Weapons

Every hit a weapon lands uses up one point of its durability, and when it has none left it breaks. Your fists never wear out. Bows are different: Bow, Poison Bow, Explosive Bow and Crossbow spend a point on every arrow you shoot, hit or miss. Some weapons never break at all: their durability reads Unbreakable.

Besides its damage, a weapon’s hit can stun, trip, knock back, weaken or set fire to whoever it lands on; the Hit effects column says which, and for how long. A weakened enemy deals 25% less damage.

Heavy weapons slow you down while you hold them: the Move speed column gives your speed with each one, and the Powerlifter skill takes the slowdown away.

Press Throw to throw what you’re holding. A Power Throw, which some skills give you for a while, flies with 1.8 times the force of a fully charged throw and winds up in half the time.

Arena objects, from barrels and urns to rocks and scrolls, turn up around the arena or fall out of the obstacles you smash, and an angry crowd throws rocks and scrolls at you. All of them but the Javelin break after a single hit. An Explosive Barrel goes off when it’s damaged, and a Barrel or a Chariot Wheel can catch fire.

A swing doesn’t stop at the first opponent it hits: it goes on and strikes the others in its path too. It stops early only if it’s a single-target attack, like a charged sword stab, or if the opponent it hit was blocking.

Kill 2 opponents with one attack for Two For One. Throw a Chariot Wheel so that it hits 3 different opponents for Drive By. Some thrown things burst where they land and hurt everything around them.

A projectile can stick in whoever it hits: in their front, in their back or in their shield. Each of those places holds six, and the next one that sticks there pushes the oldest out. When whoever they are stuck in dies, the weapons fall out as pickups or shatter. Dodging can shatter the weapons stuck in you.

Heavy Punches dislodges the projectiles stuck in the enemies you punch, and Drive It Home makes every weapon stuck in an enemy you punch do its melee damage twice. Have 10 projectiles stuck in you at the same time for Pincushion.

Something that’s on fire takes damage every three quarters of a second until the fire runs out. Dodging puts the fire out.

A burning weapon sets whoever it hits on fire, for as long as the Hit effects column says. The Flaming Obsidian Sword burns them for 4 seconds. A Barrel or a Chariot Wheel can burn too: hit something that’s on fire with one and it catches, and from then on it sets whoever it hits on fire for 2 seconds. With the Oil Flask from the Merchant, an enemy you throw lights on fire for 5 seconds. The arena’s flamethrowers set whoever touches their flames on fire. The On Fire affliction can set you on fire when the crowd goes wild.

Spend at least 10% of a round on fire for Fired Up. Get a wrestler to set itself on fire while it leaps at you for Fire Pro.

Most weapons can turn up from your first run, but Bow and Axe unlock the first time you pick one up: until then they don’t turn up in your runs, so take one from an enemy who carries it. Get a kill with every kind of weapon for Weapon Master.