Right now, I'm pretty close to achieving the Champion rank, but I'm curious as to what a change of plans would do.
I want to have a PvE viable set to use (Seerus + Chaos, already have now) and a PvP (Lockdown) viable set to use.
Here's what I have at the moment;
- Seerus Mask (I often use Sunset Stetson, which I'm heating, so I can make a Shadowsun Stetson as a shadow-defensive alternative.)
- Chaos Cloak
- Heavy Plate Shield (heating up to Volcanic Plate Shield)
- Volt Driver (heating up to Storm Driver)
- Strike Needle (heating up to Blitz Needle)
- Iron Slug
- WRH (Warmaster Rocket Hammer, may change plans here)
I'm planning on going from Gunner - Swordie Hybrid to a Gunner - Bomber hybrid, as I could carry 2 guns, 2 bombs, or 3 guns and a bomb. I'm leaning towards one of the Vaporizer bombs, like the Staggerstorm line or the Shivermist line. I really want to get the Staggerstorm line, but you can only alchemize it and get recipes w/ Krogmo coins. Both bombs are viable in PvE and PvP. I'm also thinking about having another armor piece, like the Mercurial Demo Suit (which I'm prioritizing) or a different bomb-related armor piece.
I am going to get to champion once I finish heating up + alchemizing the Heavy Plate Shield to the Volcanic Plate shield, but I still have a bunch of things to heat up. Opinions on my progress?
The best Gun-Bomb hybrid combo I can think of is Vortex Bomb into Alchemer charge shot. Iron Slug and Blitz Needle also work, but aren't quite as effective. However, the elemental variant requires krogmo coins to get, which will compete with your Stagger. You can get the shadow variant, but that'll reduce your damage in FSC.
Shivermist is more of a PvE bomb, allowing you to set up perfect point-blank Blitz charges. It's also more useful for FSC, which will get you most of your crowns. Shiver falls short in PvP because of Skolver, which is where Stagger really shines. The best LD bomber I ever faced was a Guardian who used Stagger + Venom Veiler + Ashes of Agni, if that's the kind of thing you're aiming for.
I find effective hybrid builds, especially bomb hybrid builds, are hard to pull off without a trinket or two (unless you just go full Chaos). Ideally you want a good sprite perk as well to boost your bomb CTR.
Mercurial Demo isn't the best for bombing, especially bomber hybrids. You need good CTR for bomb-hybrid builds to work, which Mercurial Demo does NOT provide. You also can only get Mercurial Demo from Shadow Lair runs (more specifically, you need the mat from the Red Roarmulus Twins). Bomb hybrid builds tend to rely on a controlling AOE bomb, followed up by a powerful charge shot. Thus, you need some really good CTR on your bombs and guns.
Finally, you're missing a shadow gun. Going with the gun-bomb hybrid theme, I'd recommend either the Umbra Driver or the Grim Repeater. You may want to keep these guns at 4* so you can benefit from the heat lvl 10 CTR med. It's very difficult to get heat lvl 10 on 5* equipment nowadays.