Rate the Weapon: Day Fifteen - Bladetongue

How often do you use Bladetongue in your playthroughs?

  • 1 - Never

    Votes: 8 25.0%
  • 2 - Rarely - The resources are too limited, or the time it's useful is too short.

    Votes: 10 31.3%
  • 3 - Sometimes - If I have the resources to spare

    Votes: 3 9.4%
  • 4 - Often - It makes progression easier, but skippable

    Votes: 4 12.5%
  • 5 - Most Games - It's great to have, but not worth ten hours to get.

    Votes: 1 3.1%
  • 6 - Always - I will build a farm for this if I have to. I'm not progressing without it.

    Votes: 6 18.8%

  • Total voters
    32

Ami

Terrarian
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 Fifteen: Bladetongue

The biggest upside of a crimson world is undoubtedly the access to ichor debuff. Whether you prefer Golden Shower, the spectacularly powerful ichor bullets, or the flask, it's a an incredibly powerful tool which reduces the defense of the enemy by 20. This effectively increases your damage by 10 (or 15 in expert) per shot, multiplying the efficacy of weapons like the megashark.

For those of you that don't know, Bladetongue is acquired by fishing in a crimson biome at any point during hard mode. the base animation is as per any other sword, however, when it makes contact with an enemy, it flings an ichor ball across the screen. My playstyle (Hardcore, speed, challenge) often finds weapons of this nature to be superfluous.

Early Hardmode items
Day 12 - Daedalus Stormbow - 4.74 (21 votes) - this guy probably needs a nerf. People intentionally go out of their way to not use it, as it makes progression too easy.
Day 11 - Nimbus Rod - 4.45 - (20 votes)
Day 13 - Fetid Baghnakhs - 3.47 - (17 votes)
Day 14 - Chain Guillotine - 3.08 - (12 votes)

Pre-Hardmode items
Day 7 - Pistols - 4.16 - (36 votes)
Day 4 - Yoyos - 4.15 - (13 votes)
Day 8 - Covered in BEES! - 3.72 - (22 votes)
Day 2 - Ore Bows - 3.53 - (26 votes)
Day 5 - Boomerangs - 3.36 - (19 votes)
Day 3 - Grenades - 3.37 - (24 votes)
Day 10 - Gem Staves - 2.80 - (26 votes)
Day 1 - Ore Swords - 2.54 - (24 votes)
Day 9 - Throwing knife/shuriken family - 2.52 (17 votes)
Day 6 - Flails - 2.04 - (24 votes) - RIP Old, bad yoyos
 
I haven't been able to experiment with this Weapon yet. (Unlike the Fetid Baghnakhs which I choose not to use) and as a result don't feel it is fair of me to vote for this Day. So for this one, I'm not going to put in a vote.

From what I know, it is useful indeed for getting access to using the Ichor debuff, though it seems like it would be awkward to use because of how you have to hit enemies with the Bladetongue itself to get Ichor flying out of the sword. Fighting the Twins and/or Skeletron Prime with this weapon is hard to imagine as a result.

I do know that @Xylia is a huge supporter of this weapon and really loves it, so they'll likely be able to explain why it's a great weapon once they're able to reply for this day. Considering how I'm primarily a "Corruption" Player and Xylia is "Crimson".
 
Wow, I got tagged even before I got to participate in the thread, LOL.

But yes, one of THE first things I do during Hardmode in a Crimson World is fish up the Bladetongue, considering I always get my Hardmode Ore through crates anyways.

I mean face it, if you never break an altar, you'll never get impromptu mech spawns nor random pockets of Corruption/Crimson growing in random spots. It's better than a Titanium Sword in every way, and that Ichor debuff is really nice too; one of the few weapons in the game that does such.

I can't think of a single reason why I wouldn't get this weapon, even in a Corruption world, because you can always import 300 Crimstone Blocks and make yourself a pond somewhere.
 
While it's definitely a good weapon, the requirements for getting it (fishing and all that entails) can sometimes be too onerous to make it worth it.
 
While it's definitely a good weapon, the requirements for getting it (fishing and all that entails) can sometimes be too onerous to make it worth it.

The beauty of it, is that if you were prepared for Crate Fishing Pre-Hardmode, then you already have everything you need for Bladetongue. If you started fishing during Easymode, and if you weren't speedrunning, then you probably had a good number of the items you need to make it easy.

If you got the Golden Fishing Rod and at the very least, the High Test Line, getting a Bladetongue is not hard whatsoever. It takes 1-2 game days of fishing, sometimes less.

But if you've never touched a fishing pole and you go out there with an Eye pole and some grasshoppers or something then yeah.... it won't be pretty.
 
It's all about fishing power right? So if I catch a rainy day with a few fishing potions, this will grant me %60 more fishing power. So, lets have a Reinforced Fishing Pole with a few worms, then we will have a total %100 fishing power. Of course, we will use Sonar Potion for bait efficiency :) So lets get straight to the point, it is not really that difficult. :)
 
It's all about fishing power right? So if I catch a rainy day with a few fishing potions, this will grant me %60 more fishing power. So, lets have a Reinforced Fishing Pole with a few worms, then we will have a total %100 fishing power. Of course, we will use Sonar Potion for bait efficiency :) So lets get straight to the point, it is not really that difficult. :)

It might take you awhile, and you need a good enough Crimson pond. You could make your own or hope the V spread hits a surface pool, or you could try and make one from existing crimson areas... but really on this you NEED a 300-tile water pool. Anything less cuts your chances by a large margin because it's a -% instead of a -x. All of those buffs, potions, etc get cut big if you're under 300 tiles.
 
