Hardmode Armor Tier List

Didn't think of the Dart Rifle with Cursed Darts, I don't know how efficient it will be but it's worth a shot at least. Definitely don't think it'll be very useful for Red Riding, though. You are not gonna be using a Dart Rifle in late Post Golem.
Welp, now it's gotta be tested! See, this would've been a lot more fun & interesting, if you added the comical tags/ commentary, especially when an Armor Sets rating gets updated. 😝🥤

Edit: Also, this is mostly to argue the grade for Huntress Armor, which is sorta post-Mech, the upgraded version is already rated A.
 
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Didn't think of the Dart Rifle with Cursed Darts, I don't know how efficient it will be but it's worth a shot at least. Definitely don't think it'll be very useful for Red Riding, though. You are not gonna be using a Dart Rifle in late Post Golem.
Well, Red Riding isn't really that late post golem, provided you've grinded t2 enough, (Which imo you should always do) you'll have enough defender medals to buy it the moment you defeat golem.
 
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Forbidden Armor is pretty insane, I already thought this armor was A tier before its buffs.
Yeah forbidden seems really strong now, it almost has as much minion damage as spider, and only 1 less minion, in exchange you get that set bonus summon, and not half bad magic stats.
It might be a contender for an S rank, consdering you have spider at A and forbidden has a bunch of other stuff that can surpass that +1 minion advantage on spider.
 
Yeah forbidden seems really strong now, it almost has as much minion damage as spider, and only 1 less minion, in exchange you get that set bonus summon, and not half bad magic stats.
It might be a contender for an S rank, consdering you have spider at A and forbidden has a bunch of other stuff that can surpass that +1 minion advantage on spider.

Forbidden is an S in the updated list, I do agree that it's strong enough to deserve it
 
I could do that but I don't think it's necessary
Mobile version still at 1.4.0.5 so...
Guide is now updated to 1.4.1, although some parts are admittedly theory-crafting rather than extensive testing Some observations based on the buffs:
  • Cobalt Armor buffs had no impact on its rank. Still the worst armor in Hardmode and just marginally better than Palladium in stats (which doesn't matter due to the Rapid Healing).
  • Mythril armor for Melee is now an interesting sidegrade to Adamantite, more specialized to just DPS, and Mythril Greaves are now a solid piece for hybridizing. The buffs were not particularly impactful for ranged or magic, though.
  • Forbidden Armor is pretty insane, I already thought this armor was A tier before its buffs.
  • Crystal Assassin is now an incredible armor set, but you need to know what you are doing with it to reach its maximum potential.
  • Generally, I think overrated T2 OOA armors and the Queen Spider, they don't seem to be as strong as I thought before.
  • The problem with Oiled not being that noticeable of a DPS increase was solved. The other issue with it, being that there is no reliable way to inflict fire debuffs at this point in the game, was not. So this set bonus is still pretty bad. I wonder if there is a possibility to move this set Bonus to Monk Armor, Fire Gauntlet and Cursed Inferno Flask will love Oiled, and Monk needs something to be comparable to Squire.
  • It seems that the VK Helmet did not get a +10% damage buff like the changelog said, but rather the VK Chestplate did. I don't know if this is intentional or not but now the combination of VK Chest + VK Greaves + Hallowed Mask/Shinobi Helmet is the strongest pre-ML armor in the game.
Also, should we add Obsidian armor while its reing lasts? I know this is supposed to be hardmode sets only, but for an armor that can be used up to Golem I think it deserves a spot.

I hate how almost all of @qwerty3.14 's suggestions are making it into the game. 🙄🧂
A lot of these were collaborative, multiple people suggested some of these changes at different points of time, I found very few changes in 1.4/1.4.1 that were suggested by a single person. But yeah, it's good seeing that devs care about our opinions :)
 
A lot of these were collaborative, multiple people suggested some of these changes at different points of time, I found very few changes in 1.4/1.4.1 that were suggested by a single person. But yeah, it's good seeing that devs care about our opinions :)
"This is the fastest EoC fight I've ever had (Master Mode)!" This is a common trend I'm seeing lately, suggesting that the newer updates are trivializing the game in a lot of ways. The newer additions are fun, I admit, but... is this what most players wanted to see happen? 🤔🥤 I honestly wouldn't know, because I voted against most of this stuff, & it was this very thing I was trying to avoid initially. Either way, I'm glad you gais are happy. I haven't seen nearly as many complaints as when I first got here, all I've come across mostly are minor nitpicks.
 
