What are the best Fallout 76 weapons?
At its undeniable core, Fallout 76 is all about surviving in the wasteland - and your survival means that a whole lotta people gotta get dead. Whether you’re killing scores of raiders and Blood Eagles, fighting off waves of Mole Miners or Scorched, or reducing countless Protectrons to piles of scrap, almost every thing you do takes firepower.
But in this game, not all weapons are made equal, so which ones are your best bet to take into wilds beyond?
Buckle up, Vault Dweller. West Virginia is Almost Heaven, and it’s your job to send the other denizens of Appalachia the rest of the way there. First up though, a quick note:
Your best weapons will have Legendary Effects, and sometimes, you get to pick them.
Really important note here. All of the weapons on this list had their screenshots with the best stats in mind for my personal build. What works for me may not work for you. I’m calling that out where appropriate and showing my work. This is me being honest with full disclosure; there’s no wrong way to play Fallout, there’s no one-size-fits-all play session. This list is being written with that in mind!
With that said, there are a few Legendary effects worth considering on the weapons you can modify on this list (which is almost all of them), but that isn’t always the case for some weapons I’m leaving off. Because your play style may differ, consider how other effects than the ones I have listed may have a boost for you. If you’re a low-health bloody build, you won’t want my Aristocrat’s perk; if you are a stealth automatic gunner with a rifle, my Gauss Minigun won’t be one of your preferred options.
Those effects include:
- Bloodied. The ‘Bloody’ legendary effects increase your damage significantly as you have lower health, percentage-wise. Most players with ‘bloodied’ builds have extremely high levels of radiation which lowers their maximum hp. They deal tons of damage but can’t take it.
- Vampire. Vampire effects are really helpful with weapons with an exceptionally high rate of fire (RoF). They heal you as you use them, and coupled with high rads and Unyielding armor (which also works with Bloodied), you can gain a level of semi-invincibility.
- Anti-Armor. AA effects can ignore up to 50% of your target’s armor, which strips away a huge chunk of their damage mitigation. The result? They die faster. A lot faster.
- There’s a host of other damage and stat buffs in the game, like Aristocrat’s (damage increases as caps increase), Juggernaut (bonus applies when you’re full health), Gourmound (stats increase when you’re fully fed), and then some specific ones (Ghoul Slayer, Mutant Slayer, Assassin) which are pretty self-explanatory.
One critical note:
This list doesn’t include base damage/stats on these weapons. Why?
Unlike other games, your damage and effects are ultimately determined by what mods you put on your weapon, what Legendary effects you use, what level the weapon was created at, what perks you may have had when you crafted it (if applicable), what mods you have on your armor, what chems you’re taking, and sometimes even what mutations you have.
Those combinations are unique to most players and their playstyle, and your weapon stats may change even in mid-session as you swap builds, eat different foods, or any one of another dozen changes.
Base stats are important in that they’re stats that get modified. The key word is ‘modified.’ Don’t panic if the damage output on your Fixer looks low if you pop one up at a weapon’s bench; the damage you’ll see once you’re done modifying it (and you) will be massively increased before you even fire the first shot.
Myself?
I like big guns, big armor, and not dying. Full health tank mode, activate!
…with exceptions. Some of them are just down-right western or even presidential.
10.Western Spirit
The Western Spirit with the Lincoln's Repeater skin attached. It makes for double-tap excitement day in and day out.
» See the Western Spirit in Action!
Ignore the name on the screenshot - it’s the literally the same gun with objectively better paint that changed the name when applied - but the Western Spirit is an absolutely solid lever-action rifle from Fallout 76. This weapon will not let you solo endgame bosses, but it has a few very solid points.
It’s a .45 cal non-automatic rifle and the best part of it is that it has a 25% damage bonus over normal lever-actions. The next best part is that as long as you’re using VATS, the accuracy per shot increases up to 95% - even if you miss. So if you’ve got a hard-to-target bad guy in the distance? A couple of shots and your accuracy is perfect.
