Sure, it sounds obvious. But a lot of people don't make any real attempt at not getting hit. And a lot of people play games where there's no reason to make any attempt at not getting hit, because you're going to trade hits with mobs no matter what you do. People might come in thinking this is one of those games. It isn't, even if a lot of people sure act like it is. That's the point of the post.

Yes, a lot of players already know this. But a lot don't.

"I agree to everything said in the OP, except using guns on Lumbers"

A lot depends on the circumstances. If you're in a tightly enclosed space, then yeah, a sword is usually better. If there are several of them and you've got a lot of room to run around, then you could easily end up dodging one only to get whacked by another.

"Most gun puppies can be given the same treatment."

It's pretty trivial to not get hit if you're taking on one or two gun puppies with a gun. With a sword, it's still doable, but harder.

One exception is when a bunch of gun puppies show up at once, such as in the third arena of an arena level, when eight spawn at once, and there are likely some mobs from a previous wave left over. Dodging two gun puppies is easy. Dodging four at once from different angles, not so much. If you're going to get hit anyway, then killing something quickly with a sword to make room to dodge the others makes more sense.

Another exception is rocket puppies in tiers 2 and 3 when they shoot homing missiles. But that's kind of an exception to the whole "you're not supposed to get hit" theme of this thread.

"using sword knock-back to keep from getting hit."

Sometimes that can work. Sometimes it's even a good idea. But sometimes it's risky. What happens if missing with your sword means that you'll get hit, and then you rely on the sword knockback and miss?

"the final attack in a sword combo doesn't just do more damage, but also will cancel a pending enemy attack."

That's why I said "sometimes" you can't finish your combo. Against a wolver or devilite, you can often not merely finish one combo, but then start another one and finish that one, too. Against a gun puppy, the final hit won't interrupt anything unless it kills the mob outright, so if you didn't get the first hit in quickly enough, you'd best not try a third.

If there are several mobs in the area, it's often better to back off more quickly. For example, when fighting a single jelly, it's pretty trivial to hit twice, back off hit twice, back off, and never get hit yourself. If fighting several jellies, the second strike (or even the first!) against one jelly might leave you open to getting hit by another.

"Now the obvious answer is "buy a third weapon slot" but for some people -- especially newbies -- that is not an option."

Tier 1 is pretty forgiving. Once you fill out with two star gear, I'd recommend getting a weapon slot upgrade. It's 250 energy from Boost, and if you have to buy crystal energy with crowns, go ahead and do so. Having the right two star tool for the job is better than having the wrong three star tool for the job.

At the start, that may not be an option for you. I'd go with a sword and a gun at that point, and skip the bomb. Bombs are useful when you're facing a lot of mobs at once, such as in danger rooms, third arenas, jelly palace, or when everyone else in your group is dead. (Or better yet, everyone else in your group is dead at the start of the last phase of the third arena of an arena level, in which case, against many mobs, either you use your bomb or you die.) You shouldn't be doing too much of any of those when you're still very new to the game.

If you get a fourth weapon slot, that lets you have at least one useful weapon of each type in all circumstances, while still carrying some weapons that will simply be the wrong damage type in some circumstances. The "useful" means as opposed to something that does one pure damage type when fighting mobs that are resistant to it. A flourish doesn't work well against constructs, for example, as it's pure piercing damage, so you only get 1/4 damage. Normal or mixed damage type weapons can be useful everywhere. For example, a nightblade isn't that effective against undead mobs that resist the shadow damage, but the normal damage part of the weapon still does full damage, so it still more or less works. The fourth weapon slot adds less utility than the third, though.

"So basically, if you don't have bombs or even guns, you're screwed if more mobs come to attack you."

You start with proto gear, don't you? That works for tier 1, until you can get two star everything--at which point, you get a two star gun and bomb and that will work for tier 2.

"It's impossible with a sword."

Impossible? Usually not. But harder, definitely, in some cases. If you have to use a sword against too many mobs, often you have to sneak in, grab one hit, run away for a while, then rinse and repeat. And if they've got a healer and you're one hit away from dying, well, good luck, but do try to kill the healer first if you can.

