Strategy:Combat shotgun

(v0.9.9.4) Ah, the combat shotgun, one of the most well-rounded and easy-to-use weapons in a Doomguy's arsenal. The combat shotgun's special feature is that it will automatically pump a shell into the chamber when you move, up to a maximum of five times. You can also pump manually by pressing r, allowing you to stand and deliver. (Prefereably behind a corner.) As a result, it can be used effectively by any build whatsoever--no traits or modifications required.

Like all shotguns, the combat shotgun deals shrapnel damage within a cone of fire, making it great for groups of early to mid-game enemies. All enemies within the cone will be damaged, and accuracy does not apply, so fire away. Since accuracy doesn't matter, you can also fire in running mode with no penalty, significantly increasing your odds of dodging enemy attacks. (With certain builds, this can bring you close to the 95% dodge cap.) With a little bit of corner shooting, it can even take down Hell Knights easily.

Though it's always effective, this gun goes best with active defense builds, particularly Dodgemaster. Dodgemaster + combat shotty will allow you to constantly stay on the move, dodging incoming projectiles and easily dispatching targets of opportunity. (Of course, if you combine Dodgemaster with Shottyman you get Fireangel, which is even more fun.)

The most specialized use of the gun is "radar shooting". This takes advantage of the fact that the gun's range actually extends beyond your vision. Since accuracy doesn't apply, you can use it as a sort of radar by firing down hallways, around corners, and into gaping rooms. Anything within range, up to 15 squares, is guaranteed to be hit. Listen to their pain sounds to determine what you're facing. You can accumalate piles of dead zombies in this way.

The main disadvantage of the combat shotgun is that eventually, like all guns, you do have to reload. Five shots goes pretty quick, leaving you standing out in the open as you attempt to load more shells in. It's also very easy to walk into a room with only 1 or 0 shells left, which is both embarassing and dangerous. Nonetheless, with proper atttention this can be overcome.

Since v0.9.9.4, the combat shotgun has been moved to dlevel 6, significantly affecting how the early game plays out. Though it does have one less die than the regular Shotgun (7d3 v. 8d3), its dropoff is 2% less, which basically means that it's more powerful. (The regular Shotgun deals only 2 more damage at point-blank; the combat deals 3 more at LOS limit.) Its cone of fire is also one square tighter. At any rate, almost every build will want to swap out for the combat shotgun when it appears. (The only serious reason to hold onto a regular shotgun is for MAD builds to assemble an elephant gun.)

The main assembly to be created is the tactical shotgun. This does away with pumping completely and reloads its whole clip (including an extra sixth shell) at once. Certain builds may find this to be wonderful (hello, Shottyhead!), but it's not always an improvement. One of the advantages of the combat shotgun is that it forces you to keep moving, whereas with the tactical shotgun, you can be lulled into inactivity, wasting boatloads of shells as you fire at enemies on the edge of your vision. Be forewarned.

As you move towards the late game, the combat shotgun begins to suffer. Like all shotguns, it deals shrapnel damage, doubling an enemy's armor defense. (For example, a Baron with Red Armor will shrug off 12 dmg per hit. Bummer.) You'll also need to keep your distance from late game enemies, and combination of dropoff + x2 armor will leave you wondering where your great gun went to. You could try to salavage it by assembling some plasmatic shrapnel (be sure to use the Nano mod first!!), but if you have a nano mod, there's probably other things you could use it for. Nonetheless, until the mid-game comes to an end, every build will want a combat shotgun and probably at least two stacks of shells. It's the best weapon for radar shooting and quite useful while you wait to finish your rapid-fire build. Shotgun builds will obviously make full use of it. GrimmC 19:28, 25 November 2011 (CEST)

(v0.9.9.4) Found from level 6 and lower (although if you're lucky you can find one in a vault as early as level 2) the combat shotgun is an asset to the discerning shot-gunner. A special feature of the combat shotgun is that it has a 5 shot clip and needs to be 'pumped' before each shot.

