Vampire Survivors - Early Access

[TheMix]

Soooooo close...

I screwed up my figuring, so I was only able to get the ebony bird.

But I was running with the water and the lightning and upgraded the bible and the garlic.

In the end, though, I got taken out by the wave of wizards that shows up around 23 minutes. I got bad drops on the waters. They were off screen, so I got swarmed by the wizards. I was at 4500 gold too. Another couple of minutes and I would have nailed it.

So apparently you can only have a certain number of weapons? I had an empty slot on the bottom, but couldn't pick up the other birds. I admit to not paying much attention, but I guess the top 6 are for weapons and the bottom 6 for augments?

[TheMix]

Coop, Hyper? None for me right now. That game is a bit fast.

I think my PC is a bit more up to the task than yours. Hyper is a little hectic at the start and I will admit I was concerned for a bit, but eventually your brain catches up.

As far as I can tell, hyper only gives you more mobs to deal with at the beginning. I haven't noticed that it stays hyper all the way through. I like to start with the garlic guy. He can wrack up the xp/kills at the beginning. Which helps him level quickly and allows you to offset the lower health disadvantage. And you get +50% to gold.

[Sudy]

So apparently you can only have a certain number of weapons? I had an empty slot on the bottom, but couldn't pick up the other birds. I admit to not paying much attention, but I guess the top 6 are for weapons and the bottom 6 for augments?

I was trying to figure that out. At first, some things were going on rows that I wasn't expecting. In one game, Knife remained taking up a slot even after I had the evolved knife. In another game, it replaced it. Maybe that was a bug?

[TheMix]

So you had both the knife icon and the empowered knife icon? I think that's a bug. I haven't seen anything like that.

[TheMix]

Finally.


And I pretty much stopped getting XP after about 25 minutes. I was just moving and trying not to die. So I didn't get to focus damage.

[coopasonic]

Evolving all the things!

[TheMix]

I try to plan ahead. So I only pick up 3-4 weapons that I'll evolve. That leaves a couple slots that I can potentially use for one of the non-evolving weapons.

[TheMix]

Doh. Somehow I missed that I ended up with 5 evolved weapons in that run.

[TheMix]

And I swear that I was not trying to level all the other things to 5. Just a coincidence!

[LordMortis]

4593 coins at level 101. It ain't gonna get no better than that form. The frame rates killed my end game grab. I may have to go to hyper. Anyhoo that's as good as I'm going to get on the basic forest.

[TheMix]

100% achievements

At least until the next update.

[TheMix]

Lasted 5 whole seconds vs Death in the new ? area (which seems to be a mix of the old Mad Forest map and both Mad Forest and Library enemies).


PS. Just noticed apparently the map is called Green Acres
PPS. Just noticed I scored over 5k gold. Which is odd, because I'd have sworn that my gold count was significantly lower.
PPPS. How did I just notice that the non-weapon upgrades mostly max at 5 levels?

[infinitelurker]

This was easily my best game thus far. Evolved 5 weapons, using Mortaccio (who gives an extra projectile every 20 levels, to a max of +3 I believe). A bit of luck there with the RNG lining up what I needed to do that... While the last minute mobs closed in a bit, nobody ever touched me:

[TheMix]

Nice.

He's hard to get rolling. Since his weapon is random.

[LordMortis]

This was easily my best game thus far. Evolved 5 weapons, using Mortaccio (who gives an extra projectile every 20 levels, to a max of +3 I believe). A bit of luck there with the RNG lining up what I needed to do that... While the last minute mobs closed in a bit, nobody ever touched me:

I don't think it takes much luck to hunt for weapons and boosts, what takes luck is getting the strategically good early ones early. I get the exact build I am trying most of the time but in doing so I tend to get a slow start which makes me underpowered and with 12 spread out weapons/boosts late in the game. That is just starting to be mitigated by gold spend though.

Your lucky build is pretty similar to my planned build, though I'd been switching it up to go non empowered, trying to get 5000 coins.

[TheMix]

I'm finding the empowered bibles to be my best weapon. But you do need something to help with anything that gets inside the spinning books. Whip and wand will both push back. I think. But I also think the axes were doing that too. I might have to make them my other go-to.

[infinitelurker]

OK - I revise my previous post to say this was my best game yet. My first time trying hyper mode and I chose the Inlaid Library. Hyper mode gave a 50% gold boost, and I got the 5000 gold in a single game achievement. This was also the first time I evolved the Peachone + Ebony Wings to get the Vandalier (the 500 extra gold I got for that is what pushed me over the edge for the 5K gold achievement too, a bit lucky). Vandalier has a nice added benefit that once you get it it frees up a weapon slot. So, in this game I had 5 evolved weapons plus the Cross. Early on I had bad choices on a level and took Pummarola - if the clover had been one of the choices I would have been sporting 6 evolved weapons.

