Gauntlet/Enemies

Generators
Generators are the primary threat to your survival. While some monsters already exist in each level, most appear from these. Enemies are generated out of the 8 directions around the generator.

There are two types: bones and blocks. Ghosts spawn from bones, while everything else spawns from blocks. There are a couple of differences between the two types. One is that bones can be destroyed by enemy fire from Lobbers or Demons, while blocks can only be weakened by them. The other difference is that bones are slightly more resistant to the Valkyrie's magic than blocks are.

Generators come in 3 levels: 1, 2, and 3. The level of the generator dictates the level and strength of the monsters spawned from it. The hitpoints of a generator are equal to its level; the level of the generator (and its spawn) will be reduced as its HP is reduced by attacks.

You can usually melee a generator, but shots are far more effective.

Enemies
A single enemy usually isn't too dangerous, but a pack can be deadly.

Like generators, enemies come in 3 levels, with the level being equivalent to that of the generator that made them. The higher the level, the more HP they have and the more damage they'll deal out.

Enemies will zig-zag as they walk toward you if you aren't completely squared with a given row or column of tiles. This can make it difficult to land a hit, and a missed shot can leave you defenseless for a few precious milliseconds. Make use of choke-points or hug walls to prevent this if you can. Otherwise, consider tapping the fire button instead of holding it to control it more precisely.

Ghosts
Unlike other enemies, Ghosts can't fight - they just kamikaze into you, which is far more dangerous. By destroying themselves, they permit instant access to the next Ghost in line. Worse, they deal much more damage on contact than a melee attack: 10, 20, and 30 base damage respective to their level. The result is a very high rate of damage.

Ghosts are arguably the hardest to deal with. You will need to be extra cautious in dealing with them, lest they slip past your defenses and sap your health.

Grunts
Grunts are low tier enemies who simply attack repeatedly with their clubs when standing next to you. If surrounded, a fighter may be better off using melee attacks to cut a path to freedom, since aiming at each manually is difficult.

Demons
Demons are basically grunts that can also shoot fireballs across great distances. Demon shots, however, do 10 damage regardless of their level. Up close, they bite as hard as Grunts' clubs hit.

Demon fireballs will damage anything. They will also open fire if they are in range, no matter what is in the way. Take care not to accidentally train their shots onto breakable jugs of food or blue potions; their shots destroy such items (and their shots don't activate potions either). Instead, train their shots onto enemies and generators to damage or destroy them.

Sorcerers
These enemies blink in and out of existence at will. Shots will pass through them while invisible, making individuals more difficult to hit. Although this can be annoying, as it allows some of them to get in melee range, it also leaves their generator less well defended, as well as allowing other sorcerers to get hit by your shots.

Lobbers
These cowardly enemies can throw rocks quite a distance, even over walls. They have no melee attack however, so once you get within about three tiles of them they will stop lobbing and start running.

Their rocks only do 3 base damage, regardless of level, making them one of the weaker enemies offensively. However, they are often situated behind barriers, meaning you'll have to deal with them for a while. The damage does add up fairly quickly if several can get a bead on you at once.

Lobber rocks can also destroy potions, food, and other enemies. Because they can be thrown over walls, it's possible to hit almost anything if you can train them. The Lobbers have a strange lead-off AI that doesn't consider walls, and can't predict erratic movements. It takes some getting used to, but would be wise to learn since you can take out threats that would otherwise cause you much grief.

Luckily, Lobber generators are not as common as other generators.

Death
Death, a special enemy that is never generated, cannot be slowed by fighting or shooting it. However, any type of potion attack will kill it instantly, no matter how weak.

When it makes any contact with a player, regardless of that character's armor, it saps HP rapidly until either contact is broken, or it reaches the limit of 200 health and disappears. As this is a considerable amount of health, either use a potion or, if you can get a sufficiently open space, dodge around it (obviously easier said than done for Thor).

Shooting Death only gives a single point for every hit. In and of itself, not very lucrative, even if you can do this from safety. However, what is very lucrative for scoring is using a potion on Death. By default, you score 1000 points. There is actually a variable points value for killing Death with a potion. Every time you hit Death with a shot, you cycle the value. By default, it is 1000 points. The full cycle is, starting from default: 1000, 2000, 1000, 4000, 2000, 6000, 8000, and then back to the default 1000. If you want to get the most points, shoot death exactly 6 times.

Some levels have around 30-50 Deaths in a single location. Suffice to say, setting them to 8000 points and using a potion on the lot of them is such a treasure trove of points, that you should try to set your level order up so that you'll get these Death filled levels when most of the food has disappeared due to an already high score.

Thieves
The Thief is a very fast enemy that appears in some levels later on in the game. He does 10 points of damage, and also steals something from you, depending on what you have. If you have any upgrade potions, you will lose those first. If you don't have any of those, he might nick your potions, keys, score, or multiplayer bonus multiplier.

The Thief spawns at the beginning of the level, and follows the path of the 'richest' character. If you hear the Thief tone, get into a choke-point, turn around, and start shooting, he will run right into your shot, and leave behind a treasure bag worth 500 points.

If you get robbed, you can kill the Thief right away to recover what he stole. If he exits safely, you can find your stolen item on the next level. Unfortunately, upgrade potions get downgraded to mere regular potions when stolen (although, in the late-game phase, this can actually be helpful to obtain another regular potion to clear an area).

Thieves are not generated, they just spawn once every few levels.