This video is really good but where is the full executioner & ecr builds?

finaly a youtuber that explains the oc playstyles in depth

A note for explosive chemical rounds: Ordinarily, getting 3 locks on a target means a guaranteed explosion on fire, as the game will retroactively refund ammo and cause an explosion if bullets kill the target early. This behavior is consistent across client and host, but there is an exception: Taking super blowthrough rounds on ECR will result in *very* inconsistent behavior, as the delay between clients and hosts will result in small targets not triggering explosions on clients, but potentially triggering multiple explosions as host. In general, I'd recommend taking electrochemical rounds with explosive chemical rounds, to avoid the inconsistencies and to just take the extra damage from electrocution.

smart gun + executioner = nice single target damage. with this you need breach cutter to clear the horde. smart gun + ERC = nice horde control with this you need rocket launcher + Propellant to kill the boss.

You most probably have single handedly raised the awareness and even popularity of the LOK1. I myself have started using executioner too, it takes some time to not use primary for horde clearing nearly at all. But I’m getting there. Rock and stone brother.

You make an incredibly compelling argument for your executioner build. Engineer is my least favorite class, but your build finally encouraged me to try it again, and I find it really enjoyable.

A few things I noticed: Electro-Chemical Rounds appears to work like some other elemental damage increases, and the 20% additional damage is converted to electric damage. The Lok-1 with ECR deals (16/1.2) = 13.3 damage to normal enemies on H5. The first shot on a tri-jaw deals 40 damage while the second hit (After applying electricution) deals 52 damage. 40 damage is consistent with 13.3x3 for the tri-jaw weakpoint. However, (13.3x1.2)3 is 47.88, which isn't consistent with 52 damage. However, if we consider the 20% additional damage as electric damage and factor in the tri-jaw's 50% weakness to electricity we get (13.3+((13.3x.2).5))3 which equals 51.97, consistent with 52 after rounding. All that is to say that it appears the bonus damage from Electro-Chemical Rounds is treated as bonus electricity damage and therefore better against targets weak to electricity and worse against targets resistant to electricity. More importantly, and much to my chagrin, it appears that when using ECR, you actually lose the damage caused by the exploding bullet. In essence, if you shoot 3 rounds from the Lok-1, you will deal the damage of two bullets and one explosion (As opposed to three bullets and an explosion, which is what I thought it was). This makes the gun SIGNIFICANTLY weaker at taking out single targets. With a perfect 3 locks to a normal enemy with no resistances or weakpoints on H5, you will deal 13.3+13.3+41.6 = 68.2 damage. A STOCK Lok-1 will deal 17.5 damage 3 times, equaling 52.5 damage. To make matters worse, every additional lock brings you closer and closer to the stock gun, as you only get the damage boost of one explosion. The specific break point is 7 locks. If you shoot a single target with ECR and lock on 7 times, you are dealing LESS damage than a STOCK Lok-1 with no overclocks or upgrades. Another note, the Oppressor is not only immune to electricity, it is also resistance to electric damage (25%), fire damage (66%), and explosive damage (66%), so even if you could electrocute it, or you managed to set it on fire, it is perhaps one of the worst enemies in the entire game to test (or use) ECR on, as a STOCK Lok-1 will actually only deal 2 points less damage than a 3 round ECR burst against them. Additionally, you'd think that ECR would be good against Rival Tech enemies, given their weakness to explosions and electricity. However, since most Rival Tech enemies have a 3x or greater weak point bonus, and the Caretaker's 45% RESISTANCE to explosions for some reason, you're probably better off with Executioner even on Sabotage missions. With these factors in mind, I think it's pretty clear that you should not be using an ECR Lok-1 on single targets in the same way as you would with the Executioner Lok-1, and should really focus on getting at least 2 targets in the blast area if possible. Given the fact that ECR leans heavily towards AoE damage, and the fact that Electric Generator Mod is single target electrocution, I think that these have less synergy than previously assumed. My assumption was that with ECR, Electro-Chemical Rounds, and Electric Generator Mod, you could come close to Executioner's Single target damage while still having a bit of AoE, but that doesn't actually seem to be the case, especially when you factor in resistances/immunities to electricity and explosions, and the fact that the Lok-1 is exceptionally good at hitting most weak points while ECR doesn't gain anything from weakpoints, and even enemies that have high explosion weakness generally have higher or the same weak point bonuses. Perhaps a better use case would be utilizing an incendiary RJ250 PGL as a secondary to light a group of grunts on fire, gaining the 20% bonus as well as firing into a pack of enemies, however the PGL has a fear factor which will cause some of them to spread out, in addition to them dying to the fire DoT regardless. An Inferno or HVC Breach Cutter will spread the status to a group of enemies, but it will also likely one shot them in the process. So my final thoughts are that ECR is probably good in only two use cases. 1) You want a full AoE horde clearing build (ECR/Breach Cutter), specializing in taking out groups of enemies and relying on a teammate specialized in single target damage (Scout?) to take out the big bads. 2) You want to use Hyper Propellant, perhaps on Elimination missions in particular, but don't want to totally lose the ability to deal with a group of enemies. Yes, both of those situations are basically things you already covered in the video, but I think it's probably safe to take a harder stance on them given the factors I listed above.

