% but close because 

INSPIRATIONS

-Resonance Field insp = Enemy hit by Skill increases the next Arcana damage by 20% (can be accumulated to 10 times).  In theory, Boosting your Arcana by up to 200%.

-Arcana Overload (2 time cost 3 times dmg)

 

Trinkets

-superpunch knuckles =  extra 100% dmg on first hit. 

-Power staff (baseball bat) 200% if overpressure and super launch

-thunder mox 10

-2x feather

 

RITUALS

-lightning crit lvl 3

-lightning strike lvl 1

-lightning skill lvl 1

-bubble finisher

-rupture 

-echoing finisher

-bubble throw lvl 3

— echoing arcana 30% dmg!!

G3 Results So Far - The 4 Backstabbers; Foo Lion

We're still running through G3, me and the kid. Mostly going by the 1e write up and number of monsters, but using stats mostly from 5e. Been interesting, but yeah, 5e parties are so powerful... it's getting tricky. I mean, the boring old HP bags that are giants tend to get the job done and make it a tough fight. Interesting things often are lackluster, which as a DM is killing me. Let's take for example last night. Mostly my fault, but then again... tricky. 

So the lead up to last night was, 

• the kid has a figurine of wondrous power... think Guenhwyvar, but it's of the "foo lion w/ statblock" variety. 
• he'd been fighting plenty of things and getting lowish on resources. The lower (southern?) half of level 1 mostly complete, working his way up the left side of the map. 
• the kid found the secretly evil dwarf Obmi, I think is his name. In 5e he has assassin stats. OK, sounds interesting, I think to myself. Didn't really read over that statblock b/c thought we wouldn't play for another week. Then kid wanted to rush through it late last night, whoops. Anyway, so by the seat of my pants DMing...
• also found 3 rakshasas that were able to trick him into thinking it was 3 old acquaintances that were trapped. 
• So, the kid is like "one more medium/small battle, then the party has to go longrest outside the level 1 area". He's like "we can squeeze this in tonight right?". I can't say no without giving too much away so... here we go. 

Last night - what occurred:

