So what are the best TC tools these days?

[Airship]

So I've just mined a bunch of cobalt and ardite in the nether, and figured it is time to upgrade my dinky stone hammer to something more useful. Problem is, the threads on this all seem to be quite old, and I'm pretty sure there was some major changes in how the mod handled certain things quite recently.

I remember that a few months back, full Ardite was king. I also remember this was supposed to be nerfed... so was it? Should I just go full cobalt, and leave it at that? I could go on a test server and test it of course, but the nature of stonebound makes such a test inconvenient to say the least.

Finally, is it worth it to use thaumium/paper in there somewhere?

 

[Symmetryc]

Cobalt Head/ Cobalt Plate/ Thaumium Plate/ Paper Rod

 

[OmegaPython]

Cobalt Head/ Cobalt Plate/ Thaumium Plate/ Paper Rod

Paper rod? You get an awful handle modifier from that.

 

[Symmetryc]

Paper rod? You get an awful handle modifier from that.

Hammers have so much durability that it's not even funny, writable is more worth it than the durability, trust me.

 

[Airship]

So Ardite is no longer worth it at all? Did they go too far when they nerfed it?

 

[Symmetryc]

So Ardite is no longer worth it at all? Did they go too far when they nerfed it?

Yeah, now it's stonebound 2 not 3 :/ and it's weighted, so if you have full ardite you have 2.0, half 1.0, etc.

 

[Silent_007]

A nice trick, if you want to take advantage of something that may or may not be a bug, is to build a tool with stonebound (use ardite, netherack, whatever) and then wear it down until it has ONE point of durability left. Then add the electric modifier. Once you recharge the tool's power it will still retain the stonebound speed bonus.

 

[Zjarek_S]

A nice trick, if you want to take advantage of something that may or may not be a bug, is to build a tool with stonebound (use ardite, netherack, whatever) and then wear it down until it has ONE point of durability left. Then add the electric modifier. Once you recharge the tool's power it will still retain the stonebound speed bonus.

I don't think that this is a bug, because after you drain whole energy your tool will use normal durability (there is also a bug with not draining energy, but it is fixed). Overall ardite is very much worth it on hammer, because it has so much durability. It won't give you as much mining speed as before, but one piece will definitely be better than additional modifier from paper or thaumium.

 

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Which weapon you want to use will depend on your personal fighting style. Personally, I like longswords. Rapiers have too low a damage output, even though they ignore armor, and the speed got hella-nerfed. Cleavers are worthless except for wither skeleton farming. Scythes are surprisingly good at area-effect damage output, which is very handy in 1.6 for dealing with zombie swarms.

Scythe with Mahnamhana head and everything else paper still has over 2k durability and has SIX slots. So you can have one for moss/electric, then five for Quartz for a total of 9 hearts per swing. Then you add on a diamond and gold block for more quartz, bringing your total damage up to 10.5 hearts (enough to one-hit most opponents). Then you tack on a Nether Star and get Necrotic Bone for lifesteal. This is the best weapon I've ever come across, assuming you have the materials.

 

[Airship]

I don't think that this is a bug, because after you drain whole energy your tool will use normal durability (there is also a bug with not draining energy, but it is fixed). Overall ardite is very much worth it on hammer, because it has so much durability. It won't give you as much mining speed as before, but one piece will definitely be better than additional modifier from paper or thaumium.

well dang, I just made a hammer without any ardite on it. With silky, it capped out at 18.33 speed (wihout wither star upgrade, haven't killed the wither yet). So how much did I lose by doing that? The speed was kind of underwhelming when compared to other high end tools like the mining drill.

 

[KillerRamer]

I don't think that this is a bug, because after you drain whole energy your tool will use normal durability (there is also a bug with not draining energy, but it is fixed). Overall ardite is very much worth it on hammer, because it has so much durability. It won't give you as much mining speed as before, but one piece will definitely be better than additional modifier from paper or thaumium.

But why would you even worry about the durability of a tool that's electric. Just make sure to have something as a charge repository. Also even with a tool with ardite... I managed to rip it a new once.. NEVER GONNA GO THAT NUTS AGAIN! I felt like a human quarry.

 

[KillerRamer]

well dang, I just made a hammer without any ardite on it. With silky, it capped out at 18.33 speed (wihout wither star upgrade, haven't killed the wither yet). So how much did I lose by doing that? The speed was kind of underwhelming when compared to other high end tools like the mining drill.

Hammers mine in a three by three grid. It's meant to be a bit slower, but I managed to get one to about 20 speed going full cobalt and a thaumiam rod. I am going to go about testing this stonebound thing and see if it pans out to make my tools faster however.. But if you want to have crazy fast mining speed with a hammer, make a speed rod with Dartcraft. I believe it's level five when you get mining haste 3... Though that might be to quick for servers as I tend to get the glitchy inviso blocks after going crazy with it.

