Read the wiki page on Damage, and in particular the section on Monster Resistances. You will learn why it is important to carry a mixture of damage types, to wield against various monsters, to exploit their weaknesses and avoid their strengths. This is the single most important rule of Spiral Knights to understand!

My other main advice is to plan your equipment based on 5-star stuff, not 2-star stuff, because it all ends up at 5-star. Try to take the long view. Yes, this is true even for F2P players; it just takes longer for them.

For weapons (swords and guns, at least), you want to own a piercing weapon, an elemental weapon, and a shadow weapon, even if you carry only two of them at a time. For example, you could own a piercing sword, a shadow sword, and an elemental gun. Before you enter a stratum, examine the gate map to decide which two are most appropriate.

I recommend that your first armor set be general-purpose. However, this does not mean just normal armor; as you go deeper into the Clockworks, monsters increasingly deal non-normal damage. They also deal status effects, of course. Perhaps the champion of general-purpose armor sets is Divine Veil with Skolver Coat. Together, they protect against all four damage types, protect against the four most important statuses, and give two offensive bonuses. For a shield, the "default best" is Grey Owlite Shield.

Finally, I don't want to be rude or insulting, but a lot of your information is just plain wrong. The Cutter line does not just go to 4-star; you must be thinking of the Spur line. Brandishes do not suck; they are some of the best swords in the game. You say you need to move while shooting, but you're considering Magnus, which doesn't let you. And your comments largely ignore damage type. So read the wiki page on Damage, and then maybe the Swordmaster's Guide and the Gunner's Guide, figure out which 5-star stuff you want, and then work toward that. :)

I'm not sure you're making a good faith effort here, but I'll continue to try to make one. Yes, Cautery Sword is bad. But I am talking exclusively about 5-star items. So when I say the Brandishes are good, I mean Combuster/Glacius/Voltedge (for elemental) and Acheron (for shadow). Cautery Sword isn't even on my radar. I can't say whether the Magnus line is good, because Callahan is and Iron Slug isn't. Do we understand each other better now? Perhaps this is what you wanted:

Piercing sword: Final Flourish or Barbarous Thorn Blade (not the other two)
Elemental sword: any of them (Combuster, Glacius, Voltedge, Divine Avenger (or Fang of Vog))
Shadow sword: either of them (Acheron or Gran Faust)

Piercing gun: Callahan, or Blitz/Plague in certain situations
Elemental gun: I'll let others comment, because this is now a religious issue.
Shadow gun: either of them (Umbra Driver or Biohazard)

Bombs: These are idiosyncratic, and damage type is not the main consideration. Read the Bomber's Guide, if you want a bomb.

Edit:

""And your comments largely ignore damage type.""
"I mentioned that I am F2P and don't want to spend tons of money on situational items."

That's fine. But do you plan on having two weapons? Then you should be considering damage type. For example, you could get a piercing sword and an elemental gun. No normal weapons are necessary. Well, you might consider Leviathan for your sword. But I still wouldn't. Good luck.

1. Why are you even buying things from the NPCs? The AH is cheaper and crafting is cheap too
2. Have only normal defense means you end up lying on the ground dead since you only are protected from one type of damage. Most armors have 2 defenses which is wayyy better.
3. The health bonus of ancient plate is not a lie and by the time you get that you will understand why it's useless.
4. Brandish lines dont suck and the cautery sword is just the bastard child of the line
5. The BTB charge is at least better than the charge of the cutter and spur lines
6. Blaster- agree
7. Antigua only works good on things that move slowly and not a construct
8. Iron Slug is useless the blaster is better
9. Having a weapon with one of the specialized damage types does NOT make it situational. I can assure you that you will meet something that is weak to elemental damage in almost every level
10. ""Plan your equipment based on 5-star stuff"
That's the whole point of this thread. See the problem is I don't HAVE 5* stuff."
So basically what you're saying is that you dont care about what happens in the future since you dont have it yet.

8. Everyone says that Valiance is the best normal-damage gun, but I don't have enough personal experience, so I'll leave that explanation to others.

9. It's true that elemental swords are split normal+elemental. But this is not a problem, because nothing resists normal. (This is unlike Argent Peacemaker and Sentenza, which deal split non-normal damage.) In the end, if you look at which swords do the most damage to constructs and undead, it's the elemental swords, because even though they're only half elemental, that's better than nothing. In guns, there are many that do pure elemental, which is great; these simply do the most damage to constructs and undead, of any gun.

