Tasks before Hardmode

[Pangaearocks]

Thank you for the detailed post

so, you got cobalt, mythril and... what's the 3rd ore? the 3rd tier is very rare by the way, but can be found often at the ceiling of hell. (though can be found elsewhere too, just rare).
early hardmode, you're quite weak, but don't worry, there are quite some powerful weapons, accessories and armors ahead.
also, 400 HP isn't the final, the max HP there is 500 HP (which will be temporarily 600 with a lifeforce potion, so that will be quite good for boss fights.)
once you defeated 1 of the 3 mech bosses (the destroyer, the twins, skeletron prime. it's not important which one you defeat first.), life fruits start to grow in the jungle. at first they're rare, I know I usually spend a long time around that stage of the game, to look for them, (each givey you +5 HP, I think?) but that +100 HP (in total) can be quite handy.

The third ore is adamantite.
Am glad you say this, about where it can be found, because I've been looking high and low for it for hours, with almost nothing to show for it. Considered blowing up more altars, but haven't dared for fear of even faster crimson spread. Have found a little bit of it, so have made the new forge and have 13 bars. That doesn't get me much though, and think I'd prefer to make the whole new armor to get whatever set bonus it has, and avoid losing the set bonus from the current armor (I forget if it was cobalt or mythril). Have gone through a lot of spelunker potions trying to find adamantite, and sometimes the cellphone highlight it, but it's really hard to find. However, when I finally found something, I noticed it was a little red-ish with a spelunker potions, so that is good. Everything looks almost similar elsewise, which makes it practically impossible to tell what is what. I'll have to explore even more thoroughly near hell and see what I can find.

At least money doesn't appear to be an issue at all. Currently have 18-19 platinums, after finally selling the stack of 3000 crimtane ores. The piggy bank was full, and I needed room to store the new ores.

Have enough adamantite bars to create the sword, but it's almost a sideways move damagewise, and I really quite like this beam sword. It is very fast and has strong knockback, which makes it easier to deal with enemies, plus it has the ranged attack once a second or so, which is nice when trying to handle those blasted skeleton archers. The wizard NPC has joined, so maybe I could have gotten a better magic weapon from him, but figured I'd try this melee thing a bit further, since I have melee specific armor. Also got an anchor, which was very good damage-wise, but not sure I will use it after all. It quite easily got 'swallowed' when close to obstructions in the ground, which means I have to let go of the lower ground advantage that you tend to get from sword swings, also making you more vulnerable to other ranged attacks.

Actually have a couple titan gloves (must be from mimics then), but not using one yet. Feels like all accessories I have are needed, perhaps with the exception of the regen band. But I kinda love having some natural regeneration, because I'm going through health potions at an alarming rate as it is

Going back to the quoted text: how rough are the mech bosses? Do I need much better gear to stand a chance? They've spawned at least five times so far, though I've repressed them by being/going underground.

Also, this was painful.....

Spoiler

Had been exploring for a very long time, full inventory+void bag, and was going to head back soon. This was in the very bottom left corner of the map... when we came across a chest. Let's just check it out first. BOOM!!!! Instantly, so it must have been trapped. There was no explosive visible.

Spend a long time to get all the way back down there, jumping+flying over all that lava, and fighting off enemies along the way. Just a little bit left, hook up to the floor and go up. When an unfortunate even with yet another demon happens. I tried to escape, but... :-/

...apparently you are automatically killed when trying to run away from the Wall of Flesh. Had at least half the health left. Gravestone appeared back at the base, as you can see. Live and learn, huh?

 

[Dreadnautilus5000🌳]

Have enough adamantite bars to create the sword, but it's almost a sideways move damagewise, and I really quite like this beam sword. It is very fast and has strong knockback, which makes it easier to deal with enemies, plus it has the ranged attack once a second or so, which is nice when trying to handle those blasted skeleton archers. The wizard NPC has joined, so maybe I could have gotten a better magic weapon from him, but figured I'd try this melee thing a bit further, since I have melee specific armor. Also got an anchor, which was very good damage-wise, but not sure I will use it after all. It quite easily got 'swallowed' when close to obstructions in the ground, which means I have to let go of the lower ground advantage that you tend to get from sword swings, also making you more vulnerable to other ranged attacks.
[/SPOILER]

The Beam Sword isn't a very good or effective weapon. The Adamantite Sword is definitely worse than the it though, so I'd keep it for now. Some decent melee weapons at this point that I'd recommend are the Shadowflame Knife, Fetid Baghnakhs, Gradient, Hel-Fire, Amarok, Sergeant United Shield, and Dao of Pow.