Mobile version still at 1.4.0.5 so...

Also, should we add Obsidian armor while its reing lasts? I know this is supposed to be hardmode sets only, but for an armor that can be used up to Golem I think it deserves a spot.

Both of these are temporary; Obsidian's getting nerfed (and as you said it's a PHM set) and Mobile will eventually update.
 
"This is the fastest EoC fight I've ever had (Master Mode)!" This is a common trend I'm seeing lately, suggesting that the newer updates are trivializing the game in a lot of ways. The newer additions are fun, I admit, but... is this what most players wanted to see happen? 🤔🥤 I honestly wouldn't know, because I voted against most of this stuff, & it was this very thing I was trying to avoid initially. Either way, I'm glad you gais are happy. I haven't seen nearly as many complaints as when I first got here, all I've come across mostly are minor nitpicks.
Make no mistake, player judgement is not without fault, though looking at the state of the game now it is VERY clear that a lot of weapons who were previously under/overpowered are now more balanced. Sure, some power scaling did happen that made a few bosses a lot easier, but think about some of the cheese methods that were also fixed (King Slime rope trick, Moon Lord and Saucer beams)... also note that most things, especially armor sets now are not broken, with the exception of Obsidian Armor which is a new item.
 
Make no mistake, player judgement is not without fault, though looking at the state of the game now it is VERY clear that a lot of weapons who were previously under/overpowered are now more balanced. Sure, some power scaling did happen that made a few bosses a lot easier, but think about some of the cheese methods that were also fixed (King Slime rope trick, Moon Lord and Saucer beams)... also note that most things, especially armor sets now are not broken, with the exception of Obsidian Armor which is a new item.
Fair enough... on another note, I might need someone to back me up about Huntress Armor, as I see it's still C rank on the list. Only reason I'm unsure about this, is that Ranger is a good Class, even without any gimmicks, & the initial score had to do with the oversight that Cursed Darts proc with Oiled Debuff. Even if it's not an A rank Armor Set, I highly doubt it's C rank. 🤔🥤 You up for some testing?

Edit: I'm also gonna try using Dart Gun beside some kind of debuff ammunition, like possibly Curse Bullets.
 
Fair enough... on another note, I might need someone to back me up about Huntress Armor, as I see it's still C rank on the list. Only reason I'm unsure about this, is that Ranger is a good Class, even without any gimmicks, & the initial score had to do with the oversight that Cursed Darts proc with Oiled Debuff. Even if it's not an A rank Armor Set, I highly doubt it's C rank. 🤔🥤 You up for some testing?

Edit: I'm also gonna try using Dart Gun beside some kind of debuff ammunition, like possibly Curse Bullets.
Low stats, oiled debuff is hard to proc, it is good for OOA, the other events allow you to use traps which are far more effective for clearing up weaker minions while you focus the bosses.

Ranged Adamantite give +43% average ranged damage, Huntress gives only 32%, and Huntress is around Plantera level, the real selling point would be the summon damage, which is quite good on other OOA sets, but the large difference in ranged damage boosts makes trying an hybrid build a lot less powerful than you did get by running full ranged.

Apprentice gives 44% average magic damage, the boost gap would easily make any viable magic weapon deal a lot more DPS than their ranged counterparts. Ranged is a powerful class, but it isn't the free DPS class everyone thinks it is.

Of course, oiled is powerful for some events, it can get you 50 DPS per oiled enemy stuck with cursed flames, it's just that the DPS gap is far too big elsewhere.
 
Fair enough... on another note, I might need someone to back me up about Huntress Armor, as I see it's still C rank on the list. Only reason I'm unsure about this, is that Ranger is a good Class, even without any gimmicks, & the initial score had to do with the oversight that Cursed Darts proc with Oiled Debuff.

C is probably a harsh rank but it may be deserved because I haven't seen a true reason to use it over any other armor available yet. Also, I think you are overhyping Oiled; Cursed Darts seem to be the only thing that can reliably apply a fire debuff and even then it's just +25 DPS, and it needs to be hit by an Explosive Trap for that buff to apply; a sentry way worse than the Queen Spider.

Then again... +30% minion and ranged damage with 3 sentries may not be that bad. Even if Oiled isn't reliable the armor may still be good enough with Queen Spiders.
 