Got into drg a month or so ago and these are by far the best vids I’ve found. Very well done mate

Probably the best drg video ive seen. Thank you so much. You have great pacing, information, visual aid, and insight

Fantastic analysis man. Really helps the end game community. Thanks for all your hard work!

Wow just what i needed is at the very beginning of the video. Idk how nobody else did a decent comparison of armor break and seeker rounds. Subscribed.

Love the detail you go into with your vids man. Keep it up.

I actually appreciate Seeker Rounds slower rate of fire, since my biggest issue with the Lok-1 is ammo management. I only use it on full teams, but it's functionality against all targets is a real boon.

Really glad to see this! My only criticism is that comparing explosive and executioner feel a bit like apples and oranges; I'll personally make a build for both and choose on a per mission basis

IDK if you already know this or not, but the issue with Seeker Rounds vs Armor Break is this: Seeker rounds don't actually travel to their targets. It shows the bullet path, but for all intents and purposes, the bullets LITERALLY just teleport to the center of the target when they're fired. This is what lets them bypass terrain, armor, and even any other Dwarfs who might be in the way (so it's actually impossible to do friendly fire when firing bursts with Seeker Rounds). As such, Seeker Rounds always bypass armor, but can't do weakpoint damage. This means you can fire directly into the face of guards, praetorians, and oppressors, and get decent, but not great damage, which can be helpful if you don't like lining up bullet arc to go around armor to hit the weakpoint. Armor Break rounds still actually travel normally, which means they can hit weakpoints. So once they break armor, if you arc the bullets properly, they'll hit weakpoints and get the bonus damage multiplier from doing so. Seeker Rounds require more bullets because they're only doing the standard damage (as in, what the damage would be if they hit a normal part of the body without armor protecting it), whereas some of the bullets you fire with armor break will hit either the head or another weakpoint depending on how you arc them, doing full damage once said armor it shattered. To sum it up, you'll get a lot less outright damage on seeker rounds, but they require less skill to use optimally, and your damage will always be consistent. Armor break, and any other overclock in general, will reward you much more for planning the path of your bullets, but any shots that don't hit a weakpoint will be doing less-than optimal damage. So despite having literal aimbot, you're still rewarded for having better FPS skill when using any non-Seeker OCs on the LOK1.

