I’ve had this rattling around in my head for quite some time and instead of just chatting with buddies about it, why not put it out there and talk about it here with everyone.
Red text guns in the Borderlands franchise are all over the map, blues are better than legendaries, legendaries are better than pearls, pearls and legendaries are worse than regular purples, etc…
What this guide is going to do is break down the mechanics of the red text guns category by category to explain WHY some are better and some are worse. Why did some not scale as well as others.
I’m going to make suggestions to how the weaker guns should of been made. I want to make it clear this is hindsight and hindsight is easy. This isn’t a dig at Gearbox Devs or anything of that matter. My hope is to get a big positive discussion around these guns so because right now Gearbox is in early stages of BL3 and it may be possible to help shine a light on why some guns didn’t work as well as others. TPS suffered many of the same issues as BL2, not as many but still many of the same.
I’m going to one type at a time because trying to do everything in one sitting would take forever.
Table of Contents
Snipers
1.Maliwan
2.Jakobs
3.Hyperion
4.Dahl
5.Vladof
Assault Rifles
1.Jakobs
2.Vladof
3.Dahl
4.Bandit
4.Torgue
Shotguns
1.Hyperion
2.Jakobs
3.Torgue
4.Tediore
5.Bandit
SMG’s
1.Dahl
2.Bandit
3.Hyperion
4.Maliwan
5.Tediore
Pistols
1.Jakobs
2.Vladof
3.Bandit
4.Dahl
5.Maliwan
6.Torgue
7.Tediore
8.Hyperion
Launchers
1.Maliwan
2.Torgue
3.Bandit
4.Tediore/Vladof
Maliwan Snipers
Storm
Click here for the in depth review of it
This is a maliwan barreled pearlescent sniper that its red text effect takes the 50% splash damage off of the pellet and splits it into 5 shock orbs that surround the point of impact and each orb is 10% splash with a high chance to DOT. It also has increased damage and decreased fire rate.
The Ugly
The fact that the splash is so spread out its not guaranteed to hit the target you shoot either because terrain or the splash might be closer to a different enemy. If the splash hits a another enemy the 10% isn’t enough to really matter. So this does less than a normal snider 90% of the time. Then the fire rate makes matters worse, sniders are nearing the slow side of snipers and this can bring it under a 1.0 fire rate as well.
The Hindsight fix
Keep the splash damage on the pellet and have the orbs, and don’t decrease the fire rate. Do that and this gun is amazing, still a bit limited do to being shock only but it would be worth its rarity and I’m sure would be a very widely used gun.
Volcano
Click here for the in depth review of it
This is another Maliwan barreled sniper and its red text upgrades the splash damage from 50% to 80% but lowers the gun damage as well.
The Ugly
This does do more on a body shot than a fire snider with the same parts but less on a crit. If you are using snipers you should be going for crits. With Maliwan and most snipers you get a x 2 and then another x2 without any skills when you land a crit. Those multipliers are much more the than 80% added splash damage. So again does less than the gun it was based off of.
The Hindsight fix
Leave the base stats alone and just increase the splash damage. Then its a really great fire only sniper. I still wouldn’t love it because I think just increasing one stat on a gun is kinda boring but it would be better than a snider and pretty powerful.
Chère-amie
Click here for the in depth review of it
This is a Hyperion Barreled moxxi sniper. The red text again removed the splash damage and replaced it with a transfusion orb, as well as having the 2-2.5% moxxi healing as well as a 20% critical hit boost.
The Ugly
Stop messing with our splash damage!! Once again the damage of this is lackluster and since its a blue unique its based on a blue sniper not a purple so the damage is already lower on top of all of that. Next the healing % compared to the DPS of this gun also makes it terrible to heal with. It’s the worst moxxi gun to heal with. The other 2-25% guns put out a lot of bullets or high damage so they balance out. This does not. Lastly the transfusion orb is so slow it rarely helps you.
The Hindsight fix
You guessed it, leave the splash on the pellet. But I still think it needs more, also upping the life steal to the rubi range of 12% and giving it a better crit bonus. I know that might seem like a lot to add but other than this, the kitten and the slowhand all the moxxi guns have a big crit bonus. This gun needs a lot of help, its a Hyperion Barreled Maliwan sniper and those are maybe the worst of Maliwan snipers.
Pimpernel
Click here for the in depth review of it
This is a dahl barreled blue unique sniper and it does a lot. When you shoot on impact the bullet pops up in a strait vertical line and then 5 more pellets split off. Each of those pellets are the same as on the card, crit damage, and splash. They also keep moving after first impact allowing you to hit up to 11 times with a single shot.
The Good
They left the splash alone, and all the stats. They just added 5 unlisted pellets that can each hit multiple times. Unlisted means synergy with amp shields, bullet split means synergy with b0re, chain reaction, and nth degree. Then you also just have massive damage with a maliwan sniper that can hit so many times. Since each bullet has splash also makes it the best slag gun in the game since you can 50-60%+ elemental effect chance and each pellet has splash so 2 chances per impact, or up to 22 chances to hit a single big target or a mere 12 on a small target. But since the pellets go out you can slag multiple targets with one shot.
