Offtopic, but here’s a weirdo hot take. FS should buff the sh*t out of the bolter’s DMG. Make it so it 1 to 2 taps everything but bosses, can penetrate most cover, and has the dmg at range buff, but no falloff at close range. In exchange nerf the sh#t out of its reload and switch times, slow down it’s ADS animation, but give it accurate enough hipfire that you can noscope with it (insert CoD meme here). Make it so ADS has no zoom and make the iron sight more intrusive (but give it and other guns tritium sights d@mnit). Cut down it’s reserves ammo by 25 to 50%.
Same for the plasma, but it has no cleave dmg falloff (does it, can’t remember). Also, change the sound for both so you get tinnitus after sustained fire, make it feel like you’re truly totting a cannon around, and make you feel like a 1-man crew served weapon with a 9-inch c@ck. Basically, up the skill floor and ceiling for it, make it so being able to dominate with it is a sweatlord flex, but newbs and normies can still live their space marine power fantasies if they have the patience for the quirks of what should essentially feel like hip-firing a high caliber HMG or a Barret 50cal.
Although that sound bit one should apply to everything, not a fan of most weapon sounds, especially on autoguns. There’s just not enough crunch to them. Also, wtf are there no cracks when you’re being shot at?
@Overlord@XeroShinobi
Thanks gents, just watched your videos. If anyone else has gameplay where they’re shining with the Vraks III, I’d love to see it.
Veteran: Confirmed kill, Demo stockpile, Demo team, Unwavering focus, Frag storm, Counterfire/sustained fire, almost exclusively on the auric board.
This is one I threw together using whatever I had lying around for it, and the one I’ve been using to try and get a handle on it. Obviously it’s geared for weak spot killing.
As for the “how to use” video, it acknowledges that it wastes ammo if you don’t actively spread the burst across targets and that you should try to line up multiple headshots in a burst if your skill allows for it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone actually spread headshots across targets with any reliability outside of clinical scenarios in any game. In fact, most games’ burstfire weapons have a much tighter burst because they’re meant to dump a ton of damage into a single target, not spread it across multiple.
It feels like it has some design contradictions, IMO. It has an ammo pool that suggests it should be used on anything, but a damage profile that makes it more suited to being a midrange special/elite killer. Which makes its weakness against maniacs kind of baffling.
This would explain my issues with it, actually. I’ve been using it as it’s used in those videos you guys posted; As a swiss army knife to be used on most things in most situations. Honestly, it sucks at this, both in how it performs and how it feels when you do it. I’ll test this tonight by using it mainly for that midrange anti-elite/special capability and see how it feels.
I’m comparing it primarily to the Columnus II braced ag, the Agripinaa I inf ag and since those are the things I use most of the time and seem to fill similar roles. Probably the Kantrael XII too, since people are saying the Vraks III is good for sniping. Also weapons like the Graia IV braced and the Columnus V infantry ag, which are both firmly middling, but fun to use in the same way that Recon Lasguns are. I’ve been through my bolter phase, now I use stuff that doesn’t turn the game into a point-and-click adventure.
Falter + No Respite makes Headhunter Autoguns heavy hitters with an insanely reliable stagger as long as you can click on heads. No Respite doesn’t explain itself well, but it creates multiple stacks of +20% Damage depending on how staggered your target is.
Also, Headhunter Autoguns are an arguably ammo-efficient weapon. You get a good amount of ammo back from pickups compared to other weapons, as well as from Veteran’s passive 4% ammo return on Specialist kills.
I can’t remember the last time I ever needed to conserve my ammo with a Headhunter on my Veteran. I haven’t used them consistently enough on other operatives to see if that changes by much.
My only criticism is that numbers on the weapon need to be tweaked slightly, especially between variants. The single-shot Headhunter doesn’t even come close to performing as well as the XII Las does, but it’s not the worst and can be quite fun to use.
The Agripinaa (2-shot burst) does consistently worse than the Vraks (3-shot burst).
Most importantly, Headhunters have a base damage multiplier of about 70% against Maniacs, one of the most crucial damage types in the game right now. Their time to kill against Specialists is very poor as a result.
