Guide on What to Buy as PFCs 3e -NEW VENDOR EDITION-

[Ttly]

PFCs get 45 points to spend on stuff in their vendor inside prep, the price of the item varies and will be listed next to them.
Almost all of the items listed are available from requisitions as well, albeit some are in very limited amounts.

RESTRICTED FIREARMS
These are various non-standard guns, most of them are niche and or their use might be specific than the general weapons.

-VP78 PISTOL (10 POINTS):
Comes with 1 VP78 pistol (preloaded) and 2 magazines (14 bullets each) for it.
Pricey, a pistol that hits like a revolver, has decent AP, firerate too, and can burst fire.
The amount of ammo that comes from this kit really makes it too limiting to use, so get more from the req vendors if you really insist on using it.

-SU-6 SMARTPISTOL (15 POINTS):
Comes with 1 SU-6 smartpistol (preloaded) and 2 magazines (15 bullets each) for it.
Niche, a pistol that has IFF which means you can shoot through other people with it, it shoots really quick too but that just leads to people who use it running out of ammo instantly, mostly missing too.
Saying that, it's actually rather weak, although it does have some AP to help against armored xenos.

-M41AE2 HEAVY PULSE RIFLE (30 POINTS):
Comes with the titular heavy pulse rifle (preloaded) and two magazines, one regular, one holo-rounds. The holo-rounds do less damage and only have 200 ammo in a magazine but debuffs xenos, making them take more damage while they glow.
Meh, the HPR has 300 ammo magazines, but other than that it's strictly regular ammo M41.
Its particular niche comes in being able to shoot through other marines when deployed with a bipod, sounds useful but there are a lot of things to consider:
Deploy time of bipod (if not using rack/portacades), someone pushing you thus undeploying the bipod, and damage falloff.
These drawbacks hinders its use in offensive ways, but you can always just use it without a bipod and treat it like a less accurate fat M41 with really space efficient ammo storage and less damage per hit.

-M79 GRENADE LAUNCHER (30 POINTS):
Only used to shoot baton slugs.
Comes with the grenade launcher, and 3 grenade boxes of 3 variety, each containing 3 nades.
Said grenades being:
=Baton slug: A weaker version of the shotgun slug that inflicts temporary slowdown and stuns smaller xenos that it hits and is reusable. The damage is marginal at best and so is the stun, only useful for annoying xenos.
=Star shell: Shoots out a spread of flares when it lands. Lighting up a wide area for shorter time than actual flares. Useful, but not something that would go amiss.
=Hornet shell: Meh, like the AGM-F except a bit weaker, and inflicts a holo-targeting debuff that increases damage taken by a xeno by negligible amount.
The grenade launcher itself can only shoot 1 grenade at a time and over other marines and xenos like the UGL.
It can also load regular M40 grenades.
Other than shooting the baton slug, it doesn't do anything an UGL M41A can't.

EXPLOSIVES
These comes in a box containing three grenades, the boxes are normal-sized which means you can put the box inside your satchel instead for better storage efficiency instead of taking the nades out.

-M40 AND ITS VARIATIONS (20 POINTS):
These grenades are generally used with the UGL, throwing them by hand gives a 5s fuze, whereas the UGL sets the fuze as 2s in addition of being able to launch it over mobs.

=HEDP: Decent, 5x5 explosion that stuns anything that get caught, not for much damage and for shorter stun the farther it is from the center.
=HIDP: Meh, diamond shaped 5x5 green fire (weak), generally only used to clear up resin, eggs, etc. than any serious area denial.
=HPDP: Meh, a rather large 9x9 smoke that disperses in a second that sets anything on (weak) fire that gets caught in it. Being set on fire denies a xeno of any heal and lits them up though, so usually they'll back off even if the fire is weak.
=HSDP: Niche, 9x9 smoke that persists for about ten seconds, its only actual use is against human enemies as xenos are practically unimpeded by the smoke. Costs 5 points instead.

-M74-AGM AND ITS VARIATIONS (15 POINTS):
These grenades are only usable with the UGL or the M79 grenade launcher and bursts in the direction they are launched into. Potentially into your own face if it bounces off a wall.

=FRAG: Good, if hard to use, launches shrapnels into said general direction, potentially doing more damage than buckshot if it lands straight in front of a xeno, but not if it lands right over them.
=INCENDIARY: Decent, launches less shrapnels but they're flaming shrapnels, also leaves a small cone of fire.
=HORNET: Meh, like the frag variation except a bit weaker, and inflicts a holo-targeting debuff that increases damage taken by a xeno by negligible amount.

-M20 CLAYMORE BOX (20 POINTS):
Niche, comes inside a normal-sized box of four claymores.
Each claymore needs to be placed in a direction, you can also disarm them with a security access tuner, and xenos can slash them to detonate them harmlessly.
You need to place them in narrow areas and/or hide them, and actually watch over them, as when a xeno triggers it, the claymore would explode in a directional shrapnel and doing a small explosion stun which is most useful when actually watched over as it won't kill xenos by itself generally.

AMMUNITION
Ammo magazine for various guns. All of these costs 10 points.