The Shadowflame Knife drops from Goblin Summoners, which spawn during the Goblin Army in Hardmode. You'll have to farm Goblin Scouts at the edges of the world to get materials for the Goblin Battle Standard, which summons the Goblin Army. It is unique melee weapon that fires knife projectiles that inflict Shadowflame and have decent range.

The Fetid Baghnakhs drops from Crimson Mimics, which are a variant of the "greater mimics" that have been discussed here already. You can summon one on the surface with a Key of Night, which is crafted from 15 Souls of Night. This weapon doesn't have a projectile, but it does insane damage to anything in its range thanks to its extremely fast use speed.

Gradient, Hel-Fire, and Amarok are yoyos. The Gradient is sometimes sold by the Skeleton Merchant, while Hel-Fire and Amarok can drop from any enemy in the Underworld and Snow biome, respectively. The Amarok is the best one out of these.

The Sergeant United Shield is a homing boomerang with a pretty long range. It is sometimes sold by the Traveling Merchant. While it is good, I wouldn't recommend going for it first because it'll take a long time to get.

Finally, the Dao of Pow is a flail crafted from Dark Shards and Light Shards, which drop from Blood Mummies and Light Mummies in Crimson and Hallowed deserts. It is a pretty good weapon, and is excellent against multi-segment enemies and tight groups of enemies, however it may not be a good idea to Crimson your Desert.

 

[Sora_92]

Adamantite, huh. Looks like the gods blessed the 3 "older" ores on your world. the other 3 are considered newer. They're all fine, but a key difference is, that the newer 3 have armors with better set bonuses, and the older 3 has better raws stats than their counterparts.
Generally, adamantite armor (with melee helmet) has the highest raw defense stats at this stage of the game, if you're into having lots of defense) - it however lacks any interesting set bonuses, so, that's what it is. tanky armor and nothing much more.

By the way, speaking of the 3rd tier of ores (adamantite in this case) don't make sword or anything from it, and definitelly no pickaxe or drill. save up all of it for the armor. if you still have excess after that, you can craft other stuff, but since it's so rare, it's better keep it for the full armor first. by the way, the pickaxe/drill from it has the exact pickaxe power as the mythril/orichalc ones, just faster, I think. No real point of crafting them, the pickaxe axe/drax after all mech bosses down is the next one to use, likely. and so, keep the mythril pickaxe until that (IMO)

Good that you use piggy bank and voide vault too. by the way, the safe works similar to piggy bank too. (if you didn't tried it yet).
And, yeah, crimtane sells for really good money XD

Swords' arc attack is certainly very handy. And the beam sword is halfways towards the so called "projectile melee weapons", which are common in later hardmode. Many later hardmode melee weapons have projectile attacks, that make them feel kind of odd why they're even melee, but, melee needs that, quite much, to fight later bosses without getting dangerously close to bosses.
As for the anchor, it has its uses, but it's not something you'll likely use much, if you have better stuff. I know though I used it to kill an ice mimic once, while hanging from the celing via grappling hook. the usual stuff you can do when enemies can't reach you, and the achor won't use ammo. XD but that's pretty much it. XD


what are the accessories you have now?

As for the mech bosses, I would recommend trying to get full adamantite armor (or frost armor, if you feel like going for that). And get some good wings.
And... well, it's not melee, but an interesting and ridicolously powerful weapon you can get is the dart pistol, from crimson greater mimics. (you can create them yourself with key of night, so you can fight them at your arena), paired up with crimson darts, it's extremely powerful for early hardmode. I find it the best against skeletron prime, though some consider him to be the strongest of the mech trio. I think everyone has their own opinion.
the trick for sketron prime is, to focus on the head only, I think. because you don't really have enough time until sunrise, to kill all 4 arms.

The destroyer for example even can be cheesed with a well-designed floating mini-arena, because it, being a worm, can't fly. so, if you're high above enough, it will never reach you, though its probes will. And you need stuff you could attack it with from far (most recommend daedalus stormbow. I think, meteorite staff is quite good as well, and several other weapons), so, even if you're relatively safe, it can take long to kill it, and if you don't by daybreak, it will go away. by the way, don't fight it near the town. it will most likely massacre everyone.

the twins are quite a pain, but it can be a good strategy to focus on one at a time, and kill it first. they transform to 2nd phase when around half-HP, and their 2nd phases are much more dangerous. you have to kill both, to win the fight.

