I'm really hoping this game gets better. I am a level 13 siren, and so far, it has been absolutely abysmal. The loot is basically nonexistant, meaning there isn't enough variation, and it doesn't seem to track with your level as you are doing missions. I did a level 9 mission and got a level 4 weapon as a reward, which is useless. On top of that, I am level 13 and until about an hour earlier than I am typing this, every gun shop, including Marcus, that I have come across in the game has only sold up to level 9 guns. I am finally starting to see some level 11s with a couple 12s here and there, which is better but still sucks. This completely takes the incentive out of playing, as it is a loot driven game. I will explain further.

I am still using white weapons that are terrible, but I just haven't found anything better. I've literally seen less than 10 SMGs the whole game. Yes, seen. None of them were worth a damn, and I still haven't found one I can use. And the variation is ridiculous. About 85% of the weapons I've found in the game have been pistols up until this point. About 80% of those pistols are of the "shoots as fast as you pull the trigger" variety.(trust me, it's not really as good as it sounds, especially when most of them have a 6 round clip) About 15% of the pistols try and double as SMGs. That is, they have a fast rate of fire but usually bad recoil, but they still use pistol ammo, which pisses me off. Why not just give me some damn SMGs? The other 5% are just standard pistols and some quest rewards that were next to useless to me. I've only seen 4 rocket launchers the whole game too. I haven't seen any slag guns or corrosive guns at all. And I've only seen maybe 2 lightning guns, but, of course, they weren't any good. I have, however, seen plenty of fire guns. And when I say "seen", I mean just that. That includes drops from enemies, in chests, and in the shops). That reminds me. Where are all the damn chests? I've seen literally around 10 the entire game. Maybe less actually, because I know I opened some twice after returning to an area for quests.

And I loved the first Borderlands too. I maxed out levels on three of the four characters and enjoyed playing through with all three of them. Somebody that has played please tell me...does it get better? Does decent loot start dropping more frequently? Are there more chests later? Do corrosive, electric and slag weapons drop regularly later on? Is there more diversity in the loot drops, meaning do different types of weapons drop more often and not just pistols? I'm just suffering through the game right now hating every second just hoping that it is going to start getting better.

Sorry for the semi-wall of text, but I just had to rant for a minute. It is really pissing me off. I am not trolling and not exaggerating either. Trust me, I don't wish any of this was even remotely true. I was so looking forward to this game after the first one, but this is ridiculous as this game is failing in the most important aspect. And the first one succeeded so wonderfully at the loot drops. Is anyone else having this problem, or did they just screw it up this bad?

The scaling is fine, you just need to play more...after all you're about two hours into the game or so. The shops have tiers of equipment, they aren't necessarily going to have stuff of your exact level all the time.

Must just be you, then. I am a level 13 Gunzerker and sporting a purple assault rifle and a sweet blue fire SMG that are destroying everything everywhere always.

It's really fun.

Luck of the draw I guess, you also gotta make sure you look in out of the way spots too. I found some crazy shit in random boxes here and there (purple automatic sniper rifle with almost zero recoil....completely badass)

You are just having extremely bad luck. There is a "magic find" percentage for finding better gear from drops, so hopefully it gets better for you as you play further. And those bigger loot chests are just a little bit hidden so you need to look at every cranny of the map. And there is always the option to buy green or better gear from Marcus or you can try the slot machines at Moxxi's. But the latter option involves luck, so I don't know about your chances...

@MB: I've been playing for quite a bit longer than two hours. I'm level 13, not level 3. I've been playing closer to 15-16 hours or so and have done all the side quests available in Sanctuary. I just completed all Lilith's quests except for the one where I have to go kill somebody named "Boll". I think that's the name. And I still have mostly whites, a couple greens, 1 purple, which isn't very good and 1 orange, which also isn't very good. The purple is just slightly better than what I had before, and has some crappy time-to-target. I stopped using the orange because there was a white that dropped of the same level that was far superior. By this point in the first game, I had at least greens and no whites, several blues that were very good, maybe a purple or two, and possibly even some oranges if I was lucky. The scaling is not fine, at least when comparing the two.

