Whips

Whips are close-ranged summon weapons that swing in an arcing motion and produce a unique sound. Like all summoning weapons, whips receive damage bonuses from minion damage and cannot normally deal critical hits.

When an enemy has been hit with a whip, any minions the player has summoned will target that enemy, much like when right-clicking an enemy with a summoning weapon.

Most whips have damage bonuses that apply to any attacking minions, in addition to their regular damage statistic. These damage bonuses last 3 seconds after striking an enemy. Sentries receive no benefit from these bonuses.

Whips can have the same modifiers as swords, including Legendary. Their best modifier is Legendary.

Tips

 * Because the primary hit of a whip operates similarly to a piercing melee weapon, they are effective against enemies that pass through blocks, such as worms, cursed skulls, and casters with destructible projectiles.
 * However, all Whips will deal less damage to each successive enemy hit close together in a single swing, all the way down to 1 damage. This penalty is heavier on earlier whips, and lighter on later whips.
 * This does not stop whips with debuff effects such as Snapthorn from applying their respective debuff. However, Firecracker's Explosive Burst effect will only be applied to the first enemy hit, even if the whip causes a different enemy to be targeted instead.
 * Whips are affected by melee attack speed bonuses. This means that melee-oriented armor sets and equipment, such as Shadow armor and Feral Claws, can greatly increase their effectiveness.
 * This includes melee speed bonuses from Snapthorn, Durendal and Dark Harvest. If the player is fast enough, they can strike once with a speed-increasing whip, then switch to a higher-damage whip to gain immense damage bonuses. The autoswing effect of Feral Claws makes this much easier, as the player can simply hold the attack button down and use the numbers on the keyboard to switch between whips.
 * Whips will gain benefits from flasks.
 * Whips do not gain benefits from any other melee bonuses.
 * The summon tag damage gives significant bonuses to minions. For instance, the pre-Hardmode whips can more than triple the DPS of the Slime Staff against the Eye of Cthulhu, and Kaleidoscope increases the damage of the Xeno Staff, an already-powerful summon, by more than 50%.
 * Summon tag damage can be stacked with the use of multiple different whips which has an even greater effect on minion DPS than using only one.


 * Whips have excellent synergy with the Valhalla Knight armor, which has a +60% summon damage bonus, high defense and regeneration, and several sentry slots, but few bonuses to other types of weapons. For more risk/reward, the Shinobi Infiltrator armor has a +60% damage bonus and a +20% speed bonus (which affects whips more than most melee late game weapons), but less armor and no healing.
 * Whips are exceptionally useful for clearing foliage due to their range and broad area of effect. Combined with the ability to break plants behind solid walls, a whip can erase an entire thorn bush in a single swing, quickly bring down vines, and can safely trigger rolling cacti to roll away.
 * Speed modifiers from armor, accessories, and buffs do not affect the range of whips; only the modifiers on whips affect the range of said whip.
 * The 1.4.1 update fixed an issue where size modifiers on whips had an inverse effect on speed, meaning big whips were always slow and small whips were always fast. Therefore, on, Sluggish is no longer a viable modifier for them.
 * Whips can be an excellent tool for an early game head start, as they have high damage and are easy to get straight away.
 * Whips Buffs from whips like the Durendal don't disappear when you change weapons. This means that you could hit with a speed buffing whip, switch to a whip like the Firecracker or the Dark Harvest, and have a speed buff along with the normal effect for that whip.

Trivia

 * Whips were added as a homage to summoners with whips from the Final Fantasy series, notably Rydia from Final Fantasy 4. They also reference the monster-catching and summoning Beastmaster class from Final Fantasy V.
 * In real life, are generally used on animals, for training and performance purposes. This is potentially why the Zoologist sells the Leather Whip.
 * Despite their similarities with Melee weapons, whips are classified as Summon weapons.
 * Despite its current name, the Ivy Whip is not a weapon. It is a hook, present before whips were added to the game.
 * Despite the similar swing pattern and sound, the Solar Eruption is not a whip, and does not cause any of the minion damage bonuses that whips do.