Low stats, oiled debuff is hard to proc, it is good for OOA, the other events allow you to use traps which are far more effective for clearing up weaker minions while you focus the bosses.
Yeah, I can agree with this much. The Explosive Traps are pretty specific, but I can't overlook the fact that I still feel like Ranger +Minions is the best possible set-up. 🤷‍♂️ 🥤

Ranged Adamantite give +43% average ranged damage, Huntress gives only 32%, and Huntress is around Plantera level, the real selling point would be the summon damage, which is quite good on other OOA sets, but the large difference in ranged damage boosts makes trying an hybrid build a lot less powerful than you did get by running full ranged.

Apprentice gives 44% average magic damage, the boost gap would easily make any viable magic weapon deal a lot more DPS than their ranged counterparts. Ranged is a powerful class, but it isn't the free DPS class everyone thinks it is.

Of course, oiled is powerful for some events, it can get you 50 DPS per oiled enemy stuck with cursed flames, it's just that the DPS gap is far too big elsewhere.
I'm not a numbers guy, so I don't really understand all of this, but I'm getting that this is Huntress compared to other Ranger Class sets at it's tier, correct? Anyhow, I did my due-diligence & ran the Class bare, with one of the best Weapons I think I'd benefit from, considering when & how you get it. I was running Imps btw.

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As I suspected, Dart Rifle (which works well with Explosive Trap) was the obvious choice in this fight, though Onyx Blaster was very fun to use. It's important to also note that it wasn't even that necessary to be accurate... like, at all. I just kept blindly shooting. 😏🤷‍♂️ I hear what you are both saying, but this just doesn't feel accurate. Also, if it matters, here's what I was using (no modifiers).

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Yeah, I can agree with this much. The Explosive Traps are pretty specific, but I can't overlook the fact that I still feel like Ranger +Minions is the best possible set-up. 🤷‍♂️ 🥤


I'm not a numbers guy, so I don't really understand all of this, but I'm getting that this is Huntress compared to other Ranger Class sets at it's tier, correct? Anyhow, I did my due-diligence & ran the Class bare, with one of the best Weapons I think I'd benefit from, considering when & how you get it. I was running Imps btw.

View attachment 295787 View attachment 295788

As I suspected, Dart Rifle (which works well with Explosive Trap) was the obvious choice in this fight, though Onyx Blaster was very fun to use. It's important to also note that it wasn't even that necessary to be accurate... like, at all. I just kept blindly shooting. 😏🤷‍♂️ I hear what you are both saying, but this just doesn't feel accurate. Also, if it matters, here's what I was using (no modifiers).

View attachment 295789
Frost armor has better ranged stats, and the dbuff it inflcts just flat up inflicts 25dps, wheras oiled requires another debuff for it to add that same 25dps. Huntress's only advantage is the summon damage and sentry slots which you don't seem to be taking advantage of, imps are just... bad for the twins and you clearly aren't using your sentry slots.
 
Yeah, I can agree with this much. The Explosive Traps are pretty specific, but I can't overlook the fact that I still feel like Ranger +Minions is the best possible set-up. 🤷‍♂️ 🥤


I'm not a numbers guy, so I don't really understand all of this, but I'm getting that this is Huntress compared to other Ranger Class sets at it's tier, correct? Anyhow, I did my due-diligence & ran the Class bare, with one of the best Weapons I think I'd benefit from, considering when & how you get it. I was running Imps btw.

View attachment 295787 View attachment 295788

As I suspected, Dart Rifle (which works well with Explosive Trap) was the obvious choice in this fight, though Onyx Blaster was very fun to use. It's important to also note that it wasn't even that necessary to be accurate... like, at all. I just kept blindly shooting. 😏🤷‍♂️ I hear what you are both saying, but this just doesn't feel accurate. Also, if it matters, here's what I was using (no modifiers).

View attachment 295789
Sorry, I don't really understand what you're showing? You're trying to say Dart Rifle is a good combo with huntress armor?
Again sorry if I'm getting this wrong.
 
For the sake of this tier list, the T2 and the T3 armors are being treated as Pre-Plantera and at least Mid-Post Golem respectively, as that's what they are balanced around. The fact you can get them a little earlier if you are motivated enough isn't relevant to the list.