One thing with the chemical rounds is that you ALWAYS want exactly three locks on a target not more not less. You can actually kill grunts with just three locks because the explosion is enough to kill them. But if you apply four five six or more locks onto a grunt you will shoot all of them or as many as it takes to kill the grunt wasting ammo since you only needed three shots and delaying your explosion

I tried the smart rifle every time I got an overclock, executioner was the last one I got and the only one I deemed usable enough over the base shotgun to actually include in a build slot. When it comes to hordes, I much prefer the grenade launcher with flame rounds and as much AoE range as it can stack, as it can easily clear a horde in one shot thanks to that extra fire damage. Still generally prefer just the shotgun, but its nice to switch it up every now and then and not feel like a wet noodle

This isn't exactly a super effective tactic but I think its really fun to use neuro-lasso to hold bugs in aoe's from either nukes or teammates. also thank you for making a video so densely packed with helpful info.

hey, great analytic video! just want to add that blowthrough rounds loses A LOT of value when paired with seeker rounds. with any other overclock, blowthrough rounds will hit every target in the bullet curve before AND after the target. but with seeker rounds, anything before the target is 100% ignored and won't take damage. not very worth imo.

As someone who loves the ECR: Yes, sometimes it is a total b...ch to get good AOE shots out but if You do the damage against hordes is ridiculous. I learned that positioning and good aiming is absolute key to use it right. You should never aim directly at the center of the horde but at the borders. So You get less targets and thus higher chances of getting 3 locks on a few of them. The explosions are big enough to wipe good chunks of the horde anyways, so You don't need to aim at the center. Also You can use it up close without hesitation because for some reason the ECR explosions don't damage You, so You get similar effects as the volatile guts modificator, but not the problem of accidentally killing Yourself. I supplement it with a Shard Diffractor for single target damage and did the "how long can you survive on diff5 with it" test. I got to 26 minutes and only lost because i used up all Nitra on the map.

i'd put executioner into hybrid to be honest, the super blowthrough rounds turn it into a horde clearing machine

I love your videos! They tickle my little information sponge brain

Very nice ;) love how Bosco is just flying around with an error cube while you fight the arbalest 😂

So I have a few thoughts on Neuro-lasso: first, I'm going to say that I certainly don't think it's better than Executioner or ECR. but, if you want to have fun, I have found that I can still pull my own weight with it, but you need to make sure to combo it differently than you normally would. Firstly, you used the Macro Lens upgrade, but I actually recommend the CCD add-on instead. I also combo it with Fat Boy, and try to get bugs that didn't die to the initial blast to stay inside the radiation as long as possible. Additionally, I take prox mines and slow things down near them so the mines can get more hits on stronger bugs. I've also taken bug repellant on platforms so help with funneling. like I said, it's certainly not the best overclock, and I don't use it often, but I can't bring myself to say that it is bad. It also works better in a team setting. It's not the best build, but it's still fun to use. And anybody who says you must use the best build isn't worth playing with anyways. I can guarantee that you can still pull your weight with it.

ECR was my first overclock on that gun and I wasn't sure how it stacked up but I kinda love it. Rock and Stone!

ECR + breach cutter got me through a 40min haz5 solo point extraction. Works fine :)

Your videos are fantastic

ECR plus hyper was where I settled on introduction.The ECR takes care of hordes and slows the big guys for the hyper.

Good explanation

1:12 I thought seeker rounds completely ignored armor, the reduced damage looks like a bug.

Piercing Executioner, exactly what I'm using. It's so good.

Thanks much for this analysis, I mentioned this on your EDD video a few days ago, but I am a diehard fan of seeker rounds due to my prioritization over action economy over ammo economy due to my tendencies to solo for most of my gameplay, which, oddly enough, your tests with oppressor are pretty much exactly why I run seeker, because whenever I try to run ECR or executioner, my runs are a lot least likely to succeed since I do most of my tests on 2 stop haz 5 escort(and I'm sure you've seen the funny moments of oppressors pointing a 90 degree angle upwards while they attack doretta, making all normal attacks basically impossible). I'm still trying to work around the weaknesses of seeker, as you've clearly outlined that it simply doesn't address threats in a timely manner, so those tests on my end are still pending, rock and stone.

Nice analisys magic engineer, your playstyle cool, but I am trying your build, I still love my KABOOM overclock and hyper propelant, but play what you want and have fun, this is the point of the games!

