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Variant

Primal Dread

  • -25% XP Gain
  • Can only evolve on the Mutant side
  • Automatically mutate once at the end of each wave
  • 25% chance for an item to mutate when you equip it (bought in the shop or taken from a crate)
Unlock
Available from the start
Winning a run unlocks
Chimera Cells (item)

Build

Community build
Meat Tenderizer is recommended so random item swaps do not ruin the run; the mutation tumour grows strong after about wave 10.
Core weapons and items
Stats to buy
Ranged Damage
Top weapons at the reference profile
Combat Shotgun IV, Machine Gun IV, Minigun IV

Full Variant build

Starting weapons

Pick one of 21 weapons. Weapons marked with a DLC name appear only when that DLC's Item Set is on.

Recent changes

  • 12 November patch: the 50% better-tier mutation was replaced by a 25% chance to mutate an item when equipped. Winning with Variant now unlocks Chimera Cells; Wildfire Mutation is unlocked by default.

How Variant plays

Orange acid pools left by mutant dinosaurs at wave 15.
Official Steam screenshot.

The Variant evolves only toward Mutant and mutates once at the end of every wave. Since 12 November it also has a 25% chance to mutate an item when you equip it from the shop or a crate.

Before that patch it had a 50% chance to replace a mutating item with a mutated item of a better tier. Players complained that useful items were replaced by unwanted ones; that rule is gone, and guides written before 12 November describe the old version.

XP Gain is −25%, so it levels more slowly. Winning now unlocks Chimera Cells. See how mutation works.

Sources

Reviewed against PC 1.2 and the 12 November patch.

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