There is nothing wrong with the Rock Salt Bomb the way it is.

The damage bonus doesn't help at all. Each shard still does pathetically low damage against slimes. It's not bad by itself, but pales when compared to the other bombs.

It has a longer charge time and, thus, less DPS than the damage bombs. The knockdown it does has less of a utility effect than poison/freeze/suction. The huge damage spike when more than one shard connects is nice but can't be relied on.

The damage bonus is nowhere near canceling out slime's piercing resistance.
The damage isn't as good as a calibur charge.
The only thing where it's not outshined is shocking groups of enemies. And I can't hit groups of enemies reliably with it (yet?)

I'd rather advise against using it.

but pales when compared to the other bombs.
less DPS than the damage bombs
The damage isn't as good as a calibur charge.
...damage...damage...damage...

Is this all anyone ever thinks about? Low damage = bad weapon, no questions?

You're kidding, right? Except for it doing low damage to slimes per single shard, EVERYTHING he wrote in that post is wrong.

And you believe him.

Or you just freeze the slime and do 6 times more damage than a single sword swing with a sword charge attack.

and haze line bombs are great~

Also, Awesomest, I already admitted that rock salt is viable to shock huge groups of enemies if that's possible to aim. But I can't do that so I'd rather try a storm driver. Just my personal choice.

I don't understand how you can value knockdown + shock to be as useful as poison/freeze/suction or even the nitronome knockback.

The Ionized Salt Bomb triggers dodge mechanics in all enemies. It is one of the worst bombs to use on wolvers and devilites for this reason. Against slimes, it is easier to get 3-5 hits off of a bomb on one slime, but you're now doing focused damage on a single opponent as opposed to a spread of damage to multiple opponents, and that damage is lower than other options you have available to you (bomb, gun, or sword wise). Honestly it is one of the largest disappointments I've experienced, bomb wise.

I'm pretty adept at aiming bombs. Just that I can't use ionized salt to apply shock as efficiently as shivermist to apply status . And I dont see how it could apply shock as efficiently as a storm driver (havn't tested that)

Blast bombs are awesome. I am absolutely astounded that you think the crystal bomb series is better. Aside from stopping at 4*, it has fewer branches, charges more slowly, hits fewer enemies per explosion, does less damage per explosion, and is pitifully weak against slimes. There is no reason to use a crystal bomb over a blast bomb in a generic dungeon run.

Rock salt stops at 4*. Blast bomb has a 5* version.

Blast bomb can become a deconstructor, big angry, nitronome, or irontech bomb. Not all of these are great bombs, but at least there's variety at the end of the line. Rock salt only becomes Ionized Salt Bomb (crystal bomb could also become radiant sun shards).

The crystal bomb series can hit at most 8 enemies, and usually only hits 2-3. You also have to aim it, which can be tricky (although will improve with time as skill builds) and tends to slow down placement. Blast bombs can be dropped as soon as they're charged and damage everything in the radius.

Hitting more enemies means doing more damage per explosion with the blast bomb. It also means culling the large crowds in arenas and deconstruction zones much more quickly.

The blast bombs will do about 6-8x more damage than salt bombs to slimes. The bonus against fiends is nice with the salt bombs, but the complete lack of utility against other monsters means you can't make it your primary weapon as you can with a blast series bomb.

Blast bombs charge faster, which means more DPS. The ionized salt bomb in particular is painfully slow.

I'm quite certain. I use a Master Blast Bomb as my primary weapon and have been tinkering with a crystal bomb lately.

The crystal bomb is a bit slower to charge (at the same level, wearing the same armor), has to be placed with aiming in mind, can hit at most 8 enemies or miss them all, but it usually hits 1-3. Because it has piercing damage, it is weak against constructs and slimes, but strong against beasts (which can dodge) and fiends. (I did really enjoy the crystal bomb against devilites.)

The blast bombs do boring old normal damage, but that means they're useful against everything. They damage and knock down everything in their radius, not just the handful in a shard path. In a danger room, I can easily hit a dozen enemies with a blast bomb when there's a new spawn and, if I'm standing shielded on the bomb, I end up with a nice safe zone around me to find a path to run and charge the next one. Not so with crystal bombs that inevitably miss a few of the oncoming monsters.

Crystal bombs are fun and I'm not saying a good bomber shouldn't ever own one, but for general utility, give me the blast series any day.

I'd have to agree, I'd rather a blast bomb than a rock salt branch crystal bomb.

The Crystal Bomb itself is actually insane, and for the speed I think the lack of accuracy and "guaranteed" damage output is fine, but the Rock Salt and Ionized Salt Bombs are just... Useless. Underwhelming would be a better description.

1) I said it was wrong. I didn't say the opposite was correct; YOU'RE reading MY posts incorrectly. And I've said this 9001 times before: just because you can't use something (Shock), doesn't mean it is bad.

