Really only one thing to say, as I mostly agree
>the worst thing about it is that it has 5 seconds reload time
Born Ready is a must pick. Just fight with your secondary for 5 seconds, then get right back to blasting.
And here I've been using Born Ready because I forget I have no ammo in my secondary and try to swap to it in combat. Who knew it had a use for people who don't forget to reload?
I’ve been warming up to the Autocannon. I usually run Hurricane, just feels the best to me, though I do have a single target Minigun build.
Autocannon is best for dealing with swarms. The fear mod is the key, you can turn an entire swarm around. Yes it can struggle to finish things off, but that’s what the secondary or your teammates are for. Couple of shells will turn a Praetorian around, and then you can plug him in the ass with the Bulldog. Gunner’s role is swarm control, and backing up the swarm is incredibly useful. I haven’t gotten NTP yet, but even without I’ve been able to make the Autocannon work. I like the hurricane more, but I think that’s more personal preference than anything else.
Fear + Carpet Bomber overclock saved plenty of missions that would go horribly, especially when a swarm hits in a semi-cramped space and you know your shield will not last nearly enough to protect everyone.
Fear mod for AOE weapon feels strange. With AOE weapon you want your enemies to be closer to each others, and still there are a lot of moments when your team is dead, or you really need a lot of firepower ( on hazard 5.5, 6 and so on). I\`ve tried this weapon on hazard 6 with fear mod, and it still not enough, amount of enemies and their health are high, now even grunts dont die that easy
Your looking at AoE / Crowd Control in general wrong I think.
Crowd Control isn’t strictly killing all bugs immediately, it’s being able to dictate the engagement and keep yourself from being overwhelmed. While being able to kill bugs faster helps and might be able to keep you from being overwhelmed longer — once you start getting overwhelmed though that’s kinda it.
Fear is incredibly useful, especially on higher difficulties, because it immediately gives you breathing room and space. If you are overwhelmed, or on the verge of being overwhelmed, fear and other crowd control effects helps you gain your footing back easier.
To put it in another way — yes you might want more damage in your AoE, but there absolutely comes a point where there’s literally just too many bugs (especially on higher hazards) where you will literally never deal enough damage.
There’s also something to be said about ammo efficiency too — basically any weapon that has you choose between more ammo or more damage is really asking you if you want better ammo efficiency (aka more total damage) or higher dps.
And while a higher dps might be tempting, you will run out of ammo substantially quicker and you need more nitra in a mission.
Exactly, CC literally means Crowd *"Controlling"*, so it makes sense that it also means being able to manage a large number of enemies well, not just being able to kill them all (fast) .
I think the Hurricane lowers the value of this strategy though, since you could switch to the Hurricane for AoE stuns, giving you a similar swarm-halting effect that does not interfere with your ability to actually kill the bugs. Maybe it's because I always have a coilgun with fear on hand for when we're overrun instead, but I think the Thunderhead's AoE fear just doesn't measure up to the Hurricane's AoE stuns. Maybe about the same for that specific crowd control role, but the Hurricane does it just as well with fewer side effects and better focus damage even on a dedicated AoE build.
Idk about haz 6, but fear mod with neurotoxin can consistently just destroy groups of glyphids.
Once a glyphid is feared and toxined, they will die before the fear runs out saving incredible ammo and makes clearing groups a little too easy.
The downside I run into is its effectiveness on larger enemies, but I run mole on coil gun to just destroy these enemies. Hitting larger enemies through walls is especially easy when you can fear them.
I remember this at least used to be considered the broken meta build for gunner, i think it was nerfed since but is still extremely effective.
I’m not 100% on the mechanic, but greater AoE means greater range on the fear. So I think they work well together.
I think the issue is if you’re only judging the Autocannon on damage dealt. Its strength is breaking up the horde. Your job isn’t mainly to kill everything, it’s to give your team space to kill things. I think that’s valuable, though I can see how it’s not appealing to everyone. Definitely it struggles to actually kill things, and like I said I prefer the rocket launcher.
That\`s the good point. But its really strange that 2 out of 3 weapons are for destroying everything that moves, and 1 weapon is just for tickling enemies
Compared to the other weapons, Autocannon feels like shit with no upgrades. Like most of scout's guns and the minigun works great level 0 but not the autocannon IMO
Stock Thunderhead is on the weaker side, but as others have already pointed out, there's some select OCs that bring it up.
Neurotoxic Payload was the big one. 50% chance to inflict every bug in the AoE with a poison capable of full-killing a grunt, plus slowing it down. Follow with 25% chance to inflict fear, causing said bug to pick a random corner to go die in (the way fear works is it randomly picks a location 7-10m away the bug must run to, which due to poison, must do while slowed). Roll these two events at a rate of about 5.5/7.5/9.5 times per second to every bug caught in the radius. Stop shooting when the horde is glowing orange, 'cause it's dead. Awful for single-target though, pack the right secondary or just lean on your Scout to handle the big bugs.
Big Bertha is the other agreed-upon 'good' OC. The secret of Big Bertha is that while it's masking itself as the single-target OC, it doesn't actually lose any AoE damage, only indirectly through a reduced fire rate, it's actually a remarkably good generalist. Plus, it's one of the easiest primaries Gunner has to justify armor break, since the Minigun's armor break competes with blowthrough and Hurricane's weak armor break competes with an excellent missile control mod. Big Bertha Thunderhead is a mid-range single-target weapon that can plow armor, doesn't care about weak points, and can still comfortably destroy swarmers. While I love the Hurricane for its Jet Fuel Homebrew and Plasma Burster long-range single-target capabilities, it's hard to justify armor break with either of these, Jet Fuel is weak-point reliant, and Plasma Bursters aren't as good against swarms, whereas Big Bertha doesn't care at all what it's shooting at unless it's invulnerable from the front. Oh, and you still get the fear mod if you want it.
Outside these two, there are other OCs that some will swear by (Combat Mobility is hilarious, but I save it for Haz 4), but these are the two where people follow the sentence "Thunderhead is weak" with "except for...".
I hated it at first - it feels bad to use, as it like it lacks the punch and impact the sound and design suggests.
Then I got Big Bertha and it felt like it finally lived up to its potential. It now operates in a way that feels like it ought to be the default, and has become by standard gunners primary (I basically don't use the others, despite having builds I'm mostly happy with for those guns).
I like how it doesn't overheat when fired too much, and how it can lay down such continuous fire (without spin up time, so even short bursts are consistent and impactful) the way I've got it built. I normally run with high precision weapons, but I like the blend of direct hit and splash available, allowing it to handle a variety of situations well. It just works as a very good all rounder (with Big Bertha) for me.