• Room 18 is next. Module says 6 firegiants in there. I half serious half jokingly ask the kid "how many giants do you think you can handle in one fight" as we're deciding for sure to press on. He's like, oh maybe 7... maybe less... or something like that. I raise my DM eyebrows and give the look. But in my brain I'm calculating... these Rakshasas are going to backstab him. Oh and that dwarf too, whatever, just a dwarf. How are they going to do it? Definitely at most opportune time... so as he opens the door to the big giant room. Let's bring down the 1e firegiant count in there from 6 to 5. That'll be fine, with 3 rakshasas (CR13) and a Dwarf whatever assassin ( I mean an assassin, can't be that bad, right? just a rogue) right? 
• The party walks up to the door... I'm getting nervous. I'm like... so what else you got to help again? Oh yeah we said the Horn of Valhalla to call a small army. And your new Foo Lion / Komainu, right? Yeah you might want to get all that ready, we are both thinking. He does. And then I am rereading that statblock, homebrew for 5e, for the Foo Lion. He has Detect evil!!! OK, if we time this right, all will be well. I figure as soon as he summons the lion, standing at the door, the foo lion is going to use his detect evil to get his bearings. He does hate devils and demons especially, doesn't he? But then, we still need to give the baddies a chance... so here's how I do it:
• The Rakshasa posing as Kasamir runs around the side and says "gotta open the door asap b/c  b/c b/c..." the kid is like what? As he does that, as the foo lion casts detect evil, he turns around at the other 3 standing behind the party and starts to growl ferociously! The kid is like "oh no, he's going to attack our innocent ppl b/c they are strangers"... I'm trying to drop a few hints but not be totally obvious. 
• The left door flings open, 5 giants are revealed, we roll init. Who is looking at what? 
• Two rakshasas get highest on init. OK, the true Reveal now. I say "And Kasamir steps behind the fighter and pulls out a knife... and tries to stick it in his back!" 
• The kid is like, no no, what happened to Kasamir?! Is that really him?? 
• Me: No, not him... he morphs into a tiger like humanoid! 
• Kid: are his hands backwards?
• Me: Yes they are. (I had two old rakshasa minis from like 2002ish, so I pull them out). 
• Now we know what we are up against. Mostly. 
• The Rakshasa misses. The 2nd rak ... I think hits the Warlock... pretty sure it was him because...  wait for it (the other backstabbers to have a turn). 
• Two of the party get to go, then backstabbers, then party, then the 5 giants go last. 
• I think the fighter is the one to do big dmg on one rakshasa. He's got a +2 weapon, so I was going to allow that to do full dmg. 
• Druid uses a cone of cold to hit 2 raks and the evil dwarf.
• The raks laugh and grin. The dwarf takes a huge amount of dmg, like 45ish. 
• Kid: Oh no, the dwarf got hurt, he must be innocent. 
• Me: well not necessarily.. and get ready b/c he's like next.
• 3rd Rak' decides to fly, not wanting in on this melee stuff. 
• The backstabbing Ombi Obmi dwarf assassin attacks the nearest foe, the Warlock. 5e says he gets 3 attacks instead of the usual 2 for the assassin (I hope I read/remembered right). So he misses... then he hits... and rolls VERY high on the poison which the kid fails his save on. And then he hits again, same thing for the poison. The Warlock is now down from like 90ish to 16 HP or so. OUCH. And the Warlock is needed for this big fight.
• I remind the kid... OK, you can call the magical valhalla army. You also have limited wish now (kinda, he's been level 14 for a bit but never officially did the upgrades) and a wish on a ring and a sword. And you've got the Montebank cape, so you can get everybody out of here if you need to. 
• He summons the army with the Barbarian. 
• I start hinting hard that you gotta do more than level 6 spells to hurt Rakshasas... and you better have a very + magic weapon to be safe. 
• The Valhalla army (he had rolled two ones for the size of the army, so I had to DM call a reroll on one die for sanity sake) block the firegiants, and tank some hits, thank God. Tried to put pressure on the Raks (well no magic dmg so Raks shrugged off the hit).
• The rakshasas all decide to fly up to get out of harms way. 
• The Dwarf is taken down.. I think Crown of Stars or some other spell that did 50+ dmg (did the kid use LimitedWish vs. the Dwarf after all? I forget). 
• Before the Raks can do any dmg, they get brought down out of the air by some combo of...
• Druid (once a day, custom thing for dragonborns at my table) bonus action breath weapon. I say it does dmg b/c not a spell. 
• Crown of Stars from the warlock
• Limited Wish - > level 7 spell of Chain Lightning for the warlock, something he normally couldn't do
• Druid had his level 7 slot saved up... casts lightning bolt to hit two in the air (kinda bent the rules, used 1e idea of lightning bounce... we had been talking about it forever so yeah why not)
• Raks fall out of the sky. Don't take fall dmg apparently, nonmagical. But... 
• TWO Raks die!
• The last Rak', cussing the party and vowing revenge, snaps his fingers (backwards) and shifts to another plane. 
• OK! The party is going to win this, we're pretty confident now. 
• We pause around this point, but 4/5 the giants were hit by Sickening Radiance, etc. and the Valhalla army has 3 guys left absorbing hits or getting some dmg in. 

Conclusions for the moment:

Was exciting and memorable. But dang, I wish the Rakshasas had done so much more... I'm quite disappointed they didn't get to do much at all. I guess really they aren't much for fights. And if I had charmed or Dominate Personned the party, it would have been a TPK (update: although rereading that spell for 5e, maybe it's not totally insane in 5e). So I guess it went about as well as it could have.

The last Rak will have his revenge in the future. A new tricky enemy to deal with long term maybe. 

If I could do it all over again, last night's session, I would have toned down the assassin a hair and turned up the notch on at least one Rak. But then again... how could they do anything more than charm? Maybe a wand of XYZ. Was going to at least do MM wands from flying, but that never happened. 

Dungeon mag has Paizo’s famous adventure paths; Huge Bestiary for Shadowdark; Pits of Brund

 Right after 3.5e dnd, see Dungeon magazine.  

• Rise of the Runelords
• Savage Tides
• Age of Worms - see Paizo's extras https://paizo.com/download/dungeon/AgeofWormsOverload.pdf

LichHouse explains at time 4:20 in his vid “review of Shadowfinder Complete Bestiary for Shadowdark Rpg” . Btw, 1700 monsters listed, borrowed from old old dnd and old Pathfinder! Much Lovecraftian, much horror. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J4OJPOnVVHg

His affiliate link: https://www.drivethrurpg.com/en/product/527598/shadowfinder-complete-bestiary-for-shadowdark-rpg?affiliate_id=2093185

1700 mobs is pretty nice. If I was playing Shadowdark I'd have to get it. Still tempting to get, but... maybe after I finish going through the billion 2e dnd monsters. 

