I joined a Tier 2 party with my main knight. Things were going well, especially since the rest of my party had all at least 4-star equipment. Then we found the danger room. Half of my equipment is 3-star, and the other half is 2-star, but their 4-star equipment reassured me things were going to be hunky-dory and those treasure boxes had our names on them.
Well. Eighty mist energy down the drain.
Look, there's nothing wrong with being heavy on swords, I've got a Striker and aiming for a Dread Venom Striker myself, but these guys loved their Avengers and their Boltbrands and their Fierce Flamberges that they were content to watch them flash while their own flesh was riddled with bullet holes and that thing called "fire". Still, I took just enough crowns away to trade for 100 crystal energy.
Some time after this, now with 30+ mist energy, I booted up my secondary knight, who is pink, and has all starting gear, except for her Autogun. It's slow and heavy, but this actually gives it a leisurely pace, a stark and refreshing contrast to my usual slash slash slash back away slash slash shield back away routine. I joined a Tier 1 party, with two other fellows already fighting, with stronger equipment than mine, and like before, admirers of the blade. Things were going well, at least for me, but either way all of us were reaping the rewards.
Then came the danger room. I was getting minerals, and they unlocked the danger "gate" before I could protest. After collecting the best Luminite I could find, I ran up to them. They were on the party pad. And they were not going to budge. So I sighed and stood alongside them, thinking I had nothing to lose anyway and might as well enjoy being maimed horribly by constructs again. My intuitions were dead on, except the part about me being maimed horribly. Very soon I was left the only one standing, and the only effective weapon I had at my disposal was my autogun. Which was actually all I needed, aside from my legs, to scurry around and avoid rockets. When I was done I revived my remaining knocked out teammate (the other one had returned to Haven). He then promptly lost connection.
Well, I got crowns and heat, and at the end of the day, isn't that what matters?
Started a new character... or rather remade an existing character. Ran the start zone again. They changed it around a little bit, but you're not missing much if you came in during the sega pass or steam eras.
...It also made me wonder if you can go back to the crash site if you have someone invite you to the abandoned depot... Anyway.
I then proceeded to run T1 with my remade character. Managed to run a Depth 7 danger room without dying. Of course I had one other person running with me. (= That run taught me that a proto gun == a pea shooter against T2 enemies. d= Anyway, I died three times on the run. One of those deaths was in Grim gallery (blasted rocket puppy.) The other two deaths were in a danger room at Depth 8.