L42A AP: Meh, 25/magazine, these uses the same ammo as M41A AP, which means you can refill them with loose ammo from them.
M41A AP: Good, 40/magazine, they're your best way to damage armored bigger xenos, you can also refill these with loose ammo from Mk1 M41A magazines available from req.
M41A EXT: Meh, 60/magazine, regular ammo, you can also refill them with loose ammo from regular magazines if you'd like to reuse them once empty.
M39 AP: Good, 48/magazine, the SMG's fast firerate and low wield slowdown allows them to chase down bigger xenos and these allows them to do a lot of damage against them.
M39 EXT: Meh, 72/magazine, but they're regular ammo, useful if you hate reloading for some reason. Refillable with ammo from regular magazine if you want to reuse them once empty.
M44 HEAVY: Niche, 7/speed loader, they do less damage than regular revolver ammo and can stun smaller xenos, but you do need to be accurate.

UTILITIES
Variety of items with a lot of specific usage, most of them can also be acquired from req proper.
They'll be grouped according to the price range.

5 POINTS:

-ROLLER BED: Used to strap a corpse/living people, including dead smaller xenos which you can then drag at a faster rate than by hand, useful if niche, available on medical lobby.
-FULTON DEVICE: Used to strap balloons into a crate/corpses which can then be picked up by a dropship with fulton module. Mostly useless, as dropships would rather have more points/use the attachment point for something else. Make sure to yell at radio for the PO to pick up the body as they only stay in air for 5 minutes.
-FUEL TANK STRAP POUCH: Stores two flamer tanks/extinguishers, just ask for them from req.
-PORTABLE EXTINGUISHER: Easily acquired from medical MarineMed vendors, has 6 uses with 30u of water in a small size item. Convenient.
-WHISTLE: Makes noise. UNAVAILABLE ON REQ
-WELDING GOOGLES: Allows you to use blowtorches without eventually going blind, not much reason to get these as the only thing you can weld are vents, portacades, and walls unless you take an engineering pamphlet.
Alternatively, you can just get technician helmets from requisitions.
-RADIO KEYS: Insert them into your headset, you can only fit three keys. Individual channels can be turned off by clicking on the headset while it is worn to open its menu.
=ENGINEERING: Used to talk to engis and shipside roles, you could talk about which part of the FoB needs more cades here.
=TACTICS: An unused deprecated channel, if you have some friends who takes them then you can consider it a private channel.
=JTAC: Used to talk to POs/CIC to coordinate for CAS/OBs, also to requisitions, the best key to pick and practically mandatory with laser designator/rangefinder.
=SUPPLY: Used to talk to requisition crew and CIC in a pinch, you could ask for a supply drop right on the frontline with these. Obsolete due to the JTAC key doing the same thing and more.

10 POINTS:

-WEBBING: Good, holds three magazines or small items, goes into your uniform.
-RANGEFINDER: Decent, a binocular where you can laze for coordinates with. Make sure to get JTAC or supply radio key to coordinate OB, mortar, and supply drops with it. You can move while locking your facing while zooming without unzooming. LIMITED ON REQ
-LARGE SHOTGUN SHELL POUCH: Decent, holds 7 handful of shells instead of 5 of the regular variation.

15 POINTS:

-BLACK/BROWN WEBBING: Great, like the webbing but holds only five small items, no magazines.
-LOGISTICS IMP BACKPACK: Good, the storage size of a backpack with the usage convenience of a satchel. REMOVED FOR NON-SYNTHS.
-SENSORMATE MEDICAL HUD: Meh, lets you see health percentage of people wearing uniforms and their defib status. It's not that informative on its own, but still lets you gauge conditions and what to do with a body at a glance without having to right click and check status while standing next to them.
The health bar percentage only tells bodily damage up to 100 damage and tells nothing else such as fractures. UNAVAILABLE FROM REQ.
-LASER DESIGNATOR: Binoculars for lazing CAS and coordinates, if you're only planning to get coordinates for mortar/OBs instead, the rangefinder will do just fine. LIMITED ON REQ.
-LARGE GENERAL POUCH: Meh, holds 3 small items/6 tiny items, alternatively one normal size and 3 tiny items/1 small+1 tiny. You can't store more than one normal-size items inside, and it excludes first-aid kit boxes.
-LARGE MAGAZINE POUCH: Good, holds 4 magazines in a pouch slot, doesn't do something unique though, consider getting the regular magazine pouch from the req vendors.
-SHOULDER HOLSTER: Niche, holds a pistol+2 magazines in your uniform, occupies same slot as the webbing. Get a drop pouch from req instead unless you really need this thing's quickdraw/1 extra magazine.
-MACHETE SCABBARD: Easily acquired from requisitions, the machete itself does more damage against resin structures than knife, don't really try fighting xenos with it though. Fits on suit storage, belt, and back.
-MACHETE POUCH: Easily acquired from requisitions, goes only to a pouch slot and cannot be quickdrawed. Right click and switch drawing method for convenience.
-DATA DETECTOR: Niche, detects items for the DEFCON intel system, bring the items detected into the intel room shipside to process them, or just leave them at the LZ for IOs to bring and process themself. I recommend bringing an empty backpack to collect intel with.
-MOTION DETECTOR: Generally useful, lets you detect whether or not there is a suspicious person/xeno within the range of 7 (short range mode, faster update) or 14 (long range mode, default) tiles.
-JTAC PAMPHLET: Lets you laze quicker using the rangefinder or laser designator. Without these, it could take up to 12 seconds to laze, with them it would only take about 9s instead. LIMITED ON REQ.
-ENGINEERING PAMPHLET: Allows you to use tools (comes separately, print them from an autolathe) to move/dismantle metal (and only metal) cades, also allows you to build and repair metal cades, but not construct folding metal cade. LIMITED ON REQ, YOU CAN ONLY READ ONE PAMPHLET PER LIFE.

