This being a particularly lazy and prone-to-videogaming weekend, I decided to take a break from Guild Wars 2 and give Borderlands 2 another spin. Yes, I am always 2-5 years behind in videogames. Dusted off the ol' level 7 Gunzerker, now level 9 and in Sanctuary.

Holy shit, this game is fun. Love the writing.

Also, being a child of the Doom generation, there really is something about FPS games that gets me every time.

I like the Gunzerker well enough but I wonder if I should reroll since I'm really, really inclined towards sniping, and mostly use the skill as an "oh shit" button when I'm swarmed by attackers. I wonder whether I should reroll Commando, Assassin or maybe even Psycho.

Who's playing and who's played it? What do y'all think?

I lurves me some Borderlands 2, that's just pure fun.  Be sure to pick up the expansion pack (GOTY edition, I think) that has Tiny Tina's adventure (it's huge, and cool, and you get a shotgun that shoots exploding swords).

The gunzerker is my least favorite character.

As luck would have it, the assassin character is the last "standard" character I played. He's loads of fun, but he has an important weakness in his skill tree--no built in healing. That means I needed to always carry transfusion grenades.

For a first go through, I did commando. I found the turret far more useful than gunzerking, or going invisible (which doesn't do a darn bit of good, really, since the melee attacks are all area of effect it seems).

I still never have played all the way through as Siren.

Anyway, all the classes can use a sniper rifle quite effectively, and sniping is lots of fun...you just don't have to be a sniper to snipe. It's not Pathfinder!

Got the GOTY, looking forward to Assault on Dragon Keep.

I read somewhere that pistols are the best choice for Gunzerking and maybe that's why I'm underwhelmed by the skill; I'm just Doing It Wrong. I'll try assault rifle + SMG in the future (two automatic weapons, distinct ammo caches).

Though I admit that both the Assassin's invisibility and especially the Commando's turret look like a better "oh shit" button; at very least it should draw aggro and pop some damage of its own. If invisibility is as useless as you say, I may be better off with the Commando anyway. I mostly considered Assassin for the sniping talents.

Quote from: The Butcher;780597Got the GOTY, looking forward to Assault on Dragon Keep.

I read somewhere that pistols are the best choice for Gunzerking and maybe that's why I'm underwhelmed by the skill; I'm just Doing It Wrong. I'll try assault rifle + SMG in the future (two automatic weapons, distinct ammo caches).

Though I admit that both the Assassin's invisibility and especially the Commando's turret look like a better "oh shit" button; at very least it should draw aggro and pop some damage of its own. If invisibility is as useless as you say, I may be better off with the Commando anyway. I mostly considered Assassin for the sniping talents.

Man, I never found a pistol I liked, and I really tried (except for a special melee pistol with a special shield). Assault weapons occasionally turned me on (and I gunzerked with dual assaults when I could, 'cuz reloading is for suckers).

I generally favored shotguns (so many fun options there), sniper rifles, and rocket launchers, with Moxxi's acid machine gun usually occupying the slot left over.

You'll find elemental weapons are always the way to go. The only non-elemental weapons I used more than for gigglers with high end sniper rifles.

Handsome Jack is probably one of the best villains of all time.  My favorite character to play is Gaige

It's the one game on the 360 I keep coming back to. The main game is fun, stylish, well written, and pretty challenging. The Shoot-and-Loot RPG model brings me back to when I played way too much Diablo 2 in the best way possible. My few thoughts:

- Good choice on the GOTY! The expansions were all pretty good, though Assault on Dragon Keep was the best, mainly because of Tiny Tina.
- Character-wise, I'm partial to the Siren and the Psycho. I just found their skill trees and play style the most interesting.
- Have a Hyperion gun when Fighting for Your Life. In those situations it's nice to have a gun that becomes more accurate the more you shoot it.

Quote from: Doom;780602You'll find elemental weapons are always the way to go. The only non-elemental weapons I used more than for gigglers with high end sniper rifles.

I agree. For the second half of the game, a good acid weapon is practically a requirement, and fire is almost always handy. Also, once I got the hang of the iron sight, I fell in love with the Buffalo sniper rifle (When it comes to rifles, I'm a loyal Jakobs customer)!

Quote from: JamesV;780609I agree. For the second half of the game, a good acid weapon is practically a requirement, and fire is almost always handy. Also, once I got the hang of the iron sight, I fell in love with the Buffalo sniper rifle (When it comes to rifles, I'm a loyal Jakobs customer)!

Yeah, that buffalo rifle is awesome in the hands of the assassin, since he has an "increase the clip" abiliity. If you don't have that, a single shot weapon with slow reload isn't so good.

That's why Moxxi's SMG is so critical, acid damage exactly when you're going up against a bunch of robots. I find a fire-breathing shotgun is also well worth it, since most melee'rs are fleshy. Sometimes a rocket shotgun works out well, 'cuz that damage is soooooo high.

Borderlands 1 and 2 are good fun for coop multiplayer games. Singleplayer I find them a bit boring, too much grinding. But together with Left4Dead 1 and 2 the best coop games out there.

One of the nice things about BL2 is that, compared to BL1, the classes are much less locked into specific weapons.

That said, Gunzerker/Sniper Rifle is probably one of the bigger mismatches

Quote from: robiswrong;780787One of the nice things about BL2 is that, compared to BL1, the classes are much less locked into specific weapons.

That said, Gunzerker/Sniper Rifle is probably one of the bigger mismatches

It's also a much harder game. Borderland 2 you really have to play as a shooter with a lot of sniping and ducking for cover. Borderlands 1 you could rush right into the heat without getting into trouble.

Trying the Assassin now, mostly for the sniping support, but Deception really plays nothing like what I expected. I expected a bog-standard stealth or invisibility-type skill, and what I got is equal parts stealth and berserk rage. I'm also unexpectedly fond of the way it's short-lived but recharges very quickly.

Deception does look a lot more fun than Gunzerking. But then again I have yet to really try Gunzerking with full auto (I've mostly used pistols so far).

Also, the Assassin looks like a total glass canon. Either you chop up everyone while stealthed, or you've got yourself into a fine mess.

It is kind of a bummer that you have to hit level 5 to find out how the character's special skill plays. Being a lazy bum when it comes to videogames, I wish I could try out the other classes without having to level them.

You could just download a trainer. Those five levels won't teach you anything interesting about the character or new about the gameplay, they're just a grindy timesink, so you're not missing anything by skipping them.

I agree with Sacrosanct, Gaige is the shit. I thought BL2's actual shooting and questing was more fun than BL1, it actually has more than one area now so that's nice, but there's still too much talking between the applied violent sciences portions of the game. Handsome Jack is also pretty entertaining, although some bits of the writing are still a bit forced. Overall though, I liked it, I'll probably pick up the pre-sequel.

Gaige is fun, but is kinda easy mode.

They all look fun, though to be honest Maya's Phaselock strikes me as underwhelming on paper. If I ever get the wife on board, I'll sell her on Gaige.

Is Krieg the Psycho any fun? I sure as hell love listening to the NPC Psychos and their often nonsensical threats.