So I am giving the Deathless run a look at right now and will probably give it some more serious thoughts after GDQ. For some reason I am unable to get dunnius's video to play.

Some of the route differences I was considering from Any%:
-Potentially pickup 6 rations after getting captured on the way back to building 1 and then would pickup the balance of needed rations before the canal sequence (I haven't done the math yet how many are needed in a decent run to see if getting them before the tank is enough).

-Substitute the the POW behind twinshot for the one to the right of the canal to save on all the distance between the elevator.

-I'm not sure of the quickest way to the final building yet, Is it walking past the tank and truck teleporting around or potentially grabbing the compass and going up by the trained scorpions.

I'm sure there are other subtle things I am missing, but are there other major strategies that should be used in a deathless run?

I think you need 7-8 rations to comfortably make it through the canal.

Good timesave idea on the hostage behind the twins.

All depends on where you are at in the run, a deathless route would seem to favor the trucks, unless you just happen to be ready for endgame as you are near the canal, which would seem likely. Walking all the way out of building 2 from the canal, then down to the truck, would be slower than just exiting in the back through card 7 and crossing the desert. Getting the compass does require additional trancreceiver calls though.

I'm going to have to do some timing after GDQ or maybe before if I get a chance to see what would be faster for routing.

So I just did some very basic testing - Looks like switching out twinshot is about a 15 second time save. I don't think there is any other out of the way POW that would save more time.

Going through the desert and getting the compass seems to be maybe about 10 seconds faster. Though that was fairly non optimal on grabbing the compass. .

Apparently Twitch messed that video up quite a bit. You can play the video if you start from around 9 minutes in, and the audio is badly descynced, and is missing occasionally. The video is fine though so you can at least see the route. Of course there are plenty of things that are out of date, so I will have to get this redone.

It is possible to do the entire run with 9 rations (and they were all needed because of the deep water), so getting all the rations in the truck after doing the rooftop is the fastest. The rations should be obtained all at once to minimize the amount of time in detour. Screen transitions take lots of time.

My run already skips the twinshot prisoner. I did a proper timing today, and the twinshot prisoner plus walkback is about 15 seconds slower than the building 2 floor 1 prisoner. By the way, in an any% both prisoners take roughly the same amount of time, with a very slight edge towards the building 2 one. The twinshot prisoner is easier because damage is not a concern, whereas building 2 damage needs to be minimized, which is easier if there is less building 2 to traverse. And that section is not very friendly.

I also timed both routes to the final building. Getting the compass costs about 45 seconds, but the desert route is faster by about 67 seconds, so that route is faster by around 22 seconds.