Alloyed Collective is an unexpected Masterpiece…
DLC 3 has been out for about a week, and I know it’s early, but I think this is currently the best expansion the game has ever seen, which I never thought I would say in a post Tofu era, especially after the disaster that was last year. Less said about that, the better. What the [ __ ] Oh my god, what? But Gearbox really knocked it out of the park with this one. I was especially impressed by the day one experience. I legitimately think this might be the first content update since early access that fixed more bugs than it created. Even Survivors of the Void had issues on day one. Not as many as DLC 2, mind you, but I think it did take a few patches for DLC 1 to get to the level of polish we saw on day one with Alloid Collective. There have been a few very minor bugs, but I still think this is about as good as it gets for a DLC launch, at least from the perspective of a PC player. Now, on the content side of things, I do have some criticism. There are some pretty major design decisions that I am not in love with, but I will talk about that after a word from our sponsor. You know what makes me sad? When companies make it ridiculously hard to cancel subscriptions, I will never forget a few years ago, I tried to cancel a certain food delivery app and the unsubscribe button was just mysteriously gone that day. They made me go out of my way to call their customer support line to figure it out. Super shady business practice, I have to say. And unfortunately, we live in a time where companies are getting away with that crap more and more every day. This is where today’s sponsor, Rocket Money, comes in. Rocket Money is the all-in-one finance app that helps you manage subscriptions, lower bills, create a custom budget, and grow your savings all in one place. This is one of my favorite sponsors. I did an ad for them about a year ago, and I’ve used the app to track my spending ever since. 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And they’ve already helped people cancel over 880 million worth of subscriptions. To save more and spend less, join the over 10 million members using Rocket Money today. Scan the QR code or click the link in the description to get started for free. Thank you, Rocket Money, for sponsoring this video. All right, so there’s a lot I want to unpack here. Make sure to check the timestamps if you’re looking for something specific, but I’m going to start off with what I think is probably the strongest aspect of the DLC, the survivors. Both operator and drifter are very fun to play. Operator feels like a redesign of pilot from Risk of Brain Returns, and he is extremely strong. His whole kit revolves around drones. Operator has probably my favorite primary in the game right now. It’s one of those that’s really easy to learn and hard to master. switching between uh spamming it for targeting a single enemy and charging it up for those higher damage ricochets is a fun balancing act and is just super engaging. Both of his utilities are also really fun and unique. The default one is probably the one I prefer more. Being in the air is just super strong in this game, but the shield is also really good. It can block attacks in forcer style and boost you off the ground acting as another jump. It’s also just a decent amount of damage. Operator is very strong. I wouldn’t say strongest by any means. Seeker definitely still holds that title, but Operator is still probably top five, at least from my initial impressions. I do think it makes sense that this is the one that was unlocked by default because his play style is very in line with a lot of other survivors. I tend to think of him as a really buff commando with drones. Drifter, on the other hand, is unlike anything else in the game, and there’s a pretty steep learning curve with her. I very much feel like I’m still learning the survivor even after playing her a lot in the beta, and I’ve definitely seen a lot of people struggle with her. There’s a couple reasons for this. Number one, and probably most importantly, Drifter is a true melee survivor. And that’s actually kind of a first for this game. Sure, there are quote unquote melee survivors, but they all kind of cheat in some way. Whether it’s mercenary with eyeframes, acid with poison, loader is the closest, but her DPS is just so insane, and she can basically fly. With Drifter, it can be really difficult to deal with long-range enemies, especially if they group up. Range is by far Drifter’s biggest weakness. On the ground though, she is very good. And with repossess, she can literally just chuck enemies off the map. I’m not going to make the massive sack joke. Okay, we have a little bit of class here, unlike some people. John, I think the other reason people are having trouble on Drifter is just the macro gameplay. Drifter relies a lot on drones, turrets, picking up the right items to help compensate for the lack of range, as well as using the bag to move things around to better positions, and knowing how to properly manage temp items if you’re using salvage. The ability to pick