This is a video showing the numbers as I shoot the target dummy and compare to the non red text counter part
Jakobs Snipers
Hawkeye
This is a Jakobs barreled sniper that has a massive 580% crit bonus but heavily reduced damage. It also has over all increased stats, fire rate, reload, and mag size.
The Bad
While this gun isn’t bad at all its not that much better than a Muckamuck and you have to kill the hardest raid boss in the game to get it. On some characters like zer0 with CA it is worse than the Muckamuck. The other increased stats help and again this is a very good sniper but it still should be better.
The Hindsight fix
Just don’t reduce the damage so much it should do quite a bit more than the Muckamuck.
Godfinger
This is a Dahl barreled sniper that has a lot of effects. It has increased damage the longer the bullet is traveling, not distance but time. It has penetration, bullet split after impact with 5 unlisted pellets. Then for some reason it is a bolt action and has heavily reduced damage.
The Ugly
Between the low damage and slow fire rate this gun is limited in use for most characters. Then the distance you need to get max damage is so far that it is only possible in very few spots. So its really hard to get the most out of this gun.
The Hindsight fix
A few things, first don’t make it bolt action. Next leave the damage alone, Jakobs snipers are powerful sure but its not like they have Raiding DPS or anything. Lastly reduce the time it takes for the bullet to reach max damage in half. Would all of that make this a really powerful gun? Yeah but it wouldn’t seem to be broken at all. It would be one of the most powerful snipers but it is a pearl so it should be one of the most powerful snipers.
Skullmasher
This is a Jakobs barreled sniper that shoots 5 pellets instead of one that are all listed and have reduced damage to a normal Muckamuck but all the pellets together has more damage than a Muckamuck. Other than that the only stat that changes is the accuracy to account for the spread.
The Good
This thing has serious stopping power but a little bit of limited range. The range is not a huge issue since most of the game is played in the sweet spot for this gun’s range anyways. If you can land most of the pellets on crit this has very solid OSOK potential. This gun is a great example of red text done right, better than its purple counter part with almost no drawback.
Bolt Action…
Everything else below are blue and therefor bolt action and bolt action in Borderlands 2/TPS have issues. Your fire rate drops to around 0.6 to 0.4 instead of the range of 2-3 like non bolt action Jakobs snipers. But there is no real damage boost for the guns being so slow. This holds back all the following Jakobs snipers. The fix for this could be a few things, increase the damage, increase the critical hit bonus, or get rid of bolt action guns. As they are now they are just plain worse than non bolt action.
Cobra
This is a Dahl barreled sniper that has 80% explosive splash damage added to the bullet with a massive radius.
The Bad
Besides the bolt action, nothing at all. The stats are pretty much the same to its blue counter part and 80% splash is a big number as well as the massive range of it.
The Hindsight fix
As above, damage, crit, or fire rate.
Elephant Gun
This is a Hyperion barreled sniper that is all about the damage. It has the highest damage of any Jakobs sniper by quite a bit but at a great cost. It has the slowest fire rate, reduced accuracy, reload speed, and mag size. The lastly it doesn’t have a scope or even iron sights.
The Ugly
I think the worst thing is I love this gun. It’s damage is enough for one shot potential on small enemies on op8 but on big enemies or even shielded medium enemies it can take a few shots. Then the fact its the hardest sniper in the game to aim since you don’t have a scope or sights. So its powerful but not quite enough, terribly slow, and it also can only get some accessories since it doesn’t have a sight. Its a very punishing gun, if you miss you often pay for it.
The Hindsight fix
I like the concept of these slow firing non scoped snipers but give them the raw power to be worth it. So once again more damage or extra crit bonus.
Buffalo
This is a faster version of the Elephant but with a Jakobs barrel. Less damage than the Elephant but better stats otherwise.
The Ugly
Where the Elephant has a 0.4 fire rate the 0.6 fire rate on this gun isn’t much better and the loss of damage hurts. If you are going to be slow and sightless embrace it and go for the damage.
The Hindsight fix
Get rid of it, or make it a legendary or better. You don’t need 2 of these guns in the same space and rarity. Even if you make one blue and one legendary one would need a bigger difference than these 2 have. Knockback or some kind of effect to show power.
Trespasser
This is a Hyperion barreled sniper that ignores shields but has reduced damage.
The Ugly
Why reduce the damage once again its not like Blue Jakobs snipers are so deadly this gun would be broken if you left the damage alone. This gun is so poor it only really has 2 purposes, knock off petes helmet and take down the chief. Thats it.
The Hindsight fix
I think they nailed it in TPS, make it a vladof, not a blue Jakobs sniper.
Hyperion Snipers
Invader
The red text here gives it a 5 round burst while you are scoped in or ADS but has decreased damage.
The Good
While the damage is lower by quite a bit reverse recoil and burst fire makes sure you can land all 5 on crit with relative ease. So it might not be your main source of damage but if you need to take down a big enemy this can do it really fast. They could of taken off less damage but over all its a really good sniper.
Longbow
The red text here removes the scope and shoots a minecraft like arrow in a slight arc. On the stat line it increases the damage, crit bonus (50%), slightly higher chance to ignite, and only 1 ammo per shot instead of 2.
The Good
Massive damage and crit makes this have massive damage potential without the terrible etech 2 ammo per shot. You have to learn how to shoot it but its the that bad. My only drawback is its only fire. This is another great example on how to do red text guns right.
