1. Experiment with skills. That is try them all and see which ones fit your playstyle.
With maxed-out permanent profile upgrades I usually run with bought (example for a wave 50 build):
- 1-2x run speed
- 1-2x regen
- crit chance + crit dmg in ratio 2:3 so like 6x and 9x
- at least 6x shop discount
- as much explosion (50% chance for enemies to explode on death) as possible so like 6-8x depending on luck. Skill gives double explosion at rank 5x
- similar with electricity skill that triggers when enemies are hit so like 8x
- same with +%bonus dmg for killed enemies (that purple bottle)
- no armor or +%bonus dmg for lost health. You don't want to get hit and almost never will be for 98% of the time
- a lot of bouncing lines, like 10x
- a lot of +attack speed (or skill trigger speed? That hourglass icon) so like 7-8x
- a bit of pickup range. 2-3x is a good spot. Again- with maxed out passive skill for that
- a lot of magic missiles so 6-8x. At lvl 5x they fragment after hitting enemies.
- like 1-2x of honey jar for crowd control.

2. Same with heroes. Some of them have attacks (weapons) that can be bought in the game, like flail or boomerang, but some are exclusive. Thor ATM is the best, after him Mage is my fav.
3. When it comes to unlocks - you can pretty much buy 1-2 upgrades after every run, unless you're really bad at the game. Anything you buy will help you so the order doesn't matter. Crit chance, speed, shop discount- they all help you push further and further.

Personally I think you should leave that +2.5% interest passive and reroll cost reduction for the last purchases. I never use rerolls, nor players can just not spend money for any longer period of time.

4. Gold management- not a lot to it. Skills of speed and pickup range are important for its collection on map. Always buy as much as you can but not at random. Just things that fit your build. Not sure about any perks rarity system. Some seem to appear for the purchase less frequently, but I would have to record like 100 games and analyze them to be sure.
Don't reroll if you don't want to buy anything or have a lot of gold left- just save for the next wave.
With every wave shop slots get cheaper. Initially buy 2, maybe 3 of them. No real reason to have more at the same time for a long time IMHO.

5. Offence is the best defense.

Originally posted by .:Jj:.:

1. Experiment with skills. That is try them all and see which ones fit your playstyle.
With maxed-out permanent profile upgrades I usually run with bought (example for a wave 50 build):
- 1-2x run speed
- 1-2x regen
- crit chance + crit dmg in ratio 2:3 so like 6x and 9x
- at least 6x shop discount
- as much explosion (50% chance for enemies to explode on death) as possible so like 6-8x depending on luck. Skill gives double explosion at rank 5x
- similar with electricity skill that triggers when enemies are hit so like 8x
- same with +%bonus dmg for killed enemies (that purple bottle)
- no armor or +%bonus dmg for lost health. You don't want to get hit and almost never will be for 98% of the time
- a lot of bouncing lines, like 10x
- a lot of +attack speed (or skill trigger speed? That hourglass icon) so like 7-8x
- a bit of pickup range. 2-3x is a good spot. Again- with maxed out passive skill for that
- a lot of magic missiles so 6-8x. At lvl 5x they fragment after hitting enemies.
- like 1-2x of honey jar for crowd control.

2. Same with heroes. Some of them have attacks (weapons) that can be bought in the game, like flail or boomerang, but some are exclusive. Thor ATM is the best, after him Mage is my fav.
3. When it comes to unlocks - you can pretty much buy 1-2 upgrades after every run, unless you're really bad at the game. Anything you buy will help you so the order doesn't matter. Crit chance, speed, shop discount- they all help you push further and further.

Personally I think you should leave that +2.5% interest passive and reroll cost reduction for the last purchases. I never use rerolls, nor players can just not spend money for any longer period of time.

4. Gold management- not a lot to it. Skills of speed and pickup range are important for its collection on map. Always buy as much as you can but not at random. Just things that fit your build. Not sure about any perks rarity system. Some seem to appear for the purchase less frequently, but I would have to record like 100 games and analyze them to be sure.
Don't reroll if you don't want to buy anything or have a lot of gold left- just save for the next wave.
With every wave shop slots get cheaper. Initially buy 2, maybe 3 of them. No real reason to have more at the same time for a long time IMHO.

