Spiral Knights - The Elite Bomber Thread

The Elite Bomber Thread

1027 replies [Last post]

Tue, 01/03/2012 - 15:24

#651

Alice-In-Pyroland

On another note Venom Veiler

On another note Venom Veiler is pretty beastly against Vanaduke. You can alternative Shiver and VV (Shiver > VV > Shiver x2 > VV > Shiver x2 > ect) and keep Vana both frozen and poisoned throughout the entire fight, which is extremely useful if you're providing support during a blitz run. I've basically changed my FSC loadout to VV/Shiver/E-Vortex/RSS at this point.

I also didn't touch upon how it works pretty well in conjunction with vortex, and it helps dispatch oilers due to their self-healing effects. With that being said you could easily swap VV out for whatever, fundamentally the only bombs you really need in FSC is vortex when in a group, and Nitro when soloing; everything else is personal preference.

If you wished to pick between VT and DBB, I guess Tempest since it has more utility, DBB probably won't see much use in there.

On another note thoughts on this thread? He makes some good points, but a lot of it makes it sound like he has considerably less experience bombing than he thinks he does.

Tue, 01/03/2012 - 14:05

#652

Fallout

Loooool, Echoes; Rookies will

Loooool, Echoes; Rookies will be Rookies. I don't see what the guy was trying to suggest either, re-balancing? heck, the whole game needs rebalancing I dun know why he doesn't know that - he prolly just feels screwed over for no apparant reason =/ Perhaps bombing just isn't his style

On another note, I'm getting a better income now, so I should be getting a better computer soon. This should mean I can update some Bomb Demo's (they are horrible; lacking sound and everything) and actually be able to record the rest of the bombs I haven't already. Expect some better quality stuff in the future xD

Thu, 01/05/2012 - 10:02

#653

Pandecoco

Ohai

So, I've recently started doing shadow lairs which means mercurial demo gear is now a possibility. Before I go splurge on it, I want opinions! Based on other posts, the movement speed is pretty much negligible. But the wiki (bombing guide) says otherwise. Sooo... which is it?

I'm mostly hoping the movement buff will help me dodge stuff while charging. Thoughts?

Thu, 01/05/2012 - 13:05

#654

Embodien

Out of curiousity Echoez what

Out of curiousity Echoez what equipment/bombs do you use on a normal run

Do you guys bomb in lockdown too?

Fri, 01/06/2012 - 04:08

#655

Fallout

umm pandecoco, basically Merc

umm pandecoco, basically Merc demo is only a good option if you have the right UV's, and sadly the CTR options outweigh any speed increase. So basically unless you are willing to fork out $60 on a UV ctr vhigh bomb or are just really lucky other options are more beneficial. I should be able to fit you with a good set if you tell me what kind of bomber you are. i.e. if you were a vaporizer bomber, you could even be better off with regular mercurial as you don't earn a lot from the damage bonus etc.

in the end merc is for serious offensive bombers with large wallets xD. still there are ways of working around things, (med ctr bomb, with 1 damage and 1 ctr trinket with merc to achieve max ctr vhigh damage and med speed etc.)

Fri, 01/06/2012 - 04:54

#656

Alice-In-Pyroland

@Embodien: Between gate maps

@Embodien: Between gate maps and arsenal stations there's little need to stick to a regular loadout when you can swap gear for any given depth. That being said for a "general" loadout;

Volc Demo Helm
Mad Bomber Suit
Elite Boom Module x2
Ash of Agni / Voltaic Tempest (Depending on stratum)
Radiant Sun Shards
Dark Briar Barrage / Nitronome (Depending on whether or not I'm soloing)
Electron Vortex / Venom Veiler / (Depending on stratum)

The only 'main' bomb I don't really shift into my generally fluid loadout is Shivermist, since honestly there are so few occassions where it will increase party dps more than any of the other status bombs, or vortex. In fact outside of FSC & IMF and their respective Shadow Lair equivilents I don't really use Shiver at all anymore.

