ME3: Best Sniper Rifle (let's keep the spoilers mild)

[nokori3byo]

All right, at hour 32, I sense that I'm nearing the endgame and possibly yet another difficulty bump. I saved up and purchased the Black Widow from Spectre Requisitions, but was disappointed to discover the damage is lower than ANY of the single shot rifles.

I have, at this point acquired both the M-98 Widow (classic) and the Javelin, thought I haven't really thrown down for upgrades yet. With about 80 grand in the kitty, I could potentially max one of these out before the penultimate mission. So, the question is: which do I go with?

I'll interrupt this thought here to say that the Black Widow is actually very good for battlefield management. Since a soldier/sniper can squeeze off three shots within a single time dilation, you can potentially kill every squishy in sight in a couple fo seconds. I haven't given up on it yet, but with the appearance of Banshees on the battlefield, the lack of single shot DPS is a bit disappointing.

Thoughts?

 

[Lilani]

So there are sniper rifles in ME3, then? Good. I played Infiltrator in the demo, as I have played since ME1, and I never got a sniper rifle. Needless to say, I had a pretty major sad throughout that demo :-\

 

[Dr. Paine]

Where do you find the M-98 Widow? I've been saving up for the Black Widow, but I may decide against it at this point. So far, I've just been working with the Mantis- quite reliable, I might add, I may just max it out and see how that goes.

 

[nokori3byo]

Yup. Not 100% sure, but I think all the rifles you remember from ME2 have returned along with some new ones: The Black Widow, a three shot semi-auto variation on the Widow, with a weakened damage per shot; and the Javelin, a geth weapon which is slightly weaker than the widow, but detects cloaked targets when scoped.

 

[Slycne]

I ended up sticking with the Black Widow. I think it hits a great mid-point between the one-shot cannons and the multi-shot pea-shooters. Most of the game is fighting large groups of small and medium enemies, so I felt the pros outweighed the cons of not having the really massive damage for the biggest enemies. Honestly with the exception of the Banshees everything still seems to die in 2-3 shots at most.

Where do you find the M-98 Widow? I've been saving up for the Black Widow, but I may decide against it at this point. So far, I've just been working with the Mantis- quite reliable, I might add, I may just max it out and see how that goes.

Thessia, which comes fairly later in the game.

 

[nokori3byo]

Where do you find the M-98 Widow? I've been saving up for the Black Widow, but I may decide against it at this point. So far, I've just been working with the Mantis- quite reliable, I might add, I may just max it out and see how that goes.

The M-98 is found later in the game, during the "Priority: Thessia" mission. The comparable Javelin shows up somewhat earlier during a series of geth encounters.

As I said, I like the Black Widow quite a bit. It's great for mopping up enemy squishies, but for taking down the hardest targets, it's a bit lacking.

Also note, as it's kind of a long wait to find the other elite sniper rifles, The BW is a good purchase, if you've got the money.

 

[Lithan]

M-98. Use it to destroy big bad mean things. Use bio/tech self/squadmate powers and a secondary weapon to take out everything else and conserve ammo.

 

[Dr. Paine]

Where do you find the M-98 Widow? I've been saving up for the Black Widow, but I may decide against it at this point. So far, I've just been working with the Mantis- quite reliable, I might add, I may just max it out and see how that goes.

The M-98 is found later in the game, during the "Priority: Thessia" mission. The comparable Javelin shows up somewhat earlier during a series of geth encounters.

As I said, I like the Black Widow quite a bit. It's great for mopping up enemy squishies, but for taking down the hardest targets, it's a bit lacking.

Also note, as it's kind of a long wait to find the other elite sniper rifles, The BW is a good purchase, if you've got the money.

Ah, I see. Thanks ^^ If I wind up having enough this trip to the Citadel, I may buy the Black Widow just to try it out. If not... well, it's back to kicking myself for buying that automatic fish feeder.

Anyway, for the time being, I'll say I greatly prefer the Mantis to the Viper. While more shots can be useful, I prefer something that just obliterates the enemy on the first go. Besides, Garrus has the Viper and it's working out pretty good for him...

 

[Martijn Nijkeuter]

Just stay away from the javelin and the incisor, Javelin needs to charge before shooting making it nearly useless while incisor is trumped by raptor in every way.
Raptor is great as a machine gun, tons of ammo, great accuracy and easy to get headshots vs soft targets with. pretty useless vs though targets though.
Widow seems pretty good though for normal sniping, but i never got the black widow so can't compare it to that.

