Pretty much what the title says. Currently I'm working on my LMG Directive, but once that's done, I'd like to shift focus to Shotguns. I've played around with a few of them, but don't have much experience to go on with any of them. So far I'm thinking the Mauler would be a solid first choice as it's the Shotty I've used the most. It seems solid and easy to use. After that though I get pretty clueless. I have literally every shotgun unlocked as well (With the exception of the NS ones), so I've got lots of options. Any insights are appreciated.
In reality it doesn't matter which are the best, you'll need to auraxium all but one in the game... I personally avoided the NS Baron during my Directive but that was simply due to a hatred of NS.
Shottys (apart from the NC heavy weapon) are all clones of each other across factions so I don't think it matters from a faction viewpoint. I hear people saying the auto shotty is the one to use in Tower stomping and the OHK pump action if you can land the first shot at close range reliably and don't mind the longer reload. But I haven't got beyond the default shottys yet, so I am only passing on what I've read. I have just got the Baron (in the cheap weapons sale recently) but I've hardly used it, although it seems to have slightly longer effective range with pellets due to smaller spread.
It depends on what you are most (un)comfortable with. Pick your least favourite shotgun and aurax all the others. I have had great success with the Baron. Its surprisingly accurate, and the extra range helps. It should be even better when the LA jetback changes hit live. And the auto shotgun is really easy to get kills with. PA shotguns is something you either love or hate. Aurax one of the pump shotguns first. If you absolutely hated it, just ignore the other one.
As already mentioned you have to do all shotguns but one. As for which one's you should do. Many many people swear by the Baron, I find it a piece of crap that doesn't have the traits you want in a shotgun but if you are one of those players who does think it's good I can't deny you to try it. I personally think that the semi-auto shotguns are the best, although not many people seem to agree with me. Semi-auto shotguns have good ammo capacities, giving you the power of a short-ranged LMG in your hands and giving you enough ammo to clear a room without reloading, assuming you live long enough to tell about it. Shotguns are, contrary to popular belief, high-accuracy weapons. Trying to rely on the spread to kill your opponent is a practical death sentence as your TTK will rise far above any other primary... And even several Secondaries. This makes the Semi-auto also a very good shotgun to pick, as you will be pressing that trigger when you think you'll hit rather than spraying and praying. Automatic shotguns are pretty damn awesome... For 1 on 1's. You'll go through your ammunition in no time and won't often have enough left for a second victim unless you got that nice 2 to 3-shot kill. Keep close to ammo packs and remember that you can pick up ammo from hostile ammo packs just as easily as from friendly. Pump-actions are pretty beastly, and the only shotguns that I happily tried to engage MAX's with. Something about a pump-shotty in your face makes MAX's shoot less accurate as I often survive longer around them. Great for people who can easily sneak up on enemies, or when targets present themselves in a more or less one-at-a-time manner. Also if you often get flanked and need a weapon that can finish the fight quickly this is a wonderful weapon, but you need one hell of a lot of aim and enemies that are nearby to pull it off.
when i was grinding for brawler i found that the Bruiser and Claw (pump actions) were the easiest, but i also loved Piston (the auto shotty), it was one of the most fun, that leaves you with sweeper, mauler and baron, if you like the reload style of Baron it can be a really good one to go for, i tried it but i hated the pump action reloading on a normal shotgun. Sweeper is nice for the large magazine, mauler is just "meh" it does its job well enough! i ended up going for Bruiser, Claw, Piston, Sweeper and Mauler
Strange , this runs totally contrary to my experience. Killing a max takes two mags with any shotgun. I find it incredibly hard to survive long enough for a complete reload of a PA shotgun after dumping the first mag into the Max. For me it works best with the Mauler because of it's very fast reload. Among it's other advantages, this was a major reason that made the mauler my weapon of choice. Oh well, I guess different playstyles might yield different results here.
Shoot for the head and you can kill a MAX with one magazine of a pump-action. Maybe I'm wrong and most MAX's were already damaged, but shooting for the head will allow you to get those kills regardless.
Don't you have to be really close to avoid pellet spread causing some misses? Genuine question. Or do you use slugs?
It's a shotgun, being close is a given. And no don't use slugs, slugs defeat the entire purpose of a shotgun. Sure it makes a poor mans battlerifle, but you are better off with just about any Carbine, including the CQC one's, unless you are gunning for people at terminals or repairing stuff. But yeah as surprising as it is, surviving in CQC against a MAX with a pump-action (you holding the pump-action, not the MAX ) is possible and actually happens more often than with other weapons. Probably because you can focus much more time on running around between shots instead of constantly trying to hit the target. I preferred to run through the target a bunch of times while doing it.