As for Lockdown, I primarily just go generic Skolver in Lockdown. That being said although I haven't done it lately due to remaking a lot of my gear with better UVs and such, one of my favoured stategies is to go Skolver until we have the majority of the capture points and then swap to a bombing load out and control said points. This is a lot more effective on 3 point maps than 5 though, on the latter unless I'm spawn camping like a complete [Explicitive here] I stay Skolver. I think what needs to be stressed here though is bombing is a lot more effective when you're well co-ordinated with your team, so bombing in LD depends on a lot on the team and communication going on.

So new update brings us all sorts of new changes, namely the blast radius of bombs is 'filled in' and a large variety of enemies have been nerfed. Although there's a lot of things to discuss listing off the most notable;

Bombs are now even more visually disruptive and lag generating for those on poor computers, so expect even more people to complain about bombs lagging them out.
Zombies and Retrodes got massively nerfed and now there is essentially no need to take Nitro into FSC at all, you can literally walk into a crowd of zombies and drop RSS as and when you please. Baiting them into swiping onto an RSS has never been easier. You can do the same with Retrodes although you obviously won't do as much damage.
Alpha Wolvers can no longer teleport mid-attack so no longer will kiting Beast arenas with Ash of Agni be completely suicidal. Similarly they no long track you when attacking so DBB is now definitively better than Nitro for dealing with them.
Gremlin dodge animation has a longer cooldown, meaning you can now viably use RSS to dps them should you want to (DBB is still superior for this though).

Fri, 01/06/2012 - 13:56

#657

Embodien

Personally i dislike the new

Personally i dislike the new bomb animations. Also preferred the challenges in fsc made it interesting. Any of you guys read the topic on RSS becoming a pure piercing or pure elemental weapon. What do you guys think? I would despise pure piercing as DBB is already there as well as ISB. However making it pure elemental could make it better as a all round weapon. Bombers would no longer need to fear turrets :D

Also does anyone know how much a enemies dmg is decreased with VV. (Think im going to take VV and shiver over VT thanks Echoez :D). So Echoez should i just spam VV and shivermist on fsc and boss. RSS to switch to dmg and electron when gathering enemies for quick kills?

Fri, 01/06/2012 - 14:15

#658

Alice-In-Pyroland

I'm all for RSS being pure

I'm all for RSS being pure elemental although I find I don't mind much either way, as long as it remains useful against greavers and undead they can do whatever with it. I'm starting to think I may prefer is RSS was left element/pierce and simply given a 5* upgrade, taht would surely solve any issues the bomb currently has with dps. Or they could just add a dedicated pure elemental dps bomb to make dealing with Constructs easier without spamming Ash.

Don't quote me on it but last I checked poison is a 10% defense reduction and 50% damage, so you're halving the damage output of enemies against your team which makes VV defensively superior to shiver in some situations. Throughout FSC itself you'll probably using vortex + vv the most since it devastates most rooms and everyone in the party will be overjoyed at the ability to use X favourite charge attack against the gathered and weakened mobs. Learn the positions of where things spawn at party buttons, then drop VV followed by a Vortex and hit the button. In areas where lots of mobs spawn through various triggers like the main room in D25 and on the left path in D26 I tend to have the team spawn all of them for some crazy hilarious vortex shennanigans, although if you're not comfortable using vortex against huge groups of mobs yet you don't have to take that approach.

Against Vana himself, Shiver > VV > Shiver x2 > VV > Shiver x2 > continue. In my experience you only need to reapply VV inebwteen every 2 Shivers to mantain poison, alternating constantly will often result in vana getting free of the ice. I'm sure you can probably do 3 shivers between veilers in fact, but I haven't really tested it extensively yet.

Fri, 01/06/2012 - 19:02

#659

Pandecoco

@Fallout: I play both support

@Fallout: I play both support and offense actually. Depends on the party I'm in mostly. Some parties want a support bomber so I just bring haze bombs then. Other times (especially when I go into pure bomber runs or just feel like going pure bomber) I bring the damage bombs out.

I was actually thinking that if I ever go get merc demo I'll have to go get me some bomb focus trinkets. Sadly, I'm not rich enough to afford CTR UV'ed bombs.

In case you want to know, these are what I'm contemplating on turning into merc demo:
heavy demo helm (shadow high) <-- leaning towards this
spiral demo helm (normal high)
fused demo suit (fire med)
heavy demo suit (stun high) <-- its already 4* so..

