Brotato Playstyles / Builds Guide

In this guide we will discuss the different Playstyles (Builds) and Synergies in Brotato. Contents By ArosRising. A Playstyle is the overall build and style youre going for. It defines which stats you need, and how you move around the map.

In this guide we will discuss the different Playstyles (Builds) and Synergies in Brotato.

Contents

Playstyles (Builds) and Synergies

By ArosRising.

A Playstyle is the overall build and style you’re going for. It defines which stats you need, and how you move around the map.

A Synergy is a collection of synergies between stats, character, items, or weapons that you can do within a build to make it stronger. 

For example, you can do a melee build, which means you need to be close to enemies, be more tanky, and look for melee damage. But those melee weapons can be explosive Planks, meaning you benefit from picking up Explosive related items. But it could also be Thief Daggers which benefit from crit Chance, making you look for those items instead.

Melee (Playstyle)

The Melee Build is one of the fundamental Brotato Builds. Compared to a ranged build, your weapons tend to have much shorter range, Melee as the name implies, but there are exceptions like Shuriken and Spear.

The advantages of melee weapons are that the weapon can cleave through any number of enemies in its path, meaning melee weapons can handle bigger numbers of enemies.

They also scale with melee damage, which you gain double the amount of compared to Ranged or Elemental damage.

There are also some downsides.

  • Lower Single Target Damage: The First one can be a lack of single target damage output for some melee weapons, compared to ranged options. This can cause some issues with killing Elites and bosses. 
  • Lack of Range: The Short range also means you can have issues with staying in range of enemies. Projectiles can force you out of range as you have to evade them.
  • You Take More Damage: If you want your weapons to hit the maximum number of enemies it requires you to move as close as possible to enemies, so the weapons cleave deeper into the group of enemies. This puts you heavily at risk of taking damage. So you’re going to have to build tankier.
  • Range: Finally Melee has a mixed relationship with range. Firstly, the effect of range is halved, but it is more powerful on melee weapons since it also increases the amount of enemies your weapon will hit on an attack. However, melee weapons’ attack speed depends on their range. Increasing the range makes the weapons attack slightly slower, and if you decrease the range, they attack slightly faster. I usually don’t worry about the slower attack speed. I like getting my melee weapons to the 200 range area.
  • Biggest Mistake: The biggest mistake I see with newer players when they play on melee, is that they don’t get close enough to enemy crowds when they dance around the Map. You need to dance on the edge of the enemy crowd, such that your weapon gets in there and cleaves it up. It’s risky, and it requires skill to not get hit. But it is so worth it.

Weapons:

There are too many weapons to mention, but here are the most common starting weapons for melee builds

  • Fist – The Fist is the basic and golden standard of a melee weapon, cheap, fast, and powerful.
  • Stick – The Stick is a very beginner friendly and super powerful melee weapon. It gains more base damage for each additional stick you have, so you always want to have 6 sticks, or 0. Perhaps the strongest melee weapon.
  • Spear – Super powerful melee weapon with an insanely long range and big hit box. It can cleave through hordes of enemies.
  • Spiky Shield – A Melee weapon that scales with Armor rather than Melee Damage, allowing you to increase your Damage at the same time as your Armor. Great hitbox and knockback.
  • Pruner – A Utility melee weapon that deals less damage, but spawns fruits for healing and gives you Harvesting. Remember to get a lot of melee damage to keep up in damage.
  • Thief Dagger – A Money making weapon. Also deals less dps, but makes up for it by giving you money when you kill enemies with a Crit.

Items:

There aren’t really a lot of items that are tied to the melee playstyle aside from all the + Melee damage items which I won’t list here. 

  • Rip and Tear – Provides Explosions on death which scale with Melee Damage.
  • Cute Monkey – Provides Healing from Materials, which is easier to collect on melee builds.

Characters: 

These characters are limited to melee weapons, or have abilities that tie them to melee weapons. There are many more characters that use melee.

  • Gladiator – Can only use Melee Weapons
  • Knight – Can only use Melee Weapons
  • Brawler – Basically only uses Fists and their cooler versions
  • Speedy – Gains Melee damage based on Speed
  • Crazy – Gains a lot of Range with Precise weapons, which is extra powerful for the melee weapons.
  • Masochist – Likes to take damage, which happens a lot in melee combat.
  • Cryptid – Doesn’t want to kill trees, so prefers melee weapons.
  • Fisherman – Usually goes Melee to handle the Crowds of enemies.

Ranged (Playstyle)

Ranged is the second fundamental playing style. You use ranged weapons, which fire projectiles at range. Your projectiles have good DPS, but can often only hit a few targets.

