You still have that Cobalt armor coupling from earlier, now you have its matching shield: Defender. It also has more defense than your current shield and also gives you even more piercing. You still need to mind getting hit, because death is bad, but you can now take two hard attacks instead of just one. Whether that one deflection matters is entirely situational but most of the time it means not taking the hit. Like all shields you can use it to defend against attacks as the name implies. Shields can also be used to bump enemies away from you but I will leave tactics others have addressed out of this. You have a better shield now, rejoice. It may not have any status resistance or anything special, but you got it for free; not much to complain about. Just like the Cobalt armor you get the recipes for free throughout the mission storyline. You get free stuff for playing the game. I want to know why beggars exist when this system practically rewards them for having the initiative to reward themselves. But I digress, Cobalt is not so great later on anyway; it is still useful, but for most it simply does not satisfy what everyone wants in armor. The shield has decent defense, though. The armor may not be so great but the shield is worth keeping around.

Originally this was going to be Cutter or Autogun, but since the mission update this sword has become fairly common. Yes, the classic we-are-not-copying-Zelda-at-all sword with the same old three hit combo in the same old bland sword design until you upgrade it more; however, there is one thing you have over almost everyone else: your spinning charge attack. Just do the twist.

Unlike those other wimpy swords which allow the user to hide in coward-land, you get to run right in the middle of everything and spin all over their hind quarters. Calibur can deal the damage from the spinning charge attack three times at the most, determined by whether the target is still close enough to hit as your spinning is too dazzling for those idiots to handle standing next to you. The solution? Find somewhere you can spin on them without blasting them to China. Like a wall. If it is something immobile like a turret then you are in luck, just do the twist and they explode in wimpiness; what are they going to do, spin more than you? What a joke. You own this dance. They are all sissies. Leviathan line is part of the Cobalt seriesesieses and its recipes are also given to you for free, so you get a sword for cheap that lets you dance all you want. Come on and twist, yeah, baby, twist.

For those a little more easy going, there is an option for you to still spin. Vanquisher line gives up a little damage, most of its knockback, and has some undead family bonus. You may not blast enemies to China, but Hawaii is still pretty far. Your damage may not be the best, but your sword has chains on it and you are not recklessly throwing enemies everywhere, meaning less chance to interfere with distance based allies. Even if they are hiding like little babies.

Be careful where you spin. Similar to the Blast lines, you still knock enemies away from the epicenter; that epicenter is you. Try not to upset dad, he just woke up from his nap. He would probably belt Leviathan if he catches him spinning recklessly. Vanquisher is just a little mischievous but normally he disappoints everyone from his slightly lower damage. He has to hold himself back to not become another Leviathan.

I know what you are thinking. It has a five swing combo, each swing has an after-hit which deals a little extra damage, and you can spam this thing everywhere anywhere all the time forever always. Sure, in lower tiers you might enjoy rolling around and slapping everything in the face, but at the end of the day all you have is a dagger. Yes, we do have daggers in this game; but there is no dual wielding, you just get one. Not that you have any reason to complain. Your basic attack combo is basically ten hits. What more could you want? The charge attack is pretty bad, but the basic attack is what you are using this sword for. The charge attack is only useful on a target which is not moving, not attacking, and basically just sitting there doing absolutely nothing. Which is almost never. The basic attack, on the other hand, lets you flail around all you want while the enemy is trying to face you to retaliate. Use this speed to your advantage. Try not to get trapped by a crowd of enemies, you have no knockback unlike the spin on Calibur or push on Blast.

Unlike Blaster but similar to Calibur, you have two options when upgrading this: Dread Venom or Wild Hunting.

Venom has no particular special effects, but it has a chance to poison the target on any of its hits. Poison decreases defense of the afflicted by a fourth, reduces their attack damage by a third, and completely prevents healing. Little do most know this weapon is intended for "assassin" tactics, sneaking up behind someone and derping out a spasm of slashes to poison the oblivious idiot. Trojans are a fun target to do this on. All you need to do is trick it into attacking, but be sure to get out of the way before the sword comes down and knocks you to India. When they are trying to lift that sword off the floor, because it is very heavy, their vulnerable back is completely exposed for some surprise action. If this does not shame them enough to commit suicide, you probably poisoned them anyway; they do less damage in case you do get hit and they take more damage. You win either way.

Wild Hunting is a little different. You have no status affliction ability like Dread Venom, but you have a bonus against beast family; lizards, Wolvers, those silly things. To be honest, Wild Hunting is more of a decoration than a weapon compared to Dread Venom; your attacks have pretty little animations, but in reality there are other weapons which outclass this thing immensely. If you still want to use this thing you basically do the same thing as with Dread Venom, but without the poison.

