Damage should always cost the same , so if you do 1000 damage with explosives it should be practical and mathematical the same work effort like if you do the damage by orbs, orbs are so cheap and therefore in the end much faster and cheaper to make than explosives.People use orbs over explosives for that reason, it does not matter in wich biome they are living, they rather run to the jungle from Sempermaru to get glands than creating explosive vases.
As said damage cost must be balanced 100%
i think something like letting a tarball cost 75 tar and lowering its drop rate from NPC’s about 90% would do the job.Or maybe remove tarball damage stacking completely? idk , just think about it, because as it is now its mathematical and practicular wrong and makes no sense.