Trinket balance & clarity

[vivid geyser]

It feels to me like the elemental trinkets (burn, poison, frost, spikes) are WAY stronger than the others. This feels a little bad to me because there are some REALLY interesting ones out there that I think are just worse benefit-wise, which is compounded if it's one of the ones that have a downside attached.

I've also noticed that there are some quirks about some of the trinkets that aren't listed in their descriptions; a friend of mine discovered that Mitosis only triggers on one orb per turn, which is fine, but not actually stared anywhere. I also recently discovered that the frostbite trinket, when completed, applies Hex the first time you trigger Frostbite each round... which would be really cool to have on the actual description, rather than it being hidden away on your status bar only after you finish stacking the trinket.

[vivid geyser]

Adding on that I kind of dislike the trinket "quests"; their tooltips are huge and overcomplicated, whereas the simpler ones that adjust the way you interact with mechanics (take damage to gain AP) tend to be more interesting.

All but one of the quests right now don't actually make the game more interesting, because they're not asking you to go out of your way to change anything about the way you're playing.

(The one quest that I'm arguing is interesting is the Blight one, but even that stops mattering after a point)

[floral flint]

Mitosis states it has max one stack

[vivid geyser]

Oh does it? Whoops

Missed that ig

[urban trench]

It doesn't clearly state it has 1 max stack. It is slightly implicated in the description though.

Just says lose 1 stack. Doesn't state how many stacks it has.

Now if it stated grants 1 stack of Mitosis, that would be 100% clear.

[floral flint]

It does say

If you hover over it explains mitosis

It’s the definition of the mitosis buff not the trinket

(Not saying trinket description could be clarified too)

[urban trench]

Nope, hovering over mitosis does nothing for me. I have tried and tried again, but nothing ever pops up.

[leaden zodiac]

Did you right click on the trinket? On vestiges it explains any keyword in the description

[urban trench]

Oh. I never tried to right-click it. All the other bolded tooltips just needed to be hovered over.

[vivid geyser]

Right clicking it doesn't do anything

Trinkets don't have right click infographics

They should, but they don't-

[kindred ibex]

Scales doesn’t really feel like it gives enough reward for how sub optimally you have to play for it to proc fully

[vivid geyser]

I haven't even tried it myself just 'cuz like

I kinda don't like Heavenly Dawn

[leaden zodiac]

I feel it can only be consistently used with the clairvoyant and it becomes trivially easy to stack

[solemn orchid]

The mitosis description never explains what a stack is

In this context

Could just say, once per turn or something

[vivid geyser]

Mitosis explains it, but Clips of Extraction does not. :\

I shouldn't have to start up a run to understand what something does

[vivid geyser]

Wha huh why did my message get blocked by Automod? D:

Now that I've played a bit more with some other Trinkets, I'd also like to add that a lot of the Trinkets feel like they don't actively do something. While it's not required for every Trinket to be game-warping, I think way too many of them feel way too passive/non-commital.

I think my favorite ones from a design standpoint are:

• Passkey of the Future. It falls into the same category as the elemental Trinkets, where it's a quest Trinket that increases the likelihood of certain Bindings/Augments/Items/stat upgrades popping up-- except the power of an accelerated cooldown is felt more imo than, for example, passively ramping burn damage. They're both +number, but Passkey is way more noticeable. I'd like to also point out that this example makes it sound like I don't like the elemental Trinkets, but I think their presence in the game is good-- they just need adjustments.
• Blessing of Misplaced Nobility. This Trinket is just really cool; it's taking what's exciting about a Sea Breach and doubling down on it. It's more-or-less everything good about devil deals in video games. High risk and high reward will always be exciting, and I'm really happy with this one. I don't think there's much else I need to say on the matter-- it's just sick as hell.
• Marker of the Unbound. Willfully taking Blight damage is similar to Blessing, and then it goes ahead and makes you immune to Blight????? This kicks ass. Just wish it was viable at higher ranks.
• Clips of Extraction. Clips is just fun in multiplayer; you get to have a bajillion orbs, and the visual output is pretty clear. Very satisfying!

I think my last favorite are:

• Rose of Rubies. I think that if I wanted to trade health for AP, I'd just take Blessing or Marker. Not only do I have to opt into Rose of Rubies, but I have to give up on whatever the hell else was in the Font.
• Emblem of Enterprise. Way too little effects to be noticed. Players never keep track of their gold during combat, so it's kinda just... meh? I feel like the Gylph reward also has some overlap with Blessing of Kwills; I think I'd rather Emblem just double down on money. I think I'd be much happier with this if it had some kind of minigame attached to it or something? Or literally anything else. A random chance to get more money on kill is more-or-less the same as saying "get this much gold on average at the end of combat". It's just not satisfying.
• Scales of Infinite Potential. I really dislike Heavenly Dawn for similar reasons: optimizing is often fun, but pain-stakingly tracking ability order in that way slows down the game too much for me to enjoy it. It's also kinda weird 'cuz there's no true "hybrid" class, and having AP plus one of the two, rather than both, is almost always the correct answer. Comparing it to some of the more out-there Trinekts, it's not really adding something new to play with (IE: Marker of the Unbound) so much as it is forcing you to pay much, much more attention to what you were already doing.
• Union of the Needless. Why am I rewarding the player for dying? And if it's not a reward for dying, why am I mitigating the pain of death, rather than being stronger to avoid it in the first place? It's kind of a noob trap; if you're going to pick this up to reduce the chances of death, why not pick up something that lets you kill stuff mitigate damage better? The best way to not die is to just not die.

And then uhhhhh misc. notes:

• My friend really likes Heart of a Hero, but I haven't played with it myself. Legendary reward sounds really satisfying, though, and it's good to have a few simple Trinkets like this :]
• I haven't played with Bounty of Sentient Beings yet. I just don't really think it's for me? I think? Idk. It just sounds kinda boring-
• Chart of Stars is kinda w/e Idk how I really feel about it
• The entire second row is really strong from my understanding. Everfrost is also way too much text for what is effectively just "Frostbite hit good", and I really don't think it needed to apply Hex-- especially considering that kinda takes even more away from Stone of Scholars.
• Dial of Fate is so weird. That's it. That's the Tweet.

[leaden zodiac]

I really dislike Heart of a Hero because it guarantees a legendary stat, but if I recall correctly it just makes one of the options legendary and if you reroll you may just get nothing. It should make it so that all the stats offered are legendary even if you reroll.

Dial of fate is just hot garbage, taking crit stats just guarantees that you will have a random assortment of useless stats and I think you are better off taking the Blessing of kwills.

Bounty of Sentient Beings is quite bad. It will only affect one of all the fights and it's not even that strong. By your second guardian, 10 ability power isn't going to make the difference between winning and losing. I think it would be much stronger if it activated at the first guardian, since you are much weaker then and even in that case it would be significantly worse than many other trinkets.

[vivid geyser]

Ah hm okay

I think guaranteeing a Legendary stat is fine myself

Apparently Dial of Fate is okay because of consistency reasons; if you don't find a crit reward, you can just take a status on instead. I kinda disagree with them, though, for the same reasons you've listed out here.

But like. Idk. Crit rewards aren't uncommon by any means, so it just feels like a waste

That also makes a lotta sense to be the case with Bounty 😔

I kinda agree-- Bounty would probably feel much better if it was for both Guardians, and maybe even the Villain?

Giving up power in hallway fights (is there a term for that here? That's what was used in StS I think) for additional power against bosses seems fine to me.

I'd also like to add that, in my experience, most builds that can beat the second Guardian are going to win the run-- which kinda defeats the point of its current iteration even more lol

[vivid geyser]

Okay wow yeah oof I was under the impression that Heart of a Hero made it so that all options at that Font were Legendary 😬

Way too high of a chance to get something that's just not useful

Not a fan.

Okay guys what're our thoughts

[prime vector]

I have yet to lose a rank 20 dive w/ misplaced nobility across all 6 aspects because pushing abilty power after every fight is objectively always going to have value in any build, so I can't see it not ending up at the top of that list. By the time I get to book 2, every fight turns into a snowball'd dunking, and the mimic in the villain showdown is regularly single-turn nuked before it is even allowed to perform its intended purpose.

[vivid geyser]

I was doing Misplaced but started struggling w/ it on Obelisk. Might've just been bad luck or smthn? Idk.

Dives 16-17 and below were crushed fairly easily w/ it tho

[prime vector]

Last obelisk I ran with nobility ended up with a mix of Crit for early and then high spike and shield gain late. The ability power packs a lot of punch to get you to the snowball in book 2

[vivid geyser]

I was having issues with dying really quickly early on, but again, it could've just been me getting unlucky with Quillion Hybrid

[leaden zodiac]

The Essence of Quilon needs to be on the tier "free win with obelisk" and the Scales of Infinite Potential are really good on clairvoyant, try them and you'll see.

[vivid geyser]

Lmfao wild

Alr

[vivid geyser]

Okay so like. Real talk

Are the lower tiers being undervalued or is balance just Like This rn

[granite dove]

Passkey of the future is incredible imo. Garunteeing smoke bomb and grasp on certain characters like magma miner, clairvoyant, obelisk and weaver is really really good. Plus it gives cooldown reduction for free on both of them.

Rose of rubies is pretty good too. Sentient of the beings isnt thr greatest but Ive used it a few times and a 20 hp heal for free is actually extremely useful. Not incredible but certaintly not useless. Ive also seen the scholar stone strong every time its used. Im not a fan of the design personally, but I guess imo it should be under the if the stars align tier. Only one I persomally think is just flat out unusable is the needless one.

[granite dove]

And actually, I would also argue quicken is incredible on obelisk. Earthquake + quicken for example is super strong. Just another reason passkey is good on him

[solemn orchid]

Why is Passkey good on weaver specifically? For the smoke bomb hex?

[granite dove]

Getting marked for your constrict is really strong with grasp + the ability to pull enemies into stitch range. Smoke bomb is just good in general. Quicken is decent on weaver as it offers mobility and any of the ascensions pretty much let you easily spam your stronger bindings which weaver likes. Pretty much all around good options for weaver

[solemn orchid]

Gotcha makes sense

[vivid geyser]

This is fair about Passkey, but I still contend with just how good Rose actually is. Again, if I wanted to trade HP for AP, I think I'd just go Blessing

[leaden zodiac]

I tried using Rose and the thing is that most of the times you get a stat fountain, there is another good stat that doesn't cost you health. I think I only chose the rose's stats 3 times in a run and that's because I had some vestiges that gave me maximum health, so it wasn't an important stat for me.

[vivid geyser]

P much

[vivid geyser]

Revised

My reasonings:

• Elemental ones are still super strong
• Blessing of Misplaced Nobility is still great
• Clips is fantastic, especially in multiplayer; it's just an amazing increase to Binding uptime
• Scales was... okay ig. It's really good on Clairovoyant, but it's not unequivocally the best option like the four elemental ones are on some of the Aspects
• Dial falls into a similar position as Scales. I shouldn't have turned my nose at it, but it's still worse than Talons of Cyn imo
• Marker of the Unbound just doesn't really do as much as the others. It's really cool and all, but raw DPS will ensure that you don't have to actually care about Blight at all for the most part, since a strong enough build can win fights before it even becomes an issue
• Heart of a Hero makes me sad since only one of the Font rewards is Legendary. Sometimes you pop off, but it's just not as good as the others for that reason
• Everything else feels like I've already said it before and is largely unchanged so I won't touch on it again

[subtle juniper]

Saw the list in #ask-the-experts, here's my take.

[granite dove]

Here is my tier list in terms of power. I dont think many of the trinkets are actually that good.

[subtle juniper]

Inkredible

• Stone of Scholars is a free +10 MP. If you have sustain, you can turn it into a stall and get more MP. The healing after a boss is a full heal. You can take more turns on the boss if needed. Poison can straight up kill any tanky mobs (Putrify for instant / Dart for high damage) Mercurial Elixir is amaizng with this due to resetting CD and free stack of damage. Fire / Frost are good clears for grouped enemies (You can pass their ascended for your main bindings)
  Also, half of the Aspect can use it. (You could push Miner and Moss to count and it's more than half)

Aspect Based

• At least 1 aspect can use it, scales is lower due to the fact that it's harder to play around it imo. (Maybe easier in coop)
• Passkey (Moved down): -1 CD will come pretty fast
• Poison might be the weakest (hence it is on Neutral).

Neutral

• They generally work on any aspects
• Heart works good your Aspect doesn't care much about your 2 drafts so you can reroll the legendary font. (*I assume this works)
• *I do not know how much Emblem gives. Scales better in coop.

Niche

• Marker: I think you could somehow make Marker work in solo and that's it.
• Stars: If you somehow need vestiges for your build, 400 Kwillings is a good amount.

Nah

• Misplaced Nobility: +10AP, -25HP, ends with a +5 gain
• Rose: 4 Elemental / Dial of Fate / Passkey should outclass it
• Bounty: If you need the 20HP and 10AP you probably won't clear the last boss unless you're saving all your Kwillings on legendary vestiges

4P

• Theoretically if you have 3 players commit die, Union gives 12AP and 75% HP for them. The alive player gets 15AP.

[subtle juniper]

Do you know if Passkey -CD stacks?

[granite dove]

Passkey is a flat -1 CD once its triggered. It never gets lower (Unless you get cooldown augments)

[subtle juniper]

Oh well time to update my list then lmao

[granite dove]

This is my enjoyment tier list

I will say, even though passkey is only a -1cd, the 3 bindings it offers are so powerful and the -1cd is impactful enough on its own that it can still be pretty good

[subtle juniper]

Hmm, which aspect do you play with it?

I think it's good but I think the other ones are a lot better. If the max CD is -2 maybe it will be on par with the others.

[granite dove]

I usually use it with obelisk. Obelisk can utilize quicken best imo since he has high cd and daze helps with his natural tanking ability. And mark helps him deal strong damage with his shield dash

Basically none of the options are bad for him

[subtle juniper]

Hmm, need to try it I guess. I mained Obelisk in Season 1. Currently doing one trick Clairvoyant in S2.

I did try his spike build and it works a lot better for him but that was like rank 11 or something.

Before that my Obelisk nukes stuff. In duo I can nuke the smaller stuff and have the other player kill the tankier ones.

I think the issue ends up to be balancing with will and CDs.

[vivid geyser]

Do you think it would be more useful to do separate tier lists of Trinkets for each Aspect?

[ivory frigate]

Unless more than half the trinkets change tiers, 6 mostly the same tierlists sounds a little overkill

I think you could get most of the way there with adding different versions of the trinket per aspect if needed, all on the same tierlist

like a "on magma miner only" trinket and "on everyone else" version of the same one

[floral flint]

6 so far. 🥺

[vivid geyser]

Fair enough

[vivid geyser]

Soon to be 8!

[vivid geyser]

Okay but I really do think Union is just so bad that it shouldn't even have its own "4P" section. If you're struggling that much, then it's not going to help you-- especially since it's more common that you'll be dying to the Guardians now, meaning you get a full-heal after.

Hm y'know now that I've put everything on a list with an "Aspect-dependent" section, I don't actually know how helpful this is

Because now it kinda just looks like this.

Which is... not great? So maybe I'll stop doing tier list stuff

[vivid geyser]

BASED ENJOYMENT LIST THOUGH

BASED OBELISK PLAYER

[subtle juniper]

Yeah but I still think it deserves its own tier in the sense u can actually use it. But it's so niche that it requires 4 people and 3 of them dying to get max output. I can see it actually being viable but the playstyle might turn people off.