Morningstar
The red text on this has a crit stacking on each hit crit that will deteriorate in a few seconds after not hitting a crit, similar to CA. You also have increased damage. The crit bonus is 20% up to 3 times.
The Good
Another good example of how to do a red text gun. You can get a lot out of this if you can reliably hit crits and those stacks don’t go away when you swap guns so you can use them to help your other guns, this can be really huge with Jakobs non snipers since they have a type B crit bonus. Once again guns that can do more with a little skill is a great way to do red text guns.
Fremington’s Edge
The red text on this is rare that part of it is in the scope, the scope has the highest zoom in the game and while you look down it you get increased critical hit damage. You also get a slight damage boost.
The Good
While this isn’t a great gun, increased zoom, damage, and crit while ADS are all positive things and thats what Red Text guns should be. On the other hand its still lacking a bit on OP8 and the zoom can be too much in a lot of close quarter fights.
Dahl Snipers
Pitchfork
This gets 4 unlisted pellets for a total of 5 pellets shot and one less on the burst fire. It also has slighly less damage per pellet and 2 ammo per shot.
The Good
Well the pitchfork just does a ton of damage with 5 pellets per shot but at a heavy cost of 10 ammo per burst. Not Ideal for mobbing because the spread is too wide for most enemies but for your big enemies and bosses it will destroy them. I wouldn’t really do anything to change this. If you make it one ammo per shot it would get more use but it would be a bit OP as well. I think this gun has a very good balance. Possibly reduce the spread.
Sloth
This gun has massive increased damage and higher accuracy at a cost of 2 less per burst and slower bullet speed.
The Good
Massive damage is always good and the reduced burst in my opinion is a benefit. 3-4 shots is plenty for 95% of the game or more and its not a raid boss gun anyways. The bullet speed is also not really that slow. I’m also a huge fan of this gun and think they got it just right. I wouldn’t really change anything on it.
Vladof Snipers
Patriot
Click here for the in depth review of it
The Patriot has massively increased damage and in return it gets fire rate, reload speed, accuracy, magazine size, recoil, and bullet speed all are made worse.
The Ugly
The drawbacks far out weight the benefits of the extra damage, the accuracy, recoil, and bullet speed are the real issues here. The fire rate, mag size, and reload are all somewhat understandable, well reload less so but those don’t kill the gun. This is a sniper that is bad at sniping and you have to beat a raid boss to get it.
The Hindsight Fix
If you want to make a high power Droog I’m down, I like the idea. Leave the accuracy, recoil, and bullet speed alone. Increase the damage and crit by another 20-25% also leave the reload speed alone. Then drop the fire rate and mag size and you have a gun potentially worthy of fighting a raid boss for.
Lyuda/White Death
Click here for the in depth review of it
The lyuda has 2 unlisted pellets that split off at a short distance, it has increased damage, accuracy, and critical hit damage with no drawbacks.
The Good
Droogs are already really good snipers and this is just a super droog because gearbox did this one as close to 100% right as you can get. 4 bonuses, no drawbacks and its not OP but just a really good sniper. Sure with Zer0 and CA it can be very OP but that is CA more than the gun because in everyone else’s hand its just a very great sniper. This should really be a template for all red text guns and how to do them right. Powerful at first use but with practice and skill of knowing when the split happens it can be much more powerful.
Jakobs Assault Rifles
Bekah
Click here for the in depth review of it
The Bekah has increased base damage, an additional 50% type A critical hit damage, 3 unlisted pellets that split off of the main pellet, and penetration.
The Good
The Bekah really has it all without drawbacks like great guns should, a lot of red text, and interesting red text that can really synergize with skill points and other gear. It has both high power and high fire rate so you can use it in multiple ways. It’s one of the best guns in the game. It is non elemental and it is jakobs so you have to pull the trigger for each shot but its well worth it. A gun that is truly worth its rarity and it is a rare find.
Hammerbuster
Click here for the in depth review
The Hammerbuster is simple and strong, massive increased damage and nothing else.
The Good
Jakobs AR’s are already pretty good with the increased crit and with the Hammerbuster massive damage as well as the Dahl barrel making recoil very little its a really powerful and fast gun as well as an easy farm. It is kinda boring to just increase damage so thats the downside but it is effective at the highest levels of play.
Stomper
Click here for the in depth review
The Stomper has increased critical hit damage with an additional 50% type A but lower damage, accuracy, and fire rate.
The Bad
While its a viable gun it isn’t very good either and little reason to use it over any of the other red text Jakobs AR’s. The way you use it isn’t any different than the Hammerbuster and its just less effective.
The Hindsight Fix
Make the Crit a lot higher so its really good on crit but not very good non crit, like a hawkeye/ladyfist. Then it would be different from other Jakobs AR’s and really solid.
Dammed Cowboy
Click here for the in depth review
It has massively increased damage, increased critical hit to a 32.5% type B, and increased accuracy at a cost of fire rate and a lot of fire rate.
The Bad
This is another gun that works but its not quite good enough to justify the fire rate going from 15 down to 2. It does more than the Hammerbuster on crit but just a bit more.
The Hindsight Fix
Like the Elephant Gun it needs more damage or more critical hit or both. Once again I’m not opposed to these style of guns, in fact I like them but make them powerful enough to justify the fire rate they loose.
