BL1 - hardcore playthrough?

[x440to220x (Del)]

I see they didn’t fix the money display issue.

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Got in a little time tuesday and wednesday this week. I was very glad to hear that you could move characters over, so I moved Lilly over and continued on. So, a mix of old and new screenshots. Got through Krom’s Canyon and a few of the RCE quests, with no difficulties. I still haven’t been downed at all!

Anarchy upgrade!

Then another, way better anarchy upgrade!

Found the golden chest and decided to open it. This is a bit ridiculous, so I decided not to use the chest for this playthrough. Sold the gun (and the next 5 chests worth) and continued on with my Tediore. This is too inaccurate anyway…

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Played a bunch over the weekend!

Bandit in Jaynestown was using this - not a huge upgrade but I’ll take it!

Hm, 2 minutes later another HF? Why not?

Went back to New Haven to turn in some quests, and…yes, that is 3 Hellfire upgrades in 10 minutes!

Zip back over to Middle of Nowhere and bought this. I never thought much about reload penalties for stocks or mags…until I switched from a 530 to this 440. It’s painful!

I got through Old Haven, Salt Flats, etc. with no surprises. Now - I have intentionally not watched any videos of the new Destroyer fight. At this point I’m feeling a bit…uncomfortable.

Victory!!! Chests are a nice change from the old “lootsplosion”.

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Here’s something I’ve never done before on a one-life playthrough - enter T-Bone Junction! I did get another anarchy upgrade from Marcus’s shop.

It’s been a few years since I’ve actually played through this DLC. From what I remember there are plenty of ways to quickly and definitively die - e.g., driving a vehicle off the edge of a roadway, getting gooped by an ignored drifter, etc.

What I did not remember is how utterly HORRIFYINGLY dangerous the Crimson Lancer vehicles are. I had barely left T-Bone before getting my Monster laser-blasted just about to bits. I decided to hop out and double-stinger it to death.

Bad idea.

Caught a blast to the face and was instantly downed. The Lancer decided to park a couple hundred yards away and continue shooting me while I frantically tried to manage recoil and reloads, as well as having my aim thrown off and vision blocked each time the Lancer fired. I came within a couple pixels of dying, but managed to just barely get up…for an instant. Unfortunately the Lancer’s last shot was en route when I got my second wind, so I was immediately downed again, this time with nothing around.

But! Off in the distance was a lonely Lance Probe that I’d managed to rile up by driving by. Another panicked few seconds of managing recoil and reloads, and I was up again. Hammered the phaselock button, ran to a hidey-hole, and started breathing again!

I’m not sure what to do about the Lancers in the future, except trying to just drive by while frantically praying.

I got through Lockdown Palace with nothing else to report.

[VaultHunter101 (So long, and thanks for all the fish)]

I’m not sure what to do about the Lancers in the future,

As long as you don’t shoot them or drive into them, they usually just ignore you.

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Also - I’m loosely following the pattern laid out in the Ideal Playthrough, which is why I went straight from PT2 vanilla to Knoxx:

The Ideal Playthrough for Borderlands 1

The oldForum link is busted. So here is a copy of the text I retrieved via wayBackMachine. I couldn’t bare to see this gem of a text fade into archives alone. Someone can feel free to dress it up with formatting. I’m starting another playthrough via backwards compatibility on xbox one so I wanted to look it up. My favorite part is this: tl;dr: |Main Game PT 1| --> |Main Game PT 2| --> |Moxxie PT 2| --> |Knoxx PT 2| --> |ZI PT 2| --> |Robolution PT 2| --> |scaled PT 2.5 free-play everywhe…

I’m thinking:

• Knoxx story missions
• Zombie Island
• Robolution
• Knoxx side missions
• Circle of Duty
• Crawmerax
• Underdome, including the 20-rounders which I’ve never done…

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Finished the Knoxx story without any problems…went to visit Ned in his Zombie-guarded treehouse. I’m seriously more excited about this game right now than ever before.

Never fought Knoxx as Lilith before, I think?