 

[DustyDrB]

Pssht. Who needs weapons when you can just chargenovachargenovachargenova?

Team Vanguard!

 

[nokori3byo]

Just stay away from the javelin and the incisor, Javelin needs to charge before shooting making it nearly useless...

That bad, huh? I might still take the Javelin out for a test drive on an N7 mission or something, but I could see how the charge would be a pain in the balls.

 

[skywolfblue]

I do miss Heavy Weapons not being part of the standard layout. I liked how they added to the suits aesthetic. And being able to use them at will. But oh well, such a tiny complaint when the rest of the game was so damn awesome.

Ok so maybe that wasn't entirely on-topic.

 

[nokori3byo]

I do miss Heavy Weapons not being part of the standard layout. I liked how they added to the suits aesthetic. And being able to use them at will. But oh well, such a tiny complaint when the rest of the game was so damn awesome.

Ok so maybe that wasn't entirely on-topic.

Yeah, not sure why they did that. Possibly as a nod to the new "weight management" mechanic? Anyway, I can think of a few enemies in ME3 I'd like to introduce to the nuke launcher.

 

[Smiley Face]

I've been playing as a Vanguard, so I haven't really had a chance to properly try out the sniper rifles (I've mostly been going with a Geth Pulse Rifle/Phaeston and a Talon/Paladin). That said, how would, say, a Widow, fare against a Banshee or Atlas? - cause I'm considering hauling one around to take care of them on my Insanity run.

That said, I like how the Black Widow allows you to have high power shots and get more than one shot off before reloading.

 

[AD-Stu]

Black Widow for me - though I was only playing on Normal difficulty, so its reduced stopping power might become a bigger issue on higher difficulties. It was one-shotting most of the things I expected it to one-shot.

I tried the Javelin briefly then ditched it just as quickly, as the charging period made it almost impossible to hit anything other than a moving target. And the other one with the huge clip but bugger all damage... the Raptor? Only tried it once in multiplayer and couldn't wait to get rid of it, sniper rifles shouldn't take five shots to bring down even a basic enemy.

Personally I'd stick with the Mantis until either the Black Widow or Widow become available.

 

[Trollsassin]

Honestly, I made an account just to defend the Javelin.
I have the Javelin maxed out, and I play only on Single Player, so I may have a different view on it, but it is still a viable option. The fact that it can pierce through cover without mods is quite useful, so you can use mod slots for more useful mods, say, a concentration mod to slow down enemies. It not only pierces through cover, it also pierces through enemies. If you can line the shot just right, you can take out a number of squishies in a single shot. My only problem with it is that it's much heavier than the Mantis, so I'm torn between the two. So far I've sacrificed heavy power useage for the raw power.
The Widow, or its Specter counterpart, on the other hand, I have no experience with, so I can't speak for or against them. I just picked it up during a mission on Thessia, and am curious about its reliability, though its weight does bother me slightly.

*I've upgraded the Widow to level 5 recently just to see the stats. With the same mods, (Sniper Scope/Concentration Mod) the Widow's stats are nearly exactly the same, except with more damage.
I've yet to test the Widow in a combat scenario, though, so I haven't chosen one or the other.

 

[omicron1]

I love the Black Widow simply because it reduces the game's arsenal to a single problematic entity. Harvesters, Brutes, anything (Anything!) Cerberus can throw at you... they all go down in 1-3 hits. Banshees are the only thing that even gives me a slight bit of trouble, and they are basically only present for three missions.

So, in short: Maxed Black Widow with damage/headshot-maxed armor-piercing bullets mode (Garrus FTW), the Max Payne-mode addon, and the extra clip space = "win button."

 

[Drizzitdude]

When it comes to single player I just found myself using the maxed out mantis the enitre time. In all honesty the thing is unstoppable on an infiltrator. The only thing I would consider swapping it with is the m-98 widow and even then I kind of prefer the mantis for its weight and comparable damage. I mean really if you put a damage mod on it it almosts maxes the bar.

All those pansy ass multi-shot rifles were dissapointing, the javelin sucks, the incisor is terrible, the vipers damage is laughable. The multi-shot black widow was the only redeeming one in the bunch and I still used the mantis over it.

 

[Elamdri]

Pssht. Who needs weapons when you can just chargenovachargenovachargenova?

Team Vanguard!

GO TEAM VENTUR...VANGUARD!