Hyper mode feels like playing the Ms. Pacman with the speed-up hack back in the arcade. For me, there was no going back to the normal game once I played the fast version, and I fear that may happen to me with hyper mode too.

[Sudy]

I really don't like this game, but I can't stop coming back to it.

I got to 28:00+ my second time playing on the library map, yet I don't think I've cracked 20:00 in the forest despite doing a good 15 runs.

Garlic feels like a must-have. I just can't survive too deep without it. It's often the same enemy types that give me trouble, no matter my strategy. I wonder if that's intentional or a balance issue. E.g., I'm rarely powerful enough to take out the green ghouls who spawn with the first mantis. Or the largest, purple bats.

[TheMix]

The Forest is harder because there are fewer mobs. So you level slower. The Library has a lot more right at the beginning. Playing the Forest on Hyper, if you've unlocked it, helps somewhat.

I've gotten so that I can get by without garlic, but it definitely makes it easier. A couple levels of it in the Library will easily let you plow through the early mobs without stopping. In the Forest I've found that I need 4-5 levels to handle the first skeleton rush.

For the first mantis and company, I often just avoid until I can escape the flowers. You can't kill the harder mobs with garlic.

The best approach for me has been getting garlic leveled to 4-5 as quickly as possible, and then focus on one "heavy hitter" - axes, fire wand, etc. If you can get one of those to 4+ (where it starts to have red damage numbers), you should be able to handle the mantis and friends.

Where I quickly know if I've gotten what I need is when the ghosts first show up. High levels of garlic will kill them, but the werewolves that come with them will destroy you if you don't have something else leveled.

I think the biggest mental switch for me was to stop picking up lots of skills. I try to focus on 2-3 until I get the first empowered weapon. Then I can expand. But for the first 15-20 minutes, you have to have higher ranks to survive.

[coopasonic]

Playing the Forest on Hyper, if you've unlocked it, helps somewhat.

Do we have any idea how to unlock Hyper mode? I did some googling and didn't find anything. I unlocked Hyper in the library on my very first run there, but it was a really good run. No idea what unlocked it.

[Sudy]

Do we have any idea how to unlock Hyper mode? I did some googling and didn't find anything. I unlocked Hyper in the library on my very first run there, but it was a really good run. No idea what unlocked it.

Exact same thing here. So, this site says:

Hyper Mad Forest – Defeat the giant Blue Venus in the Mad Forest.

Inlaid Library – Reach Level 20 in Mad Forest.

Hyper Inlaid Library – Defeat the Nesuferit in the Inlaid Library.

I dunno how you conjure the blue venus; I'm presuming that's the penultimate boss, like the nesuferit? When do they appear, at 25:00?

[coopasonic]

Yeah the blue lady showed up at 25 minutes with a bunch of her friends and got crushed by my withering hail of knives. Empowered knife, wand and garlic with a side of maxed out lightning and bible (didn't have the accessory to empower the bible ).

As soon as I ask, I unlock hyper mode. Didn't get the money achievement. I think that's all I have left.

[LordMortis]

I really don't like this game, but I can't stop coming back to it.

I got to 28:00+ my second time playing on the library map, yet I don't think I've cracked 20:00 in the forest despite doing a good 15 runs.

Garlic feels like a must-have. I just can't survive too deep without it. It's often the same enemy types that give me trouble, no matter my strategy. I wonder if that's intentional or a balance issue. E.g., I'm rarely powerful enough to take out the green ghouls who spawn with the first mantis. Or the largest, purple bats.

If you get garlic early, the library is pretty easy. You level up well ahead of curve from the monsters being thrown at you. Or maybe that's because of my pre game boosts. *shrug*

Conversely, I don't like garlic in the forest. It's uses are limited and the early game boost is much smaller.

Garlic feels like a must-have. I just can't survive too deep without it. It's often the same enemy types that give me trouble, no matter my strategy. I wonder if that's intentional or a balance issue. E.g., I'm rarely powerful enough to take out the green ghouls who spawn with the first mantis. Or the largest, purple bats.

I'm never strong enough. I dance around them picking up old gems I left behind and hunting for torches. Garlic is actually a detriment to killing them as our knives. They do so little damage even at higher levels. Those points are better spent on higher damage, less focused attacks that allow you to dance. But you do need enough directed fire to escape the second wave of skellies and the purple bats. I like the blue wand for this.

I think the biggest mental switch for me was to stop picking up lots of skills. I try to focus on 2-3 until I get the first empowered weapon. Then I can expand. But for the first 15-20 minutes, you have to have higher ranks to survive.

