There are 2 ways to get good damage with the SS (in most situations).
First I'll cover the easier method. It's not my favorite method, but it's probably
the most powerful and reliable way.
Skybomb
Sometimes called a 'line' SS or 'high angle SS' or 'Type 2 SS'.This SS is fired with high power and a fairly high angle. The shot splits open after 2.2 seconds in the air, and if you controlled the shot carefully it will split at the absolute highest point in the shot's arc, when it has almost 0 upward or downward momentum. The shot then spreads out into a nice vertical line of bubbles, and all 6 bubbles rain down onto the target's head for full damage.
The reason this works so nicely is because the shot had no vertical momentum at the moment it split open. The less momentum the SS has when it opens, the smaller the spread is. The way it spreads is to fan out in the direction the shot is moving... so if it's moving downward, it fans out horizontally (which is bad). If it's moving forward but has no downward momentum, it spreads out vertically (which is good). This might make it clear:
To ensure that the shot opens at its peak, you must figure out how much power to use. The more power you shoot with, the longer the shot is in the air. The correct power, on average, is about 3.8 bars. For close shots (1/2 screen or less) you'd use about 3.7. For far shots (near 1 screen) you'd use 3.9. The maximum power is full, and the maximum range is about 1.4 screens (past that it spreads out too much, and your damage will only be low 300's... it'd be better to just use shot 2). I've heard that with helping wind (upwind and sometimes tailwind) it's possible to hit even further way with the skybomb. For example Chill claims that in 10 upwind, 66 with full power can hit 2 screens away. I still need to confirm this but the theory is that normally these far shots would need more than your maximum power, but upwind reduces the power back to something that you're allowed to shoot with. You'd think the shot spreads too much to be useful, but the trick to it is to allow the shot to open in a diagonal line that closely matches the falling angle of your shot. Then the balls all somehow slide diagonally into them. In such situations the diagonal line happens when the shot opens a bit early, on the way up.
Power controls the airtime of this shot, which means to control the distance of the shot you must choose the correct angle. This is somewhat tricky. In the past, Turtle could fire a test shot using shot 1 or shot 2... and if the test shot hit the target then you knew your SS also would hit.
Then Softnyx changed things... they made it so that after the SS opens, the weight of the shot changes and all the balls fall to earth more quickly than before. That means that the SS sort of changes weight in the middle of the shot. It's the only Gunbound shot that does that. It also means that instead of the shot moving in a perfect parabola, the path of the shot looks a bit lopsided. Since shot 1 and shot 2 move with normal, predictable paths, you cannot tell where the SS is going to land based on what shot 1 or shot 2 did. You will have to memorize the distances and angle for the SS as if it were a completely different shot.
Distance is controlled by your angle, which can be hard to measure. 1 screen is split into 14 parts/angles, and it's not evenly split. There's no simple trick to divide a screen into 14 parts, but the average distance between angles is about 56 pixels. I think that distance increases a little bit as you shoot further, so an 89 shot is 55 pixels from 90, but a 76 shot is ~60 pixels from 77. This is a nearly full power shot, and like full power, it's possible for an enemy to be sitting between 2 different angles, where one angle lands a bit past them, but the next higher angle lands a bit in front of them. An enemy at this distance is in a "blindspot" and the only way to get a nice skybomb on them is to walk turtle forward or backward. You can't really change your power in these situations because it gives the shot bad airtime and your damage will be lower (300's instead of 500-600).
Here's the info you need to know to hit with the skybomb. Sorry if any of these numbers are incorrect. Because the change to skybomb weight is recent, good information isn't available. I recommend memorizing a few basic angles shown in the table below. At least memorize half and 1 screen shots. Then move on to my simplified windchart. After you're confident with both of these, try out the link to Mishigne's skybomb guide at the bottom of this page. This chart was perfect for the old skybomb (like all of Mishi's info) but it may not work as well for the new one with the the changed weight.
First, the skybomb table. The distances given are a combination of my own experience and measurements, test results with noob4life, info from Chill, and pre-calculated numbers from yoyobuae. These won't be pixel perfect but they should be close enough.
| Parts per screen: 14 | ||
| Power levels: 3.67 - 3.91 | ||
| Basic shots: | ||
| Angle | Power | Distance |
| 90 | 3.67 | Hits self |
| 89 | 3.67 | 56 pixels |
| 88 | 3.68 | 112 pixels |
| 87 | 3.68 | 167 pixels |
| 86 | 3.69 | 220 pixels* |
| 85 | 3.7 | 274 pixels* |
| 84 | 3.7 | 328 pixels |
| 83 | 3.72 | 387 (~1/2 SD)* |
| 82 | 3.74 | 446 pixels |
| 81 | 3.77 | 503 pixels |
| 80 | 3.79 | 560 pixels* |
| 79 | 3.82 | 617 pixels* |
| 78 | 3.85 | 676 pixels |
| 77 | 3.88 | 735 pixels |
| 76 | 3.91 | 795 (~1.0 SD)* |
| 75 | 3.94 | ~860 pixels |
| 74 | 3.97 | ~933 pixels |
| 73 | 4.0 | ~1009 pixels |
| 72 | 4.0 | ~1088 pixels* |
* These marked angles are very close to some measurements you've used before for the 2.4 and banpao formulas. They aren't exactly the same distance, but they're close enough. 86 = 20 pixels past 1/4 screen (so if the front of the enemy touches 1/4 SD then you'll hit). 85 is 7 pixels past 1/3 screen. 83 is not quite half screen, it's about 13 pixels short. 80 is 27 pixels past 2/3 screen (so the front of the enemy should be a hair past the 2/3 mark). 79 is 17 pixels past 3/4 screen. 76 is a hair short of 1 screen. 72 is a hair past 1 and 1/3 screens.