5. Offence is the best defense.

Thank u for your extended tips !
I progressed in achievements and i'm now looking at those kill " 20 enemies with one projectile " ( should be doable easily with fray in late game ) and more tricky the 2 stand still ones.

I did a couple tries with full tank talents + idle at center builds but I get wrecked by the big monsters even with lucky shop rng .
Do you have to stay at center until level 9 and 19 or just at those stages ? Because even if I reach level 9 I dont see how I could survive the boss without moving.

edit : After posting the comment I'm thinking it could be doable with a full crit thor + boomerang + all the tank and shop soul perks maxed. I dunno I'll try later.

Great little game anyway, with a bit more content and balancing everything is here to make a game with a lot of depth and a solid gameplay.
I read some comments saying it sucks because the content ends at lvl 30 and the current meta encourages idle builds, it's not wrong but breh it released 2 weeks ago

I never made to some crazy waves like 80 or 100 so I can't say how good defense skills are later on, but very quickly I started to completely ignore most of them.

Initially (when you're grinding crystals to buy more HP and passive HP regen) it's ok to pick up a few health expansions or invest more gold in said regen when you're learning enemy patterns etc; but in the long run it's just a dead end.
It's much better to invest in crits, indirect aoe (like bouncing lines) and be nimble on the battlefield, than invest in tanking because that's just not the optimal way. Goal of the game is killing everything before it gets to you, not tanking like in an MMO game.

When it comes to these harder achievements- don't worry about them until you really invest a lot crystals into passive upgrades. Surviving a wave without moving applies to that specific wave, unless something has changed.
Crit chance and damage, health pool and regen are an absolute must.

About negative reviews- game is free, and nobody promised it will have meta around level 500.
Dev(s?) are working on new characters, I'm sure more skills and weapons will be introduced. And it's not weird or badly balanced that ranged and even indirect attacks are the best.
Physical weapons like spears or flail greatly limit area of damage and put a great pressure on the player and make combat very dangerous because player can't keep enough of distance from enemies and some of them are designed to punish that, like rats or bats that are very fast and attack in large numbers.

It's the same in most games whether classic RPGs or some h'n's games. There is no point in having 'starter magic missiles' or 'bad lightning attacks'. These physical weapons act like learning tools and a starting point.

Game is designed in such a way that later on entire screen is filled with enemies and by nature the most effective way to deal with it is to deal as much damage on the biggest area as fast as possible.
Of course random explosions, lightning strikes and bouncing piercing lines have a massive advantage over limited physical, close combat alternatives.

it's drinking tea

shuriken lvl 5, veil lvl 1, lightening lvl 1, blue orbs I had lvl 18, crit rate lvl 9, crit dmg lvl 24, lvl 1 boomerang, dmg on missing health lvl 5, dmg increase lvl 5, discount lvl 8, explosion lvl 5, cd reduction lvl 8, health increase lvl 12 or w/e u feel like. Hero - thor - this is the best build you can afk up until wave 70 literally. You can push further, but it's just boring. With this build you stand in the middle and collect gold. have fun *lvl 9 blue orbs, and then only spending gold on crit dmg, and health, might get you further, I didn't test it.

Originally posted by Jegen:

shuriken lvl 5, veil lvl 1, lightening lvl 1, blue orbs I had lvl 18, crit rate lvl 9, crit dmg lvl 24, lvl 1 boomerang, dmg on missing health lvl 5, dmg increase lvl 5, discount lvl 8, explosion lvl 5, cd reduction lvl 8, health increase lvl 12 or w/e u feel like. Hero - thor - this is the best build you can afk up until wave 70 literally. You can push further, but it's just boring. With this build you stand in the middle and collect gold. have fun *lvl 9 blue orbs, and then only spending gold on crit dmg, and health, might get you further, I didn't test it.

Yeah theres a couple autowin builds, at this point killing monsters isn't the problem it's more like grabbing their loot before the timer ends.
Btw the stand still achievement is just for the said stage indeed, it's too bad because I tried stand still runs from the start and it was a nice change from the nobrain gameplay, my best attempt was a couple seconds away from lvl 9 with a careful use of reroll shop .