2) When I used the word 'damage', I wasn't trying to stress that the numbers it shows are small or large. I was trying to state how practical it is to use in situations. I can't even make a statement about that because I don't even play with numbers on.

What I don't understand is why everyone is quick to compare everything. There are times when something is good to use and times when it isn't, and in this game it is so easy to switch your gear accordingly. There's no point in saying "Weapon A is bad compared to Weapon B in situation C"; the obvious solution is only use Weapon A in situation D.

The only problem is when there is NO situation that something is useful in. But so far, no weapon in the game (except maybe Fang of Vog lulz) fits into that category.

I said it was wrong. I didn't say the opposite was correct;
So what was your point then? That "shockdown" is equally as useful as the other status ailments? That the effect is useful in some situations? I'm willing to argue that if shockdown is useful in one situation, the effects of other bombs will be at least as good.

just because you can't use something (Shock), doesn't mean it is bad.
Please, tell us about your shock strategy. Or, prove that it's possible to use it "properly".

When I used the word 'damage', I wasn't trying to stress that the numbers it shows are small or large. I was trying to state how practical it is to use in situations.
It can deal respectable damage
It annihilates Greavers. Annihilates them.
Both statements deal with the "numbers", even if you don't say it directly.

What I don't understand is why everyone is quick to compare everything.
Because if you don't compare, you'll never realize that things can be better. There's a point to saying "A < B when C" when C happens all the time. And, just because "A > B when D", might mean A has a niche use. What if A > B only by a small margin? What if D happens extremely rarely? You say that

The only problem is when there is NO situation that something is useful in.
I disagree. There can be a problem if the situation rarely occurs or if the niche solution is only marginally more effective that the "conventional" solutions.

Look, I'm all for trying out unconventional stuff. I do it all the time in other games to the annoyance of the people I regularly play with. But at one point, you really have to admit whether something isn't as good as another.

I see no facts in your post... just a personal preference.

I did mention kiting explicitly and implicitly (monsters chasing you). Dunno if you've ever used bombs in the arena? It doesn't take me any extra time at all to place my bombs with a certain precision. It doesn't require any buddies with graviton bombs, it just requires that monsters chase you, you place the bomb ahead of them at a certain distance (the reason I mentioned it takes experience) and making sure the blast radius stays on their path while they chase you. It's as simple as that.

I've also been known for bombing Spookats, it's fun to do and not at all impossible. If you'd place a bomb next to a spookat while it stands still, you're very sure to miss. So you need to plant the bomb where you know they're gonna go. Once you've figured this out, bombing Spookats is easy and lots of fun (it makes them so helpless). The bomb type doesn't matter if you ask me, although I enjoy setting them on fire very much.

I did say however that I prefer haze bombs. I've used the crystal bomb plenty in the Preview Event and the reason I turned back to my Ash of Agni is it's easier to use. But that's laziness on my behalf, it's not a testimony of how "underpowered" the crystal bombs are. They just require better timing.

P.S. Knocking down Menders with a shard bomb in the arena while never getting anywhere near the center of the field is hilarious.

@ORYLY

You're still not thinking practically. I don't know how many times I need to point it out.

Status effects stack. I'm not going to argue whether one status effect is better or worse because it's pointless. All I'm saying is you can like whatever you want to, but that doesn't make other effects worse.

DPS/damage is pointless data on its own. They're just statistics—what people want to know is how to kill enemies effectively, not how many seconds they have to count to until it's dead. At least try to understand that much.

I'm not against comparisons, but I'm against pointless ones. If Ionized is good against Greavers, you use it in Fiend strata, or strata where you're going to find Greavers. If a Haze line is better for the stratum, then use that. If a Blast line will help you to solo the stratum easier, use that instead. But EVERY weapon has its use, and no weapon is so bad that it can't help you get through at least ONE stratum. Just because it isn't the best, doesn't mean it isn't good.

@Luden

You're funny.

EDIT: Because you have no idea what you're talking about.

And Crystal Bombs are good.

Just because effects stack doesn't mean that they're all equal because you can potentially have them all. You see, charging a bomb takes time. If you choose spend time to apply shock, you're not spending that time trying to apply something else that can be potentially more useful.

Knowing DPS/damage gives you a clue on how effective something is at killing things. It's not worthless data as long as it's represented/applied correctly. If you know, for example, that a single shard does roughly as much damage as a blast and that the bomb takes longer than usual to charge then you'd be able to ask some questions about effectiveness. When there are X enemies in formation Y, wouldn't bomb B be better because it hits more of them?

Just because it isn't the best, doesn't mean it isn't good.
And just because something is effective at other things compared to another doesn't mean it's good. If other bombs can handle greavers slightly worse AND handle some other cases, why even use a slot on a special case bomb?