So far my most useful markers are the 1/3, 1/2, 2/3, and 1 screen shots. Another somewhat useful measuring trick is to count 1 angle of skybomb as a bit more than 2 angles using the 2.4 (30 part) formula. So an enemy who is about 6 parts from the end of the screen would be about 3 angles higher than your 1 sd skybomb, just keep in mind that they're actually a little less than 3 angles away from the end of the screen (because each skybomb angle is a bit more than 2 out of 30 parts)
Also, even though a true test shot is not possible, you can try using the 3.4 formula shown earlier to give you an idea of where the skybomb will land. That formula uses 15 angles per screen. A skybomb uses 14, so it's pretty close. A more accurate test method might be to use 3.45 for close shots (near half screen) and 3.5 for 1 screen. If there's wind, you would try to adjust your 3.5 'test shot' the exact same way you'd adjust a skybomb, like if the windchart says to add .2 bars, a half screen test shot with shot 1 or 2 should be fired with 3.65 bars, and your halfscreen skybomb would (in theory) use the same angle with 3.92 bars. It's not perfect but it's good if you have a chance to beat the opponent's delay and really have no idea what angle you should use for skybomb. Another tip: at full power, skybombs travel more or less the same distance that nak's shot 1 does (so 77 full would be 1 screen).
Ok... here's my simplified windchart:
Some quick explanation: This chart shows you how to change both angle and power. To make a good skybomb when there's wind, you must change both. Upwind gives a shot more airtime, and you always want the skybomb to open at its peak, so you must decrease power to compensate. Downwind decreases airtime so you must increase power to make sure it 'peaks' later. Opposite wind also decreases airtime and requires adding a little bit of power. However, tailwind does not change airtime and requires no power change. You also don't need to change power if there's opposite wind that's pointing a little bit upward.
The chart's large numbers tell you how to change your angle. This is just like the windcharts you've seen before. The numbers are all pretty easy to work with. Both tailwind and opposite wind have a factor of .53. A simple shortcut is to divide the wind's strength by 2, which would be fine for a wind factor of .5... since this is a little stronger than .5, you will see that tailwind blows the shot a bit further than expected, and opposite wind holds it back a bit more. In small winds (10 and less) this doesn't matter much, the skybomb should still hit. But in medium winds (10-20) the shot will miss by half an angle. You can compensate by walking forward a bit (when dealing with opposite wind) or walking back a bit (when dealing with tailwind). In 20+ wind, just raise or lower 1 more angle, i.e. in 22 tailwind raise 12 angles instead of just 11.
Other shortcuts: The down+forward factor is close enough to Wind/3, so in 12 wind you'd raise 4 angles. The up+back factor is pretty close to Wind/2, it's a bit less though. You'd lower 9 angles in 20 wind instead of 10. The up and down factors are tricky. In vertical wind, you will lower 1 angle for every 15 upwind (so in 26 wind, if you lower 2 angles the shot will fly a bit past your target). In downward wind you raise 1 angle every 20 wind... BUT in downwind you can't skybomb when the wind is stronger than 9 or 10. The shot is forced downward too much if the wind is stronger than that. So in 10 wind just be aware that your shot will land a half angle further than expected, because adding .3 bars of power increases the distance by that much, even with 10 wind forcing it down.
The smaller italic numbers are your power factors. The easiest ones to work with are the upward and downward factors. For every 3 wind strength you should lower .1 bars (upwind) and add .1 bars (downwind). So in 9 wind down, you'd add .3 bars, so a 3.7 bar shot becomes a full power 4.0 bar skybomb. That's why 9-10 wind is considered the max for a skybomb in downwind. Upwind has no max. Since it's .1 bars every 3 wind, you more or less divide wind by 3, then reduce power by .[answer]. For example, in 24 upwind, divide by 3 to get 8. You should reduce power by .8 bars.
The next easy adjustments are for up+towards and down+back, because they mirror each other. Add .15 bars for every 5 wind in down+back wind... so in 10 wind, add .3 bars. For up+toward wind, reduce .15 bars for every 5 wind. So in 25 wind up+towards, you'd reduce a whopping .75 bars (so a 3.7 bar skybomb is only 2.95 bars in this wind).
Down+toward and up+back wind also nearly mirror each other. Reduce .2 bars every 10 wind for up+back wind, and add .2 bars every 9 for down+towards. There's only one thing that makes this a bit confusing: The up+back wind works like upward wind on the shot, so you must reduce power to give it the correct airtime. At the same time, you must lower your angle to make it travel far enough, because you're reducing power so much. Wind pointing straight up is the same way. Downward and down+towards wind both require adding angle, because you'll be increasing power so much that you must raise angle to keep the shot from flying too far.
Lastly, the opposite wind factor, .008, boils down to this: add .1 bars for every 14 wind, so in maximum (26) wind you would add a hair less than .2 bars... so a 2.7 becomes about 2.9 bars in the strongest opposite wind.
If you want lots of detail and even more numbers, here's a link
to Mishi's skybomb info. Please note that these charts
were created before the patch that changed skybomb's weight. The power
change numbers should still be perfect, but the angle change info might not
be. I also replaced the 0-wind angles with my own estimated numbers.
Mishi's skybomb guide