Even on a large pond, I took a while to catch a toxikarp wit a golden rod and master bait with fishing potion and fishing earrings. Just bring a ton of bait and a lot of patience.
 
Even on a large pond, I took a while to catch a toxikarp wit a golden rod and master bait with fishing potion and fishing earrings. Just bring a ton of bait and a lot of patience.

More than 300 tiles has absolutely no bearing on the catch rate, unless you're fishing from the Ocean, then you need 1000+.

Did you also wear the Angler's Clothes? I usually get the GFR, the Clothes, Potion, and Earring and I get 1 every other "day" (12-18 minute fishing sessions per in-game day).
 
I'm aware of fishing mechanics. I was letting him know that, with an iron rod, it was not coming fast. Both bladetongue and toxikarp are in the "extremely rare" level.
 
I had it a few times when I was fishing for Crimson Crates. It's a good weapon, because it deals pretty high damage if paired with the ichor debuff. It's effective till Plantera, however I don't bother looking for it until I'm in need of fishing.
 
So... I killed Destroyer in <60 seconds with just the Bladetongue today. It was... rather effortless and I have the screenshots to prove it:

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Look closely at these things: The Time, The Moonphase, the Minimap, and the Potion Buffs and also the Compass.

Now look at this second screenshot:

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You'll see that I moved ~17 feet to the west, and it's 59 seconds later, same moonphase, the buff potions all have 1 minute less remaining, and look at the minimap: Above and just slightly right, there's a square of black area. If you look at the first screenshot, you'll notice that's the same area except I fell straight down.

I literally defeated the Twins, and then immediately popped Destroyer while "falling" and then got my Bladetongue ready and killed him within 60 seconds.

I know that the Stormbow and especially Baghnakhs can also do this, but dude, that's not bad considering that this is a sword.
 
I haven'tused this so I won't vote, but I know some who do, so I will weigh in. The Bladetongue is an amazing weapon. High damage coupled with the ichor debuff, just tears through everything, and you can put your sword seeking to rest til the Terra Blade. But it's for that reason that I have to say: I do not like the Bladetongue.
It is too strong for it's availability stage. The thing sits above 100 DPS with Chlorophyte weapons and Keybrand. This outstrips every ore sword, Phasesabers, Excalibur, pretty much every swingy weapon before Plantera. And you can get it immediately on entering Hardmode, with no more trouble than sitting next to a pool in the Crimson. Really breaks weapon progression, and though I know sequence jumping is integral to Terraria, this is too far, too fast.

I can't really promote this weapon unless it, the Crystal Serpent, and Toxicarp are moved to post mech boss availability. Maybe farther.
 
Yeah, rarity is not a balance mechanic. Not that it's rare that is; fishing for 10 minutes and relying on RNG isn't that difficult, just tedious. The game needs less grinding and tedium, not more.
 
Yeah, rarity is not a balance mechanic. Not that it's rare that is; fishing for 10 minutes and relying on RNG isn't that difficult, just tedious. The game needs less grinding and tedium, not more.
I didn't say it should require grinding, but it's nearest competitor, the Frostbrand, requires a trip to the Underground Snow, and fighting a few mimics. Compare this to the trouble of dropping a fishing line in a crimson pool that may well be in your backyard, and skipping mining hardmode ore for a weapon altogether. Sometimes it feels like exploration is actively discouraged by things like this.
 
I didn't say it should require grinding, but it's nearest competitor, the Frostbrand, requires a trip to the Underground Snow, and fighting a few mimics. Compare this to the trouble of dropping a fishing line in a crimson pool that may well be in your backyard, and skipping mining hardmode ore for a weapon altogether. Sometimes it feels like exploration is actively discouraged by things like this.

Well, you still gotta get ore armor, lol. If you're wanting to use this, then you want melee armor. This means getting a bunch of hardmode ore.

Though to be honest, I never smash altars anymore. The random stone turning to ebon/crimstone thing alone is enough to turn me off on doing that. Then you got the Wraith spawns, and then on top of all of that, you gotta scour the world looking for the ore.

Oh and... impromptu mech spawns. That's the cherry on top.

Why would I ever want to smash an altar again?

To be honest, I think what they need to do, is making altar smashing less of an annoyance. They need to give players a reason to WANT to smash altars instead of fishing crates. But really the way it is now... fishing crates is THE way to go. No random corruption/crimson spawning potentially inside your quarantine zone, no wraiths spawning, and no impromptu mech pops when you're not ready for them and no digging tunnel after tunnel after tunnel to find out where the *bleeeeeep* the Titanium/Adamantite spawned.

Oh, and you get your CHOICE of what you want too. Does your world have Titanium and you want Adamantite Armor? Looks like you're gonna be fishing crates afterall.
 
I ALWAYS find one, because I love the crimson potions, so I tend to fish a lot there....

However, unless I'm playing full melee, there is no reason to get these, as the Golden Shower outdoes it in several ways.

Fun item to play around with, though
 
To be honest, I think what they need to do, is making altar smashing less of an annoyance. They need to give players a reason to WANT to smash altars instead of fishing crates.
They used to do this by not having the hardmode ores be in crates. Then they listened to people's suggestions for putting them in crates and look where we are - people just fish up a ton of crates PHM, crack them all open after beating WOF like it's Christmas, and then they're rolling in Titanium.

It's really just kind of a side effect of having a lot of options. Some of the options are really strong and really easy (crates, huge mimic drops) while some of them are less optimal and more challenging (smashing altars, using ore repeaters). People who just want to "beat the game" will use the easy ones and people who want to challenge themselves will limit the items they can personally use.
 
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