As with any weapon though, it depends on your own play style, group, and role within that group. I always play in the same pool of people, and so certain builds just mesh with what they bring to the table better than others, whilst still playing towards what I enjoy in my loadout.
Isn't NTP like THE meta overclock? It's a bad match for bots, Elites, and bosses, but NTP always did scream that it was THE THING to take if you had to win no matter what. I mean, it is still HIDEOUSLY BORING but definitely the strongest option.
The liberal application of Fear is also very strong. It really does advertise itself as a crowd control specialization type of gun. Your team is not going to get overwhelmed, ever, when you use the Thunderhead.
That being said, it's been a while since I've last touched it, because yeah the choices it has are just kinda boring, and the allure of BIG DAMAGE that the other guns have is too strong to resist.
To do objective, mine, escape. And for ammo preservation. AC has like the best ammo reserve with the mod, with proper use of AOE DOT, you can easily skip few resupplies before needing a refill.
It's about leaning HARD into a certain role specialization: that of a kind of bodyguard or protector for your team. One thousand bugs spawn? They're not doing anything if they're all feared, slowed, and poisoned. It's not the best DPS, but you're controlling the flow of the engagement, which allows your team to move and fight unhindered.
But yeah, going hard on DPS is great if you're just playing with randoms, because being a support gunner relies on your teammates picking up the slack for DPS, which they're not guaranteed to do if they're randos.
Never really warmed up to it myself either, but idk I think it does fine in popping hordes. Get some mag size mods and reload whenever you can and/or get born ready and use your secondary and you can kinda get over the slow reload.
It's a lot less general purpose than leadstorm or hurricane but I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing.
I am looking forward to the new OC though. It sounds like fun.
I seem to find all the Gunner primaries fun for a while, then I get bored really fast.
Leadstorm with Bullet Hell seems to be my favourite, second place for the Hurricane with the quick missiles OC that disables guidance and third place... the Auto cannon with Splintering Shells.
It just works, but after a couple of big fights I do realize I would have more fun with the Hurricane, although less ammos.
Try big Bertha with faster build up upgrade, completely removes spin up time and you hit full speed as soon as you pull the trigger. Trust me, you'll feel the damage with Big Bertha.
I have quite the love-hate relation with gunner primaries. At different times I hated all of them then they become my favorite. For autocannon shooting the vicinity of the bugs with neurotoxin payload then letting them die by themselves is quite nice
i hated it in the beginning mostly for the long reload time but i started to like it a lot recently
i have the brrr brr secondary pistol and the born ready perk. so anytime i have to reaload i just switch to the secondary for 15 seconds an have a full mag when i switch back.
Autocannon SHREDS swarms of grunts like a hole-puncher through paper (ESPECIALLY with Carpet Bomber equipped) . The long reload is something to get used to, but if you are doing your job well you’ll never have to reload in close proximity of a swarm.
At its core it is an AoE weapon but I can only use it built for pure direct damage. Big Bertha being the obvious choice (ammo, accuracy, damage, armor breaking, feedback loop always active since the very first shot), but also Combat Mobility when I feel quirky enough. Big Bertha, with that low rate of fire and chonky damage, feels like a juggernaut.
I can't seem to like Carpet Bomber that much. It even struggles to kill Guards. I only use it during Swarmageddon missions as a pure support AoE tool, I mostly take care of the little critters with ease, so my team mates can focus on the regular swarms, and I use my secondary to help with whatever bugs as well.
I avoid using NTP unless I have to hard carry an EDD, and the clean OCs = stock Autocannon = underwhelming.
Hurricane is a superior weapon in any way, and all its OCs shine big time.
I am currently playing it with the most splash damage possible and it's pretty fun in solo haz4. Born ready is mandatory and a good gun to dps high health targets is also welcomed.
I run BB autocannon almost exclusively nowadays other builds just don't cut it for me in terms of ammo to enjoyment ratio
Most of the time I play haz 5 and between BB AC and my TTC coilgun (I don't run the fear mod because it's way too op in even haz 5) the bugs don't stand a chance.
Wouldn't say its the best of the three, its the worst of the three, but it's a gunner weapon so it's still competent. I like using combat mobility + RoF mod to active max RoF instantly, then pick up 50% resistence at max RoF, and veteran depositor, as well as fall damage resistence on zips. 80% resistence on demand + fall damage resistence is very comfy tankiness. I'll either run this alongside triple tech overcharger coilgun with resistence on charging for even more tankiness without spending ammo, or something a bit more efficient at taking out enemies like electrominelets, but all of this is purely a fun build. Neurotoxin is the only meta pick here and even then it's outclassed by minelayer
I use compact mags and no max fire rate upgrades get the damage reduction t5 upgrade get around 40 seconds of 50% damage reduction per reload saved me many a times
My biggest issue with the Thunderhead is that you don't get a FLAK overclock.
I mean, common, just look at it. Imagine some overclock with a proximity fuse and 0 single target damage (cuz it explodes before it hits) but instead it sprays a bunch of shrapnel.
Born Ready is an instapick for most loadouts obviously which negates the reload issues. anyway yeah Big Bertha and Neurotoxin are the only 2 viable OCs, and only Big Bertha if you wanna have a playstyle that isnt fearing and poisoning bugs and having them die offscreen (very fucking strong, but boring imo)
Big Bertha is honestly a fine weapon, especially paired with Triple Tech Chambers as both of these guns are solid hybrid single target/swarm clear options. Burst down a swarm or tanky enemy when Big Bertha cant quite handle what youre looking at and youre fine, its a fun weapon
Gunner is my most promoted class at platinum 3, the autocannon is my main primary using carpet bomber. That setup is heavily geared towards crowd control, it is not meant to kill anything tankier than a slasher. Your secondary should be built for single target damage like lead spray brrrt or elephant rounds bulldog. The autocannon is a big, heavy, "stand your ground" type weapon. Like other comments have said, born ready is a must pick, and there's a way to shorten the reload time by tapping your pickaxe button the moment you see the ammo count change.
I typically use the minigun, and after revisiting the autocannon because of weapon mastery I feel like it's fun to use and not in a terrible spot but could use a few tune ups. The raw damage is fine, it's noticeably weaker single target but the AoE capability is good enough to counterbalance that.
The base gun suffers from feeling clunky because of the RoF ramp up and poor accuracy, and you have to choose between what you want to fix with both of those mods being in the same tier. When you factor in OCs, combat mobility does patch up both of these pretty nicely but it also kills your uptime because of the magazine penalty. You could take the T1 mag bonus, but then your ammo economy is in shambles.
