Mental difficulty has a unique mechanic nicknamed "Bad Things" (called that way during difficulty selection and by the creator BlacKcuD in the patch notes introducing Mental). Every 31 minutes or whenever a player dies, random negative events will occur in addition to everything else. The twist: everytime bad things happen, they become worse.
Bad Things Occurrence
Bad things happen whenever 31 minutes of ingame time have passed and whenever a player's hero dies.
Mental Bad Things Severity
The actual severity of "bad things" ranges from simple Roach drops to multiple enhanced bosses spawning at the same time. Random events between the minimum and maximum severity level will happen. The minimum and maximum severity of events to happen will go up, everytime bad things are triggered. Maximum severity rises 2x faster than minimum severity. For example, after 31 minutes and 3 player deaths, maximum severity is 4 and minium severity is 2.
Possible Events by Severity
Maximum severity starts at 1 and goes up every 31 minutes or whenever someone dies. Minimum severity will grow slower, but ultimately lead to only the stronger events happening. Starting maximum and minimum severity is 1. Here is a list of possible events by severity:
- Roach Drop Pods
- Aberation Drop Pods
- Raptor Zergling Attack
- Spine Crawler Drop Pods
- Single weak random event (Zergling, Roach or Aberation Drop Pods)
- Hive Guardian attack wave
- Single weak random event
- Two stronger random events (Broodlords, Guardians, Spine Crawler or Roach Drop Pods, Mega Banelings)
- One stronger Brutalisk spawns (increased damage, armor, life and movement speed)
- One stronger Omegalisk spawns
- Two regular Omegalisks spawn
- Hive Guardian attack wave
- Two regular Brutalisks spawn
- Hive Guardian attack wave
- One stronger Brutalisk spawns
- One stronger Omegalisk spawns
- - 20. Insanely strong and fast Omegalisk and Brutalisks spawn (heavily increased speed, quadrupple damage, life and armor)
When additional Burtalisks or Omegalisks spawn, they have to be handled and killed before the map is set to complete. A good group with a skilled Predator can eventually overcome them, but it will cost them a lot of time.