I feel like I'm playing a different game than everyone else in this thread. Struggling to even hit 50 DPS in my best runs. I've got four Might upgrades (and one Luck, because I feel like I never see chicken otherwise) so clearly I'm doing something wrong, even trying to follow everyone's advice.
This is a common experience. Once you get past a couple bumps and unlock some more passives, you'll be there too (and it won't take that long). Oops, I read a little farther down and I see you're already well on your way. Sick.
Knife guy gets +1 projectiles. Skelly gets 0 to start, +1 at level 20, +2 at level 40, and +3 at level 60, so you can see how the early game is a little rougher, but he equals knife guy once you can consistently reach level 20 and is better once you can reach 40. (With both characters, that stacks with the duplicator accessory and the passive, so you can get... +6 projectiles total, I think? Which is completely sick for almost any weapon or build.) Skelly also has a unique weapon that kicks ass, but unfortunately not as much ass as the evolved weapons.
Other good characters are the -cooldown and +area guy (though for both of them, especially area, you want to be a bit pickier and grab things that really benefit from +area). The priest that starts with the Bible is good but you might need the passive speed boost maxed out before doing hyper with him.
As far as passives go, I originally would have said the
duplicator (+1 projectile) was the #1 most important. Eh, it probably still is,
but, I did some experiments with respeccing and limited passive builds a bit ago. I kept all my passives on except for the top row -
Armor, regen, max health, and maybe
damage. I was surprised to find out that this turned out to be a much more significant difficulty increase than I expected, in that I couldn't clear hyper runs as reliably or consistently at that point. I didn't do the opposite spec yet (only the top row but none of the extras, so lots of dps and effect buffs) for comparison, but, I find an investment in regen/armor/health passives to be a much bigger boost than I think conventional wisdom would let on.
Also, respeccing is free, so keep this in mind - buy the most expensive upgrades you're going to buy first, then go down toward cheaper ones. Someone has done the work to find the ideal order, but rule of thumb is expensive -> cheaper. Since the price goes up with each one you buy, this significantly affects your overall prices and lets you afford more passive upgrades than if you just clicked around to get whatever at the moment.
Along that vein, though the damage drops way down later on, garlic is a good survival tool weapon because of the knockback effects and the fact that you take health regen to evolve it. Whip actually is too, because of the max health and the life-absorb healing. Bible is another that's particularly good at keeping dudes off of you, especially from the early-mid game to the end.
