Armor Build

[EnderFridge]

I'm attempting to create a heavy armor build for Payday 2, but I just got the game about a week ago. Does anyone have any recommendations for weapons, perk decks, skills, etc.? Any help is greatly appreciated.

[Dog]

Anarchist perk deck will give you the most armor and combined with the improved combined tactical vest it's a viable combination below Death Sentence. However Anarchist doesn't regen armor when taking cover - it regens on fixed timer, so your playstyle has to adjust accordingly.

In lieu of armor (and on the higher difficulties), the Stoic perk deck is recommened with the improved combined tactical vest.

As for weapons - anything is viable depending on the difficulty you're playing. On the higher difficulties it's recommended to bring an LMG or something like Akimbo Brothers Grimm. Just make sure you use the shotgun skill tree for shotguns or at least ace body expertise for LMGs.

That's just the broad strokes - there is quite a bit more detail that can be gotten into regarding specific meta builds, etc. but this should help you get started.

[CazConnery770]

Perk deck : armorer/muscle if your focus is objectives, Maniac if you have DLC and plan on doing a lot of damage
Skills : any skills that supplement weapons should be fine as long as you grab every armor related skill besides ICTV skill. As someone who uses armor even in stealth, the Heavy Ballistic Vest usually does the trick and lets you still get some dodge.
Weapons : Type matters much less than making sure you ace skills relatedc to staggering enemies and bullet armor penetration. Goes back to the damage vs objective play style.

Personally, the ICTV isn't exactly necessary. make sure your skills support your guns. Then ensure your perk deck supports both your weapon choice AND your skills. Keep in mind whatever gun type you choose, be sure you can take out Dozers and Shields. Only get melee skills if you're actually going to melee alot.

[Ghostbear]

Bullseye is always good to have for Armour builds as far as I know, armour recovery rates do not affect the Anarcist regen times so bear this in mind when spending points while using that perk deck.

Armourer & Muscle are good ones if you going to soak damage.

Weapons wise really comes down to playstyle most tend to Prefer LMGs or Shotguns but any weapon will work with any armour build as long as you have the skill to back them up as CrowsNestWest says above..

[Huntah]

If you want an armor build that's different than what has already been thrown out there, try using the infiltrator perk deck, or Dragan's perk deck.

With that perk deck, it goes well with any other skill that ups your damage resistance like Aced Underdog and Frenzy. You'll get a damage resistance of up to 55%.
And don't forget to take armor-related skills.
Armor plus damage resistance makes for a pretty solid build.

And also, see the melee bonuses that the perk deck gives you as a plus. You don't have to focus the build on melee...unless you want to.

[EnderFridge]

Thanks for all the help given so far. How does this sound so far?

Anarchist perk deck
ICTV
Little Friend
Chicago Typewriter
Katana
Molotov Cocktail


Also, I have all DLC included in ultimate edition

[Ghostbear]

The typewriter ain't the best and careful of the small ammo pool for the Little Friend, otherwise it looks pretty good.

Would suggest the Blaster/Krinkov for the SMG if you want great damage for a decent ammo pool or the Kobra/Compact-5 if you want a great ammo pool for a fairly decent damage output

[EnderFridge]

Thanks for the advice

[Скіф]

Para, Mark 10 and Spec ops are my smg choices for killing everything except dozers.

[Yuurai]

I recommend using the AK5 or Buzzsaw lmg to replace the little friend and a grenade launcher for your secondary, 5/7 works too.

[Sep]

Originally posted by EnderNetGaming:

Thanks for all the help given so far. How does this sound so far?

Anarchist perk deck
ICTV
Little Friend
Chicago Typewriter
Katana
Molotov Cocktail


Also, I have all DLC included in ultimate edition

ICTV Anarchist is a beast in low to medium difficulty. But at high difficulty, they either inpractical (Death Sentence difficulty) or require ample of experience (Deathwish difficulty) to use it right. The 10 second interval to regenerate armor could be a rather cumbersome setback.

If you plan to play on high difficulty, using light armor with lower interval is better. In this case, you want to use 2 piece suit or lightweight balistic vest.

[EnderFridge]

I have chosen to use the Buzzsaw LMG for my primary. Any reccomendations on a secondary? I would like to use an explosive of some kind, but I won't if there's a better option.

Thanks to all of you who have helped me out so far. I greatly appreciate it!

[Dog]

I like the China Puff grenade launcher for a secondary - it does decent damage and has pretty good ammo pickup. There are probably better weapons to take for a secondary, so I'm interested in hearing what others have to say as well.

[Khloros]

If you are trying to run the ICTV ie the armor you get from specing into the big bad armor, you have imo 2 option that are the best.

In Mayham and over kill difficulties, you wnat to use the anarchist perk deck. This converts your health to armor, and then taking the talent from the armor tree that gives you back 25 armor on a head shot combined with the anarchist perk of getting 10 armor per danage hit every 2 seconds, you end up never going down or never breaking your armor.

In DW and DS builds you want to use the stoic perk, which converts armor into health, and reducing direct damage and allows you to recover health and medigate damage. THis build i have found does not work well in ovk and mayham builds as well as it does in DW and DS, as the stoic perk relies on you taking ALOT of damage at once then ignoreing it all and healing.

If you are playing in ovk and mayham, i suggest running the airburst granade launcher, as its only purpose is to deal with snipers, another good weapon is the SMG i forgot the name but its the one that looks like the SCAR and has base 104 damage, its a great all purpose rifle.

In DW and DS, i typically switch my secondary for the mission, if i know for a fact there will be a turret, i take the judge with HE rounds, if not, i take the forementioned SMG.

Side tip do NOT use rocket launchers against turrets, its a waste of a shot, same thing with minigun dozers.

[Khloros]

This is my armor build for DW and DS http://pd2tools.com/l/f19e4370fab3313db79ed22922649692

It scarifices 2 combatents to pick up more damage and utility via the tech tree.

This is my Mayham and ovk build, its using the anarchist deck and will melt pretty much anything in that bracket and you will never go down, it can be retooled to use LMG if you take all the perks out of shotguns, and take the ace out of fully loaded and put it into the tech tree to apply headshot damage to body shots. The only reason to ace fully loaded is if you really like to use throwables

http://pd2tools.com/l/2fe1373156936b4156d9e4e0dd6b964a

Note the ovk build can one shot a dozer using a charged up melee attack, so dont even bother shooting dozers.

[Khloros]

Originally posted by Dog:

I like the China Puff grenade launcher for a secondary - it does decent damage and has pretty good ammo pickup. There are probably better weapons to take for a secondary, so I'm interested in hearing what others have to say as well.

For lower difficulties, its alright imo, but it suffers the same problem all other explosives that arnt HE rounds do, they get shot mid air.