Only 1 of each of course. I already have a mad bomber mask/suit and a volcanic demo helm. Don't have any bomb trinkets atm. Some of my bombs have CTR low UVs.

Fallout, do you like your merc demo? Or am I better off making more mad bomber sets?

Fri, 01/06/2012 - 22:02

#660

Softhead

Sword Support.

What Sword should I now get other than the CIV. The Graviton+Brandish=Maximun Carnage! Should I get a brandish and which one?

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 01:12

#661

Fallout

30hours of work complete, now for some sk

yeah, I probably would suggest Mad-Bomber as it leaves your trinket slots open (i have med dmg Uvs on my DPS bombs to get dat maximum, vhigh damage is still nice anyway xD) i.e. i use gun damage trinkets so I can get the last one or two bombs when I don't feel like blowing them up. Especially with that med fire resist on one of your suits, making a madbomber/volcanic helm combo is really the best option if your pockets aren't readily disposable. Really merc demo is only nice to play around with after you have the standard mad bomber or volcanic hybrid set. Up to you ;)

I personally don't use merc as I usually get away with the negative stats and no bonus speed even with Aussie lagg... mainly because I've played the game for years and the new content seems to only get easier.... (cept shadow lairs, I just lagg out there). And really i cbf to pay a lot just to get a medium speed bonus and some shock resistance (no matter how godly it is); my pockets are usually empty and I think SK might get a tad to easy with Merc full-time. The description in the wiki about the 'elite set' is pretty much all a bomber would ever need, but if you don't have the prerequisites it just isn't as fun as the max ctr/dmg and empty trinket slots obtained with a decent 5k energy instead of the $100 option which can make one feel kinda down if you get tired of bombing (especially with this stupid opaque fuse thing).

basically until i one day craft a vhigh UV crystal+blast through my 100me a day I won't be picking up my merc demo.

@atrum get a brandish, archeron and glacius are quite godly. Just make sure the damage types coincide with the vortex (gravi=arch, Ele=Glac) for the most effectiveness.

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 13:50

#662

Softhead

@Fallout Thank you.

Should I keep my Tempered Calibur? Also, Would Arch be useful for FSC because my Fsc set INCLUDES Gravi. And if I got a Electron, Would Glac be a useful thing for FSc if I got a SMB?

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 16:58

#663

Fallout

haha, yeah Arch is really

haha, yeah Arch is really useful in FSC for obvious reason ( i was just talking about effectiveness not really any level in particular). You can however forget about getting EV for FSC and just get Glacius (which is useful in FSC) to combo with gravi just to save money(but yes the damage from the gravi blast won't be much). If you do the gravi/brandish combo, SMB isn't really necessary (only with personal preference i.e. if you rely on it) and you can survive the last wave of the last arena in FSC with no damage taken just with an EV/GV. And it is always nice to keep a normal sword in your arsenal just in case you are leveling other items; just remember not to use the charge unless you are certain the mobs you hit aren't gonna fly into anyone of your party members ;)

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 18:11

#664

Softhead

Thank you.

I'll keep my Freezing.

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 18:34

#665

Batabii

What's "arch"? And I stand by

What's "arch"? And I stand by my decision never to bother with Leviathan. The only thing it has that other swords can't do better is its charge attack. Which has neither range nor status effects. Really, you could probably just replace it with Nitronome and be better off.

Edit: It's ACHERON not "archeron". Also lol post 666

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 22:30

#666

Negimasonic

just glad I'm not alone in

just glad I'm not alone in the dislike of the new fuse, not that it seems to matter. But on my part, my experience with it improved slightly as far as lag issues were concerned, but that's not going to do anything for the extra obscurance it causes. Every bomb is now shivermist bad

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 22:44

#667

Batabii

I LOVE the new fuse, it makes

I LOVE the new fuse, it makes it so much clearer how far the ring is, especially with gremlin bombers flooding the screen.

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 04:10

#668

Negimasonic

it was already clear enough

it was already clear enough before, especially when they made red rings to differentiate. With this, if you even set up a damage bomb against the gremlin bombers, you now have something that makes it a bit harder to see where their mini bombs land.

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 04:28

#669

Batabii

You can't tell red circles

You can't tell red circles from white circles?

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 09:41

#670

Softhead

New FSC Loadout

Glac
Shivermist Buster(For support with boss)
VV
G-Vortex

Would this be okay?