ECR + Breach Cutter got me through a solo Elite Deep Dive, with one of the missions being an escort duty with lethal enemies warning. So I know ECR is amazing, and for me personally it's the best overclock in the whole game. ECR + Hyper Propellant works wonders too. Also, I have to say, ECR is not meant to be used as a horde killer by itself, at least not always. It shines the most when dealing with already softened up enemies, so you use less ammo. You can use proximity mines/plasma burster and turrets (and your teammates firepower) to prepare you enemies. So it's a really rare occasion when you have to use only ECR to kill the horde. P.S.: killing a whole bunch of swarmers or nedocytes in only ONE shot is the best feeling. Mb after using a Fat Boy against a 30+ bugs horde.

Interesting take but I think seeker rounds are wayy underrated. They are brilliant for all kinds of bossfights since you dont actually need to be positioned in front of the dreadnaughts weak spot. The dps overall is noticably lower but it makes the gun more ammo efficient( 2 shots for web spitter, 6 for acid spitter) my build is 13212

The rate of fire decreases on seeker rounds honestly feels like a help more than a hindrance. I lose less overall ammo and can more precisely manage my resources. Find myself running out of ammo mid fight very rarely with the seeker round setup.

It's like listening to a cross between David Attenborough's documentaries and Gordon Ramsey's calm but still passionate cooking videos

great video, commenting to fuel the Algorithm. I cant wait to see your next video. I would agree that Loki need a rebalance because the weapon overcloaks and mods are really stale. Especially when you compare it to the Drak there are so many different playstyles for that one weapon alone.

I dont use High voltage crossover on breech cutter. If you want a status affect breech cutter use inferno. Inferno has less beam dps but it caches everything on fire. While electricity does stun fire offers better overall dps against hoards. High voltage crossover also reduces mag count by one which can be kinda frustrating at times. This is coming from a level 203 that has all classes at least silver 2.

I have yet to unlock it but I could see the 250 Compound Overclock for the Grenade Launcher work very well with the Executioner Lok-1. The 250 Compound OC gives the launcher x1.7 ammo and by spec-ing into aoe and the incediary explosives you can get a high-ammo AOE weapon to use against groups of enemies. The added utility of being able to rocket jump would also be really fun and could get you out of bad situations. The Executioner Lok-1 makes short work of all the larger targets. You basically trade the insanity of the Breach Cutter against greatly enhanced mobility and ammo economy. You could even use the rocket-jumps to reposition yourself to hit weak-spots more easily.

If you’re going to compare ECR to the breach cutter, then you should at least be fair and compare Executioner to Hyper propellant.

Regarding Executioner vs. ECR: As someone who uses both builds, I'd say that both of them are extremely strong, *assuming you take compatible secondaries* Both builds are equally viable with breach cutter, with executioner being slightly better due to breach cutter always providing at least some aoe If you lean more toward the weapon specialization that Loki can provide, however, you can instead take hyperpropellant and any of the standard aoe secondaries. Doing so will make you somewhat more vulnerable when using Loki, as executioner and ECR cannot completely fill their niches, requiring the use of turrets and grenades to help cover/distract during swarms. For the horde clear test, I feel as though it's imperfect, as while breach cutter is exceptional for clumped hordes and executioner for cleanup, ECR was not used very well, as densely packed groups are best cleared with a plasma burster, followed by ECR on the lowest health grouped enemies, followed by turrets for cleanup, as ECR is best used for already weakened enemies, not just for entire groups from start to finish. (ammo-efficiency calculations are strange for loki because the solution to a sub-optimal situation is to swap to a different weapon, unlike the more generalist wathog and stubby) As for the idea that ECR could fill all niches, it would be slow, if useable for larger targets, assuming a secondary was used to soften them up. While I certainly use ECR on larger targets at least once per mission, I usually see it as ECR covering for my single-target secondary in a sub-optimal role, as hyperpropellant doesn't always have the ammo necessary in praetorian-heavy missions. TL;DR take ECR for swarm cleanup/all-purpose ammo, with turrets for scattered enemies, grenades for heavy swarms, and a single-target secondary for large enemies alternatively, take executioner for large enemies/cleanup, turrets for all-purpose damage, grenades for CC, and an aoe secondary for heavy swarms

