Here's a DPS chart as collected in Guild Training Hall.
I see a lot of misconceptions go around about this bomb. Today I made a Destroyer and heated it all the way to level 10. This is what the bombing guide says about irontech:
"The Irontech Destroyer deals a mid range damage (with Nitro dealing less, and BAB dealing more) bomb, with the same radius as the other blast bombs. The destroyer has a slowed walking speed while charging, and a slow fuse. The bomb is quite mediocre in that it isn't really possible to spam it like Nitronome and doesn't deal excessively large knock-back as the BAB does. Really it is a collectors item and a player is better off with the Big Angry Bomb or Nitronome."
You ask the average player about Irontech, they'll tell you something to the effect of the last couple of sentences there. Why? Because the average player has never even seen one and got all their info on Irontech from there. I'll just lay down the facts I found out researching this bomb, comparing it to every other bomb I have (all but three shard bombs) and doing some research in the Elite Bomber topic:
Charge time
Bombs have two distinct charge times. Let's call them Fast and Slow. There used to be a third charge time, Super Agonizingly Uselessly Slow reserved for only Ionized Salt Bomb, but ISB got reworked so it's gone. All bombs in the same category charge at the exact same speed given the exact same CTR, and most bombs are fast. The ones going slow are haze bombs and BAB. Notice the absence of Irontech. This is because Irontech is in the Fast charge time category.
Let me restate that last one, because this is the part everyone overlooks about Irontech:
Irontechs Bomb and Destroyer do more damage and knockback than Nitronome while still charging just as fast.
Damage, you say?
A quick damage table, as collected in Guild Training Hall, Tier 3:
Nitro: 214, 227, 241, 254, 268, 291, 295
Iron D : 239, 254, 268, 282, 297, 311, 326
BAB: 264, 280, 295, 311, 326, 342, 357
Bonuses go None, Low, Med, High, VH, Ultra, Max
I can't be buggered calculating DPS but since Iron charges as fast as Nitro, it should be slightly higher.
What about knockback?
This one's a bit harder to turn into reproducible numbers, but I'll try on these shufflebots.
-Nitro seems to knock the shufflies about half the room. A tiny bit more. I'd estimate it at 4-5 tiles.
-Irontech goes just a little bit further. About 6?
-BAB knocks them clear across the room. Diagonally. I'm pretty sure they'd go further still if there was more room. The room is at least 8x8.
And walking speed?
Again, there are only two walking speeds for bomb charging. We'll just call them Fast and Slow again. Most bombs are fast, the bombs using Slow are:
-Vortex lines
-Irontech
-Big Angry
Speed is same for Irontech and Big Angry but with vortex and irontech you can place your payload faster.
And the dreaded fuse time?
Fuse times seems to come in a much larger variety. There is much more science to be done here than I have the necessary equipment for. However, from eyeballing them next to eachother, Irontech and Big Angry appear to have the same fuse time. Fehzor insisted there was a difference, but I couldn't see it.
A point of note is that Irontech Bomb has a shorter fuse time than Irontech Destroyer. I find this crucial because the jump in damage from Bomb to Destroyer is pretty pitiful. I will conduct some more detailed studies later, but I think at heat level 10 with max damage bonus, Irontech Bomb did 311 damage on the GTH training dummies. Combine this with the fact that Irontech Bomb has the exact same blast radius as the 5* bombs do, the conclusion of my sciencing goes a little like this:
Nitro:
-Fast walk
-Fast charge
-Fast fuse
-Low knockback
-4th in damage
Irontech Bomb (4*):
-Slow walk
-Fast charge
-Slower fuse
-Medium knockback
-3rd in damage
-Fair chance of causing Minor Stun
Irontech Destroyer:
-Slow walk
-Fast charge
-Slowest fuse
-Medium knockback
-2nd in damage (but not by much) (Possibly 1st in DPS?)
-Fair chance of causing Minor Stun
Big Angry Bomb:
-Slow walk
-Slow charge
-Slowest fuse
-Preposterous knockback
-1st in damage (but not necessarily DPS!)
-Fair chance of causing Minor Stun
I think getting Irontech Bomb and stopping there is a nice, cheap alternative to getting a nitronome, provided you can deal with the walkspeed. The 4* Irontech Bomb is so good that I find it hard to recommend upgrading it.
I made Big Angry a while ago just for the derps and knockback, before the buff to blast radius and the addition of stun.
It still has the same problem as Nitronome with shaking the screen. No other bombs do that except Blast lines. We get the whole Blast tree is supposed to explode all the things, but when it quakes every couple seconds for everyone in the party with only one person using it they can get obnoxious.
I think people will still prefer Nitronome for its better mobility while charging, fast fuse, and the mission mainstream gives you its recipes for free. Blast lines are great while soloing to get through whatever tickles your nip- I mean fancy, but in parties chances are people do not want their screen to experience being injected with three shots of heroin.
I should start using my old Big Angry again. I remember its butt clenching knockback but I always feel guilty using it in parties when I can tell it messes them up. Maybe I should do it anyway. Have you seen some of the players around here? Some deserve it. The problem is innocent little Timmy Tum Tums struggling with nervousness when I suddenly rock their world a few too many times.