This weapon is best used against less targets at once since you have almost no area of effect or crowd control ability, but on a single target they are the one who has to bend over.

You probably looked back at that old Blast and thought to yourself: "Why are you not useful for me? I just wanted to blow everything into tiny pants." Dry those tears, you have hope yet to be gained in bombing even if you only want to use it as a sidearm. Vaporizers are the status based bombs. They take a second longer than the standard charge time (five seconds) but you get a little cloud that inflicts the suiting status for a few seconds. Amazing! Now those burning Oilers can be cooled off without having to kill them first. At first the cloud is too puny and short lived to satisfy, but later on you can walk into the same bar as earlier and stink up the place with a Venom Veiler or burn the whole place down with Ash of Agni. Actually, there are several statuses to choose from: fire, shock, freeze, poison, and stun. Unfortunately collecting them all does not win you a prize. There is also no option to combine them into a giant robot which belches statuses in the faces of your enemies, although that would be interesting. Since all Vaporizer bombs have the same mechanic I am forced to discuss how the status is used. For the mechanic itself, basically you are using it to inflict a certain status on the giant crowd of targets chasing after you; once the cloud is set, it only takes a couple seconds to trigger. If the target is affiliated with a certain status they are immune to it. Technically this bomb does have an offensive use, but the damaging effect only occurs when the bomb detonates in a single space radius around the epicenter upon detonation. It can still be used to attack, but the main focus of this weapon is the giant mist cloud.

Everyone likes doing more damage. Fire likes to deal damage. Make some damage babies or something. Ash of Agni is the fire Vaporizer line, burning down those morons chasing you for kicks. It may not have any fancy mobility or bonus effect like the others, but everything would have burned to death already. Usually this weapon is avoided for its lack of support utility, but against a dozen or so Mecha Knights this thing melts their metal until they are all squishy. Fire deals damage to a small area of effect around the afflicted, approximately in a 0.3 space radius; do not stand on top of someone burning. If they ask you to join in a group picture run away from them.

Zap. Spasm. Run. Zap. Spasm. Run. Repeat. That is Voltaic Tempest. Unlike most of the other Vaporizers, Voltaic line starts as a token reward from the Roarmulus boss. You have to fight the giant turrets a few times or buy the baby static shenanigan from someone who did. If fire and freeze had a baby, it would be shock; you get the constant damage of fire, but not as much, and the mobility crippling of freeze, but only sometimes. The key point of this status is the complete incapacitation phases when the status ticks, or when it takes effect every second; the afflicted spasms, during which they take a little damage from the status and are completely out of control of themself. All they can do is stand there. If it just stopped the afflicted from moving it would be the perfect middle ground between fire and freeze, but instead it completely stops whatever they thought they were doing. This also dominates Kats of all ages, preventing them from moving at all; Kats have to move before they can attack, so take one of these whenever you feel like getting the Kat back in the bag. Similar to fire, shock also has a small area of effect for the damage. In fact, it counts as an attack; if an afflicted enemy stands next to a box in range of the effect it will break it.

Since I already referenced it, the freeze line of Vaporizer bombs is Shivermist Buster. This is the most commonly used one because its status completely stops movement so long as the afflicted is frozen, but if thawed by being attacked or over time they are free as a bird. A killer bird of death that wants to eat you. Usually this Vaporizer is used in support of someone else using an Autogun, keeping the target stuck while the Autogun brings the pain. Unlike shock, you can still attack and shield while frozen; but no turning or moving. Also, to be thawed you do not have to be attacked by something that damages you; an ally can take a swing and you bust right out. By the same token targets frozen can not be moved without being thawed, so try not to trap an ally by surrounding them with enemies then freezing them. If they stole your milk money when you were a kid then do it anyway. If the afflicted is allowed to stay frozen until the status wears off they take a single, larger hit from the status. Freeze something, leave it for a while, come back when room temperature; serves one to four.

Poison. This may be the most underestimated status, though stun rivals it fairly well. It may not deal damage like the three above, but it does lower enemy stats and completely prevent healing while in effect. More specifically, one fourth of their defense and one third of their attack are confiscated from them. That does not mean you get to use those values, but that target is now more vulnerable and deals less damage until the effect wears off. It is also unhealable. That means no more of those pesky butterflies or medics. In fact, poison those too; they should be the first to die. Shut up, medics, I have a status that makes you useless. Similar to freeze this status is best used in support tactics, such as crippling a giant crowd of targets before someone else comes in and beats them all into various geometrical shapes.

