What this build excels at is quick kills with crits, huge shield boosts with Phalanx Doctrine stacks, and jumping into Iron Bear to recharge our shields while still pumping out DPS.
11/29 Update: After originally uploading a rather unoptimized version of this build, I set to work finalizing my skillset and figuring out some gear changes. Not much has changed as far as gear goes–originally I recommended a Front Loader but now I recommend The Transformer after u/Prismatic_Me 's advice on the matter.
More importantly, as I was experimenting and tweaking, Iron Bear received several buffs. To that end I added a panic switch of sorts to this build, allowing us to jump in when the going gets tough and heal ourselves and our teammates. Additionally I have chosen the two Iron Bear loadouts that I feel are performing the best with this build, and have added a section on Iron Bear. (ctrl+f IRNBR to find it).
I have taken Vladof Ingenuity down to 2 points, as I find the difference in my shields to be negligible. Fire In The Skag Den was reduced to 0/5 since this build is really never taking advantage of that bonus. Selfless Vengeance had one point so I swapped it for another skill (Full Can of Whoop-Ass). That left me with 8 extra points. I put two of those into Rushin’ Offensive, allowing for a more aggressive Run-Up-And-Shoot-Face playstyle, Specialist Bear, allowing us to produce a little more damage while our shields recharge and we sip macchiatos inside our big fancy battlemech, and the one in Full Can of Whoop-Ass facilitates our panic switch.
At that point, I am satisfied with my shields, damage output, and the small (but hopefully smart) investment into Iron Bear, so the build has 6 extra skill points that can be put anywhere you wish. I’ve therefore included another section regarding your options for these extra points (ctrl+f EXTRAP).
At this moment, and indeed for the majority of the time I’ve had to do my testing lately, my guardian ranks were broken. I’ve run the Maliwan Slaughter a bit on M4 and I’m satisfied with the build’s reliability with a +20% normal bullet damage buff–using the Lovemachine, I’m not firing normal bullets, and the build still puts up numbers with Guardian Ranks currently broken.
Baby why don’t you go ahead and ctrl+f on through my Contents:
Contents – EDKHFHK
Introduction – INTRDCTN
Skill List – SKLST
Summary – SMMRY
Skills Breakdown – THSKLS
Gear – 42069
Gear That Isn’t Guns – 42070
Iron Bear Loadout – IRNBR
Extra Points – EXTRAP
Closing Statement – STONKS
Introduction|INTRDCTN
Hello, and sorry.
This is my first-ever post in this place, and it’s my first-ever build submission. It’s also the first-ever build I used in Borderlands 3, Moze being the only character I’ve tried, and so I’m just giving you a heads-up that this is a build born of a complete lack of experience, and also as a quick aside, generally I am wrong about things having to do with math.
All that having been said, I really like it. :] I use the Lovemachine in M4 in the Slaughterstar no problem. My humble little build chugs right along. It’s powerful, it can take a beating, and most importantly to me personally, it’s not boring.
Anyhow, here’s the skill list: https://bl3skills.com/gunner/#501310150100000000000000000055321103500 |SKLST
Truth be told the skill tree is pretty similar to ewhall18’s Bang! You’re Dead! build except tooling the DPS to my liking and using specific gear to maximize what I want to do with it. You’ll notice there are 6 unused skill points. I have included ideas for the use of these extra points at the bottom of this post.
Well, What The Heck Do You Do With It?|SMMRY
I never switch away from the LOV3M4CH1N3. I brutalize the incendiary heavy Maliwan guys (I can’t remember their names) with that same gun (an incendiary SMG) and a series of well-placed shots. I melt Graveward pretty quickly (DISCLAIMER: on M4 with broken Guardian skills this is no longer quick). Most importantly, I avoid nerfs to my guns’ DPS because Gearbox only seems to care about legendaries. At the same time I want it to have mettle enough to match its DPS. What this build excels at is quick kills with crits, huge shield boosts with Phalanx Doctrine stacks, and jumping into Iron Bear to recharge our shields while still pumping out DPS, all while using only guns gained from quest rewards.
The Skills|THSKLS
Shield of Retribution. In this tree we’re focusing on our DPS and our survivability.
Armored Infantry 5/5 – I like the +15% gun damage enough, but the +13% damage reduction is nice too.
Drowning in Brass 5/5 – Yeah.
Thin Red Line 3/3 – This is at 3 to boost our shields as much as possible.
Vladof Ingenuity 2/5 – Having 2 points here accomplishes two things: first, it gets us all the way down the tree. Secondly, it gives us a little more shielding. I have it maxed at 2 as I find the benefit from 5/5 to be negligible, and I’d prefer to free those skills up for use elsewhere. You may like to have 5/5–remember that you have 6 extra points to play with.
