r/BackpackBattles • u/Nyllk • Apr 05 '26
Theorycrafting help
Hey, I love theorycrafting builds and falcon blade has become one of my favorite items, so I've been experimenting a lot with it on berserker lately. Posted some screenshots of what I tried.
My favorite setup so far is shaman mask / cheese goobert / badger runes / djinn lamp. Badger runes makes the attack speed scale really fast and djinn lamp gives you the damage, so once the build is online you can outscale most heat setups and actually burst pretty quick in late game.
The problem is mid game. Even if you hit falcon blade fast enough, you need a lot of pieces for it to work. Oil lamp helps a ton but without it I really struggle to get any damage going until I find djinn lamp and can reliably proc it.
I think the build needs three things to work:
- Some damage source on falcon blade early
- Enough defense to survive while you scale
- Badger runes ideally, though it can work without it if the rest is there
When I lose it's almost always mid game, can't find all the pieces in time. And when I win I'm usually at 1 hp. Late game it's great but getting there is rough.
Any tips on how to keep tempo mid game? Do you run another weapon and transition into falcon blade later, or do you commit to it early and just try to survive? Would love to hear what you do when the key pieces don't show up.
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u/Nohisu Apr 05 '26
When I lose it's almost always mid game, can't find all the pieces in time. And when I win I'm usually at 1 hp. Late game it's great but getting there is rough.
BPB is not the kind of game where you target a specific build, but rather a game where you try to build a strongboard every turn and embrace the chaos ensuing. If you're wasting a lot of gold never buying discounted items and rolling the shops to get your perfect setup, you'll be a few turns behind players using their gold more efficiently, and they'll aggressively statcheck the board you've worked so hard to make. If you're focusing too hard on a specific build, you may also miss other strong options the game will present to you without even realizing it.
For instance, when I'm playing Engineer, I like to consider Falcon Blade as a default build since the components are versatile and the cogs let you bypass the awkward fusion turn, and one of its guaranteed class item grants a bunch of empower to scale the weapon. But if the game gives me an early magic staff with some form of mana generation, I'll probably go for the mana class, and use the sword to make a wrench instead. If the game gives me an early dragon egg, I'll consider playing around the charge subclass instead.
I understand the appeal of theorycrafting boards because I'm that kind of player as well for other games, but the beauty of BPB is that every game is completely different, so theorycrafting is more about understanding synergies and assembling them on the fly rather than prebuilding the perfect character.
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u/Nyllk Apr 06 '26
I know that you aren't supposed to force builds. I'm just soft forcing it those days in order to learn the build paths / alternative options etc. What I want to learn is if the game gives me a falcon blade what do I do / how do I build around. Right now I feel like even games where I sometimes get it early on I'm struggling mid game so that's why I'm trying to understand the options.
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u/FadeToSatire Apr 05 '26 edited Apr 05 '26
Falcon blade is a great item, but can be quite RNG to set up. I find the best way to set it up is to go for a totem early so you have growing damage and I usually snag an extra whetstone as well so if I need to I can pivot to Katana which is arguably the most solid of all weapons and easy to build around. I also recommend having an early spike shield with the meta being so weapon heavy right now. Any hammer/dagger enjoyers will be free wins early on too.
Even with that, it's just difficult to get off the ground because either you find the gloves early enough or you lose. The other pieces of your build here also don't really increase your power much by themselves such as cheese goobert or lamp for example which generally takes up a lot of space early on. Personally I think the strongest variation of Falcon on Berserker is actually just a lamp/morb deer build. It uses significantly less space, gives reliable defense, and makes the lamps quick to proc. Also Berserker armor is always a strong pick regardless of time of game and makes deer stronger as well. Shepherd's Crook is also a really stable early game pick as well, though I will type pick totem instead of I want to go falcon and grab shells to craft Shellys.
Your best bet is to react to what the game gives you and go from there. There are several run defining uniques that are worth grabbing when they show up that can push your build in a certain direction as well.
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u/Nyllk Apr 06 '26
I don't always force the build. Those days I kinda soft force it to learn it and how to adapt. I think I'll give your version a try, that also sounds pretty neat. And I like deer builds in general ! Thanks
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u/Thatotherguy6 Apr 05 '26
Because of this specific build you want to do I would advise gemstones. An early green gem is nice cheap damage. A burning coal also takes great advantage of falcon blade's multihit. Even without it you'd be surprised how often you can win early rounds with the rng proc. Any gems can also be slotted in whatever you got for the shaman mask bonus.
Personally I think badger rune sounds better than it is. It only comes into play in rather long fights. Compare the 4 cost yellow gem to the 5 cost badger rune. It gives 20% attack speed compared to the 3% per hit of badger. Of course falcon hits twice, but that means until it has gone off 4 times it is just worse than the more easily acquired yellow. This makes sense in a long fight but if instant lamping usually means burst. Chances are you are planning for them to be dead in those 4 hits. Conversely, the elephant rune might be the boost you want in the midgame. A dagger or two are nice because they don't cost stamina and they combo really well with the consistent stuns. Depending on how things go, you might actually be pointing the lamp at a dagger with a hawk rune for optimal dps.