Supposedly stun is still a broken status, though the last time I checked with my Sudaruska it works fine. That was a couple weeks ago. Anyway, the stun line Stagger Storm can only be obtained through Krogmo minigame rewards. You have to do silly minigames before you can play with this one. The shock Vaporizer comes from Roarmulus and the other Vaporizers are crafted as normal equipment. Ha, normal. Hipsters have no need for normality. Stun slows down reality for the afflicted in every way: movement and actions. Running is slower, attacks are slower, everything is slower. Someone came up to you and broke time. From what I have seen, this is the most rarely used Vaporizer of the bunch. It may not be the best or easiest to obtain, but for collectors this is the last one they need to form the giant belching robot mentioned earlier.

But since the only way that would be helpful is if an enemy medic is stupid or if you throw a sleep vial at it, derp.

Five things when I only promised three, this means I have time for other shenanigans. Like rolling around on the floor.

I know what you are thinking. This is just Defender with some sword damage with a little less defense. And you would be right, that is exactly what this is; the difference is obtaining it is more difficult. Not that getting things for free is difficult compared to anything, but compared to the average crafted item this is one of the bigger dogs.

Bristling Buckler is, as previously mentioned, a slightly lower defense version of Defender line; however, instead of giving defense somewhere else it gives you a sword damage bonus instead. Lovely. If you do not like to use swords for your primary weapon Defender would be better for you if you still want a decent and cheap shield with normal and pierce defense, but in this house we are going to talk about Bristling Buckler or you are grounded for a week. With no dessert. Or lemons. This shield is obtained by exchanging some tokens obtained by defeating Snarbolax a few times at Brinks, along with a couple weapons we will discuss later. That means not now. Seeing as swords are the most commonly used weapon, this is one of the most commonly sought shields; it gives you more damage and all you lose is a little defense on the shield. At first this seems horrible, but at the end of the day you realize that it was completely worth it. You only lose a little bit of defense on your shield, which regenerates eventually anyway; when you get in later tiers that little defense rarely ever matters. If you prefer guns and/or bombs that little defense is more viable than buffing a weapon you never/rarely use anyway, but for the majority of people this is one of your offense bonus shields to use when you want to hit hard. From 2* to 4* it only gives a +1 (Low = +1, Medium = +2) sword damage bonus and at 5* gives you a +2 sword damage bonus. This type of bonus only stacks up to +6. Similar to Defender, you do not have any element or shadow defense; be careful around those suckers. Back to how to obtain this spiked chunk of bark with eyes on it, it is a token reward from Snarbolax. Snarbolax is currently the only T1 boss. You only need ten tokens from the crunchy fluffy behemoth and you get somewhere between one and five tokens each time you fight it, depending on how recently you joined the party. If you created the party to begin with and you have been there for the whole tier all the way, you are likely to get at least three. If you joined right before the boss you are probably only going to get one or two. The more floors you do before the boss, the more tokens you are supposed to get.

In higher tiers this weapon becomes an obvious fan favorite. You have split normal-element damage and the charge has a little range to use; more specifically, a series of explosions equal to the star rank which may inflict a status depending on which alchemy line you are using: Combuster for fire, Glacius for freeze, Voltedge for shock, and Acheron for shadow damage instead of element but no status. There is another line, Cautery, but as it currently stands this thing is useless. If you have money to burn and you want a pretty little toy, after you eat your vegetables you can make it. All Brandish line swords have the same mechanic. The basic attack is the same as Calibur, but the charge attack is significantly different. You may not be able to spin with this, but with a solid slash and a few linear explosions you will see why people often prefer it. The explosions also increase in size with star rank, so do not cry about your puny little 3* explosions. I said stop crying. Do you want to wake up dad? He hates whining more than I do. In the war he was the sergeant for all the new recruits and he had them beat the not-chocolate pudding out of each other every day as part of their exercise. Would you prefer to go to camp dad and have your digestive process sped up the painful way? Then eat your vegetables. The first part of the charge attack is the swing which does decent damage but has a small area of effect. That means you have to get in the face of your opponent before cutting their head off similar to how Calibur runs up to a crowd of them and spins their internal organs out of their nostrils in reverse alphabetical order. The explosions following the attack are often wasted if you do this, and I may be giving more power to the papaya, but if you use the attack next to the target and shield bump them in the direction of the explosions it will usually make them follow the trail depending on your timing. From what I have seen a lot of people prefer to keep a distance like babies and spam the explosion trail on targets. Because they are babies. You waste the initial swing damage if you do that, so get in their face and take them surfing. Surfing on a wave of death. That kills them. Until they are dead. Hurr. This does not work as well with status lines which inhibit enemy movement such as freeze or shock so find something else to do with those. When using the charge attack it does count as a projectile so be wary when using it against defending enemies such as Mecha Knights. Now go wash your dishes.