[vivid geyser]

That's fair

[subtle juniper]

Also my list has aspect dependant because some aspects can make full use of it, better than Scholars imo.

I just think Scholars has a better all rounder if your aspect uses magic.

Is the +1 orb from extraction really that good? I feel like I don't run movement so I can't make use of it.

[fossil frigate]

thinking about it, this would be sooo much more useful for the FIRST guardian battle rather than the 2nd in the current state of the game

in all seriousness, a slightly nerfed version that works against all guardian and villain battles might be a bit of a better design. having a trinket that literally benefits you for only one battle just feels kinda weird.

[sour flax]

Worst part is ... thats not even a boss we can hunt on the picture. Gimme a trinket/gold/stat reward on murdering whoever's face is on the poster, scale it if I do it first or second book, done

I like passkey to cheese the spend gold quest however

[subtle juniper]

Okay I hit T19, Stone of Scholars is trash now lmao

[vivid geyser]

Yeahhhhh :(

[subtle juniper]

Tbh it's strong but you really need to roll one of the 3 elementals on my first draft since you can get glyph by the second draft.

Or be me and RNG 3 books with Kwilling rewards.

🫠

[vivid geyser]

It would probably be a bit less bad if it increased the likelihood of you finding the elemental Bindings

Idk it's just kinda weird because they all have their separate flat damage stats :\

[subtle juniper]

Yeah but you can just run magic.

[vivid geyser]

Yeahhhh

[subtle juniper]

Like I just opened with this so I'm all good.

Watch as it shows up on my first draft later.

🫠

[delicate token]

Joining this thread late since I care about this topic; sorry for the necro.

I agree that the trinkets are not very balanced, and generally agree with that tier list above. But I want to push for a particular solution: most trinkets should influence drafts, the same way the elemental ones do currently. Hades did a lot of this, and I think it worked well.

I recognize that roguelikes are fundamentally about adjusting your strategy in response to your drafts, and I definitely don't want to break that. But I think there's value in giving players some influence over the probability distribution, so that they can "try" for a particular build, and have above 50% chance of getting it.

[granite dove]

I think elemental trinkets currently handle it the wrong way personally. In hades, the god boons being narrowed down still doesn't force a very specific boon to be picked (Haven't played hades, but I assume this is how it works).

With elemental trinkets, it tries to force the exact same thing every single time (For example, if I pick frostbite, Im always playing frostbite). This is fundementally different than hades and forces the same playstyle every time.

If they want to do something that does influence drafts to do statuses, it should be just that "Improved odds to get status based vestiges", without picking a specfic kind. This would still allow for variance.

[kindred ibex]

In response to “god boons being narrowed down doesn’t enforce” with fated persuasion (glyphs) it pretty much does

[delicate token]

Sure, we definitely want to find the middle ground between "This trinket fully defines your build" and "This trinket has no effect on your build"

@kindred ibex Are you saying that, in Hades, the trinket plus Fated Persuasion meant you could basically choose your build? I think that's only kinda true for me; I was regularly running out of rerolls, so I had to choose them carefully

[leaden zodiac]

This is just wrong. The keepsakes in Hades guarantee that the next boon is from the corresponding god and from that moment on you are much more likely to get it. Hades tries to narrow your available options to about 3 as you pick them. So nothing like what you decided to make up and much more forceful than this game.

[leaden zodiac]

It was really easy to force duo boon builds in Hades. Even forcing Zeus/Demeter/Dionysus with Hera's bow was really easy

[granite dove]

My point was you have 3 choices, so 1 choice isnt always forced. Burn trinket basically means Im playing burn, no choice. And like I said, Ive never played hades so I dont really know how it works. Not trying to make stuff up. Just trying to explain why I dont like elemental trinkets design.

[delicate token]

Sure, but I guess I'd argue that this doesn't mean you're forcing the whole build. "Burn" isn't a whole build, just like "Merciful End" isn't a whole build; each of them are the anchor of a build.

Actually, I guess that's the point I'm trying to make: I think it's healthy to allow players to (with effort, by spending resources) force a particular anchor, as long as they aren't able to force an entire build.

and even "effort" isn't quite the right word, since it feels easy after you've done it a few times.

[prime vector]

Going to agree w/ @granite dove on this one. In general, I find that linear trinkets that push you towards a route are not creative or interesting when compared to the more neutral ones where adapting to what you're dealt is the main focus.

These are the elemental ones, but I'd also include passkey of the future, since you are anchor'd towards those associated bindings to get use out of the trinket.

The more open-ended a trinket is in what the player's build ends up being, the more creativity it encourages to get the most out of your run, especially since you will be forced to think on your toes as the run develops.

I always tell friends who are getting into the high ranks never to plan their archtype before it starts (ie "I'm going to go burn weaver this time" before diving), as you won't know what your build ends up being defined as until the end of book 1. These aforementioned trinkets encourage you to go against that adaptive planning, and IMO can lead to overall weaker teaching to new players. I wouldn't feel so comfortable swapping between any aspect at R20 w/ neutral trinkets if I wasn't forced out of my comfort zone each run, which then means currently I'm comfortably recognizing I-win-combos when I see them coming in the drafts after an extended amount of time experimenting.

[delicate token]

I appreciate that much of this is a preference thing, not a balance thing! I think we agree that either extreme (zero influence vs. complete control) would be bad for the game.

All I'm saying is that I personally appreciate the slightly-higher degree of influence that the draft trinkets offer, and I wish that there were more (and a wider variety) of them.

[kindred ibex]

it kind of is a balance thing too

consistency has a huge affect on how viable a run will be and having trinkets that increase consistency in some form means that they are going to pretty much unquestionably be better than their counterparts

The only trinket that I can think of that's really powerful enough to not care is clips of extraction just because getting an extra cooldown on everything every turn except the first is bonkers and that's not even taking into consideration how good it is in co-op

the god-trinkets in hades were pretty much functionally broken because at higher difficulties you would be trolling not to use them

Especially here one of the issues is that there's a pretty massive gap in usefulness for many aspects i.e. I don't see anyone nabbing frostbite on magma miner

[kindred ibex]

Ultimately, the most advanced gameplay will be balanced against people running frostbite on star captain or clips on weaver and so on for each aspect. I've been thinking for a pretty long time about what a possible fix for this might be and I think I may have something but I'm not sure how I feel about it or how difficult it would be to implement.

I think that there's design space for trinkets to change a lot more of how a characters playstyle functions in a way that would make some trinkets more viable and also generally more interesting to interact with for the player. If trinkets had some unique augments that they introduced to the pools for each aspects base bindings, thusly adding functionality to that character, it might do some of the lifting necessary.

For Example:
Scales now introduces a common augment that flips a bindings physical/magic classification
Everfrost adds some "apply frostbite" augments to the aspects pool
Blessing of Kwills creates a rare augment for each characters 3 similar to the extracting smite but for glyphs
Bounty creates some augments that increase crit chance and damage specifically in boss fights

and so on. I would love if trinkets felt less like a bonus to be thrown on with some obviously not great options and more like a modular way to change up a characters playstyle, almost like secondary alliances in monster train. Trinkets as they currently are don't really actually create that much of an interesting decision for the player. (At least, from my perspective.)

[vivid geyser]

Hi I'm revising my list again

One of the wild changes to me is Dial > Talons

I unironically think Dial works better for Mosscloak than Talons of Cyn; it's more impactful early game, and the lessened decay rate doesn't often matter against bosses because the poison is cleansed on splitting

[vivid geyser]

Clips Weaver sounds fun :o

To be clear: I think it's good for each Aspect to have a "default" trinket, but each other trinket needs to be on-par for it to matter

[vivid geyser]

I feel a lil' weird about more trinkets having tilt; it's hard to get a good gauge on how impactful it actually is, since it's a pretty invisible stat (and also because humans aren't great at examining RNG)

[vivid geyser]

I think we'll get more wilder trinket options next update

... Stone of Scholars should probably make the Burn/Frost/Poison drafted bindings more common

Assuming it doesn't already. Because not telling you it does is somewhat in-line with things rn

I also think my opinion of Misplaced Nobility has degraded a bit

Book 1 is the hardest already, and you're generally pretty set if you get past it-- so there's no real reason to make yourself weaker in book 1 to be stronger later

Which leads me to this:

New and improved!™️

Blessing of Kwills is really good on Magma Miner imo, since it lets you reroll very early on to fairly reliably find Shielding Leaping Strike and Extracting Bonk

Which are, imo, the two most important Augments in the game for Magma Miner

I still don't really know how to feel about Scales; it's mostly up there because of some community opinion that I've heard

I may drop Heart of a Hero and Marker even lower tbh? Idk

Okay here

(Let it be known that I've just been using the tier names from this tier list maker)

On my tier shifts:

• Heart of a Hero outdone in both consistency and power by most other trinkets, without bringing anything new to the table. It doesn't give you any power before the first guardian, which is the most common run-ender right now-- and the fact that you can theoretically get a Legendary in a stat you don't care about, and even be forced to reroll your legendary away? Kinda stinks. I still stand by the idea that it should make the entire Font become legendary rewards.
• I love Marker so much but I cannot justify it. It's just not good. Currently, if you're worried about Blight, you're doing something wrong-- and in higher ranks, you're making yourself take 5% more total damage each time you trigger it. It's even less of an issue now that Grasp is now a thing and enemy pathing has changed a bit
• Dial is better than Talons on Mosscloak; I've finally been sold on it. It still gives you solid consistency, and a bit more flexibility-- but mostly, it's better in book 1 than Talons of Cyn is. Not to mention, by the time you get the reduced decay rate, it kinda doesn't matter anymore, because of boss phasing cleansing any status effects.
• Blessing is down for the same reason Talons of Cyn is: book 1 is just more important than the rest of the run. I can't find any way to justify taking it.
• Blessing of Kwills is up because oh my god I love this thing on Magma Miner. You get to just hard roll for the Augments you want and then you get to spend all your money on Legendaries and it's really fun and unironically good-- not to mention, if you fail to reroll into the right Binding, you can take a Shrine/Empowerment for one extra Glyph and that'll often give you another shot.
• Passkey could be higher, but while it's strong generally, most Aspects have a trinket they'd rather use specifically.

Emblem of Enterprise remains unmoved because I still think that Blessing of Kwills is just better; rerolling with cash also activates the increase in rarity, so while I like to use it to hunt after specific Augments, it's always good for Vestiges.

[prime vector]

Not sure how Nobility falls under maybe if the stars align when it has been the most consistent trinket in my rotation. It's a slotless glass cannon w/ no drawback apart from a cautious early-game (and even then, that AP gain is extremely significant that by battle 3, you're seeing really strong returns that only spirals out of control by the 1st boss).

I've ran it on all 6 aspects and never lost at rank 20

[vivid geyser]

In terms of raw power it's pretty good-- I just feel like the cost outweighs the benefit. I've found myself taking it much, much less lately. A lot of Aspects have trinkets they'd rather use to increase consistency, and if I make it past book 1 I'm probably winning my run anyways

I also admit that this could totally just be one of my worse takes LOL

[prime vector]

Nah, all your takes are valid IMO, you're more than welcome to it. I just really like the consistency of ability power since it means even if I get stuck with frost-spec on magma, that bonus damage will do work, which means you're not hurting for rerolls as badly

[granite dove]

I personally think the blight trinket is good, it just depends on the aspect

[vivid geyser]

That's fair :]

Just to put it out there, I still think that Blessing and Marker are definitely some of the most interesting trinkets-- so they're some of my favs

[prime vector]

At the moment I've been far more quiet than I would be after enough Rank 20 runs because I have a shaking feeling that the vestige sets are about to pretty much implode the discussions on this + the difficulty thread, but that's a discussion for November 😁

[vivid geyser]

Oh true

I'm super excited to see what they do

Not to mention, there'll be the new Aspects to talk about

[prime vector]

I feel that any input I have at this point are about to be moot. One thing I spotted in the demo stream is how we're seeing subtle tweaks on things going from +1 to +5 (which effectively means a -0.5 nerf w/ old metrics)

I would not be surprised if nobility goes from +1 ability power to +5 omni damage per stack as a result

[vivid geyser]

Oh true

I hope Bounty of Sentient Beings gets a rework

... And also Union of the Needless gets changed completely

[prime vector]

I've been tempted to make a thread about some concerns I have w/ the upcoming overhauls, but I'm better off waiting until it all comes out so I can deep dive (pun intended) into it. My 4p team has been pretty mixed on our initial impressions based on the reveals, but I guess we'll have to just wait & see

[vivid geyser]

I don't think there's any harm in making it so long as you're upfront about the fact that these are concerns, rather than final opinions

Plus, it's documenting community opinion :3c

There's nothing more satisfying than assuaged concerns hahahah

[prime vector]

Yah, but like I said, I'd rather just wait and see. The devs have a strong grip on their systems that I'm willing to give the benefit of doubt, movement-2.0-irks aside lol. They've commited to this overhaul, so any input I give is possibly off-base speculation.

[vivid geyser]

I'm mostly concerned about how quickly they seem to be redesigning a lot of the game >.>

I trust them, but it doesn't instill a ton of confidence in me lol

[prime vector]

It is definitely awe-inspiring to see a team willing to overhaul so much between seasons, let alone during a season. It speaks volumes that my gut reaction is to say "This might be overboard" but simultaneously still be excited just because it means I have to shake up things all over again

[subtle juniper]

I still stand by my Stone of Scholars is good as long as your first book has free glyph :^)

I think redesigning keeps the game fresh for me.

[oak citrus]

I feel that every trinket has its own personal playstyle. There are a few that I basically never use though since their viability is very limited. Bounty of Sentient Beings for example is only good for a singular fight and never has any other use. Heart of a Hero and Chart of Stars also have very limited usability. But that's likely because they're designed for accomplishing quests like "have 70 crit chance at the end of a run" or "do stuff in Derelict Starship". They're not super powerful but they help a niche that are going for those quests. Not every trinket is going to be meta material, because that's not how trinkets are designed. But there are plenty of options for power, if that's what you're into.

With the arrival of vestige sets I feel like clips of extraction is going to be much more powerful, since there is a set that gives 4 shattered will for each orb grabbed AND also reduces the shattered will stack trigger to 8 instead of 10. It's still work in progress though so it'll probably be changed before the update releases

[delicate token]

Making Clips of Extraction even more powerful sounds like a bad idea 🤔

[sour flax]

I mean you're free not to use it if it makes the game too easy

At the end of the day this isn't a competitive game

[granite dove]

Its still important that no trinket is too powerful cause it could mess with boss balance for example. If they started balancing around one trinket, all other trinkets would feel like suffering.

[sour flax]

Then it's a sign they need to rework trinket system

[delicate token]

I think balance is still quite important even in a co-op game.

[prime vector]

Better to wait and see what the vestige sets breakdowns will look like since we don't have the full scope yet to determine their interactions w/ every trinket. Hard to really speculate when we've only seen a few.

[vivid geyser]

Players will always optimize the fun out of a game if they're allowed to. This isn't even just an opinion so much as it is unfortunate fact.

[vivid geyser]

I don't really see how Blessing of Sentient Beings has any meaningfully different playstyle lol

Not every trinket should be meta, but not being meta should be because they're niche and interesting-- not because they're bad.