things up and move them around is so radically unique, and I think it will take some time for people to adjust to this play style. There’s just so much [ __ ] you can do with Drifter, it honestly warrants its own video. Speaking of temp items, this is one of my biggest sticking points with the DLC. If you are unaware, temporary items, or temp items, are a new item type introduced in the DLC. This mechanic was plucked straight from Returns, and I had very similar issues with their implementation there. So, the temp items only last 80 seconds, and they are removed from your inventory one stack at a time. There’s a couple ways to get temp items. There are the new junk drones, which drop them periodically. The amount they drop depends on how far you are in the run. There are also temp item terminals, which hold five of the same temp item. You can also get temp items from Drifter’s salvage ability, as well as the new red, the substandard duplicator. I don’t really have an issue with the way temp items are implemented on Drifter specifically since her kit was really built around it, but for every other survivor in the game, the temp items just feel so useless. 80 seconds is just not a lot of time, and I find myself ignoring them frequently. Sometimes it can be nice before a teleporter, but I often have a hard time justifying spending money on them when I could just get a real item from a chest instead. And not all temp items are created equal. Unsurprisingly, the temp items I have found have the most value are the ones that let you get permanent items from them. Rusted keys, shipping request forms, chance stalls, and sauners whispers are the main ones I look out for. This is more kind of for the terminals than for the junk drones. I do feel like the junk drones kind of suck early in a run, but they scale better over time, and I don’t hate seeing them like I do the terminals. I will never forget though that time I had a run where I had finished the boss on conduit canyon and I was prepping for soloulless swing and the junk drone just decides it wants to drop a scorpion right at the very start of the map. I picked it up, rushed as fast as I could to the TP. By the time I finished the cut scene and got into the fight, it was gone. I know that’s a cherry picked example, but like I used it to demonstrate just how short this feels in practice. I think they could probably use a buff in their duration. Or alternatively, I think the substandard duplicator could use a buff. This item was also in returns and it does the same thing in this game. When you pick up an item, it will put a temporary copy of it in your inventory as well as increase the temp items duration by 10 seconds. The first part of that sounds a lot better than it is. If you consider the fact that even if you’re playing fast, you’re only going to be getting like one to two items a minute on average. Usually, by the time you open the next chest, the previous temp item is already gone. There are definitely a few niche uses for this one though, and while it’s not an amazing red, it is a pretty interesting one. The part I take issue with more is the plus 10 seconds on all temp items. I feel like that’s weak sauce. That’s maybe one extra band proc if I’m extremely efficient with it. I honestly think this item could double the temp item duration, and I don’t think it would be that OP except maybe on Drifter, but even that assumes you’re using the default utility, and at that point, it’s like getting drone man on operator or Dios on engineer. you found that character’s red, it should be strong, right? Those are kind of my thoughts on the temp items. I’ve warmed to them a little bit over time, but I still feel like four out of five times you’re better off with one permanent item than five temporary, but maybe that’s just my play style. This kind of brings us to the next part of the video, the new items. I have a lot to say about these, but I’m going to try to restrain myself a little bit for sake of pacing. And I do obviously plan on doing a tier list soon, so I’ll leave my more in-depth analysis for that video. Also, subscribe to be notified when that comes out. That wink wink nudge nudge. I will say though, I don’t really have any major complaints with them other than what I already mentioned when talking about the duplicator. I think the parry is maybe a little strong. It works like the mercy in Risk of Rain Returns, which means you can parry literally anything. Fall damage, warp deck, void seeds. Sky’s the limit, but I don’t know if I would change anything about it. It currently takes a decent amount of skill to use properly, and having a 60-second cool down on mist parries evens it out pretty well. I think both new boss items are really fun. One lets you hold two equipment which opens up all kinds of new builds. There’s also the faulty conductor. This is an electric synergy item. Basically the icy BM of this expansion. I think it was a no-brainer and I think it was only a matter of time before something like this was added. I really like that they added some more crit to the loot pool as