So in recent discussion on Discord submachineguns were brought up as a subject, and when I rolled Bulletstorm in a Fated run I decided to try and make this about SMGs, at least until IO. With the seed generously handing multitools, this made the full-length Conamara Chaos Biolabs a desired (and rather easy) branch. This seed was generous with much more than multitools, however, what with (JS?) medi-fiber armor pickable in Callisto Rift as a random spawn and then another (this time definitely JS) medi-fiber manufacturable on Callisto Rift L3. I did use second medi-fiber to use less healing in Rift's poison when enviro pack worn off, but at Europa L1 I would necessarily discard it. Generally early game exotic armors (such as ablative or medi-fiber) aren't good for me to keep around past Callisto, as I prefer to have more mod slots and don't really dodge well in lategame.
I did use deagle for a while on Callisto Rift but mainly to get AV2 pistol AMP (which rolled with +20% crit chance and pistol focus mode), which I kept until Dante Inferno despite using plasma rifle from IO L1 onwards, as the only auto AMP(s?) I seen didn't have crit chance/damage. The versatility of Bulletstorm mastery is definitely its strong point. On Europa L1, I used "manufacture body armor" option twice due to how many multitools I had, and the second one rolled with Loading Feed, which is what I wanted. I also manufactured 7.62 assault smg, and since I had bloody tears relic from the Rift, Europa was really easy moon for me. All mods on assault SMG except vampiric were put on Europa far as I remember, whereas vampiric was put on IO when I was no longer using it.
I left exactly 10 multitools in my inventory to go through Conamara Chaos Biolabs branch, which means only one armor repair, the rest into Attunements, and no dumping multitools into health station. That was risky but paid off. Cryomancer fight was triggered to early, so I then still had bloody tears relic, which was to my detriment, but fortunately I had napalm grenade to at least cut his health significantly. So more stressful fight than I expected and more healing items used up than absolutely necessary, but still a win. I arrived on IO L1 with no multitools (I think?), so I only modded plasma rifle with auto-calibration. The rest mods on it arrived as world drops - no tech stations were found this run anymore.
Even though I had come on IO L2 with a couple of red keycards, CRI Laboratory has spawned rather than Blacksite, so Mephitic Mines was the more attractive option and keycards were ditched. In fact, I kept them mainly for the sake of RNG: Mephitic Mines was definitely considered even if Blacksite would exist, but sometimes branches are locked with keycards. This rather illustrates how Bulletstorm at L1 + Army Surplus L2 is really good ammo economy. At this point I still had pistol AMP and, like I said, would keep it until the end Dante Inferno, despite using rifles from now on. On IO L6 I would find railgun, and happily replace the unused jackhammer with it. Generally, my weapons obsoleted each other: that is, I only used 7.62 assault SMG prior to plasma rifle, plasma rifle only prior to railgun (for which Bulletstorm does nothing). Despite the fact that build had progressively less synergy with such moves, my character's strength only increased. Traits taken with Bulletstorm also helped have enough ammo to field railgun - ammo was never a concern and I only used Mephitic Mines L2 manufacture station for like 50 plasma ammo to fill it to 200, left the remaining charge unused, and never used ammo stations afterwards (even for grenades).
Dante Inferno was still dangerous and I could have died there with my reckless play (railgun didn't always kill enemies in 1 hit, and I was advancing towards enemies aggressively, and otherwise took blast damage), so this is why the choice of 2 ranks Cover Master, both of which came after Dante Inferno.
One could possibly chastize me for not keeping to SMGs since IO, but my build did not feel powerful enough to take on CRI Laboratory, and plasma SMGs are unlikely random drops (and even when they are, you are unlikely to auto-calibrate them). Overall, Bulletstorm L1 with smg-then-rifles is generally a good plan, next time best try to get auto AMP with critchance and not pistol AMP on Rift I guess. Railgun is just that powerful to work with anything that crits, has loading feed and keeps it fed, that Bulletstorm L1 falls out of use is not a weakness, given that it allows to make game easy and frees a lot of room for taking useful skills (but you do want Loading Feed on your armor). I really wish I had that railgun on masterless Tech run I attempted recently, a shame that one worked with scopes and never sought it, whereas Bulletstorm Marine had it gift-wrapped and was much thankful.
