Spiral Knights - Need bombing advice - missing elemental bomb

Need bombing advice - missing elemental bomb

19 replies [Last post]

Sun, 12/07/2014 - 09:26

Jenovasforumchar

Hello guys, I am here to ask for the best bomb vs constructs and undead, if I use nothing but bombs.

Currently I am using Dark Reprisal vs construct and DBB vs undead, but this does not quite persuade me.

I did also try shocking mist bomb vs both monster groups but this seems to be a horrible solution to me. And I had to realize that the damage of mist bomb explosions is in most deapths less or almost no different from DBB damage.

Currently I can see two bombs that may be useful where I got its 3 * versions:
-Deadly Crystal Bomb
-Electron Vortex

How good is DCB against undead and constructs?
How good is EV?
And exspecially: Are they better than DR and DBB?

Thanx for your recommendation :)

Sun, 12/07/2014 - 13:31

Fehzor

If you have charge time reduction, deadly crystal bomb suffers from damage loss due to invincitinks, which means that if you were to craft that bomb, you would want to bring a second weapon to switch to after dropping one. Otherwise you will stop dealing (very much) damage as soon as you start hitting them more than once in rapid succession.

As explained by Zeddy- http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/82883

If it were not for this damage limitation, deadly crystal bomb would be perfect for you. Because of them, it's damage (when buffed using CTR) will not exceed that of your existing bombs'.

---

Electron vortex is going to be a very slow way of dealing with things, but it's still a pretty incredible bomb simply by way of the fact that it groups enemies so well. More of a team weapon than a damage dealer.

Sun, 12/07/2014 - 14:44

Bopp

two other ideas

Well, most of the bombers I know (including me, when I bomb) use DR and DBB when they want damage, as you said.

Try spreading a status every fourth bomb or so. For example, set all of the undead on fire using Ash of Agni, and then do a few DBBs on them.

If you're partying with other bombers, then try combining statuses such as poison, shock, and fire.

Sun, 12/07/2014 - 14:49

Krakob

The difference between charge spamming a Brandish and charge spamming a bomb isn't too big if you think about it.

Sun, 12/07/2014 - 15:50

Jenovasforumchar

@ fehzor

I know about the issue of DCB's invinciticks.

Well, I myselfe use Chaos stuff the most time, so I would have CTR max at heat level 10. So... would the invincitics be nullifyed with only ctr ultra? I think about stopping to heat at heat level 9.

Is the Electron Vortex really that slow that it is not worth it if I play only bombs with no team?

I saw that EV could deal damage even after the secound explosion with its shocking status that keep monsters in place instead of blast them away. Ofc this works only in bigger groups, but it seems to fit in FSC, graveyards or crowded construct rooms.

From what you said now, the DCB would be my best choice and is better than DBB or DR. Is that accurate?

Sun, 12/07/2014 - 17:07

Holy-Nightmare

Shock is only weak against

Shock is only weak against single monsters, in groups shock from one can hurt another. In order to capitalize on this mechanic you want a vortex bomb to pair with your Voltaic tempest.

Once the are clumped up the can't move much due to the shock and are taking a much more respectable Damage over time, it is here you can use your other bombs to make short work of what you have trapped.

Sun, 12/07/2014 - 22:52

Almond-Riddle

DR and DBB is as good as it

DR and DBB is as good as it gets when it comes to offensive bombing. DCB and EV are both outclassed hard, even though they deal specialized damage. The next bomb with the highest DPS would be Irontech Destroyer. But for obvious reasons, I can't recommend that.

Sun, 12/07/2014 - 23:20

Fehzor

I'm not certain how much charge time reduction you'd have to give up to use the shard bombs effectively.. one thing, that I want to try doing, is using shard bombs with other weapons. So like, switching between shards and dark retribution/dbb/haze bombs to purposefully never trigger the invincitinks. I think you might be able to make them effective if you did that, but I haven't tested it enough... the one issue that I see is that it's a lot to focus on- enemies, shard bomb placement, and another totally different bomb's placement.