On a side note, if you found gelatin crystals while gathering crystal shards, you can also try fighting queen slime. but while she's considered easier than the mech bosses, that really depends on stuff. she is very tough, and potencially more dangerous than some mech bosses, depending on equipments and tactics.


Also, looks like you found a dead man's chest? XD You can usually spot them though, because if you look around before you open it, you can notice the traps around it. But if you don't... yeah, that can be brutal XD
And, yeah, WoF is a pain XD That happened with me too, when looking for adamatite some other time. "tried to escape"... XD


@Dreadnautilus5000
Agree, those are pretty good weapon recommendations too.
Some can be difficult to get.

• Shadowflame knives need some luck with goblin summoners. but if you get it, it's really a quite powerful and fast melee weapon.
• Fetids are powerful, but you have to be quite the daredevil to use them, because of their short range. they are brutal, but I know I prefer weapons with a bit more range XD definitely give them a try though.
• The yo-yos are also decent choices, but then isn't Yelets the strongest one in early hardmode? Or does Yelets needs one mech boss down?
• Sergeant united shield is an awesome secondary weapon too, I agree, but it really depends on luck to have the traveling merchant sell one.
• As for Dao of Pow, I think that desert there is already crimsoned, so the more difficult is probably getting the light shards. It's an interesting weapon, because it has brutal attack power, but it's very slow. An interesting and decent secondary weapon at this stage, but its slowness might makes it difficult to use in some situations (IMO).

they're all pretty good weapons, yeah. though some are more useful as secondary weapon, I think.

 

[Pangaearocks]

Thank you both, that's quite a bit to consider. Before I quit playing today, I happened to check some materials with the Guide, and turns out I only lack some light shards for Dao of Pow. If it's slow, not sure how much I will like it, but the damage is quite high I see. I've honestly enjoyed the Beam sword for now. I like fast weapons with decent knockback, because it's then easier to handle all the enemies that tend to bunch up on you.

The goblins did actually attack again too. Thought it would be easy but those summoners were tough buggers. The weapon didn't drop, but think there was a bow. Need to check again. Pirates invaded again too, and good grief those guys are tough. Only died 2-3 times now, but they're incredibly tough. Rod of Discord helps though, because I can escape up to the roof of our base for example, where they generally don't come. Then heal up.

Only had the cobalt armor because I lacked enough mithril, but have now crafted the mithril armor. Looks pretty good, and if adamantite doesn't bring all that much more, maybe stick with mithril?

All the greater mimics I've come across so far have wrecked me in a matter of seconds, so I'm either doing something wrong, or don't have good enough equipment yet.

Is the flying ability from wings much better than the flying from boots? I haven't been to the sky yet. Suppose I need to build platforms up there in that case.

Accessories: partly going by memory, but looking at the list on page 1

• Lightning boots >> Frostspark boots (got ice skates somewhere)
• Treasure magnet >> Charm of Myths (recently got philosopher's stone, and then made it)
• Cloud in a bottle
• Frog Gear
• Obsidian Horseshoe
• Cellphone in Inventory

Sure sounds like the mech bosses will be very tricky. I may need better equipment first then, and cross my fingers skills are good enough

Do indeed have some gelatin crystals, and also a few items to summon mech bosses. Figured I'd try to fight whoever shows up naturally next, but I only have the arena next to our base, and it would be a shame if all the NPCs died :-/

I've liked the idea of getting up close and personal with melee (sword), but also have to admit I've got half a mind to try out ranged, if that is safer. I imagine ranged is harder in these events with enemies every which way, but when mining for example, it's a damn pain to deal with skeleton archers and those ichor spitting flying things (and bees!), because they knock me back, and then hit me again before I can properly reach them. Repeat until I either manage to take them down, or give up. Then maybe a silly jump over a ledge and hit a sword projectile until they die. Not fast But apart from that, it's pretty versatile with a sword, and it's fairly easy to use while jumping around or when stuck to a wall with dual hook.

 

[Sora_92]

If you can get a light shard, definitely give a try to Dao of Pow. it's pretty fun. And brutally strong, just really slow.

