Testing Ranged DPS in a variety of situations and ammo types was one of the things I did a phenomenal amount of focus on leading up to release. And I gotta say, I'm pretty strongly of the opinion that Crystal Bullets ARE too strong. The increased DPS they grant to many guns is insane, they basically give it an entire tier's worth of DPS, oftentimes doubling the damage dealt. Yes, they are more subject to defense, that is entirely valid and true. Even so, outside of Chlorophyte Bullets, there are few scenarios where using anything other than Crystal Bullets is ideal. They are like the Holy Arrows of bullets.
Maybe Crystal Bullets need a bit of a nerf, sure, but I think that other bullet types need a buff more than Crystal Bullets need a nerf, which
heavily contributes to the overuse of Crystal Bullets since they are the only bullets that substantially affect DPS over just using an Endless Musket Pouch.
Almost all bullets in the entire game just hit a single target and maybe apply a debuff.
Just using a Megashark against a single dummy with a few kinds of bullets I got the following DPS results:
Meteor Shots: 220
Musket Balls: 400
Hight Velocity Bullets: 415
Ichor Bullets: 460
Cursed Bullets: 450
Crystal Bullets: 580
Do Crystal Bullets stand out here? Yes. But more importantly, no other bullets deal significantly more damage than Musket Balls.
Dart Rifles have more variety in their three hardmode ammo types than you have in almost a dozen bullet types you have at your disposal around the same time. One splits into multiple darts, allowing substantial single target hits on top of the ichor debuff, one rains down cursed flames on enemies that even linger for a little and the third one massively pierces and otherwise smart-bounces. The point being that you have three completely different choices here for very different purposes.
Only Crystal Bullets, Explosive Bullets and Luminite Bullets and Meteor Shots do more than hit a single target and possibly apply a debuff.
Luminite Bullets are obviously post Moon Lord and strong enough, but the other two could easily see some improvements:
- Using Explosive Bullets is extremely dangerous since you can literally shred your health in mere moments with these. If that wasn't the case, they might actually see use against grouped enemies in invasions due to their area of effect and high knockback. Without the self-harm, they'd be like Hellfire Arrows, but for guns and Hellfire Arrows are actually pretty decent.
- Unlike Luminite Bullets, Meteor Shots cause i-frames, so on all machine gun and shotgun type weapons, which make up 90% of the entire gun-arsenal, they are detrimental to use, which only leaves the Sniper Rifle as a possible weapon to use them with once in Hardmode. Give them the same ability as Luminite Bullets to allow for multi-hitting without i-frames and they would actually be useful on way more weapons.
Every other bullet type falls into the category of "slightly better Musket ball" as they only damage a single enemy and maybe apply a debuff that is usually more cosmetic than functional. These would be a lot harder to deal with because they would need something new for themselves.
I'll try to give some ideas for changes the HM Bullets that actually seem to be for combat, excluding Golden Bullets, which are solely for making money and Party Bullets, which are simply cheap.
- Cursed Bullets: Comparing them with the Cursed Darts, it might be a decent idea to give them a chance to spawn the same kind of lingering flame upon impact, which would greatly improve them against groups of enemies and segmented bosses like the Destroyer. Reducing the number of immune enemies could also lead to more satisfaction.
- Ichor Bullets: They are mostly fine due to them having more utility when used in muliplayer and since the dummy test does not include any damage bonuses that come from reducing enemy defense. The biggest dent in the usefulness of Ichor Bullets is that you can't use them like a mage can use a golden shower, so they see a lot less use as a result.
- Venom Bullets: Upon impact, they create a venom cloud that applies venom to all enemies within it. Also, drastically reduce the number of enemies that are immune to venom. Especially event enemies like Pirates, Hallow enemies, Slimes and many Jungle enemies do not need to be immune to this debuff.
- High Velocity Bullets: Basically Luminite lite bullets would fit these well. High velocity means high penetration in most cases, so it would be fitting if these could hit 3-5 enemies in a line.
- Nano Bullets: Probably the most difficult ones to work out. Almost all enemies seem to be entirely immune to this bullet's debuff, save for the ones that aren't even a threat to begin with maybe. If the intent is to avoid enemies attacking you, high knockback weapons or ammo will do a way better job since the confusion debuff is just way too unreliable in comparison. Might be best to discard the whole debuff and go for some smart bounce bullets with these ones.
In the end I wish there was a way to switch between or cycle through the ammo slots to be able to switch on the fly more easily, but that's probably not going to happen.