October 2021 ~ Doors Geek

Monday, October 25, 2021

Back 4 Blood - In-depth Weapons and Cards guide

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In-depth weapon/card guide By Yippo the Clown Analysis of the various weapons options, and damage-related cards, available in Back 4 Blood. Introduction Welcome to this guide on the various weapons options available in Back 4 Blood. This guide will cover weapons analysis, attachments and damage-specific cards. I will also throw in some recommendations and tips here and there, because I'm nice like that. Of course, all of this should be obvious from the title, but I'm a traditionalist and every guide needs an introduction. Disclaimer - The information in this guide is based on my own experience and research unless otherwise noted from the Credits. This was largely conducted on Veteran, though I've played enough Nightmare to form judgments on it. I will not be covering melee cards as I've not played enough melee to be confident of my view, and this analysis is better suited to a dedicated melee guide regardless (of which there are several). TL;DR This section is for those of you reading this who think they know the game very well already, and are only visiting this guide to try to find minutiae they might not know. Or possibly to try to find errors to point out. For you, I have compiled a list of what I believe are largely unknown points below, so you can skip the rest of the guide. - You should be running 2x scopes, or failing that 4x scopes, on shotguns - The UMP45 actually hits harder, per-bullet, than most assault rifles - Although the game sometimes lists increased firepower on AP and HP ammo, this is a display bug and they in fact do nothing for your damage output - All weapons have some level of bullet penetration, although this is usually no more than 10% of bullet damage unless it's a sniper rifle - Reload speed is the single most important stat for sniper rifles - The 'Firepower' stat on weapons is a function of damage-per-second, not a measure of actual damage; in testing, the Super 90 actually has the same damage per-pellet as the AA12, for instance - The TEC 9 counts as an SMG for achievements despite being a sidearm - I hate the M1A with a burning passion rivalled only by my lust for Japanese jelly beans Glossary ADS - Aim down sights AR - Assault rifles Common - Shorthand for Common Infected, a holdover term from Left 4 Dead referring to the standard, easily mown down zombies all over the map CQC - Close-quarters combat; in this guide, generally used to refer to <3m ranges and/or shotgun and melee specialisms DPS - Damage-per-second, a carry-across term from MMOs. Mostly relevant in terms of damage output against specials and bosses Duals - Dual primaries, i.e. the Two is One and One is None card. This is my term rather than a community term, but hey, here's hoping it catches on Horde - An attack, usually telegraphed, by a large number of Commons. This will typically happen either as a result of an in-game trigger (e.g. activating a map-specific object) or as a result of a Horde timer which is visible on the left side of your screen on some maps. Note that unlike Left 4 Dead, Hordes include automatic spawns of several Specials which will frequently overlap in species LMG - Light machine gun Uptime - Time spent actively firing at or engaging an enemy; most commonly used to refer to reload times (where time firing is uptime and time reloading is downtime) Special - Shorthand for Special Infected, a holdover term from Left 4 Dead referring to any non-Common, non-Boss enemy; categorised into Tallboys, Stingers and Reekers, then subcategorised further SR - Sniper rifle Sweeping - The act of clearing out non-alert commons upon entering a new area; most commonly relevant in larger, open areas. A generally under-recognised role, sweeping is most certainly a role in itself and completing sweeping efficiently leads to faster clears, lower chip damage taken from rogue commons, and lower ammo consumption across the board A note on Two is One and One is None This card, hereafter referred to as 'Duals' to spare my lazy fingers, has something of a warping effect on weapon choices as it heavily mitigates certain weapons' weaknesses and changes the ammunition economy heavily. There are, generally speaking, two reasons to take Duals - either you effectively want a more powerful secondary, or you're running a hybrid build. The former option, upgrading your secondary, indicates that you still consider one weapon your primary weapon. You will still consider taking cards which benefit that weapon type only, and you will fall back to your second primary only in situations which warrant it. Where this is the case, you will most commonly want to take an SMG as your 'secondary' weapon as both SMGs and SMG/pistol ammo in general are rarely used by most builds. This will allow you to have a plentiful supply of backup ammo and a near guarantee of a relatively powerful fallback option. The most common reason for running Duals in this way is if you want to run SRs as your primary and so will need a strong option for dealing with hordes. In the latter case, a hybrid build, you should generally avoid running weapon-specific cards unless they're particularly powerful. While in theory you could justify any combination of weapon types for a hybrid build, in practice you're effectively choosing 'shotgun plus X'. This is because you should be choosing your weapon types based on use-case, and for CQC the shotgun is near-peerless - meanwhile, LMGs, ARs, SMGs and to a lesser extent SRs all fall into the same use-case, being midrange sweeping and anti-Special. Use of hybrid builds allows for multiple people running a specific weapon type without too many issues; however, if your group includes someone running a weapon type as primary, hybrid-users should allow them priority in weapon choice due to superior uptime. Under no circumstance should you use two weapons which use the same ammunition type with Duals (e.g. AR and LMG, or two shotguns). While doing this does provide some benefit, it works out to being a waste of a card as you get no damage or ammunition benefits from doing so. Also note that secondaries are far from useless (at least the Desert Eagle and TEC 9, anyway), so be sure you definitely are using the benefit from this card if you decide to run it.