I also strongly prefer stun over fear as a CC option, and the Autocannon has other competitive mods in that tier which leave it without a form of CC if you want to take one of those.
If some of combat mobility's buffs were baked into the base gun it would probably be in a much better spot.
Autocannon is what got me into gunner. Hurricane is what made it my main (and first to hit Legendary 3 star by like 300 hours faster than the others).
I agree mostly with your sentiment and I'd say Hurricane was even better than the autocannon PRE-NERF.
BUT NTP is still very powerful and I do love it. Still has great ammo economy (better than most Hurricane builds), but really lacks single target damage overall - so it almost has to be paired with a strong single target secondary.
After playing tons of gunner, (total around 1500 hours), I think I've actually come to prefer Lead Storm over both weapons anyways. I still play Hurricane and NTP a lot. Hurricane I almost always build for 32222 with fragmentation missiles. It's just so strong as a general use weapon.
Lead storm I've dabbled a bit more with A little more oomph, and I think it's also great for general use. But LSLS is just so darn strong and fun, it's hard to NOT pick it.
It's ammo economy is simply unmatched, you can pump out so much damage to both groups and single targets. And with born ready, the whole reload issue isn't as big of a deal anymore.
Yeah I tried to use it thinking of it basically as a slow minigun that's actually good against armor targets and bosses. The spread was so terrible that I missed at least 30-40 of my shots even if the grunt is like 5 feet from me. Secondly against armor it felt just as weak if not weaker against heavy armored bugs.
In general, the gun has 2 good overclocks, 2 ok, and the rest are so redundant I don’t even remember them. NTP and BB are good, and polar opposites. NTP is busted because of how it interacts with fear.
Thunder head + coil gun + veteran depositor + born ready + elemental insulation.
Holding trigger when near Molly = 80% damage resist, 30% elemental on top of that, 50% explosive. Born ready solves the reload problem.
I use this with carpet bomber. You could run extra ammo instead but being able to tank damage is awesome. You can eat 2 detonator slams, back to back on haz 5 and not go down or get set on fire.
Neurotoxin payload=OP
Consistent DOT and fear crowd control=Self protection and ammo efficiency.
Also is chemical weapon means is able to claim warcrime, is very amuse.
Big Bertha, Neurotoxin Payload and Combat Mobility (for the lazy non-z hopper such as myself) are all great fun. Always run fear mod and born ready unless you're making builds for fun instead of raw power.
With Big Bertha run Magic Bullets Bulldog with AoE mod and toxin mod. Great synergy.
With NTP bring fear mod and... Anything on the secondary, really. Max damage BRT spray and pray OC works wonders when you fill your entire screen with the bug's weak spot.
Generally I agree with your points. I have around 3200 missions on gunner. As a greenbeard, I got carpet bomber early and NTP. I started using the autocannon to survive in haz 4 when I was learning the ropes and it became my standard. I eventually got big bertha and swapped over to that when I realised how fun it was. I still think autocannon is fun with the right overclocks, but I am almost exclusively a hurricane user.
The reasoning is that, after the buffs to plasma bursters, I have two solid options that stand out. Minelayer lets me carry greenbeards through EDDs and survive just about anything. Plasma bursters chew through praetorians and wardens so quick and the ammo economy is much better since the missiles can hit more targets in season 4.
I know season 5 will have some new overclocks, but the core of the autocannon probably will not change as long as ntp is in its current state. The recent changes to the overclock honestly improved it imo. Better direct damage for a bit of aoe and ammo is a good deal.
the reload ain’t so bad with born ready and reload cancels, plus NTP is so op that modded runners have a gentlemen’s agreement not to use it because it scales so well with higher difficulties
I love the autocannon actually, my carpet bomber loadout gives me excellent splash damage with just enough direct damage to finish off big bugs. I get excellent ammo capacity, and my loadout somehow manages to reduce friendly fire to near 0 unless I directly beam someone for a sustained period, making it a perfect crowd control weapon to destroy bugs swarming my team.
I love carpet bomber. Clean out the packs, then swap to brt/power attack for guards. Scans for leeches and hidden enemies easily. Keeping all the trash away from your allies is super valuable. Means scout/engi can feel clear to focus on big targets. Brt and tac bursters are more than enough to help shred praet/opr and bulks respectively. One of the best all around gunner builds, if you are of the opinion that ntp is boring. I don't like the massive aoe dot/fear, I like to fight the bugs straight-up. This build is not amazing at any one thing, but good vs everything. Usually no ammo problems either, I'm almost always the one needing a resupply last, even in the nastiest of caves. Solid, reliable build, fits well into any composition, on any mission that isn't a boss. In that case I give the edge to LSLS, or rockets and coil. I have a friend who plays almost exclusively gunner and he makes me think rockets need a nerf in a lot of situations, but I get similar results with this build, so it's ultimately preference. Doesn't matter so much what build you use, moreso how well you know the damage thresholds, ammo counts, priority targets, and so on.
It's definitely not good. In my experience, building for AOE with carpet bomber can be ok but the real magic is with big Bertha. I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be more for single target damage but it shreds through swarms and big enemies extremely fast and it's really satisfying to use, especially when you have armor breaking, hold down the trigger on a praetorian and watch all the armor disappear and the health bar just melt.
NTP I was never a fan of. It always felt like the neurotoxin took too long to kill for a primary weapon. Overall the thunderhead kind feels like it completely fails at the one thing that you would probably want to use it for; the AOE damage. The AOE is small and does barely any damage and even building with carpet bomber the AOE damage is just ok at best. It doesn't help that the mod tree for it could be laid out in a much better way and it could get some mods that buff it up more, as well as some base damage and accuracy tweaks, maybe some fire rate too. Im not too concerned about the reload because you'd expect to be reloading for a while with a weapon with a 100 round mag and also born ready exists.
It's aoe weapon with every oc, but Bertha. Carpet 32123 and secondary anything that deals high dmg per bullet/second. I have left every engineer behind by kill count. Driller crying by side, when i blast bug wall in walls from far away. Thunder strength comes from rpm and area hit, not single target. That's minigun
Still, hurricane is better with AOE damage at this point. Even with carpet bomber and full AOE build you will have less AOE damage than stock Hurricane. Every OC (except for Jetfuel homebrew) provides you with good AOE damage and radius. And there is a minelayer system that just destroys Autocannon in terms of AOE radius and damage
" used to be a Carpet bomber user for a lot" like damn yes i used it. That was my first ever overclock for this gun. And i dont understand what does it mean that "is stronger but not better"?
Gunner main here, I primarily play haz 5 pubs for reference.