i use the hell out of ecr and hyper propellant, hype just absolutely deletes menaces, spitballs in one crit shot and ecr i find is just really ammo efficient for dealing with hordes, since i use it so much i almost never fire more than 3 shots unless its against an enemy i know needs a few more to kill, i often outfrag drillers and gunners on my team on high hazards like 5 or dds/edds i run through all my ammo like nobody's business but thats just because i killed everything before they could get a chance, the whole not really having to aim thing is nice but to use the gun properly you still have to have good crosshair placement to prioritise getting 3 locks on targets, you feel like an absolute freight train wrecking any horde that dares come near you with a double turret setup, proxy mines and ecr, 1 weakness is dread missions though, the lok without seeker on dread missions is one of the most god awful weapons ive ever tried to use lol, you try to save ammo during hiveguards shield phase lol.

Neuro lasso does seem like it has potential to make things interesting but the devs don't want it to go in the direction I am thinking. As I would suggest that all targets that get locked on get a slowing effect, it lingers on the target for a bit after you shoot, and that your normal tap fire shots actually deal more damage on slowed targets. This effect also pairs up with slowed effects from the Driller and the scout. This would actually change the game plan on how you use the Smart rifle as you apply the slowed down buff on targets, and than use the tap fire mode to deal more damage on a target. It makes using tap fire viable, and also gives the way to play be unique as you lock on, fire, and than start to tap fire as fast as you can.

nice data :)

Wish you'd shown ECR/Executioner vs. Hordes without breach cutter also. In my experience executioner is great even against hordes the auto-lock naturally targets center mass which is the head on grunts and the like. Even thou Engi has amazing AoE with breach cutter/plasma grenades the executioner is no slouch when dealing with charging grunts or a swarm of mactera. By far the Lok's best OC in my opinion.

Hello, my friend. We're still waiting for lok-1 rebalance)) Maybe, there will be some interesting rework in season 2... Rock and stone, miner!

I love Neuro Lasso. 18 locks on the Dreathnout and I'm MVP without firing a shot. Doing nothing other than slowmo them

Amazing video, quick question though I'm still relatively new to RocknStone but I've seen a lot of yt videos always debating weapon choices for horde clearing, but I never hear them talk about the horde clearing abilities between beast tamer,Gemini,and SSG allowing you to conserve ammo for the big guys and elites, even in the few deep dives I've done it's worked out very well for me. So is it that eventually in deep dives engi utility falls off or is engi util possibly being overlooked?

In my experience, the seeker rounds oc does not work properly with blowthru rounds, any targets on the red line would be missed where normally the piercing would go thru them and do damage...

When you're comparing ECR and Executionner : "If you're taking the breach cutter with ECR, you are giving up on the hybrid playstyle and commiting fully to the crowd clearing build" I think that's not true, the breach cutter is already an amazing hybrid weapon, which is why it's so popular.

As far as i have been able to tell ecr has a bug where if you aren't the host the explosion wont always goes off. It seems like it makes it so if the shot kills it doesn't explode.

I like seeker rounds in elemination missions, combined with hyperpropellant. You're not great vs hordes and gotta be a bit careful with those, but dreadnaughts die laughable easy, sicne you can always hit them and when you get into their back you can use the massive hyperpropellant damage.

Everything that kills me is a massive swarm where ECR would be better, if I had ECR to use.

Tbh I find the breach cutter more effective at dealing with big enemies. Might as well run ECR and breach cutter

The only issue I have with Executioner is the low amount of ammo it gets.

The problem is that you assume that one will take hyperprop with ECR, but in reality you always bring plasma cutter with loki no matter the overclock it has, because Smart Rifle is a slow long/middle distance weapon which sucks at close range regardless of the build and the only good secondary at close range IS plasma cutter.

