Using the not-flamethrowers for rival pressence/Sabotage

[3ggmann]

Despite what it may seem, the cryo cannon and sludge pump both have effective builds vs robots. Do you ever take these weapons on robot infested missions and if so, what builds/ocs do you use with them?
Examples: Ice Spear is capable of dealing 50-100% of a patrol bots hp almost instantly. Volatile Impact Mixture Sludge Pump with projectile speed gives you way more range, versatility and support than the flamethrower can. Both of these are also very good at damaging the Caretaker.

[Ser Pounce]

When I do, I bring good single target build like ice storm, ice spear or sludge blast. The robots being weak to almost everything keep those weapons in a pretty good spot regardless.

[Malidictus]

As I can't be arsed to make mission-specific builds (maybe I should at some point...), I tend to just bring my Ice Spear Cryp Cannon. I can't seem to actually freeze the bots, but the spear does well enough in a pinch and the Cryo Cannon already has enough ammo. Can't speak to a secondary weapon, but my general-purpose EPC built for non-charged-shots seems to do reasonably well.

[kestrel]

meme storm is useless and i do not know why people pretend it is good
ice spear is woefully inefficient i am not spending %10 of my ammo to kill one patroller

VIM is a fine OC but i dont know that i would ever take it to a rivals mission because even with T1B you're still firing slow projectiles which rival bots can easily dodge

to be fair this has less to do with those builds being bad (except ice storm) and more to do with rival tech enemies being poorly designed and frustrating to fight against
i cannot wait for this season to be over

[Frisky]

they're alright options, but when I'm doing a rival mission it's pretty much always an assignment so I'd rather just bring flamer and brainlessly filter out robots from the mission alltogether so i've not really used builds outside of flamer

Originally posted by kestrel:

to be fair this has less to do with those builds being bad (except ice storm) and more to do with rival tech enemies being poorly designed and frustrating to fight against
i cannot wait for this season to be over

very much this, flamer is path of least resistance when fighting patrol bots 90% of the time, other builds do work but the flamer is stupidly easy to use and quickly kills what i personally think are the annoying enemies we've ever had added

also same, super eager for this season to end, as much as I liked season 2 and despite knowing next to nothing about season 3 yet I'm hyped for season 3 off the info alone that the robot arch is ending (and therefor rival presence will stop being everywhere) patrol bots and the nemesis are such a chore to fight that I'm pretty much forever burnt out on them

despite rival presence easily being my most hated mutator it's so common that I've already done more rival presence mutators (I think I'm sitting on like 100+ completions) than I have other mutators that have been in the game since I started playing like mactera plague, the damn thing won't stop showing up on my promotions

[ImaginaryDragon]

I have had a promotion assignment where 3 out of 4 missions are rival presence, that was fun /s

[Zargothrax]

A full DPS sludge pump build is actually decent against rival tech, you can forego the extra slow effects for damage instead since the bots we have currently aren't really affected by slowdown at all. The trick is to focus on DoT instead of direct damage since patrol bots can be hard to pin down, just tag them once and let the sludge to the work for you.

[Amble]

Sludge Blast is the best non-flame option Driller has for robots, but it's still never gonna out perform flame. Just a good option if you ever end up tired of flame, and it's arguably better for the Caretaker specifically.

[Malidictus]

Originally posted by kestrel:

o be fair this has less to do with those builds being bad (except ice storm) and more to do with rival tech enemies being poorly designed and frustrating to fight against
i cannot wait for this season to be over

Agreed. I've never been a fan of the Rivals' extreme vulnerability to Heat and seeming resistance to everything else. It leads to very cookie-cutter builds, and of the sort that I personally don't like. They lead very heavily into status effect builds and flame weapons, neither of which I personally favour as a matter of preference.

This is why I bring my Ice Spear to Rival Presence missions. Most of those are still bugs anyway, and I can deal with what bots show up as necessary. Now a mission that's ALL rival robots and no bugs? That would be a horror show. The Caretaker fight is already a pain in the ass, given how much it favours high single-target DPS against small. This in a game where the arsenal is largely balanced around fighting hordes of large enemies.

[Ser Pounce]

Originally posted by Malidictus:

Agreed. I've never been a fan of the Rivals' extreme vulnerability to Heat and seeming resistance to everything else.

They are weak to everything except fire (and immune to poison bhut who cares about that ?) and a huge x3 weakpoint. The only thing the flamer has for itself is the instant kill upon igniting them.

Originally posted by Malidictus:

The Caretaker fight is already a pain in the ass, given how much it favours high single-target DPS against small. This in a game where the arsenal is largely balanced around fighting hordes of large enemies.

Yey nobody seem to complain about elimination mission doing the exact same thing. Weird, right ?

[zverozvero]

Full corosion dot pump can even melt Nemesis easy and cheap if bit slow. Prity nice gun for Rival warning.

Not a fan of drillers weaponry on Sabotage whatsoever but bringing in Ice storm is fun. Everyone who ask 'Why!?'... Well, eat C4 doubters.

[kestrel]

Originally posted by Ser Pounce:

Yey nobody seem to complain about elimination mission doing the exact same thing. Weird, right ?

yeah lets just forget the 20+ minutes you need to do of waveclear defending the hack bot where single target fails to perform

wow it's almost like a mission type that demands both extremes of crowd control and single target builds is really annoying or something!!!

[Malidictus]

Originally posted by Ser Pounce:

Yey nobody seem to complain about elimination mission doing the exact same thing. Weird, right ?

Elimination missions don't really do "the exact same thing," though. Dreadnoughts have fairly large weak points and they're not immune from cold and armour-penetrating effects. About the most significant such is the Dreadnought Hive Guard who has both invulnerability phases and small weak points hidden behind its limbs. That one seems to be the least popular. But the Twins and the Vanilla Dreadnought? I'll take them over a Caretaker any day.

At least Dreadnoughts don't constantly spam me with additional enemies. Yes, aside from the Hive Guard again. But even then, those enemies aren't particularly tough (a lot less so than the graspers) and they only show up once per stage.

[Blue And Red]

Dunno.
Ive stopped using flamethrower almost right after few encounters with patrol bots way back in the beginning of season 1 and switched to sludge pump because it was and still is good against both glyphids and robots.
And my best friend have been yelling at me for quite a while to switch to flamethrower because you can apperantly insta-kill bots by ignition.
I have not tested or seen that myself.

[Chibbity]

Originally posted by Blue Versus Red:

because you can apperantly insta-kill bots by ignition.
I have not tested or seen that myself.

Yes, being set on fire instantly kills any Rival robot enemy.

That said, that certainly isn't the only viable way to kill them.

[Sokaku]

The game is a coop game and rewards cooperation between players. Many missions benefit greatly from synergies between classes and common loadouts, some more than others like sabotage and escort. Drillers are excellent to have around during the hacking stages and generally traversing the level, but for the final fight the heavy lifting falls on the other classes or at least those that should be set up for single target damage.

In all missions except Elimination I set up driller for CC. And CC is what I aim to provide in the mission, whether sticky flame walls, Sludge puddles, or freezing bugs to save the team a crap-ton of ammo. I look to complement my team and stick by them and rely somewhat on their firepower to help kill the things I'm not kitted out for.

At the end of the day, take the best tool for the job. "I can't be bothered to change my loadout" and "I only play driller" are lame self-imposed penalties players stack on themselves. If that's how you want to play the game, go right ahead, but it's pretty dumb to b*tch & while about it on forums expecting the developers to cater to one's self-imposed limitations or whine when they introduce something that breaks your lazy meta; when they've given you more than enough tools to cater for any situation. Quit yer whining and get back to work, miner!