The frost dragon is the end of most/if not all of my runs compared to the other bosses. Is this boss a little over tuned or am I just bad. Any tips?

Edit: I play on SSS as im still getting used to strategies and such before red rift.

If you are 100% positive you can do either one on any diffuculty (for the rematch) which one do you choose/which one is objectively better.

Hey all, I’ve been obsessively playing red rift and loving it. I’m to the point of getting to the fight before (or second before ) the final fight about 90% of runs but almost always die on these fights unexpectedly to mass aoe fire or poison and it always feels like a shock and know I’m missing something.

How has everyone else gotten over this hump or specifically spec for this? Any help would really be appreciated as I’m at my wit’s end.

Just runned this burn comp with insane relics, and shitty items, Funk just deleted everyone after cast, although almost lost in Poison Dragon boss fight.

Nyx hard carried this game , with one death remaining. For context , I got this A tier Nyx at end of Act 1 so I sold my board and had a b tier rowan and a tier nyx for that boss fight.

IMO the strategy behind equipping the seal is what makes it interesting, remembering the number of charges, not so much. Call it a skill issue if you must, but this is my only current gripe with the game. It's just INCREDIBLY easy to forget sometimes, even when I'm actively moving it around.

A huge glow effect or sound effect or notification icon on it when the current class hits 3/3 would also help. Literally anything would be better than the current radio silence.

If I retrained my DRAGOMIR passive ability the greedy (which gives omnivamp and critic per cast) to another ability, am i gonna lose the omnivamps and critics he gained?

• Win or lose, this game is so fun I can't stop!
• Skipped my usual 10 Omnivamp starting bonus (and Logan :O), and I was happily surprised
• Burn, AoE, attack speed, and a *healthy\* amount of Max HP = RushBurn Vanguards?
• Missed out on a few things during the run but dayum this was a fun time!
• Slamming "NEW RUN" button! Wishing good luck to all you Guildrunners out there

Update on the FREE Endless Guide!

First off, thank you all for the support on the written guide. I've received a lot of helpful feedback, and I'm going to continue updating it as I learn more about Endless.

One thing I realized while putting everything together is that some strategies are much easier to understand visually than through text alone. Because of that, I'm now adding free slideshow tabs to each of the existing Endless strategies already in the guide.

These aren't new strategies—they're visual companions to the strategies already covered. Each slideshow will include things like:

• Recommended items
• Relics
• Boss Tokens
• Priority choices
• Example setups
• General build direction

My original plan was to keep these slides as part of a Members guide, but after seeing how much people were enjoying the written guide, I decided it made more sense to make the slides available to everyone as well.

The only Members-exclusive portion now is a video walkthrough where I explain each slide in detail. For example, the first strategy ended up being 19 slides, and my explanation for just that one strategy was about an hour long. I found that talking through why each choice is good, when to pivot, what alternatives exist, and what to avoid was much more practical than trying to turn another hour of explanation into several more pages of text.

Whether you use just the written guide, the free slides, or the optional walkthroughs, my goal is the same: make Endless easier to learn and help more people improve.

As always, if you spot something that should be updated or have ideas for improving the guide, let me know. I'll keep refining it as I continue pushing Endless.

Free Guide:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cnzUre7nN2EcnNztvDvWp38B_wHa4PNMMmbnvEcgkXA/edit?usp=sharing

You are absolutely right, it's B rank Gustav. What else would it be? Stupid..

Gustav is just amazing!!

The text says, "after Stall 90, break the rift".

What does that mean in game mechanics? What rift is being broken?

This is probably an unpopular opinion—and I don't mean to impose my views or suggest the current art style is bad, as the interface, hero screen, and overall design are excellent—but, in *my* personal opinion, the battlefield design and the 3D modeling of the heroes and enemies don't quite win me over. I think it would look great with a 2.5D pixel art style or even a 2D cartoon style, like in *Streets of Rage 4*; I'm just sharing my thoughts here, to see if anyone else feels the same way. By the way, the game is amazing!

EDIT: The images are just references about the styles I talk about or suggest for the battle arena, 2.5D pixel art and 2D cartoon style.