Full Can of Whoop-Ass – After the Iron Bear buffs I set to work adding a panic switch to the build, and it’s obvious that jumping into Iron Bear is a lot nicer when your shields begin to recharge. Typically when I come back out, I still have 3 Drowning In Brass stacks, and my shields are full and around 48,000.
Experimental Munitions 1/1 – Dang if I don’t love this skill. I think it’s a clear must-have for the build. It’s also a ton of fun to spike some face with Iron Bear’s Hell on Rails and watch them splatter.
Desperate Measures 5/3 – This one’s getting a +2 bonus from my Bloodletter class mod, I have it 3/3. At 5/3 my gun damage is bonus’d up to +83%, and since I’m at 1HP full time, that just means that I’m doing +83% gun damage at all times from these three skill points. Super nice.
Phalanx Doctrine 8/5 – This one’s getting a +3 bonus from my Bloodletter class mod, but I kinda wish it was the opposite. I’d like to see 6/3 Desperate Measures. As it stands, with 8/5 in PD you get +16%/stack gun damage, +24%/stack max shields, and a duration of 30 seconds. Basically, once the firefight begins, you’re receiving large bonuses until it ends. Very nice.
Bottomless Mags. Initially, much like in ewhall18’s Bang! You’re Dead! build, we were only in it for Scorching RPM’s. However with the recent Iron Bear buffs it became prudent to stick a point into Specialist Bear as well as one into Rushin’ Offensive so it’d be easier to run up and smash face.
Cloud of Lead 5/5 – This is super cool. Between this and Redistribution the Lovemachine’s 61 round magazine seems to jackhammer Graveward’s eye forever.
Matched Set/Scrappy 1/5 – As stated above, we’ve got one point in one of these because I like them better than Dakka Bear. Really we only have a point in these because we can’t reach Scorching RPM’s without it. You might default to Scrappy – the biggest increase I ever saw with 1/5 Matched Set was five more rounds in an SMG magazine. Guess which SMG it was to win a prize.
Stoke the Embers – This is cool because Gearbox very kindly gave us a game where 90% of the enemies have red health bars. It increases our overall DPS (because we’re using Lovemachine all day long) as well as protecting it from incendiary debuffs so I don’t have to switch to some other lame gun that doesn’t even fire in a sick ass heart pattern.
Redistribution 1/1 – As stated above this is extending our time between reloads considerably, which is nice. With the right buffs we can melt Graveward in a single magazine. Once Gigamind’s shield is gone we can melt him the same way. I’ve gone entire fire fights punching holes in heads without reloading. It’s just nice. :]
Rushin’ Offensive – Part of the fun of this build is sprinting and not aiming. Sprint up to a guy’s face, laying into him the whole time. This allows for a more aggressive playstyle, which is really exactly what we want since most of our durability comes from racking up Phalanx stacks.
Scorching RPM’s 5/5 – +20% critical hit damage is cool enough, +25% Iron Bear damage is extremely great, but that fire rate buff is just one heck of a gravy.
Specialist Bear – 1 point in this doesn’t increase Iron Bear’s damage by an insane amount, but we might as well toss it in there. That 10% really counts when Iron Bear scores a critical hit.
What Gear Do You Have?|42069
Guns:
LOV3M4CH1N3/Lovemachine – This is our workhorse. I seriously never switch away from it unless I have to handle a boss’s shields. Mine has the following stats:
Damage: 490x2
Accuracy: 72%
Handling: 68%
Reload Time: 3.3s
Fire Rate: 8.76/s (this does not include skills and mod bonuses)
Magazine Size: 61
+10% Critical Hit Damage
+42% Weapon Damage
+79% Weapon Accuracy
+25% Weapon Shield Capacity
1.5x Weapon Zoom
The Lovemachine demands that our Moze engage enemies a certain way due to its heart-shaped fire pattern, but that’s fine! Because the way we have to use it is Stand In Front Of Them And Click On Their Weak Spots Until They’re Dead.
You get the Lovemachine once you do all of Claptrap’s Claplist missions, then the 3 Homestead missions. Claptrap’ll then have an easy mission called Baby Dancer, and the Lovemachine is the quest reward. I picked one up at 37 and didn’t swap out until I picked up another one at 50. I love it so much. It’s all I can do not to turn the rest of this guide into a love letter about it.
The Cloud Kill – is the optional quest reward for the story mission Beneath the Miridian and it rocks.
I use this when there’s a lot of armored enemies or for the Slaughterstar’s final bosses and stuff. It’s not a particularly broken gun but for a quest reward it’s nice. If you ever pick up The Butcher with corrosive you may consider using that instead – it fits our build much more nicely but it’s a pain to use effectively. But whatever man, we aren’t using anything but our Lovemachine anyway!
