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Forums » List all forums » Forum: Tips & Tricks, Questions & Answers » Thread: Bludgeon Selection Guide |
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Thread Status: Normal Total posts in this thread: 26 |
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rixation
Joined: Feb 19, 2005 Posts: 5043 Status: Offline |
Based on numerous requests for assistance in choosing a bludgeon, I have decided to compile a list of strategies that are effective for each bludgeon type. Please Note: this list is based on personal experience of myself as well as several Ultimate rumble players from Cobalt, Sage, and Midnight (Viridian and Ice Ultimates were unavailable at the time of compilation). Gaff: Simply an alternate version of fists. Best compared to the Foil in swordfighting, it has simple-to-break groupings of color, evenly spread across the top and bottom of the drop pattern. Since the strike and sprinkle patterns match in relative board location, the return attacks will be larger than most people can find managable. Not recommended against any bludgeons other than fists, gaffs, or fish. Can be used by anyone. Overall: Affordable, but weak. Rope Coils: Generally considered more powerful than necessary for it's price. This is the bludgeon of choice by many Ultimates based solely on the diverse pattern which can take time to dig out from. Since the strike and sprinkle colors are inverted, plus a tertiary sprinkle color is added to the center of the pattern, drops can become very complex. Combine this with the price (0 doubloon fee and no minerals in the recipe), and the fact Rope Coils can be used by anyone, this is a bludgeon with considerable "bang for your buck" potential. Overall: Affordable and very powerful. Belaying pin: Simply put, this bludgeon makes very little sense when it comes to large breaks. The strike and sprinkle patterns match on the far left and right, with some center overlapping as well. In most cases, the center groupings can be broken to drop any remaining peices, generating more sprinkles in the return attack. Effective strategies will all include fast, large sprinkles with very few strikes. Overall: Mid-range pricing, weak general performance. Chain: With an alternating sprinkle/strike drop, except for the far left side, the chain has potential, but requires a specific strategy to be effective. Using a combination of small, quick strikes followed immediately with small, quick sprinkles, it is possible to block your opponent from breaking any charged attacks and then bruise them by separating the charged ball. Overall: Mid-range pricing, powerful but specific usage. Brass Knuckles: This bludgeon is unique in that the sprinkle and strike colors match, however based on placement of different attacks, the colors will frequently cause bruising. Like the chain, the strike/sprinkle alternating attacks are quite effective. Overall: Mid-range pricing, powerful but specific usage. Cane: Matching sprinkle/strike drop colors throughout the pattern create large return breaks. Very few people can use the cane effectively and it is thought to be one of the weakest (yet more expensive) bludgeons. However, it does look quite nice with a Musketeer Hat. Overall: High-priced, weak. Leather Gloves: Surprisingly effective during high-speed sprinkle attacks. Most large strikes will cause easily broken "drop off" peices, resulting in large return sprinkles. Since the strike and sprinkle patterns are not symmetrical though, it is very possible to build layers of unbreakable color groups. Overall: High-priced, powerful but specific usage. Skull Rings: Includes bruising in the strike pattern, but their placement is not the greatest help. Large groups of the same color, in both the strike and sprinkle pattern, will create several "drop off" groups. Additionally, the strike pattern can be easily cleared even in very large combo'd attacks. The exception is if the user can manage to time the attacks properly to keep a clear screen while the opponent searches for the right breaking color. Overall: Extreme pricing, potentially powerful but risky. Blackjack: Arguably, the most controversial bludgeon. The strike pattern cannot be easily broken due to intermingling and overlapping 3rd and 4th colors, and the strike pattern contains several bruises. However, if the opponent can manage to clear the left side of the strike pattern quickly enough, a large section in the center can be easily cleared, effectively dropping half their screen. Overall: Extreme pricing, extreme power. Guantlets: Large sprinkles are easily broken, and the bottom half of the strike attack matches the color pattern of the sprinkle drop. Further testing is needed to determine best usage. Overall: Extreme pricing, genenerally weak pattern (undetermined style). Hammer: Strike your opponent down to size but beware of return sprinkles. Since the hammer includes a vast amount of bruises in the strike pattern, if the user can continuousy strike instead of sprinkle, the opponent can quickly be buried in a 50-75 percent bruised screen. However, if the opponent takes advantage of the large center grouping or the user relies on sprinkles, the hammer is easily overtaken. Overall: Extreme pricing, potentially powerful but risky. The following bludgeons cannot be purchased: Broken bottle: The only bludgeon with open spaces, which is a blessing and a curse. If the user can quickly fill the opponents screen with a mix of strikes and