Light Machine Guns LMGs have an awkawrd niche in B4B; their biggest handicap is their usage of rifle ammo, which your AR-carrying teammates won't be particularly happy to see you unloading wantonly. That said, the only time you should be firing on full auto is when you would do so with any other gun - when firing into a Special. Resist the temptation to open up against Commons, as this is both wasteful and unnecessary - stick to short bursts to allow the bodies to hit the floor and ensure your shots are hitting things that matter. LMGs are, in essence, ARs which trade their sweeping ability for better sustained damage output. They are surprisingly useful, in public lobbies in particular; here, players are often competing for Common kills, frequently isolate themselves by accident or design, and will struggle to focus fire on priority targets. Having access to the ability to simply hose down a Tallboy without regard for weakspots is a boon in these circumstances. In more coordinated teams the LMG's niche falls away, although it can still be used as an alternative to (or support of) the AA-12 as the team's primary problem-solver. As a further note - if you want to use LMGs as your primary weapon group, it is recommended that you spec into Duals and Admin Reload. This will allow you to avoid reloading for substantial periods, swapping to your secondary (likely an SMG) only for long enough for your LMG to reload. Not taking these cards can, paradoxically, lead to you spending even more time reloading than you otherwise would - you'll need to retain a minimum level of ammunition in case you need to hose down a Tallboy (or, on Nightmare, three), so you'll have to reload at 50% magazine capacity. M249 Base bullet damage: 13.0 Magazine: 80 Of the two LMGs available, this is the anti-Special (and anti-ammunition) choice. It has lower bullet damage than the RPK, as well as higher recoil - but a substantially increased rate of fire lead to a much higher DPS output. A compensator is strongly recommended to assist with keeping its prodigious recoil under control, as without one it can be challenging to maintain fire on a weakspot. Generally the better of the two LMGs for doing things that LMGs do. When firing on full auto, screaming as loudly as possible until the magazine goes dry is compulsory. RPK Base bullet damage: 18.0 Magazine: 40 Essentially an oversized AK-47 which trades awkwardness of use for a bigger clip and more bullet damage. Like its smaller cousin, its recoil can be tricky to manage if you're not used to it; unlike the AK, however, you actually have a reason to get used to this one. When compared to the M249, the RPK unfortunately falls short; it loses out on DPS and clip size, and in exchange only really gains a limited ability to sweep (a role which ARs and SRs already do substantially better). A niche weapon in an already niche category. Should really be called the AK-48. Light Machine Gun Cards Not... -that- bad, actually. Allows for some quite accurate hip-fire with a laser-sighted LMG; you'll want to be crouched regardless for Down In Front, so could be usable. That said, still probably not worth burning a card slot for, even with the movement speed added in. Submachine Guns While in most games the benefits of SMGs are mobility and better hip-fire, these aren't anywhere near as relevant in B4B; as a result, SMGs wind up being categorised for the most part as 'better pistols' (or, if you prefer, 'worse ARs'). That said, they're capable of surprisingly good damage output due to their generally low recoil and high rate of fire; they certainly aren't awful. It is simply unfortunate that they lack the bullet damage for sweeping and the magazine size for Special-killing, which results in them getting shunted into a backup role. SMGs are, as a category, very well designed; they all feel different to fire, but all perform similarly enough to one another that which one you use can simply come down to personal preference. The only one which stands out is the Uzi, which tends to underperform relative to the rest. Uzi Base bullet damage: 10.0 Magazine: 32 Evangelo's starting weapon and by far the most common SMG encountered early, the Uzi unfortunately lacks merits relative to the other SMG options; its bullet damage is low, its rate of fire is decent but not incredible, and it has some minor recoil issues. Still perfectly serviceable, but replace it with something else as soon as quality permits. Named after a famous Chinese League of Legends player. MP5 Base bullet damage: 11.0 Magazine: 25 The more generalist SMG, performing fairly well in all areas. It can largely be thought of as a slightly better Uzi, having better bullet damage and recoil but slightly lower fire rate. Doc's starting weapon. Named after the super-advanced file format used for music in the B4B universe. UMP45 Base bullet damage: 13.0 Magazine: 20 The closest thing you'll find to a miniature AR, the UMP both feels and acts like one. If you like to play with ARs but your group already has several AR-users, the UMP is a good compromise. Named for the number of UMPs in the average R&B track.

Vector Base bullet damage: 11.0 Magazine: 19 While the UMP45 is a smaller AR, the Vector is a larger TEC 9. It has an even smaller clip than its counterparts but, curiously, an extremely high rate of fire with very little recoil. The Vector's DPS output is phenomenal during its uptime, but the speed at which it empties its clip severely limit it. If you can get your hands on an Extended Mag (or at very least a Fast Mag) its performance skyrockets. For what it's worth, I adore this weapon in spite of its faults. Named after a doctor specialising in cybernetics with questionable taste in friends. Submachine Gun Cards Much like all the other similar cards, if you're running SMGs, you will probably want this card. 30% ammo capacity helps a great deal for getting through the longer maps, and 10% unconditional damage boost is nice too. Particularly useful for SMGs as they tend to have lower damage than their counterparts. 35% reload speed is actually pretty good, but the fact remains that reload speed just isn't a valuable stat unless you're running SRs. Given the tiny Vector clip you might be tempted, but in the end, avoid. Sniper Rifles Although there are three entries in this category, there are really only two sniper rifles - the M95 and the Phoenix - and these are the ones I refer to in this section. SRs, although niche, are nowhere near as weak as many in the community seem to think. They're obviously very effective at dumping damage into weakspots - this much anyone can tell you - but they're also perfectly good at sweeping and not awful at dealing with hordes so long as you're aware of one thing - reload speed affects bolt cycle time. While an unmodified SR will take a relatively long time to eliminate single Commons (which in turn causes slow sweep speeds), with a fast mag and a single reload speed card SRs quickly outpace ARs due to not needing to aim for headshots. SRs innate bullet penetration makes them fairly solid at dealing with hordes, too, so long as you can predict their approach path and position appropriately. You don't need to be getting mass-kills with each trigger pull, of course, but simply putting two Commons down with one bullet is usually enough efficiency gain to allow the SR-user to hold down one angle alone. Nonetheless, it is recommended that SR-users run Duals with a good SMG in their back pocket - not least because SR-sweeping is very ammo-inefficient. Barrett M95 Base bullet damage: 120.0 Magazine: 5 The big boy, you will not find higher bullet damage anywhere in the game. It hits like a truck (albeit a very small truck), but as a trade-off, both the bolt-cycle and the reload time is substantially longer than the Phoenix. Generally, this is not a trade-off worth making. The Phoenix already hits plenty hard enough to do the SR's job, so with the vast majority of targets the M95's extra damage is simply overkill. Having said that, if you're swapping to a higher quality M95 the damage step-up will be sizeable, so don't be too picky. If you do find yourself with an M95, bear in mind that it hits hard enough to get a stumble animation out of a Tallboy from 1-2 headshots, irrespective of weakspots, letting you generally deal with them alone. Named after a player-character in Final Fantasy VII, despite him never actually using a gun without it being embedded in at least one limb. Phoenix 350L Base bullet damage: 90.0 Magazine: 5 Essentially, this is -the- SR of the game. It hits hard enough, assuming quality-parity, to one-shot any non-Tallboy Special with a weakspot hit - including Snitches, on Veteran at least - which is extremely valuable. With a modest amount of reload speed, the bolt-cycle is barely noticeable. Like the M95 it only holds a five round clip, but since you're already incentivised to favour reload speed this is much less of a concern than it might be. As with the M95, always take a Fast Mag if you find one - an Extended Mag might give you more rounds, but it won't get them into the chamber any faster. Presumably named by someone with an extremely poor understanding of what a phoenix is. M1A Base bullet damage: 38.0 Magazine: 10 The red-headed stepchild of the SR family, this rifle should be treated like one and despised [disclaimer: this is a joke, please don't cancel me]. It is, effectively, a Ranch Rifle with a smaller clip and worse hip-fire. In theory being a semi-automatic SR should mean it can deliver frequent high-damage punches to weakspots; in practice, its recoil is far too high to maintain weakspot damage in any but the most favourable (or suicidal) of circumstances. Avoid this weapon at all costs. It is literally worse than a Desert Eagle, and when your primary is worse than your secondary you know you have issues. If you're Jim, who starts with one, learn to love your revolver until you can find a Phoenix. Unlike the other entries, I will not be closing this entry with a joke because I hate this weapon too much for comedy.