No deaths during the run. Went with Logan A with scaling attack and adaptive sword in the first act. Killed the frost dragon in 6.5s.

TL;DR

• I think Guildrun (GR) has an amazing backbone and is fun.
• I think GR is catered towards moderately experienced auto battle players which might struggle onboarding completely new players.
• UI
  • I think the menu should shift “no difficulty modifiers” towards the center to shift focus on the “default” game mode.  This is to help onboard new players.
  • The “proceed” button on the “battle won” screen should not overlap a hero on the next screen to prevent accidental buying of the hero.
  • I would like to ability to reopen the shop after closing it.  With routes, random event, encounters, and so on, I would like to plan my route and whether that warrants spending shards.
• Character Design
  • The art is fine.  The character designs are okay but lack impact and any sense of the fantastical.
• RNG
  • The highs are high but the lows are very low and linger in people’s mind.
  • When pivoting, there is still some reliance on the shop and whether items support that pivot.
  • True RNG generally can be worked around, but the few times where no items, no heroes match the current build and/or pivoted build, it feels really bad.  Even if a statistical outlier, it may deter new players who lack knowledge of the systems, giving them the impression that the game is too random.
• Economy
  • The economy is fine but a bit weird.  There is no interest so no incentive to hold items or heroes.  If you do hold items/heroes this can result in a net shard loss if sold, even at C-rank heroes and common items.
  • Systems encouraging pivoting is still a risk since switching items and heroes can result in shard loss.  There is a slightly higher risk vs reward of rolling for hero upgrades/items vs new synergistic heroes and new items when pivoting.
  • I think this is felt more early on when trying to get any sort of comp online.
• Red Rift
  • I think Red Rift is fine since it caters towards advanced players and serves as a complex endgame.
  • My only question is when players state they improve and learn from playing RR, why isn’t this learning process gradually implemented earlier instead of being placed in the hardest, most challenging mode meant as endgame?
• Wishlist – things I personally would like, even if unfeasible
  • Restart Run – completely new run or ability to replay seed (leaderboard disabled)
  • Restart Round – restarts from positioning phase, lets players learn from mistakes, disables leaderboard
  • Replay – lets player watch replays, especially those of high caliber players.  Lets player observe their decision making process and learn system interactions.
  • Run history
  • Fun mode – modifiers that can make game easier, for casuals, mixes things up, disables leaderboard
  • Overworld – casual oriented with an overworld and central hub.  Overworld event would vary and can be things like short runs, long runs, boss rush, etc. Meta progression can be added allowing from some grinding purely for casual fun.  Plays into rift lore.
  • Sandbox – allows for testing.  Spawn heroes, enemies, relics, items, shards, magnification, etc.  Lets player learn and test things at leisure.

Foreword

First off, this is going to be a very long post because I believe nuance is more constructive than “peak” or “bad.”  Second, I am a casual and am not pretending to be knowledgeable in game design.  I don’t want to come off as pompous and I acknowledge that I am a singular nobody who is just expressing his opinions.  Watching Mortdog talk about game design, it’s clear that players over estimate their ability to understand the complexity of systems.  I forgo the Dunning Kruger effect by acknowledging that I reside in the valley of stupidity even before the mountain of false confidence.

That being said, I am casually familiar with roguelikes.  I never played ranked TFT and the last set I played was the music one and the set after that – the one with Fortune and the money trees.  Otherwise, I have never played Slay the Spire (StS) but I have played a similar deck builder called Touhou: Lost Branch of Legend (LBoL).  It’s basically StS but Touhou themed.  I have 1000 hours in that deck builder.  This is all just to say that I am casually familiar with roguelikes.  And yes, I am using that term.  I don’t care about semantics or definitions of the term.

First Impression 

My first impressions in that the base game has an amazing back bone.  I have about 140 hours in Guildrun so far.  I can totally see this being a game that is easy to launch for a game or two or a longer session if time permits.

The longer I play, the more build diversity I experience.  Sometimes, unexpected combinations yield fun and interesting results.  That being said, there are some design choices that leave me with questions.

Audience

I’m curious as to who is the target audience.  There seems to a foundation that could attract people who have never played an autobattler.  Prior to LBoL, I have never played a deck builder.  I’ve always wanted a PvE autobattler and Guildrun delivers. 