Well this is very interesting... says Also compatible with the Pathfinder 1st Edition Role-Playing Game. Really, so 3.5e DnD style stats? That seems a little off. Well hell, maybe not... and 5e is just that jacked up. Orc had 5HP back in 3.5e and has 15HP now in 5e. Funky. 

OK random find, the The Pits of Brund... the same Menangerie Press that did that giant Bestiary, also did this. What a cool read on the preview: https://d1vzi28wh99zvq.cloudfront.net/pdf_previews/507036-sample.pdf ... lemme copy paste a little. It's cool, like each monster has a backstory. A wight, and Otyugh, etc. 

Absolum - Cinder doppelganger observations

 Holy cow her double you fight in the misty hole (a la The Empire Strikes Back) is crazy hard.  It does like 3 flying shredders to knock you into two planted spider mines (named after Starcraft spider mines, eh).  

Plus it will use the Up+skill to antiair you! Didn’t know that was a thing.  

It did other fancy atuff, can’t remember it all  

Trick to beat it is throw it a lot.  

Mameplayer guy says MameUi v.0.161

 On his Demonfront 2002 play… comments. Says use

Mameui v.0.161

Btw, his Vanguard https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhPaim4frj8

Nostalgia. 

Loved the look back in the day. 

Weird, what's this Jpn version guy doing? 

Absolum game. Partial review. Tons of nods/references to pop culture.

 Absolum’s references, Easter eggs (kinda?), Homages. 

REFERENCE, this has best good info so far (not sure I agree with their Pickaxe gold counting numbers) (totally disagree with their Chef's Ladle opinion, it is broken good) if you don't want to figure it out yourself first: https://progameguides.com/absolum/absolum-trinkets-tier-list-common-rare-epic-trinkets-ranked/ 

Updating the list every day or two lately. I'm putting the ones I remember down here. Can't go searching for stuff b/c too many spoilers out there. Hopefully I won't spoil too much, but something might be. 

• The six (four?)eyed alien look is on the dogs and maybe something else.  That look is way overplayed for me, but I recall it being fitting in Doom 3 (first major appearance?) on the spiderlike imps in that version.  Seems like every other artist and scifi movie since then has used the look though. Memorable in the Pacific Rim movies for sure. 
• The flower minster headed plant monster has the same flower head-mouth like the so-called demogorgon in Stranger Things. 
• the jumping screamers things (officially naming 'em) in the undead area seem to be based off the headcrab things from Half-Life, similar spikey legs, no eyes, they jump on your head. Just learned about an old school D&D monster he Brain Collector (Neh-Thalggu in that giant Bestiary for Shadowdark that LichHouse talks about). 
• Your Doppelganger in the misty area pit is much like Luke's vision in The Empire Strikes Back, fighting himself. 
• “There and back again” says Karl the dwarf shortly after respawn to start area. Like in LOTR by thehobbits… Bilbo”s book 
• In the Fire Swamp (Princess Bride reference anybody?), you’ve got walking flower shaped plants that shoot stuff and big root tentacles.  Yep, same plant monsters as 2-3 minutes into Ghouls ‘n Ghosts 1988, classic side scroller. 
• "A Fistful of Crystals", is in reference to Clint Eastwood's A Fistful of Dollars movie. 
• The metal magic rovers… their voices sound like Doctor Who Dalek enemies that say destroy destroy. 
• Rovers also said “i may not be able to see you, but i can smell the magic that taints your blood” (is that a reference?) then “you will be shredded”… in reference to Shredder from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade I for sure think… they look and move a lot like the metal roving robots (with shock tentacles) from that game. — this happens in the swamp world a lot. 
• Red Forest south south path… raft area. Much like in D&D tower of doom or shadow over mystara arcade game's raft area. 
• Rock throwing like thief in DnD SoM arcade. 
• The mount animal that looks like a dragon... might be a "dracoraptor"... it has animations and especially the fireball attack that look just like the one from the arcade classic, Golden Axe. 

How do you like the shadow under the fb? It's for fairness, eyeballing it. 

Aww, no fireball shadow. Looks nice though. 

