Yes mate. I’ve a plethora of high end shotguns on zealot (where I first used them after the flamer balance) and latterly veteran, all with full bore + a.n.other damage based blessing, and ADS headshots to the best of my ability.
ADS - no issues with damage. It’s when I hip fire that there are oddities. Not in the meat grinder, but certainly in live games. I have considered that I experience what is referred to as the hit reg bug. Could well be. Just is noticeable more on grounded targets for me.
I see that Shotguns should have 2 Ammo types at once.
Holding down Special key will keep loading special ammo type, or holding reload button would load special ammo, while pressing reload button will load normal ammo.
Whenever picking ammo you gain both special and normal ammo.
You want to load 12 Flame rounds go ahead burn those heretics with those shells, also it would make it better as you would stack up burning damage, same goes for normal variant (the horizantal shot) want to duck hunt? go ahead.
also it would free up (pressing Special button) to bash. why make a shooter-slash game with no shotgun bash.
Wasn’t trying to be rude or anything, just I remeber I played an Auric mission with a Vet complaining that the Agrip shotty sucked, and he wasn’t running either of those so I wanted to make sure.
Than yeah I don’t think it is an issue intrinsic to the Agrip, just FS games being janky as hell. I haven’t experienced that yet althought I haven’t been using the Agrip a ton recently, need to get some more games in with it.
It might be better, but playing a brawler vet with Kantrael shotgun is so much fun.
After playing around with shotguns a bit post patch 14 honestly Kantrael is my favourite and it’s not close. It’s normal fire just does so so much damage. The fire shot is still nice utility for groups of bulwarks or for the really high stagger, that can bring a dead stop to a group of approaching Ragers.
I am straight in love with Kantrael shotty on my power sword melee Vet. Lackluster is the furthest possible word I would use to describe it. For the job of very quickly and reliably removing several approaching threats I’ll take it over the Agrip and Lawbringer every day of the week.
I took the Lawbringer specialized for boosting its duckbill shot damage and horde clear, and I recorded myself on those two runs. I display some truly embarrassing instances of amateur play in these runs (I went to a wedding last night so I woke up feeling pretty drained the morning I recorded these runs) so apologies in advance for that, but I’m hoping these runs will showcase how the Memebringer might be utilized in a regular game.
All runs were on Regular Damnation with pubbies. I’m not confident of this weapon’s chances on Hi Intensity Shock Gauntlet Damnation or Auric Maelstrom yet.
More than viable for regular Damnation. You will not be a hindrance to your team for bringing it, though it’s still not exactly a meta weapon.
It is difficult to find good opportunities to really unload duckbill shot after duckbill shot into a horde, but when you do get one you can really clean them up.
The ADS shots aren’t the best, but still more than sufficient to snipe Specialists in a horde. That said, it’s not terrifically ammo efficient at doing so, either. I worry that on a Hi5Shock or Auric Maelstrom run, you will very quickly run out of ammo just from all the Specialists you’ll have to shoot.
Man Stopper synergizes well with crit-fishing builds.
Where it struggles the most is hordes of Ragers, particularly Scab Ragers whose flak armor will resist your shotgun shots. If your melee weapon can’t solo that pack of Ragers (like my knife), then you are doomed unless your teammates are nearby to support. It’s also not going to be very useful against Crusher and Mauler walls.
It is a surprisingly useful hipfire weapon when charging Gunners. The Impact of the hipfire at close range is usually enough to knock a Gunner out of its firing animation, and you can shoot it quickly enough to knock around squads of clustered-up gunners enough to keep them from hosing you with fire. Of course, it’s not going to be nearly as useful if the Gunners are far away.
Engaging spread-out enemy Shooters with the Memebringer is a bit tricky, in my experience. It’s not the most efficient at it, since you still can only really kill 1 Shooter per unit of ammo and you still aren’t exactly drowning in ammunition. IMO if a Zealot in particular tries to clear out rooms full of Shooters with it, they will likely be running low on ammo constantly. I think the Agripinaa slug shotgun would be much more suited for engaging Shooters at a distance than the Memebringer (or Lawbringers in general). That said, it can still do good damage against Shooters at close-medium range if you ADS.