[oak citrus]

Sometimes optimizing your build is the fun of a game. Especially in roguelites. Although yeah, when there's a meta that is always a go-to that can be unfun because it punishes experimentation

[oak citrus]

You're rephrasing exactly what I said actually

[vivid geyser]

Oops

In my defense I had just woken up when I sent that

And also just woken up now so I won't engage in any discussion yet 😔

[oak citrus]

Blessing of Sentient Beings is kind of pointless for me personally because by the time I get to book 2 I'm already powerful enough to deal with him no problem

Book 1 boss is the real challenge

[vivid geyser]

Basically

[oak citrus]

But they are updating and reworking trinkets in the next update on the 27th so let's hope BoSB gets some much needed love

Wait a second it's bounty of sentient beings, not blessing 🤣

[vivid geyser]

Lmfao

OH RIGHT I did see they reworked Rose of Rubies

Had to find it in another server

Kind of insane

[oak citrus]

2 omni power is 2% damage increase, if they properly updated the UI

[vivid geyser]

Yeee

Idk how worth it that is, but it's definitely more interesting (and also decoupled from Fonts now) >.>

[oak citrus]

Blessing of Misplaced Nobility is now just -25 max hp and +2 shielding

Yay! Fonts will actually be interesting real soon

Did you see the new elemental trinket reworks?

[prime vector]

Interesting.

Probably my new replacement w/ nobility getting ripped into uselessness (imo; +2 shielding is completely worthless in the long-term compared to increasing damage). Only real problem I see w/ the new rose is that you're now completely dependant on finding max-HP gear to maximize it, and I prefer trinkets that encourage a neutral play-style and not just "you need this binding/vestige for this to be worthwhile"

Although I just re-read this again and I realized: "Minions" probably needs to be revised to "While confronting guardians above [etc. etc. etc.]", because at first I thought it meant all battles, when I suspect it's only referring to guardian showdowns.

I hope this isn't the case, as that is supremely weak, then. If it's referring to all enemies? Might be really interesting to play with.

[oak citrus]

I'll have to watch the stream again because Marimo did actually use rose of rubies in one of his runs with the new aspect. I think it subtracted max HP for everything he killed but again I'll have to rewatch

[prime vector]

If it does count for everything, yeah, I'm interested. I love high-risk, high-reward builds in games in general, so despite the damage being not great, it could make for an interesting inverse of the way old nobility worked.

Since old nobility gave you a rough start and a slaughtering end-game, if I'm right about the new rubies, it will make the early-game easier, especially since damage you take isn't going to really matter when your max HP pool is decreasing with each encounter. But now you'll be encouraged to really make that end-game count so that your damage can out-class your incoming damage.

[vivid geyser]

Cracks knuckles

It's time.

I'll do a new "first impressions" tier list in a second

[prime vector]

My suspicion of Rose being something new and special was a pretty strong presumption. It's killing and can sit near the top, above bounty; bounty I thought would be slick, but its procs are too little to impact compared to the consistency of loading up the Sunny-OD

Special accomodation to Marker of the Unbound, but specifically if you're running Gunkfilled as your starter mutator. It is devastatingly overpowered, and thankfully because we can now choose trinkets while eyeing the opening mutators, you'd be very much encouraged to always run gunkfilled & switch to the Marker

IMO Union, Dial, Nobility, & Heart of a Hero have been drinking and need to be given some rehab so they stop embarassing the others in their roster.

[vivid geyser]

LOL

[vivid geyser]

This is a good point! It's also something I think I pointed out at one point

It's not a ton of damage, though, and most of the time you don't really care all that much about Gunkfilled imo

[granite dove]

I think blessing of misplace nobility will be viewed as bad, but honestly, using it a few times, its decently good

I would give it a solid C

[vivid geyser]

I think it's really good!

... On Obelisk. :p

[granite dove]

I used it on godkeeper and it went pretty well

[vivid geyser]

I feel like it doesn't generate enough value on any other Aspect compared to what that Aspect would like to do, but is probably insane on Ob

2 Shielding is great

Immortality

[prime vector]

My problem w/ Nobility is that it badly needs a way to scale up that +2 shielding to be worth considering. IMO it should gain +1 shielding per guardian-kill on top of its base, otherwise it underperforms in late-game. Maybe even have it behave like it used to by slowly regaining max-HP per battle so that it gains some extra meat on those brittle bones.

Even with my suggestion, I still would likely not touch it because despite the vestige sets warranting a lot more crunch, damage is still by-and-large king, and I'd sooner push trinkets that can push damage. If you're not obliterating everything by the finale, that +2 shielding won't have any inherent value to you.

[subtle juniper]

It's time to make to have Stone of Scholars down after doing 2 T10 runs /s

It's even harder to draft elementals now 🫠

[prime vector]

I disagree, you're able to be incredibly reckless w/ Marker + Gunkfilled, and you'd be surprised how much the OD boost ends up paying its dividends post book 1.

The immunity for 6 rounds is pretty god-tier, too now, since you'll rarely push beyond that 6 rounds if you're upping those OD rookie-numbers

[vivid geyser]

This is fair

I'll give it a shot soon

(After I hit 20 on CB)

[prime vector]

I want to do a lot more delving, but alas, the woes of having reduced playtimes. Overall we're going in the right direction in terms of trinket-balance. I'd like to see some of the weaker ones get more buffs, then see future ones get added

[vivid geyser]

I saw Gunkfilled so I'm giving it a shot rn

[prime vector]

Have fun

[vivid geyser]

[granite dove]

I 100% would be marker in S tier, no questions asked

[vivid geyser]

Oh dear lord wow okay yeah this is pretty good

[prime vector]

It's basically a no-brainer w/ gunkfilled now as a starter, since you're not at the mercy of waiting for the gunk to show-up.

[vivid geyser]

Jesus

Yeah that's an easy S

That's a ton of AP

Okay so having not yet played with it, here's my thoughts on Emblem of Enterprise:

Why?

I feel like if you want Glyphs you'd just go Blessing of Kwills (which I'm hesitant to put in a new D tier because of the Augment/drafting changes) for both that and the reroll effect, and if you want money (for some reason) you'd just go Chart of Stars

[granite dove]

Consistancy probably. I used it with magma miner. Basically you get a good amount of money throughout the run (200-300ish at a minimum) and pick up a few glyphs. Its basically an "I dont know if I will want glyphs or money, but it will help me regardless"

[vivid geyser]

I guess that makes sense, but I can't imagine it being any better than just alright

I just feel like ideally you have a good enough understanding of your character to be able to tell when you should be hunting for specific Ascensions/Augments VS when you should be hunting for specific sets

New and improved

Once I get more time I'll mess with the placement of Bounty a bit more

[granite dove]

Its very easy to reroll rares vestiges into legendaries with the glpyh one imo. I've done it at least once per run

[vivid geyser]

Hmmmmm that does change things

Bumps BoMN up to C

[prime vector]

Bounty is a B for me because again, it doesn't proc enough to feel significant. Not like the way its hot cousin Ruby makes the heads & consequently roll

[vivid geyser]

Understandable

[fervent solstice]

Heart of a hero feels better than its previous iteration but it's a little bit of a gamble

If it rolls into the right sets it can be a good power boost after the first guardian fight but at higher difficulties having what is essentially no benefit for the entirety of book 1 hurts a lot

Especially since imo post patch book 1 is a little bit harder than before if your luck isn't at least decent

I think it's okay on aspects that have an easy-ish time early game that they can forego trinkets with earlier impact and stack a lot of sets but other choices are still probably stronger

[granite dove]

Blessing of kwills is easy a tier for me now

Its so funny how easy it is to get good vestiges early on

Maybe even S tier honestly its busted

[vivid geyser]

Giving it a shot rn. Any suggestions for Aspect?

[granite dove]

Any honestly. I got 2 sails rerolling tarnished vaults twice in a roll lol

[vivid geyser]

Trying it out with CB rn

[vivid geyser]

Cleared a run. It was solid, but not nearly as strong as it was last season :(

And also bugged lol

Bumping up to A

Trying out Heart of a Hero now

My guess is that it's just alright and not much else.

[granite dove]

I would give it a B or C. Basically RNG dependant

It does give better results if you dont finish sets and just half finish them

[vivid geyser]

See but then you're usually shooting yourself in the foot I feel lol

[prime vector]

Since Heart of a Hero's previous iteration revolved around post-boss boosts, what would give it much-needed oomph would be to allow the 1st usage of the vestige-grinder you use post-guardian to be a double-one, this way you're getting the sets you really need rather than just hoping and then (likely) being disappointed.

[vivid geyser]

Honestly I think I'd just rather give it a really minor starting boost

[granite dove]

Im bumping blessing of kwills to a personal S. Its so easy to get broken builds right out of the gate

[zealous dock]

I was thinking blessing of kwills was the big loser of the patch with the lose of stat shrines but after trying it out yes, it's still my favourite

just roll the gacha and get your legendary stuff chapter 1

[subtle juniper]

Stone with crit build.

Questionable.

[vivid geyser]

Stone is eating rn 'cuz there's new cross-status synergies (IE: Thaumaturge) and most other trinkets got nerfed

[subtle juniper]

Thaumaturge kinda bad with stone I tried it ytd.

[vivid geyser]

🤔

[vivid geyser]

Don't you just get to pick up Misery's Whip and then grind it tho

Lol nice

[subtle juniper]

There's too much things stronger than Thaumaturge sadly.

It's too many stuff to make it 'comfortable' to use.

If it doesn't feel nice in T10 I don't think I can make it usable in later tiers.

If you're playing Miner Moss duo maybe it's a lot stronger there.

Precision is a must have for stones. Just to force refresh your two bindings as much as you can.

That only makes your build even stronger since you scale all your bindings lol

[vivid geyser]

Updated the list a bit after some more play

[subtle juniper]

What are you thoughts on Nobility + Shadow lol

[vivid geyser]

Ehhhhhhh it's okay. I think it's easier to just pick up a little bit of Bastion or healing; it's probably not worth the full loss of 25 HP, but I'd have to actually play with it to get a better idea on how I feel about it.

Could be worth it?

Who knows.

[subtle juniper]

Cause I did it by accident it was okay lol

[vivid geyser]

Shielding is pretty good :}

[subtle juniper]

I think it would be better on like Obelisk or smth.

I did it on Weaver by accident, forgot to change my relic lol

[vivid geyser]

Haven't tried it yet since I've been on that CB kick, but Nobility's best Aspect is probably Ob

2 Shielding is kinda great

[prime vector]

Someone had a bad round w/ Ruby to drop from A to D

[granite dove]

Its basically 2 free HP every turn. As long as you block 25+ damage with it, its already paid for the 25 hp you would have lost plus extra

[subtle juniper]

I mean if you put it that way 🤣

[prime vector]

Nobility is terrible on Obelisk because then you're not getting any damage. The extra shielding only gets you so far w/out the damage to back it.

[subtle juniper]

I guess it's just me playing a lot of coop lately to have more perspective on the relics.

Like stone is amazing in coop too :^)

As long as the people let you stack orbs.

[vivid geyser]

Notes:

• I actually got around to testing Rose of Rubies (was on Clairo). We did it in multiplayer. It nearly killed me several times over. It was only really in A tier because I hadn't properly tested it yet. The cost is just way too high, especially considering Marker actually has a 6-turn Blight immunity attached to let you scale, rather than a penalty. Not a fan.
• Bounty of Sentient Beings dropped. After testing it a bit more, I agree with Ric-- and also because I'm butthurt I rolled crit chance only once and rolled crit damage four times. >:(
• Emblem got pushed up to C because Kwilling Hoarder builds are kind of insane. Blessing of Kwills has the reroll tool, but it doesn't give you money, so Emblem at least stands out as having a reason for existing now.
• Speaking of Blessing of Kwills-- Maxx was right! This thing's pretty good still, except now it's for slightly different reasons! You're not really using it to hunt after key Augments as much anymore. I'll probably bump it up to S tier once they fix it not rewarding Glyphs on entering a Binding Empowerment.
• Heart of a Hero is just... okay. The fact that it doesn't give you any value until the end of book 1 is still the real problem with it, since that's the hardest part of a run.
• I have yet to actually look very closely at how good Blaze, Talons, and Quillion are-- but I can't imagine they're bad. Notably, what keeps them above Everfrost is the fact that they're easy to scale, and actually synergize with the Trinket. Plus, it was mentioned on a dev stream that having a set bonus gives you some tilt, so that's still present, even if it's not blatantly spelled out anymore.
• Dial my beloved look how they butchered you look at what they did to my boy

[subtle juniper]

Actually, isn't marker super good on Weaver?

[vivid geyser]

Marker is super good on everyone except SC because SC is horrible rn

SC

If you see Gunkfilled in book 1, you have to switch to Marker

It's non-negotiable

[prime vector]

I'd be hard-pressed to ask how the damage of your team-mates were in multiplayer that you were nearly getting killed w/ ruby, especially if the team is juggling aggro efficiently. In nearly every multiplayer game my group is doing, our damage scales enough to phase-break the bosses quickly if the majority of the team are pushing damage (spoiler: they should be)

[subtle juniper]

Haven't use Obelisk in awhile let's see how well it performs now in S3 lol

[fervent solstice]

Ob has a lot of good trinket options

[vivid geyser]

Trying to remember the team comp from that Rose run but failing :(

Also now that I think about it a bit more I'm exaggerating a bit

[subtle juniper]

Other than spike build, what's good?

I played spiked and I didn't enjoy the playstyle at all.

[fervent solstice]

crush

you can use the marker trinket if you get gunkfilled mod(you're melee range and you c an spam basic to stack on top of it)

[vivid geyser]

Gl!

[fervent solstice]

clips is pretty decent on Ob as well

[vivid geyser]

Clips is good on everyone

[fervent solstice]

although you'll struggle round 1 early game

[vivid geyser]

Faster cooldowns is universally good as it turns out

[fervent solstice]

yeah but Ob more than some others imo

even without earthquake

[vivid geyser]

I haven't played S3 Ob yet (and I don't think I've ever run Clips on it), so I can't say for sure. 🤷

[fervent solstice]

it's mostly bcs early game Ob cooldowns are if you can't find cd augments/vestiges

since you could end up with a dead round where everything is cd

Clips makes that impossible

[vivid geyser]

That's fair

[subtle juniper]

I really don't like clips cause I tend to go for the orb deal damage books.

[vivid geyser]

Overstim? That makes sense

[prime vector]

My last game w/ Ob sort of caused a disparity in my team, because team-mate was convinced the damage was awful, yet I was phase-breaking argolath every round by myself. Ob's good, but needs a good push to avoid falling behind tempo

[vivid geyser]

Idk how I feel about the Ob buff tbh

I also don't know how I feel about the change to all the Shielding Augments that gave shielding per hit

[prime vector]

Use my method of experimentation: Play the aspect your team is declaring is trash-tier, then out-damage them 😉

[vivid geyser]

It's a lot less fun 😭

Have you been having any issues with SC btw?

The new Vestige Set system wasn't very kind to it imo

[fervent solstice]

Yes

SC is a slog

[prime vector]

Zero. SC ruins games by making everyone else feel insignificant

[fervent solstice]

you scale so slowly

in Singleplayer

in multiplayer the passive and commander are stupid

[vivid geyser]

Wait actually? Almost everyone in my groups has been complaining about dealing no damage >.>

[prime vector]

In single, you're weak until book 1's done, then you ironically snowball for the rest.

But that's par for the course in general

[prime vector]

Very strange. SC can either hard-nuke and make mosscloaks jealous or larp as D&D bards for days w/ good drone-support.

[vivid geyser]

.>

What Trinket have you been running?

And what builds?