30 POINTS:
-B12 ARMOR: Overpriced, marginally better protection than medium armor against acid, slashes, and fractures (same as medium armor against bullets) with 3 item slots for magazines/small items. UNAVAILABLE FROM REQ.

45 POINTS:
-POWERLOADER CERTIFICATION: Pamphlet, allows you to use powerloaders normally and move around with them slowly. Almost no reason to take these unless you want to stay shipside and pretend to be hangar crew. UNAVAILABLE FROM REQ, DOES NOT COUNT AGAINST PAMPHLET READ LIMIT.

WEAPONS VENDOR
These are free.
Firearms have the following attributes which you can check through examining them:
=DAMAGE: How much damage the projectile does on a hit, depends on the ammo. In practice they'll often do less than listed due to various factors such as the target's armor, and bullet falloff.
=RECOIL: How much the screen would shake while you shoot. A non-issue outside of certain guns.
=ACCURACY: How likely it is for the bullet to hit the target if they pass through the tile they are occupying. Non-issue outside of certain guns or builds. Anything under 5 generally can't hit beyond 4 tiles and 20 can't hit well beyond 16 tiles.
=SCATTER: How likely it is for the bullet to deviate from the intended trajectory. Anything above 5 is noticeable.
=RANGE: The maximum tile distance a bullet can travel.
=FALLOFF: How much damage does the projectile loses over each tile they travel through.
=FIRERATE: How fast the gun can shoot.
=ARMOR PENETRATION: How much unit of armor can the bullet ignore.
=ARMOR PUNCH: Deprecated stat, used to determine the amount of damage the projectile does against breakable xeno armor which isn't a thing anymore.

-M41A PULSE RIFLE: Basic, also known as the Mk2, does average everything. The regular ammo has 44 damage and 5 AP, making it do better than the AP ammo except against T3s and defenders. Regular magazine carries 40 bullets, anything more than 3 shots have a good chance to break bones on armored humans, no such effect on xenos though, even runners need more than 10 hits often to kill.
Generally you don't need to care about the accuracy status with it as long as you're wielding it as you fire it.
You can point-blank fire in melee with burstfire to do slightly more damage, though not as much as the M37.

-L42A BATTLE RIFLE: Niche, does more damage per hit than the M41 and has no bullet falloff meaning it'll do more damage than it on distant targets. The magazines however are smaller, being limited to 25 bullets each, and its inability to burst which cannot be adressed with the BFA.
Good as a chase weapon if you remove the stock, as it would slow you down while wielded otherwise. The M41 is better if you want to snipe with, as you can't really chase with scope guns to finish off wounded xenos and the best you can do is scare xenos by hitting them, although if you do want damage while scoping the L42 is still the superior option.
The L42 can also attach the smart-scope which allows it to shoot through other marines as its unique trait though. You can also refill the L42 magazines with the same bullets as M41.

-M39 SUBMACHINE GUN: Meh, shoots faster than the M41, but less damage per hit and shorter range, along with noticeable inaccuracy and scatter even while wielded. Used as a glorified melee weapon as it does shoot significantly faster in burst.

-M37A2 PUMP SHOTGUN: The best, defined by its ammo, the gun itself mainly matters in what attachment it is used with.
=SLUG: The weakest option, turning the shotgun into a slow-firing rifle, the slug itself isn't that bad as it does do good damage and has AP but it's not why you are using the shotgun.
=BUCKSHOT The reason why people use the shotgun, doing good damage and stunning non-T3 xenos on a hit, the main way to use it is to shoot point-blank on a xeno, to point-blank fire you need to be on harm intent and be clicking on the target's sprite. The main drawback of the buckshot however is its lack of AP which greatly neuter its damage against armored xenos.
=FLECHETTE: Niche, having more range than the buckshot while doing less damage and no stun. It is an interesting alternative, although in the end, it doesn't do more damage against most armored xenos in melee due to its lower damage, it does do more damage against the heaviest armored xenos (crusher, defender) than buckshot though.


SIDEARMS:
You can store them in various storage spaces, most of them can also be shot accurately one-handed, though they do have significantly shorter range and more falloff, making them only good in melee for the most part.

-M4A3 SERVICE PISTOL: Good, shoots really fast and does good damage with decent AP. The main shortcoming being the small magazine. The regular ammo is the best for it generally.

-88 MOD 4 COMBAT PISTOL: Usable, large magazine, decent damage with AP, and burst capability, you can consider it direct upgrade than shooting with the M41 with regular bullets against armored xenos as it does comparable damage to M41 with AP, though keep in mind that it still has smaller magazine and less range. Excellent for killing yourself with its burst and AP ammo.

-M44 COMBAT REVOLVER: Niche, it does good damage per hit even with regular ammo, though the main draw being the marksman ammo which has no falloff, increased accuracy, and AP which makes it rather lethal against either xenos or humans alike. Other uses include knocking xenos down with the heavy ammo which could knock down even T2s, and using the smartscope/scopes or attaching a bayonet, but even with zoomed in scopes you can only reliably hit targets 5-7 tiles away unless you use marksman ammo.

-M82-F FLARE GUN: Niche, can be loaded with a regular or signal flare, comes with a built-in miniscope. You can load and shoot it one-handed which is the quickest way to light up an area as flares shot through this are brighter than hand lit ones. The miniscope is a good bonus, you can use the scope without a flare though you still need to wield it. You can also shoot a human/xeno point blank with flare to set them on fire, though it's only as strong as welder fire.