What we love:
- Maxing out your rifle perks in Perception makes this a beast. Add in concentrated fire, and you’ve got a killer weapon. Mix in some stealth (even if you’re just crouching and ‘hidden,’ and it’s an outright nightmare.
- It is a bit niche. You’re not winning huge fights with this, but it is excellent if you slip on a Prime receiver and go hunting Spooky/Holiday scorched, or if you need to blast human-type bad guys for daily challenges.
- However, it's a great support weapon - freeze big targets like the Grafton Monster or a Mirelurk Queen and you can let other players kill them with impunity.
- Quick reload, small mag, and nearly infinite ammo once you get rolling with it. It’s my favorite, ‘Oh, I need to farm presents’ weapon.
NOTES:
- 25% increase damage over normal lever-action rifles
- Caps out at lvl 45, doesn’t get stronger as you level up
- Cannot have its legendary effects modified
- Uses .45 ammo as a default, can be upgraded to Ultracite .45 (recommended)
- Possible reward from the “Most Wanted” public event in Nuka World at the Ash Heap; cannot be crafted.
9. Cold Shoulder (or the Peppershaker)
With a gold paint job applied for looks, the Cold Shoulder is a double-barrel of fun.
» See the Cold Shoulder in action!
The Cold Shoulder - a double barrel shotgun - is a painful oddity, both to get and to use against your foes. Good shotguns are hard to find in 76, mostly due to ammo and range issues, but the Cold Shoulder? It’s got a leg up on most.
And by that I mean, it cripples legs. And anything else.
The CS is freaking awesome in that it has 4x ammo capacity over the standard double-barreled shotgun, and an obscenely fast fire rate for a non-automatic weapon. If the first shot doesn’t drop your bad guy, the second will… and short of a Scorchbeast, they’re all dead by the eighth. The other two perks on it? It gets a damage bonus against cryptids (so the Mothmen, the Sheepsquach, Grafton Monster, Snallygasters and others) AND - and this is a big and - it can slow down your target with a bonus frost effect for extra damage.
What we love:
- Ignoring the obvious shotgun perks that you should have on, adding Concentrated Fire in your Perk card lineup means that any quest, daily challenge, or weekly challenge that requires you to cripple a limb can be done with ease with this weapon.
- Like the Western Spirit above, the Cold Shoulder can make quick work of almost all of your daily bad guys you find in the wild. It’s not designed to end boss-level monsters, but for your daily wasteland stroll? It works just fine.
- Shotgun shells are easy to make. Ultracite shotgun shells are easy to make in bulk, and like the Spirit, once you get rolling with it the game effectively gives you infinite ammo from all the bodies you’ll stack.
NOTES:
- Initially earned for free in Season 12, the only way that you can get it now is to spend 500 (!) stamps for it at the Whitesprings Refuge. Which is… ouch. Lots and lots of ouch. Might not be worth it compared to, say, entry 6 (or entry 1) on this list.
- Legendary effects cannot be changed, but the weapon itself can be modded. I’m a big fan of ultracite.
- If you can’t get this one, consider the Peppershaker, a heavy gun/shotgun combo that doesn’t slow enemies down but does an insanely good job at crippling limbs left and right.
8. Gauss Minigun
If it's good enough for the Secret Service, it's good enough for me. One of two Gauss weapons on the list - and one of four guns in total to use 2mm rounds.
» See the Gauss Minigun in Action!
One of three Gauss weapons on this list, has a single job and it does that job really, really well: it puts down fire. Lots and lots of fire. By default, this weapon doesn’t come with any perks which means you can roll Legendary effects for it on your own (or try your luck with the Purveyor at the Rusty Pick in exchange for Legendary Scrip).
It’s not a named weapon or a quest reward, and you can customize it to your liking. It does have a slow ‘ramp up’ period before it starts firing of a few seconds, but once it begins? Watch out.
That being said, this is a definitive ‘heavy gun.’ You are looking at ALL of the heavy gun perk cards, plus the power armor perks for increased damage/armor penetration. If you upgrade the ammo type to Ultracite, you’ll gain a weight reduction bonus from Batteries Included.