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 10:46

#671

Alice-In-Pyroland

That would be fine. Ideally

That would be fine. Ideally you'd want Electron over Graviton, but whether or not you feel like running the tremendous amount of Lockdown require to get the recipes is up to you, Grav is more than adequate anyhow.

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 11:20

#672

Batabii

You should really consider at

You should really consider at least ONE piercing weapon...

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 11:47

#673

Alice-In-Pyroland

Why? The only thing he'll

Why? The only thing he'll have difficultly handling with his loadout is the near non-existent wolvers, which will easily be handled by someone else in the group. If he was soloing perhaps, but he's already clarified it's a loadout for use in groups so there really is no need for a piercing wep.

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 11:57

#674

Softhead

I am a group man.

And the nerf made alpha's weaker. Also, on the previous page, some of my loadouts have DBB.

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 12:34

#675

Batabii

Are you forgetting that

Are you forgetting that vanaduke is weak to piercing?

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 12:55

#676

Alice-In-Pyroland

You did actually read his

You did actually read his post right? He's providing support during the vana fight via Shiver and Venom Veiler, he isn't going to be dpsing Vanaduke at any point during his pierce-weak stages, so why would he need a piercing weapon for it?

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 12:58

#677

Batabii

forgive me for not reading

forgive me for not reading the entire thread....

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 14:07

#678

Fallout

It would be nice of you

It would be nice of you batabii to stop making unnecessary posts, or at least try to make them factual; we do know what we are doing. If you feel the need to have a conversation in the thread, please just mail us in game instead so this thread is at least somewhat tidy ;)

In other news, my nitro has been feeling quite clunky lately, I don't really understand why, I don't think the Charge time has been increased. I think the fuse is getting to me, I hope it gets fixed and isn't just another one of those things I have to live with. Still, bombing has kind of become overpowered now; FSC is just a breeze with RSS and Nitro, and the retrodes which I had a serious problem with are now one of the least of my worries. The team still has some balancing issues xD

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 15:05

#679

Batabii

that wasn't unnecessary. I

that wasn't unnecessary. I didn't see him say anything about "I'm providing support only".

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 22:57

#680

Markosmesh

Connverting into full time bomber

Greetings and salutations to all.

I am a full time swordsman turned 80/20 swordie/bomber , but i have now decided to flip it around and become an 80/20 bomber/swordie

My Gear as of now:

Swords: DA, GF, BTB, CIV
Guns: Polairs, AP
Bombs: DBB, Shiver, Master blast bomb, Plasma Cap
Helmet: Devine Veil, Skolver, Volc Demo
Armor: Devine Mantle, Skolver, Vog
Shield: BTS, Owlite, VPS, CoA
Trinkets: Bomb CTR, Sword ASI

I use 4 weps and both trinkets

Plans:

Get Mad Bomber Suit
Find Voltaic Tempest Recipe
No Nitronome - I'm very underwhelmed by this bomb in its 4 star form, I think I may leave a sword in my loadout instead

I need opinions on the following:

Get a Vortex Bomb - I'm aware that the Electron is better, but that involves a whole lot of Lockdown which does not excite me, plus I'll have a Tempest, so is it that much better that I must have it, or is Graviton fine?

Get another Haze bomb - Agni, VV, both? I'm leaning with both :)

RSS - worth investing in?

Any more trinkets?

Thanking you all in advance for your advice. Love you long time

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 23:08

#681

Fallout

I'm feeling some bf3 instead o' SK

your pretty set with your armor (mad+Volcanic I'm assuming) so on with the rest;
Get a Vortex Bomb Graviton is fine, the two aren't really different (i only use vortex's for jellies anyways so the shadow is a nice bonus for me) ele is just better at crowd control with that shock bonus. If your comboing with VT it basically becomes an ele vortex with shadow damage anyway =p
Get another Haze bomb go with both if you have the money, however if you end up picking one, just go with AoA, just because it's fun and is based less situation then VV.
RSS is worth investing in; it is great while dungeon diving (wrecks zombies) and is a nice spamming/dps to own bomb if you aren't getting a Nitro.
Any more trinkets? Damage trinkets are nice; however seeing as you'll probably still be half a swordsman, I'd suggest to you to get just an elite Boom Mod for the 1st trinket and keep that Sword ASI mod as the 2nd trinket. Then if you ever decide going full bombing in a run consider getting the 5* shock and fire resistance pendents, but only do so if you stumble upon that many tokens (in other words not really needed but helps with the mad Bomber suit)