UTILITIES:

-M5 BAYONET: Essential, mainly used for cutting weeds, damaging resin structures, and taking out shrapnel from your body (activate the knife while it is on your active hand to do this), can also be attached to the gun to do more melee damage when whacking with said guns, though the knife attacks faster while it is used by itself than it does while attached to a gun. If you aren't shooting at anything, cutting down resin structures and weeds is always useful, go for the resin nodes as weeds would die off by itself without them.

-FLARE PACK: Good, eight flares in a normal-sized pack, each flare lasts for 30 minutes until they burn out once they are lit. Load them into flare gun instead for better effect as flares shot using the flare gun emit more light than ones activated by hand. Each flare pack can lit up one screen worth of area, even more if used with the flare gun.

[Ttly]

FREE
This section covers the items that can be picked for free (doesn't cost points) that are also in the vendors.

STANDARD EQUIPMENT:
-BOOTS: Protects feet as much as the medium armor, also stores a knife and starts with one already stored if you get it from the vendor but not from the spare uniform vendor.
-UNIFORM: Slightly protective compared to being naked, webbings and various patches accessory are attached to this. Drag the item from your worn slot into your hand to unequip.
-GLOVES: Protects hands as much as the medium armor, does not protect against shocked doors. You can get colourless (black) variation from the spare uniform vendor.
-HEADSET: Enables squad HUD and communication, say "; Message here." to talk to your squad, use ":g Message here." to use the general channel (shipside only), you can also fit radio keys (up to two) to access more radio channels. Click on it while equipped to disable/enable channels. Drag the item from your worn slot into your hand to unequip.
-HELMET: Protects as much as medium armor, also stores certain small size and tiny size items in its two storage slots. Said items would also show up as cosmetic. Also provides decapitation immunity. You can store a rail light on it and it could illuminate your surroundings, less than the armor light though.
-MRE: One of the most space efficient food item in the game, you can also reuse the water bottle once empty as an alternative to a flask albeit it does not fit into helmet and only stores 50u of liquid. Also comes with cigarettes and matches. Eating restores blood, so it's not a waste to carry it. You can also just eat it as your post-cryo breakfast instead of bothering with the cafetaria food.

ARMOR:
They slow you down noticeably, but they protect against neuro spits slightly. The armor lamp is the second best light source you can have on you, a gun with rail light is brighter, and carrying a flashlight is dimmer.
Armor covers your chest, arm, and legs.
Protection on hand, feet, and head are instead from gloves, boots, and helmet.

-LIGHT: Less slowdown, less protection. You're more likely to get bone breaks which would slow you down if you get hit while wearing these. Has more protection against acid spits.
-MEDIUM: Has three item storage slots for magazines/small items unlike the other armor, nothing much to say. Armor protection stacks with the uniform.
-HEAVY: Good against bullets, only marginally better against slashes and fractures than medium. Also slows you down more. Has even more protection against acid spits than light armor.

BACKPACK:
-BACKPACK: Awkward to use, more storage.
Drag the backpack into your hand slot to take it off then switch active hand and click on it to open, or click on it while it is worn and wait several seconds but you can't move while opening it this way.
Stores: 7 normal size items, or 10 small+1 tiny size items, or 21 tiny size items. You can also take out the last stored item by alt clicking it while worn.
Generally you should always take the backpack, just to fill up with various items and toss into the FOB and leave it there if nothing else due to everyone spawning with backwear already.

-SATCHEL: Very easy to use, just click it on the back slot while it's worn, though some people like to store guns on their backslot instead.
Stores: 5 normal size items, or 7 small+1 tiny size items, or 15 tiny size items.

-SCABBARD: Stores variety of shotguns, not just the M37, assuming you can get your hands on said other shotguns that is. Mostly obsolete due to M37 being wearable on back without this.

BELT:
-AMMO LOAD RIG: Stores 5 magazines/flare/grenades/knives/MRE/ammo handfuls. Right click and switch storage drawing method to immediately take the last item you put on it. Alternatively you can alt+click a container to take the last stored item.
-GENERAL PISTOL HOLSTER: Holds one pistol and six small magazines, can be worn on suit storage with the armor or on the belt.
-KNIFE RIG: Holds 12 knives of various types, starts with 12 throwing knives. The throwing knives has a noticeable amount of damage and AP if you can hit xenos by throwing them. The only way to get throwing knives.
-M39 HOLSTER: Holds one M39 submachinegun, SMGs with folding stock fits on this with no need to fold it. Mostly used by people with unusual loadouts. Certain attachments prevents SMG from fitting.
-M44 HOLSTER: Also known as the revolver holster. Functionally the same as the pistol holster except it can only hold the revolver.
-M82F HOLSTER: Also known as the flare gun holster. Holds two flare packs worth of flares in addition to the flare gun. Theoretically you can use a G8 carrying a flare gun and two flare packs instead, but this is more convenient thanks to its quickdraw capability. Can be worn on suit storage.
Flares shot by the flare gun are brighter than regularly activated and hand thrown flares.
-SHOTGUN SHELL LOADING RIG: Holds 14 handfuls of shotgun shells/loose ammo, click on it with shotgun shell boxes to fill it with shells after a short delay.
-G8-A GENERAL UTILITY POUCH: Holds 5 small/3 normal+1 tiny size items, worn on belt/suit storage. Very useful if you need storage versatility over the ammo belt after you used up some magazines.
-M40 GRENADE RIG: Holds 12 grenades of any kind, not just the M40.

POUCHES:
You can vend two pouches, even two of the same ones.

