Can you expound on the 'wow?'
Thank you for the formal excuse to gush like a little girl with a new doll.
This build
works. The immediate lesson is that Combat Shotguns are a completely different beast then Doubles, and Fin->Fin->Jug is to Combat Shotties as Rel->Rel->Sht is to Doubles. Furthermore, Juggler completely compensates for not having a Combat Shotgun until you find one (I didn't find any till the first level of Deimos.) It's costly in inventory space and time after-the-fact manually reloading, but being able to bust out shotgun after shotgun, instantly, with Juggler really saves your ass on early levels. That's really nice because getting past the first few levels is so often a huge pain-in-the-ass, waiting for the RNG to stop screwing you over till you've got a trait or two under your belt. Even better, Finesse is just as good as Reloader for early-game survival; since the guaranteed shotty on Phobos Entrance has a reload
and fire time of 1.0, saving time in either category increases your effective damage output. Also, it gives you access to Whizkid early on as well, in case you stumble across some nice mods. On later levels, I know Juggler will replace Reloader - I found
two Combat Shotguns on Deimos 1, giving me 5 extra shells on instantaneous tap when I need 'em.
Secondly, Rocket-Jumping is
awesome. The 9.9.3 bug never let me play with it as much as I wanted, but now that I can, it's fantastic. I used it to fly through the hordes of Formers on the hard Chained Court and luckily landed right next to the Arena Master, who went down to my 'zerked Chainsaw with ease. The Hell Knights were pushovers. Most notably, the Lost Souls waiting in the wings on Phobos Anomaly are a real pain in the ass in this version. I figured I had their number this time; hit them with the Hell Staff and followed up with a double-shotgun blast... and yet I was still surrounded. Without a Phase device, I sat there, pondering my fate... and remembered the rocket-jump. Juggler gave me the launcher without suffering a Lost-Soul gangstabbing, and in one turn I blew up most of the Souls, flew all the way to the opposite door, opened it, stepped through, and closed it. Too bad, cacodemons! From there it was child's play to cornershoot the rest down.
Then I took on the Bruiser brothers. I just smacked them with Rockets until one got close to my corner, and I laid into him with the chainsaw, which worked pretty well. Then his brother came up behind him and started circling to attack me as well. 2v1 just wasn't happening... so I insta-switched and rocket-jumped away again, hitting them both with the blast. Then I just picked them off with rockets as they tried to close again.
So far I've gone Marine, Fin->Fin->Jug->Bru->Bad->Bru, which is working well. Since Finesse 2 and Juggler seem to cover all my shotgun-related needs so well, I'm seriously considering taking Berserker, then Vampyre (if I read this right, Vampyre gives +3 HP for
any kill, not just ones made in melee,) both of which will mesh well with Badass (esp. another rank of it.) Or I could go with Hellrunner or Nails, I guess, to keep it masterless.
This is on HMP, no less, not a cake difficulty. I'm amazed at how flexible it is.
EDIT: The chainsaw as an instant secondary is great all-around. Many a time have I blasted a Baron point-blank, only to immediately eat an acid blast because the Baron was knocked back a few tiles. It's even worse with Arachnotrons. That's not a problem with the Chainsaw, and once I make it piercing it'll be even better.