What we love:
- The best part of this weapon is that the 2mm shells it uses explode on impact, adding splash damage. The Grenadier perk card increases that explosion radius, which turns this into a wastelander-tagging machine. The extra explosive damage probably won’t kill anything around it, buuuut, it will weaken them and give you credit for the kill.
- You can fully customize this one with a Legendary effect of your personal style. Since I plug Ultracite ammo into it, I went ahead and just dropped a Zealot effect to use it as my primary anti-scorch weapon (to clear out Fissures, Daily Ops, and the Scorchbeast Queen).
NOTES:
- You have to learn the plans for this one, which means completing the Main Quest series that ends with the Secret Service and high faction with the Settlers or Raiders. Or, you can get it for a bit less from Minerva when she spawns - though all of those purchases, plus the mods, will take gold bullion.
- It chews through ammo at a rate that’s faster than what you’ll see drop naturally in the world. Get used to crafting it, and if you go for ultracite… get ready to farm flux. It takes 2mm by default.
- The time-to-kill rate on it isn’t the best. However, what it lacks in individual bullet damage, it makes up for in range and exploding rounds.
7. Plasma Caster
I tap (1) trigger and cast Plasma.
» See the Plasma Caster in action!
The Plasma Caster is the rifle of the Heavy Gun world. It combines two major things: the heavy weapon perks and long range. I can’t say much more than that; it’s an energy-based weapon, it takes plasma cores, and you will get some use out of it against… honestly, against a lot of things. It’s incredibly versatile, and doesn’t use a lot of ammo by any stretch. Two shots will wipe out most of the bad guys you encounter.
What we love:
- If you’re in Power Armor (and you should be for this weapon), there aren’t a lot of weapons that go long that don’t have some obvious drawbacks: mini-nukes are super slow and borderline harassment at public events; the Gauss Minigun has a slow time-to-kill rate and eats ammo; the .50 cal machine gun types suffer from the same issues as the Gauss. The plasma caster? VAT target, fire once or twice, forget.
- Entirely customizable. With some effort, I decided to go with Ultracite ammo (again, I know) and the Anti-Armor Legendary effect. I pull the trigger and things die. That's all I can ask for.
- Versatile. It can be used to solo events, clean up mid-range targets at ease, and it can allow you to do damage on boss mobs like the SBQ, Earl, or the Ultracite Titan alike. Does a lot of damage to robots, too, if you aim for their combat inhibitors.
NOTES:
- Another weapon that requires a lot of plans to modify and buy, you’ll need bullion, high faction with the Raiders or Settlers, or to talk to Minerva.
- Not an automatic weapon. You will have to pull the trigger repeatedly.
- I’ve found that it has really terrible hip-fire accuracy (or maybe it’s just me). VATS and Concentrated Fire are your friends on this one.
- Reload time isn’t the greatest.
- Since it isn’t an automatic weapon, you aren’t doing ‘spray and pray.’ Generally, personally, I like walking up to a crowd and knowing that if I pull the trigger, I don’t need to worry about trivial things like ‘aiming’ to get the job done. As a result, the PC isn’t the greatest for every situation, and it doesn’t churn through groups quickly (or cloaked bad guys), but it still is more than enough to get most jobs done.
- (But to get a job “well done,” stick around for our #1 entry on this list!)
6. Gauss Shotgun (or Rifle)
A shotgun that acts like a sniper rifle, has a variable rate of fire, and puts down wide AOE damage that can tag a slew of bad guys all at once for exp? Yes, I will marry you.
» See the Gauss Shotgun in Action!
Another shotgun on the list, it’s almost a rifle in its own right. I literally used this weapon nearly exclusively for a year after I picked it up, and if the other entries on the list didn’t exist, I still would. You don’t need Power Armor for this one, so grab your favorite suit of Brotherhood Recon or Secret Service and get ready to put pain out in the world.
Before you go any further, note that there’s one other weapon that does almost exactly what this one does: the Gauss Rifle. Your personal preference and perk cards make the difference in the final bit of damage output, but they hit nearly as hard as each other. The Riffle has better range; the Shotgun has better damage… but the shotgun has outstanding range itself.