Sniper Rifle Cards Absolutely terrible. There is no reason why you need to boost your movement speed while in ADS, let alone this much. Don't waste your cards. Just like all the other ammo cards, you'll want this in your deck if you use SRs. In this case, though, it's more for the ammo than anything else. Almost certainly not worth it for an SR-user. SRs are already plenty accurate when in ADS, and they're inaccurate enough from the hip that you probably shouldn't be taking pot-shots even with this card. Even if this were good enough to enable SR hip-fire, it still wouldn't be valuable enough to burn a card slot on. Avoid. Shotguns A class of weapons which are extremely powerful in their niche, shotguns excel at holding down specific areas and dealing with hordes. Later-game shotguns also become Special-killing powerhouses; as well as this, shotguns have arguably the best weapon-specific cards besides melee weapons. As a result of all these factors, every team should have at least one shotgunner to be competitive. That being said, shotguns fall into the CQC position that melee also competes with. Generally shotguns will be substantially easier to use and work around, as well as coming online earlier; however, melee has a power ceiling far beyond anything else in the game. Which is used will depend on your group (and player preferences), and there is room for both to an extent. However, try to have no more than two CQC players in any given group - more than this will lead to difficulties sweeping and reduce the number of people available to reinforce any given side of your group when defending a fixed point. Incidentally, while recommended for all players in general, shotgun-users in particular should prioritise the Down In Front card (assuming they're not playing on Recruit, of course). In any given situation Shotgunners are most likely to be in the front (and so most vulnerable to being tagged by less-than-competent allies), while also having arguably the highest damage potential from a misfire (aside from SR-users who are supposed to be the marksmen and therefore less prone to have an 'incident'). N.B. Pellet counts are from my own count on the firing range; I think they're accurate, but not 100% certain. Like any good guide-writer, my approach to accuracy is to whine 'but that's hard' and give up after a few tries. 870 Express Base bullet damage: 8.0 Pellet count: 8 Magazine: 8 Your bog-standard pump-action shotgun, Holly starts with this alongside her bat (or more accurately, has this as a secondary weapon for enemies slightly outside bat's reach). It's underwhelming but does the shotgun job acceptably well in the early game; unlike later shotguns, its damage output against Specials is mediocre. Remember that, like SRs, pump-actions get dual benefit from reload speed as it also improves the speed that they pump (heh heh). Replace with one of the two auto shotguns as soon as you find one. Named by someone who mistakenly believed they were naming a train. TAC-14 Base bullet damage: 10.0 Pellet count: 12 Magazine: 3 Hoffman starts with this, and he is not particularly happy about it. Functionally identical to the 870 Express, it has better per-shell damage output but a laughable three shell capacity. Given that both reload shells individually, the only real difference between the two is how often you have to hit the 'R' key. Just like the 870, replace ASAP (with a better shotgun, obviously, not that M95 you found in a closet). Its full name is 'Teamkillers Are Cool 14'. AA12 Base bullet damage: 8.0 Pellet count: 7 Magazine: 12 Now we're talking. The AA12 is without doubt the best shotgun in the game; it has a serious argument for being considered the best gun in the game, period. It has a nice chunky magazine which reloads fairly quickly, enough punch to put down a Common with one shot on any difficulty (provided reasonable range, anyway), and most importantly, the ability to unload shells extremely quickly. This makes it phenomenal at bursting down Tallboys who, if not killed outright, will invariably be stumbled by the damage output. The only thing the AA12 doesn't do well is sweep, for obvious reasons. Trust your AR and SR players to sweep for you, don't get greedy and waste shells trying to do their job, and in return they will trust you to protect them from hordes, hold down chokepoints, and obliterate any Tallboy who looks at them funny. Also note that the 2x scope is optimal on the AA-12 despite common sense suggesting otherwise, simply due to the damage boost. This gun's very existence makes the setting and premise of the game implausible, because anyone holding one is essentially immune to everything, everywhere, ever.

Super 90 Base bullet damage: 8.0 Pellet count: 9 Magazine: 6 Inevitably the Super 90 must be compared to the AA12, as the premium weapon in the class. The result of that comparison is... unfavourable, but reasonably close.The Super 90 boasts somewhat superior per-shell damage due to pellet count compared to the AA-12, but that is essentially its only selling point. The AA12 wins for magazine size, reload speed and DPS - and therefore is superior for doing the two things shotguns exist to do, i.e. kill Tallboys and hold the line. That being said, this doesn't mean the Super 90 is bad. Not at all - it does the job and it does it well. It's simply unfortunate for it that the AA-12 does the job excellently. Use the Super 90 if you haven't found an AA12 yet, if you're using shotguns in a hybrid build and your primary shotgunner wants the AA12, or if you're an idiot hipster who thinks stacking 200% reload speed is a good idea. Shotgun Cards Although in theory this card is fantastic - 7+ health per shot, not considering penetration! - in practice it never seems to do as much as it should. I suspect it may be tracking how many total enemies are hit by any given shot, rather than how many pellets hit. I recommend you run Face Your Fears instead, as it works universally. Not good enough. The movement speed while firing is basically irrelevant, so you're basically just taking a card with 10% shotgun damage on it. There are better options out there. Much like Mag Coupler, would be good if the AA12 didn't exist. Since it does, you don't need this card. As with the other similar cards - if you're using shotguns, you'll probably want it. If you're not, you definitely don't. Sidearms pt. 1 Sidearms (or secondary weapons as they're usually referred to in-game) are very much a mixed bag, running the gamut from absolute garbage (The M1A Belgian) through various flavours of mediocrity, all the way up to 'pretty good actually' (TEC 9 and Desert Eagle). However, this is only if you're considering them as what they are - secondary weapons. As standalone choices (i.e. if considered in the context of Duals), everything shifts downwards, the Desert Eagle and TEC 9 are underwhelming and everything else becomes worthless. As such, when considering the relative merits of these guns, don't think of them as weapons in isolation. It's not just a TEC 9 - it's a TEC 9 and also a bonus card slot because you didn't take Duals. That's worth a lot, especially on Nightmare where drawing cards from your deck is a luxury, not a right. .357 Magnum Base bullet damage: 20.0 Magazine: 8 The best you can say about the Magnum is that it's not completely awful. It effectively acts as a substantially worse Desert Eagle, doing the same job - allowing for sweeping with your secondary - but with a slower reload speed and a LOT more recoil. Its only point of superiority over the noble bird is that it uses rifle ammo, which is far more plentiful than sniper ammo (at lesat assuming nobody's carrying an M249). Incidentally, Jim starts with one of these, and it's effectively his primary weapon because the M1A is so very, very horrible. In practice, don't take one of these if you're the SR-user - you already have an SR which does the sweeping job far more effectively. Instead, look to the TEC 9 to give you some measure of anti-horde capacity. Named after a famous private investigator. Beretta M9 Base bullet damage: 10.0 Magazine: 12 Doc's starting sidearm and a study in mediocrity. It functions exactly the same as every other pistol in every other game. Importantly, however, it is the only gun which actually fits Holly's 'pew pew' voice line. Beretta M9 Burst Base bullet damage: 10.0 Magazine: 12 Identical to the M9 but only fires in three-round bursts, which has no real benefit but makes the kick worse. Take this if you have such a severe inferiority complex that you won't even allow yourself mediocre things. Note that the designer of this weapon cunningly sidestepped the issue most burst guns have - overkill - by putting the burst function on a gun with no stopping power.

