Pistol Stalker Zer0 and Optics, Precision, Velocity and TwoFang

Borderlands 2 Zer0 the Assassin
#1

Been curious about this…how these skills might effect a Pistol Stalking Zero with a Sheriff’s Badge and HUGE FR.

So I spent the afternoon testing…a quick caveat before we get started. I’m no scientist and I am absolutely positive (if I remember my High School science teacher correctly)…that I DO NOT have a large enough sample to really conclude anything. So take this all with a grain of salt…YMMV. And I take no offense if you disagree or point out things that your experience is totally different.

I used three different guns kind of wildly different…DPUH, Lil Evie and an Infinity. I also tested at the exact same range on the exact same wall about 25 yards/meters which from my Army days the Sergeants training us said was max effective range for a pistol. Probably game true as well. I shot both in open sights free hand and ADS.

General Conclusions:

  1. Effects seemed to respond differently to each weapon and while no surprise here, it was kind of a surprised that a weapon like the Lil Evie seemed to show NO discernible response or improvement to anything except TwoFang.

  2. Optics seemed to only very slightly affect positive accuracy (but of course I wasn’t taking damage at the time like the skill says.)

  3. Precision adjusted the up/down vertical pattern of fire ever so slightly. When looking at the pics and measuring, I say it was close to the 25% a 5/5 spec would give you.

  4. Velocity adjusted the side to side verticle pattern of the fire slightly at 5/5 squeezing it in a bit…again, I’d guess around 25%…similar to Precision

  5. Two Fang was strange in the fact that while it made the Lil Evie jump around a bit more, it seemed to TIGHTEN the fire from a DPUH while not seeming to affect the Infinity at all.

  6. Two Fang…at 5/5 sped up the converted FR (after additions of the Stalker Mod and Sheriff’s Badge) from an average of 14.0 to 19.0 on a DPUH…that’s 19 rounds a second folks…from a VERY powerful gun! A DPUH would empty it’s entire Mag in less than 1.5 seconds. Now I have never understood the business about FR Break Points in this game…and the difference between PC’s and consoles in this regard… but I can tell you that 1.5 seconds to empty a DPUH is FAST. Other Weapons also showed a NICE improvement. With a Stalker mod, you give up some survivability but for a QUICK takedown of a big enemy…I think it has merit…especially if you are not going to go down the Cunning tree farther than B0re.

Final, unscientific Conclusions/Impressions for these skills with a Pistol Stalker Zer0:

Optics…Meh
Precision…Meh (Maybe only for a specific weapon like a Kitten or an Infinity)
Velocity…Meh…and it screws with a Lyuda big time which I hate
TwoFang :heart::heart::heart: If you can afford the points!

The "Kitchen Sink" Build....Yes....I want it ALL!--UPDATED!
#2

If you are using a weapon that is very nearly already precise you won’t see much of an improvement. Additionally DPUH and Infinity have a roughly fixed spread. You could mod yourself into an Accuracy of 1000% and see little difference over 50%, BUT you could get a strong scope on the DPUH and see a tighter pattern when aiming down the sight.

#3

Good info…I got to thinking and with this mod…and a run and jump all over the place FAST type of playstyle.

Just how much actual accuracy is going to make any kind of difference. Because your engagement ranges are so VERY close

More bullets coming from your pistols with increased FR = YES

Actual pin point accuracy or tightness of spread = NO

Agree on ADS tightening stuff.

But I got to thinking how many times I have ADS doing the two DLCs I have run as a Pistol Stalker Zer0 and I can’t remember a time when I did it.

Snipers…yep…pistols…nope.

#4

I use this on my Run & Gun Zer0. It is part of my playstyle to pull the Aim trigger and fire trigger almost simultaneously (xbox 360). I find I get better kills due to more DPUH shots connecting.

#5

Respect to you sir…

I simply don’t have the reaction time anymore.

40 years ago…yes…

Now…hmmmmmm

But I’m still damn good on a real pistol range at 25 yards if I say so myself…

.45s…9’s…etc…Favorite is a Walther PPQ Q5 Match Pistol in 9mm with a Trijicon RMR Red Dot…and the sweetest, smoothest trigger pull. Oh my…best pistol I’ve ever owned. Well…that and my Service Colt .45.

Sorry…got off topic…

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#6

Lol, I understand.

I like 45s, I can get a fair accuracy with them for someone who rarely shoots. I used to be a great shot with a longarm.

#7

Just curious, what system do you play on.

#8

I’m on the PC

#9

Ah, I’ve never been coordinated enough to game well on the PC, too much stuff everywhere… Do you use mouse & keyboard or a Game pad?

#10

I have a totally Hybrid setup that works well for me.

