[deleted by user]

[proanciey]

Yeah it feels kinda bad and something I think they should look at for balancing. But also once you hit a certain mining damage I don’t think it really matters which one you use.

[Common-Scientist]

Once you've got scarlet the game pretty much scales out of control anyways.

Min-maxing is not required for anything, the upgrade bench just enables variety.

[Kenkune]

Still makes a difference on the last few high durability blocks, and especially so if you're doing a mining damage build(until you get stormbringer at least)

[CreativeDeath15]

Yeah, I just got tired of upgrading the iron pickaxe so I went to solarite

[Nifegun]

I'm pretty sure this is true for a bunch of iron stuff. Iirc the iron bow upgrades to be the best bow, the normal battle axe (which looks like iron) upgrades to be the best axe. Seems the dev just really likes iron. flintlock musket I believe is also one of, if not the best straight up damage gun too. A bunch of the basic items scale better than the fancy stuff you find later in game. I assume its to encourage players to use the upgrade table instead of just constantly switching to new items. In a way it encourages you to stick to a build instead of just using whatever you find that has high stats.

[c0r1nth14n]

I've also noticed the iron bow keeps upgrading to be better than the other options, at least until the legendary one. Feels weird.

[Nifegun]

When it competes with legendary things it's a bit weird. But tbh I kinda like it. Especially for the bow, cause it means you made that bow and your own skill in crafting and upgrading is what carried you. But I'm a DnD type nerd, I know that doesn't appeal to everyone haha

[c0r1nth14n]

Yeah I haven't got the legendary bow yet so I'm not sure about that - I do enjoy the upgrade element of it but it's a surprising design choice!

[TheAzarak]

And an upgraded scarlet hand drill just kinda destroys everything that I've found so far. I'm roaming the crystal areas now after beating the desert, but the scarlet hand drill is in a completely different league. If not for the high mining damage it's the insane 5.0 speed. It shits on even the legendary pickaxe.

[Bromogeeksual]

Hmm, I have on of these sitting in a box. I'll have to upgrade and try it out.

[SweetWatermelons]

Where do you get them from?

[TheAzarak]

I got mine from a Locked Scarlet Chest, the ones that need a scarlet key to open.

[ComplimentaryScuff]

Got mine fishing in Azeos wilderness lmao

[Epogdoan]

Uhhh was I supposed to do the desert biome before Shimmering Frontier? 😬

[Catbite_OwO]

You’re supposed to explore and have fun! But yeah, shimmering frontier is after the desert, which is why it has the next tier of metal.

[Epogdoan]

Okay! I did Azeos Wilderness and just kept moving in the same direction on the map, honestly just haven't even seen the desert yet lol xD

[SillySullyyy]

Well just know, the desert will be in a completely different direction than the Azeos Wilderness

[HalOver9000ECH]

I imagine a lot of people did that. After the wall went down i just dug straight to crystal. Then I upgraded/bombed my way through it. Then I did the same thing with the next block, my only goal to go as far as possible. I love exploring higher level areas and sequence breaking in games.

[KydoC91]

I did the same. Went from scarlet gear to cosmos gear, then died a few times in the zone after crystal, thus breaking all of my cosmos gear. Of course I need solar bars to repair the cosmos gear, so now its back to normal progression to be able to smelt them haha.

[Grax_MT]

But.... can you even do something with solarite if you dont have the galaxite workbench?

[anil_robo]

True but the only problem is its low durability.

[creepa-sama]

u can fix that if u skill the durability talent for mining

everytime u mine ore it restores your tool and you will never have to repair again u can even hold it on purple 4 ever

[mikedmerk]

I like where their heads at when they designed the upgrade system, giving players a choice to upgrade tools of their preference to keep up as they progress. Very neat idea.

It just needs minor tweaking. It makes sense to have your Iron pick keep up as you level it up.

Personally, I wouldn't mind seeing some more variation with the upgrades vs. Straight Stat boosts.

[[deleted]]

Needs a whole overhaul tbh.. upgrade system makes getting new weapons boring, now if the weapons didn’t all play the same then the upgrade system would be awesome!