[prime vector]

Ruby. It's why I keep pushing it, or Marker if I want to dunk w/ the gunk

[vivid geyser]

Maybe I should give Ruby a few more tries

[fervent solstice]

really? I find if I don't have artic commander or roll any cryoclasm asc my book 2 becomes miserable

[prime vector]

The build is going to vary, because I just roll w/ whatever can push my damage. I won't push for frost unless I'm getting served frost, so it tends to either push me towards omni/magic w/ fat doses of crit-boosting via precision/reaver or I'm pimping the drones, because the drones don't joke around if you play around them

[green osprey]

i don't know if it was proposed alredy, but Scales of Infinite Potential definitly need counter

[vivid geyser]

Yeah people have talked about that

[green osprey]

it impossible to use them fully without headache

[vivid geyser]

There just needs to be more clarity (hence the "& clarity")

[fervent solstice]

Ruby is good, but you really do need to push for early verdant to feel safe

[vivid geyser]

I mean Idk I did that and then I ground up my Verdants and it pushed me below 20 HP

[prime vector]

Verdant's welcome, but not required. vigorous has been a fun support for keeping you feeling invulerable

[green osprey]

ruby and scytche is insane combo

[prime vector]

The goal w/ ruby play is to get the damage high enough that you're effectively a glass cannon w/out needing glass cannon, this is reliably consistent whether you're getting support from verdant or are massly stacked on reaver/precision

[fervent solstice]

then dont droop verdant :p

[prime vector]

Anyway, time to catch zzz's, good luck w/ your runs 🙂

[fervent solstice]

and some shields+vigourous+blur should keep you safe from anything that isnt a nuke

[vivid geyser]

Yeah but then I'm stuck with less inventory slots for the entire run

Which just feels rancid

[fervent solstice]

for an insane amount of Omni, and still not dead amounts of hp

fair trade off

[vivid geyser]

I guess

I'd imagine it's much harder in solos though

[green osprey]

not really, if you do it right

with shields and blur you are not supposed to take damage in the first place

[fervent solstice]

yep

+points if you're an aspect that gets additional access to stuff like that

[vivid geyser]

I'll give it another shot tmrw ig

[vivid geyser]

Any other things on the list y'all disagree with btw? :o

[fervent solstice]

everything else looks spot on

to me at least

[azure bay]

in my experience, Ruby can be a bit of a nail-biter until you hit 8 verdant or an early scythe, but the omni damage does help a lot in killing things before they kill you.

[fervent solstice]

Death is the best cc after all

[azure bay]

if you hit either of those your hp will just massively outscale the loss from ruby and you'll end the run with 100+ hp and a bunch of omni damage

[fervent solstice]

[subtle juniper]

I lost and don't really like Nobility on Obelisk.

I just didn't have enough damage for 2nd boss lol

[subtle juniper]

Me I still don't get what's the hype on clips.

[fervent solstice]

cooldowns

pretty much

and also if you get the shattered will oriented vestige set it can get pretty nuts

[kindred ibex]

Ruby on obelisk is splended

I rolled invigorate and the max hp augment and then just kind of stalled until I scaled properly into the late game

[brisk eagle]

Quillion is the only thing I ran on Obelisk last season and I enjoyed running it. Now tho, it doesn't feel as good. Is that just me?

[prime vector]

The 2nd row trinkets that were pretty popular last season were never ones I cared for, but the current iteration of them feel weaker because the main draw is the starting set bonus, and their secondary effects feel weaker. I can't really justify the starting set bonus, mostly because it locks you into a mentality of pursuing that set, and if you don't land vestiges that push you toward that set, it's going to be a rough time. It's why I'm still going to always argue that the best trinkets are the ones that take a neutral consistency approach with less focus on RNG gains.

[vivid geyser]

Nah it's not just you the entire row of elemental trinkets got nerfed pretty hard

Also Rubies for scaling at the cost of needing to take a billion defensive options feels kinda redundant if book 1 is the hardest part of the run

[kindred ibex]

At least in my opinion, it felt WAY too good in the first place. Obelisk could so reliably just never take damage and if you went all in on the +1 shield for 3 enemies hit clap then spike generation would just become not okay

[vivid geyser]

"Redundant" is the wrong word but Idk what other word to put here

[vivid geyser]

Playing a solo run and got to Ruhnstone; it's not bad actually. I think I was probably just throwing the other games lol

I don't really like that it hard-locks you into Verdant to keep getting value out of Rose, though-- and Verdant 8 isn't even actually that good without a ton of healing

[prime vector]

You really don't need verdant. At maximum, I'd shoot for 2 if it's available and not care beyond 2 set pieces, since the Max HP gain is all you'd need for some topping. To score verdant 8 means to sacrifice way more damage from better damage-increasing sets.

This is especially pointless to chase when you're not going to have a high enough max-HP pool for the 5/8 set bonus to be worth anything compared to some raw damage sets

[vivid geyser]

This is fair

[prime vector]

Friend and I did a dual run w/ rubies, rank 15 (our play times are limited so it's taking time to get back to 20), and by book 2 we were more or less 1-shotting every wave, acquiring verdant 2 pretty early, then just letting that carry us while we were pimping our damage sources. Chainbreaker + GK.

What's pretty gross about Rubies is that you're not required to last hit, so even a party running them leads to pretty great tempo in terms of winning the DPS race.

[fervent solstice]

Huh it's just one verdant seed + any other verdant set vestige and if you take a not great vestige you can just grind it at the end of book 1 to keep the set effect and get back an item slot

[vivid geyser]

Yeah the commitment needed for it was much lower than I expected now that I was actually paying attention (esp. in solo)

Our group runs that night must've just been really chaotic or something lol-

But yeah

[lime kite]

I definitely think that Chart of Stars is easily better than the elemental trinkets in the same tier. It doesn't commit you to a build, and the money allows you to aggressively roll for useful vestiges, while making breakpoints for Binding Augments and the first shop, while aggressively looking for early game vestiges, instead of kwillings caches.

Its very versatile

[vivid geyser]

This is fair

Honestly I might bump the elemental trinkets down to C

They're just... not actually that good anymore.

I don't think, anyways. 🤔

[granite dove]

Spike one has been doing me well the most since it is a consistent status. And getting the spiked set is hardest it feels like, so getting that extra starting set is really good

[vivid geyser]

Ah right I should've excluded Spikes

I think that's the only good one rn 🤔

Frost especially is suffering 😔

[tawny summit]

I'd bump up the Enterprise then

Money generation in any form is good with the introduction of sets

[vivid geyser]

Chart kicks in earlier than Enterprise, which's why I put it ahead-- also because Glyphs aren't as important as they were in season 1 imo

[prime vector]

The conversation really needs to start shifting from comparing the girth of the top trinkets to improving the pride of the lessers, IMO. Before going to bed, here are thoughts to improve them without deviating too far from their original design. Enjoy:

► Heart of a Hero could have a significant interest-increase if the 3 random boosts were based on your highest current vestiges as a means of promoting power-boosts to the ones you are prioritizing. IE if I have two sets at rank 3 and three at rank 2, the rank 3’s go up, and a random rank 2 goes up.

► Everfrost of Arcturia has a sexy name but an unsexy dose of RNG. I’ve already said I’m not a fan of the elemental row, but this one has been singled out amidst its peers as lesser, a simple alteration would be to inflict 1 frost bite to all enemies. It’s a small boost, but it’s one that creates good early-game AOE incentive. Maybe even lower the 100 threshold down to 50 to accelerate its progression faster. It can’t hurt to boost this so it doesn’t look so emo.

►Dial of Fate is a badly mixed drink, period, because even if you get a little more damage of the type you’re chasing, you won’t feel fulfillment. Just suffer from hangovers. This will sound crazy, but I’d like to suggest just making dial of fate dish out 1 vestige set-bonus of those respective types (Molten, Venemous, Everfrost, Eviscerator, Pincushion) after every battle, mostly because at least then you’re going to see some sort of potentially creative mid-game power-shift, where you might just stick on a few doses of those sets to take advantage of the % damage bonuses. Just a thought.

► Union of the Needless, aka the girl preparing to be prom queen, only to be absolutely rejected by everyone. If I’m going to suggest keeping the theme of this poor trinket the same, here is my suggestion: Make the omni damage permanent and reduce it to, say, 20. I foresee an instance of such a change leading to fun coordinated plays for a group of number-crunchers, where Union would go from nah to niche, and not the bad sort of niche either. Could become the ultimate try-hard trinket if your team are willing to get obliterated between routes for the sake of that extra damage-increase. The real solution is to completely start this trinket over from scratch, especially since it has zero use in solo-play, but I’m trying to stick to the existing themes.

[brisk eagle]

I wouldn't say it's pointless, since as seen with my run here (I realize it was only T14, but that's just cuz I've only played 4 games this season), verdant 8 and vigorous 5 compliment each other very well. my max hp was way beyond the starting hp, even with 90 stacks from the rose trinket. and if u get a vestige to scale with your healing/health as well (such as Window to Eternal Longing), you're golden

[subtle juniper]

I think the question is how often are you gonna run into these two sets.

[fervent solstice]

Very often honestly

Like max verdant 8 and vig 6 not so much

[brisk eagle]

2/2 runs that i focused on it, i got it

so low sample pool, but it seems often

[fervent solstice]

But 5 verdant and 2/3 vig are very easy to hit

[brisk eagle]

my other 2 runs were trying to go for spikes on 1 and crit on the other

spikes felt pretty mid (and i used the spike trinket)

crit felt better

[subtle juniper]

Okay after doing a T10 and T11 run, I think Stone is better than scales. Crit build is way too busted.

Vestige that has Precision set

23%              - 2/25 Common
25.72%           - 5/54 Uncommon
24.47% / 28.83%  - 5/57 Rare (6/57 if Moss / Godkeeper)
24.90%           - 2/23 Epic
8.82%  / 17.11%  - 1/34 Legendary (2/34 if Godkeeper)

Honestly Epic and Legendary is kinda out cause you should have gotten a 6 piece by then.
The odds also doesn't count stuff like other useful crit vestiges, (Uncommon - Boiling Muck, Cloak, Counterassistance, Wheatstone. This makes Uncommon to have 42.79% of a good roll)

[subtle juniper]

Theroritically this can be played on Godkeeper for better odds...?

I have yet to unlock him to tell.

"If it is a crit build then why not bounty?"
Stone gives, hex around the end of the first book / start of second book depending on how rough your fight gets. Stone scales really well. Worse case you can still go for a HP tank build (Verdant + Vigorous) due to bad drafts, and stack as much HP as you can.*

*I have not test how well a tank build will go but this is all in theroy.

[ivory frigate]

what are the percentages?

[subtle juniper]

Odds of drafting a vestige with precision bonus.

[ivory frigate]

no rerolling?

[subtle juniper]

No rerolling.

If you reroll it's still a 23% on common.

It also doesn't take into account you can get an uncommon in the common rolls.

But if it does that then you still end up with a higher chance I'm pretty sure.

[ivory frigate]

Is the tilt mechanic accounted for with that?

[subtle juniper]

Nope.

[ivory frigate]

so these should be "worst case"

[subtle juniper]

This still applies if it does.

Just because there's too much good crit vestiges in uncommon pool.

[subtle juniper]

So yeah I guess 3 runs in a row getting precision isn't that hard.

And getting +30MP and Hex from Stones during the first boss.

[prime vector]

My point of saying it's pointless is that verdant 2 is all you need to get the engine going, whereas other damage-boosting sets (which are far easier to prime and tend to yield more immediate benefits) are going to do the rest of the heavy-lifting effortlessly. If you're lucky enough to end up with some fat max HP-boosters early on? Sure. Take verdant 8, but in all my runs I've ran w/ rubies, it was a safer gamble to just hit 2, then chase others.

And yes, vigorous is definitely a no-brainer compliment for rubies, in general.

[subtle juniper]

So far that was my worst run due to not getting good vestige but it still went without a hitch lol

[brisk eagle]

i have the -40% healing modifier lol

this verdant + vigorous combo is fun and seems to be consistent to get if you focus it (im 3/3 on achieving it now)

[vivid geyser]

Honestly one of the best buffs they can give Everfrost is making it so that allies that proc your Frostbite count towards its progress. Your allies cannibalizing your Frostbite stacks in less coordinated lobbies just feels terrible.

[vivid geyser]

Maybe? Idk. I could also see a "when you use a Vestigial Shrine" kinda effect, or something in the vein of Thaumaturge. Generally though? It just needs to be redesigned imo.

I think Union is unsalvageable as-is.

I also still stand by the fact that either book 1 needs to become easier, or Heart of a Hero needs to actually do something at base

[prime vector]

These were more or less just think-tank ideas I had while I was chilling. They're subject to edit, but my big sticking point in my quest to improve the weak trinkets is I'd like to see those little chumps tweaked/re-designed to be competitive with the big leagues.

If there's anything I'm learning about the big comparisons between the S-C ranks in this thread, it's that everyone has their sweet spot. Personally, I never run clips and find it to be the most gimmicky pick in the whole roster, but I understand why so many people consider it a no-brainer S tier, so I'm not going to take that away from them. It's a me-preference.

That said, those 4 I brainstormed are clearly the "nope"s, so we need a means to get them to be, at the very least, competitive, even if they aren't pushing to the front of the line.

[vivid geyser]

Fair enough

[subtle juniper]

I hate clips cause I get less choices on the books. Plus I still don't feel CD helps at all.

Likewise I feel Makers gives you more options on books as u can pick the one that enemies drop blight on death.

But of course if you're playing in a group clips can be good.

[fervent solstice]

Eh I feel like it really depends on aspect

Some aspects disproportionately benefit from the CD that clips can provide compared to others

Ie weaver, ob

It's not about will

It's about getting an extra constrict cast

As for OB it's bcs if you dont roll CD augments/vestiges it's a very real possibility to have dead rounds where everything except basic is on cooldown

[subtle juniper]

Yeah then you just need better orb management.

There are turns where enemies don't hit you at all.

Obelisk for me in general is either you have not enough damage and lose or you snowball through it. There's rarely the if I had that CD I would've won.

[fervent solstice]

Personal preference ig

But clips lets Ob spam skill 3 making book 1 kind of a breeze

[subtle juniper]

Weaver makes sense but precision exists now.

[kindred ibex]

Cooldown is basically draw lmfao whether its helpful or not is very dependent on how much energy you’re generating-
But it can absolutely be absurd

Clips can be the difference between early game cultivate being used once a combat and twice a combat

Three times in the boss fight even

[subtle juniper]

Idk, my fights never last that long in general.

Most if not all the waves die in 1 turn when I'm in book 2.

[kindred ibex]

Different playstyles ig

Its fun to hear that different things work

[subtle juniper]

I just feel the overall should not make it regarded so high.

• Increased CD reduction
• Make orb sets stronger (Or any Vestige that +Will per orb)
  - Play around orb RNG
  - 2 books that have Orb drawbacks (3 if you add blight on death)
  - Does not scale well unlike other trinkets

[subtle juniper]

Overall I think clips kinda fill the base line of a decent trinket but outshined by other trinkets.

[prime vector]

Didn't know my off-comment about not caring for clips would spur this level of discussion but I'd like to iterate that it's fine for all the good trinkets to be well-regarded on the individual level. If someone can blitz through R20 with ease using all these trinkets, cool. They are all valid and quite frankly it feels a little silly to claim one is better than the other or to determine some sort of ranking if, at the end of the day, R20 is winnable consistently with all of them.

I'm less interested in determining which of the winners is MVP as much as I am interested in bringing up the losers now that there's enough determinations and spammed tier-lists to know which trinkets are the weak links.

[subtle juniper]

Well I think these kinds of discussions are fine, I felt weird as I've seen so much good stuff out of clip in this thread.

I do agree many trinket still can make R20 without a problem (some are easier) but within the top and the lower tiers there needs to be a baseline on what should be acceptable for a trinket.