Hope I helped; if you need anything else feel free to ask ;)

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 23:54

#682

Markosmesh

Thanks for that, totally forgot about status trinkets, and since i got 7 million spark tokens, i should get me some :)

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 05:41

#683

Alice-In-Pyroland

Make Ash of Agni, Vortex,

Make Ash of Agni, Vortex, possibly RSS although you may not need it if you're using swords and consider a Brandish line sword since they combo well with vortex and other status bombs.

Edit: So after some testing VV/Shiver alternation does only need to be done every after every three Shivers assuming Max CTR, and provided you don't mess up the placement the time frame between mists is so insignificant than it's highly unlikely Vana will free himself unless the party members providing dps are completely out of sync with one another.

Having validated VV's use throughout FSC I'm thinking of trying to test it in some of the Shadow Lairs, I think it could actually be extremely potent in URJP thanks to the abundance of Silkwings, but you'd need to somehow keep the Silkwings alive as long as possible to really abuse it. I don't think it will be viable in UFSC though due to the different dynamics of the enemies and room layout, so that leaves UMIF where I imagine it will have a fair bit of utility. While I'm at I suppose I should probably try providing some good Shadow Lair loadouts since the question has come a fair bit in the thread as of late.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 06:08

#684

Batabii

Once I realized the

Once I realized the difference between glacius and shivermist, I regretted crafting the Fiery Atomizer instead of the Combuster.

The thing is, Freeze is the only status effect you can break accidentally. So the shivermist reapplies that status while glacius does not (still I like strong freeze). Meanwhile, fire stays whether you hit once or many times. So now I feel like it was a waste to craft FA over Combuster since the latter has STRONG fire and more outright damage, and only a little less range.

Anyway about the bombs again, is VV really that popular? Until recently, I never saw ANYONE use it. Right now my poison and freeze bombs are only 2*. Would they be any use whatsoever on Vanaduke? As long as they hit, it's the same status, right? I was working on Voltaic Tempest but unless the enemies got patched so they're actually staggered by it, it's more for PVE and it never seemed to help me much on Vanaduke at 3*...

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 07:55

#685

Trying

VV isnt that popular. I

VV isnt that popular. I believe it used to have a smaller radius than the Shiver and AoA. Also very few people like carrying a bomb that has such a passive effect.
The statuses do actually get stronger as you upgrade them despite what the description says. Vanaduke can break out of a 4* freeze but cant break out of a 5* freeze.

I think you're getting confused between the stagger storm and the VT

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 09:17

#686

Alice-In-Pyroland

Blitz Needle didn't used to

Blitz Needle didn't used to be popular. When I started playing during the Steam release Vanaduke fights were all about Argent Peacemaker, very few people used Blitz whatsoever. Yet now it's probably the single most used weapon against Vanaduke, and nothing changed about Blitz, it's just that more and more people became aware of how good it was. Nobody would ever attempt sword-runs against Vana outside of gimmicky fun runs once upon a time, yet now the world record Vana fight is held by a sword only run. In games with any variable like gear, stat distritbution, different movesets or whatever, there are inevitably going to be things that people overlook and then one day via exposure gain popularity; half the time these things are no better than they previous were; people just never really considered them. The competetive Pokemon metagame is more or less entirely built around people coming with crazy ideas that take the meta by storm, and dozens upon dozens of other games demonstrate this. It probably only doesn't happen too much in SK due to the fact the competetive aspects of the game are relatively young, and there isn't a massive gear selection. Point being, something becoming popular doesn't have to mean it's gotten better, it could simply mean people have discovered uses for it that simply hadn't been given exposure previously.

Although considering VV specifically, it's worth noting that a while back poison didn't even function properly as a status when dealing with healers, which is one of VV's main niches. And pre-Shadow Lairs most stratums don't have a particuarly large abundance of healers, so outside of arenas most people wouldn't consider it. VV also unfortunately has the disadvantage of not increase overall party dps as much as AoA or VT, and lacks the crowd control effects of Shiver and SS with means it only has a few limited niche uses. Of course with those particular niches being mainly prominent in arenas and boss stratums (The depths people run the most) it does end up seemingly have more utility comparatively than bombs that it actually doesn't.