well in the form of hiker’s boots. Crit was something that was only getting less common with each expansion and I definitely think there was a bit of a gap there. Collector’s compulsion is a really fun one. creates a lot of new and unique synergies. And the fur day spur is also looking like it’s going to be the goat for pillar skipping now. Just look at this commando gameplay. Like what? What? What? What even? Just just what? Absolutely ridiculous. Some really strong reds, too. Obviously, not the duplicator, but the router is really strong. This is one of those reds that is never bad. It’s good for single target, even better for hordes, and it’s a debuff that contributes to death mark. Death mark stocks always going up. The other new red is the orphaned core, and it spawns a little drone buddy that rolls around and kills for you. This is a great red, and I just have to say the level of polish on this is amazing. The best buddy has so much personality and swag, especially when compared to older items like empathy cores or the friendly beetle guard. There’s actually a new item type in this expansion as well. Those being the items that are exclusive to the new cooking mechanic. See my video from a few days ago if that just sounds like madness. There are five of these, but the standout is definitely the sake worms. You get this by combining both perforators, and this item is exactly as strong as you hope it would be for the steep price. They also added seven new drone types as well as buffing all the drones AI. This is definitely another category that is ripe for a tier list, so I won’t go too too indepth, but yeah, I will say uh there is a bit of a drone meta. Now, I already talked about the new junk drone, which I do like when it’s not throwing items off cliffs, but there are some really powerful new ones as well. I think the standouts are the bombardment drone and the freeze drone. Bombardment is just really strong DPS-wise, but the freeze drone is crazy good as well. That plays the freeze effect that Arty has. This doesn’t work on most bosses except Myith for the some ass backwards reason. I never understood it. I guess it’s a science thing. They buffed the TC drone a boatload. It’s probably the strongest one in the game now, which is good considering its absurd asking price. Gunner turrets are also really cracked for some reason. They have nutty regen and they stay alive much longer. I honestly think they might be bugged in some way because I have seen them take multiple blasts from vagrants and just shrug it off. The cleanup drone is another really good one, too. This one gives you extra gold for killing nearby enemies. Honestly, better than any economy item in the game. This lets you farm gold so much faster and is definitely one to look out for in speedruns. And the last one I wanted to talk about was just the backup. This equipment has been in the game for years, and it has always been one of the worst equipments in my eyes. No longer though has it got a massive buff this update. Not only from the new drone AI, but they made it properly level now, as well as a general buff to its speed and regen. I also briefly wanted to talk about the multiplayer drone update. I made a video showing off a full run of this a few days ago, but if you haven’t seen that, essentially, when you die, you can now respawn as a drone. Healing and gunner drones are free, but you can spend money to buy some of the more expensive drones, including the TC280. Yeah, this is extremely busted. You often do more damage as the TC, and you can respawn as a drone infinitely as long as your teammate is alive. I like this. I think it fixes one of the biggest issues with multiplayer where in the past, if you die in a run, it can be really hard to recover. Now, coming back as a drone, it’s a lot easier to keep up, and you also just have something to do when you die. It’s a lot more engaging. I do think the current implementation is a little strong though, mainly with the TC drones, it’s almost impossible to die as a TC. And if you have a single roll of pennies, you can farm thousands as TC. At which point, even if you do die, you can easily just reby the TC and come back. It’s dumb. I kind of feel like drones shouldn’t have infinite revives. You die as a drone, you die in real life. Well, if you die as a drone, I think you should be done. That was already your second chance. Other than that, very, very good change. Moving on. I have a lot I want to say about the bosses, but before I do, I want to go over the maps and enemies. Kind of talk about both in the the same breath here. The maps themselves, I think, are all pretty solid. This is by far the most consistent aspect of every DLC. Even Seekers had good maps at launch. I especially like Conduit Canyon with all the zip lines and the kind of progression of it. La Hunter is a very cool boss as well, but he gets a little bit broken in Eclipse. At some point, he just stops moving entirely and spams his laser over and over. That doesn’t feel super great. And also trying to fight him while dealing with collective elites