We’ll take a look at all the Legendary Sniper Rifles you can find in Outriders in this guide, how they stack up and how you can get them.
Overview
You might think that only Technomancers have any business being near Sniper Rifles due to their specializations, but you’d be wrong. If you’ve delved into the more difficult content in the Outriders endgame, you’ll likely have realized by now that every class should be carrying long-range weaponry, as the best tactic in every encounter is to pick off as many opponents as possible before you engage in close range combat, regardless of your class. This means everyone, and we mean everyone, can benefit from using a strong sniper rifle. Even if your class is more effective up close, it never hurts to nail some enemies from a cozy distance before you switch to whatever playstyle is typical of your spec. Not all guns are made equal, and this can be said of Legendary Sniper Rifles too. Of course, they’re all heavy hitters and a cut above their more common counterparts, and while having one definitely helps in the endgame, worrying about getting the best should mostly be reserved for Technomancers.
How To Get Legendaries
Unlike some other looter shooters - looking at Destiny - legendaries are not tied to specific actions or quests, meaning there are no guaranteed ways of getting any exact weapon. This is where farming comes into the picture - you’ll need to crank up the world tier to at least V before legendary loot comes into play, after which the fastest way to get them is by grinding expeditions. Since there are a total of 10 legendary sniper rifles, farming all of them out will definitely take a lot of time.
The Mindmugger
The Mindmugger is an automatic legendary sniper rifle that is great when used alone, but the benefits diminish when rolling in a group. Alongside the high damage and accuracy typical of weapons in this category, the Mindmugger has a 35% Armor Piercing bonus, 12% Healing bonus and 3% Skills Life Leech bonus. With that Healing bonus, you might be tempted to use it when playing in a team, but the Weapon Mods it uses might discourage you. Anomaly Mutation is what generally throws a wrench into team play, which changes the active status effect on any enemy hit by a shot. Since status effects can play an important role in some builds, using this gun can result in interfering with a teammate’s combos. That said, the other Weapon Mod is all the more useful, especially when playing in the higher world tiers. Damage Link augments the damage output of the weapon based on the strength of the enemy it is used against - meaning the tougher the enemy you’re shooting at, the more damage you’ll deal. This comes in particularly hand when facing tough encounters solo.
The Headhunter
Sporting a 100% accuracy rating rivalled only by the Iceberg, the Headhunter is definitely for those of you who like laying down precise headshots from a distance. With bonus stats of 32.5% Armor Piercing, 13% Long Range Damage and 12% Healing Received this is definitely aimed at long distance fighting. However, being a single shot bolt-action rifle with low stability, you won’t be shooting in quick succession and you’ll need to seek your target again. The Burst of Decay weapon mod will cause toxic explosions on all critical hits, hitting enemies in a 5 meter radius with a Damage Over Time effect. If you trigger this on a close cluster of enemies, the DoT will whittle down their health to require fewer shots to kill them by the time you work your way through the group. While the Headhunter doesn’t have a Skill Leech bonus stat, the Vampire weapon mod makes up for it - every killing shot will give you a temporary 15% Skill Leech buff. Leech and DoT might seem like an odd pairing for a weapon with a slow rate of fire, so we only recommend this for experienced players.
Blightbearer
Few guns in Outriders sport a design as striking as the Blightbearer, being wrapped in the cut up remains of gas masks. In a rather odd turn, this weapon has no scope and comes with a 12% Close Range Damage bonus boost, despite being a ‘sniper rifle’. Additional boosts are 32.5% on Armor Piercing and 3.5% on Skill Life Leech. Sharing the Burst of Decay mod with Headhunter, this too is a good crowd control weapon by affecting multiple enemies with a DoT, which paired with the rather lackluster stats for a legendary mean this weapon is clearly intended for a support role in team play. This is further reinforced with the other weapon mod, Resistance Breaker, which reduces the Resistance rating of enemies you hit by 35% for 6 seconds, a debuff that other builds and weapons can handily exploit. Even so, Blightbearer is a highly situational weapon and would almost never be our first choice.
Spirit Hunter
If you’re a particularly blood thirsty outrider, this is the gun for you. The full auto bolt action rifle (how does that work?) has a pair of tusks strapped to it, and gives you bonus stats of 23.3% Critical Damage, 23.3% Status Power and 13% Healing. Those Status Power and Crit Damage bonuses come in handy when we take the weapon mods into account. Bleeding Bullets inflict a DoT bleed effect on enemies with an 8-second cooldown, the potency of which is boosted by the Status Power bonus. Additionally, Ultimate Bone Shrapnel causes the bones of the enemies you score a critical strike on to explode, damaging said enemy and all others around them while also inflicting once again a DoT bleed effect. Now that’s metal.
