Uses of the Boom Barrel Dispenser?
One of the traps I find difficult to use is the boom barrel dispenser. I've seen a few videos that use it, and maybe I'm missing something, but it seems that even in those videos they often don't do much, if you're watching carefully. For example, when I was watching Nananea and Fryedegg do Not Rocket Science, it's apparent that most of the boom barrels in their killbox blew up well before any enemies reached them. They're both better players than I will ever be, but I think they could have done better even with the limited trap selection using the wall space and money for something else.
Here are what seem to be the problems, though I may be mistaken:
* The straight damage output of the dispenser over time is pretty poor. There is a long time between barrels.
* Barrels tend to explode if they fall from any height. Dispensers looked interesting at first to me because they could stack above other wall traps, but I had trouble making that work. It may be that there are rules to this I don't understand.
* Barrels tend to detonate prematurely in most killboxes. Lots of things set them off early. Barrels that land on floor scorchers, for example, tend to get flipped away and then explode before enemies reach them.
* It's pretty damned rare that it's useful to deal with them by hand. Usually you're pretty pressed for time. Throwing a big batch with the wind belt might work.
On the other hand, a dispenser could in theory give you a big alpha strike, in cases where doing a lot of damage all at once is more important than steady damage output. A late dispenser can easily accumulate 4+ barrels, which can be handy if you have a couple of Earth Lords late in the wave.
Has anyone done any real Science on the subject?
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Personally, I wish the Boom Barrel Dispenser had the Unique that makes them inherit Boom Barrel upgrades be a special upgrade instead. While the unique is replaced with one that shortens the time between barrel dispenses. As otherwise the proximity barrels unique is underused due to a lack of damage.
Personally, I wish the Boom Barrel Dispenser had the Unique that makes them inherit Boom Barrel upgrades be a special upgrade instead. While the unique is replaced with one that shortens the time between barrel dispenses. As otherwise the proximity barrels unique is underused due to a lack of damage.
I personally never found the "dispensers dispenses upgraded barrels" to be worth the automatic explosion, considering it gives you the unique ability to minefield the map.
Besides, we don't actually know how much damage upgraded barrels do.
This text is machine translation.
By the text, since you cannot explain, please see an animation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oDxncnxGJ3M
All the traps have faced up to many enemies.
Also by the trap which is not here, Push Trap, Void Wall, Coinforge, Decoy, etc. are favorite traps.
I consider Boom Barrel Dispenser as it is better to reload early to a slight degree.
If I take a dispenser, it's always for complementary damage on top of a working, sustainable kill box. They are far too inconsistent to be anything other than that in a killbox.
You can use them outside of the killbox though for great applications like the proximity minefield and for Wind Belt tossing.
I think they're nice but quite situational, and only really useful on endless modes. Seems that on anything other than endless there are much more cost efficient things you can get, and better things to take up your wall space and a trap slot.
Like you said, they have great synergy withh brimstone and demolish pesky earth lords and mountain trolls easily (until the reallly high waves where you basically can only use physics traps to kill stuff)
Another nice thing about them is, when you're not fighting or otherwise busy, you can stash extra boom barrels around the place, which is useful if a group of mountan trolls breaks through your traps (which with those bloody goblin sappers) isn't that rare :(. Also, there's few things that feel better than giving a massive cluster of barrels a good smack with the dwarven hammer (yes i use the hammer - shoot me) and watching the enemies fall to pieces.
I'm quite a big fan of the Boom Barrel Dispenser (BBD) and can only reiterate some of the points that have already been mentioned.
- I only find their use is worth anything in Endless.
- Their ability to smash elementals into nothing WHEN they hit.