Desert Eagle Base bullet damage: 28.0 Magazine: 7 Much better. The Desert Eagle is the ideal sidearm for the shotgunner who wants to be able to help out with sweeping, but not enough to take Duals - it packs enough of a punch to one-shot a Common from a chest shot on most difficulties and has a good reload speed, which is about all you can really ask for. Don't make the mistake of thinking it can function as a SR - it can sweep, but it can't kill Specials particularly effectively. Also note that it uses sniper ammo, so don't over-use it if you have a SR-user because they'll probably need that stuff at some point. 'Desert Eagle' is actually the gun's Native American name, but its real name is long lost in the mists of time. Sidearms pt. 2 Glock 23 Base bullet damage: 12.0 Magazine: 15 Basically it's the M9 but better in every way. Still extremely generic, though. Take this pistol if you want to pistol at things with your pistol. Walker starts with this, as is only fitting for the most generic character in the game. If for some reason you're using this a lot, it is a legal requirement for you to start every round by telling your team to 'glock and gload'. [N.B. [i]Okay, that was the single worst joke in this entire guide. I can only apologise. But not enough to delete it or come up with anything better[/i].] Glock 23 Auto Base bullet damage: 10.0 Magazine: 15 Identical to the Glock 23, but with the added bonus of missing roughly 50% of its rounds due to the ludicrous recoil and losing 16% of its bullet damage for no adequately explored reason. Would be borderline usable for emergency situations if the TEC 9 didn't exist. Named 'Auto' because it's actually capable of transforming into a car; unfortunately, as it can only hold 15 bullets' worth of fuel, this doesn't come up much. [N.B. [i]Serious competition for the joke above[/i]] M1911 Base bullet damage: 15.0 Magazine: 8 Hoffman's starting pistol, this isn't actually too bad as far as pistols go. It has acceptable punch given it hits harder than an AK-47, and so long as the zombies aren't running at you very quickly that's often enough. Unfortunately it gets outscaled pretty quickly. Named because even though it's a pistol, it's still 1911 times better than the M1A. TEC 9 Base bullet damage: 9 Magazine: 20 Karlee's starting pistol and the other side to the Desert Eagle's coin; where the birb makes you a pseudo-sweeper, this makes you pseudo-horde control. It's easy to underestimate the TEC 9, as its bullet damage is poor and its clip size is mediocre; what matters, however, is that it has fairly minimal recoil and a high rate of fire. This means that despite its unassuming appearance, it can put out DPS comparable to an SMG. Just make sure you're aiming it at the weakspot, or if you want to actually deal damage, take Duals and replace it with a Vector. Note that, despite being a sidearm, this counts as an SMG for achievements. Also note that despite being heavily associated with street crime and school shootings, carrying this gun does not make you any edgier. You heard me, Karlee. The Belgian Base bullet damage: 8.0 Pellet count: 12 Magazine: 2 Mom's starting secondary, and kind of a multi-layered joke. On the one hand, it's a double-barrelled shotun that still only gets one shot, which is funny. On the other, it can still do more damage in one shot than an M1A, which is also funny. Unfortunately, the comedy drains away once you start actually using this weapon, which is too awful for laughs. Note that although this is a sidearm, it uses shotgun shells and counts as a shotgun for achievements - this is a purely academic fact, however, because you'll never actually fire it. Named 'The Belgian' because it's small, inoffensive, politically irrelevant and shares a land border with France. Sidearm Cards No. Absolutely not. If you're that desperate for ammo you should be running a max ammo boost, not fishing for a 2% chance to get a handful of rounds. Better yet, just play Hoffman. Do not take this card. While this card is worth taking if you're focussing on SMGs, it really isn't worth taking just to bolster your sidearm damage. In this context, do not take.