I go the other way. I try to fill in all 12 spots as quickly as I can to get the skills I want. But I concentrate on only leveling the highest weapon at any given time unless I am going for the birds. If I go for the birds, I want them empowered as quickly as possible so I have the best shot at getting the right 13th spot.

I dunno how you conjure the blue venus; I'm presuming that's the penultimate boss, like the nesuferit? When do they appear, at 25:00?

Sounds about right, 25 or maybe 27/27:30? There are two or three mob shifts after it. If they happen every 30 seconds that might even put it as late as 28:30 but I don't think so.



I still need the money achievement. I may try to hunt it again if I upgrade to hyper mode.

[coopasonic]

As soon as I ask, I unlock hyper mode. Didn't get the money achievement. I think that's all I have left.

Oops, still need to merge the birds too.

[LordMortis]

My first time ever getting all Steam Achievements in a game. How soon until we more stuff?

[TheMix]

I spent much of the day trying to get a good run going with the ghost. I did get 200 luck going on one run. But I just couldn't get the right upgrades to hold on.

[Sudy]

Finally blew open Mad Forest by getting a lucky quick holy wand evolution... I got three magic wand bumps out of the same chest. I have no idea how to get 5,000 gold though... I only managed 2,708 on that run. (I think I did a lot better on my library run.) Is getting gold just a lamp hunt? (Oh... hyper mode plus perks I guess.)

I feel like that's close enough to "beating" the game for me. Once you evolve a few weapons things get boring, I guess presuming you've chosen a decent build.

[TheMix]

Running hyper mode for the bonus.
Getting the mask and leveling it. (Pick the Library and head right. They give you one for free.)
Boosting luck for more braziers/candles. And better rewards.
Taking levels in Greed.

I think that's mostly it.

[coopasonic]

Just got the gold achievement (5800) in 24 minutes. It was not the best build but it was good enough. Basically all the things TheMix said. Maxed out Greed, maxed out Mask+1, maxed out clover, library on hyper mode.

[LordMortis]

Running hyper mode for the bonus.
Getting the mask and leveling it. (Pick the Library and head right. They give you one for free.)
Boosting luck for more braziers/candles. And better rewards.
Taking levels in Greed.

I think that's mostly it.

+1 Also in the library I take blue wand guy and then garlic first with the green gem on the left. If you want to be cheap you can just keep restarting until it's an option. Garlic first at that spawn rate will get you many level in the first 3 minutes or so with no chance at damage.

[coopasonic]

Played a round with the skelly just to see what I could do. Made it the full 30 and raked in 6600 gold without even really trying.

[TheMix]

Officially done with the Pentagram. I lost potentially 4 chests in the last run. Which probably cost me at least one empowered weapon.

[LordMortis]

Officially done with the Pentagram. I lost potentially 4 chests in the last run. Which probably cost me at least one empowered weapon.

Yeah, I did the pentagram once and then said, nope. Never again.

[Sudy]

Is there a reason to use it other than to prevent imminent death? Even then, if you were in that position you're unlikely to recover.

[LordMortis]

Is there a reason to use it other than to prevent imminent death? Even then, if you were in that position you're unlikely to recover.

It goes off at an interval I can't predict so I can't think of a reason. You don't get gems or chests or rewards for the torches. If you need it to save you, then you're probably already circling the drain anyway.

[Sudy]

All right, that's all achievements unlocked for me. Thanks for the tips! Evolved garlic/whip/ace/magic wand & fire wand/runetracer got me to 25:00 on hyper library, but I could have planned my upgrades a little better.

Ten hours of fun and complaining isn't bad for a $3 indie title.

[TheMix]

I'm struggling with garlic. It's really useful early on. REALLY useful. Especially in the Library. But at the end, I don't think it holds up well. Especially since the bibles are my go to. In addition to the whirling death, they do an excellent job of knocking things back. The problem with garlic is that it only affects the things inside the bibles. And if something got inside, garlic probably isn't going to do much. For healing, I much prefer the whip. What I'd love is to be able to drop garlic around the 10 minute mark to pick up something better.

I wonder if it would be worth skipping the empower. That way garlic would take up one less slot....

[TheMix]

Probably as close to a perfect run as I'll ever get. Got all the skills that I wanted. Wasn't even sweating at the end with the flood of the elite bats.


Though I supposed I should have grabbed the cross at the end instead of the santa water. Since I already had the clover. Not sure the empowered cross would have been better than the water though.

I will say that this was the first time I ran into a bit of a slide show at the end. I suspect that the Vandalier isn't optimized.

[coopasonic]

Quick Q, is the Steam screenshot key (F12) working for you guys for this game?

[TheMix]

No clue. I've just been using the Print Screen button, then dropping it in Paint to crop it. I suppose I should see if there is an easier way, but it just hasn't been worth the effort.