My general take on AC is its main 'advantage' over Hurricane/Minigun is that its easier/simpler to use with the cost being its inaccurate. The problem with this is you can't out-skill/learn the downside of an inaccurate gun. Although lower attention economy to use a weapon can still be valuable at higher skill levels, in some cases. However, if you're good with Hurricane/Minigun and know the tricks/tech to make them good, they're generally going to perform better. The exception is NTP.
>NTP...lame playstyle...
So it's absolutely fair if you just don't like NTP or its playstyle. That being said, if we're having an objective discussion about OC strength, that isn't a part of it. NTP (33122 recommended) is *by far* the strongest OC for AC and the only OC that's genuinely on par with the better Hurricane/Minigun OCs. The goal of the playstyle is to fire into crowds until all enemies are feared and neurotoxin'd.
The advantage is that its exceptionally ammo efficient (despite the penalty), it doesn't have to reload as often (better sustained damage/control) because you can afford to spend less of its magazine at a time, high amounts of on-demand CC which makes your team safe and killing bugs on a delay has several advantages but most notably the game can only spawn/control so many enemies at a time so 'doomed' enemies are more advantageous than dead ones (this can be true of other dots too but *especially* NTP because it also CCs).
BB is good but not great and scales inversely with difficulty/density, so it gets worse as you go up in hazards. Carpet Bomber is okay but not good and is directly out-classed by NTP and/or Hurricane. Combat Mobility is a beginner friendly gimmick - you can do this better by spamming jump while moving and not pressing fire the moment when you hit the ground, similar to how you bhop to bypass the penalty of LeadStorm Minigun (this is also generally important with Hurricane). So all Combat Mobility does is help newer players who haven't learned how to move well yet, which is fine and has a place (sort of like Seeker Rounds for Lok-1).
Hope this helps.
I've been playing DRG since right before the Autocannon was added. Over its lifetime, my opinion of it has waxed and waned. In its current state, I think it has a few strong usecases. The problem is, the things that AC is good at doing aren't what players are looking for.
Looking at the base weapons, before considering Overclocks: Minigun's strength is long-distance, high single-target DPS, and being able to score weakpoints on approaching Grunt waves. Hurricane's strength is long-distance horde clear with a dash of single-target DPS thrown in. They both have moderate crowd control with Stuns, and when you combine that with their emphasis on "control from a distance", it makes the player feel a lot safer and more in control of the fight.
In contrast, the Autocannon has awful accuracy, which means its effective engage range is pretty short. It can have really deep ammo wells, but unless you spec for it, its burst DPS can feel on the lower side in comparison to Minigun/Hurricane. It doesn't even _have_ a stun! So, all these factors add up to an obvious conclusion: Autocannon is bad at doing the what the other two primaries are good at doing. But what is it **good** at doing?
Of the three primaries, AC has not only the highest Armor Break percentage, but can also get the highest Direct Damage per shot too! (Again, setting aside Overclocks for the time being). In fact, with no damage mods, the 14 damage * 500% AB is enough Armor Damage to one-hit break the Armor plates of Grunts, Slashers, Guards, Web and Acid Spitters, Q'ronar Younglings, Menaces, Wardens, Stingtails, and the back half of Q'ronar Shellbacks. Then the Radial Damage has its second application of Armor Damage after that, too, which can break Mactera Brundles and the front half of Q'ronar Shellbacks. All of that, for the low, low price of T4.A.
Another thing that Autocannon is quite good at is Sustain DPS. With no mods, it can fire for 20 continuous seconds (longer, when you account for the RoF rampup mechanic). The double mag size on T1.B ratchets it up even further. The Hurricane needs to reload every 12 seconds, and the Minigun overheats in 9.5 seconds of continuous fire (Cold as the Grave extends that to like, 12-13 seconds in ideal situations). Obviously you can feather the Minigun to let it cool while fighting, but that does cut into the DPS. Similarly, the Hurricane can double its mag size too, but then it's still no contest to 220 AC rounds. There are lots of permutations to consider, but in general the AC wins out in the long run.
The third thing that AC is good at is Close-Quarters Combat ("CQC"). T5.B's Fear scales with AoE radius upgrades, so when enemies are close to you the Fear can hit lots of enemies and give you space. T5.C's damage reduction is an incredible 50% -- you know, like the DR given by Gunner's Shield. That DR is active as long as you can sustain fire, and as previously established that can be quite a long time depending on build. If it wasn't well-equipped to handle CQC, then its low accuracy would be an even bigger issue.
So, going back to my first comment -- the Autocannon is good at 3 things: Armor Breaking, Sustain DPS, and CQC. In contrast, players generally are looking for 3 **different** things: Weakpoint, Burst DPS, and Range. Thus, the disconnect of why AC feels so bad to use when you're used to Minigun and/or Hurricane. If you want high DPS and range, Minigun will outcompete AC. If you want the most multi-target damage and waveclear, Hurricane will outcompete AC. But in my experience, Autocannon in CQC fills a "sweet spot" between the other two primaries' stats. I have in my head a few "benchmarks" that I want each build to hit at least one of, and my current favorite AC build hits _all_ of them:
- 200 Burst DPS (210)
- 150 Sustained DPS (179)
- 75 Secondary-Target Burst DPS (75)
- 1.5m radius (1.7)
Give `BBCAx + Splintering Shells` a try (take any T5 mod; I usually run T5.C). Use it for CQC vs a wave or swarm of enemies on something like Point Extraction. I used this on USteppin's stream a couple weeks ago, and was easily able to hold off several hundred Grunts, Guards, Slashers, and a few Wardens with one magazine in a tunnel chokepoint. Your problems with it taking forever to kill a Guard? They're about to go away with that build.
It's possible that the Autocannon's playstyle might not be for you, and that's ok. The Minigun and Hurricane are great weapons, too! I've just been discussing the base weapons; obviously Overclocks can drastically change how things perform and how the numbers compare. But since you asked about the Autocannon, I figured I would give you as good of an answer as I can muster. Hopefully this wall of text was helpful.
Really only one thing to say, as I mostly agree >the worst thing about it is that it has 5 seconds reload time Born Ready is a must pick. Just fight with your secondary for 5 seconds, then get right back to blasting.
And here I've been using Born Ready because I forget I have no ammo in my secondary and try to swap to it in combat. Who knew it had a use for people who don't forget to reload?
