Is Tungsten Armor Better Than Gold in Terraria?

As a Terraria veteran with over 800 hours played, I can definitively say yes – tungsten armor is superior to gold armor by virtually every metric that matters. I‘ll cover the key stats across defense, DPS impact, ore cost, and more to showcase why tungsten should be the armor of choice in early hardmode.

How Progression and Stats Compare

Let‘s start by looking at how tungsten and gold armor fit into the equipment progression system in Terraria from the beginning of the game:

As you can see, gold and platinum occupy the final pre-hardmode tier with average stats. Then once Wall of Flesh is defeated and hardmode activates, the ores are replaced by new ones like tungsten with elevated base defense and set bonuses.

Comparing tungsten and gold armor specifically:

Looking at the numbers, tungsten armor edges out gold in defense by 1 point across the full set. While that doesn‘t seem like much, it can make surviving devastating hardmode attacks more likely in the early game.

Damage Output and Crit Chance

However, defense isn‘t everything. Having good DPS output matters when taking down bosses. Here tungsten pulls further ahead with its set bonus providing +4% melee critical strike chance.

Let‘s say on average your melee weapon has a 10% base critical chance pre-bonus. That means 1 out of 10 swings scores a crit doing 50% more damage. If using a Legendary Night‘s Edge on Skeletron Prime, base DPS could be around 190.

• Gold Armor – 10% crit chance = 190 DPS
• Tungsten Armor – 14% crit chance (10% + 4% set bonus) = 200 DPS

As demonstrated above, the set bonus gives around a 5% DPS advantage with tungsten versus gold – very significant during difficult boss fights! And that gap widens as you raise critical chance with potions and arena buffs too.

In practice, I‘ve definitely noticed quicker Prime kills and an easier Plantera fight when geared up in Tungsten. The consistent boost in crits helps cut down bosses before they overwhelm you. So from an offensive perspective, Tungsten pulls ahead of Gold here as well.

Grinding and Crafting Requirements

Now let‘s examine the mining and effort required to obtain enough ore for a full set:

• Tungsten – 81 bars = 243 ore
• Gold – 54 bars = 162 ore

Gold is easier to craft quantity-wise needing about 50 less bars. However, gold‘s spawn rate is much lower than tungsten‘s in the underground layers. Players report Tungsten deposits being 3-4 times denser based on internal spawn logic.

Factoring in spawn rates, you‘ll likely spend more overall time mining up Gold vs Tungsten. And once Hardmode activates, the stronger pickaxes make chewing through deposits faster anyway.

I‘d estimate you can obtain enough Tungsten for a full set in 30-40 minutes of focused mining. Whereas Gold may take 45-60 minutes on average depending on luck and world size. So crafting difficulty is pretty comparable.

Appearance and Aesthetics

I can‘t claim Tungsten is better than Gold in looks – that shiny golden armor just pops visually! But Tungsten does have a nice metallic appeal that fits well as an early Hardmode upgrade over shadow armor. And using vanity slots, you can mix and match pieces to customize your player‘s style.

Verdict – Tungsten is the Superior Choice

In closing, while the differences between Tungsten and Gold armor initially seem minor on paper, the +1 defense and 4% crit bonus give Tungsten the edge for early Hardmode. The extra protection and DPS output boosts survivability and boss killing speed noticeably based on my experience.

So if you‘re progressing into Hardmode, do yourself a favor and skip Gold in favor of Tungsten for the best results. I guarantee you‘ll be slicing down the Mechanical Bosses faster with those delicious crits!

Let me know if this guide helped gear up your Terraria character in the comments. And stay tuned for more tips soon!