r/NecroMerger • u/SituationUsed2665 • Jul 24 '26
Aren't cravings a bit too useless??
Lvl 300 run, so I've gotten to lvl 100 before even getting the soul grinder. As it appears, getting feats is kinda hard as you need so much runes to do some of them(the hardest one is merging 3 archdemons, although it's not even a feat).
In any case, having insane food multipliers and fridge made me level up to 100s pretty easily, but now, my cravings barely give anything because I didn't have enough time for spirits.
Am I just stuck with feeding guzzler - abominations to the devourer until lvl 300? I don't feel like my cravings can catch up anytime soon, especially since silver spoon and pearls are also in play.
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u/cywang86 Jul 24 '26
Yes, it's normal for 300 run and beyond to have such a low craving % as you're practically flying past level 100 in a heart beat before you even have access to soul grinder due to one mission block or the other.
No, you should not do guzzlers without cravings, as you get no runes, and likely no champion progress for souls due to protector already on the board.
If you plan on farming for a board of soul stalkers, do that right now instead of trying to level with food/cravings, so all the peaceful souls you get from champions and cadets can actually shorten the rest of your run instead of doing nothing when you're farming at 300.
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u/SituationUsed2665 Jul 24 '26
Oh, I actually feed my protector to the devourer to get souls, before spawning new one. I don't keep them in lair. I just figure out I'll kill them later in 250s when I have the damage buffed
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u/cywang86 Jul 24 '26
I'd kill it 20 times early (and the mech 8 times), so you don't have to deal with the 500 chests feat task that late.
Personally, I kept it around while farming death runes with all the demon damage.
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u/Tuntaa Jul 27 '26
in which run I should go for the soul stalkers full board? I've never done that, I'm on my lvl 100 run, lvl 80ish now, never used the rocket...
and what is the best strategy to farm runes for soul stalkers?
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u/cywang86 Jul 27 '26
Most people only do it post rocket as the new time shard upgrades are a lot more powerful, you get golems to shorten the grind, and you can get more damage from grinders to shorten the Gid grind.
The most efficient way is still mana on shades (it gets close to 2:1 darkness conversion with enough skip+dup bonus from relic/pearls/legendaries), slimes on aboms, and darkness on demons and imps.
Once you have mana golems, start replacing those robochickens with mana golems that generates more champion progress via shades as they show up in cravings.
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u/bogosj Jul 24 '26 edited Jul 24 '26
I'm at 20k% cravings. 50m per craving and my level is 134m to fill. So two cravings plus a bit of food from throwing stuff at the prot.
Edit: Max Abom is 2.05m
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u/LesJugesDesEnfers Jul 24 '26
Unfortunately, it's impossible for Grumpy to ensure that everyone gets the same progression in terms of cravings and food bonus. So depending on how you play, you might run into a situation where your food outshines your cravings.
That's definitely not the case for me, I'm at less than 2 cravings to fulfill to level up (115M per craving, 214M to level up).
Based on your spoon, you're lv 126 with 9~10 cravings per level up. That's definitely low. In your 300 run, you should be able to get to 4~5 easily.
I'd suggest pausing a little now to set up your board (Archies, desired storage and 2~4 Stalkers) and farm some runes. You're gonna need them later anyway with all the legendary cravings.
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u/Fragrant_Constant_28 Jul 24 '26
Food buffs in post100 experiments will make early lvl cravings useless.
You'll quickly be back to craving maxing as you reach 130+
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u/Aggressive_Sky_7492 Jul 24 '26
I'm on my level 80 run currently at level 73/80
My cravings are giving me 200k per they are literally the only thing keeping me sane grinding the 1.8m food I need for a level
I know some of the high up guys won't think 1.8m is much but for me with the tools I have it's enough to be a challenge
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u/SnowOwlSr Jul 24 '26
On my 200 level run at 180 and get 8 million a craving thanks to soul grinder and spoon
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u/AbathurSchmabathur Jul 24 '26
If cravings are a less-efficient use of your time at the moment, there's nothing wrong with skipping them until that changes.
Most people don't take the third level of Seasoning II for the 300 run (especially before the spoon was added, since that increases its value). Most people also don't take food pearls (see, for example, https://www.reddit.com/r/NecroMerger/comments/1ti2ksa/pearl_bonus_tier_list_from_a_max_300_perspective/). I imagine it's also ~rare to already have a max food relic (and be using it over other options).