isn’t the most fun either. The collective elites are just really annoying to me. They have a constant bubble shield around them, which makes you have to take closer engagements. I like this in theory, but if you’re dealing with a bunch of them, their bubbles will start to overlap, and it can become really hard to see what you’re doing. They also tend to spawn as bosses a lot on this map, which is just a bit much for a stage 4. Throw bosses at me, sure, but elite bosses, it’s a little much. It definitely has some problems, but I really like conduit Canyon overall. What I am not a fan of is the alternate version of the new maps being locked behind looping. This isn’t a new thing they started doing that in Seekers, and as somebody who hardly ever loops, I never get to see these maps. As for the layouts themselves, I think they’re all welldesigned. I do have some issues, though, when it comes to the enemy spawn pools on these maps. They definitely did not pull any punches here, and I think the new maps are consistently harder than the ones already in the game. A lot of this has to do with the new solace enemies. There’s a bunch of them, but by far the two I’ve struggled with the most are the scorchers and distributors. The scorchers will shoot oil at you and then try to ignite it with a flamethrower. This is fairly reactable, but it is extremely punishing. The distributors can also be really scary to deal with. They hide in the ground and then start spawning these little orbs that just go everywhere and they explode on death, which can definitely catch you off guard if you’re not ready for it. If it’s an elite distributor, all of the orbs will also be elite, and getting blown up by those is very, very devastating. The solace invalidators can also be pretty rough if they disable your items at an inopportune time. I’ve been killed by these a few times now. The solace extractors, transporters, and prospectors are a lot easier to deal with, but I will say they’re probably still harder than your average enemy. So, it shouldn’t be a surprise when I say Pretender’s Precipice is by far the hardest stage, too. Now you have a few easy enemies like golems, lamarians, and wisps, but you also got scorchers, invalidators, vultures, and children. In combination, these can be really tough to deal with so early in the run. It almost feels like a stage three. And then iron alvium just has a ridiculous enemy pool. You got larvae, templars, poo throwers, scorchorms, distributors, scorchers, prospectors, and more. They just throw so much at you, and it doesn’t help that this is also where you have to hit the gnome to get the portal to spawn. There’s not a single enemy on this map that’s easy to deal with. Maybe the prospectors, but compare this to any other stage three where you’re still dealing with wisps and lamarians. It’s just a nightmare to come here most of the time. I definitely think this needs to be looked at because until it is, I will be going to the bizaar to dream for any other map. Thank you very much. Repurpose crater is the new stage 4 and it doesn’t really have that issue from what I’ve seen. I’ve only been there a handful of times, but this map does feel like it has a fair enemy pool. You do have Zconstructs, but they’re honestly not too bad on this map since there’s a lot of verticality. I do think it’s a little strange that this is the only stage 4 that has a node spawn. Siren’s Call gets a pass because killing ally worship unit spawns one of the new portals, but Sunarded Grove and Abyssal not having them is weird to me, and it kind of punishes you for going there instead of this map. The node also doesn’t spawn on Treeborn Colony, which is weird to me as well. I get that it’s probably because it’s a path of the colossus map, but honestly, the path of the colossus has never really worked that well since you can just kind of get on and off it whenever you want. You don’t even have to go to treeborn to fight false sun. You can do that fight from the bizaar after any stage three. I feel like they might as well just put a note here. Very much a nitpick, but I really don’t like when getting a certain stage just locks you out of DLC content. I already hate Treeborn because half my chests go off the map and now I just have even less reason to come here. That’s mainly it for the maps and enemies. They did a pretty solid job here, but again, I definitely think they need to look at some of these spawn pools on the new maps. This brings me to the new bosses, which is probably my favorite aspect of the DLC up there with the survivors. Starting with Solar Swing. I love this boss. It’s a very engaging fight with some pretty unique mechanics. The boss itself is extremely tanky and you’re meant to shoot four cores to weaken it. Every time you destroy a core, the fight speeds up a bit and occasionally he’ll throw in a new attack. The first one is the big Biden blast. This is easy to dodge, but you need to be ready for it because if you’re too close, you will get hit basically no matter what. He also has a laser that will track you around the arena. Kind of