 

[Airship]

I try to avoid Dartcraft whenever I can, I think it's a ridiculous mod that should never have been included in the modpack - but that's neither here nor there. The silky upgrade actually kills the speed quite a bit - my hammer would be 20.33 with lapis instead. Full cobalt with thaumium rod capped out at 17 with silky.

I did mine a lot of resources when in the nether, so I'll probably make a ardite hammer as well. Initial testing where I use a cobalt head, cobalt plate, ardite plate and thaum/paper rod gives a mining speed of 16 after all upgrades are complete (except wither), so the stonebound would have to make up 2.33 to actually become better than the cobalt/thaum hammer ... Color me skeptical. Question though before I do; Should I go with paper rod or thaumium rod? Both gives the hammer 4 upgrades, but the durability is much higher with thaumium (8k+ vs 2k).

Obviously, it would be much easier to get the durability down when using a paper rod, but would this affect the stonebound bonus at all? Is the bonus determined by percentage damage on a tool, or by amount of damage on a tool? If the latter, thaumium would be much better, no? Would love to see some kind of numbers on how stonebound works

Scythe with Mahnamhana head and everything else paper still has over 2k durability and has SIX slots. So you can have one for moss/electric, then five for Quartz for a total of 9 hearts per swing. Then you add on a diamond and gold block for more quartz, bringing your total damage up to 10.5 hearts (enough to one-hit most opponents). Then you tack on a Nether Star and get Necrotic Bone for lifesteal. This is the best weapon I've ever come across, assuming you have the materials.

Actually, the battleaxe get's the same amount of damage, using manyullium and thaumium heads, paper binding and paper rod. The scythe also doesn't need every handle part to be paper - one can be supplemented by thaumium giving you much higher durability (though not an issue with electric of course) Ended up making a scythe for myself (cause scythes are awesome) and axe for my brother who's playing with me. Also didn't go with the necrotic upgrade, as nothing really hurts me except rapiers (and then I'd rather use a rapier myself) - prefer looting when hunting mobs.

 

[Shakie666]

Which weapon you want to use will depend on your personal fighting style. Personally, I like longswords. Rapiers have too low a damage output, even though they ignore armor, and the speed got hella-nerfed. Cleavers are worthless except for wither skeleton farming. Scythes are surprisingly good at area-effect damage output, which is very handy in 1.6 for dealing with zombie swarms.

Scythe with Mahnamhana head and everything else paper still has over 2k durability and has SIX slots. So you can have one for moss/electric, then five for Quartz for a total of 9 hearts per swing. Then you add on a diamond and gold block for more quartz, bringing your total damage up to 10.5 hearts (enough to one-hit most opponents). Then you tack on a Nether Star and get Necrotic Bone for lifesteal. This is the best weapon I've ever come across, assuming you have the materials.

Seriously, do people even bother testing these things? Scythes are terrible weapons, despite what everyone says. If you look at the stats for one, it says 'Damage: Low'. This means it only does 75% of the stated damage, meaning it'll never be able to 1-shot skeletons even when fully upgraded with nether quartz. Conversely, cleavers are the only weapon with 'Damage: High', meaning they do 125% of stated damage. My cleaver has a stated damage of 9.5 hearts, but the damage bonus means I can attach a necrotic bone and electric and still be able to 1-shot zombies, skeletons and creepers. If I replaced the necrotic bone with extra quartz, it'd be able to 1-shot witches as well.

Incidentally battleaxes have 'Damage: Moderate' meaning they're pretty much worthless compared to cleavers, which is a shame since they look so damn cool.

 

[Airship]

Seriously, do people even bother testing these things? Scythes are terrible weapons, despite what everyone says. If you look at the stats for one, it says 'Damage: Low'. This means it only does 75% of the stated damage, meaning it'll never be able to 1-shot skeletons even when fully upgraded with nether quartz. Conversely, cleavers are the only weapon with 'Damage: High', meaning they do 125% of stated damage. My cleaver has a stated damage of 9.5 hearts, but the damage bonus means I can attach a necrotic bone and electric and still be able to 1-shot zombies, skeletons and creepers. If I replaced the necrotic bone with extra quartz, it'd be able to 1-shot witches as well.

Incidentally battleaxes have 'Damage: Moderate' meaning they're pretty much worthless compared to cleavers, which is a shame since they look so damn cool.

well damn ... I had no idea that was the case. Always did wonder what the point of those damage attributes were when the numbers were all the same. TIL. (And this makes me quite sad, as I basically threw my shinies away). Why are battleaxes worthless btw? As far as I can tell, you can attack a lot faster with them compared to cleavers.

