I’m doing some pre-planning for an idea for a grapple school, and I wanted to collect grappling tips and tricks from the community!
I’ll list the tips and tricks I know of, but please let me know of anything I’m missing. @DJDancecraft, you are supposed to be the best grappler, so I’d especially love to get any tips you have!
Oh, and I don’t know what the controls are on PlayStation, so please help with that as well.
Controls
Reel in to go up (R)
Reel out to go down (F)
Use WASD or left stick to lean or swing while grappled
Basic Maneuvers
When grappling onto a wall or cliff, grapple the side of the top block and reel all the way in. When you get to the top, hold forward and press jump to jump up onto the ledge
When travelling along a canyon, or between trees, you can hold left or right lean to stay away from the wall longer, letting you swing farther without hitting the wall
If you realize you have missed your shot, press the fire button again to immediately recall your grapple.
You are immune to fall damage when your grapple is attached to a block, if you are falling from a height that may cause fall damage, you can grapple the ground to avoid all fall damage
If you grapple into a monster body with your lootstick out, you are still going to take damage.
Intermediate Maneuvers
When grappling up a cliff, hold back to lean out away from the wall. This will help you avoid getting stuck on overhangs
While it is tempting to grapple a tree near the edge of a cliff, if the tree is too far back from the edge, it will change the angle of your reel-in, making it much more likely to get stuck on an overhang - it is usually best to only grapple something at the very edge of the cliff
Holding a lean into the direction you are swinging, reeling in, and falling down all increase the speed of your swing.
Advanced Maneuvers
The best place to release your grapple during a fast swing is just as you start to come up from your lowest point - this will fling you up and forward, giving you time to find another swing point or time to target the ground for a safe landing (or to smack your face into a tree at maximum velocity).
If there is a tall tree a bit back from a cliff you are trying to get past, you can use it as long as your reel-in and swing will keep you above the cliff face.
I’ve been trained and taught by @DJDancecraft so here are some top-secret maneuvers that he has explicitly asked me not to share with anyone
Upwards swing: this is used for getting out of large holes or climbing mountains. Grapple the exit of the hole or partway up the mountain. Reel out and try to get directly below your grapple (doesn’t have to be perfect) by about 15-45 blocks (depending on how far down you are) hold backward and reel most of The way in. Once you get pretty close, let go of your grapple, jump, and go forward. If done correctly, the upward momentum from your reel should boost your jump to help you get high enough and going backwards will help to make sure you don’t run straight into your grapple. If not, grapple a better point on your way back down, rinse and repeat
Sideways swinging: sideways swinging is used for going around mountains. Grapple the mountain you want to go around. Instead of swinging into it, look the direction you want to go and hold forward while performing your swing. Like a normal swing, only go for about a second. Once you perform your first swing grapple another part and keep going around the mountain until you have gotten onto the side of the mountain you want to be on
Forward swinging: grapple a point above and in front of you (ex: tree branches, floating island, player built platform) it should be a good distance above you, atleast 10 blocks above and in 10 front of you (just a rough estimate, doesn’t have to be exact. Farther you can go up and forward the better) hold reel for a small amount of time (on average, less than a second, but it depends on your swing) you don’t want to go up towards your grapple, you just want to gain a small amount of momentum to have a better swing. You can do this multiple times in a row without hitting the ground if you are in a good area (below floating islands or in a forest with giant trees)
Grapple jumps: grapple the ground in front of you and high jump and let go at the same time (do not reel all the way in, only go for about a second). Your reel speed will help with forward momentum and jumping will make it last longer (you will still need to hold forward, standing still after a grapple jump kills the momentum). Try to perform the grapple jump on a slope, because jumping while moving up a slope gives extra height. Also, if you don’t have full fall armor and your energy is too low to stick the landing, land on a slope because it will convert part of your downward momentum into forward momentum, thus lowering the impact. You can also use the grapple jump to get across gaps by using double jump to expand your jump, which will in turn give you more of that forward momentum from your grapple reel.
A lot of these look focused on the double-jump skill. I suppose I should get a sheet set up with that and have an Expert Maneuvers section for those skills, maybe also with consumables. @DJDancecraft, do you dual grapple, or do you keep map and/or lootstick out?
I use dual grapple, non hookshot. Whitelets grapples are the best
My biggest tip is time. Not just time as in practice, but reducing time between grapples.
Practice sight-reading the terrain around you. Practice accurately timing your air-time
Practice your general accuracy
Put these all together, and you can minimize the amount of time it takes you between shots. Knowing tricks is great, but it won’t do you much if it takes you a bunch of time to set things up.
Also, a sheet is definitely recommended. Double jump is really helpful and definitely under-rated
You can watch this and see how I do it too
And if anyone is curious, I don’t have different keybinds (I play on PC)
Another big tip: during a grapple trick, move around. Reposition your view and move forward during grapple jumps, swings, etc otherwise momentum gets killed a lot faster
Grappling isn’t just about tricks, it’s got a science to it
Number 1 tip for new players: you can fire your grapple at the ground when falling to automagically avoid death. I had been playing for months before I learned that!
This is not a advance grapple technique per se, but more of an exploit on the inner workings of them to extend their life. It is also good to note that in order to use this method in earnest some sort of macro is more or less required (like the ones available on gaming peripherals)
The crux of the technique centers around the fact that one point of durability is used both on firing the grapple as well as releasing the grapple (I forget who pointed this out to me) however NO durability is used when releasing the grapple via switching the item equipped on that hand.
So in other words: you can effectively double the life of your grapples by always/mostly releasing the grapple by switching items rather than actioning the grapple as normal.
As you might imagine, trying to do this manually is quite cumbersome which is where the macro comes in. The macro simply switches to a different action slot (i have mine to switch to my loot magnet) waits a short amount of time and then switches back to the grapple so that it is ready for the next use. So in other words I click the mouse as normal to fire the grapple and then use the macro to release it (which is also on my mouse)
While this is great for extending the life of your quality forged grapples, some major downsides to using this method:
it adds complexity to basic grapple operation by adding another button to the mix
if the macro tries to switch items too fast the game might not register the release at all or worse the game might appear to release the grapple but then rubber band and reconnect it shattering your rhythm. The time needed to wait to ensure a proper release can also vary with the quality of your Internet connection.
while the macro can be used as a hotkey for equipping the grapple in general… It makes for a poor option for switching to it during an unplanned fall since it wastes time switching back and forth. A third key bind (or a much smarter macro) is recommended for initial equipping.
Some people view macros of any kind either as cheating or botting… Me, I like to tinker and enjoy coming up with quality-of-life solutions for a game that largely cannot be modded =P
Aside from the double jump stuff Whitelet mentioned, I think most of your definable techniques are in my tips section. You’re just doing them much better and faster than I’ve ever managed to, myself. I also don’t have a good travel sheet. I’ll definitely make sure I have much better travel skills once this skill sheet update eventually comes.
I’ll make sure to add some of these double jump tips somewhere in my grapple school, but I’m not sure I’m skilled enough to incorporate them into actual practice areas like the rest of the stuff I plan to do. Maybe after 249.
This is some serious Mario 64 half press wizardry right here. I like it. I don’t think I would ever use it, but it’s worth mentioning!
Thanks for the contributions, everyone. It helps a lot!
As I have mentioned, it’s not always about what tricks you use, it’s about how well you preform them and how much time it takes to line yourself up for the next.