Both weapons have the same effect as the Gauss Minigun - the bullets explode. Both weapons also take a ‘charge up’ time to fire, both weapons require gold bullion to buy and to get the mod plans for, and both weapons can be rolled with whatever Legendary effects you want so you can do anything from Zealots to Quad to Bloodied or Junkies; whatever you prefer.
What we love:
- Does damage, and lots of it.
- Only requiring one set of perks (rifle or shotgun, depending), you don’t have to worry about mixing Heavy Gun stuff with it.
- Outstanding range. The shotgun has dreams of being a sniper rifle, and with the right scope, can be. Yes, you lose some damage at range, but not a lot.
- Both guns will kill things in two or three shots, meaning you’re generating more ammo from corpses than you need.
NOTES:
- You won’t use these on boss-types very much. The time to kill isn’t awesome and unless you run Quad on your legendary effect, you may spend more time than you want when reloading.
- There is (or used to be, if it gets fixed) a bug that may prevent you from using a Stimpack if you’ve just fired. It’s ANNOYING and hasn’t been fixed in years.
- Say it with me now: ultracite. With the rate that ammo drops using this one, you don’t have an excuse not to use the more expensive, harder to craft ammo with it.
5. Nuka Launcher (or Automatic Grenade Launcher)
» See the Nuka-Launcher in Action!
Before I say anything about this gun, let me be 100% clear: do not, please, do not spam this weapon at events. “But Josh, you said -.” Yes. I know what I’m about to say. That being said (or about to be said), spamming this weapon can make it hard for other players to see what they’re doing, how they’re doing it, and can really negatively impact a play session.
With that said, the Nuka Launcher is a two-shot automatic grenade launcher that turns most bad guys into kibbles and bits. It has two very important roles in the end game of 76, which can be improved on with Heavy Gunner perks, Power Armor-type perks, and the Grenadier perk to neutralize a few specific challenges below.
However, if you didn’t play 76 in early 2023… you don’t have this. AND YOU CAN’T GET IT! At least, you can’t get it right now. It was a reward from the Scoreboard in early ‘23, and hasn’t yet been added to Minerva, the stamp collector at the Refuge, or other access.
Then again, it is literally just a two-shot auto grenade launcher. You can craft one, trick it out with mods, and roll your legendary effects until you get something you like just as much - it just won’t have quite the same speed (or the anti-Mole Miner effect).
Of course, if you need this weapon to deal with Mole Miners… I don’t know what to tell you.
What we love:
- Mutated Events and Daily Ops occasionally have ‘reflective’ mutations active. These mutations reflect direct damage done back to the source (you) which can one-shot you (easily) if you’re using something with heavy damage output. Guess what the NL is?
- The NL is indirect damage. The explosion effect is where the pain is, and that damage doesn’t get bounced back. That means that you can fire this thing indiscriminately and rarely take any hits yourself. Couple this with a chestplate with Dense on it to reduce your own risk of splash damage and you can mitigate that mutation entirely.
- It’s fast-firing splash damage/area effect damage. Have an event with a lot of bad guys clustered around each other, like Guided Meditation or a Horde? Empty the clip and walk away done.
NOTES:
- The plans no longer exist as of December 2023; if you don’t have it, the Auto Grenade Launcher is your best choice instead (though Bethsda does reserve the right to add them back in at any time).
- It can be considered a griefer weapon, so please don’t be a jerk with it. If you use it at events, use it as a tag-only weapon, and even then, be considerate.
- Grenade ammo gets heavy, and this breaks quickly; you won’t be using it all the time.
4. Vampire's Flaming Chainsaw (or Auto Axe)
Once you start chasing raiders, scorched, and cultists around with this thing, you may wonder if you're the real bad guy... and if you don't, turn your speakers up and sink it into something squishy.
» See the Flaming Chainsaw in action!
