Vampire Survivors - Castlevania but You Are the Bullet Hell

[Paul le Fou]

Crossposting discussion begun in the like what you're playing thread:

Vampire Survivor is a game that dares to ask, "What if Hades was Smash TV?"

Several of my friends are into it right now. "You are the bullet hell" is a helluva pitch, even before you add the not-Castlevania skinning.

One neat thing about it that I noticed in the Steam reviews is that it scores high on accessibility, given that the entire game is played with just a single analog stick and a single button (and the button only rarely, since I think you need to press A to open chests.

I bet it would have been fun on atari or an arcade cabinet!

I'm playing it a lot ugh. Very addictive. I spent a chunk of yesterday on the browser version before getting the steam version and it's worth noting the steam version is more updated - mostly UI stuff, gold prices I think, but probably some mechanical tuning in there too. But there's also at least one extra stage (not sure if that wasn't in the browser version or I just never got to it) besides the basic forest, which I tend to find a little easier; not sure why but it's probably the fact that the top and bottom are walls so you can only scroll east/west, which limits where enemies can come from so it gets them closer together for area attacks to take out. Also at least one more character (see above as to whether he's actually specific/unique).

I can't usually get past being level 29ish on the forest, but I've had 3 different characters make it to "maxed out every upgrade until you just get gold/floor chicken on each level" in the library, 60+ish? I've only managed to evolve 2 weapons, the magic wand and the knives, so I'm trying to get a few of the others and see how they work out; not sure if I just have to stumble upon the item combinations to allow those, or just push them to max level and pray.

There are two objectives in each stage you might care about:

• Defeating a specific boss (which I think appears at the 25:00 mark in both stages) unlocks the "Hyper" version of that stage. The Hyper version isn't appreciably more difficult, largely because the increase in enemies has a corresponding increase in experience, but it awards more gold.
• Reaching the 30:00 mark despawns all enemies, summons Death to kill you basically instantly, gives you a "Stage Complete" message, and grants 500 gold, which is fairly minor compared to how much you'll have gathered on your own by then. There's no unlock associated with this, so the extra gold is the only bonus.

The second stage is quite a bit easier than the first. You'll want to focus on that stage until you're satisfied that you're doing well enough to go back to the forest.

All evolutions are contingent on the weapon being maxed out and having a corresponding passive item. Not all weapons have evolutions. The evolution is guaranteed on your next chest once you've met the conditions (except possibly if you have multiple evolution-ready weapons and the chest drops only one item).

"Floor chicken" is a delightful alternative to "wall meat."

I still can't get to level 30 in the forest; I think the all-direction spread makes it harder to collect experience as it's spread around more; harder to focus-fire enemy groups or rely on passthrough weapons; easier to get your path blocked off; random-fire weapons have more directions to go with lower or the same density of enemies cleared each time Ugh.

I did get my first 30-minute finish with an area-buff focused build - The character with the automatic +30% to area plus candelabras; rune tracers, lightning ring, holy santa water, plus fire wand and evolved magic-wand, ... Not everything actually got better with area since they only hit a limited number of targets, but it does prevent some from passing by nearby enemies? Anyway, the build passed the final test which is the "stand still" test - just stand in the middle of a room and it slays everything around it. Things had pushed in very close by the very end but I stuck it out til that 30 mark and completed the stage. This also taught me that I'd seriously underestimated the benefit of stacking area-increase effects, especially with a character making them even bigger - lightning wiping out entire rows of enemies as soon as they enter, santa water covering an entire unbroken arc of the floor to the ceiling, and rune tracers hitting so many more things than usual. Later I evolved axes and crosses with the same character (on different runs) and the huge swathes they cut through crowds... amazing.

Later, as I attempted to get weapon evolutions, I realized you actually can have more than one evolution in a run, so I later decided to do an all-evolutions run. I only picked up weapons that could evolve and their corresponding items. You can only have six weapons and there are seven total, but I got the whip, axes, king bible, fire wand, magic wand, and daggers (the starting weapon with Gennaro, who I went for to get that extra projectile); that meant I got the max-hp, area, duration, damage, cooldown, and speed bonuses. I couldn't get any of my normal standbys this way - no armor, no pummarelo or whatever, no garlic, no laurel. The big one was no duplicators... But even so this still led to my second 30-minute run because I did indeed evolve every one of those weapons and it was indeed fucking insane. The max hp and health-drain from the evolved whip basically solved my rare damage issues, the whip + book was a whirlwind of death keeping everything at bay, the axes helped thin the entire crowd, the wand provided random focused damage and the hellfire provided random total-clear areas, and the daggers funneled damage at a direct target line.