  • Great Single Target DPS: The Ranged playstyle offers the most intense single target dps in the game. Guns such as Laser Gun, Revolver, or SMG can shred a boss or elite in seconds. But they can also struggle with dealing with many targets.
  • Area of Effect options: There are many ranged weapons that are great at handling large groups of enemies, such as the Shredder, Rocket Launcher, and Nuclear Launcher, which all use explosions that harm all targets in the area. 
  • Great Range. – The weapons that scale with ranged damage also have some of the best range in the game. You get to kill enemies from a safe distance.
  • Glass Cannon – Since you’re firing from a safe distance you can focus on offensive stats and go glass cannon on ranged builds.

Weapons:

There are plenty of Ranged weapons, but here are the top starting options.

  • Slingshot – A super solid and easy to use ranged weapon. The bounces can clear out the entire map and keep you safe.
  • Shotgun – Good single target DPS, and great crowd clear. And good knockback. The slow attack speed and inaccurate shots makes the weapon slightly harder to use, as you need to position your shots. Great with life steal. Scales really well with ranged Damage.
  • SMG – Super fast attack speed, easy to use. Good single target damage and great with life steal. Scales really well with ranged Damage.
  • Revolver – Powerful all-round gun that is great in most situations, comes with its own knockback and doesn’t require specific stats. Just give it some piercing.
  • Shredder – Piercing Explosive weapon that can deal with large groups of enemies with ease.
  • Shuriken –  Scales with Melee damage, but is a ranged weapon. It is similar to the slingshot, but requires Crit Chance to bounce. Fun, but slightly harder to get going weapon.

Items:

These items work well with the ranged build, and are tagged as Ranged Damage. I’m not listing items that grant Ranged Damage here.

  • Baby with a beard – Spawns a projectile on enemy death, which scales super well with Ranged damage.
  • Bandana – provides an additional pierce for projectiles.
  • Ricochet – provides an additional bounce for projectiles.
  • Sharp Bullet – provides a very cheap additional pierce for projectiles, at the cost of reducing your piercing damage by 20%. Avoid it on weapons that already have piercing. (Not tagged under ranged damage due to a bug)
  • Pumpkin – Reduces the Pierce damage falloff for ranged weapons.

One thing to note is that each of these items help you deal with big crowds of enemies, which can be a weakness of ranged weapons.

Characters: 

Most characters can go for a ranged build, but the following almost always go for a ranged build:

  • Cyborg – Is pushed into doing a unique Range – Engineering Hybrid.
  • Ranger – Gains +50% ranged damage and can’t use Melee weapons.
  • Soldier – Has to stand still to attack, which makes it really difficult with melee weapons.
  • Renegade – Can only use Ranged Weapons. Weapons have extra projectiles and piercing.

Elemental (Playstyle)

The elemental playstyle includes both melee and ranged weapons that scale with Elemental damage.

The Special part of the elemental build is that Elemental Damage also scales the damage of the Burn mechanic – When you set enemies on fire. 

Elemental builds are often quite narrow. The typical build is to go full Tasers or Lightning Shiv, and then add Flamethrowers to the mix for its crazy burn abilities.

Since a lot of your damage comes from the burn mechanic, you might want to invest more in %Damage and Elemental damage, which scales burn and your regular weapons, rather than Attack Speed and Crit, which only work with the weapons.. (Attack Speed is still important, as it helps apply burn faster too.)

Weapons:

For weapons your starting options are:

  • Taser – shoots projectiles that slow enemies. Gains multiple projectiles when leveled up.
  • Lightning Shiv – Spawns bouncing lightning projectiles each time it hits an enemy. 
  • Wand – Not a great weapon. Shoots a projectile that sets an enemy on fire.
  • Torch – Not a great weapon. Melee attack that deals little damage, but knocks enemies back and sets them on fire.
  • Plank – Scales better with Melee damage unless you get Strange Book or are playing Artificer.

And later you can pick up stronger elemental weapons:

  • Flamethrower – The best elemental weapon. Super fast attacking, pierces enemies, and sets everything on fire. Insane with life steal.
  • Nuclear launcher – Not much of an elemental weapon, but actually scales with elemental damage and is quite powerful in an elemental build.
  • Thunder Sword – Good scaling and dps, slows down enemies and scales well with elemental damage.
  • Plasma Sledgehammer – Melee/Elemental Explosive Heavy swinging weapon. 

Items:

These items boost the Burn Mechanic.

  • Scared Sausage – It lets hits apply burn. Each Sausage also gives +1 DMG to all burn you do.
  • Snake – Burn spreads to +1 targets.
  • Eyes Surgery – Burn Ticks faster.