Melee weapons Melee doesn't really compete with firearms in many ways, so I'm mostly including this section out of a sense of completeness. Metagame-wise, though, it competes with the shotgun for the role of CQC in any given team. On Veteran, you'll find that melee locks down a tight section more effectively than a shotgun will due to the lack of downtime; however, melee is worse at dealing with Specials, and is much worse at area coverage. Melee can also fill the 'damage sponge' role more effectively than any other role once it has some cards built up. It mostly comes down to what your team wants to use. On Nightmare, on the other hand, melee is the hail Mary play. It doesn't come online until you're several cards in, and carrying a weak player on Nightmare for that long is a real struggle. Once it does come online, however, melee becomes a real powerhouse (assuming the melee-user isn't crippled by trauma, at least). The sheer number and variety of melee-oriented cards available give the role a lot of variance, and you'll need to experiment to discover your favoured way of using it. As far as individual weapons go, you're effectively making two decisions - do you want a wide or narrow swing? And do you want a fast or a slow swing? This gives you your choice - wide/fast (machete), wide/slow (bat), narrow/slow (fire axe) or narrow/fast (hatchet). Slower/narrower swings are higher damage and so more suited for putting down Specials, wheras wider/faster swings cover more area and so are better for killing Commons. General Weapon/Damage Cards pt. 1 Although it might seem like this would be good for everyone, in reality the reload times of most weapons are close enough to their swap speeds that you don't really benefit from this. Sure, you could also run a swap-speed card; alternatively, you could just run one reload speed card and one other card, and you'd get about the same benefit. The only real reason to use this card is if you're looking to run LMGs, or you really love the Super 90 for some reason. Terrible. Pistol/SMG ammo is extremely plentiful and should never be an issue, and you'll never need to use your Desert Eagle this much. Note that despite what a surprising number of people think, this does not work with Duals - you're equipping a Primary weapon in your Secondary slot, not turning your Primary weapon into a Secondary. Garbage. No matter how much you think you want swap speed, and no matter how good you think you are at avoiding damage, it's really not worth risking losing a chunk of your hip-fire accuracy because of some stray Common. Avoid. The most generic of generic damage cards, its only real stand-out feature is the bullet penetration (which, as explored in the Magazine Attachments section, is questionable at best). Avoid in favour of the more efficient damage cards like Shredder, Confident Killer etc. A very good card - the later a map goes, the more difficulties you're often having as ammo runs low and health follows it. Getting a stacking damage boost helps substantially to mitigate this. However, it is a far more selfish boost than Shredder or Marked For Death, so this should usually be lower priority unless you're running something that desperately needs a substantial damage boost. Okay, yes, I know, it's not actually a damage card. However, if you're even remotely concerned about FF (which you should be unless you're playing on Recruit), taking this card will give you a huge amount of freedom in movement and firing. As a result, it actually ends up being a functional damage boost, even not a direct one, for the vast majority of players. I strongly recommend this card for everyone. Also not a damage card, but included because it's in direct competition with Buckshot Bruiser. As noted in that entry, prioritise this one over that one, as Buckshot Bruiser does not seem to be working as advertised.

Not great. Accuracy mostly helps with hip-fire, as B4B's guns are all pretty accurate when firing in ADS, and while a barrel slot is a fair trade for improving your hip-fire, a card definitely isn't. Might be acceptable as the last card in your deck. Maybe. Ballsy. Isn't actually too bad if you're good at avoiding damage - 25% damage is a lot. That said, note that it's 30 PERCENT health, not just 30 health - taking health boosts doesn't help much. Nonetheless, can work well, especially in combination with cards like Face Your Fears. Consider taking Fresh Bandage and/or Saferoom Recovery, however, as Trauma is going to be a real problem for you. Probably the best weapon swap card, as 5% damage resistance isn't too much of a price to pay. Unfortunately, as with the other weapon swap cards, the impact just isn't enough to be worth a card slot. Terrible. You really don't want to boost your speed much while firing - all you're doing is making yourself less accurate. At least it has 5% movement speed on it, but still not worth taking in many circumstances. Not good. Aim speed is good in general, but much as with Front Sight Focus, it's good enough for an attachment slot and definitely not good enough for a card. Avoid. This is actually a really good card which most people seem to overlook. The loss of ADS movement speed really doesn't hurt much since you'll rarely be moving too much in ADS anyway; meanwhile, 50% is a LOT of extra damage. Seriously consider this if you're able to hit weakspots reliably, especially if you like to work the wide angle to help with Tallboys. Garbage. Precision kills are the fancy term for headshotting Commons, and when you're headshotting Commons you're typically not pressured at all. Improves sweep speeds by a miniscule amount, and does at least give SR-users a reason to aim for headshots (not that they want one). Not good. Makes you deal more damage against weakspots, while also making it much harder to aim for them. If you're thinking about taking this, don't. Take Hyper-Focused instead. That said, has some nice synergy with Quick Kill if you're able to burn two card slots (which, on any reasonable difficulty, you're not). Not completely worthless, but extremely underwhelming compared to other cards. On the other hand, seeing damage numbers - while useless most of the time - is pretty nice for writing guides. So there's that. Not great. 50% better performance than Combat Training - which is extremely underwhelming as a card - in exchange for quicker stamina drain. That is not an acceptable trade.

Surprisingly usable overall - most of the reload speed cards have some nasty side effects which are better off avoided. That said, reload speed isn't important enough to be worth burning a card on unless you're a SR-user (and even then it's questionable). Not too bad, but doesn't quite pull enough weight to make the cut. Even if you want a selfish damage boost, Confident Killer is going to stack quickly enough to be superior to this. If you want weakspot damage, take Hyper-Focused; if you want damage, take one of the good generic damage cards. No. Absolutely not. There is no reason why you'd want to take this unless you're utterly stumped by gauntlet events or you habitually abandon your team. Garbage card. Has similar issues to In The Zone, in that the only time you're going to be stacking a lot of precision kills are times when you're under no pressure or threat. Those are the times when you really don't need damage boosts. Take something more general instead. Not good enough for a card slot. It might be tempting if you're running an LMG/Admin Reload build, but even then, it just isn't worth it. It makes swapping feel a lot better, certainly, but shaving less than a second off that swap time is virtually never going to matter. And even if you're absolutely set on taking a weapon swap card, Guns Out is usually going to be better. Not bad, but not great. Although you can stack the damage boost quickly, unless you're using an LMG you're only going to get the full boost by the time you've basically emptied your mag already. If your team is also firing, they'll get the benefit... but even then, it's going to perform similarly to, or worse than, Marked For Death. Still better than most damage cards, but both MFD and Confident Killer will outperform this. Definitely interesting, and if it was all damage boost instead of bringing penetration into the mix it'd be potentially good. As it is, bullet penetration is barely even useful, and 10% damage boost isn't enough to cripple your personal economy over. Avoid, but be sad about it. Wow, that's a lot of aim speed. If only aim speed were a relevant stat, this might actually be good. As it is, avoid. Even if you want aim speed desperately - and you don't - Steady Aim would be better. Don't take this. There's a whole section for this card at the start of the guide. I'm not going to repeat myself here, damnit! Not awful for those who need reload speed (read: SR-users). However, while 5% damage resistance isn't too substantial, nor is 10% reload speed - on balance I'd favour Reload Drills over this as 20% is usually plenty with a Fast Mag.

NARAKA: BLADEPOINT - Character Presets (800+)

9:03 AM / by admin / in NARAKA: BLADEPOINT / with 12 comments /

Here are some character presets for character customization. It includes some custom beautiful characters and reference characters such as Zoro, Ryze, Squidward, Pico, Shrek, Saitama, Veigo, and Thanos. Hope you like it :)

Preset Download Link

Google Drive link: https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1--FM-69KK6JjFCJ9OepP2nqyI4rM18in?usp=sharing

Note: The presets are character specific, you can't use them on different characters. Reference characters (Aquaman, Ultraman, Zoro...) can be found in the reference character folder.

