Cataclysm is Sledge with the shell made as big as it gets: the largest, hardest-hitting single bullet any class can fire, a slower reload and a sturdier hull. Every shot is a commitment.
| Tier | 4 |
| Unlock level | 45 |
| Upgrades from | Sledge |
| Barrels | 1 |
| Reload (0 points) | 2.66 s per shot (0.38 shots/s) |
| Bullet speed | 239 px/s (×0.65) |
| Bullet range | about 215 px |
| Bullet damage | 40.9 per shot (×5.12) |
| Penetration | 6 (base 2 plus 4) |
| Bullet size | radius 19.5, nearly a whole tank wide |
| Recoil | 15× a Recruit's kick per shot |
| Health / movement | ×1.225 / ×1 |
| Body damage | 20 (×1) |
Every number here is at 0 stat points, before the per-level health bonus and the per-level speed penalty that every tank gets. The automatic balancer can nudge a class's damage and health over time, so treat these as the roster's base values.
Cataclysm fires one shell every 2.66 seconds. It does 40.9 damage at 0 points, has 6 penetration and a radius of 19.5 px, so it's almost as wide as a tank and very hard to dodge up close. It's slow, 239 px/s, and it only travels about 215 px before it disappears. You play inside that range and you make each shot count.
The recoil is huge: 15 times a Recruit's kick per shot, the same as Sledge's. That's your movement tool. Every shot throws you the opposite way to where you fired, so a shot at a target also kicks you clear of it, and a shot away from where you want to go launches you there. Good Cataclysm players think of every shot as both an attack and a jump.
The hull is the toughest of the Sledge family, with 1.225× health, which you need because the class fights close and waits a long time between shots. Damage per second is only about 15 at 0 points, a little above Sledge's 14. What you're buying is the size of each hit, not the rate.
Cataclysm beats anything that has to come close and can't dodge a wide shell: rammers like Caltrop and Ambush, bots that charge, and other short-range classes caught at point blank. Its shell kills a standard drone outright, since bullets do double damage to drones, and with 6 penetration it can keep going through a drone or two.
It loses to range badly. Every sniper, every missile class and even most normal guns outrange 215 px. It loses to anything fast enough to dodge a slow shell and punish the 2.66 second wait, like Afterburner and Interceptor. Streams of small bullets are a quiet problem: every bullet your shell meets strips penetration equal to its damage, and the shell's damage falls in proportion, so a Deluge or Autovolley stream can blunt a shell before it arrives.
A 33-point build: Bullet Damage 7, Reload 7, Bullet Penetration 7, Max Health 5, Bullet Speed 4, Movement Speed 3.
Sledge leads to Amalgam, Cataclysm, Skipjack, Bombardier, Sailfin and Starburst.
Cataclysm is the pure upgrade of Sledge's idea: a bigger shell, more health, the same recoil, and a slower reload. Amalgam keeps Sledge's shell unchanged and adds two drones. The four missile classes (Skipjack, Bombardier, Sailfin, Starburst) give up the recoil jump and most of the short-range punch for missiles that fly much further.
Take Cataclysm if you liked Sledge's playstyle and want each hit to matter more. Take a missile class if you keep dying before you can get within 215 px.