Would it be possible to have a talent (or something to buy with rubies, once you implement more uses for them) that shortens the transition between stages? I spend more time changing stages than I spend on actually completing the stage requirements, some way to reduce the transition time would help immensely in speeding up runs.

Make it very expensive if you want, but I think it would be a nice addition for a lot of people.

Previously, I might have said "Okay, the transition wait time is...kind of annoying, but not too big a deal", but NOW, with the introduction of Wolf King, I have to side 100% with Teschio. So in regards o ideas to speed up the process...

-Remove the "move to the right side of the screen" animation, instead having the process JUST be the wipe. Toggleable, of course. Saves about 1 second.

-It's much less visually flashy and a little jarring, but just...insta-transition. Just "blip" to the next screen. Maybe implement a pre-load function so the game loads the next area the moment you enter the current one, that way there's no need for the wipe to allow load times between areas. Again, visually, it would look a bit awkward, but this would be an optional feature for if the player wanted it this way. Saves about 3 seconds (transition happens after "Area complete!")

-If you still don't want to reduce the transition length, then just bump Wolf King's ability up to 6 seconds to last long enough between transitions.

At the moment, respecing would cost me more than 50mil, but you know what? Worth it. If that 4-second transition time was cut down to 2 seconds by the maxed talent, that's saving me 2 seconds per 1559 non-sprinted areas, which is 3118 seconds, about 52 minutes. If the reduction also affected sprint areas, that's 2059 areas, 4118 seconds, about 68.5 minutes. That'd shave a whole FIFTH of an entire run's time off. I'd make that 50mil back pretty fast with 4-hour runs.

I'm at 585M idols, and obviously I've unlocked the increased DPS cap. 2059 is currently the highest area achievable in World's Wake since 2060 is where the boss hits infinite HP again. I'll include a screenshot of my full-DPS formation and my current talent levels to minimize typing lol

Once I've reaches the my level cap and have begun switching out speed/gold crusaders for DPS crusaders, my end-of-run formation looks like this: https://imgur.com/a/lLFUDG2

All my crusaders in use have at least level 7 legendary gear, with the exception of Milgrid and Baenarall (when she's in my formation) since neither of them have female/human/global DPS buffs relative to my setup. Exchange Student only has her glasses leveled up, and is benefiting from Storm Rider's buff used by Frosty with a level-9 pipe. Materials for leveling up gear are given priority toward dual-use effects (anything Mindy can mimic doubles down on every effect-level gained, and Storm Rider also being used for Exchange Student's ability), so items like Frosty's pipe (Storm Rider buff) and Veronica's armguard (for Precise Aim) are 2 levels above most others (currently my average legendary gear level is 7 or 8).

Talents: https://imgur.com/a/FkvZmed

Priority given to "10k Training" to increase level cap, "Bonus Training" remains at 3 since Chiyome stops benefiting from it after that. After that, level "Cheer Squad" and "Valuable Experience" a few times until they each begin costing 1mil+. Once they hit level 10, each level only effectively increases your DPS by 10% and slightly reduces each level (level 10 = 10%, level 11 = 9%, etc), so that's when "Every Little Bit Helps" shines like a supernova. Insanely cheap, stacks multiplicatively 5% at a time, and can be bought in massive quantities. If you can either buy 12 levels with ELBH or buy 2 levels from Cheer Squad, go with the former. Like mentioned before, Cheer Squad might get you 10% more damage, then 9% more damage, for approximately a 20% overall difference, ELBH is multiplicative, so 12 levels would be about an 80% buff.

Rule of thumb: ELBH will ALWAYS be way, waaaay more powerful and cost-effective as long as the cost of one of it's levels is at most sliiiiiightly below the cost of Cheer Squad or Valuable Experience. At level 118, the talent still barely costs 300k per level and currently buffs me for 31.5K%. This talent, alone, is a massive DPS buff. 'Mission Adrenaline" is just a little helpful extra, as the effect does stack additively. Less priority, but still good to have hover at least around 50-100% per stack if you've got the spare idols. If you're doing missions anyway, nice to have 1500% more DPS

I like Chiyome as a DPSer because many speed crusaders synergize with her VERY well.

Crusaders that either have human-based legendary buffs, female-based, or easy-positioning-based ("4 adjacent crusaders") are Mindy, Billy, Penny, and Casey, all of which are good speed crusaders. Sjin adds speed and can easily be placed beside Chiyome for his buff. Overall, Chiyome just meshes extremely well with lots - nearly all - of the speed crusaders while also having easy-to-activate legendary abilities for herself.

Roboqueen's extra levels do make a sizable difference, but like you said, there is nowhere NEAR as much support for her.

Chiyome working best in the back row also works out very well with Pete the Carney, letting his Bad Joke ability actually affect her, as well as the fact that one of Mindy's legendaries is tied to Pete being in the formation.

For reference, this is my formation for the majority of a run: https://imgur.com/a/DF6qmwN

Mostly focusing on speed. As you can see, only Chiyome and Milgrid are non-speed crusaders, and I still get loads of DPS out of all this. Once I begin not insta-killing, the order I swap out crusaders is...

-Swap Turps with Pete the Carney, and switch the positions of Milgrid and Billy (Pete's DPS buffs keep the formation going long enough for Mindy to mimic Milgrid without the formation wiping), use "Level All" once my gold is high enough to max everyone

-Swap Baenarall for Veronica, then switch the positions of Veronica with Rex (So Rex ends up where Baenarall was, and Mindy mimics Veronica)

-Swap Rex for Sisaron, then switch the positions of Sisaron and Casey (so Casey is where Rex was, and Sisaron is adjacent to Chiyome)

-Swap Sjin for Exchange Student

-Swap Billy for Agent 79, which buffs damage a bit, but more importantly, let her projectile buffs carry me a while longer. This lets me EASILY beat 2055, so even if your DPS is a bit lower than mine, you should still manage to get at least somewhere near

VERY relevant improvement. Still not at 2059 (I also have lower talents, though, since I have less idols), but I used to get 1960 with my old formation, and this one is well over 2000. The interesting thing is, Chiyome caps MUCH before Roboqueen used to do (and by that I mean, at least 100 areas before), but still keeps on going for a lot longer. I was deceived by level cap, the sum of all legendary bonuses gives a bigger boost than what I thought. Thanks for the tips!