No big deal.

From the time-limited armory run! I’d love to have this at max level, so it figures I’d get it now.

Jakobs Cove looks much nicer in the remaster!

[Kurtdawg13 (Loot Whore)]

Off in the distance was a lonely Lance Probe that I’d managed to rile up by driving by. Another panicked few seconds of managing recoil and reloads, and I was up again. Hammered the phaselock button, ran to a hidey-hole, and started breathing again!

■■■■ Dude! I was seriously sweating reading your journey. Nail biter for sure… i can relate to the PW panic button and run to a hiding spot to regen health. lol Good stuff @MeltintheSun

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Finished Zombie Island!

I am starting to actually have some trouble. Undead Ned was pretty rough - I ran out of ammo repeatedly, and my Mercenary COM regen is pretty slow. But, made it in the end!

I really need a gear upgrade - using a Level 43 Defiler, my SMGs are 48, my COM is 34! At level 60-something, I’m really feeling it. I run out of ammo a lot with the double stinger.

I forgot that completing the Claptrap DLC in PT1 gives a skill point, so I sprinted through the rest of that in about 15 minutes.

Started playing through the PT2.5 Claptrap DLC and decided to do some pistol proficiency, since I finally got to 50 with SMGs. It hurts going back so far! I’m now running a plaguebearer COM and using a nearly obsolete Defiler. Not too bad, cause I just gear-swap back to Merc if I need a little help.

I’m worried about fighting MINAC. More worried about that than Craw, honestly.

[bryanswpaulsen]

You are really pulling it off! You are almost there! Keep it up!

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

RIP Lilly, I hate my life. Not really, but when I look back through this thread and note that I just lost more than two months of progress, it’s a little discouraging.

I got through Scorched Snake Canyon (with great difficulty) and was holding off on the idea of going after MINAC. The reason was, I had a REALLY hard time with Steele-trap, and knew that I needed some better guns to get through it. Since I didn’t feel ready I just decided to clean up some side missions for Marcus and the bounty board, and see what I could find along the way.

Got this, tossed it in the backpack as a certain upgrade over my tediore double stinger (level 43). After selling my old gun, I equipped this one to kill some spiderants and…it’s twisted. Dang it, should have checked.

Almost…

No thanks…probably twisted too anyway.

I did not realize you could farm these chests! Seems if you spawn in from the game menu they won’t be here, but if you start anywhere else and travel here…

So I bought this one somewhere…it’s a huge upgrade, because it shoots where I point it.

Some other random stuff, Claptraps are a good source of shotguns…never seen an enemy use a Butcher before!

I wish we didn’t have to kill this guy - he’s pretty cool, and we go in there to waste him for no good reason really…

So, the sad part - while I was collecting meat, herbs, and spices for Marcus, I got careless and was taken out by a Hyperion Grenadier-trap. Just a case of a quick couple shots, not noticing my low health, downed, then the dude casually walks behind a wall and doesn’t burn to death before I bleed out. So lame, after all this time, to die in such a pedestrian fashion.

Because I was level 68, and don’t have a max-level Lilith at all, I decided not to instantly delete the character. It’s a failure as a one-life playthrough, but I think I’ll keep ghost Lilly around. I finished the Claptrap DLC (with no problems, actually) and got to Level 69 just before MINAC.

The MINAC fight is actually made a lot easier due to the minimap. You can see where the stupid Divine Wind claptraps are, before they’re on top of you (because IIRC, you can’t get a second wind from them even if there are a bunch).

So, right after bad luck Bryan @bryanswpaulsen sends me some encouragement…

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Well, I deleted the old Lilith…by accident. I was farming the gift shop, got bored, decided to start a new character, and unintentionally nuked the wrong save file. No biggie, playing that file felt pointless…

started a new one, naturally. I wanted to use the 4-player slider this time, because using that is really fun. Plus, it would force me to be even more careful, and carelessness is what always kills me in the end. Unfortunately, the 4-player slider doesn’t work on the remaster.