Electron vortex = haze bomb damage, but able to clump enemies and deal shock ticks to them. This lets it deal some damage, but it's really slow damage and it's nothing compared to what your team mates would be doing when they use their almighty brandishes and iron slugs on whatever gets trapped. In terms of solo play, it works fairly well and allows you to trap enemies inside of it forever, making it relatively safe for the damage that it does. I'd recommend crafting it because it's one of the best support bombs.

Mon, 12/08/2014 - 18:05

Almond-Riddle

I forgot to mention this, but

I forgot to mention this, but all shard bombs get more damage bonus compared to other bombs. So if you do get DCB, I'd recommend getting either the Bombastic Demo suit lt the Mercurial Demo. Don't bother with CTR, shards charge crazy fast anyway.

Mon, 12/08/2014 - 19:29

Fehzor

Here is a chart of all the bomb's DPS: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1C-ZS4k9_VoyP8qPxCqPMNxwbeZybUJBm...

Pure damage shard bombs against effective enemies:
Max damage: 203
Max CTR: 239 (impossible to reach due to invincitinks)
Max both: 320 (impossible to reach due to invincitinks)

Nitronome/Dark Briar Barrage against neutral enemies:
Max damage: 155
Max CTR: 178
Max both: 245
Max CTR, high damage: 211
Max CTR, med damage: 200

Dark retribution vs neutral enemies:
Max damage: 373
Max CTR: 448
Max both: 588
No external bonuses; i.e. total of med CTR from being level 10: 284 (always out-damages shard bombs)

While the shard bombs are not the worst option, dark briar barrage is still able to outperform them when given the proper stats to do so. Dark retribution is, on the other hand, one of the most powerful weapons in the game- up there with alchemers, blitz needle, brandishes and of course the almighty sentenza, capable of dealing 20% extra damage to gremlins over obsidian carbine.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 01:12

#10

Sir-Pandabear

Like Fehzor says, Dark Retribution is an enormously powerful weapon. I believe it to have the highest DPS to safety ratio out of any weapon you can find in the game. It's so powerful that you can even take down zombies with it in a reasonable amount of time. I'd definitely just stick to it against constructs.

Against undead, Deadly Crystal Bomb is not bad. It'll take a lot of training, and it's hard to cooperate unless the other players are either using mist bombs or additional shard bombs, but they're fairly fun. Electron Vortex is bound to make you popular in parties. You can gather up a lot of zombies in one spot, and people in your party can launch Iron Slug charges and Brandish charges into the cluster to dispose of all the enemies very quickly. It can speed up encounters immensly. As a damage bomb in itself, it can be safe, but not very fast.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 02:36

#11

Holy-Nightmare

@ number guys

How does well does the VT/Vortex combo ramp up DPS for each added enemy?

I know it's very effective on large groups but I'm not sure about the field numbers.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 10:59

#12

Fehzor

Damage per second against elemental weak enemies from pure explosion:
CTR max: 132
Damage max: 123
Both max: 172

Damage from shock at D23 (I think that's where the damage chart was taken? It only changes by 2-3 if not): 28

So the shock damage would have to be 28 * the number of enemies trapped inside of the bomb * the number of ticks the shock activates, which differs based on shock resistance and the likes of that.

If 5 enemies are trapped and the shock procs 3 times on each of them, we get 5*3*28 = 420 total damage from shock
If 7 enemies are trapped and the shock procs 5 times one ach of them, we get 7*5*28 = 980 total damage from shock

If 7 enemies are trapped and a team member or yourself combusters them with max damage at D23, we get 7*1147 = 8029 total damage from combuster*.
If 7 enemies are trapped and a team member or yourself sudaruska's them with max damage at D23, we get 7*1049 = 7343 total damage from sudaruska**.

This is why I advocate the vortex bombs as a support weapon over some kind of incredibly low damage elemental damage machine.

*Assuming that combuster hits each with about 2 explosions- (707 + 220*2) = 1147
**Assuming that both parts of sudaruska hit all of them- 503 + 546 = 1049

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 11:40

#13

Holy-Nightmare

@ Fehzor

That's definitely a good bomb combo, heavy on damage, heavy on safety with that shock, and clumped up enemies make for easy targets.