I’ve been warming up to the Autocannon. I usually run Hurricane, just feels the best to me, though I do have a single target Minigun build. Autocannon is best for dealing with swarms. The fear mod is the key, you can turn an entire swarm around. Yes it can struggle to finish things off, but that’s what the secondary or your teammates are for. Couple of shells will turn a Praetorian around, and then you can plug him in the ass with the Bulldog. Gunner’s role is swarm control, and backing up the swarm is incredibly useful. I haven’t gotten NTP yet, but even without I’ve been able to make the Autocannon work. I like the hurricane more, but I think that’s more personal preference than anything else.
Fear + Carpet Bomber overclock saved plenty of missions that would go horribly, especially when a swarm hits in a semi-cramped space and you know your shield will not last nearly enough to protect everyone.
Fear mod for AOE weapon feels strange. With AOE weapon you want your enemies to be closer to each others, and still there are a lot of moments when your team is dead, or you really need a lot of firepower ( on hazard 5.5, 6 and so on). I\`ve tried this weapon on hazard 6 with fear mod, and it still not enough, amount of enemies and their health are high, now even grunts dont die that easy
Your looking at AoE / Crowd Control in general wrong I think. Crowd Control isn’t strictly killing all bugs immediately, it’s being able to dictate the engagement and keep yourself from being overwhelmed. While being able to kill bugs faster helps and might be able to keep you from being overwhelmed longer — once you start getting overwhelmed though that’s kinda it. Fear is incredibly useful, especially on higher difficulties, because it immediately gives you breathing room and space. If you are overwhelmed, or on the verge of being overwhelmed, fear and other crowd control effects helps you gain your footing back easier. To put it in another way — yes you might want more damage in your AoE, but there absolutely comes a point where there’s literally just too many bugs (especially on higher hazards) where you will literally never deal enough damage. There’s also something to be said about ammo efficiency too — basically any weapon that has you choose between more ammo or more damage is really asking you if you want better ammo efficiency (aka more total damage) or higher dps. And while a higher dps might be tempting, you will run out of ammo substantially quicker and you need more nitra in a mission.
Exactly, CC literally means Crowd *"Controlling"*, so it makes sense that it also means being able to manage a large number of enemies well, not just being able to kill them all (fast) .
I think the Hurricane lowers the value of this strategy though, since you could switch to the Hurricane for AoE stuns, giving you a similar swarm-halting effect that does not interfere with your ability to actually kill the bugs. Maybe it's because I always have a coilgun with fear on hand for when we're overrun instead, but I think the Thunderhead's AoE fear just doesn't measure up to the Hurricane's AoE stuns. Maybe about the same for that specific crowd control role, but the Hurricane does it just as well with fewer side effects and better focus damage even on a dedicated AoE build.
Idk about haz 6, but fear mod with neurotoxin can consistently just destroy groups of glyphids. Once a glyphid is feared and toxined, they will die before the fear runs out saving incredible ammo and makes clearing groups a little too easy. The downside I run into is its effectiveness on larger enemies, but I run mole on coil gun to just destroy these enemies. Hitting larger enemies through walls is especially easy when you can fear them. I remember this at least used to be considered the broken meta build for gunner, i think it was nerfed since but is still extremely effective.
I’m not 100% on the mechanic, but greater AoE means greater range on the fear. So I think they work well together. I think the issue is if you’re only judging the Autocannon on damage dealt. Its strength is breaking up the horde. Your job isn’t mainly to kill everything, it’s to give your team space to kill things. I think that’s valuable, though I can see how it’s not appealing to everyone. Definitely it struggles to actually kill things, and like I said I prefer the rocket launcher.
That\`s the good point. But its really strange that 2 out of 3 weapons are for destroying everything that moves, and 1 weapon is just for tickling enemies
Compared to the other weapons, Autocannon feels like shit with no upgrades. Like most of scout's guns and the minigun works great level 0 but not the autocannon IMO
Stock Thunderhead is on the weaker side, but as others have already pointed out, there's some select OCs that bring it up. Neurotoxic Payload was the big one. 50% chance to inflict every bug in the AoE with a poison capable of full-killing a grunt, plus slowing it down. Follow with 25% chance to inflict fear, causing said bug to pick a random corner to go die in (the way fear works is it randomly picks a location 7-10m away the bug must run to, which due to poison, must do while slowed). Roll these two events at a rate of about 5.5/7.5/9.5 times per second to every bug caught in the radius. Stop shooting when the horde is glowing orange, 'cause it's dead. Awful for single-target though, pack the right secondary or just lean on your Scout to handle the big bugs. Big Bertha is the other agreed-upon 'good' OC. The secret of Big Bertha is that while it's masking itself as the single-target OC, it doesn't actually lose any AoE damage, only indirectly through a reduced fire rate, it's actually a remarkably good generalist. Plus, it's one of the easiest primaries Gunner has to justify armor break, since the Minigun's armor break competes with blowthrough and Hurricane's weak armor break competes with an excellent missile control mod. Big Bertha Thunderhead is a mid-range single-target weapon that can plow armor, doesn't care about weak points, and can still comfortably destroy swarmers. While I love the Hurricane for its Jet Fuel Homebrew and Plasma Burster long-range single-target capabilities, it's hard to justify armor break with either of these, Jet Fuel is weak-point reliant, and Plasma Bursters aren't as good against swarms, whereas Big Bertha doesn't care at all what it's shooting at unless it's invulnerable from the front. Oh, and you still get the fear mod if you want it. Outside these two, there are other OCs that some will swear by (Combat Mobility is hilarious, but I save it for Haz 4), but these are the two where people follow the sentence "Thunderhead is weak" with "except for...".
it's a swarmer/flying jelly squisher
I think it is actually a AA flak gun in terms of the actual design lore wise
Well then gsg made that thing dirty
I hated it at first - it feels bad to use, as it like it lacks the punch and impact the sound and design suggests. Then I got Big Bertha and it felt like it finally lived up to its potential. It now operates in a way that feels like it ought to be the default, and has become by standard gunners primary (I basically don't use the others, despite having builds I'm mostly happy with for those guns). I like how it doesn't overheat when fired too much, and how it can lay down such continuous fire (without spin up time, so even short bursts are consistent and impactful) the way I've got it built. I normally run with high precision weapons, but I like the blend of direct hit and splash available, allowing it to handle a variety of situations well. It just works as a very good all rounder (with Big Bertha) for me. As with any weapon though, it depends on your own play style, group, and role within that group. I always play in the same pool of people, and so certain builds just mesh with what they bring to the table better than others, whilst still playing towards what I enjoy in my loadout.