10. Yes, you've said that, no question. You are right. I understand. But I do have one tip, that may help you communicate with people like Trying (and me). Don't ask, "Which line is best?" Instead ask, "Which 5-star piercing gun is best?" Why is this version of the question better? Because questions like "Is the Magnus line good?" don't have an answer, because there are two 5-star versions, one of which is bad (Iron Slug) and one of which is good (Callahan). You can take the Magnus line in a bad direction or in a good direction. So that's what we mean, when we tell you to think only about 5-star items. Again, I'm not trying to frustrate you or insult you. I'm just trying to help you ask the questions that will get you the information you want as quickly as possible. :)

10. Callahan, being a good piercing weapon, pairs well with an elemental weapon or a shadow weapon. Iron Slug, being a normal weapon, doesn't pair well with anything. It's all about damage type. (Okay, it's not all about damage type, but damage type should be your main consideration.) You are correct, that if you have a BTB, then you do not want a Callahan (unless you're into collecting weapons).

So I think we can finish that question off by saying that you don't want to pursue any kind of Magnus, because (A) you like to be mobile while firing your gun, (B) Iron Slug isn't very good, and (C) Callahan is redundant with your probable sword.

9. If you have a BTB (or Final Flourish), then you probably want an elemental gun or a shadow gun. And of these I would recommend an elemental gun first, because guns are very useful against turrets, and the best kind of damage to employ against turrets is elemental, because turrets are gun puppies (constructs), howlitzers (undead), or polyps (slimes).

So are we trying to figure out which elemental gun is best? There are five of them. The favorites seem to be Nova Driver (pure damage), Polaris (shock, knockback, but be careful in parties), and Storm Driver (shock). Hail Driver is (freeze) is hard to master; I find that it unfreezes as often as it freezes. Magma Driver (fire) is less popular, but I've never used it, so I won't comment further on it.

P.S. Although I know that you're trying to do this cheaply, you should consider at some point getting a shadow sword (Acheron or Gran Faust) to complement your BTB/FF and elemental gun. This would help you greatly with slimes. For example, you could tear through the Royal Jelly Palace with an Acheron and your elemental gun.

The Callahan is popular among gunners because its very high projectile speed and chance of knockdown/stun work well against the enemies that tend to dodge gunfire, all of which are weak (Wolvers, Devilites) or neutral (Gremlins) to piercing damage. The Iron Slug gives up the damage bonus to Beasts and Fiends in exchange for not being penalized against Slimes and Constructs, but those are better dealth with using other guns. If you already have a rapier and are primarily going to be using swords, you're better off skipping both Magnus lines entirely and going with an elemental sidearm, as others have suggested.

As for the Faust, I really only find mine useful in jelly levels, due to their predictability and tendency to glom into clusters that almost beg to have a heavy sword swung into them. The Nightblade is better against gremlins due to their twitchines, and groups of jellies can still be charge-kited without the chance of self-curse.

I agree stavrosg, the Polaris is great. If you don't like the exploding shots, go with the nova driver. Also, keep in mind that you're probably going to be making enough crowns in T3 to have a third or even fourth weapon slot. And a Faust can only curse you if you use the charge attack.

All of the alchemers become significantly more powerful at even just the 3* level, because their bullets begin to split on impact allowing them to do damage to more enemies with each shot. Thus a 2-shot magazine can actually hit up to 4 times (twice per shot) beginning at 3*. Each hit also has the chance to apply the status, which takes fairly often (at least 25% of the time in my experience). The fire damage will also scale up as you upgrade the gun.

I currently own the following elemental guns and would recommend you get any of them except the AP. Since you already own the firotech alchemer, your cheapest path forward is to upgrade that. You won't be disappointed.

Gigawatt Pulsar - I love it for turrets but knockback limits its damage against other things I want to shoot, like retrodes, because it often pushes them out of range of the second and third bullets.

Firo Driver (4*) - It deals great damage from the bullets and tons of damage from the fire, it's amazing in arenas especially for waves of lumbers, allows you to light something on fire and let it burn while shifting your focus to something else, maximizing your damage over all other alchemers (yes, it even easily beats out the prismatech line if you do this). I can't wait to find a magma driver recipe so I can upgrade this gun.

