Contents
All Characters Strategies
All Characters Strategies
Aliases: AC
Overview and Setup
Before starting a run, this guide assumes the player has the Spelunky RTA Tracker set up. Make sure to be able to quickly reset to a clean save file before every attempt.
There are 16 characters that can be unlocked, broadly categorized into 4 categories:
- Two of these are unlocked after defeating Olmec and Yama respectively;
- Six of these are unlocked in specific levels;
- Four of these are unlocked in specific level feelings.
- Four of these spawn randomly in each of the four zones (Mines, Jungle, Ice Caves, Temple) respectively;
The player will also want to unlock all the shortcuts to grind for the final random character in the Temple. See the ASO guide for more details.
In any given run, only one character can be unlocked (except for Jungle Warrior and Yang). Therefore, the general recommended course of action is to End Adventure immediately after unlocking a new character, unless the run needs to continue for a Tunnel Man delivery or an Olmec/Hell win. This also means that once a player encounters a coffin during a run, they will not find any different characters regardless of whether the coffin was opened or not.
Olmec and Yama wins
The Jungle Warrior is unlocked after an Olmec win, and Yang is unlocked after a Hell win. These are the two exceptions to the "one character per run" rule, and it is best to pair these with the Ninja and Au respectively.
Specific level characters
There are six characters than spawn in specific levels, which may or may not be consistently found:
- Van Horsing: Haunted Castle (consistent)
- Meat Boy: Worm (consistent)
- Robot: Mothership (consistent)
- Ninja: Olmec's attic (consistent)
- Cyclops: Black Market (inconsistent)
- Au: City of Gold (inconsistent)
The cyclops can fail to spawn if the Black Market has no Hired Help shops. Au can fail to spawn if the City of Gold layout overwrites the coffin subroom with the entrance subroom (which has a 1/4 chance of occurring). There is unfortunately no counterplay to either of these scenarios.
Specific level feeling characters
There are four characters which are found in levels with level feelings:
- Round Girl: "My skin is crawling..." level feeling
- Viking: "I hear the sound of rushing water...." level feeling
- Round Boy: Tiki Villages
- Eskimo: "It smells like wet fur in here!" level feeling
It is recommended to get these unlocked as soon as possible, so that they do not interfere with the search for other characters.
Sometimes, the coffin may fail to spawn on the level, due to level generation or enemy placement. In this case, the coffin will spawn on the following level.
The Randos
Yellow, Cyan, Lime, Purple
The final category of characters is the four characters whose coffins spawn randomly in the Mines, Jungle, Ice Caves, and Temple levels, which are referred to as the "randos." These spawn either on the main path or adjacent to it, and can be found in any regular level. The order of the characters is randomized and inconsequential (so for example, Yellow could be the first of the four randos to be unlocked, or it could be the last), but zones in which the coffins are found are always in order of Mines, Jungle, Ice Caves, and Temple.
The character coffins spawn randomly, and the probability is dependent on the number of total deaths the players has tallied up to that point. The formulas are as follows:
- Mines: 1 / (51 - #deaths), with 1/9 chance after 42 deaths
- Jungle: 1 / (101 - #deaths), with 1/9 chance after 42 deaths
- Ice Caves: 1 / (201 - #deaths), with 1/9 chance after 192 deaths
- Temple: 1 / (301 - #deaths), with 1/9 chance after 292 deaths
As the required death count can be high, it is generally recommend to grind out resets before seeking the coffins, getting the other non-rando coffins out of the way whenever possible.