I may as well start with the apparently more common one, Glacius. This is probably due to Lockdown, Vanaduke, or both. In Lockdown you stop one of the main abilities anyone relies on, mobility. You want to run around to bomb or gun? Nurp, you are frozen. A robocicle. All you need is some flavor and we can make a profit off you. In Vanaduke everything likes fire. There are fire pads, hotspots, and zombies that vomit fire all over the place. They are disgusting. What do you do about it? Apparently you freeze them with a Glacius. Personally, I always take my Shivermist with me for the big guy and a few moments in the floors before. I keep all four weapon slots open to keep variety while rolling around, more recently taking Radiant Sun and Storm Driver with me. The fourth weapon is usually a sword or something. I have Shivermist and Storm, usually those are all I use anyway. Them gunning tactics. Anyway, Glacius; you freeze stuff. You do not have to use the initial swing if you do not want to, but that means not doing as much damage. Be that way. See if I bring the drinks next time. Of all the alchemy lines only the explosions on the charge attacks for Combuster, Voltedge, and Glacius may inflict a status. No normal attacks, Acheron, or Cautery status affliction. None. Keep in mind when using the status afflicting lines that enemies may be affiliated with a status, meaning their attacks may inflict that status and they are resistant or like being afflicted with it.

Oddly enough, Voltedge is second. Unlike the other Brandish lines, Voltedge can only be obtained from Krogmo minigames through the reward recipes. It still upgrades from Brandish, but the recipes are only available if you do Lockdown and/or Blast Network. You can still use this to attack up close with the charge, but the status may interfere with surfing. Going surfing, surfing U.S.A. Why is this the only one not craftable through normal recipes? Shock. That is the reason. I am somewhat surprised the shock Alchemer is not there as well. The shock Vaporizer is already a boss token reward. Voltedge can be used as Glacius or Combuster, you have more versatility with this thing. Have fun. The normal definition of fun.

As Agni users say: "Burn everything everywhere forever always!" Combuster, if you could not tell by the name, inflicts fire on the charge attack explosions. Unlike the two above, this weapon is best used on the offense. Get in the fray, bash some heads, roll around in their ashes. Sounds like a homicidal pyromaniac. Dad would be proud. If you want to be a sissy you can still use the charge attack from a distance, but considering you want the world to burn and cry ashes you probably want to do more damage. What are you still doing here? Go burn those Lumbers down.

This one is a little silly. When a new person sees this weapon they automatically think something along the lines of: "Look a katana it are gudd because it look gudd I are buy now hurr". Weeaboo scum. Acheron is also the primary reason people try to suggest dual wielding, because when equipped the sheath is held in your shield side hand. That sheath does not necessarily need to be there, but it supposedly adds to the balance of having it look nice in exchange for not inflicting a status. Though this is used the same way as Combuster it does not inflict a status and has shadow damage instead of element, but still shares with normal. You may not have fire anymore, but now you can tackle what had resistance against your old Combuster and squish their faces into the shape of a walrus.

Delay Pulsar for a week? Derkay.

Similar to Brandish and Vaporizer lines, you have several status and non-status options: Magma, Storm, Hail, Nova, and Umbra. Also similar to how Brandish variants and Vaporizer variants are, Alchemers all have the exact same mechanical function: two shot clip, average boolit speed, approximately the same damage, and starting at 3* the bullets bounce off objects and enemies. The more you rank it, the more bouncing the bullets do; at 3* the basic bullets bounce once, at 4* they bounce twice, at 5* they can bounce three times. Since you have a two shot clip you can bounce boolits around all you want, except reloading may get in the way of maintaining a distance. Not that you need to be far away, the bullets bounce from any distance though if they do not bounce within a certain length of travel they will dissipate. The status variants are also similar to those of Vaporizer and Brandish lines but in gun form. In terms of basic tactics there are two options for using an Alchemer: primary attack and quick shot. Primary attack uses the charge attack almost exclusively against groups of enemies, using the bouncing bullet effect to use enemy placement as an advantage. Yes, you benefit from where they are standing when you fire. With the charge attack regardless of star rank the after-bullets which come from the giant orb fired in the charge attack follow a slightly arced angle toward the position fired from. This means firing straight forward will not make the bullets which come out of the charge attack after the big one dissipates go forward unless they bounce off things. The bouncing effect appears to go to random angles from what I have seen. It would make more sense for it to bounce in appropriate angles in reference to the position of the user, but instead it goes random. Stand perfectly still in front of a wall and fire a few times. Random ricochet directions. This means exact positioning on the basic attack is not reliable for the tactical gunner, though it should be to further reward skill over mindless spamming. Like Pulsar. In the right hands Alchemer combines area of effect damage with mobility, where Autoguns rely on gang tactics to take down something by leaning on each other the Alchemer tactically outmaneuvers and confuses the enemies. Quick shot uses the Alchemer as a sidearm, switching to the Alchemer for a single shot then switching back to whatever other weapon for a surprise attack when the opponent did not expect the Spanish Inquisition. I am the only one I have seen use an Alchemer for this but it is more useful with a status afflicting Alchemer. Preferably Hail or Storm. They thought you were going to swing your Brandish or something, but instead they are suddenly frozen. I would list the alchemy lines in order of how commonly they are used but I have only seen a couple people using one in the past few months. Including myself.