15 hours in and level 13? Seriously? That seems really low.

I didn't have any issues.

It's fine for me. I've got 4 legendary items and a ton of purple ones. Level 13 isn't that much, as said you just need to play more. But Gearbox did seem to scale down on the loot, gone are the days where I could find an orange at level 4.

I started my character over and the first boss dropped an orange corrosive pistol that I used for several levels. I seem to pick up mostly pistols. Found one sub machine gun, but a good variety of the other types. No rocket launchers. I've found lots of greens and a few blues. Lots of elemental weapons. Maybe try a new character and see if the drops change?

There are quite a few chests in the game, but some of them are "hidden" - placed out of direct line-of-sight from the main path.

As for loot, I have great weapons. It's a little slow - you won't get really good weapons until you get to about Lv. 20~22. Also, playing with others makes more (and better) guns drop.

Perhaps you're just unlucky?

@MB: I'm not trying to sound like a jerk, but have you played the game? There is no way you could get to level 13 in two hours. It would take you at least that long to get to Sanctuary. And that would just be with some minor exploration and doing the sidequests for Hammerlock(I think I spelled that right). However, I am playing by myself and have not, nor do I intend to, play co-op. Maybe if you have 4 people you could shave off some time by killing enemies faster, but 2 hours to level 13 seems basically impossible. Even if you were one-shotting every enemy, the travel time going through each area when doing sidequests would take substantially longer than 2 hours, and that's not taking into account any exploration, inventory management(deciding which items to keep or get rid of), as well as visiting all the different shops periodically or even gambling at the slot machines or talking to the people in Sanctuary. I'm gonna have to call some BS on that. I might have believed 8 or 9 hours which is about half of what I said. If you got really lucky with the drops(which clearly I didn't)and stayed focused on the mission without exploring hardly at all, I could potentially believe that. But 2 hours? There's no way.

I've been rolling in amazing guns since the start of the game. Also I hit level 20 at around 12 hours played. I'm not sure what it is you're doing wrong. I will say that the game didn't start dropping SMGs until around level 6 or 7 but, really, they're the second most niche weapon after bazookas which show up last. And you shouldn't write off the Jacobs revolvers, especially as a Siren. Because of their incredibly fast fire rate and generally speedy reload time, you should be able to kill most Badasses in a single Phase Lock as long as your aim doesn't suck. Just Lock, dump a clip, reload if necessary, then dump another clip. It's served me well from level 6 (or thereabouts, can't remember when I got my first revolver) and still works wonders now that I'm 28. Even Towering Ultimate Super Mega Awesome Goliaths are a joke.

@rebgav: I definitely check the stats first, but lower level weapons generally have lower stats. Not always, but a level 10 is probably going to be better than a level 4. I was just using level in this case to make the point that playing through an area where you should be level 10 for a side mission and getting level 4 weapons is a bit ridiculous. Even when I do find weapons of the same level as me, they are still usually garbage. I think I am just getting super unlucky in this game compared to the first.

@StarvingGamer: First, I do have one fast firing pistols. I wasn't saying the "fire as fast as you pull the trigger" guns are ALL bad, but many of them are just vender trash, which could be said about most weapons in an loot based game. This also goes for the "fire as fast as you pull the trigger" assault rifles. Those also drop more than any other type of assault rifle. However, the major point was that the vast majority of the guns I am getting (85%) have been pistols, and the majority of those have been this type of pistol. That is extremely irritating. In Borderlands 1, there was a rather substantial amount of variety in the guns from the start. I didn't even use pistols at all in the first game, except for the first part where you start with one. There were just so many other guns that seemed to outmatch them. It was an option in that game to use them or use other guns, and I "chose" not to use them. In this game, it's like they're trying to force you to use pistols, which is really aggrivating, since I still prefer other guns.