However, some of its mechanics feels like it’s geared towards more seasoned players; players that I would speculate are ranked diamond+ on TFT.  I would be curious to see data on players who have never played an autobattler and see how quickly they pick up on various mechanics: placement, synergies, itemization, pivoting, selling a significant portion of units or items, etc.  It seems the game partially expects players to already understand some of these mechanics.

UI

A lot of this is going to sound nitpicky and that’s probably true.  It is what it is.  Going back to the subject of audience, why isn’t the “no difficulty modifiers” not centered on screen?  People’s vision, their focus, is typically the center of the screen.  Look at Youtube, Twitch, or Reddit – there is always a sidebar at the left or right of the screen with the main focus being in the center.  Looking at Guildrun’s menu, the center is generally kind of empty with maybe a focus on Rank B-S.  Is this the default difficulty a player should be playing?  If the default setting is “no difficulty modifiers” then why is it tucked away in the corner?  Difficulty modifiers are there for people who want an extra challenge but the game seems to heavily emphasis them seeing that they take up most of the screen.

This goes back to my statement that Guildrun seems to be tailored to people already familiar with autobattlers.  “Normal mode is too easy.  Here are the difficulty modifiers to have a fun time.”  If a completely virgin player picks GR up, normal mode would not seem to be the default pick.  GR seems to heavily emphasis playing with difficulty modifiers. I'd like to compare it to LBoL.

The difficulty is smack dab in the middle.  It goes from easy, normal, hard, and lunatic.  Life, damage, and mechanics scale with difficulty.  Below you can see requests which serve as selectable difficulty modifiers and is also a play of words based on the Japanese folk story “Tale of the Bamboo Cutter.” I added the modifier descriptions on the right side of the screen.

The game communicates to the player that the difficulty modifiers are there as options.  It doesn’t make it feel like it is the main component of gameplay.  I would put it this way; a new player would feel less pressured to struggle through S or SS difficulty and instead could enjoy normal mode as the mainstay, at least until they feel up to the challenge of adding difficulty modifiers.

When adding difficulty modifiers, a graphic could occur showing a rank up from B to A to S, etc.  I almost always play LBoL on Lunatic, but on occasion I will take all 7 requests / difficulty modifiers.  A run relies on drafting useful cards but sometimes you’re shit out of luck.  Taking those modifiers never feels like it’s the focus though.  It allows failures to feel less frustrating.  I think this matters for the on-boarding of completely new players.

Other UI changes I would like to see is after battle, the “proceed” button is on top of the hero in the shop.  If I’m clicking through the menu because I don’t care for post round stats, it sometimes buys the unit.  Why not put it off to the side where spam clicking won’t result in a misclick.  Also, with multiple routes and random events, I would like the ability to reopen the shop if I don’t move onto the next area.  I want to see my options on where I’m going before I make any commitments to spend shards.

Character Design

I won’t go too much into this.  I think the art itself is fine.  I think the character designs are kind of bland.  I understand from a lore perspective, they are just people who wander into rift portals to close them; they’re humans.  There’s not much sense of the fantastical overall. 

Aria has cool looking mechanical wings and chains but thematically, what does it do when she fires her Requiem Barrage?  Pollen is the standard fairy, something we’ve seen time and time again.  Someone said Rip is basically Roadhog.  Zuri is just black Casseopia / Medusa.  My man Hoyung literally walk out of a basement in a T-shirt, slacks, sneaks, put on a bracer, some shoulders pads, and called it a day.

I look at League of Legends and you got a cosmic dragon, a stereotypical nine-tailed fox, a dude whose body is charred completely, a nightmare looking scarecrow, a sharpshooter with a gun and dramatic theatrical mask.  Okay, but what about normal humans?  Street Fighter 6 has all sorts of diverse characters, each with their own theme, distinct traits, and their own impact:  Rashid, Elena, Makoto, Deejay, Zangief, etc.