If/when I do it again I'll probably drop the daggers for the evolved crosses, because Holy Sword is fuckin sick and also looks sweet as hell, but I wonder if the lack of speed from losing the bracers would have too big an impact. Magic wand is less impressive but the cooldown reduction is huge for axes, crosses, and hellfire... Hellfire itself, being randomly-targeted, might be a good sacrifice, but then I'm losing spinach. Axes and area, that'd lose a lot of targeting from crosses, hellfire, and whip, plus shrinks the book circle. Duration is the easiest to sacrifice since it doesn't effect any of the evolved weapons iirc, but the bible circle itself is so clutch. No, I think daggers and bracers are the ones I'd try to drop to do another run like this. (That means I'll need a different starting character, so my starting weapon would have to be the whip, wand, or fire wand, and instead of an extra projectile I'd get damage, experience, or what was it, speed? as my character bonus. I wonder if the damage or speed would make up for it...

Or I could of course start with the lightning ring or bone and not do every weapon evolved. That also opens up a slot for sub-items like duplicators...

 

[JBear]

I've gotten to 30 minutes in both zones with and without hyper, but I don't know that I have any insight to offer.

I prefer the Library because it has some fun static drops that are missing from the first area, and if you pick them up late you can actually go over your 6 item limit!

I find this game is really great on delivering the same feeling that Risk of Rain does where once you reach a certain point you just feel absolutely broken in the best way. My first 30-minute run was with 3 evolved weapons and I felt like Death incarnate.

Also, I called this Castlevania with the numbers filed off, but I feel like the numbers become less filed off the deeper I go. I'm not sure if any of these are literal sprite rips, but some of them come very close.

 

[Paul le Fou]

I 30'd my first run of hyper mode in the library, even though I haven't done so to 100% of my runs there. But I feel like I have a very firm grasp on it and can consistently do quite well.

But not in the motherfucking forest! The exact same point has gotten me every time I've made it that far - shortly before I reach level 30, I think a little after 15 minutes, or however they decide it: There's a hectic flood of werewolves and ghosts, including fast ghost packs that push through the scrum and shove werewolves into you. I can usually get past that, but it's followed immediately by a flood of the big vampire bats (which are way too strong!) that surround me along with the continuing werewolf phase. I simply have never been able to escape that, or honestly even feel like I've been close.

I've been trying my various successful builds from the other level, and nothing's worked. I've tried specific altered builds to account for the different layout and flow and numbers, and nothing has even come close to getting me through that part. I've managed to get 2 duplicators well before then and still nothing. I've tried to keep a laser focus on getting an evolved weapon by then and have never been able to. I'm kind of at my wit's end here!

The only other thing I can think of is building heavy into for "immediate surroundings" - bible, garlic, whip, axe, and/or cross, maybe go with Mortaccio for bone - and pray I can keep them off of me even if the crush comes in from outside. The other idea is build strong into "crowd clearing" with rune tracer, lightning ring, santa water, but I get mobbed up close too much for that and usually can't make it far enough to find out.

Basically the only thing I can do is farm hyper library for more gold and keep powering up my base stuff. I think I'm past the halfway point on that... I can finish off the survival buffs, or make a beeline straight for unlocking the passive/universal duplicator. Or both, probably, before anything works.

 

[JBear]

Well, I can certainly say that I haven't been relying on the meta unlocks, because I've only barely started that stuff; most of my stuff is level 1 or 0.

I find it helps to have good crowd-clearing synergy; garlic plus something with knockback so you can make a hole is great. Then just slowly part the sea and keep steady in a direction. The... plant item (forget the name) that makes a shield can also be very useful, and is a very potent defensive tool at high levels.

 

[Mogri]

Laurels. It's the deepest cut in the game, since that item only ever appeared in CV2.

 

[Paul le Fou]

So I finally got a build together and cleared the forest. Once I had something that made it past the bat crush - which was still not a cakewalk! - only a few other waves gave me much trouble, though it was uncomfortably tight quite often.

I went with Gennaro(?) for the extra projectile (the sticking point is before mortaccio gets his second projectile bonus, so it would be the same effect in the end for getting me past there) The trick was, after all, that I was indeed able to evolve knives before the vampire bat wave. I evolved my whip too, but I can't remember if that was before, during, or after the trouble spot - I think it was before. I also had bibles and garlic, to protect my bubble, laurels to absorb hits, and one other... I think it was crosses? With the knives and whip combined with my other surrounding stuff I was able to walk in a direction and cut a path through pretty much anything, with the area protection and whip keeping things off my ass well enough to survive.