How to Import Preset 1. Click on the Heroes on top of screen, then select customization. Alt-Text 2. Select a slot and click on edit. Alt-Text 3. Select import on the right hand side of the screen and click on the preset that you want to use from your local files. Alt-Text Preset Preview These are some of the presets. There are 700+ more in the Google Drive. Alt-Text Alt-Text Alt-Text Zoro

Aquaman Alt-Text Viego Alt-Text Thanos Alt-Text Pico

by Mëowed

NARAKA: BLADEPOINT - General Tips & Tricks

8:54 AM / by admin / in NARAKA: BLADEPOINT / with No comments /

Things you may not know, but you should. Some things are easier to explain in many frames per second, so i'll include some YT videos instead of writing poems about "how you should use dagger to not humiliate yourself". If you would like to support me, please use my reference code in-game: chdkdkxqhr General advices Use TAB to loot items from the ground. When there are many items lying in close proximity, it is getting difficult to pick up item which you want without picking something else accidentally. Workaround to this is to stand near item you want and press TAB - this will open your inventory and will show you items lying nearby (on the left side of screen). Then just move them with your mouse by either clicking or dragging and dropping into your inventory. Change weapons quickly mid-fight. When you tap 1 or 2 button you'll change weapon from two equipped, but when you press and hold, you'll be able to swap weapons availabe to you under 1/2 key, with ones hidden in your equipment. Simple and fast enough to use mid-fight to throw your opponent off with sneaky combos. Upgrade glyphs you are using. Using them will make a difference especially higher in ladder. Also, upgrade them from lowest level to highest (don't power level 1 glyph to level 5). Every upgrade gives you the same amount of boost, so leveling them all to level 2, then to level 3 and so on will give you same boost for lower price. This is to ensure the best power boost/price ratio. Talents matter. They are available for characters you have at least 2nd level of cultivation. Chose them to fit your playstyle since every one of them is viable under certain conditions. You can drop cash with right mouse button. It is shown as "discard". Each click will drop 1000 Coins. Never fight in Banesurge zones. If you get hit by it, you are dead - it deal so much damage, you won't be able to survive unless you wear yellow armor with 50% healh buff from souljades. Always pick all fruits from bushes. Pears & (insert that other fruit name) give you 2min buff, and unlike Dandelions you can pick another when you are buffed. Why to do so? To decrease chances that your opponents will get buff (if you are solo q, pick all 4; if trio, two guys pick 1 fruit, and one guy picks 2). Use hidden coins. They are locked to current season, and if you won't use them when Tidal is over - you'll lose them. Take note that not fulfilling quest requiments or dying before completing them will lose coins spent for that quest. Also if you can, use 3xCoin quest insted of 1xCoin - you get 33 more exp/key for doing so. Keys open stashes. Sometime in-game you'll either loot key yourself (toads carry them as well), or you'll see global notification about stash being open. When stash is opened whole server can see its location on map. If you carry a key, stash location is visible only to your team until opened. Loot is good there, but you don't have to open it. You can drop key near dead zone so enemies won't get it in case of your death. Pre-load your game before diving into rankeds. If you are one of people that experience huge freeze and lags in 1st game after launching NARAKA - pre load your game. What i mean by that, is to jump into quick game/bloodbath/free training so game can load most assets so you can be AFK a little and not worry about losing ladder points because your HDD is too slow to load everything in few seconds.

Combat Ranking up is all about killing. Meta right now favorizes kills above everything else, which means killing 4-5 enemies (bots included) will give you more rank/character points than sneaking and hiding for 15-20min. If you want to rank up quicky, there is no choice other than being very agressive. Don't forget you can kill-steal with ranged weapons. :3 Cancel your combo to bait your opponent. Crouching just before your blue attack charge is best way to bait enemy counter and make him vulnerable to your quick attacks. You can also cancel by dashing (SHIFT) or jumping (SPACE). Spam crouch while healing/repairing armor. This won't stop your healing progress and will make you a harder target to shoot (won't save you against grappling hooks, but it is still worth doing). You can heal while holding vertical surface. Healing on tree is often much safer than healing on the ground - enemies have much less things in their arsenal to hurt you quickly, since melee is almost exclusively cut to airborne attack and not everybody carries bow or musket. You don't have to engage in every fight. This is not God of War 2, where you have to kill all enemies to go further. You have options to hide/wait/disengage/run (not always viable since enemies can just grapple hook spam you). Try to be smart about it. Tech chase. Quite obnoxious way to lock and kill your opponent. This is all about timing. When you knock your opponent, position and time your charged attack to hit excatly at the moment when your opponent is getting up after roll. You can see this the most with longsword users (because of their energy charged attacks that has both long and wide hitbox). Repeat it few times and you can name yourself King of NARAKA: BLADEPOINT. To decrease chances of tech chase working against you, instead of rolling when you are on the ground, just attack/parry - this will make you stand up in same spot and possible counter enemy attack chain so you can have some chances to not die like an ant. Turn on aim assist. Noob or not, this will help you nail attacks and combos more often. Even pros are using it, so don't be too prideful to "not use baby tools" to get better. Always have your melee weapon equipped. If you get ambushed/ganked you need to have melee weapon ready to parry. If you'll eat combo, that precious 1s window to swap weapon will be enough for your opponent to finish you. Equip ranged only if you plan to use it right now. Main one weapon... You'll get much better with tool you know comparing to being average with every weapon. Not to mention, finding weapon you want/main is not that hard in-game. ...but know them all. Not like you need to play them frame-perfect, but you should know what is threatening to you and how to deal with them. Map counter to separate button. Clicking LMB+RMB in-fight will most likely won't make you parry but make you continue combo - this is a big no-no. If you map it to other button (like middle mouse button) you will be able to consistently parry every time you would like to. Damage output of melee without charges drops by around 25%. Ranged need charges to even shoot. Weapons of better quality have bigger damage and amount of charges. Difference between common(grey) and legendary(yellow) is around 70-80% in terms of damage for the same moves/combos. Play with bot to get better. You have infinite HP, you can set bot to use certain weapon and it can simulate normal fight. Everything you should practice intensively about combat, that in normal game happens rarely. If you think you are good enough, play Bloodbath - it is as well combat-intensive mode but with real players. Mobility Sliding is faster than running. If you go face to face with someone who is just running, you'll see that spam-sliding (press C while running) is faster than just sprinting. To make it even faster add very faint jump after slide so that recovery animation is cut. Jump will keep a little of slide momentum and will open window for next slide repeating cycle. You can probably make macro out of this, but i'm unsure whenever devs are cool with macros. Channel-cancel dodge. When you are running and initiate channel attack your character will slide forward a bit while charging attack. Cancel it with dodge (SHIFT) when it it's momentum stops to gain more distance. I believe the most distance is gained while using spear, but it is certainly viable on all melee weapons. Press crouch (C) mid-grapple to cancel it from further pulling to object/target. You can cancel mid-flight and parry if you see your opponent preparing a focus attack (blue), or drop early if you see a pesky dagger user that loves to dodge behind you. Use Scale Rush to escape grapple hooks stagger. Scale Rush (attack while holding vertical surface) is a blue-quality fast dash attack. As you know, blue attacks overcome stagger from grappling hooks which means you can use it to escape more consistently. Enemy that grapple you, will still pull to you, but you won't be staggered (unless enemy grappled you AFTER the scale rush). Dagger mill. While attacking horizontally with dagger (LMB) while you are running, you dash forward noticeably. If you weave shift after that momentum stops, you can do it a few times gaining quite a distance in very littel amount of time. A bit like mill spades going one after another (attack/dodge/attack/dodge). This will drain your stamina, so if you plan using this consider equipping stamina glyphs (they are good in any circumstance anyway). Viper Ning Jump/dodge while channeling ultimate. It makes you harder to hit, which gives you more time to actually successfully cast it. Ranged weapons can deal huge amounts of damage with your ultimate. If you capitalize on that 5s ultimate stun with crossbow or musket dealing headshots, it should be enough to kill opponent even with full yellow armor. Kurumi Your ultimate zone can be set on fire (this changed a bit in last patch, needs revision). Enemy with either ability/lantern/souljade can set your zone in fire. When someone is standing in zone, they will get normal burning debuff. You can revive your allies with F ability (umbrella). Just press F aiming at allied husk while in range of your ability and wait some time so your healing can fill red bar. Very useful in combat since you can do all parkour stuff.