Stinkpot
Click here for the in depth review
The Stinkpot is a grenade launcher or cannon with increased damage and always comes in corrosive.
The Bad
Any Torgue Barreled AR shoots grenades and therefor can’t crit, they do have high base damage but not enough to make up for the fact they can’t crit and they also take 2 ammo per shot.
The Hindsight Fix
I won’t say change it and let it crit, but either make the AOE much bigger or have it shoot multiple grenades for each trigger pull instead of one without increasing the ammo cost.
Vladof Assault Rifles
Leadstorm
This shoots pellets in an arc and then split off into 3 with them being unlisted as well as more damage per pellet, slightly bigger magazine size, and a solid fire rate increase. In turn it has reduced accuracy and reload speed.
The Good
This does a ton of damage with the massive fire rate and pellet count, takes some getting used to how to fire it but it puts out a wall of bullets. Since they arc down it is surprisingly easy to crit and with the boosted damage and fire rate this is a dps machine.
Shredifier
This is a vladof spin gun that has every stat other than reload increased as well as a faster spin up time to get to max fire rate.
The Bad
While I know this has pretty much every part of it increased you do end up using a lot of ammo to kill most things and it could use a bit more damage. It’s not really bad but its on the weak side on op8. It also has increased damage, accuracy, and magazine size.
The Hindsight Fix
Just a bit more damge, thats it, even 10% more.
Hail
The Hail is moxxi gun with ~2% healing, a massive 200% type A crit bonus, 80% splash damage, and each pellet gets a single unlisted bullet split. The gun fires in a high arc requiring you to change how you aim.
The Good
The Hail can put out a ton of damage between the high crit, splash, and fire rate, and also keep you safe with the healing. If you can learn to use this gun its one of the best all around guns in the game, unlisted pellets, high crit and splash all have a lot of potential synergy with a lot of gear and skills.
Kitten
The Kitten is another Moxxi Vladof AR with again ~2% healing. This time you have 3 listed pellets that shoot in a pattern of a smiley face, on top of that you have increased damage, accuracy, reload speed, and magazine size but reduced fire rate. The kitten also has no recoil.
The Good
Like the Hail this is a high DPS healing gun, the lost fire rate is made up with the extra 2 pellets all with more damage and without a cost of extra ammo. Also the increased reload and mag make the DPS even better. The accuracy is misleading since the firing pattern is so wide, this is almost a shotgun in AR form but that is a good thing once you learn to use it. You can tank with the best of them with the sustained DPS and healing from this gun.
Rapier
This is all about the 200% melee bonus, what some forget is you also take increased melee damage but its worth the extra damage. The gun stats are not good with reduced damage but increased accuracy.
The Good
It has twice the next best melee weapon in the game and four times as much as your average bladed weapon. You don’t really care for shooting this gun so the reduced damage isn’t a big deal either.
Dahl Assault Rifles
Seraphim
This has massively increased damage and magazine size but lower accuracy, reload sped, reduced burst, slower bullet speed and comes in fire only.
The Bad
While I don’t think this is a bad gun, I do think they made to many things worse for the damage and again while its good, its not really Seraph good. If it was a blue, great but its not. More damage is great and even reduced burst is ok with the higher damage, but not really the rest.
The Hindsight Fix
Leave the reload speed alone, accuracy, and bullet speed. Maybe instead of reducing the burst from 5 to 3 make it 5 to 4.
Bearcat
The Bearcat shoots 3 grenades instead of one for a cost of 6 rounds per shot instead of 3, and it has a very slight increase to the magazine size but you get less shots since its double the ammo per shot.
The Ugly
This gun just doesn’t preform well, it takes to many shots to kill things, 6 ammo a shot is very expensive, you can have the grenades bounce back at you and hurt you. The mag size goes from 35 to 39 but that is 12 shots down to 7. The spread is also a bit to wide making it easy to not get the full potential out of it.
The Hindsight Fix
This gun needs a lot, more damage, less ammo consumption, tighter spread, and bigger mag. I would give it a 50% base damage boost, have it only cost 4 ammo per shot, and make the mag 48 so you get 12 shots out of it. Thats quite a bit to change but this is one of the worst red text guns out there.
Veruc
The Veruc has a unique firing pattern with 3 bullets per shot, one in the center, one wide to the left and one wide to the right, while you fire it the ones to the right and left get closer until at shot 5 they hit the same point as the main pellet, and that matches the burst of it as well. It also has increased damage per pellet, increased accuracy, and increased magazine size. It does take 2 ammo per shot instead of one like carbines.
The Good
This is a verty good gun and while it can waste some ammo with the bullets starting so wide it still destroys stuff and you can use that wide spread with singularities/converge to really quickly destroy a group of enemies. The mag size increase isn’t enough to make it have the same amount of shots as a carbine but it still is a good increase with 10 more in the mag. If the spread was a bit tighter on the first shot this would be a great gun but its still very very good.
Scorpio
This has an increased burst count that is between 5-6 that changes with RNG it also has increased damage, fire rate, and mag size for a solid increased DPS. It has lower accuracy but its so small it has no effect.