I should also probably point out that most of the discussion regarding VV going on atm is mostly me and people I've convinced to try the bomb out, it's hardly gained a massive surge in popularity; I'm just pushing the case that it has utilities that we've previously overlooked and this being a bomber thread it's inevitably going to get discussed.

As for the other status bombs, your status bombs won't do you much good against Vana at anything less than their five star variants since the raidus of the bombs won't effectively reach Vana in phase 5, and as Trying mentioned they actually do apply a stronger status at 5*. Also maybe I'm not following, but if you don't have any 5* status bombs what are you actually bombing with Batabii? Do you just carry dps bombs and/or vortex alongside swords/guns? If so you're seriously underestimating the potency of status bombs, it's a bit disengenious to compare them to the Brandish lines, the bombs have a much greater aoe and remain in play re-applying their status for several seconds unlike the rather quick Brandish charge. Not that the Brandish swords aren't excellent, but if you're looking to spread status the bombs do it far, far better.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 09:37

#687

Embodien

damage bonus trinkets for

damage bonus trinkets for volcanic helm and mad bomber..or heart pendants?

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 09:45

#688

Alice-In-Pyroland

In the Clockworks you'll want

In the Clockworks you'll want Elite Boom Modules. There really isn't ever a reason to take any sort of Heart Pendants into PvE, the health bonus will make very little difference in the grand shceme of things and the extra damage is essential for maxmimizing your dps. If for one reason or another you wanted to play pure status bombs and had Max CTR without trinkets then you could run Heart Pendants I suppose, but even then you'd probably better going for trinkets that buff the ASI or Dmg of your other weapons, unless you're only carrying support bombs which isn't something I'd recommend.

In Lockdown you'll absolutely need Heart Pendants since especially after the recent update successfully managing dps bombs in tier 3 PvP is an uphill battle, and the gain from the damage will be less effective than the additional health. Mind you I don't really bomb much in Lockdown, so someone who does should probably weigh in on that.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 10:04

#689

Darkbrady

@Embodi:Two Elite Boom

@Embodi:
Two Elite Boom Modules, Volcanic Demo Helm and Mad Bomber Suit will give all your (+10, ofc) bombs max damage and max CTR, and about a block or so of fire resistance. Since you won't have any spare trinket slots it's worth it to have at least one of your armour parts UVd with fire; with that setup you're run well in FSC and fire won't be insta-kill, but still hurt pretty badly; definitely carry remedies everywhere you go. Heart pendants aren't ever really the answer for bombers (couldn't say for the other classes) down there, as the fire will tear through your health faster than it's worth it to not just remedy.

@Batabii:
Comparing FA against Combuster is like comparing Faust to FoV; they're different *d, it's a bit unfair. The only 4* that can realistically compare with 5* stuff are things like RSS. AoA compares very well against Combuster, having a huge rad and leaving an over-time aoe that can re-ignire enemies. The same thing applies with freeze; if you drop a couple of them, you can swing a sword at a frozen mob and watch it get insta-refreezed as the first/second bomb recatches it. It's entirely possible to accomplish this with a single shiver drop if you attack quickly enough.
Remember that not only do the status effects hit harder, but the rad of the bomb itself is vastly increased on 5* which I find is good and unfortunate; it's nice to have a solid progression other than just damage, but at the same time seriously cripples the usefulness of haze bombs below 5*.

@Echoez, since you've clearly got experience with VV:
I've spent the past week or two pondering about VV myself, although mainly for the sake of JK over Vana and whether it would be worth crafting one. I still have a lot of stuff to build and help my gf build so it's not as if I can afford to do stutff just for funsies so am wanting anything I craft to be primarily practical; I've not been able to decide if it will pull its weight. Its main uses will be in JK and Vana but the real questions are..will it pull it's weight in there? Is it worth using against the bosses? Will uses for it crop up anywhere else typically, or is it just that niche?

