Crown of Life
Area: Preloop Vaults
Pro: Big HP Chests More Common
Con: No HP Drops

Sprites:
Selection Idle Walk



Tech



Strategy Guide


Crown of Life is generally considered to be the worst crown in the game. Health chests only give 4 HP a level (8 HP with Stomach) and it's very easy to take more damage than that in just one or two hits - besides just being a chance of seeing a health chest. For this reason the con FAR outweighs the pro, the only circumstances this is usually ran is during weeklies or just to unlock. There is no benefit in using this otherwise outside of wanting a challenge run.

A core part of any build here will be Bloodlust. This is the only reliable workaround to the lack of health drops and is the highest priority - without it, runs should be treated like a no hit as health lost will be very difficult to regain.

In preloop especially runs should be treated as no hit runs, at least until Bloodlust can be found. This means that levels should be cleared out slower and more methodically to avoid taking risks - any longer range weapon can help well with that. If the player is only missing 2-3 HP then health chests can be saved until the end of the level in case another hit is taken, to maximize the health gained back. Be careful as to not let the exit portal cut off access to the health chest, however.

For those trying to unlock the crown it's recommended to take it from the 5-2 Vault instead of 3-2 in order to minimize the levels in which health drops are missing. Aside from this general advice from Melting/no hit runs apply here - don't take major risks, try only taking reliable weapons for consistent damage and try to keep space between yourself and any threats.

The final roadblock for preloop will be beating the Throne as there are very few enemies on 7-3 that can proc Bloodlust at all. A separate guide will be linked later but a general summary is to stand on the sides of the red carpet to 'bait' the beam attack, which has a very obvious charge-up / sound cue and is easy to dodge. This gives time to deal reliable damage against the Throne without worrying about getting hit for a few seconds.

Upon reaching loop the run becomes a matter of having Bloodlust or not - damage here is far more frequent as well as the drops, but removing health drops from that equation is where the crown becomes fully unviable. Any long range builds will do the best here for survival, as well as quickly handling any IDPD spawns. Keeping distance is the name of the game - the more breathing room the player has, the better. The biggest roadblocks will still be both Throne fights with few chances to heal.

For meta play (loops 3+), the amount of enemies can make normal gameplay feel more vanilla with the amount of Bloodlust procs. However any boss fights that drag on (such as Big Bandits or Mom) can quickly have the player struggling for health - IDPD Freak respawns may give sparse HP back here, so a successful run mainly becomes how well the player can clear levels while avoiding damage. Due to the difficulty of the crown, sometimes a run may just be running on empty fumes.

Character/Mutation Notes: