[360] Rubble/Gravel Info Thread

I couldn't find a thread about rubble/gravel (whatever you call it--I call it rubble) on this forum. I'm aware that there is one on the Builder's League United group (CHECK IT OUT), but it is not open for everyone to contribute and discuss.

Post whatever you have found out about rubble in addition to possible tactics using rubble.

This is what I've been able to piece together on solo mode (not sure if it's different on MP):
When a block of rubble breaks, It disperses into 5 little rocks that bounce a bit, damaging blocks around, and then settle. When you touch one of these rocks (as builder), you pick it up, giving you 3 stone each. That's a possible total of +15 stone for each block. It also explains why it sometimes says +3 when you clearly picked up more than that. Note: These rocks will disappear if they hit the ground from more than 4 blocks high.

Compiled list of known things/ideas:

• It's catapult-proof
• Possible "breakaway traps" can be made because it breaks on contact
• Dispersed rocks can be useful for destruction of other blocks (Acavado)
• Will form on top of both natural and unnatural blocks (Kouji)
• Stone must be dropped from a height of at least 2 blocks to form rubble
• If another tile hits a spot before a stone block during a collapse, rubble will not form
• Rubble can be used as a temporary support for blocks, which enemies may break, triggering a collapse
• Most efficient stone farm:
  
  <breaking this forms 3 rubble blocks
  
  
• Suppresses bomb explosions--block will be destroyed but people behind remain safe
• Walking into gravel from the side will destroy it, as well as falling on it, most of the time
• Sword, hammer, and archer kick all destroy it
• Arrows must have at least the speed of a gray-level arrow upon firing--lobbing may not work (Wyeth)
• Fully-charged arrows also cannot break rubble by direct contact (see Kouji's and my post below)
• Breaking a block will disperse 5 rocks that damage blocks and yield 3 stone each (see above)
• Thrown objects can destroy it if thrown fast enough (tested with corpses, boulders, kegs, lanterns)
• It is possible to rig up explosive traps where rocks from a broken block can trigger a hidden keg
• There are no stages of damage, like bedrock and spikes, so it is easily destroyed by bombs

(I won't mention Wyeth's "gravel outline" for now because it is very much speculative; read it on the group thread)

 

Some other things I've found.

Archer can break rubble, although full charged shots will not break it.
For rubble that is perfectly horizontal from you, the following rules apply
If use the lowest powered shot, you need to have at most 3 blocks between you, like so (assume will be rubble for the following examples):

If you try any further than this, blocks will not break (probably because the velocity of the arrow is too low.

If you use a medium shot, you can hit any rubble up to 27 blocks away which is the max range I could get, so as far as I know, a medium powered shot always breaks rubble (the furthest I could get horizontally, at perfectly flat elevation)

Max charged shots showed something interesting. There are spots were rubble was unbreakable, regardless of distance.
If I stood here and had rubble in front of me like this:


If it broke with a fully charged shot, it'd break regardless of how far away I was. However if that same block was unbreakable, that block would not break regardless of where I was. I could still use lower powered shots to break it, but it wouldn't break with a fully charged shots.

All of this was tested in single player, though. I'll test it on a server later to see if I get different results and if I do, I'll edit it in this post, or add a new post if someone else has posted by then.

 

I did some follow-up testing on this, and found some very interesting results (also done on single player). The reason that a fully-charged arrow doesn't affect a block of rubble is that it actually hits the block behind the block you see it hitting. This may be related to the arrow-thru-wall glitch. In the pictures below, the archer can actually break the column of rubble behind the bedrock using fully-charged arrows.

Thus, an archer can hit the blocks behind the block that the arrow touches, but not the touching block itself.

Of course, it works in all directions.