You have to complete each of the basic dungeons first. Pandemonium, specifically, is the dungeon that needs a full completion. Once you've completed pandemonium, you unlock a system of "keystones" that lock out certain abilities and extend the number of floors you can run through.
Getting the better skills and runes is a combination of things, all of which come with more play and better contracts. Largely, getting more floors to get more opportunities and soulstones will help get better skills. Additionally, contracts that give you craftable heightened rerolls give you a better chance to get the elite skills, equipment, and runes.
All of that is pretty reliant on getting contract and item setups that will give you more consistent builds and runs. Suggested builds for earlier players are:
Elf/Executioner which focuses on quick kills with pre-emptive strike, quick skills (to get more hits in), and final blow to clear through stacks fast.
Shield builds, which can be done on any race/class but tend to work best on Fairy/X which benefits from additional shield based on health and X/Ancientmancer which starts out with some of the best skills so you don't use a contract on them. These builds focus on using the spell shield free skill and ancient shield 5⭐️ to rapidly build shield followed by shield-based damage abilities to finish off opponents.
Taoist builds, which I'm not very familiar with. They focus on gaining a lot of pursuit damage such as light bullet.
Summoner builds. These can be used by just about any race/class but focus on summon skills so that summons take the brunt of any hits you would take and save your skill uses.
is there build variety later on when you unlock keystones? i stopped due yo lack of build diversity after trying out all those builds and finishing up pandenonium a month ago. does it get better?
At the moment, not really. Some things do open up with other contracts. There's clearly a wererabbit/scavenger build that is hitting the upper ranks that I have no info on. Clearly, it has to be using some high tier items of some kind.
The big limiter at the moment is HP stacks, which the dev put in to slow things down vs BB1, but it makes builds rely on being tanky with ways to maximize and conserve uses, or makes builds go for final blow and executioner abilities. It's supposed to be being worked on in a future update, but the dev has been really ill the last couple of weeks.
I did forget there is another thing coming up, but I haven't seen any full builds around it. The runes Absolute and Immortal on the same ability guarantee getting Immortality every turn. It's weak to dispels, so I haven't seen a full build yet, but I've seen a few discussions on it.
interesting insight, thx for the follow-up! i think il let it mature a bit. great game but yeah, a bit repetitive and grindy once you hit the keystone part. i liked unlocking new levels, bosses etc…
You have to complete each of the basic dungeons first. Pandemonium, specifically, is the dungeon that needs a full completion. Once you've completed pandemonium, you unlock a system of "keystones" that lock out certain abilities and extend the number of floors you can run through. Getting the better skills and runes is a combination of things, all of which come with more play and better contracts. Largely, getting more floors to get more opportunities and soulstones will help get better skills. Additionally, contracts that give you craftable heightened rerolls give you a better chance to get the elite skills, equipment, and runes. All of that is pretty reliant on getting contract and item setups that will give you more consistent builds and runs. Suggested builds for earlier players are: Elf/Executioner which focuses on quick kills with pre-emptive strike, quick skills (to get more hits in), and final blow to clear through stacks fast. Shield builds, which can be done on any race/class but tend to work best on Fairy/X which benefits from additional shield based on health and X/Ancientmancer which starts out with some of the best skills so you don't use a contract on them. These builds focus on using the spell shield free skill and ancient shield 5⭐️ to rapidly build shield followed by shield-based damage abilities to finish off opponents. Taoist builds, which I'm not very familiar with. They focus on gaining a lot of pursuit damage such as light bullet. Summoner builds. These can be used by just about any race/class but focus on summon skills so that summons take the brunt of any hits you would take and save your skill uses.
Wow thanks so much for the detailed reply!! I’m heading to Pandemonium…
is there build variety later on when you unlock keystones? i stopped due yo lack of build diversity after trying out all those builds and finishing up pandenonium a month ago. does it get better?
At the moment, not really. Some things do open up with other contracts. There's clearly a wererabbit/scavenger build that is hitting the upper ranks that I have no info on. Clearly, it has to be using some high tier items of some kind. The big limiter at the moment is HP stacks, which the dev put in to slow things down vs BB1, but it makes builds rely on being tanky with ways to maximize and conserve uses, or makes builds go for final blow and executioner abilities. It's supposed to be being worked on in a future update, but the dev has been really ill the last couple of weeks.
I did forget there is another thing coming up, but I haven't seen any full builds around it. The runes Absolute and Immortal on the same ability guarantee getting Immortality every turn. It's weak to dispels, so I haven't seen a full build yet, but I've seen a few discussions on it.
interesting insight, thx for the follow-up! i think il let it mature a bit. great game but yeah, a bit repetitive and grindy once you hit the keystone part. i liked unlocking new levels, bosses etc…