4. Terraria Hard Mode

Now that the Wall of Flesh has been defeated the game really opens up, to the point where everything you just done was just an extended tutorial/intro. This is where you can sink 100's of hours into the game and not even realise it, there is so much content here that I have made another page where I will be focusing on most of them. This part of the walkthrough is mostly going to cover the hard mode bosses and preparing for them. The Slime, NPC, Pets and Armour trophies will be detailed on the next page too since there is a LOT of stuff involved in those.

One new thing you will notice is that a new Biome has appeared - The Hallow. This is a magical biome full of rainbows, bright colours and homicidal Unicorns........yyyeah. From this point onwards the Crimson/Corrupt biomes and the Hallow biome will start to spread over grass, stone, ice and sand, my word it spreads super fast over sand. You can prevent it spreading to your base by making a hole at each side of your base, 10 by 10 would do fine, and filling it with snow.

There are also new types of Ore here which I want to apologise for in advance because it may get slightly confusing with all the this/that stuff. You can use the Pwnhammer dropped by WoF to destroy Demon/ Crimson Altars and they will spawn a new type of Ore into the world, there are 3/6 of these split into 3 tiers. Each time you destroy one you will spawn some Cobalt/ Palladium then the next one will spawn Mythril/ Orichalcum then the next will be Adamantite/ Titanium. You have to use your current pickaxe to mine through Cobalt/ Palladium, then you need a Cobalt/ Palladium Pickaxe or Drill (Pickaxe is slightly more effective) to mine through Mythril/ Orichalcum, then Mythril/ Orichalcum to mine through Adamantite/ Titanium. The more altars you destroy the more ore will be spawned. Just make sure you leave at least one in case you need to craft stuff if needed.

Just concentrate on building up to Adamantite/ Titanium gear for now before worrying about any bosses. These bosses are a lot tougher this time around and the first one will be the toughest. Enemies now drop souls, regular enemies will drop souls depending on the biome they are in. Corrupt/ Crimson enemies will drop Souls of Night and Hallow enemies will drop Souls of Light. The bosses however drop the big souls - Might, Sight, Fright, Blight and Light (The devs love rhyming it seems)- and these are the souls you need to make some of the big weapons like the Megashark (the Minisharks older brother).

New events also happen, Pirate Invasions can now happen in place of Goblin Armies (these still occur though) and the Solar Eclipse. The solar eclipse is tough, even I can get trampled by them with the best gear in the game if I am not being careful. They occur during the day and contain enemies that are only available during the eclipse. This even lasts longer than The Blood Moon since it happens during the day. As tough as it is, it is also very good if you can get this to happen early on as one of the enemies drops the Death Sickle, which is a fantastic weapon that is one of the best end game weapons in the game and make your life a whole lot easier.

Enemies also have a 1/1500 chance of dropping a key mold depending on the biome (Snow, Hallow, Crimson, Jungle and Corrupt), these are crafted with Temple Keys (dropped by Plantera) to unlock those other chests in the dungeon. there are ways of increasing your chances of getting a mold but more on that later.

Now enough of all the new changes and time to get some progress done. On top of getting the Adamantite/Titanium gear we are also going to collect 20 Life Fruits, these are found in the jungle and each one turns one of your hearts golden granting up to 100 extra health. The Life Fruits respawn in the jungle so there is an infinite supply of them. It is also worthwhile making a Jungle farm close to spawn for these and Plantera bulbs when the time comes to look for those. Once you have found 20 and consumed then you will unlock

• Topped Off

  Attain maximum life and mana possible without accessories or buffs.

  
  1 guide

Once you have Titanium/ Adamantite Armour (hopefully Titanium as the set bonus can really help you against bosses) you should go grab some really handy gear. There are enemies now called Mimic Chests, these are found underground and drop some great stuff. The drops you should be looking for are a Cross Necklace (preferably 2 of them) and a Star Cloak. The necklace increases length of invincibility after being hit and can be combined with the Star Cloak at Tinkerers Workshop. The beautiful thing is that you can then equip a 2nd Cross Necklace to further extend that time, add that with the Titanium Armour that also grants some invulnerability after being hit and you are in for a good time. Secondly you want to find a Pirate Map to spawn a Pirate Invasion, these are drops from enemies in the oceans at either side of the world. I will include a video showing a really good farming method. During the invasion you have a chance for a pirate enemy to drop a Cutlass, this thing is seriously overpowered especially when mixed with the double cross necklace and Titanium loadout. It is best to save before the invasion as you don't always get one. Keep in mind that the pirates are a lot tougher than the goblin army, at least the ranged guys are so you may die quite a bit.