MB is closer with h

@StarvingGamer: I forgot to ask. Are you playing co-op or solo?

MB is closer with h

I agree. I haven't found a single weapon I really like and I'm level 18 now. It's really a damper on the whole experience, especially after seeing so many awesome guns in the gameplay videos before the game came out.

@MB said:

The scaling is fine, you just need to play more...after all you're about two hours into the game or so. The shops have tiers of equipment, they aren't necessarily going to have stuff of your exact level all the time.

I think you may be exaggerating good sir! =P

@Tyrrael said:

@MB: I've been playing for quite a bit longer than two hours. I'm level 13, not level 3. I've been playing closer to 15-16 hours or so and have done all the side quests available in Sanctuary. I just completed all Lilith's quests except for the one where I have to go kill somebody named "Boll". I think that's the name. And I still have mostly whites, a couple greens, 1 purple, which isn't very good and 1 orange, which also isn't very good. The purple is just slightly better than what I had before, and has some crappy time-to-target. I stopped using the orange because there was a white that dropped of the same level that was far superior. By this point in the first game, I had at least greens and no whites, several blues that were very good, maybe a purple or two, and possibly even some oranges if I was lucky. The scaling is not fine, at least when comparing the two.

I'm the same, done all the side-quests available and just finished all of Lilith's and I'm sitting around level 13-14 and that's roughly 9-11 hours I'd say. The loot has been iffy at times and some rewards have been several levels lower than what I have. The first few hours were 70% pistols and the rocket launchers only just started appearing, at the same level as my friends which makes me wonder if it locks certain types of loot back behind level walls. I'm finding that a lot of drops from bosses and such ending up being coloured, but still pretty crap. I think the game is spreading things out a little more so you don't get the best stuff at the start and end up bored by the end.

@StarvingGamer said:

I've been rolling in amazing guns since the start of the game. Also I hit level 20 at around 12 hours played. I'm not sure what it is you're doing wrong. I will say that the game didn't start dropping SMGs until around level 6 or 7 but, really, they're the second most niche weapon after bazookas which show up last. And you shouldn't write off the Jacobs revolvers, especially as a Siren. Because of their incredibly fast fire rate and generally speedy reload time, you should be able to kill most Badasses in a single Phase Lock as long as your aim doesn't suck. Just Lock, dump a clip, reload if necessary, then dump another clip. It's served me well from level 6 (or thereabouts, can't remember when I got my first revolver) and still works wonders now that I'm 28. Even Towering Ultimate Super Mega Awesome Goliaths are a joke.

It doesn't seem like there's any way to check but that time and level seems kinda crazy. I don't see how you can do it wrong either, aside from maybe taking it a bit slower? Surely not that much though. I do agree that the Phaselock/Revolver combo is damn useful and it's saved my ass on many occasions. I've found the best use of Phaselock ends up being getting easy and quick critical hits to take out the stronger opponents rather than locking them down and focusing on other monsters.

Strange. I'm constantly finding reasonable loot, and I change my core weapons every couple of hours because I stumble across something far better.

Stop doing areas with low levels mobs. I get gear all the time that I cant even use for 1-3 levels.

Quest loot: will always be rewarded based on the level of the quest, not your level.

Vendors: update based on main quest progression, so if your main quest is only progressed up to say lvl 25, the vendors in town will only sell lvl 24 loot, even if you personally are lvl 27+. Sanctuary vendors update as you progress the main quest. (Moxxi's slots work the same)

The starting area before you get to sanctuary does tend to have a lot of handguns in crates, that said i was already using AR's sniper, rifles, smgs, shotguns befoe i got to sanctuary, from shopping around and quest rewards. The drops do even out further on.

I recommend not checking out our Gun Club thread or you will be even more upset :(

I had some god-awful luck with loot for a very, very long time. Were it not for Moxxi's slot machines, I still wouldn't have a single gun that I actually like, and that's with some refreshing and waiting around for vendors to change out their inventories on top of re-killing bosses whenever possible.

