by Doc – Owner, Founder, Guider of Noobs, Himself a Noob
The short answer here is to be vertically above your opponents by using gadgets, and using a weapon that’s a bit longer-range so you can hit them while most of them can’t hit you. I was stuck in the 40s before switching to a height-based build and then I breezed through the rest of the game.
The Longer Answer
Floor 1,000 has been reached, and if you do some research on all the builds that have made it to Floor 900+ you’ll notice that they have the same three gadgets: Jump Bomb, Blast Boot, Torqscrew. Why these?
The basic idea here is that most of the enemies in the game can only attack you on the ground, and if you’re on the ground they can crowd you for an easy kill. It doesn’t matter what gun you have, at some point when you get to the ground you can’t have enough DPS to kill them without taking hits, and you really can’t take a lot of hits from these guys. So how do you get into the air?
Well, the Jump Bomb gets you into the air and keeps you there, and being in the air gets you access to a lot of relics and bonuses that boost you only when in the air. Additionally, you have Cooldown and Floaty Fall parts that let you fall slower and jump again faster. The most important one, I think, is the one that gives you (the name escapes me) access to a second Jump Bomb in your inventory. Between having all of these effects, you’ll be in the air for a while… but not forever.
That’s where the Torqscrew comes in. The Torqscrew has the ability to push you upwards, letting you be somewhat airborne (though not as high as we’d have liked) while your Jump Boots regenerate. The Torqscrew has a really long recharge time, so don’t use it wastefully, but do make sure you have one on the ground before you run out of Jump Boots. The Torqscrew also has the side effects of its vortex pulling in enemies for easy kills, which is nice, but the biggest benefit is that height.
Blast Boot is the opposite of these, and I suspect that as more people eventually beat Floor 1,000 there’s going to be a better gadget than the Blast Boot. The Blast Boot is designed to take you down to the ground, doing damage as you hit the ground. If you’re on Floor 100, that damage is perfectly fine, so we’re not worried about how it’ll fare past Floor 100. However, be careful of using Blast Boots when you don’t have a Jump Boot in your back pocket. You’ll often not kill all the enemies aroud you, leaving you open for a counterattack that you don’t have the HP to stomach and needing to immediately Jump Bomb out of there.
One more thing on these gadgets: the biggest thing to worry about (aside from building the parts needed for them, and fortunately most of the parts I’ve listed here are buildable) is getting Freeze onto your gadget. Freeze is super OP, as it buys you a lot of time to kill the Salmonid before they move to another phase. This is most helpful when it’s one of the bigger Salmonids with the weak spots that swing around a bunch, like Steelhead and Strong Arms. We’ll get to the weapons in a second, but do note that most of the best players don’t use their weapons to inflict freeze, they use the Blast Bomb to inflict it, then Jump Bomb and float away before getting a kill.
Which Weapons Should I Use?
Okay everybody, say it with me:
“I promise to only use 5-star Primo weapons.”
Good, good. Primo weapons are by far the best weapons stat-wise because they’ve maxed out the fire rate stats for that gun, which is HUGE for DPS. Getting 5-star weapons is cool but they’re all scrap metal unless they’re Primo.
I’m sure if you’re a great Splatoon player you can go on the beaten path and use the E-Liter or other snipers, and that’s fine. Some of us aren’t that close to the skill ceiling and have to play it a little more… primitive. The game gives you a Primo 5-star Level 40 Splattershot for beating the story boss. That’s a fine start to these, but keep an eye out for Dualies or Splatlings along the way. Why these? Well, you can apply Freeze and Ferment (Scorch is fine but deals a fixed amount of damage, which isn’t that helpful) parts to them to provide a percentage chance that the enemy will freeze/ferment when hit. And, unlike the E-Liter, you’re not hitting them with one shot. You’re hitting them with like fifty. I’m sure that when you get to the super late floors there’s a marked difference between freezing them with gadgets versus with your weapons, but my LPG Splatling freezes basically everything it lays its reticule on and I have no issues even without Freeze III on it. So take the easy road and put Freeze on your main weapon as well.
Upgrade! Don’t forget to upgrade. You’re going to get a lot of weapons that you need to scrap (and scrapping weapons also gets you closer to being able to upgrade the effects of your weapons as well), so cash in the Spirhalite Shards by cashing out anything you’re not using besides your main floor-killer weapon. Seriously, I cleared most of Floors 50-100 on the first try with my Splatling and just upgraded it every time I had the Shards handy, and by the end of things it was at Level 47 + 27 (for a total of 74) but clearing Floor 100.
If you don’t have all the skill compasses yet, I feel you. Skill compasses are a stupid and irritating part of the game, and I hate them. But they go a long way towards making your character tough enough to clear Floor 100 as well.
Amiibo Doctor 