-BAYONET SHEATH: Stores 5 knives, starts with 5 throwing knives.
-FIRST AID POUCH: Stores four items, only stores gauze roll, ointment, special injectors meant only for it, splints, and pill packets. There are three variations you can get from the vendor.
=INJECTORS: Starts with tramadol, kelotane, bicardine, emergency injectors. Refillable on nanomed except for the emergency injector. Each injector have three uses.
=SPLINTS, GAUZE, OINTMENT: Starts with splints, gauze, ointment, and tricordrazine injector. Generally you should take this one, the tricordrazine injector is also refillable on nanomeds.
=PILL PACKETS: Starts with two tramadol, one kelotane, one bicardine packs, each packs contain four pills. These are unrefillable, but you do get more uses than the injectors. Each pill contains 15u of the drug.

>FIRST AID ITEMS<
You can restock/refill these on a nanomed (except for the emergency injector) by holding them in your active hand and clicking on them. You can also analyze yourself by click dragging the nanomed into yourself while standing next to it. You can also separate stacks of gauze/ointment and restock the newly created separate stack in order to get multiple stacks of them instead of vending them.

==TRAMADOL: Overdoses on 30u, each injection injects 15u, overdose is lethal. Tramadol is a moderate painkiller that lets you ignore damage up to 60 and it lasts 7:30 minutes/15u.
==TRICORDRAZINE: Overdoses on 30u, each injection injects 15u, overdose is often but not always lethal. Heals you for 37.5 damage of all types throughout 2:30 minutes/15u, the heal spreads evenly across limbs.
==BICARDINE: Overdoses on 30u, each injection injects 15u, overdose inflicts burn damage on you and heals internal bleeding. Heals 75 damage of brute damage throughout 2:30 minutes/15u.
==KELOTANE: Overdoses on 30u, each injection injects 15u, overdose inflicts brute damage on you. Heals 75 damage of burn damage throughout 2:30 minutes/15u.
==EMERGENCY: Injects you with 30u bicardine, kelotane, and 20u oxycodone. Oxycodone lets you ignore pain up to 120 damage and lasts half as long as tramadol. Unrefillable.
==SPLINTS: Reduces the effect of broken bones, examine yourself by clicking on your character with an empty hand on help intent to determine which limb has broken bones that needs splinting.
An unsplinted broken head/chest/groin will incur organ damage which can be devastating if unsplinted, a priority.
An unsplinted arm/hand will make you drop items on that hand randomly, the least harmful.
An unsplinted leg/foot will slow you down massively.
Splinting yourself takes 15 seconds, having someone else splint you is faster, 5 seconds. Splints also slows you down, but less so than the slowdown from a broken limb. Splints will break if the limb they are attached to is damaged.
=ROLL OF GAUZE: Stops bleeding and allows your wound on the treated limb to regenerate from brute damage at the rate of 0.1 damage per second unless the limb gets damaged again.
=OINTMENT: Allows your wound on the treated limb to regenerate from burn damage at the rate of 0.1 damage per second unless the limb gets damaged again.

-FLARE POUCH: Convenience, you can throw flares out of their packs without these but it would involve more menu shuffling. Don't forget to bring a backpackful of flare packs to refill this constantly.
-MAGAZINE POUCH: Stores three magazines or any other ammo on a pouch slot.
-SHOTGUN SHELL POUCH: Stores five handful of shotgun shells/loose ammo, very useful if you use the underbarrel shotgun or carry two weapons.
-MEDIUM GENERAL POUCH: Stores one magazine+one small item/two small sized items.
-PISTOL MAGAZINE POUCH: Stores three pistol magazines, obsolete due to the magazine pouch doing the same thing unless you need a pouch that only stores pistol magazines instead.
-PISTOL POUCH: Stores a sidearm.

MASK:
-GAS MASK: Looks cool, protects the head against acid somewhat.
-HEAT ABSORBENT COIF: Looks cool, discount balaclava.
-REBREATHER: Looks cool.

ATTACHMENTS

=BARREL=
-BARREL CHARGER: Good, damage+ (30%, 5% on shotguns), lowers fire rate and accuracy. Excellent on guns with burstfire as bursts make up for the slower firing, not that great on shotguns due to buckshots lack of AP and the low damage bonus for slugs/flechette.
-EXTENDED BARREL: No downside, increases accuracy and projectile speed with no downside. The upsides aren't particularly relevant or noticeable unless you use scope guns though.
-RECOIL COMPENSATOR: Niche, -damage (10%) but noticeably lowers recoil and increases accuracy, especially for one-handed firing. Mostly used on shotguns with buckshot, and the occasional arm brace SMG.
-SUPPRESSOR: Good, increased accuracy, less recoil, scatter, disables muzzle flash and quieter firing sound at the cost of lower damage (10%) and increased bullet falloff, which makes it less useful on scoped guns.
-M5 BAYONET: Good, increases the melee damage to on-par with the knife by itself, also allows you to open unpowered doors while it is attached to a gun (slower than with crowbar), all at the cost of barely noticeable accuracy penalty. However, attacking with a gun in melee is slower than using the knife on a hand, and you can just point-blank shoot with burstfire instead of attacking in melee with a bayonet gun.