 

[Shakie666]

well damn ... I had no idea that was the case. Always did wonder what the point of those damage attributes were when the numbers were all the same. TIL. (And this makes me quite sad, as I basically threw my shinies away). Why are battleaxes worthless btw? As far as I can tell, you can attack a lot faster with them compared to cleavers.

Well, I take that partially back; battleaxes aren't worthless, but its quicker to 1-shot mobs with a slow weapon than it is to 2-shot them with a normal speed one. Besides, my cleaver also has a necrotic bone and electric. To 1-shot zombies with a battleaxe you'd have to give up both of those. I don't know about you, but i'd rather have infinite durability and self-healing that a slightly faster attack speed.

 

[ShneekeyTheLost]

Seriously, do people even bother testing these things? Scythes are terrible weapons, despite what everyone says. If you look at the stats for one, it says 'Damage: Low'. This means it only does 75% of the stated damage, meaning it'll never be able to 1-shot skeletons even when fully upgraded with nether quartz. Conversely, cleavers are the only weapon with 'Damage: High', meaning they do 125% of stated damage. My cleaver has a stated damage of 9.5 hearts, but the damage bonus means I can attach a necrotic bone and electric and still be able to 1-shot zombies, skeletons and creepers. If I replaced the necrotic bone with extra quartz, it'd be able to 1-shot witches as well.

I'm more worried about swarms of enemies at close range. If I have a problem with a Skeleton, I'll use my TiCo bow and arrows to one-shot it.

Yes, I did heavily test it. I like the scythe. Its area effect is very satisfying to me, if for no other reason than the knockback part inherent in the swing means nothing can close into melee with me once I back up into a corner. It will absolutely destroy zombie pigmen swarms.

The Cleaver's rediculously slow swing speed, on the other hand, means that if anything has armor, it's going to be able to hit you before you can swing a second time.

The Scythe is a defensive weapon bar none. It has phenomenal battlefield control and area-effect damage output which vastly outstrips anything else, even WITH the damage penalty.

The Battleaxe isn't even worth bothering with.

 

[Shakie666]

I'm more worried about swarms of enemies at close range. If I have a problem with a Skeleton, I'll use my TiCo bow and arrows to one-shot it.

Yes, I did heavily test it. I like the scythe. Its area effect is very satisfying to me, if for no other reason than the knockback part inherent in the swing means nothing can close into melee with me once I back up into a corner. It will absolutely destroy zombie pigmen swarms.

The Cleaver's rediculously slow swing speed, on the other hand, means that if anything has armor, it's going to be able to hit you before you can swing a second time.

The Scythe is a defensive weapon bar none. It has phenomenal battlefield control and area-effect damage output which vastly outstrips anything else, even WITH the damage penalty.

The Battleaxe isn't even worth bothering with.

To each his own I guess. Though to be honest, I rarely ever find myself 'swarmed' by enemies, apart from pigmen, which aren't worth fighting anyway.

I guess you're right about the armoured mobs, but they're rare... Come to think of it, I can't even remember the last time I saw a zombie or skeleton wearing any armour.

Finally, one thing I forgot is that the battleaxe does something really interesting with a right mouse click. Its not enough to save it though.

 

[KingTriaxx]

Don't BattleAxes have huge knockback though?

 

[Airship]

Hmm... Suddenly it became sort of hard deciding if I want to keep the scythe or if I should make a cleaver or not. Regarding cleavers - I'm guessing the ideal would be paper rods, many blade and thaum plate? This doesn't lower the base dmg and gives it an initial 6 modifiers.

Also, I actually went ahead and tested the ardite hammers after all. This involved thousands of netherrack, a filler, and quite a bit of time:
-Hammer 1 was made with a cobalt head, cobalt plate, ardite plate and paper rod. It had 1979 durability.
-Hammer 2 was made with cobalt head, cobalt plate, ardite plate and thaumium rod. it had 8576 durability.
Both hammers had gold-diamond upgrade, silky and 150 redstone.

After churning them both down to 1 durability, hammer 1 had a bonus of 3.13 from the stonebound, meaning it was quite a bit better than the cob-cob-thaum-paper hammer I made earlier. It wasn't even that bad to grind down, as it only has a modest durability. Hammer 2 was quite a bit more difficult, but ended up with a 4.56 bonus (for a total of 20.53). It's a great hammer but I'm not entirely convinced it would be worth the grind.

Basically, for most people, the cobalt/thaum head combo would probably be fine. Those who want a little more oomph and don't mind the effort might want to replace the thaum with ardite, and the crazies should replace the paper rod with thaum in addition to adding ardite to the head.

This test left me wondering - would jagged be worth it in weapons? (I won't do that test though, I don't think i hate myself enough for something like that).