Also, Corrosive, Slag and Shock weapons are pretty much barred from making an appearance until you hit around level 14 or 15 at the least, as far as I can tell. Fire and Explosive were dime-a-dozen, but I found all of one corrosive gun in my first 14 or so hours with the game, and it was the only one I saw for the next three after that as well. Just try to progress the story and hope you find something not-terrible, and never be afraid to slaughter bosses a few times to see if you can get lucky.

@Tyrrael: The loot didn't really start picking up for me until late teens, early twenties. Not sure if it was a function of my having played alone for most of the early bits of the game, or my having stuck to lower-level missions with a completionist attitude of clearing out entire regions before moving on.

Basically, I've had better luck just sticking with missions at or just above my level. Also, playing with dudes and dudettes helps, even if you occasionally run into the types who just pillage everything without leaving goodies behind for the other players in the party. I hit a big jackpot around 24 or so after a big boss encounter.

In the original borderlands I had really bad luck (especially at first) I think I was in the mid 20's before I even saw a weapon with an effect on it, this time around though one of the first guns that dropped for me was an orange pistol that shoots corrosive damage.

I think you've just had bad luck.

Quest loot: will always be rewarded based on the level of the quest, not your level.

Vendors: update based on main quest progression, so if your main quest is only progressed up to say lvl 25, the vendors in town will only sell lvl 24 loot, even if you personally are lvl 27+. Sanctuary vendors update as you progress the main quest. (Moxxi's slots work the same)

I played a majority of the first 15 or so hours with a friend, and while the loot wasn't fantastic, it was reasonable as I was still regularly finding new replacements for what I had.  I've played the last 5 or 6 hours solo and the loot has been terrible. Almost every weapon is white, and the greens and blues that do drop seem way weaker than what they should be, even when most of what drops is several levels below me. I haven't had any trouble finding good shields or grenade mods, however.  I've been using mostly the same stuff for awhile now, none of which I'm truly happy with. I also have yet to see a legendary weapon.
 
I think this game has the same problem the first one did, which is that it's really easy to over-level in the first playthrough and nothing scales properly. I'm level 24 at this point, but all the quests for the past 5 hours I've been playing have been at the 19 to 21 range. It seems like there are way too many quests that sit at a particular range for too long, and that the main story quests scale too slowly. Where this game differs from the first is that it's actually quite a bit harder. Playing solo at least, it can be pretty easy to go into an area with enemies several levels below you and still get your ass kicked. But for coming out of a fight, you're rewarded with worthless vendor trash instead of something useful.

I'm rolling in blues and purples and I'm only level 20. I also usually play co-op and I have the pre order relic that increases the magic find by 5% so that probably helps. I've found amazing guns ranging from level 5-12 that I kept in my safe because they are too good not to pass on to another character.

One of my best low level guns is this handgun with something like 50x2, a very large clip, very accurate, very fast firing rate, and a little scope. I used it up until I picked up that corrosive handgun from Tiny Tina that was basically an upgraded corrosive version of it.

There was also this lv 5 shotgun that blew everything away even around level 10.

@Tyrrael said:

@MB: I'm not trying to sound like a jerk, but have you played the game? There is no way you could get to level 13 in two hours. It would take you at least that long to get to Sanctuary. And that would just be with some minor exploration and doing the sidequests for Hammerlock(I think I spelled that right). However, I am playing by myself and have not, nor do I intend to, play co-op. Maybe if you have 4 people you could shave off some time by killing enemies faster, but 2 hours to level 13 seems basically impossible. Even if you were one-shotting every enemy, the travel time going through each area when doing sidequests would take substantially longer than 2 hours, and that's not taking into account any exploration, inventory management(deciding which items to keep or get rid of), as well as visiting all the different shops periodically or even gambling at the slot machines or talking to the people in Sanctuary. I'm gonna have to call some BS on that. I might have believed 8 or 9 hours which is about half of what I said. If you got really lucky with the drops(which clearly I didn't)and stayed focused on the mission without exploring hardly at all, I could potentially believe that. But 2 hours? There's no way.