[vivid geyser]

Sent this in #1169243998775431218 but I figured I'd send it here since it relates to Marker of the Unbound

Ehhhhh I think Marker of the Unbound just needs to be adjusted in some way-- but a lot of the issue is actually caused by the fact that changing Trinkets is available when you can see the modifiers now, allowing you to min-max this. I think Marker would be a lot less stupid if you had to gamble on seeing Gunkfilled.

[prime vector]

See my response, there. Its function is fine, the potential to abuse it just needs capping.

[vivid geyser]

That's fair ig

I still don't really like the ability to see Gunkfilled and automatically pick Marker though

[prime vector]

I mean, I could make a similar argument for the kwilling trinkets being swapped out depending on if the challenges are the kwilling-related ones. I thought the intent of trinkets now being selectable before a run is to make last minute changes that could benefit the run. It's fun. Tweaking the gross advantage a smidge would keep it fair, I think.

[vivid geyser]

That's fair I guess

[brisk eagle]

there's currently no penalty for someone to simply restart the dive if they're looking to abuse mechanics like that tho

[vivid geyser]

That's fair, but then there probably should be

At least it was time-consuming to do it before

[fervent solstice]

I mean

Have you never spammed restart in a roguelike before

I'm pretty sure it's pretty common practice

[floral flint]

Have I ever rerolled a nethack character until getting ring of slow digestion and a wand of polymorph and then rerolling until I zap my pet into a gray dragon

HOW DARE YOU CALL ME OUT LIKE THIS

[fervent solstice]

I probably have more restarts than actual completed runs in TBOI

[shrewd widget]

Heart of a Hero is currently trash. I think the problem is the randomness. You could theoretically get amazing value out of it but more often than not you will get set points in sets you don‘t use at the moment

I think a good fix would be to work only on the highest sets you already have, that are not completed. If there are none aviable, than it can choose randomly. Its a trinket that activates only twice during a run, I don‘t think that‘s an unreasonable demand

[subtle juniper]

I had a run ytd where I picked Marker when going into Silent Promande (I knew it was gonna be a long fight there.)

Overall it was a good call.

I think the overall issue right now is vestiges sets are too broken to justify trinket changes.

[vivid geyser]

Slay the Spire has mechanics to reward players for seeing it through

[prime vector]

Off-topic but the simple fix is to create a means to validate win streaking and/or adding win/loss counts.

That said, that's only going to be of value to those who care about defending their win streak honor. At the end of the day, folks who rely on rerolling runs will do it regardless. I don't think it needs to be a punishment as much as the game could acknowledge win/losses for those who care about sticking through their runs, regardless of the starting draft.

Everyone wins, then.

[subtle juniper]

More like has a mechanic to stop people from rerolling lol

The drawback from rerolling in STS is kinda huge imo.

[tawny summit]

The problem with that is if someone wants to join but it's at the start of the run, then if there's a punishment system you're incentivized to not let them even if it's only fight 1/2

[prime vector]

We'd need a run slot system to pause one run and resume it later.

Sounds like a good new thread topic.

[subtle juniper]

Sounds like dev hell right here 🫠

[subtle juniper]

Yeah that's an issue. Plus, isn't there a pity system where the more you lose the better stuff you get?

[shrewd widget]

Saving and reloading runs goes against the principle of rogue-likes. You can quit the game and return to your run already anyway, no need to add save slots too

[subtle juniper]

I think they ment like 1 for Coop and maybe 1 for Solo.

[shrewd widget]

Ah, that makes more sense.

[prime vector]

That's what I meant, yes, since I've lost count how many times I've started a solo dive, only for folks in my group to poke me for a run.

[pure vapor]

I think most of the trinkets are bland and not all that fun or useful. I'd like to see more powerful and interesting ones added.

[brisk eagle]

well, no

[vivid geyser]

Been thinking-- how good are the elemental Trinkets right now really? I put them in B before, but for most of them it's actually pretty easy to hit 3 or 6 on their set (depending on whichever you're doing)

The only real exceptions to this are spikes and poison >.>

[prime vector]

My problem with them, and this goes back to another deet I've brought up in the poison thread, is that, to me, they all have the same problem: While you can commit to poison/burn/frost/spike/bleed, you're better off taking the mid-rank vestige sets that add that juicy % damage increase to targets affected by those effects, and this is relatively easy to accomplish since they're all 3rd rank. I really don't think the 6th rank reward is high enough in value to warrant sacrificing potentially high raw-damage.

The only exception to this is if you can snag an ascension that lets you apply the damage immediately, but even then, you're better off just planning on doing damage w/ those effects supplying you rather than carrying you.

Long story short: No, I don't think those trinkets are valuable, especially since they doom you from the start by effectively telling you "you will be an X build or bust" while other trinkets that we've classified as good communicate "you will be good as ANY build."

[vivid geyser]

This is fair

I've definitely had one or two runs where that's been the case (going 3/6 rather than 6/6)

Dropping them all to C then

I also dropped Nobility 'cuz I just feel like there's not enough situations where +2 Shielding actually feels worth the opportunity cost

[edgy forge]

Marker, imo, is just so good, it should be S+, in its current state. Also, maybe Bounty going down, it just doesn''t proc enough to be worth it.

[vivid geyser]

That's fair

[alpine flume]

Totally agree, the elemental debuff trinkets are straight garbage without the probability buffs to roll into their required build.

[prime vector]

Even if the probability returned, I still wouldn't touch them for the same reason; I never cared for them in S2, either. It's just more viable to adapt and not be rooted to one playstyle. I wish I could offer improvements, but even with my idea for the domestically abused everfrost cousin, they're still in dire need of family counseling as a whole.

And yeah, bounty needs higher ticks. Compared to Ruby, aka his hot smoking sister, no contest.

[vivid geyser]

Building into status feels more secondary than before

Emblem of Enterprise is probably better than them ig

[subtle juniper]

Nobility*

[vivid geyser]

Oops yeah mb

Also raised Everfrost up because it's really bad but not nearly as bad as the other two, then brought Bounty down and Emblem up because I'm p sure Emblem is still more value than the rest of the C tier trinkets now that I look at it

I also still dunno if Emblem or Chart of Stars is better?

[subtle juniper]

Does Chart gives 100 per location? I always read it as as long as you enter one you get 100 for the entire run lol

[vivid geyser]

I think it's per location

I forget

[green osprey]

once per every listed location

[subtle juniper]

Then straight up 400 Kwillings is pretty good, 300 if you skip binding in the first book still nets you at least 1 Rare or multiple vestiges.

Imo the current state of the game, once you can clear book 1 you should not have any roadblocks.

I personally don't feel the need of glyphs this season other than book 1 either.

[prime vector]

Yeah, the balance of resources is messy now. Kwillings have gone way up in value compared to glyphs; glyphs were sort of needed in S1/S2, but S3, they're a joke, and if I see big kwilling cages vs. glyphs as a reward option, I rarely go for the glyphs.

The book 1 hard, book 2/villain easy mantra has been a problem since S1, and unfortunately, after playing enough Rank 20s in S3, I'm convinced that dropping our ranks from 20 to 10 as an accomodation for the change in design was weak-sauce, because IMO R20 S3 is significantly easier than R20 S2 was, especially with the removal of millstones & the mimic add in the final fight. I've only now had time to enjoy the R20 runs between all the aspects because I finally had time this weekend to play and see if the climb was worth it. The short answer is: No, it was a waste of time and I really hope we don't have another rank-reset, because climbing from 10 to 20 is a chore.

But that's a discussion for the difficulty thread.

[brisk eagle]

Ob at least could easily consistently win with just going spikes last season with EoQ tho

[brisk eagle]

problem with marker is that it is entirely situational. if you don't start with gunkbound, would you really choose marker?

[subtle juniper]

Yes. As long as my aspect has range.

[brisk eagle]

you've won T20 runs with marker without gunkbound?

[subtle juniper]

Yes.

[brisk eagle]

on an at least semi-consistent basis?

[subtle juniper]

Not consistent but yes.

Like I only did like 2 runs

And that's a small smaple size.

[brisk eagle]

true

[subtle juniper]

I'm just too lazy to deal with rose's 20 HP.

[brisk eagle]

i don't really feel like i have to big brain just cuz rose has low hp

not that i've tried it, but i feel like i'd have to bigger brain with marker if there's no gunkbound

[subtle juniper]

I think it's cause I'm already dodging most attack when I stand in the outer ring.

And my run only gets easier the more I play through it with more AP.

[brisk eagle]

i feel like the only aspect i'd even consider doing that with is clar

[subtle juniper]

I can do it on Weaver and Clair.

[brisk eagle]

weaver's thread range is not that great tho

[subtle juniper]

There's also Chain that might be decent on but I haven't tried Chain.

Yeah but the ink doesn't come in on the first few turns.

Plus Weaver has other options like pulling too.

[brisk eagle]

and that wastes like 3 turns of being able to build marker dmg

[subtle juniper]

If you don't have enough damage imo it's not wasting damage but dealing with bad rolls on your vestiges.

[green osprey]

it is possible with ranged guys

especially CV

[edgy forge]

You absolutely can use Marker without Gunkfilled. Creeping blight happens on turn 2, so you start stacking it immediately. Radiant Market has guaranteed ink in the middle of the map on turn 2 from the pot enemies. Same with Silent Promenade with the snake enemies. Radiant Market boss is also the only boss that lets you stack during their fight, aside from Argo. Not to mention random modifiers that create blight on enemy spawn.
There are a number of enemies that don't even attack you, which just makes it easy to abuse with the creeping blight.

Of course, ranged classes have an easier time, but creeping blight comes in close on like turn 4-5, if you want to wait it out.

Using non-attack bindings also counts for your stacks: Cultivate, Blink, any dash, any attack that can be used/thrown with no target.

[subtle juniper]

This bascially yeah.

And I'm pretty sure it becomes even better in coop.

[edgy forge]

Unless the other person knows you're using it and lets you stack it, you're probably better off using Rose.

[prime vector]

My big problem w/ Marker minus Gunkfilled is that you're getting better tempo just beating down mobs on the wave they spawn. I will rarely go past turn 3 because you're just playing with fire letting them live unless you're in a position to shrug off their damage.

So yes, you can do Marker minus Gunkfilled, but it's going to feel sloppy depending on your aspect. I also don't like the idea of just waiting to stack:

1. It's boring.
2. It's unnecessary, because you absolutely can still slaughter the run w/ Marker if you're just going from battle to battle without wasting time building stacks.

IMO if Marker had a limit of 2 charges per encounter, it would blend in better with the other trinkets more. You'd still end up with around 100 omni-damage + whatever stats you've picked up along the way.

[edgy forge]

Well, the thing that makes Marker strong is the fact that it gives you early Omni power. Book 1 is the hardest part of the run, so anything that gives a better early game will be strong.
You're also not really "waiting" unless you're intentionally abusing it. You just don't collect the orb on turn 1 and end your turn as close to the edge as you can.

[prime vector]

Got time this morning to do some testing. This is what a typical situation looks like if you're willing to take advantage of this suggestion. In ended up cleaning up but only got 4 ticks out of my marker, which is weak compared to what you'd get w/ gunkfilled by now.

Going to finish the run & report my findings. I'm actively going to stay on the edge whenever it's safe in order to see if I can play naturally w/out delaying turns and report my findings.

Nope, the R20 guardian 1 was too fat for my whopping 6 OD that I managed to scoop before encountering him. Before you hit me with the predictable git gud, here's the issue: I never found gud opportunities to stay on the edge.

That screenshot I took earlier was literally the only time in book 1 to rack up, and the other encounters absolutely required me to get out of the edge if I wanted to clear enemies & not take bucketloads of damage. I was even using lightning bolt to maximize AOE damage and this was still requiring me to get a solid dash & mark setup to get that hit, thus taking me out of the gunk.

Our girl Claire is going to be likely the most viable one since she can mostly sit in the corner, but I'd also like to point out a detail I forgot, which is that the guardian showdown sucks without gunkfilled, because by the time creeping blight kicks in, you're nearly at the end of your 6-turn immunity, whereas dead adds allow you to get some pretty sick gains during the showdown, itself.

[edgy forge]

Marker with no Gunkfilled does change the way that you play. But it's still a good option. Of course, if you don't try to stack it, it's not gonna be good. That's like playing Rose without Verdant. You have to remember to get your stacks, even if that means delaying for the next turn.

Of course, having Mumzy did help, but I didn't need it.

[prime vector]

You need to be actively attacking to stay alive. Spending the first turn running to the corner means eating unnecessary and prevntable damage.

Your OD being only 30 minus Mumzy makes me sad, because without Mumzy, it would have been a mess.

The comparison for verdant w/ Ruby I don't find holds as much weight, because Verdant 2 (aka the only tier you need to get that engine going) is extremely easy to reach within 1-2 battles. With Gunkless marker, it's too much busy-work to reach a competing OD.

[green osprey]

that's, like, your opinion, man

[edgy forge]

You don't not attack on turn 1. You attack like normal, just don't pick up the orb. And even then, you can still pick it up. Enemies spawn on turn 2, just use those enemies to stack Marker.

You just have to make sure you end turn as close to the end as you can.

[prime vector]

Yeah, but I'm saying in a lot of the circumstances, you may need to spend that precious movement to make things that would hit you die, and in most cases I tested, it was either: Move & kill, but sacrifice my edge-space, or damage & move to the edge, but then eat damage.

[ivory frigate]

What would be considered a good amount of marker stacks per fight?

Or going into each guardian

basically, how do I tell "I have a good amount of stacks"

[edgy forge]

Leaving one enemy alive, preferably a Slimpe or something weak, and farming off that one enemy is ideal. You are still trying to stack it, not kill everything as fast as possible.

[prime vector]

Consistently? Minimum 1 stack per fight will at least keep you pushing your OD, but even without delaying + gunkfilled, you're easily getting 2 stacks, aka 12 OD per fight. It's a solid engine, and it keeps it in-line with Ruby.

Without the gunkless, as was shown, he ended up with 30, which means triggering the stack 5 times. Yes, he got the vestige loadout he needed in the end to get him out of it, but my point is consistency. You're pretty much hoping that your vestiges will make up for the low performance of your trinket at that point.

I like consistency, which is why when I run Rubies, Blessing, or Chart, I know I'm going to get through the run from the power boost those tend to push.

[edgy forge]

If you can get up to the 6 required per fight, that's probably average. Of course, you want to get more, if you can.

[prime vector]

But mate, you said earlier that you're not really waiting unlses you're intentionally abusing it. Isn't that effectively playing the waiting game with that slimpe?

[edgy forge]

That is intentionally abusing it. Making each fight go up to 6 turns is not how someone would normally play.

[prime vector]

There's a puzzling challenge to running marker w/out gunkless, I'll give you this, but on the whole, IMO it doesn't feel good compared to just blitzing with other trinkets. I guess if we're using the tier list, the main reason people are rating it so high is the interaction with gunkless. Going without gunkless kills the momentum, and I'd be willing to bet my overflowing stash of dust we'd see a lot less praise of it if gunkless wasn't a mutator.

I'm not saying this should be removed, by the way; I think it's fine that it exists, but I still think a cap per battle would keep it in line rather than spiraling into holy-crap-look-at-all-that-OD territory.

[edgy forge]

The fact that it has no cap, is basically what makes it so good.

With the removal of tethered shrines, early game can feel a lot tougher without a way to bolster your damage. Marker helps with that.

[prime vector]

A proposed cap wouldn't have affected this example run you're sharing though, since you didn't even maximize your marker's potential, instead a lot of your juice came from the rest of your loadout.