In my left hand I hold a Razor Wildcat Gamepad and I only use the left side of the controller for:
Movement (with the Joystick)
Crouch
Jump
Sprint
Use
Reload
Grenades

In my right hand I use a Logitech G700, 9 button Gaming Mouse which controls
Fire
ADS/Scope
Another Reload button
Weapon swap with the mousewheel
Action Skill
Melee
Map
Inventory
Escape Key

I map the controller to do keyboard commands using a little $10 program called Xpadder.

I RARELY touch the keyboard itself.

Sounds complicated but its easy to set up and sooooo intuitive, at least to me.

#11

Interesting!

Hey, if it works for you, more power to you!

#12

[quote=“johnrr6, post:1, topic:1555525”]Optics seemed to only very slightly affect positive accuracy (but of course I wasn’t taking damage at the time like the skill says.)[/quote]0ptics is nice for very long distance shooting, and I think you’d notice Precisi0n more with weapons that come with a fair amount of inaccuracy. I might put a single point into Precisi0n just so a Legendary Sniper COM can hit it if I’m built like that, but I otherwise rarely use it.

Vel0city’s buffs to both base and crit damage are, for me, worth the price of the bullet speed with all but a very few weapons. With the Lyuda, the bullet split happens right out of the barrel, so Vel0city should keep those three shots closer together further downwind? As in, if you’re shooting at a target such that the center shot hits while the other two rounds go wide, Vel0city should let all three rounds hit the target from the same distance? I have never really tried to get all three shots on target (that’s generally too close range for me to be playing with a sniper rifle), so haven’t really noticed/cared if it works or not.

I agree about Tw0 Fang when I want a higher fire rate though.

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#13

Agree but remember I am really only talking about these skills when combined with a Stalker/Pistol Build.

With the idea that perhaps they would help/tighten the grouping of shots from the fire hose your pistols become with that mod.

To take more advantage of Zer0’s excellent Crit bonuses.

And I basically did not find that to be the case…at least at the engagement ranges that I would use.

With Snipers and a sniper type build I’d imagine it is a different story but I’d have to do some testing before I’d commit one way or another.

The Lyuda…well I have it in my head for some reason that velocity WIDENED the bullet spread. But what you say makes perfect sense and I probably have it totally backwards. I will test it but I believe you are totally right.

Question: If I want to get to Critical Ascension, do you think Velocity is a better use of points then At One With The Gun?? I like the bigger mag size and reload of it more then what seems to me a paltry 10% gun damage and 15% Crit bonus.

#14

I do, but I don’t think many people share this sentiment (I see many of them using sniper rifles like assault rifles). Here’s why:

  • I always reload after firing the first shot to keep 0ne Sh0t, 0ne Kill on deck, so don’t care how deep the magazine is (and Killer gives me enough reload speed that I’m not concerned with the reload speed buff).

  • I always aim down the sights with sniper rifles (both because I use them at range and for a few stacks of Kill C0nfirmed), so the hip fire accuracy doesn’t do anything for me.

  • While the base/crit damage bonuses are individually slight, together they’re not bad (and many of my favorite COMs hit Vel0city, so I’m getting more than that out of it), plus the bullet acceleration is wonderful. I think much of the general avoidance of Vel0city comes from the fact that everyone is using the Pimpernel based on builds/advice that shun it (as opposed to learning to account for the shot difference and not maxing it out (which will remove the ability of the Pimpernel to get those fountain head crits)). Neither of my Assassins use the Pimpernel outside of the occasional weapon exchanges I do, so I haven’t cared.

  • If you’re rocking the DPUH, Vel0city should similarly keep the spread slightly tighter further downwind? (Neither of my Assassins use that pistol either, but I’m down to let them borrow it to confirm). How much harder does a DPUH hit if more of the shots in the spread are on target? Off to Pandora to test!

edit - from the distance shown, here is the difference in grouping between no Vel0city (below) and +10 (above) after unloading an entire magazine (unscoped). In practice, it probably depends on how far away you are in general from your targets. If you use it at very close range, this may be detrimental since you may be hitting targets before all the extra shots split off. I’ll try this with a Lyuda and Infinity here next.

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spread.jpg2560×1440 1.42 MB



2nd edit - Interesting that it does not help the Infinity (or not… probably doesn’t affect weapons with dedicated spreads like the Kitten or Lascaux, although the bullets do travel faster).

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infinity.jpg2560×1440 1.27 MB


3rd edit - It does tighten the Lyuda spread (this was scoped fire). Closer than this, and the bullets haven't really split (with Vel0city). Further than this, the spread just gets worse. When using sniper rifles, I'm rarely this close to the enemy, so those extra wide shots haven't been useful for me in practice.

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lyuda.jpg2560×1440 1.34 MB

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#15

I agree with @Adabiviak for all the reasons he mentioned but here are some more.

  • CA REQUIRES you to get a critical. While At One With The Gun makes Accuracy better with hip shots, you are playing Pistol Stalker style, you probably won’t be taking a sniper into close quarters confrontation often. This means that you are probably doing ranged sniping, and thus losing that bonus.