Binary Terminal Crit – You get the Crit by tipping Moxxi $1000 until she mails it to you. The Binary Crit is worth all the money you spend to get it.
This is a fantastic gun and it stands far above any shock source I’ve come across. It only slips out of your hand if you expend the entire magazine and then reload, from what I can tell. I use it to demolish boss’s shields and then switch back to the Lovemachine. What’s fancy about the Binary Terminal crit is that the Binary prefix gives an additional pellet while the gun has +150% Critical Hit Damage and I have no idea what the Terminal prefix does. It’s missing from this weapon prefix guide. But hey you know what pal we probably don’t even need that Terminal prefix because two pellets slamming +150% critical hit damage on top of all our other critical nonsense is more than powerful enough.
In that fourth slot I use an Auditing Crossroad with +21% critical hit damage, or an Arctic Star Helix that deals 424x3 damage, or an Annexed Vicious Lyuda that deals 804x2 and boasts +40% critical hit damage. The fourth slot is up to you. You seriously won’t switch away from the Lovemachine very often.
Not-Guns: 42070
Shield: The Transformer. The Transformer is another piece of gear acquired as a quest reward, and it’s wonderful. Not only does it grant 100% resistance to shock damage, but 100% of all shock damage is converted into shields. Furthermore, with a 40% chance to absorb enemy bullets, not only are you expending less ammo but you’re almost at a 50/50 chance to not receive damage.
Class Mod: Bloodletter. The Bloodletter is fun because your health is going to be stuck at 1HP with the Deathless artifact equipped but counteracts the obvious disadvantage here by healing your shields instead of your health. Especially cool is that the mod itself comes with a wide variety of bonuses–mine grants +31% SMG damage and +45% Hyperion Weapon Critical Damage and +20% shock resistance, making it literally perfect for the build.
Grenade: I seriously never throw grenades
Artifact: Deathless. Deathless + Desperate Measures is wonderful. The one I have isn’t granting any wonderful critical hit bonuses or anything like that, but boooy when I have one such item I will be rolling these mothas like they was dice.
Iron Bear Loadout|IRNBR
I tried to take as much advantage of the recent Iron Bear buffs as I could. I figure aside from using Moze’s skills to use Iron Bear as a temporary relief, I could put a minimal amount of skills in and still be clearing mobs while her shields recharge. Mostly Iron Bear’s damage was statically raised, such as in the case of Desperate Measures and Scorching RPMs both now affecting his DPS. However, Experimental Munitions now grants Iron Bear the bonus damage upon crit, and so I’ve stayed away from the V35.
Since Moze and Iron Bear both receive +30% Incendiary Damage from Stoke The Embers, I’m partial to running two Rail Guns, both with Hell on Rails, to take advantage of our new point in Specialist Bear. You’ll find that this routinely one-shots weaker mobs on M4, and sometimes stronger mobs with a critical hit. However, two Miniguns with Let Off Some Steam equipped to both is also very melty, and may suit your playstyle/purposes better.
Extra Points|EXTRAP
There are a couple things you could do with the extra points that I find to be maximizing benefit…
5/5 Grizzled, 1/1 Security Bear – This’ll allow you to buff Iron Bear as a back-up plan a little bit more, reducing time between Iron Bear jump-ins and extending his time alive as well. However this isn’t automatically included in the build because I find the base cooldown time to be more than sufficient.
3/5 The Iron Bank, 3 more into Vladof Ingenuity to make it 5/5 – To be honest with Redistribution and the Transformer replenishing ammo I find 0/5 in The Iron Bank to still lend itself to some massive magazines. That said, it’s always nice to have even more of a good thing. As stated above I found the benefit past 2/5 in VF to be somewhat lackluster, but you might like to round out the build there.
There have been rumors that existing characters will be expanded in some way–perhaps with additional skill trees. I’m very happy to have the build currently optimized so that we can pump 6 points into a new tree the second it drops, although I don’t expect anything like that to happen in reality. The main benefit is being able to swap around extra points for the Takedown, mob clearing, farming, whatever you’re doing at the moment that can be assisted with the 6 extras.
Closing|STONKS
This is a build that rocks well enough before relevant gear bonuses, but that will be stupendous once you gather more and more relevant gear and collect your guardian tokens. Since it’s optimized to leave 6 free skill points you’re done cooking into it at level 44, so it’s even that much more of a great starter build. It’s a little challenging to play but super fun once you’ve gotten used to using one gun to shoot heads. I hope you enjoy it and that it isn’t hot garbage. Any advice and suggestions welcome. Epstein didn’t kill himself. Free Hong Kong.