I am terrified of trying hyper forest, but it's worth popping in to see just how bad it is (or if it's paradoxically easier somehow). That's the next goal post anyway.

 

[Mogri]

I got a pickup today I'd never seen before: it makes you spit extremely powerful fire for about 15 seconds. The Collection calls it NFT (Nduja Fritta Troppo) and notes that its drop rate is affected by Luck (although that's true of all candle drops aside from coin, small bag, and clover). Luck affects a whole bunch of things; it's probably the secret best stat.

My main discontent with this game is currently that success is dictated mostly by which evolved weapons you end up with. There are only a handful of non-evolved weapons that will make a big difference in the endgame (notably including Laurels). This is really only a problem because half of the weapons don't have evolutions -- I'd feel a lot less constrained if I could take any item early on.

Apparently there's a content update coming next week, so fingers crossed.

 

[Paul le Fou]

I got a pickup today I'd never seen before: it makes you spit extremely powerful fire for about 15 seconds. The Collection calls it NFT (Nduja Fritta Troppo) and notes that its drop rate is affected by Luck (although that's true of all candle drops aside from coin, small bag, and clover). Luck affects a whole bunch of things; it's probably the secret best stat.

My main discontent with this game is currently that success is dictated mostly by which evolved weapons you end up with. There are only a handful of non-evolved weapons that will make a big difference in the endgame (notably including Laurels). This is really only a problem because half of the weapons don't have evolutions -- I'd feel a lot less constrained if I could take any item early on.

Apparently there's a content update coming next week, so fingers crossed.

I got that too! I first got it when doing a run with Poe, the smelly old man, and thought it might be related to him, but then I got another on my woods-beating Gennaro run. I have no idea if I'm remembering these names correctly and I frankly don't care enough to check.

I agree with the evolution point - the lightning ring, rune tracer and santa water can all do quite a bit of damage but they just can't compare to an evolved weapon. The other thing is that needing to evolve limits your subweapon choice too, since each one requires a specific sub-tool (although some of them are pretty cool on their own. The spellbinder is annoying because, as far as I can tell, none of the evolved weapons actually benefit from it, including the Bible that requires it.

What all does luck do? Just affect candle drops? I feel like I start noticing more random red jewels on the ground when I have higher luck too, but who knows.

But a content update is exciting!

 

[JBear]

They also recently snuck in upgraded garlic (same patch as the NFT I think) and an upgrade for the birds powers, but I'm assuming that's distinct from the patch that Mogri is mentioning?

Off the top of my head, luck impacts candle drops, chest tier, and power selections at level-up (increased chance of being offered 4). I feel like it may also impact the odds of good pentagram procs, but I'm not sure. (The pentagram is pretty bad, so I haven't tested it much.)

 

[Mogri]

Chest tier is the big one for me. You essentially won't see penta-chests without a luck boost, and even triple chests are vanishingly rare.

 

[JBear]

The clover is one of my favourite passives, which is frustrating for me, as the cross is one of my favourite actives, and I think the evolved cross is actively worse. Sure, it does more damage, but it does a worse job bouncing things away from me, which is what I like about the cross. If I'm running cross + clover, I'll often specifically sit on a level 7 cross for as long as I can (until I find it in two successive chests or run out of other things to choose).

 

[Paul le Fou]

Yeah, since cross evolves with clover, it really needs some other passives to shine - area and extra projectiles, namely. The second time I evolved it I didn't have extra projectiles so only then did I realize that you went from however many crosses to just the one big sword; it was Not Great. Making the sword huge with the candelabrador is key, as with anything that passes through enemies. And because of the low base number, each extra projectile you add increases the dps by a ton, proportionally. When I get the cross in a build like that it regularly wreaks absolute havoc.

Speaking of DPS, I wish they would change the calculation (or add a category) to "time since last upgrade" since calculating all the damage your ebony wings did from the first level 1 you got through the end of the run, divided over that whole time, doesn't really give an accurate picture of how much it's contributing in the end. I actually check those! I like stats and numbers! They're useful!