Credit to THEJY HD for the video

Collect some Fairy Dust and Crystal Shards to make some Greater Healing Potions and we are all ready to take on the first of the Hard Mode bosses - The Destroyer. the best thing about these boss spawners compared to before is that these can be made on an anvil and not an altar.

THE DESTROYER

To summon him you need to make a Mechanical Worm. To craft this you need 6 Rotten Flesh/ Vertebrae, 5 Iron/ Lead bars and 6 Souls of Night. You can make this at a Mythril/ Orichalcum Anvil.

First thing you will notice if you have a corrupt world is that this guy is an upgraded version of Eater of Worlds, but unlike his easy mode counterpart this guy will hurt you. His individual sections do not break off when taken out like EoW, rather they just "turn off". If you have the gear I recommended you likely won't even need healing potions and can just tank him without doing must. The Cutlass has a very fast continuous swing so you can just hold down attack and have at him. You will recover most of your lost health from hearts dropped by the probes he releases so you shouldn't have to worry about that too much and there isn't much dodging needed, more moving to the side of him each time he re-emerges. Now you may not have Titanium Armour because your world gave you Adamantite but fear not it is entirely possible to defeat him with Adamantite Armour and zero Cross Necklaces and no deaths. I just tested it out before writing this and I only had to use 2 health potions. You will need to pay more attention to your health and keep out his way a little more as well as taking care of the probes when they appear but the Cutlass makes quick work of both Destroyer and Probes.

Here is a video of Zeb destroying the destroyer with the Cutlass, you may notice he isn't that well prepared with Armour and stuff like I suggested and didn't lose much health but I also didn't use potions unlike him so it can be made easier with Regen potions and Ironskin potions.

• Walk Without Rhythm

  Dismantle the Destroyer.

  
  1 guide

Now the world opens up just that little bit more, you will have noticed a message on screen saying "The Jungle grows restless", this is an indicator that Planteras bulbs have started to spawn. Defeating Plantera really opens up so many possibilites but let's hold off on that for now. The Destoryer will have dropped some useful items, Greater Healing Potions, Hallowed Bars and Souls of Might. If you have a MiniShark you can use these Souls along with 5 Shark Fins and Illegal Gun Parts to make the Megashark, just like the Minishark only a lot better. The Illegal Gun Parts can be bought from the Arms Dealer at night for 25 Gold. Hallowed Bars aren't really useful for anything just yet. If you have Adamantite world then you can upgrade to Hallowed Armour when you have enough bars but if you have Titanium stick wih that. You can also create up to 5 Light Discs which are quite effective at times, fast speed high damage, especially in enclosed spaces.

By now you probably have more than 40 Gold Coins so keep checking in with the Dryad and she will sell Sparkly Wings from time to time. While not the most fashionable they certainly get the job done and don't require you to go out and get Souls of Flight. Once equipped hold X to fly as high as you can and you will unlock

• Leap of Faith

  Perform an acrobatic triple jump with the help of accessories.

  
  

Not much extra prep is needed for The Twins as there isn't too much extra you can do at this point weapons wise. You may want to go into the underground Crimson/ Corrupt and start farming some Ichors/World Feeders so that you can craft some Ichor/Cursed bullets. These bullets coupled with Megashark are good enough to take down both Twins and Skeletron Prime. Purchase some Pumpkin Seeds from the Dryad and grow some pumpkins so that you can make some Pumpkin pies, this increases your stats for 15 minutes. Might also be wroth making a couple campfires and Heart Lanterns and placing them on your flat boss slaying area to help with life regen.

THE TWINS

To summon them you will need a Mechanical Eye which can be craft at a Mythril/ Orichalcum Anvil using 3 Lens, 5 Iron/ Lead bars and 6 Souls of Night. (Thankfully the devs really reduced the stuff needed to make these in the last update)

The Eye of Cthulhu's older brothers, Retinazer and Spazmatism. These twins are joined together and both have their own attack patterns. I would advise working on just one of them at a time, once their health gets to about halfway they will transform and it isn't wise to have both changed at the same time. Work on taking down Spazmatism, the one closest to you with the green flames, since he is the one who will cause most of your problems. They will stay in place most of the time fire at you with flames or lasers and occasionally charge at you but this is easily avoided once you know their patterns. Once he has transformed he will start spraying long bursts of green cursed flames while flying towards you, keep an eye on your health here as this can cause some damage, just keep dodging and firing at them with the Megashark as best as you can. Once he is down start working on Retinazer, he will stay out of your way for the most part and just slowly fire lasers at you. After he transforms his lasers start to fire a bit faster but still nothing to be too concerned about, you should manage him fairly easy.