sprinkles, those spaces will fill gaps in the board, causing a more diverse range of colors to clear. However, this can be easily prepared for in charging groups, so prepare for very large return attacks. Overall: It's free, but not generally worth the effort. Fish: You were on a sinking ship so you received one of these while coming ashore. It's intended as a punishment, not a gift (just like injuries). The sprinkle colors will meld across the majority of the board, causing absolutely huge sprinkle-based returns. Additionally, the strike pattern includes a pre-charged ball, resulting in 1 more step of the return strike attack combo that the user can send. However, if your opponent does not get either of the two colors needed to clear the entire board (yes, only two), it can be potentially brutal. Overall: Potentially decent but reliant on luck and/or timing. Skeleton Bone: You'll need to prove your swordfighting skill against Skellies to acquire one of these bludgeons, so it can be assumed these are meant for the elite (not to mention most people are intimidated by the look of them). This pattern includes every available color in an "X" pattern, causing very difficult breaks and usually small returns from the opponent. This is considered to be the "King of Bludgeons" by most people, even though it does not include any bruises, simply because large consecutive attacks can easily bury the opponent in a seemingly random mix of colors which are complex and diverse, that take a long time to dig out from. Overall: Pure power, best of the best. Disclaimer: Not responsible for you buying a bludgeon you can't really afford. Use this as a guide only, not an end-all-be-all list of strategies. Your Mileage May Vary and this guide is subject to change at any time based on yet-to-be-discovered information. Edit 1: rewording of guantlets and hammer. Edit 2: more fish testing revealed power based on luck ---------------------------------------- Epimetheus Retired ---------------------------------------- [Edit 2 times, last edit by rixation at Apr 20, 2006 10:00:21 AM] |
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TianX9
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Kudos to Epi for a very, very well-written guide! A pity it couldn't have waited until after April 25... *licks his bone* You underrate the fish terribly, though. A person using it effectively can dominate even the best skull rings/blackjack user. Furthermore, in practice even the best hammers, gauntlets, and chains are rather weak. |
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Demonyaj
Joined: Mar 16, 2004 Posts: 3498 Status: Offline |
Actually, with gauntlets, wouldn't small strikes + small sprinkles be really, really bad? ABC strikes, DABCD sprinkles? You'd generate three huge color cells with your pattern. ---------------------------------------- Denying the inevitable for as long as possible is a waste of life's work. |
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rixation
Joined: Feb 19, 2005 Posts: 5043 Status: Offline |
I really did try my best to get a wide variety of tests and opinions in. I'm quite sure there will be ammendments, but for now I stand by my post. :) As for the fish specifically, I did get pounded by one last night, but I still haven't decided if it was luck or not. The pattern could have been easily broken all 5 times I tried against it, but the right color didn't come at the right times.
Nope, the small strikes wind up being a contrast. For example, strike is (from the right): ARA Followed by sprinkles of: YBR It'll bury your charged blocks and by the time you dig out the first sprinkle set and set off your charged block, you'll have already received another round. It's quite effective. Overall, I'm open to modifications and additions for any portion of the guide, so feel free to PM me with details or catch me in-game for a match. :) ---------------------------------------- Epimetheus Retired |
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Demonyaj
Joined: Mar 16, 2004 Posts: 3498 Status: Offline |
My mind doesn't exactly wrap around the strikes too well if it's not in practice, apparently. I'm staring at the wiki pattern for the gauntlets, and it's ROOYYYBBR for the 1st sprinkle row, and globs of O-Y-B in the lower half of the strike. How would the short sprinkles not connect to the short strikes, at least up the middle? I'm more than a mite confused. ---------------------------------------- Denying the inevitable for as long as possible is a waste of life's work. |
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rixation
Joined: Feb 19, 2005 Posts: 5043 Status: Offline |
After looking at the drop pattern from the wiki, I agree. My notes don't make a lick of sense compared to that pattern (I wrote everything above based solely on practice matches and other people's opinions, not the official drop patterns). So, I'll scrap the current phrasing of the gauntlets and reword after more testing. If this applies elsewhere, please let me know. ---------------------------------------- Epimetheus Retired |
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Demonyaj
Joined: Mar 16, 2004 Posts: 3498 Status: Offline |
Sounds good! Gonna get this Rumble thing figured out yet, DY. ---------------------------------------- Denying the inevitable for as long as possible is a waste of life's work. |
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BootHook
Joined: Sep 16, 2005 Posts: 1953 Status: Offline |