And see? You have better gear now, so the pirates are less crazy. Early hardmode weapons and equipments can make quite the change.

As for greater mimics, generally, if you encounter them in the wild at this point in the game, you're almost sure to die to them. it's very hard to dodge them well down there in the caverns. But if you fight them at your own arena, they are a bit easier.

Wings are very OP, and you likely will end up considering them as something that's just needed to be part of the equipment. Interestingly enough, 1.4 made a wing available pre-hardmode too, fledgeling wing, which you can found in skyware chests. it has pathetically low stats as a wing, but it can be aquired pre-hardmode.
Hardmode wings however are something else. Especially late game wings have crazy stats.
Several accessories also add bonuses to your wings' stats. rocket boots and its derivates (so, like lightning boots, frostspark boots, etc.), frog gear and its derivates, shiny red balloon (or balloon pufferfish) and their derivates, etc.
If you keep both the frog gear and the frostspark boots for example, you will see that your wings will perform a lot better than without them.
And what's more, wings all negate fall dmg as well, so it sounds like a reasonable choice, to replace the horseshoe with them, if you want.

As for reaching the sky, platforms, rope, and such works too, but most people use gravitation potion, and flip back and foth, to shout around for floating islands. You can look for fledgeling wings too, but now, in hardmode, you most likely will soon encounter wyverns up there. they're tough, but defeating them is quite rewarding at this point, because of soul of flight.

As an alternative, before that, you could check out the witch doctor at night, when he's in the jungle, he has leaf wings for sale. since 1.4, these have like the 2nd worse stats as wings, after the fledgeling wings, but they're still pretty good, before you craft some better ones. they have significantly better stats than fledgeling by the way. they're just a bit expensive, and in accord, expensive to reforge. (you have plenty of money though)

By the way, if you have trouble with knockback, you can equip a cobalt shield. most people usually tinker the obsidian skull into that - making the obsidian shield - which also grants protection from fire blocks (though there aren't many like that). it can be upgraded further to the impressive ankh shield, with its likewise impressive crafting tree, if you feel like going for it.
You could probably replace the cloud in a bottle with that, and the horseshoe with wings, but it's up to you.
I didn't wanted to affect your choices too much, but that sort of change with inventory might could help you quite a lot.

As for classes, ranger is pretty fun too. And mage too. You can try out all sort of weapons, regardless what armor you have. of course, melee class armor boost melee weapons, but you can still use other weapons too.

 

[Pangaearocks]

By the way, if you have trouble with knockback, you can equip a cobalt shield. most people usually tinker the obsidian skull into that - making the obsidian shield - which also grants protection from fire blocks (though there aren't many like that). it can be upgraded further to the impressive ankh shield, with its likewise impressive crafting tree, if you feel like going for it.
You could probably replace the cloud in a bottle with that, and the horseshoe with wings, but it's up to you.

Oh boy, the Ankh Shield (this is a link, since it's impossible to tell on the skin I use, Overworld) sure has a crafting path and a half
Looks very good, though, just really hard to get, and sounds like a good idea to aim to replace the lucky horseshoe and cloud in a bottle. Probably underwhelming accessories at this point for seasoned players, but I use them to avoid dying to jumps, plus the ability to double jump. Double-jump + flying (boots) makes it easier to maneuver over lava down in hell.

Groan. Hadn't thought about the gravitation potion. Pretty sure I have a few of those lying around.

Speaking of accessories, there sure are many in this game. Would have been nice to easier tell what they can be crafted into without needing to consult a wiki, though. We can only see the next step via the Guide, and if that recipe happens to include another item that must be crafted too, I can't know that just by looking at the name, thinking it may drop later from an enemy or chest. Like Sharkron balloon for example, for the Pink Horseshoe balloon.

Btw, is there something akin to a Dash ability? I played Hollow Knight (crazy hard game, but also very good) prior to starting with Terraria, and something like that was valuable in avoiding enemy attacks.

 

[Doodles]

Btw, is there something akin to a Dash ability? I played Hollow Knight (crazy hard game, but also very good) prior to starting with Terraria, and something like that was valuable in avoiding enemy attacks.

