I’m late to the party on this game, been playing less than a month and only level 9 jack.
From what I’ve observed, the forge costs 10,000 and whenever I put something in it it seems like it gives practically nothing.
I’m using the +130% card but it still seems like it would take the entire horde frenzy game just to make up for the investment of building the thing. Is the fact that I’m playing frenzy instead of normal horde the reason it seems this way to me?
I feel a lot more helpful when I’m spending my time repairing the taps, refilling the sentry guns, checking around with LB frequently to see if anyone is hurt and going to help them fight, collecting power the same way everyome else does, paying attention to see if anyone is using weapons that empty quickly like dropshots and boomshots so I can bring those weapons to the base when I find them, that stuff.
People in the other threads say Jack is boring and it sounds like they’re spending too much time smelting. I think playing Jack is a blast personally. I figure I must be missing some information about why people smelt so much
Don’t bother with a Forge on Frenzy, unless it is upgraded straight to level 4 right at the beginning it’s not worth the power investment and even if it is at max right away I’m not sure if it’s worth using at all in that mode due to its short length and increased power from taps.
People play Frenzy because they want a faster game. The Forge slows it down, making players wait for Jack to smelt them all or gathering weapons while leaving one alive. That’s more common in 1-50 games where they have plenty of time, 1-2+ hours.
Baking weapons in horde is a long game. In a 50 wave horde the forge is often worth it, since there’s time to make up and surpass the cost. In horde frenzy there just isn’t enough time to return the investment of a forge and make a profit, I know I at least have never seen a forge be profitable in frenzy.
It’s definitely worth it. There are some variables though. The base cost of it can be cheaper if built by an engineer, and especially a Mechanic. JACK’s actual Optimizer card and what level it’s at.
As others have said, for every weapon smelted all team mates get the same amount so if you get 50 power per weapon, everyone will have got that so that weapon was actually worth 250 power.
It’s time consuming though, unless JACK wants to do it mid-wave which can be risky and takes JACK away from supporting the team with revives and healing. Using Power Taps is just as good if you can protect them, and makes the game quicker.
Hot tip for the Forge: don’t keep it in your base, put it in the kill zone in an invalid spot so it becomes red and intangible and enemies can’t hurt it. Then, after most/all the enemies are dead, pull it out so you can smelt near all the dropped weapons, saving on travel time.
Roomba Jack was designed with Horde 1-50 in mind so it’s natural that the numbers don’t make sense on Frenzy, more so when everyone starts with 10K.
A low level forge is actually underwhelming but a lv4 with the smelting card will turn a lousy enforcer into 250 or so power which translates into 1250 (everyone gets 250). Say there are 4 enforces nearby so you get 1000 x 5 in no time. Add team effort where everyone contributes by either marking the weapons (they can be hard to find at times) or even better by picking them up and dropping them near the forge.
With an efficient roomba jack there is more than enough to buy anything you want, perks to the max and 100K in the fabricator by wave 50.
Is it fun to play roomba jack? ■■■■ No! but it has the benefit that 99% of the lobbies won’t turn down a high level jack.
I would say it isn’t worth it in a Frenzy, it slows the game down and the ROI you get from the Forge, even with a Jack and the smelting bonus, isn’t really worth it.
For a full 50, I would say that it’s absolutely worth it, even without a Jack. Don’t forget, the power you get from the weapon is spread equally across all the players in the match, so if you get 300 power from an Enforcer from Jack with their smelting bonus, you are in effect getting 1500 power for the whole team. 5 Enforcers you are getting 7500 power, for very little effort. The ROI is very high by the end.
But this playstyle is very boring, and slows the game down a lot. You do get to swim in power by the end though.
No one could ever convince me that the Forge is ever really worth it.
Never on Frenzy, if I play and people start going Forge crazy on Frenzy I’ll leave, it’s so pointless.
But even on 50 wave games, sure the power is cool, but it turns a looong game into a looooooonnnnggg game. Not worth the time investment.
But there’s another reason why I don’t care about it, it forces Jack to give up a vital card slot so he can smelt more power. There’s already plenty of power in a 50 wave match , not needed, and I’d rather have a Jack that can inflict bleeding damage during their ultimate, than get some extra power.