Personal Roland (Soldier) build.

My personal build for Roland. Who knows, it may just be your next build!

Introduction.

Hey, every guide's gotta have an intro, right? So here's mine.

If you didn't get the memo (by reading the title), this is my personal Roland build after spending a hundred hours or so sculping, perfecting and dying while testing various other methods. This build suits my playstyle, and may not suit yours. I usually game solo, so I've made the build into something I can solo anything and everything with, from the main storyline, to the Underdome, to Crawmerax, even at a hacked 4-player difficulty.

I will be going over weapons, gear and skill points in this guide to help those who want to dish out the maximum potential damage while keeping alive. And this guide also keeps your Scorpio Turret as an asset in the heat of battle - it can even kill Crawmerax's minions with the right Elemental attribute.

So, without further ado, here is my build for Roland, the Soldier.

Weapons.

Now, without the right set of weapons, you're guaranteed to fail, no matter how badass you think your character or skill tree is. There is nothing in my weapons list that is of Blue Rarity or lower (unless you count the glitched-rarity Dahl Penetrator Legendary sniper rifle as a Purple/Blue).

Going from long-range to short/melee are the weapons I've layed out for myself:

Please note: The pictures shown are of MY weapons, modified to be the best they can be. They may or may not spawn as shown.

Dahl Penetrator, Legendary Sniper Rifle.

Although this weapon has a glitched rarity, showing the weapon as a Purple or Blue-rarity weapon, this is a legitimate Legendary. Being fully automatic provides quite a fair amount of benefits, but also a fair amount of backlash. Pros being that you can hit critical spots (especially large ones) at range with a magazine up to 10 rounds and cons being the huge drain on ammunition as well as the recoil. If it comes with an elemental, then that's more power to you. I, however, prefer it without elemental damage. Best to have a Support Gunner Class Mod if you plan to run this in your build.

Atlas Ajax's Spear, Purple-Rarity Support Machine-Gun

NOTE: THIS WEAPON HAS BEEN MODIFIED. Ajax's Spear WILL NOT spawn with the Max prefix.

Available only in the General Knoxx DLC, this Support MG is guaranteed to spawn with high-quality parts and tech, as well as a chance to spawn with the Atlas Ogre accessory, making this weapon have a 4x Explosive elemental. And, as no enemy in Borderlands is weak or immune to explosive weaponry, this gun can dish out a large amount of damage in a short amount of time. This benifits from both a Support Gunner COM and Overload Skill to boost a maxed mag at 55 rounds to 111.

Maliwan Hellfire, Legendary SMG

NOTE: THIS WEAPON HAS BEEN MODIFIED. Hellfire WILL NOT spawn with the Malevolent prefix.

Basically everyone knows about this SMG and how it procs with every hit, and how its DOT stacks rapidly. But for those not in the know, the Hellfire is a absolutely devistating Fire elemental SMG, able to roast even the hardened Crimson Lance soldiers in their suits. This weapon is magnificent if it spawns with a high firerate and magazine - all you'll need at this point is a COM that'll regenerate ammo as fast as you (literally) burn through it.

Dahl Bulldog, Legendary Combat Shotgun

A combat shotgun with a guaranteed ~20-round drum magazine and decent accuracy, this shotgun will quickly become your best friend in CQB, even more so if it spawns with an elemental. You'll be one lucky Vault Hunter if you find one with over 20 rounds, an element and over 50% accuracy and be keeping this weapon way past the endgame.

S&S Crux, Legendary Assault Shotgun

I personally LOVED this shotgun when I first played as Mordecai because of how accurate, damaging and EXPLOSIVE this gun was. Add in a large magazine capacity, and you'll find that this cross-firing shotgun will decimate all the human enemies in short time.

Maliwan Defiler, Legendary Revolver

NOTE: THIS WEAPON HAS BEEN MODIFIED. Defiler WILL NOT spawn with the Savage prefix.

Two words. GET IT.

More words: This revolver will always be your best friend against all armoured opponents, whether it's Alpha Skags, the Lance or even vehicles. The Defiler will annhilate all of them, especially if it spawns with a high-powered scope and 2-shot magazine. Plus, with splash damage and consistant DOT when it procs will make you one happy camper should you go into Fight For Your Life with armoured enemies nearby. Hell, non-armoured enemies will fall fast with this gun, as it tends to have a much higher base damage than some Legendary Sniper Rifles! Aim for the head, pop it in a few shots.

Jakobs Unforgiven, Legendary Revolver

Now hang on, I know some of you might say that this revolver isn't at all practical for standard fighting, and it's not. I personally use this weapon, spawned in with a 2-shot magazine and Masher accessory, to farm Crawmerax because of it's 200% Critical Damage. With the correct parts and prefix, the Unforgiven can easily dish out over 8k damage to Crawmerax's health, allowing him to be farmed in as little as 2 minutes, if not less (provided that he co-operates in showing you his crit spots, that is).

Now, with the weapons out of the way, let's move on to the next part: Gear.

Gear.

Now, compared to the previous section (which, no doubt, some of you readers may have said "TL;DR" and moved on, despite all that you could have learned from it), this section about gear will be comparitively short.

Please note: All gear has been modified to be the best they can be. Gear may not spawn as shown and will never be at Level 69 unless modded.

