In this here guide I will attempt to cover everything in the order it comes up in the game, give a general opinion, and leave situational uses to be mentioned in said situation's sections, and interactions explained in the section of whatever component is unlocked last.

I'll try to get the proper name on everything to show up somewhere in it's section so you can reliably Ctrl+F stuff. If that fails (on a non-WIP section), please let me know.

I have no clue when it'll be finished/updated/made to smell nicer, but am actively working on it as of 22 of March. (This is honestly only published right now so i feel obligated to work on it) it currently covers game version 1.1

I will refer to a major pickle a few times, what i mean by that is any situation where you need something for the run to continue, such as getting to a boss without damage, reaching phase infinity Dynamo without HP recovery, taking Chonko into Wasteland, picking Explosives...

Buckle up folks, this is gonna be a heavily biased ride (but hey, it's a bias towards speed)

When valuing a card, think RAM. Bear with me here, I'm (mostly) serious:

(R)emoving damage, via poofing an enemy, is always your first option. This nets you XP and prevents that same enemy from bothering you and yours ever again.

(A)voiding it, by moving yourself or the enemy, is also pretty good, as it generally consumes no resources, but eventually...

(M)itigating damage will allow your run to continue when all else fails. Be it a short distraction, a zoomy projectile, or just enemy health and speed scaling too far, you'll eventually take damage, and if you can't tank it, you's ded, friend.

So when i say a defensive option is really damn good, don't dismiss it out of hand. Yes, it's technically possible to just Avoid everything at first, and for a long while you have enough damage to Remove everything as well, but all runs reach a point where those start leaking damage, and surviving the odd leak can add another few minutes to your run (or allow it to work at all, in the case of Dynamo).

General Concepts: Most cards are multiplicative with themselves and other effects, which in practice means, for example, each of Infliction's 15% increases to damage is worth as much as the last, in this case relative to your killing speed before picking it.

Cards are listed beside the number of times they can be picked, in what is mostly the order you unlock them.

XP Gain (5): Increases XP gain by 15%. Always pick this if you're not in a major pickle.


Besides a few situations i'll outline in the Strategy section, this pays for itself quickly and is always worth it. (Currently also makes you unlock things faster)

Overclock (5): Reduces weapon cooldowns by 15%. One of the best general purpose offensive options.

This, in practice, makes you shoot ~18% faster, which is already a better DPS increase than Infliction and Crit, but increasing your volume of fire also makes your knockback and stuns more reliable, leads to less overkill and increased area coverage (Read: hit more, aim less).

Infliction (5): Increases weapon damage by 15%. Always good, rarely the best.
Infuction

More ouch, less enemy. Simplest offensive upgrade you'll get. Good when you're not offered something more versatile (or you want to add damage to your shiny Scythe), bad when you already overkill everything, like with early game Ranger.

Splitshot (3): Increases splitshot by 2, increases weapon cooldown (by 20%). Situational, but great crowd control. Don't pick it if you're shooting too slow for comfort.

By virtue of having our first additive effect, this card is actually less effective the more you pick it. It works by shooting two randomly aimed, mostly normal shots from wherever your main bullet stopped (inheriting its damage, knockback, stun and pierce, but only half the lifetime (range) and critting independently), while the cooldown increase results in a ~17% firerate reduction.

Neon Scythe (5): Gives you an orbiting scythe that deals 2 damage. Don't pick this without some forethought.

The scythe stuns and applies knockback, can crit, and damages every enemy it touches once per pass. It does not, however, swing around fast enough to do any of that reliably. Don't depend on it. Scythe will not stop projectiles and can hit shielded enemies (including the shielder itself)

Shurikens (5): Fires (every 0.5s, in random directions) piercing shurikens that deal 3 base damage. Good if you're being surrounded, incredibly unreliable otherwise.

Is helped greatly by cooldown reduction (Overclock) and Projectile Size, which make it into good, cheap DPS, but the unreliability persists. The damage looks piddly but its first upgrade already gets that up to 8.

Torpedo (5): Fires (every 1.5s, and, again, randomly) homing, exploding torpedoes that deal 25 (!!!) damage. Shurikens but good.

