???

im pretty sure it can be any difficulty, though for most speedruns recommended is violent or brutal since enemies move faster on those difficulties, some speedruns require harmless tho due to the extra hp

just play whatever difficulty works well for you

^ this exactly, violent is preferable for both any% and p% fullgame and most levels because of enemy movespeed (more instakills, etc)

harmless is better for nomo because of extra hp and stamina refill, brutal is rarely used for IL of fullgame runs

how come brutal is barely used, do the enemy changes make runs more inconvenient/slower

i havent really been here for a while, i just got back into posting ultrakill runs today

harder instakills and higher boss hp + more factors that i forgot lol

what about standard? Would that be a good difficulty to run?

harder instakills and higher boss hp + more factors that i forgot lol

ahh yeah i actually noticed the higher boss hp when doing 1-4 runs

what about standard? Would that be a good difficulty to run?

standard works fine from what ive seen

Anyone can run any difficulty they want, however if we're talking optimal difficulties it depends on the level, the category and or the enemies. Standard and Lenient specifically are almost never used since they are more of a bridge between violent and harmless and don't really offer any unique benefits. Harmless is always faster if there's no enemies to kill or very few as well as being good on some boss levels thanks to more health and faster stamina regen. (Also its basically THE option for NoMo or NoMoW runs) Violent is usually always faster if you have to do an arena fight that you can't clear in less than a second and depending on the enemies can be better than Brutal due to some changes made to make it harder. Brutal is a bit more situationally faster as a few enemies attack speed and movement speed is increased but some enemies also get changed so they are harder to kill for example mindflayers don't take damage from their projectiles anymore so you can't do the standard instakill method and you can't bait out a guttertank parry (unless you spray gasoline under them first) which could lead to a faster kill in some cases as well as boss fights being objectively slower on brutal because of the health increase. All this to say optimal difficulty is highly dependent on the level, the category and the enemies you are fighting.

thanks alot lifesaver

just asking let's say you get the world record time for p-1 but it's on harmless would it still count?

Any difficulty counts, we don't separate boards based on difficulty. (yet, supposedly this is going to be changed later down the line but not right now.)

All this to say optimal difficulty is highly dependent on the level, the category and the enemies you are fighting.

so, this means violent is the best for 5-1 p rank runs, because of the faster instakills? is that right

world record for p-1 on harmless I'm coming for you

I think more boss life and more difficult instakills.