Rate the Weapon: Day Eight - BEES

[Ami]

Inspired by another topic, it occurs to me that many of us think weapons are bad or unusable, simply because we know what we like. But, do we know what we DON'T like? What's a worthy investment of your time and resources? In the case of polls which have multiple items bunched together, such as the ore swords, pick only the best one. If you love silver sword, but think iron sword is a waste of the bars, vote as if this were a poll for silver sword. I'll be logging these in a spreadsheet and making a compilation of which items users think are good, bad, OP, or a waste of space.
If they're bad, what would make them better? Lower cost? Autoswing? Projectiles? Different attack animation?
If they're OP, what would make them balanced?

Day Eight: Bee Gun, Bee Keeper, Bee's Knees, Beenade

While these weapons have limited usefulness, spawning the witch doctor is high priority for me, and due to the ease with which abeeminations are created, farming queen bee is a great source of money in pre-hardmode. Because of this, I always have access to the full suite of bee weapons every game with no extraneous farming. Bee Gun is really good at taking out skeletron, too, as it provided sustained homing damage while you work on dodging to stay alive. My only gripe is that after skeletron, dungeon, and whatever needs to be done in underworld, they're done. There's no saving them. They're worse than useless in hardmode, due to enemy defense reducing damage to 1, and the bees triggering their invulnerability.
If I kill the 9-ish queen bees and don't get a bee gun, however, I'll find another way to beat skeletron. It's not 100% indispensable.

TL, DR: I get them every game, despite only being useful for a short time.

Day 1 - Ore Swords - 2.41 - Everyone agrees these are not very good, but have no idea how to improve them.
Day 2 - Ore Bows - 3.41
Day 3 - Grenades - 3.28
Day 4 - Normal Yoyos - 3.7
Day 5 - Normal Boomerangs - 3.47 - 1 and 6 votes. Love 'em or hate 'em.
Day 6 - Normal Flails - 2.04 - Even lower than silver sword!
Day 7 - Pistols - 4.12 - nearly 1.5x the votes on this poll, and almost exclusively positive things to be said about guns.

 

[Warpshard]

I've only done one 1.3 play-through, so I'm not exactly the best source of info, but I'd probably do a bit of work to get the Bee's Knees and Beenades on a character. The Bee's Knees was a really good bow for the time that I had it (Up until I got the Molten Fury), and Beenades are much better than Grenades in my experience.

The Honeyed Goggles, though, are worth every second spent grinding for them. It's not a weapon, but I feel like it deserves mention. Early(ish) game flight is nothing short of a godsend, when the only other decent way of flying is Spectre/Lightning/Frostspark Boots with the Bundle of Ballons.

 

[Khaelis]

6 - Always.

The Bee's Knees and Beenades are always worth having on hand, especially in Expert Mode with the Hive Pack.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

They're pretty fun to use, but I find they quickly become obsolete when hardmode hits.
They are a solid midgame-pre hardmode choice if you are a mage.

 

[Zengi]

They're pretty fun to use, but I find they quickly become obsolete when hardmode hits.
They are a solid midgame-pre hardmode choice if you are a mage.

Yeah that's also how I feel. When I got the Bee Gun and The Bee's Knees pre-hardomde, it felt pretty op, but of course when hardmode hit, it became almost useless.

 

[SteveisNoob]

8 in 6 The Bee's Knees is still a consistent weapon in early hardmode, Bee Keeper is a nice sword to have, it has features for close targets and faraway ones. And, I don't talk about Beenades, they're just exact killing method for Wall of Flesh. Oh, I don't use Bee Gun most, but if the meteor stuff didn't existed, Bee Gun would be my favourite!

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Oh yeah, beenades are op against the wall of flesh. During my expert playthrough I spammed like 50 of them + waterbolt and that brought the WoF down to pretty low health
They aren't great in hardmode though; I used my entire stock and I couldn't clear a room of corruptors and clingers. Did a number on them though.

 

[Xakk]

I've found the problem with bee based weaponry is any amount of defense makes their damage plummet. So in Hardmode they turn into little taps, against enemies who are basically immune to death by 1000 cuts. Armor penetration can help with this, but not quite enough to make them super viable.
The Bee Gun is super handy through most of normal mode, and early homing is nothing to dismiss. The Bees Knees, even without the homing bees, is a rather hefty bow. Damage is outpaced by hardmode bows, however, and homing attacks by summons and guided missiles such as flamelash and flying knife.
Beenades aren't quite as usable in underground or tight situations due to the projectiles dying after too many collisions and grenades' general inaccuracy in such situations. They can do quite a bit of damage in controlled conditions, but conditions rarely are when you need grenades.

Perhaps another look at these might sway me closer, but the factor of enemy defense takes a lot of the luster out of bee weapons immediately in Hardmode. So I have to give em a 3. And that only because they rock in Normal.

EDIT: In summation, when looking at weapons for Hardmode, I have to say, NOT THE BEES.

 

[Juno Brier]

It's hip to use bees.

They're good early on pre-Hardmode, but otherwise not too great.

 

[thatRaGe]

I rarely use bee based weapons but it is something I should try sometime.

 

[Myth]

Bees with the Hive pack are literally an army of an unstoppable force, that is until you hit hard mode. They do good against the wall of flesh helping with keeping the hungry at bay.

I'd say if we are taking prehardmode they are a beast, but in the entirety of the game they are sub par.

 

[Ezel]

4 - Often.

I really like the Bee Gun/Beenades and The Bee's Knees. They are great against pre-Hardmode enemies and the bow is still effective in early-Hardmode.

 

[Xylia]

Rarely.

I've never really found a use for them to be honest, because I always find a weapon that can do whatever these do, only better. I played around with the Bee Keeper once or twice, but in the end, a Fiery Greatsword or Night's Edge kills stuff far faster. The bow is so-so, but then if I really wanted a ranged weapon Pre-Hardmode, I'd go for a Water Bolt. Can't think of anything a Water Bolt can't kill that the Bee's Knees can. Beenades are also "meh". I hear they work good, but I've never actually needed them for anything. I'm sure they work fine... but so does a lot of other stuff, lol.

 

[5Daydreams]

If I'm playing expert, the bee-master build is my favorite way of dealing with the wall. Bee gun / Bee's knee's + Hive Pack is simply that strong.

However, it's not like I'm going to maniac my way through just to get a few beenades and ditch them in a chest afterwards ¬¬

 

[Turjan]

The bee stuff is great in pre-hardmode. The Bee Gun keeps all those annoyances away when you are busy with building or fishing. It has its uses in the Dungeon. The Bee Keeper is my favorite sword during much of pre-hardmode. I tried the Fiery Greatsword and the Night's Edge in comparison, but for my playstyle, the Bee Keeper worked much better, because the fast autoswing helps with staying untouched if you are not that great at dodging.

Of course, as soon as hardmode hit, all the bee stuff became obsolete. I'm not big on display collections, but I made a special room for it. Still, it was time to get the Night's Edge out of storage.

 

[Varsia]

The bee stuff is something I often skim over, unless I want the beeswax for a sweetheart necklace. Otherwise, I've never really given them too much of a shot. The beekeeper is a bit "meh", a decent weapon but far from something I'd use. The Bee Gun is something I tried once, found it to be decent and promptly abandoned in favour of a water bolt or diamond staff. Bee's Knees: Never used, probs never will. Beenades are pretty much useless for me. But I rarely play thrower. Gets a 1 from me.