What I will be doing is ditching most side missions and staying on level with the main story, and then going straight from PT1 to PT2 because I don’t care about backpack space. It wasn’t fun being drastically overleveled for much of the game, and the difficulty spike once I got through Knoxx was unexpected.

So far, made it to the Arid Hills. As usual, no issues yet.

[bryanswpaulsen]

After the main story of Part 2 I just level straight to the cap (The Lost Cave is mindlessly easy experience farming regardless of gear quality and you can loot 2 chests without getting attacked once the Crab Worms are dealt with), then farm Crimson Fastness for endgame gear (dangerous when your gear is awful, but exercising caution solves this). It does mean Knoxx is way under leveled until after the first armory run, but I can’t be bothered to make it more challenging. The other DLCs are all on level at that point. I suppose if you were very determined to make Knoxx challenging you could start it when it is level appropriate, do the first armory run, then just grind to the level cap.

Different strokes for different folks and all that.

Hopefully this one goes better for you.

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Yeah, different strokes. I found it a little unsatisfying being so overleveled, especially in PT2 where I started out 10+ levels over. I wouldn’t want to be over through Knoxx - the challenges I faced there were a welcome but terrifying change. Even though it makes it more likely that I’ll fail to reach my goal, I think it’s worth it.

Looking on the other thread, it seems that the 4-player slider is going to be updated. That’s cool…I’ll stick to not overleveling this time, and maybe try that next.

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

I got in a bunch of time this week, sent out on a trip for work. I added two more quick careless deaths:

• PT1 Mad Mel, the farm for a decent weapon was taking forever, so I went in with a Barrel 2 double SMG. Well, it’s too inaccurate to do much damage to MM, but more importantly it’s too inaccurate to kill the distant psychos that if left unchecked will constantly rain buzz axes on you, preventing shield recharge. Eventually he took me down.
• PT1 badass skag in Skag Gully, in that Bladeflower Seeds area where you have to jump in so can’t backtrack. Just lazy and hurried.

Right now I just finished PT1 on a new Lilith. I tried very hard to stay on-level with the story quests, with success through Master McCloud. He’s at 32 and the Destroyer is 33, but just fighting through the Crimson Fastness, Enclave, Descent, and Promontory got me all the way to 36. Kind of a bummer - that much over makes the Destroyer fight a piece of cake.

On to PT2! Doing the DLC now will overlevel me too much. I’ll sprint through Robolution later for the skill point, once I’m nearing the end of PT2 vanilla. I don’t care enough about backpack space to to Zombie Island.

Some photos:

Found this in a skag pile before you even get to Zed’s in Fyrestone. This is kind of bizarre - level 19 grenade mod at level 2!

I also got an on-level grenade mod drop prior to Nine Toes. I don’t think I’ve ever seen this before, and he didn’t like having these stuck to his chest!

Bought this from Marcus, it served as my destroyer killer:

Cool…on to PT2!

[bryanswpaulsen]

It’s possible your attempt to keep on level will raise your awareness to the point you won’t engage in risky play as much.

It’s good to hear you got another Lilith with the potential to get it done!

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

That’s the idea…though, it didnt make much difference, since I still ended at the same level as doing all the quests.

It’s a step up - then doing 4-player would be another challenge in itself. 2-3 times the badasses, everything has double health. Skag gully will be tough.

[FlamesForAll (It's a SIEGE profile picture!)]

You have my respect, admiration, and amazement!

@MeltintheSun

[bryanswpaulsen]

I have never given any thought to 4-player difficulty.

It could be something worth considering. On first thought it seems like riding elemental DoT to victory would be more necessary. Not my cup of tea with Brick, but doable.

[MeltintheSun (kills Craw with Knoxx's Gold)]

Made a little progress, so I’m now farming up a good weapon to take on Mad Mel.

I can never resist a few quick runs on the high-AL safehouse chest. This thing is, frankly, just unfair to all the bad guys. Problem is, it doesn’t exactly encourage careful play…