CylonHD does it in this video but using gravitation potions to dodge them. I personally don't really like using Gravitation potions so not sure how effective it is, if you decide to give that a try though remember to change your settings for that as it may be set to world flipping rather than character flips that default and I found that rather distracting and disorientating.

• Double Vision

  Trounce the Twins.

  
  1 guide

Again not much stuff to really do here except fight the next boss. Once you have beaten him however then we will be ready for greatness.

SKELETRON PRIME

To summon him you need to make a Mechanical Skull at an Mythril/ Orichalcum Anvil. Yo make this you need 30 Bones, 5 Iron/ Lead bars, 3 Souls of Light and 3 Souls of Night.

The big daddy of hard mode, the OG badass. Long before the newer fancy bosses got added this guy was the king of the jungle. Like his predecessor it is a head with some attacking arms, only this time he has 4 arms and each of them has a different style of attack - Laser, Cannon, Saw and Vice - but like before you can take out the head and be done with him. It isn't that necessary to take out his arms if you are able to dodge their swings but taking out the Saw arm might be worthwhile. The key thing to note here is that if you don't kill him by morning he won't just fly away like the rest, he will become Dungeon Guardian Prime essentially and just take you out in 1 hit. The fight isn't too bad but you may notice large chunks of health just disappear at times, if you like to get in close and personal like I do that is, but overall he isn't too difficult to deal with.

Here is Yrmir having some fun with him (with Gravitation potions too I should note.

• Prime Directive

  Shatter Skeletron Prime.

  
  1 guide

Defeat these 3 bosses a 2nd time now or later and you will also receive

• Mecha Mayhem

  Do battle against the Twins, the Destroyer, and Skeletron Prime simultaneously and emerge victorious.

  
  

Now playtime begins, take his Souls of Fright along with Hallowed Bars, Souls of Might and Souls of Sight and make a Pickaxe Axe (or a Drax) and let's get that armour beefed up. The Pickaxe Axe has a mining power of 200% so it is able to mine through Chlorophyte Ore which is found throughout the jungle, like Life Fruits they will "respawn", grab as much as you can. While you are grabbing the ore go out of your way to kill turtles as you will be needing 3 Turtle Shells. When you have plenty (324 roughly) then go back to base and craft yourself some Turtle Armour, this armour is fantastic, not only is it better at protecting you it also reflects full damage to the attacker (very useful for when you need to fight the dungeon guardian).

If you haven't had a Solar Eclipse yet then we are going to try get one. During my last one I had saved midway through it and when it ended a blood moon started, but when I reloaded I had no blood moon which leads me to believe that if you were to save just day started then you could keep reloading until you got one. Once you get a Solar Eclipse though save your game, this will help further increase your chances of getting the 2 items we need. If you get a Broken Hero Sword and it is still quite early save again, same applies to a Death Sickle (the main thing we want) You will need to get 3 Broken Hero Swords but if you get a Death Sickle then they aren't that important. If the Eclipse ends and you didn't get everything then reload your save, you will still have your Sickle and/or Broken Hero Swords and can try again. If you got 3 sword parts on top of the Sickle then craft yourself an Excalibur sword from Hallowed Bars and grab your Nights Edge Sword, now you can craft the Terra Blade.

Now you are a force to be reckoned with, the only thing stopping you from getting the best Pickaxe and Weapon in he game now is Plantera (who is named after the band Pantera and can drop an axe shaped like a heavy metal guitar. Once you are ready dive into the jungle and look for one of his bulbs, they are quite easy to spot due to its bright pink glows. I highly recommend watching the attched video before breaking it so you can get a good idea of how to set out the area, but you really don't need that many campfires as he uses I think most of that was just for lighting/asthetics.

PLANTERA

The most important thing here is to move around as much as possible as he loves to get right up in your face. The Megashark will work fine on him but if you got the Death Sickle use that. The Terra Blad is only really useful if you want to be a bit more risky and fight him up close. Not much else to say really, he is a pretty simple enemy if you have enough space to move despite being one of the hardest bosses. If you build up a little arena as shown in the video then you will have no problems fighting him.

