I don't mind doing compounds on T1/2 since minis don't have that much health to survive 1 or 2 hits at that point. But I absolutely despise doing compounds on T3, the hp bloating on minis making them comparable to normal mobs is absurd.
I personally went out my way to make a bomb set just to make it a more bearable experience for everyone whenever a compound comes up.
The enemies drop pitiful amounts of items and heat and there's typically only a handful of treasure boxes throughout a level that is mostly huge spaces with a couple trap rooms connecting them.
Challenging the meta is definitely novel and I enjoy them for that, compounds are certainly interesting to go through, they have a unique play pattern and are very dynamic, but as mentioned their difficulty does not match their reward at all. Fully clearing a D28 compound feels like torture and the big reward at the end is something like a single radiant drop and your heat bars gain 1 pixel.
It is not worth it to build a cool non-meta weapon that is uniquely good in compounds because clearing a compound is not worth it compared to just running through, and the fact that most of the treasure boxes are literally at the elevator further pushes rushing through compounds, because those handful of boxes at the end are the majority of the loot pool.
@Dibsville: "single radiant drop and your heat bars gain 1 pixel."
Yes this is the thing that should be addressed the most, You make an interesting point about how the loot box should be more spread across the map.
@Scuttlechan: "I personally went out my way to make a bomb set just to make it a more bearable experience for everyone whenever a compound comes up." Yay!, how do You feel about the change in the play pattern?
...might not be a feasible idea, but Dibsville got me thinking; what if there were gates tied to defeating enemies set up *off the main path*, so that if you want to sprint through and ignore things, you can - but you take on the chance of getting more loot if you decide to stand your ground and deal with the mixed enemy spawns. Like, pseudo-danger-rooms or something...
@Jcyrano Still going my way through upgrading some status bombs, but DBB- Heck, even 4* status bombs make compounds so much easier to deal with without feeling like the minis are hounding your toes. Specially when it comes to dealing with drops or scarabs.
It's been a pretty chill experience, since there really aren't that many dps bombs I focus mainly on support with status bomb or staggerlocking with DBB. But I always carry my Tortofist around as pseudo-sword/bomb cuz no elemental bombs (Shard bomb is a thing IK, but I prefer less disruptive options)
I'm relatively "okay" on Compounds but my biggest annoyance really stems from Tier 3 Compound enemies (compound-lings? Minis?) being as strong as regular ones in terms of health, maybe it's because I'm bringing 4-5* gear to Tier 2, but the Minis going down in a single melee hit in those tiers feels right for the abundance of them.
In other words, if the Compound minis' health didn't scale as intensely and they were as easy to dispatch in T3 as they are in T2, I'd probably be fine with them. Things like Scarabs' attack being so wonky and Drops having a frame 1 wind-up are a whole other issue but I wanted to add that in since it's attached to my main complaint.
Honestly, I could probably run (And have, now that I think about it...) most compounds with a Combuster and a Dark Briar Barrage and be perfectly fine.
Ah, wait, there it is. Good old gear issues again, huh? Lol.