- Can be a last defence (if left to be churned out near the Rift), but really really is just a last defence
- The explosion (either directly under the BBD placement, or a barrel you have near a safe spot to continiously churn out barrels so you can place around the map) slows down enemy movement (even if it is just a split second)
I think when you can find a map that has the space for it , it can be worth using even with its high cost. Especially if you can find a good way to make money even during the later stages. My honest opinion about it would be that its unreliable on its own. you really need like 4 of 5 to be raining down on your enemies. Some maps tend to have lots of space (tall corridors and so on) and i see that as wasted potential, and will try to include a BBD in there(, maps like King of the Hill, Caldera, Tower and Crossfire). I cant really put it better than what Rider_Of_Brohan has said when it comes to having them stashed near the rift (Point 3 of my list). It really just is a great way to have some sort of defence especially when you might not expect your kill box to be that successful and you didnt have much money left for defences.
WARNING: Boring story coming up.
One memorable night for me was when me and a friend did Caldera on Endless. I had come with a plan that would be AMAZING (if it worked) *. What i hadnt intended was the map to be covered with BBD's and my sceptical friend then fell in love with BBD's. We covered all the walls with them and it pretty much lagged out the game into disconnection as 15 barrels dropped at a time. Also a funny moment we had was in the early stages when we only had one or two up, and they served no purpose as they spawned, and exploded when there was nothing under it. We cheered (as only geeks do) when it finally hit an Earth lord and shattering it, and exclaiming "It was all worth it for that!".
-Asian Bear
* The plan was to barricade the North West stairs, the South West stairs and a thin strip just north of the East door. Then barricade "around" the Rift, leaving one way open near the South West. So, if you can picture it, any orcs coming from the North would have to run to the East corridor, then OVER the northern bridge, to the West, then OVER the southern bridge back into the East corridor, down the South East stairs and make their way to the South West gap that was left. The only worry i had was sappers from the East (which did happen and we left it be). Our money income was extremely high so it gave us the chance to A) have a lot... and i mean.. ALOT of BBD's around the map. The explosions in the East corridor was just.. awesome. B) Auto Ballistas lined up under the bridges facing North or South.
Positioned Boulder Chutes with possible coin drops around the map. The person who needed cash would sit there and farm money until they got what they needed. We were after the high wave number than the score, as you can tell :) Still, good fun.
I personally never found the "dispensers dispenses upgraded barrels" to be worth the automatic explosion, considering it gives you the unique ability to minefield the map.
Besides, we don't actually know how much damage upgraded barrels do.
Upgraded barrels are immensely powerful, and also by dispensing upgraded barrles with the increased blast radius it makes mine fields even more effective since it can allow you to destroy an entire map worth of orcs when the first one gets to the killbox thanks to the chain reaction from your traps setting off the boom barrels. Unlike with proximity where it will tend to detonate on single targets and only do enough damage to threaten/kill light/medium orcs and elementals in the early waves.
Steam Traps, dispensers with upgraded boom barrels with explosion radius works wonders for a mine field that can hit a lot of orcs.
Interesting, personally I wouldn't use a slot for steam traps even for upgraded barrels, or for anything for that matters. but I can picture it being very useful, though it might be mixed results depending on the room you place them in.
Boom barrel dispensers (BBD) are FUN! What I love most in the entire game is running around with the wind belt and reset trinket, making boom (doom) barrels rain down upon the filthy heads of my doomed enemies. Oh, the satisfaction when I blow a boom barrel such that it hits an enemy right in the kisser.
But not only are they fun, they are also immensely powerful --- that is if you max out the explosion damage and explosion radius of regular boom barrels, and make the BBD's inherit all the regular boom barrel upgrades. The BBD upgrade which instead gives you auto-exploding boom barrels is really weak in comparison. Plus, by not having auto-exploding boom barrels, you maintain much more control of your own defense. Auto-exploding boom barrels may detonate on weak enemies, such as kobolds and damaged orcs, which will be a big waste. The trade-off is, of course, that you have to take care of the detonation yourself, but that is not much of a problem. Just shoot the barrel, and it explodes. And if there are some BBD's you can't or won't babysit, just place a floor scorcher or spike trap on the floor beneath those BBD's. Floor scorchers and spike traps are excellent detonators.