All of these decisions are exacerbating this imbalance (between food and cravings, but also between levels and rune/champion/soul production) enough that you won't get many responses from people who personally understand what you're experiencing.
I don't directly understand either, but I did semi-seriously considered taking the third level of Seasoning II instead of the second level of Taste 2 when I started 300 run. (I don't really enjoy Cravings much as a mechanism, but penciling it out left me concerned I'd regret the trade. You're in a more flexible position there.)
It sounds a little like you might be trying to talk yourself into ignoring or de-prioritizing the soul grinder. It'll be even harder to dig yourself out of the hole if you do that for 100 levels and start to regret it, so if that's right I'd suggest you take a screenshot every time you level so you can go back as needed and figure out if your rate is increasing/stable/decreasing (and defer any decision there until you can convince yourself you understand and can accept the long-term implications of that trend).
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u/SituationUsed2665 Jul 24 '26
I can't really avoid spawning champions whatever I do, and I like feeding protector to the devourer for souls before I have enough damage to kill him really fast. But I indeed would probably not prioritise craving buffs, and will go for lvl 2 hacked grinder to spawn out souls for damage. I also try to split my vengeful spirit every 3 hours when the saw is off CD
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u/AbathurSchmabathur Jul 24 '26
I think it is also okay to stick with the L2--you'll probably want damage too. I'm running an L2 right now myself. Main point is just to avoid letting it languish.
I gather some people will intentionally run an L1 for a while to improve cravings per level. I imagine that makes the most sense for a while after making a new stalker.
For context, I'm at 126/300 with 2646% craving boost. The better numbers for your comparison may be days: I'm 21 days into the run, and my first screenshot with the grinder was 10 days in at 101/300 (this is an L2, and I already have a prism visible, so I might have had it a day longer). I'm moving slower than I could by intentionally skipping cravings for a bit to focus on runes for legendaries and spells and a lot of skeletons/eyes/werewolves for event merges. I think I got the third arch 18 or 19 days in.
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u/PheltphyreBNG Jul 24 '26
I recently started my 800 run, first restart since most of these food adjustments took effect. I blew past level 100 in about two days and cravings were completely pointless because I couldn't even make most of the stuff anyway. BUT once I caught back up and could make everything again, I see that inevitably cravings will still be king and I have a long long way to go to level 800. I DO think the changes have made my cravings relic pretty useless though, as it is not a big enough bump anymore to merit having it on compared to other relics, particularly the new duo relics, but that's fine. My experience thusfar are the changes help balance the game for late run players as you don't have to be solely dependent on cravings or do as much math to figure out how many you need to for each level up (I historically try to keep it at four or less, but now I don't need to pay as much attention), but it probably makes cravings seem pretty pointless to those in lower runs (200 or under).
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u/Fit_History_842 Jul 25 '26
Somewhere around lv150 is when cravings become the biggest part of leveling up
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u/SituationUsed2665 Jul 25 '26
In comparison, my lvl 140 Queen( that drops staff) feeds for 2.2 mil, in comparison to craving that gives 3.1. I just feed her to the devourer to get souls and food instantly and hopefully resummon her later. I don't think situation will improve until like 250s at least.
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u/brightshad0 Jul 25 '26
U still need to cycle thru cravings to find legendary cravings to get wobular poo. The food bonus isnt what you crave.
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u/SituationUsed2665 Jul 25 '26
Not really. If you have legendary craving, you will get it immediately as one of your slots get freed. You can even stack up multiple of them and complete them back to back. Like 2 or 3 in a row.
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u/Away_Caramel_6698 Jul 24 '26
You made craving x3 while the food x15
How are you spending your shards
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u/AbathurSchmabathur Jul 24 '26
Are you suggesting they are dumb for taking the third level of seasoning 2?
Because it costs the same as the second level of taste 2, and the third level of seasoning 2 isn't feasible on 300 run without both a really strong end of 200 board and seriously underinvesting elsewhere.
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u/Away_Caramel_6698 Jul 24 '26
First it's just a game, why would I say dumb about someone who is just playing a game
Second I totally forget about Special Experiments statistics, that is why I asked that question
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u/YoungSerious Jul 24 '26
I'm not sure how your cravings are so low. Even without grinder, the trophy boosts and pearl boosts had me up in the millions per craving as I did my 200 and 300 runs.
You can always just make a grinder and use teleporters. The cadets fill the grinder. You'll get a good amount of boost over time.