Magma has element damage and the ability to inflict fire. Sneak around while the enemies are having their tea party, then bust in a flaming bullet of bouncing death and tactically retreat or switch to another weapon to finish them off.

Hail also has element damage, but instead of fire it has freeze. I never would have guessed by the name. When you want to get away from your groupies, put them on ice. Give them the cold shoulder. Other ice puns. Hail is used similarly to Glacius in the sense of support potential, tapping several enemies at once on the shoulder and leaving them frigid.

Similar to Voltedge and Voltaic, Storm has the versatile status shock. You can spam the charge attack with this in a crowd and not worry about thawing, because they spasm regardless so long as they are shocked, and it keeps them relatively close instead of letting them roll around as they wish. Unlike them, Storm is not obtained through a token exchange or days of minigame spamming. It crafts like a normal weapon. No shenanigans to complete, no rolling around, just crafting. Exquisite.

Brandish has Acheron, Alchemers have Umbra, Vaporizers get nothing. Umbra has slightly more damage than the other Alchemers, unlike Acheron compared to the element Brandish lines. It also does not inflict a status. Why does Acheron not have more damage than element Brandish lines? Pants. It makes as much sense as any other explanation you will get.

Magma, Hail, and Storm all deal element damage and have a status to share. What about something without a status and a little more base damage? Nova. Element version of Umbra. Nothing special here, but no status means no distractions. Stop staring at that butterfly and pay attention. Blah blah blah, blah blah. Blah blah blah blah. Blah; blah blah? Blah blah.

Hoo.

Hoo.

Hurr.

Owlite is a shield with normal, element, fire, and shock defense; slightly more element than normal. Do you know what this means? Remember those robot turrets which deal element damage from their attacks? Nope, Owlite eats those bullets. Stuck in a fire/shock pad/zombie breath? Nope, Owlite. Owlite will hoot a boot up their toot. This shield is often favored by bombers because of its ability to defend against two more devastating statuses, shock and fire. Shock inhibits your ability to move regularly for everyone, but for bombers this also means that charge you almost finished is now gone and you have to start over. Unlike swords and guns, bombs force the user to charge; there is no basic attack. There used to be a while ago, but it was changed because of how ridiculously overpowered it was. What were we doing? Owlite, right; good for bombers generally, good for defensive purposes generally. It is crafted through normal means through normal recipes available normally, and it has some normal defense; a fairly normal shield. It may not have the pierce defense of your old Defender or Bristling Buckler, but it does have two status defenses and is better suited for projectiles. You would think gunners would always jump for this shield, but that will be discussed later. For sword users they usually want to stick with their Bristling Buckler for more damage, but as a bomber this thing is great. Gremlins and robots have nothing on you with this weird metal owl floating over your wrist. As all shields go, you are not invincible forever; use it sparingly. But when you do use it, you really use that thing. Hardcore shielding.