There is an accessory like that, but it's received late into the game. If you're playing Expert Mode, you can get a dash accessory much sooner. (Drops from the Eye of Cthulhu)

 

[Sora_92]

The ankh shield has a crafting tree similarly complex to the cell phone, but it can pay off nicely. And you can actually get all the parts needed in early hardmode, before even fighting any hardmode bosses, if you want.

double jump, and rocket boots' flying ability are very useful early game, but wings give a different sort of maneuverablity. Cloud in a bottle and similar items are not useless however, as they can be tinkered into shiny red balloons, making cloud in a balloon, and a few other similar ones - they even have slight differences in stats, much like their bottled versions, with cloud in a bottle being the weakest, and things like blizzard in a bottle being a bit better. their balloon counterpart actually gives boots to wings as well, if you aiming for mobility, they worth considering even later game, in my opinion, they make the character feel much "lighter". but if you would intend to use balloons, then the best choice would be bundle of balloons, which is unfortunatelly nonsensically difficult to craft.
But with wings, you might will find, that double jump is not that necessary anymore, as it was before.

(edit: also, a little correction. I meant to say frog leg and its derivates before, when said that it gives bonuses to wings. so, not just the frog gear, it work similar with other frog leg dreivates too (for example, amphibian boots) - but you have a frog gear now, so anyway. that gives bonuses for wings too.)

Yeah, there are many accessories indeed and figuring out the more complex crafting trees can be overwhelming without the wiki. But the funnier thing is, that despite there being so many acessories, you will usually settle with just a few in most playthroughs. this is part why I didn't said to replace things like the obsidian horseshoe first, and I found it an interesting accessory, because I don't think I ever used it, not seen anyone else using it before. Though since 1.4, horseshoe are a lot more common, prior to 1.4 it was common that there was only one, in a small world. Now it makes more sense to craft it, than before.

by the way, sharkron balloon is made with balloon pufferfish you can fish up, and tsunami in a bottle, you can get from crates you fish up. it's the fishermans' equivalent of similar shiny red balloon derivates. you can even add the lucky horseshoe in the mix, much like to other shiny red balloon derivates.

as for gravitation potion, it's really not obvious when you're a newbie, I know I just made a crazy tall tower from platforms and stuff at first on first playthrough, and tried to glide from there with an umbrella XD lol, it just happened there was a floating island relatively close, so after several tries, I eventually managed to reach it. But yeah, if you have gravitation potions, they can help a lot with looking for floating islands (and floating lakes) XD

And as for dash, I think there are 3 things in the game that does that. you can't get either of them right now, but like @Doodles said, one of them is expert mode only, that is, the expert drop of EoC. another one is one of the Solar Flare Armor's set bonuses, I think, but that's an endgame armor so don't worry about that for now. What you can get earlier is the Tabi, from the Post-Plantera dungeon. Don't worry about it too much for now, I think.

 

[Dreadnautilus5000🌳]

And as for dash, I think there are 3 things in the game that does that. you can't get either of them right now, but like @Doodles said, one of them is expert mode only, that is, the expert drop of EoC. another one is one of the Solar Flare Armor's set bonuses, I think, but that's an endgame armor so don't worry about that for now. What you can get earlier is the Tabi, from the Post-Plantera dungeon. Don't worry about it too much for now, I think.

There's actually a fourth way to dash: Crystal Assassin armour's set bonus. If @Pangaearocks wants to play around with multiple weapons from different classes, Crystal Assassin armour is a great option because it doesn't only benefit one class and has an extremely useful dash ability if you wear the full set. However it drops from the Queen Slime boss, which I don't think he's prepared for.

 

[Sora_92]

There's actually a fourth way to dash: Crystal Assassin armour's set bonus. If @Pangaearocks wants to play around with multiple weapons from different classes, Crystal Assassin armour is a great option because it doesn't only benefit one class and has an extremely useful dash ability if you wear the full set. However it drops from the Queen Slime boss, which I don't think he's prepared for.

Oh, is that so?
I totally forgot about that, since it's a new armor.

In that case, yeah, that could be aquired at this point in the game, but, yeah, a bit better gear would be better before trying to tackle queen slime.
Possibly even defeating a mech boss before, and using weapons from the stuff they drop and that +100 HP from life fruits (and additional +100 HP with lifeforce potion)

 

[Pangaearocks]

Cheers. I've made some changes to the accessories, because I had what it took to create the Pink Horseshoe Balloon. It feels a little different than before, but I like it so far. After a lot of spelunking, going all the way to the eastern end of Hell, I was able to get enough Adamantite to craft the full armor set. 54 bars is a lot, over 200 ores, but I probably don't have to make anything else with them, so it's fine.