Credit to meetyourdemize for the video

You know have the entire map to play on now. Plantera drops a temple key each time you defeat him and this has 2 uses, the first being to open the Lihzahrd Temple (no that isn't a typo) and the other being to craft special keys for those chests in the dungeon. Like always I can only make assumptions on what items you have found so just now you can do one of 2 things. If you have had a Crimson Key Mold drop then craft a Crimson Chest Key and go open that chest in the Dungeon (which has now been upgraded to Hard Mode Dungeon after beating Plantera so be careful) and grab the Vampire Knives. These might not look deadly with the low damage numbers but they shoot 5 of them at rapid speeds and also steal life from the enemies. My current way of fighting Plantera with these is to stand still holding the attack button and reading stuff online, checking my emails and not losing more than half a heart. So yeah they are definitely must have items. If you don't even have a Crimson then it is definitely worth creating a couple new worlds until you get one, then it only akes a few minutes to mine to hell and tank the Wall of Flesh so you can start farming for them. Any enemy in the crimson will drop molds, so you can lay down 50/60 pieces of Meteorite so Meteor Heads start spawning and increase your chances of getting one.

Of course if you don't have a mold then your other option would be to use the Temple Key to open the temple door. You will likely have seen this in the jungle, it is a large orange bricked temple that you cannot mine through. This is a place that you want to take care in, you thought the dungeon had some traps this place is crazy, everytime you touch the floor there is a chance you will activate something. The dart traps in here are also a lot more deadly than the others in the game. On top of all these traps you have the 2 main enemies - Lihzahrds and Flying Snakes - and these 2 can dish out pain. The best thing to do is keep to the roofs with wings and grappling hook, only going to ground to open the chests to get some power cells which are needed to summon the next boss, this way you will avoid most traps and can tank the enemies with the Death Sickle. Just keep working your way to the bottom and you will encounter a room with an altar. Barricade this room off so no enemies can get in and get ready to fight the Golem. It is best to have picked up a few power cells as you will want to fight him a few times so you can get the Picksaw which is strong enough to mine through Lihzahrd brick and you can also mine the altar and take it with you.

GOLEM

The best thing about this boss is that he doesn't go through blocks like the rest of them so barricade him in and just have at him with your Death Sickle and he can't hit you. His head will fly off and start firing at you which can hit you but won't cause much problems and can be taken out pretty quickly. To barricade him in easy you can just create a large wall downwards and put a door at the bottom so you can get in and out quickly. It really is that simple.

Here is a video of this in action thanks to ABeardedSage

If you didn't get the Picksaw just keep taking him down. If you run out of Power Cells then the enemies in the temple will drop them from time to time.

Now I bet you are getting pretty sick of these wings by now right, just fly up as high as you can and eventually a Wyvern will come after you, pretty easy to dodge his attacks, very similar to fighting the Destoryer really but he is smaller and weaker. He will drop Souls of Flight when killed and those can be crafted with a number of objects to make different types of wings.

Only the 1 boss left and that is the console exclusive Ocram. He is pretty much a mix of all 3 mechanical bosses but isn't that tough especially with your gear, even more especially if you have the vampire knives.

OCRAM

To summon Ocram ( a boss exclusive to consoles) you will need to craft a Suspicious Looking Skull at a Mythril/ Orichicalcum Anvil. To make this you need 2 Mechanical Eyes, 1 Mechanical Skull, 10 Adamantite, 5 Souls of Night, 5 Souls of Light.

As always I will attach a video showing someone (Yrmir again) beating him with lower gear than I recommend, always best to over prepare right? Your gear at this point will speak for itself, these bosses used to be a lot harder before they added new stuff in 1.2 update making them so much easier. He moves in an up and down motion so is pretty easy to doge, he shoots out little Servants of Ocram, these are similar to Destroyers probes and Eye of Cthulhus little eye balls. Like I said easy as pie with your gear. If you do not have the Vampire Knives then it is wise to pay attention and not under estimate him. If you have them however then sit back and relax

Assuming you have went into another world to take out Eater of Worlds or Brain of Cthulhu depending on who you didn't get to face in your world then you will unlock

• Slayer of Worlds

  Defeat every boss in Terraria.

  
  

If you haven't doen it yet then what ya waiting for!

That pretty much ends it for this section, mostly just wanted to cover bosses here, we will now be jumping between worlds for several things so fun times await.