Dailies & Weeklies Introduction

Page Contents

Dailies are a gamemode in which all players compete against others on a set seed with one attempt. Functionally these are the same as a normal run, with a few restrictions for a level playing field.

Weeklies similarly are a competition on a set seed, but can be replayed any amount of times within the time limit. These run anywhere from 4 days to 6.5 days, and have custom loadouts.

Achievements and unlocks are available on both modes, the only restriction is that golden weapons will not unlock on weeklies. These game modes are only available on Steam, Switch and PlayStation versions of the game. While Xbox has an achievement tied to the daily challenge, it is currently not obtainable.

Rollover occurs at midnight UTC when the current daily ends and a new one begins. This gives a 24 hour period for any specific daily and is not affected by daylight savings. Weeklies have inconsistent start times (early as Monday, late as Wednesday), but will always run through Sunday night. The following 24-hour clock can be used to track how many hours are left on a daily:

Thronebutt is an online leaderboard mainly for the Steam version of the game. The site is currently being fixed (more info here), but it was a place to view the specifics of a run such as mutations taken, what ended the run and what weapons were ran. The winner of the daily is determined whoever gets the most kills, distance is not a factor. Consoles must view leaderboards in-game to see who is winning, with no way to view previous days.

Daily Mechanics

Dailies will show a red calendar on the top left to signify that the daily is active. If a daily is played through rollover, the calendar may disappear and will just function as a normal run from then on. If it successfully submits, then the score will then be applied to the previous daily properly.

Daily runs always have a vanilla start, which means that no golden weapon unlock or crown can be used at the start of a run. Any character is allowed but they must use their default weapon. On the character select screen the mouse wheel (for KBM layout) can be used to swap between a characters A-Skin or B-Skin if it us unlocked.

The only other difference in gameplay is that the Proto Chest will not bring in weapons from other runs, it will always default to the Rusty Revolver when first opened. Swapping this out with another weapon will overwrite the save, meaning that weapons found in dailies can be brought to normal runs - not vise versa.

While there are no golden weapon starts, Frog can be played on dailies if unlocked. In order to do this, select normal mode first and set Golden Frog Pistol to the starting weapon on a character. Exit out of that mode and start a daily, initiating a run as that character will instead start it as Frog.

Skeleton cannot be started as just like any other mode, but can be transformed into as Melting at any point of the run. Playable Big Dog is disabled for dailies.

Weekly Mechanics

Weeklies will show a blue calendar on the top left to signify the weekly is active. If a weekly is played through rollover, the calendar may disappear and not submit. If the run successfully submits then it will be applied to next weeks leaderboard. Runs on the wrong leaderboard have been stricken if they hold a considerable lead.

Weeklies are challenge runs in which every player shares the same starting loadout. Character, B-Skin, crown and starting weapons are all pre-determined. These used to be suggested on the Nuclear Throne subreddit (until mid-2017) and then through the NT Discord (until early 2024). With Thronebutt issues there is no status on when weekly suggestions will return.

Starting loadouts can include weapons not normally in the drop pool. Information on Party Gun, Sentry Gun, Ion Cannon and Eggplant can be found here. As of mid-2024 starting loadouts can also include cursed weapons as well as secondary weapons.

The only difference in actual gameplay is that Vaults will automatically be destroyed upon entering a level to prevent players from switching crowns or use the Proto Chest. This means the entire run must be played with the starting crown, no matter how bad it is.

As mentioned above golden weapons cannot be unlocked on this mode, likely to prevent a golden weapon being unlocked that's in the starting loadout. Any other unlocks work. If the starting loadout includes a loop crown, that means it can be unlocked in preloop by sitting on/looping past The Throne.

Starting loadouts have multiple restrictions that are mainly tied to secrets/achievements.

Seeded mechanics

Many mechanics can be seeded and predictable within daily and weekly runs, while others are completely random. This entire section will brief over most predictable mechanics.

Seeded runs may generate differently inbetween versions and platforms. This includes:

Mutation Seeding

There is a community run scouting sheet that shares their mutations each day. Players from the NT Discord will contribute data about their own runs that other players can benefit from. There is a dedicated guide on how set logic works due to how many complex mechanics there are.

A brief summary of this page, Non-Beta and 2021 beta will see the same mutation sets but 2021 will start a set earlier. 2023 beta has its own set seed entirely. On the 2021 and 2023 betas, each will see an independent set for jungle, patience and destiny that is not present on Non-Beta.

Layout Seeding

Level layouts are the most unpredictable in consistency. All versions will experience different layouts from each other. Within the same version some variables that usually will be the same includes enemy spawns and density, what weapons they may drop and the location of chests.

30 and 60 FPS will have different layouts even while on the same version. While playing 60 FPS some levels may also randomly generate with a 'B layout', which will have a different layout from the normal one and have different enemy spawns and weapon drops.

Difficulty is based on the number of portals entered and can effect the enemy spawn count. Thus entering extra portals through Vaults, Pizza Sewers, IDPD HQ and situationally YV's Crib can have an effect on generation. Very infrequently layout can be different based on mutation level, which can sometimes be observed on weeklies.

When IDPD spawns, which unit type is chosen is unseeded and cannot be predicted regardless of version. There are noticable patterns to which units initially spawn in IDPD HQ across all runs, but nothing is never guaranteed.

Weapon Chest Seeding

Weapon chests are seeded and will give the same drop for Non-Beta and 2021 Beta, regardless of fps or alternative layouts. Any time a new portal is entered more weapons are added to the drop pool, which can effect which weapon appears from chests. Once the weapon pool is filled out, typically around 2-1 L1, weapon chests will always give the same seeded result regardless of difficulty.

Holding a weapon will remove it from the drop pool unless if playing as Steroids. Any seeded weapon drop or chest will give a different seeded weapon in its place, which can be utilized when replaying weeklies if weapon drops are memorized.

Big chests work the same as normal weapon chests, the weapons they give are seeded. Any weapon chest skipped gives +25% chance to spawn a big chest, however this is actually a seeded variable and is dependent on version and FPS. So one version may only need one chest skipped to see a big chest on a certain level, while another version may need three skipped. Four chests skipped gives a guaranteed chance and can be brute forced on any level starting on 3-1.

The weapon from the cursed chest is seeded just like normal chests are, but whether the chest is cursed is dependent on version, fps and crown. Crown of curses gives a 2/3rd chance each level and is independent of any other crowns. Other crowns likely all share the same 1/7 chance each level, but is not confirmed.

Chests in IDPD HQ and YV's Mansion are seeded only to their specific versions.

If running Crown of Hatred it will have a seeded weapon separate from normal. The normal weapon will appear in its place if a portal happens to open it rather than the player directly.

The 2-1 chest will always match the chest on 2-? on Non-Beta. On the Betas, this is shifted and the 2-? matches with 3-1. The same can be said for 5-1/5-? Non-Beta and 5-?/5-3 Betas. (Research crib/oasis later)

Weapon Drop Seeding

Weapon drops are always effected by version, difficulty, FPS and alternative layouts as they depend on enemy drops. Non-Beta and 2021 Beta may sometimes share drops, but are usually independent of each other.

Drops from enemies that are spawned partway into a level are completely random. This normally only includes Laser Crystals spawned by Hyper Crystal, but if running Crown of Guns can also include any enemy spawned mid-level such as IDPD or revived freaks.

Big Dog has a guaranteed weapon drop that is completely random on Non-Beta, but is fixed on the Betas and is seeded.