I know what you are thinking. Yes, again. This thing gives you more health so it must be good, right? Not necessarily. Unlike basically everything else, Vitasuits do not follow their own alchemy path. In fact, you only have three variants where only the last one is part of any alchemy line. The first one is 0* like your dusty old Proto, but gives one health. Sure, that would be useful in the baby camp for babies, but when you get out of that crib and put the rattle down you realize you can do better. In fact, you suddenly have a 2* armor which scientifically appears from nowhere and you stand triumphantly as if you did something spectacular. No, not really. You only imagined that. You are still in that tiny Vitasuit. So you grind floors until you have enough money to get something better, then you stand triumphantly and you actually did something this time! So, what did you get? Vitasuit Plus? Sure, it may be a 2* armor, but this is basically the same thing as before. You may have more normal defense than your piers, but the extra couple bars of defense do not necessarily compensate for the lack of specialized defense. Go back to your old Cobalt and work on that or you are grounded. Alright, now you have a 4*, what did you make? Vitasuit Deluxe? What did I tell you about those? You now have three more base health, but you are still using that stupid obesity suit. Keep in mind that your knight does not have regenerating health independently. Just because you have a little more health does not mean you are a tank. Not that tanking damage is a viable strategy around here, but for the scenario you think it is. Sure, you now have more health to tank enemies with; but is it the best armor to use for that? Exhibit A, your rival. Plate lines are well known for their tanking ability and will be discussed later, but to spoil a little of what is to come it has ridiculous normal defense. Anything that tries to hit you in melee wets itself because you have a metal crotch plate. Your crotch with a Plate set is better at tanking than that silly Vitasuit. You may have an attack speed reduction, but you are too busy sitting on people and crushing them with your immense weight in thick armor to care. Your weapon is not literally sitting on them, but if you want to do that I will not stop you. It would be too time consuming to roll you off everyone. Vitasuits in general are supposedly for the "medic" archetype, but we do not and will not have the ability to heal through an attack. Do not go to the suggestions subforum and attempt a healing weapon. I will personally fix your plumbing, if you know what I mean. No, I do not mean the upstairs toilet with the broken pipe. The "medical" idea comes from having more health, which means if you revive someone with that greater amount of health you are giving them more health than if you had more defense instead. Since this relies on protecting your own health, you would be useless in combat by hiding behind people and waiting for them to die. Not that support tactics are bad, as any half decent bomber knows, but if you are only useful when waiting for people to die something is wrong.

This is easily the most misused gun.

Pulsar has a three bullet clip and fires fairly slowly. Boolit slow. At first the projectile is tiny and stupid, but after a few spaces it transforms into knockback mode and explodes on anyone who touches it. Since it has three rounds in its clip this gun can easily be spammed to push things away, similar to a broom. This gun is a broom. Sweep crowds out the door if needed. If not, and everyone else in the party is trying to fight but you are being obnoxious, expect to be kicked out. Your Pulsar damage does not compare to their Calibur/Brandish/other even if you are only interfering with one person. Before the boolit expands its damage is the same as basic boolits on Catalyzer, but when they expand their damage increases to about 120-143% on neutral targets. Herp de derp, you can push enemies to Russia by spamming. You can finish them yourself while everyone else moves on. This sweeping tactic is often used in retreat or to manipulate positioning, though very often it is used to attack normally. There are two alchemy lines for Pulsar, both of which function the same excluding a couple characteristics.

Polaris line has element damage instead of normal, a little less base amount of bars on its damage, and the ability to inflict shock. Hurr. Usually people go for this one because Pulsar is useful against turrets, shock adding onto its utility.

Supernova sticks to normal damage but does not have a status. This means it can push enemies without giving them the spastic effect of shock which would ignore knockback while in effect, though it is as obnoxious as Polaris regardless. Supernova is almost exclusively used by people who know how to use Pulsar correctly though a few rare cases have appeared otherwise.

Remember how Nitronome has that constant damage rate in a large area? Imagine that with pierce instead of normal damage and the fuse being slightly slower. That is this. The main difference is the lack of almost all knockback and a significantly less obnoxious animation of a dark explosion and no screen shaking. That means you can spam it in parties without blinding or crashing anyone. Dad would be proud.

Similar to Bristling Buckler and Snarble Barb, Spine Cone is the last of the three Snarbolax token reward weapons which also only requires ten tokens. Similar to Snarble Barb, you only do pierce damage with this weapon. Mind enemy resistances when using it. Its lack of obnoxious features on Nitronome may have been countered by the specialized damage, appealing to the chaining tactic yet removing inhibiting features on Nitronome to make room for team empathy. If you like working with other people and constant damage in a large area of effect, grab an explosive pine cone and get hopping, little rabbit. A little rabbit of spiked death. Explosive death. Like that morning after Taco Bell night. When Nitronome came home from football practice one day he brought home his buddy, Dark Briar Barrage. We all know how dad has issues with the colored bombs so there was a little tension, but when they went out back dad was amazed by Barrage. A team player built to work with others without inhibiting them while being perfectly able to work independently. Barrage was like the son he never had. Nitronome tries to get dad interested in his life again, but dad is preoccupied with the new guy. Barrage was disciplined not to inhibit others before joining the team of implementation, meaning he had more time to prepare for acceptance in the community than Nitronome which was the original bomb to work off of as a stepping stone.