EDIT:
as for PvP bombing, I've never noticed any real usefulness in dps bombing with heart trinkets. I'm not using two 5* ones to be fair, but when toothpick strikers get to you, you either survive or die, it doesn't tend to be "close call" enough for a few extra hearts to have changed it. I have definitely noticed that killing them faster helps though; unless they manage to land on top of RSS they rarely die in one hit, so spending less time with them alive is better overall , since the longer they're alive, the more they're likely to kill your face off.
Saying that, I'm not going to claim to be a veteran PvPr, so that may just be coming from someone who doesn't compare against the pro's, but it's my thoughts on the subject regardless.

EDITEDIT:
@Fallout:
You use Nitro in FSC? That's a bomb I just leave at home tbh. RSS kills zombies in a couple of shards (insta kill if they land on top of it) and DBB takes care of Trojans/the few wolvers that pop up. Shiver and sword/other tends to do me fine, I've never really found a situation where Nitro seems useful. Where do you use Nitro that you feel is worth using that over RSS?

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 10:16

#690

Alice-In-Pyroland

Ash/Tempest/Vortex are all

Ash/Tempest/Vortex are all much more useful in the regular Royal Jelly Palace since at tier 2 they whittle down the meager health of mobs extremely fast and there isn't the same abundance of Silkwings there in the Shadow Lair equivilent. Against the Royal Jelly itself it helps, the fight is over so fast that poison vials are essentially just as effective. VV's primary niches are counteracting healers and debuffing large groups of enemies in situations where damage over time bomb wouldn't be as quick, and stacking with other status bombs in areas with healers to increase the damage rate. For the most part you'll find yourself using VV in Firestorm Citadel, non-Venom Fang arenas and some Shadow Lairs. Outside of those areas there's little use for it, it helps in a couple Danger Rooms but the likelyhood of you running into specific DRs during a depth isn't high enough to justify carrying bombs 'just in case'. It's something I think dedicated bombs should have in their arsenal precisely for the situations where it excells at its niche, but if you're crafting resources are limited and you're building things up from a purely pragmatic stand point you'd want more 'general' use items before aiming at the more niche selection.

In general for any bomber I always recommend the progression of bombs in "tiers" of importance;

You need them: Ash of Agni, Dark Briar Barrage, Electron/Graviton Vortex (Nitronome)

You should have them: Radiant Sun Shards, Voltaic Tempest, Shivermist Buster (Nitronome)

Niche but a dedicated bomber should probably have them: Venom Veiler, Stagger Storm (Nitronome)

Bottom: The rest of the fully upgraded bombs that no one really uses, and should probably only be made if you're a really dedicated bomber who wants to try them out, maybe try and find a use for them, or just for collection purposes.

Nitro is all over since it's position depends a lot on how much you solo, how many weapon slots you have, ect. It can either be just as important as Ash, or something you could easily put off until last. I should also mention this for use in the Clockworks, if you're wanting to bomb in Lockdown primarily then Tempest and Stagger should be elevated, although I would suggest establishing PvE loadouts first.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 10:44

#691

Darkbrady

Aye, I have most of my bombs

Aye, I have most of my bombs and tend to use pure-bomb loadouts since my GF is a swordie and likes carrying around a spare gun, so between us we have what we need. I mainly just have to 5* some stuff (primarily haven't thus far due to not being able to find the recipes alone) and could have started levelling a VV, I could honestly just never decide whether it was worth it or not, and sadly the best way to test and find out is by...well, making one which defeats the whole conundrum. By now I'm putting a lot of my CE into helping my gf get the last few things we need to be able to do Vana, since neither of us can effectively damage him (Ever tried to kill Vana with RSS? Takes. Forever.) so whether VV was a practical choice in speeding up the process was a pretty big issue.
Good to know I suppose; I'll definitely be getting it at some point, but at this rate, maybe not until I've finished finding all my 5* recipes.

Although, interesting that you should tier your bombs that way. I suppose it's different for me considering how I came to be a bomber, but I had RSS and Shiver as my first bombs.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 10:47

#692

Embodien

hmm you guys are confusing me

hmm you guys are confusing me :/
So is VV still classified as a bomb for fsc or is VT more worth it?