It takes 0.2s to pump a round for the combat shotgun and the gun is pumped when you move or when you hit the reload key. Note: This time is not effected by Reloader. Once the combat shotgun has been pumped then reloading will again add rounds to the clip (and that time is reduced by Reloader).

You can also do a full reload by pressing 'R'. Never do this unless you're certain you're in a safe place - it takes almost 4s which is more than long enough to ruin your game if you get ambushed.

To use any shotgun to it's fullest effect it helps to know what the cone of spread is. The Combat shotgun gives a focused blast which means it's spread is narrower than normal shotguns but it's damage doesn't drop off as quickly:

     
Combat Shotgun spread (range is 15)
           *****
    ************
@***************
    ************
           *****

Since the spread is more focused the combat shotgun is slightly less useful than a normal shotgun for radar shooting. I find in practice that the difference is manageable.

Use the pump-when-you-move feature to manoeuvre during combat. A good example is fighting demons: as the approach you can keep step back and fire repeatedly (until the clip runs out of course). Remember to move diagonally when move to pump - it will give you a chance to dodge and hopefully avoid taking any damage.

The Combat Shotgun has less damage drop off than a normal shotgun. This makes it more effective for killing enemies at range. Think of it as a shotgunners sniper rifle - take out those enemies before they can see you!

The combat shotgun does between 7 and 21 points of shrapnel damage. However, being a shotgun it's subject to damage drop off - the further away a target is the less damage it will take. This applies from the very first square which means the real maximum damage is 20. The following table shows the minimum, maximum and average damage values over the combat shotgun's range.

Shrapnel damage is reduced dramatically by armour (2 points of damage per 1 point of armour) The following tables show the damage values for armour values 1 and 2:

The rule of thumb to remember is that a combat shotgun loses approximately 1-2 points of damage every 2 squares.

It helps to understand Damage Dice. Don't worry, I won't go into any math. What you should know, though, is how to interpret damage dice values. A Combat Shotgun does 7d3 damage. That means for each successful shot the game will roll seven three sided dice and add them up. That total will then be reduced by a factor depending on how far away your target is and the result is the damage caused by your shot.

Now imagine you have seven of those dice (if you find it hard to imagine a 3 sided die imagine a 6 sided one with the 4,5 and 6 replaced with a second 1,2 and 3). How likely is it to roll 7 threes in a row? Not very (how often do you roll a Yahtzee?). Rolling 7 ones is just as unlikely. So I have good and bad news. The bad news is that you very rarely do maximum damage with a combat shotgun. The good news is that you very rarely do the minimum damage.

Roll 7 dice in your mind. What do imagine you'll get? A mix of ones, twos and threes. Now, if you think about it, a one and a three is the same as rolling 2 twos. What does that mean? You guessed it - the ones and threes cancel out so a combat shotgun is most likely to do an average amount of damage for any given shot. This might sound like bad news but it isn't. It means combat shotguns are reliable. At point blank range you can be pretty sure you're going to get about 13 points of damage.

Using this information the following table shows the expected number of shots needed to kill each enemy at the specified range (note: we take the natural armour value into account but some enemies (notably Barons) can pick up and use armour. In those cases you'll notice you need significantly more rounds to kill the enemy. We're also assuming that our enemy is standing still which never happens - consider these the useful 'spherical cow' stats mathematicians love so much).

If you have the Army of the Dead master trait then shrapnel damage becomes armour piercing. The following table is adjusted for Army of the Dead players:

The big brother of the combat shotgun deserves a special mention. Assembled by modding a combat shotgun with a power and a tech mod the Tactical Shotgun has one extra damage die and obviates the need to pump between rounds. If you like the combat shotgun then you owe it to yourself to try the Tactical Shotgun. The strategy remains the same - use it as a 'sniper rifle' to pick off enemies at a distance. It's especially good at corner shooting because you can fire more rounds at an enemy before it can approach.

theduck101 18:16, 26 November 2011 (CEST)