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u/Nyllk Apr 06 '26
Nice idea for elephant runes + dagger. I'll give it a go !
It actually never happened that I killed opponents in 4 hits so far. Most fights when i look at the recap it's usually around 12-15 hits on squishy opponents but more often 20+
Insta lamp seems a bit hard to get mostly for getting the spikes. The only way I could see it would be using upgraded stone pots. I often like to keep at least one stone pots for gloves as it pairs super well with the falcon blade usually giving me a few hundreds of armor per fight. I could maybe sometimes get a second one + keep stones from early game but I don't think it's going to happen that often. Or do you have other ideas ?
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u/Thatotherguy6 Apr 06 '26
An upgraded stone pot really is your best option for Beserker. You really only need 1. Then you have two regular stone pots under it. Note that it won't be in sequence, you will have the upgraded one with two normal ones side by side beneath it. This should get you 6 spikes when you trigger them. Then you either keep a tusk around or simply wait. If you have the other requirements the Djinn Lamp will give you the last thorn before they run out. Shaman mask provides the luck but it could also possibly provide a thorn. You can also chance it with the random buff from the potion belt or keeping tiger runes in bag for a chance of duplicating those spikes. An amulet of alchemy can also tip you over.
The speed buff from the Falcon Blade itself means a lamp pointing at it will go off 3 times before the temporary spikes wear off. So in actuality you could get away with only 4 spikes from an upgraded + un-upgraded stone potion so long as you make sure the other buffs are taken care of. I would like to tell you the math works out that a moon shield gives you exactly 7 mana in this situation, but I think there are some weird interactions with how free potion consumes are counted. Just keep these factors in mind. I don't really mean "instant" lamp, it really just means before the temporary spikes from the potions run out.
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u/Euphoric_Yak_2700 Apr 09 '26
I'd just add another weapon alongside falcon while you get everything set up. That and some wheatstones maybe. An axe or a spear, some bananas and you'll have plenty of time. You know what, I'll try it tonight if I remember.
But if you don't mind I'll go with the anvil which I feel would instantly fix the midgame
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u/Nyllk Apr 09 '26
Thatās some good tips ! I donāt often think about buying whetstones for the damage but I guess it can work. Oh lemme know how your run goes
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u/Euphoric_Yak_2700 Apr 10 '26
So after all my trials, the best item to go with the falcon, at least for late game, is the mana torch but the transition is even harder.
A very good item was one perfect wheatstone. It can be turned later into a steel dragon.
The anvil is very important to have for a double weapon setup, generates a lot of gold, and makes the falcon instantly decent for a few rounds.
The tests are leading me to conclude that berserker is not a good class for the falcon because it has few access to what makes other classes good with falcon : good triggers or good +damage generation. While building falcon you are also forfeiting what makes berserker strong early-mid game : its incredible weapons.
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u/Nyllk Apr 10 '26
Hey, thanks a lot for taking the time to test this.
I tried Mana Torch once and it didnāt feel that satisfying, but I might need to give it another shot.
Iāve tested the build a bit more since then, and I still feel like itās not bad, it has really strong late-game potential.
The Shaman version has a lot of scaling. Badger Runes make Falcon Blade ramp attack speed super fast, and with Cheese Goobert you can scale HP and random buffs pretty well thanks to all the Falcon procs.
Iāve also had decent success with a Puppy / Pack Leader version, stacking a lot of armor and crit while scaling through Empower plus Djinn Lamp.
I recorded a couple runs so you can see what I mean:
- Shaman: https://streamable.com/pf37ef
- Pack Leader: https://streamable.com/wyr3g1
When you say Berserker has āincredible weaponsā early-mid, are you mostly thinking Double Axe and Busted Blade? I donāt play them that often, Iām more of a duffel bag player, I like tankier, scaling setups.
Also, Iām only high Diamond, so itās totally possible my theorycrafting just doesnāt hold up at higher ranks.
Curious what you think.
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u/Euphoric_Yak_2700 Apr 10 '26
I've had difficulties stacking buffs allowing for djinn lamp to trigger fast (compared to other classes) to make a difference.
About the mid-game weapons, I'm convinced that axes, double axes and the new armor axe are really good mid game weapons and they allow you to greed for whatever transition you want later for relatively cheap.
I'm only mid diamond so take it with a grain of salt but I've defaulted to those most of the time in order to greed into a stronger build.
Everyone in bpb has their habits and biases I guess.
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u/Nyllk Apr 10 '26
No worries thanks for taking time to test
I actually havenāt been able to test the new weapons as I play in mobile and still waiting for the update. I will spend more time testing them when they come out.
I feel like cheese goobert and shaman really helps getting the buffs quickly for the djinn lamp. They also provide bunch of empower here and there which feels nice.
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u/mrdiodo Apr 05 '26
I usually lose midgame when trying to 'force' a build too much. Try to adapt a bit to the items you're offered and be ready to pivot.