Danger in the Deep advice

[Worblehat]

Against my better judgement (because I hate the speedrun mentality in general, and it's a particularly poor fit to this game) I'm attempting Danger in the Deep. I just discovered that my usual policy of having plenty of food and life potions is useless after encountering Putrid Ghosts. I can either wait off the debuff, which costs time I really don't have, or I can risk continuing and try to drop staircases without getting hit (and if that had worked, I wouldn't be posting this). Or, according to the wiki, I can carry ginger with me because apparently the nauseated debuff still allows one to eat ginger or drink ginger ale. Talk about a non-obvious mechanic...

A few questions come to mind:

1. Is Danger in the Deep (or Skull Cavern Invasion, which is basically the same thing) the only way to acquire radioactive ore? Shipping completionism is really the only reason I'm doing this. The only things I need are the radioactive ore and bar. If there's a way to get them that doesn't involve speedruns in the mines or SC, I'd be very interested. I don't see any indication of such an option on the wiki, though.
2. Is the best approach to getting this done on time to just forget about resource efficiency and blindly drop staircases immediately on starting each level? I've been treating this like SC, using my spiced eel and espresso to run around bombing rock clusters looking for staircases, only using my own staircases if there aren't any reasonable bombing targets. And the pace so far isn't really up to the level I'd need to get to 120 in a week... I do have enough staircases to do it that way, but that would set me back on being able to reach SC level 100 by another year or so (maybe less, now that I can start crafting crystalariums - but still a significant chunk of time).
3. Are there any other "surprise, you're screwed now!" monsters I should be aware of? Any other "here's a non-obvious way to un-screw yourself" remedies for them like the ginger/ginger ale?

 

[Ereo]

I like the mines and I didn't have much problems with the danger in the deep quest, although I also didn't get the part about ginger. My strategy was too carry enough staircases to get to the next elevator, then wait out the nauseousness.

If you have trouble, I would use staircases all the way. Once you have done it, you can switch the mines on and off at will which makes it much easier to get the radioactive ore... Yes, dangerous mines/skull cavern are the only way to get this.

 

[imnvs]

Re: Putrid Ghosts

Bring ginger to munch on or ginger ale to drink. It will remove the debuff that prevents eating.

 

[Elenna101]

As imvns said, you can not only eat ginger but also it cures the nauseated debuff, so that makes putrid ghosts a non-issue. It's hinted at in the ginger ale description, and Birdie (the pirate's wife on the island) also tells you, but yeah it's not super obvious. (I found out because I read the whole changelog and remembered the addition of the nauseated debuff because it sounded interesting, and then I kept talking to Birdie because I thought she was more important than she actually was, so I made the connection when I saw that hint.)

1. Yes, those quests are the only way to get radioactive ore. That being said, if you really can't or don't want to complete them, you can try getting Skull Cavern Invasion and just resetting floor 1 over and over on a good luck day for radioactive ore, instead of trying to complete the quest.
The disadvantage is that you won't get the Shrine of Challenge open, so you won't be able to get radioactive ore when you don't have the quest, but that should be fine if you only want enough for shipping completion. (Be warned that you also need a few bars/ore for crafting everything, if that's something you want to do.)

2. I can consistently complete that quest by just using +2 move speed and the swift pickaxe, only using a few bombs that I got from enemies and a few stairs from rock that I got while doing the quest. So you definitely don't need staircases. It's also definitely the easiest option. Maybe try spending less time killing enemies, if you're doing that? Hard to say exactly what the issue is without watching you, but it's definitely possible without many stairs, yes.

3. Not really, no. There's a debuff that makes things dark, which is annoying, but there's no way to get rid of it and it only lasts a few seconds. FWIW I find the putrid ghost/spider levels significantly more annoying than the lava levels, even if I need more food in the lava levels.

 

[Salty1]

As an aside, you stop running into Putrid Ghosts around like floor 90 or so, possibly earlier. Nothing else is nearly as bad (there is one new aff in the lowest floors that darkens the screen considerably, but it's way more manageable imo)

I'd also recommend juking the ghosts by moving in a crescent arc around them as they "UURP" and approach. Even if you can't reliably hit them that should help ensure they miss.

 

[Worblehat]

Thanks everyone!