Tianhai You can die in titan form. When you launch your ultimate, you gain new HP bar that is full, but if it drops to 0 - you die normally. If you end it manually (or duration ends) you'll have only same % of HP as was left in titan form. You are immune to CC while casting titan form. Although you can die while casting it if your HP bar depletes before you swap to titan HP bar. You can't grab people lying on the ground (as titan). But if timed correctly, you can tech chase with fists, grabbing people who are getting up after roll. This means spamming LMB is not that useful. You can't grab people lying on the ground (as titan). But if timed correctly, you can tech chase with fists, grabbing people who are getting up after roll. This means spamming LMB is not that useful. You can reflect ballista shots with divine bell: blast. ...and many, many more. Use RMB in titan form to grab nearby enemies. LMB launches fist that flies, grab and comes to you, but it is useless for someone dodging between your legs - use RMB in such cases, it will make giant use different animation to grab people near you. Hit titan weak point to deal with it faster. Titan has weak points chosen randomly each time Tianhan uses ultimate. They look like golden tattoos thus are easy to spot and capitalize on. Ranged All projectiles have maximum travel length, which means they will either disappear into void somewhere mid-flight or explode at max range (like ballista bolts). Most projectiles have travel arc, which means bullets/arrows/bolts will lose their straight trajectory imitating real life gravitation pull towards earth. All ranged weapons have travel time which means, projectiles they shoot take a little time before they reach destination/max distance. Misc info Your nickname can be max 14 characters long. You can reroll quest with Tae only 20 times per day. Bloodrippers is the only melee weapon that can't be used without charges. All originals characters you own can be customized. Yoto Hime can't because she is not an original character. Press F1 in-game to see info about your abilities (and equipped talents). Press F2 in-game to see info about combat, souljades and actions in NARAKA. Press F3 in-game to see info about your equipped weapon. Press J in-game to see leading person/team. Press Z in-game to see leaderboards (bloodbath). [OMNI] Rampage glyphs (more initial rage) works only 1-time after you spawn, they do not activate after every next ultimate activation. Rage is how you call your ultimate progress bar. 100% means your ultimate is ready to cast. Emblems Aggressor Deal 12,500 DMG Airborn Advance Travel 400m with grappling hook Benevolent Rescue 2 downed party memebers Big Spender Spend 20,000 Dark Tide Coins in match Captains Bloodlust Defeat 5 enemies in Shipwreck Expanse (map region) Divine Lord Defeat 5 enemies in Celestra (map region) Fickle Fortune "Effect caused by someone praying to the Statue in a Stash." Fight Fire With Fire Defeat 5 enemies in Eventide Temple (map region) First Blood Get first kill in match Gold Digger Open 20 Troves Guardian Take over 10,000 damage Healer Heal 10,000 HP Hunter Kill 5 players Kill Leader Get most kills in game Lucky Star [ranked only] "they with the strongest vital energies in this world!" (win/win after being dead/win without being dead/win after almost being dead (downed, but not dead), one of these) Lurker Spend 150s hiding in bushes Marathon Runner Run 7500m Moral Support [trio only] Enter top 5 while being dead Perfect Aim Land 5 headshots Sixth Sense Defeat enemy from over 75m away Super Weponry Defeat enemy with Ballista Sunwing's Messenger Defeat 5 enemies in Sunwing's Rest (map region) Temple Warrior Defeat 5 enemies in Shadow Jade Mine (map region) Tresure Hunter Loot items from 6 different Morus Blessing chests Weapons Master Successfully counter 3 times in 1 game. Wrath of the Gods Defeat someone using Moonbane Charm

NARAKA: BLADEPOINT - Remove Ghosting and increase performance from DLSS

8:47 AM / by admin / in NARAKA: BLADEPOINT / with No comments /

So I started this game and noticed the bad ghosting on quality mode of DLSS. I am aware of a neat upgrade lately and wanted to share it with you.

Sometime ago, Rainbow Six Siege got a DLSS 2.2 implementation. People have been using that modifed file for other games. It works with Metro for example. I replaced the file and the ghosting was eliminated.