  • Vel0city Increases the following:

    • Bullet Speed - Helps score better on moving targets (and helps your DPUH by speeding up the projectiles)
    • +10% Gun Damage - Your Shots have more effect (again, effects ALL guns)
    • +15% Critical Damage - This Stacks with the aforementioned gun damage and, since you are trying to score criticals, makes your shots vastly more effective. (Still effects ALL guns)

At One With The Gun is a niche skill, and great if you will be playing through using a sniper as your primary, but other than that it is best avoided.

@Adabiviak You should do a comparison of the DPUH: Plain, Plain & Scoped, Vel0city, Vel0city and Scoped. I use Vel0city and Scoped and I find I get a very tight group at a good range.
As for the Infinity, the grouping does look a tad tighter, but you are right, with everything I have ever tried there is a fixed spread (except for Anarchy, but that is a different bag of apples).

#16

All excellent points.

Engagement Range is a HUGE consideration for Pistol Fire…What I use may not be the best for someone else.

I ran my comparisons at about 25 yards/meters which is what my old Army brain says is max effective range.

At that specific distance…on the three pistols I tested…for the most part…What I found was:

Velocity tightened the horizontal spread…slightly
Precision tightened the vertical spread…slightly
Optics didn’t seem to do anything

Again…this was just on three pistols at 25 yards

Goal was to see if they had any value to the Stalker mod for a pistol wielding Zero.

I ESPECIALLY was curious to see if the DPUH would tighten up enough to take better advantage of Zer0’s crit bonuses.

Conclusion was: 5/5 specs in those skills for rhe Stalker mod, and for most people’s max engagement range they did not alter performance enough to warrant the points.

Buuuuut…I could be wrong…LOL Hell, I probably AM wrong. Axton, I know…this new guy…not so much. But I’m having great fun learning.

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#17

I’d just pass on CA if you are going for a pistol build.

Precicion doesn’t really affect stuff with a pre-determined pattern / spread. It’s more noticable on stuff like shotguns where you’ll notice their spread gets smaller. Spray & pray kind of weapons also start spraying a bit more towards where you are aiming making their dispersion less wild.

Velocity helps accuracy in a sense, since a lot of guns have their spread tied to how long the bullet has been in the air. That’s why it also helps predetermined patterns. I’m not sure I can explain it properly but it affects the speed the bullet goes forward but does not affect the speed it disperses / spreads out. Or something like that anyway. It’s a greatly beneficial skill for some weapons while it totally butchers some others. I put no points in it since Pimpernel is my main gun with Zer0 and if I decide to throw a leg. sniper COM on even 1 point will destroy the Pimpernel. I’ve tried SMG (Bitch) and revolver (Maggie) Zer0 builds in the past and it was great for those but I pass the skill these days because I’m a sucker for Pimpernel action. Velocity is great with DPUH.

Back to the whole CA, Vel0city and AOWTG question: If you aren’t sniping a whole bunch CA is not really worth it IMO. I use it on my build (sniper-melee hybrid) but I’m also aiming to holding a sniper as much as I possibly can so if it starts building I get the benefits all the way. IMO it’s hard to get value out of CA if you are only aiming to snipe at long ranges. I use my Pimpernels at all ranges so it can get pretty good value every now and then which saves me bullets and takes enemies out faster.

If you like Lyuda then it might be worth the point and I’d recommend Velocity to go with the rest of your build. That’s not really good for hipfiring even with AOWTG and it’s most efficient range gets pushed a little further. The mag tends to be big enough if you aren’t into total min-maxing. The biggest loss in passing AOWTG with Lyuda is the reload buff, which is pretty huge. If you are going to try Pimpernel, I’d pass Velocity. From my experience 1 or 2 points is workable but makes it a lot more situational (skags, bandits crouching slightly sideways etc…).

If you are using some more regularly behaving sniper you might actually want to consider taking points out of One shot, one kill to get both Velocity and AOWTG (at least a couple of points). This is again pretty dependant on what else you are running, I’d imagine. DPUH with Vel0city getting more crit hits with OSOK is pretty big damage for your opening shot.

Just some thoughts. This ended up being such a wall of text that I’m not sure I got any of my points through, heh.

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#18

Great response. Thank you.

And you have just pointed out a Flaw in a build I just posted elsewhere,

Pimp and Velocity…

#19

Heh, Yeah, I answered in terms of having Critical Ascension. In a Pistol build it isn’t even worth much.

My “Run & Gun” build
http://bl2skills.com/assassin.html#505451550050055105510550000000

#20

I used to manage a gun shop. Had a first generation PPQ in 9mm. Great trigger, and I’ll always favor that mag drop lever. Had to cut back on the number of guns, so that was the last cut. Down to an M&P Shield in 9mm and a G19 Gen 4 with OEM beavertail backstraps and Trijicon night sights. Not letting these go.

Sorry to derail.

Sooooo… yay for Zero!

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