Vilethorn



The Vilethorn is an unusual magic weapon that extends a 15 tile-long spear-like projection from the player's position. It extends through blocks, piercing multiple enemies, and scores a rapid succession of up to seven hits for a total of up to 70 damage per swing. Its total effect lasts roughly 1.5 seconds. The Vilethorn is the earliest weapon available to players that consistently travels through blocks. It is one of the possible drops from a destroyed Shadow Orb in the Corruption.

The Vilethorn furthermore produces miniscule knockback for each of its seven rapid hits, which tends to have the unique effect of keeping enemies from advancing while simultaneously preventing them from being thrown outside the Vilethorn's affected area, essentially freezing enemies in place for its duration to ensure multiple hits on even small enemies.

Hardmode enemies tend to have defenses and knockback resistance that render the Vilethorn nearly useless. The Nettle Burst operates similarly to the Vilethorn, and can be considered its Hardmode upgrade; though it is only obtainable by defeating Plantera, a late-Hardmode Boss. Though minimal, the Vilethorn has knockback, so its best Modifier is Mythical.

Tips

 * The most useful trait of the Vilethorn is its ability to fire through solid blocks to pierce as many enemies as its distance covers. This functionally means that players can completely wall themselves off from any threat that does not similarly possess attacks that pass through walls, and slay them all with impunity. Even with trivial damage, if you can hurt an enemy that can't touch you, you can defeat even the toughest of enemies.
 * Because enemies that are vulnerable to knockback are essentially stopped in their tracks, and the Vilethorn has a duration just barely long enough for a player to recover all their mana and fire again before the effect ends, a player can essentially just lay down a constant thorn that paralyzes any enemy that passes nearby.
 * An easy solution to Blood Moons and the Goblin Army, as it allows you to strike enemies approaching your home structure while you remain safely indoors (after having sealed off your Doors with blocks). The Goblin Army's Goblin Sorcerers may still teleport inside, but they have fairly low defenses, and the Vilethorn dispatches them rather quickly.
 * Because of its piercing ability, the vilethorn is also quite effective against any enemy that attacks in mobs.
 * Even though many caster-type enemies like the Fire Imp take negligible damage from the vilethorn, while being able to attack through walls, even dealing a single point of damage to them tends to stun them and prevents them from dealing more damage until they teleport again.
 * The simultaneous ability to travel through blocks and pierce infinite enemies ironically makes it very useful against worm-type enemies that are specifically meant to stop players from just walling themselves in, and even those bosses that have multiple segments or minions. The Brain of Cthulhu, in its first stage, with multiple floating eyes, is particularly vulnerable.

Trivia

 * Until the release of 1.2, this weapon was unique in its behavior. The Nettle Burst is essentially a hardmode version of the same weapon, being a little over twice as powerful. Other weapons were also introduced in v1.2 that can similarly attack while hiding from enemies - a Death Sickle, Mushroom Spear, and Chlorophyte Partisan, among others, all have some form of block-piercing projectile while being Melee Weapons, and summoning items like the Pygmy Staff can also be used to throw a minion out to fight for the player.