I've been playing for 3 hours (according to Steam) and I'm level 15. The early levels go by really fast, I can't see how you COULDN'T get into the teens in two hours. 13 hours seems crazy... Have you just left it on the pause screen for ten hours?

My first playthrough is going really slow too. Level 24 and 22 hours played.

If you want better loot, don't do every side quest and start progressing through the story a bit faster and getting to higher level areas. You'll get better stuff

I'm at level 14 after about 10 hours of play with commando (first playthrough). The loot I've gotten so far is about what I'd expect. I haven't gotten that one great weapon yet but I've picked up two nice sniper rifles and an excellent SMG. Every so often I find a gun that I end up using for a couple of levels and then I'll find something better to replace it.

I definitely agree with the people who say to play the main story if you want to get better loot. I was trying to do a lot of side missions early on and found that the loot just wasn't worth it when the quests were below my level.

I've had zero issues with it. Weird enough, I got a legendary within the first 2 hours and still using that weapon at level 16.

@EpicSteve said:

I've had zero issues with it. Weird enough, I got a legendary within the first 2 hours and still using that weapon at level 16.

I haven't even SEEN a Legendary yet and I have a Level 40 character on True Vault Hunter mode.

One of the things I've noticed is that I'm not finding much loot that is better then my current gear. I'm at level 17-18 and...

It seems as if I've kept the same shotgun, pistol, launcher and sniper rifle for a long time. The only thing that has changed with some regularity is the shield I have equipped.

@Tyrrael said:

@MB: I stopped using the orange because there was a white that dropped of the same level that was far superior.

Please stop lying. It doesn't help your argument.

@ZoDD said:

@Tyrrael said:

@MB: I stopped using the orange because there was a white that dropped of the same level that was far superior.

Please stop lying. It doesn't help your argument.

What, that hasn't happened to you before?

If you're level 13 and have only found 10 loot chests then you are playing with your eyes closed.  It's silly to complain about the loot when you're not doing your due diligence in finding the things that distribute the loot.

I agree but not to the extent that you have it here. There is just not that 1 awesome gun. It's not how the game works. They have to dangle the carrot.

All my best stuff has come as quest rewards. I love opening big loot boxes, but the BIG payoff is yet to come.

So far I bought one launcher from a vending machine. Most of your stuff will be from quest or chest.

If you have the preorder chest key, I would recommend using it right when you get to Sanctuary the first time. You'll get some nice purples that will take you through the next bit of the game.

@ZoDD: I can't tell if you're trolling, but I'll explain nontheless. I got an orange sniper rifle that fired 5 shots at the same time, each doing 50 damage for a potential damage total of 250, at the cost of only one round. Seemed really good so I used it for a while. The problem is that the damage is very inconsistent. If you are too far away, several of the shots will almost always miss if you go for a head shot, and if you are off center, like closer to the top of the head rather than dead center, some of the shots will also miss even at relatively close range. This goes for shooting anywhere too. Grazing the body can also result in a lot less damage as only maybe 1 or 2 of the 5 shots will hit. And going for all body shots with a sniper rifle seems like a waste, which it is in this case, so I'll explain. I then picked up a white sniper that had a flat 155 damage rating. It had a faster rate of fire, less recoil, much faster reload time, and the same number of rounds per clip. While the orange had potentially more damage, the white had much more consistent damage, especially with head shots and moving targets. If I went for nothing but body shots, the orange would probably be the way to go, but it still does less damage per second when hitting nothing but criticals, since the white gun has better stats all around except for the potential damage, which I explained why it really wasn't as great as it seemed.

I'm not saying all oranges are going to be like this, but this gun is deceptively bad. It seems like it would be great, but it isn't consistent enough with the damage output to warrant using it regularly over another standard single shot gun.

