DRG Phantasm: more kite (true solo scout)

[@ojb_]

No music upload here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/o5O8qIiffrKDr9U --- I will briefly mention these things: * This is not a seeded run. I just got very lucky and rolled a nice seed and managed to complete it. * The luck on spowder-is-blue-coilgun runs is less about the seed and more about the waves that spawn, and for phantasm it's basically just fast grabbers and that's about it. This run only had one fast grabber due to me rolling back to back grunt swarms (which was really, really lucky). Once the instant leeches are dead, pretty much everything is survivable except the grabbers which boil down to getting lucky. * This map had the dirt open but really it didn't matter too much. It would have forced me to handle the barragers earlier and linger a bit longer in the first room, but it probably wouldn't have ended the run to be forced to dig there. My usual losses are more so on gross rooms where there's no space to handle the leeches and/or fast grabbers.

[@Spurrrg]

ojb dementia playlist link? these songs are making me feel 80 years old

[@ojb_]

music.kzbin.info/www/bejne/e5KZpHStqK6frK8

[@kovreee]

wait but where ARE those questions in the description found?? or I guess the answer to them

[@ojb_]

almost, not 200, maybe, absolutely not, barely, yes, extremely, probably but glacial deserves it, sorta, absolutely

[@TopDismasFan]

I see this idea a lot, especially on reddit, about how people doubt that modded difficulties are hard. "sure its made harder by increased bug spawn, but then you make it easier again with cheaper resups!". I don't care if resups are 10 a pop that ain't helping you when this stuff at 6:48 rolls around the corner. Don't like reddit. Love the vids bro.

[@ojb_]

I 100% know what recent comment you're referring to lol. There are a lot of arbitrary lines that get drawn for each person over what determines "true drg". There's that "oh it's cheap resups, therefore it's invalid" argument you see a lot, but even among top players you'll find arguments that when you break them down to the core are all extremely similar. I'll admit to some of my own biases a lot here on this channel - I mean, this particular run uses special powder which I've gone on the record several times now as saying SP is a bit silly and breaks down the fundamental balance of the game - and this very description pokes fun at it in kinda the same way. I think it's just human nature and this bizarre need to be tribalistic or defensive over petty things because it might cheapen your own accomplishments - "oh, that's not a REAL run because it used coilgun", or "bhop? please." What's most frustrating about the 40 nitra complaint isn't that it's an argument made in ignorance (the people saying these things clearly haven't played modded at 80 nitra before nor spent the time to learn why others have come to these conclusions). It's also not a problem that they mistake the fundamental reason most people play modded - most of us are not playing hard things purely for the sake of ego or because they're hard, we're basically all playing to chase dopamine and have fun because modded offers more excitement. Those reasons don't really bother me. What's frustrates me the most is that you can come up with an extremely reasonable explanation for cheaper resups with about 4 seconds of critical thinking. More bugs = more ammo needing spent = obviously you have to tweak the numbers or you won't have a shooter game anymore. It's not complicated algebra, you just need to use your noggin with literally minimal effort. I think the prevalance of arguments like this is compounded a bit by modded scaling being a bit subtle. Vanilla players making these nitra arguments are almost certainly used to haz5's minimal resistance rooms with no stationaries and no encounters that you can blindly run into without punishment - if you ever run out of nitra, "just hold W to find more" is a pretty straightforward strat in vanilla that you simply can't do in modded or you lose. Vanilla's nitra supply is also pretty abundant for the level of bugs you might ever run into, to the point where good (usually modded-experienced) players playing vanilla will just straight up skip the majority of nitra in vanilla because you won't need it, in comparison to modded where you might need every scrap. Muddying things further is that GSG's implementation of "more enemies II" in the haz5 modifier system isn't the same as x2. It's only like x1.5. And on top of that it doesn't touch wave frequency (haz5 wave timers are pretty freaking slow), nor enemy composition compared to community difficulties. Haz5 more enemies is pretty much just more grunts, which scales pretty straightforwardly with any old AOE effect (you're basically not going to need much more ammo than haz5x1 until you start touching enemy toughness). Haz6x2 shakes it up and gives you things that are (a) more dangerous than grunts (b) require more ammo to kill than grunts and (c) require more burst damage/higher DPS because of the impact of letting these things live too long. So thinking there is a straightforward line between "I don't need more ammo for 5x1.5" to "you shouldn't need more ammo for 6x2" is very ill-informed. But honestly it's reasonable to think that way if you've never heard otherwise. I will say the other argument that "they wanna make it hard and then do something to make it easy" is silly and a bit us vs. them-y. It goes hand in hand in belittling players who play the game a lot as nothing more than "sweats" that have lost the casual point of view. But it's not true. We all play the game because it's fun, full stop. Having things be just out of reach (therefore increasing the difficulty) can be just as fun and a reason to keep going as whatever reasons other people might have. And as you get better and better at the game, the cliff for what provides dopamine anymore gets taller and taller. It's like spending all your time in haz5 and then going back to haz2 and finding yourself bored out of your mind - "where are the bugs??". As a personal anecdote, I find myself running into issues like this now too - 6x2 was once a big cliff that I felt really happy completing every run and just about every run was uploaded here so that I could look back and be proud of what I accomplished. 6x2 pheroless salvage in particular was the great white whale I hunted and it was such a big deal to finally beat one; these days pheroless salvage is basically another Tuesday and I've improved to the point where it's no longer as dopamine-rich. And it's that primary reason people up the difficulty - not to show off, but to push for the ever receding little hit of brain chemicals. Anyway that's my rant that people making the 40 nitra comments will never see. I considered replying something like this to the original reddit comment but I feel like I just don't care enough. Past me would have tried to gently argue in favor of cheaper resups in an active effort to change the original commenter's opinion (and any upvoters), but elderlyer ojb is much lazier and stopped caring. They're welcome to hold those opinions because at the end of the day it doesn't affect me in the slightest. They're kinda just... closing themselves off from exploring the game at a deeper level almost. Hell, modded is fun. I wish every one could find CD2 and make their own perfect custom difficulty, and slap on 80 nitra resups and go wild, whatever. But it's not for everyone, and that's okay.

[@TopDismasFan]

@ hands down the largest KZbin comment I’ve ever seen lol. But yeah I agree with most everything you’ve said, especially the bit about how all it requires is 4 seconds of critical thinking to rationalize. Thats why I strongly dislike Reddit, and r/drg. Sometimes I think I’m the stupid one “theres no way so many people could think this little, I must be missing something”. The one thing is tho, it does ever so slightly affect you and me. If everyone hated haz5a, ghost ship would be much more likely to add something like a swarm rate modifier. But we can also just play modded so at the end of the day it’s whatever.

[@chong1012]

Make bomerangs great MBG MBG MBG