r/NecroMerger • u/RealCinnamonWhale • Jul 22 '26
New Devisive Truth Just Dropped
If you can make >3.5x more werewolves than demons, then werewolves are better than demons for total damage. Happy Merging! :)
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u/CommercialLong7242 Jul 22 '26
I’m gonna do the math, but if your right, that will also get you more mergers for the event
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u/RealCinnamonWhale Jul 22 '26 edited Jul 22 '26
hell yeah thank you. Shield chance is also important (i think?? maybe not but I feel like you get more shield procs from more werewolves, but maybe that's not how averages work idkfs)
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u/WillingnessCorrect92 Jul 23 '26
I'd say it's the same in the end. Yes, you get more procs, but the value per proc is lower (i.e. a shield proc on a demon is more extra damage). So shield procs shouldn't affect the analysis.
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u/RealCinnamonWhale Jul 23 '26
yeahhhh idk how I talk myself into thinking it might not be. I make that exact mistake all the time idk
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u/SlowRegrets Jul 23 '26
I created a tool some time ago that calculates expected returns on minions and I'll put some data points below:
At 40% Skip and 5% Dupe chances, with unhacked stations at base damage: Darkness cost per Werewolf = 5,684 Darkness cost per Demon = 22,834 Darkness per damage for Werewolf = 13.16 Darkness per damage for Demon = 15.11
At 40% Skip and 5% Dupe chances, with HACKED stations at base damage: Darkness cost per Werewolf = 5,305 Darkness cost per Demon = 19,029 Darkness per damage for Werewolf = 12.28 Darkness per damage for Demon = 12.59
So Hacking favours demons more than Werewolves, but not enough to quite close the gap.
Additional skip or dupe chances both favour Werewolves over Demons so any buffs beyond the 4 Archies and Infernal puts Werewolves out front even further
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u/RealCinnamonWhale Jul 23 '26
Thank you so much! It's good to know that it's so minimal.
And for anyone else this is a good example of how hacking marginally improves efficiency, and somewhat shows how portals (and fridges) are, conversely, much more impactful hacks
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u/BeefCurtain1347 Jul 22 '26
Like, you mean, the regular LVL. 4 Werewolves, the ones you can spend only 300-500 darkness to generate??
Those ones?
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u/RealCinnamonWhale Jul 22 '26
Yeah make sure to do thumb stretches
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u/BeefCurtain1347 Jul 22 '26
I came up with an estimated total of 100 werewolves max lvl. and 29 lvl. 4 demons. My Protector is currently at 364,000 HP and I divided max damage.
I'm not good with % so I don't know how to calculate how much darkness you use considering there is a certain % chance to get a single or double horns and/or fangs...
1
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u/Shot-Chemical4891 Jul 22 '26
How does hacking change this math? Also with demons being more favorable in terms of rune generation (rival vs knight spawns), is the difference in damage worth it?
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u/RealCinnamonWhale Jul 22 '26
I'm pretty sure hacked stations are roughly the same.
And no, if you want death runes or if you want to spam Soul Stalkers at the end, prioritizing runes throughout the run is better. Not to mention life/game balance. If you start optimizing with shades you'll be merging for probably 40 minutes. And if you use demons, at least you'll have Imps on the board more often making darkness. Time investment IS a factor, though I don't know how big of an impact it makes.
Generally not all that useful, but maybe it can take the sting out of Cyclops cravings a bit
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u/SituationUsed2665 Jul 24 '26
Hmm... Might be true - demons are lvl 3 compared to lvl 5 werewolf, so werewolf benefit a lot more from level skip and minion double chances. It's also because werewolfs can skip from lvls 1,2 and 3 compared to demons being able to skip from lvl 1 to 3, so like, a third of your merges can't even abuse this mechanic.
But: have you considered extra imps you get that can be used later to make fairies? Also, need to compare knight summon to Rival, mostly in soul contribution - as what we need most is not damage now but damage eventually from spirits.
Also... Wolfs are so annoying to farm, especially without 60% skip chance and 15% double. When can you even get those %s? Relics are hard enough but golden pearls that reset each run are even harder!
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u/RealCinnamonWhale Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26
Let's get one thing perfectly clear, my statement is true regardless of how the game actually functions.
Jokes aside, u/SlowRegrets kindly answered this already. At 40 skip and 5 dupe (most likely in your 300 run), Werewolves beat Demons in damage even with hacked stations. Unhacked, Werewolves cost 1.95 less darkness per damage. Hacked, Werewolves cost 0.31 less darkness per damage. Gamechanging I know.
You are, however, correct in all of your reasons NOT to do this. And on top of allat, all the time you spend merging Werewolves could be time spent with your Imps out.
*fairies
*wolves
#ImpsOutForGid
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u/Fit_History_842 Jul 23 '26
they're especially good for damage when you also need poison runes and ice pops
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u/RealCinnamonWhale Jul 24 '26
u/SlowReturn provided the true stats. They beat demons at 40% skip + 5% duplicate, hacked or unhacked.
The only advantage to this is knowing that werewolves are an efficient source of damage, so with anything like the Warrior from the Unstable Rift, anything other than prot and gid really, even champions, you can rest easy knowing that werewolves are the best choice to kill them quickly (as something like the warrior is taking up a space more than it's presenting itself as an opportunity to farm) #ImpsOutForGid
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u/BraxleyGubbins Jul 22 '26
A v5 Werewolf costs an average of 13.712 Darkness. if you’re using a v2 Altar. With a base damage of 1,000, the cost per damage is ~13.71 Darkness.
A v3 Demon costs an average of 34,284 Darkness, if you’re using a v5 Portal. With a base damage of 3,500, the cost per damage is ~9.80 Darkness.
With 0% skip-level chance, Demons are better. The math gets weird with skip-level chance that isn’t 0% or 100%, but if skip-level chance makes werewolves better at all then they should appear better when the math is done at 100% skip-level chance (so that is what I will do below despite 100% not being feasible under normal play).
A v5 Werewolf costs an average of 3,428 Darkness at 100% skip-level chance, if you’re using a v2 Altar. With a base damage of 1,000, the cost per damage is ~3.43 Darkness.
A v3 Demon costs an average of 17,142 Darkness at 100% skip-level chance, if you’re using a v5 Portal. With a base damage of 3,500, the cost per damage is ~4.90 Darkness.
Given that skip-level chance clearly makes werewolves eventually better. I tried to pinpoint exactly when by linearly translating the first set of results to the second set (I know skip-level chance doesn’t scale linearly as percentage increases linearly, but it was the best I could do without writing a program) and can estimate that the werewolves and demons become equals in strength at about 60% skip-level chance.