Tried out several weapons too. First attempted to get light shard, but the hallow desert is tiny, so maybe no correct mummies will spawn there. There is a regular desert on the other flank of the base, but those don't drop the material I need. Briefly tested out Hel-Fire, which was in storage. But I struggled a bit with it. Good as long as enemies are a little off, and from one side only, but I pretty quickly got overwhelmed, and it was "only" in the surface crimson, which happened to have mostly face-eaters etc (pre-hardmode) enemies. Also tried out the Shadowflame bow, which is what dropped from the goblin invasion earlier. Again, it's pretty good if you can keep distance, but when enemies gang up on you, it's not very good. And I find that enemies get in my face a lot, and I routinely am slashing left and right to defeat them, often while jumping around. Bows simply won't work very well while mining I think, due to narrow passages and suchlike. I found that a bunch of arrows simply hit the ground.

Damage stayed roughly the same when going from Mithril armor to Adamantite, but crit chance dropped from 41% to 26%, effectively cutting DPS a fair bit. Defense increased by 13, though, so that should help a little. Btw, should I go through my current accessories and try to get certain modifiers, or isn't it really worth it? (if they will be dropped soon for better ones anyway)

Tested out one of the demon scythes as well, which looked quite nifty, though I went through mana really quickly, which might be a concern in tough combat. Ultimately I've gone back to the Bone sword for now

Looking at the Ankh Shield on the wiki, I have some of those items, but lack others that have very low drop chances. Adhesive Bandage is quite limited in who can drop it, plus low drop chances. However, I do have vitamins, trifold map, bezoar, blindfold and fast clock -- plus the Obsidian Shield.

 

[Sora_92]

Those sound relatively good.

As for adamantite armor, yes, it excels in defense stats at this point, but otherwise not very remarkable. You might will move on to hallowed armor once you get enough bars from the mech bosses.

As for weapons, I usually have two primary weapons on the hotbar, one main and one secondary. But everyone shall find out what way they prefer it. I know that I like carrying a sword or similar melee weapons (sometimes spears or flails or such) even though I usually play as a mage, so use magic weapons as main. but swords are just useful for close range combat, and dealing with annoyances, like cobweb. plus, sometimes you're just getting frustrated and wanna run around letting out some steam by chopping up some of those annoying zombies XD

As for the ankh shield, just put the parts you have in some place where you know where they are, and if you get the missing parts too, tinker it into the ankh shield. Only a few are missing it seems. (By the way, if you try to get a nazar, the pre-Plantera dungeon is usually the best place for it, and cursed skulls are often relatively common there. Post-Plantera however, there will be tons of new enemies there, making the pre-hardmode enemies much rarer.)

Also, give a try to wings.

 

[Pangaearocks]

With that in mind, went back to the dungeon and farmed for Nazar. Got almost 1000 bones out of it, but eventually it dropped. Phew.

The hallow desert is tiny, but suddenly noticed a few light mummies when I was mostly standing in the crimson part of the desert, with the hallow at the side of the screen. A few of them spawned when doing that back and forth a bit, and thankfully one of them dropped a light shard. So now I've crafted the Pow of Dao. A little difficult to use, especially when underground, because it bumps into the ground a lot and then goes behind me instead of towards enemies. However, it's nice that you can sort of use it as both a close-range melee weapon, and long range. Trying to get used to it, but still have the Beam sword on me.

Another mech boss message came up while I was at the base, so I figured I'd give it a shot. Swallowed ironskin and regeneration potions and hoped.

It was the worm that showed up.

But holy that thing is rough!! Early on it looked like the Pow of Dao would be really useful when swinging it around my head and standing next to where the worm passed by, as I hit it a lot then. But soon enough the screen was continuously nuked with lasers or something, which was impossible to escape. Got him down maybe 20-25% (he had 75-80% health left), but didn't stand a chance. He also killed numerous NPCs while moving around in our arena, including the Party Girl. Will she re-spawn? Hopefully the others will, but saw she only has a 2% chance each night. I just hope she comes back quickly since she was already present.

 

[Sora_92]

Good work with getting the nazar, and the dao of pow.