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One thing that is kind of the point of this thread, that I should perhaps say more explicitly, is that focusing mainly on doing damage is really doing things wrong. In some games, there's kind of a dichotomy where you could focus more heavily on dealing damage, to kill mobs before they can kill you, or you could focus more heavily on defensive skills, so that mobs can't kill you, and it takes however long it takes to wear them down. For example, in some MMORPGs, you could switch between those basically by how many healers your group brings, and sometimes either approach can work nicely. In Spiral Knights, trying to kill mobs quickly to prevent them from damaging you flatly doesn't work. You have to play defensively in most (but not quite all) non-trivial situations or else you will fail.

"If you're slick about it you can use swords for everything and to great effect."

If you're good enough, you can do tier 3 in proto gear. If you're good enough, then you could probably do the "dauntless delver" perk solo in proto gear, with some careful gate selection. But that does put you at a big disadvantage as compared to more appropriate gear. There are some situations where swords are best, some where it's debatable, and some where a sword only is a definite disadvantage.

In some cases, what's needed is for someone in a party to have a particular item, and not necessarily everyone. For example, if there's a gun puppy in the middle of some spikes, then to have to use a sword only is a huge disadvantage. If only one party member has a gun, then that one party member can kill the gun from a distance while the rest of the group sits there and watches, and from a party-wide perspective, it works.

There are also some cases where it's nice to have different party members using different weapons. In some spots, for example, if a couple other group members are using swords and charging ahead, then I'll stay back and fire away with a gun with no knockback so that we don't trip over each other. If the rest of the group wants to hang back and use guns against exactly the same mobs, then I'll move up and use my sword to hold mobs at bay.

A player who can use swords well and guns well and bombs well has a huge advantage over one who can only use one weapon well and can't use other weapons at all, no matter which weapon that one is.

Some things take more skill to dodge than others. It's kind of like telling a baseball player, if you strike out, you messed up. In one sense, it's true, but that doesn't mean that we expect even the best baseball players to never strike out.

There aren't very many places where you'll have to fight devilites in a tiny enclosed area maybe 6 or 8 blocks across. Usually, they're in larger areas that give you some room to run around. The rotating spikes room that I think you're talking about is huge, for example. If they don't have long enough range to throw things all the way across the room, then even if there are ten devilites in the room, if only two of them are close enough to attack you, then you can ignore all but those two.

If the devilites are spread out such that there are two on one side of the room and six on the other, then you can go to the side with only two. That doesn't mean you'll have to take on the six all bunched up later, as they'll spread out later. After you kill the two that were on one side and the others move around, it may break up as two on one side of the room and four on the other, and you can again go after the two.

If you're in a group, then you can often tell that a lot of the mobs are attacking someone else and not you. Spread out some, and if a devilite attacks a teammate instead of you, then it's pretty unlikely to hit you.

Green and blue devilites won't attack you, so you can ignore them and focus on killing the other devilites first. When it's only green or only blue devilites left, then they'll change to a different type that will attack you. You can often wear them down to just one green and one blue alive before killing one, so that you only get one extra mob that does attack you at the end.

So far, I've really only argued that you often don't have to take on as many at once as it seems at first glance. But sometimes you do have to take on a bunch at once, and that's when it gets harder. There are a handful of fights against devilites where you're basically just going to get hit and have to deal with it. But there aren't very many of them, and even those can be mitigated somewhat.

One thing that helps is to keep moving. A simple random walk algorithm (e.g., pick a direction that you can move at random, move one square, then pick a direction again, move one square, and so forth, without ever stopping) will actually dodge most attacks in this game. Moving intelligently to open space can do better yet. If you're constantly moving around, then you'll "accidentally" dodge most of the devilite attacks that you didn't even see coming.

Another thing that helps is to keep your shield up when you're not attacking. Against a lot of mobs, you can wait for them to give some tell that they're going to attack before you block. Against devilites, waiting to see a particular attack coming before you block doesn't work, as they'll snap off an attack very quickly, and it will hit you before you block. If you were already blocking before you saw some particular attack coming, then when it does come, you block it.

