How do you use this cloak?

[EmeraldFoxDeity]

I didn't play with the last update since they removed the time slowing with Omega moves so I'm a little late to this weapon. It really feels like it doesn't do anything special aside from put me constantly in dangerous positions to soak unreasonable amounts of damage in short time. And it has awfully high magick costs for unimpressive omega attack and omega special.

[Fire walk with me]

Most likely just a lack of experience and time with the game. For many players it is one of if not the best weapon in game.

Look up some strats and advice for it. It is worth the experimentation.

[wwwJam]

You mean the Black Coat? The punchy stuff?
Its Omega Attack is just awful, especially since it's suffering a bug right now where you have to be point blank for it to hit unless you dash. Before the patch, it had some good range, but even then was otherwise not worth channeling. The shield it has isn't really worth it either since you have to punch to bring it out in the first place, so it's no good for reactive defenses.

Its Omega Special is... situational. If you happen to have a strong special build going, it can wreck some serious face. Poseidon's flourish in particular goes well with it, as well as Static Shock and Support Fire, if you can get them.

But the Black Coat shines more as a non-Omega, attack spam weapon, especially with the base Melinoe aspect. Run with The Huntress Arcana, don't run with anything that gives you magick regeneration, and at the start of every room just use a bit of magick and bam, you're off to the races. Aphrodite's Flutter Strike is the typical go-to boon for obvious reasons, but Ares' Vicious Strike presents an interesting alternative now, especially with how his various support boons work with his Wound curse.
You will absolutely be in harm's way more often, that's unavoidable for such a close range weapon, but not relying on any Omega moves will allow you to weave in and out more easily, and your damage doesn't really suffer for it.

[★Miko]

Try Mel's cloak with static shock. If you wanna use magick, equip its other aspects.

[Myntkaramell]

Originally posted by EmeraldFoxDeity:

I didn't play with the last update since they removed the time slowing with Omega moves so I'm a little late to this weapon. It really feels like it doesn't do anything special aside from put me constantly in dangerous positions to soak unreasonable amounts of damage in short time. And it has awfully high magick costs for unimpressive omega attack and omega special.

Ignore the Omegas and do a Dash attack spam build. Poseidon Attack (Epic-Heroic rarity preferred) with Zeus on Special + Static Shock with Heph on Cast or Gain + his defensive boons are a god tier core on it. The reason you want Heph on Cast or Gain is so you have the prerequisites for the Zeus-Hephaestus Duo, which will strengthen your Static Shock considerably to the point that it does more damage than Wave Strike does. For the most part, it's a darting in and darting out playstyle by dash attacking, and it's instant so it's fairly safe.

[Fire walk with me]

Zeus attack and static shock is my go to core. Air quality is a huge boost as well. Heph for utility (armor, invuln). Aphrodite for secret crush and wispy wiles. 4th I tend to pick Demeter, Hestia, or maybe Hera. Anything to help proc origination easily on special. Demeter just got nerfs though because she no longer affects guardians with some skills. On top of that plentiful forage has been nerfed into the dirt.

[Myntkaramell]

Originally posted by Fire walk with me:

ZeusOn top of that plentiful forage has been nerfed into the dirt.

Plentiful Forage works through Scars 3 rn lol

[Songbird]

Attack spam is a simple build. Dash attack spam with the hammer that makes it hit four times is another fairly strong build. You can also use the missiles for curse application, weaving them in as you move between enemies since you can fire while moving, or even as your primary damage. (See this video from last patch where Mynt clears 55 fear with special spam.) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5X5YXVSzKo

Really, it's very versatile with its moveset, and not especially complicated. Except that omega attack is bad. Don't use it.

As for aspects: Mel is very very good and the default. It just straight-up does better DPS and is safer all-around. There's not much to say about it, but it's one of the best aspects in the game despite its simplicity.

Selene really wants you to start with Moon Beam and get the Prism upgrade in room 1. If you get a path that doesn't have Prism on it, your room clear is just going to be terrible and there's nothing you can do about it (I will not even play these runs out on high fear). Ideally you want a good path of stars, that is, one of the two with two sublime notes and three bright nodes. You'll be able to take either Scorn or Ferocity alongside Prism; Scorn is very strong, but Ferocity lets you take your roomclear to 11 with Hera attack (seriously, you'll just kill an entire wave at max fear with the hex alone) or add a lot of DPS with a high percent or Zeus boon. The next things you want to find are a way to spend a lot of magic quickly, and a way to regen magic well. Put it all together, and it is basically an autopilot mode where you just hit the hex button to kill everything automatically, then just get to spending magic again. You can lean into the bonus omega move damage and build into a good omega special (or omega attack if you really want), but really, the hex damage itself is the much more powerful part of the aspect than a 50% additive boost to mediocre moves.

Nyx has a pointless and bad gimmick. You slam an enemy after sprinting for a while, which does interrupt it, but isn't good DPS and costs a ton of magic. Then you get a little AoE extending from your attacks, but only at half damage, and you can't hit the same enemy twice, so it's extremely pointless. It's basically a nearly blank aspect that is usually played with the same builds as Mel aspect, but performs much worse.

[Marthzie]

Cloak is not meant to deal heavy amounts of dps like the other weapons. You can try to make it deal high dps with Zeus/Poseidon/Hammer upgrades/Hestia will make it turn into a pretty consistent weapon. You're meant to block with the Attack OMEGA and keep enemies at bay with the Special one. Naturally you're easily avoiding most damage and stunlocking enemies with the other two alt powers.

When all is lost literally just start blocking and the game becomes easy mode for the most part.

[Helen Damnation]

The main benefit to the cloak is the speed, it's really good at getting you out of the way of attacks. Like Marthzie says, the special is very good at holding enemies back and away from you, and the omega attack block is... well, I really really wish I could hold onto it for as long as I want to block, like the shield, instead of it firing automatically when it's ready, but with some practice at timing - and learning what it will and will not block it's - still decent.

Overall, it's definitely a weapon that takes skill and practice to use, but the zippiness of it at least makes it enjoyable for me.

[Helen Damnation]

Also, plentiful forage is better now, idk what you're talking about. Yes, it only heals instead of giving bonus life, but that's such a lifesaver sometimes, and now it works on all resource types instead of just seeds.

[Fire walk with me]

Originally posted by Helen Damnation:

Also, plentiful forage is better now, idk what you're talking about. Yes, it only heals instead of giving bonus life, but that's such a lifesaver sometimes, and now it works on all resource types instead of just seeds.

That's fine that we disagree, but I still firmly believe this is a downgrade. Increasing the max ceiling on life works in any situation. Finding a resource at max health is a loss of efficiency of the boon.