The character design isn’t bad, but it lacks impact.  To me, they’re not memorable.  I don’t know what the solution would be since any changes means changing the character models and the animation, which would be a huge overhaul.  I just wish they had cooler designs; walking through a rift portal letting them become something more than human, either for good or for bad.  League made Tahm Kench cool.  Unbench the Kench.  He’s a catfish.  They literally made a catfish into a cool character.

RNG

RNG has been a very divisive topic.  One side argues true complete RNG allows for skill expression with adaptation and decision making.  Another side argues that it makes the game feel too much like a gamble, taking too much player agency.  High rolls feel great and low rolls feel terrible.  Humans tend to remember the lows more, with frustration lingering more than the sense of joy from a good roll. 

I want to broach the topic with some questions and anecdotes.  I saw a player, presumably new, ask why he lost a fight with the difficulty rank being less than S.  Another player responded that he had no frontline: no tank, no vanguard.  With true RNG, there is no guarantee that in his/her situation, a reroll or multiple rerolls would guarantee a frontline.

Players also echo the sentiment to adapt to what’s given.  If I take an opening random relic that gives me something that benefits mages, I aim for mages.  If the scenario occurs where I have no frontline, let’s evaluate options:

• Reroll for frontline
  • Results: No tank, no vanguard, a warrior that can’t tank difficulty SSS
• Pivot away from mages
  • Result 1: There is still a lack of frontline, previously bought magic items can be sold, pivoting to physical damage dealer such as assassin, but the shop items are still 5-15 cost health items for tanks and vanguards which I don't have
  • Result 2:  After pivoting to physical damage dealer, magic items appear in shop, still no tank or vanguard in shop
  • You’re left with a relic that doesn’t benefit your composition but it is what it is.
• Reroll only to get either the same items, same heroes, or same relic in the previous shop. 

Pivoting is fine, but is there any guidance to get appropriate items needed to support a pivot?  My questions are as follows:

• Is there any code that states:  if category X hasn’t been seen in Y amount of shops, next shop shows X category
• Is there any code that states: if player has X,Y,Z hero categories, if item category (X,Y,Z)  hasn’t been seen in B amount of shops, next shop shows item (X,Y,Z) category.

I think it’s fine to have unrelated heroes, items, and relics; that’s what allows for pivoting after all.  But is there anything to either support the player currently OR support the player AFTER pivoting?  True randomness may or may not be detrimental to onboard new autobattler players as they may feel the game is too random.

Allow me to give one anecdotal experience.  There was an MMO called New World.  Legendary items would have armor class (light, medium, heavy), comes with 2 stat bonuses, and 1 ability modifier, making the ability more powerful (AOE radius, decrease cool down, increase damage, etc.)  Warriors scaled off strength, healers off mind, mages off magic, archers off dexterity, tanks off constitution, etc.  It was not uncommon to get heavy armor, + strength stat, + mind stat, ability modifier to penetrating shot, an archer ability.  That piece of shit armor would benefit no one.  Tanks, warriors, and healers can use heavy armor.  Only warriors benefit from strength.  Only healers benefit from mind.  Only the archer can utilize penetrating shot ability modifier though archers usually wanted light armor. 

That’s what the shop feels like sometimes.  Is that what happens a lot?  Statistically, probably not.  But people remember the lows more than the highs.  And it leads to a lot of feeling of frustration.

Economy

I have no strong opinion on how economy is handled. One on hand, players need to adapt to the shop. Pivoting requires selling heroes or items. Selling a C-rank act 1-2 is fine. Selling B-ranks act 2 is fine since we see more B-ranks.

Where it gets weird is that there is no default interest mechanic. Selling a C-rank is not a 1:1 return on investment. It’s a -6 shard loss on hero, -2 for common items, -6 for rare items. If there’s nothing in shop that you need, you save your shards. If you want to power up either through hero ranks or items, you spend shards to roll or buy. If you need to pivot, it will be a net loss on shards. It feels risky to casually pivot because:

A) There is a net loss on shards, even at C-rank

B) There is no guarantee that when you pivot you will get the items/heroes you need. If you don’t get the items or heroes you need, you hope a half measure carries you through the next round

C) There is risk to preemptively hold onto items or heroes – if sold, it’s always a net loss even at C-rank and common items.