Spine Cone was actually my first bomb, before which I almost exclusively used my Calibur line (it was Cold Iron Carver at the time) and my old Gran Faust in terms of weapons. I also happened to use Plate line which is currently Volcanic. Dat horned bucket grate face. When Snarbolax came out and I became interested in bombs, Plate was immediately set aside to start on Mad Bomber. This was back when Graviton was still part of Blast line, but that is another story. With Spine Cone I was able to damage in a decent area of effect in a party without interrupting other knights, meaning I could also get sidetracked so long as pierce worked well for what was there. If not I always had old Gran Faust to split some sides. Not from laughing, from slicing them in half. Not much to laugh about when you were just cut in half with a giant purple sword. After this followed a series of bomb related exploration and shenanigans, inevitably bringing me to where I am today; obsessed with weapons in general though favoring bombs slightly over the others.

Imagine a two handed sword. That is not what this is. This is a giant one handed sword which should be too heavy for you to carry even in two hands, yet works anyway because logic does not always apply to how things work. Big sword make smash good. Unlike smaller swords such as Calibur or Brandish, Troika is a heavy sword; that means you only have two swings in the basic combo, both of which are obviously slower than standard swords, but you will notice swings have more knockback and swing range. This thing is like a giant cleaver, its swings have width and length unlike its shorter counterparts. Its swing speed is substantially slower but each swing covers more area. Usually a swing from a heavy sword tends to do more damage than smaller swords because they only have two swings in their basic combo and slower swings, but that does not make this thing a two handed sword. This is not happy time and it is not big enough to have to use two hands. So many inappropriate implications possible.

Troika itself is actually the first heavy mechanic sword, often looked down upon by Sealed line for its lack of damage in comparison. However, Troika is not supposed to be used for damage; it is part of the "guardian" archetype along with Plate items, giving up the offensive characteristics of most other equipment in exchange for substantial melee defense and bland damage. Both Troika upgrade lines only deal normal damage but both may inflict a status on the charge attack depending on which line. Both share the same mechanic, the only real difference is the status the charge may inflict. Both have the same charge attack, a lunge followed by a smash followed by an explosion near the end of the sword which is supposed to blast enemies away. By blast I mean blast. Imagine Big Angry. Now imagine that with a sword. Now imagine the knockback only goes in the direction of where the charge attack was aimed since swords require positioning whereas bombs have a radius. That is the charge attack. The smash and explosion both deal about the same amount of damage in pure normal. That means you can use this thing against any family and do the same damage. Pretty versatile as all normal weapons go.

Now to the fork in the road between the statuses. You can go with the easier route where normal recipes obtained normally are rolling around with Sudaruska, or you could do Krogmo games for a while and get Triglav. Both are the exact same in use outside the status and rates of the status. They also look slightly different from coloration.

Sudaruska has the ability to inflict stun upon the charge. Yes, a giant pillar-sword-thing which smashes people on the noggin before blasting them to Jupiter. That is what this sword is. When an ally who relies on mobility and/or distance is trapped in an obnoxious group of enemies, blast them away with an old fashioned Sudaruska charge. By the time they realize where they are they would be dead from your ally nailing them. Dead enemies make decent wall decorations. Stun is essentially time slowing down for the afflicted, slowing down all animations; movement, attacking, rolling, eating ham. Everything is slower. Unfortunately there seems to be an issue with stun where if the afflicted was in the middle of an attack when stun was inflicted on them that attack instantly follows through and the attack process begins again automatically. Be cautious of what you are trying to decorate your room with.

Triglav is a little different. By a little I mean its status is completely different. Unlike Sudaruska, Triglav instead has the chance to inflict freeze on the charge attack. This means if the target is frozen they will not be blasted away because freeze prevents movement. Your charge still hurts them, but you skipped the part where they go to Jupiter. I hear the weather is exquisite there this time of year. Unlike stun, freeze does not directly do anything to the target; all it does is prevent them from running around or turning where they are frozen. They can still attack. If anything frozen is impacted by an attack, ally or enemy, it is thawed; this goes for knights and enemies alike. If you try to use your Triglav charge against a large group of jellies they will try to jiggle their way out of it since they are most likely close enough to do so. Should have brought the cooler. Normally this is used for short term escape or simply to keep the crowd pinned for a couple seconds while someone else is standing by with whatever attack they are about to use.