Characters: 

There are multiple Characters that can go for an elemental build, but only one is focused on it:

  • Mage

Engineering (Playstyle)

The Engineering playstyle revolves around using structures to kill enemies. Structures are anything that spawns with a blue X. There are two structure types that deal damage: Landmines and Turrets. There are also two engineering weapons, which have the Tool weapon class, that spawn those two types of structures.

While Plank does Scale with Engineering, it plays like a melee/Elemental build with Explosive Synergy.

Weapons:

Currently there are only two Engineering options

  • Wrench – Spawns different turrets depending on the Tier of the Wrench.
  • Screwdriver – Spawns Landmines every 12/9/6/3 Seconds depending on Tier.

Items:

Not including items that give +Engineering, here are some interesting items:

  • Turrets – These are great on Wrench builds, and also ok on Landmine builds. 
  • Tyler – Weird turret that can only be found in the shop.
  • Medical Turret – Provides Healing that scales with your engineering. 
  • Landmines – Gives additional Landmines. Good on Landmine builds, Ok on turret builds.
  • Improved Tools – Makes turrets fire faster, and Landmines spawn quicker depending on your Attack Speed. Very powerful item.
  • Explosive Items (Dynamite, Explosive Shells, Plastic Explosives) – Works with Tier 4 turrets and Landmines.
  • Ugly Tooth – Turrets can slow down enemies on hit, making the job of surviving much easier, and it keeps enemies in range of the turret.
  • Bandana/Ricochet – Turrets benefit from the Piercing/bounce. However it is only good on tier 1 and tier 4 turrets. But tier 4 turrets are the most important.
  • Sharp Bullet – I really like this super cheap piercing option on characters with -50% damage modifications doing engineering. (Engineer, Entrepreneur), since it will only give -10% pierce dmg, which doesn’t hurt the laser turrets too much.
  • Strange Book – Gives you an amount of Engineering equal to your Elemental damage. Rarely worth it unless you’re doing artificer or Plank build. But if you happen to have a lot of Elemental damage, or get it early enough, it might be worth it.

Characters: 

  • Cyborg – Gains tons of engineering halfways into the wave.
  • Engineer – +12 engineering, extra wrench, cluster turret. Lots of benefits.
  • Entrepreneur – Engineering ignores the -50% Damage Modifications.
  • Multitasker – Structures ignore the negative -%Dmg. 12 weapons are quite powerful.
  • Old – The Smaller battlefield is helpful for turrets and Landmines
  • Streamer – Gains 2 armor from each structure. Turrets are great for standing still.

Pacifist (Playstyle)

The character bears the name of the Pacifist playstyle. The Playstyle’s objective is to just live, without trying to kill foes or obtain resources in any other manner.

Check out the detailed guide.

Hybrid (Synergy)

The Hybrid Synergy revolves around using multiple of the four Damage types (Melee, Ranged, Elemental, and Engineering.)

Some weapons scale with multiple stats, some characters reward you for using multiple stats, and some items give you multiple flat damage stats for cheap if you can use the stats.

Using hybrid weapons, buying turrets, and spreading burn with Scared Sausage are the main ways of benefiting from the Hybrid Synergy.

Weapons:

There are more weapons that scale with multiple Stats, but here are the ones I consider in a Hybrid context.

  • Cacti Club – Melee/Range Hybrid. Often played as a melee build, using the spikes for Ugly Tooth and life steal triggers.
  • Plank – Melee/Elemental/Engineer Hybrid, Strange Book Enjoyer, and explosive fan. Fun weapon. Good setup for some burning turrets on the Side.
  • Lightning Shiv – Melee/Elemental hybrid. Likes a good amount of Melee damage for protection, but Scared Sausage can also help with that.
  • Thunder Sword – Melee/Elemental. Fine as a top end for both melee and Elemental builds, but also great as a top end for Hybrid builds.
  • Screwdriver – Scales with Melee Damage, can pick up Rip and Tear items for some fun Engineering – Melee – Explosion Hybrid build.
  • Wrench – Spawns Turrets, which can spread burn, and benefit from Strange Book.

Items:

  • Scared Sausage, Snake – Allows your Weapon attacks to spread flames, deals tons of damage based on your Elemental damage.
  • Turrets / Pocket Factory / Landmines – Allows you to deal damage outside of your weapons. Powerful if you have increased your engineering. Most importantly, turrets and Landmines can spread burn with Scared Sausage.
  • Rip and Tear / Baby with a Beard – If you’re increasing all your damage types, then suddenly these items can be used in more builds.
  • Items with multiple damage types – Hedgehog, Charcoal, Wheat, Alloy, Handcuffs, Big Arms, Gnome, 
  • Strange Book – Gives you a bonus to Engineering equal to your elemental damage. Perfect for the burning turrets strategy.

