I'm not sure if you let them fuse that you get all the loot added up from each section of Lichen. I'm sure there is some capped amount of loot that a monster can drop. Even though I've seen Lichen Colonies spit up quiet a few things time and time before.

Anyways, I let em fuse if my party members want to.

But I avoid the Giant Linchen Colonies because those are a big pain.

I don't. Not intentionally anyway. Thinking on it now, I have to say I'm ambivalent either way, unless someone knows which way is better for drops (assuming that it's not even or nearly so). Hard to get excited about fighting jellies no matter how big they are (has never fought RJ, is prepared to eat his words, but the point stands regarding lichens either way).

oh, and when I'm in a group that does that, I just stand back and let them take care of their business. I'm not in enough of a rush to charge forward and waste my HP. Chances are there's gonna be at least one guy savagely swinging his striker and getting tagged while doing it. Pull out your gun and plink away, and get your free heat when they're all dead and you're on mop-up duty. It'll allow me to actually hit the mobs for real damage, instead of having the mob pushed away from my 200pt shot by a flurry of 30pt shots.

When have Giant Lichen Colonies ever been a problem? Unless you're not carrying a shadow weapon, or only have piercing weapons.

I always allow lichens to fuse, it always seems to give a lot more payout, and hey I love the challenge that comes with it!

I get that's what you want, what I'm saying is, better to talk to them and get everyone on the same page than to be obstructionist in the middle of a fight. It goes the other way, too; if most of the party agrees to let 'em fuse and one guy runs in and wrecks it, there's no call for that. But if you haven't said anything... well, apart from trying to game arena spawns* and a few other select instances, the default mode in this game is pretty much "kill everything asap, starting with the healers". Can't blame your group for that if you haven't discussed it.

*and even then, not everybody does that, either

I still have not seen a concrete argument for better payoff after fusing. My experience is if I kill one little one it seems to produce about the same amount of crowns and heat as if I let 2 or 3 fuse together. I feel like fusing looks like it is wasting crowns and heat. Maybe their is an argument for higher quality mats (though fewer) if you let them fuse. After trying to figure out which looked better I just decided that I would kill whatever was in front of me as it came and let the gods sort it out. If they fuse, they fuse.

When have Giant Lichen Colonies ever been a problem?

When they come with four alpha wolvers and two T3 gremlin healers? OK, I no longer find that a huge problem, but it certainly is a lot more of a challenge than what you find in the second part of an arena...

I mainly solo though, so no party members to annoy.
And I fought one of those super huge colonies. It wasn't fun.

I usually don't care. I try to avoid it if possible, but I don't go too far out of my way to prevent it. I can take on giant lichen colonies when they are by themselves.

But, it's a different story when when we're in a danger room or an arena. In those cases I might die in order to stop them from merging.

I usually let them , it's fun. And the giant lichen colonies were never a problem for me, so...

I haven't seen concrete proof yet that lichen colonies offer bigger rewards than small, individual lichens, so I don't really care. I'm fine with someone else in my party wanting them to fuse, however.

I really don't like the horned lichens though.

Don't care either way. Massive Lichen Colonies guarantee heart drops though, and since i can kill one without losing health, i do that if i ever need hearts.

...solo anyway.

EDIT: Loot wise i have never checked to see the difference.

Well, I've never seen proof that letting them merge yields better loot but I don't see compelling evidence either way so I cannot see how that encourages either choice. If I had to make a bet based on what I have read, though, I'd bet on letting them merge based on better chances of rarer mats- even if overall loot value is lower otherwise. I'm sure that in the long run I'm more likely to be lacking an expensive high-star-rating mat than a common one when I go to craft something. No one has shown me proof either way, but it's also not terribly important that my intel on this particular issue be accurate.

I like to merge them because I find "Baneling" size and greater MUCH more fun to fight and more satisfying to explode, and even favour having a Piercing weapon to minimise accidents, but usually don't have the patience to slowly drag them through half the level just for that. If I think the next group is probably far away, I'll kill the current colony so I can get to the next fight sooner. Red Supergiants, as I like to call them, are great fun to try to stick as many Toxic Catalyser charges to as I can while not letting them kill me with their "Lurker & Hydra" attacks. It probably helps a lot that I have a couple of good weapons for slimes, though, and I'd probably rather kill them when they're less dangerous if I weren't especially well-equipped to handle them.

I'll go along if more than half of the party is afraid of letting them merge, (usually; I have the same compulsive reaction to bossy people as Tlachtli, though it hasn't come up yet in SK for me) but otherwise my default task sequence is: kill healers => kill fire magnets => kill everything other than lichens => herd lichens and enjoy.

Not only is it more fun, but in fact a lot quicker and easier on certain levels to just let them merge and curse them - a giant lichen colony is SO aggressive that it kills itself with very little help from shooting/ hitting it.

...a certain lichenous lair is very fast, run in, break blocks, run around chopping plants for coins whilst they merge, throw curse vial, back away, shield up and watch it spasm to death...far easier than chasing a dozen little puddles of slime around going hack hack hack and getting frustrated when they merge and heal =]

I don't know how the crowns/heat add up but there is one thing that the big red colonies drop sometimes drop that you're very unlikely to get from the small lichens: vitapods. I remember getting two 8-vitapods from a lichen colony on tier 2.

Also I much prefer one big target over five small targets

I let em colonize because it is the closest thing we get to a mini-boss in this game *hint hint*

Bindi-Badgi: Your cursing tactic is often not available. I rarely have curse vials and I rarely carry my Gran Faust, and even if I did it rarely curses. And although watching a monster kill itself is fun --- no argument there --- I'm still not convinced that it's faster than having four party members chop up the little lichens. Maybe if your party were super-coordinated in shield-bumping the lichens together, it would be worth it.

The other posters are just repeating what was said in the first few posts. Giant lichens are fun and slightly challenging. They might be more lucrative, but no serious evidence is being offered.

I don't care a lot either way, and I haven't seen any real evidence for preferring one over the other. If someone in my party has a preference, I'll defer to that. Otherwise, I'll just do whatever suits my mood.