[edgy forge]

True. I'm saying it's a strong trinket. Mosscloak can't abuse it as easily as someone like Obe or Clair. Those are the ones that it's truly broken on.

Those are the ones who can make each encounter go to 6 turns. Forcing a weak enemy to tink against their constantly generating shield.

An s1 that doesn't need a target. They can spam it infinitely.

[prime vector]

Let me rephrase, then: You can do it, but it's with the interaction w/ gunkfilled that it spirals.

And yes, I agree and forgot to mention Obby's ability to just ignore a low-damage minion and do a round of shield-applauses

I just think that, consistency-wise, running all aspects w/ a gunkless-marker vs. say, Ruby or Blessing, is going to be a mixed bag. Well played w/ your run though.

[edgy forge]

Gunkfilled just makes it easier to play. It's a strong trinket with a drawback: changing how you would normally play the game. Without Gunkfilled, you have to be mindful of your positioning. With Gunkfilled, it's just free.
It's the same as Ruby needing Verdant, or Blessing "needing" Kwilling set. If you don't play around it, it's not going to seem good.

[ivory frigate]

So it looks like without gunkfilled, when trying to stack it, you'd get at the very most 150 omni damage by the villain, assuming you 6 stack it twice or three times a fight. Is that unfairly high or low?

[sharp elk]

Why are y'all spending so much time worried about whether that Trinket is worth running without "Gunkfilled" for Book 1?

The trinket as-is provides a very strong conditional advantage. If you don't see Gunkfilled, and your goal is to min-max, simply take one of the other better options for the Book modifiers presented. If you do see Gunkfilled, and you want the most damage possible, do it. If that feels "too strong", you still have the option to choose otherwise.

Clips is really strong too, but I obviously don't take it into the 350 kwilling // -1 Will Next Turn malus either. All of the these trinkets will have best use cases, and because you get to see your Book malus before fully committing now, they can be balanced around strong conditional applications

In the S2 system, the trinkets would have had to either be more generally "fine", or have even more extreme high/low roll applications to justify taking the riskier ones

[prime vector]

Personally, I'd rather see the conversation shift to focus on the bottom-tier trinkets, because they're just fodder compared to all the big boys being discussed.

Ultimately, whether the higher ones are stronger doesn't matter. Everyone's preference is going to designate how they enjoy their runs. Marker is fine regardless of your approach.

[sharp elk]

Totally agreed.

The game is arguably on the easier side relative to its own history, as well as compared to other games in its genre. While I'd love to see additional difficulty modifiers that would meaningfully add to the experience, the choice of Trinket for now can be looked at as a self-selected handicap option.

The weakest Trinkets aren't too far off from playable, and don't need to all be S-tier, but they're not super satisfying either. Making them better should be focused on finding similar highs/lows that the top tier Trinkets provide, letting you more reliably commit to your chosen elemental fantasy sooner, or engender weird & wacky changes to the fundamentals of gameplay.

I think a quick fix for all the elemental trinkets would be to start the run with a random set-related Vestige instead of an innate +1 to the chosen set. That let's you still activate the first tier of set bonuses after your first island with a high-roll'd vestige reward, while also giving you the ability to trigger the bonus from a Vestige Grinder even if you miss out on finding a complementary vestige naturally. The additional components for all those trinkets might need their numbers adjusted too, and that could be where the more-conditional-but-powerful aspects could come into play.

[terse rampart]

To that point going the other way, I would advocate that the elemental items all work the same. Copy paste Talons across the others and let it scale with enemies killed.

[ivory frigate]

upgrading on number of enemies killed isn't as fun to me, because you have very little control over it. Outside of slimpe spawners and delaying in guardian fights, you can't really play around it to get it stronger

[terse rampart]

A good starting point would be to make the effect on hit though. Instead of on kill it could be on application of the affliction and set it at like 50 per 3 damage or something of that nature.

it could be tinkered with till its not stupid crazy but right now with ink wash existing it would give us a good damage spike before it dropps

[vivid geyser]

I basically agree with all of this

[vivid geyser]

I feel like there's not really that much to say about the bottom-tier trinkets, though

• Union of the Needless is just bad because you should never be playing around losing
• Dial of Fate just doesn't give enough value
• Heart of a Hero doesn't do anything book 1, which is the most important part of the run (I just moved it to the bottom)
• Everfrost of Arcturia is bad because Frostbite is bad, and also because it increases the amount applied, rather than the potency

[ivory frigate]

why is frostbite bad?

[vivid geyser]

Frostbite really relied on the flat bonuses to its base damage that you used to get from Fonts of Wisdom, but now those aren't a thing

[ivory frigate]

what about the bonuses you get from the vestige set or augments? Are they too weak?

[vivid geyser]

I think that's been the general consensus (but it's, at the very least, my opinion)

[sharp elk]

It's the only elemental effect that doesn't scale in power with # of applications. It's a weaker but more reliable version of Shock, single target vs all-affecting when it procs, and outside of specific interactions with a few vestiges & abilities it doesn't really matter how much more than n = 1+x your stacks become.

Thus, the trinket "scaling" up to grant extra frostbite charges is very weak relative to the other elements. Best ways now to consistently use Frostbite is to focus on Magic Power & Omni Power while combining it alongside the other Elements since there's less access to Frostbite-specific damage scaling than before.

[ivory frigate]

Do you mean smite inplace of shock? Shock is for spreading damage whereas I don't see how frostbite spreads damage any more than the other elements

[prime vector]

One way I've extracted value out of Frostbite was from landing Everfrost rank 3 for the % bonus. The % bonus does land a good punch, in that regard (as do all those rank 3's as I've previously mentioned), but in general I just don't care enough to raise my frostbite damage to maximize it. You'll feel the gains more from increasing your damage type for the other ele's, but not so much w/ frostbite. It's why even with Star Captain, I'm not quick to invest in frostbite compared to chasing damage.

I feel biggest mistake new players make is being tricked by the Captain's natural affinity to frost, leading them to think "Oh, I need the frost trinket + cone of cold on this dude."

[sharp elk]

Frostbite is worse than Smite as well, sure

[vivid geyser]

This is a really good summary

I think that rn, hitting 6 in an element isn't great; hitting 30 is usually all you need

[fervent solstice]

Yeah, it's kind of strange how eh the 6 boost feels compared to the 3 boost

Though I guess it's not bad that it's more front loaded

[subtle juniper]

I think Heart is really good in coop.

[vivid geyser]

Why co-op specifically? >.>

[vivid geyser]

Yeah but hitting the capstone in something should always feel really good

[subtle juniper]

Cause you can rig your set bonuses better.

Playing a class that does not do damage you can force Treasure Hunter.

[green osprey]

you can "rig" it by rolling and grinding vestiges

heart only giving 1 bonus

[subtle juniper]

Does it not give 3?

Oh it's 3 random sets.

Either way Treasure Hunter 8 is kinda hard to get before the 1st guardian so getting it to 7 and +1 from heart might be okay.

But either way it still does not add anything in book 1 so... ¯_(ツ)_/¯

[green osprey]

the maim problem here is that first guardian will pound you into the dirt

grabbing hoarder 3 may be okay, may be not

trying to gor bigger utility stuff will get you killed, especially in coop

and heart only making it worse

[prime vector]

Theorycrafting question: If Heart gave 1 random set bonus after every single battle, would that improve it by creating a sort of guidance for a build? I'm not sold on that idea, but it's something. The fact that you want a strong engagement vs. book 1's guardian means Heart would need tweaking to suit the early-game, and maybe that shift would create a circumstance where you can let the RNG give you a starting direction to chase.

[subtle juniper]

Ambusher set.

I think most of the trinket balance right now is more or less
"Be good before the first guardian in someway or change the balance of the game"

[prime vector]

Not really seeing the point. If it's random, you're more unlikely to get more than 1 of the same. If you do, then it's on the same level of luck of getting an early-game purple/orange vestige.

[subtle juniper]

I assume that you're using the same wording as the current one that only gives you based on the sets you have equipped.

[prime vector]

No. I'm asking for total random.

You'd effectively get more sets by late game, but then you're creating a new opportunity to scoop up some ranks that might end up complimenting you.

And you're not at the mercy of being weak early-game.

[subtle juniper]

There's 30 set bonus and like 3 fights or something?

Maybe Heart is just there to finish VB stuff.

At the end of the day, we don't need all trinkets to boost gameplay I guess.

Just fix it to not 'overcap' on stuff and it's just good for it's own purpose.

[prime vector]

I guess I just don't like the idea of having trash trinkets when they could all be, at the very least, viable.

[green osprey]

doubtful, look at Dial of Fate

[prime vector]

Yeah I know, it was just a spitball idea. Maybe 2 total-random sets would have pushed the idea better, but even then, questionable. It's the sort of thing that would require a survey of tests to see if it's either too weak or too strong.

[subtle juniper]

Idk what about draft out of 3 after every fight?

[prime vector]

Neat idea, but then that's extra work for them to setup added UI or Node just for one trinket.

[subtle juniper]

Drafting increases the odds of something by a lot.

[prime vector]

Personally, I really like that idea though, and it would suddenly add a lot more merit to Heart.

[subtle juniper]

I mean I like high risk high reward stuff but this fits neither lol

[vivid geyser]

I think it would be fine if it just gave you two or three set bonuses at the start

I like it as the "go wide and experiment" kinda thing 🤷

[green osprey]

marker is good, if you work for it

unlike Rubies, it dosen't have any cap or penalty

[vivid geyser]

Yeah Marker is broken

[green osprey]

i wouldn't say it's broken or anything

it's a very specific item, which mostly benefit certain classes and playstyles (i.e. stalling)

for solo Cv with enough vigor? yes, it's quite powerful

for something like Chainbreaker without Gunkfield? not so much

[tawny summit]

Honestly since it has a 5 turn limit, without Gunkfield it's merely "okay"

Gunkfield is what makes it strong, and being able to change to it after seeing a gunkfield option of course.

[subtle juniper]

.

Nope it's good on Chain. Notice how Gunkfield is my 2nd draft.

[subtle juniper]

Chain's 1st skill is a movement which means you can use in the blight freely

Also Clair doesn't need vigor to run it at all.

You get the right amount by the first guardian, you get a little more during the second and by that time you're strong enough.

You never needed vigor to stall either way.

Anyway the whole marker thing has been discussed to death, yes it's good.

[vivid geyser]

Fair enough hahah

[subtle juniper]

I think bounty should be higher after my run with it lol

Scholar should be A, and Bounty should be in B.

1 Stack of Bounty in crit chance is +2 and in crit damage +20

[green osprey]

14 crit chance, 80 crit damage

pretty weak stuff

[subtle juniper]

It's 22 and 130 damage tho?

[split glade]

You start with a base of 8 crit chance and 50 crit damage

[subtle juniper]

Oh right.

[ivory frigate]

When did you get bounty stacks? Other than the guardians I didn't notice it getting stacked in the run I did with it

[subtle juniper]

Enemies that has a huge health pool.

I can't remember off my head but one of them is the spear guy who dashes across the map.

[ivory frigate]

razorblade iirc

[subtle juniper]

Basically like 1 from most hard combats. Not sure if book 1 has any.

[vivid geyser]

It just felt like it didn't trigger often enough to give me the value I wanted, nor did it give me enough early value to warrant it.

Also-- the only reason Scholar isn't A is because its optimal build is double status, which you can't always get. I believe the jury is still out on whether single status is enough or not

I might drop Scales though

Since it's only actually really good on CB

And is generally clunky otherwise

[subtle juniper]

I think single is worth if you go for specific vestige sets.
I rather pick Stones on Chain than Scales.

I think the main issue is the tilt system.

Unless someone datamines it out, all the numbers are just in theory.

[vivid geyser]

That's fair

[subtle juniper]

At this point I'm just looking at everything and be like, if Marker wasn't here, what is good lol

[vivid geyser]

I feel like the elemental trinkets could be way better if they guaranteed the related elemental Binding

[fossil hatch]

i second this lol

[subtle juniper]

I think Scholar should do that too. 100% to get all 3 as your draft LMAO

[fossil hatch]

that would make scholar beyond broken kek

[vivid geyser]

Yeah defo

Okay so:

• Elemental trinkets need to either increase the odds of or guarantee finding their corresponding drafted Binding.
• Bounty of Sentient Beings simply doesn't trigger often enough to be relevant.
• Everfrost of Arcturia needs to actually make Frostbite better, rather than applying more of it. Forcing you to be the one to trigger it also kinda destroys it in multiplayer.
• Dial of Fate is just numbers and RNG. Not much else to say on the matter.
• Heart of a Hero needs to give value before Book 2 imo.
• Blessing of Misplaced Nobility is really cool, but it's in D tier specifically because it's just not worth 25 max HP (especially since this drops you to only 15 at higher ranks). Suggestion is to reduce the HP cost, rather than increasing the shielding.
• Clips is very strong, but it's also very fun, and it's hard to actually figure out how to nerf it considering the effect is so simple.
• Marker of the Unbound is nuts with Gunkfilled.

[vivid geyser]

As a reminder, this's my tier list.

Outside of those outliers, I'm happy with the current state of things.

I still have no idea how much early value Emblem is actually giving me-

Depending on how much it gives early on average, there's a chance that it's better than Chart of Stars

[subtle juniper]

Marker of the Unbound is nuts with Gunkfilled.
FTFY

Clips doesn't need nerfing.

Bounty can be stronger just by giving +1 to Precision.

I think Heart like discussed before, should just be there to help with the victory board / quest.

[prime vector]

All you'd need to do to fix Nobility is give back its original function of regaining Max-HP per battle. It used to give 10 OD per battle along w/ slowly refilling you back from -30 back to 50 max HP. If you re-insert that, suddenly it becomes less useless. Still not superb, but definitely less useless in the grand scheme.

Still think Dial of Fate should just give random set bonuses from the 5 elements per encounter rather than raw stat. You'd suddenly consider taking a few vestiges that apply the on-hit effect if it allows you to score an easy rank 3 damage boost, regardless of what aspect/bindings you are running.

My problem w/ the Everfrost of Arcturia suggestion is that if it makes Frostbite better, then it becomes a situation of ignoring Frostbite entirely if you aren't running that trinket. Instead, Frostbite should just be generally improved, and then Arcturia can further pimp the revision.

[green osprey]

misplaced nobility is just trash

you get one shielding by grabbing any early game shield item

braced belt in the first, misting bels in the second, and you alredy have 2 shielding

grind it after 1st boss to get permanent set bonus

event version was 5 shielding for 30 HP

and it was considered dubious long before set bonuses, when shielding was actualy a premium stat

[prime vector]

I don't see a suggestion.

As far as I'm concerned, its key value atm is just easy fuel for Shadow loadouts, and even then, vigorous is easy to achieve. I suppose if it granted you 1 shadow set bonus, it would push that notion of rushing a shadow spec, along w/ the gradual Max HP refilling. I have no idea why it was decided that the HP never refills the way it did in S2.

[subtle juniper]

I think it's due to Marker's buff.

We don't need too many trinkets giving Omni so it was remade to fit a different playstyle.

Except it kinda backfires cause enemies hits so hard.

[prime vector]

Exactly. It backfired and needs improvement. Would swapping out Shielding for 2 stacks of Blur per turn suddenly make it less 💩 ? I could maybe see the justification for it, then.

We don't need it to have OD, but with its current iteration, there's a big sign on Nobility that says "Shadow build me or bore me to death with your weak damage."