 

[Paul le Fou]

Case in point, I just finished (my first!) Hyper woods run. My loadout was:

Bone: 2.4m damage, - 1.3k (suspect) dps
Peachone: 1.4m damage - 1.3k (suspect) dps
Runetracer: 2.9m damage - 2.7k suspect dps (I got the runetracer and peachone 6 seconds apart, for the record.
(Those should likely be higher when comparing their level 8 performance for what they do at level 8 because of the way the dps timing seems to include the low-level run-up. But then again, the evolved weapons also clearly outperform them on sheer damage done, regardless.)
Death Spiral: 3.8m damage - 4k dps
Unholy Vespers: 3.1m damage - 3.6k dps
Heaven Sword: 4.3m damage - 6.2k dps!!

This was with Mortaccio, level 5 candelabra, and 3 duplicators (2 + passive). (Also clover, spellbinder, regen hearts, and spinach.) By the time I evolved the holy sword I was rolling with +5 projectiles and by the time I finished I had +6. That's 7 gigantic holy swords sweeping through the crowd doing critical damage.

 

[Mogri]

Yeah, even if you look at total damage done across the entire run, they're outdone by the evolved weapons. The DPS stat is always going to be misleading -- for example, if you get Pentagram at the very end of a run, it will be your highest-DPS weapon by far -- but the total damage doesn't lie except insofar as the evolved weapons have separate line items from their base forms.

 

[Paul le Fou]

Checking into the (previous) content patch, it looks like garlic got an evolution, and "another weapon" got a secret evolution (though the notes include a screenshot showing a Peachone unleashing craziness, so, probably that). Has anyone found either of those yet? Wondering what they could be... I know I've had garlic maxed out a few times in the past couple of days but haven't found an evolution yet.

Peachone I've picked up only once (mostly just to confirm that you can in fact have it and ebony wings at the same time; they rotate counter to each other but I dunno if Ebony also does more damage or anything, or if it's just the same thing. I've always liked the idea of them better than their actual performance, not least of which because I get birds flying around me. But if it evolves now...! I'm still figuring out the best buffs for them too, like, projectiles obviously; duration + cooldown should be good to get them firing longer if it works like that; then you'd have both sides covered almost constantly?)

Stacking longer duration + faster cooldown is one of my favorite new tricks (I mean, it's obvious, but I hadn't really been able to fully put it to the test until recently). It gets you some overlap, so you often have more than one set of whatever out on the screen - even pre-evolution Bibles will have a half-second where there are two sets, and that's on a character that doesn't have innate cooldown or duration boosts. This works especially well with the Bibles (until it evolves and both of those buffs stop mattering), Mortaccio's bones, and runetracers. Santa Water and the birds would probably benefit quite a bit, too. Speed is also a very good stack for the bones and runetracers (and birds and Bibles) since they tear around that much more. I just did a run where rune tracers absolutely dominated my damage, with bones a distant but significant second. Bibles and magic wand (both evolved) did less than a million damage each because they rarely got a chance to hit any enemies. I think I'll try something similar with double birds and see what happens. Hmm, do I start with the duration, speed, or cooldown character for that...?

One of the things that works so well about this game is you find one ridiculously dominant build and go "Well, that's the one for me, then!" until you turn around and try something pretty different and find out it works just as well. In the end you're ultimately still just reaching the point where you can sit back and sip your coffee as your Bullet Satan, Lord of Bullet Hell just eats all the enemy waves, but, y'know, it's about the journey and the different kinds of flashy lights and pew pew sounds.

 

[JBear]

It gets you some overlap, so you often have more than one set of whatever out on the screen - even pre-evolution Bibles will have a half-second where there are two sets

Just to be clear, I'm not sure if this is what you're seeing or not, but when you level-up a weapon it always immediately procs that weapon, so you often get extra sets of weapons if you level them up while they're already on screen.

I'm still figuring out the best buffs for them too, like, projectiles obviously; duration + cooldown should be good to get them firing longer if it works like that; then you'd have both sides covered almost constantly?)

If you check the Collection screen, it tells you what buffs don't work for each weapon and what buffs they work best with.

New weapon evolution spoilers:
It's a super bird that requires you to level both existing birds to 8. Also, unlike the other evolutions, this one can itself be levelled. I found it difficult to unlock, because I don't like either bird, and that takes up two weapon slots, but once I got it it did massive amounts of damage. (Also, notably, once you evolve it, it frees up a slot to put in another weapon.

ETA: Oh, also, relevantly to me, it's a reference to a *different* Konami game that is near and dear to my heart.

Garlic evolution spoiiler:
You need Garlic plus Pumarola, or whatever the health regen passive is called. I like the Garlic evolution a lot!

