Eternal Spear - am I playing it wrong?

[Garrett]

9 clears with Shield of Chaos and Twin Fists. 8 with Stygian Blade. 6 With Heart-Seeking Bow and Adamant Rail. Only 4 clears with my Eternal Spear with aspects maxed out.

I usually pick the weapon with "Dark Thirst" before every run so my average usage with each one is pretty balanced, and I was trying to understand why does the Eternal Spear is giving me such a hard time.

Generally the Spear feels quite underwhelming comparing to the sheer destruction & annihilation of Shield and Fists. It's narrow gap range of stabbing and throwing is not quite easy to hit with, and honestly it's kinda slow to the point I feel physically exhausted after each boss fight.

So is it just me here? Am I picking up the wrong boons? Using the wrong keepsakes?
Come on mates throw Zag a bone here, yeah?

[Polterghost]

Weapons are completely unbalanced. Spear pokes for 60-80dmg on average while, for example, Arthurs sword for 500dmg and in a wide range.

[Fourlamas]

Spears dash attack is much slower than the sword or shield one, the range it provides and the charged aoe attack are both nice aspects but thats about it. I wouldnt say its a bad weapon but it does have different behavior. Ares and his doom can be good, or Poseidon with his rupture + wall slams. I would say its more about bursting enemies down instead of having consistent attack, if that makes sense.

The hammer upgrade can always give you nice buffs like more range or triple stab.

[SaN]

Focus on the special attack with Ares as primary god and Athena as secondary.

Increase the level of doom on your special.

[Nibbie]

Varatha, Aspect of Hades, is my favorite weapon. Beat my heat 32 run with it first try. It certainly isn't the best weapon out there, but it can hold its own just fine. Its hard to know if you are doing anything wrong without knowing what you are doing, but I can give some general advice.

Probably the least obvious thing I can tell you is that you can dash while charging the spin to extend the range (think of what Theseus and Hades do with their spins). That allows you to safely and reliably hit the spin to apply the aspect debuff, or just easily deal with crowds.

For hammers I go with increased spin charge, then increased spin range, followed by whatever I feel like I need. Extra attack range, special damage/crit, or triple dash attack if I can get a high damage attack boon.

For boons/keepsakes I usually start with Aphrodite for attack, the high multiplier works well with the big spins. I would also take Dionysus, Demeter, Athena, and Artemis on attack. For special, Ares works well, Aphrodite if I don't have her on attack, Demeter, or Zeus. The other slots are less weapon specific of course, you can mostly go with whatever you fancy.

[Tarshaid]

Originally posted by Nibbie:

Probably the least obvious thing I can tell you is that you can dash while charging the spin to extend the range (think of what Theseus and Hades do with their spins). That allows you to safely and reliably hit the spin to apply the aspect debuff, or just easily deal with crowds.

For hammers I go with increased spin charge, then increased spin range, followed by whatever I feel like I need. Extra attack range, special damage/crit, or triple dash attack if I can get a high damage attack boon.

Spear with Hades aspect and both increased spin charge and range (which also increases its damage) can be pretty stupid, since the spins cover the entire screen and charge in something like half a second. I'm nowhere near the 32 heat runs, but it allowed me to completely trivialize an entire run (with also Aphrodite's attack for the raw damage as mentioned). I definitely support that build, although there are obviously other workable builds that may be less absurd (I do enjoy achille's aspect).

[Jun Gling]

I agree, spear can feel pretty janky at times. Another reason i dislike the spear, besides the ones already mentioned, is that you need to press special two times for it to return or it eats your next attack input. It is also rather slow and hard to hit enemies with in in the heat of battle

Originally posted by Tarshaid:

Spear with Hades aspect and both increased spin charge and range (which also increases its damage) can be pretty stupid, since the spins cover the entire screen and charge in something like half a second.

I think that there is a lot of weapons that get pretty powerful if you combine two exact daedalus upgrades, however it's ok, imo, because chances of that is pretty slim. Most of my runs with spear i can't even get one of the bonuses that make spin actually usable, that speaks for itself, i belive.

[pi73r]

Wut? I don't see much difference between weps in terms of difficulty. In fact spear got some crazy upgrades on dash strike which can boost it's damage multiple times.

[⭕TheSodaman]

Originally posted by Garrett:

9 clears with Shield of Chaos and Twin Fists. 8 with Stygian Blade. 6 With Heart-Seeking Bow and Adamant Rail. Only 4 clears with my Eternal Spear with aspects maxed out.

I usually pick the weapon with "Dark Thirst" before every run so my average usage with each one is pretty balanced, and I was trying to understand why does the Eternal Spear is giving me such a hard time.

Generally the Spear feels quite underwhelming comparing to the sheer destruction & annihilation of Shield and Fists. It's narrow gap range of stabbing and throwing is not quite easy to hit with, and honestly it's kinda slow to the point I feel physically exhausted after each boss fight.

So is it just me here? Am I picking up the wrong boons? Using the wrong keepsakes?
Come on mates throw Zag a bone here, yeah?

Spear has been a favorite of mine due to comfort, however, there is an entire mechanic of it that I've avoided, e.g. the Spin Attack, depending on the Pact. e.g. if the enemies are faster and the damage taken is up, then spin attack is completely out for me.

And unfortunately, none of the spears support a build I'm fond of, but relies on the Daedalus Hammer.

Depends largely what the Daedlus Hammer offers for me unfortunately. I'll start with the Poseidon trinket to grab Poseidon's Special. If I see a Zeus boon, I go for that and pick up either the Zeus Attack if available. And then the rest depends on the Daedalus Hammer.

If Exploding Launcher is available, then I look for the duo boon for Sea Storm to have knockbacks cause lightning damage, then whatever else Poseidon or Zeus boons that enhance that damage.

If only Triple Thrust or the rapid thrust are available, I'll typically go with Triple first if the pact for increased enemies is active, but Rapid before. Then I'll lean toward a rapid triple thrust build, leaning more on Zeus boons for lightning bounces, jolted, and the like.

And then if you do have the enemies set to higher speeds, I like the idea of the Mirror that slows enemies down when they have a shard in them, which means, no Demeter or Dionysus Cast.

For Exploding Launcher, if I can get the Special that deals +damage versus Armor, then my confidence shoots up.

And for the Triple Thrust & Rapid Thrust, if I get both of them, then also confidence shoots up.

Then generally a Dash from Athena, Aphrodite, or Demeter.Generally something on the defensive side, though I'll settle for Dionysus.

[RAmieL]

Originally posted by Nibbie:

Varatha, Aspect of Hades, is my favorite weapon.

I 100% agree with that. I find this aspect most user friendly. Spear's low attack is balanced with massive swipe range. Hammer upgrades are quite nice as well, increased spin range and pulse damage when charging are super useful. I like to combine it with Ares doom attack boon. You basically sweep the whole screen in seconds.

You can also try Guyan Yu aspect as it's special deals high damage however hp reduction is quite off putting.

[begulinggg]

Optimize cast with Achilles aspect.

[Kaylexandria]

I avoided the spear unlike most people have been avoiding the virus-of-the-year, 361 hours of game time and I only just the past day or so bothered with playing the spear up to 20 heat for the bounties lol.

[Dr.Killenstein]

Hades Aspect = 150% bonus damage debuff
+ Massive Spin (Hammer boon): +125% damage and hits a larger area.
+ Quick Spin: charges and recovers much faster.
+Artemis and Ares boons for damage. Deadly Strike, Clean Kill, Pressure Points, Urge to Kill.

Charge spin, then dash to do a Hades style forward spin. Blow up entire rooms with a spear instead of Exagryph missiles, and faster too.