[Guide] Community Pet Guide (WIP)

Borderlands 3 FL4K the Beastmaster
#1

Starting this thread with the idea that us FL4K players can collectively put together a resource that gives info on each of the pets and how to make the most out of them. I modeled this after the old BL2 COM guides and it’s been about five years since those were made so there’s a good chance these could be worded better.

This is meant to be a community effort so please submit info for this guide!

Jabber

(general info)

Jabber Sidekick

(star rating)

Requires no skill points to unlock

FL4K is joined by a loyal Jabber companion, armed with a Pistol. While accompanied by the Jabber, FL4K’s Movement Speed is increased.

  • Attack Command: The Jabber throws a Radiation Barrel at enemies.
  • Passive Bonus: +5.0% Movement Speed

(info)

Great in:

Beefcake Jabber

(star rating)

Requires 10 skill points invested in Stalker to unlock

FL4K’s Jabber evolves into a Beefcake, discarding its pistol and equipping a Shotgun. While accompanied by the Beefcake, FL4K gains increased Movement Speed and Maximum Health.

  • Attack Command: The Beefcake summons a melee weapon to deliver a powerful attack that knocks enemies back.
  • Passive Bonus: +5.0% Movement Speed, +10.0% Max Health

(info)

Great in:

Gunslinger Jabber

(star rating)

Requires 15 skill points invested in Stalker to unlock

FL4K’s Jabber upgrades his gear and equips an SMG. While accompanied by the Gunslinger, FL4K gains increased Movement Speed and Critical Hit Damage.

  • Attack Command: The Gunslinger equips a Rocket Launcher to attack the target.
  • Passive Bonus: +5.0% Movement Speed, +5.0% Critical Hit Damage

(info)

Great in:

Skag

(general info)

Guard Skag

(star rating)

Requires no skill points to unlock

FL4K is joined by a loyal Skag companion, which will increase FL4K’s Damage.

  • Attack Command: The Skag vomits acid onto enemies.
  • Passive Bonus: +5.0% Damage

(info)

Great in:

Great Horned Skag

(star rating)

Requires 10 skill points invested in Master to unlock

FL4K’s Skag evolves into a larger, Great Horned Skag which will increase FL4K’s Damage and Gun Damage.

  • Attack Command: The Great Horned Skag charges at enemies and knocks them into the air.
  • Passive Bonus: +5.0% Damage, +10.0% Gun Damage

(info)

Great in:

Eridian Skag

(star rating)

Requires 15 skill points invested in Master to unlock

FL4K’s Skag evolves into an Eridian Skag, which will increase FL4K’s Damage and Fire Rate.

  • Attack Command: The Eridian Skag pulls nearby enemies in by generating a Singularity.
  • Passive Bonus: +5.0% Damage, +5.0% Fire Rate

(info)

Great in:

Spiderant

(general info)

Spiderant Centurion

(star rating)

Requires no skill points to unlock

FL4K is joined by a loyal Spiderant companion, which will cause FL4K to constantly regenerate health.

  • Attack Command: The Spiderant charges into enemies.
  • Passive Bonus: Regenerates +1.0% of Max Health/sec

(info)

Great in:

Spiderant Scorcher

(star rating)

Requires 10 skill points invested in Hunter to unlock

FL4K’s Spiderant evolves into a Scorcher, occasionally dealing Incendiary Damage to all enemies nearby. While accompanied by the Scorcher, FL4K constantly regenerates health and deals increased Elemental Damage.

  • Attack Command: The Scorcher charges enemies.
  • Passive Bonus: Regenerates +1.0% of Max Health/sec, +10.0% Elemental Damage

(info)

Great in:

Spiderant Countess

(star rating)

Requires 15 skill points invested in Hunter to unlock

FL4K’s Spiderant evolves into a Countess, which will cause FL4K to constantly regenerate health and gain Damage Reduction.