 

[Paul le Fou]

Just to be clear, I'm not sure if this is what you're seeing or not, but when you level-up a weapon it always immediately procs that weapon, so you often get extra sets of weapons if you level them up while they're already on screen.

Yeah, I'm aware of that, and this is not that. As my cooldown went down and duration went up I'd spend some time standing still, absent any cooldowns, and watching my Bibles closely. They reached a point where one grew in and there were two full-sized sets for a little less than a second before the older one shrank out. I've also concretly confirmed that I've thrown bones while there are other bones still bouncing around. Runetracers are too chaotic to track but I'll be watching again at the next chance. I'll probably be taking the character with the innate cooldown buff to really break this open, too; Santa Water should be fun to mess with

If you check the Collection screen, it tells you what buffs don't work for each weapon and what buffs they work best with.

Yeah, I remember seeing that but I need to go back and comb over it in some more depth.

Also, I am excited for garlic and/or birdy times.

Also-also, I looked at reddit and saw that some people have been able to go entire minutes past the 30:00 mark with the right build, usually the clock lancet and the laurel at least, probably some knockback stuff, and some skillful dancing around the bookshelf/piano nooks.

 

[Paul le Fou]

Ok, the rainbow birb is fucking sweet. Is it the best weapon? Maybe, maybe not, but I do love it, because it's a bird. Although it does actually cause slowdown, which is pretty intense.

I'm not sure about evolved garlic still. I think it has a major problem - if you get the Bible on top of it, it rarely gets to hit enemies, and I almost never see any health regen out of it. Early on if I don't have the Bible I see the green 1s pop up, but by the end of the game, nothin'. I also don't have a good grasp on how much damage it does.

 

[Mogri]

Ok, the rainbow birb is fucking sweet. Is it the best weapon?

Very likely. Here are my endgame stats:

King Bible - 278.6k - 2:58 - 1.6k/s
(grabbed late; I thought I had the evo, but I did not. Should've grabbed the Fire Wand instead)
Evolved Cross - 1.9M - 19:37 - 1.6k
(same DPS as the Bible, but only because of when I picked it up - this says that DPS is much more a function of time obtained than of base damage)
Evolved Garlic - 769.6k - 17:25 - 735.9
(actually shockingly bad DPS, but I love this weapon anyway. Maybe not worth the secondary it requires, though)
Evolved _Wand_ - 1M - 16:03 - 1k
(pairs really well with the above)
Evolved __Axe__ - 3.1M - 12:01 - 4.3k
(top 3 weapon)
Weapon in question - 4.6M - 5:31 - 13.9k

The fact that it has the highest raw damage despite only being present for 1/6 of the run is amazing.

 

[Alixsar]

This game is incredible

Edit: I just died at 24:30 and I got there solely through the power of Runetracer. It's DPS wasn't great by the end, but it did a ton of damage early and got me through to the mid/late game. Even in the late game it's line/pierce AoE managed to keep dealing out decent damage. I got the Garlic/Bible combo up early so most things would get knocked back when they got to me, and then I managed to get the upgraded Garlic (which actually does very good damage) and the upgraded Fire Wand (which is INSANE) and kept going until a massive wave of witches got me. This game is addictive and awesome and it rules

Gennaro seems like the best character, with the one extra projectile by default, but I just did that run with Pasqualina and the projectile speed was really noticeable with Runetracer/Fire wand...I like Porta too and just got Arca, so we'll see how that goes. ARghsjkdlajkls this game is GOOD

 

[Paul le Fou]

Edit: I just died at 24:30 and I got there solely through the power of Runetracer. It's DPS wasn't great by the end, but it did a ton of damage early and got me through to the mid/late game. Even in the late game it's line/pierce AoE managed to keep dealing out decent damage. I got the Garlic/Bible combo up early so most things would get knocked back when they got to me, and then I managed to get the upgraded Garlic (which actually does very good damage) and the upgraded Fire Wand (which is INSANE) and kept going until a massive wave of witches got me. This game is addictive and awesome and it rules

Gennaro seems like the best character, with the one extra projectile by default, but I just did that run with Pasqualina and the projectile speed was really noticeable with Runetracer/Fire wand...I like Porta too and just got Arca, so we'll see how that goes. ARghsjkdlajkls this game is GOOD

Runetracer is sick. If you have increased area and/or increased duration, those pair extremely well with it too. Increased area and speed also work great with the upgraded fire wand (which is, indeed, insane).