Now, standing there with your shield up will just invite the mobs to hack away and take down your shield. But if you've got your shield up and are moving, then you'll dodge a lot of the attacks, so your shield lasts a lot longer.

Also, when you do let your shield down to attack, make it count. Even an ordinary sword hit will interrupt a devilite. If you get a devilite by itself, then get in at least a full combo, and sometimes you can keep hacking away until it dies entirely. If there are other devilites in the area, it's ideal if you can keep moving while hacking away, rather than pinning your target in a corner, so that you'll likely happen to get out of the way even if other devilites attack. Pinning your target in a corner is more ideal if there aren't other devilites in the area, as that will keep you from wandering into range of others.

Devilites are definitely best attacked with a sword. Just don't try to charge it, as that's begging to be hit while you charge it.

"I personally, and a lot of people I have played with, try to put our shields up the instant we see a mob charging an attack (colored lines)."

If you're never putting your shield up until you see a particular attack that you're trying to block, then you're going to take a ton of unnecessary damage, as often, that's too late. A lot of mobs are predictable timing, so you should largely know when an attack is coming even before they do anything to explicitly tell you. Gun puppies, retrodes, and kats are perhaps the most flagrant of these, but many other mobs are a lesser degree of the same thing.

Against a large group of devilites, maybe you'll have some problems, but that is fairly rare. Against just one, you definitely shouldn't get hit unless you mess up. There's no need to put your shield down at all until you're in melee range at a time that it can't possibly attack. Against two at once, you still usually shouldn't get hit, though I guess if you don't have a strong enough shield, taking a hit every once in a while may be unavoidable.

"It's all serverside crap, which makes blocking in some situations virtually impossible."

Occasionally there are server problems, and yes, that can lead to you getting hit when it's not your fault. But that's really not terribly common. If you're constantly having connection problems in this game, it's on your end. If it's a server problem, it should affect everyone who plays the game, not just you.

"you're making it sound like only idiots who run into mobs hack-and-slashing are the ones that die, while everyone else who plays smart lives, which is in no way the case due to the two reasons above."

Other than against Jelly King (meaning just the boss, and not all of jelly palace) and in danger rooms, I usually don't die at all in tier 2, in an entire run. Sometimes I'll go an entire level without taking damage at all. Once I went five consecutive levels (seven if you count Moorcroft Manor and The Clockworks, which you shouldn't) without taking damage.

Yes, there are some exceptions. But most of the times that people do get hit, it's because they messed up. For that matter, most of the times that I get hit, it's because I messed up, at least if you exclude jelly king and danger rooms (and maybe even if you don't). And I don't get hit that much.

"No you can't. You reach a point where two healers can easily heal far faster than you can possibly deal damage, and it will happen often enough that you can't just use vials to help."

It will take cherry-picking gates and levels. It will probably take some creative pulling to split off healers. It might take running past mobs without killing them at times. And you'd also have to be really, really good to solo tier 3 in proto gear. But I'd be very surprised if it genuinely can't be done at all.

As for tier 2 solo in proto gear without dying, that's definitely possible. Proto shield would probably be rough, but the rest of your gear doesn't determine whether you get hit, but only how many chances mobs have to hit you and how badly it hurts when they do. For that matter, I might have a decent shot at doing it myself, in practice, and not just as a thought experiment. I should try it sometime. But not today, because my gamepad broke. I disassembled it to see if I could fix it, but some rubber piece is torn, so I can't. I should be back in the game in a few days when the replacement arrives.

Right now when I'm doing tier 2, to a considerable degree, I carry whatever gear I want to level that day, especially in the third stratum, and sometimes in the fourth also. But apart from that concern, if doing a fiend-themed stratum, equipping whatever skelly gear you have would be good. Likewise, equipping whatever other gear best counters the theme of other strata would be good. Note that you have to keep the same gear equipped through an entire stratum.