VT makes for easy spam and support, while EV lets you capitalize on shock's effects to improve DPS and take advantage of the movement reduction (since vortexes slow you down it's good to have them already shocked).

Shock from the EV or VT also means you can get more DPS out of DR and DBB since enemies tend to clump up and slow down when shocked you can plant bombs closer and enemies can't move out of the DR's AoE as easily.

The only downside to relying on shock is that not all enemies are affected by it so you have to be prepared to handle the ones that are immune to shock.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 12:13

#14

Holy-Nightmare

....

dbl post

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 12:02

#15

Heyub

I've experienced this

I've experienced this elemental gap, I've found no one bomb to solve the problem. For undead I do Voltaic Tempest / Dark Briar Barrage (DBB) or Ash of Agni/DBB and some cases all three. This requires that charge time reduction be very high or max. I use the same combination for constructs but use Dark Reprisal instead of DBB. The problem with this is that on some floors constructs/undead have immunity to shock or fire.

I recently got a DCB, I've not been impressed with its performance. I've found I can use it effectively against constructs but only in large numbers, while I've found Dark Reprisal does OK when dealing with large numbers of enemies and only a handful. Please bare in mind I've only had DCB for a couple weeks.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 12:57

#16

Jenovasforumchar

let me add this...

First thing to clearify: I usually use chaos set with bomb dmg sprite perk; so I run (additional with the heat level 10) around with dmg max and ctr max.

I crafted a 4 star crystal bomb and tested it in stratum 4/5, exspecially in an arena at deapth 9.

My results:
-The crystal bomb can be used vs puppies, if two shards can hit it in the heat of battle.
-Lumbers can be killed with shards since they dont get pushed around with the 4 star version
-smaller enemies get pushed around but their attacks will not be interrupted - more than once I got an enemy attack bumped into me by my own shard
-in FSC the 4 star crystal bomb deals a horrible job (well, not that surprising since it is 4 star, but it dealt a lesser job than expected - exspecially since zombies get bumped around)

Conclusion:
I will burry my idea of using DCB for now.

I still need to test the EV as next, but it will take some time to do so.

@fehzor:
Refering to your link, I am using already the highest dps bombs (not including the mechanic). Thank you for sharing it.

Tue, 12/09/2014 - 13:11

#17

Fehzor

Lol, thank Zeddy. He produced the data from both of my links.

Wed, 12/10/2014 - 08:10

#18

Keepscaite

It's

It's ZEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEDDYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY

@Topic
VT works great, it also comboes incredibly well with both DBB and DR.

Thu, 12/11/2014 - 05:51

#19

Kyuzwei

Why bother?

From my experience in going almost pure bomber there is no point in really making an Elemental damage bomb unless it's a Haze Bomb. The Shard bombs though fun to use currently suffer some major issues which put them behind other bombs. And if you can get EV and have the Tokens for it that's great, but it's never going to be a primary damage dealer in your arsenal as all of the Vortex bombs are utility bombs just like Haze bombs, if you really want a elemental damage bomb go with AoA or VT, as they can do some decent DoT damage but still not something you want to rely on. What I use primarily is DBB, DR, Nitronome, and Polaris for Gun Puppies. This loadout will more or less cover everything you will ever run into, and has yet to fail me. If you want to go pure bomber you'd probably switch the Polaris out of a AoA, VT, or EV, if you don't use 4 slots, DBB and Nitronome will probably always be your primary 2 bombs only switching them out for Haze bombs where there needed probably.

I initially wanted to go Shard Bomber but when I made the Rock Salt Bomb and did my first Royal Jelly Palace run with it, it was the most terrible experience I have ever had in Spiral Knights. Switched to Super Blaster Bomb and it was a breeze. This was just my experience, if you want to see actually good Shard Bomb use look up Shard Squad on Youtube and you'll see what they can do when a competent person uses them, I'm really used to using Nitronome and DBB so I found them to be inconvenient and just ruining my everything, you may love them, idunno.

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Need bombing advice - missing elemental bomb