Plasma Punisher vs Exploding Crossbow

[Leech's Share]

I just picked up the Exploding Crossbow and I've really been enjoying it. But it made me think, why does the Plasma Punisher (you know... a gun shooting molten plasma) have such a ridiculous bullet-drop compared to a crossbow?

Just I gripe I realized, since both weapons are functionally similar, excluding their stats.

[Zeddy]

They are pretty similar, and for the most part I agree the crossbow is just better.

A friend of mine said they missed the drop on PP, and I enjoyed that too. It's also very helpful for playing to PP's two advantages: More ammo, and vent-busting. You can kind of just shoot up and blindly hit at enemies behind cover due to the dropoff. The projectile's slow travel and high visibility makes it easier to judge those hits, and it looks spectacular when teammates join in, too.

PP can also hurt tank vents and tower turret vents. The drop enables you to do this even from the front, although it's tricky to execute. Crossbow doesn't seem able to damage these points, or at least it takes too much ammo to be worth it.

[PVT.Blueberry]

i love my plasma shotty, i think its better for medium targets

[Quadsword]

Originally posted by PVT.Blueberry:

i love my plasma shotty, i think its better for medium targets

First person I've seen who had something good to say about the plasma punisher.

[XOLiD]

Can't stand either of them really. But yeah the crossbow is like 10% better.

[Wraithguard]

Originally posted by XOLiD:

Can't stand either of them really. But yeah the crossbow is like 10% better.

seconded.

[Key]

Plasma shotgun is legit the most fun weapon to use in the game as far as I'm concerned.

[ZiggyDeath]

Originally posted by Quadsword:

Originally posted by PVT.Blueberry:

i love my plasma shotty, i think its better for medium targets

First person I've seen who had something good to say about the plasma punisher.

Plasma Punisher is markedly superior to the Scorcher if you can hit the target.

The staggerlock it produces can stop entire hordes of mediums from bearing down on you.
The 50% more explosive damage also results in less shots to kill.

The crossbow really lacks stopping power against medium'ish targets. The Armored Bile Spewers require far too many rounds from the crossbow to down.

[Key]

Originally posted by ZiggyDeath:

Originally posted by Quadsword:

First person I've seen who had something good to say about the plasma punisher.

Plasma Punisher is markedly superior to the Scorcher if you can hit the target.

The staggerlock it produces can stop entire hordes of mediums from bearing down on you.
The 50% more explosive damage also results in less shots to kill.

The crossbow really lacks stopping power against medium'ish targets. The Armored Bile Spewers require far too many rounds from the crossbow to down.

Crossbow doesn't go ktch-ktch after shooting, that alone makes it inferior.

[Sokaku]

One other very nice thing about the Plasma Punisher is the reload. You're not sitting there jamming 8 D-Cell batteries in it while running in circles. :D

[Qua2ar]

They are both mid, but the crossbow is better.

[Wutever]

The crossbow is not better. It can't kill mediums efficiently because it has 0 penetration, and it's slow to deal with light targets because of the rate of fire and projectile speed.

Plasma at least has similar utility as the Scorcher even though it has pathetic range.

It would've been better if it was one-handed and you could shoot behind you while running.

[zdaytonaroadster]

Originally posted by XOLiD:

Can't stand either of them really. But yeah the crossbow is like 10% better.

same, use the plasma shotgun once, never again. The crossbow i never even bothered with

[Zeddy]

Originally posted by Wutever:

The crossbow is not better. It can't kill mediums efficiently because it has 0 penetration

Hi. Do you have a source this time?

https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/comments/1bz4frb/updated_data_list_of_weaponstratagems_armour/

Datamined values say pen 3, but it's rickety since it only mentions one value on the exploding primaries, and they clearly have a minimum of two. Not being able to hurt tank vents meaningfully does indicate a low penetration value, as well.

In practical terms, I find crossbow far more reliable at clearing chaff since I can shoot a spot on the ground and that will kill or hurt everything around it in a fair radius. That's 1 for small stuff like bots, striders, hunters, and up to 3 for Devestators, assuming you don't straight up dome them for an instant kill which isn't something PP can do.

Shooting the ground just doesn't accomplish this as effectively for PP and I only have a guesswork theory as to why. You can see that Eruptor and Xbow digs a hole in the ground where it lands while PP doesn't, and my current suspicion is that the ground removal clear any potential cover that sometimes leads to a PP shot landing next to a scavenger without hurting it at all.

There's a lot of PP enjoyers in this thread, which surprised me but it sounds like they're good at landing direct hits, so for this purpose you can get about an equal performance while still having a mostly viable option on tanks and turrets without a support weapon, and that seems nice. Happy for them. Personally I prefer shooting a surface and killing everything nearby.

[junimai233]

Originally posted by ZiggyDeath:

Originally posted by Quadsword:

First person I've seen who had something good to say about the plasma punisher.

Plasma Punisher is markedly superior to the Scorcher if you can hit the target.

Ah, if its only not the weapon's biggest weakness. How silly of us.

[zdaytonaroadster]

Originally posted by Zeddy:

Originally posted by Wutever:

The crossbow is not better. It can't kill mediums efficiently because it has 0 penetration

Do you have a source this time?

.

reddit is back that way ----->