Vigilant, level 18 Marine,
defeated the Harbinger against all odds.
He survived for 17589 turns.
The run time was 2h 34m 56s.
World seed was 20995.
He scored 7855 points.
He was a child of the Random Number Gods!
He was ULTRAVIOLENT!
CALLISTO L2 - Volatile Storage
CALLISTO L2 -> Callisto Rift L1
Callisto Rift L3 - Infestation
Callisto Rift L3 -> The Rift
The Rift - Cleared!
EUROPA L2 - Secure Vault
EUROPA L2 -> Conamara Chaos Biolabs L1
Conamara Chaos Biolabs L2 - Windchill
Conamara Chaos Biolabs L3 -> Containment Area
Containment Area - Cleared!
Containment Area - found Bloodletter
IO L2 -> Mephitic Mines L1
Mephitic Mines L2 - The Hunt
Mephitic Mines L3 - found Wavesplitter
Mephitic Mines L3 -> Noxious Hollow
Noxious Hollow - Cleared!
Dante Inferno - Cleared!
Dante Inferno - found Apocalypse
Awards
Medal of Prejudice (+200)
* Won with 100% kills
CRI Star (silver cluster) (+100)
* 50+ kills without taking damage
Conqueror Ribbon (+200)
* Completed all encountered special levels
He killed 837 out of 837 enemies.
34 former grunts 6 military sentries
3 corrupted grunts 13 CalSec bots
1 former CRI grunt 5 security bots
5 former grenadiers 1 military bot
5 corrupted grenadiers 20 reavers
10 former soldiers 23 cryoreavers
34 corrupted soldiers 48 toxic reavers
3 former CRI soldiers 45 archreavers
4 former sergeants 4 kerberi
3 corrupted sergeants 13 cyberi
2 former CRI sergeants 7 cryoberi
1 CRI sergeant 8 toxiberi
16 former guards 15 medusae
2 corrupted guards 11 archmedusae
23 corrupted commandoes 20 ravagers
6 former CRI commandoes 27 armored ravagers
1 former heavy 4 siege ravagers
3 corrupted heavies 12 plasma ravagers
1 CRI heavy 21 CRI marines
4 fanatics 9 CRI bots
9 security drones 20 guardians
4 combat drones 5 frost guardians
95 fiends 4 sentinels
61 fire fiends 3 warlocks
32 ice fiends 13 archwarlocks
12 toxic fiends 3 watchers
5 CalSec sentries 4 cryowatchers
21 security sentries
Traits
Hellrunner L3
Son of a Gun L3
Sustained fire L2
Tough as Nails L3
Army Surplus L2
Cover Master L2
Whizkid L1
BULLETSTORM L1
Trait order
Hr->Arm->SF->Arm->Whk->MBS->SoG->Hr->
SF->Hr->TaN->SoG->SoG->TaN->TaN->Cov->
Cov
Equipment
Slot #1 : railgun VC
* Vampiric 3
* Freezing 2
* Frenzy 10
* Electromagnetic rail
Slot #2 : 7.62 assault SMG +A2V
* Vampiric 3
* Critical 25
* Calibrated 1
* Auto-calibrated
Slot #3 : plasma rifle +PA2
* Critical 25
* Hunter 1
* Balanced 1
* Auto-calibrated
Body : AV1 marine armor BA2
* Critical 10
* Swift
* Durable
* Loading feed
Head : JS marine helmet P2BA
* Crit Enhancer 25
* Plated
* Critical 10
* Durable
* JoviSec
Utility : AV3 utility AMP
* Tenacity
* Adrenal
Relic : - NONE -
Permanents
Mephitic Taint
Exalted Essence Attunement
Acid Essence Attunement
Fire Essence Attunement
Blood Essence Attunement
Inventory
energy cell (x100)
energy cell (x100)
energy cell (x100)
energy cell (x96)
plasma grenade (x3)
ancient salve
multitool (x5)
multitool (x3)
small medkit (x1)
Author
Topic: [1.8h|U|Ma|YAAM] Bulletstorm through Europa with assault SMG, railgun late-game (Read 13 times)