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 11:19

#693

Alice-In-Pyroland

VVand VT are roughly on par

VVand VT are roughly on par with one another during FSC, VT is probably better during the citadel itself though VV is superior for Vana.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 12:36

#694

Embodien

So overall which would you

So overall which would you take?

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 12:40

#695

Halifix

So how are damage bombs now

So how are damage bombs now that it's a lot easier to set them? I just picked up a nice spine cone and plan to level it up sometime in the next month.

As for FSC, a lot of bombs can be useful, except Ash of Agni. Some are simply more rounded than others.
Electron>Graviton>Nitro. Since a lot of rooms are large, Nitro will likely be annoying unless you can trap some in a corner.
Shiver>Venom/Voltaic>SS. Voltaic works well with Graviton if you don't have Shivermist, and Venom is a good extra slot bomb. I hear Stagger can let Vana's mace hit you twice... ew.
I can't speak on damage bombs because I rely on Polaris/Leviathan.

On a small note, I get annoyed by people that spam Shivermist. They're reducing their own damage, and not letting monsters naturally clump together. If your team is not having much trouble, and you have RSS or DBB, use that instead.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 12:46

#696

Darkbrady

Damage bombs in FSC are a

Damage bombs in FSC are a complete joke after the patch. You can walk through full floors without taking a scratch just by planting RSS for zombies and circling DBB for the trojans; no effort at all. Not even been using any other bombs at all until the last room before Vana when I tend to start droppin' Shivers if things get out of hand.
Not used Nitro at all in FSC and, with the way things are with zombies, I can't see any need to personally.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 13:26

#697

Alice-In-Pyroland

So overall which would you

So overall which would you take?

I take Venom Veiler since throughout the stratum itself I find Vortex alone is often more than sufficent in 95% of FSC, and RSS easily mops up where vortex doesn't. Thus VV gets priority just for the way it speeds Vana fights up signficantly by essentially keeping him perma-poisoned during the whole fight. With that said I should probably note that you can easily get through FSC itself with just a vortex and a dps bomb, your remaining slots are mostly there for the boss.

So how are damage bombs now that it's a lot easier to set them?

Wait do you mean set or see? And what are we even referring to here, the raidus change in the latest patch?

On a small note, I get annoyed by people that spam Shivermist.

I think everyone does to be honest. Outside of Fiend levels where restricting their mobility and preventing them aiming is singificantly helpful, and of course Vanaduke there are very few situations where it provides better support than a different status bomb, dps bomb or a vortex. That being said it's more the sort of bomb I see swordsman carry because they haven't discovered the wonders of vortex, I rarely see bombers ever use Shiver outside of the few situations where it is legimiately useful.

As for Nitro in FSC, as I said last page there really is no need for it in fsc post-patch. RSS and Vortex eat the entirety of it alive, the only things left in there that are moderately scary are the Oilers; which are defanged by Shiver (Huh, that's another time Shiver's actually useful).

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 18:09

#698

Batabii

You know what I mean, just

You know what I mean, just assume I meant atomizer vs blazebrand and GF vs FOV.

And RSS works great on vana, with the only stipulation being that, after his first (fireball-less) stage, you have to lure him into charging on top of the bombs. Then each one will do 1000+ dmg per.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 18:54

#699

Fallout

yay, top o page again. Echoez

yay, top o page again. Echoez you are epic and answered all them questions.
as for darkbrady, I really only take nitro, RSS and a gun (AP mostly, sometimes calla) to fsc. RSS does the DPS in the first stage; Nitro is good for shielding my team and breaching through mist barriers when they're being hugged by zombies. RSS does a heap of DPS in a lot of the rooms, i.e. there are a lot of small crowded rooms with tons of slags, so I just nitro heard them to a corner and spam it at the massive group. Ele Vortex + RSS is still better than Nitro for fsc I just prefer a more aggressive approach and I can't really change the same strategy I've used for about a year now; It just works so well for me and it's pretty much just imprinted in my memory. It's quite the shock when I mix it up and go gunning, as I have to devise other tactics on the fly and if it's late at night and I don't feel like thinking that isn't necessarily good xD.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 19:05

#700

Darkbrady

Oh yeah, RSS works more than

Oh yeah, RSS works more than well enough but...by god is it just not worth it compared to Blitz Needle or...AP or...well...most other ways to attack him x.x

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