Gennaro is definitely the best character early on, until you can regularly get to level 20; once you can regularly get to level 40, imo he drops down a notch. (The knives aren't bad at all they're just not my favorite, which is points against him). You may not have unlocked the character I'm referring to that beats him out, but it'll be obvious when you do.

Porta and Arca are my next-favorites when I want to purposely go with a cooldown- or area-centric build, because those bonuses - especially the 30% area that doesn't need to scale up - are really good. The speed from Pasqualina helps certain weapons particularly well - Bibles and runetracer (and peachone, I think?) in particular, plus crosses (and axes too I guess); daggers and both wands get the effect but it doesn't really make them that much more effective, just buys you a little extra room at best. (Evolved fire wand sees the benefit a bit more.) Speed is also good for Mortaccio's weapon but Pasqualina can't get that. But increased area helps every one of the weapons that speed is good for and others besides (water, lightning ring, garlic), and cooldown makes literally everything better (I think).

Honestly, Antonio's not bad because damage is also nice. Imelda, though... so, getting more exp is nice and all, but I never felt like it made a huge difference in getting me past the rough parts I was running into. I didn't gain that many more levels as her, really. (The other issue is that once you hit the end of a run you're just earning money for leveling up—oh, huh, I wonder if she's a particularly good character for gold-farming because you cap your upgrades faster and get more time earning cashbags, and earn them faster. Maybe I'll try it out and see...)

 

[Alixsar]

Nevermind, get Garlic and Bible and upgrade them and then get the two birds and upgrade them and you do so much damage and there's so much shit on the screen that the game drops to single digit frame rates

It's awesome

 

[ShakeWell]

This game rules ass.

 

[Alixsar]

I played way too much of this today. I beat the Library on Hyper with upgraded Axe/Wand/Whip/Garlic and Runetracer and the Freeze Ray and it's like...this game feels easy now, suddenly. Once you "get" it, you get it. Still, an incredible game for 3 bucks

 

[Mogri]

Now do Hyper Forest

 

[Paul le Fou]

Now do Hyper Forest

 

[Alixsar]

I will but first

https://imgur.com/wPjie2x

https://imgur.com/qUxHfoW

lol, Water is bonkers when you upgrade it. Forest is definitely harder and I got pretty far this morning but haven't beaten it on Hyper yet. I'll probably do a few more Library runs for gold and then get at it.

In case you didn't know, if you do the Library and walk left, you'll eventually fine a Tome and if you walk right you'll eventually find a Stone Mask. I wasn't sure if it was gonna work so I didn't try it with the Tome, but I maxed out on Accessories and tried picking up the Mask, and it let me take it! AND level it up! I looked it up and it appears to work with the Tome too, so you can essentially have 6 accessories AND ALSO Tome and Mask. Pretty nuts.

I'm not sure about evolved garlic still. I think it has a major problem - if you get the Bible on top of it, it rarely gets to hit enemies, and I almost never see any health regen out of it. Early on if I don't have the Bible I see the green 1s pop up, but by the end of the game, nothin'. I also don't have a good grasp on how much damage it does.

Nah, it's good. Garlic/Bible is fantastic. Garlic makes enemies easier to knock back, Bible knocks back. It basically makes a huge shield around that most things can't get through once they're full upgraded. It's just a massive buzzsaw. If you're only gonna take one, the Bible is better once upgraded, but Garlic is good really early and lets you ramp up fast. I do think having a close range/knockback weapon is important and Garlic/Bible is hard to pass up. Whip is also kinda underrated, but it also kinda sucks since it locks you into looking for the Max HP upgrade, which does nothing to increase your damage output so like...eh...it's good on Antonio at least since he has the passive Spinach-esque damage boost so losing that space to a HP upgrade doesn't hurt as much

 

[Paul le Fou]

Whip is an excellent survival item. The damage isn't good, but the healing (combined with the max HP boost) make for excellent not-dying. I just did a hyper forest run with garlic and whip, both evolved, which was a fun combo. Garlic does more damage when you're recovering HP, i.e. when you're not at full (since you're always recovering with the pummeler heart), so taking some damage increases your output. The whip's healing, meanwhile (and the extra max HP) make that much safer, since you're in less danger of getting immediately ground down and can heal back up between moments of bleeding a little. I think this is how it works - I haven't tested it yet, though.

 

[Alixsar]

Okay now Hyper Forest is down. I had the Whip but I wasn't able to evolve it because of getting forced into some bad options, but Axe/Garlic/Bible were all evolved, plus the Lightning Ring/Water, and that was enough

 

[Pajaro Pete]

default MC is terrible