  • Attack Command: The Countess burrows underground and then emerges dealing Corrosive Damage in an area.
  • Passive Bonus: Regenerates +1.0% of Max Health/sec, +5.0% Damage Reduction

(info)

Great in:

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The Community FL4K Guide - All you ever wanted to know
#2

As a general rule of thumb, pet focused builds should be abusing cryo damage to slow enemies when using melee range pets. Unless your little fella has a gun, range=no DEEPs 'cuz they have to run up to their target before attacking them. Slow the enemies down or freeze them in place to get the most out of FL4K’s pets.

We need to remember that these pets are different from others in the series. They don’t move at light speed, phase through objects, or have auto seeking shots (unless Jabber). They’re going to need to be actively supported by the player to get real benefits out of them damage wise.

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#3

Hate to do two comments, but on topic for the thread:

Beefcake Jabber, Horned Skag, and the base Spiderant and scorcher, don’t have great AOE on their attack commands. The Beefcake Jabber’s hits in an arc in front of it, but it is kind of small from the footage we’ve seen. The others are single target charge attacks.

Gunslinger Jabber has great range on the attack command. It can hit for high damage from extremely far away. The base Skag also has pretty good range on it’s corrosive spit attack.

Quick note on elemental augments for pets.
Corrosive: Spiderant Countess, Skag attack command
Fire: Spiderant Scorcher
Radiation: Jabber attack command
Kinetic: Spiderant, Skag, Great Horned Skag, Eridian Skag?, Beefcake Jabber

Considering FL4K has a skill that allows them to do more damage to armor, you may be able to play with pet combinations depending on the area. Combining GammaBurst with the base Skag’s attack command may combine into a corrosive+radiation combo. We’ll need to confirm once the game is released.

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#4

Thanks for the comments; I’m gonna wait on actually adding things to the guide until we’ve actually had some time to play around with the pets but until then I definitely think it’ll be good to keep your insights in mind

1 Like
#5

Okay so now that the game’s been out for a few days let’s get this guide rolling

From my experience as a gun FL4K player, it seems that the Countess is great for fighting at long range because of the teleport while the Centurion and Scorcher are better for close range because of their apparent ability to knock back enemies (can someone confirm this?). The element doesn’t really seem to matter rn since I’m running a gun build and not a pet build

#6

I don’t have screenshots, but the spiderant does have a stomp attack that knocks back enemies, as well as the charge attack it has.

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#7

Gun FL4K thoughts v2.0 after playing a good amount of MH3:

  • The main purpose of the pet is to draw aggro and take enemy attention off of you as well as revive you via Lick the Wounds
  • The pet’s own survivability is generally fine with enough investment in Stalker although they still go down easily against badasses and anointeds; Fade Away (no Guerrillas) is your best tool for reviving them safely followed by Gamma Burst
  • The Countess is arguably the best for mobbing because you can teleport her to nearly any location and have her establish aggro there, in the same vein as Gamma Burst and Longbow Turret from BL2; less useful in boss fights because they mostly happen in smaller spaces
  • The Scorcher’s AoE attack deals great damage at MH0, not so much at MH3 but she’s better at finishing off weaker enemies than the others; the main reason to use her is the elemental damage boost which is probably the best pet bonus out there and (provided we eventually get enough points to do so) arguably worth taking Barbaric Yawp over other skills; probably the best for bosses provided you’re using an elemental weapon
  • The Sidekick and Gunslinger like to keep their distance which often has them circling around you and imo aren’t particularly great for aggro
  • Great Horned and Eridian Skag are off limits because the gun meta currently doesn’t go into Master
  • I need to play with the Beefcake’s attack command more but it doesn’t seem to work against anointeds which is a bummer (regular badasses tho idk); other than that he generally works pretty well
  • Guard Skag and Centurion do work well for gun builds but that’s about it; the skag might have higher base movement speed which would be good for Lick the Wounds but I’m not sure
  • Somewhat minor bug i’ve noticed: if you get a kill while your pet is reviving you will get an additional Second Wind later- generally not a huge deal but it does lower your FFYL time
#8

From what I’ve experienced with the Barbaric Yawp skill in the Master tree, for some reason it does not seem to boost any of the pet bonuses from the Jabber. Not sure if it’s a bug or if they thought the base bonuses from the Jabber would be too good if they got a boost, but I really wanted to mess around even more movement speed. 20% max health boost or 10% crit damage boost would have been cool too.