[green osprey]

2 stacks of blur is pretty damn op

maybe Blessing should slowly giving shadow and bastion levels, up to 3?

considering Gatekeeper history, it's rather fitting

[prime vector]

Shadow, yes, bastion, no, mostly because bastion is just a joke to acquire. You don't even have to try to get rank 3. Also, I'd still want it to retain the inherent shielding 2, so it can stack w/ bastion.

[tawny summit]

Speaking of easy to stack, someone brought up making the crit trinket give precision, but how about reaver instead?

[prime vector]

Reaver I'd put my chips down on more than precision. On average, I end up usually getting Precision 6 long before I even get half of reaver complete when I go the crit-route, and that mostly comes down to my opinion that Precision vestiges are universally more valued, I find.

A free reaver on bounty would suddenly give me a reason to consider bounty.

[subtle juniper]

For every shielding, +1 extra shileding lmao

[subtle juniper]

Cause Reaver gets really strong if you can max the set out imo.

Being able to early Precision 6 in Book 1 makes crit super strong to begin with.

[prime vector]

Which is why giving giving Bounty 1 stack of Reaver over Precision would give it value.

[subtle juniper]

Yeah but Precision 6 is still RNG :V
And the good crit enablers are Reaver sets.

[prime vector]

I don't understand the issue. We're theorizing boosting bounty by adding a set.

[tawny summit]

And we're just choosing to give it to the set that requires 8 over 6

it's already pretty easy to get Precision 6 in book 1

[subtle juniper]

I look at it where having Precision 1, you just need to shrine 2 precision items while hold 1 to hit Precision 6, rather than 2.
You save 1 slot and can already start building Reaver items which has better effects than a Precision item (Minus +CD common)

[prime vector]

I'm just saying, I consistently end up with Precision 6 long before I even get half-way to Reaver 5, and part of that reason is because there are no common vestigers w/ Reaver, and the green ones, with the exception of twin fangs (also precision) are on my skip-list unless there's nothing else to take.

Throwing a dog bone in the form of a reaver starting set bonus to bounty increases gives an incentive to actually hit rank 5, at the very least, which is usually a good stopping point.

[subtle juniper]

I believe Reaver should have its own balanced then. If you're relying on a trinket to fix a set bonus, then it should not be there to begin with.

[prime vector]

I never suggested that I'd be relying on a trinket to fix a set bonus. I've hit reaver 8 in the past when I cared enough to (though IMO rank 5 is a good stop point). I'm just saying that bounty would suddenly hold a lot more value in my rotation with this change, in the sense that it would actually become a trinket I rotate out as opposed to leave on the bench, weeping and unloved

[subtle juniper]

Sorry I meant you as in the players in general. As you said, hitting 8 because you care means it generally doesn't happen / there's better picks.

Obviously the buff can be put in place while changing Precision 6 > 7

[prime vector]

All good, I just hope a lot of these good brainstorms are being read by the devs at this point. As much as it's amusing to debate the top tiers, the discussions to improve bottom tiers should really be considered.

I'm at a point in Inkbound where, despite unlocking all achievements/boards/rank/etc., what's going to keep me invested is the enjoyment factor of running any loadout and having those loadouts feel good so that I don't burn-out. And before someone chimes in with "You can win w/ Needless/Hero/Everfrost/etc.", yes. You can, but they aren't satisfying to play when you know you're getting a weaker deal compared to the others. IMO it becomes a self-imposed difficulty.

I don't think anyone here is going to debate me that these are the "needs improvement" roster:

Heart of a Hero
Bounty of Sentient Beings
The Elementals (Yes, all 4 of them need improvement to a capacity, with a special shoutout to Arcturia)
Blessing of Misplaced Nobility
Dial of Fate
Union of the Needless

Yes, you can win with them. Yes, they're playable. But compared to every single one of the ones I didn't mention, they're the last-picks in dodge-ball, with poor Needless being bullied out of the school-yard entirely. I'd like to see improvements to these rather than nerfs to the others.

[fossil hatch]

union of the needless doesnt even exist imo

it does literally nothing

[vivid geyser]

I think it should just get cut.

Either that or completely changed out.

[subtle juniper]

I think it's there for players who are bad.

But idk how low you gotta be to have it there lol

Maybe it should be for the person who dies rather than 'other than you'

Since the bad players can use it rather than the good ones.

[fossil hatch]

It rewards players for being bad-

[subtle juniper]

Yeah but at least it's playable if you friend is bad, etc.

[tawny summit]

Union of the needless is literally "big brother mode"

you can bring your younger family members who suck at games but want to play with you anyways

like giving them an unplugged second controller lol

[prime vector]

I still think the idea of making needless' OD gains permanent would create a potentially fun high-risk puzzle for the party willing to take an extra risk by getting knocked out a lot (although not 30, I'd make it 20). Even then, it creates a messy situation where it becomes useless for 1-2 players, and god tier for 4 unless you change the rules on how many players can be affected.

Really, I want to fix Needless the way one wants to fix a friend with debilitating mental health, but just like how that's always a terrible idea, it's time to send Needless for a psyche evaluation so Dr. Shiny Shoe can prescribe them a change.

[subtle juniper]

I still don't like the concept of dying to become stronger.

Like I already made the theory of 3 people dying with Needless is decent but it's not 'fun' like you mention before.

[prime vector]

I'm not terribly convinced by my idea either. It was just a situation of it being better than the goofy current iteration. At this point I was desperately trying to salvage it based on its design.

But its design, by and large, is flawed just by the premise, alone. Failing-to-win is messy and should be avoided.

[vivid geyser]

I think it should be decoupled from death. The idea of a team-oriented trinket is great, but as-is? Not really.

[subtle juniper]

• Dial of Fate now shows the amount of the bonus given. Doubled the stat bonuses given.
• Blaze of Brigid trinket amount of burn inflicts required decreased from 50 >>> 20.
• Marker of the Unbound trinket turns of blight immunity decreased from 6 >>> 5.

Well, Marker is still good lol

[granite dove]

It would still be good even if it was set to 3 imo

[prime vector]

It's rare to hit marker's 6 cap if you're not stalling, so lowering to 5 is going to be pretty negligable.

Dia'l's update is.. Meh? Needs more work

[prime vector]

Agreed.

[granite dove]

Dont think it was mentioned in patch notes, but blessings of misplaced nobility was also buffed:

Its 100% a really good pick now

[subtle juniper]

I mean the main issue is RNG.

There's 5 kinds of stats and only a handful of characters can make use of these 5.

I think the ones who really can is Godkeeper / Obelisk
(Rest are okay-ish but not really good)
Miner / Moss / Chain / Captain / Weaver
And that's it.

Okay I guess that's most of them lol

I forget that only Clair doesn't have elemental 🫠

[green osprey]

Dial have same problem as tethered shrines, but squared

[subtle juniper]

Anyway my reason why it's good on the first two has Bleed / Spiked. (I know you can get spiked on other aspects but Obelisk has more shielding)

[green osprey]

1. It is a random stat, which may be useless to you even in general sense

2. Can't pick anything at all, completly random

3. Don't have universal stats, so no chance to even get "genera" buff

4. No class can realisticly make use of spread out buffs

[subtle juniper]

There are vestiges that can apply said effects. You end up being the jack of all traits but master of none.

[subtle juniper]

Godkeeper has the best usage since this is the only way to scale bleed.

[green osprey]

you can scale bleed with bleed set

or thaumturgy set

[subtle juniper]

I mean u can't scale it past those.

[green osprey]

or physical damage

or omni damage

[subtle juniper]

No base scaling and phys/omni isn't the same.

[green osprey]

but, unlike Dial of Fate, you don't spin roulette

it way more practical to chase this stats with another trinket's help

[subtle juniper]

You can't really do that, the closest is crit.

[green osprey]

until Dial offer more reliable and predictable scaling, it's not worth the slot

[subtle juniper]

I think it might be worth given a chance.

On paper it sounds bad but double actually might boost it pretty high.

[green osprey]

double of stat which you don't use is still double nothing

dial should give a choice, like with shrines

even limited ability to pick what you need may help

even 1 point per fight may be decent, if you can actually choose it

[subtle juniper]

Actually, I have suggested before in this thread which would be nice.

[subtle juniper]

Okay, took it for a run, it sucks.

[vivid geyser]

Been a while since I've popped down in here (or played any Inkbound at all); I appear to have missed an entire update!

These seem like pretty big changes, but the core issue behind Dial remains ^^"

Blaze of Brigid gettin' a big buff though

[prime vector]

Given how utterly quiet it's been lately in the feedback forums, I can safely presume the majority of us forumites are just waiting for February so we have new things to praise and complain about. I'm still doing the occasional dive with friends when they want to, but I ain't gonna lie: Inkbound's definitely in a state where the first month of a new season is the hypest, and then it sort of just peters out after you've gotten your fill.

[vivid geyser]

That's fair hahah

[prime vector]

I do wish it had better longevity, but that would likely require the whole season-motif to go & instead see a steady, consistent supply of new aspects/trinkets/bindings every month. But that's also a tall order without inflow of sales I imagine

[granite dove]

Longitivity would come if they add some custom modifier stuff like monster train where you pick which modifiers to use

[prime vector]

I can't speak for all players but for me and pretty much everyone I game with, longevity starts and ends w/ content, not repetition. Repetition will run its course, and then that's it, time to move onto the next game that has new content. MT for me started and ended when I got to max Cov, tried all the combos, and then eventually burnt out, with a brief rebirth from the LD expansion.

I feel like when we're piling all the major updates in the 'season update', it leads to a spark-then-burnout situation. I have to wonder if it would be better to just see a steady stream of content, month to month, even if all it is is a new aspect, bindings, stage, trinkets, villains, etc. just to help keep end-game folks from losing interest for 2+ months after the novelty wears out.

[subtle juniper]

Well I posted on this already, I took Dial for a spin and it really didn't work lol

[vivid geyser]

Yeahhhh kinda assumed that'd be the case

[subtle juniper]

Really hoped for it to be usuable honestly

[subtle juniper]

That's how I get burn out from most rougelikes too. In Gunfire I played every single build till the point that I'll probably only have fun if someone ask me to do a run. I think the longitivity for me is when a friend gets into the game and I can play with them.

[lime kite]

Social pressure and satisfaction is shown to be one of the best tools to getting people to come back to a game. Hence the popularity of multi-player games

[subtle juniper]

• Emblem of Enterprise: Increase the chance of Kwillings dropping by 30 >>> 35%.
• Dial of Fate: only can select between Burn, Poison, or Bleed damage making it a more consistent damage dealing status effect choice.
• Stone of Scholars: Magic power increased from 10 >>> 15.
• Marker of the Unbound: Reduced the amount of Binding uses required from 6 >>> 5.
• Heart of Hero: Fixed a typo in the Trinket stating it only gives 2 sets instead of 3.

New changes just dropped.

[tawny summit]

Buffing Marker seems wild to me.

[subtle juniper]

My thoughts...

Emblem: Okay change, maybe it should be a party trinket that scales based on the numbers of players using it idk.
Dial: unsure but gotta try it. I think right now it tries to compete with scholar but scholar has Hex.
Scholar: Scholar has always been strong, but this will help with all the boss buff.
Marker: Uhhh... Well.

[prime vector]

The marker buff has led me to now believe that this thread is being ignored, given that I believe everyone here has repeatedly stated it is busted.

Dial change feels like it wants to put on the big-boy pants, but it's still crapping itself.

[subtle juniper]

I realised that when Clair got buffed lol

I mean I'd take free buffs but I think Clair was at a decent spot.

At this point I don't care about balance I guess.

¯_(ツ)_/¯

I feel like the issue is the game is being balanced across all 4 player difficulty and it still isn't in a good state.

3P suffers the most.

[granite dove]

1 more

Talons of Cyn, Blaze of Brigid, Everfrost of Arcturia, and Essence of Quillion no longer apply their related status effects. They now will force their related Binding to show up in Binding drafts.

Everytime I tried using these, I would never get the drafted binding and would often suffer because of it. On the flipside, getting the drafted binding made most of them pop off a lot (especially burn). So for me this is a welcome change.

[pure vapor]

Ehh... not really excited about the trinket changes. Most of em are still boring or ass.

[tidal hill]

new elemental trinkets are doo doo water

[subtle juniper]

*Laughs in Scholar.*

[subtle juniper]

They aren't new or actually that was even similar in S2.

[subtle juniper]

The good ones just overshadow the decent ones sadly.

[long sand]

I'm so confused why they buffed it.
I already made a post like a month ago about how Marker is the best trinket in the game when Gunkfilled is available and it forces the player to play in a very unfun way. You basically want to stay in the fights as long as possible and getting more and more stacks, there's even some potential for infinite stacking when you have a lot of healing/blur stacks.
I wish they would just completely revamp this Trinket because it's so unbelievably busted and so unfun to play with it as well...

Surely they have stats showcasing how long runs/encounters take when people pick this right? They must have win% and pick% for high tier challenges too? I don't understand how this got buffed.

[prime vector]

At this point, I'm just waiting for the next season before I give more input, because quite frankly, my group and I are burnt out since the season-driven updates really slows down motivation to keep playing after exhausting enough runs, and this, combined with the #1110392538931666984s feeling mostly ignored led me to taking a break; I occasionally see a dev-response here and there on smaller immediate issues, but for the most part, these bigger discussions by experienced players aren't leading to lasting impact.

That criticism said, since we don't get to look at the data, I'm going to give credit back to the team by saying that they likely are seeing things we aren't; what seems OP to a lot of us might just be tools struggling players need to get through.

Unrelated Side note: I really think the season-driven updates need to change, because the whole 'season' approach only really makes sense if the game was still a live-service with limited unlocks, which it now is not. I feel like having us wait 3-4 months for new content makes it harder to stay invested in the game after said content is exhausted. I'd rather play the game in bursts every month if new content was dropping regularly than play it for 1-2 months, then not at all for another 1-2 months once the season's content has been exhausted.

[lusty dawn]

definitely agree, it's a weird mix of dummy strong and boring to min/max

probably needs some kind of downside to build around, like Rose?

[tawny summit]

well the "downside" is needing to stand in gunk and there to will be gunk, also the turn limit

but yeah, being able to see gunkfilled and going "oh free modifier for book 1" and just swap to Marker does make it super strong

[glossy orchid]

I was taking marker of the unbound regardless as it carried all my solo runs to 20 easy with zero losses. It's busted. Getting gunkfilled isn't necessary but it does feel nice having basically no drawback on half the run.

[subtle juniper]

Time to bring this thread back.

Changes

• Bounty of Sentient Beings (Reworked): "When defeating Guardians or more dangerous Minions, randomly gain Crit Chance or Crit damage." >>> "On first turn of combat, inflict Bounty on a random Enemy." Bounty: "On defeat, permanently grant the inflictor +1 Crit Chance and +10 Crit Dmg. (For 1 turn)
• Stone of Scholars (Nerf): 5 cast of the 3 elementals gain 1 stack. +15 >> 10 Magic Dmg every 5 stacks. At 20 >> 30 stacks these bindings deal Hex.
• Blessing of Kwills (Nerf?): Reduced slightly the impact on rerolls
• Rose of Rubies (Buff?): -1 HP +2 Omni Dmg >> -2HP +3 Omni Dmg (You can go under 20 HP if you are near the threshold. No longer shows an HP loss in combat preview when under 20hp)
• Chart of Stars (Buff / Nerf): 100 >> 150 Kwillings. Carver do not give Kwillings anymore.
• Dial of Fate (Buff?): 4 >> 7 Burn, 2 >> 4 Poison, 0 >> 5 Spiked, 0 >> 15 Frostbite, 4 >> 0 Bleed.
• Blessing of Misplaced Nobility (Buff): -15 HP, 2 shielding >> -25 HP and 5 Shielding.
• All Elemental sets: +1 >> +2 Set bonus
• Union of the Needless (Buff): +30 >> +50 Omni Dmg
• Passkey of the Future (Buff): 10 >> 8 (Says 7 in game?)
• Emblem of Enterprise (Buff): Glyph +1 >> +2.
• Heart of a Hero (Buff?) now prefers stats not at max level. Does not work on villians.