Explosive Chemical rounds works better if you use Aperture Extension as the mod and take the Breach Cutter to deal with bigger targets

Kinda unfair to do math on the opressor, he has explosion resistance, do it on preatorians (no resistances)

Would you consider doing a breach cutter overclock analysis? I know you like the lightning damage overclock but I'm curious about your thoughts on some of the other ones

Personally I'm looking for a Lok1 build to use with a RJ250 I just love Rocket Jumping around and the Lok1 is so satisfying that I want to put them together, but I don't know what would be best OC and mods for the Lok1. I guess it needs to be a jack of all trades to make up for my secondary being essentially a movement tool (it can still deal with small groups and light things on fire) Do u have any suggestions? Also great video

Honestly this comparison is fantastic other than the fact that you bring secondaries into the argument. The reason you should be comparing the overclocks is to see how the OCs themselves perform, not with the help of secondaries.

ECR is for me clear winner, 3 ammo for pack of swarmers, or clumped up enemies when picking up ur fellow rock and stoners is just tooo good. Though yeah i should use exec because Iam RJ enthusiast

Honestly it was kinda weird hearing that some people really consider explosive rounds ammo efficient. I've been using seeker rounds for a while now and got my hands on ECR and really felt how my ammo efficiency dropped. Yeah, partly you can just attribute it to the slower fire rate of seeker, but I feel like ECR explosions hardly do anything to a tankier targets, so you lose out a lot of ammo on pretorians and opressors compared to seeker where you just shred them through the armor. Overall ECR is really fun, but definitely a struggling weapon for an all-rounder, I'd say it's almost exclusively a horde clearer with ECR.

Great video, but think I disagree with your ECR vs. Executioner results when it comes to hordes. I feel you should have exclusively used the LOK-1 rifle instead of allowing the breach cutter to assist the Executioner build. Or at the very least you should have allowed the ECR build the same courtesy with hyper propellant on the oppressor test. It feels a little biased to afford one build it’s crutch secondary but not the other.

The problem with many of these OCs just examplifies my problem with the whole gun. Unless youre using exe or ecr the gun just feels so lacking because of how quickly all other builds chew through ammo, especially compared to stubby and warthog which feel ammo efficient regardless of how you build them

i would like to actually be able to eat a sandwich during a mining expedition to recover a little bit of health, that might be lessened if i had any more ammo upgrades

Did you ever get around to writing your ideas of rebalancing the overclocks?

Hello, would you prefer seeker over no overclock?

But breach cutter is just better than hyper prop and it's really just on fun value that people take hyper prop so if u wanted to get the best engi build with ecr u would still go breach cutter

Have you tried any LOK builds on modded difficulties?

How do you get those visible damage numbers?

Even after watching this, reading this and that, I still find the Lok1 to be the worst weapon in DRG and no matter the overclock or modification loadouts it just don'st work. Too little ammo, too little damage and a very long delay time till damage is applied just makes the gun almost less valuable then the pickaxe against a elite bulk detonator. At this point I think I'm just gona give up on trying to make the lok1 worth using since I can't get it to last more then 1 haz 2 wave without a resupply or handle a haz 3 dreadnaught.

I dont see the argument for any Engi primary "AOE" builds aside from just wanting to play differently for fun... You have arguably the best AOE in the entire game as your secondary, some of the best AOE nades AND turrets for crowd control... its to the point that i even sometimes run RJ250 + executioner and i dont run into any real issues with crowd control, so arguing that ECR would somehow be better is just wrong quite frankly.

ECR is best

Executioner is overhyped, small clip, even less ammo, only improved damage when you hit a weakpoint. Bullets can hit terrain easily as you desperately try to get your weakpoint otherwise the overclock is only a detriment. Just put a target on fire and destroy em with 13111 seeker, the bullets always hit, you can use insane arcs in the lock (through terrain), nice big clip for sustained fire.