I can consistently complete that quest by just using +2 move speed and the swift pickaxe, only using a few bombs that I got from enemies and a few stairs from rock that I got while doing the quest. So you definitely don't need staircases. It's also definitely the easiest option. Maybe try spending less time killing enemies, if you're doing that? Hard to say exactly what the issue is without watching you, but it's definitely possible without many stairs, yes.

Following up a bit on this - so Swift is the most desirable enchantment for pickaxes? I wasn't sure if it was better than Powerful, since I don't know how much effect Powerful has (does it allow you to one-hit the rocks in the Volcano? grumblegrumble freakin' mummified bat grumble... ). I'll need another shard to get that; so far I've only had shards to get Crusader on the sword and Master on the fishing rod.

Getting side-tracked fighting probably is costing me time. It's hard to ignore monsters that are up in my face, and they often drop staircases themselves. Maybe I just need to be more selective, only kill the plentiful, easily killed ones like those pink mushrooms that replace dust sprites, and I should try to ignore the slow easily knocked-back flyers like the ghosts and those squid things, rather than waiting for them to bob back to me from inside the walls.

Re: crafting completionism - I'm on the fence. Have to see if the Master fishing rod plus fishing buffs from food lets me actually catch legendary fish (I did finally catch a Lava Eel; just the scorpion carp and the legendaries left). My working assumption is "no", in which case I don't really care about crafting completionism since I won't hit Perfection anyway. If the "we're going to need a bigger bar" fishing strategy succeeds, going for the crafting becomes a "maybe".

 

[Elenna101]

I prefer Swift over Powerful, since a powerful iridium pick can already one-hit the Skull Caverns rocks, but I think Powerful does let you one-hit the volcano rocks. I just don't break rocks in the volcano much after getting the mummified bat (which was not as bad since I'm on PC). YMMV

Yeah, killing the easy-to-kill enemies to try to get stairs is a good idea, I meant more don't waste time if they take a long time (the ghosts are especially prone to taking a long time).

This is possibly an obvious question, but you didn't mention any bobbers when you were talking about fishing, are you using those on the hard fish? I like trap bobbers for the hardest fish since they jump around so much that they're outside your bar a lot. Some people also like cork bobbers.

 

[Worblehat]

I'm on PC too. I gather the bat is even less likely to drop on ... whatever platforms have 1.5 but aren't PCs? (I've never really paid any attention to non-PC platforms, all I know is that mobile doesn't have 1.5 yet...)

Yes, I fish with all equipment stacked in my favor, iridium rod with cork bobber. Sometimes trap bobber, but I've come to favor the plan of making the bar as big as possible. I'm just not very good at fishing.

Decent progress in the mines this time, at level 70 with three days to go. Cost a fair few staircases, but I've been meaning to start making crystalariums anyway. Some weird drops in there - I have no idea why a monster was carrying a blueberry tart!

 

[Zen_the_Ogre]

Just staircase down. You can farm the level 40-70 for plenty of jade or make some crystalizes and trade it in on a Sunday. It's easier than your making it out to be.

 

[lilan castel]

Ginger ginger ginger. And go down at least 20 floors a day

 

[Elenna101]

I'm on PC too. I gather the bat is even less likely to drop on ... whatever platforms have 1.5 but aren't PCs? (I've never really paid any attention to non-PC platforms, all I know is that mobile doesn't have 1.5 yet...)

It's just the Switch, which has a bug which makes the mummified bat super rare (as in "break rocks every day for a year" rare, from what I've heard).
On PC it's a 1/200 chance, so on average it should only take maybe a few days worth of bombing a bunch of rocks. (I say this, but I had to break probably around 1000 rocks to find one on my main file. Sometimes you just get unlucky.)

 

[DesertBoots]

Is the best approach to getting this done on time to just forget about resource efficiency and blindly drop staircases immediately on starting each level? I've been treating this like SC, using my spiced eel and espresso to run around bombing rock clusters looking for staircases, only using my own staircases if there aren't any reasonable bombing targets. And the pace so far isn't really up to the level I'd need to get to 120 in a week... I do have enough staircases to do it that way, but that would set me back on being able to reach SC level 100 by another year or so (maybe less, now that I can start crafting crystalariums - but still a significant chunk of time).

1. Are there any other "surprise, you're screwed now!" monsters I should be aware of? Any other "here's a non-obvious way to un-screw yourself" remedies for them like the ginger/ginger ale?

yes the best way to complete this (I hate speedruns too) is the staircase hack and yes ginger ale is a good carry.
I usually make it to 40 and start the stair cases.