similar to voidling, but I like the implementation here better. And then my favorite attack is this grid that will spawn at either the top or bottom of the map, and you have to position yourself in the gaps. I think this gets especially fun when you have to dodge this attack at the same time as the Biden blast. And then the last phase, the arena heats up and you need to stick by these coolers so you don’t burn to death. You can also damage the coolers to prevent them from cooling the boss, at which point he will eventually burn to death. You can also break the heaters in this last phase, but I don’t recommend it because then you have to finish off the boss yourself. Using the burn is just a lot easier. I do think that last phase could be communicated better to the player. Once you know how it works, it’s fine, but it can be a bit confusing the first time you encounter it. But my biggest issue with this fight is just the tankiness of it. Even in runs where I feel like I have a lot of damage. This fight can last a really long time. And Drifter especially struggles with it not having very much range. I don’t know if it’s the armor or the HP or what, but it’s too much and it gives me voidling vibes in a very bad way. And this isn’t just bad runs either. Even in runs where I feel like I’m absolutely shredding going through Conduit Canyon, I’ll come here and just hit a wall. This is my biggest complaint with the DLC by far. This is a very common complaint I have seen as well. And yeah, I would absolutely love to see this get addressed. After you do this fight, you can explore the arena to get some keys as well as the drifter unlock. It’s not a very big deal, but I do absolutely hate this multi Umbra fight. It’s never a challenge and it just slows the game down unnecessarily. But after that [ __ ] you can go to computational exchange and by combining the keys on the last stage, you can craft the exposed cerebellum, give it to Grock, and access the Solless Heart fight. I really like this fight as well. It has by far my favorite boss arena. This Hulk fight is so unique, and there’s nothing like it in the game. I love the arena getting destroyed as you fight and all of the different patterns you have to learn. This guy has so much aura. My issue with this fight is actually the exact opposite of Soul Swing. I feel like this fight is over too quickly. Very rarely will the fight last long enough to get to the bottom layer of the arena. I find the boss is usually dead by the time I get to the third or fourth floor. I don’t even know if I’ve seen all of the attack patterns for the laser because I always finish the fight within the first few floors. This boss actually feels a lot easier than Solo Swing, which is a little bit weird to me. A random red is a fine reward for this fight. It’s a little uninteresting, but it’s fair. If you can get through Solo Swing, you can get through this fight no problem. And that’s kind of how I feel about late game progression in general. Now, when I first played this, I was worried the cooking mechanic in Exchange would be really OP and bring a crazy level of power creep to the game. But in reality, the cooking mechanic hasn’t been that impactful in my runs. Because if you have a run that is strong enough to beat Solo Swing, you already have a run that is strong enough to beat Mithri. You could stop looting for the rest of the run and probably be fine. So, anything you get after Solo Swing is just extra. Cooking can definitely help you stomp stage five and Myithicks further, but it’s not necessary. The most challenging part of the run has already passed. You got through it without dying, and now you get to be OP. I generally like this. It’s not perfect, but it’s pretty balanced, and I hesitate to suggest any changes to this because I think if you try to make cooking more accessible, it would be more impactful, but I also think it might do more harm than good for the balance of the game, which I think is in a pretty good spot all things considered. Power creep is definitely something I’ve gotten more and more concerned about as we’ve gotten more and more DLCs. And this DLC has a little, but I think it entirely depends on what you’re engaging with because if you ignore the new stages and new bosses, I do think the game is slightly easier, but the new stuff is pretty difficult and the game gets a lot harder when you’re engaging with the new stuff. Those are just my thoughts, though. Some of this will probably be addressed with future patches. Overall though, I have to say this expansion was a spectacular comeback by Gearbox. I’d give it like 9 out of 10. I’m definitely excited to see where they take the game next. If you guys enjoyed the video, make sure to leave a like. It really does help the video. And subscribe for the tier lists coming soon. Also, thank you to my members for supporting the channel. And uh I will see you guys in the next one.
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Intro: 0:00
Survivors: 2:41
Temp Items: 5:12
Items: 8:06
Drones: 10:24
Maps/Enemies: 13:00
Bosses: 17:12
Balance/outro: 20:12