Also like I’ve seen reported by others, if you use Gamma Burst with the Jabber, it’ll just resort to using melee with its fist instead of its guns. Not sure if the Beefcake Jabber would use its club, but I would guess not unless you use an attack command.

There are also two legendary class mods I’ve seen for Fl4k that are pretty useful for their pet(s). Unfortunately I can’t remember the names of the class mods off the top of my head, but I remember the unique bonuses.
One has it to where any time Fl4k kills an enemy, their pet can get second wind. I think it also gives their pet 20% extra damage. I have one gives extra points into All my BFFs and Barbaric Yawp, and another one that also has Psycho Head on a Stick along with the other two skill I mentioned.
The other legendary class mod makes your pet taunt enemies when you activate Gamma Burst. I forgot if it did anything else along with that, but the taunt ability from the class mod was better than I expected. If I remember right, it gave skill points to Eager to Impress, Ferocity, and/or He Bites.

One thing I want to bring up about the Spiderant Countress is if you move too fast with certain movement speed skills on, sometimes the Spiderant Countress will use its action command on its own to try and catch up to you (and you will have to wait for the action command to cool down if the Spiderant Countress does that).

Sorry this was such a lengthy post, I just wanted to get this info out there.

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#9

I don’t know if you were still working on this OP, but I figured this may help.

All off the pets have the same base health and damage, where they differ is in their attack element, attack speed, special attacks, and attack range.

  • Spiderants have multiple attacks: they do a close range claw attack, a ground slam with fire dot, and a charge attack. Their attack command is a conal stomp. Their base claw attack and ground slam have a deceptively long range, while the fire pool and charge are close range abilities. Often during combat the spiderant will weave in and out of range to perform different attacks. If you have BFFs, then the spiderant can actually go toe-to-toe with M4 mobs on its own for quite awhile.
    https://youtu.be/-zvpyoOrO4U?t=78
    However, their elemental melee attacks do the exact same damage as the kinetic attacks of other pets, meaning they do the same damage vs 1 health type, and 50% reduced damage vs 2. They also attack the slowest. This makes the spiderant the worst pet for damage dealing since it will be worse than the other pets most of the time, and rarely better.

  • Jabbers only have 3 attacks: shoot, barrel throw, and attack commands. The Jabbers (excluding Beefcake) are ranged attackers, strafing around the enemy and avoiding damage. They deal kinetic damage, so they are effective vs everything. They also have the fastest attack speed (excluding Beefcake, which is about tied if not slower than the Spiderant). Because they activate from range, their attack commands are executed a bit faster than melee pets (excluding Beefcake again). Beefcake has the best synergy with GftE out of any pet though.
    Basically, Jabbers do really good at damaging enemies, but they don’t tank very well since they keep away from enemies. Aggro is a game of distance, and the Jabber will often be far enough away from enemies for them to focus on you.

  • Skags have 2 attacks only: their base claw swipe and attack command. All of them need to be within melee range to activate the attack command, so they exclusively melee oriented. They have need to be up close to deal damage, but you can’t use BFFs to make them as tanky as the spiderant. They deal kinetic damage, so they are good vs everything, and they have a middling attack speed.
    They are middle of the road damage wise, but have the worst survival potential. It doesn’t strafe like the Jabber, nor can it get extra health regen thorugh skills. It will do the most consistent DPS, and with a good build and gear loadout will probably be the highest damage pet overall.

Essentially, Spiderants have the best tanking potential, Skags have the beast consistent DPS for the worst survivability, while Jabbers have the best burst and will have the easiest time staying alive.

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#10

Hi boombumr! I decided to leave the forums a couple of months ago because it got too toxic for me and it wasn’t doing my mental health any favors. I don’t really have any plans to continue this guide so feel free to make your own if you wish.

1 Like
#11

Sorry to hear that. It has calmed down a lot since launch but if you don’t want to continue the thread I’ll take it over.

Hope you’re feeling better now. :slight_smile:

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