The Landlubber
While many other weapons on this list look scavenged and tacked together, the Landlubber is an elegant full auto bolt action sniper rifle with some art deco flair. Giving you a 12% bonus on Healing, 35% on Armor Piercing and 3.25% on Skill Life Leech, the bonus stats are pretty run of the mill. Things get more interesting with the weapon mods, however. Legendary Minefield spawns a cluster of explosive around the enemy you hit if you score a critical shot, dealing huge area of effect damage to it and all around it in a 5 meter radius. Fireworks, the other weapon mod, is also an AoE one. This one isn’t reliant on any kind of prerequisite, like a critical hit - explosive rounds mean every shot fired from the Landlubber deals some AoE damage to the enemies around your target. Considering the tendency of mobs in Outriders to group together and spawn in clusters, a pair of AoE mods makes the Landlubber one of the best weapons in the entire game, not only in the sniper rifle category. Aim for this weapon when farming.
Raróg’s Gaze
Following scavenged guns and an art deco gun, we have something that looks like a weird alien tree. This single shot rifle boasts an 11% bonus on Crit Damage, a 16.2% bonus on Status Power and 6.5% on Long Range Damage. Another DoT focused rifle, Raróg’s Gaze benefits from the weapon mod Weakness Trap inflicting, surprise surprise, Weakness - not only to the target, but to other enemies nearby, adding some limited AoE utility as well that makes the gun viable in a support role too. Burning Bullets, the other weapon mod, inflicts another DoT effect, Burn. This pairing combined with the Status Power bonus make Raróg’s Gaze potent, and best used when playing with others.
Twisted Metal
Not to be confused by the post-apocalyptic car battle game with that monstrous ice cream truck that had a burning clown head on top, Twisted Metal is a single shot rifle packing a 30% bonus on Armor Piercing, 13% on Healing and 12% on Close Range Damage. Between Armor Piercing and the weapon mod Ultimate Vulnerability Bullets, Twisted Metal is the best choice to make tough enemies squishy. Add to that the Brain Eater mod that negates ammo consumption on critical hits, and you have a pretty decent choice for an endgame rifle. Not our top pick, but definitely a solid option.
The Iceberg
I hope you packed some mittens, because this sniper rifle is literally encased in permafrost. A single shot bolt-action rifle, the Iceberg is the second gun to feature a whopping 100% accuracy rating. This is backed up by bonus stats including 12.8% on Crit Damage, 17.5% on Status Power and 7% on Long Range Damage. The Iceberg’s two weapon mods build off one another. Winter Blast will inflict a Freeze effect on any critical hit in a 4-meter radius, combing DoT and AoE functionality. However, the main benefit comes from the second mod. Icebreaker turns enemies with the Freeze effect into bombs - if you score a killing shot on a frozen enemy, they will explode in a rain of deadly shards, dealing extra AoE damage.
Molten Eidola
Outriders is an inherently bleak game with a fairly cynical outlook on the future of our species. That dour attitude bleeds over into weapon design with Molten Eidola being covered in contorted faces and spewing a biblical punishment. The single shot rifle features a 21.7% bonus to Crit Damage, 13% to Healing and 12% to Long Range Damage. We once again see the Brain Eater weapon mod thanks to which critical shots do not consume ammo, but more iconic is the Ravenous Locust mod. Every shot projects a swarm of locusts from the weapon, which cause damage over time and inflict Weakness as an extra AoE.
Icarus
With both a name and design that would feel right at home in genre rival Destiny 2, Icarus is a full auto sniper rifle with a shiny silver finish and bonus stats including 20% on Weapon Life Leech, 14% on Close Range Damage and 23.3% on Status Power. Yet again, Brain Eater saves us ammo with critical shots, while Ultimate Anomaly Surge gives our critical shots an extra explosion of AoE anomaly damage, making the Icarus particularly ammo sparing and heavy hitting. The Weapon Life Leech bonus, however, is what puts this gun above the rest, meaning you’ll be able to maintain your health so long as you are reliably landing hits. We’d pick this as the top dog among legendary sniper rifles easily.
