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The Bazaar Guide

The Bazaar Meta Builds (Patch 0.1.3)

Overview: State of The Bazaar's Meta

The latest patch brought forth many fundamental changes to the mechanics of the game. Since the update, players are given four items to choose from, but no longer begin with a skill. This helps balance out fights in the first couple of days as the power gap isn’t determined by whoever was lucky enough to get a good starting skill.

In addition to the starting changes, the biggest impact is the introduction of specific loot item level-up rewards. Burn and Poison builds heavily relied on their starting skill in order to be competitive. However, with the update they now have easy access to Cinders and Extracts and can more consistently scale to insane levels.

Loot items that scale Burn and Poison are so much stronger than their Weapon Damage counterparts, as their damage over time accelerates and compounds with every additional point. On top of that, many Ammo Weapons received heavy nerfs to their base Damage values, making their burst output even slower than Burn/Poison builds.

All of these changes have left multi Weapon builds in a tough spot. Their Damage output just pales in comparison, unless you manage to acquire the game’s new best skill; Augmented Weaponry.

augmented weaponry skill

If you happen to get the lucky drop from the Tent City Mayor PvE Encounter, you absolutely can and should play a multi Weapon build. It’s by far one of the strongest available strategies right now.

Overall, while there are still viable builds for each hero, both Vanessa and Pygmalien have some consistency problems. A big part of this is due to the lack of rerolls, but more importantly the delay of Large item vendors. With Pol (Sells Large items) not showing up in the earlier days and only offering three items, builds that rely on a key Large item are much harder to work towards.

On the other hand, if you’re a Dooley main, you’re in for a great time. You now have a ton of great early game items, and most of them are strong enough to carry your entire run. And to top it off, if you’re playing Poison, any Weapon build that isn’t fast enough can’t touch you thanks to Corrosive Toxins. Dooley is the biggest winner by far in this patch!

Vanessa

With the removal of Pufferfish and the heavy nerf to Ammo Weapons, Vanessa builds have shifted towards the more reliable single Weapon core. It’s a Damage race against all the Burn/Poison builds, but she can have a real tough time against Corrosive Toxins.

This is a tough time to play Vanessa. Either you high roll Augmented Weaponry, or you try to piece together a one Weapon build that’s fast enough to race Dooley’s Poison.

Augmented Weaponry Weapons

Augmented Weaponry redefines what’s good. It offers scaling that can benefit items immediately, along with whatever you find in the future. The actual builds can vary as they are defined by the skill more than the items. Low Cooldown items are a great choice, as are Multicast Weapons like Cutlass and Double Barrel.

This build thrives on snowballing an early start. The longer the run goes, the crazier things get, as more skills and enchants appear. Anything that can withstand the initial onslaught and outscale the Damage will give this build a tough time. A Pygmalien with a big Weapon and a ton of Max Health will punish the build’s lack of defence.

Build Guide:

Augmented Weaponry Vanessa

One Weapon Crow's Nest

These builds take advantage of Silencer + Crow's Nest to create a low Cooldown Lifestealing combo. This gives enough sustain to either outlast the opponent, or eventually outscale them (with help from Weapon skills). Flagship, Cutlass, Rifle, Sniper Rifle, and Katana are some common examples.

The biggest counter to a one Weapon build is Slow and Freeze. If you happen to get the Radiant enchant, the next worst thing is Corrosive Toxins. You’ll be hard pressed to outscale the debuff, and even if you can, you lose the race against Poison.

Build Guides:

Weather Glass

Weather Glass builds are Vanessa’s current best option to play Burn or Poison. It takes great advantage of both Cinders and Extracts, and with proper Haste support, can be the sole offensive threat of the build. Defensively, it can pick up just about every type of Freeze skill, as it inherently has access to multiple ability types (Burn/Poison/Slow/Freeze).

While Weather Glass builds apply a ridiculous amount of damage over time, they are a bit slow out of the gate. The biggest weakness are faster builds that either deal a ton of burst Damage, or apply their Burn/Poison much faster. Timely and unfortunate targeting Freeze skills can also be detrimental.

Build Guide:

Weather Glass Burn Vanessa

Pygmalien

With damage over time builds running rampant, Pygmalien pivots away from the more defensive Heal and Shield builds. They can no longer keep up with the rate of Burn/Poison, and infinite Healing is far less reliable with the faster speed of the Sandstorm.