Yellow, shiny, precious. These, a lot like shurikens, are made far more effective with Overclock, but unlike those, Torpedo really shines with added pierce. Maxing the card out gives it innate pierce, a bunch of base damage, and a large base cooldown reduction. In other words, this scales very well with itself. Pick it, hoard it, cherish it.

Currently (in 1.1, unless it was hotfixed after i wrote this), this is probably the best card in the game.

Safeguard (5): Increases max HP by 5. Pick to avoid getting one-hit-killed if you have some way to regain lost HP.

Being additive, this has more effect on survivability if you had a lower max HP before picking it. In practice, this (and the module with the same name) allows the flimsiest ship, which starts at 15HP, to be almost as burst-resistant as the sturdiest, starting at 50.

Bullet Spread (3): Increases bullet spread by 25%. Very simple, very niche.


Very little to say about this. Spreads your damage around a wider arc, good if it's currently not wide enough, very bad if you don't have enough firerate and multishot.

Crit Chance (5): Adds 0.1 (out of 1) to your critical hit chance. Infliction but worse.


Crit chance starts at 0.1, and this is additive, leading to a max of 0.6, or 60% chance of doubling (any) damage. Meaning? The first card is a 9.1% damage increase, the last is 6.7%, and this damage is more unreliable and prone to overkill than any other modifier. The only selling point here is that it does affect all damage, with no exceptions that I know of.

Multishot (3): Increases multishot (projectiles per shot) by 1, reduces damage by 15%. Almost always pick.

This is the torpedo of main weapon upgrades. First one is a 70% DPS increase (for most ships), the second is 27.5%, and the third ~13.3%. Increasing your projectile count also works to increase your knockback output, the consistency at which you output damage and other effects, and how reliably you hit anything within your firing arc. Really spicy, this one.

Explosives (1): Adds smol boom to shots, increases cooldown by 50%. I despise this.
I'm sorry Megumin

Shots explode when they stop (be it for running out of pierce or lifetime). This seems to make knockback a lot stronger, which when combined with Splitshot sometimes works to get enemies pushed into you from the sides, this is especially bad with low range and pierce. Explosions can damage enemies (and other shields) that are under a shield. Splitshot projectiles don't explode. Nukes your DPS (33% reduction), adds visual and sound pollution, gets you killed, looks at you funny... I have a very personal dislike of this, maybe try it for yourself, I guess.

Healing Totem (3): Creates a moving healing totem (~0.5hp/s).


The totem heals you if you stay in an area around it, follows you if you move too far, and otherwise moves around randomly. It's pretty slow and can be pushed around (by you and enemies).

Regen (5): Regenerates 0.1HP/s. Pick if your health is being chipped down.


This card has, in my humblest of opinions, a very pretty color. Not useful if you're not already a bit sturdy. That's all I have for this one, really.

Brawler (5): Reduces all incoming damage by 25%, and your own speed by 5%. Best defensive option.

This one is the major pickle special. Regen not keeping up with damage? Brawler. Enemies getting too close for comfort to you squishy face? Brawler. The card gives you an effective ~33% (1/3) increase in max HP and healing each time you pick it, up to a ~320% increase in raw survivability for a measly 22% reduction in speed (which is very nearly nullified by the speed module).

Piercing (5): Increases your pierce value by 1. Best AoE solution by a long shot.


Applies to most (all?) projectiles, each point of pierce means you skewer one more target before stopping (or exploding, if it's supposed to explode). Particularly good for making splitshot happen in the middle of groups (instead of at the front, where most of it goes to waste), and in late runs in general, as at that point you're almost always using most of your pierce, whatever it may be.

Stun (5): Increases stun length by 0.2s. Pretty good?


All enemies can be stunned. After a stun runs out, that enemy cannot be stunned for 0.5s. Most damage can stun (Scythes, Shurikens, Torpedoes...). If you have explosions, this makes them sound (and look) stun-y. bzzt.

Impact (3): Increases knockback by 10%. Self-explanatory.


Moves the masses, parts the seas, adds random fluff to your guide to make reading about the knockback upgrade entertaining, maybe. Keep in mind some enemies are immune to knockback and this doesn't help with them.

Projectile Size (3): Increases all bullet sizes by 25%. Pick it if you invested heavily into additional weapons, except scythes. (shuriken, torpedo, etc.)