Tediore Panacea, Purple-Rarity Shield

This shield, when spawned with the right parts, will be your best friend for most, if not all of your killing/looting spree around Pandora, with Quick Health Regeneration and a decent shield capacity. If you cannot get a Panacea, then I would highly recommend getting a different Tediore shield, as they all provide you with health regeneration, as slow as they might be.

Anashin Wee Wee's Super Booster Shield

Remember how I said that the Panacea will be your best friend throughout your spree on Pandora? It will be, until you meet and kill King Wee Wee and grabbed his Super Booster shield in playthrough 1 and 2.5 (Note how I didn't say playthrough 2? Yeah, if you kill him in playthrough 2, he won't respawn when you unlock 2.5.). This shield comes with the benefits of a Panacea, except for the fact that it also gives you an additional 15% health boost! The downside is that because of the health boost, some of its capacity drops off to compensate. Still, with Quick Health Regeneration and the 15% health boost, you'll be laughing all the way to Crawmerax and back.

Dahl Bouncing Betty Grenade Mod
This grenade mod is pretty self-explanitory. You chuck it, it pops into the air after 2 seconds, and it launches child grenades in a circle which explode after a set distance. You can choose what element you want on this mod, but I like having regular Explosive elemental on mine.

Atlas Rain Grenade Mod
Again, this Mod is self-explanitory. Chuck it, it pops into the air after 2 seconds, and it rains death on those under it. However, I would recommend getting this mod in vanilla Explosive, as any other element will have the "rain" simply rain down at a set distance if it goes off mid-air. The Explosive varient will drop explosive balls of death no matter the height above your target.

Anashin Transfusion Grenade Mod

Again, fairly simple. You chuck it when you need health, and the grenade will send out child particles that steal health from your enemies and give it back to you. Very useful when farming Crawmerax, especially if you're using one of two hiding spots while he's nearby and trying to melee you.

S&S Support Gunner Class Mod

Ah, this is what I wanted to get to. The Support Gunner COM, at a high enough level, will give you both ammo regeneration AND a magazine size increase, topping out at +30 and +42%, respectively, at Level 69 (modified). The skill points associated with it that would benefit you would be +3 Stockpile, +4 Impact and +3 to Barrage. Now, since I have no points accumulated in either Stockpile or Barrage, having Impact increased by 4 would be a huge benefit to my playstyle.

Now, with those suggestions out of the way, let's move on to the Skill Tree.

Skill Tree.

Let's get right to it, the Skill Tree for my Soldier build at Level 69, with all bonus Skill Points unlocked!

Infantry: 23 Points spent
Impact: 5 points (+4 from the Support Gunner Class Mod)
Sentry: 5 points
Scattershot: 3 points (Get this last, you have more important points to invest in!)
Metal Storm: 5 points
Refire: 5 points

Support: 20 Points spent
Defense: 5 points
Quick Charge: 5 points
Grenadier: 5 points
Deploy: 5 points

Medic: 25 Points spent
Fitness: 5 points
Aid Station: 5 points
Overload: 5 points
Grit: 5 points
Stat: 5 points

Note: I have not recieved the last Skill Point from Moxxi's Underdome in playthrough 2/2.5 ingame, but will allocate that last point to my Scattershot Skill.

And with that, that's the end of my loadout for my playstyle as Roland.

Afterthoughts.

Now, I figured, after looking at all the different varients of Class Mods, Weapons and Gear out there in Borderlands 1, I could have gone a different route. But because of my "In-Your-Face" tank style, this is much better suited for me. As previously stated: I can solo everything all the way up to Crawmerax with no outside help.

I always run with the following:
Ajax's Spear (with Ogre accessory)
Dahl Bulldog (with Electric elemental)
Maliwan Hellfire
Maliwan Defiler
when not facing against Crawmerax. But when I do go to farm him, I replace Ajax's Spear with the Jakobs Unforgiven to dish out the maximum pain.

Tell me what you guys think, your builds and weapon choices and what you might change, if given the chance.

[Three]

@Mister Torgue Flexington Indeed, it looks familiar.

[Mister Torgue Flexington]

now is it me, or does the barrel on that Defiler look similar to the barrel on the Desert Eagle?

[UBE Chief]

@RevenShepard: I'm not gonna stop you, build away! :D

[RevenShepard]

i would like to have tgis build

[Mister Torgue Flexington]

for those who aren't farming Crawmerax, the 3 points invested in "Scattershot" could be potentially used in the "Barrage" skill for the Zombie Island DLC. and since you'll almost always be swarmed, the extra shots from the turret can sometimes be a big help.

[Mister Torgue Flexington]

no problem dude

[UBE Chief]

@DrQuagmire: Cool, thanks for the info. Shame I haven't touched the game in ages though, lol.

[Mister Torgue Flexington]

it just makes the explosive damage output even more powerful, while still keeping the same parts as in the description. had originally duped it for a weapons test about a year ago, and changed the duplicate copy with the "Shattering" prefix. hence the damage being bumped up to 461.

[UBE Chief]

@DrQuagmire: But what drops in order to get that increased damage? :p

[Mister Torgue Flexington]

I just remembered something interesting......I had modded my Ajax's Spear from "Max" to "Shattering", and in doing so bumps up the damage from 444 to 461. Making its damage output even bigger.