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

Tech

Upon entering a level the game will roll a 66% chance to convert the rad can into a health chest, regardless of health
- If under half health and the original 66% roll fails, than the additional 50% roll for health chest will happen as well, making it extremely likely to get one at low health.
- While open mind cannot have 2 health chests spawn, it seems to add more chances for healing. (Will test later)

Ammo pickups will no longer convert into HP pickups.
- Mutations such as Bloodlust and Last Wish work as intended and will still heal the player.
- Character specific methods including Rebel's passive, Robot's active and Horror's Thronebutt all work as intended.
- Rabbit Paw will not convert ammo packs into health, so the boost from the mutation will only be to ammo.
- If a portal opens a health chest, the 2 hp will still spawn out of the health chest for the player.
- Health Chest Mimics still give HP drops as intended.
- Confiscate will not spawn Health Chests, as it requires HP drops in order to convert them. (Though Health Mimics won't drop health chests just with this crown)

Strategies

Crown of Life is considered the worst crown in the game by the majority of the playerbase. Health chests only heal for 4 HP a level(or 8 HP with stomach). It's incredibly common to take more than 4 damage in a level, which is why health pickups can be fairly commonplace. On top of all this, there is only a chance to get a Health Chest, making its spawn not completely reliable. For this reason the con FAR outweighs the pro. This crown should only ever be used if going for Ultra Mutant or for a weekly. There is no reason to consider this crown otherwise outside of wanting a challenge run.

Before any other piece of advice, it must be stated that Bloodlust is a MUST have! It is the only reliable workaround to having no health drops. This is one of the few instances a mutation will significantly impact the viability of a crown. While CoLife cannot be a positive, Bloodlust changes the crown from being completely unviable to being moreso difficult to work with. Runs with and without it are like night and day, so always prioritize this when picking mutations.

As for Preloop, it should be overstated that taking damage is far more impactful. The only time to heal is with Health Chests, so in general the player should be playing as they would a 'no hit' run. For maximum efficiency Health Chests should only be opened when missing 4 HP or more, so if the player is only missing a few points of damage then the Health Chest should be saved until the end of the level to be opened, just apply caution as exit portals could make the player miss the chest completely.

Upon reaching Loop and Deeploop the run becomes a matter of having Bloodlust or not.

When running Bloodlust the run is much closer to vanilla gameplay. Constantly getting kills will constantly lead to being healed, albeit at random. This means that the player doesn't need to stress out over every possible damage source, though needs to be particularly careful about taking large amounts of damage at once. Most importantly it's important to be fully aware of the dangers of Big Bandits and both Throne fights, as Bloodlust procs are infrequent due to the nature of the fights. Longer range weapons and keeping distance is the name of the game, to give oneself as much breathing room as possible.

If not running Bloodlust the run is fairly unviable, though is fairly dependent on specific mutants being played. Good defense needs to be stressed as any form of damage from enemies can be devastating. Keep distance from potential damage sources and lean completely into the 'no hit' mentality, as 4 HP can only ever be regained on most levels. The Throne fights will be the most dangerous to a run as they are two levels where healing is normally not possible.

Character/Mutation Notes
-Bloodlust is a must to reiterate.
-While not in meta, mutations like Euphoria and Hammerhead can have their perks to help avoid damage.
-Rabbit Paw is moved down in priority by quite a bit, but can be a better pick than many mid-tier mutations still for the ammo drops.
-Second Stomach only gives an extra +4 HP per health chest, it's better than nothing but not worth taking on its own for the most part.
-Robot is the best at mitigating CoLife due to having an active that can heal. Regurgitate furthers their viability.
-Melting often has to go with taking minimal damage, while he doesn't excel at CoLife his active does excel at avoiding damage, making his gameplay is fairly similar to vanilla.
-Chicken pretty much requires Bloodlust to regain her head. With this condition met the extra Health Chests chances compliments Chicken very well.
-This crown hurts Rebel the most as taking damage is an active part of her gameplay. Without Bloodlust take Personal Guard and avoid using her active completely. With Bloodlust either ultra can be taken, though Personal Guard may still suit her better as spamming allies is not very viable.