Again, very simple. Works on bullets, but not on Splitshot projectiles. Might be bugged on Chonko's main projectiles (1.1.1).

Atomic Daggers (5): Fires daggers in the direction you're moving (or right, if you're not) for 10 damage. Good for moving straight.

These come with a bunch of innate pierce. The upgrades don't change much. As most runs eventually devolve into moving straight, these can help a lot later on, especially when some knockback-immune enemies start being too tanky to kill before you run into them.

Inverse Physics (1): Makes explosions pull enemies, instead of pushing. Might make Explosives safe to use?

Honestly, i haven't tried. It might fix all of Explosives' faults, might beam enemies straight into your face. I wouldn't know, and don't plan on finding out. Leave a comment if you do, i guess.

That thing about shoving enemies into your face? Yeah, this does that. I really don't like it.

Eagle Eyes (1): Increases sight range by... 1/9th? (base value is 45, so normally +5). I like to pick this just to get it out of the pool.

Very good quality of life upgrade, increases space between you and the edges (namely the bottom/top) of the screen, reducing the frequency and severity of "oh so that's in my face now" moments.

Barricade (1): A small wall that follows you around and blocks enemies (and their projectiles). Probably good for more stationary strategies (not my thing).

Slowly moves after you, but not too close. Doesn't block your own projectiles. Is orange-ish. Doesn't actively hinder you in any way that i know of so it's... better than skipping a draw?

General Concepts: These cards do their thing when you press the right mouse button (or whatever you remap it to) and aren't affected by passive cards. Picking an active card when you already have one picks it replacing the one you had, then rerolls the card and lets you pick again. (this does not preserve upgrades on the lost secondary.)

Cards are listed beside the number of times they can be picked (with the first time giving the ability itself and any later picks upgrading it), in the order you unlock them.

Burst Mines (4): Leave a mine that stays put until it touches an enemy, exploding for 15 damage. 1s Cooldown.

Applies knockback. Lasts very long (forever?) if left alone. AoE is quite large.

Pulse (3): Pushes away enemies (strength proportional to how close they are?). 2s Cooldown.

Does nothing to knockback-immune enemies.

Teleport (4): Instantly teleports you to cursor location. 3s Cooldown. My favorite base secondary by far.

Essentially scales with view range. The visual effect doesn't care if you have particles disabled. This can instantly vanish away most major pickles. Because of the free redraw when swapping secondaries, i recommend always picking this if you don't already have another you prefer (and maybe if XP Gain is an option).

EMP Mines (4): Leave a mine that stuns enemies around it for 2s when touched. 2s Cooldown.

AoE is, again, quite large, and it lasts very long if left alone. Generally better than Blast Mine, as that does nothing defensively against knockback-immune enemies (also this one is blue).

General Concepts: A synergy activates whenever you max out the two involved cards, then break a red crystal. Activating a synergy you unlocked that same run might require leveling up between maxing the cards and breaking the crystal.

Dual Reaper: Multishot (3) + Neon Scythe (5). Takes your scythe, makes it two, and bumps the base damage up to 60.

Very good by itself, generally easy to get as you'll probably end up with Multishot anyway. Having two scythes helps a lot with guaranteeing hits on incoming targets. Still does absolutely nothing if no enemies get in range, feeling more like Mitigation than Removal/Avoidance. Never truly bad, but often an unnecessary delay on more important upgrades.

XP Healing: XP Gain (5) + Regen (5). Heals you (slightly) with every XP orb.


Not sure on the values on this one. Doesn't matter, really, it's still the best sustain you're getting. The tiny healing adds up very fast with the amount of XP that drops. Siphon module but nutty and without spending a module slot.

Blast Shurikens: Shurikens (5) + Explosives (1). Makes shurikens green and explody, shooting every 0.2s for 100 damage.

Game's apology for letting you pick Explosives. This is a lot of damage even if you can't aim it. I'm currently unsure if Explosives has an effect on additional weapon cooldowns, but i think it does, so these aren't quite as good as they look (unless you were picking Explosives anyway, you monster).

Energy Bullets: Pierce (5) + Stun (5). Turns your main projectiles into... chaining projectiles, disguised as lightning.