The Good
This is a solid upgrade from a defender with all around increased DPS and the fact its a mission reward on a story mission means its as easy to get as anything and its a solid gun. If this was a legendary or better I would want a bit more but for a blue quest reward I think this is in a very solid place. A bunch of upgrades and the only downfall is so small it won’t be noticed. It’s easy to keep this on crit and does a lot of damage when you do.
Bandit Assault Rifles
Sawbar
The Sawbar shares all the same stats as its purple variant but it acts very different. After a certain travel time 3 pellets split off of the main pellet at a shallow angle and travel a short distance and explode into a large fire splash radius.
The Good
While this is hard to master or even use properly once you get the range down its one of the most deadly guns in the game. 3 Unlisted pellets alone that all can crit and have card damage as well as nice synergy with amp sheilds is strong alone, but when you add in 3 large splash damage blasts on the end of them it does a ton of damage. It is worth learning though, don’t just shoot it and drop it, this gun has a ton of potential.
Madhouse
The Madhouse has increased damage, accuracy(misleading), and magazine size. When the madhouse hits the bullet splits into two and ricochets multiple times. I say misleading on the accuracy because the bullets shoot in almost a wavey pattern that makes it hard to predict where it will hit and hard to land crits.
The Bad
While this sounds good on paper the way the bullets shoot make it difficult to use for any sort of accuracy and you have to shoot the bullets off the ground and bounce them into the enemy. With Gaige and CE it has potential or Zer0 with B0re but it is highly difficult in practice to get a lot out of it and even when you do its not great.
The Hindsight Fix
Make the initial bullet go strait and the split should seek enemies like Gaige’s CE. Leave the stats alone and that way you could get a lot out of this gun, the poor bullet path is this guns major issue. If you can land the pellets you are ok, the issue is you don’t land many and most the ricochets never hit a thing.
Chopper
The Chopper can’t stop shooting once you pull the trigger it just fires until you are out of ammo or swap to another gun. Stats wise its not bad, you get 4 bullets a shot instead of 1 and each bullet has increased damage, you have increased fire rate, and of course mag size since the mag is the entire ammo pool. It does have highly reduced accuracy but that is to be expected since you have 4 pellets.
The Good???
I ask that instead of say it because while the gun isn’t great it does what it is supposed to do and its a really cool and funny concept. It does burn through your ammo very fast but it throws tons of bullets down range. It puts out a ton of dps in a very ammo inefficient way but thats ok, not every gun needs to be a main weapon. This is a utility piece and it works.
Torgue Assault Rifles
Seeker
This gun has massively increased damage, slight accuracy boost (pointless), and heavily reduced fire rate. When you shoot it the bullets “seek” near by enemies and home into them so as long as you don’t miss badly you will hit, but it does not crit.
The Bad
I know there are fans of this gun out there for flying enemies, mainly buzzards and I can kind of see that, its still not great. While the damage is roughly 4x higher, the lack of ability to crit and lower fire rate reduce the DPS rather than increase it. Plus buzzards are dealt with better by many guns in the game as well.
The Hindsight Fix
Let it crit and speed up the fire rate, you can have a reduced fire rate but not by that much.
Kerblaster
The Kerblaster shoots out a rocket and on impact it drops a grenade. Both the Rocket and Grenade do damage listed on the card and all the stats other than accuracy are increased, accuracy remains unchanged.
The Good
Unlisted pellet, or better yet unlisted grenade, all increased to stats make this a very nice Legendary and it does take some getting used to so you get he most out of the grenade. This gun loves singularities as well, group them up and let them all take the splash. So better over all stats, interesting red text ability, this gun is a win. It’s also just plain powerful and can be made into a total monster with the right set up.
Ogre
The Ogre is a Torgue spin gun with increased damage, fire rate, massively increased magazine size, and slightly reduced accuracy. It also has an RNG effect where the bullets ricochet and it gets increased fire rate and reload speed.
The Good
The damage, fire rate, and mag increase alone make this a very strong gun, but when the RNG effect kicks in it goes way over the top into competition with some of the best guns in the game. The fact it has high splash damage makes it even better. It’s very ammo efficient and very powerful. I don’t love RNG effects on guns but this gun stands on its own without the effect so it gets a pass. If you are going to put RNG effects on guns this gun should be the model to base them all on.
Boom Puppy
This at first glance looks like just a weaker Kerblaster but it is quite different. It shoots one grenade that bounces upto 5 times and on each bounce you get an explosion, much like the rolling thunder grenade. Stat wise it is also unlike the Kerblaster, this gun had damage, fire rate, and mag size all decreased but it uses one less ammo per shot.
The Ugly
This gun just isn’t very effective and its easy to kill yourself since the grenades can bounce back at you. Unless the enemy is in a corner or has terrain around it to keep the grenade hitting that enemy it most likely will bounce away somewhere. The reduced stat across the board also don’t help since this is a blue and not a legendary that is even worse. Blues are not as powerful as purples so reducing them really hurts.
The Hindsight Fix
Once again, conceptually I love the idea of the gun and it fits the Tiny Tina theme. Just up the stats, not just to match the blue varient but give it the same % increases the Kerblaster saw or similar and it might be a good gun.
Hyperion Shotguns
Interfacer
The interfacer has increased damage per pellet, increased pellet count, decreased accuracy (do to extra pellets), increased fire rate, magazine size (but less shots), 2 ammo per shot instead of one, additional critical hit bonus, and most importantly 2 unlisted pellets per pellet that arc out horizontal and come back to meet the original pellet. It also always spawns without a scope so you can move at full speed while you ADS.