Looking at Oiled, the get the maximum value out of it you need to maintain On Fire, Frostburn, Cursed Inferno and Shadowflame on one enemy. This would require you to have a way to inflict all four of those in hand and to micro perfectly between all of them during combat, while also having to deal with the worst sentry in the game. All of this build-around amounts to 100 extra DPS. You can get 100 extra DPS or more by summoning one more Sanguine Bat. I think that speaks for itself.

Then again, Huntress really isn't a bad armor. It has a niche of its own and putting it in C just because Explosive Traps are bad isn't fair when you can just use Queen Spiders and later Frost Hydras with it. I've raised its rank to B.
 
Frost armor has better ranged stats, and the dbuff it inflcts just flat up inflicts 25dps, wheras oiled requires another debuff for it to add that same 25dps. Huntress's only advantage is the summon damage and sentry slots which you don't seem to be taking advantage of, imps are just... bad for the twins and you clearly aren't using your sentry slots.
I don't disagree, but I was using Huntress Set retrogressed. I was simply showing that, even with the 1.4.1 updates, Ranger is still one of the best, safest Classes in the game. In addition, Minions are free DPS. It's not to say that it's better than Frost Armor, which I wouldn't know until I compared the two sets, just that it doesn't seem realistic for the set to be ranked C in any scenarios I can think of. 🤔🥤

Sorry, I don't really understand what you're showing? You're trying to say Dart Rifle is a good combo with huntress armor?
Again sorry if I'm getting this wrong.
No, Just saying that Dart Rife, +Minions is good enough to carry any build. All you have to do is spray-&-pray, the Cursed Inferno & Minions will do all the work for you. This set-up just-so-happens to work well if a player was to build around it specifically. This is just the Huntress Set without an Arena, just imagine if I started leashing the Boss into the traps for even more damage.

Then again, Huntress really isn't a bad armor. It has a niche of its own and putting it in C just because Explosive Traps are bad isn't fair when you can just use Queen Spiders and later Frost Hydras with it. I've raised its rank to B.
That's all I'm sayin'...
 
Looking at Oiled, the get the maximum value out of it you need to maintain On Fire, Frostburn, Cursed Inferno and Shadowflame on one enemy. This would require you to have a way to inflict all four of those in hand and to micro perfectly between all of them during combat, while also having to deal with the worst sentry in the game. All of this build-around amounts to 100 extra DPS. You can get 100 extra DPS or more by summoning one more Sanguine Bat. I think that speaks for itself.
Oiled doesn't stack with multiple burns, it's just if enemy is burning add 25dot. Going through the trouble of trying to inflict every burning debuff doesn't make oil any better you only need 1.
Oiled will at most add 25dot, not 100.
 
Oiled doesn't stack with multiple burns, it's just if enemy is burning add 25dot. Going through the trouble of trying to inflict every burning debuff doesn't make oil any better you only need 1.
Oiled will at most add 25dot, not 100.

Oh... well thank god the set bonus also comes with increased Explosive Trap attack speed.
 
I went through when 1.4 came out this year and did playthroughs with all 4 OOA armor sets. I know the author of this post already knows this stuff, but I'm just putting it in to compare how bad huntress is compared to the others (it's not horrible, and I haven't tried 1.4.1 yet, hope it turns out better!)

The Huntress/Red Riding Armor was by far the worst, nothing near Shroomite, even when using the set bonus (and the set bonus really made the explosions fast!). I'm hoping that the new ammo conservation and improved Explosive Traps can work better. The best place for this armor (for me) was the Moon events, where the explosive traps went to town on Mourning Wood and Everscream.

Squire/Valhalla was only really good for a tank summoner build (adding papyrus scarab and necromantic scroll and using whips). It getting nerfed isn't that great for it, but it is very, very good with Morning Star/Kaleidoscope.

The Apprentice/Dark Artist armor is actually awesome, makes for a very easy playthrough. Flame towers aren't great but this makes them better, only issue is lack of mana boost. The update adding mana reduction to this is perfect.

The Shinobi Infiltrator is much, much better than Beetle Armor. Its boosts are comparable to a fully charged Beetle Scale Mail set and the Lightning Aura gets huge when you use this. This is the best melee set in the game (outside of Solar Flare), and boosts your Xeno Staff/Stardust dragon. The fact they buffed this makes this even better.
 
Last time I played terraria on xbox 360 in like 2016, the hallowed armor was definitly a step above adamantite. But holy cow, upgrading from adamantite to hallowed is way less practical than before, idk what they did to adamantite armor, but it's way better now.
 
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