New Trinkets

• Sanguinity of Witt: +2 Bleed set bonus, paired with Cleave draft.
• Forgery Forge: Gain 10 Kwillings for every 50 Kwillings you have.

Marker is still top tier while Scholars get nerfed lmao (DoT is like 6 CD now making it even worse.)

They even cap the Scholar buff now.

[long sand]

Man, can they please just get rid of Marker. I swear we've talked about this enough. 😭

I do like some of the changes though. Mostly the Blessing of Misplaced Nobility, I think people will pick it more often now. I'm not sure on some of the others.

[subtle juniper]

Yeah I really hate it but I guess I have to play meta now as my '''fun''' DoT build doesn't work anymore.

Blessing is really good now due to the need for sustain, so it's a good place.

With Bastion and picking blur as a sustain option.

Well, I felt like the need to make one.

The issue with Bounty is being able to kill the enemy in 1 turn, but cause crit chance is rare, it might be good.

[ivory frigate]

I need to re-check what emblem of enterprise gives now, but with fewer enemies it can't be worth it. It gives 9 kwillings on average when it procs, and that is roughly every 3 enemies. So you need to defeat ~100 enemies to match the 300 kwillings chart of stars gives, and I don't know if there still are 100 enemies in a run.

Also, exclude enemies in guardian fights, I couldn't get it to proc once over something like 15 turns with 3 lil lusks a turn. That is more than unlucky

Again, need to test in 1.0 since a lot of changes have happened

[granite dove]

I think it gives some glyphs no? Not sure that makes it that much more useful, but its at least something in addition to the extra kwillings

[long sand]

I don't think Passkey is that good. What's your reasoning for that one?

[long sand]

Yes, I think it balances it out a bit more. Glymphs seem way more useful now.

[subtle juniper]

I always felt Smoke bomb and Grasp was generally good for some aspects.

Plus the increased amount of damage now might be a good draft, that's what I think personally. It's more of a Day 1 list.

[granite dove]

I think passkey has more use now that quicken is a much better draft imo. Now I feel like i have 3 good choices instead of just 2

[subtle juniper]

It's probably gonna be super skewed towards rank 20 lol

Quicken is hit or miss personally. It either becomes super good or it just doesn't get its value.

It's not something I would like to see in the 1st draft but the 2nd.

[subtle juniper]

I think the glyph is worth cause it's a free draft.

(Unless I misremembered and it was 3 glyphs, but I think the free drafts puts glyphs pretty valuable now.)

[ivory frigate]

I think it is 2 glyphs now, but thats after the guardian, so is it really worth it? I'd rather take guaranteed money and go treasure hunter 5

[subtle juniper]

Well, my two randos just now were using it and honestly, I don't know?

I had Pilfer and had way more kwillings and vestiges than them lmao

The weird thing is that fights drag out a lot more now.

Then the issue becomes if it's good enough to help you get past book 1 like before.

[long sand]

I agree that Quicken is much better now. I think it costs 0 at base? The only thing is that TBH I rarely ever need to reduce cooldowns even across multiple builds so I think Quicken is still very build specific and even with the buff that it got might not be that significant but I'll have to try it out.

Edit: I did a run with Star Captain and I had Quicken, it seemed really good actually so I might be changing my mind a bit. It might be aspect specific which is totally fine, seems good on SC.

[subtle juniper]

Yeah, quicken feel niche but with the right rolls it actually feels really good.

It's also like why people tell me clips is good but I feel it's really niche too lmao.

I still don't run clips but CD and orb sets are really good.

[subtle juniper]

Okay, bounty is bad lmao

Into F tier it goes.

The 3 stack I got was, Book 1 battle 1 and 3. And Book 2 battle 3.

All the stacks kept applying on the elites which does not help in any way.

It's better than old Bounty for sure.

(Also it applies on bosses.)

[prime vector]

I had a similar result. I think the issue with Bounty is that the random nature + the one turn means that in like 75% of the time I tested it, the enemy it was placed on was usually not the priority enemy in your circumstance. Having it land amidst a group of squishies you were planning on aoe'ing anyway? Cool. Having it land on a side enemy away from the rest that you were saving for turn 2? Not cool.

I haven't had a lot of time to delve deep beyond a few runs, but I'd describe the trinket roster as progress, but not by a large margin. There's definitely a handful that are still pretty glaring. This could be bad first impressions, but it feels like lower max HP trinkets (nobility + rose) are specifically going to feel bad vs. the Unbound, mostly because the mass-ink move (which I absolutely loathe, mechanically), more or less causes considerable problems if you aren't turn-1 obliterating him, since you're forced to effectively tank a lot of punishment without any real counter-play unless your name is Chainbreaker, especially since ink ignores block/blur.

[tawny summit]

I also think the DoT trinkets are still eh

and making them give +2 didn't REALLY help

getting 6 DoT set is already pretty easy

if it was at least +1 to two different (The 1 primary and either thaum or the hybrid ones) would be nice

Not sure about what the other perk for spike (Bastion? Verdant?)

(just give some flat damage would be better lol)

[subtle juniper]

Yeah I'm tempted to put almost all of them in F tier right now except maybe bleed and spiked.

Ugh Makers is still there. (R10)

I haven't had such an easy run in forever lmao

[ivory frigate]

Rose of rubies seems weirdly niche now. Assuming you start at 50 hp, rose will proc about 15 times now, giving 45 omni damage. Getting verdant 3, which is a lot harder to incidentally get now with common vestiges only giving a single set bonus, gives you 3 hp a combat. With there being 4 combats a book, that is an extra 6 procs or 18 omni damage per book. Facing the book 1 guardian with ~20 hp and ~60 extra omni damage doesn't sound good.

With death scythe being capped, the only ways I can think to gain max hp at any decent rate is verdant 8 or restoration with the epic +1 max hp augment. Restoration is maybe 2 casts a turn on average, assuming expert binder or some heavy starwalker investment. So thats ~3 omni damage a turn. You'd need a second or third of the epic augment and some orb generation to get that to really start bringing in the omni damage. There is a build there somewhere, but you are still spending the majority of the run with <25 max hp, and have already invested a lot so it is hard to also get shield or blur. To compare to shadow 7's 350 omni damage, you need ~30 turns of combat with the build going (say +12 omni damage a turn because you've +8 hp from 4 +2 restorations a turn) to match the extra omni damage. Not impossible, but requires a specific binding with 2 specific epic augments, expert binder 3, and 2 leaky pens worth of orb generation to get going.

Verdant 8 is capped at +3 hp a turn which is ~9 omni damage every two turns or 4.5 omni damage a turn. It also has the downside of not making much use of verdant 5's +10% attack binding damage per 10 hp, since you are stuck at <30 hp. There is a bit of a power flatline going from verdant 3 to verdant 8. I don't have any concrete ideas for what to build in the interim so that the build is strong enough to get to verdant 8. You've got something like 60 omni damage and +20% attack binding damage to work with by the first guardian and not much else.

TL;DR: Rose of rubies is kinda -30 max hp, +45 omni damage, you have very limited options to get much more out of it

[subtle juniper]

Yeah that's why I push it so far down lol

It used to be a good pick but now not really.

[prime vector]

Correct. Good breakdown @ivory frigate

[tawny summit]

also you start at 40 at higher tiers

which makes RoR even worse

RoR went from S tier to D tier for me

Forgery Forge is S tier

Because it's uncapped

[granite dove]

I was going to say its at least A rank for forgery forge imo

[tawny summit]

The second it gets a reasonable cap it drops hard lol

also union of the needless is F- lol

[subtle juniper]

Day 2 list (Lol)

[granite dove]

I will make union of the needless good, just to prove is deserves S rank /s

[prime vector]

Dial and Hero can just stay in limbo where they belong 😛

[tawny summit]

Union of the needless deserves its own tier lol

[subtle juniper]

I did the maths for it before lol

It doesn't really check out.

[subtle juniper]

I think Dial is bad cause rng is now 5 4 things from 3?

[tawny summit]

it's 4

[subtle juniper]

Elementals are in a weird spot.

[prime vector]

It's a mess to say the very least, always was IMO

[tawny summit]

but yeah, Union is the worst still

and then heart and dial right behind it

[granite dove]

But it can theoretically give 150 ability power with 4 players every fight 😄

[subtle juniper]

Theoretically if you have 3 players commit die, Union gives 150 Omni and 75% HP for them. The alive player gets 90 Omni. (From my post like 6 months ago)

[granite dove]

Oh yeah it affects you as well

[subtle juniper]

The issue with Heart is the same as always right? Too little rewards / too slow too.

[granite dove]

So it was buffed to be 300 ability power then, that must be good

[prime vector]

Yep.

[granite dove]

In all seriousness though, union would need a complete rework. I don't think its salvageable

[subtle juniper]

I'm quite curious about blessing of misplaced nobility. I put it up there but I feel like you'll just die as you climb higher ranks?

[prime vector]

I've tried to come up with ideas in the past about Needless, but it's just forever going to be the mutant.

[subtle juniper]

Everytime the an ally hits that enemy, debuff it lol

Or buff the next ally.

But then it sound really horrible.

If you have to back and forth with someone.

[subtle juniper]

I honestly don't even like this list. I feel like the tier should be S / A / C / F

Cause B feels too high lol

[prime vector]

I haven't had time to climb high (at work atm), but my impression of nobility so far is that it's mostly pretty good, but it becomes a bit of a gamble if you're fighting the Unbound, since the HP loss really starts to hurt during the ink-filled phases unless you snag some max-HP gains during the run.

[subtle juniper]

Yeah, that's my issue right now. Unless you're Obelisk, I don't know if you can even pull off the sustain?

Even book 2 now hurts a lot.

And pre villian stones have a bug right now lol

It gets buffed after every binding cast rather than end of your turn 🫠

(Oh it spawns 2 and hits AoE too.)

[prime vector]

I'll likely have more inputs when I do finish the climb overall, but it'll take some time since there's just been a lot of other games I've been enjoying too during my downtime. I still feel like we're moving in a better direction with the trinkets, but still far from ideal.

[subtle juniper]

For me it seems worse lol

[prime vector]

I did say 'far' 😉

I respect the effort to change the majority of them, it's just that they need a bit more fine-tuning to be right.

I think I've said this many months ago somewhere (can't be arsed to scroll up this beast of a thread), but a big issue is that the S-tiers really make the non-S's feel out of shape. Especially Marker, the child prodigy of the roster.

[subtle juniper]

I think the issue is that while Roses and Marker are having good change (And bounty too ngl), there's more 'nerfs' in the overall changes due to the game state.

[subtle juniper]

Yeah, that's why I enjoy pushing for scholars because I find Marker to be really boring.

[prime vector]

For sure.

[subtle juniper]

I think I need to try running it with Quicken now.

Quicken used to be a good pick if you run single elemental.

I'm pretty sure the nerfs was due to all the elemental buffs they kept adding on.

[ivory frigate]

An idea bimbleton had for it was that it powers up the still alive players, kind of a "last stand" sort of boon.

I'd imagine there's some balancing needed, like once per run, but the idea is it gives the surviving players a chance to overcome that fight, but the next combat isn't any easier. You still need to power up, but at least you get another chance at it

[prime vector]

I do like where Quicken is now. My wife's response when we started our first new run was "Honey, quicken doesn't suck anymore!" Which was nice. And funny.

[subtle juniper]

This sounds a lot better lol

It will make clutch situations even better.

Yeah I took it in my previous run and it's so much better at 0 cost.

It was already decent with the right drafts but 0 cost makes it so much better.

Either way I'm still coping that will see good hotfixes else I'm just gonna run marker right now.

[ivory frigate]

Rose is definitely nerfed overall, you get 1.5 omni damage per hp instead of the previous 2.

Bounty could be interesting in coop if another player can claim the stacks. Then you've an ok trinket to support someone else's crit build. It's not a lot, but if you aren't the carry it's an alternative to clips

[long sand]

Idk why they nerfed Rose when Marker already existed. Rose is pretty dead atm, not worth picking.

[subtle juniper]

I felt Rose was an overall buff, but the issue was the damage of the enemies right now made it bad lol

[prime vector]

I still think the random nature of bounty, even in co-op, won't work in the long term. Did a solo & co-op run with it for testing, and it panned out the same, in that it just felt like the bounty was going on inconvenient enemies, so it became a situation of either getting an easy, painless bounty or one that was going to cost us a round of pain to achieve.

And since you ideally want to score the bounty in every battle to make it worth taking, it ends up not feeling good if you only manage to land less than 75% of the bounties.

[subtle juniper]

inconvenient enemies
That's what I felt too lol

They need to have like bounty hunter actually giving bounty.

And the bounty trinket buffing the bounty bonus, while still having the current thing.

(Really niche but lol)

[prime vector]

It does need something aside from the bounty-gimmick, I feel.

I'm not sure what to suggest yet, but as it stands, it feels just much of a gamble to run atm.

[subtle juniper]

Well, still just praying we get actual changes, else I'm not staying this game for long lol

Or just mod it myself /s

[prime vector]

I don't want to sound jaded, but I don't foresee trinkets being a priority for hotfixing. They're going to be waiting on people to hit 20 so they can look at the metrics. I'd estimate 1-2 months before you see real changes in the trinkets tbh. Which is unfortunate because while I did ride out the climb to 100 + grabbing all achievements in the last 3 seasons, I'm likely going to just hit rank 20, then just casual it out with friends before waiting for new stuff.

[subtle juniper]

Yeah that's probably gonna happen. What I saw was all my favourite things getting nerfed. (Must be me making the stats looks too good 🫠 )

[sharp elk]

Scales isn't much different than it was previously, and is still one of the best Trinkets on Weaver, imo.

In fact it plays exactly the same on Weaver as it did previously, you always just get +10 physical after every combat, which lets you scale up the damage on your Constrict without having to spend any other resources on physical vestiges

[subtle juniper]

As good as it is, I feel like really restrictive. The other aspect that can use it is probably Chainbreaker and it's not that good either. But that's just what I feel, and is probably one of those that seen very little use due to all the other better trinkets.

What bindings do you usually run with the trinket?

[bronze raven]

It's damage scaling, but it's not exceptional scaling. It also does very little early for you, while having the effect be completely eclipsed by relics and sets you find later in the game. It's fine, but it's not really helping more than other trinkets.

[sharp elk]

None of the Trinkets are altogether necessary for anyone, they're just tiny boons by design. Scales are free stats on Weaver for one of their best Bindings, but one that has the opposite stat consideration from the rest of their kit. It's great because it takes zero attention for it to just passively scale your power after every combat.

[subtle juniper]

Weaver only has one physical skill if you're building it just for physical. While scaling both which is what it is for gets you +20 every other battle. And I don't feel a split build really works in the current season.

[sharp elk]

It's perfectly good early, as it gives you room to take non-DPS vestiges early that have later payoffs if needed. It's good late because it's worth +X Physical Dmg where X = number of battles. It's just always exactly as good as it needs to be

[subtle juniper]

Hence why I also asked what other bindings you run cause that will gives a better insight of how your build plays out.

[sharp elk]

It doesn't have the +20 bonus for balanced usage anymore, that's the nerf it received