Despite all that, it’s one of my favorite weapons to use.
Deadly Accurate is a misinformative Blessing due to how bonus damage works with weakspots and critical damage.
As an example, the coefficient for bonus damage via a critical hit or a weakspot hit is:
a + (b <crit/weakspot> x c <bonus crit/weakspot damage>)
In the case of Deadly Accurate, it’s only applied if the damage is both a critical hit and a weakspot hit, and for the sake of keeping it simple, I’ll only include the multiplier given by Deadly Accurate. So it’s as follows:
100 damage + 50 weakspot + 25 crit = 175 +50%
100 damage + (50 x 1.5) + (25 x 1.5) = 212.5 total damage with Deadly Accurate
That’s less than a 21.5% increase in your damage versus the “+50%”.
If I were to use the weapon in the above post as an example:
A critical weakspot hit with this weapon, without Deadly Accurate or +10% ranged weakspot damage would be 383.24 damage on a Scab Gunner (Flak, which Headhunter has a high damage multiplier against).
291.26 weakspot, no crit. With +10% bonus weakspot damage, it’s 305.6 (+4.92% bonus damage in reality).
Without either on a weakspot crit, it’s 383.24. 406.23 with +10% (6% increase).
With Deadly Accurate, it goes from 406.23 to 521.20 for a theoretical total of +60% bonus damage.
But it’s actually only a 28.3% increase.
You can find these numbers here on the Darktide breakpoint calculator. Use damage_mode: raw after setting up your weapon.
They have a variety of crit-based Blessings but to my knowledge, Headhunters have no high innate crit chance. It’s not the worst build, but with the heavy-handed nerf to Crucian Roulette, it’s no longer that viable of an option.
That being said, I believe crits on the burst rifles only check if the first bullet crits, then applies the crit to the 1 or 2 other shots in the burst, depending on the variant. Headhunters are one of the few weapons that get high value out of critting.
As a slight tangent, before Crucian Roulette got hard-nerfed, my average crit-rate was only about 24.5% by mid-empty mag with the +5% crit chance perk after rigorous testing in the Meat Grinder.
This also confirmed that in the magazine, Crucian Roulette only counts each burst as 1 bullet, so 3 rounds in the magazine is only counted as 1; 2 as 1 if it’s the Agripinaa.
If I did another test now, it would very likely be pitifully low if that logic still applies.
I’ve had pretty bad experience with burstfire performance as well. The initial feel isn’t exactly a great first impression either, feels like a niche acquired taste kind of weapon, like the gun equivalent of the shovel
Cool! You run the same feats I run when I play with the Mk3 or a lasgun. I do enjoy the grenadier lifestyle too. If the planets align and I have good latency I sometimes run a deadshot build too, but thats for my Agrip Mk1 collection. Here’s some of my favorite builds for the Mk3:
The 531 is the one I usually use, followed by the 543. The 528 feels real good though, I made it yesterday, and I’m still mucking around with it. See below for a sample of my latest 4 games (Auric) from yesterday, and yes only 1 had good latency, you can prob guess which one. They were all with either 528 or 531 if I’m not misremembering. Can’t record without setting my room on fire so this is the the next best thing I can do. Otherwise, I can just DM you my tag and we can run a few games together next weekend and you can see for yourself.
Also, you fell for what I like to call the "50% Trap"™. Initially I did as well, it almost made me drop it too. Simpliv did a better job explaining why than I ever could have (though I’m not a fan of the falter build, but it works). The magic of No Respite is that you can reliably proc it even without Falter or Opening Salvo, it’s a must have in most if not all Mk3 builds. Drop deadly accurate, also drop the 10% weak spot dmg (didn’t keep mine willingly), and use either maniac, flak or unarmored on it. Weak spot builds just don’t work on it. Center of mass is the way to go with this girl. I spent waaaaay too much cash and plasteel finding that one out.
Also don’t underestimate how much latency can affect the feel of your weapon’s dmg. I literally made a post about noreg issues likely influencing the individual rounds because when it gets bad enough it feels like I’m mag dumping to kill a single special. It also constantly tries to gaslight me into dropping my deadshot build (F U TOO FS).