The Good
Since each pellet listed on the card is actually 3 pellets, this puts out Torgue Barrel pellet counts at half the ammo cost and with much higher accuracy. Since you also have unlisted, as well as split you can abuse things like B0re and Amp shields. Add in the fact you get boosted stats like damage, crit, and fire rate it makes this a DPS machine. Sure you have the drawback of 2 ammo per shot instead of one and less shots per mag 7 vs 10, that is little compared to the bonuses it got. This is a gun worth killing Vora for. Seraphs should be like this, powerful and unforgiving when it comes to drawbacks.
Butcher
The Butcher has massively decreased pellet count from 17 to 3, but un like other Torgue Barrels it only uses one ammo per shot. You also have massively increased fire rate, accuracy (mostly due to less pellets), and a small mag increase. What makes the Butcher really special is the RNG effect of adding ammo to the mag instead of consuming bullets, letting it shoot much longer.
The Bad, Good, Odd yeah thats it
I really love this gun and will stick up for it as a top tier shotgun, but at the same time it is a pearl and a few changes would of made it a lot better to the point of being a raiding tier gun. So reducing the pellet count all the way to 3 doesn’t make sense why its a Torgue Barrel and makes it only really good with the Vertical Grip prefix so you have 5 pellets, but even at 5 pellets the accuracy isn’t what it should be compared to other shotguns with 5 pellets. With the right prefix the thing is a beast for pretty much everything outside Raid bosses, but I don’t like limiting guns to a single prefix to be good. The ammo consumption is great because most shotguns are real ammo hogs and that is where this stands out, and the fire rate combined with the deep mag do to the red text effect makes it have great DPS.
The Hindsight Fix
Change the Barrel to either a Jakobs or Hyperion and have it start with 5 pellets. This way you could use a crit prefix or others with it, and the accuracy would be higher. There isn’t a Jakobs Barrel Hyperion shotgun and I think this would be good as one.
Conference Call
The Conference call like the interfacer has 2 unlisted pellets per shot, on the CC they go out in a T on either impact or a certain time in air. You have increased damage, but lowered pellet count, and lower accuracy even with less pellets.
The Good
15 pellets per shot for 1 ammo is very nice and 10 of those being unlisted again lets you abuse things like B0re and Amp shields. The accuracy loss is minimal so you shouldn’t notice that. With so many pellets and a mag size of 10 unmodified lets you put out a lot of DPS with this gun.
Slowhand
This is a red text spat gun with increased fire rate, doubled chance to cause status effects, and reduced accuracy. Unlike the splat guns the orbs from this are not effected by gravity and fly strait making it more accurate, and it is also a moxxi gun that heals you.
The Goodish…
The slowhand is very good in many ways but like the butcher requires the vertical prefix to be effective. On this gun though its a splat gun issue not red text issue. All splat guns have one pellet or orb that is pure splash, so one impact. The impact can hit multiple enemies if they are grouped up but the single hit damage is less than almost any other shotguns. Splatguns can also hurt you if they hit you like a grenade, so you can’t use them point blank. With all that said, if you get a Vertical Prefix the damage is solid and the AOE radius of the 3 going off is also really solid causing hurt to a lot of enemies and still solid damage per hit. With the healing and increased fire rate its a very effective gun at both offense and defense. It is also one of the best slag weapons in the game, at 72% chance and with 3 pellets it not only is almost guaranteed to slag but you can slag a group with a single shot. You can even get it to 100% chance with skills, bar, and gear.
The Hindsight Fix
The slowhand is great and doesn’t really need a fix, but base splatguns kind of do. So a 20% increase do damage would make the single pellet version more useable, and also take away the ability to hurt yourself with them.
Heartbreaker
This is another Moxxi Hyperion shotgun with increased pellets but lower damage per pellet, lowered accuracy mainly due to the extra pellets, and a critical hit bonus. This gun also shoots its pellets in a heart pattern, only comes in fire, and because its a Moxxi gun has the typical lifesteal.
The Good
10 pellets for 1 ammo and 50% more critical hit damage makes for a very effective shotgun, add in the life steal and you have a very effective tool for offense and defense. The range is somewhat limited for critting but even without crits you can do damage at decent range for a shotgun.
1340
This is a shotgun that talks to you and thats it, everything else is the same.
The Bad
While its not worse than a blue hyperion shotgun its just a hyperion shotgun that talks.
The Hindsight Fix
Not every gun has to be amazing but give it something, double the mag size, or lower the reload speed. Something little to make it a bit better.
Jakobs Shotguns
The Striker
This is a sniper shotgun, the skullmasher’s brother one could say. High critical hit type A, with the Jakobs type B gives it a very high crit bonus. The increased Accuracy goes great with the high crit and the one added to the magazine is pretty nice.
The Good
Jakobs shotguns love crit bonuses because of the high crit, with the Doc’s prefix you can have 100% type A and 15% type B, which is pretty huge. No drawbacks and everything goes nice with it, accuracy and of course with 1 ammo a shot as well as 4 in the mag gives it some DPS, and its pretty easy to get that mag up alot bigger with most characters. Really well designed gun.