=RAIL=
-B8 SMART-SCOPE: Good, lets you shoot through other marines as long as it is attached, only attaches itself to the L42 or the M44 revolver though, and it noticeably lowers your damage (20%), it's a big downside, but the upside is just as big.
Also works as a mini-scope but with a delay to zooming, though it has less accuracy bonus and no falloff reduction.
-MAGNETIC HARNESS: Unique, your weapon will store itself into the suit storage if it is dropped. Generally you can live with macros to pick up your dropped weapon, but even then there are a lot of circumstances where you can't pick up your weapon no matter what you do, this lets you keep your weapon in those circumstances. Albeit at the cost of other rail attachments.
Does not work with most non-armor with suit storage such as jackets.
-S4 2x TELESCOPIC MINI-SCOPE: Niche, you can see six tiles farther than usual while zoomed along with increased accuracy and reduced fallof, but slightly lower fire rate while zoomed, no penalty other than slower movement while wielding otherwise. Also unique in that it can attach to the SMG, although the use for this is rather minimum due to the innate inaccuracy.
You can move and shoot in the direction you are zoomed in too, make sure to use direction lock.
However, due to the nature of most maps, darkness and walls makes it not that good in practice, and you'd have to watch as to not shoot other marines with it, as you can't shoot through them.
-S5 RED-DOT SIGHT: Meh, increases accuracy, practically no downside, but the upside isn't noticeable either.
-S6 REFLEX SIGHT: Good, increases accuracy and reduces scatter.
-S8 TELESCOPIC SCOPE: Niche, also known as rail scope, increases accuracy and reduces bullet falloff while zoomed, lets you see sixteen tiles farther instead of six. But you shoot slightly slower with it attached, and even slower while zoomed. Maps being dark and walls being prevalent along with other marines blocking your line of fire stops it from being anything more than niche. Also despite letting you see 23 tiles ahead of you, you can only reliably hit targets 16 tiles ahead of you.
-RAIL FLASHLIGHT:Good, lets you see farther than the armor's light, don't forget to turn it on. Knowing what's around you is the most important thing there is.

=UNDERBARREL=
-ANGLED GRIP: Good, practically no downside (slight worsening of one-handed shooting), decreases wield delay (delay until you can wield your gun after taking it out of your suit storage), reduces recoil, scatter, and increases accuracy.
-BIPOD: Niche, you shoot slower and less accurate while it is undeployed, however you'll shoot faster and more accurate once it is deployed.
It is important to have an underbarrel macro if you intent to use this as you'll often have to undeploy it to move, and if you move without manually undeploying it you'll be inflicted with temporary slower movement.
Pairs up well with the rail scope to make up for the lack of mobility.
You can deploy it instantly while standing next to tables, windows, racks, and barricades, otherwise you'll need two seconds of standing still to do so. You can shoot in an almost 180 degree with it deployed without it undeploying.
Enables IFF on HPR if deployed.
-BURST FIRE ASSEMBLY: Meh, BFA for short, enables or extends bursts on guns at the cost of accuracy. It's not bad, but it's not amazing either.
-GYROSCOPIC STABILIZER: Niche, mainly used for one-handed shotguns, not much use for anything else, noticeably lowers firerate.
-LASER-SIGHT: Good, zero downsides, increases accuracy and lessen scatter. Mainly used on pistols as the bonuses are mainly for shooting one-handed.
-MINI FLAMETHROWER: Niche, its only use is burning vines, tall grass, and weeds, the damage it does is not noticeable on non-humans, and it shoots slow.
Bring a welderpack or welder-satchel to refill it, and refill them on fuel tanks once they run out.
It is also great to kill other marines with, as the burn damage is often lethal without being overkill, letting the body be defibbed with no broken bones. Just don't forget to bring an extinguisher.
-U7 UNDERBARREL SHOTGUN: Unique, also known as masterkey, loaded with buckshot, does extra damage against walls and doors. Don't bother to try using it as damage source though, you're better off just shooting with the M41 itself as it doesn't decimate non-walls/doors much.
-UNDERBARREL EXTINGUISHER: Niche, mostly seen on flamers, though you can use it on other guns as well, obviously used to put out fire, can also put out acid spits and disable cloaking, doesn't work on acid vomits though.
-VERTICAL GRIP: Meh, even more accuracy than the angled grip but slows you while wielded.
-UNDERSLUNG GRENADE LAUNCHER: Good, you can launch grenades through marines and xenos with this, it is also how you use AGM grenades. The only problem is getting grenades, and that it cannot use the baton slugs like the M79. Grenades launched by the UGL also has a set fuze timer of two seconds instead of the hand thrown five second, making it the most reliable way to use them.
-FLASHLIGHT GRIP: Good, no downsides, increases accuracy, reduces scatter, and lights up as much as the rail flashlight, don't forget to turn it on.

=STOCK=
-M37 WOODEN STOCK: Meh, more accuracy while wielded, less if not, good if you use slugs, but you don't really need it either.
-M39 ARM BRACE: Unique, you can lock it to make the gun undroppable from your hand, it also soups up one-handed firing capability, turning the SMG into an oversized pistol. However, it also makes it practically unusable to shoot two-handed.
-M39 STOCK: Good, even more accuracy than the folding stock. Makes the SMG more usable at mid-range but doesn't help with the bullet falloff.
-M41A SOLID STOCK: Meh, good for burst fires, but it just slows you down, which is a noticeable downside, also increased wield delay.
-M44 MAGNUM SHARPSHOOTER STOCK: Bad, needs to be extended to give its bonuses (slight accuracy bonus) which takes time, also disables shooting while folded. Only use it if you really want to use the revolver as a discount sniper rifle, and even then you can do without it.
-M39 FOLDING STOCK: Meh, do not remove or try to shoot with the stock folded though. Folding it slightly increases one-handed accuracy while worsening wielded shooting, but removing it increases one-handed usability more than folding. Either way, the scatter and the recoil are still there which does not let you use it to a practical degree, so just keep it extended and wield it.
-L42 SYNTHETIC STOCK: Meh, increases wield delay and slows movement while wielded, some people remove it to use the L42 to move and shoot.