I also think you are terribly underrating the fish. Turbo striking with a fish can easily get a pirate to Ult rank. There are a couple of pirates that are really good against fish, but the fish crushes just about everyone else. Also, it doesn't matter that the fish pattern contains charged balls, because almost zero people use strikes after the first 20 seconds of the game. ---------------------------------------- Bug: Fix the multi-row sprinkles in Rumble Rumbling Guide 1 Rumbling Guide 2 Rumble Videos ---------------------------------------- [Edit 2 times, last edit by BootHook at Apr 21, 2006 10:22:46 AM] |
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DisneyFREAK1
Joined: Mar 1, 2006 Posts: 18 Status: Offline |
Wow. I didn't know those benefits. Thanks for posting it. |
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Rick9109
 Joined: Sep 19, 2003 Posts: 6719 Status: Offline |
Sweet, I feel smart for picking out the rope of the early affordable bludgeons and that my understanding of the pattern was correct. Regarding the fish: it seems to be the saber of the bludgeon world. ---------------------------------------- Rome Pirates of the Damned, Crimson Tide. I don't care what it did to them, the game's been good to me. ---------------------------------------- [Edit 1 times, last edit by Rick9109 at Apr 21, 2006 12:04:02 PM] |
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rixation
Joined: Feb 19, 2005 Posts: 5043 Status: Offline |
That's a very accurate assessment. So far, I'm not overly impressed by it, but some people claim it's better than a blackjack or skeleton bone... /me shrugs ---------------------------------------- Epimetheus Retired |
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TianX9
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It rivals the blackjack and the skull rings, easily the two strongest purchasable weapons. The charged balls in the pattern are worthless because they jump to the front of the queue. Bone still eats it alive, though. |
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rixation
Joined: Feb 19, 2005 Posts: 5043 Status: Offline |
So far, the only thing I've found that the bone doesn't eat alive is the Hammer...but I really have yet to determine why that is. I think it's an issue with mass sprinkles coming from the bone. Needs more testing. ---------------------------------------- Epimetheus Retired |
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BootHook
Joined: Sep 16, 2005 Posts: 1953 Status: Offline |
Why are mass sprinkles coming from the bone? ---------------------------------------- Bug: Fix the multi-row sprinkles in Rumble Rumbling Guide 1 Rumbling Guide 2 Rumble Videos |
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nab528
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i need to know where i can get a broken bottle can some one help me??? |
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rixation
Joined: Feb 19, 2005 Posts: 5043 Status: Offline |
No one's quite sure where they come from yet. Once it's determined, it'll be posted here . ---------------------------------------- Epimetheus Retired |
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BootHook
Joined: Sep 16, 2005 Posts: 1953 Status: Offline |
The rope coils aren't easily to use. Clearly we wouldn't have so many people spending 25,000+ PoE on expensive bludgeons, if they thought that they could do good enough with rope coils. The problem with the rope coils is that they need a hybrid strategy, which means that the user needs to be good at sprinkling and striking. Most people are only good at one of these, which is why they pick speciality bludgeons like the chain or blackjack.
I have no idea how the brass knuckles are supposed to be good at bruising the opponent. It sprinkle pattern is like the rope coils, except that it contains 5 colors instead of 3. Its strike pattern is just plain horrible, and is more likely to fall apart than be useful.
The main thing about the skull rings is that they have a 5-wide color in their 1st sprinkle row. This can cause "breaker exhaustion" if the opponent isn't careful. Also, the strike pattern is ok if you criss-cross small strikes together.
The bruises in the blackjack pattern are in the most useless places in the pattern. If you can drop half the screen while playing against a blackjack user, then it was their fault for making large strikes. The problem with the blackjack is that some people can clear blackjack strikes faster than they can be made. Even if they are getting hit by a blackjack strike every 4 seconds, they can still easily clear them. The problem with the blackjack is that it's only good at small strikes. This means that your opponent can calculate how many strikes it would take before they can interrupt the attack that they are making. This means that they can create larger attacks than they would be able to make against other bludgeons. The biggest problem of the blackjack is the fist. Fist sprinkles are 3 groups. It is very hard to make a bunch of small strikes when you only have 3 groups to work with. Contrast this with the bone pattern, which has so many different groups that you can make small strikes non-stop.
Against a really fast player, you won't have time to add extra bruises into your strikes. Without the extra bruises, the hammer strike pattern is horrible. The hammer would actually get better as the game progresses, due to the fact that your opponent's attacks can be used to add extra bruises into your hammer strikes.