Hail Driver (5*) - It's good in places where you might want to freeze things (like with lots of gun puppies around), but the fact that the second bullet undoes the freeze from the first bullet limits it damage and makes it more difficult to use (because you may want to fire one, wait to see if it freezes, then fire again). I love it, but it doesn't have the ease or power of either of the above two elemental guns.

Argent Peacemaker (5*) - It's split elemental/piercing, so it's actually a pretty terrible weapon, weak against many of the things you most want to shoot (gun puppies, retrodes, and polyps). The exception is in FSC, where it does good damage against undead and against Vanaduke. I wouldn't waste my money making it if I were on a tight budget, though, because a blitz needle, pulsar, or elemental alchemer will still be very good in FSC.

What about the Nova Driver??????

The thread is a little old in the first place (more than 10 days), but whatever.

You seem to not understand how shield actually works, so what you said is not correct. The shield stats don't had to your armor stats. The shield resistance is only applied on your shield (not on you) while you are shielding. It doesn't do anything when you are not shielding, are when your shield is broken (except for certain stats, like bonus health, ASI and Damage Bonus, which are only present on specific shields). You can imagine it as another person taking hits in your place (except it's health regenerate, contrary to yours).

So additionning your armor/helm stats and shield stats is plain wrong. You want a shield to shield longer the most frequent attacks you suffer, and armor/helm to reduce the damage you take when you are hit.

In the end, for the T2 boss run, you are not well equiped in either case, because :
- a good mass of jellies will destroy your owlite shield very quickly (that's doable, but sub-optimal)
- you'll suffer a ton of damage for every rocket or other construct hit that hit you.

2 things to do to solve that :
- get a bristing buckler, which is a good piercing shield AND have some sword bonus damage, for jellies/wolvers levels (keep your owlite for the rest)
- get a magic hood, which have elemental resistance AND is good up to FSC when 5*, for general use (you'll not use your angelic helm that much. Fiends and Undeads stratas are not that frequent in T2).

There is nothing wrong with being mistaken when you start. That's a classic mistake (I also made it when i started).

You can keep your helm and still be successful, it's just is sub-optimal. Same goes with Owlite : I did also start with it and run JK with it. It is possible to do so, it just breaks very fast compared to a piercing shield. And yeah, Owlite is good against most things, that's why it's so popular and overrused. You generally can't go wrong with an Owlite as an only shield (you'll just suffer a little against devilites furnitures, mass jellies and mass wolvers).

I know that this is off the topic completely but as you people seem to know a lot of stuff i was wondering if you could help me? You see i haven't really decided what i want, sword or gun? but i decided to go hybrid so i have a gun and a sword which could help. I know a lot of people are disagreeing on going hybrid but im not changing. you see i have a sealed sword that im going to upgrade into a divine avenger and im currently using a kilowatt pulser. the problem is that a kilowatt pulser has elemental damage and the avenger / divine avenger has normal / elemental damage so i end up dealing only normal and elemental. so i decided that i need a shadow / piercing gun or at least a shadow gun. i tried a couple of guns but they don't take my fancy. i was thinking of getting a antigua but alot of people say don't get it because it has slow bullets and is only good for damaging stationary and slow enemys. the thing is all i really want to damage with a gun is stationary enemys that will shoot me and slow enemys that if i go near them they will do a charge attack at me.

so please help me with your nearly expert knowledge :)

Thanks for the comment!

I know that most people use elemental guns but i really want to use the divine avenger so i need a shadow/ piercing gun. The thing is in a update not so long ago they added arsonel stations which allow you to change weapons in the starting area. all of the beast levels i have played (about 15) all had arsonel stations so im not worried about piercing. i have been checking the AH for the guns you told me and i checked a couple of other threds but i couldn't find a catalyzer in the AH so if someone had one could you tell me just what it's like it would be great. :)

(i always finish my comments with a smily face)

I just got myself the avenger and im liking it so far. i probobly won't get a catalyzer but i really need a non elemental gun so i will check out the Valliance. thanks :)

i did the iron claw munitions factory once and got 4 tokens but it was really hard!!! First when i get 20 tokens i'm going to get the antigua then once ive got that i'm going to get the catalyzer. Wish me luck! :)

Antigua works pretty well against wolvers (and other beasts, and fiends) because it's pure piercing. As soon as you upgrade it toward either Argent or Sentenza, you start getting the split non-normal damage that people dislike.