Twister
The Twister is an shock only elemental Quad with 1 less pellet but massively increased damage, high splash damage, massively increased accuracy (more on that later), and highly lowered fire rate. It shoots the pellets in the shape of a tornado that gets more vertical as the bullets travel. The bullets also go slow and keep traveling so each pellet can hit enemies multiple times and can hit multiple enemies.
The Good
Quads are already massively powerful, but increase each pellets damage and add splash damage makes this one of the best One Shot One Kill guns in the game (not zer0’s skill, but killing enemies in one shot). Then add the Pseudo B0re, or penetration and its even more crazy. The slow bullet speed oddly enough helps this gun if you learn to use it because it works better with the penetration, so what seems like a drawback is a bonus in the end. If it wasn’t a shotgun that might be a different story. This is one of the guns shotguns in the game without a doubt, its like Torgue and Jakobs shotguns had a baby.
Hydra
The Hydra is a bandit barrel that acts a bit more like a Quad with increased pellet count, but it fires in a horizontal row of 5 spots each with 4 pellets for a total of 20 pellets. Accuracy is also really high but with the fire pattern its still wide but in a reliable way.
The Bad
The fire pattern kind of ruins this but Bandit Barrels are also not that great compared with the two close to it, Jakobs and Torgue. So the fire pattern makes it so you often miss a good percent of your pellets, it can be good mobbing but you are still better concentrating your pellets on one target, to really make full use of this you need to use it in melee range. Then the barrel, Bandit sits in the middle of two great barrels. Jakobs barrel you have the increased damage, solid accuracy for a shotgun. Torgue you have massive damage and massive pellets. Since Bandit doesn’t have the Damage Bonus like Jakobs and Torgue you have the lowest damage per pellet, and Bandit also lowers accuracy so it just falls quite a bit below both of those other options.
The Hindsight Fix
Either give it a Damage Bonus or make it a Torgue Barrel. They could also change the pattern so you get two pellets on the far outside, four in the middles, and 10 on center point, Or you could make it 5 wide but in the width of 3 wide that it shoots now.
Triquerta
This much like the Hydra above is a Bandit Barreled Jakobs Shotgun but this one fires in a triagle, has one less pellet but still more than a typical bandit barrel. This one though has lowered damage, increased accuracy, mag size, and slightly but pointless reduced fire rate.
The Bad
Like the hydra above the Bandit Barrel would be better as a Torgue or Jakobs but even more so since they reduced the damage on it. The fire patten is better but it still has limited range.
The Hindsight Fix
Similar to the Hydra above, but also don’t reduce the damage.
Tidal Wave
This is a Jakobs barreled shotgun with increased damage per pellet, and a pointless tiny fire rate penalty that you will never notice. It fires in a bullets in a horizontal wave pattern 5 pellets wide, the pellets also ricochet.
The Bad
Like the Hydra and Triqueta the fire pattern doesn’t really do this gun many favors. Jakobs shotguns believe it or not are guns you want to get crits with and this gun makes it hard to do that and many pellets miss your main target because of the wide pattern.
The Hindsight Fix
Like the Veruc and Hydra the 5 wide is too wide and should be tightened up. The wave also hurts it since you can’t really crit well, so make them go strait.
Orphan Maker
This is another Jakobs Barreled Shotgun with massively increased damage per pellet but it only has 2 pellets, compared to 13 on a regular Coach gun. Almost all the other stats are increased, fire rate, accuracy, mag size, and reload speed. It also does damage to you when you shoot it.
The Goodish…?
This is a gun that you really need a vertical acc, or rustlers prefix to make it good because that double the pellet count to 4. The damage per pellet is huge, beyond most snipers so if you can put 4 on target you can kill most things pretty well. But without that prefix its not really worth it.
The Hindsight Fix
Give it 4 pellets per shot to start with, that way other prefixes can be worth it. 4 pellets with the crit, or Doc prefix could be really good.
Torgue Shotguns
Carnage
The Carnage is a Torgue Barreled Shotgun that shoots a single Rocket instead of 16 gyrojets. The One Rocket does have massive damage, much more than a single gyrojet but less damage than the 16 combined. It also only takes 1 ammo per shot and has increased fire rate and accuracy.
The Bad
Since it only has one pellet and that pellet is a rocket it does a lot less damage than a Ravager. The Ravager has 16 pellets that each have 100% splash damage and the pellets can crit. The Carnage only has the one and since its a rocket its pure splash, so no pellet. The fact that it is one pellet per shot and more fire rate helps but its still less. A Vertical Prefix does help it quite a bit and certain characters like Krieg and Axton can get a lot out of it with that prefix, but its limited.
The Hindsight Fix
Either give it 3 rockets to start with or make that one rocket more worth it. Also possibly make it more like the orpahan maker, have it shoot massively powered gyrojets like a regular Torgue shotgun.
Flakker
The Flakker is also a Torgue Barrel Shotgun with reduced pellets but this time it has 3 pellets. Each pellet shoots and as it travels shoots off extra explosions with the same damage as on the card, each pellet shots off somewhere between 8-10 explosions in a cone pattern or RNG since the pellets go further apart as they travel. Stat wise each pellet has over double the damage of a single Ravager pellet. You also have reduced fire rate, accuracy, and reload speed, and increased mag size.