Characters: 

All characters can use the Hybrid synergy by using the right weapons or items, but some characters are pushed towards the synergy by their ability.

  • Apprentice – The Ultimate hybrid character. You just need a bit of XP Gain, and you’ll gain all 4 types of damage. 
  • Generalist – The Generalist have their Melee and Ranged damage tied together. This is great for cacti club, but also allows them to benefit a lot from items that give both stats (Hedgehog, Handcuffs, alloy, big arms)
  • Cyborg – Cyborg is forced into doing a Ranged Damage Engineering Hybrid. But note that Cyborg can’t use Elemental damage.
  • Arms Dealer – Arms Dealer can never rely on having the same weapons next round, so damage through Scared Sausage/ Turrets is great. Having multiple damage types also means that finding weapons is easier.
  • Streamer – Streamer likes to have structures for their armor. So that is a good reason for doing some Elemental engineering.
  • Explorer – Explorer likes Cacti Club, but can also do wonders with an Elemental Turret build due to how insane pocket Factory is on Explorer.
  • Bull – Stacks Multiple Damage types.

Explosive (Synergy)

Explosions are a mechanic in Brotato, typically caused by weapons when they hit an enemy. Explosions cause damage to all enemies within the explosions’ area.

The interesting thing about explosions is that they come with two secondary stats: Explosion Damage and Explosion Size. 

Explosion Size, as the name suggests, increases the size of explosions. It is a super powerful stat in general. It can be increased with the Explosive Weapon Class set bonus, and with the item Plastic explosives.

Explosion Damage is more interesting, it works exactly like regular %DMG for the most part. If you have +50% Damage, and +50% Explosive damage, your explosions will deal a total of +100% damage. Explosive damage affects all explosions, and also the damage of all weapons that cause explosions.  

Explosive Damage can be gotten through Dynamite and Explosive Shells. Dynamite gives 15% damage for super cheap, which is one of the reasons why explosions are so powerful.

Finally, explosion damage also affects structures, even though regular %DMG doesn’t so Explosion damage works with Landmines and the Tier 4 Explosive Turrets. This makes the Explosive Synergy a must for basically all engineering builds.

Weapons:

The explosive synergy isn’t restricted to just weapons with the explosive tag, but also includes both engineering weapons. 

  • Plank – Melee weapon that scales with Melee Damage, Elemental Damage, and Engineering, explodes on hit.
  • Shredder –  Piercing Explosive weapon that can deal with large groups of enemies with ease.
  • Wrench (Tier 4) – Spawns Explosive Turrets that explode on attack.
  • Screwdriver – Spawns landmines that explode when stepped off.

And weapons you can find in the game:

  • Rocket Launcher
  • Nuclear Launcher
  • Power Fist 
  • Plasma Sledgehammer

Items:

  • Dynamite – +15% Explosion Damage.
  • Explosive Shells – +60% Explosive damage, -15% Regular Damage
  • Plastic Explosives – +25% Explosion Size
  • Rip and Tear – Enemies Explode on Death.

Characters: 

  • Artificer – Huge bonuses to Explosive Size and Damage.
  • Bull – Explodes on Hit.
  • Glutton – Explodes on Consumable Pickup.

HP Scaling (Synergy)

The HP Scaling strategy is to use weapons or abilities that deal damage based upon your Max HP. This results in a situation where you can make yourself more Tanky and also increase your DPS at the same time. 

HP Scaling is a strategy you can dip your toes into, or fully dive into. If you happen to have a good amount of Max HP, you might pick up Alien eyes and call it a day. Or maybe you’re using Choppers or Potato Throwers as weapons, and now Max HP is the way you gain damage.

The Deep HP Scaling is mostly done on characters with a synergy, and it is the most powerful strategy in the Endless Game Mode.

Weapons:

  • Ghost Scepter – Gives Max HP on kills-
  • Chopper – Gains +20% of your Max HP as Damage.
  • Potato Thrower – Gains +20% of your Max HP as Damage.

Items:

  • Alien Eyes – Decent extra damage for HP scaling builds.
  • Spicy Sauce – Not a super good item, but it can do some work if you manage to stack them.

Characters: 

  • Lich – Benefits a lot from stacking Max HP.
  • Chunky – You want to stack Max HP a bit anyway.
  • Demon – Gains tons of Max HP late game.
  • Golem – Has a +33% modifier and likes to stack Max HP.