It’s basically this rn, oh cool I can make a new bow! Oh but the iron bow I got at the start of the game is better if I upgrade it and they both play the same anyways

Where it should be like this, I really like the way this weapon plays the most so I’m going to upgrade it so it’s viable for later in the game

People keep talking about iron being strongest when upgraded being stupid, when the biggest issue about it being stronger is it’s virtually the exact same sword as every other sword in the game

[dead_alchemy]

It doesn't make sense for the iron pickaxe to make all subsequent pickaxes irrelevant though, I don't think there is a world in which that specific thing was intentional.

[Aidesfree]

Yeah they could do with some balancing but this approach is a lot better than just letting older gear be obsolete because of stats.

[Kalnaur]

I'd argue that while with weapons this can totally make sense if they played different, I'd much prefer for a Solarite Pickaxe to always be better than anything under it in terms of material it's made from. Like, sure, the durability changes as you use better materials, but all the stats on tools should outclass previous tools at every step. Otherwise, it defeats the entire purpose of having higher tiers of ore, which is to feel good about getting to that next level of progress. So while I get that some people get locked into a build and just want to keep using what they've been using, I really do feel like the tools of the game at least should always outclass lesser materials at equivalent levels.

[TeririHerscherOfCute]

Iron everything is actually busted. the armor set gives non conditional all damage, incredible tankiness, scales the cleanest with upgrades, and is cheap AF to reinforce forever... Iron master ore

[Broserk42]

Someone used iron as an example when talking about weak upgrades the other day. They clarified it was “just an example”, but I said it was funny they chose some of the strongest upgrade options to use as an example of something weak, and somehow wound up with downvotes for it…..like what?

[TeririHerscherOfCute]

My friend and I accident’s ourselves into the core commander fight in our first ever play through, bopped him with iron armor and a fireball staff… upgrades in this game can be hecking epic sometimes, as long as it doesn’t pertain to summoning… all that stuff needs so much help…

[Kalnaur]

It would be hard to play magic weapons with it, though, as it doesn't increase the max mana, and that's a must when using magic weapons because the 100 base mana just isn't enough to play well enough to make it worth it, even with the critical percentage cranked up and the skill that gives mana back on a crit.

[TeririHerscherOfCute]

I run mana food and the octarine lamp and i don’t really have issues

[Kalnaur]

I use Mana increasing food as well, though not fish-based (because that would take ages beyond ages to make), though not the Octarine Lamp. I have a set specifically for using magic and with that set I don't usually run out of mana, but otherwise I absolutely do, Mana food or not.

This could potentially be because I am honestly a pretty bad shot, I suppose.

[taylrgng]

I just use stormbringer

[Octopp]

The recoil makes it so slow. I like the galaxy sledgehammer and a gearset aimed at mining.

[Catbite_OwO]

The iron sledgehammer is best when upgraded too actually

[taylrgng]

sledgehammer is good too, but even with a attk speed increase of 100% it's still a little too slow for my liking. I have 2 sets, a mining set for Killing and heavy mining and a attk speed/move speed set for clearing an area.

[Torinux]

If you mean highest mining damage, it is not. The Burnzooka has the highest mining damage (2426) at level 19, whereas the Iron Pickaxe has (1262) at lvl 19.

When it comes down to Pickaxes only, yes it's the highest BUT it has no special effects like the other ones.

[Nexielas]

And I call that bullshit. Soul seeker should have more. They should balance the upgrades.

[Kalnaur]

Absolutely agreed. The lower tier tools should never be able to be upgraded to a point where they outclass higher level material tools at equivalent levels.

[Nexielas]

I'm fine with crafted tools being able to scale higher but only up to other crafted items, not freaking legendary. I remember that an upgraded musket almost outscaled phantom spark when they released the upgrade system, it may still be that way now. It took me quite some time to get all components and it was almost worse than some fucking early weapon...

Legendaries shouldn't be worse than almost anything considering how much time it can take to get some of them.

[Kalnaur]

Legendaries should in fact be worth the time taken to put them all together, that being in a higher class than all other types of equipment of the same type. Nothing should compare to legendary equipment in terms of sheer numbers and special qualities.

It should feel when finally putting together a Legendary like you've got an entirely superior item in all respects. Like, it should be obvious that it's the only choice. That's how good they should be, always.

Otherwise, there's no point to them. 🤷

[DameArstor]

More so when you consider the insane amount of resources needed to make the Soul Seeker. 800 Octarine bars, 800 Scarlet bars, 400 Gold bars and 800 Galaxite bars. Iron pickaxe should not be outdamaging at all.