Remember the reference to gravity manipulation? That is what this bomb is. It has the radius of Big Angry at all ranks (three) but the actual effect is the suction. At 3* the suction radius is only one, at 4* the suction radius is two, and at 5* the suction radius is three. The fuse radius shown when you set the bomb is actually false. Unlike other bombs, the suction lines do less damage but have one of the greatest team supportive mechanics: not only does it keep enemies in the suction, but if you repetitively place it you can keep them there. The main problem with attempting this is avoiding attacks since movement is significantly lowered and the base charge time is six instead of five with Nitronome or Barrage. This bomb is mostly used at 4*+ when the townsfolk are chasing you to the windmill, but with the 4*+ suction area you can easily trap several enemies in there at once. Remember how Nitronome blasts enemies into other people to make it their problem? Graviton and Electron take enemies annoying other people into itself. Winning. Be careful when using this, if you are still standing in it and enemies are sucked in it is easily possible and death inevitable.

There are two branches for this mechanic, though unlike most other weapons they are never part of each other. Graviton is pure shadow damage and Electron is pure element, though originally Electron had shock; it was removed from the effects listed on the item but it still seems to work regardless. They raised the damage on Electron to match Graviton but they apparently forgot to remove its shock. Three cheers for each ring which forgot to fix that.

Shadow Lair armor is excluded because newcomers would not be able to obtain it unless they bought a bucket of CE and poured the blubber onto the market to pay their way into the game. That does not teach them how to play, it teaches them how to steal a credit card from mom and get beaten later. By the time the average player is able to run Shadow Lairs they are able to figure things out on their own.

I probably would have never found out that. I always go for healing enemies first and rarely use poison weapons, if anyone else is with me they tend to go for anything except the medic.

Have some rock while I make more stuff.

Remember how Autogun fires several bullets at once but limits mobility while firing? This is the opposite. It only fires on bullet per click as basically all guns except Autogun do, but each bullet does not do particularly high damage. Unlike other guns, Antigua and both its alchemy lines always have a six shot clip with strafing. The bullets may not have a spectacular effect, but you can now be the cowboy you always wanted to be. You never wanted to be a cowboy? No one is going to force you to wear chaps. I thought so. Both alchemy lines are basically the same except the damage type, one being pure element and the other pure shadow. Originally they both had some pierce damage, but somewhat recently they changed it by taking the pierce damage and adding it to its other damage type so the neutral damage is the same. The thing about having two different specialized damage bars on the same weapon is they can neutralize each other. When you find the ratio of less and more effective damage rates it makes no sense for having something weak and something strong against a certain family balance each other out when it should be significantly lower from neutral. This is part of why people see pure normal damage weapons as underpowered. At 3* Antigua has puny pierce damage, when it upgrades to 4* it can either trade that in for element with Silversix or shadow with Blackhawk. Other than their damage type and some colors, there is no real difference between the two. The charge attack at 4* fires a few bullets before a large bullet, at 5* this large bullet is replaced with a holographic owl. The large bullet and owl both push enemies along with it if they continue to stay in contact with the projectile. Unlike Autogun, Antigua lines are often preferred for the basic attack for a few quick shots while maintaining mobility rather than a flurry followed by fleeing. Use Antigua while on the run, chase, or moving in general. Take it on the go. We even have a drive through. Would you like fries with your order?

If you decide to go with Silversix line as most do, your wimpy little Antigua now does element damage. You will also notice a bonus against undead family enemies. At 4*, Silversix only has a +1 family bonus. When it gets to 5* as Argent Peacemaker that bonus bumps up to +2. Seeing as zombies are slow enough to outrun with your feet chained together, that leaves Kats to take the blunt of the swing metaphorically. Kats like mobility. When they try to rush after you, run toward them while firing a few rounds into them. When they are about to start their attack and are close or if you are able to when they are right next to you as they rush, shield bump the Kat away to fire even more bullets at it. This can also be used with swords for "jousting".

If you decide to go with Blackhawk there are two things you should know. First, congratulations on not being generic. Second, this is one of the few shadow weapons in the game. Having this weapon means you want variety in your arsenal rather than the generic weapons which anyone would have. This gun works the same as Silversix and Peacemaker with one defining difference: instead of an undead bonus you get a gremlin bonus. This is especially useful in T3 gremlin floors since Thwackers have shields and Menders should be your first target. Antigua is great for picking off single targets, even in a crowd. Shadow also does more against jellies but other weapons are better suited for that type of enemy. What would you do, kill the jiggliest one first?

In comparison HDecon is a little stranger.

Of the three alternatives to Nitronome, Big Angry seems very slightly more common. At least two more people have it than the others.