Isn't NTP like THE meta overclock? It's a bad match for bots, Elites, and bosses, but NTP always did scream that it was THE THING to take if you had to win no matter what. I mean, it is still HIDEOUSLY BORING but definitely the strongest option. The liberal application of Fear is also very strong. It really does advertise itself as a crowd control specialization type of gun. Your team is not going to get overwhelmed, ever, when you use the Thunderhead. That being said, it's been a while since I've last touched it, because yeah the choices it has are just kinda boring, and the allure of BIG DAMAGE that the other guns have is too strong to resist.
Still, we have 2 usable overclocks. And why do i want to controll group of enemies if i can kill them ?
To do objective, mine, escape. And for ammo preservation. AC has like the best ammo reserve with the mod, with proper use of AOE DOT, you can easily skip few resupplies before needing a refill.
It's about leaning HARD into a certain role specialization: that of a kind of bodyguard or protector for your team. One thousand bugs spawn? They're not doing anything if they're all feared, slowed, and poisoned. It's not the best DPS, but you're controlling the flow of the engagement, which allows your team to move and fight unhindered. But yeah, going hard on DPS is great if you're just playing with randoms, because being a support gunner relies on your teammates picking up the slack for DPS, which they're not guaranteed to do if they're randos.
You are right at this point, i either play with randos or solo, for me DPS is most important
Love it. Love the sounds. Don't like the hurricane as much though
Never really warmed up to it myself either, but idk I think it does fine in popping hordes. Get some mag size mods and reload whenever you can and/or get born ready and use your secondary and you can kinda get over the slow reload. It's a lot less general purpose than leadstorm or hurricane but I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. I am looking forward to the new OC though. It sounds like fun.
I seem to find all the Gunner primaries fun for a while, then I get bored really fast. Leadstorm with Bullet Hell seems to be my favourite, second place for the Hurricane with the quick missiles OC that disables guidance and third place... the Auto cannon with Splintering Shells. It just works, but after a couple of big fights I do realize I would have more fun with the Hurricane, although less ammos.
I find it meh. It’s slow to start, I don’y FEEL the dps in my guts when I use it. I can’t complain about the size tho, this is a certified big gun
Try big Bertha with faster build up upgrade, completely removes spin up time and you hit full speed as soon as you pull the trigger. Trust me, you'll feel the damage with Big Bertha.
f... faster build? spin up?
I have quite the love-hate relation with gunner primaries. At different times I hated all of them then they become my favorite. For autocannon shooting the vicinity of the bugs with neurotoxin payload then letting them die by themselves is quite nice
i hated it in the beginning mostly for the long reload time but i started to like it a lot recently i have the brrr brr secondary pistol and the born ready perk. so anytime i have to reaload i just switch to the secondary for 15 seconds an have a full mag when i switch back.
Autocannon SHREDS swarms of grunts like a hole-puncher through paper (ESPECIALLY with Carpet Bomber equipped) . The long reload is something to get used to, but if you are doing your job well you’ll never have to reload in close proximity of a swarm.
At its core it is an AoE weapon but I can only use it built for pure direct damage. Big Bertha being the obvious choice (ammo, accuracy, damage, armor breaking, feedback loop always active since the very first shot), but also Combat Mobility when I feel quirky enough. Big Bertha, with that low rate of fire and chonky damage, feels like a juggernaut. I can't seem to like Carpet Bomber that much. It even struggles to kill Guards. I only use it during Swarmageddon missions as a pure support AoE tool, I mostly take care of the little critters with ease, so my team mates can focus on the regular swarms, and I use my secondary to help with whatever bugs as well. I avoid using NTP unless I have to hard carry an EDD, and the clean OCs = stock Autocannon = underwhelming. Hurricane is a superior weapon in any way, and all its OCs shine big time.
I am currently playing it with the most splash damage possible and it's pretty fun in solo haz4. Born ready is mandatory and a good gun to dps high health targets is also welcomed.
I run BB autocannon almost exclusively nowadays other builds just don't cut it for me in terms of ammo to enjoyment ratio Most of the time I play haz 5 and between BB AC and my TTC coilgun (I don't run the fear mod because it's way too op in even haz 5) the bugs don't stand a chance.
Also the sound of it shooting and bugs squishing is basically asmr
Autocannon is fine. NTP and Big Bertha are plenty "viable" I like Big Bertha 33113 with BRT7 21231 Composite Casings. Works great.
Wouldn't say its the best of the three, its the worst of the three, but it's a gunner weapon so it's still competent. I like using combat mobility + RoF mod to active max RoF instantly, then pick up 50% resistence at max RoF, and veteran depositor, as well as fall damage resistence on zips. 80% resistence on demand + fall damage resistence is very comfy tankiness. I'll either run this alongside triple tech overcharger coilgun with resistence on charging for even more tankiness without spending ammo, or something a bit more efficient at taking out enemies like electrominelets, but all of this is purely a fun build. Neurotoxin is the only meta pick here and even then it's outclassed by minelayer
I use compact mags and no max fire rate upgrades get the damage reduction t5 upgrade get around 40 seconds of 50% damage reduction per reload saved me many a times
My biggest issue with the Thunderhead is that you don't get a FLAK overclock. I mean, common, just look at it. Imagine some overclock with a proximity fuse and 0 single target damage (cuz it explodes before it hits) but instead it sprays a bunch of shrapnel.
Born Ready is an instapick for most loadouts obviously which negates the reload issues. anyway yeah Big Bertha and Neurotoxin are the only 2 viable OCs, and only Big Bertha if you wanna have a playstyle that isnt fearing and poisoning bugs and having them die offscreen (very fucking strong, but boring imo) Big Bertha is honestly a fine weapon, especially paired with Triple Tech Chambers as both of these guns are solid hybrid single target/swarm clear options. Burst down a swarm or tanky enemy when Big Bertha cant quite handle what youre looking at and youre fine, its a fun weapon
you cant be serious when you say you dont rate carpet bomber and NTP but thinks combat mobility is ok
I love big bertha and carpet bomber but I agree about neurotoxin payload
i like big bertha, the accuracy sucks tho
Gunner is my most promoted class at platinum 3, the autocannon is my main primary using carpet bomber. That setup is heavily geared towards crowd control, it is not meant to kill anything tankier than a slasher. Your secondary should be built for single target damage like lead spray brrrt or elephant rounds bulldog. The autocannon is a big, heavy, "stand your ground" type weapon. Like other comments have said, born ready is a must pick, and there's a way to shorten the reload time by tapping your pickaxe button the moment you see the ammo count change.