This bludgeon is overrated. Its sprinkle pattern is the brass knuckles with one more color. Its small strikes are worse than the blackjack, due to the fact that its sprinkle pattern matches up with the bottom lines in its strike pattern. Against really fast people, you won't be able to make large strikes, so you're better off just using a blackjack if you want to use a turbo-strike strategy. ---------------------------------------- Bug: Fix the multi-row sprinkles in Rumble Rumbling Guide 1 Rumbling Guide 2 Rumble Videos ---------------------------------------- [Edit 1 times, last edit by BootHook at May 21, 2006 3:48:28 PM] |
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Aximmilion
Joined: Nov 19, 2005 Posts: 65 Status: Offline |
Good guide. Though your lack of bare fists leaves something to be desired. Bare fists are quite strong. They have both a four colour strike and a four colour sprinkle which do -not- match up. Sprinkles: RRRYYYOOO Not all that strong really. The Cyan on the second line can cause some major trouble if not cleared propperly or before the next sprinkle as the yellow's wont go past them. This can cause the middle being clogged up and an inability to get a red (or orange) to cross over the board. Strike: BBCCYYRRR This strike does cause long lines of a colour to go all the way up the board, however they rely on a crossover between the groups of colour (rows: 1-2 to 3-4 and again rows: 3-4 to the repeated 1-2). If a bruise occurs at this point it becomes much harder to 'kill' your opponents strike, as you only have access to 2 lines of colour to sprinkle back at a time. It should be noted that the sprinkles don't match up with the strike (apart from a slight yellow). This means that a 15-ish combo followed by hard sprinkles is extremely hard to combat. Also, most opponents you face will know what to expect from this pattern and will build to counter it. However if you have an alternate pirate colour, you will probably throw your opponent off their game and come away with an easy-ier win. note: I'm not 100% with these patterns, I'm recalling facing them from memory and I'm pretty sure that there's another strike line or two. ---------------------------------------- Klimp - Officer in PFRC - Sage Klimpen - 48 Pally - Planewalkers - Korgath |
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BootHook
Joined: Sep 16, 2005 Posts: 1953 Status: Offline |
The sprinkles are 4 colors? Is this new? ---------------------------------------- Bug: Fix the multi-row sprinkles in Rumble Rumbling Guide 1 Rumbling Guide 2 Rumble Videos |
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mouschtie
Joined: Aug 26, 2004 Posts: 250 Status: Offline |
Definitely not new. you just need to be playing someone who can drop lots of sprinkles at once. ---------------------------------------- Captain of Champions of Valhalla on Cobalt Comfort the Disturbed Disturb the Comfortable |
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wayout
Joined: Feb 9, 2006 Posts: 12 Status: Offline |
Hes a skellie! -is suspicious- ---------------------------------------- Hugger of all oceans |
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killercarso
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Well let's have a pure sfer and rumbler help this thread out. I use one of three bludgeons Ropes: Probably most often becuase of there diverse style which makes it hard for oppents to clear. Gloves: for time I am gonna spirnkle like mad. Blackjack: I honestly like the blackjack for use with heavy amounts of bruising so i can block them out while I strike and then fill there board. Those are just my styles and perferences. but remeber a few things No bludgeon is a easy bludgeon and every bludgeon including fists can be used and considered top dog depending how you use it. Dont flame me... and my account is Blind fighter if anyone wants to be friend or sf or rumble me. |
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Belthazar451
Joined: Sep 17, 2007 Posts: 3561 Status: Offline |
Help it out to do what? This thread is two years old. |
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BootHook
Joined: Sep 16, 2005 Posts: 1953 Status: Offline |
This thread is still being directly linked from the yppedia's main Rumble page, so it's not surprising that it got bumped. However, it should be noted that in the same thread, I wrote "almost zero people use strikes after the first 20 seconds of the game", which was completely true at the time the bludgeon guide was written. This means that the bludgeon guide is a bit outdated, as we now have a lot of people making strikes after the first 20 seconds of the game. ---------------------------------------- Bug: Fix the multi-row sprinkles in Rumble Rumbling Guide 1 Rumbling Guide 2 Rumble Videos |
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Belthazar451
Joined: Sep 17, 2007 Posts: 3561 Status: Offline |
Fair enough, I stand corrected. |
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Vathmiel
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One thing I'm still trying to ferret out of here. You make suggestions for small strikes and sprinkling. But...what's best suited for large strikes? I'm just not seeing anything specifically recommended for large striking. |
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