I'd appreciate it if you didn't call me a liar without at least attempting to explain why the statement you quoted is so hard to believe, as I think I've backed up that statement pretty well right here.

@Spoonman671: I have done my due diligence looking around for stuff in each new area I come to, and the chests seem very less common, at least when compared to the first game. However, apparently I'm not that far into the game, as some people are reaching the teens in level in just a matter of a couple hours. So maybe the chests will start becoming more common when I delve into the story a bit further.

The loot has generally been sprinkled around nicely. For me purples are exceedingly rare, but it only makes it all the more gratifying to find or be rewarded with one. Oranges I've only found two of, though weirdly enough I got them both via the slot machine. A great variety of Grenades and shields are in heavy supply, though.

The one aspect of the loot I'm a bit frustrated with is the class mods. I barely ever find any decent mods for my Siren, and when I do they're usually buffing up skills from the other two trees - I'm currently investing exclusively towards Cataclysm. The most annoying thing is I've come across dozens of great class mods for the other classes, especially the Commando.

15 hours in and level 13? Seriously? That seems really low.

@morrelloman: Wow, that is very surprising. First, the chests I've opened almost always have nothing but white pistols. It's driving me crazy. Aside from that,everything, and I mean everything, that I've gotten as a quest reward has been garbage, except for maybe the shield I got from Lilith. I haven't had a chance to try it out though, and it's stats really aren't better than the one I have. It's the special property that I wan't to see if it is worthwhile. Also, it's not that the items were "ok but what I had was better" either. They were all literally unusable at the level I was at when I received them. There were some guns that did one third the damage my current gun had done of the same type, and the shields literally had 100-200 less capacity. I have come to the conclusion that I am just getting ridiculously unlucky. I think I'll probably play into the 20s for level, as a lot of people have said the loot starts getting better at that point.

@Tyrrael

I'm level 20 and I've just now finally found a new sniper that does about 500 damage with elemental added to it. I've had the same 100 damage fire damage sniper since about level 13 simply because I rarely ever get sniper drops. This is especially weird since I play Zer0 and you'd think maybe there would be some algorithm that would drop weapons more geared towards your class. I dunno maybe Zer0 is all about shotguns and I've been playing the game wrong as thats the primary weapon I always find. I do tend to find mainly assassin specialization kits so thats nice at least.

Still to go that long without finding a new sniper is kind of awful especially considering how I've dumped a lot of points into the sniper tree.

The concept of "trash loot" completely baffles me to this day. In games like Diablo 3 or Borderlands, all these guns that drop and are way worse than anything you're using now - whats the point? It's just clutter and a waste of time for the player. I'm here to have fun, give me fun guns to play with. Why can't all guns have awesome and zany effects? At level 20 why do mobs still drop pistols with no elemental effects and 50 base damage? Will the game be too easy?

In addition to this, some quests, or most quests actually give complete trash rewards. The best reward I have gotten from questing was the Lilith jobs where I got an awesome Firehawk shield that constantly blasted 700 dmg Novas while my shields were down. That shield basically automatically brought me back from the dead anytime I got knocked down and I even purposefully ran into enemies to get my shields depleted and blast everyone around me. It was such a great shield that I kept using it, despite the pathetic 300 shielding it provided well past it's prime when other basic white drops were offering 800 shielding. This is the only case though. No other quest, no matter how involved, has given me anything close to something as good. That fun quest with the AI core you lug around left and right and then get to choose a gun or a shield in the end? Pretty long quest I'd say as you have to go through that entire base all over again - the gun I got apart from the novelty "side effect" was kind of shitty stat wise. That was a lot of running around for basically trash loot, and that should never happen.

That said when I DID finally find that new sniper, and it even had a new body model that I haven't seen before with a crazy paint job - going from a 100 dmg sniper to a 500 dmg one was awesome. Those sort of moments make it really worth it, but sometimes the in-between time drags on way too long.

I'm not always getting godly loot but if I play for an hour I'm likely to come across multiple drops that have me checking stats and replacing weapons.