Another great thing about the BBD is that it can be very effective no matter how high up on a wall it is placed. If it is placed too high, the boom barrel will explode when falling down on the ground, but it still does immense damage. I've had great success (and fun!) placing BBD's above void walls (with the skeleton upgrade) in the few places where this is possible. If the enemies aren't thrown into the void walls, they instead stop and fight the skeletons, and when they do: bang bang, eiterorm's boom barrels come down upon their heads.
As mentioned, the BBD's go really well together with the wind belt and the reset trinket. With the wind belt you can pick up boom barrels from a distance and throw them at enemies. And if you place several BBD's above each other on a wall (preferably in several rows), you can use the reset trinket to let hell loose on the enemies below. This is particularly useful for the tougher enemies, especially on endless.
The BBD's can indeed be very useful on both war mage and nightmare, but endless is where they really shine: They're really great for generating kill streaks, which give you additional coin, and they do immense damage. It does, of course, depend on the map, though. Evidently, if you don't have much space for wall traps and/or the path of the enemies is a good distance from the walls, they won't do much.
In short: Boom barrel dispensers are great. And fun. Great fun.
Are you sure about that? I thought I had seen brimstone detonate a few barrels (although it might have been an archer).
Using a second trap as an auto detonator placed after the killbox proved to be very effective.
Are you sure about that? I thought I had seen brimstone detonate a few barrels (although it might have been an archer).
Using a second trap as an auto detonator placed after the killbox proved to be very effective.
I'm 110% sure that brimstones do not trigger the barrels, keep in mind barrels will blow if too many bump into each other when they are spawned by the dispenser, also, traps such as grinders nearby will detonate the barrels.
Archers do indeed blow up barrels if it happens to be in the line of sight between an orc and said archer(s).
Ah the grinders.
Yes that brimstone patch was sitting between two grinders and it was a pile of barrels at the bottom of the stairs (i set the dispensers such that the barrels roll to bottom).
The elemental lord pushed the barrel unto the patch of brimstone AND the 2 grinders on the side and then the brimstone triggered and the barrel exploded because of the grinders, not the brimstone.
I've made a point to use the boom barrel dispensers in different scenarios to see their use for myself - personally, I find them best suited for killboxes where traps are next to each others, but don't overlap except with floor traps that won't trigger the barrels (for example, if you have a grinder placed on the wall, then a zapper, then a barrel dispenser with brimstones underneath each, this is an excellent natural filter, the grinder kills weak mobs, stronger mobs like ogres or many orcs will furthermore filtered or weakened by zapper, and then the barrels will do a burst explosion, especially powerful against elementals and mountain trolls, as they're weak to explosions).
Brimstones are a prime floor trap example that goes well with the dispenser - doesn't damage the barrels, even when burning enemies ontop of it, filters kobolds to prevent wasted barrel destruction.
The zapper is another excellent example, as it flawlessly aims at the enemy that passes without destroying the barrel, if it explodes, someone was near the barrel (if you use the proximity upgrade).
The good thing about barrel dispenser is - it's the only explosive trap, as far as I'm aware, there are no explosive resistant mobs, but there are mobs WEAK to it, which means it never underperforms.
Another excellent and unique trait of the dispenser is - you can pick up barrel and scatter them around, this allow you to turn some places into minefields, and is very cost efficient, considering the price of a single boom barrel to a barrel dispenser, as the dispenser WILL drop more than 6 in its "lifespan".
Obviously, the dispenser shines the most in the Fire & Water DLC, as all types of elementals are (from what I've seen, can't tell exactly since we don't really have any numbers to consult) very susceptible to explosives.
**I know for a fact the barrel dispenser can be placed 1 trap high and won't explode on the first barrel, might explode on second, and always on 3rd on impact if above flat surface, any higher and the barrel will either explode on impact of the second spawned one will always detonate the other.
(You know, ground->walltrap->dispenser going up)
Well, why not have more numbers in OMD2?
No really, why not?