Introduction

A recent interesting growth in the player base has been noticed, which is good, but still far from what Spiral Knights deserves. The current issues of this game are no surprise to any veteran, and they will not be solved even if Grey Havens floods the game with events and boxes (although I wouldn’t complain).

With the addition of AU and BR/LAM servers, it became possible to cover the basic needs of these regions which, although peripheral, have historically many active or potentially interested players, especially Latin America, which I am part of. This is likely part of the explanation for the current growth of the game.

However, I don’t think this alone will make the game grow more. Something deeper is needed, and given the current limitations, it may simply be unfeasible to ask for new lore content, new pets to finally cover all mineral colors, new weapons, etc. I believe we can start in a simpler way, something developers have recently done and that somewhat worked, such as changes to the Charge of Divine Avenger and Gran Faust. At least for Divine Avenger, I believe it was enough, not to compete with Brandishes, but to reduce the gap enough to justify its use for players who enjoy Sealed Sword gameplay without drastically affecting overall performance.

Suggestions

There are weapon and armor families that, with minimal changes, could become viable options and indirectly improve farming for Basil recipes and tokens from missions other than Vanaduke (which currently only serves for raw currency). Here are some suggestions (weapons only):

1. Antigua Family:
   • Introduce a simple mechanic to pierce enemies, allowing shots to hit multiple or "x" quantity of enemies aligned in their path.
   • Simpler changes: increase overall damage, magazine size, and/or base attack and reload speed.
   • Future: remove the first part of the charge animation, keeping only the eagle, and slightly increase damage.
2. Driver Family:
   • Add a third shot and/or slightly increase hit area, as projectiles often miss due to very small hitboxes.
3. Catalyser Family:
   • Increase charge explosion area or significantly boost splash damage to trully fulfill the AoE burst role.
   • 3.1. Neutralizer: Make explosion pull enemies inward instead of pushing them away, increase damage if needed.
   • 3.2. Biohazard: Add small/moderate poison chance on normal hits, make charge apply strong poison.
   • 3.3. Future support role: Create a Catalyser that stacks orbs on allies, reducing damage taken and healing when detonated with charge attack.
   • Future idea: redirect normal projectiles when hitting fully stacked enemies (similar to Drivers bouncing mechanic).
4. Pulsar Family:
   • Gameplay is annoying in parties but has its weirdo niche.
   • Suggestion: add transparency settings for effects to reduce visual clutter and, with luck, overall lag experience :,).
   • Performance issues (especially PvP) may remain due to Java, so yea.
5. Flourish Family:
   • Improve status application rates, especially in PvE, since low probabilities discourage the use of status weapons because they don't compensate for the loss of base damage.
6. Sealed Sword Family:
   • Reduce knockback on basic attacks and speed up charge animation to improve the experience and prevent the Knight from being so exposed during the charge cast animation.
   • 6.1. Gran Faust: Remove the charge downside, or greatly improve risk-reward system (much more damage/ much less chance to self-curse/ drastically reduce the punitive nature of self-curse status).
7. Cutter Family:
   • 7.1. Venom Striker: Add shadow damage to its formula.
   • 7.2. Fang of Vog: Remove downside or dastically improve charge attack (same problem as GF), as competitors offer similar damage without risk (elemental Brandishes).
8. Troika Family:
   • 8.1. Triglav: Make it Elemental instead of Normal.
9. Spur Family:
   • 9.1. Turbillion: Convert base damage to elemental non-status which would improve its performance and would be in line with its concept of being a weapon that manipulates the element "air".
   • Fix bugs related to charge attack failing near walls or after defense input.

Shadow Lair Equipments and General Problems

The issue here is clear, it’s not just the existence of the Chaos Set, which only delivers a fair amount of damage for what is lost in defense. The real issue is the lack of power in specialized sets.

There are many unnecessary bonuses (like damage vs specific creature types) that don’t meaningfully influence decisions. This becomes worse after completing Shadow Lair, where players expect impactful rewards but instead receive visually appealing yet underwhelming gear.

Lore / Endgame Farming

Concrete lore updates are unlikely soon, but impactful endgame content is still possible.

Introduce a Roguelike Mode / Endless Depths integrated into the current lore of The Core, a place where everything is chaotic and yet a bit possible to control. With randomized stages, monsters, and scaling difficulty beyond depth 24+, rewards could rival or exceed Vanaduke farming.

Additional ideas include mid-run upgrades (empowerments) and scaling difficulty for better rewards. (Arcade System with Roguelike elements)

Quality of Life

• Convert heat drops into crowns/tokens/usable items if all gear is level 10.
• Pause heat boost timers when not in adventures.
• Add a key to switch chat modes without unnecessary commands.
• Reduce accessory removal energy costs or add a wardrobe system for previewing cosmetics that we don't have or doesn't listed yet on Auction House.

Note

Most suggestions aim to be conservative while still meaningful, considering possible implementation complexity. Additional ideas, especially regarding bombs, armor, and pure normal damage weapons are welcome.

If any of the weapon suggestions don't appeal to you, and you have better solutions, especially those that don't require a lot of development work (be conservative), please share them in this post. I've only gathered feedback from my guild and a few people who enjoyed responding during my few hours of gaming last week.