And, looks like the first encounter with the destroyer was a rough one XD
That one is notorious on massacring your entire town, if you fight near the town... - on a side note, this another reason why having NPCs spread out into multiple towns can help. the main town is the one where NPCs get wiped out all the time... XD - particularly problematic with the party girl, because it's quite random when will she respawn. She will respawn, but it can take much longer than other NPCs, since it's kinda random.

The destroyer can be really tough, if you face it directly. You can get overwhelmed by the probes it releases, very quickly. Maybe give a try to the other two mech bosses first, if they will go better. Try to get wings before that though. And try to fight some greater mimics at your arena. with wings, it could go much better, and if you can defeat some of those, it could give you some more confidence (and possibly some good weapons too) against the mech bosses.

 

[Dreadnautilus5000🌳]

Another mech boss message came up while I was at the base, so I figured I'd give it a shot. Swallowed ironskin and regeneration potions and hoped.

It was the worm that showed up.

But holy that thing is rough!! Early on it looked like the Pow of Dao would be really useful when swinging it around my head and standing next to where the worm passed by, as I hit it a lot then. But soon enough the screen was continuously nuked with lasers or something, which was impossible to escape. Got him down maybe 20-25% (he had 75-80% health left), but didn't stand a chance. He also killed numerous NPCs while moving around in our arena, including the Party Girl. Will she re-spawn? Hopefully the others will, but saw she only has a 2% chance each night. I just hope she comes back quickly since she was already present.

As a melee player, a strategy that works for me against the Destroyer is to repeatedly get close and damage it, then flying away once the Probes start to pile up and moving in one direction horizontally in the air until it stops firing lasers, then going back and damaging it again. You can also fly above it if your health gets low in order to regenerate.

 

[Pangaearocks]

Now we're starting to talk here...

Have jumped off of the living trees before, so don't know if something has trigged or it was luck, but some harpies swooped down from around the apex. Then a wyvern. Then three more wyverns and a handful of harpies. Ended up with 4 feathers and 34 soul of flight. After seeing what was possible to craft with the Guide, I did check out the online guide too, and noticed that Fairy Wings was better than angel or demon wings, so I went with that one.

That's a game changer allright! You guys were right to push me towards it.

Had noticed the underside of a sky island when jumping back from the ocean so went there first. It even had a cozy little house. And yet more wyverns and packs of harpies. Not the most peaceful location.

Spoiler

Had also been farming for a megaphone in the crimson desert, and by the time I noticed one drop, there was another one I hadn't noticed. A little cheesy perhaps, but had looked up what enemies could drop the bandage. The angler fish was hopeless, they almost never spawn when I need them to, so I waited for full moon and the werewolves. Somehow I've never seen them before, but noticed them at the end of a blood moon, so next time I wanted to be ready. Went kinda haywire due to slime rain occurring at the same time, but eventually the wanted bandage item dropped.

We were ready for

Spoiler

With that, the accessories hopefully look more agreeable:

• frostspark boots
• charm of myths
• ankh shield
• frog gear
• fairy wings

What is a little frustrating is that the chest area is too small, and I'm running out of room for especially banners, blocks/etc, enemy drops and nature drops (cobwebs and suchlike). Accessories and weapons are pretty stacked too, though some room was just made available in the three accessories chests. From time to time I sell duplicate items, but may have to simply sell more now, that I hopefully won't need later down the road. Way out of room for crafting stations too. Wish I built everything bigger, because it's not really possible to expand this building without tearing it up and starting anew -- and I spent a lot of time on it, although it doesn't look that hot compared to some of the stuff I've seen ofc.

With that gear, plus adamantite armor and the Dao of Pow, feels like I'm getting more 'set' now. The flail takes some getting used to and isn't always great in close areas, but the "swing around head" style is usually good there. Just hard to use the ranged attack unless you're in the open, or on high ground. Even when I think I'm on flat ground, the flail will often get stuck on something.

However, it was pretty awesome against the wyverns, because the ranged attack can hit it many times if you hit the wyvern front-to-back.

The party girl has come back too, which was nice. Think the only NPCs I've gotten while in hardmode is the wizard and pirate. Still, the home area is pretty full, and not in nice houses, but it is what it is. At least it's sort-of functional. Not that I really use any of them besides the Guide and Angler :-/

Btw, from reading a few threads already, I thought Reaver Shark was really rare. But I spent a day or so fishing at the ocean, and ended up with five of them. Then three more while waiting for Full Moon. But then I did have 98-146 fishing power, so maybe that is why. Recently got the golden fishing pole from the Angler.

