Spiral Knights - Alternatives to obtaining the Colliseum Recipes?

Alternatives to obtaining the Colliseum Recipes?

10 replies [Last post]

Fri, 08/14/2026 - 10:19

Vaultblazer

Hey hey everyone, I definitely hope I don't step on anyone's turf with this, but noticing how...barren the PvP scene is in Spiral Knights I'm wondering if there's any opinions on the recipes that Sullivan has being added to Basil's item pool, or other alternative means of obtaining them.

I say this largely because I want to get the Plague needle, and for a multitude of reasons I'm at a loss for getting them outside of Auction house luck. So what might people think, would it mess things up to make the recipes obtainable outside of the (rather barren looking) PvP gamemodes, or at this point, should they be made more accessible?

Fri, 08/14/2026 - 20:56

Kyiia

make pvp easier!

yeah it checks out, the pvp recipes are close to unobtainable for the average player now even if you actively seek out pvp games. it makes sense to have some kind of reward to incentivize pvp but the way things are isnt really working; it's mostly legacy players who have everything, and maybe some people with a hard grinder guild or a bunch of alts. (the items aren't even all that valuable to sell for the players who do own them, a plague needle costs the same as a blitz when trading between players)

it would also help to just make it easier to queue into pvp though! currently, you can only queue pvp while sitting in haven, and your loadout is locked while queued. remove the CR entry fee, allow queuing for PvP while in the clockworks (with the understanding that you'll be removed from your party if a group is found of course), and allow changing loadouts while queued (at least while queued for t3/untiered; i assume the reason for that irritating restriction is to prevent messing up the queue for low-tiered pvp), and it might be much easier for casual pvp matches to get started

Sat, 08/15/2026 - 00:49

Pdtopgun

Oh absolutely. Each set of weapon recipes goes for 300 Krogmo Coins total...and there are six of those. If you're also crazy enough to want at least one of every single craftable trinket (to say nothing of doubles), according to the handy crafting spreadsheet you're looking at over 2800 coins total. At this point I think I'd struggle to earn 1% of that. I'd love to go for a few of the weapon lines myself, but the closest practical way I have of doing that is grabbing someone's leftover 3* UV crafting attempts from the Auction House and knowing I'll never be able to upgrade them. (I've never so much as seen the poor Triglav line up for grabs there.) It's either that or find someone who's willing to craft and unbind the 5* variants at cost, which would involve saving up much more energy than I've ever had. Definitely not worth it for a single novelty weapon.

So yeah, give us some other actually feasible way to earn the tokes, or at least the recipes directly. Maybe we could exchange the standard Spark tokens for Krogmos, lord knows I have no use for most of them at this point.

Sat, 08/15/2026 - 07:49

Vaultblazer

All in due time, I suppose.

@Kyiia

Yeahh, if PvP is pretty chafing to get into I can imagine that alone can be a bit of a disincentive. I don't know much about the pvp gamemode as-is, but I have a feeling that if I tried it, I'd just be free food for someone who's invested in the meta since as a casual player myself my best weapon is a Glacius with Damage bonus - Undead Medium and maybe a shield or two with useful defense boosts and the Snarbolax set. So going up against legacy players with all the bells and whistles would be a heavy curb stomp to my enthusiasm for even trying unless I get carried.

@Pdtopgun

Whilst I'm not too surprised it's as expensive as it is being an MMO of its time, it is still a huge bummer to hear that it really does just boil down to getting lucky one way or another if you don't use some fairly cumbersome workarounds. I was a little bewildered that the Haze Bomb (Stun mist bomb) is a Basil recipe, but every upgrade to it is Krogmo coin exclusive. I'd definitely be down for some means to trade spark tokens for Krogmo coins or the recipes themselves as I really don't use them for anything but buying trinkets to sell immediately (Trinkets being a whole other beast entirely) And it's such a shame that a lot of fairly essential trinkets for late-game is locked behind a gamemode that's not popular anymore.

I wonder what the Game masters have to say about the subject, since I can't imagine it's as easy a decision as adding recipes to basil's item pool, or shuffling trinkets into other locations.

Wed, 08/19/2026 - 10:21

Holy-Nightmare

One thing that could be done

One thing that could be done is making the Recipes unbound

This would at the very least allow those who are dedicated to PVP an opportunity to collect and sell them on the Auction house

_____________________

If you still want to allow for some way of earning tokens, why not have daily hunt? Sullivan is a Devilite, and would probably be glad if you "paid a visit" to some other Pit Bosses that he thinks might try to get in on his business... kill 10 of them that day for 1 token... it's slow, but it's better than nothing

Wed, 08/19/2026 - 21:40

Pdtopgun

@Holy-Nightmare: That's a great point. Every single recipe Basil sells is unbound, and players who do Arcade runs can make a bit of profit selling the exclusive ones on the Auction House for people who don't feel like tracking them down. So why is it that this handful of recipes is treated differently? I'm sure there are dedicated PvP players out there sitting on thousands of Krogmo coins they have no use for anymore who would happily sell or trade recipes if they could.

Thu, 08/20/2026 - 03:30

Zosu

ppl usually just farm PvP

Almost nobody likes PvP, because it's against the spirit of this co-op game. So ppl usually assemble a group that wants Krogmo coins and they just farm Lockdown by letting each other win. You have to not be inactive during the match tho. I heard, some ppl even do it alone with multiple alts.

Fri, 08/21/2026 - 12:31

Batabii

"I heard, some ppl even do it alone with multiple alts."

People should get banned for exploits like this. PVP being largely dead is not an excuse.

Fri, 08/21/2026 - 18:48

Holy-Nightmare

@Batabii

"We think there is a fundamental misconception about piracy. Piracy is almost always a service problem and not a pricing problem," - Gaben

In a similar vein exploits in such a manner as this are just a response to the service issue, which is a lack of alternatives to obtaining said recipes... If this issue is correctly addressed then the people exploiting it will largely vanish.

Sat, 08/22/2026 - 03:59

Turbek-Turbek

I think PvP being so heavily

I think PvP being so heavily gated behind optimal gear is a huge issue. Another fix besides slashing Krogmo coin prices would be to have a combat gamemode with pre-set weapons.

I've tried to get into lockdown, but realistically my options were to either spend extreme amounts of resources to craft pvp-specific gear or to be a detriment to my teammates who have optimized loadouts. Not great!

This in turn means anyone dipping their toes into the gamemode will be immediately destroyed by competent players not just via raw skill but also through movement tech that you don't have the equipment for as a casual.

Sat, 08/22/2026 - 04:05

#10

Zosu

Not sure it's still like that, but 99% of LD used to just be luck and turning on auto-aim.
Haven't tried it in years tho.

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Alternatives to obtaining the Colliseum Recipes?