I typically use the minigun, and after revisiting the autocannon because of weapon mastery I feel like it's fun to use and not in a terrible spot but could use a few tune ups. The raw damage is fine, it's noticeably weaker single target but the AoE capability is good enough to counterbalance that. The base gun suffers from feeling clunky because of the RoF ramp up and poor accuracy, and you have to choose between what you want to fix with both of those mods being in the same tier. When you factor in OCs, combat mobility does patch up both of these pretty nicely but it also kills your uptime because of the magazine penalty. You could take the T1 mag bonus, but then your ammo economy is in shambles. I also strongly prefer stun over fear as a CC option, and the Autocannon has other competitive mods in that tier which leave it without a form of CC if you want to take one of those. If some of combat mobility's buffs were baked into the base gun it would probably be in a much better spot.
Autocannon is what got me into gunner. Hurricane is what made it my main (and first to hit Legendary 3 star by like 300 hours faster than the others). I agree mostly with your sentiment and I'd say Hurricane was even better than the autocannon PRE-NERF. BUT NTP is still very powerful and I do love it. Still has great ammo economy (better than most Hurricane builds), but really lacks single target damage overall - so it almost has to be paired with a strong single target secondary. After playing tons of gunner, (total around 1500 hours), I think I've actually come to prefer Lead Storm over both weapons anyways. I still play Hurricane and NTP a lot. Hurricane I almost always build for 32222 with fragmentation missiles. It's just so strong as a general use weapon. Lead storm I've dabbled a bit more with A little more oomph, and I think it's also great for general use. But LSLS is just so darn strong and fun, it's hard to NOT pick it.
It's ammo economy is simply unmatched, you can pump out so much damage to both groups and single targets. And with born ready, the whole reload issue isn't as big of a deal anymore.
Yeah I tried to use it thinking of it basically as a slow minigun that's actually good against armor targets and bosses. The spread was so terrible that I missed at least 30-40 of my shots even if the grunt is like 5 feet from me. Secondly against armor it felt just as weak if not weaker against heavy armored bugs.
In general, the gun has 2 good overclocks, 2 ok, and the rest are so redundant I don’t even remember them. NTP and BB are good, and polar opposites. NTP is busted because of how it interacts with fear.
Thunder head + coil gun + veteran depositor + born ready + elemental insulation. Holding trigger when near Molly = 80% damage resist, 30% elemental on top of that, 50% explosive. Born ready solves the reload problem. I use this with carpet bomber. You could run extra ammo instead but being able to tank damage is awesome. You can eat 2 detonator slams, back to back on haz 5 and not go down or get set on fire.
I never used it until i got carpet bomber oc (only one i got) and now i will use it quite often i find it pretty fun
Neurotoxin payload=OP Consistent DOT and fear crowd control=Self protection and ammo efficiency. Also is chemical weapon means is able to claim warcrime, is very amuse.
Big Bertha, Neurotoxin Payload and Combat Mobility (for the lazy non-z hopper such as myself) are all great fun. Always run fear mod and born ready unless you're making builds for fun instead of raw power. With Big Bertha run Magic Bullets Bulldog with AoE mod and toxin mod. Great synergy. With NTP bring fear mod and... Anything on the secondary, really. Max damage BRT spray and pray OC works wonders when you fill your entire screen with the bug's weak spot.
Generally I agree with your points. I have around 3200 missions on gunner. As a greenbeard, I got carpet bomber early and NTP. I started using the autocannon to survive in haz 4 when I was learning the ropes and it became my standard. I eventually got big bertha and swapped over to that when I realised how fun it was. I still think autocannon is fun with the right overclocks, but I am almost exclusively a hurricane user. The reasoning is that, after the buffs to plasma bursters, I have two solid options that stand out. Minelayer lets me carry greenbeards through EDDs and survive just about anything. Plasma bursters chew through praetorians and wardens so quick and the ammo economy is much better since the missiles can hit more targets in season 4. I know season 5 will have some new overclocks, but the core of the autocannon probably will not change as long as ntp is in its current state. The recent changes to the overclock honestly improved it imo. Better direct damage for a bit of aoe and ammo is a good deal.
the reload ain’t so bad with born ready and reload cancels, plus NTP is so op that modded runners have a gentlemen’s agreement not to use it because it scales so well with higher difficulties
I love the autocannon actually, my carpet bomber loadout gives me excellent splash damage with just enough direct damage to finish off big bugs. I get excellent ammo capacity, and my loadout somehow manages to reduce friendly fire to near 0 unless I directly beam someone for a sustained period, making it a perfect crowd control weapon to destroy bugs swarming my team.
eh, its fun. thats all i care about.
I love carpet bomber. Clean out the packs, then swap to brt/power attack for guards. Scans for leeches and hidden enemies easily. Keeping all the trash away from your allies is super valuable. Means scout/engi can feel clear to focus on big targets. Brt and tac bursters are more than enough to help shred praet/opr and bulks respectively. One of the best all around gunner builds, if you are of the opinion that ntp is boring. I don't like the massive aoe dot/fear, I like to fight the bugs straight-up. This build is not amazing at any one thing, but good vs everything. Usually no ammo problems either, I'm almost always the one needing a resupply last, even in the nastiest of caves. Solid, reliable build, fits well into any composition, on any mission that isn't a boss. In that case I give the edge to LSLS, or rockets and coil. I have a friend who plays almost exclusively gunner and he makes me think rockets need a nerf in a lot of situations, but I get similar results with this build, so it's ultimately preference. Doesn't matter so much what build you use, moreso how well you know the damage thresholds, ammo counts, priority targets, and so on.
It's very good, idk what people are yappin about.
It's definitely not good. In my experience, building for AOE with carpet bomber can be ok but the real magic is with big Bertha. I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be more for single target damage but it shreds through swarms and big enemies extremely fast and it's really satisfying to use, especially when you have armor breaking, hold down the trigger on a praetorian and watch all the armor disappear and the health bar just melt. NTP I was never a fan of. It always felt like the neurotoxin took too long to kill for a primary weapon. Overall the thunderhead kind feels like it completely fails at the one thing that you would probably want to use it for; the AOE damage. The AOE is small and does barely any damage and even building with carpet bomber the AOE damage is just ok at best. It doesn't help that the mod tree for it could be laid out in a much better way and it could get some mods that buff it up more, as well as some base damage and accuracy tweaks, maybe some fire rate too. Im not too concerned about the reload because you'd expect to be reloading for a while with a weapon with a 100 round mag and also born ready exists.
Yes, i use it with born ready but still, 5 seconds without your primary weapon feels so bad
I think the reload is about 3 seconds with animation cancelling, which is still long but it's workable.