• Swamp area, spike worms have the vacuum suction thing… where is that from … was it tmnt or Final Fight? Man that is so familiar. 
• The "grab 'em, hit hit throw" stuff was in Final Fight and Street Fighter 2. Was also in Double Dragon on the NES, so that mighta been first. 
• Cinder's Wall jump from Street Fighter 2 -… and she has the off the wall air vega claw+arms open wide+chest hit attack (Flying Barcelona Attack) from SF2 also. 
• Galandra’s dive kick is styled much like Cammy’s move from Street Fighter.  
• Brome’s reflect mirror super is like Urien’s in Street Fighter. 
• Cinder's (and others?) Dive kick from Street Fighter 3... Yun and Yang were the first I recall at least. Oh wait, TMNT the arcade game had dive kicks of course! Probably something else before that. 

Divekick in TMNT.

• Cinder's Maximum Spider super move, like Spiderman's from Marvel Super Heroes, the arcade game. I think newer Cammy has a version, too. 
• Cinder says vs. undead dwarf giant king - “look on my xxxxx and despair!” From LOTR the elf Galadriel. 
• Cinder’s Dash into grind attack from… from… so familiar. What the heck is that from? 
• Cinder - “So shiny, my precious” when good loot. LOTR's Gollum's saying.  
• Galandra's name (the necro chick) has to be inspired by LOTR's Galadriel's name. 
• Mouth of Sauron from LOTR reference below. One of the Blackcoats has the look. It occurs in the necromancy/dead area... behind the portcullis door that requires the "thumbs dwn thumbs up password".    

The covered face with only a giant creepy smile. Mouth of Sauron. 

• Lizardpeople - the main bad ones look and move a lot like the Lizalfos from the recent Zelda games. 
• The main Necro chick with the giant Dark Souls sword. Sword looks goofy just like in Dark Souls, which got it from the Berserk Manga... but anyway, yeah, it swings (with an effort, a heft) very much like Dark Souls to my eye. 
• Brome floats/levitates like the Lich in D&D TOD and the dashing Green and Black wizards in D&D Shadow Over Mystara. I like it. 
• He also has a Hold jump button, slowly floats down. Feels like... yeah feels like Storm in X-Men:COTA arcade game (I think you hold UP with her to slow float fall)! And maybe the 6 armed Spiral in COTA had similar(?). And maybe Magneto from Marvel Super Heroes arcade fighting game... or was his just Fly?  
• The Raft Scene is very similar to the one in whichever D&D arcade game that was, TOD or SOM. 
• 
  

 

Slight Review

FUN?

The game is fun, really fun, let's get that straight. It took some adjustments for me, but once I got over the first couple of hours, it started to make more sense (from a gaming/fun perspective). 

TYPE OF GAME?

Beat 'em up or Roguelike? Well I practically grew up on what people now call Beat 'Em Ups. Golden Axe and the sort were like the best thing ever as a kid. I also was fairly heavy into the early years of Blizzard's Diablo 1 and 2, and that's the closest thing (as far as I can tell) to a Rogue-like game that I've played. So my viewpoint is not a typical video game reviewer who has played 500 games already this year. Nope, I save my playtime for only games I stumble upon that are really fun, then I tend to play them heavily for a while. 

So what is this game then? To me, it's a game where you can't quite configure your characters the way you want (like in Diablo)... and you can't quite perfect what you are trying to do, b/c those options don't come the first 20 hours of play. No, you get just a couple of "tools" that are consistent, and the rest is random. So as I play on, I am good with the variety... although my "gotta hone this option" gene is annoyed, it's satisfying the "try out something new" gene and the "is this combination of things so good it's kinda broken in a fun temporary way?" gene. Let's talk about that more.

Update: been playing more. Beat the first run through of the game with frogger Brome (the delay Pressure for bigger combos plus stacking dmg on his melee is gooood), but it's not really over. Got to the end of the second run through with Brome and Galandra (trying not to type Galadriel). Starting to feel like the way to beat the game is to get all the super power ups, stack more power ups, and then it's not too bad. It goes from hard to power-overwhelming at some point. Maybe there is a gradual shift, but it felt a little abrupt every time I did it. See my Kinda Broken Combos below.... I guess the good news is that they purposely(?) put in some weaker options so you can mess around. For instance, just for the hell of it I went all Luck Based on my last run with Galadriel... and to my surprise it became really powerful. Had 20% no it was 30% dodge incoming attacks, had like 12.5% luck, etc. Will talk more below on the Luck Build. 