When piercing an enemy, this makes it so that the shot turns to another nearby enemy (otherwise hitting the same enemy repeatedly, last i checked). Limited by projectile pierce and lifetime. Maximizes damage and knockback on the front of the group you're shooting (via piercing laterally, and making splitshot pop clooser to you, if you have that). Effectively adds a lot of knockback. Turns into weird dust projectiles (that still chain) if you have Projectile Size.

Powershots: Impact (3) + Projectile Size (3). Doubles all ship damage.


A very simple 100% increase to damage, this is only slightly (17%) less effective, per card, than Infliction at increasing your damage, but with knockback and proj. size on top.

Multi Missiles: Torpedo (5) + Splitshot (3). Replaces your torpedoes with a missile that fires those instead.

Missile is fired once per second with infinite (actually just 100) pierce and 150 damage. The torpedoes it fires aren't affected by projectile size. Increases you killing power by a lot, but makes it less centered on your position, and thus less effective at preventing catastrophic mission failure (death, that means death here).

This is currently (1.1) very bad, simply because Torpedo is slightly ridiculous right now, and this takes it away from you.

Warrior: Brawler (5) + Safeguard (5). Makes you immune to enemy damage while dashing.


Takes a very tanky build and gives it a NOPE button. Very good at avoiding damage from leaks in longer runs. Won't save you from Gyro or the small map borders, I tried.

Earthquake: Infliction (5) + Pulse (3). Upgraded pulse with damage on top.


This is just pulse with far more range, a 1s cooldown and 15 damage to everything affected. comparable to teleport in raw usefulness. Maybe.

Dual Harvester (T2): Dual Reaper + XP Healing. Dual Reaper but green (and better). Has healing (which is completely overshadowed by XP Healing)

Increases base damage to 80 (from 60) and knockback by 50%, might also spin faster and be bigger, too. Grants a piddly heal when hitting (killing?) enemies with the scythes.

Laser Shots (T2): WIP

Projectile Drone (T2): WIP

Champion (T2): WIP

Formatting: Keeping with the RAM concept previously introduced, entries will be made as "[DPS / Speed / HP] Ship Name", with the best ship at any given thing marked with a "!", and more unique stats being talked about below.

[7.5 / 20 / 25] Duster: WIP

[10 / 40! / 15] Speedster: WIP
Purple Boi

[20 / 20 / 50!] Chonko: WIP

[15!*/ 25 / 20] Ranger: WIP

[10* / 30 / 20] Blaster: WIP

Abyss: WIP

Fear Factory: WIP

Bomber Blitz: WIP

Dynamo: WIP but i have another guide on it.

Wasteland: WIP

Noctorum: WIP but i have another guide on it.

WIP

Provisionally, avoid dying, as it seems to be a common cause for losing a run. Funny that, eh?

Q: What Modules should i get first?

A: IMO just pick whatever looks shiny, it doesn't matter much as long as you get Mobility, Regen and Piercing, after you get going it only takes a few long-ish runs to get everything up to snuff.

Q: Why is my game lagging/stuttering?

A: Probably because there's a boatload of XP orbs on-screen, which can be fixed by turning on "combine xp" in settings. If that doesn't work, i suggest you ask on the game's Discord server (linked in-game).

Q: Why does the game make my fans loud/my computer hot?

A: The game does not, by default, limit your framerate, which can lead to using lots of resources on frames you're not even seeing. This can be fixed by changing "framerate" in settings to anything but Uncapped. (This, as of 1.1.1, visually reverts every time you open the settings, but whatever you picked is still in effect until you manually change it)

Q: Why is this thing so damn ugly bro?

A: I HAVE BUILT IT IN MY LIKENESS, SO AS TO IMMORTALIZE MYSELF IN THE COLLECTIVE SUBCONSCIOUS OF HUMANITY. Alternatively, I either haven't had the time or didn't care to fix or learn to fix whatever's bugging you. All images, for example, are placeholders.

Q: To whomst'ses persons should i give thanks for this beautiful guide?

A: This would not have been possible without the folks at the game's Discord[discord.com], and the Dev of this shiny, shiny game, which also happens to be at said Discord. Click the link already, you know you want to.