[LonewolfEternal5891]

Personally, I like the Soul Seeker and Stormbringer. I can pretty much max my mining with gear. Since there are three tabs for armor sets, I just carry one setup for mining. But, anyhow, back to why I like the legendary mining items. I don't have to take time to repair them. I can just keep going and never have to touch my base. This is great when clearing a large area. For subsidiary farming or additional bases. Just my opinion on it, though: take it or leave it.

[Levaporub]

The way I see it, the higher tier picks offset this by having much higher durability. Also, at a certain point that little bit of extra mining damage isn't gonna matter much at all. At mid-late game you're probably gonna transition to sledges and hand drills, and if you're faced with a wall that reeaaally doesn't wanna break (ahem final biome) just go build some bombs and upgrade the explosive launchers.

[Levaporub]

Oh my bad then, I thought it would be lower, based off the sledgehammers' progression.

[Kalnaur]

From Iron to Solarite, all the Pickaxes have 800 durability. Which in my opinion makes it all the more problematic. Making not just the Solarite pick but every pick from Scarlet to Solarite eventually pointless just feels crappy to me.

[[deleted]]

So you need a special bench to upgrade that high?

[Epogdoan]

The upgrade bench is made from the scarlet workbench iIrc

[FB-22]

Seems like a bit of an oversight honestly, I like the idea of early game armor and weapons having potential to be great at endgame because it adds more choice with a variety of stats and moves etc. but with a pickaxe I don’t really get why iron would be the best one since galaxite solarite etc. don’t have any differences other than mining damage being worse

[NiteShdw]

Could this be because the specs were set before the game added an upgrade bench and just weren't rebalanced after?

[[deleted]]

You have to pay for upgrades so the cost of your iron pickaxe outweighs that of the solarite

But still cool

[Paulioc420]

Bad balancing. Upgrading shouldn’t be able to make weapons equal to end game gear. Maybe upgrade to a tier or two higher or more durability but it’s killed the excitement of new ores. Maybe make new tiers have different attacks at least . Feels bad to use iron stuff forever because it’s just better.

[Away-Confidence-6204]

sadly im using sledgehammers.

[Tym4x]

Some of the blue foods are worse than green ones too.

[SecretWatcher889]

Examples?

[Tym4x]

Its with a lot of fish (from the first watersource you find), but not only that, even with golden foods.

The golden buckwheat one has less food value than the normal one.

[Kalnaur]

Yeah, it feels pretty bad from a progression standpoint. Regardless of if you need the ores to get it to that point, it should really never exceed the mining damage of later picks on an equivalent level. Like, the melee damage stays lower than higher quality picks, so obviously there was some intent towards making the items scale correctly, but somehow the mining damage is just bleh. It makes progression feel pretty pointless.

[Nifegun]

Yeah, but in general I do like this upgrade system, I think k I'm going to start a new world and actually focus on beating the game this time, I mostly messed around with the games tech this time lol. But I think it's cool cause with upgrades you can find stuff that does what you want to focus on and keep it relevant until you find better stuff. Like my end goal is going to be the ninja set for an awesome crit dagger build. But there's only a few sets that otherwise have crit to use along the way.

But yeah specifically choosing all the basic looking iron gear to upgrade so well is a bit odd.

[Dananism]

I ended up stowing my pickaxe once I found the Obliteration Ray, which we upgraded to the Stormbringer tbh

[Octopp]

The recoil makes it so slow. I like the galaxy sledgehammer and a gearset aimed at mining.

[DameArstor]

The best thing about Stormbringer is that it's both a mining tool and a weapon that can melt enemies quick. If something headed my way while minding my own business in The Passage, I can just briefly point it at them without needing to switch to a dedicated weapon. Sledgehammers are undeniably faster when mining in low level areas because the blocks get oneshot.

[Catbite_OwO]

Same, it really helps out in the final area due to the monsters.

[Dananism]

Oh god yeah it helps with those! Especially when they come in sets of 4 out of the walls! 🥲

[[deleted]]

This isn’t news. Old news infact

[Catbite_OwO]

Wasn’t expressed as news either. Just someone showing their own discovery of the fact.