REQ EXCLUSIVE
These are only available from the req, you'll have to stand in line and ask for them. Some are also available from the squad req.

-M56D HEAVY MACHINE GUN: Meh, the bullets individually do 35 damage and has 50 AP, but it shoots rather slow, takes time to setup, and leaves you immobile but lets you shoot very slightly farther, and has awful accuracy especially for distant targets. On the upside, you get 1400 ammo which you'd really have to try to run out of, and it can shoot through marines.
You can carry the folded gun on your back, you can also load it before assembling it.
Assemble/Disassemble with screwdriver, once assembled you can rotate it with the wrench even while mounted. Stand next to it and click drag the mount to your sprite to mount it, if it has been set up correctly you'll mount it. Repairable by welding if damaged by slashes.

-M2C HEAVY MACHINE GUN: Hard to use, the bullets individually do 50 damage and has 20 AP, and it shoots extremely fast, and lets you shoot slightly farther. Unlike the M56D, it has no IFF and you'll actually run out of ammo if you use it carelessly, it can also overheat, disabling it temporarily if you shoot too much in a short time, also cannot be set up too close to walls or cades.
Can be devastating if used right, but hard to use as the chances of decimating other marines through FF are just as high.
Can rotate without additional tools. Can be repaired by welding if broken.
Examine it for instructions on reloading, mounting, and dismantling.

-HEAVY MACHINEGUNNER INSTRUCTIONAL PAMPHLET: Meh, sets your engineering skill to 1 if it's lower. What this lets you do is to repair metal cades, or repair them for more health in the portable cade case, use a welder, and don't forget toggling the technician helmet or welding googles, get your hands on industrial blowtorch or a welderpack too as repairing takes a lot of fuel. Does not count against pamphlet limit.

-M804 HEAVYGUNNER RIG: Niche, stores M56D/M2C drums, also most engi tools and extinguishers, pretty much your main way of carrying the ammo for them as the machine guns can only be either stored on your back or carried around by hand, you can get away with using G8 but it has less capacity than this.

-MOU-53 SHOTGUN: Good if you know how to use it, a shotgun that can only load flechette and slugs, three shots, but it shoots really quick.
Experienced players have been known to load flechette, walk right next to an xeno and shoot it all out for massive damage.
Some people uses it with slugs, though it's not as effective in terms of killing even if it really annoys xenos.
The stock is often unused as it increases wield delay and does not help much with flechette.

-M41A PULSE RIFLE MK1: The M41 but often better, has limited attachment options (only masterkey/Mk1 UGL underbarrel, no scopes, no stock, only suppressor or bayonet barrel), and slightly slower fire rate. But in return you get the capability to load 95 ammo Mk1 magazines loaded entirely with AP, the Mk1 underslung grenade launcher however, cannot shoot through neither xenos or marines, making it harder to use.
You can also load Mk2 magazines into the Mk1.

-M44 MARKSMAN SPEED LOADER: Good, significantly increased accuracy and AP without doing less damage, it's pretty much the main reason to use the revolver as without it, the M4A3 is generally better.

-M240 INCINERATOR UNIT: Niche, the fire does actual damage unlike the miniflamer. However, they are still often too weak on its own as actual deterrent against xenos, due to how easy they are to put out, and most would gladly walk through the fire to drag you into it if they can help it, and ravagers along with queens are immune to fire damage.
However, it still makes for decent deterrent against most T2s and T1s on top of fire ignoring xeno armor among other things such as lighting them up and disabling healing.

-M15 FRAGMENTATION GRENADE: Good, bigger explosion than the HEDP and comes with actual damaging shrapnel on explosion. The only downside is that it doesn't load into the UGL, meaning you'd have to time the fuze of 3-5 second to catch something mobile in the explosion even if it is larger.

-PLASTIC EXPLOSIVES: You can use these with engineering skill, mostly used to blow up walls or xeno tunnels, alternatively you can use 3 HEDPs on a tunnel to blow them up.

-DROP POUCH: Meh, attaches to the uniform like webbing, stores the equivalent of 1 normal+1 small sized item. That means you can store a pistol, flare pack, extinguisher, or an MD on it.

-KNIFE WEBBING: Niche, stores 5 knives or throwing knives, if you want to carry as many knives as possible, ask for it. Does not come with knives.

-G4-1 FUELTANK: Niche, has 350u capacity that starts filled with napalm, you can refill it with welder fuel once empty but they're awful, also has three storage slots which can store incinerator tanks (which it refills if you click the backpack with it)/extinguishers.
You can get away with just using a regular satchel with incinerator tanks, which would be less fuel, but you'll have better storage versatility for more extinguisher/tools.

-INCINERATOR TANK: Niche, starts with 100u of napalm, refillable with welder fuel but it is bugged for use with miniflamer so just use welderpacks which aren't bugged if you're using miniflamers.
A direct hit with flamer loaded with napalm does 90 burn damage, the fire inflicts 30 damage per second if you are lit by them.
Meanwhile a welder fuel fire or miniflamer only do 30 burn damage on direct hit, with the fire doing 10 damage per second while having shorter duration.

