I never bothered with shotguns til A17 B221.
Before A17, i'd tried them, i'd been singularly unimpressed every time.
When A17 came out, i didn't bother, but when the B221 came out, I gave it a try, due to reading the patch notes that damage was buffed.
HO-LY CRAP it made a difference.
It's a superior POI weapon for fast clearing (not the creep thru and bow headshot 1 at a time), probably more efficient than almost any other (much cheaper ammo than AK, pistol comes close with a lot of mods and headshot perks....but with few mods or perks, shotgun is amazeballs), since everything takes place in the melee to medium-short range.
For active defense bridge bases, where you're fighting the horde with minimal traps and a straightaway approach of up to 20 blocks, the shotgun also shines. It might get beat by the AK again here, but yet again, the ammo is a good bit cheaper, and the knockdown on the shotgun really shines here. you'll be able to hit enemies reliably and strongly out to about 12 blocks...maybe 18 with the choke.
Yes, you damage enemies near your target, i've taken a regular zombie to ALMOST dead, then aimed at a feral coming up past it and fired, right as the reg zombie got up behind it, and knocked down the feral and killed the reg zombie. That being said, I personally tend to aim around the upper chest/lower head...especially when they get right up on me, as the number of times i've tried to get a point blank headshot, only for the attack animation on the zombie to move the head and i hit nothing has happened often enough that i just aim at top of chest most of the time.
The shotgun choke is pretty nice...I use that over all the other barrel/muzzle mods if i get the chance, since it really enhances the effective range of the weapon, and means at very close ranges, aiming center mass is still likely to make all of the projectiles hit, doing great damage and having an amazing knockdown chance.
I still use a larger-mag weapon as a secondary/alternate weapon (since the shotgun is NOT good at lining up a bunch of zombies and headshotting down the line, like a pistol (or vastly reduced recoil SMG/AK) excels at, and I find myself doing bridge-base approach defending swapping between the two often...using the pistol or SMG with sights to pop heads in rapid fire, and swapping to the shotgun for stronger enemies nearling me, or if a cluster of zombies starts getting close.
Before A17, i'd tried them, i'd been singularly unimpressed every time.
When A17 came out, i didn't bother, but when the B221 came out, I gave it a try, due to reading the patch notes that damage was buffed.
HO-LY CRAP it made a difference.
It's a superior POI weapon for fast clearing (not the creep thru and bow headshot 1 at a time), probably more efficient than almost any other (much cheaper ammo than AK, pistol comes close with a lot of mods and headshot perks....but with few mods or perks, shotgun is amazeballs), since everything takes place in the melee to medium-short range.
For active defense bridge bases, where you're fighting the horde with minimal traps and a straightaway approach of up to 20 blocks, the shotgun also shines. It might get beat by the AK again here, but yet again, the ammo is a good bit cheaper, and the knockdown on the shotgun really shines here. you'll be able to hit enemies reliably and strongly out to about 12 blocks...maybe 18 with the choke.
Yes, you damage enemies near your target, i've taken a regular zombie to ALMOST dead, then aimed at a feral coming up past it and fired, right as the reg zombie got up behind it, and knocked down the feral and killed the reg zombie. That being said, I personally tend to aim around the upper chest/lower head...especially when they get right up on me, as the number of times i've tried to get a point blank headshot, only for the attack animation on the zombie to move the head and i hit nothing has happened often enough that i just aim at top of chest most of the time.
The shotgun choke is pretty nice...I use that over all the other barrel/muzzle mods if i get the chance, since it really enhances the effective range of the weapon, and means at very close ranges, aiming center mass is still likely to make all of the projectiles hit, doing great damage and having an amazing knockdown chance.
I still use a larger-mag weapon as a secondary/alternate weapon (since the shotgun is NOT good at lining up a bunch of zombies and headshotting down the line, like a pistol (or vastly reduced recoil SMG/AK) excels at, and I find myself doing bridge-base approach defending swapping between the two often...using the pistol or SMG with sights to pop heads in rapid fire, and swapping to the shotgun for stronger enemies nearling me, or if a cluster of zombies starts getting close.