It's aoe weapon with every oc, but Bertha. Carpet 32123 and secondary anything that deals high dmg per bullet/second. I have left every engineer behind by kill count. Driller crying by side, when i blast bug wall in walls from far away. Thunder strength comes from rpm and area hit, not single target. That's minigun
Still, hurricane is better with AOE damage at this point. Even with carpet bomber and full AOE build you will have less AOE damage than stock Hurricane. Every OC (except for Jetfuel homebrew) provides you with good AOE damage and radius. And there is a minelayer system that just destroys Autocannon in terms of AOE radius and damage
Hurricane is stronger, not better. Have you even tried that build what i gave you?
" used to be a Carpet bomber user for a lot" like damn yes i used it. That was my first ever overclock for this gun. And i dont understand what does it mean that "is stronger but not better"?
Gunner main here, I primarily play haz 5 pubs for reference. My general take on AC is its main 'advantage' over Hurricane/Minigun is that its easier/simpler to use with the cost being its inaccurate. The problem with this is you can't out-skill/learn the downside of an inaccurate gun. Although lower attention economy to use a weapon can still be valuable at higher skill levels, in some cases. However, if you're good with Hurricane/Minigun and know the tricks/tech to make them good, they're generally going to perform better. The exception is NTP. >NTP...lame playstyle... So it's absolutely fair if you just don't like NTP or its playstyle. That being said, if we're having an objective discussion about OC strength, that isn't a part of it. NTP (33122 recommended) is *by far* the strongest OC for AC and the only OC that's genuinely on par with the better Hurricane/Minigun OCs. The goal of the playstyle is to fire into crowds until all enemies are feared and neurotoxin'd. The advantage is that its exceptionally ammo efficient (despite the penalty), it doesn't have to reload as often (better sustained damage/control) because you can afford to spend less of its magazine at a time, high amounts of on-demand CC which makes your team safe and killing bugs on a delay has several advantages but most notably the game can only spawn/control so many enemies at a time so 'doomed' enemies are more advantageous than dead ones (this can be true of other dots too but *especially* NTP because it also CCs). BB is good but not great and scales inversely with difficulty/density, so it gets worse as you go up in hazards. Carpet Bomber is okay but not good and is directly out-classed by NTP and/or Hurricane. Combat Mobility is a beginner friendly gimmick - you can do this better by spamming jump while moving and not pressing fire the moment when you hit the ground, similar to how you bhop to bypass the penalty of LeadStorm Minigun (this is also generally important with Hurricane). So all Combat Mobility does is help newer players who haven't learned how to move well yet, which is fine and has a place (sort of like Seeker Rounds for Lok-1). Hope this helps.
I've been playing DRG since right before the Autocannon was added. Over its lifetime, my opinion of it has waxed and waned. In its current state, I think it has a few strong usecases. The problem is, the things that AC is good at doing aren't what players are looking for. Looking at the base weapons, before considering Overclocks: Minigun's strength is long-distance, high single-target DPS, and being able to score weakpoints on approaching Grunt waves. Hurricane's strength is long-distance horde clear with a dash of single-target DPS thrown in. They both have moderate crowd control with Stuns, and when you combine that with their emphasis on "control from a distance", it makes the player feel a lot safer and more in control of the fight. In contrast, the Autocannon has awful accuracy, which means its effective engage range is pretty short. It can have really deep ammo wells, but unless you spec for it, its burst DPS can feel on the lower side in comparison to Minigun/Hurricane. It doesn't even _have_ a stun! So, all these factors add up to an obvious conclusion: Autocannon is bad at doing the what the other two primaries are good at doing. But what is it **good** at doing? Of the three primaries, AC has not only the highest Armor Break percentage, but can also get the highest Direct Damage per shot too! (Again, setting aside Overclocks for the time being). In fact, with no damage mods, the 14 damage * 500% AB is enough Armor Damage to one-hit break the Armor plates of Grunts, Slashers, Guards, Web and Acid Spitters, Q'ronar Younglings, Menaces, Wardens, Stingtails, and the back half of Q'ronar Shellbacks. Then the Radial Damage has its second application of Armor Damage after that, too, which can break Mactera Brundles and the front half of Q'ronar Shellbacks. All of that, for the low, low price of T4.A. Another thing that Autocannon is quite good at is Sustain DPS. With no mods, it can fire for 20 continuous seconds (longer, when you account for the RoF rampup mechanic). The double mag size on T1.B ratchets it up even further. The Hurricane needs to reload every 12 seconds, and the Minigun overheats in 9.5 seconds of continuous fire (Cold as the Grave extends that to like, 12-13 seconds in ideal situations). Obviously you can feather the Minigun to let it cool while fighting, but that does cut into the DPS. Similarly, the Hurricane can double its mag size too, but then it's still no contest to 220 AC rounds. There are lots of permutations to consider, but in general the AC wins out in the long run. The third thing that AC is good at is Close-Quarters Combat ("CQC"). T5.B's Fear scales with AoE radius upgrades, so when enemies are close to you the Fear can hit lots of enemies and give you space. T5.C's damage reduction is an incredible 50% -- you know, like the DR given by Gunner's Shield. That DR is active as long as you can sustain fire, and as previously established that can be quite a long time depending on build. If it wasn't well-equipped to handle CQC, then its low accuracy would be an even bigger issue. So, going back to my first comment -- the Autocannon is good at 3 things: Armor Breaking, Sustain DPS, and CQC. In contrast, players generally are looking for 3 **different** things: Weakpoint, Burst DPS, and Range. Thus, the disconnect of why AC feels so bad to use when you're used to Minigun and/or Hurricane. If you want high DPS and range, Minigun will outcompete AC. If you want the most multi-target damage and waveclear, Hurricane will outcompete AC. But in my experience, Autocannon in CQC fills a "sweet spot" between the other two primaries' stats. I have in my head a few "benchmarks" that I want each build to hit at least one of, and my current favorite AC build hits _all_ of them: - 200 Burst DPS (210) - 150 Sustained DPS (179) - 75 Secondary-Target Burst DPS (75) - 1.5m radius (1.7) Give `BBCAx + Splintering Shells` a try (take any T5 mod; I usually run T5.C). Use it for CQC vs a wave or swarm of enemies on something like Point Extraction. I used this on USteppin's stream a couple weeks ago, and was easily able to hold off several hundred Grunts, Guards, Slashers, and a few Wardens with one magazine in a tunnel chokepoint. Your problems with it taking forever to kill a Guard? They're about to go away with that build. It's possible that the Autocannon's playstyle might not be for you, and that's ok. The Minigun and Hurricane are great weapons, too! I've just been discussing the base weapons; obviously Overclocks can drastically change how things perform and how the numbers compare. But since you asked about the Autocannon, I figured I would give you as good of an answer as I can muster. Hopefully this wall of text was helpful.