-TECHNICIAN WELDERPACK: Niche, functionally a backpack with less capacity, carries one less normal-sized item, starts filled with 260u welder fuel. Perfect in tandem with the miniflamer, but you might rather prefer the welder-satchel.
Available from squad req.

-TECHNICIAN WELDER-SATCHEL: Niche, a satchel with less capacity, carries one less normal-sized item, starts filled with 100u of welder fuel, a good pair with the miniflamer but the amount of fuel can be noticeably limiting in the long run.
Available from squad req.

-AUTOINJECTOR POUCH: Amazing, holds 7 autoinjectors, starts empty. Fill them up with injectors from the first aid pouch from squad req and you'll have more doses than you can often use up before needing to refill.

-EXPLOSIVE POUCH: Niche, stores three explosives, including grenades or plastic explosives.

-LARGE PISTOL MAGAZINE POUCH: Good, stores six handful of bullets or pistol magazines, does not include shotgun shells.

-MEDKIT POUCH: Good if annoying to use, stores a medical kit box which has seven storage slots for small sized medical items and various stuff such as drinking flasks or MRE, get an autoinjector pouch instead if you're gonna fill it with injectors.

-TOOLS POUCH: Niche, can carry shovels, and mini-extinguishers other than engineering tools.

-SLING POUCH: Niche, carries certain normal-size and most small-size item, notably motion detector, crowbar, and extinguisher. Item stored snaps back into it when dropped just like magnetic harness weapons would.

-SIGNAL FLARE PACK: Niche, holds 8 signal flares in a normal-size pack, they lit up less area than regular flares and lasts shorter, mainly used for CAS targeting and allows CAS to shoot on unlazeable locations albeit they'll have no vision of the target area which means you need to coordinate with them. Can be loaded into flare guns.
Examine the ground to determine whether or not CAS can shoot into it; it is also possible for CAS to shoot into caves as they are divided into shallow and deep caves but the examine text does not discern this.

-FOLDING BARRICADE: Niche, alsoo known as portable barricades or portacades, can be stacked up to three and carried on the back, each cade are rather fragile and it takes time to fold them up, on top of that you can't stack them if they are damaged. Make sure to get welding googles/technician helmet and welder(s) if you intent to reuse them once deployed. To fold them, click drag the deployed cade sprite into yourself.
Actual engineers can fold them quicker using the wrench and crowbar. They are also repairable without training.
Available from squad req.

-BINOCULARS: Meh, lets you see sixteen tiles farther, often towards nothingness as there are walls and darkness, still useful for locating where other marines are, you can walk while zoomed as long as you lock your facing.
Can be used in tandem with the motion detector for better awareness.

[c4xmaniac]

Meh to the sensor hud and the m39 extended mags but a good to the m39 ap... bro...

[Ttly]

Bro... You can technically just right click check status to check defib status, and EXT mags are literally just regular ones with +50% capacity so theoretically if you can reload quick enough it's a non-issue.

[Paperbell]

While it is expensive without a ton of benefit, I think B12 is a nice brainless option when you don't want to be bothered with choices. It has the melee and internal protection of heavy, the bio protection of light, and storage space of medium. You'll still eventually become a walking splint, but at a slightly slower rate. A lot of the other point items are more complicated and you can mess up really bad with grenades or waste AP magazines with bad aim. Sensorhud also looks cool and it feels satisfying to watch your health tick up over time.

[ObsidianCrow]

Bro... You can technically just right click check status to check defib status, and EXT mags are literally just regular ones with +50% capacity so theoretically if you can reload quick enough it's a non-issue.

nah sensor mate is super important. You can evaluate your team health just by looking so you can make better decisions on weather or not to run or if its time to be aggressive. Also EXT mags have 5 armor piercing now which basically makes them better in AP in all situations except against crushers and t3s you do like 2 or 3 less damage a bullet but you can keep mag dumping so it makes up for it. Also reloading in this game can be fumbled. Thats why the best players can use MOU-53s and DBs super efficiently. So if you're a reloader just use the mou and dont bother with the SMG.

[Ttly]

Alright, good point on the XT mags and sensorHUD I guess, as for the B12 I'd still have to say it's overpriced as while it's a direct upgrade, it doesn't really let you do different stuff that can be gamechanging.

Also, it's 5-8 more damage with AP against 25 armor xenos which all the T3s have than with regular ammo with their 5 AP which is already like 25-30% more damage.
As for the sensorHUD, I'm afraid that the healthbar is just too vague since again, doesn't say about broken limbs, damage type, etc.
It's simply too vague. Not to mention whether or not they still have ammo/haven't lost their gun.

[Ugnip55]

MASK:
-GAS MASK: Looks cool.
-HEAT ABSORBENT COIF: Looks cool, discount balaclava.
-REBREATHER: Looks cool.

Gas mask: Looks cool but also gives you extra head armor. Real fact.

[Ttly]

Added various things and updated the list with newer relevant stuff over whatever there is over the recent times.

Also with req only stuff that isn't covered already.

[ObsidianCrow]

Quick tip for anyone looking to optimize their loadouts. Quit taking like 50 handfuls of buck holy shit you do not need that much buck unless you are running 2 m37s. You need like 5, 10 MAYBE. There is buck all over the colony. Shitloads from req or pre-drop chads who load ammo boxes. If you are terrified of not having your 20th handful of buck please just make two boxes of buck in squad prep and just throw them onto the FOB when you land. I'm tired of looting your bodies and finding like 3 mags of l42 and 18 handfuls of unused buck.