Wasn’t a knock on you, like I noted on the same post, I only said that for the sake of clarity.
If by that you mean “I traded out a bad L2 blessing for the least-bad alternative I had”, then yes
I wasn’t kidding when I said I threw that one together with what I had lying around. I have put zero effort into curating a blessing pool for this gun.
Honestly I feel like it wouldn’t make a hell of a lot of difference with better blessings, though that’s probably just inexperience talking. Outside of ragers and ogryns, most elites/specials within falloff range seem to go down to a single burst to the head with that weapon I posted.
I should be clear that it’s not the damage output that I’m complaining about, it’s the method of applying it that’s throwing me off. The gun forces too many restrictions on my flow, if that makes sense.
One thing I did notice is that in a lot of the footage I’ve seen of people doing OK with it, they’re using a mod that keeps the crosshairs visible even when ADS’d. The sights on the gun model are atrocious IMO. Up there with the worst in the game. I wonder if using that mod would help change my mind.
The mod is excellent. I use it everydays with the mod perspective (3rd person view) to get the crosshair (as a chevron) for the melee weapons. But I also use it for plasma gun to get the crosshair.
It can solves problems with ironsights.
Based on my experience, and testing it does, it reaaaally does. Like I noted @simpliv did a better job at explaining why. If you can at least get no respite 3 on it plus anti special or maniac along with your infested you can make a decent DMR out of your Mk3 to carry you through T5 STG, and maelstrom. But this is all on the DPS and performance front of things. If you just feel like it forces you to slow down, my offer to show and tell, so-to say, stands.
Otherwise, if you just don’t like the feel, and handling then that’s just a matter of taste. There is nothing I or any other Mk3 cultists could do or say short of strapping you to a chair and using a car battery or a bucket of water and a rag that will likely change your mind. And that’s fine? No need to force it.
On mods, I do run the 3rd Person plus perspective mods. I also recently put holosights on it with the custom weapons mod. Finally I changed its audio to that of the revolver with the sound mod. Basically one of the few that sounds like an actual gun. Lol. It feels amazing to me with this set up, although I was still getting numbers like what I showed in the screenshot before getting mods.
I’d definitely agree in general. But on Vet, staying lined up with lots of heads is very easy to do during Volley Fire. Falter is probably overkill in general, but I find it extremely useful against enemies like Reapers.
You could easily substitute it for another damage Blessing at that point.
Overall the Headhunter Autoguns are slight underperformers and thus need all they can get to do decently in Damnation. I don’t really have any consistent experience with them on any operative but my Veteran so my interest in them is very biased for now.
I also forgot to point out that they’re also solid hip-fire weapons.
We had a discussion a few months back in this post by our very own @simpliv about this exact issue that I thought was pretty productive:
Give it a read if you like, but the main takeaways were:
Advantages
One of the best anti-flak / anti-scab weapons in the game
Very good, reliable anti-shooter weapon overall
Accurate and controllable hip-fire, especially during volley Fire
Decent overall usability and ammo economy
Disadvantages
Very, very poor maniac damage and hit-mass penetration
Lower overall damage potential against other non-flak armour types than comparable weapons
Difficult to meet specific breakpoints without a “god-roll” (especially on the Vraks VII)
Overall a bit underwhelming before class abilities that give more power / accuracy
Both the Vraks III and VII are decent Veteran and presumably Psyker weapons, while really only the Vraks III is useable for Zealot. The Agripinaa is currently just.. not worth using for a few reasons.
In that thread, I broke them down as such:
Vraks VII Single Shot: High Damage per Shot, Moderate DPS, Moderate Stagger. The ultimate anti-infantry and anti-shooter.
Suggestion: Increase Unarmoured damage by 7%-9%, and boost crit/headshot damage to Carapace.
Vraks III 3 Round Burst: Moderate Damage per Shot, High DPS, Low Stagger. The comfortable to use generalist.
Suggestion: Slightly increase total ammo pool to improve reliability and make up for it being more ammo hungry than its cousins.
Agripinna IX 2 Round Burst: High Damage per Shot, Moderate DPS, High Stagger. The elite/specialist hunter.