Critical Hit (Synergy)

Critical Chance is a very expensive way of increasing your DPS, but it also comes with some potentially powerful synergies that makes it worth the price tag.

Typically I completely avoid crit on weapons such as Fist and SMG which have a Crit Modifier of 1.5x. On regular weapons with a 2x modifier, I tend to pick up the powerful crit options I’m offered, like a random tier 3 Crit upgrade or Sunglasses. Here Crit mostly serves as a secondary DPS increase. Maybe I find a Hunting Trophy and I go more into Crit.

But if I have one of the following Weapons, I always go into crit fully.

Weapons:

These weapons have a higher Critical hit damage modifier than 2x or have an ability that triggers on critical hits. When using one of these weapons, you should aim to get to 100% crit chance.

  • Thief Dagger – Grants money on Critical Hit kills.
  • Knife – Up to 4x Damage Modifier.
  • Shuriken – Bounces on Critical Hit.
  • Crossbow – Pierces on Critical Hit.
  • Sniper Gun – 4x Damage Modifier.
  • Claw – 2.5x Damage Modifier

Items:

These items are typically great on crit builds, 

  • Lucky Coin – Grants a large amount of Luck depending on your crit chance.
  • Tentacle – Heals on Critical Hit kills.
  • Hunting Trophy – Grants money on Critical Hit kills.
  • Giant Belt – Deals bonus damage on Critical Hits.

Characters: 

The following characters have synergy with Crit.

  • Hunter – Tagged for crit, +25% crit modifier. 
  • Crazy – Tagged for crit, bonus range with precise weapons.

Standstill (Synergy)

The Standstill subclass emerges from a set of items that grant you powerful bonuses while not moving. It is mostly used on the Characters, Soldier and Streamer, which have built in mechanics that support the mechanic.

But even on those characters I often skip out on the Synergy of the items, since I consider this archetype to be mostly a trap. That said the items do have their moments where they can be good.

Weapons:

There aren’t any weapons that specifically are made for standstill, but the following are common options

  • Slingshot – Powerful weapon, bounces kill enemies all over the map.
  • Shotgun – Powerful weapon, great area clear and knockback to protect you.
  • Wrench – Spawns Turrets that protect you.

Items:

  • Esty’s Couch – Gives HP Regeneration depending on how much negative speed you have. All standing still items grant negative speed.
  • Statue – Grants Attack Speed while standing still.
  • Barricade – Grants Armor while standing still.
  • Chameleon – Grants Dodge while standing still.

Characters: 

  • Soldier – Gains +50% Damage and Attack Speed from standing still.
  • Streamer – Gains Materials from standing still.

Luck (Synergy)

Luck is a very powerful stat. It functions as an economic stat, since it improves the items and upgrades you find. It also increases the amount of Loot Crates you find and the rarity of the items inside. You can pick up Trees, Bags, and a Recycling Machine to maximize the value from Loot Crates.

It also functions as a powerful method of healing, since it increases the amount of Consumables dropped. You can get Weird Food and Lemonade to increase this healing.

And finally it can be a source of Damage with Baby Elephant and Cyberball. You pick up as many of those items as you can and get as much Luck and %Dmg you can. This can be powerful on characters like Arms Dealer and One Armed who can struggle with getting enough reliable damage. It works best with ranged weapons like SMGs and Slingshots that really can make use of the random chip damage.

I tend to go for Luck Synergy with the consumable healing on most characters, but I skip Cyberball and Baby Elephant most of the time. They require the right situation to shine.

Items:

  • Baby Elephant – Deals damage based on your luck
  • Cyberball – Deals damage based on your luck
  • Lucky Coin – Gives Luck depending on your Crit Stat. 
  • Lemonade – Gives +1 Consumable healing
  • Weird Food – Gives +2 Consumable healing
  • Bag – Gives +15 Materials for loot crates.
  • Recycling Machine – Increases recycling value from 25% to 60%.
  • Tree – Spawns more trees.

Characters: 

  • Lucky – Starts with 125 Luck, a +25% modifier, and a super version of a Baby Elephant.
  • Glutton – Starts with +50 Luck, and wants more Consumables.
  • One Armed – the +100% Damage modifications can be great with a luck build. Can really use the additional Clear of Cyberball/Baby Elephant. 
  • Arms Dealer – Same as One Armed, +33% Damage Mod, and likes any secondary damage that stays between shops.
  • Chunky – Loves Consumables.

Thank you for your time and I hope this little tutorial was helpful to you.

More Guides:

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