Dauntless Best Weapon Tier List

Dauntless’s launch on the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One has brought with it a number of players, as well as a number of questions. The first for pretty much any player is likely this: Which weapon do I start with? The six categories of weapons in the game each do very different things. While none of them are useless by any stretch of the imagination, there’s a depth of utility, power, overall moves, and accessibility that makes some better candidates for use than others. What’s the best? We’ve put together a tier list of Dauntless weapons based on the above factors and more.

---

S Tier

Chain Blades

When it comes to slice damage and mobility, the Chain Blades have pretty much everything you need. Their key component is the ability to hook and pull yourself to the Behemoth and then vault out to a safe distance in relatively quick order, making them arguably the best weapon in the game for evasive maneuvers. Then there’s their attacks. The heavy attack on the Chain Blades is a very long range one that allows you to hit most Behemoths from a relatively safe distance and more easily watch for and dodge incoming danger.

When you do decide to go all-in, the Chain Blades’ combos also have you covered. If you have time, the Weak, Weak, Weak, Strong combo creates a windmill that hits rapidly and stacks damage fast and hard. There’s definitely a window for it, but the same can be said of any weapon. Where other weapons have pretty blatant weaknesses, the Chain Blades' one weakness of weak singular hits feels marginal in comparison to the fact that it can deliver a ton of those hits in short order. It then allows you to back off fast, do some damage from a distance, and get right back in when you want to, making it an all-around great option.

A Tier

Hammer

The Hammer is worthy addition to any hunting party for a very, very important reason: it is the only weapon with built-in stagger damage. Even beyond that primary factor, it hits like a freight train. The hammer in the hunting party is huge in battles versus heavily-armored Behemoths and those that can be knocked down and stunned, making an open target for everyone else to lay the beatdown on. Sure, the hammer is slow when you compare it to weapons like the Sword, Chain Blades, and War Pike, but it still combos very well.

That combo is aided by the fact that the Hammer can finish pretty much any string of attacks with a devastating strike which expends its ammo system in a hard-hitting explosion. The thing that keeps the Hammer from being truly godlike is that once that ammo is expended, you need to reload it to reach your full damage potential again. Fortunately, the reload mechanic can also be sped up with a well-timed button press during. It has a long range gunfire attack, but it’s not really the star attraction so much as a little something extra. It takes some practice to get down everything the hammer can do and find the right moments in its slow pace, but it arguably serves one of the most important roles in the fight, making it easily the weapon of choice for utility to the team and versatility on its own.

B Tier

Sword

There is nothing particularly problematic about Dauntless’ Sword. It’s very easy to use and has quite a few options that can aid any hunting party throughout most fights. It has a decent speed and damage. Once the Sword charges up, you can empower it to launch waves of long-range damage in addition to the physical strikes of the blade itself. Moreover, in your charged state, you gain access to a dash that can put you in and out of attack range from Behemoths, which is also great.

That said, it seems to us like everything the Sword can do, the Chain Blades can do better. You don’t need to power up the Chain Blades to strike at long range, get in and out of attacking range, and be evasive. You can just do that with them, and though the Chain Blades may hit for less damage per hit, it feels like you can fit a lot more of those hits into smaller windows. The Sword is not at all bad, but when all of these things are considered, it feels like Chain Blades that have a cooldown on half of their kit.

War Pike

We’re going to be honest here. The War Pike is incredibly fun. It’s probably our favorite weapon. But fun and functional are not always in the same sphere. Don’t get us wrong. The War Pike can do a lot of neat things. It has piercing damage which can wound Behemoths, which other hunters can then hit for higher damage. It also has good rapid combos, and if you can build your combos, you can load the momentum into a shell and fire upon the Behemoth with a super hard-hitting shot at range.

Here are the things that are not so hot about the War Pike: no escape opportunities and an unforgiving drawback to the momentum system. The War Pike has only one mobility option in the form of a charging attack where you jump forward to strike. That means unlike the Sword or Chain Blades, you have to rely solely on dodging to stay out of harm’s way for the most part. It wouldn’t be so bad if the momentum system didn’t rely so crucially on you not getting hit. If you get hit by the Behemoth before you can back out of engagement to load your stacked momentum into a War Pike shell, you lose an enormous chunk of it and have to look for another chance to build back up. The piercing damage is nice too, but is terms of utility to the party, we’d argue the Hammer sets up bigger opportunities. Ultimately, the War Pike has a lot going on, but it asks a lot in return to be truly effective.

C Tier

Axe

The Axe is a tough nut to crack. There is basically no better raw damage weapon in Dauntless, but the sheer plodding slowness of this weapon means you’d best have the time and room to swing. That means having very supportive teammates that will help you set up for those big hits. When you get a crushing blow with an Axe, it’s going to be a sight to behold, but all of that raw power doesn’t mean much if you don’t have coordinated allies helping you make it happen That makes the axe more of a cumbersome challenge to handle than many of the other weapons.

When compared to the Hammer, it misses out on that blunt, staggering damage too. Sure the Axe can deliver a massive payload of pain, but then again, the Hammer can do that, plus let everyone else unleash a barrage of attacks on a stunned enemy. When it comes down to the bottom line, the Axe is all power, no mobility, very little utility, and that makes it hard to recommend above other choices outside of hunting parties that build around it.

??? Tier

Osterian Repeaters

The Osterian Repeaters occupy a nebulous space in Dauntless’s tiers of weaponry for good reason: The effectiveness of this weapon is pretty much dependent upon how a player customizes it. Between being able to craft parts that change its special abilities and passive qualities, the guns can be okay or outright devastating. For instance, you start out with a buster shot and drop ability that raises attack rate temporarily, but you could change that out for parts that launch frost sprites, fire missiles, drop landmines, and more.

The regular gunfire is average at first. It does little at range and only really gets effective when you’re up close. If we were talking solely about attack, the only good thing about the Osterian Repeaters is that you don’t have to get close if you don’t want to. However, the abilities you can swap out on a whim with this weapon are really what opens up the possibilities, making its efficiency and output truly the whim of the crafter. In other words, with a mix-and-match of parts, the Osterian Repeaters can be as powerful or dysfunctional as you make them.

---

As mentioned before, none of the weapon categories in Dauntless are bad. This list is purely based on what they can do alone and what they bring to a team. What’s your favorite weapon type? Let us know in the comments! And don’t forget to get your Daily Deathmarks for Hunt Pass experience!