Consistency is a big issue for Pyg because he more than any hero relies heavily on Large items. Getting access to these later means less time to scale Property values, and ultimately makes the builds challenging to assemble. Either you go big, go fast, or you go home.

Augmented Weaponry Weapons

Augmented Weaponry is everything you could want from Crook and then some. Pick from the many great options in Pyg’s item pool, or even throw together an arsenal of Small Weapons. Pyg’s Economy allows Augmented Weaponry to scale to ridiculous heights, making any build centered around it absolutely insane.

Unlike Vanessa, Pyg’s experience with Augmented Weaponry is a lot more variable, as his item pool better supports extra Damage scaling. With the right set of Weapons you can take on just about anything. The biggest counter would be heavy Freeze builds with either a ton of skills or a nasty enchant that can lock the build out of contention.

Build Guide:

Flamethrower Pygmalien

Big Weapon Max Health

In a meta where Burn and Poison are essentially the “burst” builds, Max Health builds are actually very well positioned. Since most of these damage-over-time builds don’t have strong defensive options, sometimes all it takes is one good whack to get the job done. With enough Max Health, you’ve got plenty of time.

Without a Radiant enchant these builds are extremely vulnerable to disruption. Outside of that, the next biggest hurdle are builds with big scaling potential. Max Health builds may have a lot of time, but they only have so much pressure. Give enough breathing room to the enemy and they’ll eventually become more than you can handle.

Build Guides:

Crook Medium Weapons

While many Weapons have been nerfed this patch (Crook included), Crook still stands strong and reliable, so long as you can find it. The greater challenge now is acquiring and upgrading the Crook in a reasonable timeframe, as we no longer have access to the Tool vendor until Day Four. With a full board of Medium Weapons it threatens a lot of Damage very quickly. Plus to top it off, Caltrops is a mean counter to all those spammy Poison builds.

Consistency issues aside, Crook doesn’t quite deal the same amount as it once could with its Yo-Yo and Busy Bee variants. This means it can be more easily outscaled if you’re too late into the run. Freeze and Slow tend to be the main counters to really weaken its DPS as many of its Weapons have moderate Cooldowns (aside from Atlatl).

Build Guide:

Crook Pygmalien

Dooley

With Poison at the forefront and Large items becoming harder to acquire, Dooley shifts away from the slower-scaling defensive builds in favor of Hasty Friends and the newly buffed Rays. The level-up changes have greatly favored Dooley as both Burn and Poison are very viable.

Dooley is incredibly well positioned right now, as the biggest threats are either high roll Augmented Weaponry builds or even better Dooleys. And even those that oppose will still fall to the right skills or tech items.

Companion Core Monitor Lizard

Companion Core + Monitor Lizard combined with Dooley’s many “on Core use” items creates an insanely fast burst of Poison. It’s arguably the strongest build in the game, and with skills like Corrosive Toxins or Titanium Casing it can survive against most contenders. There are many effective variants available, some involving the likes of Race Carl or Rays. But at the heart of it all, there’s still Monitor Lizard.

This build will beat just about everything it encounters. Its most common threat is the mirror, but otherwise would need to face a high roll Augmented Weaponry build or some turbo Freeze enchant shenanigans.

Rays

Full Ray builds have ridiculously fast scaling and can easily disrupt the enemy with items like Beta Ray and/or Cool LEDs. Its strength is in its flexibility to adapt, as multiple Cores and supporting items are viable. Dooley has a lot of great Small items, allowing the build to make adjustments on the fly depending on the hero matchup.

Your mileage will vary depending on which Rays variant you are playing. However, the typical contenders will usually involve faster Monitor Lizard or Force Field builds. Augmented Weaponry high rolls will also be tough since Rays need time to scale.

Build Guide:

Full Rays Dooley

Companion Core Dinos

A much rarer build to assemble, but has the ability to completely dismantle the enemy. Freeze skills can halt the opponent long enough until the destruction happens, and after that the Dinos can finish their meal. Mass item destruction is almost an ensured victory so long as you don’t die during the process.

Skills will play a big factor here, especially those that apply at the start of combat. A fast enough Monitor Lizard will leave too much Poison to where item destruction doesn’t even matter. Outside of that, Freeze and Slows are a huge problem without access to Radiant enchants.

Build Guide:

Double Dino Dooley