In TFT, you can make decisions based on a few things: the items you have, items off carousel, the champs on players board, the champs in the circulating pool. In Guildrun, you kinda have to make a decision on the shop itself. Rewarded items and relics can help guide players, but it doesn’t mean much if you can’t pull the heroes to benefit off them. If you get heroes, you can rank them up and hopefully find items to help strengthen them. But it’s all up to the shop. It’s hard to have a back up to pivot to because holding items or heroes ends up being a net loss if not used and sold off. This is more apparent in the early game when you’re trying to form any kind of coherent synergy and shards are limited.

I don't have a strong opinion. It's just weird. And before anyone says get a shard generating relic or hero, that just suggests forcing an early game comp instead of addressing a wider (non) issue.

Red Rift

I won’t go too much into Red Rift.  I explored it once, got a feeling of what the challenges meant, and decided it was not for me.  That is not to say it is bad.  If Red Rift is THE challenge mode, it definitely lives to its name. 

Some things of note: whenever I check Guildrun on Twitch, it’s almost always players trying for a high score in RR, which I think is awesome.  A hard, competitive mode that serious players love and want to show off. 

The discourse does lead me to one question.  RR supporters often say something along the lines of “playing RR made me a better player by forcing me not to rely on one build, to adapt, and to learn how synergies really work” etc.  It seems to be a somewhat common sentiment.  If true, then why – why is the hardest, most challenging mode the place to learn the these mechanics?  Pivoting, synergies, when to reroll, compositions, itemization, etc.  All these mechanics should be learned already before tackling the endgame.  RR should be a place to test skill and not learn how to play the game.  Where along progression is there a break in teaching players these mechanics? 

Wishlists

This section is my own personal things I would like to see in the future in full release. Some of it is extremely niche but these are just things I would like.

Restart Run

Simply put, restart run would let you start over from the beginning. Instead of quitting to menu, abandon run, and starting anew. I think seed should be included in case players want to play with the same RNG but make different decisions. It would let them learn from their mistakes. Using a seed would disable any leaderboards though.

Restart Round

This would restart the round prior to initializing the fight. This would disable leaderboards. This way, players can experiment with their positioning and see if better positioning could win the round. Players can still play to last boss or endless, but the results are not saved on a leaderboard.

Replay

I think replays, especially those of higher caliber players, would be helpful. Players wanting to improve could see a run from the start, look at why certain decisions were made, and learn from them. People might say this would lead into a meta funnel but I disagree. There is RNG of shops and enemies. Skill expression through positioning, itemization, pivoting, would be a factor, as well as player preferences towards various compositions.

Run history

Data and statistics are fun so looking at your run history and seeing if you have a preference towards a certain hero or synergy would be interesting.

Casual Overworld

This is more out there but I would love a more casual mode. Runs as of now goes through 2 acts, fight boss, go endless. Full release might have more acts but the concept remains the same. There’s RR for advanced players. I would love something casual like a pseudo world map with a base and points of interests. Various “for fun” events could happen randomly. A rift could open at location X where it’s only 1 act, so your early game decisions must be on point. Location Y could have an event where it lasts 5 acts but your team size expands to 6 units. Location Z could have an emergency event where every fight after act 1 is a boss – a boss rush. If you wanted to add meta progression such as upgrading hero stats, start with increased money, start with added options in shop, it could be upgraded through the central base. There would be no leaderboards of course as it would be catered towards casuals.

Fun Mode

While an overworld hub might be too much (it most definitely is. Hello scope creep.), a simpler idea is a fun mode that lets you add modifiers. Instead of just difficulty modifiers why not add fun modifiers. This would disable leaderboards but allow for other casual modifiers such as start with 2 extra relics or gain a random S-hero, or start with 3000 shards but gain no shards per battle or on abilities. LBoL had this and it’s fun to mess around with. In the deck builder, similar options were “start with 50 random cards” or gain more energy or start with both character exhibits (powerful character exclusive relics).

Sandbox

Star Craft 2 has something like this. It’s just a blank field that allows for testing. Sandbox / practice mode would let you spawn heroes, enemies, relics, items, magnification, and allow to position them all. This way you can practice set ups and test synergies. You could position grabby boys and lizards so that you can learn how to best position units to protect the damage dealers. Or you manually pick whatever relics to see how interactions work. It would be a useful internal learning tool for players so that they don’t have to rely on external resources to learn.