Steps:

Download the file from https://www.techpowerup.com/download/nvidia-dlss-dll/ (NVIDIA DLSS DLL 2.2.16)
Take this file (dll file) and replace it the one in your Naraka: Bladepoint install location (Iadvise backing up the original file just in case)
Proft

Guide by Robmo

NARAKA: BLADEPOINT - Cultivation Guide

8:46 AM / by admin / in NARAKA: BLADEPOINT / with No comments /

A little help about Cultivation of character in game

Cultivation Guide

Regarding Cultivation in the game, depending on the mission that requires us to play in survival mode, there are a number of tasks we can do in Bloodbath mode.

There is a small bug in Viper Ning's Cultivation when you reach Master and want to upgrade to the next but when you follow the instructions of the mission to use Flamebringers, there is no progress, this error is written by the game developer. wrong or wrong translation, to do that mission you can enter Bloodbath map minefield or play in survival mode

As for Bloodbath mode, each time you play you will be randomly assigned a different map, so you need to exit and find the match again and again until you find that mine map.

Of course it's in Morus's blessing and you have to risk it to get it.

Guide by Fenrir

NARAKA: BLADEPOINT - Beginner's Guide

8:45 AM / by admin / in NARAKA: BLADEPOINT / with No comments /

A guide aimed at those whom have completed the tutorial but are then not sure how to begin actually playing and improving

Introduction

Naraka Bladepoint is a hack and slash battle royale game that is somewhat of a child between Sekiro and Fortnite. In this game you will be transported to an island with 60 other combatants where you will have to loot up, prepare for battle and avoid the enclosing shadow to survive. This guide will assume you have completed the basic and advanced tutorials.

Movement

The most important thing you will want to learn in this game is movement. You can run by holding the dodge button either from standing or coming out of a dodge. You can use the dodge to cancel many things such as charging your regular attacks into a blue focus attack. As these are the only attacks that can be parried it is a good option to use them as bait to open your opponent for free attacks.

Whilst running you can slide which will allow you to dodge under horizontal attacks but you can cancel this early with a quick jump. This will allow you to resume running but also allow you to move faster than running if you chain these in rapid succession. This slide step will be the first thing you want to master.

Once you have a weapon you can perform a focus attack on lmb or rmb from running but then dodge out of this, if holding the dodge you will resume running. Chaining these together will allow you to move faster than the slide cancel. This weapon slide cancel will be the second thing you want to master. Once you have both movement techs down you will want to combine these together to move around the battlefield as fast as possible.

With both movement techs combined you will then be able to add grappling hooks. You can attack at the end of a grapple to keep your momentum to go further than your target, jump to initiate a second grapple or crouch to land early. You can even cancel aerial attacks with crouch to further chain attacks and not overshoot your opponent.

With the previous three movement methods down the last thing you will want to learn is how to rapidly climb and launch from surfaces. Whilst travelling up you can perform a quick LMB to climb in rapid succession or hold the attack to launch yourself in the direction you are facing.

Attacks

There are three types of attacks in Naraka bladepoint. Regular attacks and focus attacks are the two that I will talk about here. There are also gold attacks which work like focus attacks however these cannot be parried.

Regular attacks are your normal lmb or rmb attacks that you will use to attack your opponent. They will clash with other regular attacks and cannot be parried. Focus attacks are blue aura attacks which will normally knock your opponent down and can be parried. These occur as either the 3rd attack in the standard chain (second on greatsword) or when you hold lmb or rmb. You will mostly only want to use a focus attack to clash with another focus attack, to attack through a normal attack or to catch your opponent as they come out of a dodge. You never want to use a focus attack unless your opponent is in an action where they cannot parry.

Parrying is when you press lmb and rmb together. This can be chained much faster than the instant parry option so we will prefer to use this. Most bad players will always go for the standard 3 hit chains so their third hit will be a free parry and a great opportunity for you to disarm then possibly kill your opponent.

Whilst attacking you will want to focus mainly to normal light attacks. You can jump or crouch after your 2nd (1st on greatsword) hits to extend these attack chains to make your own combos. You also get special lmb and rmb attacks from crouch and jump to add further to your combos. Adding in grapples or certain abilities can allow you to further extend these chains. Each weapon has a unique set of high damage custom combos that can be used but this is not within the scope of this guide.

Guide by Revan619

NARAKA: BLADEPOINT - Viper Ning Costume

8:44 AM / by admin / in NARAKA: BLADEPOINT / with No comments /

Viper Ning By Jade Viper Ning Costum Red Dark Blue Pink Black White Ghost View Nature doesn't look like me :D

NARAKA: BLADEPOINT - Luck Talents Guide

8:41 AM / by admin / in NARAKA: BLADEPOINT / with No comments /

I use a lot of luck talents, so I decided to test it out. Here are the results.

Methodology

Basically, I went around with my 1500 luck (max is 1800) and tallied how many troves of each type I opened, and how many epics/legendaries I got from it. Then I repeated that, but without any luck talents. Finally, I took it, made a spreadsheet and applied some statistics.

Results

I continued collecting results until I got a 95% confidence interval of about 5%. That means the number I have should be within 5 percent of the actual drop rate. If I took a 100 of the same size samples, then 95 of those would be within that five percent. I spent more time however on the sample with luck, as you will soon see.

From an Orange Trove, with 1500 luck,

Chance to get an epic or better item: ~50%.
Chance to get a legendary item: ~12%.

From an Green Trove, with 1500 luck,

Chance to get an epic or better item: ~50%.
Chance to get a legendary item: ~50%.

From an Blue Trove, with 1500 luck,

Chance to get an epic or better item: ~15%.
Chance to get a legendary item: ~1%.

In total, I opened about 500 troves with 1500 luck.

Within twenty orange troves with 0 luck, I began to have a lot of doubts. Out of those 20 troves, I got 55% epic, and 30% legendary. That's a combined epic or better chance of 85%. Now obviously, I decided to apply some statistics. If the real chance of getting an epic or higher level item was 55% (max with confidence interval), then the chance of getting an 85% drop rate (or higher) with a sample of twenty would be <1%.

That being the case, I ended the experiment there. For orange troves, adding luck does not make you luckier.

HOWEVER:

It appears that adding luck more accurately moves luck. Although I haven't collected enough data to be able to fully confirm this, and I'm not planning on doing so, it appears that when you have more luck blue troves are significantly more likely to drop epic quality gear. Again though, I don't have a big enough sample to confirm this. If true, adding luck would be a decently good play style for those who choose not to spawn in high resource areas as it considerably increases the odds of you being well geared early on. And while I wasn't tracking it, it also appears to increase the chances of rare items appearing.

Conclusion

Adding luck likely increases chance of getting good gear (rare/epic) from lower end troves, at the cost of your chances of getting high end gear (epic/legendary) from high end troves (orange/green).

Guide by Aezora