Oh Bethesda, there are days I love you. The patch that improved the viability of automatic melee weapons turned a Doom-style joke into an endgame weapon of unparalleled equal. It just takes a little bit of love, and a little bit of understanding of game mechanics.
Let's start with the basics: the Chainsaw is a weapon that has no plan, and you have to scrap them to learn one of the critical mods to this build. There are several locations to get it, but the easiest place (for me) was to farm them out of the Foundry in the Union Dues expedition. You can find them in a few other locations, like the Watoga Ranger’s Office, but expect to have to loot/scrap them repeatedly to get the mod you want: Dual Bar.
Dual Bar gives you two blades on the saw, and it should go without saying…
The other mods you want? Flaming. This mod cannot be learned, and you have to buy it from NPC vendors (or PC vendors if you get lucky). The good news is that you’ll find them with a regular frequency; hop over to Watoga Station or the Brotherhood bot in Watoga itself.
Final thing to note: make sure the chainsaw you get ready to mod is level 50. They can spawn as level 20 and 30, and the level 50 has just that much more damage.
Once you have those things?
What we love:
- This is it. This is your melee weapon. You do not need another. It’s cheap, it’s easy to find, and it just looks sick (and sounds nauseating when you get up close and personal with assorted fleshy bits).
- You do need to throw on all of your melee perks to get the most from it, but you don’t need Concentrated Fire. With the 12/5/23 patch, certain meat-based foods can now grant you up to an extra 85% (holy crap) bonus to your melee damage!
- This thing chews up everything in the game. It’s not even close. You can use it in just about every single situation, with the exception of maybe the SBQ… but there should be enough other Vault Dwellers firing on her to force her to land.
NOTES
- As good as the base weapon is, you’ll want Legendary Effects. I experimented a lot with it and decided against min-max metagaming and went with a Vampire effect. Why? Because it hits so fast, as long as you’re making contact with your victim, you don’t die. It can work very very well with Unyielding armor and low health builds, but I couple it with Power Armor; I’m a tank that acts like a woodchipper.
- It breaks quickly, so consider adding the random-weapon-repair perk to your Luck cards.
- There’s also the Auto Axe from the Pitt. However, it takes luck to get the plans or Stamps, and the Chainsaw? You can get it just by being in the world. The Auto Axe doesn’t look quite as cool, but it does deal slightly more damage.
- However, honestly, you won’t need it. With this weapon, you can solo Heart of the Swamp without moving for anything but the boss and you can rip through Resilient mutations without a care in the world.
- You become the star of a horror movie stalker flick just by putting it on. Trust me. I have felt like the bad guy on more than one occasion running around ripping people to shreds with this.
3. Enclave Plasma Rifle w/flamer barrel
A rifle with delusions of being a heavy flamer - a perfect compliment for any Rifleman build.
» See the Enclave Plasma/Flamer in Action!
For a while, I used this, but it takes a lot of ammo and it breaks fast. However, it’s still arguably one of the top DPS weapons in the game and when used correctly (ideally with a Bloodied effect and Unyielding armor), it can solo endgame bosses with ease.
It is kinda hard to get. First, the Rifle can’t be crafted; you have to find one in the wild from one of the Enclave events (such as Dropped Connection in Watoga). The mods can be learned through crafting and scrapping normal (not Enclave) plasma rifles, which is good - except for the flamer mod. That mod is a rare spawn on NPC vendors in the Cranberry Bog area. It took me a literal month(!) to find one, but your experience may vary.
Now let’s talk about the uses. Specifically, the flamer mod on this turns this non-automatic rifle into an automatic flamer without needing Heavy Gun or Automatic style perks. It can be used with normal armor and doesn’t need Power Armor to maximize it, and to make the most of it, you need a lot of AP and Critical hits (but spamming Canned Coffee + holding in the crit button while firing in VATS does the trick).
Once you metagame the crap out of this, it becomes game-breaking powerful.
What we love:
- Cool look, cool effects. Can be modified with your choice of Legendary bonuses, but Bloodied or Armor-Piercing are going to be your go-tos more than likely.
- Doesn’t require a lot of perks to be the most effective. Load up your Rifleman bonuses and you’re good.