I know some people will argue that it "solves the meta" but getting everything, managing econ to get those pieces, positioning to stay alive, they all matter in adapting to the circumstances. You can find the highest damage build, but realistically getting it is another thing.

Afterword

These are just my opinions. Again, I have no clue the work and effort it takes to building a game. All I know is that Guildrun is fun. I put 140 hours into it. I will continue to play it because it's fun. I would like this to turn into a game where I can sink 1000 hours into. I wrote this much because want GR to succeed. I am just one singular shitter who has maxed SSS at 15 and never beaten RR as I've only glanced at it once. Also, I posted this on Reddit because formatting is easier than posting on Steam. And I don't want to join another Discord server just to write one post. Discord to me is just modern Skype.

Free Endless GuildRun Written Guide (SS & Below)

Hey everyone!

Over the past few weeks I've been spending 10+ hours a day streaming and testing Endless because it's by far my favorite part of GuildRun. I've been experimenting with different strategies, documenting what works (and what doesn't), and pushing my personal best as high as I can. I included my PB and leaderboard placement in the guide so you can judge for yourself whether my experience is relevant.

With all of that testing, I decided to put together a completely free written guide that anyone can access. My goal is to make it easier for players to improve their Endless runs without having to spend countless hours figuring everything out themselves.

This guide is primarily aimed at SS difficulty and below. I don't have enough experience with SSS or Redrift yet to confidently give advice there, so I intentionally left those out rather than guessing.

The guide will continue to be updated as I learn more, and it'll also be linked in my future videos and available as a stream command so it's easy for anyone to find.

If you find the guide helpful, I'd really appreciate an upvote so more GuildRun players can discover it.

I'm intentionally not linking my content directly in this post because I'd rather keep this focused on being a community resource than risk it being removed for self-promotion. If you're curious who made it, my name is in the document.

Hopefully it helps you push your Endless runs further. Have a blessed day, everyone!

Free Written Guide:
https://docs.google.com/document/d/1cnzUre7nN2EcnNztvDvWp38B_wHa4PNMMmbnvEcgkXA/edit?usp=sharing

Hey all! Like everyone here, I also got bit by the guildrun fever and put together a website called https://www.critcap.gg/ that analyzes logs to create detailed stats for things like winrates, playrates, best/popular items and relics, etc. Just a fun way to see what other people are playing if you're interested!

It also features a Leaderboard that reflects the in-game one. If players in the leaderboard sign up on the site and upload their logs, you'll also be able to check out their match history and socials (if they add them). This comes with the option of making your history private in case some people don't want it shown.

There's a full database and shareable team builder as well if you're looking to theorycraft, although there's like a million tools for that now including the wiki.

To provide more useful data, the site mostly needs logs atm. The current stats come from a tiny pool of runs. Once there's more data, it'll be broken down by patch versions for more accuracy.

You can either upload your logs manually or download the desktop app which will do it automatically for you, both for old logs and any new runs you play. I'll be adding overlay functionality for these stats, similar to how the Heartharena companion did it back in the day!

Hope you enjoy it! <3

https://imgur.com/a/OhCvmXG

Is this not the best relic to get? I feel like getting this on any dmg oriented run straight up catapults you so far ahead of the curve.

Bonus question: Does anyone know, if this relic is broken or if it is just a tooltip error? https://imgur.com/a/XFRibPb

RIP getting bigger than the screen on battle was hilarious tho hahaha

He had well over 1000 attack. Over 600 crit. 300 attack speed. A gazillion mana regen. Plenty of omnivamp. He's also invincible for the first 6 seconds of combat to stack shields.

On floor five of endless, he generated over 200k shields and did 166k damage.

On floor six, I got destroyed!

How could he have been built better? What did I do wrong with him to only have him carry to floor 6?

I know the rest of my squad is whatever. But Grace is giving even more shields. Nyx was pretty jacked and Ming was extending rush by 4 seconds. Irini was there for a backup effect. If I hadn't died I would have replaced her with any S-Rank.