Well then... suppose I should check out more of the sky islands. See how many there are, and if there is anything special there. Hopefully a proper lake somewhere, since the Angler keeps wanting fish from them.

About the boss fights: do you guys have several arenas, or set it up further from town(s)?

It's been quite nice to have close by, for blood moons and pirate invasions, and of course bosses so far. But I don't particularly want the NPCs to get wiped out either, which can happen if all these mech bosses are as nasty as the Destroyer was. Most of them survived in fairness, because only three are very close to the arena, but the pirates keep wiping a pack of them too when they invade.

 

[Sora_92]

Great progress! Your gear seem to be a lot more ready for the mech bosses.

As for storages, you could easily expand your base downwards with another, or a bigger basement. Though I'm not sure if there's actually need for that many chests.

on the topic of reaver shark, I'm actually not sure how common it is now, but now its pickaxe power is the same as gold/platinum pickaxe, so there's not a lot of reason to fish for it, although it's quite fast, so, there's that.I personally don't like it though, because it's way too bulky, which obstruck vision of what I'm actually mining XD but that might be just my opinion. I mean, if precision is not important, it sounds all good. But when it's that, then I'll just use explosives instead XD

for floating islands, if this is a small world, there are usually 3 floating islands, and 1 floating lake there. (if it's a bigger map, there are likely more)

For arenas and towns, I would recommend making at least another town somewhere elsewhere, and get some NPCs move there, like the party girl, to keep her safer.
I usually don't build arenas against the mech bosses, as far as the twins and skeletron prime concerned, flying above the town or nearby is usually fine. They possess little danger to NPCs, so you can fight them wherever you want, and usually the wide open sky is the best place for it, so there's lots of room to dodge.
You can add some rows of platforms too, so you can land there, when needed.

The destroyer is the only one of the trio that posses real danger to the town. That one can be made much easier with an arena, especially because it can't fly.
But there's no need for an arena against the other two, I think. But if you think it would help, you can try to build one.

 

[Dreadnautilus5000🌳]

With that, the accessories hopefully look more agreeable:

• frostspark boots
• charm of myths
• ankh shield
• frog gear
• fairy wings

If I were you, I'd get the Amphibian Boots, which are a bit slower than your current boots on land but boost your wing flight, which comes in handy against the mech bosses. Both components come from fishing, but in my experience don't take too long to get. Then you can swap out the Frog Gear for a Warrior Emblem, once you get it, and then replace that later on with a Fire Gauntlet after you've beaten the mech bosses.

 

[Sora_92]

If I were you, I'd get the Amphibian Boots, which are a bit slower than your current boots on land but boost your wing flight, which comes in handy against the mech bosses. Both components come from fishing, but in my experience don't take too long to get. Then you can swap out the Frog Gear for a Warrior Emblem, once you get it, and then replace that later on with a Fire Gauntlet after you've beaten the mech bosses.

Doesn't the frog leg's wing boosting abilities apply in the case of frog gear too? Not just amphibian boots.
Though Amphibian boots is often considered better than the frog gear, because many of the frog gear's abilities became largely obsolate by later game, and in comparison, amphibian boots require less stuff to craft, and can be a good alternative for other running boots.

Though if you use both frostspark/terraspark (or such) and frog leg (or its derivates) they both add to your wing's stats, I think? so, if mobility is higher focus, this setting seems to be good. you're right though that some of that could be traded away in favor of higher attack or something. Well, I dunno which is the better.

 

[Pangaearocks]

Doesn't the frog leg's wing boosting abilities apply in the case of frog gear too? Not just amphibian boots.

Don't have amphibian boots, but tested out this. Just the wings, and I don't jump all that high tbh. Add frostspark boots, and the jump is a fair bit higher. Replace the frostsparks with frog gear, and the jump is noticeably higher still, and I seem to climb quicker as well. Add them all up (wings + boots + frog gear), and the jump is yet higher. Can't tell exactly how high it is, because I have nothing to measure against so high up, but it was easy to notice just by using the minimap (where 'darkness' begins) and the arena. Could be twice as high as with only the wings. So for now I'll use all three of them, as I have nothing better to use anyway. Rather than replacing the boots, I was looking more towards upgrading them with the lava version --> Terraspark boots.