TIPS/SECRETS

• Jaroba’s fire swamp, sputh path…the secret is right side of pond, down down, a bramble to hit. Past that and “under” the purple pond is a Chest! Nothing to do with the funky NoClipping rocks.  

 KINDA BROKEN COMBINATIONS, in a good way?

• Unstable Dash Time ritual to dash thru phase thru is AWESOME Vs. bosses like the undead king in mine. 
• Cinder with the triple jump + wind gale thing on her feet or on the enemy. She tends to combo them into the ceiling.  
• Cinder's Skill move, the arm that stretches out... if you get in the right situation, it is really good at comboing bosses into the ceiling by repeating it a lot (needs to be mostly the forward stretching not the diagonal I find). Against the giant sized green goblin(?) boss, I had a couple of times where it was nuking him. 
• Brome's dash into Drill move (Skill triangle move option you might get) seems really really good. Do that, into the default Skill move (giant exploding globe), repeat forever I think. Oh, I had the Wind Gale yellow rings (probably improved) on the enemies when I did this, and it made it really hard for them to deal with, they kept floating up forever. 
•  Update: upgrading his melee is awesome. His thingie that makes melee hit twice per one hit (something about how many mana bars are full or something?, it's green power) is awesome. Stack that with Burn, Super Punch Knuckles(?), Eyeball Mono dmg, and whatnot, he will be hitting HARD. Like stun locking everything in the game, especially bosses. 

• Dwarf's grenade R2 super move + Big Waves (option) on R2 super + the Reload Mana option. Wow, this is broken. I blew through the entire swamp world and was only stopped by the giant Lizard boss at the end b/c I didn't know what to expect with him. Up until that point, it was very broken. Shoot to the right, reload, shoot to the left, reload... etc. just wherever the enemies are, you'll get 'em and sometimes juggle them with the reload even. Only once or twice it got tricky b/c the enemies (I think the Rogue looking ones in maybe the library area) were so fast they'd run up and get me during a reload. 
• The Necro chick, Galandra, with the giant Dark Souls sword. I have played her the most, despite her voice. If you get her infinite spin on their head with the sword move (skill move in air), that seems really broken. No other combinations needed, so this seems kinda easy to get. Then again, I thought I saw it as the 2nd to last pay-for-with-game-currency upgrade, so... is that the upgrade that stays with you? Must not be permanent, but another chance drop, I'm still not organized there yet. 
• Use her dash into regular combo a lot.  

•  What is the deal with Deathvines and her? Every site says it is good. Tech hit? What is that in this game, i can't find it. One says she has a skill that works on downed enemies. Is a tech hit just hitting a guy on the ground or something? ?

• Luck Build. Update. Happened to be using Galandra, got the spinny super Reaper Cyclone that is probably her best, and I got the invulnerable pet Sword that lasts forever. Had four of the 4-leaf clover trinkets. Had a  Crown of Dissonance Epic +2.5% Luck per Ritual family held (total 10 luck). Had two of the Cloaks that give you dodge Evade 5% based on luck. Had a Crown of Harmony Epic (more of same ritual is better).  By the end, had a whopping 30% Evade (awesome!... wait, I see a Backtrack level 2 ritual of Time showing me 30% chance to Evade, so is that the same thing completely overlapping or was it stacking???). And was so lucky on loot drops on the last stage/tower, that I randomly got a Spark of Power in a hallway statue (the Star double trigger Ultra-Super-Duper move that you get only 1 or 2 of ever). Also had awesome options at the end to choose from, got a Chef's Ladle Epic giving me 50% extra lifebar. First time ever, I got a Level 3 Burn on melee hits... and first time ever got a ritual giving Spectral Armor on melee hit. That comboed well with Spectral Armor other effects (was it... something that seemed like it was stacking, but spawn a Rose turret on dropped armor or something?). 
• Reaper Cyclone Arcana side note - sf2 style "walls" they bounce off of will do dmg to enemy.  
• Haha, I just found this... apparently I got two of the 3 S-Tier items for this Luck Build. Just lucky when I went for it I guess. https://progameguides.com/absolum/absolum-trinkets-tier-list-common-rare-epic-trinkets-ranked/

DESIGN/LOOK Problems?