The Good and Bad
The Flakker has some of the highest damage potential in the game with a casual prefix (vertical grip) 5 pellets each putting out 8-10 explosions is 45-50 hits at damage on card, and since they are unlisted its also 8-10x amp damage. It makes it quite deadly, The bad is its one of the slowest guns in the game, both fire rate and reload are bad and since the damage is so spread out, its not always the best mobbing gun, but a great boss gun. It can be a bit hard to get used to its “sweet spot”, but if you do its deadly.
The Hindsight Fix
TPS seemed to tighten the spread on this so its easier to land more pellets on a smaller target and its easily one of the best guns in that game. So thats the fix, but getting rid of the fire rate penalty on it would also help quite a bit.
SWORDSPLOSION!!!
This is an Etech Torgue Shotgun which is odd since Torgue doesn’t make Etech shotguns. I compare it to a Ravager and in that sense it has only one pellet compared to 16 but that pellet does almost 3x the damage of a Ravager pellet. It also has better accuracy, and fire rate, but a reduced reload speed. This gun shoots a sword that has a pellet and splash damage and on impact 3 smaller swords shoot up and off of it that are grenades so pure splash and no pellets on them. Lastly it consumes 2 ammo per shot and can cause self harm.
The Good and Bad
Once again a shotgun with one pellet makes it another casual dependent (vertical grip), but with that grip it really strong with the unlisted explosions and low ammo consumption, also has great synergy with B0re family skills, but you need that prefix/acc. With 3 pellets thats upto 15 impacts including splash damage and thats high damage hits.
The Hindsight Fix
Maybe 2 main swords, I think 3 would be too much to start going upto 5 would be almost too good. But 2 or 4 seems a better fit so it wasn’t so reliant on the one prefix to be good. Either that or leave it at one and do more grenades, maybe 5 so its like a pimpernel shotgun. It doesn’t really “need” a fix its really good, just I don’t like guns that are so dependent on prefixes.
Landscaper
I’ll come back to this, I don’t want to talk about this gun right now
Tediore Shotguns
Omen
This is an Etech Tediore shotgun that is far different from a splatgun. Instead of a single pellet it has 9 pellets that each do roughly half as much as the splatgun pellet but they also have splash damage. It also has increased fire rate, and reload speed, but reduced elemental effect chance which makes sense going from 1 pellet to 9. The pellets shoot in a circle pattern that converges in and then spreads back out as the bullets fly, as well as penetration.
The Good
Splatguns in general are lackluster but this is very good, a much higher damage potential, you don’t have the arc, you can crit as well. It does take some skill to know the range where the pellets converge on the center point so you can do the most damage. Then when you take into consideration that it only takes 1 ammo per shot you have a very powerful and efficient shotgun that can have strong synergy with characters because of the penetration.
Retcher
This is also an Etech tediore shotgun but is much more like a splatgun than the Omen. This gun has increased damage and fire rate, but decreased accuracy, reload, mag size, and chance to corrode. It is also locked in corrosive. Lastly the arc of all the splat guns is more severe with the Retcher giving it less range.
The Bad
Splat guns are already poor and this is pretty much equal to a splat gun, some stats more and some less but even with less range. I would say this isn’t even as good as a regular tediore splat and and the fact that you have to beat a Raid to get it and its locked to a single element makes it pretty terrible.
The Hindsight Fix
We don’t really have a chucking shotgun, most of these are better to shoot. So really up the mag size and make it a chucking shotgun. At least it will have a purpose then, maybe also make it available in all elements.
Deliverance
This is identical to a purple Home Securtity (its purple varient) on all stats and when you throw it instead of a typical Tediore toss it goes in a strait line and can reflect a few times and shoot bullets as it flies.
The Bad
The toss is cool, but not that great and the stats are just that of a regular shotgun, and tediore regular shotguns are not the strongest of shotguns. If this was blue instead of legendary maybe, but then again it would be weaker because it wouldn’t be based on a purple.
The Hindsight Fix
Make the Chuck more worth it, this is a chucking shotgun so either up the damage or mag to make the chuck better.
Blockhead
This is a fire only Tediore shotgun with high splash damage, shoots in a square pattern of nine pellets and they can reflect off of surfaces. The only stat change is going from 6 pellets to 9.
The Good
The 9 pellets with high splash damage for 1 bullet with a reliable spread make this a beast of a gun. It can destroy pretty much all flesh enemies outside of Raids with ease (unless they are fire resistant). Between the high damage, ammo efficiency, ease of use, solid fire rate, and extra damage on reload this is easily one of the best shotguns in the game. The reflecting bullets give it even more efficiency and have strong synergy with many characters.
Octo
This is another blue tediore barrel like the Blockhead above. The octo has increased pellet count from 6 to 10, and Highly increased accuracy. The pellets shoot in a sine-Wave pattern where they weave in and out between each other, never getting to wide but getting very tight.
The Good
10 pellets for 1 ammo with high accuracy and damage on the reload is just nice, it does not have the power of the Omen or Blockhead but its a really solid shotgun. Not great but nothing really wrong with it. It has great range because the firing pattern the bullets stay close and don’t spread out at range like other shotguns. Solid but not great. Maybe a bit of a damage boost would put it at a higher class but not all guns need to be there.