While there is some role overlap between the Memebringer and horde-clearing melee weapons like the Crusher, I still found that they complimented each other well enough. The duckbill shots–where you have the opportunity to do so–can clear out hordes quite well, which can help trigger Fury faster if the enemies are close enough to you. Meanwhile, the Memebringer’s ADS shots are sufficient to manage Specialists provided that there aren’t like 2 Trappers, 3 Flamers, and a Dog on you at the same time. The Crusher, meanwhile, can handle melee Elites, while also giving you another ammo-free option against hordes. It would be risky, however, to bring a Lawbringer alongside a melee weapon that struggles badly against melee elites, since the Lawbringer isn’t much use against them–on an unrecorded run, my Knife-Stealth build got obliterated when 12 Scab Ragers bore down on us and we all got separated.
On Regular Damnation, I didn’t find ammo to be a major issue unless, for some reason, I kept being pressed to use the Lawbringer on many targets.
Once I get more practice in with the Memebringer (and maybe on a day when I’m less fatigued), I might bring it to a Hi5Shock and see how that goes. Not well, I’d guess, but I think I’ve at least demonstrated that the Memebringer can definitely contribute to a Regular Damnation run.
(Unrelated: I feel like the game kept dropping my inputs especially on my recorded Crusher run. If you see me randomly holding up block or ADSing into the face of a Poxwalker horde, it’s probably due to input issues.)
Yeah this is the best true shotgun, as in delivering the chunk in very close range. The damage drop off distance is an easy trade to make. And it can still do boss damage like a flamethrower, but with much easier dodge dancing.
The Agrip I wouldn’t even bother with over Revolver anymore, seriously why did they buff it again. I guess you can’t be suppressed with it unlike the revolver, but everything (and everything directly behind them) dies so fast to the cowboy gun that usually isn’t a problem.
Lawbringer still has the same issue as before - confusingly poor secondary shot, and a not so good damage model vs Kantrael. You’re supposed to fight more outside CQB, similarly to an Mk5 Ripper, but without the reserves to bother with. It is still hot garbage to me.
But Kantrael shotgun absolutely is dunking atm, though it is probably being carried by Annointed in Blood on Zealot.
This is where the norespite, maniacs and full bore combo really shines on the lawbringer. The memebringer suffers conceptually because its normal shots become so weak in favor of the special shell being just ok comapred to…a flamer for example.
I’m pretty much in agreement. While a Lawbringer’s ability to ADS means it can at least snapshot a Special or two unlike a Flamer, relying heavily on the duckbill shot basically just turns it into a ballistic Flamer. Which is cool and fun, but not exactly the best ranged weapon out there.
Meanwhile, a Full Bore-No Respite Lawbringer would definitely be a lot more useful on harder difficulties…but if I’m using a shotgun to snipe specials, I think I’d rather just bring my Agripinaa (which also uses Full Bore-No Respite) or Kantrael shotguns.
So, in conclusion: if you want to have some fun with the Lawbringer’s duckbill shot, there is definitely a way to build it, but memery aside you’re better off using a different build.
The one advantage this weapon has over others is being able bith ADS snapshot specials and clear hordes. Its a good pairing for a hammer. Otherwise i struggle to find value for it. Right now, too, a lot of melee weapons don’t really have the horde weakness they used to. Hammers partially included. This may change but right now its really only a good pairing in that niche case or because you like the weapon. Otherwise yeah, the agripinaa is better.
using up roughly 15% of your ammo reserve to clear a single trash horde isn’t selling me on its effectiveness. Use it on a stack of ragers and see if it does anything worthwhile.
For funsies, I did a quick video of the Memebringer shotgun in the Psykanium. This is basically what the gun will look like in its best use-case scenario. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0-aXa0RiC4
Is it good? Absolutely not. But it’s good enough to farm plasteel with on Regular Damnation, and watching the duckbill shot actually do things is funny.
Can’t say I really agree. I would have fired about as much ammo out of my flamer - 17% vs 12% of my shotgun. For the same effect. Keep in mind I’m not saying this is an extremely good solution, its an adequate one when your melee weapon (like the ironhelm) is not especially good at quick horde clear. The weapon also is able to reach out and touch shooters and specialists at reasonable distances on a quick draw weapon. The combination of these two things is pretty rare in the game. Ammo efficient, reasonably effective shooter clear, effective specialist 1taps. So its a good pairing weapon. I don’t run it on most of my loadouts but with a hammer it has a niche as a multi-tool that is better than other competitors.