Victory

[NickAragua]

Well, I finally cleared level 7 with the ivory bot. My secret trick is liberal overuse of time machines at the end of a level to build up extra XP and loot. By the end, I had done each of the first six levels at least twice. I had about eight drones and some ungodly damage/firing rate multiplier - any bad guy that got caught in my barrage was incinerated within a second, tops. Minibosses? Forget it. Regular bosses? Downed in seconds, especially because I had the disrupter(? -the short range rapid fire cone attack). The only trouble was the fact that I was producing so many shots that I couldn't see some of the bad guy shots, which resulted in a lot of unnecessary damage. No big deal though, with 43 health, I can take a few hits. And when I'm really hard up for health, I can blow some nanite leeches to heal up.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that I'm a time machine convert.

[Logorouge]

There's no kill like overkill!
Congratulations for your victory. I, too, am a fan of the time machine. So powerful yet surprisingly common.

[Pepisolo]

Out of interest, what do you think of the new Disruptor weapon? Fun? OP? Thanks!

[Misery]

......Methinks the time machine things are going to become more rare soon.  An item like that is the sort of thing that shouldnt even be showing up every run.

I hadnt even noticed this before.... mostly because the consumables overall have been so bad for so long that one tends to ignore them; we really need to get those fixed up in general.

[Logorouge]

......Methinks the time machine things are going to become more rare soon.  An item like that is the sort of thing that shouldnt even be showing up every run.

Just yesterday I found two of them on the same floor.

[Pepisolo]

......Methinks the time machine things are going to become more rare soon.  An item like that is the sort of thing that shouldnt even be showing up every run.

I hadnt even noticed this before.... mostly because the consumables overall have been so bad for so long that one tends to ignore them; we really need to get those fixed up in general.

I'm currently working on fixing up the energy weapons, but I can do the consumables next, probably, although that might not be for a while.

[Misery]

I can probably do them myself for the most part.  Just a matter of figuring out what to do... right now most of them are pretty darn terrible.

I would say though, just work on whatever you feel like working on if you have an idea for it.  If you do have an idea for a particular consumable, by all means, go ahead and do it.

Granted this approach is a bit disorganized, but it's certainly the way I always do things....

That time machine thing though is the biggest one right now.  Isaac actually has the exact same item; in that game, the issue is solved by having it be a secret-room only item (which is pretty rare, not many items have that trait).  After messing with that item in that game and knowing how strong it is, I really should have spotted the issue with THIS one sooner... It's not hyper-broken like a couple of other items were, but it's very close.  I have a couple of ideas I'm going to experiment with on it.  One thing it DEFINITELY shouldnt do though is appear as it does now, in normal chests.  It's just too strong.

Also going to test this disruptor thing myself later if I have a chance today.  Still aint seen it.  Been a bit overly focused on the stupid bosses, need a break from those... though Mirror is almost ready to go.  Spinning beam walls!

[NickAragua]

Out of interest, what do you think of the new Disruptor weapon? Fun? OP? Thanks!

I find it to be an excellent choice. The tradeoff of course being that you have to get close to the enemy, but, if you can, it's a tremendous damage boost. Especially useful against bosses/minibosses and other large enemies. Probably one of my top weapon choices, along with the dual cannons and torpedo launcher (for those low-missile-count bots).

[Misery]

Out of interest, what do you think of the new Disruptor weapon? Fun? OP? Thanks!

I find it to be an excellent choice. The tradeoff of course being that you have to get close to the enemy, but, if you can, it's a tremendous damage boost. Especially useful against bosses/minibosses and other large enemies. Probably one of my top weapon choices, along with the dual cannons and torpedo launcher (for those low-missile-count bots).

Ah?  It's a short range weapon, is it? 

That could be an issue.  It's literally impossible to get close to certain bosses (Centrifuge...), particularly on the higher difficulties.  I've no intention of trying to avoid that with pattern design (WAY too difficult/involved).  On Misery mode, nearly all of them will be impossible to get close to for the entire fight.  This will be the case with a great many enemies as well.   I'm trying out the new Mirror patterns with this, and.... yeah.  Cant get anywhere near close enough to use this.  You have to actually sit in bullets to do that.  And that's just it's first attack... the second will be worse.  The one and only boss it'll sorta almost maybe be able to hit is Battleswarm, but... that's only in a purely technical sense.  That and Crystal Mother's first attack, but I plan on boosting that one.  Even on Normal mode, some bosses still cant be approached (Aberration, for instance). 

Short-range weapons of any sort have been pretty useless throughout the whole game; the balance of the entire thing just doesnt support them.  Though, this is very typical of this entire genre.  Even in something like Isaac, which has no bullet-hell element, those weapons just go unused.

Hm, yeah, I definitely will have to test this a bit in a full run though (on Hard for now) and see what happens.   Might have to wait till tomorrow though.  Arm hurts like hell for no apparent reason.  I'm blaming the weather again.  I'd LOVE if the temperature would stop going from 60 to 30 and then back to 60 EVERY DAMN DAY.   Whoever invented winter should be kicked off a cliff by a horse.

[Pepisolo]

Out of interest, what do you think of the new Disruptor weapon? Fun? OP? Thanks!

I find it to be an excellent choice. The tradeoff of course being that you have to get close to the enemy, but, if you can, it's a tremendous damage boost. Especially useful against bosses/minibosses and other large enemies. Probably one of my top weapon choices, along with the dual cannons and torpedo launcher (for those low-missile-count bots).

Thanks for the feedback!

Ah?  It's a short range weapon, is it?

That could be an issue....

I don't think the general range problem is as severe for secondary weapons. As long as the player has a primary weapon that has range then they're probably gonna be fine against any boss. For high damage short range secondary weapons you only really need to get in close to the boss once or twice to unload the damage, which I'd guess is possible in a lot of cases if you're patient or with certain defensive loadouts.

The Distruptor also has the added advantage against bosses that it can reduce the boss fire rate for a time, too, which helps balance the lack of range.