So on the Ionized Rock Salt Bomb, does it feel like the slimes are getting reduced damage to piercing and to the normal damage half of the bomb? Because it seems like I was doing more damage in T2 with the Rock Salt than I am in T3 with the Ionized. Really I just feel like the Ionized is missing some damage. At T2 with the Rock Salt, the boost was enough to make the bomb worthwhile as long as you were up against large hordes of slimes, but once you hit the Ionized version I can't mentally justify it against slimes. In T2 the item is scaled back significantly, and in T3 it simply doesn't do enough damage relative to most any other option.

Honestly I use this most on beasts. Wolvers can dodge, yes, but they can also dodge right into shards, which is forever hilarious. It isn't too rare for me to hit a warping Alpha Wolver twice with shards going in completely opposite directions, while never getting too close to the beast. Because most beasts have a good charge-up time before their attack, you can often drop the bomb in the middle of a crowd fairly easily. Fiends are much harder, since dodging Devilites requires much more distance with their thrown attacks, and Greivers won't let you charge a bomb unless you have friends to distract every single one of them.

Still, the extended charge-up time of this bomb feels kind of cruel. I'm not sure why it takes me longer to charge an Ionized that's at level 10 (CTR Medium) than a Radiant Sun Shards that hasn't hit level 5. Shock is a nice debuff to be sure, but I feel like that makes up for the bomb's less than incredible damage, rather than the huge charge time.

EDIT: Reading some of this thread, I'm amazed to see that DPS is being called a worthless statistic. If you can kill an opponent on average a few seconds faster, that reduces their damage output on you. Killing things quickly before they wear you down with the inevitable counterattack is a very important aspect of any fight in the clockworks.

TiVVV: I can't really give you a time to use ISB specifically for the shock. I originally had a section in my post about how you could get Shock into a group with a voltech, with much less risk than using the ISB, but I decided to drop it because I was already rambling. It's the major reason to me that the shock doesn't make up for the long charge time: Voltechs simply do it faster.

Shock is a bonus on the ISB, not the main feature: the long charge-time makes it too difficult to consistently apply it.

It amazes me how little Awesomest understands about balance. Both in this thread and the Cold Iron Vanquisher thread he's basically said "Who cares if it's objectively a worse weapon? It can still kill things!"

It looks like half the people in this thread haven't even USED the bomb but just read the wiki and said "yeah, it's good".. No, you are wrong, the bomb is complete garbage. Slime bonus? Useless, it does <30 damage to t3 slimes. Shock? Useless, 8 shards with too wide arcs to hit anything reliably besides puppies and lumbers (not to mention that ime it doesn't even get close to applying shock with the same freq as the haze line applies fire/freeze/poison). Projectile attacks ->trigger the epic dodge animations; yes the bomb is useless vs the t3 wolvers that will teleport around unless they're in melee range.

Yes maybe if you know the timings inside out and live in the server room you might get a bomb exactly under a wolver, grats. Now you can do what a sword user does in 1 charge attack. For the average joe, or hell, even the experienced joe, this bomb will hit 2 maybe 3 enemies if he's lucky doing mediocre damage.

"It annihilates greavers"? Are you kidding? Because the only greavers it'll annihilate will be the t1 ones you don't care about. Need i remind you that you can't shield while charging and that the 4* version charges very slowly while greavers not only swoop in very fast but inflict statuses even without hitting you?

Maybe if the bomb fired 12 or 16 shards instead of 8 (to cover the arcs properly) it might have been usable, but atm way too many creatures slip between the trajectories easily.

Awesomest. On DPS and usefulness. It's true that dealing the maximum amount of damage possible in the game is not necessary. You don't need to be perfectly specced with top tier everything to be useful in a fight. However, weaponry that is slow, low damage and low utility (no knockback or status debuffs) is in fact a hinderance since it brings nothing to a fight. Your presence in a party has increased the HP of each monster, and as such the opportunities those monsters will have to lay waste your, and your teammates faces. Since your damage output is so low, and you are not doing anything exceptional to counter it, the bonus you gave to your opponents outweighs your contributions to killing them.

So no, you don't have to be the veeerrrry best to be worthwhile. But even you realize why you shouldn't use a Proto Sword past tier 1. Sure, you can still kill things. But it'll take you much longer, in which time you're likely to get yourself and others killed. As it is, the Ionized Salt Bomb, and to a much lesser extent the Rock Salt Bomb, are very close to the line that seperates useful weaponry with liabilities. The ISB doesn't do amazingly high damage to make up for its high charge time, which means that you're relying on the shock effect to make up the difference. In my opinion, it doesn't, especially considering how long it takes to plant a bomb which may or may not shock any given target.

Essentially, the bomb is too slow, or it's not strong enough in terms of damage. I'm more in favour of it gaining back some of its speed than an increase in damage, but that's just me. I'd rather be using it for shock utility and some okay piercing damage than solely damage, with a side of occasional shock.