NOTES:
- It’s harder to get than most weapons. It does churn through ammo and it does break quickly.
- Day to day, it’s useful, but this is more for major encounters or soloing tough spots.
2. The Fixer/Blooded Homemade
Got a problem? We can fix it.
Entire builds are built around the name of this weapon, if that tells you anything. These two automatic rifles are more or less equal, but The Fixer comes with exploding bullets and a chance to generate a stealth field (keeping you hidden and giving you extra ‘sneak attack’ damage bonuses) per shot.
These are designed for Commando Builds, and revolve around Bloodied and Unyielding armor to max out their utility. This isn’t a playstyle I personally get a lot of joy from, because you do have to be health conscious. That aside, this is useful for everything you encounter in the game.
What we love:
- The Fixer plans can be rewarded from Mutated Public Events if you don’t have them, or have a chance to spawn as a result of the player-triggered event, Encrypted.
- Has increased damage, stealth effects,and increased player movement speed as base effects that aren’t overridden when you apply other Legendary effects to it.
- Uses .45 ammo, which is super easy to make and find.
- For anyone using a commando build, it’s arguably the ultimate weapon.
NOTES:
- If you’re willing to sacrifice movement speed and stealth perks, the Automatic Homemade can do the job just as well (if not better, situationally).
- Does take significant meta-gaming to maximize the potential.
- Automatic rifle, so you’re after Commando perks, concentrated fire, stealth perks and the like.
- Heavily modifiable.
1. Holy Fire
I will purify you in fire. And there's a lot of you to purify.
» See the Holy Fire in action!
This is it. For me, this is my personal ultimate in the game. I use it daily and I use it on all things all the time. Other than resilient (can only be killed by melee) or reflective (bounces back damage) bad guys, as a tank-based Power Armor user, there’s nothing better.
The Holy Fire is a named Flamer that drops in the Beasts of Burden event. It can have its Legendary effects modified but for the most part, you can’t use typical mods on it. Range wise, it’s mid-short, so you won’t be blasting the SBQ out of the sky. However… oh, oh the however.
I really can’t speak highly enough of this weapon. It’s everything I need in 76, and unless I have a need for extended range (Scorchbeasts, Eviction Notice, or the like), this is what I use all the time.
What we love:
- Base effects for this include Vampires, better damage (18dmg/3 sec) instead of the normal 9dmg/3 sec of your typical flamer, a faster fire rate, and a default better range.
- You can roll your own Legendary effects if Vampires isn’t to your liking and keep the better base damage and the range!
- No VATs needed. Point. Pull trigger. Keep trigger pulled until the bad guy is charcoal.
NOTES:
- It is a flamer, which means it burns up ammo (pun not intended). Enough fuel drops from the bodies of the deceased to make up for it though (just try not to think about that too much).
- The low durability means you may need to repair it mid-session. But, with the rate that repair kits drop off of the Scoreboard, it should be a non-issue; just an inconvenient one.
- I put Anti-Armor on mine and the minute I did, it became my personal melter. Nothing stands up to this. Nothing. Everything burns. I haven’t solo’d Earl, the Ultracite Titan, or the SBQ with it but I also don’t need to metagame myself into a fit; I equip it and load my Heavy Weapon perks and then I go destroy the world.
- One of the easiest weapons to get, you don’t have to farm gold bullion or a ton of Legendary cores; you don’t need massive faction grinds or lots of Stamps. You can find it in player vendors or at an even with a semi-common spawn and drop rate.
- Everything about it is ‘ease of use.’ Find it easily. Make default ammo. Aim in the general direction of your target. Kill things. Most things die before they hit you more than once or twice, including boosted enemies in Daily Ops
- Outside of specific situations, I use nothing else.
- The one downside? Kinda rough on you if you have carpal tunnel in real life, just because it’s a constant click and hold of the mouse (for PC users). And that’s honestly the only one.
Enjoy this article? Have a shopping list for your arsenal in Fallout 76? Before you go, take a look at these writeups, too!