I have beef with the divergence from classic D&D, sword and sorcery, and that sort of thing. I don't like mixing genres. I don't like things that just go against the medieval feel of those worlds. So yeah, I would have done a lot of things differently. Also, I like grittier art styles, but this thing does look good overall. OK, enough dancing around the topic, here's what I would have liked to have been done differently:

• Voices. Please no modern voices. No tough guy businessman style, or overly Cockney style (I can't help but get London modern criminal actors out of my head), or overly stereotypical American movie teen speech. This is a tall order, I am sure, but... yeah. 
• I prefer more realistic representation of NPCs. Males have historically for thousands of years held more of the fighter/knight/soldier/warrior type roles. I'm cool with like one or two special for the story types of women... maybe the main heroes, that's believable and fun. When 1/2 of the super tough types are women shaped like men, with giant man arms, it doesn't suit my tastes. Are we looking at bodybuilders from the world of 2025 on Earth? Stop taking me out of the immersion of the game/genre. 
• No guns. No guns. No guns. I don't want blackpowder anything, my medieval fantasy worlds are before guns. 
• Overly cartoony art on many characters. The goofy giant fists + wrists that are half the size of a torso are no good for me. The characters that are 90% torso + arms and 10% legs give me  serious annoyances. 
• Mushroom people monsters are wwaaaayyy goofy. Too goofy for me. 
• I prefer goblins to be 100% evil, but I can deal with this game making them neutral I guess. Well, this game pretty much makes all monster races neutral in the sense they might be good or bad. I prefer to have only purely evil monsters to kill in games myself. 
• UPDATE: man, the amount of po litical stuff in this game (too many games nowadays, I miss the old days) just grates on my nerves. Keep all that junk out of my escape from reality, if I want to see po litics I would watch the news every day. 

DESIGN/LOOK Good stuff?

• Backgrounds, plants, floors, buildings, wagons, etc. look really good. 
• I like the goblins a lot, in their look. yeah slightly too cartoony, but overall kinda great. 
• The lizardmen(people?) are fun. Not super gritty, but still neat, just like when they were in Zelda.
• The map looks great. 
• The story is mostly pretty cool. Having to look at a giant pregnant belly every time I die is definitely incentive not to die. Hey, having kids is great and obviously the most important and awesome superpower of us animals in real life. It's disturbing to see the human version of it constantly in a video game though.  

G3 to xxxx then Q1 (replacement for Q1)

Noone of Consequence on yt recommended replacing Q1 with this Skein of the Death Mother from Dragonsfoot.  

https://heroes.mystara.net/selenica/adventures/DF16_Skein_of_the_Death_Mother.pdf

https://www.dragonsfoot.org/dfpublications/

5e conversion~ below

https://www.reddit.com/r/dmsguild/comments/wl15y8/q1_queen_of_the_demonweb_pits_5e_conversion_with/

***Wow, Dragonsfoot has  TON of stuff you can dl.  Dragonsfoot has some great stuff, I REALLY like this Monstrous Tome 2: https://www.dragonsfoot.org/files/pdf/DF15.pdf

• AXXTOER -  scary monsters. Grabs you from a tree (both att.s hit), bites head off on 19-20, otherwise 4-24 dmg (on one type of att, it has many) in 1e, that's a lot. 
  

Here's a good smattering of the fun homemade 1e vibe

They even have a floating octopus thing, similar to "The essential worldwide monster guide" version. 

AD&D 2e Hyenas had more HP than Gnolls, 5e is the opposite

So in 2e, Hyenas had 3 HitDice (3d6HP ~= 10.5HP), and Gnolls had 2 HitDice (2d6 HP~=7HP). Orcs had 1 HD (1d6~=3.5HP). Hyenas did the same dmg as ~orcs and gnolls, too. 

There were even Hyenodonts which were like giant hyenas with 5 HitDice (5d6) and 50% more dmg. 

5e DnD is the complete opposite, with gnolls averaging 22 HP and hyenas avg.ing 5 HP. 

What does this mean? Well, hyenas were tougher, I imagine them darting in and out and not such an easy target. Now in 5e, it's like the humanoid style monsters are just automatically the important guys and are better than regular animals. Also means fireball doesn't kill squat in 5e compared to 2e, but we already knew that. Even high level spells often aren't guaranteed to kill basic 1/2 challenge rating things like gnolls. It does grate.