Suggestion: Give the weapon more of an identity by drastically increasing stagger values and further increase it’s damage against Maniac, Carapace, or both.
The rational for why can be seen in the thread itself. It’s worth noting that I had a personal bias towards using the Vraks VII on Veteran at the time, so it has the more crunchy suggestions. I’ve since rolled a few decent Vraks III’s and tried both weapons out on Zealot as well, but in that thread the suggestions for the other weapons was based on others’ feedback.
Improving their ability to deal with Unyielding and Maniacs would better allow them to handle the new, higher difficulties in the game while not making them better or worse vs. comparable guns, allowing it to maintain it’s identity as an anti-flak specialist. I, at least, can no longer justify bringing these to anything with increased specials.
A slight boost to unarmoured would help the underperforming variants meet some breakpoints and solidify the weapon’s primary role as the king of the anti-shooters. I think it’s more than fine for it to be bad against hordes and carapace.
Yeah, that fits with my feeling that it’s more of an anti-elite/special than a generalist like the others I’m comparing it to.
I’m pretty convinced now that the terrible sights are a big reason I don’t like it.
Anything that forces me to release ADS to acquire a new target because the model blocks everything around what I’m looking at is just bad. The ADS/release animations are too slow in this game to lock you the way they do. The other small autoguns are way better in that regard.
There’s also this itch in my brain that forces me to wait for the slooooow burst to finish before moving to a new target, because if the current target moves and it doesn’t die because some of the burst missed, then I have to waste more time and probably ammo on the next burst to kill it.
I agree that ADS FOV for it is ass (you described partly why). If you’re not interested in using the custom weapons mod, switch to some of the free skins for it, the ADS on them is less obstructive if I’m not misremembering. Also, the target acquisition on ADS for it feels slower because the extra zoom plus restricted view slows you down as though you’re using a scope.
Switching in and out of ADS to acquire targets is actually best practice unless you have a mouse sensitivity macro set up. Although I’ve seen some mlg types do both. Once you get the hang of it you can clear groups of enemies insanely fast. You can also do small “u” swings when servicing clustered targets (1 to 3m spacing) while in ADS. This is another way you can speed up your target acquisition. Both of the noted techniques work great on all weapons btw, not just the MkIII. Once you get the hang of em they’ll make you feel like a badass, especially once randos start accusing you of running an aimbot, lol.
Pedantry notwithstanding, the reason I call it a DMR and not a sniper rifle is because of how good it is at flexing between near and far shooting. Especially in firefights. Now stuff like the XII and helbore III, those are sniper rifles in handling.
But if you want a proper battlerifle, which is the vibe im getting from you, stick to the Agripinaa MkI infantry gun. If you use sniper + deadshot + sustained fire feats on it with an anti special/maniac build you can do some brutal, boltgun tier, wave wipes with it on auric STG and maelstrom.
Overall I think you’re just not into the feel of the gun. That’s fine, I’d say stick to the MkI if the MkIII feels too slow even after applying some of the tips above. The Mk1 is a better special killer in my experience anyways.
Crucian still “feels” good, I never said otherwise. Personally i feel it’s viable even. But so is surgical, and smarter people than me on here and elsewhere have pretty clearly shown that it just isn’t competitive anymore after crunching the numbers post nerf.
So unless you’ve got anything other than “nU-uH”, this is the last response you’re getting out of me.
I’ve installed the custom crosshair mod, but it hasn’t made much of a difference thanks to the bunk weapon model. I’ll try one of the free skins, thanks for the tip.
Yeah, this too. It feels really off given that there isn’t actually a scope.
I agree that switching in and out of ADS is often the way to go, but as I said, the way ADS works in this game doesn’t agree with me. It’s way too slow to be something you’re using all the time.
I’ll definitely try out the U trick, thanks! That’s not something I’ve had to use before. It’s probably applicable to other weapons with garbo sights, like the helbore.
You might be right. Slow animation for a constantly-used ads that zooms in a bunch (because reasons?), slow firerate and bursts that are prone to wasting ammo, bunk default weapon model. If it wasn’t for those things I’d probably think it’s a beast.
